The North Little Rock Six of Scipio A. Jones High School - Class of 1958

The Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka U.S. Supreme Court case of 1954 ruled that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional even when equal in quality. As a result, all public schools were to be integrated beginning in September 1957, starting with high schools. The judgment increased the flames of racism across the south. A wave of desegregation and segregation rebellion began as city, state, and school officials were required to implement the change. Several rebellions were documented and publicized for the world to reference for years to come. However, countless rebellions were not, leaving many brave Black students’ stories untold and underrecognized. Among those stories are those of Eugene Hall, Frank Henderson, William Henderson, Richard Lindsey, Gerald Persons, and Harold Smith – the North Little Rock Six.

THE SCHOOL BOARD

North Little Rock school officials of 1954 did not want to change the status quo. Many justified their reasoning with statements such as: Black schools were just as nice as white schools, Black teachers had more master’s degrees than the white teachers, and the Black facilities were newer and/or newly renovated, so desegregation would offer no advantages. However, their opinions never publicly challenged the Supreme Court’s ruling, and they were still prepared to adhere to racial change.

Gov. Orval Faubus’ halt to the integration, plus the segregationist uproar, gave North Little Rock a welcome excuse to stall the integration process of its schools. The board remained still, not moving on desegregation according to Arkansas law. They saw the Brown v. Board of Education decision as a statement of principle rather than a mandate, since Faubus had halted it, which warranted no immediate action. So they made none.

BLACK DELEGATION

A Black delegation developed as a result of the board’s stagnation. It was comprised of fifty working-class folk, thirty-one of whom were women. Its notion was that North Little Rock did not need to wait to see what other communities in the state would do, and they petitioned the board to desegregate sooner rather than later. The board’s attorney and municipal judge, Milton McLees, agreed with the delegation’s notion, stating that the board’s decision to wait was “premature and unwise.” Nevertheless, he told the delegation that the board would comply “in a spirit of cooperation,” but not until “suggestions for implementing the Supreme Court’s decision…reach North Little Rock from national and state levels.” This response came after the North Side NAACP chapter petitioned for a hearing to discuss desegregation.

To counter McLees’ disposition, a board member discredited the delegation’s relevance in contrast to their petition. It was a general opinion that the delegation was not “a representative group of our educational and civic-minded negro people.” However, it included laborers of the Missouri Pacific Railroad (MoPac) [one primary source of employment in North Little Rock], custodial workers, domestics, and beauticians that lived closed to North Little Rock High and were married. And although NAACP-affiliated attorneys Wiley Branton and George Howard, Jr. of Pine Bluff, and Thaddeus Williams and Jackie Shropshire of Little Rock” were a part of the delegation, it absorbed its gall from its local African Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.) Church more than anywhere else. And that was enough.

PROMPT AND REASONABLE

By the end of the 1955 school year, no Black enrollment applications were submitted, and desegregating North Little Rock schools had still not started. The board was in no rush, taking full advantage of the natural division between residential areas of the races. Superintendent C.S. Blackburn stated, “In North Little Rock, no school is to permit the attendance of a student who does not live in its attendance zone. And no Negro lives in the attendance zone of a white school.”

Aware of many school boards’ manipulative measures, the U.S. Supreme Court mandated that schools make “a prompt and reasonable start” toward desegregation. The board held one special meeting with local Black educators and NAACP representatives to address the “problems” with integration and discuss whether, to begin with, seniors or first-graders, refraining from the NAACP’s request to the desegregation process immediately and comprehensively. By the end of the meeting, the board reached a unanimous agreement.