segregation on the upper main line

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SEGREGATION ON THE UPPER MAIN LINEThe "School Fight" of 1932-34

Roger D. Thorne

INTRODUCTIONFor many, the word "segregation" conjures upimages of dogs, flames, and violence. Certainlythese graphic images of intolerance and hatredwould not, in any way, describe the relationshipsbetween white and black residents on the UpperMain Line during any period, and in particularwithin the townships of Tredyffrin and Easttown.

Yet, if one could turn back the clock 72 years tothe Berwyn of 1932, subtle—and in some casesnot so subtle—evidences of segregation and dis-crimination between the powerful and the weak were common. Across the pedestrian bridge con-necting Lancaster and Cassatt Avenues next tothe Berwyn railroad station is a structure called"Cassatt Crossing." Built in 1917, this buildingwas, for

/ remember the Berwyn movie theater on Cassatt Avenue. We'd walk over, both

white and colored boys. The colored boys would go sit on the left hand side in the back and the white boys would go down on the right side near the front. It was a always a cowboy show and we all took our cap pistols and cowboy stuff. After the show we would all join up on the railroad bank and reenact the whole movie, the colored boys and the white boys all together again. — Ed Hayes, lifetime resident of

Berwyn.

many years,the Berwyn

Theater.During the1930s,black andwhite chil-dren wouldwalk to-gether towatch theSaturday

afternoonmatinees,

but the chil-dren knew that once they bought their ticket theywould be expected to split up during the show.White children were allowed to sit anywhere, butblack children were allowed to sit only in thetheater's last three rows on the left hand side asthey walked in. Farther east, at the Wayne Thea-ter, the only other movie house in this area at thattime, blacks were only allowed to sit in the firstfive rows on the left. And you would never find

an incriminating sign to that effect; it was simplythe "understanding."

In 1932 you would find no black-owned busi-nesses along the Lincoln Highway, and there wasonly a single small black-owned business in all of Berwyn. Boy Scout troops would not allow black boys to join them. The meeting halls would notbe rented to "people of color," ultimately forcing

the local black community to build the RobinsonWellburn Lodge 794, the Berwyn branch of theImproved Benevolent Protective Order of Elks of the World near the intersection of Lancaster Ave-nue and Bridge Street in Berwyn.

But despite these "understandings," the schoolsof Tredyffrin and Easttown Townships were opento every student in his or her respective township

without prejudice to color ornationality. In the early 1930seach grammar school held

classes for grades 1 to 8. Therewere few kindergartens at thattime. Students from eithertownship entering 9th gradewould attend the then consoli-dated Tredyffrin Easttown HighSchool, dedicated in February1909 and located on the south-west corner of present dayConestoga and HowellvilleRoads.

The oversight of this arrange-ment had been cumbersome,

with each township having its own elected schoolboard obligated specifically to its taxpayers. Eachschool board was solely responsible for the ad-ministration of the grammar schools within theirrespective township, although in 1908 the twoboards had agreed to join together to administer aconsolidated high school. In May of 1931, how-ever, in order to substantially increase the effi-ciency of the overall administrative process, both

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The Robinson Wellburn Elks Lodge 794, on Lan- caster Avenue near Walnut Avenue in Berwyn, operated strictly for people of color for over 70 years.

school boards voted to place all educational af-fairs for the two townships under the directionand oversight of a veteran school administrator,Wilmer K. Groff. Mr. Groff s official title wasSupervising Principal for Tredyffrin and East-town Townships.

Wilmer K. Groff came to Berwyn in 1926 as principal of the East- town Elementary

Schools. In 1931 he became the Superin- tendent for the joint Tredyffrin and East- town school boards and the Tredyffrin/ Easttown High School.

THE BEGINNING OF THE "SCHOOLFIGHT"

It was into this social and administrative contextthat an article appeared in a major suburbannewspaper that would change everything. On thefront page of the March 10, 1932 Main Line

Daily Times, published in Ardmore, was a pieceentitled "Townships Will Provide Exclusive Col-ored School - Tredyffrin-Easttown to SupportInstitution With Negro Teachers In Charge." Thearticle informed the reader that plans had justbeen completed by the joint school boards for

"Negro pupils of Tredyffrin and Easttown town-ships to have their own grade school." The articlecontinued:

According to Norman Joy Greene, presi-dent of the Tredyffrin Township schoolboard, the negro school, which is to be

taught only by negro teachers, will offer anumber of advantages to the colored resi-dents of the community.

Easttown and Tredyffrin townships are twoof the few townships in the State whichhave not had colored schools, Mr. Greeneexplained. This has probably been dueto the fact that neither township has here-tofore had a sufficiently large negro pop-ulation.

In my opinion, this is the largest step for-ward that Berwyn has taken in the last 25years. Our community is one of extremenatural beauty and it is a shame that thebuilding-up process has been stagnatedby inadequate schools and the policy of mixing the races therein.

In explaining the proposed plan, Mr. Greene, aprominent investment banker from Tredyffrin,who joined the School Board in January 1931,outlined two principal agreements reached by thetwo boards:

Agreement No. 1 - Provides that the twotownships will jointly operate a coloredschool in what is now the comparativelynew brick building [a 1912 structure thencalled the Berwyn Primary School and tobe renamed the Lincoln Highway School]now being used by Easttown Township. Itis anticipated that the property will be made

attractive by the addition of suitable fenc-ing and shrubbery. Teachers will be col-ored, as will also be the janitor. Experi-enced educators, with whom Mr. Groff,

joint supervising principal, has been intouch, tell us that the colored children pro-gress far more rapidly under colored teach-ers. It seems that the colored teachers arebetter able to understand the natures of their children and very often mix with the

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parents socially and know intimately thehome conditions.

Mr. Greene described the financial arrange-ments between the two townships, including pro-portional rental fees for their use of the brick

school building, and that the "expenses of the(colored) school would be divided by the twotownships in proportion to the number of theirstudents enrolled." Agreement No. 1 was to runfor three years, beginning July 4, 1932.

Originally called the Berwyn Primary School, the Lincoln Highway School, built in 1912, was brought out of retirement in 1932 as a blacks-only facility.During the intervening 20 years its condition had deteriorated badly.

The Main Line Daily Times article then pro-ceeded to outline Agreement No. 2 , in which theTredyffrin School District would discontinue theuse of its old and obsolete North Berwyn

The North Berwyn School was built in 1892 as a one- room schoolhouse on the southeast corner of present day Conestoga and Howellville Roads. Later addi- tions enabled it to operate until 1932, when it was closed to facilitate the agreement between the townships leading to the school board's segregation decision.

School—at the southeast corner of Conestoga andHowellville Roads—and send its white grammarschool students to the new, state-of-the-art East-town Elementary School—at the intersection of Bridge Street and First Avenue in Berwyn—thenunder construction, for a specified fee per pupil,

effective for three years beginning July 4, 1932.

Opened in October 1932, the new whites-only Easttown Elementary School at Bridge Street and First Avenue in Berwyn became a symbol of

inequality when compared to the old Lincoln Highway School for black children.

Mr. Greene is quoted, saying that the array of advantages of this plan for both townships:

. . . become obvious with a little study. Thegrowth of the two townships has been re-tarded by the fact that we mix the coloredand the white in our schools. Prospectivehome owners will undoubtedly be attracted

to the communities and real estate valuesshould be very much improved. . . . East-town Township will benefit by being ableto open their new school as an all-whiteschool, and their per capita costs will bematerially cut down by the fact that Tredyf-frin Township will be sending them andpaying for more pupils than they will findit necessary to send to the colored school. . . .A colored school in the location of the brick building [at the corner of the Lincoln High-way and Walnut Avenue in Berwyn] will notlower the tone of the neighborhood becausethe brick building backs up to Walnut Ave-nue, which is already a colored district. Thechange will give the colored of the districta fine school with the finest colored teachers,and the best equipment that can be procured.

The article ended with the statement that thisagreement "has been highly commended by theBusiness Men's Association and by the Berwyn

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Civic Association."

THE RESPONSE OF THE LOCALBLACK COMMUNITYWithin hours of the distribution of that Main Line

Daily Times on March 10, 1932, disbelief within

the black community along the entire Main Linehad turned into a firestorm of disappointment andanger, especially from the black parents withinthe two affected townships. Many of these resi-dents had grown up in the South, had experiencedhostile segregation first hand, and had moved,believing they had left segregated schooling be-hind.

A meeting to plan a several-pronged responseto the joint school board's decision took place

just days later on the second floor of the UnitedAmerican Protestant Association Hall at the

Located next to the Elks Hall, the "APA Hall" was owned by the United American Protestant Associa- tion. It was one of the only places in Berwyn where people of color were allowed to hold meetings. The first "school fight" planning meeting was held up- stairs. It is presently a nail shop.

corner of Bridge Street and Lancaster Road inBerwyn. Mr. Primus Crosby, a printer and ownerof the only black-owned business in Berwyn,

Primus L. Crosby was born

in Alabama in 1884, attended Tuskegee Institute,and studied under Booker T. Washington. He came to Pennsylvania in 1918, and his wife Jesseye and twin daughters, Bessie and Es- sie, joined him later. During the "school fight" he as- sumed a significant leader- ship role in local black op- position to segregation.

presided over this planning session. By the closeof the session a petition had been drafted uponwhich signatures would be affixed to be taken bya committee of three black Berwyn residents tothe Easttown School Board. The first small re-sponse to what the black community came to re-

fer to as the "school fight" had been taken.

We attended that very first meeting and in that small upper room we had about 10 people . . . I remember one white man who had the reputation of being the town drunk,sort of a "nobody." But he attended that meeting and he spoke up that night and said, "This is all wrong. I've only got $5.00 but here it is." He was the first man to contribute money to the defense fund of

the "school fight." — Mrs. Essie Crosby Brock,as a 17 year old twin daughter, accompanied

her father, Primus, to that first meeting in March

1932 at the APA Hall. She was "called home" in

November 2004, just a few weeks after relating

this memory.

On March 16, 1932, the Main Line Daily Timesreports the first mass meeting in Easttown Town-ship to protest the joint school board's decision.Held at the Robinson Wellburn Lodge No. 794 in

Berwyn, the meeting was attended by severalhundred black residents as well as the leadershipfrom the Bryn Mawr Branch of the National As-sociation for the Advancement of Colored Peo-ple. David E. Long, secretary of the RobinsonWellburn Lodge, expressed his opinion that thedecision of the school boards "tends not towardthe betterment and benefit of the conditions sur-rounding the negro school children, but rathertoward the degradation and segregation." Mr.Long went on to say that, "the main argument

against the proposed new scho ol .. . is that thecolored people cannot see why they should beforced to use an old school building no longerwanted by the school board, when they, like thewhite residents of the same section, have paidtaxes to support the building of the new $250,000grade school in Berwyn."

In the Minutes of the Easttown School Districtdated April 26, 1932, a notation states: "Thepresident of the Easttown School District re-ceived a petition from certain voters of Easttown

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Township, headed by Primus L. Crosby, Chair-man, Harvey Tyre, and Edgar R. Powell, in re-gard to the school arrangement with Tredyffrin."

On May 5, 1932, ten days after receiving thepetition, an entry in the minutes of the EasttownSchool Board records a response to the black

community:

After consulting with members of theTredyffrin and Easttown Boards prior tothe meeting, the Easttown School Districtinstructed the Secretary 'to notify Mr.Primus L. Crosby, Chairman, also Mr.Powell and Mr. Tyre as follows:'

The action of this Board in adoptingthe plans which you protest was takenonly after careful and mature consider-ation in the sincere belief that ultimatelythey will work to the best advantage of every pupil.

We feel that you should show suffi-cient confidence in your Board to en-able it to make a fair trial of this planfor the three years to which it is com-mitted.

Once the plan is in operation your

Board believes that the results willprove entirely satisfactory to all ourcitizens.

Relying upon your cooperation, weremain. .. .

Also, under the segregation plan, a front pagearticle in the Saturday, May 7, 1932 Main Line Daily Times reported that pupils of the newschool would be taught entirely by colored teach-

ers and that the board had announced the receiptof more than 250 applications for the eight posi-tions that were expected to be open.

A LEGAL PERSPECTIVE ON THEJOINT SCHOOL BOARD'S DECISION

It is easy to look back at this or any historicalevent without taking the time to place those deci-sions and actions within the legal, political, andsocial context of the time. So let us review thelegal footing upon which the Tredyffrin and East-

town school boards, made up of well-educatedand astute leaders of their communities, madetheir decision to segregate the township's ele-mentary schools.

Three previous legal actions had laid the semi-nal framework upon which the local boards made

their pivotal school decision. The first of thesewas an act passed in Pennsylvania on May 8,1854. Entitled "An Act for the Regulation andContinuance of a System of Education by Com-mon Schools" ( Laws of the General Assembly of the State of Pennsylvania Passed at the Session

of 1854, No. 610), it created a state-wide systemof separate education based on race within publicschools and both authorized and required allschool districts within the commonwealth "toestablish within their respective districts separateschools for Negro and Mulatto children . . . so asto accommodate twenty or more pupils; andwherever such schools shall be established andkept open four months in every year the Directorsand Controllers shall not be compelled to admitsuch pupils into any other schools of the district."

Twenty-seven years later, a second legal actionoverrode the 1854 act. In 1881, several chal-lenges to segregation in the schools resulted in anamendment to Pennsylvania law making itunlawful for schools or teachers "to make anydistinction whatever on account of, or by reason

of, the race or color of any pupil or scholar whomay be in attendance upon, or seeking admissionto, any public or common school maintainedwholly or in part under the school laws of thiscommonwealth."

But a third action, a decision at the nationallevel by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1896, over-turned any gradual gains in the civil rights of mi-nority citizens. A landmark case, Plessy v. Fergu-son, (163 U.S. 537, 1896), ruled by a significantmajority of the Court that separate but equal ac-

commodations are permitted under the Constitu-tion. Further, distinctions based upon race did notrun contrary to either the Thirteenth or Four-teenth Amendments, two Civil War-era amend-ments passed to abolish slavery and secure thelegal rights of former slaves.

Although nowhere in the Court's opinion willone find the phrase "separate but equal," this rul-ing allowed legally enforced segregation as longas legal jurisdictions did not allow facilities forblacks to be inferior to those of whites. In the

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delivery of the Court's opinion, Justice BillingsBrown stated:

Legislation is powerless to eradicate racialinstincts or to abolish distinctions basedupon physical differences, and the attempt

to do so can only result in accentuating thedifficulties of the present situation. If thecivil and political rights of both races beequal one cannot be inferior to the othercivilly or politically. If one race be inferiorto the other socially, the Constitution of the United States cannot put them uponthe same plane . . .

Justice John Marshall Harlan of Kentucky of-fered the sole dissenting opinion, propheticallystating in part:

If evils will result from the comminglingof the two races upon public highwaysestablished for the benefit of all, they willbe infinitely less than those that will surelycome from state legislation regulating theenjoyment of civil rights upon the basisof race. We boast of the freedom enjoyedby our people above all other peoples. Butit is difficult to reconcile that boast with astate of law which, practically, puts the

brand of servitude and degradation upona large class of our fellow citizens, ourequals before the law.

SUMMER 1932Clearly, in light of the overwhelming legal set-back on civil rights from the highest court in theland, any chance of a successful legal responseby the township's black parents would require alegal resource of substantial influence and tenac-ity. Not only would such a resource be expensiveto working people, but in 1932 there was not asingle black attorney licensed to practice at theChester County Bar. And the president of theChester County Bar Association, the powerfulColonel A. M. Holding, also acted as chief coun-sel for the joint school directors. What could theparents do?

An initial contact for assistance to the NAACPin Philadelphia proved unhelpful. It is recorded,however, that through an introduction by Mr. C.A. Loeb, owner of a large lumber company in

Devon and for whom Primus Crosby alsoworked, Mr. Crosby was able to meet with thevery influential Judge Buck of King of Prussia toexplain the dilemma of the black parents.Through Judge Buck's personal introduction,several men including Mr. Crosby and Mr. O. B.

Cobb, president of the Bryn Mawr Branch of theNAACP, were invited to Philadelphia to presenttheir case to the well-known attorney, RaymondPace Alexander, at his office at 1901 ChestnutStreet. Formidable talent and influence would berequired for the fight ahead, and such strengthswere to be found within Alexander's firm.

Mr. Alexander was a Philadelphian, born in1897. He was the first black graduate of the Uni-versity of Pennsylvania Wharton School, Class of 1920, and a 1923 graduate of Harvard LawSchool. By 1932 he had been in private practicefor 9 years.

Raymond Pace Alexander was a Philadelphian born in 1897, the first black graduate of the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, and a 1923 graduate of Harvard Law School. He led the black community's legal response during the "school fight."

Practicing with Mr. Alexander were threeyoung attorneys:

• John Francis Williams - Yale LawSchool, Class of 1922, and a former edi-tor of the Yale Law Review

• Maceo Hubbard - Harvard Law School,Class of 1926

• Sadie Tanner Alexander-Raymond'swife, the country's first black female

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Ph.D. in economics (University of Penn-sylvania Wharton School, Class of 1921),University of Pennsylvania Law School,Class of 1927, and a former editor of theUniversity of Pennsylvania Law Review.

After considering the case facing the black families of Tredyffrin and Easttown, Alexanderoffered his services pro bono. This offer of di-minished fees for the public good was gratefullyaccepted, and Alexander soon began visiting theblack communities in Berwyn and the Mt. Pleas-ant section of Tredyffrin, establishing trustamong families and taking depositions for thefight ahead.

The July 2, 1932 Main Line Daily Times re-ports that "the National Association for the Ad-vancement of Colored People will file suit in theChester County Courts at West Chester .. .against the proposed exclusive school for negropupils of Tredyffrin and Easttown townships."Mr. Alexander is quoted: "The pleadings are un-der preparation and will be ready during the earlypart of next week." Mr. O. B. Cobb, president of the Bryn Mawr Branch of the National Associa-tion for the Advancement of Colored People,called the segregation plan a "great injustice." Hesaid, "This plan can do only one thing. It willperpetuate race prejudice, something that we

have been trying to overcome for the past 60years."

This litigation would clearly be an uphill legalbattle of major consequence.

Meanwhile, by the summer of 1932, the new,ultra-modern Easttown Elementary School atFirst Avenue and Bridge Street in Berwyn hadbeen completed. New furniture had been movedin and the building was ready for occupancy inthe fall term starting in September. At both theMt. Pleasant School on Upper Gulph Road in

Tredyffrin—now also designated as a blacks-onlyschool—and the Lincoln Highway School, bidshad been accepted for repairs and modificationsto these structures. The school board minutes re-cord that: "the school building(s) will be put intofirst-class condition . .. preparatory to [their]opening in September. This work will be done inline with the recent statement of the board that[these] building(s) will be in the best of repair, ona par with all of the other buildings in the town-ship, when school opens for the fall term."

This school building on Upper Gulph Road in the Mt. Pleasant section at the extreme eastern end of Tredyffrin Township was designated one of the two

blacks-only schools during the "school fight" of 1932-34.

In August 1932, it is recalled that the joint Tre-dyffrin-Easttown school board issued official no-tices to all black parents and guardians in the twotownships that their children would be attendingschools specially designated for them in Mt.Pleasant and Berwyn. Busing instructions wereprovided.

All during that summer and early fall of 1932—and for the next two years—the old Mt. Zion

A.M.E. Church, built in 1861 and located on Ber-wyn-Baptist Road in Devon, was continuallyused as a meeting place for the black community.

Built in 1861, the old chapel of the Mount Zion A.M.E.Church on Berwyn-Baptist Road in Devon originally served an African-American enclave known as Quigley Town and acted as a continual meeting place during the "school fight."

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It is recalled that the church "served as the placewhere people would gather together and vote ontheir actions. It was a natural meeting place, andthere were times when you could hardly find aseat. It was a magnet for the black families. Pri-mus Crosby would call a meeting and when hearrived, he often could hardly make his way to

the front."

FALL 1932The fall school term of 1932 was scheduled tocommence as usual immediately after Labor Day.However, on September 1 st, the TredyffrinSchool District minutes simply state that due to"'the prevalence of infantile paralysis," bothschool boards recommend that the opening of school be deferred until further notice—a peek into the days before Dr. Jonas Salk, when eventhe threat of this incurable disease brought dread

to a community.One month later, on Monday, October 3, 1932,

the public schools of Tredyffrin and Easttowntownships did open. O. B. Cobb's memoir states:On the opening day of the new semester, both

schools intended for Negroes [the Lincoln High-way School in Berwyn and the Mt. PleasantSchool in Wayne] were carefully guarded by par-ents and officers of the NAACP. Most childrendid not enter, and parents held firm to their re-solve to keep their elementary children out of the

segregated schools." The "school fight" had be-gun in earnest.

At the start of the school term, my Mother took my sister, Edith, and me, and my brother Andy, not to the Lincoln Highway School where we had been assigned to attend, but to the new Berwyn [Easttown] Elementary School, which was a "whites-only" school. We all stayed together the whole day at the new

school - the teachers ignored us - and then we all walked home again to Greene Road.My mother was a very strong-willed woman,and it is quite probable that despite the letter,she and her children went to the new school as a form Of protest. — Miss Esther Long livedwith her family in a largely black community on

Greene Road in Tredyffrin Township, approxi-

mately 1/2 mile north of the present Tredyffrin/East-

town Middle School. She would have entered the

2nd grade in the fall of 1932, but instead spent the

next two years at home, for which her father wasput in jail.

On the legal front, we have stated that therewas not a single black attorney at that time admit-ted to the Chester County Bar. And no lawyer,white or black, could practice or plead a case inthis or any other county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania unless he or she was admitted onmotion of an attorney licensed in that particularcounty.

Raymond Pace Alexander and members of hisfirm had prepared two restraining writs of man-

For the first week or so of the 1932 school year, we followed the rules and took the bus to the Lincoln Highway School.The room to which I was assigned had nothing but black kids.Then the local NAACP representative, Primus Crosby, con- tacted my dad and told him that they were trying to segregate the kids, and that he must go and get us out of school. My father said he didn't know that we shouldn't come to this school. Mr. Crosby said to my dad, "We'll go down there to-

gether and you get them." So Crosby rode my father over to the school. My father opened the door [to the classroom],looked around, saw us, and wiggled his finger, motioning us kids to come out, and he took us home. [A year later] they put him in jail for 5 days for doing that, but we never came back to Berwyn to be segregated. The next time I went to school was two years later in Paoli. — Mrs. Bessie Marshall Cunninghamhad moved with her family to Minor Avenue in Paoli in the summer

of 1932 from the segregated school district of Willistown Township.

At the start of the new school year she was planning to enter the 5th

grade at the integrated Paoli Elementary School.

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damus against the jointschool board decision, andAlexander now personallycarried these documentsto the Court House inWest Chester. Not unex-pectedly, the Clerk of theCourt of Common Pleaspromptly refused to ac-

cept them because Alex-ander was not a memberof the Chester CountyBar.

Alexander attempted topersuade several membersof the Chester County Barto move his admission,but all requests were re-fused. In his memoir,


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Alexander recalls, "I took my case to the press,publicizing the inability of a Negro lawyer toeven have a 'just and proper' complaint filed incourt. But one single solitary gentleman of thebar, a [white] former District Attorney of ChesterCounty, came to my support. Thank God for

him!"And so, on October 8, 1932, under the auspices

of this heroic former District Attorney, and withAlexander by his side, the two writs of manda-mus were filed against the Tredyffrin and East-town school directors and the supervising princi-pal. "Mandamus," a Latin term meaning "wecommand," is an extraordinary order of the courtcommanding an official to perform an act that thelaw recognizes as an absolute duty rather thanone for discretion.

The two writs of mandamus, filed by Mr. Alex-ander and the former District Attorney—whoremains unknown to this day—were filed on be-half of Harvey Tyre, a resident of Maple Avenuein Berwyn and the father of 11-year-old LillyMarie Tyre, and Elizabeth Temple, a resident of

IN THE COURT OP COMMON

PLEAS OP CHESTER COUNTY

TERM, 1932

NO. 58

VS.

TEMPLE

THE SCHOOL DISTRICT OPTREDYFFRIN TOWNSHIP a n dNORMAN J. GREENE, ROBERTC. LIGGET, SIDNEY S. MORRISWILLIAM T. VAN DEVER, C.COLKET WILSON, JR . , W IL-LIAM Y. BART LE a n d RAY L .WILLIAMS, Sc ho o l Dir ec to r s

of the School District of Tredyffrin Township andW. K. GROFF, SupervisingPrincipa1

PETITION FOR MANDAMUS

( C OPY )

LAW OFFICES

RAYMOND PACE ALEXANDER19OI CHESTNUT STREET

PHILADELPHIA. PA.

The writ of mandamus, filed on behalf of Eliza- beth Temple,

sought to re- verse the school board's position on segregation.It was signed by Raymond Pace Alexander and submitted to the Chester County Court of Com- mon Pleas.

Centerville—a small community in TredyffrinTownship near the intersection of Swedesfordand Devon State Roads, just south of the presentGateway Shopping Center—and the aunt of Priscilla Temple. The first writ alleged that whenthe new elementary school was erected in East-

town Township, the Tyre girl was not permittedto attend classes there and was forced to attendsessions at the old Lincoln Highway School withonly negro pupils. The second writ charged thatthe same conditions existed in Tredyffrin Town-ship, and that the Temple girl was being com-pelled to transfer from the new Strafford Schoolto the older and more distant Mt. PleasantSchool. Both girls were recorded as "straight Ahonor students."

An old school at the corner of Upper Gulph and

West Valley Roads was replaced in 1930 by the new, larger Strafford School built on a piece of adjoining property. It remained a whites-only school during the "school fight." It is now the private Woodlynde School.

Although the proceedings were initiated on be-half of only two pupils, the wording of each writindicated that all black pupils within the twoschool districts were affected by the alleged ac-tions of the school directors in segregating allNegro pupils from schools attended by white pu-

pils. Alexander charged that the two schoolboards made an agreement whereby "certain"pupils would be sent to separate schools andwould not be permitted to enter the new schoolsin Berwyn and Strafford. The "certain" pupils, hesaid, were all colored children.

In early December 1932 the case was finallyargued in the Chester County Court of CommonPleas before Judge Hause, with testimony takenat two hearings. Colonel Holding, representingMr. Groff and the school directors, argued to

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quash, or annul, both writs on the basis that theCourt of Common Pleas had no jurisdiction inthis case. He further argued that the mandamusaction should instead have been initiated by theChester County District Attorney's Office or,preferably, by the Attorney General of the Com-

monwealth of Pennsylvania.Alexander argued against the motion to quashthese injunctions, stating that Colonel Holding'smotion was merely taken for the purpose of de-laying the final outcome of the case, and thatsuch a delay would work a hardship upon themore than 200 black pupils of the two townshipswho had received no schooling so far in 1932 as aresult of the alleged segregation.

The December 6th Coatesville Record recordsthat "while arguments were heard in court on themotion to quash the mandamus writs, upwards of

one hundred and fifty colored residents of theschool districts were present."

On December 11, 1932, the Chester CountyCourt of Common Pleas, in an opinion signed byJudge Hause, refused to judge the case on itsmerits and ruled to quash the writs of mandamus.The opinion upheld the contention of ColonelHolding that the mandamus action should be de-clared invalid on the grounds that the ChesterCounty District Attorney or the state AttorneyGeneral must bring such a suit in order to give it

proper legal status. Round One of the legal battlehad just ended in favor of the school boards.

WINTER 1933Round Two of the legal and increasingly politicalbattle began on February 15, 1933 with a hearingand mandamus application held in the SenateChamber in Harrisburg before an assistant attor-ney general of the Commonwealth of Pennsyl-vania. Raymond Pace Alexander sought to haveAttorney General William A. Schnader join the

proceedings against the school boards. ColonelHolding argued that the school directors for East-town and Tredyffrin Townships had, in fact, nopower to effect segregation. About one hundredwitnesses from Berwyn, who had rented buses totransport them to and from Harrisburg, testified atthis proceeding.

On March 2nd, hearings were continued in Har-risburg, and testimony by both sides was givenbefore Deputy Attorney General Harris Arnold.Attending with the spectators, which included

State Attorney General William A. Schnader refused to become involved in the "school fight" until he needed the black vote because he wanted to be governor of Pennsylvania.

He paved the way to end the segregation, but,ironically, lost the vote for governor to George H.Earle in a very close election.

Dr. James N. Rule was the Pennsylvania Superinten- dent of Public Instruction during the period of the Tredyffrin-Easttown segregation case, and applied significant pressure on the

joint school board by threatening to cut public funding from Harrisburg.

150 black residents from the two townships, wasthe Pennsylvania Superintendent of Public In-struction, Dr. James N. Rule. Since school hadbegun the previous October, no legal attempt had

been made by the townships to force the black children to attend their assigned school.

On March 9, 1933, the following letter to theTredyffrin Township School Board was receivedfrom Dr. Rule:

Mr. Robert G. Ligget,Secretary, Tredyffrin Township School BoardBerwyn, Pennsylvania

Dear Mr. Ligget:

It has come to my attention that since aboutthe first day of October 1932, your schooldistrict has refused or neglected to enforcethe compulsory attendance provisions of the school laws in the district, and that as aresult a large number of children of compul-sory school age in your district have notattended school since that date.

Therefore, you are hereby notified

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the black children of grammar school age, how-ever, solidarity with the school boycott continuedstrong—but not absolute.

In order to attend school full time and wishingto avoid the lapse, with no apparent end, in for-mal education in their own local schools, many

black parents had sent their children to live withfriends or relatives in adjacent Delaware orMontgomery Counties, or in Philadelphia. Someblack children of grammar school age had evenbeen sent to live in New Jersey or Delaware toavoid the ramifications of the "fight."

registered at the Mt. Pleasant School, 11 pupilswere attending classes. Four of these childrenlived in Montgomery County and crossed thecounty line to attend. Four were boarders whoseparents lived elsewhere and had been enrolled inthe schools by their guardians. The remaining

three had parents in Tredyffrin Township.The Coatesville Record also reported "a most

peculiar condition existing at the Lincoln High-way School where one 6-year-old girl, MargaretHill, gets the entire attention of a principal and ateacher each day. This little girl has been placed

in school by her

/ started high school in the fall of 1932, so the "school fight" never affected me directly. But my younger brothers, one 2 years younger and the other 4 years younger, definitely had looked forward to attending the beautiful new [Easttown Elementary]

school, and were now scheduled to attend the old Lincoln High- way School. When the fight started, my father got someone to board them in Philadelphia so that they could attend the Phila- delphia schools. On Sunday night or Monday morning they would travel in to Philadelphia and stay for the week with a woman who provided a "home away from home" while they attended school. Then every Friday night or Saturday morning my father would return them back to our home where we would wash and iron their clothes. This routine involved not only my two brothers, but also the sons of several other families in the area for two years. This solution enabled my brothers to not lose two years of their education. I remember my parents attending these meetings, and they supported the fight, but fortunately they

found this Other way. — Mrs. Elsie Holly Fuller had just gradu-

ated from 8th grade in the spring of 1932 and was entering the fully inte-

grated Tredyffrin/Easttown High School.

guardians, since herparents work as do-mestics on the MainLine. She is the onlypupil in this schoolwhere there should bemore than 100 chil-dren."

At the small, remoteSalem School, locatedon west YellowSprings Road in theCedar Hollow area of Tredyffrin Township,black children of mostly quarry work-

ers had traditionallyrepresented one-thirdof the 60 or so pupilsin the student body.During the 1932-33school year, black

In the first year of the "school fight," the Mt.Pleasant School, staffed by principal Miss MazieHall and several black teachers, and the LincolnHighway School, similarly staffed by a core of

black educators, had virtually no black childrenattending classes after the first few days in Octo-ber 1932. By the start of the 1933-34 school year,all the black teachers and staff had been fired andreplaced by white teachers. A trickle of black students were returning to the two segregatedschools, but the majority of the black childrencontinued to remain at home without any formaleducation for a second year.

The Coatesville Record reported on October 10,1933 that out of the 125 children who should be

The Salem School, built in 1863 on the western end of Yellow Springs Road, was one of two schools built to replace the Diamond Rock School which closed the same year.

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children had been barred from attendance at theschool. For unexplained reasons, at the beginningof the 1933-34 school year, at least 10 black pu-pils living in that jurisdiction had enrolled for,and were attending, classes at the Salem School.

As the second year of the boycott started, how-

ever, no black students attended the EasttownElementary School, the Strafford School, or thePaoli Elementary School. For the majority of theaffected children of grammar school age, the fallof 1933 was the harbinger of yet another yearwithout a formal education, save for those fewparents suitably educated themselves to teachtheir own children, or with the means of findingothers to provide an appropriate home schoolprogram.

These black children, who could not attend public school classes, were provided with home-school education at the Mt. Zion A.M.E. parsonage in Ber- wyn.

My parents did not have the opportunity to get any [educational] help for me, so I was forced to stay home. I helped around the house and read books as we had them, but I sort of became a

loner. I just can't explain to you in words how I felt when my parents explained that I could not return to my school like the other kids. I was hurt because I couldn't go, but I tried to make the best of it. I felt that, sooner or later, right would be right. —Mrs. Estelle King Burton waslooking forward to returning to the Strafford School

to begin 5th grade in the fall of 1932. Instead, she

spent the next 2 years at home, for which her father

spent time in jail.

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The Paoli Elementary School, built in 1927, was located on the north side of the railroad at the corner of Fennerton Road and Central Avenue in Paoli. It served as a whites-only school during the "school fight."

THE FINES AND ARRESTS OF

BLACK PARENTS AND GUARDIANS

Round Three of the "school fight" began on Oc-tober 5, 1933 with a protest rally outside theEasttown Elementary School from which black pupils had been barred for over a year. Many of the 225 black pupils of the two townships at-tended the meeting with their parents. The meet-ing is both recorded and remembered as beingpeaceful.

As October continued, it appeared probable thata number of black parents would be fined, or

jailed for five days in lieu of paying their fine, forfailing to send their children to school as ordered.Truant officers from the school district called oneach black home asking why the children therewere not attending school. They explained that if

the children remained truant, the parentwould be issued a fine until the child onceagain returned to classes in his or her seg-regated school. The fines for violationwere $1.00 for the first offense and $2.50

for each subsequent offense; this is equalto $43.00 and $105.00 in 2004 dollars.

Two Justices of the Peace, one fromDevon and one from Berwyn, instructedRaymond Pace Alexander that they wereprepared to carry out their threats of im-prisonment under the commonwealthschool compulsory attendance law. Alex-ander was given five days to file an ap-peal. He announced, however, that he


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would not appeal the fines, and would delay anyfurther action to determine whether the prisonthreats would actually be carried out.

On October 19, 1933, the first four black men,all from Berwyn, were arrested and transported inhandcuffs to the Chester County Prison to begin

their 5-day sentences following their refusal topay a $2.50 fine imposed upon them for failing tosend their children to school. They were: AndrewHearn, his son Virgil Hearn, Walter Harrison, andthe Rev. Charles Shepard, lay minister at the Mt.Zion A.M.E. Church in Devon. It was recalledthat these four volunteered to lead those still to be

jailed, and said of the jailing: "Someone has to gofirst - let it be us."

Dozens of parents and guardians were fined or jailed, but no individual was jailed more thanonce. O. B. Cobb recalls in his memoir that,"some paid fines for others. Many, while inprison, were supported by their neighbors."

/ remember that my mother would cook food for people who had lost their job —their way of earning —and an older man,Mr. Horace Young, would deliver it. My mother would cook all kinds of food and give it to people, because they didn't have enough food or they didn't have money. — Mrs. Bessie Crosby Whitney isone of the twin daughters of Primus Crosby.She remembers the many kindnessesextended by her mother and others asneighbor supported neighbor during thestruggle.

Raymond Pace Alexander told the black parentsthat, "when the next person goes to jail, you bringyour children. Tell them: 'I don't have anybodyto care for them, and my children must go to jail

with me.' "It is recorded that one mother with an infant inarms finally broke the jailing cycle. Rcollectionnames this woman as a Mrs. Williams, who re-fused, on principle, to have her fine paid by theNAACP, and, knowing that her husband wouldbe fired from his job if he did not show up forwork, agreed to go to jail in his place so he couldkeep working to support their family. At thispoint the court ceased arresting parents.

Easttown School District minutes note a propo-

sition unanimously approved on November 14,1933 by the Joint Board whereby a personal so-licitation would be made to have all absenteechildren in the Tredyffrin and Easttown SchoolDistricts return to school by Monday, November20th. A member of the black community, Mr.

Morris Ray, would be appointed "to a Committeewho shall pass upon all applications that may bemade for reassignment." Further, all pendingprosecutions against the parents or guardians of all children returning to their classes by Novem-ber 20, 1933 shall be suspended during the periodnecessary "to pass upon any applications for suchreassignment." The Joint School Board's planwas found unacceptable by the local black com-munity and the Bryn Mawr Branch of the Na-tional Association for the Advancement of Col-ored People and further consideration was re-fused.

WINTER OF 1933-34What about the ongoing legal battle to resolve the"school fight." As Alexander himself describes inhis memoir: ". . . for two long years, battling inChester County, rebuffed; then to Harrisburg tothe Attorney General of Pennsylvania for statesupported mandamus, then returning to ChesterCounty, back to Harrisburg and innumerable trips- all at night - at least 50 in all - to take testi-

mony in various churches."The second year of the struggle had turned very

political. Pennsylvania Attorney GeneralSchnader had political ambitions—he wanted tooccupy the governor's mansion. The second termof Republican governor Gifford Pinchot was dueto expire in January 1935, and Schnader wantedthe nomination to succeed him. To do that heneeded the widest possible support, including thestate's black vote. Although Schnader had repeat-edly declined to cooperate up to now in the man-

damus action, on March 8, 1934 he told a delega-tion including lawyers and ministers that hewould consider their request for assistance to endsegregation of black and white children in Ber-wyn.

THE FINAL ROUNDWith his hat in the gubernatorial ring, AttorneyGeneral Schnader now sought a way to favorablysettle the segregation case. O. B. Cobb describeshow Schnader appointed two Deputy Attorneys

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General who were to confer with the SchoolBoard for the purpose of settling the case. TheBryn Mawr Branch of the NAACP wroteSchnader a letter reminding him of his formernegligence and asking him to recall the deputiesand to contact the school authorities himself.

On March 17, 1934, the following letter wasreceived by the Bryn Mawr Branch of theNAACP:

Dear Mr. Cobb:I hope you will forgive my long delay inreplying to your very kind letter of March10. I am willing to do anything in mypower to try to settle the unfortunate dif-ference between the School Board and theparents. I am today writing to the Attorney

for the School Board to see what can bedone. I appreciate immensely the spirit of your letter and would be more than de-lighted if I could be of real service in bring-ing about an adjustment.

Sincerely,William SchnaderState Attorney General, (Pa.)

Forty-four days later, the Berwyn "schoolfight" was over. The May 1, 1934 Coatesville

Record records the end:

Tredyffrin township's segregated schoolcontroversy ended yesterday when Negroboys and girls and white children attendedthe same schools.

Announcement was made by RaymondPace Alexander, colored attorney represent-ing the parents of more than 220 Negro chil-dren who refused to attend schools specially

designated for them, that the joint school,boards of Easttown and Tredyffrin town-ships had notified him yesterday that thesegregated system would be done awaywith at once.

Alexander, in turn, sent notice to the par-ents that they should send their children toschool yesterday morning, and a check upshowed that nearly all of the parents hadcomplied.

It was the first time since June 1932, thatthe Negro and white children in the twotownships were in the same school build-ings. In Tredyffrin township they wereattending Mt. Pleasant School, and for thefirst time since the new Berwyn Schoolwas built in Easttown township, white andNegro children were in the same classesyesterday morning.

The old Berwyn School, on Lancaster Pike . . .was closed yesterday and will remain closedfor the remainder of the term.

EPILOGUEThe struggle for equality of education had finallyended successfully. It is reported that in the re-

maining month of the 1933-34 school year, theapproximately 225 black pupils reported to theirnearest grammar school to be reintegrated withthe rest of their class and grade. Over the sevendecades since that time, participants rememberthe crowded classrooms during that final monthof classes, and nothing but kindness on the partof both teachers and pupils as former classmateswere reunited. By the following September, at thestart of the 1934-35 school year, class balancinghad been completed and normalcy had returned.

The price of victory had been high, leavingcasualties from the struggle. Many black chil-dren, whose parents were without the means toprovide suitable and ongoing education duringthe two-year boycott, had fallen behind academi-cally, requiring them to leave their old classmatesand be reassigned to another grade. As happenedto many, a student scheduled to enter the thirdgrade in 1932 would now be obligated to enterthe third grade in 1934 even though the child wastwo years older than his or her classmates. Chil-

dren can be cruel about such things, and thoseinsults are recalled over the decades. Of particu-lar concern, were students who would have en-tered 7th or 8th grade in 1932, and who wouldnow be forced to catch up academically in thegrammar schools even though they had grown tonear-adulthood physically. Many individuals re-called leaving school permanently rather thanface taunts of alleged retardation.

Furthermore, because the case had been settledon legal and political fronts rather in the courts,

no clear precedent had been established for others17


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to follow. When a group of black parents sued theChester, Pennsylvania, School Board for main-taining segregated high schools, the school boardretaliated by failing to renew the contracts of 50black teachers.

School segregation remained pervasive in much

of Pennsylvania well into the 1940s. In 1948 theNAACP conducted an extensive survey of schoolsegregation in the state, and found that more thana quarter of the surveyed school districts main-tained some form of formal separation betweenblack and white students. They had either segre-gated schools or segregated classes withinschools. The towns of Chester and West Chestercontinued to operate all-black elementaryschools. Willistown Township, Downingtown,and Kennett Square continued to operate segre-

gated classrooms within integrated schools, withblack teachers teaching only black children. Insome of these segregated classrooms, black chil-dren of various ages and ability were combined ina single room, called a "union room," resulting inan educational experience not only separate butinferior to that offered to white students.

It would be another 20 years until the case of Brown v. Board of Education was heard beforethe U.S. Supreme Court in 1954, and the"separate but equal" doctrine previously adopted

in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson was unani-mously struck down and found to have no placein public education. Chief Justice Earl Warren,reading the decision of the unanimous Court onMay 17, 1954, underscored that segregation of children in public schools based solely on racedeprives children of the minority group of equaleducational opportunities, even though the physi-cal facilities and other "tangible" factors may beequal. The Court's decision was a major step to-ward complete desegregation of public schools.

And yet, two decades before this sweeping de-cision from the highest court in the land, a lawyerof uncommon brilliance, and hundreds of brave,local men, women, and children acted upon theirconviction that a line had been crossed, andstarted a "fight" that served as a precedent of what could be done when equality was compro-mised.

APPENDIX

ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS INVOLVED

IN THE "SCHOOL FIGHT"

• A new Berwyn Primary School had beenbuilt in 1912 on Lancaster Avenue atCentral and Walnut Avenues in EasttownTownship, one block west of an oldergrammar school, the Easttown PrimarySchool, that closed in 1926. In 1932 theTredyffrin School Board leased the va-cated Berwyn Primary School from theEasttown authorities. The school wasrefurbished and renamed the Lincoln

Highway School and continued in opera-

tion until 1939. It is currently a privateoffice building.

• In 1930 the school authorities in East-town decided to build a modern consoli-dated grammar school. They acquired atract of land on the south side of FirstAvenue, east of Bridge Street in Berwynand two blocks southeast of the BerwynPrimary School, and construction of anew Easttown Elementary School beganlater that year. The new school was firstoccupied in the fall of 1932. It closed in1977 and the building was converted toadministrative space for the Tredyffrin/ Easttown School District.

• An original school building in the Mt.Pleasant section of Wayne was built in1867 and razed in 1903. The new, stone

Mt Pleasant School building was builtthe same year on the same site, at theextreme eastern end of Tredyffrin Town-

ship. This school was used until the1940s. The building, located at 1008Upper Gulph Road across from theRadnor Country Club, has been reno-vated and is now an office complex.

• An old school at the corner of UpperGulph and West Valley Roads in Tredyf-frin Township was replaced in 1930 bythe new, larger Strafford School built ona piece of adjoining property. The school

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served for fifty years until it closed in1981. The private Woodlynde Schoolnow occupies the site.

• Salem School, built in 1863 on the west-ern end of Yellow Springs Road in Tre-

dyffrin Township, was one of twoschools built to replace the DiamondRock School which closed the same year.This school consisted of an original one-story structure and an adjoining two-story frame building. The Salem Schoolwas closed in 1939. The buildings arenow privately owned.

• Paoli Elementary School was built in1927 and located on the north side of the

railroad at the corner of Fennerton Roadand Central Avenue in Paoli. It remainedin service until 1981, and is now operatedas the Delaware Valley Friends School.

• The North Berwyn School was built in1892 as a one-room schoolhouse on thesoutheast corner of what is today Cones-toga and Howellville Roads. Later addi-tions enlarged it to contain four class-rooms. The school operated until 1932,

when it was closed. The old school build-ing was then renovated and a secondfloor was added. In 1936 it was usedagain, this time by the Tredyffrin/ Easttown High School for its vocationaland art departments. Today it houses theMaintenance Department of the Tredyf-frin/Easttown School District.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

In preparing this narrative I received extraordi-nary assistance from many individuals to whom Iwish to express my sincere gratitude for theirideas, information, and encouragement during theresearch of this seminal, yet little-known, civilrights struggle:

Essie Crosby Brock

Estelle King Burton

Ernestine Corbin WoodsMatthew Corbin

Bessie Marshall Cunningham

Irma DennisChristopher Densmore, Curator, Friends

Historical Library, Swarthmore CollegeElsie Holly FullerMazie Hall

Helen and Ed HayesEsther LongJosephine Morgan

Diane Mastrull, The Philadelphia Inquirer Dale Mezzacappa, The Philadelphia

Inquirer

Alberta Carter ShepherdBessie Crosby WhitneyRobert Wright

I also wish to thank members of the Tredyffrin/

Easttown School District, and members of theSchool Board, including, but not limited to, Dr.Peter Motel, Mrs. Liane Davis, Dr. Dan Waters,Dr. Mary Lou Folts, and Mrs. Nancy Letts.Thank you for your interest and guidance.

SOURCES

Davison M. Douglas. "The Limits of Law inAccomplishing Racial Change: School Segre-

gation in the Pre-Brown North." UCLA Law Review, vol. 44, no. 3 (February 1997).p. 727-28.

Joseph H. Rainey. "Segregation Ends in PublicSchools of Two Townships." Philadelphia Record, May 1, 1934.

Raymond Pace Alexander. "Outline of the SchoolSituation in Easttown and Tredyffrin Town-ships" (October 18, 1933). NAACP Papers,Box 1-D-48, Library of Congress.

Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, Race RelationsCommittee. Minutes for 1929-36. FriendsHistorical Library, Swarthmore College,Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

Easttown School District. Minutes for May5, 1932 through June 14, 1934.

Tredyffrin School District. Minutes for January

29, 1931 through September 25, 1934.

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Tredyffrin Easttown History Club, Berwyn,Pennsylvania. Newspaper clipping files.

Frederick Douglass Institute, West ChesterUniversity, West Chester, Pennsylvania.Newspaper clipping files.

Robert L. Ward. "Public Schools of Easttown andTredyffrin Townships - Part II." Tredyffrin

Easttown History Club Quarterly, vol. 35, no. 3(July 1997). p. 81-96.

A Short Summary of the Life and Activities of Raymond Pace Alexander. (Judge, CommonPleas Court #4, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania).May 1966. Paper provided to the author by Mr.Robert Wright.

Oscar Bullock Cobb. A Brief History Of The Bryn Mawr, Pa . Branch Of The National Association For The Advancement Of Colored People. Bryn

Mawr, Pennsylvania, 1934. Paper provided tothe author by Mr. Robert Wright.

Chester County Court of Common Pleas. Legaldocuments filed with the court pertaining to the"school fight." Provided for review by the authorby the Tredyffrin/Easttown School District.

Main Line Daily Times. Various issues for theperiod March to July 1932. Microfilm collection,Free Library of Philadelphia.

Lisa Cozzens. "Brown v. Board of Education."African American History. 1995.http://fledge.watson.org/-lisa/blackhistory/ early-civilrights/brown.html

Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483(1954).http://www.nationalcenter.org/brown.html

U.S. Department of State. Basic Readings inU.S. Democracy. Introduction to the Court Opinion of the Plessy v. Ferguson Case.http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/ democrac/33.htm

Roger Thorne, a retired executive for an interna-tional services company, became president of theTredyffrin Easttown History Club in 2003. A May

2004 Philadelphia Inquirer article first exposedThorne to the "Berwyn school fight," and providedthe catalyst to pursue the details and context of thislittle-known event in our local past. This talk waspresented at the October 24, 2004 meeting of theTredyffrin Easttown History Club.

ILLUSTRATION CREDITSFront cover Courtesy Matthew Corbin. p. 4 Top, Roger Thorne, photographer, 2004. Middle, Courtesy Coates- ville Record, p. 5 Top left and right, Roger Thorne, photographer, 2004. Bottom left, Courtesy Tredyffrin East-town History Club. p. 6 Middle, Roger Thorne, photographer, 2004. Bottom, Courtesy Essie Crosby Brock,p. 8 Courtesy University of Pennsylvania, p. 9 All photographs Roger Thorne, photographer, 2004. p. 11 Left,Courtesy Tredyffrin/Easttown School District. Right, Roger Thorne, photographer, 2004. p. 12 Top, CourtesyArchives and Special Collections, Franklin and Marshall College. Middle, Courtesy Main Line Daily Times.

p. 14 Courtesy Coatesville Record, p. 15 Left, Courtesy Esther Long. Right, Roger Thorne, photographer,2004. p. 22 Left, Courtesy Matthew Corbin. Right, Courtesy The National Air Tour. p. 23 Courtesy EleanorRoosevelt National Historic Site. p. 24 Courtesy Colonel Roosevelt J. Lewis Collection, Moton Field, Tuske-gee, Alabama, p. 27 Top left Courtesy Rare Book Department, The Free Library of Philadelphia. Bottom left,Courtesy Tredyffrin Easttown History Club. Right, Atlas of the Properties of Main Line Pennsylvania Rail- road. . .. Philadelphia: Muller, 1912, plate 9. p. 28 Top left, top right, and bottom right photographs, CourtesyRare Book Department, The Free Library of Philadelphia. Bottom left, The A. Edward Newton Collection of Books and Manuscripts. Parke-Bernet, 1941. part of front endpaper, p. 32 Top, Courtesy Tredydffrin EasttownHistory Club. Bottom, Joyce A. Post, photographer, 2005. Back Cover The A. Edward Newton Collection of Books and Manuscripts. Parke-Bernet, 1941. part of back endpaper.

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segregation on the upper main line

Documents