doors and minds begin to open: decade of desegregation
|
|
By Carolyn Sydnor Parsons ’83
In February of 1968, five young women gathered informally in the office of The Bullet, Mary Washington’s student newspaper. They wanted to talk about something they all were experiencing: isolation.
|
|
On a campus with more than 2,000 students, they were the only African-Americans. Three were freshmen – Claudith “Dottie” Holmes and twin sisters Anita and Orita Whitehead. The other two – Venus Jones and Chris Hall – were upperclassmen. Four of the “Big Five,” as they called themselves in reference to the Big Four civil rights leaders, would become the first group of African-American students to graduate from what was then known as Mary Washington College of theUniversity of Virginia.
This year, in light of the 50th anniversary of the historic Brown v. Board of Education decision, stories of these students and Mary Washington’s desegregation history assumed more prominence. Simpson Library sponsored a lecture series and an exhibit titled, “Opening Doors, Opening Minds: A Celebration of Brown v. Board of Education’s Impact at MWC and Beyond.”
While the Brown ruling primarily challenged discriminatory
laws in elementary and secondary schools, its legacy also was felt in
higher education. Forty years ago, Mary Washington’s Board of
Visitors approved a policy of desegregation. That decision is what formally
opened the institution’s doors to African-American students.
The “Big Five” were not the first African-Americans students
to attend Mary Washington. That milestone occurred in 1962 when JacquelynPulliam,
a teacher in the Culpeper County public schools, enrolled for the summer
session as a commuter student.
The following year, local resident Gaye Todd (now Adegbalola)
took summer French classes as transfer credits for Boston University,
where she was enrolled as a senior. It wasn’t until after the
Board’s decision in 1964 that Mary Washington admitted its first
African-American residential student. That was Kay Estelle Savage; she
attended for two years and then transferred to Howard University.
Despite the College’s prevailing reticence, the student body was
ready to integrate and began to work on and off campus to encourage
this. A campus panel in 1961 discussed “What is the Responsibility
of College Faculties and Students in the Integration Crisis?”
Students spent breaks working for the Southern Student Organizing Committee.
SSOC was a predominantly white organization that encouraged and coordinated
student activism on campuses.
Mary Washington students registered voters, worked in community centers and talked with African-American high school students about attending college. Locally, they even participated in a civil rights demonstration. Led by Nan Grogan Orrock ’65, now a Georgia state legislator, a group of students joined area residents to picket the Fredericksburg Circuit Court building in protest of “Bloody Sunday” (March 7, 1965) in Selma, Ala., and to show their support for upcoming voting rights legislation.
It was the students’ hope, wrote Mary Fitch Harahan ’65 in a letter to The Free Lance-Star shortly after the rally, that “their personal beliefs would become integrated into national policy.”
On that wintry day in The Bullet office, though, as the conversation bounced from topic to topic, the No. 1 concern among the five women was segregated housing. The Whitehead sisters and Holmes all were placed in the same room in Virginia Hall. “I’m sure a computer didn’t do it,” Holmes ’71 quipped during the “Big Five” discussion. “It’s very disappointing and disheartening to think that you have come to an institution of higher learning and open mindedness only to find that you’ve come to a place that’s living 25 years in the past.”
 Anita
Whitehead Scott knew from the start that she “always wanted
to teach.” After graduation, she worked in Charlottesville
schools while her husband completed his law degree. When he finished,
the couple moved back to Fredericksburg, and Scott has since taught
at Hugh Mercer Elementary School. |
Students en masse protested this discriminatory housing policy, saying it denied them the opportunity to learn about one another. Finally, in January of 1969, Chancellor Grellet Simpson issued this statement: “The necessary steps were taken to assure … there would be no discrimination in the assignment of rooms. . . . The College regrets that the situations have occurred in the past.” From the 1969-70 term forward, all living areas were integrated.
Their meager social life available on campus was also a point of group discussion. Upon returning home to Tidewater Virginia, Anita Whitehead Scott ’71 said the sentiment of her friends was: “Now you can get with your sisters and brothers.” Anita had friends at Virginia State University, and they would invite her to Homecoming and events at their school. Others in the group had contacts at Howard University, U.Va. and Virginia Union University. Plus,they all had friends on campus – many of whom tried to set them up with blind dates, especially with Marines stationed at Quantico.
 Orita
Whitehead Martin attended Mary Washington through 1969. The following
year, she moved to Denver, Colo., and completed her education at
Regis University. Today Martin and her family live in Colorado where
she works as an accountant. “I remember fondly my time at
MWC and the friends I met.” |
“The town was so good to us,” recalled Holmes. Frequently,
the women were invited over for meals with local families after church
and various faculty members opened their homes to the African-American
students. Holmes reminisced about one of her favorite professors and
friend Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English Donald Glover. “You
could just drop in and have dinner. His wife made the best chicken pot
pie. I’ll always remember. I sat right at the table with his children.
You were always welcome.”
The women also supported each other. The older African-American students
helped the younger ones get off to a good start. They explained the
nuances of Devil-Goat Day and offered transportation. “We were
there for each other,” Holmes said describing their camaraderie.
“We were few in number, but we always got along well. We always
supported each other … We knew it was an opportunity just to be
at Mary Washington.”
As the group left The Bullet office that day, they had no way of knowing
that in only two months, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would be assassinated.
For Anita Scott, now a second-grade teacher at Fredericksburg’s
Hugh Mercer Elementary School, that day was the most transforming experience
of her college career. Students joined hands on Ball Circle and sang
12 choruses of “We Shall Overcome.”
Scott felt the College recognized that Dr. King “wasn’t
just a great man to African-Americans. He was a great man to all Americans,
and he was making an impact. It really made me feel more included –
that one single event.”
 A
chemistry major, Christiana “Chris” Hall-Worthams was
the first African-American graduate from Mary Washington to become
a teacher. She began her career in the Arlington County public school
system and today lives in California. |
The students’ tribute and subsequent city memorial also moved Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Philosophy George Van Sant. He served as a marshal for the city’s memorial march and recalled recently, “We marched into St. George’s Episcopal Church and filled it. Black and white, completely integrated. It was a beautiful service.”
Bolstered by the display of unity following Dr. King’s death, the faculty became more vocal in support of integration. They passed a resolution stating that “Mary Washington College should strive to become more relevant in the area of human rights and dignity lest we contribute to the growing polarization of white and black America.” Student-faculty committees were established to address specific areas of concern in admission policies, curriculum and hiring practices.
 President
of the student Afro-American Association, Claudith “Dottie”
Holmes vowed “to do her best” when she came to Mary
Washington College of the University of Virginia in 1967. She majored
in history and would later return to her alma mater as a member
of the first class of MALS graduates in 1983. Today she lives in
Richmond and works for Verizon. |
Mary Washington’s first African-American faculty member was a veteran teacher in the local public schools and a respected member of the African-American community. Johnny P. Johnson was hired in 1968 as a part-time instructor for “Methods of Teaching Art” in the education department. Now retired, Johnson admits he initially had concerns. Not wanting to be viewed as a token, he “made sure he was up to the task,” completing his master’s degree soon after he was hired.
Johnson used opportunities in the classroom to discuss racial differences.
For instance, when white students asked for flesh-colored paint, Johnson
would invariably “give them a tube of black paint. We’d
laugh, and they’d get the message – flesh color for whom?”
Overall, Johnson felt his years at Mary Washington were “a very
rewarding experience.” He said recently, “I made so many
friends with students, and now many of those students are teaching.”
Even in the ’60s, there were daily reminders that full integration
would come slowly. A police officer frequently followed Johnson when
he drove his art student teachers back to campus. The local chapter
of the Council on Human Relations, a state organization that sponsored
interracial dialogue, had student members but was not allowed to meet
on campus. “These were things we lived with,” Johnson said.
Anita Scott, one of the trailblazing “Big Five,” agreed.
“Students today have no understanding of the struggle people had
to go through.”
Carolyn Sydnor Parsons ’83
is special collections librarian and archivist at Simpson Library.