Children can teach all of us many lessons about racism

(This column, dealing with some of the racial issues in my hometown, appeared in the Aug. 14, 2013 edition of The Anderson News.)

 I recently had a very serious talk with my 12-year-old daughter.

We were driving to Louisville on U.S. 60, west of Simpsonville, when I pulled into what is now known as the Whitney Young Job Corps Center.

Fifty years ago, however, it was simply known as Lincoln Institute.

We didn't get out of the car, just drove around the campus while I told her how Lincoln Institute existed as a school for African-American children because most communities would not allow them to attend the local schools.

It was the price many good people paid simply because of the color of their skin.

With the simultaneous innocence and insight of a 12-year-old, my daughter simply said, “That's stupid.”

I am so glad she feels that way.

It was stupid. It was just plain wrong that Anderson County, like nearly every other locale south of the Ohio River – and many north of it – had separate schools for children with dark skin. However, many who attended Lincoln Institute believe their education was superior to the one the white children received.

I don't doubt that a bit.

Fifty years ago, however, Anderson County stopped sending young people to Lincoln Institute as Anderson High School integrated in the fall of 1963. Many other counties were doing the same thing at the same time and less than three years later, Lincoln Institute closed its doors as a high school.

I grew up in Anderson County and didn't start school until the fall of 1964, when I enrolled in first grade at Alton School. Every single kid in the entire school was white. I know I thought nothing about it because I did not know anything differently.

I was fortunate as child. It would be naïve to think I was raised with a strong understanding of race relations in an era when they were making the news nearly every day. White kids, like me, didn't know. We had not experienced discrimination, so we couldn't really know.

Still, I was blessed to be raised in a home that did not intentionally tolerate racism in an era when people were often denied service in a restaurant because of the color of their skin. My parents taught me to respect all people, regardless of color. And after being told I was not to use the “N-word,” I never tried to find out what my punishment would be if I did.

I'm thankful.

Yet, the older I got, the more I realized the Anderson County I called home was far more segregated than I ever realized. Was it blatant racism or the result of people unknowingly being products of the time in which they lived? Many of the ones that truly know have passed on, so we will never really know.

It probably doesn't matter. The shameful results were the same.

I never saw separate bathrooms or water fountains designated “white” and “colored,” but heard the latter term used so many times in reference to so many aspects of life, that I did not know it was hurtful as well.

I went to a school that was all-white and knew there was an elementary school on Lincoln Street for children who had different color skin than mine, even after the high school had integrated. That was just how it was.

But even as a little boy, I had become a sports fan who counted Cincinnati Reds center-fielder Vada Pinson as one of my heroes. I can remember thinking it was odd that kids who looked like him were treated differently than me.

I grew up in a town that had a swimming pool but an unwritten rule that African-Americans were not welcome. As a kid, I did not know things could be different.

But, like my daughter today, I thought it was stupid.

Thankfully, much has changed.

Lincoln Street School eventually closed in the 1960s, but the legacy of Mr. Coleman, a wonderful man who headed the school, has lived on in the lives of many of his students.

Three of my children graduated from Anderson County High School and counted many people of different races as their friends. They had African-American teachers, something that would have been unheard of 50 years ago.

It can't be denied that the world has developed a much better understanding of racial issues in the 50 years since Anderson High School first integrated. But it would be foolish for anyone, of any color, to think there is still not a huge gap to close.

As a sports writer, I long for the day when teams primarily made up of African-Americans are no longer referred to as “athletic,” while all-white teams are not automatically termed “intelligent.”

I looked forward to the day when someone who is not white could realistically have a chance to become President of the United States. I had hoped that person would have been Colin Powell, but that was not to be.

Now that someone who is not lily white has been elected as the leader of our country, I long for the day when people can disagree with policies – which I strongly do – and not be accused of doing so simply because of his skin color.

(Admittedly, it would be foolish to think racism is not at the root of some opposition and at some of the President's support as well. That is a different column for a different day.)

It's probably unrealistic to think we will ever live in a colorblind society. We are all shaped by our life experiences and perceptions which will affect us throughout our lives.

That doesn't mean, however, that a colorblind society is not a worthy goal.

Most of all, I long for the day when we all heed the words of Dr. Martin Luther King: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."