Even a casual reader of this site can spot its most glaring weakness: the near-total absence of material concerning Bradley’s black community. However, that is a circumstance of necessity (to this date, anyway) and not of choice.
In an earlier post (10/1/07), I mentioned that much of the material to be found on this site would be, at least initially, taken from the archives of my own family. Families tend to collect and save information and mementos about themselves. That’s what families do. As a result, I have almost no material about the many contributions of African-Americans to Bradley and the area around it.
Fred Harris, who grew up in Bradley and now lives in Doddridge, has brought to my attention the existence of a group of alumni of the Bumpham School, which was located about a mile north of Gin City, and operated as an all-black school until complete integration of the Bradley Schools began in the fall of 1970. (I can remember the exact date because I was a teacher in the Bradley Schools for the first year of full integration, 1970–1971.) This group even has its own web site, www.bumpham.com. The ex-Bobcats have planned their next triennial reunion for July 3, 4, and 5 of 2009.
If any readers of this site should have any photos, old newspaper clippings, etc., of general interest concerning Bradley’s black community, and are willing to share them, I would be most interested in seeing them and possibly sharing some of them with the readers of this site. Perhaps the single most interesting item along those lines would be pictures of the Bumpham School while it was still in operation. But information concerning area churches and cemeteries, as well as other groups, would also be quite interesting.
bradleyark.com 