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teN YEARS in review SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—MAY, 1964—PAGE 13-B Demonstrators Under Arrest University of Mississippi, 1962. Every State Experienced School-Race Incidents OKLAHOMA State Waited One Year Before Starting Change (Con/inued from Page 12-B) University of Georgia, Athens- Two Negroes entered the university on Jan. 9, 1961, by court order. After minor incidents on the night of Jan. 10, a large crowd of students and out siders gathered on the campus the following night. Bricks and fireworks were hurled and dormitory windows broken. Several persons were injured and tear gas and fire hoses were used to break up the crowd. That same night, the two Negro students were suspended and removed from the cam pus “in the interest of their personal safety.” Another court order returned the two on Jan. 16, with tightened security measures. As a result of the Jan. 11 disorders, eight Klan mem bers and two students were arrested. Thirteen students were suspended, although some were reinstated. 1961- 62 No major incidents of violence or protest occurred, Public officials in Atlanta, Ga., Memphis, Tenn., and Dal las, Tex., made extensive preparations to avoid violence when their public schools desegregated for the first time in the fall of 1961. 1962- 63 New Orleans, La.—Crowds gathered outside desegregated public and Cath olic parochial schools to jeer Negro students and to cheer white parents withdrawing their children. Shots were fired through a door at a Catholic school, and the window of a Negro Parent’s car was smashed at a church school. Several bomb threats caused the evacuation of parochial and public schools for searches. This was the third year of desegregation. (See 1960-61.) Atlanta, Ga.—When desegregation °egan at West Fulton High School A ^g. 20, three young members of a white-supremacy organization were arrested and fined for refusing police °™ers to cease picketing. The same school, on the same day, expelled a u dent carrying a sign bearing a Nazi swastika and legend. Buras, La.—A boycott began Aug. > the first day Negro students en- “j red Our Lady of Good Harbor Cath- u ' c School. The Negroes did not show P on the second day. The school then because of “numerous threats” ~ Insufficient police protection.” c ass ® s resumed for a few days, but a com' te b °y c °tt began Sept. 7 and ^®3 64)^ throughout the year. (See j a ^ n * Vers *ty of Mississippi, Oxford— °h th S ^ Meredith, a Negro, arrived Panv 6 *) airipus °n Sept. 30, in the corn ua °1 ^ e< fi era l marshals, to enroll r three federal court orders. Gov. Johns Barnett and Lt ' Gov - Paul B ’ had blocked previous efforts. a televised appeal by Presi- a „ ennedy for peaceful compliance, bric]»° Wd 2,500 gathered to throw pipg S bottles, and to use lead federal ^°tguns and rifles against the tear e mars hals. The marshals used op as gainst the mob. During riot- tVench • nigbt Sept. 30-Oct. 1, a ho* Journalist and an Oxford juke- thari 3^ rat ° r were killed and more big P^sons were injured, includ- aji . naarshals. The President issued ^ at ion a Tp tlVe ° rder P lac ™g 11,000 OPd a,- Guardsmen in federal service Vjoo ^P a tched to the scene about Pig, vvlvn r * roo P s - Destructive riot- ^*f°rd m s P rea< l into the town of hi hours by the troops after Rested . ore than 150 persons were ■ "fin A u ^l U| fing former Army Gen. th e s k "'alker. Meredith remained °°1, accompanied by federal marshals, until he was graduated in June, 1963. Caswell County, N.C.—Negroes en tered three formerly all-white schools in Yanceyville, Jan. 22, 1963, and Jas per Brown, father of four of the child ren, later shot two young white men on a rural road. Both victims suffered minor wounds. Brown, who claimed that his life had been threatened, was sentenced to 90 days in prison and given a 12-18 month suspended term. In 1964, he said he was moving to Washington, D.C. Dollarway, Ark.—On Jan. 22, 1963, a Negro girl entered the already deseg regated Dollarway School. At the end of her second day, the girl’s uncle, William Howard, had his car windows broken when he arrived to pick up two Negro students. A white boy in the 12th grade was stabbed and Howard was arrested. The Negro girl, Sarah Howard, reported that students had kicked and shoved her and thrown things at her. A white mother said her two daughters had been abused for befriending Sarah Howard. One of the daughters withdrew from school but her sister and the two Negro students returned after several days. 1963-64 Jackson, Miss.—Medgar Evers, 37- year-old NAACP field secretary in Mississippi, was shot to death early June 12 when he stepped from his auto after returning from a desegrega tion strategy meeting. Evers, a leader in desgregation efforts in Mississippi, was a plaintiff in a suit to desegregate Jackson public schools. Byron de la Beckwith, an ardent segregationist, was charged with the murder. His first trial was declared a mistrial, and a second mistrial was declared on April 17. Cambridge, Md.—Gov. J. Millard Tawes sent in National Guardsmen on June 14 after racial hostilities had erupted into rioting, a shooting, arson and brick-throwing. Demonstrations prior to the arrival of troops had been touched off by the breakdown of bi- racial negotiations. Negroes called for full desegregation including schools, as a part of their demands for “equal opportunities.” Periodic demonstra tions continued and Guardmen were called to restore order again on July 12. On July 23, Cambridge leaders signed an agreement in the offices of U.S. Attorney General Robert Ken nedy, with assurances of accelerated desegregation. Kansas City, Mo.—On July 5, more than 200 persons marched on the Board of Education calling for greater deseg regation and modification of school district boundaries. St. Louis, Mo.—A protest march was made to the Board of Education build ing June 20, by about 1,000 persons calling for maximum desegregation in city schools, first desegregated in 1955. On July 26, civil-rights groups pic keted a board meeting, and in August, Negro adults and children picketed the home of the board president. The demonstrations ended when the board agreed to additional desegregation. Prince Edward County, Va.—About 60 Negro youths marched in Farm- ville, the county seat, on July 25, to protest closed schools. In the next three days 33 Negroes were arrested for demonstrations against segregation. Prince Edward had closed its public schools in the summer, 1959, to avoid desegregation. Washington, D.C.—The March on Washington “for jobs and freedom” brought about 200,000 Negroes and whites together Aug. 28, in an orderly protest. The marchers’ demands in cluded total desegregation. Buras, La.—Our Lady of Good Har bor, a parochial school, was damaged by a gasoline fire and explosion on Aug. 27. Boycotted completely since its desegregation, the school in Plaque mines Parish had been scheduled to reopen Sept. 3. (See 1962-63.) Columbia, S.C.—A midnight explo sion on Aug. 26 blew a small crater near the home of Miss Henri Mon- teith, an 18-year-old Negro scheduled to enter the University of South Caro lina in September by a federal court order. When classes began in Septem ber she was one of four Negroes ad mitted. Smithville, Tenn.—Gunshots pierced a Negro family’s home and car on Sept. 3, the day after their two child ren had become the first Negroes to enroll with whites in a DeKalb County school. No one was injured. Rowan County, N.C.—A white boy was suspended Sept. 6 from East Rowan High for attacking the first Negro to enter a white county high school. New Orleans, La.—After the arrest of over 100 persons, in a series of demonstrations by Negroes, an esti mated 8,000 persons marched on City Hall, Sept. 30, to present grievances, including demands for faster school desegregation. Hammond, La.—At Greenville Park High, 200 Negro students cut classes in early September to parade to City Hall, demanding an end to segregation. Suspended for a week, the pupils pic keted the school the next day to pro test their suspension. Birmingham, Ala.—The home of a Negro leader and attorney, Arthur D. Shores, was bombed twice within 15 days. The second bombing, on the night of Sept. 4, damaged his home and injured his wife. Rioting touched off in the Negro community by the latter explosion resulted in the death of one Negro and the injury of several persons, including policemen. Earlier the same day, city police had quickly quelled jeering disorders outside two of three schools desegregating for the first time, by order of federal courts. Gov. George Wallace used state troopers to block actual desegregation until Sept. 10, when President Kennedy federalized the Alabama National Guard and all five U.S. district judges in Alabama issued an order restrain ing interference by the governor. Five Negroes then entered the three schools. Street demonstrations and rioting by white students and adults, along with white boycotts of the schools began Sept. 10 and continued until Sept. 14. Federal indictments against eight white adults were later dismissed. On Sun day Sept. 15, an explosion at the Six teenth Street Baptist Church killed four Negro girls and injured 23 others. Within hours after the explosion, two white youths fatally shot a 13-year- old Negro boy, and policemen shot to death a 16-year-old Negro boy. Two major fires, believed to have been set, broke out that night amid confu sion and scattered incidents of vio lence. Rock-throwing by Negroes was reported in many areas. Gov. Wallace rushed 300 state troopers and alerted 500 National Guardsmen in Birming ham. Three white men, all with Ku Klux Klan backgrounds, were con victed of illegal possession of dyna mite in connection with the church bombing; they were sentenced to six months in jail and fined $100 each. By late September, attendance at Birmingham schools was near normal. Mobile, Ala.—Some 300 white stu dents demonstrated against the admis sion of two Negroes to Murphy High, but after the arrest of 54 of them Sept. 12, the boycott diminished. Macon County, Ala.—After Gov. Wallace’s resistance ended, 13 Negroes entered Tuskegee’s only white high school Sept. 10. All whites subsequently withdrew. On Jan. 30, the State Board of Education ordered the school closed. The Negroes in the school were pad locked out when they reported for classes Feb. 3. A federal court ordered six each admitted to Shorter and Notasulga High Schools. On the night of Feb. 2 crosses were burned at the homes of three members of the county school board, and on Feb. 4, two build ings burned at the home of another board member. The Negroes entered the schools at Notasulga and Shorter and partial white boycotts at both schools became total. Fire destroyed the Notasulga school in April, and the local board transferred the six Negroes to an all-Negro school. Jacksonville, Fla.—One person was injured in the Feb. 16 bombing of the home of the only Negro at previously all-white Lackawanna Elementary School. William Sterling Rosecrans, a white Indiana laborer, was convicted for the dynamiting. Five others, all identified as Ku Klux Klan members, were charged as accessories. These events contributed to rising tensions OKLAHOMA CITY O klahoma public schools en rolled white and Negro stu dents separately in the fall term of 1954 as state educators awaited further instructions from the U.S. Supreme Court on its school rul ing. The following spring Oklahoma vot ers set the stage for desegregation by approving on April 5, by a 3-to-l mar gin, a “better schools amendment” to the state constitution. It eliminated the old countywide four-mill levy for sep arate schools, replacing it with a man datory four-mill levy going to all dis tricts on a per capita basis. This, in effect, merged previously separate white and Negro school budgets. Later, on May 28, 1955, the legisla ture adopted a new school code em bodying the financial overhaul and also giving local boards the power to designate schools to be attended by children of the district. The State Regents for Higher Edu cation on June 6, 1955, opened all state colleges and universities to quali fied undergrad uates of all races. State officials, led by Gov. Raymond Gary, set the tone for official com pliance by de claring on June 17, 1955, that Ok lahoma would no longer pay for two separate school systems. They also official ly voided all state statutes in conflict with the U.S. Supreme Court order. Announce Plans In the same month of 1955, desegre gation plans were announced by 10 Oklahoma school districts, led by Po- teau and including Tulsa. Oklahoma City’s board voted full-scale desegre gation Aug. 1, 1955. The State Board of Education an nounced in January, 1956, a new finan cial policy of calculating Negro and white enrollments together in figur ing the number of teachers on which districts can draw state aid. A U.S. District Court ordered four Negro pupils admitted in February, 1957, to the Earlsboro white high school in Bottawatomie County but permitted the district to keep other pupils seg regated until the following school year. In August a settlement of a fed eral court suit brought by the par ents of a 10-year-old deaf mute opened the Oklahoma School for the Deaf at Sulphur to Negroes. Negroes enrolled in white schools for the first time in Morris and Preston, Okmulgee County, for the fall term of 1957 on an or der of U.S. Dis trict Judge Eu gene Rice. A year later, in fol low-up rulings, he declared the Supreme Court did not suggest Oklahoma had to maintain only “int egrated” schools and that a Negro is not in the city, where demonstrations were being conducted against segregated businesses. Mayor Haydon Bums depu tized more than 400 city fireman as auxiliary policemen. On March 23, Negro groups, mostly youths, roamed the streets, threw rocks at cars and set fire to buildings. One Negro woman was shot to death and three persons wounded. On March 24, the rioting continued, with serious disturbances at two high schools. Police said more than 1,500 persons took part in the day-long rioting. About 350 persons were arrested in the two-day period. St. Augustine, Fla.—On Jan. 21, 1964, fire damaged the automobile of a Ne gro family whose three children at tended Fullerwood Elementary School in the first year of local desegregation. The next night a Negro man sought to enroll in a white adult training pro gram and was slugged on his way home. On Feb. 7, 1964, fire destroyed the residence of the only other Negro family sending a child to Fullerwood. Greenbrier County, W. Va.—At White Sulphur Springs, over 100 white students boycotted a school for two days in mid-March because a Negro girl was named a majorette. denied his constitutional rights if he is required to follow regular transfer procedures. The state’s policy of applying finan cial pressure on local districts to en courage desegregation was tested by the Graham and Fox school boards in Carter County in the summer of 1958. They asked for continued sep arate calculation of races for state aid purposes for another year. The state board turned them down. That fall Graham desegregated after failing to find financing for separate schools. Fox operated separate schools for another year. Faculty Desegregation Oklahoma City had its first faculty desegregation in February, 1959, when Negro counselors were assigned to two desegregated schools, Webster Junior High and Culbertson Elementary. By May, 1960, the school board had re placed white faculties there with Ne gro teachers because the once all- white schools had been resegregated as Negro. Creston Hills, another ele mentary school, had previously gone through this cycle. In the spring and summer of 1959 Negro families were moving across Oklahoma City’s Northeast 23rd St., the traditional “boundary” between Negro and white residential areas. The migration led eventually to the de segregation of a high school and sev eral elementary schools in northeastern Oklahoma City. It brought also the organization of neighborhood commit tees that sought to prevail on white families not to move out. The predominantly Negro Langs ton University got a new president, Dr. William H. Hale, in May, 1961. He served notice he would fight to keep the school going even as economy - minded legislators talked of closing it. Alumni and other friends got a leg islative “declara tion of intent” that summer that Langston is im portant to the state’s higher education system. Nearly two years later the school appeared on solid footing as it received a $1,119,000 government loan to help finance a 10- year building project. Transfer Law Attacked The constitutionality of Oklahoma’s pupil transfer law was attacked in a federal court suit in October, 1961. A Negro father charged the Oklahoma City board used it to retain school segregation. The board of education contended any “unintegrated” schools were the result of residential patterns, not any official effort to maintain seg regation. On July 10, 1962, a three-judge fed eral court ruled the Oklahoma City board had not unconstitutionally ap plied the law giv ing it the right to designate schools for pupils to at tend. The case was returned to the district court for trial on fact ual issues. U.S. District Judge Luther Bohanon, in a July 11, 1963, ruling, ordered the Oklahoma City school board to stop transferring pupils on the basis of race and to be gin biracial faculty assignments imme diately. The board came up Aug. 5 with a court-ordered desegregation plan, which eliminated the minority-to- majority transfer plan but re-asserted the neighborhood-school principle. This was confirmed in a permanent policy statement adopted Jan. 14, 1964. Judge Bohanon refused to approve or dis approve it, calling instead for an out side expert’s study. During the decade, an estimated 396 Negro teachers lost their jobs because of desegregation in the state. At the end of the decade a newly established state human rights com mission was calling for repeal of racial laws, including those on school seg regation. GARY