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Oral History Interview with Glennon Threatt, June 16, 2005. Interview U-0023. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007).
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  • Abstract
    Glennon Threatt describes his experiences with racial segregation in his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. Threatt, a lawyer in Birmingham, was one of three gifted African American students who integrated an all-white elementary school gifted class. His presence at the school both helped propel him to academic success and made him a double target for violence and intimidation. Threatt left Alabama to attend Princeton, leaving behind a city where residential and school desegregation seemed to nurture, rather than erode, racism. When he returned to Birmingham twenty years later, he found African Americans in leadership positions, but also golf courses that continued to refuse them membership. Researchers interested in the Birmingham experience with segregation, one African American's experience with racial discrimination and violence, and reflections on the life of racism in America will find this interview very useful.
    Excerpts
  • Desegregating a gifted education class
  • Desegregation hurts educational opportunities for blacks
  • Life in segregated Birmingham
  • Desegregation roils Birmingham
  • Poor whites end up at desegregated schools, sparking tensions, but many whites support movement
  • Boycotts drive desegregation
  • Violent response to civil rights movement
  • Law versus custom in South and North; economic ramifications of protest
  • Desegregation hurts community coherence
  • Various forms of white resistance to civil rights
  • Endurance of white power structure in Birmingham
  • Legacy of racism in Birmingham
  • Integrating Indian Springs High School
  • Socioeconomic dimensions of desegregation's legacy
  • Continuing taboo on interracial romance
  • Persistence of community segregation
  • Convoluted idea of race
  • Learn More
  • Finding aid to the Southern Oral History Program Collection
  • Database of all Southern Oral History Program Collection interviews
  • Subjects
  • School integration--Alabama--Birmingham.
  • Interracial dating.
  • Civil rights--Alabama--Birmingham.
  • Gifted children--Education.
  • The Southern Oral History Program transcripts presented here on Documenting the American South undergo an editorial process to remove transcription errors. Texts may differ from the original transcripts held by the Southern Historical Collection.

    Funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this title.