50 Years Since Integration At The University Of GeorgiaFifty years ago, two-African American students walked onto the campus of the University of Georgia in Atlanta, effectively integrating the school. One of them was Charlayne Hunter-Gault.
Hamilton Earl "Hamp" Holmes and I take our first steps toward becoming students at the University of Georgia. At that moment, making history was less on our minds than making it to the registrar's office to sign up for classes.
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I remember being more concerned with finding a pen in my very large purse than being worried about the ugly jeers outside our window. Oddly enough, neither of us believed we were in danger — despite the racist taunts of "Kill the niggers."
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My first day of class at the Henry W. Grady School of Journalism, where I had no intention of letting anybody stand in the way of fulfilling my dream of becoming the next "Brenda Starr."
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I had all the time in the world for AP reporter Kathryn Johnson, because she was the first person who called me in my dormitory at Wayne State University and broke the news that Judge Bootle had ordered Hamp and me into the University of Georgia. So if it was a scoop she was looking for, I was trying to oblige. (Johnson had sneaked onto campus dressed as a student.)
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I will always remember the first brick that the mob outside threw through my window. My first thought was: 'My goodness, glass all over my still-unpacked suitcase full of clothes. (I was 19 and very much into my clothes.) And then I went on to think, "so this is what it's like in the eye of a hurricane."
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So many people who saw this photo thought I was crying out of fear. I wasn't afraid. I was crying because I was frustrated that I couldn't think of how to persuade UGA not to suspend us. The same thing happened to Autherine Lucy at the University of Alabama. Autherine never made it back. I was determined not to meet the same fate. I just couldn't figure out what to do.
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As an aspiring journalist, I learned a lot in the midst of chaos by watching and taking mental notes about the journalists watching me, as was the case in this shot.
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Being the first black female student at the University of Georgia, I had unique opportunities like this one — with Labor Secretary Arthur Goldberg presenting two scholarships. Experiences like this helped me not be intimidated in the face of power later in life, during my career as a journalist.
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This was the moment that made the long, often bumpy road we walked as the University of Georgia's first two black students worth it. And I was so proud of Hamp who, despite the stress, graduated Phi Beta Kappa.
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My proudest moments were always standing beside my friend and classmate, Hamilton Earl Holmes. Unfortunately, while there were many, they were far too few. I continue to shed tears about his all-too-early departure from my life and those of his family, friends and colleagues.
Rick O'Quinn/AP
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Fifty years ago, two-African American students walked onto the campus of the University of Georgia in Atlanta, effectively integrating the school. One of them was Charlayne Hunter-Gault.
Host Michel Martin speaks with the award-winning journalist and with Vernon Jordan, the civil rights lawyer who fought for black students to attend classes at the university, about that historic event and its legacy.
