Wright, George C.
Dr. George C. Wright was born in Lexington, KY. He received the Governors Award from the Kentucky Historical Society for his book, Racial Violence in Kentucky, 1865-1940. According to his research, at least 353 lynchings took place in Kentucky up to 1940. Though Wright states that it is impossible to accurately count the number of African Americans lynched, his research shows that the majority of the lynching victims were African American men. More than one-third of the lynchings occurred between 1865 and 1874.
Dr. Wright is also the author of Life Behind a Veil: Blacks in Louisville, Kentucky, 1865-1930 and co-author of A History of Blacks in Kentucky.
Dr. Wright served as the seventh president of Prairie View A & M University in Texas. He served as president for 14 years before stepping down in 2017 to return to teaching. In 2020, he was named Senior Advisor to the University of Kentucky President and the Interim Vice President of Institutional Diversity at the University of Kentucky. Dr. Wright is a graduate of the University of Kentucky (B.A & M.A.) and Duke University (Ph.D.).
For more see Racial violence in Kentucky, 1865-1940; lynchings, mob rule, and "legal lynchings," by G. C. Wright; Roenker, R., "George C. Wright: presidential success," Kentucky Alumni, Winter 2012 (online); "PVAMU President Emeritus George C. Wright named distinguished scholar, senior faculty fellow at University of Kentucky," a Prairie View website (online); and George C. Wright's schoolarly publications bibliography at the University of Kentucky's History Department website.
