The Modern School photographs

1934-1990s

This Biographical note was originally written by Allison Hughes in 2023, with some revisions by Emily P. Dunne in 2024.

The Modern School was a private elementary school in Harlem founded by Mildred Johnson (1914-2007) that operated from 1934 to 2007. The school offered Black students an independent, progressive education.

Mildred Louise Johnson (1914-2007) was born in Jacksonville, Florida, to Nora Ethel Floyd and composer John Rosamond Johnson. Her uncle was the civil rights activist James Weldon Johnson. She grew up in New York City and attended the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, where she was the first Black student to graduate from its Teacher Training Department in 1935.

Johnson founded The Modern School (TMS) in 1934 while completing her teacher training at Fieldston, which required practical experience. Due to the largely segregated New York City school system, most private schools were reluctant to accept a Black student teacher. Instead, Johnson founded The Modern School at age twenty. TMS began with eight children in the rectory of St. Philip's Episcopal Church and later moved to various locations in Harlem before Johnson purchased a building to be a permanent site for the school at 539 West 152nd Street, and in 1953 TMS expanded to teach nursery school through sixth grade, with attendance peaking at over two hundred students. Johnson sold the building and retired in 1999, and the school continued under new leadership until 2007.

From 1933 to 1965, Johnson also ran Camp Dunroven, a summer sleepaway camp located first at Greenwood Lake and later Pine Bush, New York. The camp offered hiking, swimming, horseback riding, and arts and crafts, among other activities, and was one of few such camps available for Black children at the time.

Johnson was involved in numerous professional and community organizations, including the National Association of Nursery Education, Progressive Education Association, Girl Friends Inc., Jack and Jill of America, and the Urban League. She also maintained a house on Martha's Vineyard and was an active member of the Cottagers, a group of African American women homeowners on the island.

Johnson married Hedley V. Edwards in 1951, but they later divorced. The couple had one daughter named Kim Melanie Edwards. Johnson suffered a stroke and died on August 11, 2007 in New York City.