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In the Story, the Nickel Boys our 3 main Topics were a huge part of this story. Our 3 main topics were Racial Tension after Brown v. Board of Education (green), Brown vs Board of Education(Blue), and The Little Rock 9 (Pink). In our Padlet, we organized our topics by color as you can see. We have written out the information we have found on each topic that we have then compared to the book.

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Racial Tension after Brown v. Board of Education. 

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Racial Tension after Brown v. Board of Education. 

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Colson Whitehead's novel The Nickel Boys is the journey of two fictional young black men, Elwood, and Turner, who try to live in a racially segregated reform school in the 1960s. Whitehead’s novel is historical fiction, so it is valuable to understand the atmosphere of the time to evaluate the authenticity of the characters. The book is based on the Florida Dozier School for boys, where over 50 bodies were discovered in an unmarked graveyard. The eyewitness account of those who lived through the nightmare shows the racial equality and violence that existed after the Brown vs the Board of Education decision deemed racial segregation unconstitutional. The ideology of the time was more powerful than the court decision. The associated press reporter Brendon Farrington’s article, "Men Relive Reform School Horrors as Florida Prepares Apology” offers accounts from those who lived the racial tension and abuse. Men like 70-year-old Richard Huntly, who at the age of 11, ended up in the Dozier reform school for not going to school. Huntly, just like Elwood, was beaten in the White House. His offense was talking to a white student. Although the characters are fictional, the historical aspect of the story is factual. Whitehead uses a collective voice to create characters who represent young black men during a period of racial discrimination in hopes of creating awareness.

Farrington, Brendan. "Men Relive Reform School Horrors as Florida Prepares Apology.” Yahoo! News, Yahoo!, https://news.yahoo.com/men-relive-reform-school-horrors-florida-prepares-apology-101256502.html.

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Marshall, Thurgood, and Ruby Bridges. “Brown v. Board at Fifty: ‘with an Even Hand‘Exhibition Home.” Library of Congress, 13 Nov. 2004, https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/brown/.

Tushnet, Mark. “The Significance of Brown v. Board of Education.” Virginia Law Review, vol. 80, no. 1, Virginia Law Review, 1994, pp. 173–84, https://doi.org/10.2307/1073595.

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Kamal

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Brown v. Board of Education in PBS' The Supreme Court

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The article “Brown Vs. Board of Education Re-enactment” describes When the cases came before the Supreme Court in 1952, There were five separate cases heard by the U.S. Supreme court. The court combined all five cases under the name of “Brown v. Board of Education.” “These cases were Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Briggs v. Elliot, Davis v. Board of Education of Prince Edward County (VA), Bolling v. Sharpe, and Gebhart v. Ethel.” The article has written that “each case is different, the main issue in each was the constitutionally of state-sponsored segregation in public schools.” These cases were handled by the Thurgood Marshal and the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. Marshal confidently stated the case before the Court and also “raised a variety of legal issues on appeal, the most common one was that separate school system for blacks and whites were fundamentally unequal and therefore violate the ”equal protection clause” of the fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution”.

“History - Brown v. Board of Education Re-Enactment.” United States Courts, https://www.uscourts.gov/educational-resources/educational-activities/history-brown-v-board-education-re-enactment.

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The article, Brown V. Board of Education, describes racial segregation in the educational system in the 1950s was challenged by a father, Oliver Brown. He filed a lawsuit in 1951 against the board of education when his daughter, Linda Brown, was denied access to all-white elementary schools in Topeka, Kansas. This was a groundbreaking case where segregation was ruled unconstitutional. The case was instrumental in the social rights movement. The belief that “separate but equal” was deemed not a representation of equality. The case provides historical evidence seen in the book, The Nickel Boys. Author Colson Whitehead tells the story of two young men lost in a racially unjust system. The main characters Elwood and Turner, are thrown into a racially segregated school and treated unfairly because of the color of their skin. In chapter six, Elwood tries to help a young man but instead ends up whipped. However, he was taken to the White House, a place where only black students were brutally beaten by a strap (68-69). Understanding Brown vs The Board of Education gives Whitehead’s book historical credibility by showing the lack of equality for black students in the 1950s and 1960s.

History.com Editors. “Brown v. Board of Education.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 27 Oct. 2009, https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/brown-v-board-of-education-of-topeka.

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Racial tension after Brown v. Board of Education

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Racial tension after Brown v. Board of Education

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The article, "The Troubled History of American Education after the Brown Decision,” elaborates on the opinions and bias in the 1960s over the decision to segregate schools. The article discusses racial tension after the Brown v. the Board of education ruling that declared that “separate but equal” was unconstitutional. According to the article, several black leaders thought that civil rights leader Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP should instead sue for equity for black schools. The decision created an uproar among Southerners who fought to maintain white supremacy at any cost. The tension was severe enough that President Eisenhower called for military action to protect the Little Rock Nine (black students) as they integrated into a white high school from the angry mobs and threats from the government. The racial divide is prominent in Colson Whitehead's historical fiction novel, The Nickle Boys. A clear understanding of the time and racial tension in the 1960s helps readers fully grasp the characters' struggles. The book does an excellent job of showing the racial tension over race and education and the reality that most young black men endured in the 1960s.

“The Troubled History of American Education after the Brown Decision.” The Troubled History of American Education after the Brown Decision | The American Historian, https://www.oah.org/tah/issues/2017/february/the-troubled-history-of-american-education-after-the-brown-decision/.

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The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine black students who enrolled at formerly all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, in September 1957. Their attendance at the school was a test of Brown v. Board of Education, a landmark 1954 Supreme Court ruling that declared segregation in public schools unconstitutional. Until the court’s decision, many states across the nation had mandatory segregation laws, or Jim Crow laws, requiring African American and white children to attend separate schools. When Elwood goes to Nickel Academy he is taken there handcuffed with 2 other white boys. He is then assigned to Cleavland dormitory on the black student's campus. Every year at Nickel there is a student boxing match between the best black boxer and the best white boxer. Comparing the book to little rock 9, little rock 9 declared that both white and black people should have the right on being able to go to school together. However, in this story, they kept the white from black apart from each other unless it was for the entertainment of hurting each other and competition between races.https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/central-high-school-integration