Civil Rights in Texas

Chartered in 1996, the San Antonio Chapter of National Coalition of Black Women, Inc., strives to positively influence the lives of young African American females in San Antonio and to empower African American women in general, to reach their highest potential. The San Antonio chapter participates in community programs related to their mission. Its members also mentor in local elementary and middle schools to help young girls plan and eventually meet their career goals.

Communities Organized for Public Service (COPS) is an organization of 26 parishes in the predominantly Hispanic, low-income West Side and South Side of San Antonio. Founded in 1974, it is the oldest of the Interfaith Area Foundation (IAF) organizations in Texas and, indeed, in the entire national network. The Metro Alliance, which shares office space and many resources with C.O.P.S., formed in 1989 through a merger of the East Side Alliance, composed of African American and Hispanic low- and lower-middle income churches, and the Metropolitan Congregational Alliance.

The collection of writer, educator, and civil rights advocate George I. Sánchez, contains correspondence, written works, speeches and interviews, photographs, and reference materials documenting Sánchez's career as an educator in New Mexico and Texas, his involvement with organizations such as the American Council of Spanish-speaking People, the University of Texas and the League of United Latin American Citizens, and his activism against the segregation of Mexican American schoolchildren in the southwestern United States. See also: a collection of digitized photos from the Sánchez papers.

Ramiro R. Casso was a civil rights activist that fought for school desegregation and equal educational opportunities for Mexican American children. As a member of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), Casso also advocated on behalf of Texas farm workers and promoted public health issues along the Texas-Mexico border. Active also in politics, Casso ran for mayor of McAllen, Texas, in 1981, campaigning for increased vigilance on issues of police brutality directed at Mexican Americanss and immigrants. Casso also served on the Texas Board of Health and the Texas Human Rights Commission. Materials in the collection include print documents such as speeches, testimonies and correspondence from each of Casso's endeavors, with a particular focus on health and education issues along the border.

Travis County native Ada Anderson shares a wealth of memories from the Civil Rights struggles she led in Austin from the 1940s to the 1990s. As an African-American mother, she helped integrate Austin schools and Girl Scout programs. As a graduate student, she helped open opportunities for students of color at the University of Texas. And her ability to form meaningful relationships with people such as Governor John Connally and several Austin mayors helped open employment in local and state government to all qualified applicants.

Part two of the interview with Anderson about the Civil Rights Movement in Austin and Travis County.

Marshall, Texas teacher Rebecca J. Buard spent her childhood in near-total segregation amid a tightly knit extended Black family near Caddo Lake in East Texas. She began her teaching career in an all-Black school during segregation and was among the first Black teachers to help lead integration at previously all-white Marshall Senior High School. Her common sense approach to her students and her personal standards of fairness guided her efforts through an historic period.

The uniqueness of the civil rights era in Texas’ Permian Basin is analyzed by Gene O. Collins, born in 1951 as part of Odessa’s five percent Black population. Collins blames the failure to fully desegregate Odessa schools until 1982 on oil-fueled wealth that funded excellent, segregated Black schools and prompted reluctance by both Blacks and Whites to change. He argues that justice should be the goal of the civil rights movement and laments the view of others that racial integration was the end result. Collins also recalls West Texas liquor chain owner Pinkie Roden, whose fortune helped fuel Black political and economic progress.

Black Dallas educator Sadye Gee recalls the good and the bad of the city's gradual desegregation and the importance of the Hamilton Park neighborhood to Dallas' Black leadership.

Educator Lorraine O'Banion discusses her experiences during the mid-20th century, including a comparison between neighboring towns of predominantly African-American Prairie View with mainly white Hempstead, education, and changes as a result of civil rights.

African American educator, Dorothy Robinson discusses her personal philosophy, family history, career and civil rights work of her husband, Frank Robinson, particularly in Palestine, Texas, which she continued after his death.