1. Teacher Resource Supplement to “Schoolhouse Activists” Lecture
Tondra L. Loder-Jackson
The University of Alabama at Birmingham
“Stony the Road We Trod”: Exploring Alabama’s Civil Rights Legacy
NEH Summer Teacher Institute
July 23, 2018

2. Birmingham Education Timeline
1863 – Emancipation Proclamation; 1st school for freed Blacks established in (Huntsville) Alabama
1865 – Civil War ended; Freedmen’s Bureau (FB) established; FB & American Missionary Association (AMA) promote Black education.
– Black Reconstructionist legislators fight to establish public schools for Black children in Alabama; Booker T. Washington embarks on ambitious rural Black school development.
Schoolhouse Activists

3. Birmingham Education Timeline
1871 – Birmingham is founded
1874 – 1st Birmingham public elementary school for White children
– Black community efforts to establish “Free” Colored School
1881 – Booker T. Washington et al. founded Tuskegee Institute
1883 – 1st Birmingham public elementary school for Black children
1900 – 1st public high school for Black children
Industrial High School for Negroes, later named A. H. Parker High School
Schoolhouse Activists

4. Birmingham Education Timeline
1903 – Carrie Tuggle et al. founded Tuggle Institute
1900s-1930s – New schools erected
1940s – Teacher salary equalization cases
1954 – Brown v. Board of Education
1955 – Brown v. Board of Education, II
1957 – Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth & family attempt to integrate Phillips High School (now Phillips Academy)
1963 – Graymont, Ramsay, & West End schools desegregated
– Four integration plans enacted
Schoolhouse Activists

5. Birmingham Education Timeline
1983-present –
Resegregation
District splintering
School choice
Schoolhouse Activists

6. Schoolhouse Activists
Arthur Harold Parker
Schoolhouse Activists

7. Carrie Tuggle: The “Female Booker T. Washington”
Schoolhouse Activists

8. White Advocates for Black Education
John Herbert Phillips
Samuel Ullman
Schoolhouse Activists

9. Archival & Oral History Resources
Alabama Department of Archives & History
Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
Birmingham Public Library
See “Booker T. Washington & The Shiloh Baptist Church Tragedy”
Duke University
Schoolhouse Activists

10. Archival & Oral History Resources
National Council for the Social Studies
Primary Research & Writing: People, Places, & Spaces, Lynn Lewis Gaillet & Michelle F. Eble
Southern Oral History Program
Schoolhouse Activists

11. CRM & Black History Resources
AFT
Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (BCRI) Curriculum Guide
MSU Milestones in Black History
Oral History Resources for Teachers
PBS
Teaching Tolerance
Schoolhouse Activists

12. Schoolhouse Activists
CRM & LGBTQ
Bayard Rustin
I Must Resist: Bayard Rustin’s Life in Letters
Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin,
James Baldwin
I Am Not Your Negro,
Lorraine Hansberry,
Schoolhouse Activists

13. Schoolhouse Activists
CRM & LGBTQ
Activists Supporting Gay Rights
Reverend Joseph Lowery
Congressman John Lewis
Julian Bond
Reverend Jesse Jackson
Reverend William Barber
Reverend Al Sharpton
Schoolhouse Activists

14. Tips on Unearthing Oral Histories
Begin with your personal network – family, friends, neighbors, civic groups, etc.
Talk to local educators.
Visit school warehouses & storage rooms.
Acquaint yourself with archivists at libraries (don’t forget your own alumni institutions!), museums, and historic sites.
Research digital archives.
Attend community forums.
Embark on your own oral history project.
Schoolhouse Activists

15. Schoolhouse Activists
Reflection Questions
What parallels do you observe between educators’ involvement in the Alabama CRM compared to educators in your own state or region?
Compare and contrast the role of Black teacher associations and post-Brown integrated teacher associations such as NEA and AFT. What was gained? What was lost?
Teachers today are organizing – many of them, independent of union affiliations. Is this is a positive or negative sign? How long can this organic type of organizing be sustained? (Also consider in light of the recent Supreme Court’s recent Janus ruling striking down non-union-member mandatory dues.)
Schoolhouse Activists

16. Schoolhouse Activists
Contact Information
Tondra L. Loder-Jackson, Ph.D.
Professor (Fall ‘18), Educational Foundations Program
Secondary Appointment, African American Studies Program
UAB School of Education
Department of Human Studies
EB 207, nd AVE South
Birmingham, AL
Web page:
Office phone: (205)
Schoolhouse Activists