author
J. L. M. (Jabez Lamar Monroe) Curry
1825–1903
Remembered for his long public career and his later push for Southern education, this 19th-century Alabama leader moved from politics and diplomacy into influential work as an advocate for schools. His life also reflects the deep contradictions of his era, including service in the Confederacy before he became a prominent voice for public education.
1 Audiobook
Education of the Negroes Since 1860
by J. L. M. (Jabez Lamar Monroe) Curry
About the author
Born in Georgia in 1825 and raised in Alabama, he studied at the University of Georgia and later at Harvard before building a career as a lawyer, minister, teacher, and politician. He served in the Alabama legislature and in the U.S. House of Representatives, and during the Civil War he was an officer in the Confederate Army.
After the war, his work shifted in ways that made him especially notable in Southern history. He taught and helped lead institutions of higher learning, served as a U.S. diplomat to Spain, and became widely known for promoting public education across the South. He worked closely with major educational philanthropy, especially through the Peabody Education Fund and the John F. Slater Fund.
Curry is often remembered as an energetic spokesman for schooling and regional reconciliation in the postwar South. At the same time, any brief portrait of his life has to acknowledge the fuller historical context: he was a defender of secession before the war, and his legacy sits within the complicated political and racial history of the American South in the 19th century.