Reunion stirs memories of
a little-reported integration in Ky.
By JENNIFER P. BROWN / Copyright 2005, Kentucky
New Era, Hopkinsville (Aug. 6, 2005)
http://www.kentuckynewera.com/articles/stories/public/200508/06/4uff_news.html
Stanley Russell wore a crisp dark suit and had an easy smile
as he sat for a grilled chicken dinner at the reunion of Todd
County Training School Friday night in Hopkinsville.
He knew just about everybody in the room, about 200 people, and
he could tell you almost everything there is to know about the
former African-American school in Elkton. He remembers the coal-burning
stoves in the high school, the dirt basketball court and the outhouses.
He remembers the hand-me-know books from white schools, and he
remembers teachers who were sincerely interested in his future.
But Russell, 58, who lives outside of Elkton, did not earn his
diploma from Todd County Training School. He left his senior year
and was part of a group of students who forced the issue of integration
in Todd County.
It is a story many people have never heard.
Forty-two years ago, on a Tuesday morning, the Todd County superintendent's
office put out a 10-word news release, a terse acknowledgment
in those days that integration was under way in one local school.
"Todd Central enrolled 82 students who formerly attended
Todd Training," an official announced to area newspapers.
It was Sept. 3, 1963, and Todd Central had opened as the first
consolidated school in the county to replace aging high school
buildings for white students in Elkton, Trenton and Guthrie.
But black students in the county saw the new school as something
more -- a chance for them to challenge the status quo and push
for an integrated high school.
"If they had a desegregation plan in Todd County, I didn't
know about it," said Russell, one of the first black students
to walk into Todd Central that morning.
News reports at the time indicated there was not an integration
plan in Todd County. Still, many of the black students at Todd
County Training believed they had every right to attended Todd
Central.
"We thought, if they were going to consolidate, then they
should really consolidate," Russell said.
Russell, 58, who leaves outside of Elkton, was a senior that
year. He and three other seniors --Wilbert Shanklin, Norma Smith
and Joe Ligon -- left the black high school and enrolled at Todd
Central.
On the opening day of classes, 82 students at Todd Training told
their principal, William Gilbert, they wanted to go to Todd Central.
Gilbert had prepared for the move and had three buses waiting
for the students so they could drive across town to Todd Central.
He called the principal at the new school, Robert Bush, and told
him the students were on their way.
Russell remembers he was on the lead bus when it pulled up to
the school. The white students had already arrived.
Bush, the principal, stood at the front door and waited. When
the students approached, he opened the door and motioned them
inside.
"He had a smile on his face, and he told us to come in,"
Russell recalled.
Although Russell didn't always feel welcomed at the school, he
said he never forget Bush's greeting that day.
"That was huge for that day and time," Russell said.
Bush died a few years ago, and Russell regrets he never talked
to him about that first day.
"I wish I had told him how I felt about it. It meant a lot,"
he said.
Russell earned his diploma at Todd Central in 1964. He was one
of four black students in the class.
Russell still thinks he made the right decision to leave for
Todd Central that year, but today, his fondest memories of school
are tied to Todd County Training.
At Todd Central, Russell never felt the same camaraderie he knew
at Todd County Training.
The white teachers seemed to have a tougher time accepting the
change, Russell thought.
"I didn't have any trouble with the students," he said.
"But it wasn't easy. You sometimes suffer in silence just
to keep things going."
Friday's reunion at the Hopkinsville-Christian County Conference
and Convention Center is one of several Russell has attended in
the past several years. The school has a reunion every two years.
He has not been to a reunion for Todd Central.
Recently, Russell and others have been working on a historic
marker for the site of the old black school, which is now the
bus garage for Todd County schools.
Annie Morehead, who organized this year's reunion, said she believes
it is important for people to remember the old school.
"We were close at Todd Training. It was a small group, and
we were close," she said.
Jennifer P. Brown can be reached by telephone at 887-3236
or by e-mail at jpbrown@kentuckynewera.com.
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