A White Pastor's Choice to Support Little Rock School Integration

Reverend Dunbar Ogden was a white Presbyterian minister who had moved to Little Rock in 1954 with his wife and children. Ogden was an active member of Little Rock’s community and, in 1957, was elected president of an interracial group of religious leaders from different faiths who, among other things, supported racial integration. In this excerpt, Daisy Bates, a leader in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and principal advocate for the Little Rock Nine, describes what happened when she asked Ogden to walk with the nine students to Central High School on their first day. ¹

When I talked to him that night, he was momentarily hesitant. “If it’s God’s will, I’ll be there.” Later he admitted that much of his hesitancy was due to simple fear. 

The next morning, when the children assembled to go to school, Mr. Ogden was there to walk with them. With him was his son David. The father was pleased and proud that his son had accompanied him. “When I left the house this morning,” he told me, “I wasn’t sure how many would be here. I phoned all the ministers that I thought might come, but there was doubt in their voices. ‘Isn’t this a bit dramatic?’ ‘Is this the responsibility of the ministry?’ In fact, more than one replied, ‘I’m not sure that this is the will of God.’ But as I was getting into the car, David came out of the house and said, ‘Dad, I’ll go with you. You may need a bodyguard.’” 

Only three ministers had come, and Mr. Ogden said somewhat apologetically, “I’m very discouraged that I wasn’t able to get more, but frankly, I had to pray for courage myself. All I could think of was a pop bottle hitting me on the back of the head.” 

He never suspected that the white citizens of Little Rock would turn on him. He was, after all, a minister and a Southerner. But that day, when he saw the stored-up hate in the mob and their contorted faces, when he heard them screaming not only for the blood of the nine Negro children but for his and all connected with him, he realized how vicious was the system under which he had lived all his life. “I became aware of where segregation led. I had to make a decision,” he told me later …

To the segregationists, Mr. Ogden had become a traitor. … Members of his church stopped attending services, stopped giving financial support, and finally forced him to resign. … 

[Eventually, the Ogdens decided to move out of the city.] The night before Mr. and Mrs. Ogden left Little Rock … they came to see me. … As we talked … I was reminded of the insulting telephone calls he received night and day, the abuse and verbal indignities heaped upon his family, the rejection by his lifelong friends, and the loss of his church. This reflection of the price he had paid for decency caused me to regret having made that first telephone call to him. “I’m sorry I got you into this,” I said. 

He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Don’t feel sorry. If I had to do it all over again, I would. I believe that I’m a better Christian for having been privileged to participate in such a worthy cause.” ²

• 1 Daisy Bates, The Long Shadow of Little Rock (New York: Van Rees Press, 1962), 189–93.
• 2Ibid.