Portals of the Past: A black fighter for civil rights in pre-Civil War North Beach

The life and times of Jonas H. Townsend

The first block of Varennes Street, formerly Lafayette Place.

Jonas Holland Townsend, who was to become a leader of Gold Rush-era San Francisco’s black community, editor of the city’s first black newspaper, and a fierce fighter for civil rights for blacks in California, was born in 1820 outside Philadelphia. In 1840, he became the first black student to attend Colgate College in New York, aided by a sponsorship. According to Diane Cicconi, author of Into the Light: The Early African-American Men of Colgate University Who Transformed a Nation, 1840-1930, for unknown reasons Townsend left Colgate after two years and moved to Albany, New York, which had a vibrant and active African-American community.