1957 The Little Rock Nine
Carlotta Walls, my mother’s brother’s daughter, my first cousin and a heroine of the Walls-Boyd family clan.
1957
High school should be a time when a child makes their best memories, for my cousin and her brave black schoolmates, those 4 years were the worst of times. Racial epitaphs and human feces smeared on their lockers, white students spit at them every day, being called ‘nigger and coon’ as commonly as one would use their real names. All of this because they wanted an education on par with the white students of Little Rock, Ark.
Carlotta to the immediate right of the soldier
Ernest Green and Carlotta Walls inside Little Rock High School
Orval Faubus, Racist Democratic Governor of Arkansas from 1955-1967
In 1957 President Dwight D. Eisenhower knew he had to act boldly. He placed the Arkansas National Guard under federal control and sent 1,000 U.S. Army paratroopers from the 101st Airborne Division to assist them in restoring order in Little Rock as a result of Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus's refusal to integrate the Little Rock public school system and white rage riots broke out. Army paratroopers from the 101st Airborne Division were sent to assist them in restoring order in Little Rock. The daring tactic worked and the African American students were enrolled without further violent disturbances.
Little Rock Nine with Thurgood Marshall
All of these students would go on to receive college degrees and have dignified careers in their chosen fields, a few would write books and some remained activists in their communities.
It was one among many attempts to smother BLACK POTENTIAL
(L to R) Big Sister Camille, cousin Carlotta, myself and my sister Renata circa. 1958 - 1959