The museum is an amazing representation of the challenges that African Americans have faced in their struggle for the rights that many take for granted. I took a guided tour, and it was wonderful (sad, but very full of education). It began with a short video on what life was like for a slave, an emmancipated black during the reconstruction or during the time of Jim Crow laws. Then, we entered another room, the "Walk of Shame." Our guide eloquently told us, "Though the firehoses aimed at them were strong enough to actually peel back their skin, it was not enough to quench their zeal for equality or dignity." The Walk of Shame showed pictures of many of the humiliations and attacks, big and small, that blacks suffered for simply wanting to be able to vote, have a good education, live in nice homes, and have their place on the bus or restaurant. Included was the story of Emmett Till, the African American teenager whowas murdered in Mississippi in 1941 for allegedly flirting with a white woman on a dare from his friends. I knew a little about young Emmett...I knew the Billy Holiday song Strange Fruit was about him, and that his murderers were aquitted, although they later admitted what they had done to him. I did not know what they had done to him...he was beaten, had his eyes gouged out, shot in the head, and weighted down with barbed wire around his neck before being thrown in the river. I did not know that the only thing that told investigators who he was was the ring his father had given him. I did not know that his mother, although urged to have a closed casket,chose to have an open casket funeral so that everyone could see what had been done to her little 14 year old boy, and that tens of thousands of people attended the funeral.
The showcase of the museum, though, is the historic Woolworth diner where, on February 1, 1960, four young men, the A&T 4, staged a sit-in to protest the unfair practice of not being served in a "white establishment." A few things I didn't know...there were actually black employees working the diner counter. The four young men did not come in and sit together, but rather sat 2x2 because the restaurant was very busy. Some of the customers were very hateful, but there were a few who actually voiced words of support. The men were not arrested during the first sit-in, and were not served that day. They worked out a shift schedule so that they could continue the campaign. Hecklers of hate yelled at, hit, spilled hot coffee on, and spit on the peaceful protestors (many of whom brought homework to do while they waited, or they read newspapers and books. The protesters were arrested. (In fact, they came ready to be arreted and unable to pay bail, using the "jail, no bail" strategy of overcrowding jails. They would be released and they would get right back out there and do it again. They did pausse for a little while during "negotiations", but, after a seven week truce, when it was clear that this was just a stall tactic of the restaurant owners, theyy got back to doing the sit-ins. During the summer, when college students went home, high school students from local (I think) Dudley high school, filled in for the college students. The sit-ins spread to the neighboring Kress store lunch counter, included hundreds of people, spread across the country. Ultimately, after several months of protesting, and a loss of over $200,000 for Wollworth's, store manager relented and changed the segregation policy of the store. On Monday, July 25, 1960, store manager Clarence Harris asked three African American employees to change out of their work clothes and order a meal at the counter. They were the first blaacks to be served with the new desegregation policy. Powerful! The room where this series of sit-in protests occured is preserved.
I took over 6 pages of notes during the tour, and could go on and on forever!! I will add one final exhibit that really had a powerful impact on me. I had the opportunity to take one of the "literacy tests" given to potential voters. The questions that were asked were ridiculous! How many jelly beans are in a jar? How many bubbles are in a bar of soap? History questions that even a history teacher couldn't answer and poll taxes poor blacks couldn't afford. Not to mention being fired and blackballed if you even tried to register to vote.
I'll add more meat to this post once I get back from the trip. SAdly, we spent so much time in the museum that we ended up deciding to skip our next two stops of the day (Appomattox Court House, where the Civil War was officially ended, and Monticello, the plantation home of former president and writer of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson). It was sad to skip those trips, but we were happy to arrive at our Treehouse Cabin in Rohhersville, MD in time for a gorgeous firefly light show.
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