SWANSGATE COMMUNITY COMES ALIVE AGAIN FOR SENIORS IN HEART OF MYRTLE BEACH

Before it was a senior community, it was a place of learning, at a time when African American students were educated in churches, not in “white” schools.
A product of segregated times, the six-room wood frame Myrtle Beach Colored School opened in 1932. The school became a source of pride for the African American population of its day. For decades, the school nurtured young Black students, stimulating minds and hearts to embrace the possibilities only education can provide.
In 1953, the old schoolhouse was replaced by Carver Training School, built a stone’s throw away. Carver became the community’s new center of education until full integration of schools arrived in 1978.
“That area was a tight knit community, lots of families and seniors living there,” said Annie B. Futrell, who taught at Carver School from 1959-1978 and whose husband James Futrell was the first Black City Council member of Myrtle Beach. “The school was a centerpiece of the neighborhood; people looked out for each other and knew their neighbors. It was the way it should be.”