Collection SC 0151 Manassas Industrial School Fiftieth Anniversary Program 1945 Table of Contents User Information Historical Sketch Scope and Content Note Container List Processed by Laura Christiansen 23 March 2021 Thomas Balch Library 208 W. Market Street Leesburg, VA 20176 USER INFORMATION VOLUME OF COLLECTION: 1 item COLLECTION DATES: 1945 PROVENANCE: Gift of Velma Dunnaville Leigh, Donated by Wilhelmina Leigh, Washington, DC. ACCESS RESTRICTIONS: Collection open for research. USE RESTRICTIONS: No physical characteristics affect use of this material. REPRODUCTION RIGHTS: Permission to reproduce or publish material in this collection must be obtained in writing from Thomas Balch Library. CITE AS: Manassas Industrial School Fiftieth Anniversary Program, 1945 (SC 0151), Thomas Balch Library, Leesburg, VA. ALTERNATE FORMATS: None OTHER FINDING AIDS: None TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS: None RELATED HOLDINGS: Lewis, Stephen Johnson. 1994. Undaunted faith--: the life story of Jennie Dean: missionary, teacher, crusader, builder, founder of the Manassas Industrial School. V REF 921 DEAN JENNIE Sherry Zvares Sanabria, Settle-Dean Cabin, Acrylic on Museum Board, 2002 [Painting is in the Thomas Balch Library Collection] ACCESSION NUMBERS: 2019.0063 2 HISTORICAL SKETCH Jennie Serepta Dean (1848–1913) was the daughter of Charles W. Dean (born c. 1822) and Annie Stewart Dean (born c. 1826) of Loudoun County, Virginia. Enslaved, the Dean family lived in a cabin near the village of Conklin. Following Emancipation at the end of the Civil War, the family moved to Prince William County. After attending school, Jennie Dean worked as a domestic servant in Washington, DC while helping her sister attend school. Around 1878, Dean founded a Sunday school in Prince William County, and began traveling around the area providing religious instruction and education. Resulting in the founding of several religious schools where she also offered classes cooking and sewing. Dean helped to establish Prosperity Chapel in Loudoun County and the Dean- Divers Chapel in Prince William County. By 1888, Dean had plans to establish a school to teach skilled trades to African American children. Working with her sister, Ella Dean (1873-1933), who was a teacher at Thoroughfare Gap public school, and with other supporters, Dean began raising funds and organizing support for the industrial school she envisioned. After selecting a site near Manassas, Dean and her supporters raised funds for the school, named Manassas Industrial School for Colored Youth. The school received its charter in October 1893. In 1894, the first students started classes and Frederick Douglass spoke at the dedication of Howland Hall, the first building completed. The Industrial School’s enrollment grew from six to seventy-five students within the first year. Courses offered included training for occupations such as dressmaking, blacksmithing, cooking and farming, as well as liberal arts classes. Dean served on the Board of Directors for the school and continued to raise funds for it until her death in 1913. Between 1938 and 1959, the Industrial school served as a regional segregated high school. Following its closure in 1959, the school building was demolished and a new elementary school built nearby. In 1994, the site was added to the National Register of Historic places, and in 1995 was designated Manassas Industrial School and Jennie Dean Memorial, part of the Manassas Museum System. In October 2020, a sculpture of Dean honoring her contributions was installed at the site. SOURCES “Jennie Dean,” Virginia Changemakers, accessed March 22, 2021, https://edu.lva.virginia.gov/changemakers/items/show/213. Peake, Laura Ann. 1995. "The Manassas Industrial School for Colored Youth, 1894-1916"Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects. Paper 1539625943. https://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21220/s2-44ct-vp36 3 Lewis, Stephen Johnson. 1994. Undaunted faith--: the life story of Jennie Dean : missionary, teacher, crusader, builder, founder of the Manassas Industrial School. Manassas, VA: Manassas Museum. Manassas Industrial School Fiftieth Anniversary Program, 1945 (SC 0151), Thomas Balch Library, Leesburg, VA. SCOPE AND CONTENT NOTE The collection consists of one program published for the fiftieth anniversary celebration of Manassas Industrial School, celebrated 20- 27 May 1945. The program contains a poem and essay in honor of school founder Jennie Dean, history of past principals and board members, and class photographs. Programs for the 1945 Baccalaureate and Commencement Programs are also included. The program was collected in a scrapbook by Velma Dunnaville Leigh (1924 - 2012), a Howard University Graduate who taught Home Economics in the DC public schools for twenty-eight years. This is the only item from the scrapbook that is in the collection. CONTAINER LIST SC 0151 Folder 1 Program, Manassas Industrial School Fiftieth Anniversary, 1945 4 .