Construction and school literacy may have resulted from the Bray School. The building's original lot was on the southeast corner of Prince George St. and Boundary St. in Williamsburg, Virginia traces to a September 6, 1712 deed to William Craig, which included stipulations to build a house within 24 months. In 1719, a dwelling house is recorded in a will to Craig's daughters. On November 15, 1734, daughter Sarah Craig Henrikin sold a lot on which they had been living to Hannah Shields. Hannah's sons Matthew and James then sold it to
Dudley Digges Jr. on November 14, 1763. In 1763-1765, the house was rented for £8 per annum by the Associates of Dr. Bray, which had been organized to educate
enslaved African-Americans. In 1756, Franklin had been awarded an
honorary degree by the College of William & Mary during a visit to Williamsburg. During his 1756 visit and through correspondence with Williamsburg residents, Franklin became familiar with the college's ecclesiastical faculty and their religious education of Black students:
Henry Compton,
Bishop of London and first
chancellor of the College of William & Mary, was a "powerful proponent for the salvation of black souls in America" and
William Dawson, the Church of England rector of
Bruton Parish Church and
president of the College of William & Mary, had written to England in 1743 inquiring about school rules should a school for Black students be founded in Williamsburg. William & Mary also sent two of its enslaved children, Adam and Fanny, to the Bray School in 1769. with Wager escorting the students to Bruton Parish services on
feast days and giving students copies of the
Book of Common Prayer after completing an exam on the
catechism. Wager was kind to her students, though the curriculum also enforced pro-slavery ideology. Although Black Virginian
oral tradition referred to some Bray School students as the "first black teachers in Virginia" and says they assisted in the escape of their fellow enslaved through sharing their knowledge of writing, writing was not taught at the school. The Bray School moved from the original building in 1765 and closed in 1774. Over the school's 14 years of operation, Wager educated up to several hundred students. A 2014 dig performed by a joint Colonial Williamsburg-William & Mary team was performed at the site of Brown Hall in search of evidence of the Bray School; it was the third-straight year of digs at the site. In 2019, a Virginia state
historical marker commemorating the Bray School was unveiled at the school's original site during a ceremony featuring William & Mary president
Katherine Rowe, Meyers, and Lemon Project director Jody L. Allen. At the ceremony, Meyers said that William & Mary could "with obvious caveats and qualifications" be described as "the first institution of higher learning in what is today America to concern itself with black education" because of its association with the Bray School. After the college's military science department left the building, an inventory was performed with the objective of preparing for the restoration. The building's survival to present has been described as "remarkable" in light of the significant number of demolitions undertaken during the 1920s restoration efforts. ==Architectural history==