Virginia Union University

Virginia Union University is a private historically black university in Richmond, Virginia.

History


The American Baptist Home Mission Society (ABHMS) founded the school as Richmond Theological Institute in 1865 shortly after Union troops took control of Richmond, Virginia, at the end of the American Civil War, for African-American freedmen to enter into the ministry. The college had the first academic library at a historically black college or university (HBCU), building the library in 1865 which was the same year the college was established.

Its mission was soon expanded to offer courses and programs at college, high school, and preparatory levels, to both men and women. This effort was the beginning of Virginia Union University. Separate branches of the National Theological Institute were set up in Washington, D.C., and Richmond, Virginia, with classes beginning in 1867. In Washington, the school became known as Wayland Seminary, named in commemoration of Francis Wayland, former president of Brown University and a leader in the anti-slavery struggle. The first and only president there was George Mellen Prentiss King, who administered Wayland for thirty years (1867–1897). Famous students there included Booker T. Washington and Adam Clayton Powell, Sr.

Beginning in 1867, Colver Institute was housed in a building long known as Lumpkin's Jail, a former "slave jail" owned by Mary Ann Lumpkin, the African-American widow of the deceased white owner. It became Richmond Theological Institute (formerly Colver) and joined with Wayland Seminary of Washington in 1899 to form Virginia Union University at Richmond.

In 1932, the women's college Hartshorn Memorial College, established in Richmond in 1883, became a part of Virginia Union University. Storer College, a historically black Baptist college in West Virginia founded in 1867, merged its endowment with Virginia Union in 1964.

Academics
The university is divided into four main schools:


 * Evelyn Reid Syphax School of Education and Interdisciplinary Studies
 * School of Arts and Sciences
 * Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology
 * Sydney Lewis School of Business

Theology program
Virginia Union University's Theological training program is called The Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology. James Henry Harris, the early American civil rights advocate, was a graduate. The school is a member of the Washington Theological Consortium.

Student activities
There are over 20 student organizations, including several fraternities and sororities.

Athletics
Virginia Union competes in the NCAA Division II in the Eastern Division of the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association. The school has varsity teams in men's basketball, football, cross country, golf, tennis and track and field, and in women's basketball, bowling, cross country, tennis and track and field, softball and volleyball.

In 2018, both Virginia Union University's DII Men & Women's Basketball Teams won the CIAA Championship. Virginia Union plays basketball and volleyball in the Barco-Stevens Hall, built as the Belgian Building for the 1939 New York World's Fair. The building, which has stone reliefs depicting the Belgian Congo, was one of thirteen facilities designated as "unique" by NCAA News in 2005. The building was awarded to the university in 1941 and moved to its present location in 1943. The basketball team began using the facility in early 1947.

Affiliations
It is affiliated with the American Baptist Churches USA.