A book about the desegregation of Clinton schools won the Tennessee History Book Award for 2023.
The book is “A Most Tolerant Little Town: The Explosive Beginning of School Desegregation.” It was written by Rachel Louise Martin, a historian and writer, a press release said.
The award was announced by the Tennessee Historical Commission and the Tennessee Historical Society. The award prize includes $2,000.
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Oak Ridge is celebrating the 65th anniversary of its school desegregation this weekend.
“Sixty-five years ago this September, 85 brave and dedicated young African American students entered all-white classrooms in the Oak Ridge High School and the Robertsville Junior High School in Oak Ridge, Tennessee in a historic school system desegregation,” organizers said in a press release.
It wasn’t the first public school desegregation in the nation, but organizers said it was the first public school desegregation in the Southeast.
“As such, it challenged the racist and sometimes dangerous Jim Crow culture,” the press release said. “This desegregation stands as an important milestone in American civil rights history.”
The anniversary events are being held with the Oak Ridge school system. Public participation in some events had to be scaled back because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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CLINTON—Civil rights pioneer Anna Theresser Caswell asked people to not hate.
Civil rights leader Reverend Harold Middlebrook told local Black Lives Matters protesters that the movement will require more than a march.
Caswell and Middlebrook were two of about a dozen speakers at a Black Lives Matter march and protest that started at the Clinton football field and ended at Clinton Middle School on Thursday. Several hundred people attended.
Clinton Middle School is where the high school used to be. It was desegregated more than 60 years ago. It’s reported to have been the first high school in the South to desegregate under the U.S. Supreme Court decision Brown vs. Board of Education in 1954.
Caswell, 77, was one of the 12 Black teenagers who walked down from Green McAdoo School on Foley Hill and desegregated the old Clinton High School, which had been all-white, on August 27, 1956.
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You can learn more about the history of desegregation and profiles of those who have shaped the area during a September 9 meeting in Oak Ridge.
It’s a kick-off meeting for Women’s Interfaith Dialogue of Oak Ridge. It is scheduled to start with a brief meet-and-greet at 10:45 a.m. Monday, Saturday 9, at St. Stephens Episcopal Church at 212 North Tulane Avenue, and the program will start at 11 a.m.
Rose Weaver—an active member of the Oak Ridge community, a poet, and a historian—is currently working on researching the history of desegregation of the area and the people who have had the greatest impacts in shaping Oak Ridge, a press release said.
Weaver will also speak about the exciting NAACP Tennessee State Convention that is being hosted in Oak Ridge from Thursday, September 26, through Saturday, September 28, the press release said.
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Alfred Williams
Alfred Williams, one of the Clinton 12 students who fought for the integration of Clinton High School in 1956, died Thursday, March 14. He was 83. His funeral is Saturday.
“On behalf of the Green McAdoo Cultural Organization, the City of Clinton, and the State of Tennessee, we extend our heartfelt condolences to the family of Mr. Alfred Williams,” Green McAdoo Cultural Organization said in a statement. “Alfred passed away at The Waters Nursing and Rehabilitation Facility on March 14, 2019, surrounded by family. He was one of the Clinton 12 students that fought for the integration of Clinton High School in 1956, blazing a trail for all black students to achieve equal education under the law. He went on to work in the city school system and became one of the friendly faces of Clinton Elementary School and the ‘candy man’ until his retirement. He will be missed by family, friends, and all those blessed to know him.” [Read more…]
The recently passed Tennessee budget includes $100,000 for the maintenance, restoration, and operation of the Green McAdoo Cultural Center in Clinton, a press release said.
The funds were secured in the budget by Tennessee Lieutenant Governor Randy McNally and Representative John Ragan, both Oak Ridge Republicans, the press release said.
The Green McAdoo Cultural Center commemorates the Clinton 12, the first black students to integrate a public high school in the South, the release said.
“The story of the Clinton 12 is a pivotal event in the history of our state and our region that must never be forgotten,” Ragan said in the press release. “The Green McAdoo Cultural Center serves an important function in our community to remind us of this important history. I am proud the state will play a part in furthering the important mission of the center.” [Read more…]
Information from WYSH Radio
This past weekend, someone threw eggs at the statues of the 12 students who desegregated Clinton High School in 1956 that stand in front of the Green McAdoo Museum.
On Saturday afternoon, the Clinton Police Department was called at about 5 p.m. to the museum that pays tribute to those students—and tells the story of the South’s first desegregated public high school. Officers made contact with a woman who said she had come to visit the museum, not realizing it closed at 4 p.m., and had noticed the vandalism to the statues. [Read more…]
