University Libraries - Main Library Gallery

Pencil drawing based upon an earlier portrait, Cloy Kent, 1975

Though his term as president was brief, James Black gave the University a new impetus with respect to professional instruction.

By the time of his departure, the Law and Medical departments were firmly established, while the Preparatory Department, designed to prepare incoming students for the University, was eliminated.

Black was educated at Washington College in Pennsylvania, receiving the Bachelor of Arts degree in 1848 and the Master of Arts degree in 1851.

After serving one year as an academy principal in Pennsylvania, he became pastor of a congregation in that state, where he remained until 1859 when he returned to Washington College as a professor of Greek language and literature. He moved to Iowa City in 1868. Following his term at Iowa, he went to Wooster, Ohio, where he accepted a professorship at Presbyterian College (later the University of Wooster), a position he held until retirement.

Black was born in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, on April 27, 1826, and died in Wooster on December 22, 1890, at age 64.