23/54 PROJECT

Celebrating Black Appalachian Community

About the Project

Background

In 1947, 23 courageous parents from Pulaski County joined Dr. Percy Corbin in filing a lawsuit against the Pulaski County School Board, demanding better educational facilities for 54 Black children. The case, Corbin et al. v. County School Board of Pulaski County, resulted in a successful outcome in 1949 and marked a significant step in the ongoing struggle for educational equality. This local effort also contributed to the growing momentum that culminated in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954.

To commemorate this significant chapter in civil rights history, the 23/54 Project has created a quilt that serves as a living monument to these families’ resilience and determination. Each of the 23 squares represents one of the families involved in the lawsuit, offering a window into their histories, achievements, and enduring values. The quilt’s design was a collaborative effort, with descendants participating in sessions to share their stories and influence the artistic direction. Crafted by a dedicated local quilting group, the quilt incorporates over 400 artifacts, each narrating a unique aspect of the families’ journeys and the broader struggle for educational equity. 

PROJECT COMPONENTS

  • Oral History Interviews: Capturing personal stories from Black families who lived through struggles. 
  • Story-Gathering Events: Informal community sessions to collect additional narratives.
  • Community Quilt: A community-based quilt project will be a central feature of the project, representing the collective memory, creativity, and resilience of the community.
  • Traveling Exhibit: The quilt, accompanying interpretive materials explaining the meaning behind each quilt block, and a panel explaining the background of the 1947 lawsuit will travel around the New River Valley, Wytheville, and Galax from June through October 2025. 
"Class Photo,” Calfee Training School Museum Digital Archive, https://calfee.omeka.net/items/show/


Group of Calfee Training School teachers and students gathered outside the Calfee Training School building.
  • Digital Exhibit: A digital exhibit showcasing an interactive digitized quilt with multimedia components, a documentary about the 23/54 project, tools for other communities, and oral history interview clips will be available online as well as on an interactive touchscreen at the Calfee Center.
  • Resources for Communities: Project leaders are documenting this process in order to develop tools that will help other communities to document their own histories and struggles. Community partners in Wytheville, Galax, and Christiansburg will also work with the 23/54 team to develop programs utilizing the traveling exhibit that will contribute to their own organizations’ and communities’ missions during the summer of 2025. 
  • Fellowship Program: A paid team of researchers representing the local community as well as university students are gaining valuable research and community organizing skills while contributing to the research and community building aspects of this project.

The Advisory Board

The 23/54 Project Advisory Board is providing direction to the 23/54 project team as it navigates this important project. The board consists of individuals and representatives of organizations with a connection to the history of African American struggles for equality in the Appalachian Mountains as well as cultural institutions providing technical assistance to the project:

  • Descendants of the twenty-three families who were part of the 1947 lawsuit,
  • Calfee Center Board members,
  • Representatives from other alumni-led regional organizations working to restore Jim Crow era Black schools, including:
    • Christiansburg Institute Alumni Association
    • Galax’s Rosenwald Revamped, and 
    • Wytheville Training School 
  • Draper Arts and Quilting Collective
  • Fine Arts Center of the New River Valley

A major topic discussed at the first advisory board meeting was defining success for the 23/54 project. Is success measured by honoring the parents and children who fought for better educational opportunities? Or is success about inspiring young people today to take action and stand up against injustice in their own communities? Although there was no formal conclusion drawn, the discussion proved fruitful in surfacing the two main goals of the project:

  • Honoring the brave parents, their children, ancestors, descendants and all Black families in Southwestern Virginia who have fought for justice and improved conditions for their families, communities, and future generations.
  • Inspiring young people today to take action against the injustices they face in their own communities—just as those parents did in 1947. 

PROJECT TIMELINE



Calfee Students and Teachers at unidentified year. Image stored on https://calfee.omeka.net/files/show/384
  • January 31, 2025: Community Meal and Story Swap: An evening of storytelling about the 23 families, the lawsuit, and beyond with Appalachian storyteller and musician Aristotle Jones who will compose a song about the 23/54.
  • February 7, 2025: Second Advisory Board Meeting 
  • Late April 2025: Third Advisory Board Meeting
  • May 31, 2025: Quilt unveiling event program honoring the families, including keynote speaker, Leon Russell, Chairman of the National NAACP Board of Directors.
  • June – October 2025: Quilt and accompanying interpretive materials travel to Christiansburg, Galax, and Wytheville for programs to support work in those communities. During this time, the quilt will also be displayed in other places in Pulaski County and beyond as it is available.
  • September/October 2025: Final Advisory Board Meeting
  • November 2025: Quilt returns to Calfee Center, is installed at Calfee, documentary is released, and digital exhibit is unveiled.