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The site became part of the National Park Service in 2024. The permanent exhibition predated National Park Service oversight and opened ca. 2008. Blackwell School Alliance, curators.

Public education for Mexicans and Mexican Americans (Mexican/Americans) began in Marfa, Texas, in 1885. At that time, Mexicans were a sizable population in most Southwest cities. The Mexican Revolution (1910–1920), ranching and labor-intensive industries, and Marfa's proximity to the border were factors in the growth of the city's Mexican/American population, which caused concern among Anglos. An adobe school building was erected in 1909, with a band room added in 1927 constructed of non-adobe materials. It was known as the Ward or Mexican school until 1940, when the facility was named in honor of its long-serving principal, Jesse Blackwell. He arrived at the school in 1922 and remained its principal until 1946. Among his contributions, Mr. Blackwell created Spanish-language University Interscholastic League (Uil) teams, which allowed his students to enter academic competitions in their native language. By the time he retired, Blackwell had more than six hundred students and four campus buildings. The school continued to grow and remained the local Mexican school until 1965, when the Marfa Independent School District (Misd) opened an integrated school on the white side of town, less than a mile away. Because the city encompasses only 1.63 square miles, the new school's proximity to Blackwell masks that it was moved from the Mexican to the white area of town. The opening of the new school led Misd to use Blackwell for storage from 1965 until 1971, when it reopened Blackwell as a vocational school. The campus served in that capacity until 1996. Many of its buildings were torn down and some of its land was converted to public housing.

Issue Section:
Public History Reviews
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