MOUNT AIRY — Sixty-one years ago this month, Cora Beasley dashed through the hallways and classrooms of Flat Rock Elementary School near Mount Airy, shepherding children out of a building engulfed in flames.
Tragedy to Triumph
Mount Airy, North Carolina
copyright 2007
Author Randle Brim- it is signed and gift noted by the author
376 pages
dust jacket has a 1-1/4" inch tear at top / on the front , see scan.
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MOUNT AIRY — Sixty-one years ago this month, Cora Beasley dashed through the hallways and classrooms of Flat Rock Elementary School near Mount Airy, shepherding children out of a building engulfed in flames.
A third-grade teacher who loved music and children, Beasley had ushered numerous students to safety, helping them out of second-floor windows into the outstretched arms of high school students waiting below, when she spotted 9-year old Larry Adams, gripping the sides of his desk, frozen in fear.
Her will to save the boy was no match for the swift-moving fire, and the two were fatally burned, a tragedy that resonated deeply in this small, close-knit community known for its large granite quarry.
Beasley’s sacrifice that day in 1957 will be immortalized in a ceremony on Feb. 22, the anniversary of the fire, when the rebuilt school’s main building will be named the Cora F. Beasley Building.