It was the dawn of the civil rights era. The U.S. Supreme Court had outlawed public school segregation, sparking hope across a divided nation that black children would finally have the same chance as white children to get an education.
As many in South Carolina rallied against integration, that promise dimmed.
Except at one school in Rock Hill.
In 1954, the same year the Supreme Court ruled that separating students by race was unconstitutional, St. Anne's Parochial School became the state's first school to allow black students to attend with whites.
The school of some 30 students, housed in St. Anne's Catholic Church rectory off Saluda Street, opened its doors to five black children from the predominantly black St. Mary's Church nearby.
It was a step nearly a decade ahead of the rest of the state.
South Carolina on Monday will honor the school, now St. Anne Catholic School located off Bird Street, by unveiling a historical marker at its old home off South Jones Avenue.
Former students and teachers, several of whom plan to attend the ceremony, said life inside the school at the time was a world apart from the racial tension coursing through the city.
“When I think about Rock Hill, I feel overwhelmingly blessed to have been a part of that scene,” said Sister Marie Magdalena, who taught at the school from 1958 until 1965 and is now in Pennsylvania. “It was a great experience because those little white kids and black kids played well together. They didn't even seem to notice the color.”
The focus was on running the school, said the Rev. William Pentis, one of four faculty members teaching eight grades in 1960.
“I remember being totally exhausted,” he said. “There was not time to think about what people were thinking and not thinking. The world was much more crazy outside.”
James White was one of the five black students who enrolled at St. Anne's in 1954. He was a second-grader.
“As children we didn't realize the impact of it all,” said White, who was born in Rock Hill and attended public school prior to attending St. Anne's. “We were excited (about going to a new school). We felt a little special.”
Faculty and classmates treated everyone equally, he said.
“Basically, we were insulated.”
But stepping outside was a harsh reminder of the world around them.
White recalled a class trip to a circus where the group was forced to separate. “Four or five of us had to sit in the colored section,” he said.
Some mornings while students stood outside reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, people driving by screamed the N-word and other racial slurs.
Families opposed to integration withdrew their children from the school. Others who stayed received threats.
“My parents had friends who wouldn't socialize with them,” said Joan Waks, a white student who enrolled in 1952 as a third-grader and was later part of the first graduating class.
Police urged church van drivers who took the black students to and from school every day to change routes often to avoid an ambush.
In 1957, at the school's new building off South Jones Avenue, a cross was burned on the front lawn.
“Back then, Rock Hill was a divided city,” said Brother David Boone, a member of The Oratory in Rock Hill who has fought for civil rights for decades. “The blacks lived on one side of the railroad tracks and whites lived on the other. They just didn't mix.”
Eye-opening experience
The Charleston Diocese created St. Anne's Parish in 1919 for 20 Catholics living in Rock Hill, said Michael Scoggins, a historian with the York County Culture and Heritage Museums. The next year, the parish built York County's first Catholic church, also called St. Anne's. The parish in 1946 built St. Mary's Church off Crawford Street for black Catholics.
St. Anne's Parochial School opened in 1951 with 17 students in kindergarten and first grade and kept adding grades and students in the following years.
The school integrated quietly.
“They made no announcements,” Boone said. “People didn't know anything about it until they saw the kids playing together on the playground.”
By 1961, 15 black students were enrolled.
State archives show that the second school to integrate, an elementary at Fort Jackson in Columbia, didn't do so until 1963, Scoggins said. Public schools in York County didn't start integrating until 1964.
In 1958, three nuns, including Sister Magdalena and Sister Mary Louise Gallagher, from the Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, came from Pennsylvania to teach at St. Anne's School.
“I had heard stories about the South, but never experienced it,” said Magdalena, 25 at the time. “I remember getting off the train and being surprised at the water fountains. They were separated for whites only and blacks only. Even that whole idea that you had a white parish and a black parish was new to me.
“Philadelphia had its problems too, but it was the people who were prejudiced, not the laws.”
The experience was eye-opening, said Gallagher, 29 at the time.
“Anything you saw in the movies, that's what we experienced,” she said. “It was a shock.”
But “those days were very, very happy days,” she said. “We were one big happy church family.”
Those early days shaped lives.
“It left me scarred,” Waks said. “Just the knowledge that people hate you for what you are. They hated us for going to school with black people. And they hated black people for being black. It took me until I was an adult to really fully comprehend the significance of what I was part of.”
In a recent letter to the school, Waks, now an attorney in New Jersey, wrote:
“I can honestly say that my experiences at St. Anne's made me who I am today. People sometimes wonder why I have such a deep sense of social justice. Then I tell them about my time at St. Anne's and what the first students witnessed and endured, and how our parents were ostracized by some in the community because of their willingness to be a part of something so right but truly controversial in a small Southern town.”
White, now a monsignor in the Blessed Sacrament Parish in Bronx, New York, was equally affected.
“It gave me a real understanding of race relations,” he said. “It made me the person I am. It helped me understand other people. That probably influenced my decision (to become a monsignor) a lot, that people considered us real human beings.”
“Now thinking back, you say, ‘Wow, did that really happen?'”
Want to go?
St. Anne Catholic School will be commemorated with a South Carolina state historical marker during a ceremony at 11 a.m. Monday at the school's previous location, 648 S. Jones Ave., Rock Hill.
Students will sing the Lord's Prayer and other selections. Rock Hill Mayor Doug Echols, York County Council Chairman Buddy Motz, Father William Pentis and Brother David Boone will speak.
A reception with light refreshments will follow the unveiling of the historical marker.
The St. Anne's Parochial School Historical Marker was erected by the Culture & Heritage Museums of York County, St. Anne School and The Hands of Mercy.
For more information, call 803-329-2121 or visit www.chmuseums.org.
Shawn Cetrone 803-329-4072
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