Speaker 1: Coming up on the A Building, HBCUs tended to focus
Speaker 1: as much on moral uplifts. These schools were havens of
Speaker 1: black political conservatism, even as there, of course was a
Speaker 1: legacy of black radicalism.
Speaker 2: And that was part of the reason that I got
Speaker 2: expelled from school my junior year, because when we locked
Speaker 2: up the board of trustees in that building.
Speaker 3: Wait a minute, The A Building, Episode six, The Aftermath.
Speaker 4: The Maroon Tiger is the official student newspaper Morehouse College,
Speaker 4: an HBCU in Atlanta, Georgia. It has served as a
Speaker 4: platform for student journalism, activism, and intellectual discourse for decades.
Speaker 5: The publication dates back to the early twentieth century, evolving
Speaker 5: over the years into a respected source of news, opinions,
Speaker 5: and cultural commentary. It has played a key role in
Speaker 5: shaping student perspectives on social justice, politics, and the black
Speaker 5: experience in America. Many notable Morehouse alumni have contributed to
Speaker 5: or been influenced by the paper.
Speaker 4: Initially founded in eighteen ninety eight as The Athenium, the
Speaker 4: publication served both Morehouse College and Spelman Seminary. By the
Speaker 4: nineteen twenties, it was a joint venture edited by students
Speaker 4: from both institutions. In nineteen twenty five, Morehouse students rebranded
Speaker 4: the newspaper as The Maroon Tiger, focusing more closely on
Speaker 4: the Moorhouse community. In nineteen forty seven, a young undergrad
Speaker 4: Gate wrote a piece for The Maroon Tiger that would
Speaker 4: go far beyond the walls Moorehouse College. The article was
Speaker 4: called The Purpose of Education. The author Martin Luther King Jimior.
Speaker 6: As I engage in the so called bull sessions around
Speaker 6: and about the school, I too often find that most
Speaker 6: college men have a misconception of the purpose of education.
Speaker 6: Most of the brethren think that education should equip them
Speaker 6: with the proper instruments of exploitation, so that they can
Speaker 6: forever trample over the masses. Still others think that education
Speaker 6: should furnish them with noble ends rather than means to
Speaker 6: an end. It seems to me that education has a
Speaker 6: twofold function to perform in the life of a man
Speaker 6: and in society. One is utility and the other is culture.
Speaker 6: Education must enable a man to become more efficient, to achieve,
Speaker 6: with increasing facility, the legitimate goals of his life.
Speaker 4: Here, at only eighteen years old, doctor King speaks with
Speaker 4: the wisdom of a man much older, he speaks about
Speaker 4: the global advantage of education. He wanted Black Americas to
Speaker 4: think about the college experience far beyond the benefits of
Speaker 4: money or prestige.
Speaker 5: Doctor King, even as a college freshman, understood the value
Speaker 5: of knowledge. His article would continue.
Speaker 6: Education must also train one for quick, resolute and effective thinking.
Speaker 6: To think incisively and to think for oneself is very difficult.
Speaker 6: We are prone to let our mental life become invaded
Speaker 6: by legions of half truths, prejudices, and propaganda. At this point,
Speaker 6: I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose.
Speaker 6: A great majority of the so called educated people do
Speaker 6: not think logically and scientifically. Even the press, the classroom,
Speaker 6: the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not
Speaker 6: give us objective and unbiased truths. To save man from
Speaker 6: the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of
Speaker 6: the cheap aims of education. Education must enable one to
Speaker 6: sift in weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false,
Speaker 6: the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction.
Speaker 6: The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to
Speaker 6: think intensively and to think critically. That education, which stops
Speaker 6: with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society. The
Speaker 6: most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason
Speaker 6: but with no morals.
Speaker 4: The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with
Speaker 4: reason but with no morals. We hear echoes of these
Speaker 4: words in the letter from a Birmingham jail, and that
Speaker 4: I have a dreamed speech at the March on Washington
Speaker 4: just sixteen years later, Doctor King was speaking about the
Speaker 4: power of education. Doctor King was a Morehouse man. Here's
Speaker 4: more from doctor Lomax, president and CEO of the United
Speaker 4: Ingo College Fund and former president of Dullard University.
Speaker 7: I watched my grandson go from the sidelines of observer
Speaker 7: in his early career at Morehouse to full embrace of
Speaker 7: the notion that he was on a journey to become
Speaker 7: a more house man. And you know, when he had
Speaker 7: that mantle placed on him, he was not going to
Speaker 7: do anything, nor were his classmates going to do anything
Speaker 7: to diminish the power and significance of that moment. One
Speaker 7: of the things that I think is so powerful about
Speaker 7: Black colleges is, yes, they are places where you get
Speaker 7: certifications and credentials and you get a diploma, but what
Speaker 7: you also do is you you begin to understand what
Speaker 7: is your place in the world, and your place in
Speaker 7: the world is in many ways defined by that institution
Speaker 7: that is giving you those certifications and diplomas. So it's
Speaker 7: a richer and fuller experience than I think some people
Speaker 7: have who just think of college as a place where.
Speaker 5: You get the approval that will get you a job someplace.
Speaker 7: This is this is really education for life and for
Speaker 7: how you live your life, and not just education for
Speaker 7: a career.
Speaker 5: However, after the locke in the punishments came down hard
Speaker 5: and swift. Several students were expelled or placed on probation.
Speaker 5: Many of the seniors who participated that day were not
Speaker 5: allowed to participate in commencement ceremonies. The idea of resistance
Speaker 5: that was so important to being a morehouseman was suddenly
Speaker 5: weaponized against the students.
Speaker 4: To be young, gifted, and black in the late sixties
Speaker 4: carried a certain responsibility. If you were fortunate enough to
Speaker 4: go to a school at Morehouse, expectations were high, and
Speaker 4: the expectations were high from your family, The expectations were
Speaker 4: high from your community. Therefore, the idea of using an
Speaker 4: opportunity for resistance was downright and practical. So the irony
Speaker 4: of receiving an education of resistance while being taught to
Speaker 4: conform at the same time was truly at the heart
Speaker 4: of this lock in. Two worlds, A generation and pedagogy
Speaker 4: were colliding.
Speaker 5: Leading up to the lock in in nineteen sixty eight,
Speaker 5: the articles of the Maroon's Tiger grew angrier and more militant.
Speaker 5: For lack of a better word, the student population was
Speaker 5: frustrated with the middle of the world political stance of
Speaker 5: Morehouse College. They want to be at the center of
Speaker 5: the black intellectual landscape. This was the perfect opportunity for
Speaker 5: morehousemen to step forward. They did so and were punished
Speaker 5: for it.
Speaker 4: King's words on education connecting multi generation on diaspora through
Speaker 4: the Black experience in America. Education historically has been directly
Speaker 4: connected to the most brutal forms of institutionalized racism. During slavery,
Speaker 4: it was a capital offense for a slave to know
Speaker 4: how to read.
Speaker 5: The gift of reading was far too powerful for anyone
Speaker 5: whose sole purpose was servitude. Abolitionist Frederick Douglas connected his
Speaker 5: freedom to his mental liberation far before his physical liberation.
Speaker 5: Douglas writes in his groundbreaking autobiography narrative of the life
Speaker 5: of Frederick Douglas, an American slave, written by himself. It
Speaker 5: was critical for the publisher to highlight that Douglas wrote
Speaker 5: the book himself, as most slave narratives were dictated to
Speaker 5: white authors.
Speaker 8: The more I.
Speaker 6: Read, the more I was led to abhor and detest
Speaker 6: my enslavers. I could regard them and no other life
Speaker 6: than a band of successful robbers who left their homes
Speaker 6: and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes,
Speaker 6: and in a strange land, reduced us to slavery. I
Speaker 6: loathed them as being the meanest as well as the
Speaker 6: most wicked of men. That this very discontentment which Master
Speaker 6: Hugh had predicted would follow my learning to read, had
Speaker 6: already come to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish.
Speaker 6: As I writhed under it, I would at times feel
Speaker 6: that learning to read had been a curse rather than
Speaker 6: a blessing. It had given me a view of my
Speaker 6: wretched condition without the remedy. It opened my eyes to
Speaker 6: the horrible pit, but to no latter upon which to
Speaker 6: get out. In moments of agony, I envied my fellow
Speaker 6: slaves for their stupidity. I have often wished myself a beast.
Speaker 6: I preferred the condition of the meanest reptile to my
Speaker 6: own anything, no matter what, to get rid of thinking.
Speaker 6: It was this everlasting thinking of my condition that tormented me.
Speaker 6: There was no getting rid of it. It was pressed
Speaker 6: upon me by every object within sight or hearing, animate
Speaker 6: or inanimate. The silver trump of freedom had roused my
Speaker 6: soul to eternal wakefulness. Freedom now appeared to disappear no
Speaker 6: more forever. It was heard in every sound and seen
Speaker 6: in everything. It was ever present to torment me with
Speaker 6: a sense of wretched condition. I saw nothing without seeing it,
Speaker 6: I heard nothing without hearing it, and felt nothing without
Speaker 6: feeling it. It looked from every star, it smiled in
Speaker 6: every calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in every storm.
Speaker 4: For Frederick Douglas, reading would provide him with the tools
Speaker 4: to understand the true evil of slavery. An effective slave
Speaker 4: has no critical thinking skills, no basis to understand the
Speaker 4: depth of the evil. King starts on education echo this idea.
Speaker 4: For racism to truly take an effective shape, the disenfranchised
Speaker 4: must feel like they deserve it. These ideas were beaten
Speaker 4: into American slaves.
Speaker 5: Education is the first step in any resistance movement. Douglas continues, I.
Speaker 6: Have often been utterly astonished since I came to the
Speaker 6: North to find persons who could speak of singing among
Speaker 6: slaves as evidence of their contentment and happiness. It is
Speaker 6: impossible to conceive of a greater mistake. Slaves sing most
Speaker 6: when they are most unhappy. The songs of the slave
Speaker 6: represent the sorrows of his heart, and he is relieved
Speaker 6: by them only as an aching heart is relieved by
Speaker 6: its tears. At least, such as my experience, I have
Speaker 6: often sung to drown my sorrow, but seldom to express
Speaker 6: my happiness. Crying for joy and singing for joy were
Speaker 6: alike uncommon to me. While in the jaws of slavery,
Speaker 6: the singing of a man cast away upon a desolate
Speaker 6: island might be as appropriately considered as evidence of contentment
Speaker 6: and happiness as the singing of a slave. The songs
Speaker 6: of the one and of the other are prompted by
Speaker 6: the same emotion.
Speaker 5: Welcome back to the a building.
Speaker 4: The oral tradition of education of blackness runs a generational
Speaker 4: line of progress. This progress requires forward motion and history.
Speaker 5: Lessons on inside the Actors Studio. Morehouse alum Samuel L.
Speaker 5: Jackson talks about his educational path to Morehouse.
Speaker 4: What high school did you go to? Riverside High?
Speaker 2: It was a very nurturing kind of school.
Speaker 4: We had minor violence. Where did you decide to go
Speaker 4: to college? I ended up at Morehouse College. What was
Speaker 4: your major?
Speaker 2: I went to school as a marine biology major.
Speaker 4: And did you change your major?
Speaker 2: I was taking a public speaking class and Mr Guthrie
Speaker 2: or Doctor Guthrie, was doing a production of Three Penny
Speaker 2: Opera and didn't have enough guys the audition, and he
Speaker 2: offered us extra credit for doing the play. And I
Speaker 2: went to the audition that night and they were doing
Speaker 2: a photo session that night and all these girls sitting
Speaker 2: around in like garter belts and and bustier's and I
Speaker 2: was like, this is not gonna this is all right.
Speaker 4: Yeah. During this conversation, he speaks about the disconnect between
Speaker 4: the educated classes was in the black community in a
Speaker 4: way that only Sam Jackson can well.
Speaker 2: Morehouses sort of an elitist school in a way. The
Speaker 2: first thing I did when I got there, as soon
Speaker 2: as my mom dropped me off and left, I saw
Speaker 2: a basketball court. When I was on my way down
Speaker 2: to the campus. I actually went up the street and
Speaker 2: used my fake ID. I bought a quarter beer. I
Speaker 2: went over to the basketball court and I started playing
Speaker 2: ball with these guys. And I played ball with him,
Speaker 2: and I hung out with him and robbed Morehouse students
Speaker 2: with him for about two semesters. And that was part
Speaker 2: of the reason that I got expelled from school my
Speaker 2: junior year, because when we locked up the board of
Speaker 2: trustees in that building, wait a minute.
Speaker 4: Like many African Americans with the opportunity to attend college,
Speaker 4: Sam felt conflicted or perhaps isolated by the large institutional
Speaker 4: walls of higher education. As a young man, he felt
Speaker 4: more comfortable in the local barbershops than the Atlanta projects.
Speaker 4: This was an easier transition than the educational expectations of Morehouse.
Speaker 5: The tension can be traced to the growing educated class
Speaker 5: in the black community and the enhanced poverty in urban
Speaker 5: centers around the country. These cities would burn to the
Speaker 5: ground after the death of Martin Luther King junior. We
Speaker 5: would see similar unrest after the murder of George Floyd
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty.
Speaker 4: Before writing his best selling book How to Be an
Speaker 4: Anti Racist Doctor, Ebram x Kindy spoke about campus activism
Speaker 4: on black campuses in the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 1: At historically white colleges before the Black Campus movement, practically
Speaker 1: all of the professors, administrators, and staff were white. The
Speaker 1: coursework covered Europeans and white Americans, and racist traditions were
Speaker 1: innumerable across the nation. At black colleges or HBCUs, even
Speaker 1: though practically all of the students were black, these schools
Speaker 1: encouraged their students through their curricula, policies, and programs to
Speaker 1: assimilate or accommodate to the politics, culture, and values of
Speaker 1: white America. Until the nineteen twenties, most of the HBCU
Speaker 1: presidents were white. Until the nineteen sixties, most of the
Speaker 1: trustees at black colleges were white. Black cultural and political
Speaker 1: nationalism was usually sunned and habitually dumped on the edges
Speaker 1: of these campuses. They were rarely courses on the black experience.
Speaker 1: As I stated earlier, the administrative paternalism toward the students
Speaker 1: was overwhelming and intoxicating. Non academic rules were innumerable. Hpcus
Speaker 1: tended to focus as much on moral uplifts due to
Speaker 1: the perceived low moral acumen of blacks, as they did
Speaker 1: on intellectual development. These schools were havens of black political conservatism,
Speaker 1: even as there, of course was a legacy of black radicalism.
Speaker 1: At the beginning of the twentieth century, WB the Boys,
Speaker 1: the nation's leading black academic, called on college educlated blacks,
Speaker 1: whom he called the talent attempt to lead Black America.
Speaker 1: It was a daunting charge for people rising out of
Speaker 1: one of the most politically and culturally conformist meleeus in
Speaker 1: American society at the time. Before du Bois passed away
Speaker 1: on the eve of the March from Washington in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty three, multiple decades of studying these college students had
Speaker 1: caused him to note that they were simply only interested
Speaker 1: in leading themselves. He said, and I quote, they proposed
Speaker 1: to make money and spend it as they please.
Speaker 4: This last comment is critical to this discussion. W. E. B.
Speaker 4: Du Bois, whom may be considered to be the godfather
Speaker 4: of Black American academics, was disappointed with the educated African
Speaker 4: American class at the end of his life. In his mind,
Speaker 4: they pursued education only for commerce.
Speaker 5: We speak to professor of philosophy at Morehouse College, doctor
Speaker 5: Elia Davis, just.
Speaker 9: The year of nineteen sixty nine articles from the Maroon Tiger.
Speaker 9: Their critiques, more often than not, are about the administration
Speaker 9: and how they believe the administration to be culpable in
Speaker 9: creating a certain type of morehouse graduate buying into the system,
Speaker 9: quailing certain radical views.
Speaker 4: And this is represented by a Gloucester Yes.
Speaker 9: Because he's president. Yeah, he's president. Yeah, time he's president.
Speaker 9: So in nineteen sixty nine is directly at him. He's
Speaker 9: the president. And some deans, you know, dean of students
Speaker 9: here and their academic dean they bring up every now
Speaker 9: and again, but he's the administration. Article after article they're
Speaker 9: constantly saying, like I told you before. One article, the
Speaker 9: guy says, I don't know who I am. You know,
Speaker 9: I wake him in the morning, I look in the mirror,
Speaker 9: or he'll talk about his classes. He says, I go
Speaker 9: to class. Some of these professors are so idealistic. They're
Speaker 9: trying to make us idealistic, but they fail to understand
Speaker 9: the radical nature of.
Speaker 4: Being in the US.
Speaker 9: They go on and on about being radical. You're not
Speaker 9: radical enough. You're trying to make me complacent. YadA, YadA, YadA.
Speaker 1: It's interesting.
Speaker 9: At the end of the article, He then says, well,
Speaker 9: I'm not trying to indict more House. It's still a
Speaker 9: good education, but these other things are problematic.
Speaker 5: This idea makes King's purpose of education article even more impactful.
Speaker 5: Doctor King was no stranger to higher education. He was
Speaker 5: a third generation Morehouse man. His father and grandfather had
Speaker 5: both been educated on the legendary campus. Despite that, Doctor
Speaker 5: King had a populous attitude towards education. He wanted the
Speaker 5: space of HBCUs to nurture the minds of the educated class,
Speaker 5: and not just the wallets.
Speaker 4: These ideas came to a collision in the nineteen sixties at.
Speaker 5: Morehouse Welcome Back to the A Building.
Speaker 4: The primary tension between doctor King and Malcolm X was
Speaker 4: based on class. Malcolm was also the son of a preacher,
Speaker 4: but his father was murdered when he was a child
Speaker 4: and his mother was committed to a state on mental institution.
Speaker 4: He grew up on the streets and ended up in prison.
Speaker 4: The Nation of Islam helped him try his life around.
Speaker 4: He was an autodidactic student who read hundreds of books
Speaker 4: behind bars. Once he left prison, he worked for the
Speaker 4: Nation in grassroots recruitment efforts for young men on the streets.
Speaker 4: Of Harlem.
Speaker 5: By contrast, doctor King, also the son of a preacher,
Speaker 5: was a gifted orator. An educated man, he grew up
Speaker 5: in a stable home and family. His middle class values
Speaker 5: were evident in his preaching and his approach to civil rights.
Speaker 5: In a cruel irony, both men would end up giving
Speaker 5: up their lives to the civil rights movement at thirty
Speaker 5: nine years old.
Speaker 4: For the lock in. The students wanted to find ways
Speaker 4: to remove the arbitrary barriers of education. One Spelman educator
Speaker 4: played a key role in the locke in at Morehouse.
Speaker 4: He heard his name before, doctor Abdul Kalimat when our
Speaker 4: research began. I saw a picture of him during the
Speaker 4: locke in standing on a balcony holding a megaphone, and
Speaker 4: I thought to myself, we have to speak to this man.
Speaker 4: Here is social activist doctor Abdul Kalamat talking to Hans
Speaker 4: and myself about his role as a negotiator between the
Speaker 4: board and the students, along with Warmer Spellman, educator Ab Spellman.
Speaker 8: I remember that Ab and I were in constant communication.
Speaker 8: He was in the room as well, and tea boy
Speaker 8: Arthur Ross, Diana Ross's brother was there.
Speaker 4: Was he a student and more rest of the time. Okay, okay,
Speaker 4: and was involved in the lock in.
Speaker 8: Yeah, he was an activist, but he didn't he wasn't
Speaker 8: really militant until he had visited a relative in I
Speaker 8: think it was Birmingham. He had a confrontation and the
Speaker 8: police knocked her down or something, but he came back
Speaker 8: you know, black power, you know, that was on his lips.
Speaker 8: There was this transformation. The board meeting was in Hardness Hall,
Speaker 8: in this conference room, they were feeling very superior. Well,
Speaker 8: what is it that you all have to say? And
Speaker 8: that's when we started talking about our view that the
Speaker 8: university should be consolidated as a university and developed, and
Speaker 8: that the black community should have more assertive control over
Speaker 8: what was happening there. So there were really two points.
Speaker 8: The lack of empathy with what we were trying to do.
Speaker 8: We were really feeling our energy, you know, and so
Speaker 8: we were very assertive about our views. The Morehouse students
Speaker 8: were gathering outside that moment, that picture that was in
Speaker 8: Ebony I think or wherever it was. When I was
Speaker 8: speaking to the Morehouse students that had gathered, basically the
Speaker 8: orientation was they had to liberate their president. Marrill Merrill
Speaker 8: Lynch was there, and of course we took that as
Speaker 8: an opportunity to confront power, you know, and you know,
Speaker 8: what right do you have to be here, you know
Speaker 8: over us. We were confronting him with what we thought
Speaker 8: was the alternative future, alternative beyond him, you know, and
Speaker 8: that has, you know, its strengths and its weaknesses, and
Speaker 8: it's gains and its losses. So there was a social
Speaker 8: gathering of the sort of black middle class and I
Speaker 8: was invited, and they had arranged at this social occasion
Speaker 8: for me to have a sit down with Gloucester.
Speaker 4: This is before or after the after after, okay.
Speaker 8: So we sat down and had a conversation that was
Speaker 8: closer to this understanding that what his position was, what
Speaker 8: my position was, in a non confrontational way, and we
Speaker 8: were both sitting down having a cocktail, you know, and
Speaker 8: having a just sitting off to the side.
Speaker 5: They had arranged it.
Speaker 8: In other words, a black middle class had that double position.
Speaker 8: On the one hand, they went along with power to
Speaker 8: put them out, but at night they wanted to embrace
Speaker 8: these young people and protect them. You fight your battles
Speaker 8: under you know, the conditions that where you find yourself.
Speaker 4: So did you find that to be a productive conversation
Speaker 4: with Gloucester.
Speaker 8: Yes, and I felt I could use it as evidence
Speaker 8: against him.
Speaker 5: Same lore, Same lore.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 10: What do you mean by that, Well, I mean, in
Speaker 10: other words, the the the accommodation people were willing to
Speaker 10: make for the reforms they could get was too high
Speaker 10: a price that I was willing to pay at that moment.
Speaker 8: It's a choice you have to make in the context
Speaker 8: of the struggle. Yes, sir, because I mean, you look,
Speaker 8: my biggest concern at this moment of the Palestinians, why
Speaker 8: did they agree? Why did hamosen them agree with the
Speaker 8: twenty point plan. Well, first of all, they didn't agree
Speaker 8: with the twenty point plan. They agreed with the first
Speaker 8: part of it. Why because genocide was happening. Yeah, just
Speaker 8: like Black lives matter. I mean, how many times can
Speaker 8: you just be in the street, you know, getting into
Speaker 8: police's face. You better start talking to your mama and
Speaker 8: your grandmama, your auntie and the bus driver and who's
Speaker 8: ever delivering the mail, And you know, those are the
Speaker 8: people that are going to make change. It's everybody. We
Speaker 8: can't just act like young people or ideological people or
Speaker 8: the political activists. We are the helpers. We are the
Speaker 8: servants of the masses of people, and at those rare
Speaker 8: moments like in the sixties during the civil rights movement,
Speaker 8: and it was decades built up before that happen.
Speaker 4: You know. Yeah, the mood at this time can be underplayed. Here,
Speaker 4: Just like today, there was growing unrest and real anger
Speaker 4: at the injustice in the world. Malcolm and Martin's brutal
Speaker 4: assassinations were still part of the student's mindset and emotions.
Speaker 5: Friday April eighteenth, nineteen sixty nine, one day before the
Speaker 5: lock in front page of The Maroon Tiger, a headline
Speaker 5: reads campaign sixty nine to save a Dying Moorhouse.
Speaker 6: Is that I promised to improve the conditions of Morehouse.
Speaker 4: Time again, this sounds familiar. In Part four of our series,
Speaker 4: we discussed the student uprising at Howard University in twenty
Speaker 4: twenty one over poor housing conditions a student services. However,
Speaker 4: in Morehouse they had the same issues. The article will continue.
Speaker 6: However, this year's emphasis on rats and roaches and better
Speaker 6: dining hall hours has shifted to a secondary position. This year,
Speaker 6: the painters for Public Office are bringing up such issues
Speaker 6: as the sustainability of curriculum, with an understanding of the
Speaker 6: forces that shaped students' destinies. Equal representation and decision making
Speaker 6: committees made up of administration, faculty, and staff, and encouraging unity,
Speaker 6: not isolation from the neighboring community.
Speaker 5: What we see here is the direct struggle that Sam
Speaker 5: Jackson was experiencing while at Morehouse. The boys wanted more
Speaker 5: community and connection from educated black students. Doctor King wanted
Speaker 5: the experience to be more than money and elitism. These
Speaker 5: students felt angry and isolated. The article continues.
Speaker 6: To Save a Dying Morehouse is the slogan for the
Speaker 6: campaign nineteen sixty nine to Save a Dying Moorhouse.
Speaker 4: The lock in and subsequent expulsions would make national news.
Speaker 4: The term militants would be used like a slur in
Speaker 4: the headlines April twenty fourth, nineteen sixty nine the Atlanta
Speaker 4: Constitution headline Moorhouse cancels concessions.
Speaker 6: The Morehouse College Board of Trustees Wednesday rescinded the agreements
Speaker 6: it made with a group of students who imprisoned the
Speaker 6: board in a college building for twenty nine hours last week,
Speaker 6: but the chairman of the Board of Trustees pledged to
Speaker 6: stand by another set of agreements worked out during the
Speaker 6: lock in with the Morehouse Student Government Association and remained
Speaker 6: committed to amnesty for the students who barricaded the trustees
Speaker 6: and Harkness Hall. Charles Merrill of Boston, the board chairman,
Speaker 6: said Wednesday a telephone poll of the trustees had produced
Speaker 6: the decision to nullify the agreements because they had been
Speaker 6: granted under duress and because only a minority of the
Speaker 6: twenty four member board had voted for the concessions to
Speaker 6: the group that occupied the hall. Merrill added that the
Speaker 6: band of students and faculty members who held the trustees
Speaker 6: captive had no cause whatsoever to say it represented the
Speaker 6: Morehouse student body. Merrill said he did not want to
Speaker 6: establish the precedent that anybody with enough power could seize
Speaker 6: control of our trustees meeting and put the screws to them.
Speaker 6: The Morehouse Trustees, Meryll said, were influenced by fear of
Speaker 6: a police rate on the building that would have resulted
Speaker 6: in their being physically threatened. Some of the students occupying
Speaker 6: the building carry cans of aerosol deodorant that could have
Speaker 6: been used to blind them, Meryl said.
Speaker 4: In the wake of the lock in, news spread far
Speaker 4: and wide television newspapers covered the event, and none of
Speaker 4: them were complimentary about the students who conducted the lock in.
Speaker 11: Last week, our cameras weren't permitted on this floor. Students
Speaker 11: were in control. Today it's a different story. The students
Speaker 11: at Morehouse College have some definite thoughts about what happened
Speaker 11: here last week. They questioned the tactics used, not the motives.
Speaker 11: So far, nothing concrete has come from the lock up
Speaker 11: of the board of trustees last week, but for now,
Speaker 11: the issue before the students is to keep their college
Speaker 11: president on the job.
Speaker 12: The president of Morehouse Alumniasciation has urged the college's board
Speaker 12: trustees stake firm disciplinary measures against student militants who locked
Speaker 12: the trustees in the administration building over most of the weekend.
Speaker 5: Nobody involved can claim ignorance anymore to what has.
Speaker 12: Gone down Atlanta, Georgia. The president of Morehouse College's student
Speaker 12: government says a militant minority of the predominantly black school
Speaker 12: has made bomb threats and intimidated other students.
Speaker 13: In relationship to doctor Gloucester. The students, having essence, given
Speaker 13: him a voter confidence when they voted not to accept
Speaker 13: his resignation.
Speaker 14: Now the circumstances surrounding my resignation are very complex, and
Speaker 14: I am still considering what the best course of action is.
Speaker 12: Fifteen black militants have been expelled from predominantly Negro Morehouse
Speaker 12: College by locking the board of trustees in its own
Speaker 12: meeting room and forcing agreements to a list of demands.
Speaker 13: I personally feel that doctor Gloucester has tried to make
Speaker 13: certain changes, and that only been in office two years,
Speaker 13: that these changes just unfortunately having to come aback little
Speaker 13: too slowly.
Speaker 12: Atlanta, Georgia, a majority of Morehouse College trustees, the chairman
Speaker 12: said Wednesday, has repudiated two concessions wrung from some of
Speaker 12: the trustees last week while they were held prisoner by
Speaker 12: a band of student militants militancy.
Speaker 4: This became the new fear of the US government. These
Speaker 4: expelled students were now exposed to the worst of American forces.
Speaker 5: The FBI and the civil rights movement are intrinsically connected.
Speaker 5: In our next episode, we will explore how and why
Speaker 5: next time on the A.
Speaker 15: Building under Hoover's time, You've got this kind of communist scare.
Speaker 15: Bombs are going off, riots in the street. What's going
Speaker 15: on now in college? Campuses as a government, we're not
Speaker 15: accepting free speech. Am I a fan of violence?
Speaker 9: No?
Speaker 15: Have I worked cases against Hamas a proven terrorist organization? Absolutely,
Speaker 15: they are cold blooded evil. Have I seen any evidence
Speaker 15: that the people Corbitt grabbed by master men on campus
Speaker 15: are Hamas?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 15: I haven't, so I worry that we're you know, we're
Speaker 15: going back. We're going back.
Speaker 5: The A Building is produced by Imagine Audio for iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 5: It is written and hosted by me Hans Charles and
Speaker 5: my co host menelec La Mumba.
Speaker 4: It is executive produced by Carl Welker and Nathan Kloke,
Speaker 4: me Menelik Lamomba and Hans Charles.
Speaker 5: Executive producers at iHeart Podcasts ar Katrina Norville and Nikki Torre.
Speaker 5: Marketing lead is David Wasserman.
Speaker 4: It is produced, directed, and edited by Nathan Fernarra, with
Speaker 4: producer John Asanti, Sound design and music by Alloy.
Speaker 5: Trax, and special thanks to April Ryan, Doctor, Elia Davis,
Speaker 5: Kim vc Ada, Bobby Know and James Early. If you
Speaker 5: enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate and review The
Speaker 5: A Building on Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.