Education Research Notes |
Interior Camp County Training School
Afro-American Teachers and Educators
Rosenwald schools in Camp County
Map, Texas, Camp County
Date: 06-17-1910
Creator: United States. Bureau of Soils.
Description: Map displays creeks, lakes, towns,
schools, churches, gins, mills, roads, and railroads. Includes Lindsey Spring School,
County Line School, Diffey School, Arlington High School ,Garfield School, Oxford School,
Shady Grove School, Shepperd School, and Midway School
are shown on this map as well as "dots" along roads that seem
to designate individual homes.
Odd Fellows' Male and Female College
Camp County Superintendents of Schools
Report of the Department of Education 1882 - 1883 and 1883 - 1884
Report of Superintendent of Public Instruction 1884 - 1885.
Report of Superintendent of Public Instruction.1885 -1886.
Education Census 1890-1920
Teachers' Certificates Granted by the Summer Normal Institutes (Afro-American)
Teachers Certificates And The Law
Notes |
"The changing nature of employment opportunities has led to an increasing emphasis on the importance of formal education. In 1897 most of the county's school-aged children attended one-room, ungraded schools. Children generally walked to school, so districts were small. Small districts, and the traditional policy of rigidly segregated schools, meant that the county's limited resources were divided and strained. None of the county's thirty-four common school districts in 1897 contained school libraries, and only one had a graded school. School terms varied from a low of forty-nine days to a high of 140. Most children in the county quit without ever attending high school.
By 1937 improvements in transportation had led to consolidation, and the number of school districts in the county had dropped to seventeen. All of the schools were graded, and school terms varied from a low of 110 days to a high of 179 days. More than 600 pupils were attending high school that year. Still, resources were inadequate, and fewer than one-third of the county's teachers had received a bachelor's or higher degree.
By 1955 all of the school districts in the county had been consolidated into the Pittsburg Independent School District. In 1980 less than twenty percent of all children between the ages of sixteen and nineteen had dropped out of school before graduating from high school, and for the first time in its history, more than 50 percent of the county's residents over the age of twenty-five had graduated from high school."
Sources: The information on this page was extracted from the Handbook of Texas Online website.
Center Point Settlers in
the area had established a church by 1873 and a school by 1889.
These were the focus of the dispersed rural settlement. By 1897
the one-room, one-teacher school enrolled thirty-one black
children. That year the school was listed in the county school
superintendent's report as being in bad condition and worth only
fifty dollars. The school term was 100 days.
In 1900 the residents of the community began a long and
ultimately successful campaign to improve their school. By 1908
the school had two teachers, and bonds voted shortly thereafter
financed a four-room school building in 1916. The General
Education Board donated $1,700 for additional buildings, and
Julius Rosenwald later made donations totaling $5,750, which were
also used for buildings, including a library. By the 1935-36
school year the school had become in many respects one of the
best schools in the county. Its physical plant included four
buildings with ten classrooms and was valued at $14,000. Nine of
the ten teachers who taught in the Center Point school had at
least B.A. degrees, and, despite the fact that black teachers
were typically paid less than white teachers with the same
education and experience, the average teacher's salary at Center
Point was higher than that at any other Camp County school, white
or black. The school term was 176 days, only one day shorter than
the longest school term in the county. The school enrolled 279
students, 129 in high school. Many of the high school students
came from other districts that did not offer the upper grades.
During the late 1930s the population of the area began to
decline, at first because of the Great Depressionqv and then in
the 1940s and 1950s because of increased economic opportunities
for blacks in urban areas. By 1938 the enrollment in Center Point
High School had dropped to seventy-eight, and by 1955 the
district had been consolidated with the Pittsburg Independent
School District. The 1983 county highway map showed two churches,
a cemetery, and a community center at the site.
Harvard By the 1930s Harvard had a sawmill, a school, two stores, and two churches (Methodist and Baptist). The school, operated by the board of the Midway school district, was only one room, but it employed two teachers and offered instruction through the first seven grades to forty-seven black children. The children then transferred to Pittsburg or to Center Point for the higher grades. By 1955 the school district had been consolidated with the Pittsburg Independent School District
Living Green developed around Living Green Baptist Church, a black church organized in 1875. Originally, the church building also served as a schoolhouse and was located a mile from the present church building. The community was rural and agricultural and never had a post office or any significant commercial establishments. By 1935 the school offered the first eight grades and was being administered as a part of the Oakley common school district. It served seventy-eight black children of elementary school age. By 1955 the school district had been consolidated with the Pittsburg Independent School District
Miller Grove was originally a black
community centered around a one-room, one-teacher, ungraded
school that served a school district with twenty-six children. By
1935 the school district had been consolidated with the Ebenezer
school district
Myrtle Springs The focus of Myrtle Springs was a black church and school organized during the 1880s. In 1897 the one-teacher, ungraded school served a scholastic population of forty-five black children. The community was rural and agricultural, and as the rural population of the county began to decline in the 1930s, the population of Myrtle Springs apparently declined also. By 1935 the school had been consolidated with a neighboring district, and by 1955 all the schools in the area had been consolidated with the Pittsburg Independent School District.
Rocky Mountain was a black community centered around a school, which in 1897 employed two teachers and served the area's seventy-eight children. By 1908 the community also had a church, sometimes referred to as Rocky Mountain Church. By 1935 the schools in that portion of the county had been consolidated into the Sheppard Common School District, and the school for black children was located near Harvard.
West Chapel grew up around
a black church and school organized sometime between 1876 and
1885. One of the early leaders of the community was Richard A.
Caldwell, who obtained 400 acres of land in the area shortly
after the Civil War. The father of eighteen children, took
an active interest in church and school affairs. In 1885 he
purchased an 800-pound bronze bell made in West Point, New York,
for the church and school building. By 1897 the ungraded school
served a scholastic population of sixty-six black children.
During the late 1930s the population of the area began to
decline, as Camp County farmers gradually abandoned cotton
production for livestock. By 1935 the school had been
consolidated with another common school district, and by 1955 all
the schools in the area had been consolidated with the Pittsburg
Independent School District.
Sources: This information was extracted from
the Handbook of Texas Online website.
Image: Papers of Jackson Davis, Special Collections, University of Virginia Library