Committee working to raise $175,000 to build campus statute of Humphries

Back when Frederick S. Humphries was FAMU’s president, he kept watch to defend the university from internal and external threats. Now, Rattlers are working together to erect a bronze statue of Humphries that will symbolically keep watch over The Hill forever.

The Frederick S. Humphries Life Got Better Bronze Statue Committee wants to raise $175,000 to create a statute of the eighth president of FAMU. It plans to place the statute in front of the Eternal Flame in the campus quadrangle. Humphries built the Eternal Flame to commemorate FAMU’s selection as the first ever TIME Magazine/Princeton Review “College of the Year” in 1997.

Jim Davis, who worked as Humphries’ director of governmental relations, is chairing the statute committee.

“I’m in the belief we should really honor the people who really do something for our people and our institution,” Davis said in a quote published by The FAMUan.

According to The FAMUan, the committee recently raised about $10,000 at dinner event held at Humphries’ home in Orlando.

Humphries served as the president of FAMU from 1985 until his retirement in 2001. He has held a Regent Professorship at FAMU since 2003. In 2009, he was named president emeritus.

During his presidency, Humphries more than doubled enrollment while simultaneously raising academic standards. He increased the number of National Achievement Scholars at the school ranking first in the nation three times, out recruiting Harvard and Stanford, and made FAMU the nation’s number one producer of African Americans with baccalaureate degrees and third in the nation as the baccalaureate institution of origin for African-American doctoral degree recipients. Humphries also established the Life Gets Better Scholarship and Graduate School Feeder programs.