Segregation, Intolerance, and Integration

Former Springfield College President and University of Massachusetts-Amherst Chancellor Randolph W. Bromery, 78, was asked by the Republican's Newspaper in Education program to share his story of growing up during the 1930s in Maryland as part of the paper's "Exploring Black History" series.

I was born in a small house on Carroll Street in Cumberland, Md., on what I am told was a very cold day in January 1926 and was the second child born to my parents. My sister was born less than a year earlier.

It's better, but much is left to do
On King's birthday, blacks view civil rights movement

ALISON BUNTING
Times-News Staff Writer

CUMBERLAND —

African Americans in Cumberland view the civil rights movement as positive, but not without difficulty. Most say there is still a distance to go.

Today the nation is observing the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. His legacy lives on.

Pansye S. Atkinson (1930-2022)

Pansye S. Atkinson was born in Asheville, North Carolina and acquired her undergraduate degree from Fisk University in Tennessee. She began her career as a school teacher in Georgetown, South Carolina and later taught in Baltimore City.

THE RECENT PAST

Pam Harper described what it was like to grow up black in Cumberland. "It wasn't until 1957-1968 that blacks here began to be treated like people. We weren't 'allowed' in movie houses. We had different schools (Harper attended the all-black Carver School which was located on Frederick Street). We weren't 'allowed' to eat with whites and we had different bathrooms and water fountains. We went swimming in the 'black pool.'"

Crossing The Bridge...

"We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal."—Declaration of Independence.

And now, almost two hundred years after Thomas Jefferson wrote these words, America's dream of brotherhood, equality and tolerance is coming true. Integration bridges the chasm of racial intolerance and convinces us that the aspirations of our Founding Fathers were not wishful dreaming but functional democracy.

Breaking Barriers
February 29, 2004

Area residents recall an era of integration.

Just 50 years ago black patrons weren't allowed to enter the front doors of some theaters in downtown Cumberland. Local restaurants required African-Americans to dine in separate areas from whites, or they banned black customers altogether.

But perhaps worst of all, until the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark 1954 decision in a case that became known as Brown vs. the Board of Education, black children could not attend the same schools as white children.

Carver High School: relic of an obsolete era

REV. MICHAEL ALLEN MUDGE, Crellin

Segregated schools are a part of American history. They were a part of American life.

Maryland had lacked "a uniform public school system and standardized education" as late as 1864, but segregation of the schools began that early when legislation of that year provided that the schools for Negroes would be supported by certain state and local funds and the county taxes paid by the black population, as well as private contributions.

I was born and raised in Cumberland and graduated with my sister Betty in the first graduating class from Carver High School in 1942, a class of 16 students. Carver High School was formerly known as the Frederick Street High School. I attended the school from the first grade to the 12th grade, and my high school English teacher was Miss Ruth Franklin. I was blessed with a loving, warm, but strict home environment made up of my mother, Edith Bromery my father, Randolph Bromery and my grandmother, Sarah Bromery. All lived out their full lives in Cumberland.

Inspired by teachers, together we overcame segregation

Recent articles have prompted me to write about Miss Franklin, other dedicated teachers and the struggle to acquire an education at Carver School.

Reader Commentary

Miss Franklin was one of many teachers who set high expectations for the Carver student body. If she heard a grammatical error, she displayed a face so soft and somber, we all secretly vowed to never again commit such a felonious act. Speaking ebonies would have horrified Miss Franklin and the entire faculty.

Lincoln School History Traced

Over the past year or so several inquiries have come to me about the Lincoln School here in Frostburg. To most people, that name is associated with the small brick building that is now the headquarters for the campus police at the university.