Sometimes We Destroy Our History

Here is a great article from the NY Times about the ongoing movement to preserve segregated black schoolhouses in the south. Many schools were constructed from funds raised by the president of Sears, Julius Rosenwald, at the urging of Booker T. Washington. The schools were in keeping with the “separate but equal” standards of the day, which relegated black education to primitive standards at best.

Many of these buildings were saved from demolition at the urging of historians and other preservationists who recognize the historical importance of the structures in telling the history of civil rights. There have been countless books written about pre-civil rights education in the south, but not everyone will read a book. As a former attendee of one of the schools so aptly stated, “Sometimes we destroy our history…You can tell kids about it, but they appreciate it better when they see it.”

[Image via MarkFoxjr]