Grade book lick-clack the rattlebag

SHOWDOWN IN LITTLE ROCK 
This informational text discusses the Little Rock Nine, a group of nine exemplary black 
students chosen to be the first African Americans to enroll in an all-white high school 
in the capital of Arkansas, Little Rock. Arkansas was a deeply segregated southern state 
in 1954 when the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in public schools was 
unconstitutional. The Little Rock Crisis in 1957 details how citizens in favor of 
segregation tried to prevent the integration of the Little Rock Nine into a white high 
school. 
As you read, note the varied responses of Americans to the treatment of the Little 
Rock Nine. 
[1]Three years after the Supreme Court declared race-based segregation illegal, a 
military showdown took place in the capital of Arkansas, Little Rock. On September 3, 
1957, nine black students attempted to attend the all-white Central High School. 
The students were legally enrolled in the school. The National Association for the 
Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) had attempted to register students in 
previously all-white schools as early as 1955. The Little Rock School Board agreed to 
gradual integration, with the Superintendent Virgil Blossom submitting a plan in May 
of 1955 for black students to begin attending white schools in September of 1957. The 
School Board voted unanimously in favor of this plan, but when the 1957 school year 
began, the community still raged over integration. When the black students, known as 
the “Little Rock Nine,” attempted to enter Central High School, segregationists 
threatened to hold protests and physically block the students from entering the 
school.Q1 
Under the pretext of maintaining order but in support of the segregationists, Arkansas 
Governor Orval Faubus mobilized the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the Little 
Rock Nine from entering the school. After a federal judge declared the action illegal, 
Faubus removed the troops. When the students tried to enter again on September 24, 
they were taken into the school through a back door. Word of this spread throughout 
the community, and a thousand irate1 citizens stormed the school grounds. The police 
desperately tried to keep the angry crowd under control as concerned onlookers 
whisked2 the students to safety. 
The nation watched all of this on television. President Eisenhower3 was compelled to 
act. 
[5]Eisenhower was not a strong proponent of civil rights. He feared that the Brown v. 
Board of Education4 Supreme Court decision could lead to an impasse5 between the 
federal government and the states. Now that very stalemate6 had come. The rest of the 

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country seemed to side with the black students, and the Arkansas state government was 
defying7 a federal decree.8 The situation hearkened9 back to the dangerous federal-
state conflicts of the 19th century that followed the end of the Civil War.Q210 
On September 24, after the mayor of Little Rock asked President Eisenhower for help 
enforcing integration, Eisenhower ordered the troops of the 101st Airborne Division 
into Little Rock, marking the first time United States troops were dispatched to the 
South since Reconstruction.11 He federalized12 the Arkansas National Guard in order 
to remove the soldiers from Faubus’s control. For the next few months, the African 
American students attended school under armed supervision. Even so, they faced 
physical and verbal abuse from their white peers. The Little Rock Nine were instructed, 
just as during the pro-segregation protests, not to respond or react to these taunts.Q3 
The following year, Little Rock School District officials under the command of Faubus 
closed the schools to prevent integration. But in 1959, the schools were open again. 
Both black and white children were in attendance. 
The tide was slowly turning in favor of those advocating civil rights for African 
Americans. An astonished America watched footage of brutish,13 white southerners 
mercilessly14 harassing African American children calmly walking into school, intent 
on getting an education. Television swayed public opinion toward integration. 
In 1957, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, the first such measure since 
Reconstruction. The law created a permanent civil rights commission to assist black 
suffrage.15 The measure had little teeth16 and proved ineffective, but it paved the way 
for more powerful legislation in the years to come. 
1. Irate (adjective): very angry 
2. Whisk (verb): to move to another place very quickly 
3. President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969) was President of the United States 
from 1953 to 1961. He is also well-known for his outstanding military service as a U.S. 
General during World War II.
4. In Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, the Supreme Court ruled that it was 
unconstitutional to separate schools by race.
5. Impasse (noun): a situation in which no progress seems possible
6. Stalemate (noun): a disagreement in which neither side can win
7. Defy (verb): to refuse to obey
8. A federal decree is a national law, and therefore overrides any conflicting state laws.
9. Hearken (verb): to give attention to 
10. The American Civil War was fought between 1861 and 1865.
11. The Reconstruction era lasted from the end of the Civil War in 1865 to 1877. It was 
a period of transformation for the Southern United States following their defeat and 

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destruction in the war, and historians often consider it a failure because the South was 
left facing poverty and racial discrimination.
12. Federalize (verb): to cause something to be under control of the federal government 
13. Brutish (adjective): cruel, violent, and stupid 
14. Merciless (adjective): having or showing no mercy; very cruel or harsh
15. Suffrage (noun): the right to vote 
16. little ability to work effectively or enforce itself