Southern Food

The above photograph is the truth.

Now that we are through the Civil Rights blog posts that formed the basis of our trip to the American South, let's talk about something we were really looking forward to out of our May vacation: the food. I'm serious. I've never really explored southern food in its element and this trip was an opportunity to do just that. We were prepared for some down home, finger-licking, butter-filled, deep-fried, artery-clogging goodness. Well, maybe not goodness in the artery-clogging department but we were looking forward to eating some stuff that tasted super good at just about every meal. Tons. Of. Flavor.

I went south with a list. Fried green tomatoes. Fried chicken. Biscuits. Greens. Barbeque. And maybe a few other things mixed in there that I either for sure loved or felt pretty darned confident that I would love. I did my research on where to eat online, on Netflix, in guidebooks and from memory, and laid out what I thought would be a pretty good list of places to stop and chow down.

I was right. We had some amazing eats. We also had some misses both in terms of restaurants serving what I thought were sub-par versions of foods that we sought and in terms of restaurants that we would never return to based on our one stop there. It was bound to happen. There are too many different opinions and palates out there; not everybody is going to agree on what the best food is. Here are a few words about the best stuff I thought we ate in in our 10 days in Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas. I'm highlighting the best of each type of food we had as I go.

And spoiler alert: there's no banana pudding on this list. I'm not going anywhere and deliberately eating anything banana flavored. Except maybe when it comes to actual bananas, and then only in the tropics but definitely in Ecuador.

Biscuits

I have to tell you, there are some foods in this world that I just don't get what all the fuss is about. And biscuits are on that list. If there was a redemption story possibility for a food on this trip, it was the biscuit. I took a trip to Texas in 2013 to see if I really did actually like barbeque (turns out I do!); this trip had the potential to do for the biscuit what Texas did for BBQ in '13.

I still don't get the fuss. I used to make biscuits at home on weekends and have them with jam for breakfast and I thought those were pretty good. Every other biscuit, including most on this trip: meh! I find them stodgy and heavy and that's about it. And if you want to make them worse for me, throw on some sausage gravy. I had some gravy on this trip at a somewhat famous restaurant in Memphis that was like paste. Paste is not good.

This trip didn't save biscuits for me. However, I did find one that I would try again. Best biscuit: Nashville Biscuit House, Nashville, TN.

Fried Chicken

The best meal we had on this trip (hands down) was at Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken in Memphis. The second best meal we had on this trip was also at Gus's.

By my count, I had fried chicken eight times on this trip, including twice for breakfast, in a sandwich, in wing form, twice in a biscuit and twice at Gus's. There is just one I'd go back to in a heartbeat and that's (obviously) Gus's. I don't know how they make the batter so light (with that hint of hot sauce) and keep that chicken so juicy. It's pretty much perfect. If there's a better piece of fried chicken out there, I don't know what it is. This stuff is the best.

OK, so truth be told, I'd been to Gus's before and I knew it was good. I just didn't know we'd end up there twice in a five night stay in Memphis. Best fried chicken: Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken, Memphis TN. And it's not even close!! I do feel that Saw's Soul Kitchen in Birmingham, AL deserves a shout out here. I had the fried chicken sandwich and I'd eat it again although I will say there's more tolerance for lack of perfection with a sandwich than a piece of chicken by itself. But I'd still order it again.

Fried Green Tomatoes

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, the picture above looks like a burger. That's because it is.

If there's one food I convinced myself I would love on this trip, it was fried green tomatoes, despite not having really any experience with this southern staple. Looking back on things, I'm thinking maybe I confused fried green tomatoes with pickled green tomatoes. 

I ate fried green tomatoes twice in sandwiches (including the burger shown above and an actual fried green tomato sandwich) and once as a side on this trip. For the sake of accurate comparison, I did remove the FGTs from the two sandwiches so I could taste them on their own.

I have to say I'm not thrilled, although the ones on the burger above had the most flavor and the most tanginess. Maybe a little heavy on the batter but still with good flavor. The other two just tasted like oil. Soft pass on these things in the future. Best fried green tomatoes: Cahawba House, Montgomery, AL. Yes, it's the burger above.

Barbeque

There are a ton of barbeque traditions in this country and they all have their own distinct tastes. Go to North Carolina or Texas or Kansas City or St. Louis and you'll find dishes that have a common theme (meat cooked slowly over wood or coals) but have completely different taste profiles. We managed just two true barbeque meals in our time down south and both were in Memphis, which happens to have both dry (meaning dry rubbed with spices and served with or without sauce) and wet (meaning flavored with sauce during the cooking process) varieties of barbeque.

We chose two barbeque joints in Memphis. One offered both dry and wet options; the other had only wet. And like Gus's, I had been to one of these two (the one with the dry and wet options) before.

Barbeque is inherently messy. Sauce gets everywhere. So a dry-rubbed and smoked rack of ribs is refreshingly non-messy. Being able to strip meat off a rack of pork ribs with your teeth while getting incredible flavor and no sauce all over your hands and face is a good thing. A really good thing. I have to say that my memory of dry rubbed barbeque in Memphis from my trip in 2018 was better than this year but I'd still opt for dry over wet any day. Best barbeque: Central BBQ, Memphis, TN.

Greens

I don't know what it is that makes greens so good. I mean this is about the least appetizing side in the world. It's just chopped up leaves in liquid. But it can be so, so good.

I made it a point of pride on this trip to eat greens whenever I could, which meant I discriminated not at all. There was no advance research on best greens in the four states we visited, I just jumped in every time I found them. I didn't keep track of the number of times I ate greens on this trip (and it was mostly collard greens by the way) but I'm pretty sure it was close to the number of times I had fried chicken, although admittedly I didn't eat greens for breakfast.

If I had to describe my perfect greens, I'd have them made them juicy and rich and slightly bitter with a little spice thrown in via maybe some red pepper flakes. The greens in the photograph with the ribs two pictures up matched that description and maybe because I'd already had them at Central BBQ three years ago that way, they became a self-fulfilling prophecy as my ideal greens (turnip greens, by the way; the only ones we found on this trip). But I was surprised once in our week down south to be served some collards that were decidedly sweet (the photo above) in downtown Montgomery. Totally different than Central's turnip greens but equal in a completely alternate universe way. When I think of greens from this trip, those are the two dishes I remember best. Best greens: Central BBQ, Memphis, TN and Cahawba House, Montgomery, AL.

Tamales

Why are there tamales in the South east of the Mississippi River, you might ask. Well, apparently the story is that Mexican immigrant workers brought tamales with them when they came to work in the fields in the Mississippi delta after the end of the Civil War and they caught on. So these days there are tamale shacks all over Memphis and down into Mississippi. You won't find them in corn husks like the traditional versions in Mexico. More likely you'll get them in wax paper which works just as well for steaming.

A tamale is a pretty simple dish: it's just corn masa with some kind of meat filling. In our pre-vacation planning research we found a lot of ground beef and ground turkey tamales and not much else. We opted for our single meal of tamales at Doe's Eat Place in Little Rock, which I realize is not in the delta but the original's Doe's is. We figured a franchise of an original classic would deliver the same experience and Doe's is legendary in Little Rock, with photos of celebs and politicians (including Bill Clinton, who we have followed culinarily before in Iceland and Germany).

We opted to share a dozen beef tamales with chili at Doe's. They were hot and filling and corn-y and we found the chili essential to counter the density of the tamales. This is comfort food. I'd go back if I were ever in Little Rock. We also managed to stuff down some corn fritters and hush puppies (I can highly recommend both). This was not a healthy meal. Best Tamales: Doe's Eat Place, Little Rock, AR. This is not a by default rating; these things were good.

Pimento Cheese

Let's get one thing out of the way right away in this section of this post. I LOVE pimento cheese. I know it's not a natural food and I don't care. This stuff is so cheesy and spicy (and how is there really anything much better than that) and honestly, I'm not sure I've ever had pimento cheese that I didn't like. I still remember one of my best meals ever as a pimento cheese sandwich in Bardstown, Kentucky and that meal was nothing more than a cold sandwich on plain bread. The pimento cheese is everything.

Not familiar with pimento cheese? Three mandatory ingredients: some sort of cheddar, mayonnaise and pimento, which is generally a roasted red pepper cut small. It sounds amazing, right? Even if it doesn't, it is. Trust me.

My pimento cheese on this trip was confined to one state: Alabama. It was worth the wait. I had it on a sandwich, on a burger (see the fried green tomato section above) and in pure unadulterated way-more-than-I-should-have-eaten form with some flatbread (that's the picture above). The spiciness definitely came through the best when I ate it just by itself but that may have been because there was nothing else competing with the pimento cheese gorgeousness (or it may have been some cayenne in the mix). Best pimento cheese: EVERYWHERE! But specifically Saw's Soul Kitchen, Birmingham, AL; Central Restaurant, Montgomery, AL; and Cahawba House, Montgomery, AL. The picture above is from Central.

White Chocolate Ducks

OK, so there's no way chocolate mousse-filled white chocolate ducks were on my list before arriving in Memphis. But on our first morning in town we hit up the Peabody Deli & Desserts for breakfast and these things caught my eye. And after a couple of more breakfast stops, I figured we may as well spring for one each of these on our last night in the hotel. It's not every day we stay at the Peabody so why not.

So, honestly, how could this not be really good? While the white chocolate was not as sweet as I'm used to, the mousse was a perfect filling for the duck. These are overindulgent and overpriced but I'd honestly suggest anyone staying at the Peabody spring for one if you deserve a treat while in Memphis. Best white chocolate ducks: Peabody Deli & Desserts, Memphis, TN. Duh!!!

Fried chicken sandwich with pimento cheese and collard greens. Pretty much the perfect dish.

That's my food report for this trip. Almost. There are a few last odds and ends to address.

If there's one regional specialty that is a glaring omission from this list, it's macaroni and cheese. I absolutely love mac and cheese and for some reason we ate zero of this dish on this trip. None. Not a single forkful or bite. Too distracted by the greens, I'm guessing. I didn't miss it in any way. And I'm shocked to be writing those words. 

Despite the absence of mac and cheese, we did have a couple of pasta dishes on the trip and I'll never be able to understand the appeal of spaghetti with barbeque sauce. Who knows, maybe there's only one restaurant in the world that serves this dish but if that's true, we went there and I just don't get it. Barbeque sauce does not belong on spaghetti in any world that I can imagine.

Finally, I think a shoutout is appropriate to a spot where we didn't expect to find anything good food-wise and that's Tupelo, Mississippi. We hit up Tupelo to visit the Elvis Presley Birthplace on the way from Memphis to Birmingham. Our plan was to grab a sandwich from the Peabody Deli and stop somewhere along the way at a park or picnic table somewhere but we decided not to do that and instead stop wherever we got hungry. That place turned out to be Tupelo.

By sheer chance, we picked pretty much the first place we came to and that was Kermit's Soul Kitchen (formerly Kermit's Outlaw Kitchen). The lunch we had here was amazing and Kermit himself was serving up food when we walked in. If we'd known about this spot, I'd have even considered staying in Tupelo just so I could eat a couple of times here. I'd love to explore the rest of Kermit's menu based on the one meal we had.

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How We Did It

There are ten photographs in this post from seven separate restaurants (I'm not counting the Peabody Deli & Desserts). Here's the scoop on each one. Click the name of each to visit their website.

Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken (photos one and three): Gus's is located just a bit off Beale Street in downtown Memphis. It's worth the walk (twice) to get their chicken. There might be a wait. Give them your number, sit on one of the benches outside and wait for a text. You won't regret it.

Nashville Biscuit House (photo two): We didn't really visit Nashville on this trip. We just flew there and drove straight to Memphis. But we needed breakfast and stopped at the Biscuit House. It's on a sketchy looking road with lots of similar businesses with bars on the windows. It looked deserted from the outside but we found it packed on the inside. Can't explain that quite.

Cahawba House (photos four and six): That messy looking burger was almost just that. I don't understand the Texas toast instead of the bun. It doesn't do the same job as the bun in terms of keeping the filling between the bread. But I'll give them a pass based on the fried green tomatoes, the pimento cheese and the greens. Cahawba House is my one food regret from this trip. Their breakfast menu looks amazing. We just ran out of time to start our day there one morning.

Central BBQ (photo five): The whole plate of food at Central BBQ was awesome. The ribs. The onion rings. The greens. All of it. I'd go here every time I was in Memphis if I visited the city often (and after I had at least one meal at Gus's, of course). Central BBQ is a block away from the National Civil Rights Museum. Highly recommend a visit here. You can even leave the Museum and go back in after a meal if you want. We did. 

Doe's Eat Place (photo seven): The original Doe's is located in Greenville, Mississippi. We considered making the trip to Greenville on our Mississippi day but knew we'd have to cut out a couple of things on an already really long day if we did so we figured we'd wait until Little Rock. There are a number of other Doe's all around the area.

Central Restaurant (photo eight): We picked Central (not to be confused in any way with Central BBQ) as our fancy restaurant on this trip. We ate out back in the alley, which was definitely a great place for a meal if we didn't have to see the undesirable political flags on the deck of an adjacent building. If you order the pimento cheese appetizer, share it with someone. I didn't and it was really way too much food.

Saw's Soul Kitchen (photo ten): There are several Saw's restaurants in Birmingham. We picked the Soul Kitchen in the Avondale section of town (which took us past the awesome Sloss Furnaces site) based on their menu. The food here was good. I mean I had pimento cheese on fried chicken with greens on the side. After we were done at Saw's, we grabbed a couple of beers at the adjacent Avondale Brewing. If you have this same idea, I'd think twice. I thought both beers were forgettable.

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Separate But Unequal (1957)

This post will take a while to get to the point. Lots of legal stuff. Bear with me.

At the end of the American Civil War, the Congress of the United States passed three amendments to the Constitution. The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, except for those convicted of criminal offenses; the Fourteenth Amendment redefined citizenship for former slaves and addressed equal protections under the law; and the Fifteenth Amendment prohibited discrimination in voting on the basis of race or previous conditions of servitude. If it seemed like these sorts of amendments might have been opposed by those states which joined the Confederacy...well, they lost the War so...

Despite these Amendments (which were fully ratified by 1870), the Louisiana State Legislature in 1890 passed the Separate Car Act, which required "equal, but separate" train cars for white and black people. Some folks thought this law might violate the Fourteenth Amendment.

Enter Homer Plessy, a New Orleans resident whose ancestry was 1/8 African, who bought a first class train ticket in June of 1892, took a seat in the whites only car and then deliberately revealed his 1/8 African ancestry to the conductor. The resulting series of lawsuits from Plessy's arrest ended up in the United States Supreme Court as Plessy v. Ferguson. Homer lost his case and the resulting verdict, that states had the right to require separate but equal accommodations for whites and blacks, set the Civil Rights Movement back decades. Sanctioned segregation would become the law of the land in the South.

Exhibit at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute.

But things weren't equal. Separate, yes. Equal, no way. And starting in the 1930s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) started to challenge segregation in public education. Their efforts ended up in 1954 in front of the United States Supreme Court as Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. That case was actually a collection of five similar cases filed in various locations, including one in Virginia related to the student walkout at Moton High School in Farmville, VA which we visited back in February of this year (love it when different trips interrelate!).  

The Brown verdict was a landslide. A 9-0 ruling in favor of the plaintiffs, with a finding that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional because it violated the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. However, in their ruling, the Court didn't spell out how to end the current segregation in place. I guess maybe they assumed all segregated schools would just integrate the next day?

So a follow up case was brought before the Court the very next year to address the timeline for desegregation. Their ruling this time? That integration should happen "with all deliberate speed". Gee, that helps a lot. Thanks for clarifying that. Effectively, the Court's ruling created the means for those so motivated to challenge racial segregation in their schools, but unless a town or city saw fit to desegregate on their own (and some did), then desegregation might take a while. Or forever even.

Which brings us to Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957. Which also brought us to Little Rock in 2021. For a visit to the Little Rock Central High School.

Little Rock Central High School.

Little Rock Central is an active high school so a visit there is not necessarily all it could be. We visited on a Tuesday in May which meant that class was in session while we were walking around campus. Because of its historic significance in the Civil Rights Movement, the National Park Service offers educational tours of the property. The NPS has also constructed a Visitor Center and owns the old Mobil station that the press used while covering the events of the beginning of the 1957 school year. The Mobil station (which is now the NPS's conference center) is across the street from the High School's property; the Visitor Center is across the street from the gas station.

Under normal circumstances (meaning non-global pandemic circumstances), the NPS tours include a visit inside the school. Considering we are in a public health emergency, their tours are strictly exterior right now, although we did have about an hour of classroom learning with audience participation to reconstruct the timeline of the Civil Rights Movement from the arrival of the first slave ship in the New World up to 1957 before setting out on our tour. Not kidding. We seriously were in a classroom with markerboard with Ranger Rebecca in the teacher's spot. It was actually really fun and informative. Thank God we had been to the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis the very day before so we knew some of the answers.

We knew we wouldn't be able to get inside before we went to Little Rock. Despite the fact we were limited to strictly exterior access, we still found it way worth the trip. There is most often great value in being there, wherever "there" happens to be. We found this rule applied even when we only walked about one city block on the outside of a building.

The desegregation of Little Rock Central High School was ugly. Maybe it was destined to be that way but it certainly seems to me that the actions of adults in responsible charge made it way worse than it had to be. 

In the March of 1955, the Superintendent of Schools, Virgil Blossom, submitted a plan for the integration of schools in Little Rock. After some loopholes were added, and maybe a little school district gerrymandering, the city was ready to proceed with a plan for integration in 1957. 200 black students applied for enrollment, which shocked the school board. The board claimed there was not enough capacity for that many additional students in a school built for 3,000 students that in 1956 held just 1,500 (math not a strong suit of the Little Rock school board in the mid-50s, apparently).

So they changed the rules. Perfect grades and perfect attendance were added as requirements. That got 200 or so down to 17. Then extracurricular activities were banned. So was retaliation if the students choosing to integrate were attacked in any way. 17 was reduced to 10. Then the list of the 10 was leaked to the press and then to the general public. Threats of violence and threats against employment for parents were made. 10 was reduced to nine. That number stuck: the Little Rock Nine.

Testament: The Little Rock Nine Monument. Outside the Arkansas State Capitol. 

The first day of the 1957 school year was set for September 3, the Tuesday after Labor Day, and classes at Little Rock Central High School did start that day. But not for the Little Rock Nine. They were advised to stay home for their own protection on September 3. They gave it a shot the next day and failed. In fact it would be all the way until September 23 until any one of them set foot inside the school. And then only under the escort of armed members of the Little Rock Police and Arkansas State Troopers. Armed escort. To get into school. To learn. Kids.

What could possibly have delayed the entrance into High School of nine kids looking to do nothing more than get an education? How about Orval Faubus, the governor of Arkansas, interrupting the Labor Day broadcast of I Love Lucy to claim that "caravans" of white supremacists were on their way to Little Rock to demonstrate outside the school? How about the Arkansas National Guard being called out to deal with threats of violence but then being ordered to keep anyone not white (including kitchen and maintenance staff as it turned out) out of the building? How about lawsuits? How about the President of the United States getting involved? All this because nine kids from the absolute bottom of the social structure in our country wanted to go to a better school.

Those "caravans" by the way? Didn't exist. But white supremacists DID show up after the Governor claimed they were already there. And threats of violence? The Governor claimed he had evidence but just declined to produce it. Sound familiar? Hmmm...I wonder.

That was the first three weeks of the school year. It would be October 24 before an armed escort would NOT be necessary for the Little Rock Nine to enter school. One month later!!!

I can't imagine what that first year was like for those nine kids. All they were trying to do was get an education and learn. The "no retaliation" condition of admittance must have been equivalent to state sanctioned bullying. Over their first year there would be student strikes; bomb threats; bullying; beatings and tauntings by both white students and parents; boycotts of local newspapers supporting integration; kids jumping out of windows; suspensions. All because nine kids wanted an education.

All of the Nine did not make it through year one but none of them dropped out. Minniejean Brown was suspended in December of 1957 for spilling chili on two boys blocking her way. She was then expelled in February of 1958 for calling some girls "white trash" who threw a purse filled with locks at her. After she was expelled some students distributed cards with the slogan "One Down..Eight To Go". I can't imagine the pain.

As if all that weren't bad enough, the next year they didn't have school at all. It was cancelled. The whole year. The idea of more than 1,500 white kids sharing a school with fewer than ten black kids scared people so damned badly that they just cancelled the whole school year. Think about that: people were so upset about nine black children getting a good education that they denied everyone the opportunity to learn. How messed up is that?

Little Rock Central High School exhibits at the National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis.

I got all that out of our visit to Little Rock Central. But that's not really what I got out of being there. There's always a "being there" part and the story from being there that will stick with me forever is the story of Elizabeth Eckford.

When the Little Rock Nine were advised to stay home for their own safety on September 3, Daisy Bates, the co-owner of the local Arkansas State Press newspaper and advocate for the desegregation, coordinated a plan whereby all of the Nine would meet at her house and then walk, escorted, together to the school on the morning of September 4. She managed to coordinate this plan the night before with the exception of looping in Elizabeth, whose family did not have a telephone. She figured she'd get a hold of Elizabeth the next morning somehow.

She forgot. So Elizabeth Eckford got on the school bus near her home and got off to find the school surrounded by the Arkansas National Guard, all of whom were under orders to not let her into the school.

Elizabeth, all of 15 years old on September 4, 1957, described her attempts to enter the school being met with refusal by armed Guardsmen with rifles and bayonets while being surrounded by white children and adults chanting anti-integration rhymes and threatening lynching (there are estimates that there were 400 protestors outside the school that day). She's a 15 year old girl who looks utterly unlike the crowd around her and she's carrying books to try to get an education and she's met with every sort of scaring and hatred you can imagine. At one point, she sees a woman who looks like she has a sympathetic face so she heads towards her only to be spat on by this woman. Which causes other members of the crowd to spit on her and the dress she made specially for this first day of school as well. 

I know we are almost 64 years removed from that September day but I shudder to think that nobody in that crowd wondered what exactly it was about a high school girl that caused them to threaten, bully, intimidate and just generally behave this way towards another person. If they did, they certainly didn't do anything to stop it.

Display from the Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site Visitor Center. Original photograph by Will Counts.

Not knowing quite what else to do after being turned away from a day of high school by soldiers because of the color of her skin (just writing that sounds crazy), Elizabeth decided to walk right past the School to the corner of South Park Street and West 16th Street where she knew she could catch a bus at some point and go right back home. She first tried to enter the drug store across the street but the owner of the store locked the door when he saw her approaching. So she sat on a bench on that corner and waited. With a mob of white people all around her yelling at her.

That walk from the time Elizabeth got off the bus until she sat down on that bench must have seemed interminable. It's one block but it is a long, long block. Almost a quarter of a mile. We walked it one day last month in our guided visit to the High School site while not having our path blocked or having our lives threatened or being spit at. We didn't get to do too much else but that walk was enough to understand just how long and painful that walk must have been for Elizabeth Eckford. It feels a little strange writing a whole blog post based on a one block walk but ultimately that act made some of the events of that September day sink in.

For Elizabeth, this was day one. There was still an entire school year to go of this sort of stuff, albeit without the adults participating for the most part. One of the most frustrating parts of our Civil Rights trip was the acts of violence or intimidation directed towards those that are the most powerless and certainly children fit first and foremost in that definition. Even if those perpetuating the violence were also children.

The added irony of the hatred and violence these nine kids endured in Little Rock is it likely would not have been as bad if it weren't for the Governor of Arkansas, the highest elected official in the state, getting involved. It might be easy in 2021 to assume integration of schools in the 1950s seems like a concept that was doomed to fail, but it had already taken place without incident in many places of the country, including in the South and in the state of Arkansas. Seriously. In Arkansas, Charleston and Fayetteville had integrated even before the Brown v. Board of Education decision; Bentonville began integration in 1955; and the town of Hoxie had to go to court to get an injunction from a court of law IN FAVOR of desegregation. I'm not saying things in Little Rock in 1957 would have gone smoothly, but the Governor certainly made it worse and likely did it for his own political gain. Again...sounding familiar? 

Elizabeth Eckford Bus Bench. The Little Rock Central High School is visible behind.

Just three of the Little Rock Nine ended up graduating from Little Rock Central High School. Ernest Green, the only senior enrolled in 1957, got his diploma in 1958 (and even had Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. attend his graduation). Ernest was followed by Carlotta Walls Nier and Jefferson Thomas in 1960. School closure in the 1958-1959 school year and transfers and expulsions prevented the others from completing their academics at Little Rock Central.

In 2005, a sculpture featuring all nine members of the Little Rock Nine was unveiled on the grounds of the Arkansas Capitol. I've already named Minnijean Brown, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Carlotta Walls Nier and Jefferson Thomas. The other four were Melba Patillo Beals, Gloria Ray Karlmark, Thelma Mothershed and Terrence Roberts. There are quotes from each of the Nine around the perimeter of the sculpture. I couldn't help thinking how ironic it was that we are relying on these (former) kids to teach us about tolerance and acceptance after all they have been through.

The spot where Elizabeth Eckford sat on a bench surrounded by an aggressive mob now holds another bench named in Elizabeth's honor. There's a quote from Elizabeth on a plaque next to the bench about the importance of standing up for others who are being harassed and despised just based on the fact that they look different. Again, we are relying on those who have been harassed and despised to deliver messages to the rest of us.

One of the more frustrating aspects of this trip we took this May was the knowledge that there were people who had to suffer or die to advance society those tiny little steps forward. In cases like those of Emmett Till, the suffering was clear to see; he was straight up tortured and murdered. But make no mistake there was plenty of suffering endured by the Little Rock Nine as well. All nine of these kids had their lives affected by the mental, emotional and physical abuse suffered while attending (in some cases) just one year of school at Little Rock Central. Some still bear actual physical scars and if proof beyond that is necessary, look no further than Elizabeth Eckford's two attempts to take her life. 

I think there's a tendency to dismiss the suffering of the Little Rock Nine as "if they didn't do this, someone else would have had to" but I can't stop thinking about Orval Faubus' completely unnecessary and blatantly untruthful press conference. What would have happened if he hadn't done that? And I guess honestly we'll never know.

I believe our time in Little Rock was worthwhile. Sure, access into the school was off limits and that was unfortunate. But just like roaming around rural Mississippi in search of Emmett Till, I think we owed it to these kids and the change they helped bring about to go to Little Rock and learn. I think there is also a lot of value in hitting up multiple Civil Rights sites in one trip. The constant repetition really emphasizes causes and effects within the Movement which I think is super valuable. The concepts discussed in Ranger Rebecca's "class" were echoed in the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis and the Birmingham Civil Rights Museum.

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How We Did It

The Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site is open daily with guided Streetscape Tours offered twice daily with a 48 hour advance reservation requirement (although honestly, I think we could have done ours without advance reservations, although I'm not 100% sure that would have been allowed). There may be days (like Federal Holidays and school breaks) when tours are discontinued. Best to check the website for the latest information, particularly because if we ever truly come out of this pandemic, all the rules for everything may change. There is a museum exhibit inside the Visitor Center; it took us about 45 minutes to an hour to get through everything there pretty thoroughly.

The National Historic Site website has a list of sites related to the history of the events of September 1957 which you can drive by. We elected not to do this and instead head over to the Testament statue on the grounds of the State Capitol. It's on the south side of the Capitol building and there are free parking spots nearby for Capitol visits. We assumed our visit to Testament counted as a Capitol visit.

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