The Sixties

The Sixties. Civil Rights, also, People. During the 1960s, Black Texans held demonstrations within the state and boycotted segregated stores. In conjunction with the National March on Washington in 1963 approximately 900 protesters, which included Hispanics, Blacks and Whites, marched on the Texas state capital. They were against the slow pace of desegregation in the state and Governor Connally's opposition to the pending civil rights bill in Washington. The 24th Amendment passed in 1964 barred the poll tax in federal elections and that same year Congress passed the Civil Rights Act outlawing the continued enforcement of Jim Crow laws. Texas followed suit in 1969 by repealing its own separatist statutes., When John Carlos and Joe Tave arrived at East Texas State University (ETSU) in 1966, the community had just begun the process of desegregation. Carlos was a sprinter from Harlem who would later become best known for his participation in the Silent Protest in Mexico City in 1968. Tave was a political science major who quickly took on leadership roles at ETSU., At ETSU, Carlos turned the attention his athletic prowess attracted from the local press into a forum through which to challenge ongoing inequities. Though he would ultimately leave ETSU after only a year, he credits the racial tensions that forced him from this area with inspiring his involvement the next year with one of the most memorable social justice efforts in sports history as he stood atop the medal stand in Mexico City., On the night of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s (MLK) assassination Joe Tave established the Afro-American Students Society of East Texas (ASSET] and began writing ASSET's “Declaration of Rights" which listed fourteen concerns of African American students in areas which included demands for equal treatment in housing, course offerings in African American history and literature, the employment of African American faculty members, equal treatment of student-athletes, and the withdrawal of university support for racist organizations and events. The "Declaration" was signed by over 100 students and presented to ETSU president D. Whitney Halladay weeks later, followed almost immediately by a public statement by Halladay in which he addressed each of the key concerns and promised action. Their efforts ultimately resulted in the first Black faculty member and administrator being hired in 1968., Installed on July 7, 1921, the sign near the Katy Railway Station originally read "Greenville Welcome-The Blackest Land, The Whitest People." Realtor William Harrison had created the phrase for his business cards in the early 1900s. In 1916. Harrison was in Kansas City at the same time President Wilson was. Harrison had his business card delivered to the president's room whereupon Wilson invited him up for an audience. Greenville leaders quickly began using that phrase for advertising, which culminated in the new sign that appeared over Lee St. While "The Blackest Land phrase is generally agreed to have meant the black soil that is synonymous with this area, "The Whitest People” phrase has a more complicated history. While the phrase "The Whitest People" may not have started out in a deliberately racist vein, there was some context to it, especially once 600 members of the Ku Klux Klan marched through downtown Greenville underneath the sign on December 16, 1921. Their event was the largest in the North Texas area for many years. In 1968, four years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act, "Whitest" was changed to "Greatest”. The sign was removed in 1969., Reverse Side , David Arlington Talbot , David Talbot was born in Guyana (then British Guiana) on Jan. 25, 1916. He died on March 9, 2003. He came to what was then East Texas State University in 1968, just a short time after the school's desegregation, as the first Black faculty member., Talbot came to America in the 1930s. He received his undergraduate degree from Morris Brown College in 1939. Talbot continued his studies at Columbia University and the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, where he received his master's in 1951 and his doctorate in 1966., Dr. Talbot served at East Texas State as Professor of Counseling and Guidance and worked in the Center for Counseling and Student Development Services. He organized and established a multi-cultural Teacher Training Institute as well as an Inter-Cultural Living Experience on the university campus., Talbot spoke seven languages and served as an interpreter under General George Patton in World War II. In 2017, the Hall of Languages building at Texas A&M University-Commerce was rededicated as the David Talbot Hall of Languages in his honor., Ivory Moore , Ivory Moore was born in 1924. He died on Aug. 1, 2014. In 1972, Moore joined the East Texas State University (ETSU) as the first Black administrator at the recently integrated campus. He was also the first Director of Minority Affairs at ETSU. He was Commerce's first Black mayor and was responsible for many major improvements for the Black community on campus and throughout the Norris Community, an all-Black community established in the 1890s in northeast Commerce. He established the Trio mentoring program and Upward Bound at ETSU. He worked on improving the unpaved streets, inadequate plumbing, phone, and police services in the Norris Community. Moore added a fire station, public housing, and parks. He was a founding member of the Norris Community Club., Rev. Charles Faulkner , Charles Faulkner was born in Louisville, Kentucky, on Sept. 16, 1944. He grew up in Mount Sterling, Kentucky. After graduating from Dubois High School in 1962, he attended Jarvis Christian College in Hawkins, Texas. He graduated in 1966 with a BS in Elementary Education and two minors in Religion and History. In 1971, Faulkner received a master's degree in Sociology from East Texas State University and earned numerous certifications in the teaching field. He received his Master of Divinity from Houston Graduate School of Theology in 1987., Faulkner worked as a 5th grade teacher at Booker T. Washington High School from 1966-1967 and then as a 6th grade Teacher at Crockett Elementary from 1967-1982. After working for 48 years at many schools in Texas, Faulkner retired from teaching full time but remained involved with students as a substitute teach. He was Pastor at Clark Street Christian Church from 1968-84 and Center Point Christian Church from 2004-2007, before he founded the Rising Star Christian Church-Disciples of Christ in 2008.