The historic Stonewall Jackson Manual Training and Industrial School was established by an act of the state legislature in 1907 and opened in 1909 as the first juvenile detention facility in North Carolina. The school was named for Confederate General Stonewall Jackson. The institution is located three miles (5km) from Concord. Walter Thompson was the first principal. Originally encompassing 290 acres (1.2km2),[3][4] the campus is 800 acres (3,200,000m2), 58 acres (230,000m2) of which are still used, with 5 buildings on the property. As of 2018–19, the Youth Development Center had 107 residents and the Juvenile Detention Center had 26, with full-time equivalent staff of 257.[5]
Due to the school's pioneering status and the quality of several of its early buildings, the Stonewall Jackson Training School Historic District has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This designation includes 71 acres and 50 buildings.[5]
Established to provide a place for troubled youths separate from adult prisoners, this was considered a progressive institution. Its founding was the result of twenty years of organizing by white women's groups in North Carolina. They lobbied for construction of a reformatory for white boys as part of prison reform.
Particularly influential were the King's Daughters (North Carolina) from 1902 on, and the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). The North Carolina Federation of Women's Clubs (NCFWC) and the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) also participated in campaigning strongly to raise funds and influence the legislature. When the King's Daughters promised to name the school after General Stonewall Jackson, many Confederate veterans in the legislature finally approved the project, which was authorized in 1907. As a sign of their influence, four women were named to the board of the school.[6]
Boys were generally incarcerated for relatively minor scrapes with the law, including school truancy.
At the school, the young men lived in a series of dormitory style buildings, and received an academic education as well as learning a trade. Students worked in industries including shoemaking, printing, barbering, textiles, and a machine shop. Many of the young men worked on the school's farm, learning modern agricultural techniques, and maintaining the fields and cattle herds that supported the school. The print shop produced a small newspaper called The Uplift.[7]
Both white and African-American women's groups pressed the legislature for similar facilities for white girls, and for African American boys and girls. Such facilities were not constructed for several years: the first, for white girls, was built in 1918 in Moore County and called Samarcand.[8]
Post-World War II
In 1948 as part of continuing statewide efforts to limit "feeblemindedness" and improve the population, the Stonewall Jackson Training School was the site of sterilization by vasectomy of six teenage white males, in operations authorized by the state Eugenics Board. Most sterilizations were performed on girls and women rather than boys or men. North Carolina was one of the last states that continued to perform sterilizations on people under state care.[9]
During the decades of its existence, the School was criticized for abuses common in many detention facilities, such as overcrowding and prisoner violence. At its peak the facility held about 500 youths. At times there were inhumane conditions in which youths were attacked and raped by other inmates. Prison activist Russell Smith stated he suffered such attacks there when imprisoned in the 1960s from age 13–15. As an adult (and after time in state and federal prisons), Smith became an activist against prison violence, founding both the National Gay Prisoners Coalition (NGPC) and, in 1980, People Organized to Stop Rape of Imprisoned Persons (POSRIP).
In the 1970s, ideas about treating youths changed, and they were seldom incarcerated for offenses as minor as delinquency. The state reduced the population at the facility. The size of the campus had been reduced earlier when the extensive agricultural program was dropped. Later called the Stonewall Jackson Youth Development Facility, it was used for serious offenders involved in drug abuse and weapons-related charges. About 150 young men were generally held there. Sixty acres of the facility were enclosed by a 15-foot (4.6m)-high fence.[7]
Starting in 1992 the center had a Pet Therapy Program, in which youth learned to care for dogs. Animals were sometimes made available for adoption outside the center.[10]
Architectural historian Peter Kaplan, speaking to a 2014 meeting of the Historic Cabarrus Association, called the historic campus "which I understand is now completely vacant ... a remarkable collection of Colonial Revival buildings and one of Cabarrus County’s most impressive architectural groupings."[11]
As of 2015 23 of the 60 structures were used, and most of them were used for storage purposes.[12]
As of 2019, the Stonewall Jackson Youth Development Center served "at-risk youth", allowing them to attend high school or receive a GED.[13] In 2020, the center was renamed Cabarrus Youth Development Center.[2]
In 2020, North Carolina State SenatorPaul Newton sponsored a bill transferring the historic campus to Cabarrus County along with 238-acre (960,000m2) Frank Liske Park, which was a farm used by the school and became a park in 1979, leased to the county since then. Demolition of the historic buildings would cost $3.8 million but selling the buildings increases the chance for preservation. This bill has become law.[14][5]
↑ Peter R. Kaplan and David William Brown (January 1984). "Stonewall Jackson Training School Historic District"(PDF). National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory. North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office. Retrieved August 1, 2014.
Kannapolis is a city in Cabarrus and Rowan counties, in the U.S. state of North Carolina, northwest of Concord and northeast of Charlotte and is a suburb in the Charlotte metropolitan area. The city of Kannapolis was incorporated in 1984. The population was 53,114 at the 2020 census, which makes Kannapolis the 19th-most populous city in North Carolina. It is the home of the Kannapolis Cannon Ballers, the Low-A baseball affiliate of the Chicago White Sox, and it is the hometown of the Earnhardt racing family. It is also the headquarters for the Haas F1 racing team. The center of the city is home to the North Carolina Research Campus, a public-private venture that focuses on food, nutrition, and biotech research.
Cabarrus County is a county located in the south-central part of the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 225,804, making it the 9th-most populous county in North Carolina. The county seat is Concord, which was incorporated in 1803. Cabarrus County is included in the Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Concord is the county seat and most populous city in Cabarrus County, in the U.S. state of North Carolina. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 105,240. In terms of population, the city of Concord is the second-most populous city in the Charlotte metropolitan area and is the 10th-most populous city in North Carolina and 287th-most populous city in the U.S.
Concord University is a public university in Athens, West Virginia, United States. It was founded on February 28, 1872, when the West Virginia Legislature passed "an Act to locate a Branch State Normal School, in the town of Concord Church, in the County of Mercer". This normal school was founded by veterans of both the Union and the Confederacy, Concord is named for the ideal of "harmony and sweet fellowship".
Cabarrus County Schools is a local education agency headquartered in Concord, North Carolina. The system presides over the vast majority of Cabarrus County, North Carolina, the exception being an area of Kannapolis in the northern part of the county that operates its own district. Over 33,000 students are enrolled in Cabarrus County Schools, and the school system has over 4,300 employees. The current superintendent is Dr. John Kopicki, who was the Cabarrus County Board of Education announced, as superintendent at its Work Session on Monday, August 2.
Jay M. Robinson High School, often referred to as Robinson, JMR, or JRob by students, is a comprehensive public high school located in Concord, North Carolina. It is the fifth high school of the Cabarrus County Schools system, opening its doors in August 2001, the county's first new high school since 1966. The school's enrollment dropped with the openings of Cox Mill High School and Hickory Ridge High School.
Concord High School is a public high school in Concord, North Carolina, United States. First opened on September 2, 1895, it is the oldest public high school in Cabarrus County and one of the oldest extant in North Carolina. It became part of Cabarrus County Schools in 1983 when Concord City Schools merged with the county school system. It is also a half regular high school and half IB high school.
In criminal justice systems, a youth detention center, known as a juvenile detention center (JDC), juvenile detention, juvenile jail, juvenile hall, or more colloquially as juvie/juvy or the Juvey Joint, also sometimes referred to as observation home or remand home is a prison for people under the age of majority, to which they have been sentenced and committed for a period of time, or detained on a short-term basis while awaiting trial or placement in a long-term care program. Juveniles go through a separate court system, the juvenile court, which sentences or commits juveniles to a certain program or facility.
Cannon School is an independent, nonsectarian, college preparatory institution serving students in junior kindergarten through grade 12. The school enrolled approximately 1045 students for the 2024–2025 school year. Cannon School is located in Concord, North Carolina in Cabarrus County, on a 65-acre (26 ha) campus on Poplar Tent Road near the Cabarrus–Mecklenburg county line. The school is fully accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and the Southern Association of Independent Schools.
Odell School is an unincorporated community in northwestern Cabarrus County, North Carolina, United States, named for W. R. Odell Elementary School, a part of the Cabarrus County Schools system. It lies between Huntersville and Concord.
The Cannon Mills Company was an American textile manufacturing company based in Kannapolis, North Carolina, that mainly produced towels and bed sheets. Founded in 1887 by James William Cannon, by 1914 the company was the largest towel and sheets manufacturer in the world.
The North Carolina Department of Public Safety (NCDPS) is an umbrella agency that carries out many of the state's law enforcement, emergency response and homeland security functions. The department was created in 1977 as the Department of Crime Control and Public Safety. In 2012, the North Carolina Department of Correction and the North Carolina Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention were merged with Crime Control & Public Safety to create the new agency.
The Fred C. Nelles Youth Correctional Facility was in essence a prison for youth located on Whittier Boulevard, in Whittier, California. Operated by the California Youth Authority, now part of California Department of Corrections, it once quartered young people incarcerated for law-breaking until it was closed by the state of California in June 2004. Open for 113 years, it had been the oldest juvenile facility in the state, and became registered as California Historical Landmark #947. It was closed because of the reduction in the number of juveniles being housed.
The Mississippi Department of Human Services (MDHS) is a state agency of Mississippi, headquartered in Jackson. The department operates the state's family services.
The Gatesville State School for Boys was a juvenile corrections facility in Gatesville, Texas. The 900-acre (360 ha) facility was converted into two prisons for adults, the Christina Crain Unit, and the Hilltop Unit.
The Gainesville State School is a juvenile correctional facility of the Texas Juvenile Justice Department in unincorporated Cooke County, Texas, near Gainesville. The fenced, maximum security state school is located on a 160-acre (65 ha) tract east of Gainesville, 75 miles (121 km) north of Dallas, along Farm to Market Road 678 and near Interstate 35. Gainesville is a maximum security facility and is fenced. As of 2012 it is the largest juvenile correctional facility in Texas. As of 2012 it houses 270 teenagers. Many of them are 17 and 18 years old.
The North Carolina Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (DJJDP) was a state agency of North Carolina, headquartered in Raleigh. The agency operates juvenile corrections facilities in the state. It is now a part of the North Carolina Department of Public Safety.
The Florida School for Boys, also known as the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys (AGDS), was a reform school operated by the state of Florida in the panhandle town of Marianna from January 1, 1900, to June 30, 2011. A second campus was opened in the town of Okeechobee in 1955. For a time, it was the largest juvenile reform institution in the United States.
The Texas Juvenile Justice Department (TJJD) is a state agency in Texas, headquartered in the Central Services Building (CSB) in Austin.
The historic Cabarrus County Courthouse in Concord, North Carolina was completed in 1876, replacing one that was destroyed by fire just the previous year. It was designed by architect G.S.H. Appleget. It includes Second Empire, Italianate, Classical Revival, and other architecture. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974. In 1975, a new courthouse was built; the historic courthouse is now the home of the Cabarrus County Veterans Museum and the Cabarrus Arts Council. It is located in the South Union Street Courthouse and Commercial Historic District.
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