Georgia. Governor (1868-1871 : Bullock)

Atlanta University, founded in 1865, by the American Missionary Association, with later assistance from the Freedman's Bureau, was, before consolidation, the nation's oldest graduate institution serving a predominantly African-American student body. By the late 1870s, Atlanta University had begun granting bachelor's degrees and supplying black teachers and librarians to the public schools of the South. In 1929-30, it began offering graduate education exclusively in various liberal arts areas, and in the social and natural sciences. It gradually added professional programs in social work, library science, and business administration. At this same time, Atlanta University affiliated with Morehouse and Spelman Colleges in a university plan known as the Atlanta University System. The campus was moved to its present site, and the modern organization of the Atlanta University Center emerged, with Clark College, Morris Brown College, and the Interdenominational Theological Center joining the affiliation later. The story of the Atlanta University over the next twenty years from 1930 includes many significant developments. The Schools of Library Science, Education, and Business Administration were established in 1941, 1944, and 1946 respectively. The Atlanta School of Social Work, long associated with the University, gave up its charter in 1947 to become an integral part of the University. In 1957, the controlling Boards of the six institutions (Atlanta University; Clark, Morehouse, Morris Brown and Spelman Colleges; and Gammon Theological Seminary) ratified new Articles of Affiliation. Unlike the old Articles of 1929, the new contract created the Atlanta University Center. The influence of Atlanta University has been extended through professional journals and organizations, including Phylon and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, for both of which Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, a member of the faculty, provided leadership. Clark Atlanta University website http://www.cau.edu (Retrieved March 4, 2009)

Rufus Bullock was the first Republican to be elected to Georgia's highest political office, serving as governor from 1868 to 1871. Bullock was a northern-born businessman who cooperated with the Confederacy, became the most hated man in the state during Reconstruction, was forced from office by the Ku Klux Klan, and recovered enough of his reputation to become president of the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and master of ceremonies at the Atlanta Cotton States and International Exposition in 1895. Still, until the 1990s historians generally accepted the negative view of Bullock gleaned from the partisan politics of Reconstruction, agreeing with the novelist Margaret Mitchell, who painted him as a carpetbagger and scalawag who looted the state. New Georgia Encyclopedia http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org (Retrieved March 4, 2009)

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