Another Black Freethinker: Hubert Harrison

Hubert Henry Harrison

Below is text taken from a post on Black Perspectives, a blog of the African American Intellectual History Society. As Dr. Oliver thought, Hubert Harrison, or "Black Socrates," was one of the individuals pictured on the book I presented. So, I thought it worthwhile to follow-up with some details about this fascinating person. Perhaps continued posts about black freethinkers is also worthy endeavor. Stay tuned for Sikivu Hutchinson next!

Hubert Harrison: Black Griot of the Harlem Renaissance

Hubert Henry Harrison was born in 1883 to plantation workers of African descent on the Caribbean island of St. Croix. He obtained a grade school education as well as some religious training in the Anglican Church. Orphaned as a teenager, Harrison managed to relocate to New York City in 1900 thanks to his sister Mary.

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Due to the migration of African Americans from the south and Afro-Caribbeans from the Antilles, Harlem became a global hub of Black economic, intercultural, and ideational exchange. Numerous neighborhood associations, churches, and fraternal orders combined to form a rich tapestry of social and community institutions. By attending Black church lyceums with mentors like John E. Bruce and Arturo Schomburg, Harrison received a rigorous training in intellectual debate and critical thinking, eventually breaking with religion on the grounds that Christianity “Still Enslaves the Minds of Those Whose Bodies It Has Long Held Bound.”

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Harrison’s greatest contribution to Black intellectual culture came from his prodigious work establishing the “Outdoor University,” as some community residents called the street corner oratorical method of popular education he established. Speaking from “the Campus” on the corner of 135th Street and Lenox Avenue, his intellectual range covered a vast array of topics, including anthropology, English literature, evolutionary biology, Black culture, economics, theological criticism, African civilizations, sexuality, and global geopolitics. His oratory was so popular that ordinary people regularly turned out to hear him in numbers large enough to block traffic. As one observer put it after witnessing Harrison in action, “the Age of Pericles and Socrates in ancient Athens had nothing on the present age of Harlem in New York” (full post here).