James E. Guinn School
Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas
Marker Inscription
After Fort Worth public schools were organized in the fall of 1882, black students continued to be taught in black churches for more than a year. The city completed a schoolhouse for blacks on E. 9th Street at Elm in December 1883. The son of a former slave, James Elvis Guinn was born in Fort Worth. Though neither of them could read nor write, his parents placed a great value on education, and James attended Fort Worth's early schools for blacks. He later pursued a college degree and became a professor of chemistry at Prairie View College, now Prairie View A&M University. Guinn returned to Fort Worth as principal of South Side Colored School in 1900. Construction of a new three-story brick school building, designed by the prominent architectural firm of Sanguinet and Staats, began at the corner of Louisiana and Rosedale Avenues in April 1917. Shortly before its completion, Guinn died on July 11, 1917. Six days later the school board voted to name the new school building James E. Guinn School in his honor. It was the largest black school in Fort Worth in 1930. After sixty-three years of service it, it was closed in 1980. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
When Fort Worth organized its public schools in 1882, Black children were first taught in churches before the city built segregated schoolhouses. James Elvis Guinn, the son of formerly enslaved parents who prized the education they never had, rose to become a chemistry professor at Prairie View before returning home to lead the South Side Colored School. The grand three-story brick school begun in 1917 was named in his honor days after his death, and it grew into the largest Black school in the city.
Why it matters
The school embodies the determination of Black Texans to build institutions of learning in the teeth of Jim Crow segregation, and it honors an educator who turned the barest beginnings into a lifetime of teaching.
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Related people
- · James Elvis Guinn
Themes & tags
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