The political climate was such back then, particularly in Jefferson County, that no one expected any action - ever. My ex-wife is from there and the emotion in her own family about racial divide was a real eye-opener for me. Huntsville had already started taking baby steps towards integration in schools and public accommodations on its own, accompanied by threats from the legislature and Wallace for repercussions. As one of the original black NASA scientists said recently, they used to caution each other that "when you step outside Huntsville, you're back in Alabama."
It's interesting you bring this up because my own upbringing on racial issues is rather complex. Dad is from rural Missouri, and Mom spent her first 18 years in Lanett, where she never had a black classmate (they integrated in the Fall of 1965 after she graduated in the spring), and four years at Judson College in Marion, a private (mostly white if not all-white then) Christian school. Meanwhile, I grew up in the military community where by the mid-1970s when I began school we were ridding (our) world of being allowed to view everything through a prism of race (not that we always succeeded). My best friends my first three years of elementary school were two white dudes, a Hispanic kid, and several black kids.
WE NEVER CARED about any of that stuff at the time. My folks never once told me I couldn't go to Darryl's house because of anything (except maybe I had chores to do). So I never thought anything about it.
Then we moved to Illinois in 1978. On the military base, no problems whatsoever. Off the base in the civilian community, I got confronted with stuff I never entertained, including some words that should not be used (people always are aghast when I point out to them my first indoctrination in that stuff was up north). The next year, we moved to Mississippi (for the second time) and I had an experience every white person probably needs - I was one of only FOUR white boys in a class of 35 students. A very small minority. I adjusted and although there were a couple of 'cultural misunderstandings' (sociological?), we all got along great.
So when I first saw and began to learn about things like "Crisis at Central High" or a show I saw about the integration at UA and Wallace's stand in the door, I'm looking at it thinking, "This cannot be real." And then Mom tells me it was VERY real and she lived through it......although the distance from Lanett to Tuscaloosa back then was about like the distance (comprehension wise) from the USA to the Third World. I'll say that Mom's family was perhaps 'lax' on civil rights - what I mean is, they didn't want to harm anyone but probably didn't care one way or the other about rights and resented the feeling of being 'forced' into a pluralistic society. They treated black individuals VERY well - just the same as whites, and I never got the old 'talk bad about the person when he leaves.' And my grandmother (born 1904) used the 'n' word but I never got FROM HER that it was in a malicious sense (e.g. she grew up using that word to describe a group of people pre-Depression and never stopped using it).
I did, however, learn the malice and strong oomph from others who used that word.
So I was mostly confused except I was always taught to treat people right. (The political thing is another matter altogether).
My best friend in college was the reporter who cornered Haley Barbour about five years ago over the Confederate flag license plate proposal. We went everywhere together, walked together. In two years at that school NOT ONE PERSON gave me a hassle about hanging around with him - but he got no end of grief from people of his own race for hanging out with me. (Don't worry, about to tie it all together).
In 1988, "Mississippi Burning" came out and an 18-year old white freshman journalism major wrote a scathing review of the movie because.....she took it personally. She actually insisted that none of what was in the movie could have been real and it made every white Mississippian on the planet look like a racist. So - of course - I asked Mom, who went to see it (first movie she and Dad went to together since he ticked her off by explaining how "The Towering Inferno" was fake DURING the movie, ha ha).
She made the point it was EXACTLY (in terms of maltreatment of blacks) representative of the time - with violence, killing, attacks, etc. Then she went into one of her few political subjects she ever talks about, what a lying little weasel George Wallace was. Her claim - and I don't know if this is true - was that Wallace had publicly said he would go to jail before he'd let them integrate the university. Of course, we all know what happened - but she said that he either should have not made such a public spectacle of himself or he should have actually gone to the slammer - anything but what he did. (Of course, we're both aware there was a bigger agenda in Wallace's mind).
But this particular subject makes me angry (the church girls's murder). Mom would concur with Earle that there was no chance in the 1960s those Klansmen would go to jail. Maybe (and I HATE to say this) it was at least better that it was delayed so they weren't found 'not guilty' (a la OJ) and could not be imprisoned. But I just really despise the whole thing.
Thank you for your indulgence.
