Elizabeth Eckford

PRIMARY SOURCE I--Photograph

Black Students Integrate Little Rock's Central High School

Elizabeth Eckford ignores the hostile screams and stares of fellow students on her first day of school. She was one of the nine negro students whose integration into Little Rock's Central High School was ordered by a Federal Court following legal action by NAACP. Stock Photo ID: BE024335 Date Photographed: September 6, 1957 Model Released: No Release Property Released: No Release Location: Little Rock, Arkansas, USA Credit: © Bettmann/CORBIS License Type: Rights Managed (RM) Category: Historical Collection: Bettmann Premium Max File Size: 137 MB - 6930px × 6920px • 23.00in. × 23.00in @ 300 ppi Restrictions:
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PRIMARY SOURCE II--Oral History

"I am Elizabeth Eckford. I am part of the group that became known as the Little Rock Nine. Prior to the  [de]segregation of Central, there had been one high school for whites, Central High School; one high school for blacks, Dunbar. I expected that there may be something more available to me at Central that was not available at Dunbar; that there might be more courses I could pursue; that there were more options available. I was not prepared for what actually happened."

"I was more concerned about what I would wear, whether we could finish my dress in time...what I was wearing was that okay, would it look good. The night before when the governor went on television and announced that he had called out the Arkansas National Guard, I thought that he had done this to insure the protection of all the students. We did not have a telephone, so inadvertently we were not contacted to let us know that Daisy Bates of NAACP had arranged for some ministers to accompany the students in a group. And so, it was I that arrived alone."

"On the morning of September 4th, my mother was doing what she usually did. My mother was making sure everybody's hair looked right and everybody had their lunch money and their notebooks and things. But she did finally get quiet and we had family prayer. I remember my father walking back and forth. My father worked at night and normally he would have been asleep at that time, but he was awake and he was walking back and forth chomping on cigar that wasn't lit."

"I expected that I would go to school as before on a city bus. So, I walked a few blocks to the bus stop, got on the bus, and rode to within two blocks of the school. I got off the bus and I noticed along the street that there were many more cars than usual. And I remember hearing the murmur of a crowd. But, when I got to the corner where the school was, I was reassured seeing these soldiers circling the school grounds. And I saw students going to school. I saw the guards break ranks as students approached the sidewalks so that they could pass through to get to school. And I approached the guard at the corner as I had seen some other students do and they closed ranks. So, I thought; 'Maybe I am not supposed to enter at this point.' So, I walked further down the line of guards to where there was another sidewalk and I attempted to pass through there. But when I stepped up, they crossed rifles. And again I said to myself; 'So maybe I'm supposed to go down to where the main entrance is.' So, I walked toward the center of the street and when I got to about the middle and I approached the guard he directed me across the street  into the crowd . It was only then that I realized that they were barring me, that I wouldn't go to school."

"As I stepped out into the street, the people who had been across the street started surging forward behind me. So, I headed in the opposite direction to where there was another bus stop. Safety to me meant getting to that bus stop. It seemed like I sat there for a long time before the bus came. In the meantime, people were screaming behind me what I would have described as a crowd before, to my ears sounded like a mob."

from the website Facing History, https://www.facinghistory.org/for-educators/educator-resources/resource-collections/choosing-to-participate/her-own-words-text-only-version An audio version is also available on this page.

SECONDARY SOURCE

Little Rock Nine,  group of African American high-school students who challenged racial segregation in the public schools of Little Rock, Arkansas. The group—consisting of Melba Pattillo, Ernest Green, Elizabeth Eckford, Minnijean Brown, Terrence Roberts, Carlotta Walls, Jefferson Thomas, Gloria Ray, and Thelma Mothershed—became the centre of the struggle to desegregate public schools in the United States, especially in the South. The events that followed their enrollment in Little Rock Central High School provoked intense national debate about racial segregation and civil rights .

During the summer of 1957, the Litte Rock Nine enrolled at Little Rock Central High School, which until then had been all white. The students' effort to enroll was supported by the U.S. Supreme Court 's decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which had declared segregated schooling to be unconstitutional.

Warned by the Little Rock board of education not to attend the first day of school, the nine African American students arrived on the second day accompanied by a small interracial group of ministers. They encountered a large white mob in front of the school, who began shouting, throwing stones, and threatening to kill the students. In addition, about 270 soldiers of the Arkansas National Guard, sent by Arkansas Gov. Orval Eugene Faubus , blocked the school's entrance. Faubus had declared his opposition to integration and his intention to defy a federal court order requiring desegregation.

The confrontation in Little Rock drew international attention to racism and civil rights in the United States as well as to the battle between federal and state power. Television and newspaper reporters devoted substantial coverage to the “Little Rock Nine,” as the African American students were called.

Britannica Library, Reference Center http://library.eb.com.ez.trl.org/levels/referencecenter/article/605810