Earliest Known Public High School for African Americans in Virginia

Petersburg established a public school system in 1868, two years before the state's mandate. Colored Elementary School #1 was conducted in the old church building of the African Baptist Church, which had been moved to this site in the 1830s from Bolling Hill, where it had served in the 1820s both as a church and as one of the earliest organized schools for African Americans in Petersburg. A second story was added for the opening of a high school in January 1870, reputedly the first African American public high school in Virginia. Maj. Giles B. Cook, who had served as General Robert E. Lee's staff officer during the Siege of Petersburg, was the school's first principal. By 1874 the school had expanded enough to require a new building facing Fillmore Street, which housed both the elementary and high school and was called the Peabody School because both had been funded with George Peabody Fund money. After repeated petitions by the Rev. Henry Williams of Gillfield Baptist Church and others, African Americans were appointed for the first time as administrators and teachers in Petersburg's African American schools during the 1882-83 school year, beginning with Alfred Pryor as principal of the Peabody School. Because of growing inadequacies, the school moved in 1920 to a much larger new building on Jones Street. The old building served for several years as an armory before being demolished for the new Anna P. Bolling Junior High School, built for white students and opened in its present-day building in 1926. Court-ordered integration in 1971 led to Anna Bolling's closing in 1974, and the building now houses apartments for the elderly.

Petersburg, Virginia · United States