The history of Industrial and Roosevelt High Schools is mainly significant to those of us who attended and/or graduated from these schools.  These schools existed in City of West Palm Beach, Florida during the strict segregation era of the United States of America where laws prohibited Caucasians and Negroes from attending the same schools.  During that period in history, the schools were designated separate but equal which the Supreme Court of the United States in 1955 eventually ruled against. 

 

However, the teachers at Industrial and Roosevelt High Schools were quite aware of the knowledge the students at these schools needed to have to succeed during this era.  So they equipped their students with the knowledge needed to survive and advance in these United States of America.

 

They taught that no one is going to do for you what you can and should do for yourselves.  Because we walked the corridors of these schools, we thought it not robbery for us to organize the masses to insure the revitalization of the buildings at the site of the Roosevelt High School which was opened in 1950 and closed in 1970.  We thought that future generations needed to know the significance of these schools to the Historic Northwest Community and the need for the African American Museum and Research Library to be housed at this site.