I listened to the school board meeting tonight. I hope I never have to endure doing that again. I hate watching school board meetings.
Last night, supporters of George Hampton were out in force. I don’t know Mr. Hampton. I have nothing against him. I had never heard of him before. He certainly has a lot of friends, even some who didn’t even know his name, but that’s ok.
I understand their dedication to someone they feel has made positive contributions to the community. However, some of the speakers continued to throw out ‘facts’ that simply were not true.
Several speakers talked about the state of Virginia closing the schools for 5 years. That did not happen. The schools in Prince Edward County (near Farmville) were closed for 5 years, but not by the state. Prince Edward County closed their own schools.
The locations that were closed by the state were Front Royal, Charlottesville, and Norfolk. Those schools reopened the same school year. Prince Edward County had a different situation. According to the Virginia Historical Society:
“After Virginia’s school-closing law was ruled unconstitutional in January 1959, the General Assembly repealed the compulsory school attendance law and made the operation of public schools a local option for the state’s counties and cities. Schools that had been closed in Front Royal, Norfolk, and Charlottesville reopened because citizens there preferred integrated schools to none at all. It was not so Prince Edward County. Ordered on May 1, 1959, to integrate its schools, the county instead closed its entire public school system.
The Prince Edward Foundation created a series of private schools to educate the county’s white children. These schools were supported by tuition grants from the state and tax credits from the county. Prince Edward Academy became the prototype for all-white private schools formed to protest school integration.
No provision was made for educating the county’s black children. Some got schooling with relatives in nearby communities or at makeshift schools in church basements. Others were educated out of state by groups such as the Society of Friends. In 1963–64, the Prince Edward Free School picked up some of the slack. But some pupils missed part or all of their education for five years.”
