Gwendolyn E. Armstrong | |
---|---|
Education | Rowan High School |
Alma mater | University of Southern Mississippi |
Occupation(s) | Civil rights activist, jazz singer |
Known for | Integrating the University of Southern Mississippi at Hattiesburg |
Gwendolyn Elaine Armstrong was a black Mississippi pioneer in the Civil Rights Movement. In September, 1965, she and Raylawni Branch, both local natives, integrated the University of Southern Mississippi at Hattiesburg. They thus completed the process of breaking the segregation barriers at Mississippi's universities which had been begun by Clyde Kennard at (then) Mississippi Southern College (1956–61) and carried forward by James Meredith at the University of Mississippi (September, 1962) and Richard Holmes at Mississippi State University (July, 1965).
Armstrong was a 1965 graduate of Hattiesburg's Royal Street (then Rowan) High School. She wished to attend college but had to stay at home to care for her invalid mother. The NAACP offered to support her entry into the local segregated white university, and recruited local civil rights activist Raylawni Branch to enter with her as moral support.
This required considerable physical courage for both, but especially the inexperienced 18-year-old Armstrong. Having grown up in the black community of Hattiesburg, she was well aware of the notorious miscarriage of justice in which the last black (Clyde Kennard) to attempt to enroll at the university had been falsely sent to prison and an early death. [1] [2]
By this time (September, 1965) both Ole Miss and Mississippi State University had been integrated – the former violently, the latter peacefully. The Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission and University of Southern Mississippi leaders, such as President Dr. William David McCain, had earlier fought vociferously and successfully to thwart Clyde Kennard's attempts to enroll at (then) Mississippi Southern College. They had now come to realize that the battle to maintain segregation was lost. Therefore, McCain and his staff made extensive confidential plans for the admission and attendance of Armstrong and Branch. A faculty guardian and mentor was secretly appointed for each. The same campus police department which in 1959 had attempted to railroad Kennard to prison when he attempted to enroll, now had very strict orders to prevent or quickly stop any incident involving the two black students. Student athletic, social, and political leaders were recruited to keep the calm and protect the university from such bad publicity as Ole Miss had suffered from its reaction to James Meredith. [3] [4]
As a result, Armstrong had only very minor negative experiences. She studied music and singing, and helped the university choir win a championship. According to Branch, they were "treated just like everybody else.". [3] [4] In 1968 Armstrong (as Elaine Armstrong) pursued a brief career as a jazz styled singer recording in Nashville for a release on King Records.
The two women were accompanied by six bodyguards when on campus. The university administration appointed Dr. Geoffrey Fish, an oceanographer who taught biology as her guardian and tutor. Fish took a genuine interest in both women, gave them advice and jobs in work-study. He was very kind, listened to them, and was like a father figure to them. [3]
The civil rights movement was a social movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement in the country. The movement had its origins in the Reconstruction era during the late 19th century and had its modern roots in the 1940s, although the movement made its largest legislative gains in the 1960s after years of direct actions and grassroots protests. The social movement's major nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience campaigns eventually secured new protections in federal law for the civil rights of all Americans.
James Howard Meredith is an American civil rights activist, writer, political adviser, and United States Air Force veteran who became, in 1962, the first African-American student admitted to the racially segregated University of Mississippi after the intervention of the federal government. Inspired by President John F. Kennedy's inaugural address, Meredith decided to exercise his constitutional rights and apply to the University of Mississippi. His goal was to put pressure on the Kennedy administration to enforce civil rights for African Americans. The admission of Meredith ignited the Ole Miss riot of 1962 where Meredith's life was threatened and 31,000 American servicemen were required to quell the violence – the largest ever invocation of the Insurrection Act of 1807.
Hattiesburg is the 5th most populous city in the U.S. state of Mississippi, located primarily in Forrest County and extending west into Lamar County. The city population was 45,989 at the 2010 census, with the population now being 48,730 in 2020. Hattiesburg is the principal city of the Hattiesburg Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses Covington, Forrest, Lamar, and Perry counties. The city is located in the Pine Belt region.
Ross Robert Barnett was the 53rd governor of Mississippi from 1960 to 1964. He was a Southern Democrat who supported racial segregation.
Paul Burney Johnson Jr. was an American attorney and Democratic politician from Mississippi, serving as 54th governor from January 1964 until January 1968. He was a son of former Mississippi Governor Paul B. Johnson Sr.
Clyde Kennard was an American Korean War veteran and civil rights leader from Hattiesburg, Mississippi. In the 1950s, he attempted several times to enroll at the all-white Mississippi Southern College to complete his undergraduate degree started at the University of Chicago. Although the United States Supreme Court had ruled in 1954 that segregation of public schools was unconstitutional, the college rejected him. Kennard was among the thousands of local activists in the 1940s and 1950s who pressed for their rights.
Vivian Juanita Malone Jones was one of the first two black students to enroll at the University of Alabama in 1963, and in 1965 became the university's first black graduate. She was made famous when George Wallace, the Governor of Alabama, attempted to block her and James Hood from enrolling at the all-white university.
Jackson Academy is a private school in Jackson, Mississippi founded by Loyal M. Bearrs in 1959. Bearrs claimed he established the school to teach using an accelerated phonics program he developed, but the school remained completely racially segregated until 1986, even forgoing tax exemption in 1970 to avoid having to accept Black students.
The University of Southern Mississippi is a public research university with its main campus located in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools to award bachelor's, master's, specialist, and doctoral degrees. The university is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity".
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William David McCain was an educator, archivist and college president. He was a recognized leader of the Mississippi political establishment and a leader in its struggle in the 1950s and 1960s to maintain racial segregationism and what he considered the "southern way of life." He served as Mississippi state archivist, a Major General in the Mississippi National Guard, a longtime leader and promoter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, and as the fifth president and a major architect of Mississippi Southern College.
Raylawni Branch is a black Mississippi pioneer of the Civil Rights Movement, a professional nursing educator and US Air Force Reserve officer. She is best known for her leading role in the integration of the University of Southern Mississippi (Hattiesburg) in 1965, which was peaceful as opposed to the violent riot triggered by white racism after the enrollment of James Meredith at the University of Mississippi (Oxford) in 1962.
Richard E. Holmes is an American medical doctor who specialized in emergency department medicine. As a third-year college student, in 1965 he enrolled in the previously segregated Mississippi State University. He was one of five black Mississippians who pioneered the effort to desegregate the major state universities of Mississippi as part of the Civil Rights Movement. Following passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, his enrollment was the most peaceful of these efforts to that point.
The Ole Miss riot of 1962, also known as the Battle of Oxford, was a violent disturbance that occurred at the University of Mississippi—commonly called Ole Miss—in Oxford, Mississippi. Segregationist rioters sought to prevent the enrollment of African American veteran James Meredith, and President John F. Kennedy was forced to quell the riot by mobilizing over 30,000 troops, the most for a single disturbance in American history.
In the United States, school integration is the process of ending race-based segregation within American public and private schools. Racial segregation in schools existed throughout most of American history and remains an issue in contemporary education. During the Civil Rights Movement school integration became a priority, but since then de facto segregation has again become prevalent.
This is a timeline of the civil rights movement in the United States, a nonviolent mid-20th century freedom movement to gain legal equality and the enforcement of constitutional rights for people of color. The goals of the movement included securing equal protection under the law, ending legally institutionalized racial discrimination, and gaining equal access to public facilities, education reform, fair housing, and the ability to vote.
Theron Carl Lynd was an American circuit clerk and voter registrar in Forrest County, Mississippi, who refused to register Black people during the civil rights movement. Lynd was the first southern voter registrar to be held in violation of charges of discrimination under the Federal Civil Rights Acts. Even after being ordered to cease denying African Americans voting rights in federal court, he continued to obstruct their registration by various means. Despite Lynd's segregationist stance and his six years of legal troubles, he continued to be re-elected until his death in 1978.
A statue of James Meredith stands on the campus of the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Mississippi, United States. The statue honors Meredith, a civil rights activist who integrated the university in 1962. The statue was dedicated in 2006 and is located near a portal, which collectively make up the Civil Rights Monument.
The history of the University of Mississippi, the first public institution of higher education in Mississippi, began in 1844, when the Mississippi Legislature chartered the university. Construction of the university was completed in the rural town of Oxford in 1848.
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