New Orleans University was founded in 1869 by the Freedmen's Aid Society with funds from the Methodist Episcopal Church.[2] It was located above Canal Street (present-day Lower Garden District),[2] at Camp and Race streets in New Orleans. In the year 1869, sixteen schools for African Americans were active in the New Orleans area.[2] It later moved to 5318 St. Charles Avenue, near what is presently Jefferson Avenue.[3]
New Orleans University was considered an auxiliary school to the Gilbert Academy, a prestigious college-preparatory school for African-American students in New Orleans.[3] The two schools formed an administrative merger in 1919,[4] with the two institutions remaining in their respective locations.[5] When New Orleans University and Straight College combined to form Dillard University at a new campus in Gentilly in 1935, Gilbert Academy moved into the buildings vacated by New Orleans University.[6]
^United States. Works Progress Administration of Louisiana; McKinney. "Description and history of Gilbert Academy". Louisiana Digital Library. Louisiana Works Progress Administration. p. 35.
^Bethea, Judith (April 2004). "Two remarkable African-American schools and the site they shared on St. Charles Avenue". Preservation in Print. 31 (3): 28–29.
^Campanella, Richard (February 2021). "Preservation's selective lens: the Gould House, Gilbert Academy and the legacy of New Orleans University". Preservation in Print: 10–12.