A few weeks back, Around the D shared news about a series of events in Charlotte recognizing the events of 1963 around desegregation. What happened in 1963, was just a beginning. An unrelated question asked about local history ended up with the discovery of a local headline from May 29, 1969:
Photograph and headline from the May 29, 1969 Mecklenburg Gazette
This announcement –made 44 years ago– had its beginnings in the culture changes of the 1960s. One piece was the closing closing the Ada Jenkins School in the integregation of public schools and the opening of a new kindergarten. In 1967, public kindergartens were brand new and the Davidson Community Relations Committee applied for permission to open a pilot program in the Ada Jenkins building.
As what became known as Child Development Center No 1 began operations, other groups were becoming interested in nursery schools and day care. Although women have been working for generations, the need for day care and the acceptance of day care centers was still new. Davidson College Presbyterian Church began operating a nursery school in 1967 and Davidson resident Pat Sailstad started a day care for African-American children. Her daycare stated in her home but soon came under the care of the St. Alban’s Guild.
Elizabeth C. Cumming
Both of these programs encouraged a new coalition started work for an integrated day care center, soon to be named the Davidson-Cornelius Day Care Center. Under the leadership of Elizabeth Cumming, other volunteers include Davidson coach Charles Parker, Pat Sailstad, Mrs. James Martin, Mrs. George Abernethy and Mary Potts.
In October 1968, she laid out the goals of the center. It was to be “a place where the little children of working mothers will develop physically, with healthful conditions and expert attention, and mentally, with a simple educational program on a nursery school level.”
The plans expanded by 1969 to include observation booths for visitors, including Davidson College psychology students studying child development. The building was completed in early 1970 with Cornelius Elementary School serving as a temporary site for the first group of children. Over the next decades, the center lived into the hopes of its founders providing care and education to children of all races.
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