African American students, who were selected to participate in the initial integration of the Newberry South Carolina school system, tell their firsthand accounts of experiences that occurred during this process. The voices and stories of these courageous students and the personal sacrifices they made as participants on the frontline of school integration have never been documented, until now!

 

Child POWs: Stories of Students on the Frontline of Initial School Integration

 

In 1954 the decision known as Brown v. Board of Education, which included five cases arguing for school desegregation from Kansas, Delaware, Virginia, Washington, DC, and South Carolina (i.e., Briggs v. Elliott), ruled “public school segregation based on race is unconstitutional”. In September 1963, South Carolina became the last state to desegregate its public school system when eleven African American students desegregated Charleston County’s white schools. The process to integrate the school systems across South Carolina and other southern states was gradual due to Massive Resistance. In my hometown of Newberry South Carolina, the first African American students to integrate its white schools happened in 1964. In 1967, as a fourth grader, I became a participant in this process that changed my life.

 

It was after I spoke about my experiences and feelings as a student during the early stages of school integration at an MLK Day event in Newberry, that I was awakened to the fact that there were many more black students involved in the initial integration process prior to me. I was shocked that my story and experiences turned out to be interwoven into many of their stories and experiences. My wife and I recognized that the stories and personal sacrifices made by these black students of various ages should be captured in their own words as a part of history. The making of this documentary will allow each participant to step back in time and give their narratives, both good and bad, of their frontline involvement in the desegregation of the school system in Newberry South Carolina. They will be able to look back and see if the sacrifices they made were worthy of the progress achieved by African Americans today.

 

It has been a long journey but we started making this documentary in January 2022. During the early filming, the historical accounts of these events were both emotional and therapeutic to the participants. Their sacrifices and contributions to the civil rights movement have, until now, been relegated to personal recollections, and never as an expressed part of history.

 

Help us to preserve an important part of history by donating to the making and completion of this documentary. Remember that these students were the pioneers of school integration. Take a peek at the promo and help us bring this project to fruition! Please give what you can because we believe that whatever you give will be multiplied exponentially to complete this project!

 

Thanks for your support!!!

 

Tim Turner