The St. John Rosenwald School Reopens as a Community Center

This page reports the school's reopening in November 2023.

The grand opening of the St. John Rosenwald School community center in Gordonsville, Virginia, November 2023. National Park Service.

Julius Rosenwald, president of Sears, Roebuck and Company, was a businessman and philanthropist who partnered with Booker T. Washington to build schools for African American children across fifteen states. The St. John Rosenwald School in Gordonsville, Virginia, built in 1922–1923, was one of more than 380 schools built in Virginia through the Julius Rosenwald Fund. It is a powerful reminder of how African Americans were shut out of public education, and an example of how a former school can be preserved and given a new use for its community.

Interpretive panels inside the restored school. Image from the National Park Service's page.

A new life

The St. John Family Life and Fitness Center, Inc. received two African American Civil Rights Grants from the National Park Service to rehabilitate the building, which is individually listed in the National Register of Historic Places, as a community and fitness center and museum. The work included stabilizing the foundation and installing heating and cooling, plumbing, insulation and electrical systems. The reopening was celebrated in November 2023.

The African American Civil Rights Grant program

Since 2016, the program has provided more than $100 million to document, protect and celebrate the places and people of one of the greatest struggles in American history. Its goal is to preserve sites associated with the struggle for equality from the transatlantic slave trade onward, and additional funding is available to tell the civil rights stories of all Americans. At the time of the announcement, the next funding opportunity was expected in fall 2024.

Sources

• National Park Service, "St. John Rosenwald School." https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/st-john-rosenwald-school.htm
• NPS, African American Civil Rights Grants: https://www.nps.gov/subjects/historicpreservationfund/african-american-civil-rights.htm; "The Rosenwald Schools: Progressive Era Philanthropy in the Segregated South": https://www.nps.gov/articles/the-rosenwald-schools-progressive-era-philanthropy-in-the-segregated-south-teaching-with-historic-places.htm; Virginia Department of Historic Resources listing: https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/historic-registers/002-1056/