The Education of a WASP

Chapter Two

Chapter Two Introducing the idea of a Negro teacher for our school was to be deceptively easy. Ben, who often found the flaws in my enthusiasms, had listened, smiling, as I described my feelings after the Panel luncheon. I half expected him to ask some question I hadn't considered or to urge, as he had at other times, that I wait, that I think it over. Instead, he nodded when I told him I thought our school should have a Negro teacher. He thought so too, but for reasons different from mine. "I've been a little concerned," Ben told me, "about our children growing up in this neighborhood ." Even though our realtor friend, Ann Howard, assured us it was coincidental, Ben reminded me that our neighbors were all white, Christian, and even of the same income level as ours. "I drove past Westside High School the other day," Ben said, "and it struck me for the first time that all the youngsters there come from neighborhoods around here, just exactly like ours." This meant, Ben said, that our children would grow up in a kind of isolation until they were college age. How much damage could it do to Spike and Noah and - 11 - Sarah, waiting that long before they met people who were different from themselves? Ben's heavy eyebrows had pulled together in a familiar expression . He was carefully considering all sides of a deep concern. Then he smiled at me. Perhaps one Negro teacher couldn't solve the entire problem of our children's isolation, he said, but it could help. At the board meeting of our school parents' committee, I simply quoted Ben's remarks. I had joined the parents' group before Spike entered kindergarten and now, as editor of the newsletter, I was a member of the board of directors. 'Vhen I made my suggestion about the Negro teacher, our young, innovative principal immediately expressed his approval. Lester Wheed, president of the parents' group, looked cautiously around for other opinions. My closest neighborhood friend, Bibi Van Dorp, cited child psychology specialists on the handicaps of suburban isolation. The only non-WASP her child saw, she said, was Bessie, their cleaning woman. She didn't want her child to grow up with a stereotyped idea of "colored people." Jim Gibson was the only person at the meeting who failed to join in the general enthusiasm. I had always felt a vague pity for Jim. He was the denial of the "jolly fat man" myth. The folds of his fleshy face fell into the lines of a petulant infant and his puffy hands were often tightened into fists. I knew he had had several different jobs in the past few years and probably many disappointments. His answer to Bibi was: "We don't have a cleaning woman-so our kids aren't contaminated by that stereotype!" He had pulled his chin deeper into his collar as he said this. But even Jim Gibson finally agreed with a shrug that a Negro teacher "couldn't hurt anything." Lester Wheed, the always-smiling thin little man who was our president, asked for a vote and seemed relieved that no one disagreed with - 12 - the majority opmIOn that we should try to find a Negro teacher for our school. Lester said since it was my idea, he felt it was my responsibility to talk with our district school superintendent. I said I would. The superintendent of our suburban school district was younger, friendlier, and easier to see than I had expected. He quickly became enthusiastic over the idea. "Frankly," he smiled, ''I'm a little ashamed I've never thought of it. My only excuse, I guess, is that no Negro teacher has ever applied to our district." I said perhaps they thought they would be turned down. The superintendent and I shared a smile over the suspicions of minority groups. Then, full of self-congratulations over having opened a door so easily, I volunteered to take another step. 1£ he wanted me to, I would help find a Negro applicant. Somewhere I'd heard of the Urban League. Should I tell them our district wanted a Negro teacher? The superintendent said "Greatl" and we shook hands as if we'd just completed a mutually profitable business deal. Driving home that spring day I felt satisfaction at having dispatched my obligations to other groups so easily...