67 pages • 2 hours read
Carlotta Walls LaNier, Lisa Frazier PageA Mighty Long Way: My Journey to Justice at Little Rock Central High School
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Middle Grade | Published in 2009A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Further Reading & Resources
Further Reading: Literature
The Schoolhouse Gate: Public Education, the Supreme Court, and the Battle for the American Mind by Justin Driver (2019)
This book examines the many legal battles conducted over the state of education in the United States. By examining the historical legacy of how the Supreme Court has engaged in matters of education, Driver builds a case for how the Supreme Court has failed in creating measures to provide equal public education for all since the 1970s. Like the segregation and educational redlining LaNier describes, these failures are related to systemic racism in the United States. Actions commonly undertaken by schools, such as random drug testing and searches, repressive dress codes, and “zero tolerance” laws often have racialized undertones and disproportionately affect Black, Indigenous, and other students of color.
A More Beautiful and Terrible History: The Uses and Misuses of Civil Rights History by Jeanne Theoharris (2018)
This book addresses common “fables” people tell about Civil Rights History. One of the most pertinent myths debunked by this book is that the Civil Rights movement ended anti-Black racism in the US. Rather, the wide reach of systemic racism across the national infrastructure has institutionalized and engrained anti-Black racism. While LaNier and her comrades are Civil Rights icons, the fight for equity in education continues through the 21st century.
- A More Beautiful and Terrible History on SuperSummary
Something Must Be Done About Prince Edward County by Kristin Green (2015)
This nonfiction book examines the history and consequences of the five years that public schools were closed in Prince Edward County Virginia. As with Faubus in Little Rock, this was done to resist integration. Another similarity between the events in Prince Edward County and the ones in Little Rock several years earlier was the building of all-white private schools so that white children could continue to receive education during this time, while Black students were disproportionately harmed by the legislation.
- Something Must Be Done About Prince Edward County on SuperSummary
Warriors Don’t Cry by Melba Patillo Beals (2007)
This award-winning memoir is written by another member of the Little Rock Nine. It gives Melba’s perspective on the events at Central, from their first attempt to enter the school to Faubus’s closure of the schools and her departure for college. Melba experienced a variety of physical attacks from her white peers, such as being held under scalding water and attacked in the cafeteria.
- Warriors Don’t Cry on SuperSummary
The Long Shadow of Little Rock: A Memoir by Daisy Bates (1962)
This memoir was written by “Mrs. Bates” less than a decade after the Little Rock Nine’s first attempt to attend Central. Mrs. Bates was an activist and the President of the Arkansas Conference of the NAACP. After the nine enrolled at Central, she became their advocate and mentor. Her memoir recalls the Brown v. Board ruling and the flurry of violent white nationalism that cropped up in response, as well as her mentorship of the Little Rock Nine amid the integration crisis.
- The Long Shadow of Little Rock by SuperSummary
Further Reading: Beyond Literature
“White Flight”: Central Arkansas Library System’s Encyclopedia of Arkansas
This article defines the phenomenon of “white flight” and how it impacted Central Arkansas in the decades after integration. White families left the city and moved their children either to suburban schools or expensive, private “academies.” LaNier describes the beginnings of these academies, which Faubus allowed to rent out the closed down public high schools of Little Rock.
“Why Racial Inequities in America's Schools Are Rooted in Housing Policies of the Past”: by Lynette Gustaferro in USA Today, Nov 2, 2020.
This article addresses how “segregationist policies” continue to affect public schools in the 21st century. “Educational redlining” is the term for when schools receive funds based on their surrounding property values: This disproportionately disadvantages people living in lower-income communities, who are often also racially marginalized.
Video & Podcast Resources
“School Segregation and Brown v. Board: Crash Course Black American History #33”: CrashCourse (2022)
This educational video discusses how Jim Crow laws were implemented in response to the Reconstruction Amendments that gave Black Americans citizenship. Access to education should have been a right given Black Americans under citizenship, but segregation gave Black schools far less resources. This video covers the NAACP’s slow fight for educational integration, spanning from the 1930s to 1950s.
The intended audience of this two-part podcast episodes is children ages 9-13 and their parents. Featuring LaNier’s first-hand accounts, it explains how segregation worked in accessible language children can understand. It also discusses events that had major effects on LaNier’s life, like the lynching of Emmett Till, Rosa Parks remaining in her bus seat, and her time at Central. It covers many of the events LaNier details in her book, like her trip to New York and encounter with a bus driver who tells her to move to the back of the bus.
“The Little Rock Nine”: Black History Buff Podcast (2020)
This podcast episode details the story of the Little Rock Nine. It debunks the “separate but equal” argument by detailing statistics and numbers about the resources and money devoted to white and Black children before integration. It features first-hand statements by various members of the Little Rock Nine, such as Elizabeth Eckford describing the attacks and abuse of the white mob when she approached Central before being turned away by the Arkansas National Guard.
Other Relevant Media Resources
This Life gallery features photographs of the Little Rock Nine. Some of the many pictures depict the nine being turned away from school and then later arriving with armed guards, Elizabeth Eckford being verbally assaulted by segregationists, the Arkansas National Guard assembled around Central, and Mrs. Bates watching the US Army’s 101st Airborne Division escort the nine from her home.
“Little Rock Central High School”: Little Rock School District
The pictures on this page show Little Rock Central High School, once called “America's Most Beautiful High School” by the American Institute of Architects. Central is designed in the Art Deco and Collegiate Gothic styles, meant to visually invoke Ivy League and European universities. The figures carved in white stone depict the allegorized Ambition, Personality, Opportunity, and Preparation. LaNier silently asks them to “walk with” her when she finally enters the school through the front door.
“Little Rock Nine Monument”: Encyclopedia of Arkansas
This monument, entitled “Testament,” was unveiled in 2005. It shows the Little Rock Nine walking together as teenagers, symbolizing their historic entrance at Central and the violence and obstacles they faced along the way. The monument stands outside the Arkansas State Capitol, in the same place where Governor Faubus once passed extreme legislation that shut down all Little Rock high schools in protest of integration.
“Ethnic Composition of Little Rock Metropolitan Area High Schools”: Arkansas Times
This graph shows the demographic composition of Little Rock high schools based on 2011 data. Despite legal integration, the racial demographics of high schools reflect structures of systemic racism in the 21st century, such as redlining, gentrification, income inequality, and educational privatization. For instance, the image shows that Little Rock’s private schools have a vast majority of white students that do not reflect the make-up of the city. In the 1950s, after integration was slowly introduced and again in the 1970s after bussing was implemented to bus Black students from distant neighborhoods to various public schools to assure integration, white communities built private charter schools. Similarly, high schools in the suburban areas reflect disproportionately large percentages of white students, reflecting “white flight”: the large-scale movement of white people out of urban centers in response to increasing racial and ethnic diversity.
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