Samuel Massie Jr.

(July 3, 1919 – April 10, 2005)

The first African American to teach at the U.S. Naval Academy.

He was born on in North Little Rock, Arkansas. He earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry with a minor in mathematics in 1937 from University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff and a Master’s Degree in Chemistry in 1940 from Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. Massie later received a PhD in organic chemistry from Iowa State. An organic chemist, Samuel Massie, Jr. was the first African American to teach at the U.S. Naval Academy.