H.B. Sugg High School

H.B. Sugg High School was a top K-12 educational institution founded in 1903, based at S. George St., Farmville, NC. It was closed on July 4, 1999.

Named after Herman Bryan Sugg, H.B. Sugg Elementary School is in Farmville, North Carolina. The Farmville Colored School was renamed H.B. Sugg in 1951. The son of slaves, Herman Bryan Sugg grew up hearing stories of his father’s escape from slavery in Greene County to link up with General Sherman’s Union Army as it marched through the Carolinas. Sugg heard of how his father was forced to sleep outdoors, like a dog, and how his mother was fortunate enough to have been taught to read by her masters. From this, H.B. Sugg rose from poverty to become a successful leader and molder of future generations. Stories of his parents’ experiences as slaves doubtlessly colored the imagination of H.B. Sugg as he struggled to attain an education. With the shadow of slavery’s injustices still fresh in the minds of many in the South, H.B. Sugg was able to rise above the challenges that faced him through hard work, dedicated study, and personal initiative to become an educational leader in Farmville, North Carolina.

In the post-slavery United States, H.B. Sugg’s life experiences were varied. He was born and reared on a farm in Greene County near Snow Hill. His early life consisted of farm labor and occasional elementary schooling. Sugg’s formal education was obtained at the Mary Potter Memorial School at Oxford, NC, and later at Lincoln University in Oxford, Pennsylvania. As a youth, Sugg commented that work on the farm often superseded the demands to be at school for most kids. But Sugg loved going to school so much that he found ways to be there. Sugg stated: “I’d do my share of the work. I’d get up early and feed the stock or do whatever else I was told. After school and on Saturdays, I’d have to do big jobs like hauling wagonloads of firewood for the coming week. I’ve picked cotton many a time by moonlight so I’d be free to go to school the next day.”

In his mid-twenties Sugg attended Mary Potter School in Oxford, North Carolina. Sugg lived in a dormitory on campus while pursuing his studies at Mary Potter, and he continued to work before and after school and during the summers to pay for tuition and books. “In the summers I worked in the tobacco factory in Durham and also did some gardening there.” Following graduation from the Mary Potter School, Sugg went to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania and earned his B.S. degree in teaching. During his time as a student in Pennsylvania, Sugg continued to work to pay his way: Sugg “milked cows, fed stock, and cut wood to pay my way there. I also worked summers as a waiter on a passenger steamship which ran from New York to Massachusetts . . .”

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