Rallying to save Belmead//
An intent crowd listens as volunteer Rodney Jackson rallies support last Saturday to keep the Pennsylvania-based Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament from selling their 2,265-acre Belmead property in Powhatan County. The SBS once operated two Catholic boarding schools for African-American students on the site. Mr. Jackson stands in front of the Belmead mansion, the former home of St. Emma Military Academy for Boys. The other school was St. Francis de Sales School for Girls. About 200 people attended the rally, but the prospects are regarded as slim that the SBS leadership will change course. Already, the SBS essentially has dissolved the nonprofit FrancisEmma Inc. that managed the property for the Catholic order of nuns for the past 12 years.
