At the end of a Fulton County Schools documentary on Eva L. Thomas High School, a former student sums up the wounds created by segregation and desegregation, which led to the fight to keep the College Park school open in the late 1960s.
Black communities adapted when forced into segregation and made it a way of life, Brenda Harris says in the film, “Our School, Our Fight: Saving Eva Thomas High.”
But, when the mandatory integration of schools took place, there were many casualties in its wake: “promise,” “hope” and “self-worth.”
“When you lose that, it takes a long time to build that back up,” Harris says.
The Teaching Museum & Archives of Fulton County Schools produced the documentary. It was filmed earlier this year and released on YouTube on Nov. 15.
Eva L. Thomas High School was newly built when it opened in 1964 and only operated as a high school until the spring of 1970. It was named after a metro Atlanta educator.
Former teachers and numerous alumni are featured in the documentary and recount the protests against the Fulton County Schools system, their love of the school, its teachers and activities such as the winning basketball team.
The alumni contacted Fulton County Schools archivists in 2021, providing details about the school’s past and began to provide oral histories and mementos, said Mike Santrock, archivist for the school system and an executive producer on the 33-minute film.
While the passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 outlawed segregation in public spaces and schools, Eva L. Thomas High School did not have to close, Santrock said.
The school board had other options, he said, such as rezoning or moving some students to another school that only white students were attending and transferring other white students to Thomas High.
Footage in the film shows the Fulton County Schools superintendent at the time, Paul West, saying his hands were tied by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, which was led by Leon Panetta.
“The sad fact is that it was expected that the Black communities would bear the brunt of desegregating. They would be the ones that would be suffering. Their student population would be scattered out of their community, never vice versa,” Santrock said. “It was always done to try to respect the rights of white people back then, instead of the communities that were Black.”
When the high school closed in 1970, it became the integrated Eva Thomas 8th Grade School until 1980, Santrock said. The school building operated as Beavers-Thomas Elementary School from 1981 to 1988 and that year became College Park Elementary.
The elementary school building located on Princeton Avenue was demolished in 2012 and rebuilt.
My sister was among the ones who were bussed to Eva L. Thomas in the late 60’s. The black kids didn’t want them there and the white kids didn’t want to be there. The government didn’t do any favors by forcing these kids together. There were fights. We began the long rides to drop off and pick up my sister. We worried for her safety. Many started sending their kids to private school. Our one income family couldn’t afford that as I’m sure others couldn’t. The lesson was that nobody wanted to be forced into desegregation. I was in high school in the late 70’s and race relations were never good. We were physically together but socially and culturally we were miles apart.