Troy University's Board of Trustees voted to rename historic Bibb Graves Hall — currently named for a former governor who had ties to the KKK— in honor of John Lewis.
In a posthumous op-ed, the late congressman and civil rights leader said he'd been"inspired" in his final days and called on young people to build a"nation and world society at peace with itself."
The university said the name change is effective immediately and the building will now bear the name John Robert Lewis Hall. Lewis as a teen applied to the then-all-white university but did not get a reply. The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave him the nickname the “boy from Troy” at their first meeting in 1958 in which they discussed a possible lawsuit against the university for its policy of not admitting Black students.
Both Troy University and the city of Troy later honored the civil rights icon. One of several memorial services for Lewis was held on the campus last month.
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