It is essential that we never forget our history for as Marcus Garvey wrote, “A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots.”
In 1957, nine black students attempted to enter Central High School in Arkansas but were turned away by the National Guard. This was three years after the landmark Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision struck down racial segregation in public schools. Arkansas was one of two Southern states to proactively announce it would take immediate steps to comply with the court ruling.
Eventually the nine entered the school under the protection of 1,000 members of the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army as ordered by President Dwight Eisenhower.
This week, America lost one of the brave nine who first desegregated the Little Rock, Ark., public school system — Jefferson Thomas.
Thomas was one of the nine African American teenagers involved in the nation’s first major publicized battle over school segregation. Thomas passed away Sunday, Sept. 5 in Ohio of pancreatic cancer. He was 67 years of age.
Upon graduating from Central High School, Thomas served in the U.S. Army in Vietnam and went on to receive a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Los Angeles State College.
It is difficult for the present generation to even imagine an environment of hate so charged that soldiers would be posted in the hallways of a school to escort black students to their classes.
The “Little Rock Nine” included: Thomas,Carlotta Walls, LaNier, Melba Patillo Beals, Minnijean Brown Trickey, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Gloria Ray Karlmark, Terrence Roberts and Thelma Mothershed Wair.
In 1999 President Bill Clinton, also from Arkansas presented the Nine with Congressional Gold Medals shortly after the 40th anniversary of their enrollment.
President-elect Obama sent Thomas and other members of the Little Rock Nine special invitations to his inauguration in 2008 as the nation’s first black president. Speaking about Thomas, President Clinton described him as “a true hero, a fine public servant, and [a] profoundly good man.”
Thomas was a groundbreaker and one of the reasons African Americans have attained a measure of success in this country. Although we have a long way to go, through his example and that of the other Little Rock Nine members, we should always remember that what we may think is a difficult path, will never approach what they had to go through.
The torch of standing for something should never fall by the wayside. Find a cause and fight for it. –torrance stephens, ph.d.
