DAPHNE, Ala. — The Jubilee City regularly celebrates its Italian and Cajun heritage with annual gatherings such as Supporting Educational Enrichment in Daphne’s Schools’ Mamma Mia Cook-off and the city’s Zydeco festival.

But Wednesday, Daphne took time to honor its black heritage by commemorating the first school in the county to teach black children and adults.

City and state officials joined former Baldwin County Training School students, teachers and their families in the W.J. Carroll Intermediate School cafeteria to celebrate the museum’s grand opening. The mood inside the gathering was joyous, reverent and nostalgic as former students — some who hadn’t seen each other in years — recalled memories and laughed at the time that had past.

“I cannot help but reflect on the fact that almost 100 years ago, the Rev. (E.S.) Bracy and members of the Eastern Shore Missionary Baptist Church Association had the vision to erect a school for black children,” former student Rose Washington said. In 1889, guiding the Eastern Shore Missionary Baptist Church Association, Bracy and his parishioners purchased 18 acres with the sole intention of teaching Baldwin County’s black children and adults who were denied school attendance.

In addition to devotion and prayer, students were taught reading, writing and arithmetic; former pupils fondly recalled the gift of knowledge.

“Education has always been an important part of life in the black community,” former student and Baldwin County Training School Heritage Festival Foundation President Gartrell Agee said. “I know that our schools are good today and even though we didn’t have the advantages you have today, those teachers made us believe. I appreciate all of the teachers.”

“These people wanted to give us the best that they could give to prepare us for life,” former student Matthew Jenkins said of the school’s teaching staff. “They wanted us to go out into the world. They wanted us to do something and be somebody.”

Overcoming adversity was an everyday challenge, Jenkins said.

“It was not easy,” he said. “The facilities were inadequate. White kids got new books and we got the old, discarded ones.” The Baldwin County Board of Education would purchase new textbooks for the white schools every six years; old textbooks were handed down to black students.

“In spite of the many hardships, this staff pushed ahead with determination,” Jenkins said, adding that faculty also shared life lessons.

“They took personal responsibility for mentoring us,” he said. “They taught us values and ethics; to be neat and clean; dress appropriately for the occasion; to be of high moral value.”

Punishments were severe but they provided students with discipline and responsibility, he said.

The Baldwin County Training School flourished for nearly 80 years until the federal government mandated integration in public schools.

After desegregation, the school was restructured as Daphne Junior High. It was again changed in 1993 to Daphne Intermediate and to Daphne Elementary South in 2004. The old Baldwin County Training School buildings, including a dormitory, were torn down to make way for W.J. Carroll Intermediate in 2008. The school was named in honor of Walker J. Carroll, who served as principal for the training school’s final 32 years.

Today, all that’s left of the original campus is a small, white building that served as the school’s home economics and agriculture hall.

Inside the museum, black and white photographs of children playing adorn the walls. A large room in the back has been converted into a model of the school’s original workshop class.

The museum also has a recreation of a student’s dorm room. The training school offered housing to students whose commute was too far to make a regular trip to school.

“It’s not a finished product,” Agee said of the museum. “It is a work in progress. If you have anything to contribute, we are open Tuesday and Friday from 10 until 4.” The Baldwin County Training School Heritage Festival Foundation, established in 1991, works to keep the school’s memory alive by preserving its legacy and providing scholarships for descendants of former students. The foundation asks that former students donate memorabilia from their school days.

“We’re asking that if they still have items, such as a band instrument, to put it on loan,” former student and project chairwoman Thelma Todd said, adding that the foundation has already received many old photos.

Meantime, residents can reflect on the school as a symbol of hope, attendees said Wednesday.

“In spite of its past, no other country provides opportunity like good ol’ America,” Jenkins said. “If you are prepared and you have a good education, you can move like Barack Obama and be the president of the United States.

“We have come a long way,” he said.