A plan to save a childhood school led two Charlotte friends to a lost piece of history
When Mary Brown was 6 years old, she pricked her finger and pressed it against the hand of her best friend Berlinda Tolbert.
It symbolized their lifetime commitment and pledge to forever be sisters. It was also around the time, nearly six decades ago, when the two entered the Morgan School — a segregated elementary school for Black children in Charlotte’s Cherry neighborhood.
Growing up together in Cherry, they knew the neighborhood’s deep history and importance, Brown said. Years later, a community effort to preserve the historic Morgan School led Brown to learn her grandfather was among the first families to own property in Cherry.
“I am in awe of this Black man – my grandfather – who had a dream for more,” says Brown, who is now 73. “Both for himself and for his family.”
Cherry was platted in 1891, local historian Tom Hanchett wrote on his website. Brown’s maternal grandfather Jones Ross purchased property on Luther Street in 1901.
Almost all of Cherry’s residents were skilled or semi-skilled laborers in its first two decades, the website reads, save for Ross. He worked as a butler and drayman.
It was this research Tolbert, who is the same age as Brown, discovered in 2021 as she joined the preservation efforts. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, which owned the building, was weighing a decision to sell the building. So Tolbert researched the neighborhood to help show the building’s significance to the community.
When she saw the name Ross it sounded familiar.
“There could only be one Ross,” Tolbert said. “I knew Ella Ross (Brown’s mother) and then I thought is that her father?”
It wasn’t until she spoke with her aunt Juanita Tolbert that she made the connection. Her aunt recalled the man of many trades, she said. The two families had known each other for years.
Tolbert went on to an acting career in television, starring on CBS sitcom “The Jeffersons.” Brown became a beautician and entrepreneur. But the two always kept their sisterhood, Tolbert said.
Brown said she had no clue her family’s history in Cherry went back to the neighborhood’s beginning. She knew her grandfather as a caring man. During the Great Depression, he collected canned goods to share with those in need, she said.
Ross’ penchant for helping others was well known, says Tolbert. When a child in Cherry fell into a mini-swamp he used his horse and bed wagon to save her, she said. He then collected gravel, straw and rocks to fill the swamp so no other child would fall in.
“Her grandfather became like a hero in Cherry,” Tolbert said.
Brown said it was inspiring to learn her grandfather owned property at the turn of the 20th century despite the barriers he faced back then. And finding out was all thanks to her best friend, Brown said.
“I would never have known all this information about my grandfather and his historical footprint that’s on Cherry,” Brown said.
Connecting history
Kernels of history that are still being discovered is why preservation is key, Tolbert said. Cherry’s drive to see the structure of Morgan School is about honoring the history of the school and the legacy of Cherry residents like Ross, she said.
“These buildings are about people and people’s lives and investments,” Tolbert said.
Sylvia Bittle-Patton, a Cherry native, said the Cherry Community Organization (CCO) wants a historic designation for both Morgan School and Cherry Park. The park is the first built for African Americans in Charlotte, Bittle-Patton said. The CCO itself is one of the oldest community development corporations in the city, she added.
“It’s a lot of history here,” Bittle-Patton, whose mother Yvonne Bittle co-founded CCO, said.
Cherry organizers have fought to preserve the building since the school’s closure in 1968. The goal is to turn the building into a multi-purpose facility for the Cherry community, Tolbert said.
In March, lawmaker Kelly Alexander Jr., who represents the 107th District in the N.C. House, filed a bill to support the purchase of the building. The bill asks for $4.9 million from the state’s historic preservation foundation to support the purchase.
But it’s about more than just a building, Brown said. It preserves a historical root in a community.
It’s the connective tissue that will lead others to learn about Cherry residents like Ross.
“It’s not too late to stop destroying African American history,” she said.
This story was originally published May 8, 2023 at 7:00 AM.
