Joseph H. Vaden

Joseph Henry Vaden was a physician, educator, and civil rights leader. Born in Smith County, Tennessee to a slave and her master's son; Joseph was white-passing and grew up without many of the restrictions and poor treatment that the other black children received on the plantation. 
In 1846, Joseph's father paid for him to travel to the east coast to attend college. Joseph enrolled at Bowdoin College, where he graduated with a medical degree in May 1849. Following his graduation from Bowdoin, he moved to the midwest and made a home in Indiana at Robert's Settlement. He opened a private practice for both blacks and whites, and received many black patients from the relatively new state capital of Indianapolis. 
He began taking apprentices to assist him in his practice, mostly young sons of the farmers in town, and soon realized how illiterate most of them were. In 1852 he organized a school and began teaching the boys of the community reading, arithmetic, philosophy, and history. Vaden began to attract blacks from nearby Indianapolis as well as around central Indiana, and in 1854 he officially started the Vaden Institute with classes held in the town meetinghouse. In 1859, Vaden purchased land on Indiana Avenue in Indianapolis and moved the school there; hiring four additional teachers and expanding the program to include a junior college. The school quickly began to grow as Dr. Vaden garnered support from several Baptist and AME congregations across the midwest who would send large numbers of students to the school. 
On September 9, 1863, Indiana Governor Oliver Morton, officially chartered the school as the Indiana Colored College and began providing state funding through federal and private loans he attained. Dr. Vaden continued on as Principal, with the school initially offering degrees in Education, Medicine, and Classical studies.
Vaden continued leading the school until 1868 when he relocated to Houston, Texas. In Houston, Dr. Vaden purchased a home in Freedmen's Town in the Fourth Ward, where he used the bottom floor as his private medical practice. He began attending Antioch Missionary Baptist Church, which at the time was led by Jack Yates. Dr. Vaden and Rev. Yates quickly became major leaders of Houston's early black community. They partnered in founding a college; on March 18, 1869 Heritage Christian College was incorporated and began welcoming students one month later to study education, medicine, and theology. A permanent building was completed in November 1870, a technical department was added in 1873, and the first black high school in Houston was added in 1878. 
In 1875, Dr. Vaden was invited by African-American Baptist in Georgia to establish and lead a college in the state. Central City College was established in 
Dr. Vaden left Antioch in 1885 and began attending the newly formed Holy Temple Baptist Church led by Rev. J.P. King, a minister from Memphis with a fiery and passionate preaching style. In 1887 Rev, King appointed Dr. Vaden as the Education Director for the Southern Association of Baptist Church, of which King was the President. Dr. Vaden was tasked with opening similar school's in a freedmen's town or major black city in every southern state with the financial backing of the association. Dr. Vaden and Rev. King would identify ministers in the communities they sought to establish schools and invite them to learn and shadow at HCC for one year before sending them back to their homes to start their own schools, on land purchased by the association. In his capacity as Education Director he oversaw the establishment of twelve colleges, all of which still exist today: Heritage Christian College of Tennessee in 1890; Heritage Christian College of East Texas and Heritage Christian College of Louisiana were founded in 1893; Heritage Christian College of Mississippi, Heritage Christian College of Alabama, and Heritage Christian College of Arkansas were founded in 1896; Heritage Christian College of Central Texas, Heritage Christian College of North Texas, and Heritage Christian College of Georgia were founded in 1899. Heritage Christian College of Oklahoma, University of Cleveland, and Kinloch College were founded in 1899. 
Dr. Vaden retired as the President of Heritage Christian College and Education Director for the SABC in 1903, shortly before his 80th birthday. 
The Board of Trustees of Indiana State Colored University voted to rename the school Vaden University in 1913, upon the schools 50th anniversary at which Dr. Vaden was present.