Post World War II - 1954
The Boomers Go "Boom" in Fairfax
The post-war population boom and rush to the suburbs hit the Fairfax County Schools like a tsunami. In 1941, there were 6.760 children enrolled in FCPS. In April 1959, there were a total of 48,400 students, and by 1966, the year Fairfax was fully integrated, there were a total of 102,000 students in Fairfax Schools. Over these years, the proportion of African American students in the total population declined singificantly, most likely due to both segregated housing opportunities and limited educational opportunities past 7th grade. Minutes of Fairfax School Board meetings are consumed with details about school construction and bond issues and very little about supporting "Negro schools" or contemplating integrated schools.
The timeline below highlights some of the significant news items and developments regarding desegregation in Fairfax County, from the growing support for a public high school for Black students within the county, to desegregation news in neighboring counties, to the conflict over segregated schools on Ft. Belvoir.
late 1940's
Mary Ellen Henderson, the longtime Falls Church educator and principal of first the Falls Church Colored School and later James Lee Elementary school, was instrumental in conducting research to expose and publicize inequities in funding and support for "Negro" schools versus white schools in Fairfax County.
The flyer to the left was produced by Mrs. Henderson (known as "Miss Nellie" by her students and the greater community) and distributed by the Fairfax Branch of the NAACP to raise awareness and advocacy for improved school buildings and funding for Black schools.
Mary Ellen Henderson was the wife of Edwin B. Henderson, who later became the head of the Virginia NAACP. The Falls Church-News Press in 2005, on the occasion of a new middle school being dedicated in her name, described her work in an article in 2005 highlighting her lasting positive impact on the greater Fairfax community:
For years Miss Nellie taught at the all-black school house in Falls Church, a two room wooden structure without central heating or indoor plumbing. As she worked teaching grades 4-7 she was aware of the dramatic difference between the resources given to the white schools and those for the black schools. [...]
In response Mrs. Henderson compiled information detailing the inequities. She described the conditions at her school, while giving data comparing funding disparities between black schools and white. The report entitled, Our Disgrace and Shame: School Facilities for Negro Children in Fairfax County showed how less than seven percent of all school funds went to Negro schools.
The report caught the attention of parts of the white population in Fairfax County and created a wave of support for the building of a new school, the James Lee School House on Annandale Road, a brick building with indoor plumbing, heating and enough classrooms for each grade to have its own room. ("Mary Ellen Henderson Middle School, n.d.).
1948
The James Lee Colored School, a new brick schoolhouse with enough classrooms for each grade to have its own classroom, opens in 1948 after years of advocacy from Mary Ellen Henderson and the Fairfax NAACP.
October 1948 - The Fairfax School Board received a letter from the School Emergency Group "recommending that a high school for colored students be erected in Fairfax County as soon as possible", joined by letters from the Fairfax County Colored Citizens Association and the Fairfax NAACP requesting that bond money be secured for the building of a high school. Superintendent Woodson also shared letters he had received recommending construction of a high school "for Negro students" written by the "Joint Committee on Colored Schools" and the Fairfax County Parent Teacher Federations. (Fairfax County School Board, 1948)
1949
"As late as 1949, the County operated one-room elementary schools for Black students that lacked indoor plumbing, heating, and/or kitchen facilities." Black teachers typically had twice as high a student-teacher ratio as white teachers, and they often were called upon to do tasks such as janitorial work that white teachers did not have to do (Donahue, 2017, p. 141).
Coalition for a Black high school forms
The Fairfax NAACP "joined forces with an interracial reform commitee, the Fairfax County Federation of Community Associations (FCFCA), and the League of Women Voters (LWV), to urge local officials ot build a high school for Black students so they could attend a local school" (Donahue, 2017, p. 141).
1950
37 Fairfax County students attend Manassas Technical School in December of 1950 with an attendance of 83.67%. (Fairfax County School Board, 1951, Jan 2, p. 220)
DC Public Schools announces that students from outside of the District would have to pay tuition. Arlington School Board agrees “agreed to pay tuition for the remainder of the year for Arlington students enrolled in DC schools.”
It is unclear whether Fairfax County ever formally paid DC tuition for Fairfax residents, but it was well known that many Fairfax students used DC addresses in order to attend public high school in DC. Even Louise Archer, the principal of the Vienna Colored School for whom Louise Archer Elementary was named, allowed her former pupils to use her DC address in order to attend high school in DC, since there was still no high school in Fairfax County for Black students. (Baker, 1989).
Carter won her case against Arlington Public Schools on appeal, with “Judge Bryan to notify the school board that they would be required to provide equal facilities for the county’s Black students”. This led to the pay rate for Arlington teachers being improved as well. (Arlington Public Library, 2018).
1951
January 1951 - Fairfax NAACP requests a status on "plans for the proposed high school for colored children" and stating that "the conditions of travel, time consumed, and generally unfavorable conditions at the Regional High School are causing numbers of drop-outs." At this point, a site had not been selected and funds to build the school were in the proposed upcoming bond issue "but that litigation had prevented sale of the bonds." (Fairfax County School Board, 1951, Jan 2, p. 221)
Superintendent Woodson expressed defensiveness in reply to the NAACP letter, stating that "many buses in Fairfax County are on the road for a longer period of time each morning and afternoon than are the buses to Manassas and this Board has no report regarding any larger percentage of drop-outs in the Regional High School than in the high schools in Fairfax County." (Fairfax County School Board, 1951, Jan 2, p. 221)
A committee from Faifax Negro Elementary PTA expressed distress about the terrible condition of the building and were alarmed to hear that there was no money allocated for this in the upcoming bond issue, and the Superintendent replied that there was no money available "until the bond issue is cleared." (Fairfax County School Board, 1951, Jan 2, p. 223)
April 23 - Barbara Johns, a 16 year old student at Robert Russa Moton High School in Prince Edward County, Virginia, leads a peaceful student strike of her high school in protest of unequal conditions. Her advocacy eventually leads to the Davis v Prince Edward County lawsuit, one of the 5 suits that were part of the momentous Brown v. Board of Education decision 13 years later.
July 1951 - Fairfax County School Board passes resolution to purchase a 15 acre tract of land in Merrifield for "a new high school for Negro pupils" (Fairfax County School Board, 1951, July 19, p. 415)
December 23 - The Washington Post reports that the Fairfax NAACP is planning a mass meeting in support of "more money for Negro schools" and seeking legal advice for what avenues to pursue to ensure that Black students are not the lowest priority for school funding, as the head of the NAACP asserts they have been in the past. ("Fairfax Negro Groups Seek School Funds", 1951).
Superintendent Woodson noted that the white student population had grown 130% in the past 10 years (7167 students to 16,605 students) while the Black student population had grown by just 46%, 1028 students to 1502 students in 1951. ("Fairfax Negro Groups Seek School Funds", 1951).
1952
The NAACP (national) urges the U.S. Defense Secretary to abolish school segregation at Army bases including Fort Belvoir. The NAACP points out that President Truman opposed segregated facilities, so this would be “a shocking departure” from Truman’s stand.
Ft. Belvior PIO “admits segregation” but says the post has to comply with Virginia law which forces segregation since the schools are operated by Fairfax County Public Schools.
At the time, 10 on-base “Negro students attend the Manassas Regional High School”. ("Racial Schools", 1952).
Archival photographs and a full history of Ft. Belvoir Elementary and the segregated communities associated with the Army fort are featured in this "What's in a Name?" video by Fairfax County Public Schools. The video makes no mention of the severing of ties between FCPS and Fort Belvoir schools that occurred in the wake of the DOD desegregation order.
1953
As the population boomed and school construction went into overitme, some of the one-room schoolhouses in FCPS were being consolidated throughout the county, including some of the schools for Black children. Floris, Rock Ridge, and Oak Grove Elementary schools were all consolidated into a new four-room brick building in Herndon.
February 1953 - An $11,000,000 school bond issue passes with a significant majority vote. A group headed by Manning Gasch, the Fairfax County Freeholders Protective Association, vows to fight the bond referendum in court. ("School, Health Bonds", 1953). Gasch went on to lead the white supremacist Defenders of State Sovereignty and Civil Liberties group in Fairfax.
March 20 - President Eisenhower says he will look into the issue of segregated schools at Fort Belvoir. (Rogers, 1953).
State superintendent Dowell Howard said that “no state funds could be put into a county which operated non-segregated schools because the State Board of Education would be spending money in violation of the State Constitution.
“This question arose two years ago at Quantico, VA when a Negro sergeant’s daughter was entered in a white high school on the base which was supervised by Prince William County...Prince William severed its affilation with the government operated schools. All the schools at Quantico now are integrated and totally operated by the government.” (Rogers, 1953).