Berkeley

New Dorm to Honor David Blackwell, Berkeley’s First Tenured Black Professor

Published

7 years ago

February 20, 2018

By Will Kane

UC Berkeley’s newest residence hall will be named after David Blackwell, the first Black professor to ever receive tenure at UC Berkeley and a preeminent statistician, Chancellor Carol Christ announced last week.

Blackwell, who died in 2010, is an “exemplar of what Berkeley stands for: scholarly excellence of the highest caliber tied to a mission of social justice and inclusion,” Christ wrote in a letter nominating Blackwell.

The new dorm at Bancroft Way and Dana Street will house some 750 undergraduates and is slated to open in time for the fall semester, helping to ease UC Berkeley’s undergraduate housing crunch. The building will have commercial space on its first floor and also house Stiles Hall, a community center for students.

In choosing Blackwell, Christ honored a dedicated teacher and statistician who made UC Berkeley his home for almost 50 years. He once said he loved to teach mathematics because “in transmitting it, you appreciate its beauty all over again.”

“He never introduced himself as a professor, he always called himself a teacher,” his son, Hugo Blackwell, told Berkeley News upon his father’s death.

Scores of suggestions for naming the new residential unit were submitted by students, staff, faculty and alumni groups, which were then reviewed by a committee of students, faculty and staff. Four “exceptional individuals” were submitted to Christ, who chose Blackwell.

Not only was Blackwell a gifted instructor who made the dizzying theorems of statistics accessible to hundreds of undergraduate and graduate students, he was a distinguished researcher who invented dynamic programming, a statistical method still used today in finance and areas like genome analysis.

The new Blackwell Hall is slated to open in time for the fall 2018 semester.

That invention, and his development of a fundamental theorem still underpinning modern statistics, helped propel Blackwell, in 1965, to be the first Black man inducted into the National Academy of Sciences.

“He went from one area to another, and he’d write a fundamental paper in each,” Thomas Ferguson, an UCLA emeritus professor of statistics, told Berkeley News when Blackwell died. “He would come into a field that had been well-studied and find something really new that was remarkable—that was his forte.”

But the world of mathematics was not always welcoming to Blackwell, who was born in small-town Illinois in 1919. His father, a railway worker, and mother, who raised Blackwell and his three siblings, sent Blackwell to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign at age 16. By 22, he had graduated with a Ph.D. in math and set his sights on finding a home in academia.
Blackwell applied to 104 historically Black colleges and universities, telling an ethnographer recording his oral history in 2002 that he assumed doors were closed to Blacks at non-Black institutions.

While a professor at Howard University, in 1941, Blackwell was approached by the chair of Berkeley’s math department and interviewed to join the faculty.

Blackwell didn’t get the job, assuming his inexperience and the military draft had made a female competitor for the job a better candidate. Only when he finally joined Berkeley’s faculty in the 1950’s did he learn that his race had been the reason he didn’t get the job, Blackwell said in a 2002 interview.

But times changed, and within 10 years Blackwell was offered a full-time position at Berkeley. He made tenure and eventually served as chair of the newly formed statistics department between 1957 and 1961.

Blackwell also served as assistant dean of the College of Letters and Science, where his job was to review requests from students about their classes, school policy or grades.

“I enjoyed that a lot, helping students,” he said in the 2002 interview. “The student was asking to be excused from some regulation or be given some exemption or something of that sort. And I almost always said yes. We would have lively debates in the council of deans, and sometimes I’d win and sometimes I wouldn’t.”

“I enjoyed that,” Blackwell added. “And I think I was helpful to the students.”

Berkeley News reporter Robert Sanders contributed to this report.

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Progressive Missionary Baptist Church of Berkeley Celebrates 90th Anniversary

Dr. Earl C. Stuckey, Sr., who has served as Progressive Missionary’s pastor since September 1977, said the church also delights in the fact that it has hosted only five pastors in its 90-year history, including Pastors James E. Moore, H. A. Green, F. Douglas Farrell, and Edward Stovall, who served for 37 years.

Published

2 weeks ago

May 16, 2025

Oakland Post

Progressive Missionary Baptist Poster. Dr. Earl C. Stuckey, Sr., Pastor of Progressive Missionary Baptist Church in Berkeley with his wife, Kay Frances Stuckey.

By Oakland Post Staff

The Progressive Missionary Baptist Church of Berkeley is celebrating its 90th church anniversary on Sunday, May 18 at 10 a.m. at 3301 King Street in Berkeley.

The celebration will feature Pastor Darnell Manuel of the Union Baptist Church in Vallejo as guest speaker, along with many other special presentations.

Those who wish to share in Progressive’s history can purchase a 100-page full-colored souvenir book for $25.

The church boasts a number of notable people who either regularly attended or became members of the church since its inception, including former Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson, Oakland mayoral candidate Loren Taylor, and one of the organizers of the Gospel Music Workshop of America, Helen J. H. Stephens.

Pastor Stuckey often remarks how longevity flourishes at the church — it boasts 13 centenarians (people who have reached 100 years or more). Currently, it has one centenarian who is still surviving, Mrs. Dorothy Chambers, and 14 members who have reached 90 years or more.

Recently, on Feb.17, the pastor and his wife Kay Frances, celebrated their 73rd wedding anniversary.

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Activism

Faces Around the Bay: Author Karen Lewis Took the ‘Detour to Straight Street’

“My life has been a roller-coaster with an unlimited ride wristband! I was raised in Berkeley during the time of Ron Dellums, the Black Panthers, and People’s Park. I was a Hippie kid, my Auntie cut off all our hair so we could wear the natural styles like her and Angela Davis.

Published

4 weeks ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

Karen Lewis. Courtesy photo.

By Barbara Fluhrer

I met Karen Lewis on a park bench in Berkeley. She wrote her story on the spot.

I got married young, then ended up getting divorced, raising two boys into men. After my divorce, I had a stroke that left me blind and paralyzed. I was homeless, lost in a fog with blurred vision.

Jesus healed me! I now have two beautiful grandkids. At 61, this age and this stage, I am finally free indeed. Our Lord Jesus Christ saved my soul. I now know how to be still. I lay at his feet. I surrender and just rest. My life and every step on my path have already been ordered. So, I have learned in this life…it’s nice to be nice. No stressing, just blessings. Pray for the best and deal with the rest.

Nobody is perfect, so forgive quickly and love easily!”

Lewis’ book “Detour to Straight Street” is available on Amazon.

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Activism

Golden State Warriors Program Is Inspiring Next Generation of Female Engineers

Breaking down barriers and biases that deter young girls from pursuing STEAM subjects is essential for creating a level playing field and ensuring equal opportunities for all. By challenging stereotypes and promoting a culture of inclusivity and diversity in STEAM fields, experts believe young girls can be empowered to pursue their interests and aspirations without limitations confidently. Encouraging mentorship, providing access to resources, and celebrating girls’ achievements in STEAM are all crucial steps in creating a supportive environment that fosters success.

Published

2 months ago

March 23, 2025

Oakland Post

Front Row: UC Berkeley Steel Bridge Team Back Row: Girls, Inc. Participants. Photo courtesy of the Golden State Warriors.

By Y’Anad Burrell

The Golden State Warriors and e-commerce giant Rakuten are joining forces to inspire the next generation of female engineers through Building STEAM Futures, part of The City Calls campaign.

Organizers say the initiative is founded on the idea that science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) are crucial fields for innovation and progress, and empowering young girls to pursue careers in these areas is more important than ever. Studies consistently show that girls are underrepresented in STEAM fields, resulting in a gender disparity that limits potential and hinders diversity.

On Saturday, March 8, International Women’s Day, the Warriors and Rakuten hosted 20 middle school girls from Girls Inc. of Alameda County at Chase Center’s Above the Rim for a hands-on bridge-building experience. The young girls from Girls, Inc. of Alameda County had an opportunity to design, build and test their own bridge prototypes and learn the fundamentals of bridge construction from the Engineering Alliance and the UC Berkeley Steel Bridge Team.

This STEAM experience for the girls followed the first session in January, where they took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Golden Gate Bridge, learning about its design and construction from industry experts. The City Calls campaign, tipped off with the unveiling the Warriors’ new bridge-themed City Edition jerseys and court design earlier this year.