Middle School Students Find Buried Treasure

CAPITOL HILL (WUSA) -- How much do you know about Washington history?

No, not George Washington and the Revolutionary War. The history of DC, its neighborhoods, and segregation.

At Stuart-Hobson Middle School, there are some students who can teach you a thing or two.

History is sometimes a treasure hunt, and in a storeroom at the school they found a remarkable trove. Stuffed among the old files, students and teachers found pictures and newspaper clippings dating back 80 years.

"This is a museum itself right here," says teacher Lesa Warrick, leafing through old files.

With the help of the Institute of Museum and Library Services, they've archived the records. It's a priceless social history of DC.

"Someone would go out at night and light up the little streetlights. Someone actually had to do that," says 12 year old Antoinette Mathis, leafing through a book that records the occupations of all the schools parents back in 1926.

But it is also a record of the shameful past of school segregation.

"There were only Caucasians at this school at this time." says Mathis.

It was only in 1954 that the courts forced the integration of Stuart-Hobson and other schools. And even then, alumni say, African Americans were barred from gifted and talented classes.

"Even though integration was in the schools, this was another form of segregation," says 7th grader Courtney Thomas, Jr.

The students have just buried a time capsule so students 20 years from now will know what our lives were like. But in all their treasure hunting, the one thing they've been unable to find is the time capsule left by students 20 years ago for them.

"We're going to put a stone, a date and a marker, so we can find this time capsule," says Warrick, the teacher.

Maybe the next treasure hunt will be a little less of a hunt.

The young historians are asking students at other schools to check their basements and storerooms to see if they too have stories hidden and just waiting to be revealed.