RICHMOND
Barbara Johns didn't live to see the day.
Neither did Oliver W. Hill Sr., Spottswood Robinson III or the Rev. L. Francis Griffin.
But each of those Virginia civil rights pioneers will be posthumously recognized Monday as part of a ceremony honoring the strides they made.
On that day, the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial, bearing their images in bronze, will be unveiled on the grounds of the state Capitol.
The four-sided memorial surrounds a granite block. It will rest alongside statues of past Virginia leaders, some of whom owned slaves or fought on battlefields and in government halls to preserve a segregated society.
"It's ironic that the civil rights monument is being placed in the middle of all those Confederate heroes," said John Watson.
"It's poetic justice," said Watson, 75, a longtime news radio host in Wilmington, Del.
On April 23, 1951, Watson was one of the dozen or so students who joined a Barbara Johns-led strike to protest the conditions at Robert Russa Moton High School, an all-black school in Farmville.
Johns' likeness, and those of Hill, Robinson and Griffin, a Farmville minister involved in the struggle, are depicted on three of the monument's four panels.
Attorneys Hill and Robinson represented the Moton students, whose original intent was to secure a better schoolhouse.
Their lawsuit was one of five that was combined into the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case. The U.S. Supreme Court's 1954 ruling in that matter paved the way for the end of public school segregation, which took years to be fully enforced in Virginia.
To stall desegregation efforts, state and local lawmakers used a variety of tactics.
That movement came to be known as Massive Resistance; a bronze statue of the lawmaker often associated with it, former Gov. and U.S. Sen. Harry F. Byrd Sr., is located not far from the site of the civil rights monument.
Oliver Hill Sr., Richmond lawyer who worked with the NAACP, died last year at age 100 but had known the memorial was under way.
Oliver Hill Jr. said his father also lived long enough to know a state government building "where the Byrd machine was planning the resistance to the Brown decisions" had been named in his honor.
Momentum for a memorial came in 2005 when Gov. Mark Warner and the General Assembly approved a commission to aid in creating the monument on Capitol Square.
A year earlier, the legislature approved scholarships to help pay for continuing education costs of some former students whose studies were interrupted by Massive Resistance policies.
But the genesis of the memorial came, proverbially, from the mouth of a child.
A question from 7-year-old Eliza Warner to her mother in 2002 about the dearth of statues honoring civil rights leader in the Capitol sparked the idea, recalled Warner's wife, Lisa Collis.
"It just sort of grew from there," said the former Virginia first lady, a member of the commission and the foundation that raised funds for the $2.45 million project.
About 400 groups contributed to the privately funded project, including a $50,000 donation from the Landmark Foundation, a charitable arm of The Virginian-Pilot's parent company.
The memorial, measuring more than 12 feet high and 8 feet wide, has four panels - each featuring a different scene - and 18 figures.
One side has statues of Hill and Robinson; another shows Griffin speaking to a child.
The larger panels depict Johns leading students on strike, and a diverse group of people walking together that "expresses people moving on, people involved in civil rights today," said the monument's sculptor, Stanley Bleifeld, who is based in Weston, Conn.
Johns, who died in 1991, didn't talk much about her role in the school strike, according to family members.
"She just had a strong sense of justice," said Johns' adult daughter, Terry Harrison of Toms River, N.J.
"She said to me: 'I did what I thought I had to do,' " said Harrison, 46.
Beside the new memorial, another site that pays homage to Johns and her fellow students is the former Moton school in Prince Edward County, which was converted into a museum in 1996.
Museum director Lacy Ward Jr. called the students' struggles "a story that all Virginians should be aware of. I'd even go on to say all Americans."
Julian Walker, (804) 697-1564, julian.walker@pilotonline.com
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"Also, Republicans.. regularly give ... higher percentage"
"Also, Republicans of all income levels regularly give a statistically higher percentage of their salary to charity. How do we spin that one, folks? Cheers, MGM"
1 Corinthians 13 (King James Version)
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
Compassionate conservatives
Republicans associated with racism? I would like to say a word otherwise. Qualifier: I am sure there are racists in both parties, including Democrats who use blacks for their agendas but would never have them in their home unless a camera were nearby.
I am Republican, a conservative Baptist in a racially diverse church. We have friends of all races in our home--we go to theirs. We often go out together to events without calling reporters to try to grandstand how diverse we are. We are, nonetheless, aware that many call us "heartless, racist Republicans." I am not sure how the press would deal with our politically conservative black friends.
Also, Republicans of all income levels regularly give a statistically higher percentage of their salary to charity. How do we spin that one, folks? Cheers, MGM
Honoring Heroes
Hear! Hear! Thank you Mr. Roy Hobbs.
Only a racist would disagree
I would like to acknowledge the American heroes who fought racism in the belly of the beast - cities throughout the South - at great personal risk. A monument to these brave American citizens is the very least every community in this country can do to honor their efforts.
Sometimes at the cost of their lives, these Americans shattered racism's hold and drove it into the dark corners of our society. While racism hasn't been eliminated - a fact these boards make painfully clear - it is now despised by most Americans and its supporters must find more subtle means to spread their illness.
Unless you are a racist, there is no reason to demean the sacrifices of these brave Americans - of every color - and the change they brought to our country and a region diseased by the grip of racism.
Your need for anonymity is proof of their success and your words are a reminder that the job isn't finished.
Correcting Buckley
Fergus, You forgot to mention that the people you were talking about were SOUTHERN Democrats, who are now represented by the republican party. They left after the passage of the Civil Rights Act.
Actually, you are wrong. No southern Democrats left the party after passage of the Civil Rights Act. Strom Thurmond left the Democratic party in 1948 and formed the Dixiecrat party when Truman placed strong civil rights language in the Democratic platform. He had a change of heart about civil rights in 1964 and joined the Republican party. Strom became the first southern senator to hire a black in his senatorial office. No matter what part of the USA the democrats hailed from, all the problems we have with racism in this United States can be laid at the feet of the Democratic Party. Politicians like Warner and his wife, would prefer that blacks don't get the real truth about civil rights and which par
Is that really necessary
Is it really necessary to turn every subject into childish partisan bickering?
thank god the republicans won the civil war
Lincoln is one of the GOP's greatest heroes and fought for equal rights for all Americans.
It's no wonder that republicans call Lincoln our greatest leader and a hero for saving our country.
Same Old Tune....
So it's okay to condemn and despise white Southern history, heritage and culture, but it's nearing a criminal offense to even question the constant barrage of "honoring" events for various civil rights activists? As much as some blacks hate the very idea of whites having any pride in themselves, thank God that some few whites have the backbone to speak up regarding this demonization of their culture. Yes, it was a terrible time. Most of the world's history is not "happy time". But Many whites rose up as Abolitionists against slavery, and hundreds of thousands of whites died to reunite the country and emancipate the slaves. The trans-Atlantic slave trade was halted mainly by the efforts of the Royal Navy. No one speaks about institutionalized slavery widely practiced in African nations today. Of course, it isnt a "marketable" plight, since no whites can be blamed for it. The cynical, con
A rather tainted view of history
Fergus, You forgot to mention that the people you were talking about were SOUTHERN Democrats, who are now represented by the republican party. They left after the passage of the Civil Rights Act.
Apparently, racism is one of the American values the republicans believe in, and they welcomed Southern racists with open arms.
The South's legacy of racism and it's current problems with race relations are illustrated on these boards every time blacks attempt to honor the heroes of their past.
This is no place to promote the southern apologist view of history, which is studied and promoted only within the states most embarrassed by their ugly past.
Why do you find it so hard to honor people who put their lives on the line to fight the virulent strain of racism bred in the South? You can't make the South's past any prettier by claiming that racism exists outside the South.
Attorneys Hill and Robinson
Attorneys Hill and Robinson represented the Moton students, whose original intent was to secure a better schoolhouse.
Their lawsuit was one of five that was combined into the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case. The U.S. Supreme Court's 1954 ruling in that matter paved the way for the end of public school segregation, which took years to be fully enforced in Virginia.
Are the Warners teaching their daughter that BrownVBoard of Education was only to reverse a segregation law enacted by DEMOCRATIC State Legislators that 60 years earlier upheld segregation? Yes,teach her about PLESSYvFerguson ! Tell her about how the republican party was created as the anti slavery party ! Tell her about the creation of the KKK by the democrats in Congress to gain back power from BLACK REPUBLICANS. Tell her how hated the first seven blacks elected to Congress were despised by the democratic party.