“The Dubois Club,” Purdue Exponent, October 29, 1909

By Adriana Harmeyer, Archivist for University History

On October 29, 1909, the Exponent student newspaper reported on the newly established Dubois Club at Purdue, an organization of African American students inspired by the work of W.E.B. Du Bois.  Listed among the officers of the club was Miss R.G. Webb, Treasurer.  Previously, the earliest female African American student identified by name was 1927 graduate Inez Mason, though earlier group photographs indicated that she may not have been first. This 1909 citation meant we had the opportunity to highlight possibly the first African American female student, a young woman who attended the university nearly twenty years before Mason, but the subsequent research process was difficult.

Several factors complicated the search for Miss Webb, some of which we only learned later in the research process.  We knew that during this period women were often left out of campus-wide activities, which were usually organized by and geared toward male students.  Minority students were often excluded from campus activities and were banned from living in residence halls, so they did not often appear in records of student life.  Both were factors in the case of Miss Webb, whose name appeared in none of our most used resources, such as the Exponent (aside from the single Dubois Club announcement) or Debris Yearbook.  Further, Miss Webb’s name did not appear in the commencement programs or the Board of Trustees minutes recognizing each year’s degree recipients, so it is unclear from university sources whether she graduated.

Polk’s 1909-10 Lafayette Directory

Since Miss Webb did not appear in these Purdue resources, I expanded my search to HeritageQuest, a commonly used genealogy website.  I found no good matches in the census records, which was unlikely with a name as common as Webb and no first name.  However, a search of Lafayette city directories led to my first promising find.  Rhoy G. Webb, student, lived in Lafayette during the 1909-1910 year.

With that first name, I continued my search and found another possible match in FindAGrave.com.  Rhoycnette A. Webb (1893-1922) was buried in Peru, Indiana.  Upon searching for that unusual full first name, I located a digitized student directory from the University of Illinois that included a Rhoygnette Ellison, whose name had been incorrectly transcribed as Rhoycnette.

Webb’s gravestone

With this new name in mind, I returned to FindAGrave and viewed the image of Webb’s headstone and found that her name had been written incorrectly and was likely Rhoygnette, not Rhoycnette.

With this first name now seemingly confirmed, I began a new search for Rhoygnette Webb.  This finally led me to sources about the former Purdue student and her life after West Lafayette.  She is mentioned by name in at least two books about black women in Chicago that were keyword searchable in Google Books: The Chicago Black Renaissance and Women’s Activism and Toward a Tenderer Humanity and a Nobler Womanhood: African American Women’s Clubs in Turn-of-the-Century Chicago, which identified her as a graduate of the Purdue University School of Pharmacy.  This finally confirmed that the name of Miss R.G. Webb of the Dubois Club was Rhoygnette.

Biographical sketch of Rhoygnette Webb in Toward a Tenderer Humanity and a Nobler Womanhood: African American Women’s Clubs in Turn-of-the-Century Chicago by Anne Meis Knupfer

Seeking additional information about her life, I searched the Chicago Defender newspaper database.  Articles in the Defender confirmed her identity and her path to becoming a prominent nurse in Chicago’s black community.  Webb graduated from the Provident Hospital and Training School in 1914, listed as “Rhoygreete” and “Rhoygneette Allegra” in announcements about the graduation. The following year, Webb was featured in a front-page article about her career and appointment as head nurse at Dr. Butler’s Sanitarium in Evanston.

The Chicago Defender, April 17, 1915

From there, I continued checking other common sources to flesh out any more details about Webb’s life.  Of the three censuses in which she appeared, her first name appeared differently – and never correctly – in each one.  1900 saw Rhoyjnette Webb living with her parents on East 2^nd Street, Peru, Indiana, with a birthdate of March 1886.  In 1910, Rhoygnetta Webb, birthdate 1889, lived with her parents Joe and Mattie Webb on East Warren Street, Peru, Indiana, along with her younger brother Joe Webb, an orchestra musician.  By 1920, R. Webb lived in Chicago with her Provident Hospital classmate Edna DePriest in a home located at 210 Rhodes Avenue, with a birthdate of 1893.  With these inconsistencies, it is no wonder that identifying her was a challenge.

Webb’s entries in the 1900, 1910, and 1920 censuses

Webb died in 1922, only in her 30s.  She left land to her friend Edna DePriest and the rest of her estate to her family.

There is a single reference to Miss Webb in the 1924 Purdue Alumni Directory as a former member of the 1911 Pharmacy class.  This final piece of information about her time as a Purdue student provides yet another reason why she did not appear in any of the traditional student sources.  In the earliest years of the university, the School of Pharmacy was often treated as a separate institution from the rest of the university and not active in student life.

There is still so much more to Rhoygnette Webb’s story, some of which may never be known.  Miss Webb’s career aspirations, race, and gender all combined to make her seemingly invisible in the records of the university, and her frequently misspelled name made her difficult to trace in newspapers and vital records.  She likely would have remained unknown to us had she not taken an active role in the leadership of the Dubois Club.  Thanks to that club and its coverage in the Exponent, we can now identify and celebrate Miss Webb as one of Purdue’s groundbreaking students.

In 1900, Winthrop Stone became President of Purdue University.  In the fall of that year, Lauson Stone, his much younger brother, enrolled as a freshman.  What was life like for a student whose older brother was running the university?

Winthrop Stone in 1902; Lauson Stone in 1904

A 21-year age gap between the brothers meant that by the time Lauson was born in 1883, his brother Winthrop was already a college graduate who had left the family home.  After studying in Germany around the time of Lauson’s birth, Winthrop moved to Tennessee. He later became a Professor of Chemistry at Purdue, in 1889.  When Winthrop’s oldest son was born in 1890, Uncle Lauson was only seven years old.

Winthrop Stone was promoted from being the first Vice President in Purdue’s history to being President after the sudden death of President James Smart on February 21, 1900.  It’s unlikely that the brothers spent very much time together before Lauson’s arrival at Purdue in the fall of that year.

Lauson became famous early in his college career for being the president’s brother.  The Debris yearbook, created by seniors who usually had little time to spend on freshmen, included a joke about the Stone brothers in its 1901 volume:

Great disturbance in the Dormitory! A Freshman kicking posts out of the banisters, just to see ‘em drop down the stairs.  Prof. Alford rushes wildly upon the scene.  “Stop that noise, immediately! Who is the cause of all this disturbance?” “I, sir.” “Report to Dr. Stone at once! No explanations are necessary.  Save them for Dr. Stone.”  Dr. Stone is greatly surprised to receive, within the next few minutes, an official call from his brother. (p. 301)

Despite the attention, or maybe because of it, Lauson was a popular student active in many clubs, including the Chemical Society, Mechanical Engineering Society, Minuet Club, Irving Literary Society, and the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity.  He was also a Cadet Captain in the Cadet Corps, Associate Editor of the Debris yearbook his junior and senior years, Junior Class Secretary, and part of the Senior Class Banquet Committee.  When the 1903 Debris yearbook made humorous suggestions for the following year’s yearbook titles, one suggestion was, “How I was Chased by All the Frats at Purdue, by L. Stone.” (p. 296)

Sigma Alpha Epsilon in 1904.  Lauson Stone is in the center row, fourth from the right.

Lauson contracted typhoid fever in late 1903, and his prolonged absence from school meant he would not be able graduate with the Class of 1904 as planned.  Still, he was listed among the seniors in the 1904 Debris with this thorough biography:

Lauson Stone has labored under three handicaps in his college career, any one of which would have had nine out of ten of us down and out before we had passed the Sophomore mile­stone. In the first place the incubus of being a brother to the president of the University has weighed upon him in the shape of his nickname of “Doc,” which was bestowed on him early in our Freshman year, and has clung to him ever since. Secondly, at about the same time as above mentioned, he developed what is technically known as a “case,” which has not become any less acute with years, and which was partly responsible for his attempt to take both Mechanical Engineering and the Science Course at the same time. Lastly, a six months’ tussle with typhoid did indeed send his chances of graduating with us glimmering, but he is an ’04 man through and through, even if he does have to fall back on ’05 for his sheepskin. He is from Amherst, Massachusetts. (p. 112)

Lauson spent the following year working as a student assistant in the Practical Mechanics department while completing his coursework, and finally graduated in spring 1905 with a degree in Mechanical Engineering.  In 1909, he married Helen Estelle Darby, a fellow member of the Purdue Class of 1904.  Their marriage announcement in the Exponent student newspaper makes no mention of Lauson’s notable brother.  It also misspells Lauson’s first name.

Helen Estelle Darby, 1904

The marriage of Miss Helen E. Darby and Mr. Lawson Stone occurred yesterday at 3 o’clock at the Darby home on East Main street. The ceremony was performed by Rev. G. W. Switzer and was witnessed by the relatives and a few intimate friends of the bride and groom. Both Mr. and Mrs. Stone are graduates of Purdue of the class of ’04 and have a host of [f]riends at the University. Mr. Stone holds a government position in the department of the interior at Pittsburg[h]. He is a member of the S. A. E. fraternity. (March 28, 1909)

Lauson did not stick around Purdue after graduation.  He spent his career in Pennsylvania, first in a teaching position at Western Reserve University, then with the United States Geologic Survey, and later in the steel industry.

Meanwhile, as Winthrop and Lauson Stone were advancing their career and education at Purdue, their middle brother, Harlan Fiske Stone, was building his legal and political career and eventually became the most notable member of the family.  Harlan served as Dean of Columbia University Law School, United States Attorney General, Associate Supreme Court Justice, and eventually Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

All images from the Debris Yearbook.