#  RPL in the News: "Harvard Divinity School Senior Lecturer Discusses Role of Slavery in School’s Founding" 

 





February 15, 2023

 

 

     ![Harvard Crimson Newspaper Seal](/sites/g/files/omnuum8216/files/styles/hwp_16_9__480x270/public/rpl/files/harvard_crimson_newspaper_crimsonseal-large-color.jpg?itok=wzTSET4n) 

 



 

Harvard Crimson writer [Tyler J. H. Ory](https://www.thecrimson.com/writer/1217489/Tyler_J.%20H._Ory/) covers the third event in the HDS series of public online conversations titled “Religion and Legacies of Slavery,” which aims to build on Harvard’s [landmark Legacy of Slavery report](https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2022/4/26/harvard-legacy-of-slavery-report/) released in April 2022. The event, “Harvard Divinity School and Slavery: Family Stories,” featured HDS senior lecturer Dan P. McKanan, and was hosted by Diane L. Moore, faculty director of Religion and Public Life; and Melissa Wood Bartholomew, associate dean of diversity, inclusion, and belonging.

> McKanan outlined how the Legacy of Slavery report revealed HDS’ deep entanglement with slavery.
> 
> He discussed three individuals with ties to HDS who came from families with fortunes derived from enslavement — William E. Channing, class of 1798, a prominent Unitarian preacher who McKanan called the “visionary behind the founding” of HDS; Thomas W. Higginson, class of 1841, a minister, abolitionist, and HDS graduate; and John G. Palfrey, class of 1815, the first dean of HDS.
> 
> “It’s easy to assume that slavery was a relatively distant reality for the Divinity School’s founders and early students,” McKanan said. “The truth revealed by the report is that the founders of the Divinity School — many of them — were much more entangled with enslavement than most New Englanders of their generation.”
> 
> McKanan spoke about how Channing, Higginson, and Palfrey grappled with the “moral injury” of inheriting wealth from enslavement.

Read the full piece on the [Harvard Crimson](https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2023/2/15/hds-legacy-slavery-discussion/).



 

 

 



 

 See also:- [ Religion, Conflict, and Peace ](/news/religion-conflict-and-peace)