ed on such a massive scale and lasted for more than a year. Perhaps even more so, the Montgomery Bus Boycott was important because it set the tone for the whole civil rights movement. In particular, the boycott established Martin Luther King as a leader within the national movement and showed that the non-violent protest was effective.In 1957, the final major civil rights issue of the 1950s came to a national scale of recognition. Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, was to begin the 1957 school year desegregated. On September 2, the night before the first day of school, Governor Faubus of Arkansas announced that he had ordered the Arkansas National Guard to monitor the school the next day. When a group of nine black students arrived at Central High on September 3, the were kept from entering by the National Guard. On September 20, Judge Davies granted an injunction against Governor Faubus and three days later the group of nine students returned to Central High School. Although the students were not physically harmed, the harassment of fellow students in the classroom and thousands of townspeople harassing them outside the school, prevented them from remaining at school. Finally, President Eisenhower ordered 1,000 members of 101st Airborne and 10,000 National Guardsmen to Little Rock, and at the end of September, Central High School was desegregated. They graduated their first integrated class in 1959.Television caused America to look upon these specific issues that would have otherwise gone unseen. The theatre tended to deal with more widespread racial problems being faced by blacks in the 1950s. In Member of the Wedding , the contradictions between the steps forward and the progress remaining to be made, in the early 1950s, were clear. Bernice is treated well, almost like a mother to Frankie. The children treat her a a close friend, a best friend. But, the black men are not treated with tremendous respect. Fr...
