African Academy (Baltimore)

African Academy, the first permanent school in Baltimore, Maryland for African Americans. It was located at 112–116 Sharp Street, between Lombard and Pratt.[1][2]

There was an initial attempt to operate the African Academy beginning in 1797, when a group of black Methodists received support from the Maryland Society for the Abolition of Slavery,[3] specifically involving Elisha Tyson and his brother Jesse Tyson.[1] The school and meetinghouse was opened on what is now Saratoga Street (previously Fish Street), but after a few months they were forced to leave the building due to insufficient funds.[3] The meetinghouse congregation was affiliated with the Lovely Lane Meeting House until 1802.[2][4]

Having acquired sufficient funds, the African Methodist Episcopal Church and the African Academy were established on Sharp Street in 1802[3] by the Colored Methodist Society, at which time the congregation separated from the Lovely Lane Meeting House.[2][4] Daniel Coker, who was the school headmaster until 1817,[5] established the Bethel Charity School in 1807. It was sponsored by the Colored Methodist Society.[3] Children from Baltimore and Washington, D.C. attended the school.[4] In 1817, Coker became the pastor of the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church on Saratoga Street, east of Holliday Street, and operated the school at that location.[3] By the 1820s, there were 150 students in attendance.[4]

Daniel Coker, a founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church,[2] was also the lead teacher of the congregation until 1817.[5] In 1860, a new church was built on the same site. A Gothic style church, named the Sharp Street Memorial United Methodist Church and Community House, was built on Dolphin and Etting Streets in 1898.[2]

References
  1. Rasmussen, Frederick N. (February 16, 2002). "Abolitionist rose to free city slaves until dying day". Baltimore Sun. Retrieved March 11, 2020.
  2. Arnett, Earl; Brugger, Robert J.; Papenfuse, Edward C. (1999-05-03). Maryland: A New Guide to the Old Line State. JHU Press. pp. 281. ISBN 978-0-8018-5980-9.
  3. "1831-1884: Abolition and Emancipation". Baltimore’s Civil Rights Heritage. Retrieved March 11, 2020.
  4. Halpin, Dennis Patrick (2019-05-01). A Brotherhood of Liberty: Black Reconstruction and Its Legacies in Baltimore, 1865-1920. University of Pennsylvania Press. p. 13. ISBN 978-0-8122-9621-1.
  5. Chavis, Charles L. (February 24, 2015). "Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, Baltimore, Maryland (1785- )". Retrieved March 11, 2020.

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