The West End School

No longer standing, the West End School was built as an additional school for mill children, who were also served by the 1913 school on Baltimore Avenue. The West End School was built in 1922 on land donated to the project by Dan River Mills. These schools did not just serve Schoolfield children, but also Dan River management’s desire that their millhands have an organized home life. Dan River paid partially for most teachers’ salaries, sharing the cost with the county school system. However, management did commit to paying the entirety of salaries for “domestic science” teachers who taught sewing and cooking and other home economics to young women. Clearly, management prioritized the domestic arts and lay most of burden for an ordered homelife on Schoolfield’s young women, to whom these subjects were primarily taught.

By 1926, the total student population in the village was well over 1,200 as the schools gradually added grades beyond the initial offering of elementary levels. But it was only in 1935, according to local historian Nell Collins Thompson, that there was a class of graduating high school seniors in Schoolfield. Though they valued education for the purpose of domestic order, Dan River management were likely reluctant to organize higher education, especially in the 1920s, as children and young adults were valued more as millhands than as students.

The West End School was in use as a public school for Schoolfield and then the City of Danville after Schoolfield’s annexation in 1951. By the late 1960s, however, the school building was deteriorating as it had sat vacant as storage for Danville Public Schools beginning in 1962. In 1968, the West End School was sold to Hardees, which opened up a restaurant on that site that still is in operation today.

“West End School Sold to Hardees Franchisee.” The Danville Register, November 21, 1968.

This undated photo shows the old West End building, which was torn down in the 1970s for a Hardees, and the Dan River mill site can be seen in the background along Bishop Avenue. Photo courtesty of Jonathan Travis Hackworth via Facebook.

“Reception Marks Opening of West End School.” The Bee, February 21, 1923, p 2.

See also:

Smith, Robert S. Mill on the Dan: A History of Dan River Mills, 1882-1950. Duke University Press, 1960, p 248.

Thompson, Nell Collins. Echoes from the Mills. Roanoke, Virginia: Toler Printing Co., 1984, pp. 49-53.