Nnamdi Azikiwe and Lincoln University:   An Analysis of a Symbiotic Relationship

Levi A. Nwachuku, Lincoln University

It is almost impossible to write Lincoln University’s 20th century history without mentioning the name of Nnamdi Azikiwe, popularly known as Zik.  Few individuals have left an enduring exemplary mark on their alma mater as Zik has. Seen as one of Lincoln University’s success stories, the institution has often, with a sense of pride, claimed a major credit for providing Zik with the intellectual and humanistic logistics that assured the great achievements he made.  Although Lincoln University provided the nurturing foundation for Zik’s formative years, the latter’s achievements equally contributed to the international recognition that Lincoln University now enjoys.  In essence, Zik and his alma mater  shared a mutually beneficial relationship.

When Zik left Nigeria in 1925, his major pre-occupation was to be educated in the United States.  Lincoln University was not among the institutions he applied for admission.  He left Nigeria to attend Storer College and later Howard University.  At the time Zik was seeking an opportunity for a post-secondary education, Nigeria was under British colonial tutelage.  One would expect, then, that he should have sought admission into any British institution of higher learning.  Contrary to this, his interest was in obtaining an American education.  Among the factors which ignited this interest were:

1)  The Influence of Dr. James Kwegyir Aggrey.  Dr. Aggrey, a Ghananian, was a member of the Foreign Missions Conference of North America which visited Nigeria in 1920 under the auspices of the Phelps-Stokes Fund.  Zik heard Dr. Aggrey’s sermon in Lagos.  Dr. Aggrey discussed the importance of education for Africans and also praised American education.  He later presented Zik with a directory of institutions of higher learning for African-Americans in the United States.  Zik, who had already nursed the ambition of furthering his studies, was encouraged by what Aggrey said and the Directory gave him the direction to what schools to apply for admission.

2)  President James A. Garfield’s biography.  After reading Garfield’s biography, From Log Cabin to the White House, Zik became impressed with how James Garfield was able to become a President in spite of relatively poor economic and social background.  Zik also read President Abraham Lincoln’s biography.  Lincoln, like Garfield, achieved the highest political position in the nation overcoming his social and economic deficit.  The lives of the two presidents made Zik realize that it was possible to achieve greatness in spite of obstacles.  This possibility was real in America where opportunities exist for anyone with ambition and determination to succeed.  For Zik, the lesson was very relevant.  After graduating from high school, Zik realized the distance between his ambition and the means to achieve that ambition.  He drew strength from knowing that Garfield and Lincoln experienced the same predicament that was tormenting him.

3)  The Marcus Garvey Factor.  While in secondary school, Zik was exposed to the ideas of Marcus Garvey.  Garvey emphasized empowerment of Africans, redemption of Africa for Africans, and African racial pride.  Garvey’s contemporaries were greatly influenced by these ideas, particularly in the United States.    Zik had questioned the legitimacy of European hegemonization of the Africans.  Garvey’s ideas fed Zik’s thoughts and induced in him a desire to be educated in the land where Garvey’s influence fermented.  It is proper to infer that the philosophy of universal fatherhood, universal brotherhood as well as universal happiness which characterized Zik’s later life was nursed in the crucible of Garveyism.

4)  United States’ Philosophical Symbolism.  America symbolized an anti-colonial power having wrenched itself from the claws of British colonialism.  It was easy for those colonially oppressed to identify with the United Sates. Zik, psychologically tormented by British colonial oppression, felt that the United States would provide a psychological safety-valve from colonialism.

5)  Inadequate Opportunity for Higher Education in Britain.  As Britain was Nigeria’s colonial master at the time, one would expect that Zik would have undertaken his educational career in that country.  But Britain did not have financial opportunities for indigent foreign students to complete their education.  On the contrary, the United States had many charitable organizations that were willing to redeem the financial obstacles of foreign students.  This writer was influenced in his decision to attend school in the United States because of the possibility of financial assistance from charitable organizations.

Zik felt that if he acquired a post-secondary education in the United States, he would be able to achieve his economic and political objectives in life.  To him, a good education would open the door to a better job and thus financial success.  After graduating from secondary school, he took appointment in the Treasury Department as a clerk.  He was not happy with the job.  It paid little.  At the job, he found that the British held high positions.  Zik was unhappy with the marginalization of the Nigerians.  He was equally displeased with the domination of Nigerians by the British.  These concerns became a source of frustration for him.  He determined to find solution to these issues that pre-occupied his youth by educating himself, preferably in the United States.

Zik’s academic sojourn in the United States reminds one of a journey whose under-taker stops at symbolically historical sites along the way.  Each of the sites carries with it a symbolism that informs the sojourner of his mission in life.  When he first arrived in Washington, D. C. on his way to Storer College, his eyes caught the inscription at the Washington, D. C. Union Station.  The inscription read, “ Let all the end thou aim’st be thy country’s, thy God’s and truths.  Be noble and the nobleness that lies in other men, sleeping but not dead, will rise in majesty to meet thine own.”  This inscription emphasized in Zik the majesty of patriotism and the need to pursue high moral character.  Later in life, Zik would manifest these qualities in his fight to restore and uplift the dignity of the African.

Storer College was another benchmark in Zik’s academic journey in the United States.  Storer College was located in Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia.  Harper’s Ferry holds a special place in the historiography of the abolition movement.  It was here that John Brown carried out his raid in 1859 in an attempt to end slavery, an institution that de-humanized the African.  Harper’s Ferry thus represented a struggle for the emancipation of the black man.  For Zik, the struggle during his time would not be to humanize the black man but to restore his dignity.  The black man had experienced emancipation from slavery in the nineteenth century.  He would experience a restoration of his dignity in the twentieth century.

In 1927, Zik completed his preliminary studies at Storer College.  He, thus, transferred to Howard University.  At Howard University, he came in contact with leading black educators of the time.  Among these were Professor William Hansberry, an anthropologist, Professor Tunnell and Dr. Ralph Bunche, both political scientists and Dr. Alain LeRoy Locke, a philosopher (Azikiwe, 1970).  Zik’s intellectual encounter with these educators enriched his educational philosophy.  He would use this experience during his academic sojourn at Lincoln University and after.  But Zik did not complete the requirement for his first degree at Howard.  The financial requirements at Howard were beyond his reach.  Howard’s failure to provide him with needed funds made him apply to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania for admission.

Zik at Lincoln University

Zik’s entry into Lincoln University reaffirmed what seemed to be a tradition for him to attend institutions of symbolic relevance for the black man.  Lincoln University was founded in 1854 by the efforts and the vision of John Miller Dickey.  The institution was established 11 years before the legal demise of slavery in the United States.  At the time of its birth, it was not popular to establish institutions of higher learning for the education of the freed black man.  The founding fathers of the American nation were not at ease with the idea of permanent residence of blacks among the whites.  Some whites were willing to emancipate the enslaved Africans, however, to the extent such measure should be followed with their repatriation.  This desire influenced the formation of the American Colonization Society whose premise was to re-settle the emancipated Africans in Liberia at the time.  At best, there was a partial repatriation.  President Abraham Lincoln’s “compensated emancipation” and his interest in allocating $100,000 to resettle the freed Africans in any region away from the United States re-affirms the notion that a free African-American was not intended to have a place in the United States (Franklin, 1994).  In the above context, it would be unwise to build colleges to educate the blacks and make them viable citizens of the United States.  Lincoln University essentially challenged this notion, and Dickey would have to struggle to overcome racial and financial obstacles, to realize his vision.  Lincoln University, therefore, symbolized persistence, perseverance and unflinching determination to succeed.  On balance, Zik’s life career reflected the above qualities.  It is relevant to recall the several abortive efforts Zik made as he was leaving Lincoln to raise funds in order to establish a printing press in Nigeria. He did not kow-tow to the prospect of failure.  He pushed on and eventually succeeded.

However, for Zik, Lincoln University represented much more than a metaphor for struggle and triumph.  The University’s philosophy and objectives benefited Zik’s quest for the type of education that would make a successful man out of him.  Lincoln University’s philosophy reflects an open-arm and humanistic policy in which education should be a liberating as well as redemptive instrument.  This policy cast Lincoln in the light of an institution that opens its doors of progress and hope to the economically deprived, socially despised and politically marginalized.  In essence, Lincoln’s mission emphasized re-building the truly disadvantaged into respectable and functional human beings who would apply their Lincoln experience to the service of humanity.  Slavery had dehumanized the Africans, colonialism had marginalized him politically and oppression as well as exploitation had physically and psychologically bruised him.  Lincoln’s mission was to restore his dignity through the enlightenment which education provides.

When Zik arrived at Lincoln in the fall of 1929/30 session, he quickly appreciated the institution’s potential as a nurturing ground for achieving the goals of his life.  The financial problem which made him leave Howard University eased at Lincoln.  As he was no longer saddled with the thoughts of how to make ends meet, he was able to harness his mental energy to exercise  his intellectual objective, that is, to use the power of the pen to denounce the evils of British colonialism.  This was evident in his article “Murdering Women in Africa” (Crisis 1930).  In this article, Zik excoriated British cruel massacre of Nigerian women who opposed unjust taxation.  Also in his review of Georgia Nigger, by John L. Spivak (Journal of Negro History, 1933), Zik denounced the economic and social slavery which still tormented the African-Americans especially in the southern states.  Zik was also a frequent contributor to the Lincoln University student newspaper—Lincoln News, now Lincolnian.  In these columns Zik discussed several nagging issues of his day—namely, the upsurge of Nazism and fascism, the threat to the survival of democracy, particularly the exclusion of the Africans from the rewards of democracy.  Zik also used his columns to encourage the Lincoln students to pursue academic excellence and as a result to become functional citizens not only of the United States but of the world at large.

As one reads the writings of Zik during his stay at Lincoln University, one sees in him a man with an intense passion for, as well as an addictive romance with, freedom and democracy.  Zik argued that if the principles of democracy were to be applied to African nations, it would be out of place for a few Europeans to dominate a majority of Africans.  He reminded his readers that Woodrow Wilson’s notion that World War I had been fought to make the world safe for democracy was belied by the Europeans on the African political landscape.

When Zik graduated from Lincoln, his alma mater gave him a teaching position while he continued his graduate work in Religion and Anthropology at Lincoln University and the University of Pennsylvania, respectively.  Although he earned an M. A. degree in religion in 1932, it was not his intention to become a pulpit preacher, but later in life, he was able to transform his spiritual zealotry into nationalist theology.  For Zik, teaching at Lincoln was an opportunity to introduce African history course in the curriculum.  At the time, some professors expressed doubt about the intellectual validity of a course on African history since it was popular then among conservative scholars to deny the historicity of Africa.  Nonetheless, Zik taught  the course and its  popularity among students drowned the echoes of doubt from the professors.  The introduction of a course on African history would turn out to be a major legacy which Zik left for Lincoln University.  It was a legacy well appreciated.  In an article, “Farewell Friend Azikiwe” (Lincolnian, 1934), W. G. Ware wrote, “...not until you came within our midst did we have the opportunity to study our history as a special course in the curriculum.  Since you are gone, we are again deprived of such a privilege.”   Ware continued, “if by chance you return to your dark skinned brothers of Africa would that they may profit and be enlightened by your leadership as we were.”  He had left in the minds of the students at Lincoln a racial consciousness that invoked a desire to study more of the history of the black race, in the context of the contributions it had made to world civilization as well as the failure of the white world to appreciate the historical importance of this race.  It is important to underscore the relevance of Zik’s efforts in this intellectual area to the subsequent demand by activitistic black students to re-define social science and humanities curriculum in colleges in Africa and the United States.  By the 1950’s, African history courses began to be accorded intellectual respect and by the 70’s American institutions of higher learning were pressured to establish what was then “Black Studies Programs.”

Beyond the intellectual legacy Zik left for Lincoln, he became an unofficial good will ambassador for his alma mater.  His success in terms of achievements has largely been attributed to the education he received at Lincoln University. Younger generations after Zik have sought identification with Lincoln.  In the mid 60’s when this writer was a student at Lincoln, there were over 200 African students, out of which at least 60 percent were Nigerians.  In the above context, Zik said, “God grant that as I leave the sacred precincts of Lincoln, I would be true to ideals of Lincoln and inspire more students with ambition to come to Lincoln and to drink out of the fountain which has nourished me all these days” (Zik, 1972).

It is because of Zik and Nkrumah, who graduated nine years after Zik, that Lincoln University proudly claims to be the first university in the Americas to produce the first presidents of two Anglo-phone West African nations.  Furthermore, the majority of the activistic nationalists who pioneered Nigerian independence received Lincoln education.  They include, among others, C. Nwafor Orizu, Mbonu Ojike, Michael Chukwuemeka, Ibanga Udo Akpabio, Kalu Ezera and G.K.O. Mbadiwe (Bond,1976).  Beyond Nigeria, Lincoln’s influence throughout Africa has been unimaginably tremendous (Nkomo, 1990).

Although Zik has secured a prominent place in Lincoln’s history, he equally derived much from his Lincoln as well as his American experience. Among these are:

1)  The spirit of philanthropy.  Zik left Nigeria with three hundred pounds for his education in the United States.  This amount, although appreciable at the time, was barely enough to maintain him at Storer College.  Although he worked as he attended school, it was largely the financial assistance he received from Lincoln and other charitable organizations that enabled him to complete his education. By this experience, Zik appreciated the importance of philanthropy and he applied this when he established himself in Nigeria.  The spirit of giving to the needy, the spirit of helping the struggling became a visible trait in Zik’s human relations.  The University of Nigeria he founded was premised on a philosophy of providing education in Nigeria to those who could ill afford the financial requirements of overseas education.

2)  Zik’s Lincoln experience re-affirmed his belief in education as a constructive social force which could be harnessed for social progress.  It was on this premise that he encouraged Asquith’s Commission on Education, 1943 which suggested the establishments of universities in Nigeria to educate Nigerians who would build a strong nation.

3)  Confidence in political leadership.  Armed with a university education, he once remarked that “a university education enables an individual to discover himself,” Zik developed a sense of providential confidence in his mission of political leadership, for he said, “I believe that Nigeria and Africa need me as a budding leader.”  This messianic mission represented the penultimate of Zik’s life ambition.  It is relevant to quote Zik’s statement on the day Nigeria achieved her independence.  He said, “As for me, my stiffest earthly assignment is done.  My country is now free and I have been honored to be its first indigenous Head of State.  What more could one desire in life” (Jones-Quartey, 1965).

4)  African racial consciousness.  Zik’s interest in exposing the contributions of the Africans to the civilization of mankind induced him to teach a course on this subject at Lincoln.  In the process, he became deeply cognizant of the place of the black man in history and, consequently, became disturbed by the marginality that the Africans suffered in the estimation of the white race.  It is the obsession he had developed about racial injustice toward the Africans that induced the active role he played in dismantling British colonialism in Nigeria.  Expectedly, it was during Zik’s tenure as Nigeria’s first president that the government of Alhaji Tafawa Balewa led a successful movement to oust South Africa from membership in the British Commonwealth.  Concomitant with Zik’s racial consciousness, is his globalization of racial struggle to restore the dignity of the African.  In his contact with George Padmore and W. E. B. Dubois, Zik joined the international fight against racial oppression, which had defied the import of the Atlantic Charter.  These gallant fighters against racial injustice formulated their tactic within the Pan-African context.

5) In the United States, Zik came in contact with Africans from different regions of the world.  These Africans were not only unified by race but also shared a common experience of oppression and racial degradation.  Zik understood that unity of action as well as unity of purpose was a necessary condition for the survival of the Africans.  It is largely on this understanding that Zik advocated the maintenance of one Nigeria.

Finally, Zik’s experiences at Lincoln University and in the United States in general taught him the lessons of toughness and doggedness.  During his days at Lincoln the institution only admitted men. These male students often held “bull sessions” where they “woofed,” roaring and making loud noise in defense of their arguments.  On many occasions, it was a matter of who made the loudest noise.  No one wanted to be out-shouted.  Everyone would shout to bull his way to the top.   This experience taught Lincoln men to be bold and unrelenting in pursuit of their objective.  Zik often manifested boldness in pursuit of justice, or any cause he deemed to be right.  This was evident when he established the African Continental Bank in spite of obstacles mounted by the British Colonial government.  This spirit of boldness and indefatigability was evident when he built the University of Nigeria amid mockery and financial obstacles.  On balance, there was always a show of doggedness whenever Zik fought a cause.  Surely, Lincoln University was Zik’s benefactor in this philosophy of indomitable fierceness in the pursuit of objectives.  It is proper to end this article with a quote that clearly demonstrates the symbiotic relationship that Zik shared with Lincoln University.  “Zik awakened us!  I oppose him now and think it right to do so.  But all Africans are grateful to Lincoln University for it was your school that trained the men like Zik who truly awakened all Africans!” (Bond:544)

In 1996, at the age of 92, Zik bade goodbye to the world, when death, that ultimate dysfunction, took him.  To immortalize his memory, Lincoln University, among other things, named a building after him.

References

Azikiwe, Nnamdi, My Odyssey (NY: Praeger, 1970).

___, Zik (London: Cambridge University Press, 1961).

—, Review of John L. Spivak, Georgia Nigger New York: Brewer, Warren & Putnam 1932 in Journal of Negro History, Vol. 18, No. 2, 1933.

—, “Murdering Women in Nigeria” The Crisis, vol. 37, 1930.

—, “Democracy or Oligarchy” Lincoln News, Vol. I, No. 3, 1931.

Bond, Horace Mann, Education For Freedom: A History of Lincoln University               Princeton University Press, 1976).

Franklin, John Hope, From Slavery to Freedom, (New York: McGraw Hill, 1994).

Jones-Quartey, K. A. B., A Life of Zik (Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, 1965).

Ikeotuonye, Vincent C., Zik of New Africa (London: P. R. MacMillan Ltd., 1961).

Nkomo, Sibusiso, “Lincoln’s Impact on Other Parts of Africa” The Lincoln Journal, Summer, 1990

Nwachuku, Levi A., “Two of Africa’s Giants—Zik and Nkrumah—The Lincoln Days”, African Profiles International, April/May, 1994

Ware, W. G., “Farewell Friend Azikiwe” Lincolnian, October 19, 1934.