Scott's Branch School

Front: Previously located at Taw Caw Baptist Church outside Summerton and at a site on 1st St., Scott’s Branch School moved here 1937-38. The first school at this site was a white, ten-room, frame building and enrolled African American students in grades 1-11. The current campus, completed in 1952, was the first school built through S.C.’s equalization program, a statewide effort to preserve segregation by upgrading black schools. Reverse: In the late 1940s, Scott’s Branch School became the focal point of petitions and lawsuits filed by local African Americans to secure equal resources for black pupils in Summerton schools. Facing fierce opposition, 20 families ultimately sued to desegregate local schools in 1950. These efforts, led by Rev. Joseph A. DeLaine and the NAACP, resulted in Briggs v. Elliott (1951), first among five cases that in 1954 led the U.S. Supreme Court to declare segregated schooling unconstitutional.