What a strange outcome for the fame of John McDonogh who played a major role in establishing public education in New Orleans and Baltimore. I think it rather sad that politicians (both black and white) did not understand and credit what this strange man (and his laggard trustees)actually accomplished. There's room for a brilliant book about this man:
5. MCDONOGH DAY BOYCOTT
One of the first organized protests of the Civil Rights struggle in New Orleans was the
McDonogh Day Boycott in May 1954. John McDonogh was a parsimonious eccentric who died
a a generous philanthropist, leaving an endowment to the public schools in Baltimore,
Maryland, and in New Orleans. He was a slave holder, but one with a curious twist: he
educated a handful of his slaves, freed them (manumission), and helped them establish a
model community at McDonoghville in present-day Algiers. He did this in the hopes of preparing
the former slaves for a new life in Liberia, West Africa.
In May of each year, a timeless ritual was played out: students from the segregated school
system gathered at Lafayette Park in downtown New Orleans to pay homage to John
McDonogh. They placed flowers at the foot of his statue, the different bands played, the
students sung the McDonogh Ode, and finally each delegation picked up a symbolic " key to
the city" from the mayor who stood across the street at Gallier Hall, which was then the City
Hall.
The white students, according to the dictates of segregation, were the first to deposit their
flowers at the McDonogh statue, the first to sing, and the first to receive the keys of the city
from the mayor. The black children, in contrast, often had to wait in the hot sun while the white
students finished their ceremony and only then did the ceremony for black students begin. It
was a subtle act of denigration, typical of the system. Nonetheless, McDonogh Day was an
occasion that stood out in the minds of all children.
QUOTE:
In A House Divided, Revius Ortique recalled that"as a child he was proud to participate" in the
McDonogh Day ceremonies. He enjoyed dressing up for the occasion; he enjoyed the pomp
and circumstance; he was young and did not understand the degrading symbolism; he felt
special even within the constraints of segregation.
In 1954, the black teachers' associations protested the discrimination evinced at the McDonogh
Day ceremonies. Arthur Chapital, director of the local branch of the NAACP and a postal
employee ,called for a boycott of McDonogh Day. He said, "We know we have to do
something." Chapital urged Revius Ortique to make radio broadcasts urging black parents to
keep their children home on McDonogh Day. Ortique, then vice president at large of the
Louisiana Council of Labor and also an employee of the state Department of Labor, agreed,
and his radio broadcasts began a life of civil rights activism. A.P. Tureaud, A.L. Davis, and
other black leaders supported the boycott.
In May 1954, white students from Orleans Parish met at Lafayette Park and honored John
McDonogh in the traditional manner. The crowd of dignitaries and others awaited the sound of
one of the bands from a black school. The sound was not forthcoming. The boycott was almost
total. Only thirty-four of the city's 32,000 black students showed up. One black principal
appeared; she never regained a leadership role in the black community.
The boycott was effective. The mayor of the city, Chep Morrison, stood in front of Gallier Hall
with 32 keys to the city in his hand but no school delegation to bestow them on. The boycott
lasted for the next two years.
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