20 Facts About Colgate Darden

Colgate Darden's ancestors had lived in Southampton County for generations, Darden's Tavern had figured in Nat Turner's Rebellion.

Colgate Darden grew up on the family farm and attended the local public schools.

Colgate Darden studied at the University of Virginia for two years beginning in 1914.

In 1916 Colgate Darden volunteered to serve in the French Army before the United States entered World War I and became an ambulance driver with an ambulance corps of the American Field Service in France.

Colgate Darden contracted malaria in the trenches near Verdun and returned to the United States in 1917 to recover and enlisted in the United States Marine Corps after the United States declared war on Germany.

Colgate Darden was commissioned a lieutenant, earned his pilot's wings and became a Marine aviator during World War I A couple of weeks before the armistice that ended the war, he was seriously injured in an airplane crash and was hospitalized for 10 months.

On December 3,1927, Colgate Darden married Constance Simons du Pont, a daughter of Irenee du Pont, of the wealthy du Pont chemical-manufacturing family in Wilmington, Delaware.

Colgate Darden became active in the local Democratic party and aligned with the Byrd Organization.

In 1929, Colgate Darden won his first election, becoming one of Norfolk's four representatives to the Virginia House of Delegates.

Colgate Darden won re-election and served alongside Daniel Coleman, Vivian L Page and Wilson W Vellines from 1930 to 1933, when Darden resigned because of his election to Congress.

In 1932, Colgate Darden won election as a Democrat in an At-large election to select Virginia's US Representatives to the 73rd Congress.

Colgate Darden supported loans to European allies as early as 1939, before the United States entered World War II.

Colgate Darden eliminated the state debt and created a surplus which was allocated to vocational schools, colleges, hospitals and other public services.

Governor Colgate Darden refused to overturn the firing of several black educators following the 1940 federal equal pay decision in Alston v School Board of Norfolk.

Colgate Darden was elected president of the University of Virginia in 1947, despite public misgivings from some among the university faculty, who resented his lack of faculty experience, and some students who feared that he planned to abolish the fraternity system at the university.

At Virginia, Colgate Darden was responsible for erection of the student union building, named Newcomb Hall for his predecessor John Lloyd Newcomb; the establishment of the Judiciary Committee ; the creation of the graduate school of business administration and significant improvements to faculty salaries.

Colgate Darden died in 1981 at his home in Norfolk, Virginia.

Colgate Darden was buried in the family plot with his parents.

Colgate Darden is memorialized with a historic marker at the site of his birth.

In 1968, the Board of Visitors of Old Dominion University voted to rename its school of education the Colgate Darden School of Education after Colgate Darden, who was a strong advocate for education in Virginia during his term as governor.