Associate Archivist - Mount Sinai Morningside and Mount Sinai West
Arthur H. Aufses, Jr. MD Archives
To celebrate Black History Month, we would like to bringWilliam Johnson Trent, Jr. (1910-1993), to your attention. Trent was the first African-American elected to the Board of Trustees of St. Luke’s Hospital, now Mount Sinai Morninside. He was an active member of the Board from 1965 to 1977 and served four years as the Board’s President from 1970 – 1974. He remained a concerned Honorary Trustee from the time of his resignation until his death from cardiac arrest in November 1993.
Trent was born in North Carolina and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. He attended a private high school and graduated from Livingstone College in 1930. He went on to earn an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and was one of its first black students. Trent then went on to graduate work in economics at the University of Chicago. Afterwards, he returned to North Carolina and taught economics for two years at Livingstone College and later at Bennet College, where he was Acting Dean of Education for a year.
William Johnson Trent, Jr.
The son of an early organizer of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Trent, Sr.’s civil rights activism appears to have passed down to Trent, Jr., who served as Adviser on Negro Affairs to the Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes between 1939 and 1946, where Trent was instrumental in desegregating national park facilities. Later he held the position of Race Relations Officer in the Federal Works Agency. Most significantly, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt invited Trent to be a part of an informal group of African-Americans, referred to as the “Black Cabinet,” who served as public policy advisers to Roosevelt and his wife during Roosevelt’s administration.
Joining with Tuskegee Institute president Frederick D. Patterson, and educator and civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune, Trent was co-founder of the United Negro College Fund in 1944 and led the organization as Executive Director. Called the architect of UNCF by the Wharton Magazine, his twenty years there raised $78 million to support private black colleges and universities,which he said helped to make "strong citadels of learning, carriers of the American dream, seedbeds of social evolution and revolution."(Wharton Magazine, 7-1-2007)
During Mr. Trent’s tenure on the St. Luke’s Board, he worked as an Assistant Personnel Director at Time, Inc. where he was involved in personnel training and development. He retired in 1975 and returned to North Carolina. While directing the UNCF, he lived in Manhattan and New Rochelle, NY, and served on the boards of the National Social Welfare Assembly of New York City; the African-American Institute; the New Rochelle Council for Unity; The Child Study Association of American; and Livingstone College. He also served on the College Housing Advisory Committee; Housing and Home Finance Agency; the Advisory Committee on Governmental Operations for the City of New Rochelle; the Steering Committee of the African Scholarship Program of American Universities, Cambridge, Mass., and the Personnel Committee of International House, a Morningside Heights neighbor.
While Trent was a strong advocate for African-American causes, he had the ability to bring people of all colors together to work for worthy causes, which may have been what led to his nomination to the Board of Trustees at St. Luke’s Hospital and made him a beloved and honored member of it.
Michala Biondi
Associate Archivist - Mount Sinai Morningside and Mount Sinai West
Arthur H. Aufses, Jr. MD Archives
To celebrate Black History Month, we would like to bring William Johnson Trent, Jr. (1910-1993), to your attention. Trent was the first African-American elected to the Board of Trustees of St. Luke’s Hospital, now Mount Sinai Morninside. He was an active member of the Board from 1965 to 1977 and served four years as the Board’s President from 1970 – 1974. He remained a concerned Honorary Trustee from the time of his resignation until his death from cardiac arrest in November 1993.
Trent was born in North Carolina and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. He attended a private high school and graduated from Livingstone College in 1930. He went on to earn an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and was one of its first black students. Trent then went on to graduate work in economics at the University of Chicago. Afterwards, he returned to North Carolina and taught economics for two years at Livingstone College and later at Bennet College, where he was Acting Dean of Education for a year.
The son of an early organizer of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Trent, Sr.’s civil rights activism appears to have passed down to Trent, Jr., who served as Adviser on Negro Affairs to the Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes between 1939 and 1946, where Trent was instrumental in desegregating national park facilities. Later he held the position of Race Relations Officer in the Federal Works Agency. Most significantly, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt invited Trent to be a part of an informal group of African-Americans, referred to as the “Black Cabinet,” who served as public policy advisers to Roosevelt and his wife during Roosevelt’s administration.
Joining with Tuskegee Institute president Frederick D. Patterson, and educator and civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune, Trent was co-founder of the United Negro College Fund in 1944 and led the organization as Executive Director. Called the architect of UNCF by the Wharton Magazine, his twenty years there raised $78 million to support private black colleges and universities, which he said helped to make "strong citadels of learning, carriers of the American dream, seedbeds of social evolution and revolution." (Wharton Magazine, 7-1-2007)
During Mr. Trent’s tenure on the St. Luke’s Board, he worked as an Assistant Personnel Director at Time, Inc. where he was involved in personnel training and development. He retired in 1975 and returned to North Carolina. While directing the UNCF, he lived in Manhattan and New Rochelle, NY, and served on the boards of the National Social Welfare Assembly of New York City; the African-American Institute; the New Rochelle Council for Unity; The Child Study Association of American; and Livingstone College. He also served on the College Housing Advisory Committee; Housing and Home Finance Agency; the Advisory Committee on Governmental Operations for the City of New Rochelle; the Steering Committee of the African Scholarship Program of American Universities, Cambridge, Mass., and the Personnel Committee of International House, a Morningside Heights neighbor.
While Trent was a strong advocate for African-American causes, he had the ability to bring people of all colors together to work for worthy causes, which may have been what led to his nomination to the Board of Trustees at St. Luke’s Hospital and made him a beloved and honored member of it.
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