CML graduate researcher Marion Dobbins, a local historian and for many years a popular interpreter of Fairfax's and Virginia's African American past gave a public talk on renowned Northern Virginia educator and suffragist Jennie Deans as part of the local Women's History Month observances. Dobbins' talk drove home the "powerful impact one person can have on society," according to event host the League of Women Voters of the Fairfax Area. It took place at the main Fairfax branch of the county's public libraries.
Dean, a once enslaved native of Prince William County, founded the Manassas Industrial School for Colored Youth in 1894. In the absence of a segregated public high school for Black children in Fairfax, her institution was for decades their only recourse for continuing education beyond the seventh grade, often as boarders. Dean and her school were recognized by national figures as varied as Frederick Douglass and President Theodore Roosevelt, and she leveraged that stature for essential financial support from donors including from Andrew Carnegie, until it became Manassas Regional High School, serving the counties of Fairfax, Prince William, Fauquier, Warren, and Rappahannock.
Dobbins, a doctoral student at George Mason University and CML's community historian. can document her family's presence in Fairfax going back seven generations and is the author of a new book about county history, The Lost Black Communities of Merrifield, The Pines, and Williamstown. As a historian and ethnographer, she has worked and consulted at Monticello, Mount Vernon, Gunston Hall, Sully Historic Site, Colvin Run Mill, and the National Park Service's Manassas Battlefield. She also serves on multiple county and local historical boards.
The League of Women Voters is a nonpartisan organization that encourages informed and active participation of citizens in government, works to increase understanding of major public policy issues, and influences public policy through education and advocacy.
May 27, 2025