Earliest Known Public High School for African Americans in Virginia

Earliest Known Public High School for African Americans in Virginia. Petersburg, Virginia. , Petersburg established a public school system in 1868, two years before the state's mandate. Colored Elementary School #1 (as it was called) was conducted in the old church building of the African Baptist Church, which stood to your left. The building 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 constructed to accommodate the opening in January 1870 of high school. This was reputedly the first African American public high school in the state. Maj. Giles B. Cook, who had acted as General Robert E. Lee's staff officer during the Siege of Petersburg, served as the school's first principal., By 1874 this school had expanded so much that it required the construction of a new building in the space in front of you, facing Fillmore Street, still accommodating both the elementary and the high school. Since both schools had been funded using the George Peabody Fund money, the new school was called the Peabody School. As a result of repeated petitions by the Rev. Henry Williams of Gillfield Baptist Church and others, African Americans were appointed as administrators and teachers in the African American schools in Petersburg for the first time during the 1882-83 school year. The first of these appointments was Alfred Pryor as principal of the Peabody School. Due to growing inadequacies, the school was moved to a substantially larger new building on Jones Street in 1920. For several years the old building served as an armory, but it was eventually demolished to make way for the new Anna P. Bolling Junior High School. Built for white students, the school opened in its present-day building in 1926. Court-ordered integration in 1971 led to the closing of Anna Bolling in 1974, which now houses apartments for the elderly., [Captions:] , In 1870 the Old African Church was renovated and housed both an elementary school and the first public high school for African Americans in Virginia., Walter C. Holmes (1884-1963) graduated from Peabody High School in 1901. He is pictured wearing his graduation pin. His father, James Meredith Bolling Holmes (1844-1923), was the first Black letter carrier in Petersburg., Maj. Giles B. Cook, the first principal (from 1868 to 1871) of the earliest known public high school for African Americans in Virginia and its associated elementary school.