Lincoln University (Lincoln or LU) is a state-related (independent but with public funding) historically black university near Oxford, Pennsylvania. Founded as a private university in 1854, it has been a public institution since 1972 and was the United States' first degree-granting HBCU.^[4] Its main campus is located on 422 acres near the town of Oxford in southern Chester County, Pennsylvania. The university has a second location in University City, Philadelphia. Lincoln University provides undergraduate and graduate coursework to approximately 2,000 students. The University is a member-school of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund.

While a majority of Lincoln University students are African Americans, the university has a long history of accepting students of other races and nationalities.^[5] Women have received degrees since 1953^[5] and made up over 60% of undergraduate enrollment in 2018.^[6]

In 1854 Rev. John Miller Dickey, a Presbyterian minister, and his wife, Sarah Emlen Cresson, a Quaker, founded Ashmun Institute, later named Lincoln University, in Hinsonville. They named it after Jehudi Ashmun, a religious leader and social reformer. They founded the school for the education of African Americans, who had few opportunities for higher education.

John Miller Dickey was the first president of the college. He encouraged some of his first students: James Ralston Amos (1826–1864), his brother Thomas Henry Amos (1825–1869), and Armistead Hutchinson Miller (1829/30-1865), to support the establishment of Liberia as a colony for African Americans. (This was a project of the American Colonization Society). Each of the men became ordained ministers.

In 1866, a year after the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, Ashmun Institute was renamed Lincoln University. The college attracted highly talented students from numerous states, especially during the long decades of legal segregation in the South. As may be seen on the list of notable alumni (link below) furthered their in careers in many fields including but not limited to academia, public service, the arts and many other fields.

In 1945 Dr. Horace Mann Bond, an alumnus of Lincoln, was selected as the first African-American president of the university. During his 12-year tenure, he continued to do social science research, and helped support the important civil rights case of Brown v. Board of Education, which decided in 1954 by the US Supreme Court. His relationship with the collector Albert C. Barnes was essential in ensuring the university's role in the management of his art collection.

From 1854 to 1954, 20% of African American physicians and over 10% of African American lawyers in the United States.^[7]

The university celebrated its 100th anniversary by amending its charter in 1953 to permit the granting of degrees to women.^[8]

In 1972 Lincoln University formally associated with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as a state-related institution.

In November 2014, University president Robert R. Jennings resigned under pressure from faculty, students and alumni after comments relating to issues of sexual assault.^[9] Jennings was also the subject of a couple of no-confidence votes by faculty and the alumni association in October 2014.^[10]

On May 11, 2017, the Lincoln University board of trustees announced the appointment of Dr. Brenda A. Allen, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at Winston-Salem State University as Lincoln's new president. A 1981 alumna of Lincoln, Allen's inauguration was announced for October, 2017.^[11]

According to U.S. News & World Report, Lincoln University ranks number 20 out of 81 in the 2013 magazine's first ranking of undergraduate education at HBCUs. It is ranked as a Tier One school on the list. Lincoln University shares its ranking as No. 20 with Alabama A&M University.^[12] In 2012 the US News & World Best Colleges Report rated Lincoln as a Tier Two University overall.^[13]

Lincoln University's International and Study Abroad Program had student participation in Service Learning Projects in the countries of Ecuador, Argentina, Spain, Ireland, Costa Rica, Japan, France, Cambodia, Zambia, Liberia, Ghana, Kenya, Russia, Australia, Thailand, the Czech Republic, Mexico, and South Africa

The Lincoln-Barnes Visual Arts program is a collaboration between Lincoln University and the Barnes Foundation. It established a Visual Arts program that leads to a Bachelor of Fine Arts, and most recently, a Pan-Africana Studies major has been added to the list undergraduate majors available at the institution.

Lincoln University offers 38 undergraduate majors and 23 undergraduate minors.

Lincoln University main campus is 422 acres (1.71 km2) with 56 buildings totaling over one million gross square feet. There are fifteen residence halls that accommodate over 1,600 students. The dormitories range from small dorms such as Alumni Hall, built in 1870; and Amos Hall, built in 1902, to the new coed 400-bed apartment-style living (ASL) suites built in 2005. There are additional off campus housing arrangements such as Thorn Flats, in Newark, Delaware.^[14]

A $40.5 million, four-story, 150,000-square-foot (14,000 m2) Science and General Classroom High Technology Building was completed in December 2008. A $26.1 million 60,000-square-foot (5,600 m2) International Cultural Center began construction on April 10, 2008, and was completed in 2010.

The $28 million Health and Wellness Center is a 105,000 square feet (9,800 m2) facility that opened in September 2012. The facility contains basketball courts, locker rooms, classrooms, track, rock climbing wall, health clinic and healthy eating café.

An on-campus football stadium with concession stands, a separate locker room, and storage facilities opened in August 2012. A separate practice field with Field Turf II is located near the Health and Wellness Center, where six new lighted tennis courts are located. New baseball and softball fields are adjacent to the football stadium.

One of the most visible landmarks on campus is the Alumni Memorial Arch, located at the entrance to the university. The arch was dedicated by President Warren G. Harding in 1921, to honor the Lincoln men who served in World War I. The Mary Dod Brown Memorial Chapel is the center for campus religious activities. This Gothic structure was built in 1890 and contains a 300-seat main auditorium and a 200-seat fellowship hall.

Vail Memorial Hall, built in 1899 and expanded in 1954, served as the library until 1972. The facility houses executive administrative offices including the President, Vice Presidents, and other staff.

The Langston Hughes Memorial Library (LHML), named after the famous alumnus, houses more than 176,000 volumes, and subscribes to more than 600 current periodicals. A substantial number of the library's periodicals are on microfilm and can be accessed electronically through the school's website. LHML is equipped with the JSTOR database for online academic proprietary research tools. A separate section of the library contains special African-American collections. This includes the personal papers and artifacts of poet Langston Hughes (class of 1929).

The completely renovated Student Union Building contains the bookstore, café, two new television studios, and a radio studio, postal services, and multipurpose rooms. The Thurgood Marshall Living Learning Center, along with the Student Union Building, are the centers for campus social and meeting activities. Marshall graduated in the class of 1930, directed the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund in groundbreaking cases, and was the first African American to be appointed as a justice to US Supreme Court.

Manuel Rivero Hall is the athletic and recreation center at Lincoln University. The main gymnasium seats 2,500 for athletic and convocation activities. A separate full-size auxiliary gymnasium, Olympic-size swimming pool, training room facilities, wrestling room, and eight-lane bowling alley are contained in this facility.

Lincoln University is a census-designated place (CDP) for statistical purposes. As of the 2010 census, Lincoln University CDP had a resident population of 1,726.^[15] Lincoln University has a post office with a ZIP code of 19352.

Lincoln University - University City, a six-story building in the University City section of Philadelphia, offers select undergraduate and graduate programs in the School of Adult & Continuing Education.^[16][17]

Lincoln has over 24 student organizations as outlets for multiple intrest including fashion, arts, social justice, religious, international, cultural, service, leisure, media and publishing

Lincoln University participates in the NCAA as a Division II institution. Lincoln has won 17 NCAA Division III Track & Field championships since 1985. Lincoln competes as a Division II member of the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association and, the Eastern College Athletic Conference. Lincoln Lions compete in intercollegiate athletics in the following sports: Baseball, Soccer (Women), Basketball (Men & Women), Volleyball (Women), Indoor Track (Men & Women), Outdoor Track (Men & Women), Cross-Country (Men & Women), Softball, and Football.

As president of Lincoln University (1945–1957), Dr. Horace Mann Bond formed a friendship with Albert C. Barnes, philanthropist and art collector who established the Barnes Foundation. Barnes took a special interest in the institution and built a relationship with its students. Barnes gave Lincoln University the privilege of naming four of the five directors originally set as the number for the governing board of the Barnes Foundation. [1] ^[27] ; [2] ^[28]

Barnes had an interest in helping under-served youth and populations. Barnes intended his $25 billion art collection to be used primarily as a teaching resource. He limited the number of people who could view it, and for years even the kinds of people, with a preference for students and working class. Visitors still must make appointments in advance to see the collection, and only a limited number are allowed in the galleries at one time.

In the mid-20th century, local government restricted traffic to the current campus, located in a residential neighborhood located at 300 North Latch's Lane, Merion, Pennsylvania. Barnes' constraints, local factors, and management issues pushed the Foundation near bankruptcy by the 1990s. Supporters began to explore plans to move the collection to a more public location and maintain it to museum standards. To raise money for needed renovations to the main building to protect the collection, the Foundation sent some of the most famous Impressionist and Modern paintings on tour.

In 2002, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania D. Michael Fisher contested Albert C. Barnes' will, arguing that the Merion location of the collection and small number of Board members limited the Foundation's ability to sustain itself financially. Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell brokered a settlement in 2005 between the Barnes Foundation and Lincoln University. This agreement resulted in the number of directors increasing. This has diluted Lincoln's influence over the collection, now valued at approximately twenty-five billion dollars.

A documentary named The Art of the Steal depicts the events.

Lincoln University has numerous notable alumni, including US Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall; Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes; musical legend Cab Calloway; Medal of Honor winner and pioneering African-American editor Christian Fleetwood; civil rights activist Frederick D. Alexander; the first president of Nigeria, Nnamdi Azikiwe; the first president of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah; song artist and activist Gil Scott-Heron; Emmy Award-winning and Tony Award-nominated actor Roscoe Lee Browne; Dr. Robert Walter Johnson, tennis coach of Althea Gibson and Arthur Ashe; and Melvin B. Tolson, teacher and coach of the Wiley College, Marshall, Texas, debate team portrayed in the film The Great Debaters.

Lincoln University has alumni who founded the following six colleges and universities in the United States and abroad: South Carolina State University, Livingstone University, Albany State University, Allen University, Texas Southern University, Ibibio State College (Nigeria) and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (Ghana).

Lincoln University has two alumni honored with commemorative stamps by the United States Postal Service: Thurgood Marshall (BA 1930) and Langston Hughes (BA 1929).^[18] Joseph Newman Clinton, member of the Florida House of Representatives.