Pursuit of Liberty: New Insights into Prince Edward County’s School Desegregation Struggle

In commemoration of Barbara Rose Johns Day, Dr. Brian Daugherity will discuss recently conducted archival research related to school desegregation and the civil rights era in Prince Edward County, Virginia. Dr. Daugherity will show and discuss new information that sheds light on, and raises additional questions about, the steps leading to Brown v. Board of Education, and about segregationist resistance to school desegregation in the county. Dr. Brian Daugherity is a professor of history at Virginia Commonwealth University. His research focuses on the implementation of the Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision in Virginia. Dr. Daugherity has published and edited many works including With All Deliberate Speed: Implementing Brown v. Board of Education (2008), Keep On Keeping On: The NAACP and the Implementation of Brown v. Board of Education in Virginia (2016), and A Little Child Shall Lead Them: A Documentary Account of the Struggle for School Desegregation in Prince Edward County, Virginia (2019). He is currently co-producing a 60- minute documentary film on the historic Green v. New Kent County (1968) U.S. Supreme Court decision. Following the lecture, guests are encouraged to view the maquette of the Barbara Rose Johns statue that represents Virginia in the United States Capitol’s Statuary Hall.