Wake County, NC - Bicentennial File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Barbara Kawamoto Reprinted with permission of the News & Observer and cannot be reproduced without permission. A Method for Educating The News and Observer December 29, 1991 Bicentennial Special/Early 20th Century Raleigh 200 By Treva Jones Born the child of a slave in 1861, Berry O’Kelly was the most prominent black leader in Wake County when he died in 1931. He had helped develop Method, a black community that still exists in West Raleigh. His mercantile business, situated on a railroad spur track, included trans-Atlantic shipments of goods. And he we instrumental in giving the community a school that provided black students, even those well beyond its borders, an opportunity for education when most doors were closed to them. His mother died soon after his birth in Orange County. He was reared by relatives in the Method community, known then as Mason Village. As a youth, he worked for a white family. In his 20s, he clerked in the Mason Village Store. Later, he bought part of the store. Then he bought the whole store. After that, Berry O’Kelly was his own boss. When the community got a post office, it was renamed Method and he was the first postmaster. He established an investment company and a shoe company and was involved with real estate, life insurance and banking. He helped the Mechanics & Farmers Bank of Durham start a Raleigh branch, and later became branch vice-president, manager and board chairman. It was one of only two banks in Raleigh that stayed open during the 1929 bank holiday. O’Kelly owned property, was politically active and got into newspapering as principal stockholder in the Raleigh Independent, a black newspaper published from 1917 to 1926. His first wife, Chanie Ligon, died in 1902. He married schoolteacher Marguerite Bell in 1923. They had a daughter, Beryl, in 1929. Education for blacks was a driving force in his life. He upgraded the Method school, giving his time, money and real estate to improve the campus and the curriculum and raising money for other improvements by obtaining gifts from contributors and foundations. In 1914, it became one of only three county teacher training and industrial schools in the state and was named the Berry O’Kelly Training School. He helped consolidate it with three other small rural schools and transformed it into a boarding school with students from around the state. By 1923, it was one of only three fully accredited black high schools in the state. When he died in 1931, Mr. O’Kelly’s funeral was in the school auditorium. He was buried in the St. James A.M.E. Church yard adjacent to the school. As other schools for blacks improved, fewer boarders attended O’Kelly and the boarding department was eliminated. After Wake County opened a new black high school in Apex about 1955, enrollment dropped. The high school was closed in 1966 and a year later the elementary school was closed. Now, the city of Raleigh operates Method Park and Method Community Center on the old school site. ============================================================== USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, data may be used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material. The electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or for presentation by other persons or organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for purposes other than stated above must obtain the written consent of the file contributor, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. ==============================================================