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Texas Poll Tax Payment, Proposition 1 (1902)

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Ballotpedia: The Encyclopedia of American Politics

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founding of ''harlem hellfighters'' [1913]

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founding of ''harlem hellfighters'' [1913]

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Consistently organizing and financing landmark civil-rights lawsuits, the Texas NAACP became an important component of the national organization.The state's first chapter, established in El Paso in 1915, was joined by four new branches in 1918.

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Texas NAACP History - Texas NAACP State Conference

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Consistently organizing and financing landmark civil-rights lawsuits, the Texas NAACP became an important component of the national organization.The state's first chapter, established in El Paso in 1915, was joined by four new branches in 1918.

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dorris miller award with a gold medal of honor  [1942]

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dorris miller award with a gold medal of honor  [1942]

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Juanita Craft was the first Black woman to vote in a public election in Dallas County and served more than 50 years with the Dallas chapter of the NAACP.

DALLAS - No matter the roadblocks or reasons she shouldn't have been able to, Juanita Craft lived a life built around bringing equality for the Black community in Dallas.

Craft was not only the first Black woman in Dallas County to vote in a public election, but she also served more than 50 years with the Dallas chapter of the NAACP.

Juanita Jewel Shanks Craft was born in February of 1902.

While she was a granddaughter of slaves, Craft was an only child of schoolteachers David Sylvestus and Eliza Balfour Shanks.

Her mother, Shanks, died from tuberculosis after being refused treatment because there were no state hospitals for Black Texans.

Even after getting her teaching certificate from Samuel Huston College, now known as Huston-Tillotson University, Craft had to work as a maid at the Adolphus Hotel in Dallas and later as a seamstress.

However, it didn't take long for things to change not only for Craft but for the city she called home.

Changing Dallas for the better

In 1935, Craft joined the Dallas chapter of the NAACP. It only took her seven years to become the chapter's membership chair.

By the 1940s, Craft was organizing multiple branches of the NAACP and had created the Dallas NAACP Youth Council, which became a model for chapters across the country.

After the 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, Craft tried to enroll Black students at both the University of Texas and the North Texas State College (now North Texas State University). This sparked a battle inevitably won in court.

Craft also led a group of youth council members who formed a picket line, protesting segregation at the State Fair of Texas. She wanted African Americans to be able to fully participate in the fair for more than one day.

It didn't stop at the fair, as Craft took part in sit-ins at many establishments and pushed back in places where she knew she wouldn't be served.

Craft was a two-term Dallas City Councilwoman in the 1970s, spending much of her time fighting for equal rights for Hispanics and Native Americans.

She received many awards for her efforts in the Civil Rights Movement, including the NAACP Golden Heritage Life Membership Award and the Eleanor Roosevelt Humanitarian Award.

In 1985, the NAACP national chapter awarded Craft for serving fifty years with the organization.

That same year, at the age 83, Craft passed away in Dallas and was buried in Austin.

Craft's legacy in North Texas

After Craft's death in 1985, the Juanita Craft Foundation was created to sustain her ideas and beliefs.

Craft's name can be found throughout Dallas. There is a U.S. post office in southeast Dallas as well as a recreation center in East Dallas.

Craft's home on Warren Avenue in South Dallas is now the Juanita J. Craft Civil Rights House, where you can learn about her life-long fight to bring equality to her community.

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Changing her community for the better: Juanita Craft's life-long fight for equality left an impact on Dallas

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Juanita Craft was the first Black woman to vote in a public election in Dallas County and served more than 50 years with the Dallas chapter of the NAACP. DALLAS - No matter the roadblocks or reasons she shouldn't have been able to, Juanita Craft lived a life built around bringing equality for the Black community in Dallas.

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Prints & Photographs Collection, Heman Sweatt file,
The Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin

In 1946, Heman Marion Sweatt applied for admission to the University of Texas School of Law, which was at the time an all-white institution. Sweatt met all eligibility requirements for admission except for his race. At that time, Article VII, Section 7 of the Texas Constitution read: "Separate schools shall be provided for the white and colored children, and impartial provision shall be made for both." Based on the Texas constitution, the university registrar rejected his application because Sweatt was black and the University of Texas was a segregated institution. With assistance from NAACP counsel, Sweatt sued in state court, requesting that the court require state and university officials to enroll him. The trial judge continued the case to give the state an opportunity to establish a "separate but equal" law school, and a temporary law school was opened in February 1947, known as the School of Law of the Texas State University for Negroes.

At the School of Law of the Texas State University for Negroes, students had access to the Texas Supreme Court library, and several members of the law faculty of the University of Texas School of Law taught classes. After the establishment of the black law school, the state court dismissed Sweatt's case. Sweatt appealed the dismissal of the case to the United States Supreme Court, claiming that the Texas admissions scheme continued to violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court ruled that in states where public graduate and professional schools existed for white students but not for black students, black students must be admitted to the all-white institutions, and that the equal protection clause required Sweatt's admission to the University of Texas School of Law. In the summer of 1950, Horace Heath enrolled in the Graduate School of Government and John Chase enrolled in the architecture program at the University of Texas. Heman Marion Sweatt entered law school at the University of Texas in the fall of 1950, as did several other blacks.

The case had a direct impact on the University of Texas because it permitted black applicants to apply to graduate and professional programs. However, black students could only pursue those degrees that were not available from segregated black universities such as Prairie View A&M University and Texas State University for Negroes, now known as Texas Southern University. Since the University of Texas adopted a narrow interpretation of Sweatt, black undergraduate students were not admitted. Graduate students, however, were allowed to enroll in undergraduate courses when necessary for their program.

At the same time the Supreme Court considered the Sweatt case, it reviewed the policies of the University of Oklahoma in McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education. On January 28, 1948, a retired black professor, George McLaurin, applied to the University of Oklahoma to pursue a Doctorate in Education. University authorities were required to deny him admission because of his race under Oklahoma statutes making it a misdemeanor to maintain, operate, teach, or attend a school at which both whites and blacks were enrolled or taught. McLaurin filed a complaint to gain admission. On October 6, the Court for the Western District of Oklahoma found those parts of the Oklahoma statute that denied McLaurin admission unconstitutional, and held that the state had a constitutional duty to provide McLaurin with the education he sought as soon as it provided that education for applicants of any other group. With this ruling the University's Board of Regents voted to admit McLaurin, but on a segregated basis.

On October 13, 1948, McLaurin entered the University. He sat at a designated desk on the mezzanine level of Bizzell Library rather than in the regular reading room, at a desk in an anteroom adjoining Classroom 104 in Carnegie Hall, and ate at a separate time from the white students in the cafeteria. McLaurin once again filed suit, claiming that this segregation violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The Supreme Court unanimously ruled that as a result of McLaurin's segregation he was "handicapped in his pursuit of effective graduate instruction. Such restrictions impair and inhibit his ability to study, to engage in discussions and exchange views with other students, and, in general, to learn his profession."

With Sweatt v. Painter and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education, the Supreme Court began to overturn the separate but equal doctrine in public education by requiring graduate and professional schools to admit black students.

View Case: Sweatt v. Painter, 339 U.S. 629 (1950)

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Tarlton Law Library: The Papers of Justice Tom C. Clark: Sweatt v. Painter (1950)

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In 1946, Heman Marion Sweatt applied for admission to the University of Texas School of Law, which was at the time an all-white institution. Sweatt met all eligibility requirements for admission except for his race.

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D.joe Williams integrates  collegite sports [1953]

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D.joe Williams integrates  collegite sports [1953]

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Skip to main menu Skip to page content Skip to footer

People of African descent have been inextricably linked to the history of the land now known as Texas since the earliest days of colonization

African American Texans have created culture and community despite being subjected to racism and oppression in the form of enslavement, segregation, and violence, and have improved the state of Texas with valuable cultural and historical contributions.

I belong to myself now. Harriet, freed woman, 1865

African People Under Spanish Rule

With their arrival in 1528, people of African descent, enslaved and free, were instrumental in the settlement of Spanish Texas.

People of African descent were part of the population that settled Texas in the 17th and 18th centuries. This population included free and enslaved black and mixed-race people, as interracial marriage was legal and very common. The enslaved population was afforded some rights under Spanish rule, including the right to purchase freedom, protest against abuse, or obtain new masters if they were being treated unfairly.

Though African people occupied the lower end of the "castas" racial categorization system of Spanish Texas, some African and mixed-race people were able to ascend the classification system by gaining wealth and prestige through their labor

Mexican Independence and Texas Revolution

Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1821 following an 11-year revolutionary war. Under Mexican rule, slavery was officially outlawed in Texas by 1829. However, special consideration given to Anglo settlers meant that the enslaved population of Texas continued to grow, as enslaved men and women were forced to accompany their enslavers on their journey into Texas.

Following Mexican Independence in 1821, the Mexican government adopted policies to gradually outlaw enslavement in the newly established country, but Anglo settlers actively worked to ensure slavery was preserved in Tejas. A number of enslaved African Americans arrived with Stephen F. Austin and his Anglo settlers in 1824. By the end of 1825, there were around 443 slaves in the colony -almost a quarter of its population. By the time that clashes with the Mexican government led to the Texas Revolution in 1835, more than 5,000 enslaved people lived in Texas.

Slavery in Texas

African American life after Texas Independence was shaped by new and existing legal constraints, enslavement, and violence. Free blacks struggled with new laws banning them from residence in the state, while the majority of black Texans remained enslaved.

The Texas Constitution of 1836 gave more protection to slaveholders while further controlling the lives of enslaved people through new slave codes. The Texas Legislature passed increasingly restrictive laws governing the lives of free blacks, including a law banishing all free black people from the Republic of Texas.

Texas's enslaved population grew rapidly: while there were 30,000 enslaved people in Texas in 1845, the census lists 58,161 enslaved African Americans in 1850. The number had increased to 182,566 by 1860.

Most enslaved people in Texas were brought by white families from the southern United States. Some enslaved people came through the domestic slave trade, which was centered in New Orleans. A smaller number of enslaved people were brought via the international slave trade, though this had been illegal since 1806.

Most enslaved African Americans in Texas were forced into unskilled labor as field hands in the production of cotton, corn, and sugar, though some lived and worked on large plantations or in urban areas where they engaged in more skilled forms of labor as cooks, blacksmiths, and carpenters. While there were no large-scale slave insurrections in Texas, enslaved people resisted in a variety of ways, the most common being running away. Enslaved people made personal connections, and established family relationships wherever possible despite the odds, which was made more difficult by the changing nature of Texas and its white population.

De slaves was about de same things as mules or cattle, dey was bought and sold and dey wasn't supposed ter be treated lak people anyway. We all knew dat we was only a race of people as our master was and dat we had a certain amount of rights but we was jest property and had ter be loyal ter our masers. It hurt us sometimes ter be treated de way some of us was treated but we couldn't help ourselves and had ter do de best we could which nearly all of us done.

-Mollie Dawson, enslaved in Navarro County, Texas

Civil War and Emancipation

Life for enslaved African Americans remained relatively unchanged during the Civil War. However, with Union General Granger's emancipation announcement at the end of the war, African Americans celebrated their independence and began new lives as freedpeople.

On February 23, 1861, Texans voted to secede from the Union and joined the Confederate States of America. Because Texas remained relatively unscathed by fighting during the war, life for enslaved African Americans continued in much the same way as it had before the fighting. Felix Haywood, who worked as a cowboy while enslaved in San Antonio, described his experience of the war when interviewed in 1937: "It's a funny thing how folks always want to know about the war. The war wasn't so great as folks suppose. Sometimes you didn't know it was going on. It was the ending of it that made the difference."

While Felix Haywood's life was undisturbed by the war, other enslaved people experienced upheaval. Some enslaved people were moved from the eastern areas of Texas or from other southern states to keep them away from Union troops, and many were made to labor for the Confederate Army, building fortifications and other methods of defense.

On June 19, 1865, at the end of the Civil War and over two years after President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, General Gordon Granger landed in Galveston and declared that enslavement was ended. However, many black people in Texas remained enslaved for months, and in rare cases years, when their owners refused to release them. Many newly emancipated people celebrated their independence at the holiday subsequently known as Juneteenth, though some found their celebrations thwarted by disgruntled former slave-owners. Some people immediately set off in search of lost family and friends, while others experienced confusion and uncertainty about their futures as freedpeople.

What I likes best, to be slave or free? Well, it's this way. In slavery I owns nothing and never owns nothing. In freedom I's own the home and raise the family. All that cause me worriment, and in slavery I has no worriment, but I takes the freedom. Margrett Nillin

Reconstruction

Reconstruction, a period when people across the United States attempted to reckon with the political, economic, and physical destruction of the Civil War, was a difficult time in Texas, and throughout the country. This era was marked by intense violence and extreme social turmoil, and had lasting implications at the local, state, and federal levels. State and national governments worked to reintegrate Confederate states into the Union, while African Americans navigated the increasingly complicated process of freedom.

Black Codes instated by an all-white state Constitutional Congress in 1866 severely limited black people's rights. These Black Codes included labor, vagrancy, and apprenticeship laws that were meant to mimic the conditions of enslavement. White Texans, reacting to the end of the Civil War, increased violence and attacks against African Americans. The Ku Klux Klan was present in Texas by 1868 and its members intimidated and assaulted freedpeople, usually to reduce black political participation. The Freedman's Bureau, which began in Texas in September 1865, attempted to curb this violence. Its success diminished over time. In addition to protection against white violence, the Freedman's Bureau aimed to assist newly freed African Americans with legal matters, education, and employment.

Newly freed African Americans, most of whom had few resources with which to start their new lives, found themselves increasingly limited by the legacies of enslavement. Many were forced to sign sharecropping contracts with their former owners, while others were incarcerated at rapid rates. Despite these difficulties, African Americans began constructing new forms of family and kinship ties, while making gains in literacy and education

Political Advancement

With the implementation of national Reconstruction, African Americans became more involved in state political processes, and some black men, including G.T. Ruby and Matthew Gaines, served in the Texas Legislature.

Starting with the election of nine African American delegates to a state constitutional convention in 1868, African American men began a brief period of political engagement. George T. Ruby, a former Freedmen's Bureau agent originally from New York, was a particularly prominent black voice in Texas politics, serving in the Texas Legislature from 1870 until 1874. Matthew Gaines, formerly enslaved in Fredericksburg, Texas, was a Baptist minister who served as the Senator from the Sixteenth District in the Texas Legislature during Reconstruction. Both Gaines and Ruby advocated for the rights of freedpeople during their tenures in office, and both were forced to relinquish their seats after Texas Democrats (the party then ruled by former slaveowners) regained political power.

Segregation and Violence

With the end of Reconstruction, segregation and suppression controlled the physical movement, social advancement, and political participation of African Americans in Texas.

Reconstruction in Texas officially ended with the inauguration of Democratic Governor Richard Coke in January 1874, and the brief political engagement of Texas African Americans was severely curtailed until the mid-twentieth century. White Texans utilized violence, intimidation, and legal means to limit black suffrage, and passed a poll tax in 1902 to restrict the political participation of poor people of all races. The most effective means of reducing black political participation, however, was the white primary, which restricted voting in Democratic primary elections to white Texans. Many African Americans challenged the legality of this system, including Lawrence A. Nixon in 1924 and Richard R. Grovey in 1935. Nevertheless, the Texas Democratic Party's use of the white primary persisted until the Supreme Court struck it down in 1944.

Laws requiring segregation of railroad cars, waiting rooms, restrooms, restaurants, entertainment establishments, and residential neighborhoods also restricted African American mobility and advancement during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The Ku Klux Klan, which experienced a national resurgence in the 1920s, enacted violence and terror on Texas African Americans, and lynching became an increasingly prevalent form of racial intimidation. Between 1885 and 1942, there were 468 documented victims of lynching in Texas, the vast majority of whom were African American.

Community and Resistance

While African Americans fought against discrimination and repression, they also organized in their neighborhoods, participated in war efforts, and influenced the larger state of Texas with valuable cultural, political, and economic contributions.

Black people built neighborhoods, participated in churches and organizing efforts, and owned businesses and newspapers, all while living under the shadow of racist violence and oppression. While schools continued to be segregated until later in the 20th century, black Texas educators including Melvin B. Tolson at Wiley College in Marshall and W. Rutherford Banks at Prairie View worked to improve historically black colleges and universities. Mary Branch was appointed president of Tillotson College in Austin, Texas, in 1930, and transformed the college from a struggling junior college for women to a successful four-year college and led the way for the future merger with Samuel Huston College, forming Huston-Tillotson University in 1952.

In addition, African Americans participated in the war efforts of the First and Second World Wars. Black men were called up for enlistment at higher rates than their population percentages, while black women worked in the defense industry and supported troops from home. Doris Miller, born in Willow Grove, Texas, distinguished himself during the Pearl Harbor attack on December 7, 1941, while Leonard Harmon, originally from Cuero, became the first African American to have a warship named after him, for his heroism during the battle of Guadalcanal in 1942. Black men and women also enjoyed more employment options with the desegregation of the defense industry after the enactment of Executive Order 8802 in 1941.

At the same time, the black rural population declined as more African Americans moved to urban areas in Texas. Black people increasingly participated in urban industry, and the number of black professionals rose from around 400 in 1940 to almost 4,000 by 1960. This number continued to increase throughout the twentieth century.

Black musicians and athletes, including Blind Lemon Jefferson and Jack Johnson, achieved national recognition for their contributions to Texas and American culture, while John Biggers, J. Mason Brewer, and many others influenced state and national art and literature. Black Texans continued to work to confront racism and segregation, and laid the groundwork for the progress that would be achieved during the Civil Rights Movement.

The Civil Rights Movement in Texas

African Americans continued to confront racist legislation and legal segregation, organizing in their communities against their continued oppression. The Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act were catalysts for increased black political and social participation in the mid-20th century.

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in Texas, target of racist ire since its formation in the state in 1915, chipped away at legal restrictions on black rights and won important cases in Smith v. Allwright, which declared white primaries unconstitutional in 1944, and Sweatt v. Painter, which desegregated the University of Texas Law School in 1950.

African American women, including Lulu B. White and Juanita Craft, were instrumental in political activism. Lulu B. White was an important organizer and activist in the first half of the 20th century. White became the president of the Houston chapter of the NAACP in 1939, and transformed her chapter into the largest in the South by 1943. She later served as the state director of the NAACP.

Juanita Craft worked with Lulu B. White at the NAACP, and was the first black woman to vote in Dallas in 1944. During her long career in Texas politics, Craft was responsible for the 1955 Dallas Youth Council protest of Negro Achievement Day at the Texas State Fair, and was involved in desegregation efforts at the University of Texas and North Texas State University. Later, she was elected City Councilwoman for the Dallas City Council.

While African American women worked for progress on the state and local levels, federal policies also created opportunities for black Texans. The passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act in 1965 allowed for more black participation in the political process, and helped people achieve more opportunities for advancement in employment, and state and national recognition for contributions to the arts, music, athletics, education, food, politics, science, and business.

The Story Continues

The Story of Texas cannot be told without recognition of 500 years of African American impact and contribution to the state's legacy. African descended people in the state of Texas have encountered incredible difficulty, but have continued to build community and create identity throughout their presence in the state. While Texans continue to work toward equality and justice, African Americans remain an integral part of the larger story of the state of Texas.

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The African American Story | Texas State History Museum

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Skip to main menu Skip to page content Skip to footer People of African descent have been inextricably linked to the history of the land now known as Texas since the earliest days of colonization African American Texans have created culture and community despite being subjected to racism and oppression in the form of enslavement, segregation, and violence, and have improved the state of Texas with valuable cultural and historical contributions.

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dallas youth council protest of negro acheivement day [1955]

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dallas youth council protest of negro acheivement day [1955]

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In 1955, the Texas State Fair in Dallas was segregated, a tradition that dated back to 1889 when planners first set aside a day for African Americans to attend the fair. Then called Colored People's Day, it was discontinued in 1910 and renamed Negro Achievement Day in 1936.

A collaboration between the Negro Chamber of Commerce and the State Fair Board, Negro Achievement Day featured a parade decked out with floats and fair Queens, the presentation of the Most Distinguished Negro Citizen Award, and high school and college football games. The day drew African American visitors from all over the state.

In 1953, the fair announced that African Americans could attend the fair on any day, but could only fully participate in the fair's enjoyments on Negro Achievement Day. Juanita Craft, NAACP Youth Council advisor for the Dallas branch, spearheaded a movement to end discrimination at the fair so that any person of any race could participate on any day they chose. Craft and members of the Youth Council decided to stage a boycott of the fair to draw attention to discriminatory practices. Teenagers, equipped with signs proclaiming "TODAY IS NEGRO APPEASEMENT DAY AT THE FAIR," picketed the parade that began at the local black high school. In an interview given in 1974, Craft remembered, "Those kids went to the starting point at Lincoln High School and boarded the floats right along with the queens and everybody else and rode down the streets saying, 'Stay out. Don't sell your pride for a segregated ride.' The kids were on top of people's houses along the route of the parade with megaphones telling about the segregated policy out there and to stay out."

When the parade reached the picket line at the entrance of the fair, participants turned and refused to enter. The picket line lasted throughout the day and into the night. While the Youth Council did not succeed in ending Negro Achievement Day, they were able to draw attention to the discrimination African Americans faced. The Youth Council was given an award by the NAACP for their well organized and peaceful demonstration. In later years, adults took over picketing the fair. Achievement Day (fair planners dropped the "Negro" in 1957) officially ended in 1961, followed by the full desegregation of the fair later in the '60s.

The boycott, and the majority of other civil rights activity in Dallas, was captured on film by photographer R. C. Hickman. Born in the East Texas town of Mineloa in 1922, Hickman moved to Dallas with his family in the 1930s. After attending Tillotson College in Austin, he served as an Army photographer in World War II, then returned to Dallas to work as a photographer for the Dallas Star Post. As the unofficial photographer of the African American community in Dallas in the 1950s, he captured pivotal moments in the city's civil rights history, including visits by Martin Luther King Jr. and Thurgood Marshall.

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NAACP Picket the Texas State Fair in 1955

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In 1955, members of the NAACP Youth Council formed a picket line to protest segregation at the Texas State Fair in Dallas.

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George N. Green General Entry

Though the Mansfield school district, seventeen miles southeast of Fort Worth, numbered fewer than 700 Whites and sixty Blacks in 1956, it segregated Black children to an inferior elementary school. Black teenagers were obliged to ride public buses, which dropped them twenty blocks from a school in Fort Worth. In response to a suit brought by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People on behalf of three Black high school students, the Mansfield school district was the first in the state ordered by a federal court to desegregate. The school board acquiesced, but White citizens resisted, aided by the complicity of the mayor and chief of police. While some 100 other, mostly West Texas, school districts desegregated quietly that fall, angry mobs of 300 to 400 Whites ringed Mansfield High School on August 30 and 31, preventing the enrollment of the three students. During demonstrations Whites hanged three Blacks in effigy, roughed up several outside observers, and threatened the sheriff. Downtown stores closed in a show of support. Vigilantes met all cars entering town, barring suspected sympathizers with integration. Governor Allan Shivers, calling the Mansfield demonstration an orderly protest, defied the federal court order by dispatching Texas Rangers to uphold segregation and authorizing the Mansfield school board to transfer Black students to Fort Worth. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, in the midst of a reelection campaign, did not intervene.

The demonstrations ended as the status quo was restored. The Mansfield uprising was the nation's first clear example of failure to enforce a federal court order for the desegregation of a public school. The Eisenhower administration took no action until the next year, when a similar, more visible situation arose in Little Rock, Arkansas, where Governor Orval Faubus's resistance to integration was possibly inspired by Governor Shivers's success in Mansfield. The Mansfield uprising was an apparent factor in the passage of the state's 1957 segregation laws, which delayed integration for several years. In 1965, faced with the loss of federal funds, the Mansfield school district quietly desegregated.

George N. Green, The Establishment in Texas Politics (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood, 1979). Texas Observer, September 5, 1956, June 9, 1978.

Categories:

Education

Infamous Moments, Groups, and Events

Law, Law Enforcement, and Outlaws

Vigilante Activity/Mob Violence

Peoples

African Americans

Activism and Social Reform

Civil Rights, Segregation, and Slavery

Places:

Dallas/Fort Worth Region

North Texas

The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this entry.

George N. Green, "Mansfield School Desegregation Incident," Handbook of Texas Online, accessed March 02, 2021, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/mansfield-school-desegregation-incident.

Published by the Texas State Historical Association.

This entry belongs to the following Handbook Special Projects:

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George N. Green General Entry Though the Mansfield school district, seventeen miles southeast of Fort Worth, numbered fewer than 700 Whites and sixty Blacks in 1956, it segregated Black children to an inferior elementary school. Black teenagers were obliged to ride public buses, which dropped them twenty blocks from a school in Fort Worth.

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Our Black History Month celebration on the men and women that have and continue to shape the world of sports returns - we'll be posting a few times each week, including this evening where we are honoring the Texas Western Miners men's basketball team, which captured 1966 NCAA D-I Championship.

The Miners were a team many of us learned about in the 2006 movie - coach Don Haskins started five African American players, who led the squad to an exciting (and very impressive!) 72-65 victory over the University of Kentucky.

The Wildcats entered the final contest of the 1965-66 school year as the favorite.

Let's learn a bit more about the Miners, who represented Texas Western College, which is now the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP).

Getting to know the Texas Western Miners:

Coached by Don Haskins, who was inducted into both the Basketball Hall of Fame and College Basketball Hall of Fame, led the Miners to their first and only championship with an upset win over Kentucky.

Texas Western started five African American players against a Kentucky program that did not integrate until the 1970-71 season. Tom Payne became the first African American to compete for coach Adolph Rupp. Payne would play just one season for the Blue and White before turning pro one year later where he spent one season with the Atlanta Hawks.

Prior to their 1966 NCAA Championship, the Miners made back-to-back appearances in the national postseason in 1963 and 1964. In 1964, they advanced to the the Sweet Sixteen, but lost to Kansas State. They did win, however, the Regional third place game against Creighton.

The Miners posted a 28-1 record during the 1965-66 season. Their only loss occurred at the end of the regular season against Seattle.

Following their end of season setback to the Red Hawks, Texas Western rattled off five-straight wins, including a pair of overtime victories against Cincinnati and Kansas. Their win over the Jayhawks - an 81-80 victory in double-overtime - secured Texas Western a spot in the national semifinals against Utah.

The 1965-66 Texas Western Miners squad featured seven African American student-athletes: Bobby Joe Hill, Orsten Artis, Willie Worsley, Willie Cager, Nevil Shed, Harry Flournoy, and David Lattin.

As many historians and sports writers noted, the Texas Western victory over Kentucky opened the door for even more African American student-athletes to play sports at the collegiate level, not just basketball, but also football, track, baseball, and others, according to Dan Wetzel.

Articles and Links on the 1966 Texas Western Miners:

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Noontime's Black History Month: The 1966 Texas Western Miners

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Our Black History Month celebration on the men and women that have and continue to shape the world of sports returns - we'll be posting a few times each week, including this evening where we are honoring the Texas Western Miners men's basketball team, which captured 1966 NCAA D-I Championship.

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election of barbra jordan to texas state senate [1967]and house of representatives [1973]

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election of barbra jordan to texas state senate [1967]and house of representatives [1973]

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texas legislative black cauces formed [1973]

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texas legislative black cauces formed [1973]

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The Texas Legislative Black Caucus was formed in 1973 and consisted of eight members. These founding members were: Rep. Anthony Hall (Houston), Rep. Mickey Leland (Houston), Rep. Senfronia Thompson (Houston), Rep. Craig Washington (Houston), Rep. Sam Hudson (Dallas), Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (Dallas), Rep. Paul Ragsdale (Dallas), and Rep. G.J. Sutton (San Antonio). The TxLBC is currently composed of 17 Members of the Texas House of Representatives and two Senators of the Texas Senate committed to addressing the issues African Americans face across the State of Texas. Rep. Nicole Collier (Fort Worth) currently serves as Chair of TxLBC for the 87th Texas Legislative Session.

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The Texas Legislative Black Caucus was formed in 1973 and consisted of eight members. These founding members were: Rep. Anthony Hall (Houston), Rep. Mickey Leland (Houston), Rep. Senfronia Thompson (Houston), Rep. Craig Washington (Houston), Rep. Sam Hudson (Dallas), Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (Dallas), Rep. Paul Ragsdale (Dallas), and Rep. G.J.