The Lions of Little Rock (27 page)

56

SUMMER

A lot of things happened that summer.

In June, new school board members were appointed, and they voted to rehire the purged teachers. Daddy received his teaching contract for the next year on June 18. He signed it and returned it to the post office the very same day.

David changed his major yet again. He was studying politics this time and went to live with a friend in Washington, DC, for the summer.

Mother gave Betty Jean a raise.

And Judy came home. I expected it to be awkward, like our visit at Christmas, or tense, like over spring break when I had to watch every word. But it wasn't. It was comfortable. Like reuniting with an old friend. After dinner, I went into her room to watch her unpack.

“And tomorrow,” said Judy, “maybe we can go to the zoo and then the pool.”

“Actually . . . ,” I said.

“What?”

“I already have plans.”

“Oh.”

I couldn't read her face. Was she disappointed or surprised or something else? “I'm going to the movies with Nora. We're going to see
South Pacific
downtown and out for ice cream afterward.”

“Oh. Nora, huh?”

“You can come too if you want.”

“Nah, I really wanted to catch up with Margaret.” To my surprise, Judy was smiling. “I was just trying to be nice to you. But it sounds like you don't need me to arrange your social life anymore.”

“No,” I said. “I guess I don't.”

“You don't sound too happy about that,” said Judy. “It's a good thing, Marlee.”

“I know, it's just . . .” And then I told her about Liz, and our final phone call.

“Oh,” Judy said when I was done. “Well, last time she disappeared you sent her a note, didn't you?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Well,” said Judy, “maybe you should try it again.”

So I wrote Liz a note. It was really more of a letter this time. I told her about how Little Jimmy and I had had our Coke by the pool, how we'd eaten a burger at Krystal and gone skating at Troy's on a rainy afternoon. I told her that Nora, it turned out, liked cards, and was almost as good at hearts as I was. I told her how JT and Sally were going steady, and how it had seemed to make them nicer to everyone, at least most of the time.

Most of all, though, I told Liz about how I went to the zoo, every Tuesday afternoon, by myself, and thought about her and the past year. I told her how Red was gone, and that I still had the book of magic squares. Every time I added up a row, column or diagonal, I thought of her. I promised to be at the zoo every Tuesday afternoon that summer, just in case she ever wanted to join me by the lions.

I was just getting ready to seal the letter and run it over to Pastor George to give to Liz at youth group, just like I'd done before, when I thought of something else. I looked through my purse and found the tattered black feather. I tucked it inside and licked the envelope shut.

I waited week after week by the lions, but she never showed up.

The high schools were scheduled to open early that year, on August 12, 1959, before the pools even closed. The elementary schools and junior highs wouldn't open until the day after Labor Day, like always.

When August 12 finally came, Daddy and I got up with Mother and Judy, in a reverse of the day last fall when Daddy and I had gone to school and they hadn't. We all got into the car and drove Mother to Hall High School and dropped off Judy at Central.

On the way home, one of the streets was blocked off. Daddy parked the car and we got out to see what was going on.

There were more than two hundred people in the street, some in cars and some on foot. In the front walked a man holding a Confederate flag. Others held signs reading
ARKANSAS IS FOR FAUBUS
and
RACE MIXING IS COMMUNISM.

“What's going on?” I asked.

“They're protesting,” said Daddy in a monotone.

“We're marching to Central,” a man called out. “Stopped them last year. We will again.”

“No,” Daddy muttered. “Not again.”

A car was playing “Dixie” way too loud.

“This is how it started in 1957,” whispered Daddy. “Protests that turned into mobs. And the police did nothing.” Daddy and I turned and saw police and firemen up ahead. They'd set up a small barrier. Daddy shook his head. “They're going to let the protesters pass, just like they did two years ago.”

But I thought I saw something different in their faces, a determination to make Little Rock a different place than it was before.

One of the officers held up a megaphone. “Stop. You are not allowed to get any closer to the high school.”

The protesters just kept marching on.

I'm not sure who was more surprised, Daddy or the protesters, when the firemen turned the hoses on. In an instant, the segregationists were soaked.

Most of the protesters left immediately, wet and soggy as they made their way home. But a few became enraged and started throwing rocks, bottles, the very signs in their hands.

But before we could run back to the safety of our car, the police moved in and began arresting people. Daddy and I stood and watched, frozen. “It's not going to happen again.” And when he grabbed my hand, I thought he was going to cry.

In a few minutes, over twenty people were arrested, and the street was empty again. They'd been stopped just a block from Central High School.

Daddy looked at me.

“Have no fear of them,”
I quoted Peter at him.
“Nor be troubled.”

He gave me a hug. “That's my brave girl.”

At dinner, when we asked Judy how school had gone that day, she said, “Fine. There weren't even any protests this time.”

Daddy and I glanced at each other, but we didn't say a word.

In the end, there were only three colored students at Hall—Effie Jones,
Elsie Robinson and Estella Thompson—and only two at Central—Carlotta Walls and Jefferson Thomas. There were no colored students at the junior highs or elementary schools. “Only five students,” said Mother, shaking her head.

We still had a long, long way to go.

57

THE HIGH DIVE, PART 2

The next Tuesday, like always, I spent wandering around the zoo. I visited the gorillas, Ruth the elephant, the zebras and flamingos, and finally, when I was tired of walking, I stopped by the lions.

There, on our bench, sat a tall girl with black hair and skin the same color as mine. She was clutching an old black feather in her hands.

“Hi,” I breathed. Nothing else would come out.

“I'm sorry I couldn't come sooner,” Liz said. “It took me this long to convince my mother to let me . . .”

I shook my head. “It doesn't matter.” She was here now.

“I showed her my notebook. I wanted her to know about the turtles and the crawdads and the quiet lessons. After my mother read it, she said I could come see you. One last time.”

I didn't know what to say.

“She's actually just over there, waiting by the monkeys,” said Liz.

I glanced up and caught a glimpse of Mrs. Fullerton. She was watching us, and if she wasn't smiling, she wasn't frowning either. I thought of how scared she must have been this past year, and suddenly I no longer blamed her for keeping us apart. I waved, and after a moment, she nodded in return.

“So,” said Liz. “The schools reopened.”

“Yes.”

“Integrated. Even if it is just a token number of Negroes, it's . . .”

“Integrated,” I finished.

“Yeah,” said Liz.

There was a long pause. Finally, I sat down on the bench next to her.

“How's Curtis?” I asked.

“Fine,” Liz said, and blushed, which told me everything I wanted to know. “How's Little Jimmy?”

“I like him a lot,” I said. “Though I think just as a friend. Anyway, you were right. I did need other friends. Even if they aren't friends as good as you.”

“Are we still friends?” asked Liz.

“Of course,” I said. “We'll always be friends.”

“Even if we don't ever get to see each other?” said Liz.

“I've thought about it a lot,” I said. “I think a friend is someone who helps you change for the better. And whether you see them once a day or once a year, if it's a true friend, it doesn't matter.”

“You're pretty good at saying what you think now.”

“I learned from the best.”

Liz smiled. “Remember when we saw
The Wizard of Oz
at the Gem?”

“Of course I remember,” I said. “It was the first movie we saw together.”

“It was the only movie we ever saw together,” Liz said.

“There'll be others.”

“Someday,” said Liz.

“Things will be different,” I agreed.

“Somewhere,” said Liz. “Over the rainbow.” She stood up. “Until then, call me.” And then she was gone.

On the seat where she'd been sitting was another three-by-three magic square. The first two and last two digits were the year, 1959. And the other five numbers, well, they were her new phone number.

As soon as I got to the pool that afternoon, I knew what I had to do. I didn't say a word to anyone, just put my towel down next to Judy and waved to Little Jimmy and walked over to the five-meter platform dive and started to climb. It was a beautiful clear day, and when I got to the top, the wind danced the ends of my hair so they tickled my neck.

I walked to the edge of the platform and looked down. It still made me dizzy. Everything was the same and yet not the same. I looked up. A plane flew overhead and my eyes cleared. I imagined Liz and Curtis and Betty Jean at the pool, swimming with Nora and Little Jimmy and Mother and me. Somewhere. Over the rainbow.

And so I jumped.

I wish I could say it was a perfect swan dive. Actually, it was more like a crazed belly-flop, and all the air was sucked out of me as I hit the water at a funny angle. I floundered under the water, my skin stinging all over, sure I was drowning. Then I opened my eyes.

The water was blue and full of chlorine, and my eyes stung, but I factored the equation and realized I was upside down and all I had to do was right myself and swim up. Sounds easier than it was, but I clawed my way to the surface. And when I took that first deep breath and saw the clear summer sky, and heard my sister and Little Jimmy and Nora and even Sally and JT cheering for me, I swear I heard the lions roar.

 

 

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AUTHOR'S NOTE

In 1957, nine African American students integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. The Little Rock Nine, as they came to be called, endured daily abuse and harassment so extreme that the 101st Airborne Division was called in to keep the peace. The story made headlines across the nation.

So when I sat down to write another book of historical fiction, setting it in 1957 Little Rock seemed like an obvious choice. My mother was born there, and I thought the events at Central would be an exciting backdrop for my protagonist. However, when I flew to Arkansas in 2008 to do interviews for
The Lions of Little Rock,
I found that while people there certainly remembered 1957 and the Little Rock Nine, what they really wanted to talk about was 1958, when all the public high schools in Little Rock, white and black, were closed in order to prevent integration. Their stories of that “lost year” were so compelling that after my visit, I decided moving my story to 1958 made sense for a number of reasons.

The first reason was that the events of 1957 are already quite well known. When I was in elementary school, my own education about the civil rights era was sketchy at best, but even I learned about the Little Rock Nine. Also, there are already a number of excellent books written about the 1957–58 school year, and I realized there was no way I could ever write anything as interesting as the Little Rock Nine's own firsthand accounts of what had gone on inside Central High. On the other hand, I had never heard of schools being closed to prevent integration, even though I later learned it had happened in my very own state of Virginia as well. This seemed like a story that needed to be told.

In addition, some of the people I interviewed (who lived in Little Rock but did not attend Central in 1957) said they really didn't discuss what was going on at the high school with their parents or anyone else, unless they saw pictures or it was otherwise unavoidable. Others admitted that, like many young adults today, they were rather self-centered and were more interested in what was going on in their own schools and with their friends. This changed in 1958. The conflict could not be so easily brushed aside when they saw their older brothers and sisters sitting at home or sent away to attend school. Perhaps it wasn't as dramatic as soldiers at a high school, but on an everyday basis, more people were affected.

Finally, 1957–58 was a terrible year. That the Little Rock Nine endured, and no one was killed, was probably the high point. Many citizens of Little Rock were embarrassed that the world saw only the hate and bigotry in their town. In contrast, by 1958–59, some people in Little Rock had started to speak out. The more I learned about the Women's Emergency Committee to Open Our Schools (WEC) and the Stop This Outrageous Purge (STOP) campaign, the more interested I became in this year when the city itself seemed to find a voice.

And finding a voice was something I was interested in. My mother and her family moved away from Little Rock in 1954, but if they had remained, my aunt would have been a member of the sophomore class at Central High School in 1957. This is what she had to say about it: “All my life I have wondered how I would have behaved if I had been a student at Central. I know without a doubt I would not have called names or been rude. But my real question to myself is, would I have been kind? I'm afraid I would have done nothing.” Perhaps one can think of 1957–58 as the year many did nothing, when the voices of the segregationists drowned out the thoughts of everyone else. By 1959, however, many of those people with “kind thoughts” had finally started to speak up.

I don't want to give the impression that the struggle for integration in Little Rock was over in 1959—it wasn't. But it seems like the beginning of the end, in a way that 1958 clearly does not. My hope is that
The Lions of Little Rock
will allow a more complete view of what happened in Little Rock during those years.

Although this book is fiction, I have tried to be as historically accurate as possible, especially in my portrayal of the WEC and the STOP campaign. The books and videos listed below were invaluable in learning about the time, and are a great starting point for anyone wanting to learn more. I was fortunate enough to speak personally with Cynthia East, the daughter of Dr. Agar (one of the organizers of the STOP campaign), and I got to hear firsthand her memories of working on the election, receiving threatening phone calls, and being sent away from town.

Marlee and Liz are fictional characters. However, my uncle, who attended West Side Junior High, said that when he was a student there, he knew a boy who was “there one day and gone the next.” The rumor was that the boy had been black, passing as white. While I have no evidence that this happened in 1958, it seemed like perhaps it
could
have happened. With a bit of poetic license, it gave me the idea of how Marlee and Liz might have met and become friends.

The bombing, as described in the book, is fictional, though it was based on two separate real events. On September 7, 1959, the day before Labor Day, three bombs went off in Little Rock—one at the school board administrative building, one at the business offices of Mayor Werner Koop, and one in the station wagon of Fire Chief Gann Nalley (who had turned fire hoses on segregationist protesters just a few weeks before). More dynamite was found in the woods on the edge of town. Five white men, all linked to the Ku Klux Klan, were arrested and eventually convicted. The other event was the bombing of the house of Carlotta Walls (one of the Little Rock Nine) on February 9, 1960. As described in her book (see below), the investigation into this bombing was handled terribly, and included the questioning of her own father and the arrest of two family friends.

Finally, I hope this book expresses my admiration and respect for public schools. When I was in elementary school in the early 1980s, my mainly white neighborhood was paired with a mainly black neighborhood to create two integrated elementary schools, one for grades K–3 and the other for grades 4–6. When I asked my parents why I had to ride the bus to school instead of just going to the school nearest my house, they told me it was a great opportunity for me to go to school with people who were different from me, by race, social class, religion, et cetera. They said it was only fair that the busing be shared by both neighborhoods. Their enthusiasm for the pairing of our schools made a huge impression on me. Sometimes I think people today forget that public schools are not just about reading and writing, math and test scores, but also about bringing different types of people together. I'll never forget my parents' belief that school integration was important and beneficial to all of us, no matter what our color.

 

Kristin Levine

June 1, 2011

Alexandria, Virginia