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The financial contributions of Moses Taylor Pyne (Class of 1877), one of Princeton's most prominent benefactors, reveal the complex relationship between Princeton, the American sugar trade, and the slave economy.

In 1786, an enslaved man named Prime became one of only three enslaved people to be manumitted by act of the New Jersey legislature in exchange for his service during the Revolutionary War.

African Americans were a constant presence at the College of New Jersey as servants, support staff, research and teaching assistants, and students. They labored under harsh conditions on a campus dominated by racism and white supremacy.

In the late-19th and early-20th centuries, several African American men attended Princeton as graduate students. Princeton president Woodrow Wilson’s administration may have attempted to erase their presence from institutional memory, creating an inaccurate historical justification for excluding black students from the university.