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On Sunday, November 5th, my travels took me to a venue in Topeka, Kansas, U.S.A, called the "Brown Versus Board of Education National Historic Site." Of course, I realize that I am writing for a Turkish magazine with a truly international audience through this column. However, it strikes me that my experiences at and relections about my visit to this historic point of interest crosses borders.
In reality, this particular historic site was known for the greater part of its existence as Monroe School. For years, the site was an elementary school in a very unassuming neighborhood just a few blocks from the Kansas Statehouse. Monroe School was built to educate black children ... white children attending classes elsewhere.
Through the 1950s in the United States, the black and white populations of the country were kept seperated. Seperate schools ... seperate seats on busses ... separate lives. In the United States, it was legally permissible for there to be seperate public accomodations for black and white people provided these accomodations were "equal." All of this began to change in the 1950s and 1960s because of the actions of people like a little girl from Topeka, Kansas, named Linda Brown and her mother. Linda was a student at Monroe School. I actually had the privilege of meeting Linda Brown in the 1990s as well as the honor of getting to know her sister, Cheryl Brown Henderson (who now heads up the Brown Foundation).
Late in the 1950s, a group of mothers of African descent from Topeka, Kansas, brought a lawsuit on behalf of their children. These brave mothers contended that the concept of "seperate but equal" -- which was the law of the land -- had an implicit negative impact on the emotional wellbeing of a segment of the population ... in this case black children.
In the landmark case of "Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka" the United States Supreme Court declared that the concept of "seperate but equal" was unconstitutional. No longer would seperate accomodations be permitted because of the color of a person's skin.
I arrived at Monroe School -- the Brown Historic Site -- mid-morning on a Sunday. As it happened, I was the only person touring the building at the time. I felt rather like I was walking through a church.
Through the halls of Monroe School had walked children and parents who truly did change the course of history in my own country. Moreover, these children and their parents remain examples of how seemingly small steps can advance the cause of ending oppression in many places around the world even yet today. These innocent children remind us all that we can play a lasting role in making our corner of the world a better place in which to live.
As I left Monroe School that Sunday morning, I knew in my heart that I had just walked over hallowed ground.
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