Carver 4-County Museum

Dear Friends:

We are excited to participate for the third time in GiveLocal Piedmont -- ESPECIALLY during our 75th Jubilee year.  We are asking for your generous donations to make the museum ADA compliant, purchase a digital kiosk, and complete the filming and editing of our documentary to be presented in October this year.  

Our organization is honoring the opening of the George Washington Carver Regional High School in 1948, and its transformation in 2023 into a vital community asset.  We are celebrating the four counties we serve (Culpeper, Madison, Rappahannock and Orange) by having a major event in each.  

HAPPENED ALREADY

We began at The Carver Center in December with a consecration ceremony, announcement of our overall theme, "Telling Our Story," and unveiling of our 2023 commemorative calendar.  

February 19th, in Madison, at Madison Fire House, we held a luncheon under the theme, "Telling Our Story: Let the Music Play."   It honored Carver's band program and some of its students who developed a jazz band while Carver students, and continued in professional music after graduation.

April 16th, in Orange, at Sweet Vines Farm Winery, we hosted a program under the theme, "Telling Our Story: Teach the Children."  Orange had a rich tradition of education for minority children that carried through to the opening of Carver.

UPCOMING

July 29th, in Rappahannock at Amissville Fire House, we will have an Ol' Fashion Picnic under the theme, "Telling Our Story - On the Bus," because students from this county had the longest route to travel to Carver.  

September 16-17, in Culpeper at The Carver Center, we will partner with the Carver Agricultural Research Center and Minority & Veteran Farmers on the annual farm tour under the theme, "Telling Our Story - Till the Soil."

October 21st is our Jubilee Gala in Culpeper at the Germanna Joseph R. Daniel Technology Center. We are proud to announce that our keynote speaker is Dr. Belle Smith Wheelan.  She is:

-  President and CEO, Southern Association of Colleges and Schools' Commission on Colleges

-  Former Virginia Secretary of Education in Governor Mark Warner's administration

-  Newly inducted into the Hall of Fame of the American Association of Community Colleges

NEW AND EXCITING

• Being A Citizen, our NEW traveling exhibit, is ready.  Generously supported by the Power of Change grant through the Rappahannock Electric Cooperative, the exhibit examines acts of citizenship by Carver's administration, faculty and students while legally, minorities were not considered citizens.  This is examined in the context of the 1954 U. S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education and subsequent challenges.  It ends by asking the question, "What are YOU doing to improve your community?  To schedule Being a Citizen at your venue, email our curator at carver4cm@gmail.com. 
• Renovation at The Carver Center is underway.  We are anxiously awaiting the restoration of the original name to the building.   

     The Carver 4-County Museum is one of two programs ("Scholarships" is the other) of the George Washington Carver Regional High School Alumni Association (GWCRHSAA).  Officially opened in February, 2019, the museum is a manifestation of the mission:

     To document, celebrate and share the educational, social, cultural and military history and accomplishments of students, faculty and administrators of George Washington Carver Regional High School, the only institution of secondary education that served minority children in the four-county region of Culpeper, Madison, Orange and Rappahannock counties from 1948-1968.

     Our museum is located in the original library of the school, now called The Carver Center.  We are administered by the all-volunteer History Committee of the GWCRHSAA (members listed below) who now serve as our board of directors.  Since 2016, they have contracted with a curator who helps to execute our mission through exhibit preparation and marketing.

OUR ADMINISTRATION   

     The members of the museum's governing board are:  Dr. Hortense Hinton-Jackson (President); Alan G. Johnson (Vice President); Jane C. Pollard (Secretary); Charlotte B. Carpenter (Treasurer); Marlene G. Ware (Social Media Coordinator); J. Hubert Jackson; Charles C. Jameson; William H. Lewis; Myra C. Williams; and Rev. Frank D. Lewis, Sr. (Chair, GWCRHSAA, ex officio). 

     Our curator is Ms. Terry Miller.  

     We invite you to visit us on our website at http://www.carver4cm.org, email us at carver4cm@gmail.com, and like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/Carver4cm.