Francis Sumner was an African American educator and psychologist. He was born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, the son of David and Lillian Sumner with one brother named Eugene. As a child, he was educated in the elementary school systems in Norfolk, Virginia, and Plainfield, New Jersey. After elementary school, he was self-educated with the help of his parents. Sumner’s early education consisted of reading and writing assignments given to him by his father, who too had been self-educated.
In 1911, Sumner enrolled at Lincoln University; at the age of 15 Sumner passed a written exam in order to be accepted because he did not have a high school diploma. In 1915, Sumner graduated from Lincoln University at the age of twenty. He formed many good friendships at Lincoln; two of the most important were his relationships with the president of Clark University G. Stanley Hall, and his relationship with James P. Porter who was the Dean of Clark University and a professor of psychology.
During the spring of 1915, Sumner had been accepted to Clark’s undergraduate program for the fall semester. While attending Clark, he continued reading many different books and he hoped to become a writer. In June 1916, Sumner received his second Bachelor’s Degree in English. His relationship with G. Stanley Hall steadily grew into one of mutual respect. Sumner’s admiration for Hall led him seriously to consider psychology as a graduate major.
In the fall of 1916, Sumner again returned to Lincoln University as a graduate student and a German professor. While at Lincoln, Sumner recognized that he wanted to advance in the field of psychology so he began to look at different Graduate schools. After Sumner had heard discouraging responses from both Illinois and American University he received his M.A. in June of 1917, he received word that he was accepted to Clark and been awarded a senior scholarship in the field of psychology.
In 1918 he served in the United States Military during World War I. Sumner remained in France until the middle of 1919 traveling to many different parts of Europe. Sumner returned to Clark and in 1920 began his doctoral dissertation, “Psychoanalysis of Freud and Adler”, that same day his thesis was accepted.
On June 14, 1920 Francis Cecil Sumner became the first African American to receive a Ph.D. degree in psychology. He was interested in understanding racial bias and supporting educational justice. Sumner is also credited as one of the founders of the psychology department at Howard University, which he chaired from 1928 until his death in 1954.