In its first forty years, the Afro-American Studies program had five permanent directors each of whom faced their own obstacles while contributing to the program’s development and evolution. Retention of a director itself was a major issue—it was difficult to attract black scholars to Maine, where the black community has always occupied a sliver of the state’s population. And because the program could only support one professor, it was challenging to develop a community of black scholars.
Students for the Reappointment of Dr. Walter
At the 1979 Sarah and James Bowdoin Day in October 1979, students lead over one hundred people in a peaceful demonstration in response to the non-reappointment of Walter. At the protest, students “urged a change in the admissions policy toward blacks, an increased commitment toward black faculty, and the creation of a full-time minority recruiter in the admissions department” according to the Orient coverage of the event.