Media coverage of a violent attack against integrationists forced reevaluation of segregation
Pollitt discusses two incidents of fierce support of segregated public facilities. The depiction in the press of an elderly priest's arrest began to make Chapel Hill residents question Jim Crow accommodations.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Daniel H. Pollitt, November 19, 1990. Interview L-0048. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- DANIEL H. POLLITT:
-
...But the way that it happened
was that there was a speaker invited down to the Y, by the Y, from the
"Village Voice". That's Anne Queen reaching
out for new experiences and new voices. So she invited somebody from the
Village Voice and David Dansby was a law student who was the first
black, I think, to graduate from the undergraduate school and the law
school, and a professional school. And it was still very rare. I think
we had maybe three or four blacks in the entire law school and he was
one of them. But David Dansby was the host with somebody else. They had
called what was then "The Pines" restaurant, and said,
"We're going to come for dinner
afterwards," and the guy said, "Fine. Table for
five," or something like that. They showed
up with a guest, the "The Village Voice" speaker,
and two or three other whites and David Dansby. So, they said,
"We cannot serve you." And they said, "I
called you and made arrangements." "Well, we
can't serve you." And so, they wouldn't
leave and they were arrested. That was the first arrest. And it was dumb
to arrest somebody from the "Village Voice" because he
probably went back to New York and wrote it all up. "What kind
of a town is this?" You know. But then, two nights later,
there's another group that decides to go down to
"The Pines" and seek service and integrate it. And one
was Father Parker. Father Parker was a retired Episcopalian priest who
was well into his eighties. He wore the clerical collar and the black
vest and he had snow white hair and he looked like a saint. He was tall
and sort of gaunt. He went with the next group, the second group, to
"The Pines" and there were maybe four or five and I
forget who the others were. But they told them to leave, and they
wouldn't leave and they called the cops and told them they
were trespassing. At that time, the policy was to go limp, just go limp,
and then the police would carry you out and put you in the car and you
would be charged with resisting arrest for going limp and for
trespassing. The bail was $150 for each and so there was a
problem of raising bail money. We didn't like people to get
arrested unless they had the bail money with them. But Father Parker
went limp and somehow he lost his hat in the melee, so the front page
story had a picture of Father Parker being carried out. Then the caption
was "Father Parker Loses Hat," or something. Well,
about fifty people sent him hats.
- CINDY CHEATHAM:
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Was this on the "Chapel Hill Weekly"?
- DANIEL H. POLLITT:
-
Yes. So that got a lot of publicity going. And if Father Parker is going
to lay his body on the line, you know, at his age, why
shouldn't the rest of us? So, that started the tumultuous
period. There were letters to the newspaper every day pro and con. There
was a big debate going on everywhere. Every night there'd be
a sit-in somewhere. And this time, it was done by the college students,
all of whom had been active in the Y.