John Houston Burrus (February 22, 1849 – March 27, 1917) was an educator in Nashville, Tennessee and Lorman, Mississippi.

[5] At the end of the War, Burrus, was with his two brothers, mother, and Braxton Bragg's Army in Marshall, Texas.

Finally free, they were brought to Shreveport, Louisiana, then to New Orleans, and then Memphis, Tennessee, where John took a job as a cook on a stern-wheel steamboat.

He remained in Memphis for a short time, and moved in 1866 to Nashville, where he took a job as a hotel waiter along with James.

[6] During this time they saved enough and learned enough so that by 1867 they were able to enroll at Fisk University along with America W. Robinson and Virginia Walker, who were the schools first students.

This was based on the requirements of the Morrill Act of 1862 which funded land-grant institutions and resulted in new scholarships for black students at Fisk University.

[8] In August 1883 he was offered the presidency of Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College in Lorman, Mississippi, following Hiram Rhodes Revels in that position.

[6] James Burrus had become professor of mathematics and superintendent of the college farm in 1882, and had played a key role in promoting John for the position.

In 1903, he wrote to the Nashville American again criticizing inequal treatment of blacks when federal moneys given to Tennessee under the Morrill Acts were dispersed.