The Charlotte Hawkins Brown Museum at the Historic Palmer Memorial Institute

(prepared for www.backporch.org)

Drive east out of Greensboro toward Burlington and about half way there you will enter the recently incorporated town of Sedalia, North Carolina. Within the town limits of Sedalia is the site one of the most truly remarkable institutions in the history of Guilford County, and a story of one amazing woman, Dr. Charlotte Hawkins Brown.

The site is that of the Charlotte Hawkins Brown Museum at Historic Palmer Memorial Institute.

When one thinks of the most important and influential people and institutions in the history of Guilford County, this official State of North Carolina Historic Site celebrates a person and place that should be in anyone’s “final four.”

The subtitle of the definitive work on Dr. Brown and the Palmer Institute (for sale at the gift shop) really encapsulates the inspirational nature of visiting this historic site: “what one young African American woman could do.”

The story of Charlotte Hawkins Brown and the Palmer Institute is the story of how one person, committed to the well being of a community and a people, can make a profound difference in the lives of others. It is a story to inspire the best in all of us.

She was born a Lottie Hawkins in 1883 in Henderson North Carolina, later to change her name to Charlotte Hawkins. To escape the pressures and injustices of the Jim Crow era, and for the sake of opportunity, her family moved to Cambridge Massachusetts in 1888. There Lottie was able to receive a solid education at Allston Grammar School, Cambridge English High School, and Salem State Normal School. Her drive, personality, and intelligence caught the eye of many, including Alice Freeman Palmer, who would help Lottie in her education, and to whom Charlotte Hawkins would later dedicate her new school in North Carolina.

Young eighteen year old Charlotte Hawkins arrived in what is present day Sedalia in 1901 with an assignment from the American Missionary Society to teach at the Bethany Institute, a struggling school in the small predominantly African American community. Soon after her arrival the Association decided to close the school after one term, yet Charlotte Hawkins, encouraged by members of the community to stay, saw opportunity across the street (now Highway 70) in an old blacksmith’s shop, and soon had raised the money from friends and associates back in New England to open the Palmer Memorial Institute, a day school and boarding school, named after her mentor back in Cambridge Mass.

Charlotte Hawkins, soon to become Charlotte Hawkins Brown, would go on to lead and guide the Palmer Institute for over fifty years.

It is worth the better part of a morning or afternoon to walk the large campus, read the various signs about the many buildings, and take a tour of “Canary House,” Mrs. Brown’s home, restored much as the way it was (including furniture) when Dr. Brown lived and entertained there. There is a short video which excellently captures the spirit of Dr. Brown and the school. What is so impressive is the ongoing ripple effect of the school in communities far and wide, as graduates of the Palmer Institute have themselves gone on to make a difference in places far and near.

Dr. Charlotte Hawkins Brown ran the Palmer Institute for 50 years touching the lives of countless young men and women. Her story should be told, made into a movie, and proclaimed abroad, for it is a truly inspirational story of what one person can do.

I am very happy to have learned that the State of North Carolina has budgeted money for the upgrading of the site, including the renovation of some of the central buildings. That should provide even greater access to this great place, and great story.

You can read all about the Charlotte Hawkins Brown Museum, and get directions to the Historic Site, by going to their outstanding web site - http://www.ah.dcr.state.nc.us/sections/hs/chb/chb.htm.

Wikipedia has an interesting article on Charlotte Hawkins Brown here.