Call Number:

Ms. Coll. 1499

Repository:

University of Pennsylvania: Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts

Extent:

1.17 linear feet (1 box)

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

The Robinson School, Puerto Rico photograph album, 1945-1946, Ms. Coll. 1499, Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, University of Pennsylvania.

Date:

1945-1946 (inclusive)

Abstract:

This photograph album chronicles an unidentified woman's time exploring and working in Puerto Rico as a teacher for the Robinson School in 1945-1946.

The Robinson School was founded in 1902 by May Leonard Woodruff (1862-1948), executive secretary of the Women's Home Missionary Society of the United Methodist Church, as a home for orphan girls in the Puerta de Tierra neighborhood of San Juan, Puerto Rico. George O. Robinson (1832-1915), an attorney from Detroit, donated $10,000 to purchase 4 acres of land in the Condado neighborhood and the orphanage became known as the George O. Robinson Orphanage and Industrial Home for Girls. The school expanded and developed rapidly over the next several decades. It introduce the first kindergarten education program in Puerto Rico in 1905 and was accredited through 8th grade by the Department of Instruction in 1918. It expanded its facilities in 1923 to accommodate grades 1-4 and again in 1941 to house 120 boarding students. It became co-educational in 1944 and graduated its first class in 1947 (all female). The Robinson School was incorporated in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in 1977 as an English-language, coeducational, college preparatory school for grades kinder to twelfth. The school is still operating today on the original campus built from Robinson's donation.

Source: Robinson School, 2023. https://www.robinsonschool.org/history/.

This photograph album contains 263 mounted black and white photographs. The album was compiled by an unidentified woman from the state of Georgia in 1945-1946 and documents her time as a teacher at the Robinson School as well as her travels throughout Puerto Rico. Many photographs from the Robinson School campus are labeled and identify fellow teachers, administrators, visitors (including U.S. servicemen), buildings, students, events, and local staff members. Her travels throughout the island include souvenir and personal photographs of beaches, historic sites, farms, villages, transportation, local residents and a "rest home," and emanate from locations such as La Pearla, the El Morro Castle, Condado Bay, the Falls at El Yunque, Luquilla Beach, Aibonito, the McLean Conference Grounds, and Ponce. Also included is a program from an Easter service, 1945 and a pamphlet for the McLean Conference Grounds.

Researchers should handle the album with care as the pages are extremely brittle and some of the pages have become detached.