With his dedication to the community, the state?s first African-American architect helped inspire generations of designers Up until his passing, architect John Saunders Chase kept a box of letters at his house. Many of them, written by people who had never actually met him, refer back to a moment when Chase found himself in the national spotlight.
The first African-American to attend the prestigious architecture school at the University of Texas in Austin in 1950, Chase was a pioneer. AP photographers showed up when he registered for classes, and in addition to the hate mail, he was trailed by a federal marshall between classes, and was forced to live off campus since no landlords near the school would rent to a black man at the time.

By the time he retired?after establishing a successful practice, John S. Chase, Architect, helping found the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA), and serving as president of the Texas Exes, an honor at his alma mater?Chase had become not just a respected architect, but a community leader. It showed in his welcoming, expansive designs: modern buildings made to be inspiring and inclusive. ?Chase mobilized modern architecture as a democratic process, and his buildings embraced the future that was determined to be better than the past and the present,? Stephen Fox, an architectural historian at Rice University, told the Daily Texan.
Biography
Growing up in Baltimore, John S. Chase knew he liked to create and to draw. St...