Elizabeth Eckford - One of the Little Rock Nine HARDtalk

Now on BBC News it's

time for HARDtalk.

Welcome to HARDtalk.

I'm Stephen Sackur.

Nowadays, Arkansas, little rock, is

associated with Bill Clinton. But

little rock has another import blaze

in American recent history. It was

here at Little Rock Central High

School that one of the key battles

of the civil rights era was fought.

In September 1957, nine

African American students,

including Elizabeth Eckford,

entered the all-white

Little Rock Central High School

in Arkansas, thereby breaking

the racial segregation barrier in US

schools for the first time.

They became known as

the Little Rock Nine.

Two years earlier the US

Supreme Court had ruled segregation

in schools to be unconstitutional.

Little Rock Nine one of their right

to enter Little Rock Central High

School. Like Rosa Parks before them,

they came to embody the bravery

behind the civil rights struggle. My

guess today is one of them.

Elizabeth Eckford. She was just 15

in 1957 but one extraordinary

photograph ensures that her role

will be forever remembered. Little

Rock Central High School Little Rock

Central High

Elizabeth Eckford, welcome to

HARDtalk and thank you very much for

inviting me into your home. You are

very welcome. Let me begin by asking

is something that struck me entering

your house. You have had six decades

of people eating a path to your

door, wanting to talk to you

because, as it happened, you played

an extraordinary role as an

individual in the civil rights

movement in the United States. Do

you ever sometimes wish things had

gone differently? That you did not

have all this attention?

When I was

a child, I was very shy, I was a

submissive child from a household

where my parents, frankly, were

benevolent Ali oligarchs. We knew

they loved us. Two jobs to take

care, six kids to take care of. In

this house? It does not look the

same but it was the same.

It was not

a household that was full of

radicalism, the beginnings of the

demand for civil rights equality and

justice. How can it be that you, as

a shy, timid 15 it-year-old, ended

up on that first list of black

students who were going to roll at

the White high school?

Actually, it

almost didn't happen. I asked my

mother during spring that we had

learned it would be desegregated. I

called her the Queen of now, now

that she is not around at this time

she did not say no and that was an

characteristic of my mother.

This is

what a writer who wrote a very

interesting and long piece about you

on the 50th anniversary of the

events at Little Rock Central High

School. She was painfully shy

15-year-old daughter of a hyper

protective mother who was reluctant

to challenge the racial Morais and,

in fact, Elizabeth was the

unlikeliest child blaze of all.

Yes,

not only because of my personality

because of my mother. In our

household... Both parents were

always on the same page for the

Ossetians. It took a long time to

get to yes for them and so when

names of the 17 students who were

selected were in the newspaper, I

told my parents that it was almost

too late, that I had to go. The

reason I wanted to go is that I

wanted to get the best education

possible. I had been brought up in a

working-class family but I had been

brought up with the assumption that

I would go to college and I knew

that, to do that, I needed to get

scholarships.

Do you think that you

or your mum or your dad had any idea

of the scale of the opposition and

the hate and violence that could be

started up by whites in this town?

This was a total shock. Violence in

schools was not part of the 1950s

and it being allowed to continue day

after day... First it was thought

things would get better as timed to

sign and when it didn't change and

even a few students who had made

friendly overtures to us now turned

their backs so the only voices of

being heard were the voices of

people who were organised to attack

us, both physically and verbally...

Who were systematically racist.

Yes

stop the fall spending time thinking

about the impact that had a new ones

you started Little Rock Central High

School, lets think about the moment

that you were actually the first

black student to appear at the high

school, September four, and because

of a bit of a mixup over timing, the

other eight were not with you?

But I

was not the only one who came there

independently. Terence Roberts who

lived with him walking distance of

the school, less than ten blocks

away, walked to the school, and

after he was turned away, he came

and tried to encourage me to leave

with him.

The fact is, the several

minutes, you are pretty much

isolated as EU face not just one or

to but actually a couple of 100, at

least, white people - now some of

them young and some of them old- who

had gathered to try to block any

black student getting into school

that day.

Yes. That was shocking.

What was more shocking to me was

that I had thought that a National

Guard was there to protect all

students, including me. They were

there to keep me out and I did not

realise that an deal I was turned

away the third time and, even

directed to go across the street,

where those angry voices were.

I

have been reading some of the words

directed at you. 15 years old, Lynch

hurt, people said, they used the end

of word. People said get out of

school, go back to where you came

from.

And some said, they thought I

should go back... LAUGHTER.

Even

though you were born and raised in

their town.

Some believe that I was

somebody who had been brought here

specifically to disrupt their

life...

To make trouble. Yes. What

innocent is made of this

particularly remarkable for you and

lived through the ages as your

experience was one photograph. The

picture is remarkable for lots of

different reasons. I mean, that

dignity in your pose and the sense

of isolation amongst all those white

faces that there is in new but of

course the other reason it is

remarkable is because it captures

the rage of one young woman, a

fellow student, Hazel brand, who is

right behind you and her face is

twisted in a shout. At that time,

were you aware of her presence and

her shouting?

For a long time, I did

not know who she was and finally I

did learn her first name but, after

a while, I forgot it.

The trauma you

went to the top you had to turn

back, the National guard were not

going to let you in, the people did

not want you in and you just had to

turn around. I just wonder why your

parents, at that point, did not say,

enough, we cannot put Elizabeth

through that again and we are going

to have to go back on this planet

and put back in the black school.

My

mother had been an accommodated to

avoid difficulty with white people.

She had grown up in Royal Arkansas

-- rural. Their livelihood dependent

on the goodwill of white people. She

came to Little Rock as a teenager in

order to get an education and she's

not unique in that.

When we get to

the reality of what it was like you

inside the school, here are some

quotations I have taken for what

were later released papers of the

headmistress of the school. Later we

found this, an account of the days

after you had gone into the school.

October 28, Elizabeth shoved in the

whole weight. -- Hollway. Jostled in

the gym. Hit with an implement.

Kicked. Elisabeth punched. Elisabeth

shoved on the stairs. Elisabeth

knocked flat. That was your reality?

Yes. And... A lot of horrible things

that happened were in the gym. Our

show is did not have petitions

between people so when the water

turned suddenly hot, very hot, I

could see that the girl on the side

and this side had turned the water.

They had anticipated it, which

brings to mind the many, many

bystanders who turned their backs

and acted like they didn't hear or

see what was happening. That makes a

person who is being attacked feel

like they think we are getting what

we deserved and that is one thing

that encouraged encourages me to

speak out, to let people know how

powerful they can be in someone's

life who is being set apart and

attacked and other people are

ignoring it. There were two students

at my school who engage me in

ordinary conversation every day.

Why

students?

Yes to white students and

a new debate had to have paid a

price for that. I did not know what

until many years later, I learned

the girl who lived outside the town,

on a farm, and her father hired

armed guards and the boy was

supported by his parents.

The

atmosphere was toxic, really. Yes.

And this very year you have written

a book about bullying and what

children experience when they are

terribly bullied. I just wonder now

that you reflect on it, you think

that, frankly, it damage due in ways

that you have had to live with the

rest of your life?

Yes, that is

apparent when I hear outside

noises... But most of the attacks

were behind me and I only turned

around 1's and so I couldn't

identify my attackers and... But

what was most important to me were

the people who supported me and that

allowed me to tell students,

particularly, that they can help

somebody live another day by

engaging them in a humane way, by

acknowledging that even though they

are different that that difference

does not mean that they would hate

them. That is very powerful to a

person who is being hurt and

isolated.

the individual, is suffered so much

on what you did was part of

something that was much bigger, that

is the struggle for civil rights and

it was not just about the

segregating the schools, it was

about so many other things too, but

do you think in a sense, I was

sacrificed to a bigger, wider

movement?

It was a self-sacrifice,

self-sacrifice. I had to make a

decision every day that I was going

to go back into that hellhole. I

knew what I would be facing after a

while. But... One of the Little Rock

nine was a girl who had a hole in

the heart, years and years before

open-heart surgery was available. In

fact, she did not have surgery until

after she had graduated from college

and she was in a crisis. So... How

could I leave her behind?

I wonder

if it ultimately helps you to come

back to Little Rock because after

school, you spent quite a few years

out of this place, and I know those

were really tough years for you.

Yes, I didn't know the full extent

of, of my experiences. I did not

know how damaging, how damaged I

was. But I felt like I was fortunate

to be in an environment where people

did not know anything about my

background.

Rights, you want to just

be out of that for a while.

Yeah.

That it was not making you happy

because you were...

No, I had

periodic depression, serious

depression. But, I never knew. I did

not understand why. I did not

understand that I have post, big

stress. And they have... I did not

start talking to students until

1990... Seven, I think.

Which is 40

years after.

Yes. Well, for 30

years, none of this talk about what

was like for in school. Most people

think the worst happened on the

first day.

Yeah.

But was much more

than that.

But also brings me to ask

you about the complicated

relationship that you developed with

hazel Brown, who was the girl were

referred to earlier in the picture,

Liz yelling at you with hate in her

face.

Yes, yes. The photographer who

took that picture introduced me to

her a couple of days before the 40th

anniversary, and... I knew that she

felt a lot of trepidation about

going public. She had told her sons,

who were the older kid, about the

picture that they would encounter.

-- kids. To prepare them, but I

remember being with her family

members and I remember her daughter

saying, that she was looking through

a book and she said that is my

mother. She had not been prepared.

But the point is, Hazel wanted...

She wanted... She wanted to reach

out to you.

Yes, she had called me

in 1963, during the summer, to

apologise. But she never said what

she was apologising for.

How do you,

what do you mean by that? You think

that somehow she wanted you to

forgive her that she did not want to

delve deep into... Where she was out

on what she had done?

Yes, yes, yes.

In fact, I began to realise, we

spent two years together.

Umina

after 97.

Yes. Gradually I began to

realise that she was not

acknowledging the full extent of

what she had done.

-- you mean.

She

told one reporter that life is more

than a moment and she should not be

judged just on that moment, but also

I had acquired is three different

videotapes of her having some

moments. -- had acquired three. She

eventually said that she had amnesia

about the past.

Umina about other

incidents where she was expressing

racism?

Yeah, and the parents

removed her from Central sometime

during March, no, I am sorry, much

earlier than that. Sometime during

October, 1957, they said for her

safety.

I just wonder if here, there

may be some deeper sort of metaphor

about where America is because

reconciliation is not easy.

No, it

isn't.

You know, you have had the

congressional medal, you have had

meetings with your Clinton and

statues erected in your honour and

the Little Rock nine's honour, and

you have become a hugely respected

figure because of the way you have

handled your own personal

experience, but in the end, for

America to really come to terms with

all of this is not about just

putting up statues and giving gold

medal is out, it is about every

person's heart and mind changing.

And I wonder if you feel that is

really happening.

This is my mantra.

The only way we can have real

reconciliation is to honestly

acknowledge our painful is not

shared past.

Let me ask you this. I

dare say it not so very far from

this house they will be a young

15-year-old black girl who is

currently enrolled in Central high,

here in Little Rock. Do you believe

that her life, her opportunities,

her experience, is going to be much

better, much easier, for sure, then

yours or not?

I know that the

possibilities for her future art,

will be... Better than mine were.

Because so much has changed,

especially opportunities for women.

But... That depends upon her being

prepared, prepared. I tell students

that it is their obligation to

prepare themselves for their

futures, and those who do not repair

it will be cast aside. I do not

pretty it up, I just tell them

straight up they will be cast aside.

We have talked a lot about what has

happened in the States in your long

life, and I just wonder when we

talked about the journey and you

express your concerns about America

today, EU said the journey is

nowhere near complete, in fact, we

are still near the beginning, but do

you have faith that ultimately, that

journey will lead to a place where

the races are equal, where justice

and equality are guaranteed for all

Americans, including black

Americans?

That is my hope for the

future. But it's been a long time

coming, and it will be... I don't

know whether I will live to see it.

I do not know whether I will live to

see it. But... That's my hope for

the future. I understand my place in

history, I am an historical

footnote. That is 1am, not a

celebrity. When I started talking to

students, I would cry during my

presentations. -- that is what I M.

I have worked my way to wear that

does not happen any more but I guess

I was doing my own exposure therapy.

-- I am. I did not even know about

exposure therapy until recent years.

Elizabeth Eckford, it has been a

real honour to talk to you and thank

you for letting me into your house

and thank you for being on HARDtalk.

Thank you. When I had an opportunity

to speak to the public, I always

remind them of how powerful their

voices can be in support of a person

who is being hurt.