The first African American museum has opened in Warren County, Virginia, fulfilling the legacy of local activist James Wilson Kilby.
According to the Northern Virginia Daily, Kilby helped desegregate Warren County High School in the 1950s. Wanting this legacy memorialized through a museum, he co-wrote a memoir with his daughter, Patricia Kilby-Robb, in 2000 to recall his journey.
Despite dying three years later, Kilby’s legacy finds fulfillment through his daughter. Alongside her husband, Kilby Robb established the James Wilson Kilby African American Museum and Education Center at her family’s home to tell the story of her parents’ fight for justice in the area.
Kilby was born in 1917 in Madison County, Virginia. He and his eventual wife, Catherine Ausberry, came from slavery and transitioned to sharecropping. He wed Ausberry in 1941, moving to Warren County to build a homestead for his family on land he bought with two other men.
The youngest daughter of their five children, Kilby-Robb saw her father become fed up with the abysmal educational opportunities available for colored children. In the county, no schools would take Black students after seventh grade.
“Dad believed in equal education, he was not allowed to go to school full time. They were sharecroppers — they had to work to survive,” stated the doting daughter. “Dad had this protective nature of all of his children, Mom too, but when it came to the girls, he wanted to make sure that nothing happened to them. When my sister was ready to go, he said absolutely not. I’m not letting my daughter get on any bus to go anywhere.”
His dedication to his children’s academics led him, along with other Black parents and the NAACP, to sue the county. A judge ordered the high school to allow the children to enroll as the only option in the area. However, Virginia’s then-governor, J. Lindsay Almond, shut the school down.
Despite this, in February 1959, the Kilbys entered Warren County High School. They also faced violence for their insistence of equality, including bullet holes and burning crosses on their property.
To settle the case, Kilby negotiated with local officials to build a high school for Black students. However, his efforts to provide an academic space for his children and other Black youth in the community will be forever remembered in the museum.
The museum will also include documents and other memories by families who were part of their community. With its grand opening, it will take visitors by appointment.
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