Willow Hill School and Community

In 1874, nine years after the Civil War ended, former slaves of the Riggs, Donaldson, Parrish, and Hall families founded Willow Hill School to serve the area’s black children. Georgia Ann Riggs, age 15 and a former slave, was the first teacher, and classes were held in an old turpentine shanty. One of 15 family-operated black schools in Bulloch County, Willow Hill became the center of a community of successful land-owning black Americans. In the first half of the 20th century, the Rosenwald Fund helped pay for construction and the Jeanes Fund helped train faculty. In 1920, the Bulloch County Board of Education purchased the school for $18. In 1954, the county built the sixth and current building to house the school, located .5 miles southwest. Children began attending an integrated facility in 1970. When Willow Hill closed in 1999, it had operated for 125 years as the county’s oldest school. In 2005, descendants of the founders bought the school building for $113,000, and the Willow Hill Heritage and Renaissance Center seeks to preserve the legacy of the former slaves who built a community and sustained the school.

Georgia · United States