Parkersburg enjoys the distinction of having established in this State
the first school for Negroes supported by private funds. Having a
desire to provide for their children the facilities of education long
since denied to members of their race, a group of progressive Negroes
met in Parkersburg in January, 1862, to translate their idea into
action. Among these persons were Robert Thomas, Lafayette Wilson,
William Sargent, R. W. Simmons, Charles Hicks, William Smith, and
Matthew Thomas. They organized a board, which adopted a constitution
and by-laws by which they were to be governed in carrying out this
plan. They then proceeded to establish a subscription school requiring
a tuition fee of one dollar a month of those who were able to pay; but
poorer children were admitted free of charge. At this time there was a
certain stigma attached to the idea of educating one's children at the
expense of others or at the expense of the commonwealth. Persons able
to pay for the instruction of their children were, therefore, willing
to do so that they might not have a reputation for dependency or
delinquency.[6]
The teachers first employed in Parkersburg were Sarah Trotter and
Pocahontas Simmons, persons of color and Rev. S. E. Colburn, a white
man. The number of pupils enrolled in the first year approached forty.
To encourage Negroes in that city to avail themselves of their
opportunity for their enlightenment, these teachers moved among the
people from time to time, pointing out the necessity for more
extensive preparation to discharge the functions of citizenship then
devolving upon Negroes in their new State of freedom after the Civil
War.[7]
Parkersburg enjoys also the distinction of having established the
first free school for Negroes in the South. The work of the school
organization of 1862 had been so well done that it was easily possible
to interest school officials in the extension of school privileges to
Negroes. The Parkersburg _Weekly Times_ of June 7, 1866, carried a
notice to the effect that the first public free school for the Negro
children of the city of Parkersburg, West Virginia, had been opened in
the school ward lately removed. "All colored children over six years
of age and under twenty-one, as the law directs," continued the
editor, "are at liberty to attend and are requested to do so." Rev. S.
E. Colburn was the teacher. The private school then came to an end.[8]
It does not appear that the Reverend Mr. Colburn remained for a long
time in this school, for at the close of the session in 1866 we have a
record of an exhibition in Bank Hall under the charge of T. J.
Ferguson. Ferguson was a versatile character among the Negroes at that
time, participating extensively in politics during the reconstruction
period, and contending for the enlargement of freedom and opportunity
for their race. The next man of consequence after Ferguson was J. L.
Camp, who served the system for eleven years. He passed among his
people as a man of high character, and is remembered today as one of
the most successful and inspiring workers to toil among the lowly in
West Virginia. The Negro schools could then be turned over to teachers
of the race who, having availed themselves of the opportunities for
education, had become equipped for service among their own people.
With the further organization of the public school system of
Parkersburg, the Negro school was brought under the direction of the
local superintendent of schools and given the same sort of instruction
and inspection as that provided for the white schools. In the course
of time the work developed from a primary into an intermediate and
then into a grammar school.
Parkersburg is unique again, moreover, in having the first high school
for Negroes in the State. This advanced phase of public school work
was added in 1885, and the first class was graduated in 1887. For a
number of years the Negro schools were housed in a frame building of
two rooms, which was somewhat enlarged in 1883. This, moreover, has
been followed by the erection of a brick structure with the modern
conveniences for public schools, facilitating especially high school
instruction, which under former conditions was handicapped. A new
building known as the Sumner High School was constructed there in
1886, and A. W. Pegues, a graduate of the Richmond Institute, was made
its first principal. He showed himself a studious man of intellectual
bearing, but after serving in Parkersburg one year he resigned to
accept a chair in Shaw University in North Carolina. He has since been
made the head of the Deaf and Dumb Asylum of that State.[9]
Following Professor Pegues came T. D. Scott, who served in this high
school five years, reorganizing the work and enlarging the curriculum.
When he resigned in 1892 he became an instructor in natural science at
Wilberforce University, of which he was an alumnus. Carter Harrison
Barnett, a graduate of Dennison University, became principal in 1892
and served one year. Then came John Rupert Jefferson, who took charge
of the institution in 1893, a position which he has successfully
filled until the present time with the exception of one year when he
was supplanted by Mr. B. S. Jackson, an alumnus of Howard University,
who at the close of his first year's service gave way to Mr.
Jefferson.[10]
Clarksburg followed in the wake of Parkersburg and soon bestirred
itself in the direction of the education of Negro youth. The first
school was established there in 1867, with an enrolment of thirty
pupils under the direction of Miss Joe Gee. For her time she was
well-prepared woman, using up-to-date methods, and was very successful
in the work there for two and one-half years, at the expiration of
which she married. Her successful work was due in no small measure to
the cooperation of Mrs. Mary Rector, Mrs. Phyllis Henderson, Mr. Fred
Siren, Jr., and Mrs. Harriet Beckwith. They did not own the school
property, but conducted the work in a one-room ramshackled structure.
Another group of ambitious Negroes established a school at Glen Falls,
in the same county, in 1872, with Noe Johnson as the teacher.
Steps were soon taken to provide better educational facilities for
Negroes in Clarksburg. On July 15, 1868, the Board of Education of
that city accepted a bid of $1,147 to erect a one-story brick building
to be used as a Negro school-house. This structure was completed and
occupied by the end of the school year 1870. After the school had been
better housed, the work was professionally organized and thereafter
intelligently supervised to standardize instruction.
In the beginning of this new day the schools were successful in having
a number of popular principals to serve them efficiently. Among these
may be mentioned Charles Ankrum, a pioneer teacher, who was principal
of the school from 1870 to 1873, J. A. Riley, a man of the same type
serving from 1873-1874, G. F. Jones, a man of little more preparation
than that of his predecessors, from 1874 to 1876, W. B. Jones, an
honest worker, from 1876-1878, and M. W. Grayson, who served the
system well from 1878 to 1889, doing much to lay the foundation upon
which others built thereafter.[11]
The first Negro principal at Clarksburg, with extensive preparation as
judged by the standards of today, was J. S. Williams, a graduate of
Morgan College, who was the head of this school from 1889 to 1891. Mr.
C. W. Boyd, a normal school graduate of Wilberforce University, served
the system one year, that is, from 1891 to 1892, after which he became
a teacher in the Charleston Negro Public Schools of which he is now
the head. Then came Mr. Sherman H. Guss, the first Negro to receive a
degree from Ohio State University. He made a special study of the
needs of the school, forcefully presented them to the educational
authorities, enlarged the school's facilities, and developed there a
high school which ranks today as one of the best in the State. In 1901
Mr. Guss resigned to become instructor in Latin at the West Virginia
Colored Institute, where he is still employed. He was followed by J.
W. Robinson, a man of liberal and specialized education, who
endeavored to maintain a high standard and to extend the influence of
the Negro schools, adding much to develop an intellectual atmosphere
through the enlargement of the school library and other accessories.
After toiling in this city for a number of years he taught at St.
Albans. He then accepted the principalship of the high school at
Northfork, during his incumbency of which he has served as a member of
the Advisory Council to the State Board of Education of West Virginia.
Weston did not lag far behind the other towns in making some provision
for the education of Negroes. During the early years immediately
following the Civil War, a white man of philanthropic tendency named
Benjamin Owens taught a Negro school in an old church located not far
from the head of Main Street extended in Weston. A local historian
believes also that one Doctor Gordon's daughter taught in the same
school. It does not appear that Owens was a man of exceptional
intellectual attainment, but he had well mastered the fundamentals of
education when working in the printing office of Horace Greeley in New
York, where he learned to manifest interest in the man far down, and
to make sacrifices for his cause. His work was so successful that the
school was later established as a public institution supported by the
State.
The next pioneer to lend a helping hand was George Jones who, after
serving the Negroes in Weston as a teacher for a number of years,
abandoned this field for a much larger work as a minister. Then came
Misses Hattie Hood, Grace Rigsby, and Anna Wells, who taught in this
school one or two years each. There appeared next W. P. Crump, who is
referred to as the first Negro teacher of exceptional ability to toil
in Weston. He did much to develop the school and exerted a beneficent
influence upon the people. After serving them as instructor for a few
years, he abandoned the work for a more lucrative employment
elsewhere. The next teacher of importance was Mr. Frank Jefferson who
also toiled successfully in these parts. Inasmuch as the salary at
that time was unusually low compared with the compensation offered in
other parts, he eventually gave up that work for other service.[12]
About 1898 there came Mr. L. O. Wilson, a man of scholarship, who
later became a leader of power and influence throughout the State of
West Virginia. He reorganized the school, improved the methods of
instruction, and supplied it with a library. He endeared himself to
the people here, as he did wherever he was known; and, although he was
several times offered higher salaries elsewhere, he preferred to toil
among the people of Weston for less compensation. The results which he
obtained, while laboring among these people, stand as a monument
justifying the sacrifice which he made to serve them.[13]
The next school of importance in this part of the State was that of
Piedmont, since then designated as the Howard School. Educational
efforts began in this section about six years after the Civil War.
Prior to that time the few Negroes coming into Piedmont were too
migratory to necessitate any outlay for their education. Some efforts
were made to secure their education through private instruction in the
fundamentals, and a little progress therein was noted. Years later
there came such substantial friends of education as the Barneses, the
Masons, the Thomases, the Biases, and the Redmons. There was no
organized effort to establish a real public school, however, until the
year 1877, when one John Brown, being influential with one Mr. Hyde,
then President of the Board of Education, induced him to provide a
school-room and hire a teacher for the instruction of the Negroes. The
following persons, since known as Mrs. Emma Stewart (Mason), Miss
Mary Thomas, Mr. John Brown, Jr., Miss Alice Brown, and Mr. Harry
Bias, presented themselves as the first students of this school. One
Mr. Ross, a white man, was the first instructor. The next teacher of
this school was a white man, and he was followed by a member of his
own race.
The early history of this school published in 1919 states that the
attendance was regular and that after three years of conducting a
private school the board of education formally established this as a
public school in the year 1880, with Mrs. Steiglar, a white woman, as
instructor. The school was still held in the private building which
has since been occupied by the Williams, Redmon, and Taylor families
of that vicinity. After this school was conducted thus for about ten
years, there came a change which marked the epoch of progress in
education in Piedmont. This was the time when the white teachers were
exchanged for those of Negro blood, who having more interest in their
race, and treating the pupils with more sympathy, achieved much
greater success than their predecessors. This school has since been
much developed under the direction of Mr. H. W. Hopewell and Miss M.
Brooks.[14]
The early schools of Shepherdstown, Martinsburg, Harper's Ferry, and
other places nearby in West Virginia were in the beginning largely
private, and even when established as public schools accomplished
little more than their predecessors until they received an impetus
from without. The first stimulus came from Miss Mann, a niece of the
great educator, Horace Mann. She was sent by the Christian Commission
to Bolivar, near Harper's Ferry, to open a Negro school, which in
spite of militant race prejudice she maintained a year.[15] Then came
the establishment of Storer College by that philanthropic worker for
the uplift of the Negro race, Rev. Nathan C. Brackett, a graduate of
Dartmouth College, who had during the last year of the Civil War been
attached to the Christian Mission of Sheridan's army in Virginia.
Fortunately the agents of the Freedmen's Bureau in charge of the
educational work among Negroes designated him as the superintendent of
such schools to be established in the Shenandoah Valley. While he was
thus organizing and directing the education of the Negroes in this
section, Mr. John Storer, of Sanford, Maine, expressed a desire to set
aside a fund of ten thousand dollars for the establishment of an
institution of education for the freedmen on the condition that an
equal amount should be raised by other persons within a specified
period. As there was an increasing interest in the uplift of the
freedmen throughout the country at this time, it was an easy matter to
meet this condition with a similar contribution from another quarter.
The additional funds came largely from the Free Baptists, in the
principles of which this institution had its setting when established.
The work was begun, by special arrangement with the Federal agents, in
dilapidated houses recently abandoned by the Union troops at Harper's
Ferry. With the cooperation of friends the buildings were secured
through the influence of James A. Garfield, then a member of Congress,
and William Fessenden, then United States Senator from Maine. Mr. and
Mrs. Brackett opened this school in October, 1867, with nineteen
earnest students. Since then it has become a power for good, a factor
in the development of actual Christian manhood and womanhood. For a
number of years it was the only graded school for Negroes in the State
of West Virginia, and had to supply many of the first teachers and
ministers in West Virginia and even in the adjacent portions of
Maryland and Virginia. The towns nearby caught the spirit of the
uplift of the Negro from what was being done for the race in Storer
College. This institution, of course, had its opposition; but wherever
there was a helpful attitude toward the Negro, the work which it was
doing in spite of its difficulties stood out as a shining light.[16]
Many of the early teachers of Storer College spent a part of their
time working among Negroes in nearby communities. Mrs. Annie Dudley, a
white woman connected with that institution, taught the first school
at Shepherdstown. She had about twenty-five students and conducted a
night and a day school. She was a well-educated, sympathetic woman who
did much to lay the foundation for the Negro public school which was
established there in 1872. The next popular teacher in the Eastern
Panhandle was William B. Evans, who successfully taught in
Shepherdstown, Keyser, Martinsburg, and Bolivar for forty-two years.
His wife, Mrs. M. E. L. Evans, after beginning in Virginia, taught ten
years at Storer, Summit Point, Smithfield, and Bolivar. William Arter
taught thirty-two years at Kabletown, doing excellent work. The most
prominent teacher that Shepherdstown had was John H. Hill. He graded
the work of the school and endeavored to standardize instruction. He
is still remembered in that community for the efficient work which he
did. He was finally succeeded by Alexander Freeman when Mr. Hill
became an instructor in the West Virginia Colored Institute, of which
he later became principal.
About the same time the influence of Storer College was felt in
Charles Town, the county seat of Jefferson County, where there was
another settlement of Negroes. The first teacher of whom we have a
record was one Enos Wilson, a Negro. He was a man of fair preparation
through self-instruction. He had much enthusiasm in his work, exerted
an influence for good, and won the respect of his people. In achieving
his success he had the cooperation of Mr. William Hill, the
grandfather of J. H. Hill. Although not well informed himself, William
Hill believed in education and religion, and supported all uplift
movements then taking shape among the Negroes.
Following Enos Wilson, who later became an instructor in another
field, came L. L. Page, who building upon the foundation made by his
predecessors rendered unusually valuable service. Like his predecessor
he was a very good man and an enthusiastic worker. The people waited
upon his words, answered his summons to social service, and supported
him in his efforts to promote their general welfare. This is evidenced
by the fact that he served his community acceptably about twenty-five
years. He was succeeded by Phillip Jackson, who found the school
sufficiently well developed to necessitate the employment of three
teachers.
Not far away from this point Mrs. Emma Hart Brady opened a large
school at Kearneysville, in Jefferson County, in 1869. She was a
popular teacher for that day, used modern methods, and successfully
instructed 80 or 90 students there for two terms. This school today,
as it was then, is overcrowded and in need of better facilities.[16a]
Speaking generally, however, one must say that the education of the
Negro in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia today is, after all,
much more backward than in other parts. A good example of noble effort
in behalf of the Negro was given, and the spirit with which workers
should address themselves to the task was furnished by the founders
and graduates of Storer College, but they were not supported by public
sentiment among the whites of that section. Glancing at the map of
West Virginia, one can readily see that the Eastern Panhandle is
geographically a part of Maryland and Virginia, states which have not
as yet been converted to the wisdom of making appropriations to Negro
education equally as large as those providing for the education of the
whites. The ardor of the successors of these early enthusiastic
workers in that section, therefore, was dampened, and the results
which they obtained fell far short of the aspiration of these pioneers
to remake these freedmen that they might live as the citizens of a
free republic.
A mere glance at the Negro schools in the northern section will show
that these beginnings were confined to the Baltimore and Ohio railroad
and its branches. There were not many Negroes living in the other
northern counties of the State. In 1878, Moundsville in Marshall
County welcomed a Negro woman, of Smithfield, Ohio, who taught its
Negro public school. She had a fair preparation and rendered valuable
service with the cooperation of such patrons as Mrs. Rollen, William
Love, and Thomas McCoy. Because of the small Negro population in this
town, however, this school has not rapidly developed, although the
work of the teachers employed there has been efficient, as has been
evidenced by their well-prepared eighth-grade students who have done
excellently in more advanced schools.[17]
A little farther north, in Wheeling in Ohio County, Negro education
had a better opportunity. Wheeling is geographically a part of
Pennsylvania, and its attitude toward education has been determined to
a large extent by the impetus given the cause in that progressive
commonwealth. The spirit of fairness in dealing with the man far down
in urban communities nearby, moreover, has been reflected to a certain
extent in the policies of the educational authorities of Wheeling in
dealing with the Negro. At an early date the Negroes of Wheeling were
provided with elementary schools. Referring to the increasing interest
in Negro education in 1866, State Superintendent White said: "An
excellent school has been started in Wheeling and a few are reported
in other places. The school-house in Wheeling cost about $2500. The
school is conducted by a teacher of their own color and the behavior
and scholarship of the pupils are worthy of imitation."
Here, as in the case of most Negro schools near the Ohio River and
even in the central portion of the State, their first teachers came
from Ohio, where they had the opportunity to attend the high schools
and even colleges of high order, although they were not able to
over-ride the race prejudice which barred them from the teaching corps
in that free State. In Wheeling, moreover, the salaries paid were much
more inviting than in many towns of West Virginia, and that city could
easily employ the best equipped Negro teachers, who in the beginning
came largely from Ohio.
The Wheeling school, then, fortunate in having the service of such
teachers, developed about as rapidly as possible under the
circumstances of a limited Negro population; for Wheeling is not in a
Negro section, and the industrial aspect of the city not being
inviting to Negro workers, the population of color did not rapidly
increase. Because of the small enumeration thereby resulting, more
extensive facilities could not be provided even when the board of
education was favorably inclined. In 1897, however, when the pupils of
all of the grades reached about three hundred, the city established
the Lincoln High School, which had its development under the late J.
McHenry Jones. He called to his assistance well-equipped teachers and
succeeded in offering to the Negroes of that city practically the same
course of study taught in the white high school, though at times some
classes were too small to justify instruction in certain phases of
specialized work.[18]