Archival News

Amistad Research Center, Tulane University

The Amistad Research Center is excited to announce the award of a 2016 Basic Preservation Grant from the National Film Preservation Foundation (NFPF). An 8mm home movie highlighting Ruby Bridges will be preserved. The film was shot at William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans, shortly after Bridges integrated in as its first African American student. The grant will pay for the creation of a new preservation master of the film, as well as a much needed access copy, which will be made available to researchers for viewing.

Following the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954, four girls in the first grade were chosen to desegregate two schools in Orleans Parish in Louisiana. On November 14, 1960, Bridges was escorted by United States marshals as the lone student integrating William Frantz Elementary. The moment was later commemorated by Norman Rockwell in his famous painting, The Problem We All Live With, which was published as the centerfold of LOOK magazine in 1964. The painting was later installed outside the Oval Office in the White House by President Barack Obama.

This brief film depicts Bridges with four white students at William Frantz Elementary School, likely toward the end of the first grade year in 1961. The film begins with black and white footage of picketers outside the school. It is followed by color footage of children playing and sitting outside the school, including Ruby Bridges. It was shot by Josie Ritter, a teacher at William Frantz.

Film & Media Archive, Washington University

Coproduced by Jack Willis, John Reavis, and Fred Wardenburg, The Streets of Greenwood chronicles the voter registration efforts of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Greenwood, Mississippi, in the summer of 1963. The documentary features footage of SNCC activists and likeminded protestors, as well as interviews with hardline segregationists such as Greenwood Mayor C. E. Sampson. It also includes footage of Pete Seeger performing folk classics such as “We Shall Overcome” and “Eyes on the Prize.” Washington University has been awarded a 2016 Basic Preservation Grant from the NFPF to preserve and digitize this film.

The Streets of Greenwood was filmed in July 1963, shortly after Byron de La Beckwith of Greenwood assassinated civil rights leader Medgar Evers, and one month prior to the March on Washington. It was the first film from Jack Willis, who went on to become an Emmy Award-winning director and producer. Willis’s acclaimed documentaries include Lay My Burden Down (1966), Appalachia: Rich Land, Poor People (1968), and Hard Times in the Country (1969)—all films that reflect Willis’s affinity for what he calls “unheard voices, unserved voices.” ¹

The Washington University Film & Media Archive acquired the Jack Willis Collection in 2014, a collection that contains film, video, and manuscript material from Willis’s original, independent productions. The Film & Media Archive will use the 2016 NFPF grand funding to preserve out-takes from The Streets of Greenwood, along with a print of the film donated by Willis.

Film Study Center, Yale University

The Film Study Center at Yale University recently received a donation of original 16mm film elements from director Josh Morton, an alumnus who received his BA and MArch degrees from the university. While living in New Haven, Connecticut, Morton began making films about the local chapter of the Black Panther Party, including Puppet Show (1970) and Mayday (1970). Puppet Show (8 min.) captures a hand-puppet performance by the Little Revolution Theatre called “The Child, the Man, the Revolutionary, the Panther.” Mayday (24 min.) documents the events of late April and early May 1970, when thousands gathered in New Haven to protest the jailing of Panther leaders Ericka Huggins and Bobby Seale.

Work on these projects is ongoing, and will result in new 16mm preservation negatives and prints as well as digital transfers of the films. Future preservation projects will include Morton’s film Breakfast (1968) detailing the Black Panthers’ free breakfast program for children, and a 1971 filmed interview with Charles Garry, Bobby Seale’s attorney.