Ends: 6/15/2024
The Burwell School Historic Site preserves the setting for one of the state’s earliest schools for girls, The Burwell Academy for Young Ladies. Today, tour the site's two-acre property to see the historic Burwell residence (ca. 1821, 1848), the original brick classroom building of Robert and Margaret A Burwell, the gardens and a rare brick "necessary house." The tour focuses on life at the Burwell School from 1837 - 1857, when it was the home of the large Burwell family, a varying number of free and enslaved servants, and the remarkable story of Elizabeth Keckly, a Burwell family slave who later purchased her freedom and became a prominent businesswoman and activist in Washington, DC, as well as the confidante and dressmaker to First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln.