DAPHNE, Ala.—The Baldwin County Training School—the first school in the county to educate black children and adults—will be commemorated with a dedication service at 10 a.m. Wednesday in the W.J. Carroll Intermediate School cafeteria.

The grand opening of the museum will follow from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and will continue from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Thursday and Friday.

The training school, founded in 1889 by the Eastern Shore Missionary Baptist Association, was established to educate black adults and children in Daphne.

“The BCTS, at one time, was the only school in the county that blacks could get an education from,” former student and foundation president Gartrell Agee said.

Agee, who attended the school from 1946 to 1957, said the typical school day began with devotion.

“You started off with the Pledge of Allegiance,” former student and project chairwoman Thelma Todd said. “Then you had prayer.”

 “We learned Bible verses and we sang songs,” Agee said.

The students learned the fundamentals of reading and writing, which black residents hadn’t been able to do, prior to the school’s establishment.

“The teachers were always interested in making sure you got a basic education,” said Todd, a 1964 graduate. “We learned English, history, math. They did have home economics and typing.”

However, Agee said, the textbooks were the white schools’ leftovers. The school system regularly purchased books every six years; new materials went to white schools and old books went to the training school.

“Looking back on that, you know it’s not right; but we didn’t let it get to us,” Todd said, noting the camaraderie students shared. “It was like a family, even though it was a segregated school.”

“We were so poor but we didn’t know it,” Agee said. “Somehow, our families and the community made us have pride in whatever we did.”

The gift of literacy

Under the guidance of the Rev. S. Bracy, pastor of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, the Eastern Shore Missionary Baptist Association in 1889 purchased 18 acres in Daphne. The association constructed a one-room structure that operated as a private school for training ministers, deacons and other clergy. Morning classes were taught one or two days a week.

“The need to establish schools to teach both children and adults to read and write was a concern to Rev. Bracy and other ministers and laymen,” Todd said.

In 1916, the one-room school was renamed the Eastern Shore Colored Industrial School.

In 1926, a graduating class of four students became the first to complete 12th grade and earn high-school diplomas.

The school received its final moniker—the Baldwin County Training School—in 1927; it closed in 1970.

In 1955, after the landmark Brown versus Board of Education case, the federal government issued a decree that all public schools integrate “with all deliberate speed,” according to the U.S. Department of Education.

The Brown case—involving 13 parents who, on behalf of their 20 children, filed a 1951 class action lawsuit  against the Topeka, Kan., school board—left the authority and timetable for integration up to each state government; many Southern states were slow to integrate.

It wasn’t until the 1969 case of Alexander versus the Holmes County Board of Education—regarding 33 school districts in Mississippi—that the U.S. Supreme Court mandated the integration of public schools “at once.”

After desegregation, the Baldwin County Training School was restructured as Daphne Junior High. It was changed in 1993 to Daphne Intermediate and to Daphne Elementary South in 2004.

The old Baldwin County Training School buildings, including a dormitory, were torn down to make way for W.J. Carroll Intermediate in 2008. The new school was named in honor of Walker J. Carroll, who served as the training school’s principal in its final 32 years.

The museum was built on the site formerly occupied by the school’s home economics and agriculture building. Todd said one room in the museum is set up like a dorm; she perceived that many people are unaware the building was a boarding school.

Preserving history

The Baldwin County Training School Heritage Festival Foundation asks that former students donate memorabilia from their school days.

“We’re asking that if they still have items, such as a band instrument, to put it on loan,” Todd said, adding that the foundation has already received many old photos.

A dinner and dance Thursday at the Daphne Civic Center will culminate a two-day celebration of the Jubilee City’s black heritage. Meet-and-greet is from 6:30 until 7:30 p.m., dinner time. The dance, featuring the band Emerge, will perform from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. Admission is $70 and is open to the public; dress code is business casual. Prospective guests are encouraged to purchase tickets before Monday. Call Gartrell Agee at 928-0495 or  510-0355 to order. Proceeds will help pay for the event and a portion will benefit a scholarship fund, Todd said. The Baldwin County Training School Heritage Foundation Scholarship Committee annually awards a scholarship of an undisclosed amount—organizers requested that the newspaper not print this figure—to eligible students, based on funding availability and the number of candidates. Rose Washington, board member and a foundation founder, said the scholarship is open to graduating seniors—and descendants of former training-school students—on their way to college.

The foundation, established in 1991, works to keep the school’s memory alive by preserving its heritage and legacy and providing scholarships for descendants of former students.