William S. Scarborough (1852-1926) and Sarah C. Bierce Scarborough (1851-?) were educators and writers in Greene County, Ohio, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. W. S. Scarborough was born and raised in Macon, Georgia, and attended Atlanta University for two years before migrating to Ohio to enter Oberlin College. He graduated in 1875, then spent a year studying Semitic languages and Hellenistic Greek at the Oberlin Theological Seminary before joining the classical department at Wilberforce University in Greene County. In 1878 he received his Master of Arts, three years before his marriage to Sarah Cordelia Bierce. Bierce was an 1875 graduate of the State Normal School of Oswego, New York, who served as principal of the Normal Department of Wilberforce University from 1877-1887. At that time, the department was taken over by the state of Ohio and converted to the Combined Normal and Industrial Department which Bierce also headed as principal for the next twenty-seven years. From 1914-1921, Sarah Scarborough returned to teaching English, History of Education, and Principles of Teaching. During those years, William Scarborough moved up through the ranks of faculty and administration, transferring into the chair of Hellenistic Greek in the Payne Theological Seminary of Wilberforce University in 1891, then becoming vice-president in 1897 and president in 1908. Scarborough retired in 1920, just one year before his wife. During their careers as educators, both wrote frequently, Sarah focusing on fiction for women's and Christian magazines, and William on scholarly topics. William joined a variety of professional and race-related organizations, including the Afro-American State League and the American Negro Academy while his wife pursued her family genealogy, collecting correspondence and documents for the Abbey and Bierce families.
The William Sanders and Sarah Cordelia Bierce Scarborough Family Photographs, ca. 1850s-1920s, consist of individual photographs of Scarborough, Bierce, Abbey, and Grant family members and other family members, friends and associates. Also included is an album of views of Tretton Place, home of the Scarboroughs. The collection includes 55 black and white photographs that measure 8 x 6 inches and smaller.
This collection will be useful to researchers studying the history of the African American community and higher education in Ohio.
The collection has been retained in original order.
The researcher should also consult MS 4213 William Sanders and Sarah Cordelia Bierce Scarborough Papers.
None.
[Container ___, Folder ___ ] PG 396 William Sanders and Sarah Cordelia Bierce Scarborough Family Photographs, Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, Ohio
These photographs were removed from MS 4213 William Sanders and Sarah Cordelia Bierce Scarborough Papers. Gift of Sarah A. Grant in 1985.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.