A Girl Stands at the Door

March 26, 2018
In this accomplished history of the school desegregation fight from the late 1940s through the mid-1960s, Devlin, a Rutgers University associate professor, offers a cogent overview of the legal strategies employed and delves into the stories of the African-American girls (and their families) who defied the ignominious public school systems of the Jim Crow South. After the landmark Supreme Court cases that broke down racial barriers in graduate education, families of school-aged girls in several states launched full-scale desegregation battles in elementary and secondary schools. The NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund held off taking the grade school cases as long as possible because they intended to focus on colleges and high schools first, but eventually succumbed to grassroots pressure. Like many civil rights pioneers, the girls—such as Nancy Todd, whose straight-A grades were lowered in retaliation for her parents’ activism, and Barbara Johns, who organized a student walkout to protest conditions in her high school—were selected as plaintiffs not only for their academic achievements but for their ability to stand firm in the face of white harassment. Devlin also illuminates various cultural facets of the fight, from the school clothes the students wore and tactics they used to handle verbal and physical harassment to the roles of fathers and white supporters in the movement. In an invaluable postscript, Devlin recounts what happened to some of the “firsts” later in life. The telling at some points lacks verve, but Devlin’s use of diverse secondary and primary sources, including her own interviews with some of the surviving women, bring fresh perspectives. This informative account of change-making is well worth reading.

May 1, 2018

Devlin (history, Rutgers Univ.; Relative Intimacy) reveals how the dawn of the civil rights era was led by young women, who were often portrayed by the media as young, naive, and inexperienced, or humble and knowledgeable. However, young black women were the root to social change during the civil rights movement, as they questioned American society's norms and racial discrimination. Before Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, were Ada Lois Sipuel, Esther Brown, and Lucille Bluford. These women and many others found their voice and changed the course of history as they broke through unchartered territory and set legal battles in motion. Each person profiled here brought an unusual set of skills that sparked societal change, laid the groundwork for Supreme Court cases, and paved the way for many of the women we currently admire. VERDICT A thoroughly researched, well-written work about civil rights, American history, and the momentum of political change that young people, particularly women, initiate.--Cicely Douglas, Delray Beach P.L., FL

Copyright 2018 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2018
Devlin takes an unusual perspective on the story of school desegregation in the U.S., which culminated in the landmark 1954 Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education, by spotlighting the fact that the majority of black students who stepped forward to integrate colleges, high schools, and elementary schools from the 1940s to the 1960s were girls. Some of these courageous women retain a place in American consciousness, such as Elizabeth Eckford and Melba Pattillo Beals of the Little Rock Nine, while many others, including Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher, who challenged the segregation of the University of Oklahoma's law school, and the McDonough Three in New Orleans were heralded at the time but have since faded into obscurity. The decade of work Devlin put into recovering this underappreciated aspect of civil-rights history is fully on display in her portraits, supported by quotes and photographs. She also offers analysis of the social and cultural skills marshaled by black Americans in resisting racism, prejudice, and discrimination and covers persistent attempts to roll back a crucial legal decision.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)