Hiram Rhoads Revels’ Handwritten Letter on U.S. Senator Chamber notepaper, May 14, 1870.
Above, the first African American U.S. Senator consents to give a lecture, probably at the Philadelphia Academy of Music where T. B. Pugh (mentioned in the letter) was the manager.
Due to his expectation of a short term in office in completing the unexpired term of another, Revels likely eschewed having official senate stationery printed. When this short but noteworthy term expired in 1871, Revels became the first president of Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Alcorn State University), an historically black college in Mississippi.