Black Texans, Inc.

EVERY STONE HAS A SONG:  Mansfield’s Long Road from Rejection to Representation. By Pastor Kyev P. Tatum, Sr. History must be told carefully. Especially when we are celebrating how far we have come. In August 1956—before Little Rock—Mansfield High School became the site of Texas’ first major confrontation over school desegregation after Brown v. Board of Education. Black students attempted to enroll under a federal court order. A mob formed. Effigies were hung. Public resistance was loud and unapologetic. Let us be clear: Mansfield did not close its high school. But Mansfield did resist. Mansfield did reject. Mansfield did refuse to comply with constitutional mandates and federal court orders. And that resistance continued until 1965. That was Mansfield’s stone. A hard stone. A heavy stone. A historic stone. Meanwhile, one year later in 1957, it was Little Rock Central High School that became nationally known when the Little Rock Nine were escorted by federal troops amid a crisis t...