25 Facts About Blanche Bruce

Blanche Kelso Bruce was an American politician who represented Mississippi as a Republican in the United States Senate from 1875 to 1881.

Blanche Bruce was appointed as Recorder of Deeds in Washington DC during Benjamin Harrison's presidency.

Blanche Bruce's home, the Blanche K Bruce House, is a National Historic Landmark.

Blanche Bruce's father was his master, Pettis Perkinson, a white Virginia planter.

Blanche Bruce was treated comparatively well by his father, who educated him together with a legitimate half-brother.

One source claims that his father legally freed Blanche Bruce and arranged for an apprenticeship so he could learn a trade.

Blanche Bruce attended Oberlin College for two years in Oberlin, Ohio.

Blanche Bruce next worked as a steamboat porter on the Mississippi River.

In 1868, during Reconstruction, Blanche Bruce relocated to Bolivar near Cleveland in northwestern Mississippi, at which he purchased a Mississippi Delta plantation.

Blanche Bruce became a wealthy landowner of several thousand acres in the Mississippi Delta.

Blanche Bruce was appointed to the positions of Tallahatchie County registrar of voters and tax assessor before he won an election for sheriff in Bolivar County.

Blanche Bruce later was elected to other county positions, including tax collector and supervisor of education, while he edited a local newspaper.

Blanche Bruce became sergeant-at-arms for the Mississippi State Senate in 1870.

In February 1874, Blanche Bruce was elected to the US Senate, the second African American to serve in the upper house of Congress.

On February 14,1879, Blanche Bruce presided over the US Senate, becoming the first African American to have done so.

Blanche Bruce acquired a large townhouse and summer home, and presided over black high society.

At the 1880 Republican National Convention in Chicago, Blanche Bruce became the first African American to win any votes for national office at a major party's nominating convention, with eight votes for vice president.

In early 1889, politically connected blacks lobbied for Blanche Bruce to receive a Cabinet appointment in the Harrison Administration.

Blanche Bruce served by appointment as the District of Columbia recorder of deeds from 1890 to 1893.

Blanche Bruce served on the District of Columbia Board of Trustees of Public Schools from 1892 to 1895.

Blanche Bruce was a participant in the March 5,1897 meeting to celebrate the memory of Frederick Douglass and the American Negro Academy led by Alexander Crummell.

Blanche Bruce was appointed as Register of the Treasury a second time in 1897 by President William McKinley and served until his death from diabetes complications in 1898.

On June 24,1878, Blanche Bruce married Josephine Beall Willson, a fair-skinned socialite of Cleveland, Ohio, amid great publicity; the couple traveled to Europe for a four-month honeymoon.

Blanche Bruce was named for US Senator Roscoe Conkling of New York, Bruce's mentor in the Senate.

Lawrence Otis Graham authored a historical book about Blanche Bruce titled The True Story of America's First Black Dynasty: The Senator and the Socialite in June 2006.