Speaker 1: Be out here and being a product of Winston Salem
Speaker 1: State University, I thought I was very familiar with Virginia
Speaker 1: Union University. I mean, we played the Panthers in football, basketball,
Speaker 1: all the sports. Highly competitive. I mean you could almost
Speaker 1: say they're our rivals. But what I didn't know was
Speaker 1: that Virginia Union went from incarcerating black folks to educating
Speaker 1: black folks sorta.
Speaker 2: I didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. I
Speaker 2: didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know.
Speaker 1: To understand how Virginia Union was founded, you got to
Speaker 1: know who Robert Lumpkin and Mary are. See in the
Speaker 1: eighteen thirties, Robert Lumpkin he purchased Mary when she was
Speaker 1: a child. By the time she was thirteen, she had
Speaker 1: given birth to Rob's first child. Then she messed around
Speaker 1: and gave him Foma. Robert Lumpkin was twenty seven years
Speaker 1: older than Mary. That mean when she was thirteen having
Speaker 1: his first child, oh Rob with forty. In eighteen forty four,
Speaker 1: Rob bought a jail called Lumpkins Jail. They said it
Speaker 1: was one of the seven most cruel prisons in the South.
Speaker 1: They gave it a nickname The Devil's half Acre. In
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty six, Rob died. See by then Mary and
Speaker 1: her kids were living in Philadelphia. They relocated there during
Speaker 1: the Civil War. But in his will, Rob left the
Speaker 1: jail to Mary. But she ain't wanting to do with
Speaker 1: that prison. So along came an abolitionist minister. His name
Speaker 1: was Nathaniel Cover, and he was looking for a space
Speaker 1: to start a seminary for formerly enslaved individuals, and Mary
Speaker 1: very gladly leased him to land. See, the northern teachers
Speaker 1: of that time, they found it necessary not just to
Speaker 1: educate the former enslaved individuals, but the white folks in
Speaker 1: the South that hadn't been educated to the same degree
Speaker 1: as the white folks in the North as well. Now
Speaker 1: this is all post Civil War. So once Clove gets
Speaker 1: a hold of the Devil's half Acre, his workers going
Speaker 1: there and tear up all the cells. They take the
Speaker 1: bars off, and they turned the sales into classrooms. There
Speaker 1: they started teaching black kids and birthed Richmond Theological Schools
Speaker 1: of Freedmen.
Speaker 2: It even got a new.
Speaker 1: Nickname, from the Devil's half Acre to God's half Acre.
Speaker 1: The Richmond Theological School of Freedman became the first institution
Speaker 1: of higher education for black folks in Virginia. In nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty two, they merged with the first College of African
Speaker 1: American Women in Virginia and became one of the first
Speaker 1: established HBCUs Virginia Union University.
Speaker 2: And I didn't know.
Speaker 1: Maybe you didn't either.
Speaker 2: No,