James Lawson Fleming

James L. Fleming (1867-1909), in serving as the North Carolina state senator representing Pitt County between 1905 and 1909, was the leading legislative advocate for the founding of a teacher training school in the East. That Fleming understood the school to be specifically for white students was made clear in his reasoning for its creation. Fleming noted that while two teacher training schools for black students had already been established in the East, not one had been created for their white counterparts. This, in Fleming’s view, was blatantly unfair. More than his advocacy of the training school, however, Fleming is best known for introducing the legislation that resulted in the founding of ECTTS. In it, the role of the school as a training ground for “white men and women” was stated unequivocally. Thus, Fleming stands as the legislative father of the institution, and arguably as the author of its status as a segregated, Jim Crow institution.

Born in Pitt County, N. C., Fleming was the son of Leonidas and Harriet Fleming. His early years were spent on a farm and his education, the product of rural schools. Later, he was taught by W. H. Ragsdale, at the Greenville Academy that Ragsdale directed. A Baptist, Fleming graduated from Wake Forest College, and then studied law at the University of North Carolina. He was admitted to the bar in 1892, and then practiced law in Greenville.

Fleming was active in local politics, once being elected mayor of Greenville. He was a partner in Fleming, Aycock and Moore Law Firm with Charles B. Aycock and Lawrence Moore. In 1904 and 1906, Fleming was elected to the N.C. Senate as the Democratic candidate from the Sixth District (Pitt County). A community leader, Fleming helped organize the Greenville Chamber of Commerce. In part, the Greenville Chamber was founded to enhance the town’s bid to serve as the new school’s home.

Tragically, less than two years after leading the push to establish ECTTS and have it located in Greenville, Fleming was killed in a deadly automobile accident on Dickinson Avenue in Greenville, November 1909, shortly after ECTTS opened. Fleming' son, James L. Fleming, would later serve as a professor of Foreign Languages & Literatures at East Carolina from 1945 to 1970.

Sources:

• "An Act to Stimulate High School Instruction in the Public Schools of the State and Teacher Training", Public Laws of North Carolina, 1907, Chapter 820, 1907.
• James Lawson Fleming Papers, Manuscript Collection. J. Y. Joyner Library. East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina.
• Bratton, Mary Jo. East Carolina University: The Formative Years, 1907-1982. Greenville, NC: East Carolina Alumni Association, 1986.

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