Administrative Information

Access Restrictions

The collection is without restrictions.

Use Restrictions

See the University of Virginia Library’s use policy.

Preferred Citation

The Papers of the Yancey Family 1899-1953 , Accession #11599, Special Collections Dept., University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Va.

Acquisition Information

The papers were given to the University of Virginia Library by Sidney M. Tate, Principal of B.F. Yancey Elementary School, Esmont, Virginia, on March 10, 2000 through Will Thomas of the Virginia Center for Digital History.

Scope and Content Information

Benjamin Franklin Yancey was the founder and principal of a one-room school for African-American children called the Esmont Colored School, Scottsville, Virginia. His daughter, May Yancey, also taught there in the decades following her father's death and her graduation from college.

Letters from Benjamin Franklin Yancey are chiefly to his wife, Harriet. The other correspondent was the Reverend S.P. Robinson, Richmond, Virginia. Correspondents writing to Yancey include his wife, Harriet, A.W. Cawthorn, William H. Coleman, B.J. Franklin, J. Thomas Hewin, the Reverend W.H. James, Jr., Barbara Jenkins, B.S. Lewis, S.F. Mason, Rebecca Moore, Josephine M. Pride, J.G. Shelton, Rosa Bell Simpson, Albert Stein, P.B. Taylor, T.C. Walker, William A. White, and Susan P.H. Winslow.

Correspondents writing to Harriet Yancey include: Elizabeth Angell, Joseph Blair, her cousin, Jesse Brown, E.L. Carter, J.W. Crosby, William R. Eason, H.H. Greer, John A. Hains, Edna M. Hall, Charles P. Harris, William A. Harris, Ruth Jackson, the Reverend W.H. James, Barbara Jenkins, M.J. Jenkins, William Johnson, M.J. Kishner, Josephine M. Pride, Louise Rice, her cousin, William M. Scott, Cornelia Sellers, H. Shelton, Myrtilla J. Sherman, J.E. Simpson, Adele Smith, Eva L Spell, J.D. Taylor, and Pollie Tunstall.

Family letters to Harriet Yancey include those from her son, Roger Yancey, while attending the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute (1918-1921) and the Christiansburg Normal & Industrial Institute (1924-1925), her son, Benjamin Franklin Yancey, Jr. (d.1924), while attending V.T.S. & College, Lynchburg, Virginia (1923), and her daughter, May Yancey, while attending the Virginia Normal and Industrial Institute, Petersburg, Virginia (1920-1928). There are also letters from her grandsons, William R. Eason and Roger M. Yancey, Jr. when he was in the 3703rd Training Squadron, Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas (1950).

The chief correspondents writing to May Yancey include her mother, Harriet Yancey, and her brother, Roger M. Yancey, Howard Johnson, Adele Smith, and William Eason.