Desegregation - Elizabeth Eckford and The Little Rock Nine - 50th Anniversary

The Little Rock Nine

Elizabeth Eckford was born in October of 1941 and is one of the African American students known for their desegregation in the 1950's as the Little Rock Nine. Specifically, on September 4, 1957, Eckford and eight other African American students attempted to attend Little Rock Central High School, which before this date had only enrolled white students. The Little rock Nine were all stopped at the door of the school by Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus and the Arkansas National Guard troops. The Little Rock Nine attempted again without success to attend Central High on September 23, 1957. On the next day, September 24, 1957, President Dwight David Eisenhower commissiond United States Army troops to accompany the Little Rock Nine into the school for their protection.

In 1996, seven of the Little Rock Nine, including Elizabeth Eckford, appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show. They came face to face with a few of the white students who tormented them as well as one student who befriended them. A reunion in Little Rock in 1997 provided an opportunity for acts of reconciliation, as noted in this editorial from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on the first day of 1998:

One of the fascinating stories to come out of the reunion was the apology that Hazel Bryan Massery made to Elizabeth Eckford for a terrible moment caught forever by the camera. That 40-year-old picture of hate assailing grace — which had gnawed at Ms. Hazel Massery for decades — can now be wiped clean, and replaced by a snapshot of two friends. The apology came from the real Hazel Bryan Massery, the decent woman who had been hidden all those years by a fleeting image. And the graceful acceptance of that apology was but another act of dignity in the life of Elizabeth Eckford.

Commentary

This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of desegregation in many public schools. 50th anniversary! Therefore, during the lifetime of my parents, schools were segregated. This meant black students were in far inferior academic environments than their white counterparts. Overall, fifty years is not that long ago. The Little Rock Nine must be continually honored for their valor and resolve during extreme racist hostility.

I would like to think that I could have endured and succeeded in that environment, however looking at the Elizabeth Eckford picture and seeing the hate and spite on the peoples faces would have caused me to start a riot. We are naive to think that this mentality has been eradicated from our society. We certainly have made significant strides, but we have a long way to go.