Farmville, Virginia

— Prince Edward County —

On this site of the former R.R. Moton High School, the actions of some brave African-American students to achieve equal educational opportunities for blacks eventually led to the end of legal segregation in American public schools.

Moton High School was built to house 180 black students. On April 23, 1951, it held 450 instead, with some classes conducted in "tar-paper shacks," resulting in a student walkout protesting the unequal facilities, course offerings and buses. Within weeks the students sought legal redress of their grievances. The NAACP agreed to support a suit for school integration, believing that goal to be in the best interest of the community. The subsequent case, Davis et al. v. County School Board of Prince Edward, was decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1954 in its landmark Brown v. Board decision, which stated that "in the field of public education the doctrine of eparate but equal' has no place." A second Brown decision in 1955 mandated that integration be achieved "with all deliberate speed."

Rather than integrate its public schools, Prince Edward County withheld funds for all public education. As a result, all of the county's public schools were closed from 1959 until 1964, when the Supreme Court ruled in Griffin v. Prince Edward that localities must fund and operate public schools.

Today, Prince Edward's fully integrated public schools bear the legacy of a fight for civil rights in education that began here with a courageous, non-violent act by a group of high school students and resulted in three historic United States Supreme Court rulings. In 1998 the site was designated a National Historic Landmark. In 2001 it formally opened as a museum.

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Show me all markers in:  Farmville, VA  |  Prince Edward County  |  23901  |  Virginia  |  United States of America

Robert Russa Moton High School
Longwood College
Longwood University
Farmville Female Seminary Association
First Baptist Church
Beulah AME Church
Four Sororities Founded
Main Street - Mayor J. David Crute - EACO Theatre
Dr. William W. H. Thackston
Confederate Veterans Monument

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