Mary Mcleod Bethune School # 157

Shuttered-Corner of West 33rd and Pearce Street. 1955

The Duval County School Board purchased 14 acres of land in 1955. An elementary school was built and named Mary McLeod Bethune.  It opened, and operated for over forty years, closing in 2001 due to concerns of contaminated property. 

The land had once been known as Brown’s Dump located at 4330 Pearce Street which included some 50 acres. The school had been built on a parcel of that land.

In talking with Anthony who lives behind the school on Bessie Street, the land was tilled, new dirt brought in and the area cleaned up which he said he watched over the years from his own back yard. The school remains closed and use of the property is still being discussed in 2023.  There is a “for sale” sign on the corner of the land.

In happier days, the school was a welcome organization when it was built in the mid 1950’s offering hope for the future of the children in the area.  It’s name sake had a history of giving and caring which honoured the community.

Mary McLeod Bethune was born in South Carolin on July 10, 1875. She died in Daytona Beach on May 18, 1955 and is buried there in Volusia County, Fl. She is credited with having been an educator, and “most influential” woman.  In 2022, a statue of her was unveiled in the National Statuary Hall inside of the United States Capitol.

 The National Women’s History Museum wrote the following about Mary Mcleod Bethune:

“In 1904, her marriage ended, and determined to support her son, Bethune opened a boarding school, the Daytona Beach Literary and Industrial School for Training Negro Girls. Eventually, Bethune’s school became a college, merging with the all-male Cookman Institute to form Bethune-Cookman College in 1929.”

The school merged with the Cookman Institute of Jacksonville in 1923 thus known as the “Bethune-Cookman University”.

Florida Memory notes that when she began her school she had “$1.50 in her pocket.”

See you tomorrow,

Nan

Sources: Wikipedia, Florida Memory, Duval Public School system post re:” “Browns Dump”, Personal visit

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