Jackson Heights Elementary School may be renamed for first principal, Robert Harvey

ALBANY — At the age of 94, words can sometimes come slowly to Robert Harvey. Some memories get a bit fuzzy, but others remain sharp as ever, like his memories of an Albany school that’s particularly special to him.

In 1951, Harvey, a lifelong educator, became the first principal at Jackson Heights Elementary School. Once he got job, he remained there for more than three decades, finally retiring in 1984.

“That school meant a whole lot to me,” Harvey said in a halting voice. “It was a good school and I was the first principal. I was the principal for 33 years and six months.”

The school, the only black elementary school on the east side of the river, began with just 14 students.

“Times were hard back then; it was rough,” Harvey said recalling the days of segregation “We always got the last of everything or what the white schools didn’t need anymore.”

Harvey’s son, Hernando, remembers those days — including dumpster diving behind the white schools for discarded text books.

“I don’t remember how many dumpsters I climbed into, but I would bring out any I could find, we’d take them home and dad would clean them up and take them to Jackson Heights,” he said. “Those were our textbooks.”

Hernando Harvey said it also wasn’t unusual to walk into the school and find his father mopping the floors. “He really did it all,” he said.

“I did every thing but cook,” the elder Harvey added.

Albany attorney Frank Faulk and Harvey grew up together. They’ve remained friends all of their lives.

“Robert is like a brother to me,” Faulk said. “His father was a sharecropper on a small farm in Terrell County and one day she took a notion that he needed an education and I needed a playmate, so she would bring him to our house during the day and teach him. He became a voracious reader and always had his nose in a book.

“Like I said, I love him as a brother and skin color has nothing to do with it. He is a self-made man in every respect and I am proud to claim him as a friend.”

Now, some former Jackson Heights students have asked the Dougherty County School Board to rename the school in honor of Harvey. Henry Mathis, Kenderson Hill and Peggy Hill-Lyons made the request last month, and the School Board is considering it.

“He (Harvey) was a staunch disciplinarian and everybody east of the river was better off for it,” said Mathis, a former Albany city commissioner. “He looked after the entire community, going as far as retrieving text books which had been thrown away from the white schools. Any black person over 60 who lived east of the river came through Robert H. Harvey. He is more than a school principal and administrator, and he influenced many, many lives.

“You have to remember, back then Jackson Heights was the only school for Negroes. He was a lot of things to many different people and that’s why it’s important we rename this school in his honor.”

Kenderson Hill, also a former city commissioner who attended Jackson Heights during Harvey’s tenure, agreed with Mathis.

“To me, Mr. Harvey was a mentor and a principal and was instrumental in my development as a person.” Hill said. “At that time there were not a lot of African-American males in the school system and he was my role model. Renaming that school for him is just a small gesture because he touched the lives of every young black person on the east side from the ’60s to the ’80s.

“I was the youngest child in my family and I know he was influential and touched all of our lives.”