I needed the lift too.
Her beauty, courage and dignity all wrapped up in her six year old body was and still is inspiring.
About her teacher, Mrs. Henry.
Barbara Henry is an American teacher who refused to leave her teaching job when parents, students, and teachers decided to leave their elementary school to protest the desegregation of schools in New Orleans in 1960. Henry was the first teacher in the Frantz Elementary School who was willing to teach an African-American student, Ruby Bridges.
Mrs. Henry was accustomed to a diverse world experience from her travel and teaching experiences in Europe, not to mention her own education at Girls’ Latin School in Boston, a microcosm of the City of Boston where “we learned… to appreciate and enjoy our important commonalities, amid our external differences of class, community, or color.” Prior to moving to New Orleans she had taught in an overseas military dependents schools which were integrated.Henry had been living in New Orleans with her husband for just two months when a call came from the superintendent offering her a teaching position. When Henry asked if the job was in a school that would be integrated, the superintendent replied, “Would that make any difference to you?” She said no.
In New Orleans, in 1960, the young teacher Henry frequently passed through a mob of protesters shouting racist insults and threats. "That was the reality in 1960 for both Ruby and Barbara. Ruby was six years old, and the first black student to help integrate the William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans. Barbara, her white teacher, was a newcomer to the city and its schools."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Henry
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