UofL Libraries: Uncovering Racial Logics: Louisville's History of Racial Oppression and Activism: Education

Education

Introduction

school bus — A group of Black and white women standing in front of a bus, 21 July 1966. Source: R_18909, Royal Photo Company Collection, 1982.03, Photographic Archives, University of Louisville, Louisville, Kentucky.

Louisville has a long history of racial inequities, segregation, oppression, and activism in its education system. Prior to the Louisville and Jefferson County school merger in 1975, Jefferson County schools outside of the city were well over 90% white. When the 1975 school desegregation plan was met with violence, protests, and other forms of backlash (and later court cases and challenges), Louisville activists, organizations, and communities of color mobilized. They worked to educate, march, protect Black students and families, and organize anti-racist efforts. Scroll down to view important documents and images showcasing examples of racial violence and anti-racism efforts in Louisville’s education system during the 1970s.

Progress in Education (PIE) Records

Progress in Education (PIE) was a grass roots activist organization that formed in 1975 against the backdrop of Jefferson County’s contentious court ordered busing program to desegregate schools. PIE was intentionally comprised of both Black and white membership with the expressed aim to end racism in Louisville area schools and core membership included Anne Braden, Ilene Carver, and Nancy Gall-Clayton. Documents stored in the PIE Records collection include notes from meetings, membership lists, flyers, monthly newsletters, newspaper clippings, letters written by members, and much more. By working with this collection, researchers gain an understanding of the tensions and debates surrounding Louisville’s 1975 move to desegregate schools by busing students throughout the county. Researchers using this collection will also be able to see a how grassroots activists organized and kept movement work going in the 1970s – a time before the internet. Much of PIE’s work was geared towards public education about busing and desegregation, reflected in many of the materials in the collection.

Find more information about the Progress in Education Records collection.

Important News from Progress in Education, November 1975
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 1, Folder 7 "Brochures"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

PIE issued a regular monthly newsletter (many of which are available at UofL Archives and Special Collections). The document posted here is PIE's November 1975 newsletter. Each newsletter would highlight information from recent meetings and on-going issues the group was addressing. For example, this newsletter issue discusses the Coleman family, a Black family that had recently moved into a white neighborhood and were facing harassment and violence from white supremacists and white residents hostile to integration. After a bomb was thrown into the Coleman’s yard, PIE organized support for the family through financial donations and a rotation of volunteers who would stay at the Coleman’s house in case further violence occurred. Through PIE’s newsletters we get an idea of how their grassroots organizing happened month to month, the types of activities they prioritized, and how they built up their membership and support.

News from Progress in Education press release, November 11, 1975
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 1, Folder 10 "Notices and Statements to the Press, 1975-1976"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

This document is a press release prepared by Progress in Education. PIE engaged in many public education efforts, including regular press releases about their activities. This helped the organization to promote their own efforts, but more importantly to call attention to racial injustices underway in Louisville. After the busing program began in September 1975 there were multiple incidences of violence from whites opposed to integrated schools. Often these incidents were aimed at Black students being bused into majority white schools. This PIE press release from November 11, 1975 is focused on PIE's efforts to motivate the Louisville Metro Police Department and the FBI to take action against people who reportedly brought dynamite to Fern Creek High School the previous week.

Louisville, The Truth About Busing, circa 1976
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 1, Folder 7 "Brochures"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

The Truth About Busing is a flyer created by PIE to raise awareness of the historical roots of the controversy surrounding busing and desegregation of schools in Jefferson County and to highlight the group’s efforts toward integration. The flyer provides information about the reasons forced busing was deemed necessary in Louisville schools in 1975 long after Brown v Board of Education ended “separate but equal” in the U.S. public education system. It also discusses violence that erupted from whites opposed to desegregation and busing at the start of the 1975 school year and shows the reasons that PIE and other grassroots groups were necessary. From this flyer, we can see some of the tactical strategies PIE used at the time to educate the public about busing and the anti-busing movement, such as an anti-racism rally held in October 1975. The flyer itself was publicly disseminated as an educational tool and recruiting tactic.

Public Hearing to Support Active Resistance to Racist Attacks, May 15, 1976
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 6, Folder 20 "Public Hearing on Racist Attacks, May 15, 1976"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

This document is an announcement of a public hearing PIE organized in the wake of an escalation of racist attacks by whites in the anti-busing movement in May, 1976. The document contains general information about the attacks and ways that activists in support of busing and integrated schools were trying to combat them. The document notes that the public hearing was a collaborative effort supported by other local groups and individuals including PIE, The Central Organization of US Marxist-Leninists, the Alliance against Racist and Political Repression, the Kentucky Christian Leadership Conference, and Reverend Charles Elliott.

Letter to Judge James F. Gordon from Progress in Education, June 18, 1976
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 3, Folder 2 "Protest Busing 900 More Blacks, 1976"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

Louisville’s busing program began in the 1975-1976 school year. Over the summer of 1976, plans were announced to increase the numbers of Black students being bused to majority white schools, while the numbers of white students being bused would remain the same. PIE wrote to Judge Gordon asking him to reconsider his decision to bus even more Black students during a time when Black students were already four times more likely to be bused than white students.

March on Frankfort flyer, July 2, 1976
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 3, Folder 3 "Statewide March on Frankfort, July 2, 1976"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

Many of the items in the Progress in Education Records collection were not necessarily the creation of PIE themselves. They are included in the collection because they were important enough to PIE to be filed away and stored by the group as a part of their own record keeping. This flyer advertises a march in Frankfort, KY in the summer of 1976 in acknowledgement of the 200-year anniversary of the United States Declaration of Independence. The aims of the march were to highlight the struggles of Black people and poor whites in the United States over the 200-year span and to build solidarity between these two groups which have been pitted against each other throughout the history of the United States. The march was sponsored by a Louisville based group called Humanitarians for Peace.

Progress in Education Brochure, circa 1975-1977
Progress in Education (PIE) Records, (Box 1, Folder 7 "Brochures"), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

This document is a trifold brochure that, when assembled, would fit neatly into a standard size envelope. Brochures would have been distributed in person or mailed out to potential PIE supporters. PIE used these brochures as promotional materials to give broad overviews of the issues surrounding busing and to make a case for others to join and/or support the group’s efforts financially.

Lyman T. Johnson Papers

Lyman T. Johnson is often remembered as the first Black graduate student to attend the University of Kentucky in 1949. However, this was just one aspect of Lyman T. Johnson’s Civil Rights work in Kentucky. As a teacher at Louisville’s Central High School in the 1930s, he fought for equal pay between Black and white educators. He taught at Central High School through the 1960s and was then a junior high principal for several years. Eventually, he would become head of the NAACP in Louisville. Through his work with the NAACP, he was in communication with other Civil Rights activists throughout the U.S. While Lyman T. Johnson’s focus was always on education, his Civil Rights work addressed multiple issues, especially around desegregation. Documents stored in the Lyman T. Johnson Collection include many different types of material, such as newspaper clippings, reference files, audio and video tapes, yearbooks, photos, plaques, awards, and diplomas. The material included covers the range of Johson’s career, from the 1930s-1990s. Researchers working with this collection get a sense of the different aspects of the Civil Rights movement in Louisville through those decades, and can see how Johnson figured prominently in Civil Rights movement circles, especially when it came to desegregation in education. Find more information about the Lyman T. Johnson Collection here, and access a 1976 oral history recorded with him here.

Letter to Board of Education from NAACP and Louisville Urban League, February 3, 1939.
Lyman T. Johnson Papers, (Box 10, Folder "Board of Education," 2 of 3), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

In this letter sent in February 1939, Louisville’s NAACP and Urban League write to the Louisville Board of Education to call attention to racist discrimination in teacher salaries. As a consequence of policies in place at the time, Black teachers earned 15% less salary than white teachers.

Salary Equalization Campaign letter from NAACP, October 17, 1939
Lyman T. Johnson Papers, (Box 10, Folder "Board of Education," 2 of 3), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

The fight for equal pay for teachers continued throughout 1939. In October, this letter was sent out to Louisville area teachers to raise awareness and generate funds in support of the local NAACP chapter’s work to end discriminatory teacher salaries. We see in this letter and example of how such fundraising would have happened at the time, with a list of “authorized persons” that recipients of the letter can trust to get their financial contribution to the right place.

Letter to Mayor Joseph Scholtz from John A. Miller, December 21, 1940
Lyman T. Johnson Papers, (Box 10, Folder "Board of Education," 2 of 3), Archives and Special Collections, University of Louisville.

By the end of 1940, equal pay for teachers in Louisville had still not been achieved. In this letter from December 1940, the Louisville Board of Education writes to Mayor Joseph Schultz expressing concerns that the budget allocated to the Board of Education will not be enough to equalize teachers’ pay. Through this letter, we can see some of the logistical concerns that existed at the time, such as the link between local Louisville residents’ taxes and the need for more funds to increase Black teacher’s salaries. The letter references a resolution from April 20, 1939 where the Louisville Board of Education adopted a plan to equalize pay among Black and white teachers within 5 years.

Louisville Defender on Education

The Louisville Defender, a local Black newspaper founded in 1933, is an excellent resource for researching Black life in Louisville. The following short video combines clippings from the Louisville Defender with select excerpts from an oral history Lyman T. Johnson housed in Archives and Special Collection's Oral History Center.

Oral Histories in education

The Oral History Center contains a large number of oral history interviews from community members, many pertaining to education, segregation, integration, discrimination, and busing. Each link will take you to the OHC's website, where you can see a brief description of each interview, some of which are available to listen to online.