FIGHTING TO PRESERVE Black History - Black universities and colleges need money to renovate historic buildings

Black Issues in Higher Education, July 20, 2000 by Jacqueline Conciatore

Years after congressional appropriations were made and public awareness has faded, Black college officials still are struggling to restore historic properties

TALLADEGA, Ala. -- Ask Talladega College President Dr. Marguerite Archie-Hudson about historic-building renovations needed on her campus set here amidst the hills and valleys of this suburban Southern town and she recites a litany: Swayne, Foster and Andrews halls. DeForest Chapel. The president's house. The library.

Many of the Black college's historic buildings are on the National Register of Historic Places, or are eligible for inclusion. Fifteen are 100 years old or close to that.

"We could use $25 million easily to restore and preserve these buildings," she says.

And that's just a small part of the bigger picture. A few years ago, the Congressional Black Caucus asked the General Accounting Office to estimate the cost of restoring and preserving historically significant properties on historically Black college and university campuses. The resulting 1998 survey estimated that $755 million would be required for 712 properties. About half the properties were already on the National Register, while almost a third had been named eligible by state historic preservation officers.

Many of the schools had funds set aside to restore the buildings, but their reserves--$60 million -- amounted to only a tiny fraction of the estimate.

Despite the sizable cost projection, Congress was not moved to provide much funding. It rejected a bill, supported by the Black Caucus, that would have authorized the $755 million. But Congress has appropriated nearly $21 million of $29 million it approved in 1996 for historic preservation at HBCUs.

Now, four years later, many of the buildings that hold invaluable Black history within their crumbling and aged walls still have yet to be restored. Officials say it's hard to raise the necessary money, and sometimes even more difficult to raise awareness of why efforts should be placed into restoring old buildings in the first place.

But, says Rep. James E. Clyburn, D-S.C., -- often heralded as the biggest champion of historic building preservation on Black campuses -- "many of the structures and sites on [HBCU] campuses are in jeopardy of being lost forever."

Getting the Grants

There's no denying the huge need for restoration of historic properties at HBCUs, but it's unrealistic to expect a $700-million subsidy, says Cecil McKithan, chief of the National Register programs division with the National Park Service. "We're blessed to receive the amount we have," he says.

The 1996 Omnibus Parks Act was earmarked for about a dozen schools, many in districts of lawmakers who pushed through the authorization. Talladega won two grants totaling $1.36 million. Like all recipients, the school must match the dollars to receive them.

Institutions located within Clyburn's district have benefited as well. Allen University in Columbia, for example, won almost $1 million in federal monies -- which it had to match -- to restore the 110-year-old Arnett Hall. Claflin College in Orangeburg, S.C., won $1,000,000 and has completed work on Minister's Hall, which was closed after a fire. And Voorhees College in Denmark, S.C., received a $2,000,000 grant.

Elsewhere, renovation projects are under way at Fisk University in Nashville, Knoxville Business College in Knoxville, Tenn., and Stillman College in Tuscaloosa, Ala. Not all of the funded work has begun, because some schools still are raising the matching dollars.

In addition to the 12 schools awarded money in the '96 appropriation, there are 11 others with funds from earlier congressional appropriations; they have the help of the College Fund/UNCF in raising matching dollars.

A Parallell History

On many campuses, buildings most in need of repair are the original school facilities -- and their history parallels that of African American higher education.

Archie-Hudson relates the history of two Talladega buildings: Swayne Hall and the library. Swayne Hall was built around 1852 as an academy for White males. The chief builder, William Savery, was a master carpenter and slave who led construction of the building noted for its two identical three-story circular staircases.

During the Civil War, Union soldiers used the hall as a prison. In 1867, Savery called upon missionaries and a local freedmen's official to buy it. They did, and he founded Talladega.

Talladega's library, named after Savery, went up in 1939. It was dedicated on the hundredth anniversary of the Amistad Revolt as a commemoration of the first civil rights case in the country, Archie-Hudson says. It includes a mural, painted by Hale Woodruff, depicting scenes of the on-board slave revolt, the subsequent trial and finally the victorious Mendians returning to Africa.

On many campuses, students and faculty constructed the original buildings. In 1900-01, Maj. Richard R. Wright, the first president of Georgia State Industrial in Savannah, built Hill Hall with five faculty members and eight students. Later to become Savannah State University, the school was Georgia's first public Black college, says humanities professor and school historian Dr. Charles J. Elmore.