Rediscovering Rosenwald Schools With Cassandra Williams-Rush

SPEAKER 01 : 0:03

Welcome to Restoring Education in America with Priscilla Ron. She’s a master educator and author leading the conversation to restore the American mind through wisdom, virtue, and truth.

SPEAKER 04 : 0:17

Well, hello, everybody. Welcome. Come on in. I’m so glad you decided to join the conversation today. My show is called Restoring Education in America, and I’m your host, Priscilla Ron. We talk about all things education. And I have discovered something new that I was never taught about. And it’s the Rosenwald schools. And I was talking with one of my cousins and she said, oh, of course, we know all about Rosenwald schools. And she recommended a historian to talk to that knows all about our Black history and education. I’m going to bring her up to the stage. Welcome, Ms. Cassandra Williams-Rush. How are you? Hi, Priscilla, and thanks so much for inviting me. Now, you and I are meeting for the first time, but we have someone in common that we both love, and it’s my cousin Cheryl Shaw. My father is a Shaw from Shaw Corner in King Street, South Carolina. But before we go into the interview, I’m going to share a little bit of your bio with our listeners. Thanks. So Cassandra Williams Rush is the 1966 valedictorian of Tomlinson High School, a Rosenwald School in King Street, South Carolina, which is in Williamsburg County. She enrolled in Morgan State University in Baltimore and majored in chemistry and had a 15-year career in engineering. She has a master’s degree in public health from the University of South Carolina. Cassandra has been an avid collector of African-American culture and history since the late 1970s. In 1990, she started the art and expressions business, retailing and collecting African-American art, bronzes, dolls, figurines, textiles, ceramics, pottery, stamps, Christmas items and more. By 2010, Cassandra opened the C. Williams Rush Museum of African American Arts and Culture. Her purpose and existence is to reach a greater audience and continue to share Black history and culture along with the many accomplishments and successes. Cassandra is a mom of three, grandmother of eight, and she also has five great grandchildren. OK, so I literally had to pare down your bio because you’ve done so many amazing things. But tell me, what do your grandchildren call you?

SPEAKER 02 : 2:44

Me mom and me mommy. My kids call me mommy, mommy, and the grandkids call me me mommy.

SPEAKER 04 : 2:51

Oh, I love it. I love finding out like all the grandma names because you’re young, you’re a young, youthful grandma and great grandma. So I’m so excited to have this conversation with you. One of my professors that I took a leadership program of the Rockies course with, Dr. Cranawitter actually told me about this concept of Rosenwald schools. And I was amazed, but I was also upset because I had never heard about this part of our history. And I’m thinking, once again, why are we not learning about this amazing contribution? between him and Booker T. Washington. So before, I’m not, you’re the expert. So why don’t you tell us who Rosenwald is and what his partnership was with Booker T. Washington?

SPEAKER 03 : 3:44

Okay. I first learned of the Rosenwald schools myself while I was living in Columbia because I lived in Columbia from 1970 to 2018. And I was also active with the South Carolina African American Heritage Commission. I was a commissioner there. So I was doing that process. I learned about the schools and I learned that Richland County, I learned that they had Rosenwald schools and I started thinking, well, why don’t we have any? So once I opened the museum in 2010 and started researching the schools through a project with the Williamsburg County Tourism Board, in fact, Lily McGill and I researched the Rosenwald schools. And in that process, we learned that there were 10 Rosenwald schools in Williamsburg County. Tomlinson is a Rosenwald school and there were nine other schools, so we were able to get some signs to be placed at those locations, but I didn’t feel comfortable placing signs at locations I was not sure of. There are only about three or four that I was sure of. Since then, we have found the exact locations of others, but presently, all of the signs for the Rosenwald schools of Williamsburg County are there in front of Tomlinson schools since Tomlinson is considered to be the mother school of the district. I also attended, I was so excited, I attended a Rosenwald School Conference at Tuskegee University. It was either in 2013, 2015, and it lasted several days. I mean, it was so enlightening, just so thrilling, just terribly exciting to learn about the collaboration between Rosenwald, who was the president and CEO of Sears and Roebuck, and Booker T. Washington. In fact, Rosenwald invited Booker T. Washington to Chicago to a board meeting of Sears. And Booker T. attended. And of course, the board members were very impressed with Booker T. And it was there that Booker T. asked Rosenwald to serve on the board of Tuskegee. This was in about 1912. So I guess Rosenwald had some apprehension, but he agreed. He made the visit to Tuskegee, and he was very impressed with what he saw. Of course, there was George Washington Carver there doing all the research on the peanuts and other things that were going on there. So Rosenwald agreed to serve on the board. However, in 1915, Booker T. Washington passed away. But Roosevelt continued the collaboration they had established, which was to create schools for the Negro students. And they started in Tuskegee, Alabama, then went throughout Alabama, all of the Southern states, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, what am I missing? Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Like I said, Florida, then Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, I think even in Virginia. And by the time he had finished, he had contributed 25% of the total cost of all of these schools. And there are about 5,400, 5,500 such schools and teacheries that have been created by Rosenwald during that time.

SPEAKER 04 : 7:06

So when you talk about Rosenwald, his parents were immigrants, German Jews from my research. He became the CEO of Sears and Roebuck and transformed that company and just became this amazing philanthropist. And Booker T. Washington was actually born a slave. But then by the time he passed, he had contributed all of this wonderful knowledge and advice around how to help. freed Blacks to get an education. And something interesting that I found out about Rosenwald was Booker T. Washington told him, don’t fund 100% of this because this needs to be something that’s partially funded by us from the Black community. We had to have skin in the game. And so when you say Rosenwald contributed 25%, the Black community also contributed quite a bit. And Tomlinson was built by African-Americans. The school building was built by our community. And because when you have skin in the game, you… Care more about it. So, you know, during that time, I remember my dad who graduated, I think he graduated in 63 or 64. I can’t I can’t remember. I think 63. Cousin Cheryl is the family historian. She’s first cousins to my dad. And she’s I don’t know how she keeps everything locked into her brain. And I’m kind of embarrassed to think that I don’t know the exact date, but I but I think I’m correct in 63. Okay. He was the drum major. I remember him saying he was in the Glee Club. He was the drum major at Tomlinson and he was so good. They asked him to come back the year after he graduated to do one more season of Marching Band. And I think maybe that’s where I get some of my music, love of music, music teacher and played in the band. But I remember my dad saying, you know, at that time during segregation, they had all black teachers, black principal, black businesses. My grandfather owned two businesses, a garage and a nightclub. And in Shaw Corner, you can still go there and see Shaw Corner. And they didn’t know any different. Yeah. But Cassandra, I want to get your impression. What was it like being a student during that time in a Rosenwald School?

SPEAKER 03 : 9:33

Can I give a brief history of Tomlinson High School? Yes. Tomlinson, well, I’ve done some research and my research indicated it was started like maybe 1905 and 1907, and I have a huge article that I published in King Street’s The News newspaper. King Street, in my research, and as we were researching for the historical marker, we found out that King Street was really started in 1866. It is the first Negro public school in the state of South Carolina. I would always say that it’s the mother school of the district, but now it’s really the mother school of the entire state of South Carolina. So I said Tomlinson was started in 1866. Tomlinson was a Rosenwald school. Tomlinson was an equalization school. And Tomlinson was also the site of Dr. Martin Luther King’s May 8th, 1966 speech, Let Us March on Ballot Boxes. So there’s a huge amount of just rich history there in King Street. And I go on into the Williamsburg County has produced four HBCU presidents. Six more HBCU presidents with direct ties to Williamsburg County. But as far as attending schools during the segregated era, I had indicated the various schools I attended prior to arriving at Tomlinson. I attended Tomlinson from 1960 to 1966. It was a very close knit community. You could just feel the love from our teachers and their interest, best interest in our needs and trying to ensure that we got the proper education we needed to be able to compete in the world once we left the segregated environment. I mean, it was just the community was very passionate. Your church was very passionate. And so we just had a kind of cohesion that was kind of like a stimulus to continue to thrive and do what you can. So and as I got closer to, I guess, senior year, I kept hearing things where you go to an HBCU to get an undergrad degree. But at that time, you, of course, had to go to a major university to get an advanced degree because the HBCUs at that time, too many of them did not offer degrees beyond the bachelor’s. So it wasn’t until graduate school, and I guess in my first job out of college that I had to interact personally with white folk. But let me back up. There was during the civil rights era, there was a Williamsburg County Voters League and there was a youth division of the Voters League. So I was one of the youth that was very active in that process. And I guess one of my main interactions in high school of my main interactions with whites was when I asked them if they would support my efforts to go apply at Rose’s Five and Dime as a sales girl. I was either in 11th or 12th grade, and they said they would support my efforts. So I went and applied, and the manager there was very nice, Mr. Fulmer. He hired me. And so that I wouldn’t be alone in the store, he also hired the daughter of his maid, Eliza Coswell. So Eliza and I were probably the, you know, I guess I was the first, and she was the second African-American sales girl in the in williamsburg county of course now they didn’t put us on the registers our purpose was and our job was to keep the clothing neatly fold all the shirts need to fold the pants if someone were to come in and um look at an item and did not fold it back properly and placed it back in this proper space it was our responsibility to do that so that was my first interactions really with um the white population in in the king street area and of course my first job out of college was just nightmarish with the the things i had to encounter and have learned to encounter and have encountered since then until this day.

SPEAKER 04 : 13:43

My guest today is Cassandra Williams Rush. She’s a scientist, an engineer, mom, grandma, great-grandma, and a historian. And we’re talking about the history of Rosenwald schools and during that time, the impact of of education. And I find it really fascinating that our students seem to really love going to school. I looked at old pictures of my dad’s yearbook and how nicely dressed you guys were. It’s so different from today. I mean, boys were in ties. The ladies look so lovely, did their hair and dresses. It’s not that way. I’ve been in education now for 32 years. And sadly, what I’ve seen or a lot of students who don’t want to be in school. They don’t like being in school. I’ve spoken to some Black educators who were kind of in that cusp where they were bused, where they were forced to desegregate and integrate. And I’ve asked them, you know, before you were forced to desegregate, Did you like going to school? And they said, I loved going to school. It was really difficult for them to be out of their community. And there was a really tumultuous time. I don’t know what that’s like because I’ve only lived in a time where I could go to any school. But what… What was it like during that that that bridge between segregation and the civil rights movement and young children going to school to contribute to the reason why, you know, now we have in the black community this big education disparity?

SPEAKER 03 : 15:26

Well, I had the option. I was asked if I wanted to go and I said no. I kind of had a feeling early on, I guess beginning of my junior year or whatever, I was being told that you’re on the track to being valedictorian. And I knew deep in my heart that if I had left Tomlinson to go to an integrated school, there’s no way I would have been able to be the person that would be named as valedictorian, even if I had the proper average to do so. But I’ve talked to some of the other students who have gone. in that integrated situation. And it was harsh. I mean, they would tell how the white students would spit on them. And in fact, at King Street High, there was one teacher, Mrs. Cunningham. She was the wife, a white teacher. She was the wife of the veterinarian in town. And she was a little lady and had polio and worked in spite of her constrictions. She called me and asked me to do an article on one of her students. I forgot his first name, Adamson. He’s a physicist, PhD physicist in I think the Chicago area. And I was thinking in the back of my mind, I usually don’t do articles on living. I tried to do articles on those people who were not recognized and acknowledged at all during that Jim Crow era. So within a year she passed. So then I did call Dr. Adamson and asked about the interview. And he did not realize that Mrs. Cunningham has such an admiration for him. But when I asked him about his ideas about her, he indicated, that her classroom was the one safe place in the school. So students could use her classroom as a haven to protect themselves from the harassment, the spitting, the cursing, the kicking, all of that. And she, of course, that little lady at five feet tall with polio would just not allow that in her class. So it would take people like her to help the students to overcome and try to achieve in spite of those conditions that could certainly hamper that. And I’ve had some other students. In fact, there’s a Dr. Williams at Claflin University and I who’ve been talking and we want to do a research project on having interviews with those students that experience, you know, their experience, the individual experience and the hatreds and all of those things that happened during that timeframe. But luckily I did not experience it because I stayed at Tomlinson. But of course, 1970 was the year that total integration occurred in Williamsburg County and some other places. So after 1970, even the Tomlinson students had gone to King Street High. And of course, that’s where they graduated from. And they’re the ones that had the interactions with the white students. But it was not a pretty picture. Believe it or not, in places like, well, in fact, it’s not really happening that much in King Street anymore because they’ve opened a private school. So the 99 percent of the white schools, white children go to the private school, except for a few who may not, you know, family may not can afford it. So even the black students now in Williamsburg County are not really aware of what the interactions could be like in a public school situation. And something else I wanted to mention about Tomlinson and the Rosenwald. Rosenwald School Building in King Street was a two-story building, a two-story brick building. And I think it had either six or eight classrooms. And I did have classes in that Rosenwald School Building. They tore it down before I returned to King Street to help in preserving things there. But when it was built, the community came together and donated an additional $7,000 to brick the building in because one of the rural Rosenwald schools was burned down. And of course we know why. So in King Street, the community added an extra, at that time, $7,000 to brick the school in for protection against being burned down.

SPEAKER 04 : 19:38

Wow. What a rich history that I’m learning about that. I, you know, the fact that Rosenwald and Booker T Washington contributed to building 5,500 schools across the South so that young children could have access to a great education and pursue their dreams. And I, I, But again, I’m looking at the situation today, and I look at the data. And back then, it appeared to me that so many of the Black Americans in the South were educated. They went to high school. They were entrepreneurs and self-employed or went to college and became very, very successful. it was almost the norm in a period of time when you were growing up and when my father was growing up. I come from a family of educators on my dad’s side, a bunch of military service people. And you know, housewives who raised large families and people who farmed in, you know, if you go to Shaw Corner, there were old tobacco fields that were there. So we know our history. But Cassandra, give me some hope. You know, my my my show is called Restoring Education in America. And it makes me sad to see my students who don’t like going to school. They expect something for nothing. They hate America. Yeah. A lot of them, not everybody, but they’re being raised in a time where I was raised by a military father who taught me how to love my country and to be patriotic and to serve. And it’s so foreign for me to teach children who don’t understand the struggle of our history because if they knew- What it was like, they would come to school on time, ready, turning an excellent level work, striving to be valedictorian of their school. Give me some hope, Cassandra. Tell me, like, where have we gone wrong and what do we need to do to fix this?

SPEAKER 03 : 21:54

Well, I had a friend who used to say that integration was the biggest con job that was forced on us. And I’m thinking he’s saying that because he is aware of the, like I said, the love, the support of the community, the Black community. We may not have had the newest books. We had the used books, in fact, updated books. We didn’t have the equal facilities until the equalization schools of the 1950s. But we had something there that has gotten lost over the years, somehow or another. Now, I feel as though, even though Williamsburg County is like 65% Black, that because we were one of the areas that, you know, like 1866, we had a school, we had a public school in town. And my hypothesis is once the rural areas discovered that the kids in King Street were being educated, they started schools all over the county. Williamsburg County is like 934 square miles. And I have found 70 plus such schools that were started throughout the county. So I think it was during that era that parents really stressed the importance of education. They expressed the need for education and their impressions were very significant and had a definite impact on their children. As you can tell, some of these recent generations, education is not their priority, unfortunately. So if education is not the parents’ priority, they certainly can’t impress that upon their children if their children see that that’s just a secondary thing. I have some serious and personal concerns as well. about the lack of interest in education. And I wish I knew what the magic answer is, but I don’t. It’s just that it’s a process. We almost have to start the process all over again. It’s like getting people to vote, for instance. It’s a process. But if we could You know, could just have that significant impact to the point that we can convince the parents, you know, my my kids, my grandkids, my great grandkids, how important education is and should continue to be. I think it can make a huge difference and we can slowly move back into that educational arena and be serious about it.

SPEAKER 04 : 24:32

Well, we could talk about this for a very, very long time. Real quickly, I want people to know a little bit about your museum. Where can people find you? Can you give us your website and how people can make a donation to your museum?

SPEAKER 03 : 24:50

Oh, yes. Thank you so much. And yes, we are in desperate needs. We’re in a desperate need for donations and contributions. I founded the museum in 2010 and It was in 2018 that I realized, oops, I need some funds. Well, anyway, what has happened, because I just annexed the building and some other buildings, downtown King Street, to the King Street Historic District. So the building is an authentic and verifiable historic building that needs to be stabilized. And the roof has started to collapse. So I’ve had to move everything out of the museum temporarily. issued the RFP to get the work done, but we don’t have enough money to get the building stabilized and the roof completed and even complete phase one. So we’re in desperate need of funding. Our website is cwilliamsrush.org. africanamericanmuseum.org. But if you just Google Rush African American Museum King Street, one word, K-I-N-G-S-T-R-E-E, you’ll get us. So we’re requesting a donation to help us out so that we can get back on the road. I mean, we haven’t stopped museuming. We just did, I co-hosted with a young lady, I guess you may not have in that area, hearing about the sestercentennial of the United States, the revolutionary era. Well, we just hosted a big event November 15th at Hob Car Barony with former plantations. on trying to publicize the efforts and the work and the accomplishments of those individuals that have never been recognized, the enslaved, the indigenous people, the Native Americans. It was a huge success. So we are really motivated. We’ve gotten the community motivated, and we are going to do an Indigo Festival in Williamsburg County next year because Williamsburg County was the highest producing indigo location in the states. So we’re going to do an Indigo Festival Saturday, September 5th, 2026 at the Williams Muscadine Vineyard in Neesmith. The ones probably ever heard of Neesmith, South Carolina is a small town. So I’ll send you information on that for you to help us share. But yes, we are in the need for donations, please.

SPEAKER 04 : 27:18

Well, we’ve had such a great conversation and we’ve got to land our plane. But Cassandra Williams Rush, thank you so much for sharing your history and knowledge of the Rosenwald schools and Tomlinson High School, where you and my father both graduated from. But to my listeners, thank you so much for joining in today. Catch me next time. And remember, educating the mind without the heart is no education. So seek wisdom, cultivate virtue and speak truth.

SPEAKER 01 : 27:50

Thanks for tuning in to Restoring Education in America with Priscilla Ron. Visit PriscillaRon.com to connect or learn how you can sponsor future episodes to keep this message of faith, freedom, and education on the air.