Central High School

Central High School
Little Rock, AR
December 2010

Central High School made history as the first mandated desegregated high school in the state. The museum to highlight this event sits cattycorner to the school and re-creates moments that made me feel as if I was in the middle of this awful time in our history. Six Afraican American high school students wanted to attend this all-white school because this school offered better academic opportunties for them.

This is a must see museum.  How did those six Black kids have the courage to face those angry, dangerous White crowds.  One  student talked about seeing a woman about her mother's age.  So she sought this woman's comfort and the woman spit on her face.  Who would spit on a child?

The National Guard had to be called in to escort these six black students to school.  The Guard stayed in the building all day to make sure the kids stayed safe and then they were escorted home.  This Guard detail was mandated by the President because the Governor would not guarantee the safety of these kids.

I marvel at people who have so much more courage and conviction than me.  I have never been tested to the point where I had to put my safety in jeaporady for my principles.  And as I stood on this corner on this day, I wonder where I would have stood on that corner, as a White person in the early 1950's.