Newspaper Page Text
SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—MAY, 1962—PAGE 17
OKLAHOMA
il School Board Says Desegregation
t Caused by Residential Patterns
ttt
t, j OKLAHOMA CITY
de. fTNiNTEGRATED schools are the
^ U result of residential patterns,
jot any official effort to maintain
segregation, the Oklahoma City
goard of Education contends.
Setting forth its position in a federal
Lurt brief, the board declared it has
| jo control over the concentration of
population of one race in a particular
gea.
The board thus sought to answer
If claim by Negro attorneys that, after
icven years of desegregation, Oklahoma
Sty still has all-Negro and all-white
: it schools.
hid I Filing of briefs followed arguments
*t ipril 3 before a three-judge panel in
th Jie U.S. district court suit, Dowell v.
)u - Board of Education. It was filed Oct. 9
' to jy Dr. Alfonzo L. Dowell, Oklahoma
I Sty Negro optometrist, in behalf of
his son, Robert, 14.
Dowell charged his son was not al-
ate owed a transfer from Douglass High
m- School to Northeast High School unless
ist le took a specified course. He asserted
led he same requirement is not made of
white students desiring transfers to
Lt. Sortheast.
Right to Designate
nit The right of a board of education
he io designate schools in its system for
>v, students to attend had been singled
in jut as a principal issue in a pre-trial
nt conference Jan. 26.
ot But in the April 3 hearing attorneys
m. :or Dowell conceded Oklahoma’s school
B. iistrict transfer law is legal and the
ty school board has a right to make as-
rt signments.
nt That raised the point whether a con-
is stitutional question was involved and
t- whether a three-judge court thus could
or lear the suit. The court agreed, how-
or ever, to hear the case and then assign
to it to a single judge if a question of
of constitutionality is not involved.
The school board’s attorney, Walter
lybrand, contended that, if the trans
fers were made largely at the request
as of parents, the board was not commit-
j. ing an unconstitutional act.
Mother Testifies
Mrs. Gloria Burst testified her child
,,j was forced to attend Creston Hills, an
in ifl-Negro elementary school 18 blocks
is -om their home, while white children
, e ie plays with in the same neighbor -
'-cod attend Harmony School, only
y iree blocks away. She said she had
s oeen denied transfers on two separate
n occasions.
. Ira D. Hall, Negro principal of In
Oklahoma Highlights
The Oklahoma City school board
denied in a federal court brief it is
segregation-minded and said it can
not control residential patterns.
The Hobart school board an
nounced closing of its Dunbar
Elementary School and placement of
the remaining Negro pupils there
with white students next fall.
man Page Elementary School, said no
white children attend there although
white families live in the area. He
agreed some of his pupils come from
other attendance areas and that he
“advised with parents” in suggesting
their transfer.
One of Dowell’s attorneys, summing
up, said the question is “whether or
not after seven years the Oklahoma
City school board has come up with a
workable plan that will lead them out
of this morass where you have integra
tion (in some schools) and 100 per cent
colored and 100 per cent white in
other schools.”
Otto Thompson, school board mem
ber, testified students who are of a
minority race at a particular school
may transfer to another school where
they will be a member of a majority
race.
‘Work Both Ways’
He was asked by Chief Judge A. P.
Murrah of the U.S. 10th Circuit Court
of Appeals if such transfers “work
both ways.” Thompson replied, “Yes
sir, they certainly do.”
Thompson said the rule was adopted
to handle “emotional problems” that
might arise in children who are in a
minority at the school they attend.
Phil Bennett, another board member,
said since 1955, when the city’s schools
were desegregated, slight modifications
in boundaries have been made. But he
said they were required because of
new schools, population changes and
the need to keep classrooms filled, not
because of race.
“The school board, either fortunately
or unfortunately, doesn’t decide where
people are going to live,” Bennett said.
“We haven’t connived to make Doug
lass a colored school.”
Elaborating in its brief, the board
said residence in a particular attend
ance area determines which school a
student goes to but that transfers are
allowed on two conditions.
One is the situation in which a pupil
finds himself a member of the minority
race. The other is a lack of educational
opportunities in the home school. The
second type is always granted, regard
less of race, the brief said.
It added that the policy of allowing
transfers of students in the racial
minority is a “safety valve” measure.
It explained the board must proceed
educationally on two fronts: To con
duct a system for the benefit of all
and to educate the school population
on racial relations.
To Minimize Friction
“This could only be done properly
by avoiding unnecessary friction and
dissension in student bodies,” it was
declared.
The brief pointed out that “uninte
grated” individual schools, like Doug
lass, are commonplace “in cities long
desegregated where there is a large
concentration of population of one race.
Defendant has no control over residen
tial pattern.”
Hearing the case with Murrah were
U.S. District Judges Luther Bohanon
and Fred Daugherty.
Schoolmen
Separate Schools
To End in Hobart
With Fall Opening
Hobart, a southwestern Oklahoma
community, will have a fully desegre
gated school system next fall with the
closing of its Negro school.
The action will complete a three-
step desegregation program which
started at the high school level in 1955.
Beginning in September, Supt. Ma
rion J. Due said, 66 Negroes now in
grades one through four at Dunbar
School will be placed in classes with
white pupils.
Another 56 Negroes in grades five
through 12 are already in schools with
white students, Due said. The fifth and
sixth grades were desegregated in Sep
tember, 1961. The high school grades—
seven through 12—were desegregated
seven years ago.
Thus, when schools open in the fall,
130 Negroes will be in class with white
pupils. The increase over the present
122 Negroes will result from more first-
graders entering the system than sen-
el "
Oklahoma Desegregation
Predominantly White
Total
Number
Date
Senior Colleges
Enrollment
Negroes
Deseg.f
Central State
4,070
250**
1955-V
East Central State
1,665
5**
1955-V
Northeastern State
2,854
40**
1955-V
Northwestern State
1,154
0
1955-V
Oklahoma College for Women ..
778
6
1955-V
Oklahoma State University
11,912
some**
1955-V
Panhandle A&M
972
0
1955-V
Southeastern State
1,608
15*
1955-V
Southwestern State
2,466
20*
1955-V
University of Oklahoma
11,523
Unknown
1948-C
State Junior Colleges
Cameron State Agricultural ....
1,398
Unknown**
1955-V
Connors State Agricultural
460
1**
1955-V
Eastern Oklahoma A&M
667
17**
1955-V
Murray State Agricultural
301
15 or 20*
1955-V
Northeastern Okla. A&M
1,066
0
1955-V
Northern Oklahoma Junior
492
Unknown**
1955-V
Oklahoma Military
493
Unknown**
1955-V
Municipal Junior Colleges
Altus Junior
288
18
1959-V
El Reno Junior
118
0**
1956-V
Muskogee Junior
165
25
1956-V
Poteau Junior
109
22**
1955-V
Sayre Junior
173
0
1954-V
Seminole Junior
39
2
1957-V
Predominantly Negro
Langston University
675
674
1955-V
*Estimated
**1960-61
fY—Voluntary; C—Court Ordered
iors leaving, Due said. Total district
enrollment at present is 1,400.
The Hobart Board of Education voted
in its April meeting to employ William
Young, principal of Dunbar School, as
a counselor for the Negro students and
a liaison officer between the Negro
community and the schools. He also
will do tutoring and act as truant offi
cer. He will not be used in the class
rooms, however, except perhaps as an
associate instructor in the larger phys
ical education classes, Due said.
“We feel the community is not quite
ready for a Negro (teacher) in a full
classroom situation,” the superintend
ent explained. “The people accept the
situation as is full well, but I don’t
believe they would go along with that.”
Oklahoma Negro groups, while con
ceding the state has made progress
generally in school desegregation, have
decried the failure of most districts to
absorb Negro teachers into their white
faculties.
The other Negro teacher at Dunbar,
responsible for the first and second
grades, will not be retained.
Due said the board has received no
pressure from Hobart Negroes for fac
ulty desegregation. “They seem to be
happy to have their children instructed
by white teachers,” he said.
Desegregation has worked very satis
factorily in Hobart, Due went on. The
big problem has been the inability of
Negro pupils to adjust academically.
“We’ve found they have been de
prived of academic training, although
some are coming along fine now,” he
said.
Special Tests
A number of Negro children have
been tested for placing in special edu
cation classes next year but Due said
the results aren’t known yet. The fifth-
and sixth-grade Negroes were tested
for this year but none “qualified” for
special education.
Due said Hobart has found desegre
gation to be “very wholesome” and
the Negro population is happy with it.
There has been no “open objection”
from the townspeople, he said, attrib
uting this to the way the board laid
the groundwork and “brought the peo
ple along.” # # #
West Virginia
(Continued From Page 16)
^rt. The same proposal also has gone
0 the board.
★ ★ ★
- e gregated College Opens
^rive for $2.5 Millions
West Virginia’s only segregated four-
s ;' ear college, Morris Harvey at Charles-
. '*0, has started a $2.5 million fund-
aising campaign.
The drive, decided upon by the col-
e ge’s board of trustees at a meeting
tpril 27, will continue through 1963,
tie college’s 75th anniversary year.
President Leonard Riggleman told
7® board the campaign is “unquestion-
% a bold venture.”
.The major item to be financed is a
'/■'j million building to house a cafe-
i ba, snack bar, student lounge, col-
store, conference rooms, faculty of-
classrooms and laboratories.
More to Come
Mother $300,000 to be raised will be
iSe d for completion of dormitories now
' ^ er construct i° n -
, Morris Harvey has conducted three
j “'raising campaigns in the past 17
and they brought in a total of
■l ■” million, the same amount the board
,J Pf s to raise in this one campaign.
.Morris Harvey is a privately owned
sfitution and has a student body of
i^ re than 1,000. College officials say
is a waiting list because of in-
^cient space, particularly dormitory,
ther public and private colleges and
I. Ver sities desegregated after the Su-
Court rulings in 1954.
o here i s one other college in Kanawha
sti^ty—West Virginia State at In-
i ] 9 ^ te - It was a Negro institution until
t'i'o ’■ an< ^ now ii s student body is ap_
Philately 70 per cent white. # # #
Econom ic Factors Keep Negroes Segrega ted
By LEONARD JACKSON
ALTUS, OKLA.
he impact of a federal military
base helped desegregate this
community’s schools but economic
factors have kept most Negro
children in segregated classes.
Only 51 of the 376 Negro pupils are
enrolled in predominantly white
schools.
The others attend Lincoln School,
deep in the Negro residential section
in the southwest comer of town, to
take advantage of its month-long re
cess for the cotton harvest each fall.
Altus, choked with 24,440 residents
at latest count, is one of America’s
space-age cities. Altus Air Force Base
sprawls at its east doorstep. But even
more pressure on its housing and
schools has resulted from the 12 Atlas
missile “siloes,” or launching sites, now
under construction in a giant ring
around Altus.
Part of District
The Air Force base is part of the
Altus district, so the 1,250 children of
military and civilian personnel are en
titled to attend its schools. The board
of education operates Falcon Elemen
tary School, located on a site adjoining
the base. Its student body is composed
almost entirely of military children,
both white and Negro.
Yet, six other grade schools in town
already had Negroes and whites in
class together before Falcon was built.
General Dynamics-Astronautics and
its various sub-contractors have pour
ed some 4,000 technicians, mechanics,
electricians and other workers into the
area to build the underground launch
ing pads. With one site accepted by the
Air Force and others nearing comple
tion, the work force is beginning to
Some of the workers brought in were
Negroes from the North. Yet a General
Dynamics spokesman insisted the firm
has encountered no racial problems,
either in housing or otherwise.
The way was prepared not only for
this but also for desegregation of the
schools by the opening of two tracts
of 600 new homes in parts of Altus
always considered to be white residen
tial sections. Since they were built with
federal defense housing funds, no racial
restrictions could be applied in their
sale. A number of Negro civilian fami
lies bought homes in the two areas, one
located in the southeast part of town
and the other, in the northeast part.
Families of Negro military and con
struction personnel also moved in.
With the residential barrier broken
down, the Altus Board of Education
decided to abandon its separate school
ing systems. Negro children were ad
mitted to previously white schools in
1957. In a somewhat unusual step, the
board eliminated all attendance areas.
Any School They Wish
The board’s official policy, adopted in
May, 1957, stated that pupils could
attend any school they wished to, re
gardless of race or place of residence.
However, in case of over-loading at
any school, children living closest to it
would receive preference.
Actually, the board did apply one
restriction temporarily. Dr. C. G. Rus
sell, a dentist and school board presi
dent, explained the number of Negroes
at Central Junior High School was
limited for about two years because of
a severe over-crowding situation. The
building was designed for 450 students
and it had 800, he said. Therefore,
Negro children at the junior high level
living closer to the Negro school, Lin
coln, were asked to attend there.
When the new Northeast Junior High
School was completed last year, the re
striction was lifted. Negroes are free
now to attend either Central or North
east or to remain at Lincoln, Dr.
Russell said.
Number.Is Low
Yet, although all but two (both ele
mentary) of the city’s 11 traditionally
white schools are desegregated in fact,
only 51 Negroes
are attending
classes with white
students, Supt.
Clifford Peterson
reported.
‘We have had no
problem over de
segregation,” said
Peterson. “We
have a very Tin
derstanding peo
ple in this com
munity. They have
given fullest co-operation to our
schools in this program. We have made
our schools available to all, but a large
per cent of our Negro population prefer
the segregated school.”
One possible factor in holding down
the number may be a board require
ment that, once a pupil enrolls in a
school in the fall, he must remain there
for the entire academic year.
A more likely reason is the one given
by W. C. Davis, principal of Lincoln
School. He said the economic status of
the Negro in Altus is low. About the
only employment available to him is in
the cotton fields, the cotton compresses
and at the Air Force base. Davis said
the Negro’s lot has improved somewhat
since the base was established.
Most of the Negroes live in sub
standard homes in an area south of
Broadway and west of Main, the two
chief thoroughfares criss-crossing Al
tus. The area is divided by railroad
tracks, and the Lincoln school lies be
yond them, with a cotton compress to
the north of it and another to the east.
The Negro school operates on a split
term. Classes for the fall semester be
gin the first Monday in August and
run until about Oct. 1. Then comes a
month’s vacation for the cotton harvest
and school resumes the first Monday
in November.
Want to Work
Lincoln gets “99 per cent” of all the
Negroes who live in Jackson County,
Davis said. A few live on farms outside
Altus and ride school buses to town.
“I guess you’d say they go to Lincoln
by choice,” the Negro principal said,
“but they do it so they can work in
the cotton harvest. None of the other
schools lets out.”
He explained that Negro youngsters
in the junior and senior high schools
and in grades 4 through 6 work in
the cotton fields. They earn $2 per
hundredweight, and the older boys can
pick as much as 300 or 400 pounds of
cotton a day, some as much as 500.
Some of the Negro pupils have
switched over to Altus Senior High and
done well; others have returned to
Lincoln.
Dramatics Limited
“A (Negro) kid going to Altus High—
if he can play football or basketball,
that’s fine,” said Davis. “But there are
no other activities for them, such as
school plays.”
He could recall only one Negro stu-
(See ALTUS, Page 18)
PETERSON