431 graduates integrated Deep South offices after $40 training
A 1965 New Orleans vocational center provided typing and shorthand skills to Black women who secured positions at Shell, Standard Oil, and Pan-American Life.
By Oliver Bennett ·
431 women, most of them African American, graduated from a New Orleans vocational center between 1965 and 1972. Their combined tuition for books totaled roughly $17,240, with individual costs set at $40 per student. This low-cost program in the French Quarter equipped them with the specific clerical skills required to enter white-collar roles in the Deep South.
The Adult Education Center opened at Exchange Place in 1965. It was established by Father Timothy Gibbons, a Catholic priest who sought to bridge the gap between high school and corporate employment. He recruited Alice Geoffray, a national classroom teacher award winner, to lead instruction. Geoffray taught for seven years, focusing on typewriting, shorthand, and job interviewing techniques that were previously unavailable to many Black women in the region.
Raphael Morgan enrolled in 1970 after high school. She cited a lack of funds for college and a recurring barrier in job interviews where employers rejected candidates without typing experience. Morgan noted that her mother had performed domestic work because she could not afford higher education. Morgan completed her training in 1971. She subsequently earned a teaching degree from the University of New Orleans and worked for the Orleans Parish School Board and as an insurance adjuster.
Jeff Geoffray, son of Alice Geoffray, stated that his mother was not a civil rights activist but a teacher trying to support her children. He observed that the center’s graduates broke into previously segregated corporate spaces. He identified Shell, Standard Oil, Pan-American Life, and New Orleans city hall as key employers that hired these women as their first African American secretaries. Geoffray said his mother maintained close friendships with many of these graduates until her death.
The center closed in 1972. Jeff Geoffray and his sister Jeanne now operate the nonprofit 431 Exchange, named after the total number of alumni and the school's location. The organization advocates for affordable education access and provides scholarships for adults pursuing higher learning. A PBS documentary chronicling the school's history and the nonprofit's current work is slated for release in 2027.
Morgan attended a reunion in mid-May with other graduates. She described the documentary as a way to share their collective experience with a wider audience. The group's story illustrates how targeted vocational training in the mid-1960s facilitated economic integration in the South. The 431 Exchange continues to operate from the site where the original school stood.
