Board of Directors & The Sisters
Belmead on the James, Inc., ("BOJI" dba The Drexel-Morrell Center) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. It began in 2016 in order to purchase the land at Belmead. The Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament have been in Powhatan since 1892, when Saint Katharine Drexel and her sister and her brother-in-law, Edward and Louise Morrell founded two boarding schools for African-American students: St Emma Military Academy and St Francis de Sales High School.
In 2016, the Sisters decided that they needed to sell Belmead in order to care for their elder Sisters. The Belmead site was sold in 2019. Between 2005 to 2016 and the non-profit, FrancisEmma Inc. had managed the site.
In those 15 years FrancisEmma successfully raise over $5 million from thousands of donors, including SEMA and SFDS alumni, natural and historic preservation supporters, foundations, and volunteers.
The historic Rosemount house was purchased by BOJI in December 2020. It has now become the Drexel-Morell Center.
