Segregationist Namesake For School Should Go: Council President

SILVER SPRING, MD — Montgomery County Council President Nancy Navarro has called on school officials to rename the Col. E. Brooke Lee Middle School, saying the former Maryland politician had a "deeply disturbing racist history."

The school, located at 11800 Monticello Ave., is slated to reopen after renovations are complete in September of 2021. More than 90 percent of the students who attended Col. E. Brooke Lee Middle School between 2017-18 were minorities, according to enrollment data.

In a letter to Superintendent Jack Smith and Board of Education President Shebra Evans on Tuesday, Navarro said the school should ditch its namesake during renovations.

"As you know, over 90 percent of the children attending that school are children of color. It is also a school with a record of high mobility that is impacted by poverty," Navarro said. "Despite the storied demographics of the school, each time I visit the school, I am struck by the boundless enthusiasm and curiosity of the children and their willingness to triumph over the gritty reality of their daily lives."

She added: "It is therefore a supreme irony that these children of color attend a school that is named after the late Mr. E. Brooke Lee, a man with a deeply disturbing racist history."

The school's namesake, Col. Edward Brooke Lee, was a World War I veteran with a political pedigree. Lee was the son of U.S. Sen. Francis Preston Blair Lee and great-grandson of Francis Preston Blair, who discovered the spring that would eventually give Silver Spring its name, according to the school's website. Lee was also the great-nephew of Montgomery Blair. The first high school in Montgomery County is named after Blair. Lee's son, Blair Lee III, was the former governor of Maryland.

The school's website offers a brief history of Lee's life. However, according to Navarro, it "sanitizes his racist past."

Lee was credited with developing the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission. What's lesser known is that he intentionally attached racially restrictive policies to all his suburban properties, The Washington Post reported. These policies prohibited African Americans from renting or buying homes in specific areas.

"The thing to know about him, from a historic standpoint, is that he was probably the most important political figure in Montgomery County's history in the first half of the 20th century," Matt Logan, the executive director of Montgomery History, told Patch. "He absolutely dominated local politics and civic affairs. To say he was an important figure is an understatement. Because of him, we have the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission. It was also because of him that lead to the development of the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission."

"Definitely those were good things," Logan added. "But at same time he was very much a segregationist. Up until the bitter end, he continued to hold those views."

In her letter, Navarro said there are many names of individuals that would represent what Montgomery County stands for.

There is a Board of Education policy in place that presents guidelines for identifying and determining the name for a county public school facility. According to the regulation, which can be found here, it is "preferred that school facilities, or portions of school facilities, be named for deceased distinguished persons, who have made an outstanding contribution to the community, county, state, or nation."

"With the approaching re-opening of a brand new facility, the Board has a unique and exciting opportunity to rename E. Brooke Lee Middle School after a transformational individual that all our students can be proud of, Navarro said. "Continuing to name that school after Mr. Lee would be simply wrong."

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