Penn Center

"The Gullah people of St. Helena Island still relate that their people wanted to 'catch the learning' after Northern abolitionists founded Penn School in 1862, less than six months after the Union army captured the South Carolina Sea Islands. In this broad history Orville Vernon Burton and Wilbur Cross range across the past 150 years to reacquaint us with the far-reaching impact of a place where many daring and innovative social justice endeavors had their beginnings. Penn Center's earliest incarnation was as a refuge where escaped and liberated enslaved people could obtain formal liberal…