The Tredyffrin The Tredyffrin EasttownEasttown

‘‘School Fight’School Fight’1932 – 19341932 – 1934

Presented by Roger D. ThornePresented by Roger D. ThorneTredyffrin Easttown History ClubTredyffrin Easttown History Club

Across the pedestrian bridge connecting Lancaster and Cassett Avenues in Berwyn, a structure built in 1917 was originally called the

Berwyn Theater. Seating was segregated through the 1930s.

The Robinson Wellburn Elks Lodge 791, on Lancaster Avenue in Berwyn. Built in the 1950s, it operated as an active lodge for

people of color for almost 50 years.

Wilmer K. Groff

W. K. Groff was born in Limerick, PA in 1880, He received his B.S. degree

from the University of Pennsylvania and a M.S.

degree from Lafayette College.

He came to Berwyn in 1926 as principal of the Easttown

Elementary Schools.

In 1931 he was made Superintendent of the entire

Tredyffrin and Easttown townships and the T/E High School, the position he held

at his death in 1941.

March 7, 1932 – Two Agreements were consummated between Tredyffrin and Easttown School Districts

Agreement #1: • The Tredyffrin School District will abandon and discontinue the use of its North Berwyn School.

• The Tredyffrin School District makes application to Easttown District to permit certain pupils from specified parts of Tredyffrin Township to be assigned to and enrolled in the new Easttown Elementary School now under construction, for a specified fee per pupil, effective July 4, 1932

The North Berwyn School was built as a one-room schoolhouse on the southeast corner of what is today Conestoga and Cassett Roads in 1892.

Later additions enlarged it to contain four classrooms. The school operated until 1932, when it was closed. The old North Berwyn School was then

renovated and a second floor added. In 1936 it was again used, this time by the T / E High School for its vocational and art departments. Today, it

houses the Maintenance Department of the T/E Schools.

March 7, 1932 – Two Agreements were consummated between Tredyffrin and Easttown School Districts

Agreement #1: • The Tredyffrin School District will abandon and discontinue the use of its North Berwyn School.

• The Tredyffrin School District makes application to Easttown District to permit certain pupils from specified parts of Tredyffrin Township to be assigned to and enrolled in the new Easttown Elementary School now under construction, for a specified fee per pupil, effective July 4, 1932.

In 1930 the school authorities in Easttown decided to build a modern consolidated school They acquired a tract of land on the south side of

First Avenue, east of Bridge Street in Berwyn, and began construction of a new Easttown Elementary School. The new school was first occupied in

the fall of 1932. The school was closed in 1977 and converted to administrative space for the Tredyffrin / Easttown school district.

March 7, 1932 – Two Agreements were consummated between Tredyffrin and Easttown School Districts

Agreement # 2:

• The Tredyffrin School District reaffirms its desire to abandon and discontinue the use of its North Berwyn School.

• The Tredyffrin School District agreed to establish and maintain together with Easttown District a school now owned by Easttown District and currently called Easttown Primary School [to be renamed the Lincoln Highway School], for the joint use in the instruction of certain pupils of both Townships. The Tredyffrin School District agrees to pay its share of operating expenses to the Easttown District plus a lease fee per year. Agreement effective July 4, 1932.

A new Berwyn Primary School was built in 1912 on Lancaster Avenue at Central and Walnut Avenues, in the next block west of an older Grammar

School closed in 1926. In 1932 the Tredyffrin School Board leased the vacated Berwyn Primary School from the Easttown authorities. The school was refurbished and renamed the Lincoln Highway School, and continued

in operation until 1939. It is currently a private office building.

March 10, 1932 - The Main Line Daily Times

Townships Will Provide Exclusive Colored Schools

". . . Easttown, and Tredyffrin Townships are two Townships which have not had Colored schools. This has probably been due to the fact that neither of them heretofore had a sufficiently large Negro population. In my opinion [this] decision is the largest step forward that Berwyn has taken in the last 25 years. It's a shame that [our townships have] been stagnated by inadequate schools and the policy of mixing the races therein!"

The first public meeting to protest the joint school board’s decision was held on March 16, 1932 in the United American Protestant Association Hall located at the corner of Bridge St. and Lancaster Road in Berwyn. Primus Crosby of Berwyn presided. At the close, a petition was written for signatures from the

black community to be taken to the Easttown School Board.

Primus L. Crosby

Primus L. Crosby was born in Alabama in 1884, attended

Tuskegee Institute and studied under Booker T. Washington. He left Alabama for Pennsylvania in

1918, and his wife Jessye and twin daughters Bessie and Essie joined

him later.

Although a printer by profession, and the only black businessman in Berwyn, Crosby was also a lumber grader for C. A. Loeb & Co., Devon,

and worked for the American Bronze Co., Berwyn.

He and his family moved to Maple Avenue, Berwyn in 1924 where he

lived until his death in 1980.

May 5, 1932 - Easttown School District Minutes -

After consulting with members of the Tredyffrin and Easttown Boards, the Easttown School District instructed the Secretary ‘to notify Mr. Primus L.

Crosby, Chairman, also Mr. Powell and Mr. Tyre as follows’;

"The action of this Board in adopting the plans which you protest was taken only after careful and mature consideration in the sincere belief that ultimately they will work to the best advantage of every pupil.

We feel that you should show sufficient confidence in your Board to enable it to make a fair trial of this plan for the three years to which it is committed.

Once the plan is in operation your Board believes that the results will prove entirely satisfactory to all our citizens.

Relying upon your cooperation, we remain”

Raymond Pace Alexander was a Philadelphian born in 1897, the first black graduate of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, class of 1920,

and a 1923 graduate of the Harvard Law School. By 1932 he had been in practice for 9 years.

An original school building in the Mt. Pleasant section of Wayne was built in 1867 and finally razed in 1903. The new, stone Mt. Pleasant School

building was built upon the same site. This new school was used until the 1940s. The building, located at 1008 Upper Gulph Road across from the

Radnor Country Club, has been renovated and is now an office complex.

Built in 1861, the old chapel of Mount Zion A.M.E. Church in Devon originally served an African-American enclave known

as Quigley Town

The interior of the old chapel of Mount Zion A.M.E. Church in Devon. During the ‘school fight’ it served as a primary meeting hall for the

black community from both townships.

The original cover page for one of the two PETITIONS OF

MANDAMUS, notarized October 8, 1932 and signed by Raymond Pace

Alexander

An old school at the corner of Upper Gulph and West Valley Roads was replaced in 1930 by a new, larger Strafford School built upon a piece of

adjoining property. The school served for fifty years until it was closed in 1981. The private Woodlynde School now occupies the site.

March 9, 1933

Mr. Robert G. Ligget,

Secretary, Tredyffrin Township School Board

Berwyn, Pennsylvania

 

Dear Mr. Ligget:

 

It has come to my attention that since about the first day of October, 1932, your school district has refused or neglected to enforce the compulsory attendance provisions of the school laws in the district, and that as a result a large number of children of compulsory school age in your district have not attended school since that date.

 

Therefore, you are hereby notified that on Monday, March 27th, 1933, at 3:50 o'clock, P. M, I will hold a hearing in my office in the Education Building, State Capitol, Harrisburg, at which your Board is required to appear and show cause, if any you have, why the State appropriation allotted to your school district should not be forfeited as provided by Section 1431 of the School Code of 1911, as amended by the Act of May 2, 1921, P. L. 1034.

 

Very truly yours,

 

JAMES N. RULE

The Salem School was built in 1863 on the western end of Yellow Springs Road, one of two schools built to replace the Diamond Rock School which

closed the same year. This school was made up of an original one-story structure and an adjoining two-story frame building. The Salem School was

closed in 1939. The buildings are currently owned by private owners.

The Paoli Elementary School replaced an original building built in 1902 on the east side of South Valley Road. This new modern grammar school, built in 1927, located on the north side of the railroad at the corner of Fennerton Road and Central Avenue in Paoli, remained in service until 1981. It is now

operated as the Delaware Valley Friends School.

Truancy Fine SchedulePayable by Parents of Absent Pupils

October 1933

• First Offense - $1.00 (equates to $43.00 in today’s dollars.

• Second and subsequent Offenses - $2.50 (equates to $105.00 in today’s dollars.

Raymond Pace Alexanderdescribes the grinding legal battle:

“. . . for two long years, battling in Chester County, rebuffed; then to Harrisburg to the Attorney General of Pennsylvania for state supported mandamus, then returning to Chester County, back to Harrisburg and innumerable trips — all at night — at least 50 in all — to take testimony in various churches . . .”.

A Short Summary of the Life and Activities of Raymond Pace Alexander

March 17, 1934

Dear Mr. Cobb:

I hope you will forgive my long delay in replying to your very kind letter of March 10. I am willing to do anything in my power to try to settle the unfortunate difference between the School Board and the parents. I am today writing to the Attorney for the School Board to see what can be done. I appreciate immensely the spirit of your letter and would be more than delighted if I could be of real service in bringing about an adjustment.

 

Sincerely,

William Schnader

State Attorney General, (Pa.)

The Coatesville RecordMay 1, 1934

“Tredyffrin township's segregated school controversy ended yesterday when Negro boys and girls and white children attended the same schools.  

Announcement was made by Raymond Pace Alexander, colored attorney representing the parents of more than 220 Negro children who refused to attend schools specially designated for them, that the joint school boards of Easttown and Tredyffrin townships had notified him yesterday that the segregated system would be done away with at once. 

Alexander, in turn, sent notice to the parents that they should send their children to school yesterday morning, and a check up showed that nearly all of the parents had compiled.”

 

The Tredyffrin The Tredyffrin EasttownEasttown

‘‘School Fight’School Fight’1932 - 19341932 - 1934

8 Minute Bell Questions:

• When did the “School Fight” occur?• What did the TE School Board want to do?• What buildings were involved?• Who were the leaders of the School Fight?• What did the black community do to fight

back?• How did they break the “jailing cycle”?• How was the fight resolved?