Declaring April 10th as Lincoln University Day, and congratulating Lincoln University on its Sesquicentennial Anniversary.

WHEREAS, Lincoln University is America's first Historically Black University, located just a few miles from Philadelphia in southern Chester county, a nationally acclaimed institution of higher learning that provides the best elements of a liberal arts and sciences-based undergraduate core curriculum and selected graduate programs to prepare its students to live and compete successfully in a highly technological and global society; and

WHEREAS, Founded in 1854, Lincoln University is nationally recognized for being a major producer of African Americans with undergraduate degrees in the physical sciences (biology, chemistry, and physics); computer and information sciences; biological and life sciences; and

WHEREAS, Lincoln University was originally known as Ashmun Institute upon its founding in 1854 by the Rev. John Miller Dickey, a Presbyterian minister, and renamed Lincoln University in 1866 after the assassination of President Lincoln, and current enrolls 2,000 students; and

WHEREAS, From April 10, 2003 through May 2004, the University is celebrating its Sesquicentennial anniversary with an array of campus and external events, activities, and announcements, including gala events in four cities, and one hundred and fifty campus programs for students, faculty, alumni and visitors; and anniversary services in major churches in 10 American cities; and

WHEREAS, Lincoln has the distinction among the nation's universities of having two of its distinguished alumni honored with commemorative stamps, of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, a 1930 Lincoln graduate, and 1929 Lincoln University alumnus Langston Hughes, a world-acclaimed poet; and

WHEREAS, Lincoln University has an impressive list of African Americans who have distinguished themselves as doctors, lawyers, educators, businesspersons, entrepreneurs, literary figures, theologians, heads of state, political and military leaders, including Roy Nichols '41, the first African American Bishop of the United Methodist Church; Kwame Nkruman '39, the first president of Ghana; Nnamdi Azikiwe '30, Nigeria's first president; Robert N.C. Nix, Sr. '28, Pennsylvania's first African American U.S. Congressman; Herbert Millen '10, Pennsylvania's first African American judge; and Harry W. Bass '86, the first African American state legislator in Pennsylvania; and

RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, That Council hereby declare April 10th as Lincoln University Day, and congratulating Lincoln University on its Sesquicentennial Anniversary.

FURTHER RESOLVED, That an Engrossed copy of the resolution be presented to Dr. Ivory Nelson, the President of Lincoln University, as evidence of the sincere sentiments of this legislative body.

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