Lane College

History

Lane College was founded on November 12, 1882, by Bishop Isaac Lane of the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church — the body that would later rename itself the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. Lane, born into slavery in 1834, organized the founding committee and personally contributed a substantial share of the initial funding. The school opened as the CME High School with elementary and secondary instruction, training Black students at a time when Tennessee's public common-school system for African Americans was uneven and undercapitalized.

In 1884 the institution was renamed Lane Institute in honor of its founder. The college department was added in 1896, and the Board of Trustees voted to change the name from Lane Institute to Lane College in the same year, reflecting the school's transition from a secondary academy to a degree-granting institution.

Lane has remained continuously affiliated with the CME Church for more than 140 years, making it one of the longest-running denominationally rooted HBCUs in the country. The college's curriculum centers on liberal arts and education, and it competes athletically in the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference at the NCAA Division II level.

On April 20, 2026 the Board of Trustees appointed Dr. Donald W. Comer as Lane College’s eleventh president, and he was formally installed on August 21, 2026. A Jackson native and former FedEx executive who led the company’s decision-science and analytics functions before retiring, Comer had served roughly two years as interim president; the board elevated him directly rather than conducting a national search. He holds a doctorate in urban higher education from Jackson State University and has framed his tenure around leveraging corporate partnerships and employment pathways for enrolled students.

Notable Alumni

A representative selection.

Significance

Lane College is one of the few HBCUs founded, organized, and led by formerly enslaved Black people themselves rather than by white Northern missionaries or state legislatures. Bishop Lane's biography — born enslaved in West Tennessee, self-educated, ordained, elevated to bishop, and architect of a denominational college — sits at the center of the institution's identity and is essential context for understanding the CME Church's role in nineteenth-century Black higher education.

In a higher-education environment that has been particularly hostile to small private HBCUs over the past two decades, Lane's continuous accreditation under SACSCOC and its sustained enrollment of roughly 800 students represent a quieter form of institutional achievement.

Source notes: Founding history from Lane College institutional records and the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church archives. Enrollment and accreditation status from current Lane College publications and SACSCOC records. Discrepancies noted in the corrections log.