Clara Luper, Freedom's Classroom, and the Civil Rights Movement: A Conversation with Marilyn Luper Hildreth

• Published in: World literature today Vol. 97; no. 3; pp. 14 - 17
• Main Authors: Hildreth, Marilyn Luper, Hill, Karlos K
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Norman University of Oklahoma 01.05.2023
• Subjects: Children & youth; Civil disobedience; Civil rights; Civil rights movements; Classrooms; Community leadership; Demonstrations & protests; Drug stores; Luper Hildreth, Marilyn; Luper, Clara; Segregation; Social change; Students; Teacher-student relations; Teacher-student relationships; Youth; United States; United States > US; Oklahoma
• ISSN: 0196-3570; 1945-8134; 1945-8134
• DOI: 10.1353/wlt.2023.0107

ON AUGUST 19,1958, a high school history teacher named Clara Luper and thirteen members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Youth Council, ranging in age from seven to fifteen, organized a sit-in at a segregated Katz Drug Store in downtown Oklahoma City Within two days, the Katz Drug Company had desegregated not just this one local store but more than fifty locations in states across the Midwest. By courageously fighting against injustice while simultaneously centering youth activism, Luper created an enduring legacy of nurturing social change through nonviolent civil disobedience. [...]in order that they could better understand the functions of the government in Washington, DC, she had her students take part in mock elections, where they cast votes to elect fellow classmates as senators, members of the House of Representatives, and president. [...]for fifty years she took young people to the NAACP National Convention, including people who I call the "have-nots." Who could have imagined sixty-five years ago that a group of young people in this town would launch a