FARMVILLE, VA. _ The Robert Russa Moton Museum will host a gala fundraiser and tribute to its major contributors on Friday, April 23, 2010 at the museum, located at 900 Griffin Boulevard in Farmville. Download the Invitation here.
Virginia Secretary of Education Gerard Robinson and Actor/Director Tim Reid will be special guest for the event scheduled from 7 pm until 10 pm and will also include the unveiling of the Moton 2011 capital project.
The film “Strike: April 23, 1951,” which Reid directed and produced, will also be premiered. The film was underwritten by the Dominion Foundation.
The movie is the dramatization of the day Moton students walked out to protest inferior conditions and took the first steps toward desegregation of the school system.
Students from Longwood University and Prince Edward County who appeared as extras in Reid’s film will host the event.
The Virginia Tobacco Commission and the National Education Association are among Moton’s major contributors being recognized for their support of Moton 2011: the Permanent Exhibition.
“Two years ago we promised to open the Moton museum’s permanent exhibit on the 60th anniversary of the student strike,” Museum Director Lacy Ward Jr. said. “With one year to go, we’re on track. So on April 23 this year, we’ll thank those sponsors whose investment in this community is making possible the realization of the museum’s vision and making possible proper acknowledgment of the vital role Prince Edward County’s citizens played in moving America from a segregated to an integrated society.
Organizers are sending out 1,000 invitations for the event, which is also open to the public and will have limited public seating.
The Robert Russa Moton Museum is located at 900 Griffin Boulevard, Farmville, Virginia. It is the site of the April 23, 1951 student walkout, led by 16-year-old sophomore Barbara Johns, in protest of inferior educational facilities. The Moton strike launched Prince Edward County’s 13-year struggle for Civil Rights in Education and resulted in the filing of Davis v. Prince Edward, which called for an end to racial segregation in public education. Davis was decided, along with four other cases, in the landmark 1954 Brown v. Board Supreme Court decision.
The museum is establishing a permanent exhibit that will trace Prince Edward County’s 13-year struggle to establish an integrated school system. The exhibition will be in place by April 23, 2011, the 60th anniversary of the student protest. It will offer the only place in the Commonwealth of Virginia where visitors can come to understand the processes by which citizens and their national, state, and local governments resolved the policy issues of segregation in public education. For more information visit the museum’s web site at https://motonmuseum.org <https://motonmuseum.org/> .
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My mother, Hilda Johnson, now Hilda J Cosby was the home economics teacher along with Mrs. Minnie MIller at Morton during the walk out. My mother is 82 years young and is currently the curator of The Museum in Memory of Virginia Estelle Randolph, located in Glen Allen, VA. She would love to be kept informed of the progress of the opening of the exhibit. Her address is 5901 Pouncey Tract Road Glen Allen, VA 23059.