Fifteen Red Roses: The Challenge of Public School Race Relations in Rural Georgia

By Ann W. Yearwood

In the fall of 1962, Eve Windham begins her high school teaching career with enthusiasmIll be the best teacher they ever had!

By the spring of 1969, the power of the civil rights movement reaches Janus County, resulting in a court order to integrate the public schools the next fall. Eve must face the challenge of possible violence with courage.

Persevere with her to create new grading systems and group activities for her mixed classes. Ride with her to transport contestants and judge debate competitions. Sit with her in long, continuous meetings for the boys and girls. Laugh and cry with her in the interactions with family, colleagues, and administrators. Pray with her as she seeks to interpret for her teenagers war and death in Vietnam, bitter disappointment, baffling college standards and demonstrations, and a shifting culture. Then you may rightly judge the significance of Fifteen Red Roses, one for each year she taught us.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jun 14, 2018
• ISBN: 9781973623908

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Copyright © 2018 Ann W. Yearwood.

Interior Graphics/Art Credit: Anna Grace

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Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-9736-2391-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-2392-2 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-2390-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018903697

WestBow Press rev. date: 5/07/2018

CONTENTS

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2 1962-63

Chapter 3 1963-64

Chapter 4 1964-65

Chapter 5 1965-66

Chapter 6 1966-67

Chapter 7 1967-68

Chapter 8 1968-69

Chapter 9 1969-70

Chapter 10 1970-71

Chapter 11 1971-72

Chapter 12 1972-73

Chapter 13 1973-74

Chapter 14 1974-75

Chapter 15 1975-76

Chapter 16 1976-77

Chapter 17

Epilogue

Endnotes

PROLOGUE

It was teachers, and the author was one of them, who saved the South from violent revolution during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Churches prayed for them. Husbands comforted and protected them, for they were mostly women. If history counts the war for independence as the first American revolution, the Civil War for the Union and freedom of slaves as the second, then the third revolution was for full citizenship and equality for black citizens under the law. It is this third revolution in one county of Georgia in the United States that is the subject of this book. It is the view of the writer that had it not been for the courage, sense of fair play, rapport with students and fellow teachers, simple level-headedness supported by local and state law enforcement, individual prayer, and prayer from local church congregations, that the inevitable changes of the Civil Rights Movement would have resulted in violence and bloodshed. Not only could the Black leadership have disrupted and destroyed orderly schools and communities, they would have, as they did in other places, joined by the white backlash.

This book intends to present the cavalcade of change, the fifteen years from 1962 through 1977, through the eyes of a white teacher in a small rural Georgia county. For obvious reasons, names have been changed, but the author remains true to the events which happened. She secured questionnaires from teachers, students, and families to present their personal memories. She has conducted much research in local, state, and national news sources, reflecting the struggles of participants in civil rights, in college student demonstrations for education rights and against the Vietnam War, and in the tragic consequences of the war itself. These events necessarily are played out in Janus County High School, the locale of this account. Anyone living in the county during the cited years will recognize himelf by the events which involved him and included the author. Regrettably, the author’s choice of which references to include may be offensive to community members, but was never intentional nor malicious.

Teachers and principals, others in authority, and students, looking back over the fifteen years included in this narrative, are likely sure that they never want to experience it again. A new word to describe teacher stress leading to exhaustion was invented: burnout. In addition, over time as children got rights, teachers lost theirs, and were forced to work under rules of respect and behavior spelled out for them, often without any input from them. They endured, some of them at great personal sacrifice.

Because everyone has been to school somewhere, all are authorities on how schools should be run and students taught. It follows that many groups, including teachers, will not share or approve all the views presented by the author. However, if or after burnout fades, the writer hopes that these teachers will ultimately experience student appreciation for their standing in the gap, engagement and order on one side, apathy and disorder on the other. For that is what they did.

It is also the desire of the author that the story has been told well, and that the new generations of students, products of the integration of Southern public schools, will continue to make their marks for progress and good works in both leadership and achievement.

Personally, to my students of Janus County High School, you have made your marks on my heart. As I write about you, I commend you: for your great patience in a time of trial, for your common sense in de-escalating tendencies to violence among the students around you, for your unfailing support of your teachers in the classroom, for your efforts to maintain your enthusiasm in spite of disappointing circumstances, and for your sweet compliments and notes of encouragement to faculty and students alike. What a privilege it was to have you in my classes and enjoy your respect, humor, forgiveness, and love!

Ann W. Yearwood

CHAPTER 1

Well, you’d think after 15 years of going to honors programs, Miz Windham would be used to it. There she sits on the stage with all the other award-giving teachers, students, and administrators on the hard metal folding chairs of the Janus County auditorium on Thursday night, May 26, 1977. Eve, or Miz Windham, teaches high school social studies, mostly to juniors and seniors. She has a reputation of being hard, but only because she makes assignments and expects her students to do them. If they don’t, she takes off points. She never forgets. That’s why they think she is hard, because she cuts no slack. The last years have been emotionally difficult for her because her own children have come through her program. This year the last one will graduate. Miz W. is still young and attractive, with green eyes, reddish hair, a slim figure, and a grace about her which suggests someone who does the right thing and tells the truth. She is proud of the profession, this senior class, the school, even the nebulous progress the last years have brought to the county.

Occasionally someone in the audience gets up to leave, squeaking the seat, as so many students have done before them. Those are the same old wood seats which were in the former grammar school auditoriums and were removed here when the schools were consolidated. Some of them still have the initials of the proud school from which they came, formed in the iron supports. The veneer is cracked and the hinges rusted, reflecting the make do attitude of the Board of Education, which encourages sprucing up over purchasing; so these are still in use. These eager students and their parents are the cream of the Janus County crop, expecting some rewards to come from the years of discipline and denial, as they raised their kids to value homework over TV or good times cruising the community drive-ins. They also are patient and enduring, having sat there since 7:30 p.m. It was going on 9. Who could criticize restlessness this late in the evening?

What am I doing here? Well, I look after Miz W., sort of like a guardian angel. Since we are talking about school, she is my assignment. I am available to help her maneuver her way through any school challenge, mustering confidence, defending her positions, and helping her to persevere. However she doesn’t know I am here, running interference for her. I prompted her to write this account, and after four tries and several years, she finally did.

There are four Windham children, but only one of them is present in the auditorium, the last one, the only boy, who sits with his friends close to the center front. His father, Trent Windham, has slipped in late from the golf course he manages, and sits on the back row near the door. He can see his wife on stage, hoping she gave him some points for coming to this long program. However, he loves his son, and probably would have come anyway, even if she wasn’t watching for him. In the Windham family, most people do what is expected of them. And that’s where this story begins: what happens when you do what is expected.

Miz W. was on the back row of two long half-moons of teachers and student speakers, but mostly, by this time, to her they were just legs and backs, the women in dresses and sandals, the men in dress slacks and shirts with ties, the superintendent in a coat, also the principal. From her vantage point Eve could see the piano, the podium, the principal, the high school counselor, the superintendent, some teachers, and a few students, all part of the program.

I could tell she was getting fidgety, first one foot, then the other quietly put out in front of her, then crossed and uncrossed, straightening her skirt with each movement, while she squirmed on the hard seat. Those high heels she felt propriety called on her to wear were getting tight, but you couldn’t help but notice that she had nice legs, and her ankles were not swollen like some of her colleagues. That was the reason, one of them she liked to say, which helped her make her decision to leave her teaching career at the end of the term, two days away. She couldn’t bear the thought of thick ankles with opaque stockings and matronly dresses looming in her future. I suppose she was right. I could see that the more successful female veterans looked much like that, swollen ankles and all.

Even if you were only slightly acquainted with Miz Windham, you knew she approved of the honors program, no matter how long it dragged on. She believed, and said so on many occasions, that excellent students, who had done their schoolwork and applied themselves daily during the entire school term, should be honored. She wanted to give more than one award per subject in a department and say something wonderful about each recipient. But that was impossible. Already it was nearing nine o’clock, and the program was not done yet. She had given her two subject awards and was awaiting the close of the program, a fixed smile on her face. Ultimately, she began to appear somewhat dazed, staring into space, her face still expressive, remembering…

She heard her home phone ring. It was the county school superintendent, John Wyatt, offering her a job to teach social studies classes at Janus County High School, beginning in the fall of 1962. Dreamily she recalled driving up the driveway on the first day of school, catching sight of the flags flying out front, the gentle morning breeze revealing the Stars and Stripes and below it the Georgia flag with its Confederate symbol. She saw herself getting out of the car, walking slowly toward the building, and quickening her step, she reached the entrance where teenagers were gathering to go in.

I knew what she was thinking. I can be happy here. I’ll be the best teacher they ever had!

CHAPTER 2

1962-63

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Already a veteran of two months as a student teacher, Mrs. Eve Windham was somewhat used to the driveway pea gravel and the bright sun’s beams from behind the one-story building stretched out horizontally before her, much like a flat pancake with a jelly lump toward the middle. It was Friday, August 24, 1962.

I watched as she parked the new light green Rambler, a midsize 4-door sedan put out by American Motors. She and Trent had gone to Atlanta to purchase it, trading the old black Chevy in which they had courted. A new car just went with a new job, but Miz Windham was slow to get out. Was she praying as she gathered up her stuff? One really couldn’t tell for sure, but it wouldn’t have been out of character. She was eager to do what she was trained for: teach social studies to high school children. Her certificate said she was eligible to teach for life, grades seven through twelve. This job was for ninth and tenth, Civics and World History, but because they needed someone to teach Algebra I, she also was taking that on until the principal got his bearings and organized the school year. Then he would teach the math, he told her. No wonder she got out of her car slowly. The sheer burden of the job was something to adjust to, all right. Student teaching had been both drudgery and triumph, bringing her an A+ from the college and a fine recommendation from her supervising teacher, and probably because of it, she got this assignment. But she had not forgotten how long the days had been, nor how demanding the students, nor how long she spent on lesson plans at night after Trent and the four children had gone to bed.

Trent Windham farmed and worked long hours in those days, daylight to dark. Between him and Eve, they planned to get everything done on the farm and let Eve work outside the home, too. The children were Claire, who was in the third grade; she had skipped the second on the teacher’s recommendation. Susan was in the first. They rode to the elementary school in Harmony both ways on the school bus. Roselyn and Rob were both in a private kindergarten in Janusville. They rode in with Eve every morning, and Trent picked them up in Harmony when the teacher, who lived in Harmony, brought them home with her at noon. Trent fed them and took them to work with him. Eve picked them up at the field road on her way home.

Eve was a great believer in self-reliance for children. She doled out plenty of household chores, and held the children responsible for their share. Each child had a list of things to do before school, before bedtime, and on Saturday, and was expected to do them, and attend church on Sunday as regularly as school. Nobody was to shirk anything, unless he was sick, which fortunately was rare, because the others were expected to take up the slack. She followed good advice about homework: provide a desk, a light, and private time, and require that children do their own homework.

As I told you, I ran lots of interference for her: keeping everybody healthy, keeping the cars going even when she forgot to put in gas regularly, trying not to let them get stuck in the mud, and providing help like the neighbor boys when she did, making the school a nice place for her, and protecting the children from hatefulness. And when she forgot where or when to pick them up, I always got somebody to remind her.

From my place that Friday I watched Miz Windham finally get out of her car and go toward the front of the building, which stretched out north and south in front of her. Under the long metal-covered awning which formed the roof over the two front doors, one could walk left to the shop, a large classroom with small windows without blinds, framed in white against the brick walls. To her right stretched mostly academic classroom windows, one with an air conditioner sticking out, the principal’s office. The others all had blinds raised to the same level, visible all the way to the end of the building. There were shrubs of boxwood planted under the classroom windows nearest the door and green nandinas the rest of the way down the long brick wall of the front. Between the front door and the shop were larger bushes, ligustrums with their shiny leaves toward the sun, which spread light in the rectangle not covered by the metal roof. The wide curving drive was made of pea gravel and sand, with gray dirt where the cars were parked, and drying green grass from there to the main road, leading south from town. There was one large chimney standing from the roof, back and to the right of the front door, and a curved vent with an antenna attached to the top of it. In the back could be seen a power pole with a transformer. The gym was back there, but it could not be seen from the front drive. To the left of the inside lobby was the lunch room with a small stage, which could be used by teachers for class events or practices. To the right of the door outside the principal’s office stood a large trophy case, containing bronze figures with basketballs and tennis racquets, some with ribbons draped over them. Through the front doors straight back was the exit to the gymnatorium, with its ticket booth, doors, and lobby. The gym was separated from the main building by a driveway and student parking lot, which extended up beside the lunch room windows. While students ate, they could view any vehicles entering or leaving this parking zone. Some teachers parked there also. After school, buses circled the building, lining up in the front driveway. Most teachers parked their vehicles in the front, across the gravel drive from the building. The school was on the south side of Janusville, just outside the city limits, but within walking distance of the courthouse uptown. There were a few paved sidewalks, but most town children rode the school bus, according to a special arrangement. There was a tennis court next to the drive in back.

Miz Windham went past the principal’s front office lobby door around to the secretary’s hall door, where she was told that a faculty meeting would take place in the library at nine. She glanced at a wall of boxes, one with Windham written under it, her mail box, where some papers were stuffed and wrinkled. She pulled them out as she greeted the smiling secretary, and went on down the hallway, made narrower with a row of lockers on each side between the classroom doors. She smiled hello to everyone she saw, ending up in room eight, on the front side of the building. No, her name was not over the door, but an 8 was. Just as no assigned parking space was made, there was also no personal sign that she was expected that day. She noticed the front wall of windows, with blinds evenly raised just above the open pull-out windows on the bottom. All of the windows were open, that is, pulled out. There was a faint morning breeze.

This afternoon, the western sun will really warm this place up, she said aloud to nobody, but in the winter, it will feel really good.

Not a complainer by nature, and definitely the low man on the school totem pole, she was content to get a good room which seemed clean, except for spots on the ceiling tiles. She liked being on the front side of the building. Last term she and her students could get a good look at anyone who parked or walked near the front door. She might have thought about those more modern schools where there are no windows, and the students are never distracted by the outdoors. I’m sure Miz Windham would never be happy in one of those, more of a prison than necessary, she would think. Miz Windham had observed last term that the only difference between schools and prisons was that schools didn’t have any bars on the windows; they both were painted the same drab colors. Miz Windham said, too, that if they didn’t spend the money on schools in the young years of life, they would surely have to spend it on prisons in the mature years of life. Of course, she was right.

Maybe one day I shall arrange a forum for her, perhaps a sociology class. I can already imagine the students calling it Windhamology.

Miz Windham walked down the rows of desks, five of them, seven chairs to the row, room for thirty-five. As a student teacher she had had thirty-three in one class, quite a crowd. The state standard was 30 to a class in five classes each day, 150 students. The desktops were wood, some of them gouged and marred. The frames were metal.

My students will need to have some padding under their papers to write well. I think this school opened in 1956. Did they buy new chairs then? In six years they have taken a beating. She continued talking to nobody.

A blackboard claimed the front of the room with two clean erasers and some broken chalk in the tray, but there was a new box on Miz Windham’s desk. The side next to the hall door had a bulletin board which ran the length of it. Everything was painted either gray or light green, and the door was green, too. The other rooms were exactly like this one, though some were smaller, and the reverse on the other side of the hall. Over each door was a transom, open to catch any breezes. There was just time enough to put her purse in the desk drawer, grab a pen and paper, and report to the library.

It’s good to see everybody. Welcome to the new teachers, greeted the principal, Mr. Edward Allen, who had called each of them by name as they entered. I’ve been looking around, getting the rooms cleaned and painted, patching the window insulation to hold out the cold air, checking the roof, and I have your rooms in pretty good shape. I’ll try to be available for you, he told them. After a few more friendly remarks, he said, I have held back the most significant thing for you to do: schedule the students for classes. I do have your homeroom rosters and duty assignments completed.

Miz Windham sat up straighter at this news, and frowned somewhat. Had her training included scheduling? She planned to put up her bulletin board, clean the desktops, and divide her textbooks into sections and sequences for teaching in blocks. She planned to make lesson plans and rolls, and be ready for the students next Thursday.

The other faculty members tried to be cheerful as they heard this news. Miz Windham got the impression that the scheduling was done by the faculty every year. She kept smiling. She tried to be happy thinking about being in charge in her classroom, not like student teaching or being a substitute. She and another lady had ninth grade homerooms.

We have made a tentative subject offering grid, the usual six periods, five days a week, but it is not written in stone and can be changed if necessary. Let’s try to go by it without change, unless the senior teachers find that it is unworkable for our graduates. After saying that, Mr. Allen left the task to them and returned to the front office, to his own responsibilities.

It grew hotter as the day wore on in the library, but there were fans near the door and front windows, which lined the west wall like Miz W.’s. They sat at large wood tables on wood chairs, placed conveniently in the over-sized classroom, the first room on the right as one begins the walk from the front office down the long corridor to room eight. Two walls were filled with books, almost to the ceiling. Free-standing bookcases, almost as high, stood perpendicular to the back wall with just enough space to walk around them. All in all, it was a fine collection of books, most of them in excellent condition. Miz Madden’s desk was across from the door. On it was the bell, a memorable leftover from years past. One hit it with the finger by banging on the top metal tip. The cupped metal base vibrated with the sound of the clapper, which could be heard all over the library. Miz W. remembered that if a group of students did not quiet down, they would be sent back to their classrooms. Intending to adjust and learn, Miz W. and her colleague, Miz Gwen Merryman, began.

Remember, everyone gets English, math, science, and social studies. Electives can be added later. You may need to check permanent records to see whether they all passed last year. If they failed, they must repeat the course before going to the next level, she said. They brought all the records in here to save us some walking.

Does the faculty do this every year? Eve asked her fellow teacher.

Gwen replied, Sometimes it is done for us by the principal and secretary in the summer, but usually we have to make many changes. Sometimes the kids go to summer school in Evansville, and we have to check their records. It is the first week of school that kills us. We are trying to get everyone scheduled, books given out, and make a start at teaching, while the kids want changes because their girl friends or boy friends are in a certain class, and their parents do not discourage them.

It’s a wonder everyone gets in the classes that he needs. I guess mistakes are made inadvertently, Eve observed.

It’s during this time that the principal really earns his keep, trying to make the faculty happy and direct kids out of the halls.

How are people assigned to lunch? Eve remembered that last winter much of her duty time was spent telling students No, you can’t go to your locker on this hall.

Gwen answered, It’s based on the room they’re in at lunchtime. We have two lunch periods: half go first, mainly seniors and others on this end of the hall; they are kept reasonably quiet while the others have class. Then those on the back hall go to lunch. They can go outside in the back if they finish early. No one is allowed on this end during lunch or in the front driveway.

I remember who enforces these rules.

You got it. One of us is at the restrooms on the hall, directing traffic. Others are blocking other areas from student traffic to keep them quiet enough for classes to proceed. I always hated parking lot duty, but the men usually do that. And the principal roams everywhere or has parent conferences. And we have a ‘no smoking or dipping’ rule. Also some of the younger students like to stuff paper in the toilets. Sadly for the rest, we have to limit paper for a couple of weeks until the revenge is over.

And that nice little grill at the end of the driveway, is so convenient. Wish there were some way we could get things sent up to us teachers, Eve remarked.

Usually our meals here are very good. We get surplus food and good recipes from the government, the Agriculture Department, and our manager is an excellent cook. You see what her rolls and pure butter have done to me, Gwen said with a look toward her hips.

Eve was skinny as a rail, her aunt always said. The idea of a home-cooked meal every day with no cleanup afterward certainly appeals to me. How can anyone complain about ready-made food?

I suppose we’d better get started on these schedule cards if we expect to have any time left to get prepared ourselves. Let’s see. What periods is English 9 taught, or is it English I on this grid?

Thus Miz W.’s enthusiasm and energy were being swallowed up in the laborious task of scheduling about 55 ninth grade students into the required classes, plus PE and an elective, either agriculture shop for the boys or home economics for the girls. Such is school, Miz W. realized, full of both pleasant and unpleasant surprises.

The bitter with the sweet! Trent would say.

Eventually the faculty got the cards stacked with all the students’ schedules prepared. We always have new students, sometimes as many as 25, plus old students who did not register last term, Gwen said.

Who will schedule them?

If we can’t do it, the school secretary will. They will just line up in the office.

Thursday the students arrived, eager to see their friends and begin a new year. The farm children had been somewhat isolated all summer, and school was the place to socialize again. After three months of chores or labor in the cotton fields or peach packing sheds of the rural county, they were ready to talk. They all survived the first day of changing schedules and introductions to new teachers, and especially examining the principal, who had assumed leadership last year well into the first semester. This was his first beginning with them.

Miz W. observed her students during the next week of school. Both ninth and tenth graders came noisily into the classroom and sat down, in their assigned seats, alphabetically arranged to save time when taking up papers for grading and recording, Miz W. planned. The girls dressed pretty much alike, dresses or skirts, knee length or longer, with socks and loafers, or flats with hose, their books on their hips across a large notebook, not much different from Miz W. herself as a high school student. Boys wore long pants, khakis or jeans, with a belt at the waist, shirts with an open collar, usually freshly ironed, and neatly tucked in. They wore shoes with socks; however some had boots, those who did outdoor chores before school. The parents were careful to follow a dress code for their children of what was proper. Like the Windham children, most kids had three wardrobes: one for play or chores at home, one for school, and one for church. It was common to do all that changing of clothes. Above all, parents believed they must come to school clean, and they saw to it.

Mornin’, Miz Windham.

Good morning, Suzanne. I like your skirt. It’s very becoming.

Thank you. Mama made it. I like it, too.

Mornin’, Miz Windham. You doin’ all right today? This came from a neatly-dressed boy, with red hair, freckles, and smiles.

Doing great, she replied, instantly liking him. She knew he would brighten her days.

Teachers had their own dress codes, too. Miz Windham always wore a dress or skirt and blouse with hose and heels. Her reddish hair was always neat and stylish, though not trendy. She wore a watch and usually earrings and a necklace or a pin. She never took off her wedding rings, and she wore a small birthstone ring on her right hand. She wore only a little makeup with lipstick. At five feet seven inches tall, she made a handsome figure in the doorway. Her green eyes were kind, along with her smile for each student who made eye contact. At this time of year, her freckles were still visible. She was still too new at the job to be very informal. She avoided small talk and wise cracks as the students came in. They were more interested in themselves than in her until they sat down. Then most of the students looked her up and down. If you had asked the girls what she wore last Thursday, they probably could have told you.

She had given both grades a printed assignment list the first day. Referring to that, she was ready with great expectations.

Get your pens and notebooks ready for class discussion, she told them as she finished the attendance roll for first period. Our books are on the back table, ready to be given out.

I’ll help, Miz Windham.

Me, too.

The two boys began distributing the history books.

You want to write your name, my name, and the year on the next line on the inside cover. If your book gets lost, it can be returned to me or you, and you won’t need to pay for it. Do this in ink. When I call your name, call out the number of your book.

There was a smattering of talking while this was being done. Miz W. didn’t mind.

When nothing’s going on, you may talk, but in a low voice, she told them.

Then she stood up again, and class began, as it would five times a day for one whole semester and then another. It was required that teachers actually teach five periods a day. For her sixth period, at the fifth period time slot, Miz Windham kept a study hall. It was supposed to be her journalism class, the newspaper staff, but nobody on the staff could schedule it. So it became a study hall for mostly juniors and seniors. These were students she didn’t know or teach. Sometimes she got a lot of paper work done then, and lesson plans for the next day. Some days the students, or one of them, got rowdy, forcing her to patrol the room.

The school was short a math teacher, or rather, an algebra teacher. There were two classes, one morning and one afternoon. Mr. Allen approached Miz W. about taking the morning class, just until he finished the opening chores of the school year. It was ninth grade. Miz W. knew the students, as well as she knew any of them. But where did the principal get the idea that she would make a good algebra teacher?

She struggled each day to keep at least a page ahead of them. She had not had an algebra class since her year at the Atlanta Division, UGA, back in 1952, before she and Trent married. She racked her brain to guess how she rated the Janus County High class. I took algebra and math classes as electives because I felt incompetent in math. Of course, they are on my transcript in my personnel folder. That’s where he got the idea that I’m competent in math, she thought.

The days dragged on as Miz W. was up late studying, trying to learn her subjects before teaching them. She kept the algebra class the entire first quarter. It was pointed out that students shouldn’t change teachers in the middle of a grading period if it was not absolutely necessary. How about teachers changing students? She endured. She even overheard one student tell another, Wish we had Miz Windham for Algebra I. Marty says she explains things so that he can understand it. Little did he know that she explained things so that she could understand it.

Both of her world history classes were hard to challenge. She was disappointed in the book they were using; it was so dry and dull that they all hated to read it, even the teacher. She began searching the book catalogs for another, not necessarily with pictures, but with a more inclusive world view, and one that included China, India, and Africa. She finally found one rather large, heavy book in the samples she ordered from publishers. She was delighted when it got approved. Next year’s classes would have the new book. They were this year’s civics students. She was very pleased with herself.

Civics, or government, was very interesting to Miz Windham. She liked to know what was going on and tried to make her students more aware. The book had an attractive cover, inviting even the most lackadaisical pupil to open it.

What was that? Was that a spitball? She was startled.

The class giggled. Everyone looked guilty. Miz W. glanced around the room, just then concluding what all those spots on the ceiling tiles were. The current ball was on the blackboard, centered just behind her. What would she have done if it had hit her? But the thrower placed it just where he wanted it. Miz W. went on with her introduction for the day’s work, putting them on task for a new unit. Then she sat down at her desk to grade papers. Another spit ball passed, this time, just over the head of a boy in the back of the room.

Miz Windham, I can’t work when I may be hit with a spit ball any minute, the boy, Henry, said.

Of course you can’t, Henry. Somebody with very bad manners is disturbing us all. Is there anyone who would like to apologize?

No one. They resumed their work, those in front, but those in back were looking around, ready to laugh again at the culprit. A few knew who it was. The class left before Miz W. could find out.

The next day, out of the corner of her eye, Miz W. saw the culprit, bolder now that he had not been caught. In the middle of her sentence of instructions, she interrupted herself with, Stanley, stop by my desk after class.

Yes, Ma’am, sure will, he said, cocky for his audience to hear.

Miz W. took Stanley to the principal’s office, where she recounted his spitballs, and his disregard for property and class instruction.

I will handle this matter, Miz Windham. Thank you for bringing it to my attention, Mr. Allen said, and she left to go back to her classes.

The next day when she arrived at school, Mr. Allen informed her, Stanley will apologize for his disruption yesterday, but he steadfastly denied that he had ever thrown any spitballs at anybody.

Mr. Allen, I saw him throw it. Apparently, he thinks he can pull the wool over both our eyes. I shall continue to watch him.

He said a boy named Maurice was doing it, and that you were mistaken, he continued.

Well, I shall watch Maurice also, she replied and walked on down the hall to her spitball-splattered room, feeling that she was on trial instead of Stanley.

It was a week before spitballs came up again, no activity in Miz W.’s room, but Mr. Martin, the agriculture teacher, brought Stanley to the office.

I had been watching him. Somebody had been throwing spitballs at Maurice and sticking them on my ceiling tiles. I finally caught Stanley, he told Miz W. in the hall. With your experience and mine, Mr. Allen will punish him by requiring that he clean our rooms. His parents have been notified. He will begin this evening. I think they plan to help him.

That was Thursday. I’m sorry, Miz Windham., that I gave you a headache. Please forgive me, a contrite Stanley told her in the hall before class on Friday. I cleaned your room, even some I didn’t do.

Let’s forget it. You can be a better student from now on, now that you don’t have to think about throwing spitballs, and she laughed.

On Monday Stanley was not at school. There was a withdrawal slip in Miz W.’s box.

Trent, did you know that his parents transferred him right out of Janus County to another school. I had no thought it would end like that, she told her husband Monday night.

Well, that’s one less troublemaker you’ll have to deal with.

He’ll probably be a model student for somebody else.

Parents have to do what they think is best for their children. You know that. They may have been thinkin’ of doin’ this all along. You and Mr. Martin just helped them make up their minds.

Every week after the civics lesson was over on Fridays, the real government lesson began. The major local issue was the proposed federal construction of the Sprewell Bluff Dam across the Flint River in the neighboring county south of Janus. If constructed, the resulting lake would back up water in a reservoir to cover the whole town of Mansfield, and perhaps fill creeks in Miz W.’s own yard. Her house was only about two miles from the river in western Janus County, but there were hills and valleys between, and creeks.

My report is on the proposed Flint River dam project. Our congressman said at the last Lions Club meetin’ that the project failed to get the votes in Congress, but it would prob’bly pass in 1963, this comin’ year. Ever’body I know wants to get this passed, but my mother. She’s constantly writin’ letters to ever’body important to vote against the project. The Flint River has the longes’ stretches of free-flowin’ water in the United States, with many one-of-a-kind species of plants an’ animals along its shores. It’s important to save these in their natural habitat for future generations, my mother believes, an’ I agree with her. Cain’t our governor stop this construction? Paul ended with a question.

Does anybody know why he might not be able to stop this construction? Miz W. asked.

I know, Miz Windham. The Flint runs through lots of counties, an’ they might want the dam, Louise said.

An’, this from Jeff, some people might like the idea of a lake with boats an’ fishin’ an’ new houses built around the lake, you know, just to have a good time without drivin’ very far.

A lake would be a good irrigation possibility if we had a drought, an’ a dam might control water if we have too much, an’ it can provide electricity for big cities, Ruth said.

Paul argued, But we don’t have any big cities around here. An’ the towns we have will be flooded as the lake builds up. My town will be flooded. Our land will be covered, not just flooded. It will become the bottom of the new lake.

Does the Flint go through any other states? Miz Windham asked.

Well, no, not exactly. It joins with the Chattahoochee River way down south at the Florida line, but that’s so far away. Surely Florida’s governor would object to dammin’ the upper Flint, Mary Emma added.

Well, I like huntin’ and especially fishin’ on the river. I don’t want a lake, Joe said.

I like it that the Flint is the last of the rivers in Georgia with no developments on it to block its natural flow or kill the native plants on the shores, Sam said. My daddy and I take trips on the river all the time.

Spoken like a true environmentalist, Miz Windham said just as the bell rang.

So, back and forth in the classroom, and searching the newspapers for facts as they occurred, the civics classes became lively places. Miz Windham loved it. She scheduled a current events day for all her classes on Fridays. When she learned that some of the students were sharing their articles, or events to be reported, she required all of them to be handed in at the end of each class. Each student had to turn in one or take a failing grade for the day. Submitting to the inevitable, her students were forced to read the paper and listen to the news on TV, interpreting it for themselves. She allowed her students to bring in whatever world or local events they were interested in, and class time was spent listening to their points of view, or opposing it. Some of these discussions got loud, even controversial, but she was able to control them.

As I said, I ran interference.

She called on Evelyn the next current event day, whose hand was waving in excitement. My report is about James Meredith. You never heard of him? Well, you will from now on, prob’bly. He tried to enroll in college at Ole Miss at Oxford, Mississippi, twice, and the governor stopped him. He’s a colored man, you know, but he thinks he has a right to go to college there if he’s qualified an’ has the money, this article says. President Kennedy sent marshals there to keep order. Last September 30 they had riots an’ 160 marshals were wounded an’ two students killed. Troops were sent, too, an’ people spit on them an’ hollered insults, but James Meredith registered the next day. The governor was ordered to step aside, an’ he did.

But Miz Windham, why would people spit on the army an’ call out bad names an’ get so mad? Gloria asked innocently.

I don’t know that I can answer that, but I’ll try. Many white people think that these changes will be bad for them and their children. They don’t want their children or anybody’s to go to school with colored, or Negro, or Black children. Some people even become violent when they oppose it, and that’s what happened at Ole Miss. There were probably some armed white people there when James Meredith enrolled, but because of the marshals and troops who definitely had visible weapons, the most those white people could do was yell and spit, Miz Windham began. What do you think was the reason?

Well, my mama lets me play with the colored boy down the road, an’ his mama helps my granny with her housework. We grew up together, except he went to the colored schools an’ I go here. But I wouldn’t take spittin’ off anybody, even him, an’ name-callin’ is bad. I wouldn’t think that any of our colored people would behave like that, tall, husky Ronnie answered in Gloria’s place.

You are missing the point, Ronnie. It was not the colored people who were spitting and yelling. It was the white people. The colored student was exercising his right as a citizen, enrolling in college. Troops had to support his right because the white people were not ready to yield him that right. Miz Windham elaborated. When the white people couldn’t spit on James Meredith, they spit on the troops enforcing the right, who were under orders to keep the peace, and they had to stand and take it.

Mississippi is a southern state an’ so are we. What if a colored person wanted to go to school at the University of Georgia? Gloria asked.

He would have the right as a citizen, as any other high school graduate, who was qualified, Miz Windham said. I think James Meredith was going to enroll as a transfer student; so he had credentials from another college.

My daddy is a UGA graduate. He’s already said that no Negro, only he didn’t say Negro, is going to enter the university or any other school in Georgia, as long as my daddy is alive, Gene added.

My daddy says that, too, chimed in a few more students.

The time is coming. All of us need to get ready, Miz Windham ended that discussion just in time. Some of the faces of students were getting red, ready to voice louder, perhaps profane opinions, like they may have heard at home. She pointed to Emily next.

My report is different. Emily had raised her hand to contribute. Marilyn Monroe is dead. They found her in her bedroom. She was only 36. They think she committed suicide, too many drugs.

Yes, Miz Windham liked her civics classes, full of young people who loved politics, whose parents paid attention to the news or began when they got the questions from their children. She was just informal enough to encourage free discussion, but not enough to lose control. In her structured classes of world history and civics, she was easily in charge. It was the informal, extracurricular assignments which created stress for her.

Miz Windham’s extracurricular activity was the Roman Voice, the school newspaper. Unfortunately, she had never put together a newspaper in her life.

She elaborately explained the problems to Trent. "I have to order supplies, ink an’ paper, an’ black ink stencils for the mimeograph machine, not those purple ones we do tests on. The students have to be taught how to use ‘em, an’ me, too. I’m getting the hang of layout an’ editing, but typing to fit spaces an’ trying to save stencils from being discarded with each error is a constant challenge for all of us. One paper a month seems to be all we can do. Few people know just how much effort that is. We edit, type an’ re-type, an’