John Houston Burrus

John Houston Burrus
Image of Burrus from 1887
Born	(1849-02-22)February 22, 1849 Rutherford County, Tennessee, U.S.
Died	March 27, 1917(1917-03-27) (aged 68) Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.
Alma mater	Fisk University
Occupation	educator
Political party	Republican

John Houston Burrus (February 22, 1849 - March 27, 1917) was an educator in Nashville, Tennessee and Lorman, Mississippi. He was a member of the first class of students at Fisk University in Nashville and when that class graduated became among the first group of African-Americans to graduate from a liberal arts college south of the Mason-Dixon Line. He was a professor of mathematics at Fisk and in 1883 became the second president of Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College, a position he held until 1893.

John Houston Burrus was born February 22, 1849 to William C. J. Burrus and his slave, Nancy near Murfreesboro, Tennessee in Rutherford County. William was a planter and lawyer and had been a whig member of the General Assembly of Tennessee. Nancy was mixed-race: African-American, Native American, and white. William and Nancy had two other sons, James Dallas Burrus and Preston Robert Burrus and lived together as husband and wife, with William never marrying and James later remembering their relationship as affectionate and respectful. William died in 1860 and the Burrus family went to a brother of their master, the mother as a cook and the brothers as body servants, serving their master while he was a soldier in the US Civil War (1861-1865).

At the end of the War, Burrus, was with his two brothers, mother, and Braxton Bragg's Army in Marshall, Texas. Finally free, they were brought to Shreveport, Louisiana, then to New Orleans, and then Memphis, Tennessee where John took a job as a cook on a stern-wheel steamboat. He remained in Memphis for a short time, and moved in 1866 to Nashville where he took a job as a hotel waiter along with James. The pair studied nights with two ladies boarding at the hotel where they worked. During this time they saved enough and learned enough so that by 1867 they were able to enroll at Fisk University along with America W. Robinson and Virginia Walker, who were the schools first students. During his first year at Fisk John converted to the Congregational Church. As a student, Burrus would teach during the summer until his eyesight began to weaken. In the summers of 1873 and 1874 he gave religious presentations with a panorama he bought. At Fisk, John studied Greek and James studied math. John, James, and Virginia Walker graduated in May, 1875, becoming the first blacks to graduate from a liberal arts college south of the Mason-Dixon Line. America would join the Fisk Jubilee Singers and become fiance to James, although they did not marry.