The Kitchen School
12 min. 2025
directors: Ann Verrall, Sheryl Grant
producers: Ann Verrall, Fultz House Museum
Now in their 80s, lifelong friends Maxine Gough and Freda Henry, come together to share their unique story of attending what was called the Maroon Hill ‘Kitchen School’ in Middel Sackville during the 1940s and early 1950s. It was in the era when segregated schools were legal in Nova Scotia. In Middle Sackville the Black children were not allowed to attend the ‘white schools’. When retired teacher Pleasah Caldwell returned home from the West and discovered this, she began teaching the Black children in her house. Maxine and Freda’s sheds light on the historical injustice of segregation in this province and the creative inspiring ways it was challenged. A project of Fultz House Museum, The Kitchen School is part of a series of short films about the segregated schools in the Sackville area of Nova Scotia and include short films on former students from Lucasville and Cobequid Road. The films will be available to view at the Fultz House Museum as part of their exhibit of the segregated school story.
May 31, 1949 Mail Star Maroon Hill students at the Halifax Music Festival Freda Henry & Maxine Gough
Maxine interviewed by Heidi Petracek for Global TV Sept. 25, 2024
Fultz House Museum – Maxine & Freda with old photos from newspaper
Fultz House Museum visit – seated L-R: Maxine, Freda, standing L-R: Sheryl Grant, Joanne Boudreau (Fultz House Museum), Ann Verrall
Former ‘Kitchen School’: Freda, Maxine, with current owners Earl Mosher, Louise Wiseman
Community Screening of Segregated School Project Nov. 8, 2025 at the Wallace Lucas Community Centre, Lucasville. Former students: Freda, Maxine, Irma Oliver-Riley & Phil Parsons of Lucasville, Sandra Reddick of Cobequid Rd.
