By Nicole Brown

A central part of my career in the last four academic years was my role as Graduate Assistant for the William & Mary Bray School Lab. I have worked on a variety of student-driven digital projects, overseen the review of Williamsburg and Fredericksburg Bray School transcriptions, assisted with general research, and collaborated on descendant engagement. Most often, I served as both a mentor and guide for undergraduates conducting primary-source research associated with the Williamsburg Bray School, the Associates of Dr. Bray, or eighteenth-century Black education in the British Empire. As I move into the next stage of my doctoral studies within the American Studies graduate program at William & Mary, I must transition away from the Bray School Lab and onto other new and exciting projects.

There is something truly special about working on new scholarship with students, descendants, and scholars alike. The collaborations generated via William & Mary’s Office of Strategic Cultural Partnerships are exceptional in the academic world. One such example includes The Williamsburg Bray School: A History Through Records, Reflections, and Rediscovery (The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2024), the book I had the privilege to co-edit alongside Bray School Lab Director Maureen Elgersman Lee. Despite my heartache at leaving my position, there is also much to be thankful for. Chief among those thanks includes the lessons I learned from collaborating and counseling undergraduate students, as well as learning from the many descendants who have shared their knowledge, passion, and insight.  

Learning from the Ancestors and the Elders

“Remember the ancestors” is an adage I hear often repeated by the men and women far wiser than me. The descendants of Bray School students and those whose families (enslaved and free) lived and labored in Williamsburg from the seventeenth century onward always remind me to carry this phrase with me, wherever I go. Collaborating with descendants has taught me that shared authority is not only important, but essential to understanding our past. When museums, universities, and other similar institutions value their own thoughts and ideas about history over the ones shared by descendants, massive swaths of our history are lost – or outright ignored.

Over the years, I have learned that remembering ancestors is not just saying an individual’s name – you must also share how these individuals shaped the world we live in today. Share this knowledge loudly and often, even in spaces where people might prefer you to be silent. I am forever grateful to the many descendants who have taught me that I am part of the collective to remember their ancestors. Their willingness to teach me has foundationally shaped both my PhD dissertation and my life.

Learning from the Next Generation

 One of the best things about working with undergraduates is their unique way of looking at history—especially eighteenth-century history. Early American history often feels static and removed from lived experience. When an event – such as the closing of the Williamsburg Bray School – occurred more than 250 years ago, it can feel impersonal to your daily life. However, undergraduates often have the most innovative perspectives on studying the past because they are willing to grow and learn while studying it, rather than assuming they know everything there is to be derived from eighteenth-century documents, narratives, and events.

One student’s detailed analysis of the 1762 Bray School regulations made me consider this source in new ways. The absence and presence of students in this record became apparent to me through her. Another undergraduate’s ability to consider how hand sewing skills might have influenced the experiences of young Black girls at the Williamsburg Bray School has fundamentally changed the way I write about them. Thanks to her, I take every opportunity to mention what kinds of sewing skills may have been taught at the Bray School. A more recent W&M student shared her unique perspective on walking through a city that has a multilayered past and present. Her ideas reshaped how I conceptualize children walking through eighteenth-century Williamsburg. I cannot walk by the Bray School building without thinking about this student and the quiet wisdom she carries with her on topics such as religion, memory, and history.

What Have I Learned?

Each student I have had the pleasure of studying with in the last four years has taught me valuable lessons. While I have mentored students on how to read eighteenth-century handwriting, contextualize colonial newspapers, or explore the microhistories of Virginia’s colonial capital, they have also taught me how to think anew about the past. To each one of these students, I say: thank you. I am humbled by working with you and working alongside you. If you are any indication of how the next generation of historians will study the past, we are all in excellent company.

Similarly, the descendants who have sat me down to discuss family history, challenge my conception of the America’s founding, or reiterate that I should keep pursuing my research, have reminded me that my passion to study the Williamsburg Bray School is a lifelong journey that cannot be confined by any title or position I may hold. To them I say: thank you. I have learned what resilience truly means from your guidance and love. I promise to honor you, and your ancestors, in my next steps.

The hundreds of hours I have spent working with these teachers, young and old, give me hope for the future. They also remind me that there is always something to be learned from anyone you meet. While ancestors and elders often hold keys to wisdom, so, too, does the next generation. I am excited to hand them the keys; they will unlock doors that neither I nor my contemporaries even thought to open.

Nicole Brown is a PhD candidate in the American Studies Program at William & Mary and a renowned scholar of the history of the Associates of Dr. Bray and of Bray schools in North America. She has served as the William & Mary Bray School Lab Graduate Assistant since the Lab was launched in 2021.