Central High School

Central High School. Charlotte Court House, Virginia. , Central High School opened in 1939 as Charlotte County's first African American high school. Before its construction, African American students attended the Charlotte Training School, which had been built between 1928 and 1929 with contributions from parents, the community, and the Julius Rosenwald Fund. Rosenwald, president of Sears, Roebuck, and Co., helped pay for the construction of more than 5,000 schools for African Americans in 15 Southern states, more than 350 of them in Virginia. Central High School saw its first class graduate in June 1941 and remained in operation until 1969, when the county consolidated high schools during integration. Following consolidation, the facility served as Charlotte County's middle school and was later converted for use as an early childhood center., Citizens initiated a project in 1997 to preserve and commemorate Charlotte County's African American heritage in a museum. The Charlotte County Board of Supervisors granted the group permission to locate the museum in the former Central High School library, and the Central High Museum opened in 2001. In 2016 the museum moved to its current location in the newly renovated building that once served as Central High School's agriculture building and bus shop., The Central High Museum collection includes more than 2,500 items that document African American life, history, and cultural contributions. The museum is unique in that it draws a direct line between formal education and students' later contributions to the surrounding community. Some of the items on display reflect the daily activities of pupils and recognize the accomplishments of alumni, whose ranks include physicians, teachers, college professors, and community leaders.