Personal Stories and Perspectives of Integration

Unfortunately, because of segregated neighborhoods, achieving racial balance required extensive busing of students and the closing of many Black schools that had been the foundation of social and educational life for Roanoke’s African American residents. The transition was difficult and created fear and turmoil within communities and among students.

Reflections on Passive Resistance

Peter Carr Jones, Integrating the Star City of the South p. 59

“In Roanoke, passive resistance kept schools essentially (or completely) segregated much longer than massive resistance. Urban renewal brought positive changes for Roanoke’s downtown, but at the expense of a black community who lost not only bricks and mortar but pieces of their identity and history.

These are some of the ironies of Roanoke’s Civil Rights Movement. The democratic movements, for which the Civil Rights Movement is famous, only touched Roanoke briefly. Replacing these were a secret biracial committee that successfully integrated many businesses, golf courses, parks, waiting rooms, and buses. The School Board resisted change for over a decade and then closed inner city schools that whites largely did not want to attend.

This smoothing over of racial conflicts and reliance on civilized discussion even in the face of discrimination created an environment where it was possible for an African American to be elected mayor (Noel C. Taylor, 1975-1992) in a City which was overwhelmingly white.”

Reflections on Integrating Roanoke Schools

R. R. Wilkinson Foundation Facebook Page, Post 9/24/2021

“On September 7th, 1960 nine Black children were chosen by the Roanoke NAACP Chapter to integrate Monroe Junior High School, West End Elementary School, and Melrose Elementary School in Roanoke, Virginia during the 1960-1961 school year.

Earlier in May 1960, Rev. R.R. Wilkinson, who was President of the NAACP in Roanoke, Virginia, announced that Black students would file applications for admissions to Roanoke’s all white schools for the fall term. Against heavy resistance from the state of Virginia, Roanoke NAACP attorney Reuben Lawson fought school segregation hard filing several desegregation lawsuits in Virginia Federal District court to obtain a federal court order to desegregate Roanoke public schools.

Several weeks later the NAACP won their court order. On September 7th, 1960, the nine children from four black families chosen to integrate were Cecelia Long, Rosiland Long, Milton Long, Eula Poindexter, Darlene Poindexter, Charles James, Judith James, and Cassandra and Nadine Wilkinson. Together they would all make history by attending all white schools for the first time in Roanoke, Virginia. Surrounded by reporters and cameras, Euphesenia Wilkinson, bravely escorted her two daughters, Cassandra and Nadine, to the all white Melrose Elementary school that day without any incident.”

Excerpt from The Roanoke Times, Roanoke’s School Integration, May 2011

“Cecelia Long vividly remembers her first day of junior high school. It was September 1960. She wore black oxfords, a plaid skirt and a plaid top to match. Her bangs were primly rolled, her hair pressed in place with a white headband. She carried a small black purse and a brown paper lunch bag in one arm, school folders in the other. “I tried to look like everyone else,” Long said. “But of course, I couldn’t, because I was different.”

She wanted to walk to her school, Monroe Junior High, but her mother wouldn’t let her, so she caught a ride with her classmate, Eula Poindexter. A crowd surrounded the Poindexters’ station wagon about a block from the school. Eggs and tomatoes splattered the car. It didn’t help that the two 12-year-olds were greeted by photographers flashing cameras in their faces. As they waited for the school doors to open, white students gawked at the two black girls. “I knew it was not going to be a simple matter that day,” Long said 50 years later.

All day long, she said, other students muttered derogatory comments just loud enough for the girls to hear — but not loud enough to cause a commotion. “N—–, get away from our school.” Cecelia Long said the discrimination she experienced while in school didn’t bother her much because she was determined to be focused. “I was there to study,” she said, “not to make friends.”

Excerpt from The Roanoke Times, Roanoke’s School Integration, May 2011

“Euphesenia Massey remembers holding the hands of her two daughters, Nadine and Cassandra Wilkinson, 6 and 8 respectively, as they walked stoically into Melrose [Elementary School]. Her then-husband, the Rev. Raymond Wilkinson, was away on business and she decided to walk her daughters to school in case there was jeering or unrest. To her surprise, things were peaceful at the elementary school. “It was strange,” she said. “It was the most harmonious integration I’ve heard of.The girls’ experience was mostly positive — although their white classmates’ parents wouldn’t let them play together after school…

The girls didn’t grasp the historical significance of the steps they were taking. All they knew was that it was important. Their father told them so.” “He would tell us we are just as good as white students,” Cassandra Wilkinson-Lightly said. “He told us to be strong; he said afterwards we would learn the importance of what we were doing.”

Excerpt from The Roanoke Times, Roanoke Reborn, May 2016

“Joanne Poindexter was in the second desegregated class (1961) at Monroe [Junior High School]. The black students all stood in a group waiting to enter school the first day, nervous, fearful of being called names or struck, wondering how many black friends would be in their classes. Poindexter quickly learned which teachers were sympathetic and whose classes were a safe haven. In the hallways, anything might happen. There was a group of white boys who daily stood on a landing in the stairwell and taunted the black kids with racial slurs. All the black students were in the last gym class of the day, Poindexter said, and she and others suspected that it was so no whites would have to shower after them.”

For more information on integration perspectives from pioneer Black Roanoke students, visit:

https://vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/bitstream/handle/10919/56661/Poff_ME_D_2014.pdf;sequence=1

Reflections on Biracial Committee

Nathaniel Raymond Benjamin, 9/18/2020

History of Roanoke, VA Facebook Page

“Rev. R.R. Wilkinson, President of the Roanoke NAACP, had meetings with an all white Roanoke City Council, Mayor Vincent S. Wheeler, and with the city manager to discuss creating a Biracial Commission to improve race relations in Roanoke without demonstrations. Unfortunately, Roanoke government officials did not support the idea of a Biracial commission. In their opinion it would stir up trouble between blacks and whites. Rev. Wilkinson stressed to them that segregation was morally wrong. They were unwilling to act against Virginia’s segregation laws which were strongly supported by Governor J. Lindsay Almond.

Frustrated with leaders in Roanoke’s government, Rev. Wilkinson held a press conference on April 14th, 1960 at Hill Street Baptist Church. Rev. Wilkinson called out the local government for their unwillingness to work with the NAACP to improve race relations in Roanoke. There would be no hope to improve race relations in Roanoke unless there were nonviolent demonstrations.

Young black citizens of Roanoke heard Rev. Wilkinson’s support for nonviolent demonstrations. In the spring of 1960, several black protesters took action and held a peaceful demonstration in front of Woolworth’s on Campbell Avenue while holding up signs to protest against Woolworth’s refusing service to black citizens.

In the meantime, Rev. Wilkinson reached out to black and white business owners in Roanoke to help organize a Biracial Committee made up of black and white preachers, doctors, lawyers, and local business owners whose main purpose was to peacefully integrate department stores and lunch counters. This Biracial committee orchestrated strategies to achieve nonviolent integration.”

Nathaniel Benjamin, Opinion The Roanoke Times, 2/27/2020

“In 1963 Wilkinson and the NAACP led a protest to remove [the] Roanoke landfill which was placed in the middle of the black neighborhood in Washington Park. On May 13th, 1963 Wilkinson confronted Roanoke City Council with a platoon of support from both black and white pastors and clergymen. Wilkinson challenged Roanoke City Council to close and remove [the] dump and garbage out of the Black neighborhood at the site known as Washington Park dump once and for all or face demonstrations. At one point, Wilkinson threaten[ed] to organize a ‘Baby Carriage Brigade’ demonstration and march young mothers with their babies in carriages down to Washington Park hand in hand to form a human chain barricade to block the entrance to the dump to prevent dump trucks from entering Washington Park. The demonstration threats worked. Finally to avoid any demonstrations the Roanoke City Council voted to close Washington Park dump permanently and on June 1, 1963 the dump was moved to another location.”

Reflections on Integrating Roanoke Businesses

Nathaniel Raymond Benjamin, 9/18/2020

History of Roanoke, VA Facebook Page

“On July 22nd, 1960 Civil Rights activist Rev. James Lawson visited Roanoke as a guest speaker at a NAACP rally meeting that was held at First Baptist Church. Rev. Lawson spoke to protestors about how to organize nonviolent demonstrations in Roanoke. He also taught Roanoke protesters the same lunch counter sit-in strategies that sparked the first lunch counter sit-in movement in Nashville, Tennessee, which he led earlier that year.

Roanoke news reporters claimed that white citizens of Roanoke were not ready for integration. There were also reports that people were expecting violence to occur during the lunch counter sit-ins. What the Roanoke press did not know was that the Biracial Committee, led by Rev. R.R. Wilkinson, held secret meetings with white merchants before the lunch counter sit-ins would take place. Since the Roanoke government was being non-cooperative on improving race relations, Rev. Wilkinson’s strategy to achieve racial equality was to negotiate and make allies with white merchants in Roanoke. This strategy helped make white merchants see that change was nothing to fear.

During those meetings they reached an agreement and discussed plans on how to peacefully organize lunch counter sit-ins. As a result of the Biracial Committee meetings with white merchants, on August 27th, 1960, Woolworth’s lunch counter became the first establishment in Roanoke to integrate without any incidents. Two black women and a boy whose names weren’t reported sat at the lunch counter and ordered a slice of pie, a soda and a sundae, all under the watchful eye of the Rev. Wilkinson and the Biracial Committee that had organized the event.

After the successful first integration of Woolworth’s, gradually Kress lunch counters also began to integrate. Although it took 3 years. S&W Cafeteria became Roanoke’s first and only cafeteria to integrate after negotiations with Rev. Wilkinson and the NAACP, with backing from the Biracial Committee…Within a year a total of 17 lunch counters were integrated in Roanoke, Virginia without any violence or incidents.”

More on R. R. Wilkinson

For more information, photos, and video clips of R. R. Wilkinson and integration go to Rev. R. R. Wilkinson Webpage:

https://www.rrwilkinson.org/integrate-woolworth-lunch-counters

https://www.rrwilkinson.org/integration

https://www.facebook.com/TheRRWilkinsonFoundation/

Ralph Berrier and Matt Chittum,

Roanoke Times, Roanoke Reborn, May 2016

“The Baltimore Colts were set to take on the Pittsburgh Steelers in an exhibition football game in the fall of 1961 at Victory Stadium. Both teams were integrated. The stadium was not. NAACP attorney Reuben Lawson took the city to court that spring seeking an injunction to integrate the stadium before the game. City leaders passed the buck, saying state law required such public gatherings to be segregated…

Meanwhile, some black activists clandestinely bought tickets for seats in the white section of the stands…Wilkinson, the NAACP leader, lobbied the black players on both teams to boycott the game…[Although the players opposed playing for a segregated audience] Ultimately, the players could not back out because they were contracted to play…

At kick-off, police were in place, firemen stood at the [entrances] ready with hoses, and the National Guard and the FBI were on hand. About 13,000 fans showed up. A few hundred black spectators sat in the white section. Nothing happened. Victory Stadium was integrated quietly.”

Sources

Benjamin, N. R. (2020, February 27). Benjamin: Rev. R. R. Wilkinson’s legacy lives on. The Roanoke Times, Opinion. https://roanoke.com/opinion/commentary/benjamin-rev-r-r-wilkinsons-legacy-lives-on/article_4b62883b-b259-595f-9ac0-d364ede785ff.html

Benjamin, N. R. (2022, January 5) Rev. Dr. Raymond R. Wilkinson, Roanoke, Virginia’s Civil Rights Pioneer. https://www.rrwilkinson.org/

Berrier, R. & Chittum, M. (May 26, 2016). Roanoke Reborn. Discover History and Heritage Magazine. The Roanoke Times.

Ellis, S. (2011, May 28). Roanoke’s School Integration: ‘I tried to look like everyone else.’ The Roanoke Times.

History of Roanoke, VA Facebook Page & Benjamin, N. B. (n.d.) Timeline Post September 18, 2020. https://www.facebook.com/groups/174768989223451/posts/3686454598054855/

Jones, P. C. (2013, May). Integrating the Star City of the South: Roanoke school desegregation and the politics of delay. [Master’s thesis, The College of William and Mary] https://scholarworks.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6051&context=etd

Poff, M. E. (2014, March 17). School desegregation in Roanoke, Virginia: The black student perspective [PhD Dissertation]. Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.