AAHS hosted The Underestimated: Hillburn’s Brook School and the Fight Against Segregation, an evening revisiting the 1943 desegregation fight in Hillburn—when Black families, supported by the NAACP, challenged unequal schools and helped lay groundwork for the broader civil rights movement.
AAHS hosted a meaningful community gathering at the historic Brook Presbyterian Church, listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This event continued a relationship that began in 2007, when AAHS first started meeting with Hillburn community members in the church and in their homes.
A Milestone in Preserving Local Civil Rights History During October, the African American Historical Society of Rockland County launched the Historic Hillburn website, a new digital platform dedicated to preserving the powerful civil rights legacy of Hillburn, New York. This groundbreaking site highlights the pivotal 1943 Hillburn school desegregation...
Ethel Roseboro hailed from North Carolina. She moved to Hillburn in order to teach the third and fourth grades.
Cicely Savery Gunner was the daughter of William Savery, a former slave and master carpenter whose desire to educate his children after the civil war led to the building of the first school for African Americans in Talladega County, Alabama. This school later became Talladega College. Today, visitors to...
This video is courtesy of LOHUD. An advertisement will play before the video starts. Ramapo Film documenting desegregation battle “Two Schools in Hillburn” recounts the 1943 struggle to integrate the village’s Main School for white students and the Brook School, where “colored” students were sent. Joe Allen’s film recounts the...
This is a true story about two separate by equal elementary schools in Hillburn, New York — one white and one black elementary schools. In the 1940s, Thurgood Marshall played an important role in this gripping story, 11 years before his well-known involvement in the Brown v. Board of...
Kate Savery, the daughter of William Savery, and sister of Cicely Gunner served as principal of the Hillburn Brook School. Her father, William Savery was a master carpenter who was formerly enslaved. His desire to educate his children after the Civil War led to the building of the first...
Hulda DeFreese was born in 1908 in Hillburn and attended the segregated Brook School. She later advanced to Suffern High School and went on to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree from Geneseo College in Upstate New York, and a Master of Arts from New York University in New...
By Travis E. Jackson, Ed.D. The decade between 1940-1950 was dominated by the Second World War and the uneasy peace that followed. When the Japanese launched their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in December of 1941, they were already in control of much of the Pacific region. Their major...