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<br /> NPS Form 10-900-a OMB Approval No.1024-0018
<br /> (8-86)
<br /> United States Department of the Interior
<br /> National Park Service
<br /> National Register of Historic Places
<br /> Continuation Sheet
<br /> Section number 8 Page 17 Ridge Road School
<br /> Orange County, NC
<br /> that he either rendered drawings or revised standard plans issued by NCDPI. The OCBE selected the
<br /> general contractor team of Forrest and Roberts to build the two-room White Oak Grove School and to add
<br /> second rooms to Sartin and Piney Mountain schools. W. H. Woods was hired to erect the one-room New
<br /> Branch School.34 Of the aforementioned sample, Merritts,New Branch, Piney Mountain, and Sunnyside
<br /> schools have been demolished. Sartin School was disassembled and removed from its site in 2021.
<br /> White Oak Grove School was significantly altered when converted into two apartments and is now vacant
<br /> and in poor condition.
<br /> Additional Context: Jones Grove Missionary Baptist Church History
<br /> African American farmers Joe Bethel Brooks and John William Jones organized the Jones Grove
<br /> Missionary Baptist congregation on March 11, 1926. The membership was closely aligned with Lea's
<br /> Chapel Baptist Church (now Lee's Chapel Missionary Baptist Church) in Cedar Grove, where Brooks and
<br /> his family resided. The Jones family lived closer to Hillsboro. John's father Joseph H. Jones conveyed a
<br /> one-quarter-acre portion of his farm to his son, Joe Brooks, and Joe's brother William Brooks, all church
<br /> trustees, on March 10, 1927. Congregation and community members facilitated construction of the one-
<br /> story, front-gable-roofed, weatherboarded sanctuary completed in early 1928. Buck Jacobs made a
<br /> sizable cash donation, while others contributed smaller amounts as well as building materials and labor.
<br /> John Jones borrowed white neighbor Carl Pope's truck to deliver lumber, William Brooks supplied sand,
<br /> and Aldolphus Hester provided logs.35
<br /> Reverend Joe B. Brooks presided at the sanctuary's March 11, 1928, dedication and served as the
<br /> congregation's pastor until his death on January 6, 1954. The church, like Ridge Road School to the
<br /> south, was a vital component of community life. Reverend George W. Davis of Durham assumed the
<br /> congregation's leadership on September 11, 1954, and remained until 1974. During his tenure, the frame
<br /> sanctuary was replaced with a front-gable-roofed concrete-block sanctuary. Church members again
<br /> subsidized construction with financial and material donations. Congregants Otha Thompson and A. J.
<br /> Breeze were the general contractors and Thomas Watkins supplied lumber. The church was dedicated on
<br /> June 11, 1961.36
<br /> During the mid-1970s, the congregation enlarged the sanctuary with a rear wing that encompassed the
<br /> pastor's office, restrooms, and a baptismal font, and updated the interior by sheathing the walls with faux-
<br /> wood paneling. Reverend Theodore C. Nicholson of Durham served as pastor from August 10, 1975,
<br /> until May 30, 2016. The congregation began planning to build a fellowship hall in the mid-1980s.
<br /> 34 OCBE meeting minutes,June 6, 1932, August 18, 1932,August 5, 1935,August 19, 1935;"New White Cross
<br /> School,"Chapel Hill Weekly,July 14, 1933,p. 5.
<br /> 35 U. S.Census,population schedules, 1920-1950;Orange County Deed Book 101,p.24;Catherine Brooks and Amy
<br /> Dickey,"History of Jones Grove Missionary Baptist Church,"2017,p. 1.
<br /> 36 Brooks and Dickey,"History of Jones Grove Missionary Baptist Church,"pp. 1-3.
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