African American Schools in Lexington and Fayette County, KY
Start Year : 1798
One of the early schools for African Americans in Lexington was taught by a white man from Tennessee around 1830. But an even earlier school was a Sunday school taught in 1798 at the old home of Colonel Patterson on High Street [source provided by Yvonne Giles: "A Sunday School," Kentucky Gazette, 10/16/1798, p.3. col.2]. Between 1866-1870, there were at least four schools supported by the U.S. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands [see the NKAA entry Freedmen Schools, Kentucky]. In 1867 there were at least two colored schools, Howard School on Church St and Mitchell & Talbott School on Upper Street. The first commencement for the Fayette County colored schools was held at the courthouse on June 1, 1894 [source: Programme: 1st Commencement of Fayette County Colored Schools]. The graduates were Cora B. Simpson, Coleman Greene, Sallie Coleman, Mary Greene, all from Uttingertown School. Frank Byrd and Bessie J. Cooper graduated from Fort Spring School. G. S. Johnson, Green Seals, Garfield Sanders, and Claude W. Strider were all graduates from Cadentown School. By 1899 there were three colored schools in Lexington, and that number would increase. Below are the names of many of the colored schools in Lexington and Fayette County.

City Schools

• Chandler Normal School [photo]
• Christian Church School (on 4th Street, became Mitchell & Talbert School)
• Colored Industrial School (Negro WCTU)
• Colored School No. 2
• Colored School No. 3
• Corral Street Normal (1868), supported by the American Missionary Association - [source: Congressional Serial Set, Executive Documents of the House, 2nd Session of 46th Congress, 1879-'80, v.2, Education no.1, part 5, v.3, p.80 (online in Google Books)]
• Constitution Street School
• Douglass School
• Dunbar School
• Fourth Street School
• Forest Hill School
• Independent African Church School (Frederick Braxton entry in NKAA)
• Jane Washington School (on 2nd Street, opened prior to the U.S. Civil War) (supported by Lawyer Andrew Bush)
• Ladies of the Episcopal Church School [source: Kentucky Gazette, 12/28/1867, p.3]
• Lexington Freedmen School
• Lexington High School (supported by the Freedmen's Bureau)
• Lexington Polytechnic Institute [source: Kentucky Leader, 0/15/1894, p.7]
• Lexington Sabbath School (established by the Episcopal Church & supported by the Freedmen's Bureau)
• Lower Street School (1883)
• Patterson Street School
• Pleasant Green Church School (closed around 1876, and reopened as Patterson St. School)
• Russell School No. 1
• St. Andrew's Colored Episcopal Parochial School [source: Lexington Daily Transcript, 02/01/1891, p.7]
• St. Peter Claver
• St. John's School (opened 1888) [source: Lexington Daily Press, 06/18/1889, p.4]
• Mitchell & Talbott School [Mrs. E. Belle Mitchell-Jackson and Mrs. Talbert]
• Sunday School (1798)
• Bethesda Normal and Industrial school - [established by Rev. O. L. Murphy on the corner of Alford and Smith Streets - source: Lexington Leader, 12/04/1906, p.1, c.2] - provided by Y. Giles
• Canadian and Ohio Industrial School - [opened at Colored Methodist Church at Race and Corral Streets - source: Lexington Leader, 08/31/1907, p.1. c.2] - provided by Y. Giles

County Schools

• Athens School
• Avon School
• Bracktown School [photo]
• Briar Hill School [photo]
• Cadentown School [photo]
• Chilesburg School [photo]
• Coletown School [photocopy, Rosenwald, p.2]
• East Hickman School
• Ft. Spring School
• Gilead School
• Jonestown School (closed in 1936)
• Kirklevington School
• Little Georgetown School [photo]
• Loradale School
• Maddoxtown School [photo]
• Peach Orchard School
• Pricetown School
• Russell Cave School
• South Elkhorn School [photo]
• Stickaway Freedmen School
• Uttingertown School [photo]
• Warrentown School

For more see The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861 by C. G. Woodson; Maydwell's Lexington City Directory 1867; Emerson and Dark's Lexington Directory 1898-9; "Colored school location," Leader, 08/10/1883, p.1; "Colored county schools," Leader, 09/06/1903, p.3 and other articles in the Lexington Leader newspaper between 1895-1911; and Educational History of the Negroes of Lexington (thesis) by William Henry Fouse. See Rosenwald Schools in Kentucky 1917-1932 by A. Turley-Adams, Kentucky Heritage Council and Kentucky African American Heritage Commission. See 1929 photo image of students in the lunch line at Maddoxtown Colored School at Kentucky Digital Library - Images.


Subjects: Communities, Education and Educators, Grade Schools & High Schools in Kentucky, African American Schools in Kentucky (Counties A-Z)
Geographic Region: Lexington, Fayette County, Kentucky