In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

{ 121 } CHAPTER 6 THE LONG HOT SUMMER, 1963 On July 9, 1963, a reporter for the Richmond Times-Dispatch informed his readers that black protesters had attempted two sit-ins in Farmville.Obviously shocked by these developments, he termed the events at the College Shoppe restaurant and the State Theater “the first reported Negro movement in this Southside Virginia locality, which has gained prominence in recent years as the focal point of a struggle over the closings of Prince Edward County’s schools.”1 In this writer’s mind, and perhaps many of his readers’ as well, social movements were synonymous with street protest. But the two are not one and the same. The Prince Edward freedom movement, after all, did not begin in the streets in 1963, but more than a decade earlier in the schools. The July sit-ins emerged from an already vibrant climate of protest, yet the Times-Dispatch reporter was right to see in them the emergence of a new pattern of resistance in Prince Edward. Much of the nation experienced new heights of racial confrontation in the summer of 1963. Byron de la Beckwith murdered NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers in Jackson, Mississippi. Mass protests— and violent reaction—continued in Birmingham, Alabama. More than 200,000 people converged on Washington, D.C., for the March on Washington. And in Prince Edward, teenagers once again took control of the freedom movement, staging daily street demonstrations. The local NAACP chapter supported the protests, calling for a boycott of county merchants to remain in effect until the reopening of the schools. Lawenforcement officials arrested nearly fifty people throughout the course of the summer, and casual conversation between blacks and whites all but ceased. Teenagers decried what they considered the older generation’s “inability to move,” and subtle divisions in the black community came sharply into focus.2 As the demonstrations intensified, an increasing mood of militancy swept the teenage population. Many young people acknowledged feelings of anger and resentment toward the older generation, criticizing their elders for not doing enough to challengewhite supremacy. Somewalked the picket lines with their parents’ blessing—or even company—while others defied parental au- 122 } The Long Hot Summer, 1963 thority to participate.Those who marched explained when interviewed that the demonstrations would “make thewhites take notice,” that theyenhanced black “togetherness,” and that they evidenced willingness to “fight for our rights.” Motivation to join the protests came from different directions. Most of the teenage picketers listed opening the schools as their primaryconcern. But forcing an opening of new jobs to African Americans ran a close second. Protesters hoped to soon see blacks working in Farmville businesses, in restaurants, construction , teaching, and medicine, and in shipping and transportation. Others joined in hopes of securing increased wages for jobs they already held, of stemming the flow of young people from the county, and of achieving the broader goals of “freedom” and “equality.”3 While the Prince Edward story is largelya tale of courtrooms and classrooms, the 1963 demonstrations reveal the convergence of courtroom strategies and direct action tactics that characterized so many school desegregation campaigns . The secondary issues addressed through the pickets—discriminatory hiring practices, economic inequality, and the daily humiliations of Jim Crow— rose to the surface because the crusade for equal education had already tilled the ground for protest. While the ins and outs of the Prince Edward legal proceedings were serpentine indeed, local blacks did not suffer in silence, passively waiting for the courts to invalidate the school closings. On the contrary, local residents opposed to the lockout, both black and white, organized for action. The street demonstrations of 1963 brought the battle to topple white supremacy into the stores, churches, and restaurants of Farmville. The fact that these actions ultimately proved unsuccessful in reopening the public schools does not take away from their importance.The organizing efforts that produced the demonstrations served as a vehicle for the development of a new political consciousness and prodded federal officials to provide a temporaryeducational program the following fall. It was not the reopening of the schools, which finally arrived in 1964 with the Supreme Court decision in Griffin v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, that permanently changed life in Prince Edward, but the civil rights struggle itself. Concentrated demonstrations began in late July, under the leadership of two young ministers, Rev. J. Samuel Williams Jr. of Levi Baptist Church and Rev. Goodwin Douglas of Beulah A.M.E. Church. Williams and...

Share