Page 40 - Georgetown Prep - Endowment of Tears, Hope for Reconciliation

Following in the footsteps of Anthony Pierce, John McKnight was elected president of his seventh and eighth grade classes and served as a quiet, widely respected leader throughout his six years at Prep. Vincent was also elected a class officer in each of his high school years. At John’s graduation in 1970 – the last at which there would be only one black Prep graduate -- his father, Dr. Herbert V. McKnight, Sr., delivered the commencement address, the first African American to do so. The following year, during graduation exercises, Vincent received the Harvard Club Award for Most Likely to Succeed.
John and Vincent enjoyed their time at Prep with classmates and forged warm relationships. But they also had to navigate “the sometimes treacherous and hurtful landscape” of being among the very few black students on campus and often the only black student in the classroom or on the field.
John views his classmates as “true friends,” both then and now, noting that “we were ‘just kids.’” There were experiences along the way, however, involving upper classmen, parents, faculty, and clergy that proved difficult and often demeaning. In one such instance, John arrived at an appointment with a faculty counselor to begin discussions about the college application process. John greeted the priest warmly and enthusiastically, but was met with the curt declaration that “There is really no need to meet, as you will not be going to college!” John turned, thanked him, and navigated his college journey alone.
John rebounded from this disappointing and hurtful comment by later accumulating not just his college degree from Johns Hopkins University, but also a medical degree from Howard University College of Medicine, and an MBA from the Carey School of Business at Johns Hopkins. He has been engaged in the practice of medicine as an oft-honored board certified specialist in Medical Oncology for several decades.
Vincent recalled that his “life at Prep had a normal rhythm and flow that was probably no different from the life of a white student - until it wasn't. Out of nowhere, something would happen that would sting, hurt, or punctuate the differences between us.” For example, Vince saw the Confederate flag hanging on the wall in a boarder’s room, and he recalls a few heated and hurtful exchanges with teachers. In succeeding decades, many African American Prep students experienced uncomfortable interactions even as the number of black students increased significantly in the late 1980s and accelerated in the new century.
Vincent obtained his undergraduate degree at Brown University and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. He has practiced law with distinction in the Washington Metropolitan Area since 1980, and he specializes in representing whistleblowers against federal contractors alleged to have committed fraud in connection with their federal contracts. Vincent is currently the managing partner of the Washington D. C., office of Sanford Heisler Sharp, LLP.
John and Vincent brought their unique perspectives to the Prep Board of Trustees, serving as the first African American Prep alumni on the board -- Vincent from 1992-1995, and John from 1995-2002. On leaving the Board in 2002, John became the first African American to receive the Insignis Medal, Prep’s highest honor, given “for Service to God and Community.” John was also a proud Founding Board Trustee of the Washington Jesuit Academy.
The McKnight brothers and Michael Brooks, in addition to the other trailblazing African American students who preceded and followed them at Prep, would each encounter joys, challenges, and pain at the school, but their courage, contributions, faith, and achievements would, over time, reshape Prep’s school culture. A key part of that Prep culture involved the residence school, where another trailblazer was making history.
Guerdon H. Stuckey, Jr.
Darnell C. “Bubba” Beatty
Darnell C. “Bubba” Beatty
studied hard, played football,
joined the yearbook staff, stood up for fellow resident students, and participated
and founder of the Black Student Union (now Black Student Association)
Guerdon Stuckey, Jr., transferred to Georgetown Prep from Lackey High School in Indian Head, Maryland, at the end of his freshman year. He did so at the encouragement of one of his teachers at Lackey, Webster Knight, who had graduated from Prep in 1965. Extroverted, confident, and in his own words and those of classmates, “fiercely independent,” Guerdon won election as President of the Yard in the spring of 1972. Concerned that black students in the area’s overwhelmingly white independent schools did not have an adequate support system, he worked with Headmaster David A. Sauter, S. J., and President Vincent F. Beatty, S. J., to establish the Black Student Union — now known as the Black Student Association (BSA). On a recent visit to campus for a gathering of past presidents of the Yard, Mr. Stuckey, who has spent his career in public administration, expressed pride in having initiated an organization that has supported diversity at Prep for almost 50 years.