Gloucester County’s 2023 commemorative ornament featuring historic Holly Knoll and the Gloucester Institute is now available.
For the past 25 years, the Gloucester County Historical Committee has chosen a historic location, person, or event to commemorate with a keepsake ornament. The ornament may be purchased for $20 at the Gloucester Visitor Center, Gloucester County Library, Museum of History, and Treasurer’s Office.
Custom-made in the United States, the ornament is a limited edition with only 350 produced.
“We are excited to feature Holly Knoll because it is one of the most important historic sites in Gloucester,” said Robert Kelly, Gloucester’s Museums Coordinator. “As the former residence of educator and civil rights icon Dr. Robert Russa Moton and as the current home of the Gloucester Institute, Holly Knoll’s legacy should be celebrated.”
Holly Knoll was built in 1935 for Dr. Robert Russa Moton and served as his retirement home. Moton was one of the most influential African American educators and civil rights leaders of his time serving as an administrator at Hampton Institute and later, Principal of Tuskegee Institute. For Moton, retirement did not mean giving up his lifelong work of building bridges to solve the problems of the day—Holly Knoll regularly hosted the greatest African American minds to debate and address issues of African American advancement.
Following Moton’s death in 1940, Dr. Frederick Douglass Patterson transformed Holly Knoll into the Moton Conference Center. Under Patterson’s leadership, the center hosted many civil rights leaders such as Thurgood Marshall and Oliver Hill, The Greensboro Four, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Andrew D. Young, and Congressman John Lewis. The United Negro College Fund was also founded at Holly Knoll.
Charles and Kay James purchased Holly Knoll in 2005, with a vision of restoring the campus and using it to cultivate the next generation of African American leaders. Today, three programs are offered: the Emerging Leaders Program, the Moton Forums, and the Moton Fellows Program. To learn more, visit gloucesterinstitute.org.