By Ali Sullivan The final meeting lasted just a few minutes. After months of investigation, an advisory committee determined that Paul H. Cale Elementary School—named after a former Albemarle County Public Schools superintendent—should change its name. The recommendation comes nearly four months after the Cale Advisory Committee’s first meeting and almost a year since Lorenzo […]
By Ali Sullivan The final meeting lasted just a few minutes. After months of investigation, an advisory committee determined that Paul H. Cale Elementary School—named after a former Albemarle County Public Schools superintendent—should change its name. The recommendation comes nearly four months after the Cale Advisory Committee’s first meeting and almost a year since Lorenzo […]
Lorenzo Dickerson is always chasing down stories that he heard as a kid. “Stories I heard who knows when,” he says, local stories he now feels compelled to share with local audiences. His fifth documentary film, 3rd Street: Best Seats in the House, tells one such story—that of the Third Street side entrance to The […]
“White parents would not permit their children to receive instruction from inferior Negro teachers—and they were inferior.” These recently resurfaced words, which originally appeared in a July 1, 1956, article titled “Virginia’s Creeping Desegregation: Force of the Inevitable” in Commentary Magazine, were said by Dr. Paul Cale, the longest-serving Albemarle County schools superintendent, and the […]
When Lorenzo Dickerson was in fifth grade at Murray Elementary school, he had to write a book report. He went down to the school library and came across Extraordinary Black Americans, a book full of dozens of profiles on inventors, politicians, activists, artists, writers and more. It was a sizable read for the fifth-grader, who […]
Throughout this month, an exhibition titled #BlackOwnedCville by local photographer and filmmaker Lorenzo Dickerson is on display on the third floor of the Central Library. Dickerson says he was moved to pursue the project because, “I was curious myself about African-American businesses here locally. Growing up here I knew of some. Like Mel’s Café on […]
Local filmmaker, age 35 Though he only began teaching himself the art of filmmaking four years ago while researching his ancestry, Lorenzo Dickerson’s calling has always been storytelling. “I enjoy bringing awareness to stories that either have been forgotten or that people have never known about,” says Dickerson about his films. “That’s really where my […]