Browse Items (9 total)

The Colored Citizens Association was founded in September 1928 in Merrifield, Virginia. The sixteen founders, both male and female, chose three watchwords to represent their association, “Vigilance, Progress, and Cooperation.”  In 1941 the…

Mary Eliza Church Terrell (1863- 1954) was born to enslaved parents in Memphis, Tennessee. She received a BA and Master’s Degree from Oberlin College. In 1887, she moved to Washington, DC where she taught at the M Street Colored School in the Latin…

The Merrifield area originally known as Mills Crossing. It also was known as Williamstown. An African American community existed on the east side of Gallows Road roughly from Lee Highway in the north to south of the current Route 50 and what is now…

Roots of the group date to December 15, 1875. In 1946 a group of Masons moved away from their home lodges and formed a lodge at the First Baptist Church. Leaders of the movement were Charles R. Dale, the Rev. Wallace E. Costner, and the Rev. Columbus…

Historical MarkerThis Colonial Revival bungalow (part of 1724 1,279-acre Pearson Grant) bought by Dr. Edwin B. Henderson in 1913. Henderson's ancestors include Powhattan Chief Mimetou. In 1904 he was first African-American certified to teach physical…

Historical Marker Seizing Freedom and Facing Challenges You are standing across the street from land that Harriet Brice, a “free woman of color,” purchased in 1864. Together with her husband, George Brice, she struggled to farm the property during…

Reverend Cyrus Franklin Carter was born enslaved in 1815 in Port-as-Prince, Haiti. When he was a young child, his family was relocated to Lancaster County, Virginia, where he resided until enslaved people were emancipated during the Civil War. Along…

During the Depression, in 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration established the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) to help unemployed men, ages 18 to 25. CCC men created state parks, improved soil conservation, conducted reforestation…