Architectural Wonders…
The Rosenwald Fund provided architectural models of schoolhouses to communities. These models, similar to house kits sold by Sears, were clean, affordable, and carefully designed to produce a healthy learning environment. This included adequate light, ventilation, separate outhouses, coatrooms, and quality blackboards and desks. This attention to detail significantly increased the quality of African-American schoolhouses during segregation when white school boards often siphoned off public monies, leaving little or nothing for black schools.
Introduction
The Rosenwald Schools of Virginia
The Rosenwald Schools were financed jointly by Julius Rosenwald and local communities between 1917 and 1932. Even earlier, Julius Rosenwald was approached by Booker T. Washington to use funds donated to the Tuskegee Institute to construct six schools in Alabama. Impressed with the results, Rosenwald set up the Julius Rosenwald Fund to build schools for African American children. During the 15 years of the fund’s existence, the Rosenwald fund helped finance 4,977 new schools, 217 teachers’ homes, and 163 shop buildings. In some communities these schools were the first formal school house, in others they replaced dilapidated and unsafe structures. In each case, this program encouraged communities to contribute to the construction of their school and be involved from the ground, up.
This website focuses on the 371 Rosenwald Schools built here in Virginia. These schools are found in every region of Virginia (except the four counties in the Appalachian region in the far southwest). They range from small, one-teacher schools, to larger industrial education schools found in cities.