Roanoke city schools unveiled a state historical highway marker Friday honoring Lucy Addison, a pioneering teacher and administrator who transformed education for Black students.
Addison moved to Roanoke to teach in 1886, and later became principal at the segregated Harrison School, the city's first Black high school, when it opened in 1917. The city later named Lucy Addison High School for her when it opened in 1928. It was the first public building named for a resident.
Addison wasn't always the warmest teacher. At the marker dedication, historian Jordan Bell read from a Roanoke Times interview with his great grandmother, Robbie Board.
"In this interview, she talks about this Miss Addison. She says, 'She and I didn't get along too good,'" Bell read. "Robbie Board graduated from Harrison High School. She said about Lucy Addison, ‘She was very stern. She didn't put up with no foolishness. And she clapped her bony hands and called us in order.’"
Bell says that for all that, her students prove Addison's genius. Robbie Board became a champion of civil rights and desegregation in Roanoke. And Board's classmate, Oliver White Hill, Sr., led a lawsuit that was rolled into Brown v. Board of Education, which ended the "separate but equal" legal doctrine.
Roanoke school superintendent Verletta White says it's important to study and honor the legacy of individuals like Lucy Addison while looking forward to the future. She says Lucy Addison would be proud of her legacy in city schools today.
"Miss Addison, she was a pretty stern educator, and that she was very serious about education," White says. "I think if I had to predict what she would say today, I think she would be proud, proud of the legacy, proud of the work. I think she would say, continue to fight the good fight for education."
The marker was approved by the Virginia Department of Historic Resources and sits on across from Washington Park on Orange Avenue, just off Interstate 581.
