By Clint Confehr
LAWRENCEBURG, TN — Belmont University students have designed options for renovation of West Gaines School where Black children were educated here until desegregation nearly 60 years ago.
Belmont University Architecture and Design College Professor Rebecca Moore — a 1990 Lawrence County High School graduate — says six of her students prepared several concepts for the West Gaines School Community Center Inc. (WGSCC), a non-profit group planning a community center.
Belmont students propose a classroom area to be restored like a Rosenwald School classroom. The design students’ proposals also include: a time-line of the building’s history; a community area where the gymnasium is; a music studio; a computer lab; a catering kitchen; reconfiguration of rest rooms; and, restoration to meet building codes, Moore said.
Belmont requires students to volunteer in community projects such as the WGSCC, the professor said. It’s to remind students that giving is important and mutually beneficial.
Development of a community center would be a new use for the nearly 90-year-old building where African-American children were taught for nearly three decades.
Before an April 23 gathering in St. John’s United Methodist Church — it’s on West Gains Street near the school — where the students’ were to display and deliver their renovation designs, Dr. Moore and WGSCC President James Wallace said restoration of the building’s outside and interior renovation ought to follow Rosenwald School designs.
Years ago, the building’s front and side doors were changed and should be rebuilt as they were, Moore said.
Area residents’ research indicates that West Gaines School might not have been built with Rosenwald Fund money, but its design is very similar to many Rosenwald Schools, named after Julius Rosenwald of Sears, Roebuck and Co., who collaborated with Tuskeegee Institute President Booker T. Washington to foster schools for Blacks. Across the South, restoration of historic schools has resulted in some being listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Few, if any, question that the building here stands as a witness to some American history.
Advocates for its preservation say the West Gains School could be a tourist attraction with a local history museum, and a potential place for Boys and Girls Club activities, an after school study hall, and a place for community meetings.
WGSCC leaders prefer modern energy-efficient windows, Moore said. West Gaines School’s original windows are in good shape, but need caulk, she said. Continued use of the original windows would be historically correct.
They might be a factor if the building is to be placed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Wallace says the building was owned by Lawrence County’s school board, but now the county has the deed. Various county leaders have been looking for a contractor to replace the building’s damaged roof. As previously reported, there are county leaders who want to give the building to WGSCC after the roof is repaired. The county can’t pay for work on private property, so if the building’s to be donated, then roof repair or replacement must be done before the building is donated. Wallace says a state law was changed a few years ago so local governments may give surplus property to non-profit organizations without a public auction.
Meanwhile, more than $5,000 were raised as a result of a WGSCC fundraising luncheon Feb. 24 at the Society American Nosherie restaurant on Lawrenceburg’s Public Square, Wallace said. The luncheon speaker, John Finch Nelson, discussed evolution of Blacks’ education, religions and businesses.
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