The mission of Robert R. Church Elementary School is to provide a high quality education for all students through effective teaching and a rigorous curriculum. University Press of Florida Book: Robert R. Church Jr. And the African American Elizabeth Gritter, author of River of Hope: Black Politics and the Memphis At Robert R. Church Elementary School, children learn to be trailblazers like its black namesake - whose money spared Memphis from oblivion in 1870. The fever brought Memphis a public relations disaster, as papers far At Robert R. Church Elementary, pictures of Church, as well as his family, are Robert Reed Church was an African-American entrepreneur and landowner who lived most of his adult life in Memphis. His father, Charles B. Church was a Robert Reed Church, Sr. (1839-1912) was one of America's most profound rags to riches stories. Church not only became the South's first African American