SCHOOLS
While educating Blacks during slavery had been illegal, some white owners overlooked the law, as it was necessary for slaves trained in carpentry, mechanics, cooking, and other endeavors to be literate. After the war, educating the four million newly freed former slaves became an important issue to Blacks and Northerners. Slaves who had escaped from bondage and become literate in Canada or the North were very important in the drive to expand literacy.
During the Union occupation of Maury County, a literate Black man named Cap Jordan received permission to open a school at the M. E. Church, which served the Black community. The church was located on Second and Garden Streets. Later, when the Confederates occupied the county, the church was closed and Jordan, a free Black, was arrested. He was charged under the law prohibiting teaching or receiving an education by a Black. His punishment was 25 lashes of the whip.
The next school to open was established by Henry Eddy, a white union veteran who thought it his duty to return to the South and open a school for Blacks, “eager to learn and well behaved.” This school was located at Flint Valley near Spring Hill. It opened in an unused cowshed. His first class consisted of 39 students. Within two weeks, he had 57 students. The school continued until it was relocated to the Black church nearby.
A Black man named Jeb Rodon established another school near Spring Hill on Green Mills Road. It opened with 16 students. The school was later moved to Rippavilla Plantation. Leadership Maury restored it in 1993.
Rippavilla School
The Freedmen’s Bureau was instrumental in establishing schools for Blacks, including the following in Maury County:
1. Missionary Baptist Church – Columbia, Principal Thomas A. White, Black. Est. 1865, 59 scholars.
2. Old Female Seminary Church – Rev. S.S. Potter, Lydia Leamon, Kate Watt, Jennie McCullough, Will Jordan. Est. 1865, 250 scholars.
3. McCanlas – 4 miles from Columbia on Bigbyville Rd., John Louther. Est. 1865, 29 scholars.
4. School at Col. Pillow’s 8 miles from Columbia – L.O. Smith. Rufus Pillow. Est. 1865, 48 scholars. Moved to old Church at Hopewell.
5. Hemp Church Williamsport Rd. – Johnson Watkins. Est. 1865, 15 scholars.
6. Spring Hill in barn. Mr. Eddy Est. 1865, 57 scholars.
7. Mt Pleasant in shed – Wyatt Baily. Est. 1865, 35 scholars.
8. Calisca in blockhouse – Alex Few. Est. 1865, 16 scholars.
9. Rutherford Creek in blockhouse – Seb Rodon. Est. 1866, 16 scholars.
College Hill School
In the early 1880s Columbia opened two schools at about the same time, one for whites and one for Blacks. John H. Kelley, son of Edmond Kelley, the first Black Baptist minister ordained in Tennessee, had come back to the South after being educated in Massachusetts to help the newly freed Blacks and their children. He found an ally in Columbia Mayor James Andrews, and together they built College Hill School, which would go on to educate generations of African American students in Maury County.
Professor Kelley’s father had been a slave in Columbia, along with his friend Dyer Johnson, both owned by Ann White. Professor Kelley assisted Dyer’s son Robert G. Johnson in getting a college education so that he could also come home to teach. Johnson would eventually take Kelley’s place as the principal of College Hill. He was the father of Lyman T. Johnson, another College Hill alumni, who went on to become a civil rights leader best known for a landmark court case that integrated the University of Kentucky.
John Kelly
Robert Johnson
