Heeere's Jennie!

Hays-Porter High Tech (former site of the Jennie D. Porter Middle School)

Jennie D Porter Park

Yesterday was my last day at my temporary assignment at an insurance broker, so today, I decided to walk around the West End some more and stumbled upon yet some more pieces of black history.

Jennie Davis Porter was the first African-American woman to earn a doctorate from the University of Cincinnati and one of the first African American female school principals in Cincinnati.

Porter was born to freed Tennessee slave William A. Porter and Edlinda Davis Porter. Her father was Cincinnati's first African American morticians.

Porter operated the Harriet Beecher Stowe Elementary School during the day and attended University of Cincinnati at night, ultimately earning her bachelor's master's, and doctorate degrees. Porter ran the school until illness forced her to take a leave of absence one year before her death in 1936. In addition, she published articles on African American education and social issues in national publications.

Among her students were DeHart Hubbard, the first African American to win an individual gold medal in the long jump at the Paris Olympics in 1924, and Theodore Berry, Cincinnati's first African American mayor (1972-1976).

The school itself closed in 1962, and the property of 1030 Cutter Street has gone through many incarnations before the school merged with the former Hays School in the early 2000s to become what is now Hayes-Porter High Tech.

A few blocks east of the school stands the Jennie D Porter Park, which was built by students of the former Jennie D Porter Middle School in the early 1990s.

Happy Friday Eve!