A First Black Professor Remembers Her Segregated Education

By NPR Staff

Published May 18, 2014 at 9:28 AM CDT

Hortense McClinton graduated from Howard University in Washington, D.C., in the 1930s and became the first black professor at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

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Hortense McClinton has lived with a remarkable sense of determination — for 95 years.

Her father's parents were slaves, and McClinton grew up in a completely segregated society, the all-black town of Boley, Okla.

"I didn't realize how segregated everything was," she tells NPR's Lynn Neary. That changed after a visit with her uncle in Guthrie, Okla.

"I went to the movies and I didn't know blacks were supposed to sit upstairs. And I sat down and they told me to go up," she says.

"Well, later that evening when we were eating supper, I was talking about it, and I said they make the children sit upstairs," McClinton says. "My uncle said, 'They make you sit upstairs because you're colored.' And that was my first experience."

My father used to say 'Don't ever bother anybody, everybody is the same. And treat everybody the same. But then if they bother you, do what you can and you know you might die.' So that was the way I lived.

McClinton left Oklahoma to study at Howard University and then at the University of Pennsylvania. She went on to become the first black professor at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, where she taught social work.

As the nation marks the 60th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court decision that resulted in school desegregation, McClinton says some things have gotten better — but in some ways they haven't.

"I think if people who are in charge could, they would take us blacks back," she says. She thinks of the recent incident involving racist statements by LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling.

"It's very sad to me, at 95, to know that there is so much hatred still in the world. I know that's not a nice thing to say, but it's true. I do feel it."

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Hortense McClinton grew up in an all-black town in Oklahoma and has lived through almost a century of U.S. history. She says in some ways it is worse for African-Americans today than in the past. Do you agree? Tell us what you think on the Weekend Edition Facebook page, or in the comments section below.