The little rock nine were students enrolled in Little Rock Central High School who were African American. The Little Rock Crisis was about the students who were not allowed to go to the school that was a segregated school. This was supported by, Orval Faubus,The Governor of Arkansas. The nine people who were in the Little Rock Nine were Ernest Green, Elizabeth Eckford,Jefferson Thomas, Terrence Roberts, Carlotta Walls Lanier, Minnijean Brown, Gloria Ray Karlmark, Thelma Mothershed, Melba Pattillo Beals. Their entrance into the school in 1957 sparked a nationwide crisis.
The governor called the Arkansas National Guard to stop the Nine from entering. On September 4, 1957 Nine attempted to enter the central but turned away at Arkansas National Guard troops. On May 24,1955, Little Rock Nine adopted a plan to do a gradual integration. This was known as Blossom plan, also known as the Little Rock Phase. The plan was called to a meeting for desegregation to begin the fall in 1957. It would start with the central and filter down the lower grades for the next six years. This plan was that all the students would be permitted to transfer from any school where all their race was in the minority.
This meant that all the black schools would remain racially segregated because of too many people who believed that only a few white students would attend predominantly all black schools. The Blossom plan was supported in the Federal Courts. It responded to the lawsuit by a national association for the advancement of colored people (NAACP). When Elizabeth Eckford arrived at the campus at the intersection of 14th and Park Streets, she was confronted by a whole group of angry people of protestors. She tried to enter at the front of the school but she escorted back out to the street by two guardsmen.
She was alone walking around J. LaBeau 2 by the crowd. She reached the south end of Park Street and sat down on a bench to wait for the city bus to take her to her mother’s workplace. Eckford later said, “I tried all I could to find a friendly face somewhere it the mob-someone who maybe would help. looked into the face of an old woman and it seemed like a kind face, but when I looked at her again, she spat on me. ” Anyone that was a part of the Nine arrived on the same day and they gathered on the corner and they had an integrated group of local ministers who gathered there to support them.
They were also turned away by guardsmen. Every person who was in the Nine stayed at home for more than two weeks, trying to keep up on their schoolwork the best they could. When the federal court ordered Gov. Faubus to stop interfering with the court’s order, Faubus removed all of the guardsmen from in front of the school. The police, didn’t think they could control the mob in front of the school, and they removed the Nine later that morning. They returned home again and waited for further information on when they all would be able to attend school.
On September 23, 1957 all the Nine entered the school for the first time. The outside crowed chanted, “Two , Four, Six, Eight… we ain’t gonna integrate! ” They even chased and beat black reporters that were covering the events. They were calling the mob disgraceful. Eisenhower called out 1,200 members of the U. S. Army’s 101st first Airborne Division and put the Arkansas National Guard under federal orders. On September 25, 1957, under all federal troops escort, the Nine were all escorted back into Central for their first full day of school.
J. LaBeau 3 Melba Pattillo later wrote, “After three full days inside Central, 1 know that integration is a much bigger and better word than | thought. ” But they returned to school every single day to persist in obtaining an equal education. After everyone in the Nine suffered repeated harassment, like kicking, shoving, and lots of name calling, the military started to assigned guards to escort them to their classes. The Guards could not go everywhere with the students. The harassment continued in places such as restrooms and locker rooms.
Although everyone from the Nine endured verbal and physical harassment during the whole year at Central, Minnijean Brown was the only one that could respond; she was first suspended and then was expelled for retaliating against the daily torment by dropping her lunch tray along with a bowl of chili on two white boys and later, by referring to a white girl who hit her as “white trash. All the rest of the eight students remained at Central until the end of the school year.
Uha All the other eight, were forced to attend different schools or take correspondence classes the next year when all the voters opted to close all four of Little Rock’s High School to prevent further desegregation efforts. They all had a course in all human relations at first hand. All of her experience, later that day she said, “I just can’t take everything they all throw at me without fighting back. ” Brown moved to New York City and graduated from New Lincoln High School. On May 27, 1958, Ernest Green became Central’s first black graduate. It was a great day for him. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. also attended his graduation Ceremony.
