Miller School of Albemarle

Samuel Miller grew up poor in Albemarle County, Virginia, then built a fortune in business before his death in eighteen sixty-nine. His will directed one point one million dollars toward a school for children who could not afford an education.

The Miller Manual Labor School opened in eighteen seventy-eight on the very land where Miller had grown up, with its first students and a philosophy of combining academic study with practical work. Its centerpiece, Old Main, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in nineteen seventy-four. The school still operates today as Miller School of Albemarle, a boarding and day school tracing its mission directly to a self-made merchant's wish that opportunity reach the children who needed it most.