Elizabeth Eckford and the Little Rock Nine by bswise The above photo by Francis Miller, and others from this day, flood social media each year on the anniversary of racists blocking the Little Rock Nine from integrating Central High School. The young Black woman in front is Elizabeth Eckford, who has struggled with depression and trauma throughout her adult life as a result. Photo by Francis Miller, September 3, 1957 Caption: Elizabeth Eckford, turned away from entering Central High School by Arkansas National Guard by order of Governor Orval Faubus, is followed by hostile whites, Little Rock, Arkansas. Credit: The LIFE Magazine Collection, 2005 www.icp.org/browse/archive/objects/elizabeth-eckford-turn... See More: Little Rock Central High School Integration crdl.usg.edu/events/little_rock_integration/#:~:text=The%.... * * * Read more: Little Rock Nine: the day young students shattered racial segregation www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/24/little-rock-arkansa... The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine African American students enrolled in Little Rock Central High School in 1957. Their enrollment was followed by the Little Rock Crisis, in which the students were initially prevented from entering the racially segregated school by Orval Faubus, the Governor of Arkansas. They then attended after the intervention of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. The U.S. Supreme Court issued its historic Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, on May 17, 1954. Tied to the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the decision declared all laws establishing segregated schools to be unconstitutional, and it called for the desegregation of all schools throughout the nation.[1] After the decision, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) attempted to register black students in previously all-white schools in cities throughout the South. In Little Rock, Arkansas, the school board agreed to comply with the high court's ruling. Virgil Blossom, the Superintendent of Schools, submitted a plan of gradual integration to the school board on May 24, 1955, which the board unanimously approved. The plan would be implemented during the fall of the 1957 school year, which would begin in September 1957. By 1957, the NAACP had registered nine black students to attend the previously all-white Little Rock Central High, selected on the criteria of excellent grades and attendance.[2] Called the "Little Rock Nine", they were Ernest Green (b. 1941), Elizabeth Eckford (b. 1941), Jefferson Thomas (1942–2010), Terrence Roberts (b. 1941), Carlotta Walls LaNier (b. 1942), Minnijean Brown (b. 1941), Gloria Ray Karlmark (b. 1942), Thelma Mothershed (b. 1940), and Melba Pattillo Beals (b. 1941). Ernest Green was the first African American to graduate from Central High School. When integration began on September 4, 1957, the Arkansas National Guard was called in to "preserve the peace". Originally at orders of the governor, they were meant to prevent the black students from entering due to claims that there was "imminent danger of tumult, riot and breach of peace" at the integration. However, President Eisenhower issued Executive Order 10730, which federalized the Arkansas National Guard and ordered them to support the integration on September 23 of that year, after which they protected the African American students.[3] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Rock_Nine * Elizabeth Ann Eckford (born October 4, 1941[1]) is one of the Little Rock Nine, a group of African-American students who, in 1957, were the first black students ever to attend classes at the previously all-white Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. The integration came as a result of Brown v. Board of Education. Eckford's public ordeal was captured by press photographers on the morning of September 4, 1957, after she was prevented from entering the school by the Arkansas National Guard. A dramatic snapshot by Will Counts of the Arkansas Democrat showed the young girl being followed and threatened by an angry white mob; this and other photos of the day's startling events were circulated around the US and the world by the press.[2] Counts's image was the unanimous selection for a 1958 Pulitzer Prize, but since the story had earned then-rival Arkansas Gazette two other Pulitzer Prizes already, the Prize was awarded to another photographer for a pleasant photograph of a two-year-old boy in Washington, D.C. A different photo taken by Counts of Alex Wilson, a black reporter for the Memphis Tri-State Defender being beaten by the angry mob in Little Rock the same day, was chosen as the "News Picture of the Year" for 1957 by the National Press Photographers Association. This image by Counts prompted President Dwight D. Eisenhower to send federal troops to Little Rock.[3] Eckford only spent one year at Little Rock Central High where she and the other black students were tormented throughout. In the years since, she has struggled through life, and twice attempted suicide.[4] She was subsequently diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.[4] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Eckford * The Story Behind the Famous Little Rock Nine ‘Scream Image' www.history.com/news/the-story-behind-the-famous-little-r... https://flic.kr/p/2nJLbdz
