page_title: Alain LeRoy Locke
section_title: Early life and education
hierarchical_section_title: Alain LeRoy Locke / Early life and education
caption_attribution_description: English: Alain LeRoy Locke Original caption: Alain LeRoy Locke of Pennslyvania, first colored winner of the Cecil Rhodes Oxford Scholarship
context_page_description: Alain Leroy Locke was an American writer, philosopher, educator, and patron of the arts. Distinguished in 1907 as the first African-American Rhodes Scholar, Locke became known as the philosophical architect —the acknowledged "Dean"— of the Harlem Renaissance. He is frequently included in listings of influential African Americans. On March 19, 1968, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed: "We're going to let our children know that the only philosophers that lived were not Plato and Aristotle, but W. E. B. Du Bois and Alain Locke came through the universe."
context_section_description: He was born Arthur Leroy Locke in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on September 13, 1885 to parents Pliny Ishmael Locke (1850–1892) and Mary (née Hawkins) Locke (1853–1922), both of whom were descended from prominent families of free blacks. Called "Roy" as a boy, he was their only child. His father was the first black employee of the U.S. Postal Service, and his paternal grandfather taught at Philadelphia's Institute for Colored Youth. His mother Mary was a teacher and inspired Locke's passion for education and literature. Mary's grandfather, Charles Shorter, fought as a soldier and was a hero in the War of 1812. 
  At the age of 16, Locke chose to use the first name of "Alain". In 1902, Locke graduated from Central High School in Philadelphia, second in his class in the academic institution. He also attended Philadelphia School of Pedagogy.
  In 1907, Locke graduated from Harvard University with degrees in English and philosophy; he was honored as a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society and recipient of the Bowdoin prize. That year he was the first African American to be selected as a Rhodes Scholar (and the last to be selected until 1963, when John Edgar Wideman and John Stanley Sanders, a future notable writer and politician, respectively, were selected. In the early 20th century, Rhodes selectors did not meet candidates in person, but there is evidence that at least some selectors knew that Locke was African-American. On arriving at Oxford, Locke was denied admission to several colleges. Several American Rhodes Scholars from the South refused to live in the same college or attend events with Locke. He was finally admitted to Hertford College, where he studied literature, philosophy, Greek, and Latin, from 1907–1910. In 1910, he attended the University of Berlin, where he studied philosophy.
  Locke wrote from Oxford in 1910 that the "primary aim and obligation" of a Rhodes Scholar 
  "is to acquire at Oxford and abroad generally a liberal education, and to continue subsequently the Rhodes mission [of international understanding] throughout life and in his own country. If once more it should prove impossible for nations to understand one another as nations, then, as Goethe said, they must learn to tolerate each other as individuals".
caption: Alain LeRoy Locke, c.1907
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