University of Richmond UR Scholarship Repository Master's Theses Student Research 8-1993 Open the doors : an analysis of the Prince Edward County, Virginia, Free School Association Lisa A. Hohl Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.richmond.edu/masters-theses Recommended Citation Hohl, Lisa A., "Open the doors : an analysis of the Prince Edward County, Virginia, Free School Association" (1993). Master's Theses. Paper 577. This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Research at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Open the Doors: An Analysis of the Prince Edward County, Virginia, Free School Association by Lisa A. Hohl Thesis for Master's Degree I University of Richmond I 1993 f' ,\ Thesis director Dr. R. Barry Westin j1ii l When the Supreme Court ordered integration of public l' l : schools in 1954 following Brown vs. Board of Education, ' Virginia responded with a policy of "massive resistance." Public schools were closed in Prince Edward County between 1959 and 1964. This thesis examines the school closings themselves, but concentrates primarily on the creation, implementation, and effect of the Prince Edward County Free School Association, a privately funded school system that operated during the 1963-1964 school year. Initiated by the Kennedy Administration as a one-year, emergency program, the Free Schools were designed to reestablish formal education for the county's black children. This thesis relied primarily upon the uncataloged Free School papers, personal interviews and documents from the John F.