“Revolutions Happen through Young People!”

“It Was a Heightened Time of Awareness”: The Movement Takes Shape

The first major manifestation of this budding black student movement took place at the all-boys Boston English High School in September 1968. The fact that this movement took root at English High was not coincidental; rather, students’ political mobilization was fueled by significant demographic changes at the school and the surrounding neighborhood. From 1967 to 1972, the percentage of black students at English High increased from 19 to 81 percent thanks to the alteration of student feeder patterns by the School Committee. ²¹

In September 1968, English High senior Glen Grayson and a group of black students began meeting to discuss their dissatisfaction with the lack of black faculty and staff, the school’s dress shirt and tie dress code, and the absence of black history courses. As a protest against school policies, Grayson and a classmate wore dashikis rather than their school uniform to school on September 19, 1968. It did not take long for Headmaster Joseph Malone to suspend the two young men. Within hours of their suspension, black students formed a BSU. Susan Clements identified the dashiki protests as a critical turning point in the movement. She said, “When that boy wore his dashiki and got suspended, that was the end of it for us.” School officials told students, “You can’t wear an Afro. You can’t wear this. You can’t wear a dashiki.’ Anything that had to do with black pride they were trying to diminish and that’s what we couldn’t stand for.” ²²

The following morning, September 20, students and community activists gathered for a protest rally in front of English High, and presented Headmaster Malone with a list of demands. They called for the reinstatement of Grayson and his co-protestor, the elimination of the school’s shirt and tie uniform and right to wear traditional African clothing, and an apology from Malone to the black student body for “the insult of such an act, which in essence denounced [black students’] right to be proud of their heritage, culture, and black identity.” Student protestor Yezid Nezinga said, “[Malone] called them clowns and said their dress was disgraceful. He has no regard for our heritage and culture.” Activists called for recognition of “Black Student Liberation Day” and the creation of a review board made up of school officials and BSU representatives to evaluate school regulations that were “a direct insult to the Black man.” They demanded that black students “be allowed to review any complaints that Black students file against any teacher.” Emphasizing the importance of African culture and heritage in their vision of a quality education, students said,

Africa is our home and from it we derive our culture. Black Americans are turning to Africa for identity and dress is very much a part of the search for identity. Whitey doesn’t dig this and will do everything to stop us. ²³

Black student protestors placed special emphasis on their demand for the hiring of black teachers, guidance counselors, and administrators not only at English High but also systemwide. Despite the dramatic increase in black enrollment, English High had just three black teachers. ²⁴ In a letter to Headmaster Malone, students called for the immediate hiring of black educators and administrators at all BPS schools attended by black students “because white teachers, administrators, social workers, counselors, and other [sic] referred to white insensitive professionals cannot [sic] related to us as human beings, nor as first class citizens and certainly not our . . . beautiful black heritage [emphasis in original].” Students also submitted a list of black teachers, guidance counselors, and athletic coaches whom they wanted Headmaster Malone to ask the Boston School Committee to hire before the end of the month. ²⁵ The BPS were characterized by the widespread segregation and discrimination against black educators. As of 1971, 75 percent of Boston’s black teachers were assigned to schools that were more than 50 percent black, and eighty-one schools had never employed a black teacher. ²⁶

Black students’ concerns with the lack of black history courses had deep roots in their personal experiences in the BPS. Leon Rock described his desire as a young student to learn about black history and culture.

I was really interested in learning more about myself, my history, my background. Even though we were in the William Lloyd Garrison we never heard about Garrison and his work as an abolitionist. Why are we in the William Lloyd Garrison and never heard about abolitionism, particularly in Boston? We never even really heard about slavery. My education was thwarted. ²⁷

Likewise, Susan Clements spoke of students’ desire for “the history to be told properly about Boston” and said that a desire for black studies was “the number one thing on our list.” ²⁸

When Headmaster Malone refused to meet with BSU representatives, students enlisted adult activists, including Freedom School leader Reverend James Breeden, to negotiate on their behalf. After several hours of negotiations, Malone agreed to alter the school’s dress code to allow students to wear dashikis, recognized the BSU, and approved students’ request to hold a community meeting in the auditorium. ²⁹ However, this solution quickly unraveled. The following Monday, September 23, Associate Superintendent Louise Welch assumed control of English High and retracted Headmaster Malone’s concessions, with the exception of the revisions to the dress code.

Welch’s actions sparked a surge of student protest. The following morning, Tuesday September 24, one hundred black and two hundred white students gathered in protest outside English High waving their ties above their heads and chanting, “Hey, hey Joe. We won’t go!” Some students attending classes jumped out of windows to join the crowd of protestors outside. ³⁰ Across the city, dozens of false fire alarms interrupted classes, sending throngs of students onto the streets to join the growing crowds of protestors. ³¹ On the whole, white student participants focused on the issue of the school’s dress code, and ignored the demands for black teachers and studies. At Boston Latin High School, black students called on Headmaster Wilfred O’Leary to allow students to wear African dress, allow the formation of a black student organization, create Black History Week, organize a weekly assembly featuring outside speakers, and establish of a black library within the existing school library. O’Leary accepted all demands except for the revisions for the dress code and stipulated that the BSU must also accept white students. ³²

On the morning of September 25, black students and community leaders from across the city met for a protest rally in Franklin Park, in the heart of Boston’s black community. For more than two hours, student and community leaders delivered speeches calling for student solidarity, black studies courses, black teachers, and student power. The crowd frequently erupted with cheers of “Black and Beautiful.” Speaking to the crowd Grayson said, “We want black power in the schools and we can do this by forming a Black student union. A Black student union must get together today so that we can run our schools.” ³³ Referring to Welch’s reversal of Headmaster Malone’s concessions, English High student Kenneth Farrar said, “Never try to negotiate with a white man unless you have an ax over his head.” He urged students to go back to their schools and tell their peers “we’re all black, light or dark, we’re all black, and the white man looks at us all in the same way.” Adult activists including Reverend Breeden, State Representative Royal Bolling, and Chuck Turner of the BUF were also in attendance. Turner pledged the support of his organization and told the crowd “We need to take control.” Black Power muralist Dana Chandler told students “You have freed yourselves, you are your own emancipators.” He continued, “We want the power to determine our own community.” ³⁴ Midway through the rally, students spotted Louise Day Hicks, city council member and fierce opponent of civil rights, hiding behind a hill to watch the rally and chased her from the park.

At the conclusion of the rally, three hundred black youth marched to the nearby Jeremiah E. Burke High School with plans of pulling students out of classes to join their protests. When youth attempted to force their way into the building, a confrontation erupted between students and several dozen police officers. The confrontation turned violent almost immediately, and the police force, which had swelled to one hundred officers, used heavy physical force to suppress students. Police used clubs against marchers, tackled youth as they fled the area, and dragged them into police wagons. Youth and adult activists charged police brutality, and pointed to a long history of violence in the Boston Police Department’s (BPD) dealings with the black community. ³⁵

In the wake of the violence at Burke, fifteen black youth and adult activists attended a Boston School Committee meeting later the same day to express their anger over school and city authorities’ response to the student protests. Tensions between black activists and Boston School Committee members flared almost instantly. Activists including Grayson, Reverend Carter, and Chandler demanded sweeping changes in school curriculum and governance, and charged police with brutality against black students. Speaking to the Committee, Grayson asserted that his suspension from English High and subsequent arrest were illegal. He called for the creation of a BSU in all schools and the observance of a holiday for Malcolm X and other black leaders. When Committee member Thomas Eisenstadt replied that official holidays were only observed for U.S. presidents, Grayson replied, “What president was Christopher Columbus?” English High sophomore Deborah Person told the Committee that a school administrator called her a “black nigger” because “she wore natural hair.” Reverend Carter joined the heated debate telling the Committee that “The trouble is the white people are scared, because you’re going to have power in black hands.” Community leaders, including Chandler, accused Eisenstadt of encouraging the use of heavy force by law enforcement to suppress the student protests because he was in the midst of a campaign for Suffolk County Sherriff. In the midst of the statements by black activists Eisenstadt voted to adjourn the meeting and the Committee members filed out of the hearing room. ³⁶

Near the end of this tumultuous day, the Roxbury Leadership Group, a newly formed coalition body of community organizations, convened to discuss ways to support student activists. Group leader and longtime community organizer Mel King urged students to boycott the BPS, and expressed his support for “the attempts of black high school students in Boston to wear African dress and to organize black student groups in the public schools.” He condemned the “militaristic and fascist behavior of some uncontrollable policemen” and the “provocative actions of Boston School Committee Chairman Thomas Eisenstadt.” King praised black students’ efforts “to reject the cancerous conformity being forced upon them by school officials.” He urged parents to keep their children home from school and for the creation of a Black Parent Union to support the students. ³⁷ On September 28, 150 parents of black junior and high school students formed the Black Parent Union expressing its commitment to finding solutions to ongoing conflicts related to the school dress code, black studies courses, the lack of black faculty, and the formation of black student groups on campus. ³⁸

That Friday, September 27, more than six thousand students stayed out of the city’s sixteen high schools. Absenteeism among black youth remained high the following Monday. The boycott was called off on Tuesday October 1 when headmasters citywide agreed to students’ demands to wear “ethnic dress” to school. School officials’ decision to cede only to this demand regarding dress was a shrewd political move—in that it narrowly defined the students’ movement as solely concerned with dress code and in doing so erased their broader critique of school governance and institutionalized racism. A revision to the school’s dress code, although an important part of the students’ demands, fell far short of addressing their concerns with the structural racial inequities in the BPS. School officials skirted the issue of the recognition of the BSU by stating that district authorities would consider its status at an undetermined point in the future. When students returned to school on October 2, they continued to push for the creation of BSU, but school authorities never readdressed the issue as promised.

Adult activists continued to support black students after they returned to classes. In a Banner editorial on October 3, Chuck Turner wrote, “Students are closest to the situation in the high school and know best the issues which need to be raised . . . To deny students this right is to treat them as ‘second class citizens in our community.’” At the same time, he cautioned adults not to “sit back and let students shoulder the entire burden,” arguing that adult leaders had a “responsibility to offer advice to the students when we feel it might be helpful.” He reminded adults of their “responsibility to acknowledge and support the lead of the students in their fight for power—black power—in the high schools.” He called for the support of adults who “have the strength to JOIN students in their fight” and urged them to not “be threatened or disturbed by the student protest during the last three weeks.” Turner’s comments suggest that some adults acknowledged the political expertise and autonomy of high school students while others hesitated to let students lead and feared the directions their movement might take. The Banner seconded Turner’s statements calling on “parents and all adults to support the youth at this time, and to help them help themselves.”

Officials at English High and the district level expended considerable energy to suppress black student activism for the remainder of the school year. Administrators attempted to ban protestors from returning to campus and specifically targeted Grayson, leveling at least twelve separate legal charges against him ranging from suspension to assault and battery. Ongoing disciplinary pressures eventually prompted Grayson to transfer from English High to Dorchester High and the loss of his leadership was a serious blow for the black student movement at English High.

“Now It’s Time to Really Organize!” The Citywide Movement

Although the momentum of the student protest at English High declined somewhat in the spring of 1969 with the graduation of many of the protest leaders, behind the scenes, this was a time of increased organization and political consciousness for the black student movement. In wake of the recent protests at English High, in the late fall of 1968, a group of high school- and college-aged black youth from across the city began meeting informally to discuss the creation of a citywide black student organization. They discussed the need for such an organization to build greater solidarity among black students citywide and to offer a strong support structure for protests like those at English High. Students decided to form the BSF (alternately called the BSU) to help black youth secure a “decent education” and “combat racism.” ³⁹ The BSF developed slowly beginning that fall and winter, and adopted a purposefully loose-knit organizational structure because of fears that they would be targeted by the FBI like other black radical organizations of the period. The BSF also hid the names of its leaders and made frequent leadership changes to avoid political persecution. In the earliest stage of the Federation’s organization, black college students occupied leadership positions, but after 1969, there was a conscious decision to limit involvement to high school students. At this time, a group of black high school students, including Rock, English High student Stephen Sutton, Hyde Park High student Anthony Banks, Jeremiah E. Burke High student Cheryl Borden, and Hyde Park student Arlene Bond, emerged as the leaders of the fledgling organization. ⁴⁰ The group devised a plan to visit every high school in the city with any black students, help form a BSU, and then unite individual unions under the umbrella of the citywide BSF.

The origins of the BSF highlight the significant influence of Black Nationalism and Black Power on the burgeoning black student movement. In the early days of the BSF, students met frequently in the offices of the BUF in Roxbury, where Rock had worked as a community organizer after leaving Trade. The BUF, a national organization formed in the wake of Dr. King’s assassination to organize for black power and black community control, played a key role in the formation of the BSU. Through its foundation, the Boston BUF received hundreds of thousands of dollars of funds from black organizations and liberal white foundations, which they distributed to social service agencies and community organizations in the black community. The group took a special interest in the black education and community control—calling for the renaming of the Campbell Junior High School in as the Martin Luther King, Jr. Junior High School and for all schools in black communities to have an entirely black staff and administration. In addition, they called for the black Bostonians to exercise total control over curricular development and human resources in schools in their communities. ⁴¹ Rock credits his work with the BUF as a vital experience in his political education. “It was a great opportunity for me to learn about community building, grassroots organizing, and that was what I brought to the table when I started working with the BSU.” ⁴² Other Black Power community organizations that supported the student movement included the Malcolm X Foundation, the Boston branch of the Black Panther Party, the Republic of New Africa, the Black Topographical Center, and the De Mau Mau. ⁴³

The Movement Spreads

While black student activists like Rock, Sutton, Banks, and Borden worked to create a network of BSUs citywide, a new wave of protest emerged at several high schools in the winter and spring of 1969-1970. In December 1969, a group of black students at English High met with Headmaster James Dailey to request permission to form an Afro-American Society. School officials had successfully evaded students’ demands for the creation of an official black student organization since the fall 1968 protests, but students were determined to settle the issue once and for all. After a tense meeting with black students, Dailey agreed to recognize the Afro-American Society as an official student group on the condition that it also accepts white students. Black students reluctantly accepted Dailey’s stipulation—expressing concerns about the role of white students in the new Afro-American Society. Group leader Eddie Crowder said, “The only students who can truly be a member of the society, must be persons of an African descent.” Crowder ultimately expressed his willingness to “give it a try and see what happens and once [and] for all we will know if the so-called black militants are right that you let ‘whitey’ in and you be worse off than you were before you started.” Their hesitancy to accept white students into the Afro-American Society reflected a broader shift in black politics in the late 1960s toward a more racially separatist model of civil rights politics. Ultimately, no white students attempted to join the group. ⁴⁴

The Afro-American Society focused on promoting racial pride and unity among black students, promoting the interests of black students, and increasing knowledge of black history and culture. In their mission statement, they declared their intention to “bring black students together in Brotherhood where we can define and express our cultural values” and “act as a sanctuary for black students.” The Society had a strong educational focus—compiling a recommended reading list, which included Floyd McCissick’s Three Fourths a Man and John Hope Franklin’s From Slavery to Freedom. The newsletter also featured a regular column on black history such as a piece titled “Brother Marcus Garvey, the Father of Black Nationalism.” ⁴⁵

While the formation of the Afro-American Society temporarily reduced tensions at English High, student unrest ramped up at Hyde Park High School with the start of the new year.

During the week of January 12, a series of scuffles broke out in and around Hyde Park High School between white and black students, including one particularly violent incident on a school bus after school. Tensions escalated on Thursday January 14 in the wake of a statement read by Hyde Park Headmaster David Rosengard reflecting of the assassination of Dr. King on the occasion of the first official city commemoration of his birthday. ⁴⁶ The growing racial unrest in the school spilled over into open violence on Monday January 19 when a white student was seriously wounded in a fight between a group of black students and white neighborhood residents less than a quarter mile from the school. Hyde Park student Arlene Bond describes how she and a group of other black students were walking from the high school to the bus stop when they were approached by a group of white teenagers who threatened them physically and verbally. One black student struck back, stabbing one of the whites with a box cutter. ⁴⁷

Although school officials expressed shock at the incident, and insisted that relationships between black students, white students, and the surrounding community were peaceful and positive, race relations in Hyde Park were anything but that in the late 1960s. Hyde Park was a historically white working-class community. It bordered the neighborhood of Mattapan, which was undergoing a major racial transformation in the mid- to late 1960s as large numbers of Jewish families and businesses moved out, replaced by a growing black population. The expanding black community in Mattapan spilled over into Hyde Park, which led to increased black enrollment at Hyde Park High. Prior to the late 1960s, the schools had only a handful of black students, but by January 1970, 129 of the total 1,716 students were black. By the following fall, that number climbed to 225. The expansion of the black population in Mattapan and Hyde Park was accompanied by increasing racial hostility and violence. Bond and other black students recounted frequent incidents of racial hostility and aggression from white residents in the neighborhood around the school and their constant fear of violence. ⁴⁸

On Tuesday January 20, black students arrived to school to a crowd of white community residents gathered outside the school building, some of them armed, enraged by the stabbing. Black students pushed past the crowd into the school, where there was a heavy police presence. A group of students gathered in the auditorium where they met with Headmaster Rosengard and Reginald Eaves, a representative from the Mayor’s Office of Human Rights. Black male students informed the administration that they would not participate in athletic events until the administration could guarantee the safety of students, particularly black females. Conflicts between black and white students grew throughout the day as did the crowd of whites outside the building. Rosengard, responding to pressures from black student leaders, arranged for buses to evacuate all 129 black students from the school by midday. ⁴⁹

After only half of the students attended classes on Wednesday, Headmaster Rosengard organized a meeting of 102 students (two representatives from each homeroom) in the auditorium on Thursday January 22 to discuss the schools’ racial challenges. This gathering gave birth to a biracial student committee made up of thirty students (fifteen white and fifteen black) tasked with resolving student unrest. In the wake of their first meeting the following day, members presented two recommendations: for the administration to hold a community meeting to discuss the problems in the school and neighborhood and regular weekly meetings of the biracial committee for “the establishment and improvement of a healthy climate.” Rosengard praised the committee for its efforts and accepted their recommendations. ⁵⁰ The following Monday, January 25, the administration and the biracial student committee hosted a public forum attended by more than five hundred community members, in which they discussed the racial unrest in the community. Racial tensions at Hyde Park High School dissipated in the wake of the community meeting, although tensions continued to bubble beneath the surface. ⁵¹

While the conflict subsided at Hyde Park thanks to the strong leadership of students and administrators, yet another wave of protest broke out at English High in the spring of 1970. Throughout the winter, the newly formed Afro-American Society worked quietly and diligently to increase students’ knowledge of black history and culture and provide a safe space for black students. The peace was broken however on April 9, 1970, when Headmaster Dailey suspended eleven African American students—all of whom were members of the school’s Afro-American Society—for inviting an “un-authorized” speaker, a member of another student union at Cambridge High and Latin School, to the school to present to the Society. Students asserted that Dailey used the issue of speaker authorization as a pretense to repress black student political activity. Dailey denied students’ assertions that he took exception to this speaker because he advocated black student organizing insisting that he suspended students because they had violated a school rule requiring administrative approval of all outside speakers. ⁵² That week, fights broke out between white and black students resulting in the suspension of three black female students at Cambridge High and Latin School. Students there called for an increase in the number of black faculty, revisions to the school’s disciplinary code, and the school’s Afro-American Council to oversee disciplinary proceedings for the suspended students. The concurrent protests and collaboration between black student activists in Boston and Cambridge highlights the geographic expansion of the student movement. The heavy-handed discipline of school officials reflected their anxieties about the emergence of a metropolitan movement. ⁵³

The following day, April 9, more than five hundred black students walked out of classes citywide in protest of the suspensions at English High. More than four hundred students marched from a rally at English High to Northeastern University where they held a several hours–long strategy meeting from which white protestors were barred. After the meeting, black students took part in a series of strategy workshops organized by Northeastern University’s Afro-American Institute. The meeting proved a powerful spark for the student strike. ⁵⁴ The following week, only four hundred of English High’s 1,100 students attended classes. Student protests also broke out at Jamaica Plain High School in support of the movement at English High, temporarily forcing the closure of the school. Student protestors called for the reinstatement of the eleven suspended students and the revision of school policy with the abolition of the rule requiring pre-authorizing of “outside” speakers. ⁵⁵

Like they had in 1968, activists faced stringent, if uneven, opposition from school officials. High-ranking school officials, much as they had in the past, took a hard-line position issuing an official statement that any disruptive students “shall be dealt with severely in the way prescribed in the Code of Discipline” and called for an expansion of headmasters’ disciplinary authority by granting them the power to expel rather than suspend students. English High administrators took a slightly more cooperative stance agreeing to demands to reinstate the suspended students but declining to consider the issue of outside speakers. By the time the strikes subsided in the wake of April vacation, students had negotiated the reinstatement of the suspended students and blocked the School Committee’s efforts to expand the disciplinary power of headmasters, but had not succeeded in altering school policy regarding outside speakers. ⁵⁶

Boycott!

The farthest reaching and longest lasting wave of protest in the black student movement began on January 22, 1971, when English High administrators suspended five black students on charges of damaging school property. By this time, the BSF was well established having fostered the creation of eleven BSUs across the city and poised to take the reins of the most recent wave of protest. Within hours, black students at English High and the BSF organized a two-hundred-person occupation of the auditorium, followed by a walkout. The same day, Dorchester High School students staged a sit-in in the wake of a physical confrontation between a white teacher and black student. Within days, three hundred black and 250 white students also walked out of Brighton High School. Sustained black student protests at English High forced school administrators to close English High for the next five days. ⁵⁷

Black student leaders at Dorchester and Brighton High Schools joined in solidarity with their peers at English High calling for a boycott of the BPS by all black students and supportive whites to begin on February 4. To coordinate the logistics of the boycott, the BSF created the Citywide Coordinating Strike Committee made up of representatives of BSU groups citywide and established an information center at the Roxbury Multi-Service Center. ⁵⁸ The BSF kicked off the boycott with a rally at English High and a six-hundred-student march from English High to Northeastern University, where they took part in a two-day-long strategy session at the university’s Afro-American Institute. Thanks to the efforts of the Federation, more than 2,500 students stayed out of school on February 5. The following week, boycotting students met at the New School for Children, a community-controlled school, for classes in black history and culture. The action at English High motivated protests at other high schools, including a walkout of three hundred black students at Hyde Park High. ⁵⁹

The Federation presented their demands to school officials. Their demands included the hiring of “more qualified” black faculty and staff (including guidance counselors), an end to the harassment of Black students by white students and school staff, the creation of black studies courses, complete amnesty for striking students, and “an evaluation of the Boston school system by the Bridge Fund,” an umbrella group of fifteen groups working on issues of racial and economic justice). While the demands related to black studies courses and black faculty had been present during previous boycotts, the call for oversight by the Bridge Fund reflects an evolution of students’ activism toward securing school governing power for the black community. ⁶⁰

School administrators followed a similar pattern in their response to student activism as they had in 1968 and 1969, likely believing that they had succeeded in stamping out activism in previous school years and could do so again. English High administrators suggested that the school switch to an “open-campus” plan and the creation of a council made up of student, community, parent, and faculty representatives. This council, although a nod to students’ calls for community governance, was a far cry from students’ calls for oversight by the Bridge Fund. Administrators asked students to sign a statement prior to returning to school agreeing to “abide by the rules and regulations of the school” and pledging their understanding that they would be removed from school if their “conduct disrupts the education of others.” ⁶¹ BPS authorities took a hard-line stance against student protestors ordering the stationing of police in the schools and the prohibition of “racially-specific” student groups. In addition, the School Committee unanimously passed motions for the investigation of Rock’s activities by the district attorney and for administrators to “take action against ‘any students who may have caused a school to remain out of operation to the detriment of the majority of students.’” ⁶²

While school officials had success with these tactics in the past, the student movement had become much more resilient by this time thanks to the diligent organizing work of the BSF. In the face of English High administrators’ recommendations and the actions of the School Committee, Federation leaders called on students to continue their boycott until the School Committee removed police and school officials met all of their demands. Students responded with a flurry of action. During the week of February 8, 1971, close to 50 percent of black junior and senior high school students stayed out of school. ⁶³ Racial unrest at English High prompted administrators to cancel classes on Tuesday February 9. The few schools that remained open that week did so with large numbers of police stationed inside guarding doorways and fire alarms. ⁶⁴

Strong support from the community also fueled the resiliency of the black student movement. Mel King approached student protestors, including Leon Rock, very early on in the boycott to offer his support and that of the New Urban League. King invited students to the New Urban League to discuss protest strategy and philosophy, on how to expand their movement beyond the boycott, and on how to secure the support of the NAACP and other civil rights organizations. ⁶⁵ Likewise, a number of community organizations, including Freedom House, the United South End Settlements, the Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts, and Northeastern University’s Afro-American Institute, opened up their institutions for striking students to study at informal “Freedom Schools” to help them stay current with their coursework. ⁶⁶

When the boycott entered its third week with no end in sight, city and school leaders interceded. On Thursday February 25 and Friday February 26, two hundred white and black students came together for the Boston High School Student Conference at Boston University to discuss their grievances and find solutions. Attendees, elected by their classmates, represented every high school in the city. Also in attendance were Reginald Eaves and Deputy BPS Superintendent Thomas Meagher. Eaves suggested that the conference would show school officials that support for the strike was “broad based and not the work of a few troublemakers or radicals.” ⁶⁷ The conference got off on a rocky start on Thursday with tempers flaring between white and black students, but student leaders managed to get the proceedings on track by the day’s end. Students re-focused their frustrations at the School Committee and Superintendent Ohrenberger who had failed to appear. Tessil Collins, an African American Boston Latin student and conference steering committee member, described students’ frustrations that the “school committee did not think the meeting was important enough to attend. They’ve made it [sic] other emergency meetings, why couldn’t they make it to this one?” School officials claimed that they had not received a formal invitation. Undeterred, students demanded that Committee member John Tierney and Superintendent Ohrenberger come to the meeting immediately to hear their demands. ⁶⁸

When Tierney and Ohrenberger arrived, students presented a list of twenty demands. (1) They called for improved physical conditions in the schools; (2) “improved attitude by teachers”; (3) a “medical team to give complete physical examinations at every school; (4) longer gym periods to allow time for showers; (5) “space for cultural activities in the school”; (6) “more varied music program, with not just Bach and Beethoven, but blues, spirituals and folk songs”; (7) school breakfast programs; (8) greater numbers of black teachers and staff; (9) “a community bulletin board” to inform students of events; (10) the right to choose school speakers; (11) an expansion of language programs to include Chinese and Swahili; (12) the addition of self-defense to the gym program; (13) “full control of student council without headmaster veto”; (14) the improvement of “Afro-American programs” in schools with a sizable black enrollment; (15) the merging of the business and college preparatory curriculums; (16) the removal of police from schools and surrounding areas; (17) to have public phones in schools; (18) improved quality books; (19) the construction of portable buildings to relieve overcrowding; and (20) approval of all other demands made by black students prior to the conference (amnesty for striking students and the evaluation of the schools by the Bridge Fund). After the presentation of their demands, student leaders called on Tierney to convene an emergency meeting of the Boston School Committee for the following day to discuss and adopt these demands. ⁶⁹ Although Tierney characterized the demands as reasonable, he declined to commit to their adoption and informed students that the Boston School Committee would meet Tuesday March 2 rather than immediately as requested. ⁷⁰

Students returned to school on Monday March 1 to report on conference proceedings to their peers. Any hope stemming from the conference quickly dissolved into one of the most tumultuous days in the movement fueled by students’ frustrations over the lack of responsiveness of the School Committee. Before the end of the day, a wave of student walkouts spread across the city including six hundred students from Hyde Park High and three hundred students at Dorchester High. On Tuesday, Lewis Junior High students attempted a walkout, a fire broke out at English High, and Boston Latin joined the boycott. ⁷¹

In a public forum on March 2, the School Committee met with student protestors to discuss the twenty demands presented during the conference. Rather than taking up these issues, the School Committee used the meeting to increase its pressure on students. The Committee passed two motions mandating the removal of boycotting students over the age of sixteen from the school rolls and their prosecution as truants. In addition, the Committee banned twenty black student activists from the meeting on the grounds that they were truants. ⁷² Instead, they took statements from South Boston High School students, one of the few high schools not involved in the boycott, who renounced the student protests. The opposition of South Boston students to the black student protest was not surprising to black student activists given South Boston’s long history as a hotbed of racial hostility. ⁷³ Speaking at the hearing, Rock reiterated students’ demands and their intention to “continue the boycott indefinitely” until school officials devised “a plan for how to infuse more black teachers into the school system,” “encourage and engage in new educational policies,” and “do more about the level of drop outs.” ⁷⁴

In the wake of the fiery public hearing, black student protestors took to the streets. On a windy snowy morning on Wednesday March 3, five hundred black students gathered in the lobby of City Hall where Leon Rock and other BSF leaders spoke to the crowd. After the rally, students marched the short distance to the offices of the Boston School Department and demanded to meet with Superintendent Ohrenberger. Ohrenberger refused to meet with students on the grounds that they were out of school illegally and that an official meeting would legitimize their actions, and sent an administrative assistant in his place. Ohrenberger insisted that the student disruptions had a “national foundation” and that someone was “leading” the students—a charge that he and other city leaders alleged with increasing regularity. One student leader responded that school officials’ insinuations of “under the table subversive infiltration smacks of scare tactics, McCarthy-era red baiting. A witch hunt.” ⁷⁵ Mayor White took a similar stance, warning students that they “could not hope to achieve a legal solution from an illegal position.” ⁷⁶

On March 8, black students asked State Representatives Royal L. Bolling and Carter Kimbrel to act as their representatives in formal negotiations with the School Committee. The day prior, the Committee had announced its agreement to three of the demands made by black students: the addition of black studies courses, hiring of more black faculty and staff, and concrete steps to end the harassment of students. The Committee’s rejection of the students’ demands for an evaluation of the system by the Bridge Fund and amnesty for striking students drove their decision to enlist the aid of Kimbrel and Bolling. ⁷⁷ In a ninety-minute negotiation session, the Committee and Bolling and Kimbrel came to an agreement in which the School Committee agreed to hire more black staff, crack down on harassment of black students by white students and staff, create black studies courses, and provide amnesty to striking students. ⁷⁸

This progress quickly dissipated when the Committee rejected multiple invitations from students and community leaders to meet with Chuck Turner, NAACP branch president Jack Robinson, and Leon Rock in Roxbury to discuss the details of these reforms. School Committee member John Craven stated his willingness to meet with black community leaders at the School Committee’s offices in downtown Boston but refused to “go down to Roxbury” to talk with “the likes of these people.” ⁷⁹ School Committee members’ refusal to meet with black Bostonians in their neighborhoods conveyed their contempt toward black Bostonians and their unwillingness to share power, and incensed student and community activism. In a letter to Committee members, African American city councilor Thomas Atkins wrote, “[s]ince you have seen fit to meet officially with other communities, we feel that an official meeting within our community is long overdue.” ⁸⁰ When the Committee denied subsequent requests for a community meeting in Roxbury, students announced that they would continue the strike indefinitely. ⁸¹

In the face of School Committee intransigence, the Change Committee, a black community organization affiliated with the BUF, appeared before the School Committee on April 6 calling for the immediate adoption of black students’ demands and $140,000 in funding for their implementation. The group of fifty black activists arrived at the Committee’s offices in a motorcade of fourteen cars, all waving the Pan-African flag, including one hearse with a sign that read “Here Lies the Boston School Committee.” Several cars also waved signs calling on the Committee to come to Roxbury to discuss student demands. ⁸²

The momentum of the boycott declined as the end of the school year approached and more students, especially graduating seniors eager to get their diplomas, returned to classes. Some parents, concerned about the impact of the boycott on their children’s education, urged their return. The transition back to school was far from smooth for many youth. Many protestors took long breaks before receiving their BPS diploma, some enrolled in alternative educational programs, and others never received a high school degree. ⁸³ Ultimately, the School Committee agreed to students’ demands for amnesty, withdrew police from schools, and pledged to create black studies courses and hire more black teachers, but never agreed to Bridge Fund evaluation.

The start of the 1971 school year was marked by a fresh wave of black student protest and racial violence at Hyde Park High. Unrest began on Tuesday September 28 with a fight between white and black female students on a public transportation shuttle bus. There were conflicting accounts of what happened that day. The Globe reported that “four white girls were attacked by black girls” while the Banner stated that a group of whites attacked the bus throwing rocks, bottles, and bricks, and badly injured one black female student. ⁸⁴ Black students, including Rock and other leaders, charged the city’s white media with racial bias in its coverage of the school conflicts, portraying black students as aggressors and whites as victims. ⁸⁵

In the wake of this incident and in light of a long history of interracial violence in and around Hyde Park High, black students decided to take extra precautions to protect themselves at school. On Thursday September 30, 125 black youth gathered at the bus station to make the walk to school together. The group, some of whom were carrying weapons, included Hyde Park students, citywide movement leaders including Leon Rock and Anthony Banks, and adult activists Gloria Joyner and Allen Clark. After a scuffle with police officers, black students arrived at school where they were confronted by a large group of white Hyde Park residents and students, many of them armed, who attempted to bar their entrance. After pushing through the crowds, two hundred black students gathered in the cafeteria while a smaller group of black students met with new headmaster John Best, former headmaster David Rosengard, and football coach John Collins. Black students expressed their fears for their safety in the school and asked the administration to arrange transportation to the Mattapan subway station. ⁸⁶ At 10 a.m., buses evacuated two hundred black students under police escort. ⁸⁷

In the wake of this chaos, students sprang into action. That weekend, BSF leaders, including Rock, held a community meeting at the Elliot Congregational Church attended by BPD representatives, Hyde Park school administrators, black students, community activists, and parents. During the meeting, black students and their families shared their fears for their safety in Hyde Park calling on administrators and police to do more to protect them, and announced their intention to boycott school the following day. ⁸⁸ On Wednesday October 6, the school’s biracial student committee presented four recommendations to the School Committee: the creation of a “rumor control clinic,” the stationing of newly hired school aides in bathrooms where student clashes were most frequent, that police be present in schools only in cases of serious crisis (as determined jointly by administration, teachers, and student committee members), and the creation of student recreational areas to reduce the number of students lingering in hallways. After the meeting, violence decreased considerably, and the majority of students returned to school.

Conclusion

Although the intensity of the black youth movement decreased after 1971, black youth continued to voice their discontent with the educational status quo in the BPS through the mid-1970s. In 1973, black junior and senior high school students from Roxbury and Jamaica Plain attended a Boston Model Neighborhood symposium to voice their dissatisfaction with their schools’ low academic standards, poor physical conditions at the schools, lack of black guidance counselors, and the prevalence of school drug use. ⁸⁹ During the 1974-1975 school year, black students at English High pushed for the appointment of a black principal.

Although the black student movement did not achieve all of its goals, youth activists affected substantial changes in the BPS. Black student protests prompted many Boston area high schools to eradicate their dress codes and create black studies courses, and granted permission for the formation of black student organizations. The black student movement also shaped the reforms that emerged out of court-ordered desegregation. Student activists credit their movement with shining a light on the low numbers of black teachers, guidance counselors, and administrators in the BPS and in prompting the NAACP to take up the issue in Morgan v. Hennigan. ⁹⁰ While serving on the board of the Boston NAACP from 1972 to 1973, Rock played an important role in convincing the body to include the issue of segregation and discrimination of faculty and staff in Morgan v. Hennigan. ⁹¹ Judge Arthur Garrity’s decision cited overwhelming evidence of racially discriminatory practices in the recruitment, promotion, and assignment of minority staff, and ordered immediate faculty desegregation and increases in minority hiring. ⁹² Despite the efforts of activists and the courts, seven years after the initial Morgan v. Hennigan ruling, the BPS had still not met the court’s benchmark for African Americans to comprise 25 percent of BPS staff and administration. ⁹³

The court also took up the issue of student governance with the creation of the Racial Ethnic Student Councils (RSCs) in October 1974. The RSCs were part of a multitiered structure, known as the Citywide Parents Council (CPC), tasked with overseeing the implementation of the court’s desegregation orders. ⁹⁴ RSCs consisted of student representatives from elementary, junior, and senior high schools, and were mandated to have a balanced racial makeup. The greater inclusion of black and white citizens in school policymaking through the CPC represented a major shift in the operation of the BPS—and, in many ways, an adoption of black students’ demands for a direct role in school governance.

The significance of the black student movement lies in its vision of culturally relevant quality education and community and youth-centered school governance. Black youths’ vision of a libratory and culturally relevant education and their assertion that they had the right to this type of education and the expertise to be equal partners with school officials in educational delivery were transformative politically and pedagogically. By claiming a space as the political equals to their elders, black youth shifted the internal political dynamics of the movement—bringing to light the valuable contributions that youth had to make to the movement. Their demands for black studies courses, black educators, and the revision of student dress and disciplinary codes forced educators and city leaders to grapple with changing understandings of quality education within the nation’s increasingly diverse urban public school systems. Far from being educationally and politically apathetic, black students in Boston, like their counterparts across the nation, were committed to securing a quality education, and pursued this goal persistently and passionately. With their demands for a quality education and greater educational decision-making power, black students rejected stereotypes of black youth as politically apathetic and juvenile delinquents. Their calls for a culturally relevant education turned theories of African American deviancy and inferiority on their heads—instead proclaiming the beauty and value of their culture and history.