Hilton PremDas (j. 3/1957; d. 2004), who joined with his wife, Almira, was born in Guyana, immigrated to the US with his mother as a youngster, and grew up in DC. He was baptized as an Anglican, but after moving to the US he once said he was “inclined toward Unitarianism in an effort to resolve the segregationist attitude of Washington with his faith and philosophy.” His son Phil was active as a teenager in All Souls’ Charmian youth group in the 1960s.
PremDas graduated in 1934 from Dunbar High School, received a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and English at Miner Teachers College, now part of the University of the District of Columbia, and a master’s degree in Spanish literature from Catholic University in the mid-1950s. When there were no openings in the all-black DC schools, he began a 37-year daily commute to Baltimore, where he taught mathematics and foreign languages at Baltimore’s Douglass High School.
After retiring in 1978, PremDas had a second teaching career, teaching adult education at Armstrong High School and the Naval Research Laboratory, and English as a second language at Sacred Heart School.