A price tag on trauma? College town weighs Black reparations

AMHERST, MASS.-- Professor Edwin Driver arrived in Amherst in 1948 as one of the first Black teachers hired at a flagship state university in the country.

But the 23-year-old sociology instructor at what would become the University of Massachusetts Amherst says he was denied pay raises for decades, despite being one of its most published professors.

Driver and his wife, who was from India, also encountered roadblocks trying to buy a house in the mostly white college town. Their three children faced racism from neighbors and school officials alike.

“There’s a lot of people in Amherst that have not gotten a proper share of things,” the now 96-year-old professor emeritus said at his home in nearby South Hadley recently. “I ended up being the lowest paid professor in the department, but also its most productive.”

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