GBH Openvault

Boston School Committee Report On Sit-ins

Part of From the Vault.

09/06/1963

In June 1963 the Education Committee of the Boston Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) presented the Boston School Committee with a 14-Point Proposal to end de facto segregation in the public schools. The contentious and failed negotiations precipitated a series of nonviolent, direct action demonstrations in Boston, including the Stay Out for Freedom Day on June 18, 1963 in which 3,000 stayed away from the Boston Public Schools and attended Freedom Schools organized by the Citizens for Human Rights organization. Various civil rights groups picketed outside the Boston School Committee Headquarters at 15 Beacon Street during the summer. Later, the School Committee conceded to meet with the NAACP on August 13, 1963 only to summarily end the meeting when Ruth Batson, Chair of the Education Committee, mentioned the term, “de facto segregation.” On Thursday, September 5, 1963, the NAACP stepped up the nonviolent direct action protests by organizing a Sit-In at the School Committee Headquarters. In the “Boston School Committee Report on Sit-Ins,” WGBH interviews Thomas Atkins, Executive Secretary of the Boston Branch of the NAACP who explains the grievances and events leading up to the Sit-In demonstration. The program also includes comments by Louise Day Hicks, Chair of the Boston School Committee, about the failed negotiations and NAACP Sit-In. In addition, “Boston School Committee Report on Sit-Ins” program provides extensive excerpts of the regular meeting of the Boston School Committee held on Friday September 6, 1963 in which the committee members voted to have the police remove the NAACP Sit-In demonstrators who were still protesting elsewhere in the building. [Note: Later in the evening all persons were evacuated from the building due to an alleged bomb scare.] The segment ends with Kenneth Guscott, President of the Boston Branch of the NAACP, providing an official response to the School Committee’s actions. Summary and select metadata for this record was submitted by Audrea Dunham.

License Clip

Program

Boston School Committee Report On Sit-ins

Program Description

Radio

Duration

00:25:44

Asset Type

Raw audio

Media Type

Audio

Subjects

African Americans-Educational Opportunities

Race Relations-Racial Imbalance

Race Relations-Northern Discrimination

Race Relations-De facto Segregation

Race Relations-Boston School Committee Negotiations

African Americans-Structural Racism

Stay Out for Freedom Day

Boston School Committee

African Americans-Civil Rights

Freedom Schools

African Americans-Social Justice

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

Boston, Massachusetts

Roxbury, Massachusetts

Civil Rights Era

African Americans-Human Rights

Topics

Education

Contributors

Winter, Edward J. (Speaker)

Eisenstadt, Thomas (Speaker)

Mascott, Ted (Producer)

Guscott, Kenneth (Speaker)

Atkins, Thomas (Speaker)

Lee, Joseph (Speaker)

O’Connor, William (Speaker)

Gartland, Arthur (Speaker)

Hicks, Louise Day (Speaker)

Citation

Chicago: “Boston School Committee Report On Sit-ins,” 09/06/1963, GBH Archives, accessed April 19, 2024, http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/A_6ED1655D46F942E38B57A81B1B91198F.

MLA: “Boston School Committee Report On Sit-ins.” 09/06/1963. GBH Archives. Web. April 19, 2024. <http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/A_6ED1655D46F942E38B57A81B1B91198F>.

APA: Boston School Committee Report On Sit-ins. Boston, MA: GBH Archives. Retrieved from http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/A_6ED1655D46F942E38B57A81B1B91198F