Desegregating West End School

In Birmingham in 1963, community civil rights leaders who organized the Movement and embraced nonviolence sought well-disciplined children of good moral character and brave parents willing to integrate city schools despite bullying, violence, economic threats, and fear of the Ku Klux Klan. Only a few families agreed to cross the color line so their children could attend better-equipped White schools. On September 11, 1963, teenager Patricia Marcus became, with Josephine Powell, the first Black student to attend West End High School, an all-White school in Birmingham. A photograph from that day shows Marcus sitting alone in her classroom after White students left in protest. Marcus, Powell, and the three other students who integrated former all-White schools in Birmingham in September 1963 endured extreme isolation, name-calling, threats, and other bullying from many White classmates who did not accept them.

Birmingham, Alabama · United States