Old Bear Poplar School - Rowan County, North Carolina
(Cropped) Photograph of Rose Aggrey or her daughter, Abina Aggrey. African American teachers in Rowan County, at old Bear Poplar school, October 19, 1930.
Note on back reads: "School taught in this building last winter. The only school for Negroes ever built (?) at this place."
Source: State Archives NC- Department of Public Instruction: School Planning Section, School Photographs File, Box 6.
During the early days of immigration into Rowan both German and Scotch-Irish settlers were zealous for education and religion. In their communities the school house and the church were usually one and the same structure. Thus prior to 1850 much of the educational upbringing of children was handled by religious institutions.[58]
Rev. Andrew Lockridge, the pastor of Back Creek Presbyterian Church, in addition to his ministerial work taught a classical school in the community. During this time he convinced members of the community of the need to have a denominational home college.
Back Creek Church members subscribed and paid for the founding and support of Davidson College during 1835-1839.[59] Public schools began to appear in early the 1850s after the county legislature passed the law on public education in 1843.
Private schools continued operations because public schools were poorly financed and operated only four or five months a year. Back Creek Academy at Mount Ulla was in operation as early as 1868.
German Lutherans started one of the first area subscription schools in 1872 soon as the congregation of St. Luke's Lutheran Church formed in 1869. A parochial school was built in 1880 and St. Luke’s provided a school for the community until 1897 when it closed due to public schools moving into the area.[60]
Between the years of 1881 and 1924 the public county schools in the area were the worst in the state. Many schools had only two rooms, often not fit for school use. Mount Ulla had a public school in 1918.[61]
In 1924 John H. Cook of the Greensboro Woman's College recommended improvements in public school buildings, increasing their size to not less than eight rooms. Mount Ulla was on the list of communities to improve its public school.[62]
Mount Ulla Elementary School was accredited in 1937. Mount Ulla High School was accredited in 1927.
A segregated unaccredited Negro school operated at Bear Poplar.[63] Public schools integrated in 1961 and by the mid-1960s Bear Poplar school for Blacks stopped its operation.
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Source: Wikipedia