Alabama A&M honors founder William Hooper Councill as homecoming week builds

Alabama A&M University stopped on Wednesday morning to remember the man who started it all. Students, faculty and alumni gathered for the yearly wreath-laying ceremony honoring founder Dr. William Hooper Councill as homecoming week builds toward Saturday.

A tradition rooted in gratitude

University leaders said the ceremony gives the campus family a chance to pay tribute to Councill, who launched the school more than 150 years ago. Corey Hawkins, grand master of the Prince Hall Masons of Alabama and a graduate of the university, noted that Councill was an officer of the Masonic Grand Lodge.

Hawkins said many of his lodge brothers studied at Alabama A&M and would not be where they are today without the founder's vision.

From slavery to school founder

Councill was born into slavery in Fayetteville, North Carolina, in 1849 and escaped with his family through Union lines during the Civil War. In Alabama he worked as a teacher and later passed the state bar. He became the first principal of the school when it opened in Huntsville on May 1, 1875, with 61 students, two teachers and $1,000 a year from the state.

Industrial training was added within a few years. In 1891 the school began receiving federal land-grant money and later moved to roomier grounds at Normal, Alabama. That modest normal school is now one of the best-known historically Black universities in the country.

Homecoming on the hill

More events are planned on campus throughout the week leading up to Saturday's 3 p.m. homecoming game against Grambling State, when thousands of alumni are expected to return to the hill.