Abstract
Even though the St. Louis Board of Education established the first high school for blacks west of the Mississippi River, the first facility was substandard. As the black population of St. Louis grew and encroached upon the white residential areas, it became necessary to provide additional school facilities for black enrollment. On several occasions, school officials reluctantly resorted to the conversion of school buildings from white to black use. During the decades of the 1930s, 1940s, and early 1950s, the St. Louis Public Schools district experienced a tremendous increase in the black student population. School conversions were prompted by civil protests and demands by the black community. The conversion (from white to black) of a school building’s use, in some instances, tended to elicit the ire of the affected white parents.
In the early 1900s, blacks from the rural South began to migrate to St. Louis, Missouri, in large numbers in spite of the city’s location in a former slave state and state-mandated segregation laws. Kenneth L. Kusmer and Joe W. Trotter posit participants in the Great Migration (movement of approximately six million blacks from the South to urban centers in the North, East, and Midwest) generally preferred destination cities that were not located in former slave states with de jure segregation in place. “In 1930 almost 72 percent of all southern black migrants were living in just ten metropolitan areas of New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Detroit, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Kansas City, and Cincinnati.” A close examination of these popular metropolitan destinations for blacks reveals that eight of the ten are cities located in states never associated with a history of slavery or de jure segregation. 1 The Missouri State Constitution of 1875 mandated segregation of the races and that public education in the state is performed in separate facilities. 2 Black migrants did not view the social conditions in St. Louis in the same light as cities located in the former Confederate States of America. 3
Segregation laws were applied unevenly in St. Louis. “[St. Louis was] an uncertain mixture of North and South, in terms of politics and culture . . . where the nation’s conflicting racial views and policies met and clashed.” 4 For example, de jure segregation in St. Louis was not enforced in public libraries and public transit, but strictly enforced at swimming pools, ballparks, theaters, hospitals, hotels, churches, and especially public and private schools. 5 For blacks in St. Louis, the first forty years of the twentieth century offered a community experience which differed greatly from their counterparts in the Deep South where black education was suppressed. 6
The St. Louis Public Schools (SLPS) district encompasses the city of St. Louis only. Governed by the St. Louis Board of Education (Board), the district was a progressive pioneer in the field of public education. There are several firsts in the field of education attributed to the SLPS district in the United States. 7 In 1875, the Board established the first high school for blacks west of the Mississippi River. This high school, Charles E. Sumner High School, became a center of the black community in the City of St. Louis in the ensuing years. 8 In the 1800s, when the Board established schools for blacks, they not only brought black students into the SLPS, but black educational activists as well. There are several advancements in the SLPS sector for blacks attributed to black activism after 1865: the hiring of black teachers, the creation of Sumner High School, and the transition from school numbers to schools named after blacks (initially black schools were identified by numbers instead of names as was accustomed with the white schools). 9
The migration of Southern rural blacks to St. Louis during the first half of the twentieth century created facility challenges for the Board to operate a dual and equal system for all citizens while acquiescing to the wishes of its white citizenry in the containment of the growing black population. 10 The separate but equal doctrine in U.S. constitutional law permitted racial segregation by public entities. In reality, the majority of public entities practiced always separate and never equal. The SLPS district was such an entity.
Even though the Board established the first high school for blacks west of the Mississippi River, the first facility was substandard. “The building had been deemed unsuitable for white students and abandoned.” 11 As the black population grew and encroached upon the white residential areas, it became necessary for the Board to provide additional school facilities for separate black enrollment. The Board reported black enrollment in the SLPS district as follows: 1909 (4,737 students); 1920 (9,395 students); 1930 (13,986 students); 1940 (20,483 students); 1950 (27,226 students). 12 On several occasions, the Board reluctantly resorted to the conversion of school buildings from white to black use because a conversion generally necessitated a longer commute for white students to a white school outside of their attendance area. However, there was overcrowding of the Colored schools in the area because of the increased black population from migration, and construction funds were not available to erect new facilities for blacks. Additionally, black activism (petitions, newspaper editorials) and the Board’s sense of fairness for equality of facilities are noted as reasons prompting the Board to resort to conversions.
In several hearings before the Board, convincing factual data were presented by blacks in favor of educational equity for the black student enrollment. For example, as an unmarried teacher at Sumner High School in 1906, Miss Julia Childs was instrumental in the mapping of all of the Sumner High students’ residencies on a map to show how far they traveled to school each day. This map was an integral part of the convincing evidence/data presented to the Board by the Colored Citizens’ Council (CCC) in their advocacy/petition for a new building/location for Sumner High School in 1907. In spite of white opposition to the new building/location for Sumner High School, 13 the Board approved, erected, and opened a new Sumner High School in 1910. 14 In 1922, Mrs. Julia Childs Curtis, the former Miss Julia Childs, was active again in school affairs as she assisted Dr. George E. Stevens’s presentation to the Board regarding the Central School Patrons’ Association’s (CSPA) data reflecting the need for a second black high school within the SLPS district. 15 Priscilla Dowden-White points out the organizations that preceded the National Urban League–initiated “fact-finding social surveys . . . as the chief tool to bring social problems to public attention.” 16 The Urban League was active in St. Louis during the early decades of the twentieth century.
Historical Context
There was an ever-present white opposition to black occupancy in St. Louis, especially as blacks continued to migrate into St. Louis in the early 1900s despite the City’s de jure segregation laws and former slave state status. From 1911 to 1915, elected city officials (Municipal Assembly) rejected passage of a segregation ordinance. 17 During this period, the validity of segregation ordinances in the United States was under scrutiny as such ordinances were proposed in several states. 18
White pro-segregationists in 1915 organized and petitioned to have a special election to place a segregation ordinance on the ballot. 19 White real estate interests, the St. Louis Real Estate Exchange, along with neighborhood and ward improvement associations coordinated their efforts under the auspices of the United Welfare Association (UWA). 20 “Proponents of racial zoning drew on the principle and practice of school segregation and argued that mutual restriction was in the best interest of both races.” 21 The proposed ordinance, if enacted, made it illegal for blacks to move into and occupy a residence that was in a majority white residential area. Whites, opposed to the segregation ordinance, included twenty-three of the twenty-eight aldermen and Mayor Henry W. Kiel. 22 “The St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the St. Louis Globe-Democrat attacked it vigorously. . . . Jewish leaders opposed it calling it a first step toward segregating all minorities.” 23
The black community, led by black ministers, the local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and the St. Louis Argus black weekly newspaper, opposed the UWA’s proposed segregation ordinance. Rev. George E. Stevens, pastor of the black Central Baptist Church (eighteen hundred members), was one of several opponents of the segregation ordinance. “Dr. Stevens, though not in the ordinary sense a pulpit politician, has always in his sermons indicated the course his people should take at the polls when great principles were involved.” 24 In 1915, Rev. Stevens wrote a multipage treatise urging all Christian people to vote against the segregation ordinance. The treatise was subsequently published in 1915. 25 The treatise’s goal was to “expose race relations as being socially constructed rather than derived from evolutionary law or divine judgment.” 26 The Central Baptist Church along with other black churches and public places hosted several meetings regarding the black opposition to the segregation ordinance. 27
The St. Louis Argus reported local and national news regarding the growing popularity of segregation ordinances by whites in municipalities in other states. 28 The newspaper also reported the various local activities related to the segregation ordinance. Additionally, the St. Louis Argus through thought-provoking editorials publicized the need for the black community to stand in opposition to the proposed segregation ordinance. 29 The St. Louis Argus was certainly supportive of the fledgling NAACP. In one editorial, the newspaper referred to the acronym NAACP to stand for Negro Awake Always Counts for Power. 30 In concert with the NAACP, the newspaper presented a pamphlet authored by the NAACP in its editorial page that explained the implications of the segregation ordinance in very simple terms. 31
On February 29, 1916, in a special election, St. Louis city residents voted three to one in favor of the segregation ordinance. 32 However, in 1917, the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated racial segregation ordinances in a unanimous ruling that the segregation ordinance of Louisville, Kentucky, was unconstitutional (Charles Buchanan v. William Warley). 33 It is within this context of race relations that blacks continued to migrate to St. Louis, Missouri, and seek and expect equitable school facilities for their children.
In 1917, a petition from the Simmons School Patrons’ Association (Association) called the Board’s attention to the congested condition in the Simmons Elementary School for blacks, requesting that relief be given as early as possible. 34 The Board’s response was that the situation would be addressed when its funds and other pressing needs of the schools permit. Later, a petition from the Association in 1919 requested the Board divide the Simmons School attendance area to relieve the overcrowding. 35
In the 1920s, the black leadership in St. Louis, in the form of religious and political organizations, convened meetings of black citizens with the purpose of discussing the conditions in the black schools. Organized as the Central School Patron’s Association (CSPA), Dr. George E. Stevens presided over one such meeting held at Central Baptist Church in March 1922. In this meeting, a resolution was adopted to petition the Board for practical changes to accommodate the growing black enrollment in the SLPS district. Included in the petition was the request for a black high school east of Grand Avenue. Using data, compiled by the Urban League and the NAACP, associated with the migration patterns from the South along with the residential patterns of the city, the CPSA presented an argument for a new high school east of Grand Avenue that was hard to refute. 36 Their efforts resulted in the construction and opening of a second high school (George B. Vashon High) for blacks in 1927. 37 Later in the decade, white candidates for the Board seeking black voter support addressed the concerns of the black electorate with the promise of more schools and received editorial support of their candidacies from the St. Louis Argus. 38 Candidates realized they needed to show they were serious about meeting the needs of blacks if they wanted their support in an election. White outreach to the black community evidenced the growing political influence of the black vote in St. Louis.
During the decades of the 1930s, 1940s, and early 1950s, the SLPS district experienced a steady increase in the black student population. School conversions by the Board were prompted by civil protests and demands by the black community comprised in part of black ministers/churches, the NAACP, St. Louis Urban League, the black weekly newspapers—the St. Louis Argus and St. Louis American—and a plethora of community organizations/black social clubs. 39 The Board’s actions to convert school building use, in some instances, tended to elicit the ire of the affected white parents.
Conversions in the 1930s
The black population in the area surrounding William Glasgow, Jr. Elementary School (Glasgow School) increased considerably since the 1920s. The Superintendent of Instruction, Henry J. Gerling, recommended to the Board’s Instruction Committee the change in use of Glasgow School from white to black. It was later determined that conditions (restrictive covenants) attached to the title of the property on which the Glasgow School stood might preclude the conversion of the school from white to black use. 40 Pursuant to this possibility, the Board authorized its attorney to secure an abstract of title to render an opinion regarding the change in use of Glasgow School. 41 The alleged conditions in the title were unfounded and the change in use initiated by the Board.
The Board approved the conversion of the school at its meeting November 8, 1932. The St. Louis Argus was forthright in its praise of Henry J. Gerling’s support of his recommendation for conversion in the wake of white protest in opposition to the conversion. 42 In an earlier conversion of a white school facility (the undersubscribed-closed Franklin School), “Superintendent Gerling’s position had been in concert with the organized voice of the African American civic community throughout the struggle.” 43 Although the Board approved the change in use, the white parents of the Glasgow School filed a court petition alleging that the Board exceeded its authority in approving the change in use of the school. The judge in the case, John W. Calhoun, ruled in favor of the Board, stating that the Board was perfectly within its rights to make the change. 44 This ruling, in favor of the Board, did not deter subsequent challenges of the Board’s authority to convert school use. In light of the change in use of the school, Glasgow School was officially renamed Paul Laurence Dunbar Elementary School, effective January 28, 1933. 45
Later in the decade, the Board converted the building, Wayman Crow Elementary (Crow Elementary) located at 3325 Bell, from white to black use at its meeting in May 1937. The Board authorized the reopening of Crow Elementary for the instruction of black elementary school students, effective September 6, 1937. 46 This building had not been in service as an elementary school for several years, but rather utilized as the Board’s Education and Traveling Library. This recent usage probably preempted any protest from the white community. The converted usage of the building as a black elementary school accommodated enrollment of 738 students. 47 Six years later in 1943, the Board officially renamed the school George Washington Carver Elementary School in honor of the African American scientist, botanist, educator, and inventor. 48
In 1938, the Board attempted to convert an additional elementary school for black use. The Board approved the recommendations of the Superintendent of Instruction to close the Patrick Henry Elementary School (Henry School) for the instruction of white children and reopen the school for instruction of black students. 49 White citizens in the area surrounding Henry School made presentations to the Board’s Instruction Committee on July 5, 1938, which prompted the Instruction Committee to recommend postponement, for one year, of the prior action taken by the Board. The Board agreed. 50
The decade ended with two new elementary schools for blacks under construction. The controversial Waring School and the new Banneker School evidenced the steady increase in the enrollment in the black schools while there had been a slight decrease in the enrollment of white school children in the SLPS district.
51
The issue of school space for all children was further exacerbated by an order from the city’s prosecuting attorney to refrain from the use of third floors in the SLPS district’s school buildings which were not equipped with exterior fire escapes as required by Missouri state law. Compliance with this law rendered the third floor of approximately sixty-five buildings in the SLPS district unusable for classroom instruction. To comply with the law and continue instruction of the district’s students, classes in double sessions were employed: one set of students attending classes from 8:30
Conversions in the 1940s
The number of white children in the Thomas F. Riddick Elementary School (Riddick School) attendance area had diminished by the late 1930s. Riddick School, located at 4136 Evans, was three short blocks from 4107 Finney Avenue. As a point of reference, in 1921, Charles J. Gates, a black mortician, operated a successful mortuary at 4107 Finney Avenue and filed as a candidate for the St. Louis Board of Alderman to represent the Twenty-third Ward. The black businessman owned and resided in property located at 4124 Cook Avenue, which is just two short blocks from Riddick School. 53 Mr. Gates was one of the founders of the Twenty-third Ward Improvement Association. This organization was founded to improve the political conditions of black voters in the twenty-third ward. 54 Blacks actively participated in ward clubs, political organizations, and the voting franchise within their communities.
The Board approved the conversion of Riddick School from white to black use, effective January 29, 1940. 55 The white enrollment at Riddick School prior to the change in use was 113 students. As a black elementary school, the enrollment soared to 912, thus justifying conversion and overcrowding relief for adjoining black elementary schools. 56
The decreased enrollment of white children in the area surrounding the Clement Biddle Penrose Elementary School (Penrose School) made it expedient to transfer all of the white children of the Penrose School to adjoining white schools. The Board’s Instruction Committee recommended that the Penrose School close as a white School and reopen as a black school. 57 The Board approved the recommendation, which served to relieve overcrowding in the following black elementary schools: Dunbar, Divoll, and Carr Lane schools. 58 In 1945, the Board officially changed the name of the school to T. A. & W. P. Curtis Elementary School. 59
Shortly after the conversion of Penrose School, the Board deemed it necessary to convert Will Carr Elementary School (Carr School) from white to black use. The action was approved and made effective January 31, 1941. The building was vacated as a white school on January 24, 1941. 60
Cote Brilliante Elementary School
One of the more contentious school conversions involved the Cote Brilliante Elementary School for whites located at 2616 Cora Avenue in the north-central section of the city. The Board utilized a portion of the elementary school building (Cote Brilliante Elementary) in the early part of the 1940s as a ninth-grade high school center for white students. 61 A considerable decrease in white high school enrollment because of circumstances relating to the U.S. participation in World War II afforded the Board the opportunity to address the overcrowding in black elementary schools near the Cote Brilliante building in 1944. In the school year 1943–1944, there were 154 white elementary school students enrolled at the Cote Brilliante building along with 267 white ninth-graders. 62 Phillip J. Hickey, Superintendent of Instruction, was well aware of the overcrowded conditions at the black elementary schools in proximity to the Cote Brilliante building. For example, in the school year 1943–1944, student enrollment at Simmons Elementary, a black school located three city blocks northeast of Cote Brilliante, was 1,403; student enrollment at Marshall Elementary, a black school located three city blocks southeast of Cote Brilliante, was 1,123. 63 Cote Brilliante Elementary, Simmons Elementary, and Marshal Elementary were similarly sized facilities, so one can imagine the crisis of overcrowding at the black schools.
The Board decided to reconsider the dual use of the Cote Brilliante building as a white elementary and high school. In September 1944, the Board concurred with the recommendation of its Instruction Committee and closed the building to study the best use of the building for the second semester of the school year 1944–1945: for white or black use. 64 During the closure of the building, the Board’s Instruction Committee entertained addresses from black and white groups/individuals who advocated for and against the change in use of the building. 65
After several months of closure, the feasibility study was completed. The study requested by Superintendent Hickey revealed the following data: (1) the population surrounding Cote Brilliante Elementary was majority black, (2) overcrowded conditions existed in nearby black elementary schools, and (3) Cote Brilliante Elementary was needed as a black elementary school. Hickey recommended to the Board’s Instruction Committee to reopen the Cote Brilliante building as a black elementary school. The recommendation was adopted by the committee. 66
Immediately, there was a court challenge by a white group, composed of more than seven hundred homeowners and businesses, who proclaimed property values, would depreciate if the change in use occurred. This flawed argument was proffered in 1915 as justification for passage of the segregation ordinance. In essence, the cause of the fall in property values wrongly attributed to black occupancy was due to white landlord neglect and white realtors sowing seeds of fear. 67
A temporary restraining order was granted to a white group pending an injunction hearing scheduled for March 22, 1945. 68 The restraining order, in effect, prevented the Board from considering the recommendation to change the use of the school. At a hearing on the matter on March 28, 1945, Circuit Judge William S. Connors indicated that he planned to dismiss the suit because it did not deal with facts. Still, Judge Connors ordered the plaintiffs, the Marcus Avenue Improvement Association and ten white residents of the Cote Brilliante attendance area, to file by Monday, April 2, 1945, a memorandum citing precedents before he would render a final ruling. 69 The petition for a permanent injunction against the conversion of the Cote Brilliante school building from white to black use was denied on April 4, 1945. In ruling against a permanent injunction, the Circuit Court took the stance that it had no power to interfere in the operation of the school district. The restraining order was lifted, and the Board was able to proceed with the Instruction Committee’s recommendation.
The lawsuit dismissal did not deter the will of the white citizens. At its regular meeting on April 10, 1945, the Board agreed to hear the concerns of organizations and individuals for and against the change in the use of Cote Brilliante Elementary. The proposed change in the use of the Cote Brilliante building was referred back to the Instruction Committee for further study and consideration. 70 The Instruction Committee met on May 1, 1945, to reconsider the use of the building.
Phillip J. Hickey was resolute in his support of his original recommendation to convert the building’s usage. The Instruction Committee, composed of the three Board members Dr. C. Oscar Johnson, Dr. Herbert O. Winterer, and Fred Beck, were divided because of the absence of Dr. Johnson. Winterer favored adopting the recommendation and Beck dissented. However, because Winterer was the Committee Chairman, the majority report to the Full Board recommended the adoption of the change in use. Beck cited the existence of restrictive deed covenants in the area surrounding the Cote Brilliante building, the opposition of white churches, the opposition of DePaul Hospital, and the opposition of the Catholic McBride High School as reasons for his opposition. 71
Beck filed a minority report, suggesting that the Washington Elementary School (Washington School) for whites, located at 1131 North Euclid Avenue be opened to blacks instead of Cote Brilliante Elementary. Beck cited the recent removal of restrictions on the sale of property to blacks in the area served by the Washington School as motivation for his preference to convert the Washington School to black use. He also called attention to the restrictions still existing in much of the Cote Brilliante attendance area. 72
At its meeting on May 8, 1945, the Board acknowledged that further study and consideration had been given to the issue. The Instruction Committee recommended the Cote Brilliante building to be opened as an elementary school for black children, effective July 1, 1945. 73 The Board vote to convert the building to black use was eight to four in favor of the proposal. 74 Angry white protesters disappointed with the passage of the proposal were removed from the Board Room. 75 There had been a nearly yearlong process to convert the Cote Brilliante school building to a black elementary school.
In the fall of 1945, the Civics Committee of the Federated Block Units Area “B” thanked the Board in written correspondence for authorizing the conversion of Washington School from white to black use. 76 The school was officially closed as an elementary school for whites on January 25, 1946, and reopened as an elementary school for blacks on January 28, 1946.
Conversions in the 1950s
In the early 1900s, St. Louis blacks’ initial requests of the Board focused on making equal school facilities available within the framework of segregation. By 1950, the focus transitioned from working within the framework of segregation to the elimination of segregation. Local NAACP lawyers challenged the status quo of segregation from different perspectives. In the spring of 1945, St. Louis’s NAACP leadership was involved in a law suit against Washington University in St. Louis. NAACP lawyers, George L. Vaughn, David M. Grant, and Robert L. Witherspoon, argued that Washington University in St. Louis did not deserve tax-exempt status as long as it refused to admit black applicants for professional training. 77 In another legal matter, an association of black real estate brokers hired attorney Vaughn to represent a black family in the landmark case of Shelley v. Kraemer in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1948 that restrictive covenants in deeds was unconstitutional.
The federal government selected St. Louis as a critical center for the defense industry in 1940. 78 Another wave of black migrants to St. Louis occurred during the 1940s. The black migrants sought the promise of war industry jobs. Classroom space for the exploding black population continued to be a critical issue for the Board. In 1948, the Board president Elmer Putney said, “Completely equal facilities for Negro pupils cannot be afforded because we will not have the money to provide them with more modern buildings, equipment, and a more numerous teaching staff.” 79 The teaching staff for black students required trained black teachers. Three years earlier, Superintendent of Instruction, Hickey, commented to a newspaper reporter, “If we get anymore Negro pupils, I will tell you frankly I simply don’t know where I am going to put them.” 80 The change in the use of some buildings continued.
Samuel Cupples Elementary School
The Instruction Committee recommended the conversion of Samuel Cupples Elementary School (Cupples School) from white to black use. Hickey reported the Cupples School had thirteen vacant rooms. The conversion of Cupples School was recommended to relieve overcrowding at the following black elementary schools; Marshall School, Riddick School, Washington School, Simmons School, Cole School, and Cole Branch. 81
The recommendation was adopted by the Board without protests or incidents from the white community. However, the position of the black community was that the conversion of Cupples School did not solve the current problem of overcrowding in the black elementary schools, nor did this conversion anticipate increases in black enrollment in the near future. A St. Louis Argus editorial regarding the conversion stated, “The availability of Cupples School is needed, however, its addition to the colored school system might be compared with the forcing of a gallon of water into a pint jar. It just won’t suffice.” 82 The Cupples School was ordered closed as a white school at the close of school on October 20, 1950, and reopened as a black school effective October 23, 1950. 83 White students were transferred to other white schools in the area, all of which had one to seven rooms vacant: Benton Elementary, Clark Elementary, Field Elementary, Gundlach Elementary, and Scullin Elementary. The white enrollment at Cupples School prior to the change in use was 452 students. As a black elementary school, the enrollment soared to 902—justification for the conversion and overcrowding relief for adjoining black elementary schools. 84
Overcrowding in the Black High Schools
The 1950s ushered in acute overcrowding in the black high schools as well. With the large increases in black elementary school enrollments, naturally, the black high school enrollments would follow. The Board utilized three high schools for blacks: Charles E. Sumner High School, George Vashon High School, and Washington Technical High School. The overcrowded conditions at the black high schools was noted at the close of school year 1950–1951 without a plan put in place by the Board to adequately address the issue during the summer months of 1951. 85 In September 1951, the Board opened its schools in the same format as it had closed them in June 1951.
The St. Louis Argus newspaper, in its traditional role as the black Press, ran several articles and editorials to inform the public of the serious nature of the overcrowded conditions. 86 The St. Louis Argus also reported the details of the protests organized by black activists to engage the Board in dialogue to address the issue. 87 In September 1951, blacks organized as the Citizens Protest Committee Against Overcrowding in the Negro Schools (CPC) attended a Board meeting and requested the Board “to take necessary steps immediately to relieve overcrowding in the Negro high schools of the city.” 88 As Hubert L. Brown, chairman of CPC, presented the request to the Board, an orderly line of black citizens picketed outside the meeting with signs. Some signs read, “Our Schools Are Overcrowded: Fight Communism with Democracy,” an obvious reference to the continuing McCarthy campaign to fight the communist party in America. Lang contends, “Cold War southerners equated Black civil rights [activism] and economic justice with communism.” 89 Another sign read, “Patience Gone; We Want Action.” 90
The protest at the Board meeting was followed by a demonstration of Vashon and Sumner students on Monday, September 17, 1951. According to the St. Louis Argus, approximately one thousand students paraded down Locust Street to the Board building, “where they loudly, but in orderly fashion, protested against the continuing overcrowded conditions of their schools.” 91 The CPC, which called for the demonstration of students and parents, was surprised by the large number of students who assembled to participate in the protest. Hubert L. Brown and several members of the CPC entered the Board headquarters and met with Phillip J. Hickey and Oscar A. Ehrhardt, a Board member. During the meeting, several questions were posed to the school officials including the proposal to convert Central High School at 3616 N. Garrison Street from a white high school to a Negro high school. Brown and his group left the building with an agreement to meet again with Hickey and any other Board members to draw up recommendations to submit to the full Board at a special meeting within two weeks.
Central High School was not converted. Instead, in a special Board meeting on September 27, 1951, lasting only sixteen minutes, the Board decided to address the black high school overcrowding issue by converting two white elementary school buildings for use as ninth-grade centers for Sumner High School and Vashon High School. 92 A precedent for such action had been set in 1941, with the Cote Brilliante school building used as a ninth-grade center for whites. The two white schools converted for use as black ninth-grade centers were Edward Bates Elementary School (Bates School) for Sumner High and Jacques Marquette Elementary School (Marquette School) for Vashon High. Unfortunately, neither the black nor white community was pleased with the conversion. On October 2, 1951, a white parents group presented the Board with a petition signed by several hundred white citizens protesting their opposition to the change in use of Marquette School. The group, The Marquette Public Grade School district Residents’ Association, through its treasurer and apparent spokesperson, threatened the Board with legal action if the signed petitions were not heeded. 93
Mrs. A. N. Vaughn, chairman of the Education Committee of the St. Louis branch of the NAACP, saw the conversion as a temporary fix, with the only relief for the situation being elimination of segregation.
94
In January 1951, the St. Louis branch of the NAACP launched the most important campaign, Educational Defense Fund, in its history according to its new President, Dr. Henry T. Reams.
95
The St. Louis Argus endorsed the Educational Defense Fund and its purpose as one that all citizens, black and white, should support. In an editorial, the newspaper proclaimed: We also demand that inasmuch as this so-called “separate but equal” has been and is depriving the Negro children of their equal rights that the court declare the equal but separate section of the Constitution null and void. By so doing, the Board of Education can and will no longer have the equality clause as a subterfuge to deny Negro children all their rights to education in this state.
96
The new president of the local chapter of the NAACP used Sumner High School as an example of the inequities in the school district. Dr. Reams cited the age of the building (opened in 1910), the original student capacity of the building (750) later enlarged to accommodate 1,200 compared to enrollment data in 1950 (2,053), and an exceptionally small lunchroom. Dr. Reams pointed out “if all the present available classrooms in the St. Louis Public high schools were used on a non-segregated basis, the present overcrowding would be taken care of.” 97
Hubert L. Brown, chairman of the CPC, stated for the record, “If the Board had elementary schools available for change-over, they should be utilized to relieve overcrowding in the Negro elementary schools.”
98
The black group had plans to seek additional remedies to address overcrowding in the black high schools. In articulating its opposition to the planned conversion of the two buildings, the St. Louis Argus presented an editorial that read in part, From the Negro pupil’s point of view, the Board apparently gave no consideration to the fact that elementary school buildings are not equipped for high school students. But, of course, the Board isn’t worried too much about the schools being equal. All it wants to do now is get the public off its neck. Yet, when push comes to shove, the Board members will argue themselves blue in the face that our schools by law must be separate and equal.
99
Although there were many examples of the inequities within the segregated SLPS district, the Board continued to position itself as compliant to state law in maintaining separate and equal schools for blacks and whites.
White groups and individuals with the intent to present their objections to the approved change in use of Bates and Marquette schools requested time to address the Board at its October 9, 1951, regular meeting. One group was denied the privilege to address the Board. Board member H. M. Stolar declared, In the past three years no one to my knowledge has ever been denied the floor. However, it is common knowledge that the purpose of the organization Mr. Hamilton represents is not to enlighten, but to divide the community by a despicable appeal to prejudice.
100
After rejecting Mr. Hamilton, the Board heard other speakers for the two school groups.
Although an injunction to restrain the Board from converting Marquette School was not upheld, the Marquette group proceeded with its threat to file a lawsuit in the matter. The Board’s attorney made a motion to dismiss the case in a court proceeding, but the motion was overruled. Subsequently, the Board’s attorney reported updates periodically on the status of the lawsuit to the Board (Division No. 2 No. 49970, Floyd and Ruth, et al v. Board of Education, et al.). 101 As of June 22, 1954, the suit became null and void, with the Board’s decision to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education by initiating a three-step desegregation plan for its public schools. 102
Thomas Hart Benton Elementary School and Eugene Field School
The expanding residential areas of the black community made it necessary to consider conversion of additional elementary schools in the SLPS district. In a proactive measure on July 7, 1953, Phillip J. Hickey recommended the conversion of two elementary schools, Thomas Hart Benton Elementary School (Benton School) and Eugene Field Elementary School (Field School), to the Instruction Committee for its consideration and recommendation to the Board. As had been the case at previous Board meetings, which would decide the future use of an elementary school, parents’ groups appeared before the Board to argue for and against the conversion issue. At the meeting on July 14, 1953, Hickey informed the Board there had been no objections received by his office regarding the conversion of Benton School. 103
There were objections to the proposed Field School conversion. A former St. Louis City counselor, George L. Stemmler, appeared before the Board on July 14, 1953, to present objections to the conversion. He described the school as “part of the tradition of the neighborhood.” 104 Stemmler added, “In undertaking to provide adequate facilities, the Board should not favor one segment of the population over another—and that is exactly what this conversion would do.”
A black attorney, David M. Grant, represented a black parents’ group which urged the approval of the conversion. In his presentation to the Board, Grant said the overcrowding problem arose “because you [the Board] have to administer two school systems, not one.” 105 Mr. Grant was an active member of the St. Louis branch of the NAACP and committed to the branch’s goal to dismantle segregation in the public schools of St. Louis. Attorney Grant was a seasoned reformer, having been instrumental in the political party shift of the St. Louis Negro electorate from Republican to Democrat in the 1930s. David M. Grant was a past president of the St. Louis NAACP, elected in 1937. His rise in the NAACP signaled a change in the branch’s approach to the issues and agenda affecting blacks in St. Louis. Although a lawyer by profession, David Grant favored a more militant protest style over traditional NAACP reliance on court action. 106
The Board voted unanimously to approve the conversion of the two schools. 107 Concerned white citizens filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn the conversion of Field School. This lawsuit became another case for the Board’s attorney to provide updates to the Board regarding its status as it languished in the Circuit Court awaiting a trial date (Division No. 2 No. 66834-D, Rose Roeder, et al v. Board of Education, et al.). 108 There was not another occasion for the Board to consider conversion of a white school to black use because of the May 17, 1954, U.S. Supreme Court ruling commonly known as Brown v. Board of Education. 109
Discussion
This history of black activism reflects the activities of the black community working outside societal boundaries to create change. “The urban political culture [of St. Louis] provided important openings for the development of vital black civic institutions, political associations, and organizations that protested, challenged, and eventually dismantled legal apartheid.” 110 The use of these local institutions by blacks fostered a sense of community because St. Louis “experienced a dramatic spike in spatial apartheid between 1910 and 1930.” 111 Initially, the black community responded by pursuing their educational aspirations instead of patiently waiting for them to be granted within the framework of segregation. As early as 1864, a St. Louis Board of Education for Free Colored Schools was created to run the American Missionary Association (AMA) schools for Colored students. Free colored men of St. Louis lobbied the AMA to allow them to run their own schools and eventually hire colored teachers for their classrooms. In existence for a short period of time before being absorbed by the St. Louis Public Schools, the black school board reflects the early advocacy efforts of blacks to control their educational destinies. 112
In 1907, the Colored Citizens Council (CCC), led by Rev. George E. Stevens, appealed to the Board for a new building/location for Sumner High School. The Board approved and erected a new building after considering the evidence for the proposal presented by the CCC in spite of opposition from the white community. 113 These successful instances of black advocacy for education are examples of blacks’ willingness to work within the framework of segregation during this period.
Black participation in the advocacy for public education of their community in St. Louis partially grew from unsuccessful attempts to elect a black Board member starting in 1921, 114 to a mayor-appointed black Board member in 1949, 115 and on to the successful election of the first elected-black Board member in 1959. 116 During this period, the black political experience transitioned from traditional Republican Party allegiance to the Democratic Party.
The decades of the 1940s and 1950s ushered in a new emphasis for the black political culture in St. Louis. With traits present in St. Louis that mirrored Northern de facto segregation policies toward blacks, several factors contributed to blacks’ transition from working within the framework of racial segregation to an insistence to end racial segregation, especially in the public schools. Davison M. Douglas described these factors as the return of black military personnel from World War II, the NAACP and other civil rights organizations commitment to racial integration, and black voting power. 117 In St. Louis, the black vote played a key role in city-wide municipal elections as black leadership sought to reach political parity through ward representation on the twenty-eight-member St. Louis Board of Aldermen. 118
Conclusion
The events detailed in the Cote Brilliante Elementary conversion from white to black use are an example of white resistance to the increased visibility of blacks in the Northern cities in the early twentieth century, which heightened the friction in residential areas between whites and blacks in the ensuing years. 119 The whites affected by the conversion resisted the change by challenging the proposed conversion in court. In the displacement of white students, the action taken by the Board conveyed to white families that the area was a developing African American residential area in spite of St. Louis’s long history of restrictive housing covenants. 120 Faced with tremendous overcrowding in the closest black schools, the Board chose to displace a small number of white students.
In its efforts to gain support for a school bond issue to erect new buildings in 1951, the Board argued against further conversion of white schools to black use citing that white elementary schools on the periphery of African American residential areas also were full. 121 In the early 1950s prior to 1954, the Board utilized some school conversions but primarily pursued a capital construction plan to erect new school facilities in the black residentially segregated areas of the district. The SLPS Superintendent of Instruction, Phillip J. Hickey, recommended to the Board the “construction of a number of branch schools, six and eight room units to alleviate overcrowding.” 122 The branch building was composed entirely of classrooms double-loading (a single straight corridor with classrooms loading off of both sides) and presented classrooms but little else to the surrounding community. In the SLPS district, the concept of annexes took the form of branch schools. This concept (branch building) in most instances was located and constructed on a parcel several blocks from the main elementary school in St. Louis. The buildings were not equipped with a cafeteria or a gym, but with classrooms only. 123 The design maximized the number of classrooms in the smallest space. Larger elementary schools were constructed to accommodate black students living in the newly constructed low-income federal housing projects. The Board used branch buildings throughout the 1950s as an inadequate remedy to the continued overcrowded conditions in the black elementary school buildings.
Several incidents after the Cote Brilliante Elementary issue were encouraging for the black community. First, in February 1948, President Harry S. Truman, a Missourian, directed the U.S. armed forces to desegregate as quickly as possible. In July 1948, President Truman issued Executive Order 9981 calling on the military to end racial discrimination. Using the Executive Order meant that President Truman could bypass Congress. Second, the City of St. Louis was home to a case that rendered a decisive setback to the containment agenda of whites through the use of racial restrictive covenants in 1948. Racial covenants sought not to bar specific uses of land but, rather, certain classes of persons from its ownership and occupancy.
In the case Shelley v. Kraemer, Kraemer and other white owners governed by a restrictive covenant brought suit to block the black Shelley family from owning a property in the 4600 block of Labadie Avenue. The property was a mere three short blocks from Cote Brilliante Elementary. The plaintiffs lost at trial, but in an appeal to the Missouri Supreme Court, the ruling was reversed. The Missouri Supreme Court ruled the agreement was effective and that it did not violate the Shelleys’ constitutional rights. The Shelleys appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. “By the time that Shelley v. Kraemer reached the Supreme Court, racial restrictive agreements were being enforced in many northern cities, and the prospects for the spread of the racial covenant system to other parts of the country were very strong.” 124
The case was argued before the U.S. Supreme Court on January 15 and 16, 1948, and on May 3, 1948, decided unanimously by a 6 to 0 vote, with three Justices not participating. 125 The U.S. Supreme Court ruled: “State judicial enforcement of agreements barring persons from ownership or occupancy of real property on racial grounds is forbidden by the Equal protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.” 126 “It [the ruling] destroyed one of the most formidable instruments devised to effectuate racial discrimination.” 127 The legal option supporting residential segregation was invalidated but de jure segregation remained along with the racial attitudes of whites in the City of St. Louis.
There was a third incident that contributed to black optimism in the struggle against racial subordination. On January 24, 1951, Victor Lay, an African American, introduced a bill in the Missouri House to allow blacks to attend any public school in the district where they lived. Mr. Lay, a democratic legislator from St. Louis, was joined by three other African American legislators in sponsoring the bill. The other three legislators were Representatives John W. Green and Leroy Tyus of St. Louis and McKinley Neal of Kansas City. All four were members of the Democratic Party. Encouraged by a circuit court decision in the summer of 1950 that permitted blacks to enter the University of Missouri at Columbia if the courses they wanted could not be obtained at Lincoln University for blacks in Jefferson City, Missouri, the legislators continued the efforts to legally strike down the state-mandated segregation of the races in public schools. There was a growing movement in Missouri by religious leaders, civic leaders, and several organizations to eliminate de jure segregation in Missouri’s public schools. 128 The Missouri House Committee on Education voted 15 to 5 in favor of House Bill 135, which would bar racial segregation in Missouri’s public schools. The bill simply stated “Any child of school age should be admitted as a pupil in any free public school in the school district in which he resides.” 129
On June 5, 1951, House Bill 135 was passed in the Missouri House by a vote of 101 to 6 and sent to the Missouri Senate for consideration. The bill had been significantly altered from its original introduction by the four African American legislators. The measure that won overwhelming approval in the Missouri House required that the question of maintenance of separate schools for Negro students be submitted to the voters in St. Louis and each county in the state at the next general election in November 1952. If a majority of votes in any county are cast in favor of the question, separate schools shall be maintained, but if a majority of the votes is against continued maintenance of separate facilities they immediately shall be discontinued.
130
The Missouri Senate left Jefferson City, Missouri’s state capital, for summer break in June 1951 without attending to the segregation proposal. The Missouri Senate reconvened on September 10, 1951 and failed to end segregation in the state.
The conversions of elementary schools from white to black use in the SLPS district are examples of the presence of black activism within the civil rights movement outside of the Deep South prior to the 1960s. Endowed with the elective franchise in a political/social environment devoid of the terror employed against blacks in the other former slave states, the St. Louis black citizenry sought adequate school facilities within the SLPS district. The petitions, requests, pickets, and subsequent demands by black leaders addressing the Board illustrate the black resolve to utilize the political process in its efforts to acquire additional school facilities (school conversions) in the segregated SLPS district.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.