UNRECORDED
Rust University, Holly Springs, Mississippi 17 August 1894. Dear Brother: Rust University opens October 2nd.
Holly Springs, Miss: August 17, 1894.
1p. handbill. 6 x 5-1/2 inches. UNRECORDED. Minor repairs at folds Item #352793
Small broadside or handbill circular letter from school President Charles E. Libby notifying community members that the school is preparing to open "with better facilities than ever for good thorough work" and further asking recipients "Will you please make a special effort to notify your people of this, and urge upon them the necessity of an education?" The broadside continues describing a program whereby "worthy poor" students can secure "school privileges" and that every sixth student sent would be free. Pencil numerical notations on verso perhaps refer to numbers of students send each year.
The educational institution today known as Rust College is a historically Black college which was established in 1866 by the Freedman’s Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Its founders were Northern missionaries who opened a school in Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church, accepting adults of all ages, as well as children, for instruction in elementary subjects. A year later the first building on the present campus was erected. The Reverend Charles E. Libby served as the school president from 1885-1897, and it was during his tenure that the name of the school was changed to Rust University, a tribute to Richard S. Rust of Cincinnati, Ohio, Secretary of the Freedman’s Aid Society.
OCLC locates no other copies of this broadside. A scarce piece of African American ephemera from a small Mississippi community.
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