The Old Massanutten School

Luray, VA

This building served as a school from 1875 to 1937. It was moved to downtown Luray in 1974 so that it could be preserved as a historical attraction.

From Horrible to Hopeful

Luray, VA

American slavery was, of course, a horrible institution. Here we have what is said to be a slave auction block, where enslaved people were displayed for potential buyers. 

The Narrative of Bethany Veney is a short and fascinating [online] autobiography of an enslaved woman who lived in the area and faced auction but managed to avoid being sold into a new (and potentially worse) situation.

Read the text on Historical Marker Database.

We can find a more hopeful piece of Luray history on West Main Street. The Andrew Jackson school was built for Black students a century ago. It now serves as a recreation center for the community and also has a museum that’s open on Saturday afternoons.

The school was not named for President Andrew Jackson; it was named after a local Black businessman. This was a Rosenwald school, one of over 5000 schools built in the south with support from communities and Julius Rosenwald in partnership with Booker T. Washington. It functioned as a school until 1959.

Reflection Intruding

I was taking a picture through a window and the sky was behind me.

This image reminds me of a double exposure.Years ago, I traveled to Florida to take a short course taught by Jerry Uelsmann, master of the double exposure. He did amazing things with photo manipulation, long before digital photography was invented.

Recently Lost

Over the past two weeks, I have been saddened by death notices for several fine people. A few of my fellow bloggers may remember Connie Biltz. She stopped blogging some years ago, but I continued to follow her on Facebook. She was a published poet.

Here in the Shenandoah Valley, we lost a couple of men who shared their extensive knowledge over the years. Rob Simpson taught photography and natural history at Lord Fairfax Community College (now called Laurel Ridge). I took a couple of workshops in nature photography with Rob, and also a semester in photo marketing. Along with his wife Ann Simpson, Rob authored a number of books on our national parks and wildflowers, beautifully illustrated with photographs. If you have browsed the bookstores at Shenandoah National Park, you have probably noticed some of his books.

Jim Moyer was also a writer and educator, although he might not have referred to himself as one. I learned from his articles on Winchester history and George Washington. He was active with the French and Indian War Foundation, and participated in reenactments from that time period. He was always willing to smile when I took his picture

These were all good people who generously shared their time and skills. We are fortunate that they left us their writings and other contributions. 

Thank you.

Happy Birthday to the NPS

Today marks the 109th anniversary of the founding of our National Park Service. Here are some pictures of National Park Rangers that I’ve taken over the years. The first batch is from Cedar Creek and Belle Grove National Historical Park. It’s fairly local to me and I’ve attended many tours and lectures there over the years. 

Actually, I toured parts of it with college history classes before the park was established. It’s fairly new to a national park, first designated in 2002. Before that, Belle Grove existed as a historical site and part of the surrounding Cedar Creek Battlefield was preserved by a battlefield foundation. 

Related: Photos I took at Cedar Creek in 1993.

2006 Post: 100th Birthday of National Park Service.

Also, Shenandoah National Park is local to me. It was built before I was born, and I’ve been going there all my life. I grew up in Northern Virginia, so even then, it was only a few hours away. 

Collage of SNP Rangers for Mosaic Monday

Currently our National Parks are underfunded. They are a treasure and a wonderful resource and deserve the support of the American people and the government.

A Loyal Following

On Thursday, I went to the funeral of Charles Poland, a beloved history teacher, who passed away at the age of 90. I wrote about him on Tuesday and have mentioned him many times over the years. The funeral was in Purcellville, not far from where my sister used to live. Then we formed a car caravan and rode out to Ebenezer Cemetery in Bluemont.

The ride felt familiar although most of the territory was new to me. Our field trips with Dr. Poland were carried out in a similar way: car following car down rural roads into the middle of nowhere. We passed homes and farms. At one point I thought I heard goats and glanced over and saw some standing on top of a car in a farmyard! 

Finally we reached a country cemetery, which seemed poetically appropriate. Dr. Poland often ended his tours at a cemetery where Civil War soldiers were buried, where he would discuss the losses of whatever campaign we were studying. Even though he made a career teaching and writing about the Civil War, he made sure we understood that it was a terrible and wasteful war. 

I picked out three more pictures from past tours to show you. The first one amuses me because group members are studying a map after we took a wrong turn near Cold Harbor. That rarely happened because Dr. Poland and his wife Betty drove the routes on a previous weekend to plan all the stops. He’s second from left in the picture.

When I first started taking his classes in 1989, I feared getting separated from the group because we had no cell phones or GPS. We only had small sketched-out maps, not to scale, and verbal directions. I only got hopelessly lost one time and that was in Newport News. 

I took these classes for 23 semesters, typically in the spring. It took eight years to complete all the eastern campaigns, and at that point I thought I was done, but a classmate called me and ask me to go again because he often rode with me and was afraid of getting lost by himself. So I did the whole series again, and then there were additional semesters covering specialized topics like guerrilla warfare and Civil War hospitals.  So I kept going until Dr. Poland retired. I loved these trips.

I wasn’t the only regular. There were people who started the courses before I did and kept on going almost until the end. This sort of travel could be strenuous so adult students sometimes found it became too hard to keep doing. Quite a bit of walking was required, and I remember getting exhausted.

(The CDP Theme is Shadows. Also Sharing with Shadow Shot Sunday.)

Dr. Poland usually wore a hat, and I quickly learned that it was important to have one for sunny afternoons. I also learned to carry sunscreen, water, snacks, and insect repellent. 

Today’s final photo is from 2009. It was a pleasure to see some of my old classmates at the funeral, and they were in this Appomattox photo: Jon and Sheryl W., Pam, John B., plus Martha and Betty. 

Notes: My Civil War Field Trips website was about these tours. Eventually I gave it up for the easier task of blogging.

I also wrote book reports for homework and turned them into reviews on Amazon, which was known mostly as a bookstore in those days. This started my hobby of writing reviews, which I still do.

Dr. Poland recently completed a book on Animals in the Civil War. I have ordered a copy.

A Respected Teacher, a Caring Friend

 Charles Preston Poland, Jr.
1934 - 2025

Dr. Poland was an enthusiastic and caring teacher. I first took one of his history courses 35 years ago and enjoyed it so much that I kept taking his classes until he retired. Mostly, they were summer or spring field trip tours. I was fortunate that the first one I signed up for covered the beginning of the American Civil War. We followed the war chronologically for the most part. It took eight seasons to cover the entire war, and we only concentrated on action in Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Much of the time was spent traveling by car, following the routes of the major campaigns. 

Some of my classmates had completed the series before and were doing it a second time. Well, I wound up doing the same thing. The trips were never exactly the same though, for Dr. Poland was always learning new things and leading us to new places. 

He and his wife were some of my favorite people. We continued to exchange Christmas cards after he retired. It hurts to lose him. 

Once a High School

Mt. Jackson, VA

Opening in June as a Community Center

Wordless Wednesday on Tuesday

Rappahannock Student Mosaics

These were on display at the Rappahannock Art Tour in November. Elementary and Middle School Students made these mosaic-style murals.

Sharing with Monday Mosaics / Murals

Near Chantilly

Rajdhani Mandir

This temple was built in 2000 to serve the Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist communities in Northern Virginia. 

I stopped there to take a picture last month when I made a short side trip on my way to Herndon. I had turned off Route 50 to take a look at a community near South Riding. I was curious because the neighborhood was built on a farm once owned by Charles and Becky Poland. I went on many Civil War field trips with them some years back.

When they sold the land in order to move away because Chantilly was choked with traffic, they envisioned that a senior community might be built there due to the fact that the school system was already up to capacity. The developer had other ideas and the housing there is closely packed. I was shocked at how dense it is.

I noticed that streets and a pond were named after members of their family. The farm is gone, and I didn’t recognize anything except for a few turns on the road leading there. I have many fond memories of summer cookouts in their yard at the end of each season of field trips. I took those trips every summer for 20 years. Great people.

The Lucy F. Simms Continuing Education Center

Harrisonburg, VA

Wordless / Signs

 

See Previous Post about Lucy Simms.

The Jessie Rupert Schoolhouse

New Market, VA

Jessie Rupert headed the New Market Female Seminary during the Civil War years, although she was a supporter of the Union. Many of her neighbors resented this and after her husband died in 1867, she lost her job.

In 1868, she opened a new school in this building on Congress Street. At first it was another school for young women, but around 1870, she got funding for the "Woodward Cottage Institute," which provided free education to local white and African American children. These students typically could not afford tuition to local private schools. 

Sadly, the school only lasted for a year or two. The school faced opposition from the community and Mrs. Rupert faced threats of violence. After the school closed, she continued to live in New Market and earned money as a traveling speaker. She died in 1909.

Tuesday Treasures

Rosenwald School #12

Yesterday I was returning from buying groceries and decided to look for a historic marker. I always learn something from these signs, and often they are in a photogenic location. This one was on the want list for the Historical Marker Database because they needed a close-up shot. I drove right past the location and didn’t see the marker, so I had to turn around and go back. This is in a rural area between Rectortown and Marshall.

“In 1912, Booker T. Washington, head of Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, asked Julius Rosenwald, a Jewish Philanthropist and President of Sears, Roebuck & Company, to serve on the Board of Directors at Tuskegee. Their unique partnership led to the creation of the Rosenwald Fund to support the education of African-American children in the rural South. There were 382 Rosenwald schools built in Virginia between 1917 and 1932. Eight such schools in Fauquier County offered a quality education to untold numbers of African-Americans.

Mr. George W. Bannister and his wife, Addie, Rectortown residents, provided the land for the original No. 12 school at this site. Mr. Rosenwald wanted to provide seed money to encourage community support for a new and improved No.12. This new school was built in 1924 at a cost of $4,500. It was funded in three parts: the Black contribution — $800, public contribution — $3,000 and Rosenwald contribution — $700.”

This school was replaced in 1963 by the new, integrated school on the adjacent property. It is sad to realize that schools in the south for black children were given such low priority that outsiders had to step in just to provide adequate buildings. Eventually 5,300 southern schools were funded by Julius Rosenwald working with Booker T. Washington and local communities.

Laurel Ridge CC in Middletown

Laurel Ridge Community College used to be called Lord Fairfax Community College. That was its name when I took classes there, but I always thought the name was confusing because there is a different community college in Fairfax County, where I earned an associates degree many years ago. 

Lord Fairfax administered a significant portion of Virginia in colonial times. He remained loyal to the king of England during the American Revolution but was allowed to live out his years peacefully in Virginia, partly due to his age and no doubt due to his personal friendship with George Washington.

Laurel Ridge’s local campus is in Middletown and is on the Cedar Creek Battlefield. I should point out that the historical battlefield is huge. Only part of it is within the official boundaries of the Cedar Creek and Belle Grove National Historical Park.

This historical marker is right in front of the college parking lot. Directly across the road is a Civil War Trails marker.

“Near this point General Early, on the morning of October 19, 1864, stopped his advance and from this position he was driven by Sheridan in the afternoon.”

Union Counterattack 

Ranger Shannon’s Last Program

My friend Shannon is leaving the National Park Service after 13 years at Cedar Creek and Belle Grove National Historical Park. Her new job is working for the Army Corps of Engineers as a Public Affairs Specialist.

I first met Shannon Moeck as a fellow student in one of Jonathan Noyalas’s Civil War seminars. She was hired as one of the first rangers at the park, which was still being developed.

I was happy to hear that she will continue to give occasional talks at Belle Grove, telling visitors the story of Judah the cook. This program takes place in the basement kitchen where Judah, an enslaved woman, prepared meals for the Hite family under the challenging conditions of the early 1800’s.

Link: Judah, born 1794

Jennie Dean and the Manassas Industrial School

Though little known outside of Manassas, Jennie Serepta Dean was a significant figure in the field of education during the waning years of the nineteenth century. Born enslaved in 1848 in Prince William County, Dean received only a basic education in the years following the Civil War. Unable to attend school on a regular basis, she took a job in Washington, D.C. as a paid domestic servant in order to earn money to help her family. During these years, Dean also founded several churches, including one in Prince William County.

Seeing many young African-Americans struggle with low paying jobs and little opportunity for advancement, Dean resolved to build a school to teach not only the basics in education but also skilled trades. For three years she labored to bring attention and funding to her cause. Dean's efforts were realized when the Manassas Industrial School for Colored Youth opened in 1893.

Read the rest on Historical Marker Database.

Model of Campus

Foundations are Preserved.