The Campaign to Create the Julius Rosenwald & Rosenwald Schools National Historical Park

The Campaign is working to establish historic places in America, and a multi-site National Park celebrating the 2015 documentary flm, Why a National the life and legacy of Julius “Rosenwald,” directed by flmmaker Rosenwald, the son of Jewish Aviva Kempner. Inspired by the Park honoring immigrants who, after achieving flm, representatives of the National Julius Rosenwald? great wealth leading Sears, Roebuck Parks Conservation Association & Company, became a visionary (NPCA) and the Trust began philanthropist. meeting, exploring the possibility of a National Park. Other highly dedicated What is a Julius Rosenwald partnered with volunteers soon joined the Campaign. African American communities Rosenwald school? across the South to build school Today Julius Rosenwald is barely houses for children who otherwise remembered, in part because, unlike would have had extremely limited others who created philanthropic access to the public education funds, he did not believe in perpetual to which they were entitled. As endowments. Each generation, he envisioned by the Campaign, the felt, should create wealth and direct park will include a visitor center in that wealth in ways appropriate to the Chicago to focus on Rosenwald’s time. In keeping with Rosenwald’s overall contributions and a number wishes, the Julius Rosenwald Fund, of restored schoolhouses in several which he created in 1917, put itself states to be selected by the National out of business in 1948. Park Service. And yet, across 15 states of the Two things came together to create American South, there are places the impetus for the proposed park - where the name Rosenwald IS the ongoing work of the National remembered. Steeped in the Trust for Historic Preservation, which traditional Jewish teaching of in 2002 named the Rosenwald tzedakah - the importance of treating Schools of the American South to its every human being with both annual list of most endangered righteousness and justice - Rosenwald identifed African Americans as State Historical Preservation Officers The imaginative and far reaching particularly in need of and deserving from 14 states recommended to the philanthropy of Julius Rosenwald is aid. Campaign that 55 Rosenwald Schools an essential part of the American and one teacher home be considered for story in the twentieth century as Afer reading “Up From Slavery,” inclusion in the park. To date Campaign the nation, wrestling with the meeting its author, Booker T. representatives have visited 34 School legacy of slavery and continuing Washington, and joining the Board facilities and gathered important data on inequality, reached for ways of of the Tuskegee Institute in 1912, them for a report that it will prepare on achieving a more perfect union. Rosenwald enthusiastically embraced the Schools in the near future. the idea of partnering with African Between 1913 and 1932 Rosenwald American communities in the South, provided partial funding for 5,357 many of them extremely rural, that The Campaign also has had a historic context study prepared schools and related buildings. were already raising money to build African American men and women the schoolhouses that state school that concluded that Julius Rosenwald and the Rosenwald provided land, labor, materials and systems were not funding. reliably providing. Schools are of national historical Between 1913 and 1932 significance and that a National Rosenwald’s funding of schools and Teir enthusiasm Rosenwald provided Historical Park would be an important enhancement to the later awards of fellowships to highly and enterprise partial funding for 5,357 qualified and promising African helped encourage National Park System. In schools and related September 2020 the Campaign American artists, scholars, writers state school systems and scientists, many of whom to begin to more buildings. African issued a report on sites in American men and Chicago relevant to Rosenwald played important roles in the Civil adequately meet Rights movement, deserve to be their women provided land, that might be candidates for a visitor center. interpreted and celebrated in a responsibilities to labor, materials and National Park. provide education. funding. The Campaign is working with partners to help These buildings - many of them one enact The Julius Rosenwald and Rosenwald or two-room schoolhouses on country Schools Act of 2019, which would direct the For more Campaign roads surrounded by felds and woods National Park Service to conduct a special information, contact - were a source of pride and afection resource study of the sites associated with in their communities. Te schools Rosenwald and the Schools. This study will be educated one-third of the African the key first step toward the ultimate legislation [email protected] American children of the South in the creating the park. Twenty-five nonprofits have and visit the website years before the legal end to signed on in support of the legislation. segregation. Following the Brown v. rosenwaldpark.org Board of Education ruling many fell Rosenwald’s funding of schools and later into disrepair or passed into private To make a tax-deductible donation hands. awards of fellowships to highly qualified Send checks to: and promising African American artists, In more recent times communities from the suburbs of Washington, DC, scholars, writers and scientists, many of Rosenwald Park Campaign to East Texas have come together to whom played important roles in the Civil 19 Maplewood Park Court restore and preserve these simple Rights movement, deserve to be Bethesda, MD 20814 structures, familiarly referred to as interpreted and celebrated in a “Rosenwald Schools.” National Park. With the goal of creating a Julius Rosenwald & Rosenwald Schools National Historic Park, the Campaign has received input from a variety of historians, educators, philanthropists and preservation experts.

8/2020