Union College Black pioneer dies
Twitty J. Styles, a retired professor emeritus of biology at Union College and the first Black tenured faculty member at the Schenectady institution, died Thursday at the age of 94.
An immunologist by training, Styles earned a PH.D and specialized in infectious diseases, particularly parasitology and immunity to parasitic infections. He was a frequent speaker at professional
conferences and worked at clinics in developing countries. He led the college’s AIDS Committee and was active in regional AIDS awareness programs.
Born on May 18, 1927, Styles was named Twitty after a late uncle.
The youngest of eight siblings, Styles grew up in a single-parent home in rural Virginia in the 1930s. His mother died when he was 3.
In his 2019 autobiography, “Son of Prince Edward County,” Styles describes growing up as a "nice, but invisible" Black youth in the segregated American South. He details experiences with racial discrimination that shaped him and catalogs the people who influenced his journey to prominence in higher education.
Styles graduated in 1944 from Robert Russa Moton High School, an all-black school in Farmville, Va. Ten years later, the school would become a test case for Brown v. the Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that deemed racially segregated public schools unconstitutional.
He was a student of mathematician and "human computer" Dorothy Johnson Vaughan, who was portrayed in the film "Hidden Figures," based on a book about three African American women who worked behind the scenes on the U.S. space program.
"I was sent to a separate, unequal school," he told the Times Union in 2017. "Dorothy taught in a separate, unequal school."
Styles attended Virginia Union University, a historically Black college, majoring in biology. He joined the U.S. Army and was assigned to a medical lab in Tokyo where he served during the Korean War. It was at that lab, he wrote, that he was first introduced to protozoology and parasitology.
After his service in the army, he spent 10 years at New York University working on his doctorate. While the GI Bill covered his books and tuition, he worked full-time to cover his living expenses.
He is survived by his wife Dr. Constance "Connie" Glasgow Styles, a pediatrician in Clifton Park, their daughter, Auria, and son, Scott, and grandson, Steven.
The couple came to Union College in 1965, but finding a home to rent wasn't easy. Although there were three houses with "for rent" signs across the street from the college, landlords and realtors at the time understood that certain ZIP codes were only for whites.
"Restrictive (racist) covenants were in full force in those days," he wrote in his autobiography.
Their first apartment was outside the city and lacked running water and insulation. Eventually, the couple built a home in Clifton Park. Their children both graduated from Shenendehowa High School and Princeton University.
Styles retired from Union College in 1997 and, with colleague and close friend Carl George, professor emeritus of biology, launched UNITAS, which Styles described as “a campus-wide organization whose primary mission is to support and encourage diversity, acceptance and the celebration of cultural differences.”
To fund UNITAS, Styles and George wrote letters to hundreds of former students. They quickly raised $50,000, an amount matched by the college.
In a Union College press release, George describes his friend as “remarkably kind, generous and outreaching. He had a global perspective and wide-ranging interests and he was so socially adroit.”
Styles and his wife were widely traveled and collected art, including stone carvings from Africa, George said. He also collected frog figurines, a fitting hobby for someone whose fascination with biology began with a high school frog dissection. “Frogs were important to him,” George said.
Union President David R. Harris, who became the college's first Black president in 2018, said Styles and Glasgow were among the first people to welcome his family to Union.
“In addition to his wellestablished reputation as a teacher and mentor, Twitty was committed to building a community that welcomes all and celebrates the diversity that is our strength," Harris said. "I know that his legacy will live on through the initiatives he championed and the many colleagues and alumni who have been lifted by his wisdom, empathy and courage.”
“In addition to his well-established reputation as a teacher and mentor, Twitty was committed to building a community that welcomes all and celebrates the diversity that is our strength.” Union College President David R. Harris