Born a slave in Clark County, Virginia, George Washington Henderson graduated from the University of Vermont in 1877 and became the first African American to be inducted into Phi Beta Kappa (PBK), the highest academic honor society. He later received a bachelor’s degree in divinity from Yale University, spending a career in academics and theology. George Washington Henderson was illiterate when he arrived as a teen in northwestern Vermont at the end of the Civil War, perhaps working as the servant of a Vermont resident he met during the war. Henderson spent the next eight years in tutoring at the Underhill Academy and was admitted into the University of Vermont in 1873. While in school he worked as a farmhand in Waitsfield during the summers and from 1875-1876 served as principal of nearby Jericho Academy. In 1877 he graduated from the University of Vermont first in his class and was inducted into the school’s Phi Beta Kappa chapter. Henderson was the first black to be inducted into the society but was not the first black to be elected to join. Yale graduate Edward Alexander Bouchet (1852-1918) was elected into the society in 1874, but his induction was delayed while the … Continue reading George Washington Henderson (ca. 1850-1936)