Echoes of the Past: Ruby Nell Bridges First Day at School (standard:non fiction, 2318 words)
Author: J. P. St. Julian	Added: May 23 2015	Views/Reads: 2695/1844	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
I didn't know at the time, but I was to learn valuable lessons from this occurrence.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

Black people in our community then stayed tuned to the radio, listening
to the good soul music and for news of the integration of the schools 
in New Orleans.  Little Ruby Nell wasn't the only black child going to 
a white school, however, we found out that she was going to be the only 
black child to be going to one particular school.  She was apparently 
the only child chosen to start first grade at an all white New Orleans 
school called William Frantz Public School.  The community was buzzing 
with talk on this subject.  Telephones were few among black people in 
our community, and the ones who had them had to be careful who they 
talked to and even more careful of what they said because the phone 
system we had in our community was a “party line.”  For those 
unfamiliar with this system, it was an open line telephone system in 
which anyone on the system could pick up their receivers and listen in 
on whoever was talking at the time.  No privacy whatsoever, but it was 
cheaper than a closed system, and it was all most could afford.  Black 
people's phone calls were constantly being monitored by white people.  
Consequently, only a few of us had or even wanted phone service.  Those 
Blacks who did have phones had codes for their conversations with each 
other. Most of the real communicating took place Sunday after church, 
or at the Laundromat or wherever the women got together to do their 
hair.  For my stepfather and the other black men, it was the barber 
shop, Sunday after church, or any place they all got together.  If my 
stepfather wanted to know what the latest buzz was, he went to see \ 
other Black men at one the town's two Black barber shops. 

All the black community talked about for a long time was this
integration case.  My mother told me that if it worked in New Orleans, 
chances are that they would want to do the same thing with our schools. 
 I remember telling her that I would never want to go to the white 
school.  She just said that we'd see when the time came. 

We all kept track of Ruby Nell over the radio and through relatives
living in New Orleans.  It seemed that she was protected by Federal 
Marshals during her installation in that school.  They showed her first 
day arrival on the television.  There were lots of mean and hateful 
looking white people outside the school shouting, yelling, and waving 
their fists.  Most of the parents took their children out of the 
school.  But for days, white protesters stood outside the school doors 
shouting nasty racial slurs, threats and innuendoes.  There were riots 
all over New Orleans. News came to us through relatives that Ruby 
Nell's father was fired from his job, and that they were being denied 
the right to shop in certain privately owned stores.  Ruby Nell's 
grandparents, who lived in Mississippi, were evicted from the White 
man's  land they had lived on for over 25 years.  At that time I felt 
so sorry for that family for what they were enduring.  I often asked 
myself why they don't just take the girl out of that school.  I learned 
the answer to that later, but then it really puzzled me why people 
would let themselves be bullied so badly when they could stop it by 
leaving the school and going back to a school for Black children.   I 
learned the answer to that question later too. 

But a thing happened that was unexpected.  Some of the whites let their
kids go back to William Frantz Public School.  All of our community had 
been praying for Ruby Nell and her family.  Assistance was given to her 
grandparents by other Blacks in Mississippi who knew them.  Her father 
was given a job by one of his neighbors who was a contractor.  Other 
neighbors, Black and White, joined together to watch their house to 
keep away troublemakers and baby sit while her parents worked.  Some 
even started to walk behind the Marshals car as they drove Ruby Nell to 
school each day.  My mother and her friends kept in constant touch with 
relatives in New Orleans for the latest news, and then would share it 
with everyone else.  All in all, things started to settle down by mid 
1961.  We had all learned some valuable lessons, especially me.  We all 
got more attuned to the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, and 
in particular, our own state.  For the first time in my life, I 
realized just what it really and truly was to be Black in this country. 
 Until that time I never knew anything about anywhere except the quiet 
little community where I lived in Amite County and the little hamlet of 
Buffalo that was home to me then.  I never knew of or thought about the 
“outside world.”  But all that changed because of a little girl named 
Ruby Nell Bridges.  I now realized that there was someone out there 
fighting so that Blacks could be treated with dignity and respect, and 
be treated as equals by the Whites in our country.  I didn't know what 
it all meant yet, but I knew I wanted to be a part of it. 

I asked my mother why Whites were so mean to us.  She told me that they
were just afraid, that they had lived and had things their way for so 
long and now they were afraid to see that their way of life was 
changing and there wasn't much they could do about it.  So they lashed 
out at us because they saw us as the real reason they were having 
difficulties.  She also told me that some of them didn't know any 
better and was letting their fear overrule their common sense. 

Many, many of the Black kids I knew were so bitter and resentful towards
Whites.  They often said things that were vicious, cruel and demeaning 
about Whites.  In many ways, they reminded me of White people. I never 
joined in those conversations and was asked why.  When I repeated to 
them what my mother told me, they ridiculed me and called me Uncle Tom 
and other names.  This was truly a new area for me.  What my friends 
did and said to me made me feel exactly the same way that the cruelty 
from whites did.  It's funny how I used to view racism as just White 
folks hatred of Black folk. I never thought of it any other way until 
then. I learned that racism was not just limited to White against 
Black.  I also learned that racism is just as cruel and wrong no matter 
who the racists are.  I learned, by the grace of God, that not all 
White are not my enemy, and that not all Black men are my friends.  
These were concepts that were overwhelming for me at that time.  But I 
chose to learn about the Black leaders of the time and focused on 
Medgar Evers, Charles Evers, and Dr. King.  In my teen years, I also 
joined the NAACP and gave my small contribution to the movement by 
working to facilitate voter registration among Black people. My 
contribution was not without a little peril, and many times I was 
afraid, but I persevered. 

Those years are still so fresh in my mind, yet they feel a world away. 
My parents and all Black parents of that era were all so hopeful that 
when we children were grown up, we wouldn't know racial prejudice in 
our children's lifetimes.  Now it is the year 2000 and we still battle 
the same demons as our parents did.  Not exactly the same demons mind 
you.  They are not new, just different.  There are laws enacted by the 
Civil Rights Act that protect Blacks to a large degree.  Those laws do 
not guarantee that Whites or any other group will love us or treat us 
truly equal, or that we will love them.  However, those laws do make 
White men less willing to lynch or kill me because he will now be 
brought to justice for it.  The days when they could do anything they 
want are gone. I constantly ask myself, why is it that mankind has this 
propensity for racism and hatred?  It makes no sense.  I finish this 
article with a quote from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. 

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot
drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence 
multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending 
spiral of destruction....The chain reaction of evil--hate begetting 
hate, wars producing more wars--must be broken, or we shall be plunged 
into the dark abyss of annihilation.” 


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