Alex Wilson on Covering Little Rock as a Black Journalist

Teachers should review "Teaching Note 1: Offensive and Dehumanizing Language" in the lesson "The Media’s Choices During the Little Rock Integration Crisis" before using this material.

On September 23, 1957, a mob of over 1,000 segregationists gathered outside Central High after Governor Orval Faubus removed the Arkansas National Guard. The mob turned violent and attacked Black journalists Alex Wilson of the Memphis Tri-State Defender, James Hicks of The Amsterdam News, Moses J. Newson of the Baltimore Afro-American, and photographer Earl Davy. Shortly after he was attacked, Wilson wrote about his experience in the Tri-State Defender.

I parked my car about two blocks from the intersection. Newson and I were in front with Hicks and Davy following. 

Then, someone in the crowd of whites spotted us advancing.

Suddenly the angry eyes of the entire pack were upon us. We moved forward to within ten feet of the mob. Two men spread their arms in eagle fashion. One shouted: “You’ll not pass!”

I said: “We are newspapermen.” Hicks added, “We only want to do our job.” I tried to move to the left of the mob, but my efforts were thwarted. I made a half-turn left from the sidewalk and went over to a Little Rock policeman, who was standing mid-center of the street.

“What is your business?” he asked. I presented my press card. He took his time checking it. Then he said: “You better leave. Go on across the sidewalk” (away from the mob at my heels).

I followed his suggestion. After taking several steps, I looked back. The officer was near the opposite sidewalk, leaving the angry pack to track me. 

The mob struck. I saw Davy being roughed up. Hicks and Newson were retreating from kicks and blows. I stopped momentarily, as the boots and jeers behind me increased.

Strangely the vision of Elizabeth Eckford, one of the nine students, flashed before me as she with dignity strode through a jeering, hooting gauntlet of segregationists several days ago. Maybe, too, my training as a U.S. Marine in World War II and my experience as a war correspondent in Korea, and work on the Emmett Till case [a young African American boy who was lynched in Money, Mississippi, for whistling at a white woman], influenced my decision during that moment of crisis.

I decided not to run. If I were to be beaten, I’d take it walking if I could—not running.

One man yelled, “We’ll teach you northern niggers about coming down here!” 

What the bigoted creature didn’t know is that I am one of the many southern-born citizens dedicated to the cause of helping to bring full democracy to this great country of ours. 

Yes, I was abused—a victim of misguided violence—but I am not bitter. If my effort to help bring human dignity in its fullest sense to the oppressed minority here is successful, then the welfare of all will be enhanced. ¹

Reflection Questions

1. What conditions did Black journalists face in Little Rock?
2. Why did Alex Wilson refuse to run? What message was he trying to send? 
3. Wilson stated that he was “dedicated to the cause of helping to bring full democracy to this great country of ours.” What do you think he meant? How might covering the crisis in Little Rock bring about an expansion of democracy in the United States?  

Teach a Facing History lesson featuring this resource.

• 1Will Counts, A Life Is More Than a Moment: The Desegregation of Little Rock’s Central High (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999), 49–51.