Hohenwald's Rosenwald School featured in Tennessee State Museum exhibit

The term "Rosenwald Schools" refers to approximately 5,000 structures built across the Southeast between 1912 and 1932 as part of a matching grant program and initial partnership between Booker T. Washington, the black president of the Tuskegee Institute, and Julius Rosenwald, the Jewish philanthropist and president of Sears, Roebuck, and Co. At the program's core was the idea that Rosenwald, black and white local community members, and state and local governments would all contribute to raise money to create the school buildings.

In Tennessee, over a nearly 20-year period, 354 schools, nine teacher homes, and ten school shops were built across all three of Tennessee's grand divisions. In many cases, the black communities, which advocated for and constructed these schools, raised more money than the Julius Rosenwald Fund required. In addition to money, community members often contributed supplies, land and labor to ensure a school was constructed in their community. With segregated systems, schools for black students routinely received less public funding then white schools. Although black community members already paid taxes to support education, they assumed the additional burden of supplying matching funds for Rosenwald grants because they wanted better schools for their children.

Hohenwald and Lewis County attended a one - room schoolhouse located in a former church. The building was indicative of many rural schools for black Tennesseans during this period. The teacher there, beginning around 1926, was Eula Gray Allison. Originally from Hickman County, Allison studied education at Tennessee Agricultural and Industrial State Normal Collage, now Tennessee State University. After receiving her teaching certificate, she began working in Lewis County.

The beginning of Allison's future in teaching coincided with a program that would have a significant impact both on her career and the advancement of black education in the state: the Rosenwald Fund's construction of "modern" schools- commonly known as Rosenwald Schools- for rural black students across the Southeast.

By chance, on a train ride from Hohenwald to Nashville in the late 1920s, Allison met R.E. Clay, the Rosenwald Field Agent for Tennessee. The two discussed the Fund's program, the old school at Hohenwald, and the possibility of constructing a new building there. The result was a local campaign by Hohenwald's black residents to provide land and money to erect a new school. According to an account by Allison published by the Lewis County Historical Society, "we had every form of money raising activities we could."

By July 1929, the new school - a two-teacher model - was finally constructed. It was the only Rosenwald School built in Lewis County. Not only did Allison teach at the new elementary school after it opened, but she continued to work there until it ultimately closed after integration in the 1960s. Afterwards, she continued to be involved in education and was instrumental in establishing kindergarten programs in Hohenwald. These classes were also held in the Rosenwald School building for a time. As a result, Allison taught and impacted the lives of generations of students in Hohenwald and Lewis County. Today, her former students still remember her kindness, commitment and generosity.

Mrs. Allison passed away in 2004 at the age of 103. An inductee in the Tennessee Teachers Hall of Fame, her legacy lives on in the accomplishments of her former students, some of whom became educators themselves.

Today, the former Hohenwald Rosenwald School still stands as part of the Lewis County Senior Citizens Center. This is just one of the stories told in the Tennessee State Museum's new exhibition Building a Bright Future: Black Communities and Rosenwald Schools in Tennessee, which will run from June 16, 2023 to February 25, 2024. Developed in partnership with the John Hope and Aurelia E. Franklin Library, Special Collections and Archives at Fisk University, the exhibition focuses specifically on individuals like Allison and their Rosenwald School communities across the state. To prepare for the exhibit, staff from the Museum and Fisk University met with alumni and community leaders across the state who attended Rosenwald Schools and are active members in preserving their histories. Generous former students shared their memories and lived experiences of growing up in and attending Rosenwood Schools. From Memphis to Newport, one theme that continuously emerged was the impact the school's teachers like Allison had on their students and the communities they served. The exhibition will also act as a platform for Rosenwood School communities in Tennessee to help tell their stories. Rather than simply focus on the period when many of these schools were built (1912-1932), the exhibit will place Rosenwood Schools within the historical context of Black education in Tennessee, while also discussing the importance of preserving these buildings.