Black Student Protest Raleigh City Schools Headquarters on Devereux Street, 7 August 1962.

Their signs read, “Let’s enforce the 1954 Supreme Court decision.”
“Why support two school systems?” “Reassignment by locality not personality.”
“No more token integration.” “Segregation out—integration in. When?”

The protest was organized by the local chapter of the NAACP and took place shortly before school board members met in a closed executive session to determine where nine Black students were to attend high school. These nine students were first denied at a previous hearing in which 37 Black students were admitted to white schools.

At the time, reassignment requests were based on the student’s “grades and personality.” Ralph Campbell, a parent of one of the nine refused and a past president of the local NAACP, remarked, “You say that you based assignment on personality and grades, but I don’t think there’s a man at this table who can tell me the personality of my children.”

Rev. John Bryant, whose son had been refused reassignment, stated, “It is our firm hope that our son can get an education which will permit him to live in an integrated society.”

All nine were denied reassignment during the closed session.

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Image and narrative source: NO.62.8.70
From the N&O Negative Collection, State Archives of North Carolina.