Birthday wish saves Harvey Colored School
Annie Wilson Mosby's birthday request has resulted in the preservation of Harvey Colored School in Pittsylvania County.
Monday, August 5, 2013
When Annie Wilson Mosby thinks about growing up in the Callahan’s Hill neighborhood of Pittsylvania County, she thinks about where she went to school: Harvey Colored School.
The simple, one-room, white building, topped by a red tin roof, once sat back off U.S. 58, near the line that separates the county from Danville. Annie said the school closed in June 1964, when schools were integrated. She and the other black children in the neighborhood then went to Stony Mill Elementary.
The years passed. Annie married her husband, St. Elmo, and moved to California, but returned to the Danville area often to visit friends and family. The school building was used as a place to store tobacco, Annie said.
As her 57th birthday approached, St. Elmo asked what she would like as a gift.
“Never mind a diamond ring,” Annie said, with a big smile. “I wanted the school.”
Annie had talked to the property owner — former Danville City Attorney Ewell Barr — about purchasing the building and moving it to family property on Callahan Hill, but their discussion ended when Barr died in 2002. His widow, Lamar Barr, finalized the deal by selling the building — no land — to Annie for $1,500 in 2003.
“I knew he liked the idea, so it was fine with me,” Lamar Barr said. “I think it’s great. Annie’s done a wonderful job and [has] been very persistent.”
It took another decade for it all to come together. Annie formed the Harvey School Historical Society and tried doing fundraising to cover the cost of moving the building, but they weren’t very successful.
“It took more time to beg than to work and earn the money,” Annie said.
Finally, last September she decided she needed to get the project done.
“I was going to be 67. If I didn’t do it now … ,” her voice trailed off.
St. Elmo agreed, noting that passing time also meant there were fewer classmates alive to appreciate it.
“When she started out, there were 15 former schoolmates; now there are just five [of the oldest classmates] left,” St. Elmo said.
It was a lot of hard work, but now the building has been reassembled in the back yard of the home Annie grew up in.
“Last year, at this time, it was setting in the woods,” Annie said. “We pulled it apart plank by plank, numbered them all and hauled it here.”
It looks the same, she said, right down to not having any underpinning beneath the building.
“We froze in the winter and were scorched in the summer,” Annie said.
The reunion for former Harvey Colored School students has been scheduled for 1 p.m. Aug. 10. Annie said admission is a contribution to the potluck picnic — “Share your favorite food,” Annie said. “And bring a lawn chair.”
Annie said she doesn’t plan on many public tours — she said laws about operating such a business are complicated and costly — but she expects the building will get good use from family and friends.
“Everybody on the [Callahan] Hill is my family. It will be a place for us all to get together,” Annie said. “It’s been in the woods unused for 50 years. I’m going to use it — I think it’s rested long enough.”
For more information, call Annie Mosby at 434-685-7456 or 707-246-4708.
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