Black and White

    This old building stands in the yard of a nearby church. It once served as a school for African American children. I was lucky enough to meet a 73-year-old man who had attended school here.  He would have begun first grade in 1943.
    He said that the building used to be twice as big. It was cut in half when it was moved to make room for the new brick church built in 1960. It used to have four rooms and was heated by a wood stove. Considering how sparsely populated our rural county was back then a four room school house seems pretty big.
    Imagine children walking here from great distances, the younger ones watched over by their older siblings. All of the children would have carried their lunches from home.
    Their teacher probably would have been educated at one of our state's black colleges. She would have owned a home nearby or  boarded with a local family.
    Students finished school when they reached the ninth grade. They were needed to help support the family and would have begun working on the farm or elsewhere.