Middle Tennessee State University alumnus and former administrator Vincent Windrow stands in front of The Cemetery School, located off Old Nashville Highway just outside Murfreesboro, Tenn. The school was once the heart of a thriving Black community, and Windrow and the Friends of Cemetery School are working with MTSU’s Center for Historic Preservation to restore the school and transform it into a community center and museum. (MTSU photo by J. Intintoli)

Echoes of the past remain in the classroom of the Cemetery School, a historic Black school located off Old Nashville Highway just outside Murfreesboro, Tenn. Middle Tennessee State University’s Center for Historic Preservation in Murfreesboro is working with the MTSU alumnus and retired administrator Vincent Windrow and the Friends of Cemetery School to restore the structure and open it as a museum and community center. (MTSU photo by J. Intintoli)

Middle Tennessee State University alumnus and former administrator Vincent Windrow stands inside the long-shuttered Cemetery School, which once served as a hub for a bustling Black community. Windrow talks about the history of the school, which sits just outside Murfreesboro, Tenn., and is one of the few surviving examples of segregated schools built in the rural South. Windrow and the Friends of Cemetery School are partnering with MTSU’s Center for Historic Preservation to restore the structure and open a museum and community center. (MTSU photo by J. Intintoli)

Books used by students of the Cemetery School, located just outside the city limits of Murfreesboro, Tenn., are stacked throughout the interior of the former classrooms. Middle Tennessee State University’s Center for Historic Preservation in Murfreesboro is working with the MTSU alumnus and retired administrator Vincent Windrow and the Friends of Cemetery School to restore the structure and open it as a museum and community center. (MTSU photo by J. Intintoli)