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About Us

The purpose of the Barrett-Peake Heritage Foundation is to restore the legacy and preserve African American structures and landscapes in the city of Hampton, Virginia.

The Foundation is committed to creating a museum, educational and cultural center at the state headquarters of the historic Virginia Federation of Colored Women’s Clubs, preserve historic Civil War-era cemeteries as sacred landscapes and secure signage at those cemeteries, initiate and monitor historical narratives on markers on the Memorial Trail at the former site of the Virginia School for the Deaf, Blind and Multi-disabled, and offer expert support to other initiatives in historic preservation.

An article about the Barrett-Peake Heritage Foundation from the (Norfolk) Virginian-Pilot

Honoring women who mothered Hampton's children: 
The legacy of Mary S. Peake and Janie Porter Barrett


By Denise M. Watson - The Virginian-Pilot

The boarded-up house at East Pembroke Avenue and Eaton Street in Hampton is the roomy dream any mom would love, especially Janie Porter Barrett.

Before Barrett died in 1948, the social reformer would likely have filled its three stories and wrap-around porch with children to teach to read. To teach them how to pray, how to hold themselves with a pride that she knew from experience they would need.

The house is quiet now, rust-streaked and dark, in need of a loving touch like Barrett’s.

Two Hampton women have formed a foundation to restore the home in the name of two historic women who lived in different eras but had the same purpose of mothering Hampton’s lost children.

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