Why Little Rock Nine’s Legacy Still Matters

By Quintessa Williams | Word In Black(WIB) – Screaming parents, students yelling racial slurs, and a law enforcement escort. That’s what the Little Rock Nine faced on September 25, 1957 when they made history as the first Black students to racially integrate Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas.The nine Black students — Minnijean Brown, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Thelma Mothershed, Melba Pattillo, Gloria Ray, Terrence Roberts, Jefferson Thomas, and Carlotta Walls — entered the school under the protection of federal troops.& Reflecting on her experience in a& 1999 interview, Melba Pattillo Beals described her fear walking through the angry crowd: “…It was absolutely terrifying to walk past them. Every moment I wondered what would become of me. It was the kind of fear I had never known. And it went on for most of the year.”By bravely entering the school, the students challenged the longstanding lack of enforcement of the Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision.RELATED:& 7 Facts About Modern School SegregationBut even as we remember and recognize the bravery of the Little Rock Nine, the reality remains: too many Black students today face inequalities that echo the very struggles those pioneers fought to dismantle.Racial& Violence...