Thursday, February 18, 2016

University of Scranton Names Building After Its First African American Graduate, Louis Stanley Brown, Class of 1919


Louis Stanley Brown


Louis Stanley Brown Hall

The University of Scranton:

The University of Scranton dedicated Louis Stanley Brown Hall to honor its first African American graduate, who was a member of the class of 1919. University of Scranton President Kevin P. Quinn, S.J., named and blessed the building, located at 600 Linden Street, at a ceremony on Feb. 18 as part of the University’s Black History Month celebration.
“The University is proud to dedicate Louis Stanley Brown Hall, which takes a page out of the University’s history books and brings it to new life on campus and in the greater Scranton community,” said Father Quinn. “As an African American college graduate in the early 1900s, he serves as an illustration to Jesuit and Catholic education’s longstanding commitment to justice.”
Born in 1902 in Scranton’s Pine Brook section, Brown earned a commercial degree in 1919 from The University of Scranton, then St. Thomas College. He was one of five children born to Henry and Sarah Brown and attended St. Cecilia’s Academy prior to St. Thomas College. The college’s yearbook noted that Brown was ambitious and industrious, as well as humorous and witty. After graduation, he remained in Scranton, working as a shoe shiner, a laborer in the coal mines and for G.W. Brown Inc., a local trucking company. He died at the age 62, and is buried in the Cathedral cemetery in Scranton.

Brown Hall, formerly known as the Ad-Lin Building for its location on the corner of Adams Avenue and Linden Street, was built in 1896. The four-story brick structure, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, is an example of both Classical Revival and Commercial Style architecture. The building, acquired by the University in 2012, houses Enrollment Management and External Affairs and University Advancement divisions on the second, third and fourth floors. The Small Business Development Center and Lavish Body and Home, a privately owned hair salon and store, occupy the first floor. 

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