Collections

This collection consists of a scrapbook compiled by Charles "Cookie" Walker documenting his athletic accomplishments while a student at both Lylburn Downing School in Lexington, Virginia and Virginia State College (now University) in Petersburg. The scrapbook includes rosters, school yells, photographs, clippings, certificates, and programs for sporting events. The scrapbook is dated 1948-1955. Due to its fragility, the scrapbook was disbound and pages foldered in effort to ensure its preservation. The front and back covers were kept.

A copy of an original photograph of students of the class of 1961 Lylburn Downing High School in Lexington, Virginia during their freshman year of 1957. Lylburn Downing School was an African - American school built in 1927. Student Amy Linette Tinsley is identified in the photograph.

This collection includes photographs, ephemera, clippings, correspondence, and printed material created and/or acquired by members of the Walker and Wood families, specifically Harry L. and Eliza Walker and their daughter Nannie and her husband Clarence. Subjects include the Walker-Wood Brothers meat and grocery business, the family home Blandome, properties owned by the families, First Baptist Church, and social organizations in Lexington and Roanoke such as the NAACP and the Virginia Federation of Colored Women. Several of the photographs date to the late 19th century and feature multiple generations of both families. Of particular note are photographs of Freedman's Hospital nurses and a unit of Buffalo soldiers. The families were very active in advocating for the education of African American children in Lexington, and this collection reflects that. The collection includes documents related to the advocacy for and development of Lylburn Downing School and the organization of the Home and School League.

Published lecture by retired professor John McKenzie Gunn, dated April 25, 1994; "Can Economics be Both Relevant and 'good'?"