Blacks@Dartmouth 1775 to 1960

Remus Grant Robinson

Immigrant From Bermuda and Southern Educator

alumnus image

Dartmouth College B.L.

Class of 1897

Born  1873  Hamilton Bermuda

Died 1910 Montgomery AL

Quotes from Biographical Sources

Prof. R. G. Robinson, B.L. the subject of our sketch, was born in Hamilton, Bermuda Islands, B. W. I., February 16, 1873. In pursuit of education he came to the United States at the early age of eleven, going directly to New Hampshire. In the fall of '85 he entered Dow Academy in Franconia, N.H. By economy and thrift he maintained himself in this institution for eight years, graduating in 1893, second in his class. During this course he was several times elected president of the Autonomation Literary Society. His conduct and standing was very tersely stated by one of his professors, when he said that 'he was courteous and obliging under all circumstances, clear and logical in his deductions and conscientious as a Christian.'

He immediately entered Dartmouth College in the class of '97. During his college course he was prominent in athletics, at the same time holding a good position in his class. Despite the fact he was one of the two colored men in a class of a hundred and twenty-eight, yet at the close of Freshman hear he was unanimously elected class auditor for the ensuing year. He was a charter member of the Ruskin Society, a society for the cultivation of the histrionic art in Dartmouth College. In 1897 Dartmouth gave him the degree of Bachelor of Letters. Says President Tucker of Dartmouth: 'He is a man of clear and earnest purpose, possessing tact and good executive ability.'

After graduation he was elected to the chair of English language and literature in the Tuskegee Institute, but resigned at the close of the year and was elected principal of one of the city schools of Montgomery, Ala., which position he held until elected by the Freemen's Aid and Southern Educational Society as principal of the La Grange Academy, La Grange, Ga.

In 1899 he was married to Lily Belle, the daughter of Wm. Hill, the wealthy truck gardener of Montgomery. Mrs. Robinson is a graduate of the A. & M. College of Normal, Alabama. They had a son, Mason Francis. [Mason Francis died in 1902, the year of this publication. A second son, Remus Grant, Jr., was born in 1903.]

Prof. Robinson has a brother who is a member of the Boston Bar. He graduated from Dow Academy in Franconia, N. H., in 1893; attended Oberlin College and received the LL.B. from Boston University. In 1898 he was a member of the Boston Common Council.

[R. G. Robinson died on 4 Feb 1910 in Montgomery, Alabama.]


Culp, Daniel Wallace. (1902) Twentieth Century Negro Literature: Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating to the American Negro (p. 302). Naperville, Ill: J.L. Nichols & Co.

Other source(s)

Profile image source: Culp, Daniel Wallace. 1902. Twentieth Century Negro Literature: Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating to the American Negro, 302. Naperville, Ill: J.L. Nichols & Co.