(cars whooshing) ADRIENNE McGIBBON: A small wooden school building is shedding light on the lives of African Americans in the 18th century.

BRANDON HEWITT: John, eight years.

Anne, six years.

Dick, three years.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: The names and ages of these young students are some of the only remaining evidence of their experiences.

BRANDON HEWITT: Give me the three that are classified as "free."

[Visitor] Elisha Jones.

BRANDON HEWITT: Yes, Mary Anne, yes.

[Visitor] And Mary Jones.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: But Williamsburg is using an original colonial era structure to secure their place in history.

BRANDON HEWITT: Exactly, exactly right.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: New walking tours explain the story of the Bray School, which is the nation's oldest surviving school for free and enslaved Black children.

BRANDON HEWITT: Bray School was one place that the African Virginia students were meeting, kind of a formal setting.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: A place where they could learn arithmetic and how to read.

But the goal wasn't purely education.

BRANDON HEWITT: And the motive for this one, the Bray School, the motive is control, assimilation.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: Assimilation into a system that relied on slavery.

(horses clacking) BRANDON HEWITT: And Hannah, 23, oh, one of my heroes, she is rejecting the false teaching that's being daily given by Ann Wager.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: Ann Wager was their teacher.

She was paid by a group of English clergymen who created and funded many colonial schools to educate Black children.

MATT WEBSTER: But I think what people also need to learn here is that education is power.

So once a person is educated, you can't take that knowledge away from them, and you can't really control what they do with that.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: Matt Webster is in charge of preserving the 265-year-old building.

MATT WEBSTER: We actually had removed several 1920 to 1950 additions from the building so we could actually restore it back to its original look in the 1760 look of the building.

(power tools whirring) ADRIENNE McGIBBON: Work on the building's exterior is expected to wrap up by fall 2024.

And Webster hopes it'll give visitors a better understanding of all of Williamsburg's 18th century residents.

MATT WEBSTER: Those children were part of the community.

They were seen in the households, on the streets.

So putting this back tells a part of the story of the community and how it functioned and how it worked in the 18th century.

ADRIENNE McGIBBON: Visitors to Colonial Williamsburg say the new program is shedding fresh light on slavery in the colonies.

MORGAN HESS: I remember years ago when I first came here, there were a few things to do, but now there's more nation builders, and I think it's cool to kind of take like the unheard voices and build upon that.

(horses clacking) ADRIENNE McGIBBON: Colonial Williamsburg is a VPM sponsor, but had no involvement in the production of this report.

I'm Adrienne McGibbon for VPM News.

(thoughtful music)