El Centro’s Segregated Schools

Multimedia producer Laura Gonzalez has written a fantastic article about El Centro’s Washington Elementary School and Douglass High School. In her Imperia Valley Press article titled “Teachers Offered Love and Compassion during Segregation.” Gonzalez interviewed former students like El Centro fire department battalion chief Albert Newton and El Centro mayor Sedalia Sanders. Mayor Sanders told Gonzalez “that many people assume the school is named after President George Washington”, when it is really named after Booker T. Washington.

According to Gonzalez’s article “African American student didn’t have a place to go after graduating from Washington School. At the time, Central High School didn’t allow blacks into the school. This situation encouraged Payne to create Douglass High School.” The Payne she is referring to is Professor William Payne, the same Professor William Payne that helped form the California Colony and Home Protection Association with Colonel Allensworth. Professor Payne taught school in Allensworth from 1909 to 1919; then left to become the principal of Eastside Elementary School in El Centro.



Stephen Hill, Sr.