Through These Gates: Buffalo’s First African American Architect, John E. Brent

Recent research has uncovered significant contributions to architectural design, landscape architecture, and draftsmanship made by John Edmonston Brent (1889-1962) in the city of Buffalo and surrounding counties of Western New York. His grandfather, John Brent, was born a slave, but later purchased his freedom and that of his wife. His father, Calvin Thomas Stowe Brent, was an accomplished architect in Washington, DC, “one of the most sophisticated cities of Black culture,” according to architect Robert Traynham Coles, who wrote a biographical sketch about John E. Brent for the African-American Architects: A Biographical Dictionary, 1865-1945, published in 2004. Named after his grandfather, Brent was born in our national Capitol, educated at the Tuskegee Institute, and received a full scholarship at the Drexel Institute of Art, Science and Industry, graduating in 1912. He came immediately to Buffalo, New York and started employment with Max G. Beirel; thus becoming the first African American architect in the city. He was a member of the American Institute of Architects. In addition to his architectural engineering and design accomplishments, Brent became the first president of the Buffalo Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) on November 30, 1914.