ST. PAUL SCHOOL BLACK 1889-1912 was in Old Jefferson in District 6. It was about one-fourth mile east of the square toward the river and on the left side of the road.
On January 30, 1889, John M. Reese and wife Mary H. signed a deed for one square acre to School Commissioners L. A. Ward, J. B. Ward, and W. H. Thompson. The land adjoined the St. Paul Colored Church. On May 7, 1912,
Mrs. Oscar Mann, O. N. Mann, Mrs. Anne Zumbro, and Alex Zumbro deeded one half acre adjoining the St. Paul Church lot to the Rutherford County Board of Education.
The one-room building had eight grades and one teacher.
Teachers remembered are Florence Ella Berth and Kitty Howse.
The children of John Butler were students. Other family names were Gooch and Peebles. Turner Peebles attended when he was eight years old, in about 1896.
Turner Peebles was later financial secretary for all the colored schools in the state.
Both St. Paul Church and ST. PAUL SCHOOL burned. The church burned first.
SOURCES: Deed Book 30, p. 538; Book 55, p. 352. Interview, February 13, 1983, with Turner Peebles, now deceased.