How many of us remember that famous line? That line chanted in hatred by those who did not want Little Rock Central High School integrated in the late 1950’s. I remember the line but, at the age of 13 in Fort Dodge, IA, I was probably more worried about what I was going to wear to school the next day and if I could get that cute guy next to me in Latin class to say hi to me than in some city in Arkansas. My only contact with overt prejudice came when I took a trip to Willamsburg with my aunt and uncle who lived in Washington, DC. There I saw bathrooms labeled: Women, Men, Colored (and not Colored Men and Colored Women - just Colored). What really struck my 13 year old mind was the older African American sitting outside the Women’s door - obviously there to clean. She couldn’t use the bathroom but she could clean it. Later when I taught American HS History, I learned lots more about it but it wasn’t until today that I got to see it when we visited the Little Rock Central High School NHS and walk across the street to the high school itself and see the steps and the entryway, where we could shut our eyes and envision the bravery of the Little Rock 9.
Obviously, segregation, Jim Crow laws and racism had been a blot on America for a long time. But it came to a head in 1954 when the Supreme Court ruled in Brown vs the Board of Education in Topeka, KS that ‘separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.’ To comply with this ruling, the Little Rock school board came up with a plan to integrate the schools gradually beginning with Central High.
This integration came with some caveats:
‘you’re not going to be able to go to the football games or basketball games. You’re not going to be able to participate in the choir or drams club or be on the track team. You can’t go to the prom. There were many more cannots...’
Carlotta Walls LaNier, one of the LR 9
‘when my tenth-grade teacher in our Negro school said there was a possibility of integration, I signed up We all felt good. We knew that Cental High School had so many more courses, and dramatics and speech and tennis courts and a big beautiful stadium.’
Minnijean Brown, LR 9, to Look Magazine 6/24/1958
The school board called for volunteers and many volunteered. These volunteers were then vetted by the local NAACP and finally 9 were chosen for their courage, their ability to remain calm in a storm among other characteristics. They were Minnijean Brown, Terrance Roberts, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Thelma Mothershed, Melba Patillo, Gloria Ray, Jefferson Thomas, and Carlotta Walls. However, they were given counseling for several weeks prior to entering school so that they would know what might come their way and how to deal with it.
Knowing what was coming, the AR Governor, Orval Faubus called out the National Guard on September 2, not to help these 9 students get to class safely but to ‘maintain and restore order’ and to keep them ‘safe.’ Actually, they were to keep them from entering the school.
‘I thought he was there to protect me. How wrong I was.
Thelma Mothershed Wair, one of the LR9
‘We didn’t know that his idea of keeping the peace was keeping the blacks out.’
Jefferson Thomas, one of the LR9
On September 3, a mob gathered and the LR 9 did not appear. The next day, 8 of them met at a single location so they could enter together. One, Elizabeth Eckford, whose family did not have a phone, did not get the message and tried to enter all alone but faced a large crowd. She tried to make her way through the crowds but the National Guard held her back. The enduring image was a picture taken by Will Counts, a young photographer for the Arkansas Democrat. He caught her as she was walking with the mob in back of her. But, look at the picture - whose face stands out? Who do you really see here? Elizabeth calmly walking along or the young woman in back of her caught in mid-epithet? I have always remembered the young woman in back, Hazel Bryan, a 15-yr old student. And, it was this picture that hit the news, this picture that seared the memory and this picture that was the iconic picture of the LR9. (Ironically, Bryan also got some hate mail and her parents withdrew her from the school even before the LR9 ever attended any classes.) (You can read the story of these two in a book called Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock by David Margolick, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair.)
Elizabeth retreated, seeing that none of the others were coming. In response to Faubus’ action, a team of NAACP lawyers, including Thurgood Marshall, won a federal district court injunction to prevent the governor from blocking the students’ entry. With the help of police escorts, the students successfully entered the school through a side entrance on September 23, 1957. Fearing escalating mob violence, however, the students were rushed home soon afterward. Then, President Eisenhower entered, he federalized the National Guard and called in 1200 soldiers from the 101st Airborne, the Screamin’ Eagles, to protect the students and guard them as they enter the school. Faubus then said that Arkansas was ‘an occupied territory.’
When the 101st was withdrawn in November, the federalized National Guard took over protecting the students as the arrived at school and then inside the school they escorted the students to their classes. through the halls. However, they could not go everywhere and inside classes and inside bathrooms, the 9 experienced violence and harassment everywhere. Urine and feces were smeared on their lockers. One of them was kicked, beaten and had acid thrown in her face, African American effigies were burned out side the school. another was pushed down a flight of stairs. And these are just a small example of the gauntlets that the 9 had to run. Even though student leaders had pledged to obey the law and asked their fellow students to do the same, many did not follow suit and made it difficult for those who did.
Imagine being one of them - you never knew when a foot would slide out to trip you, you never knew when a hand would shove you from behind, you never knew when something would be thrown at you, you never knew when hateful words would be tossed your way. Friendly looks were few and far between since those who showed friendship towards the 9 were called ‘Nigger Lovers.’ One young woman got so tired of trying to maneuver through the cafeteria when chairs were pushed into her way that she dropped her lunch tray and the bowl of chili on it splattered on two white boys. Can you guess who got expelled? Of course you can, she was. After she was expelled, cards the size of business cards circulated: ‘ONE DOWN, EIGHT TO GO’. Little action was taken against white students who harassed the 9.
And it was not only the students who faced harassment: one mother was fired from her job with the State of Arkansas when she refused to remove her daughter from the school. Hate calls and hate mail came regularly to their homes. Caravans of cars passed their homes at night yelling obscenities. In one instance, several men appeared at the front door of one of the families wanting to take the daughter down to be fingerprinted so that people would know who she was when she was dead. Imagine being a parent having someone say that to you.
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