Jet Magazine, January 1961

Jet Magazine, January 1961

Column written by Charlayne Hunter

Charlayne Hunter spoke to her personal experiences and opinions in a post within the education section of JET Magazine. This account is from the week after the riots and chaos that broke out after the Georgia-Georgia Tech basketball game, where her dorm was raided by racist groups and locals. Hunter was extremely positive as she described the events that have occurred in the past couple of weeks from when her piece was published. She describes her dorm being normal, the dormitory mother of Myers Hall treating her like any other resident, and how she was going to classes with mostly kind peers surrounding her. She explained how there are still few students who will mock her or make faces, drawing attention to her, but generally, students and professors treated her fairly and with kindness. In the “Georgia Historical Quarterly” by Robert Cohen, reported in 1996, old accounts of other students’ opinions toward the integration of Hunter and Holmes are included. These accounts and quotes from students back in this time expressed the acknowledgment that racism is taught but not inherent, and how it has no place in the university setting. This sheds light on the surprising positivity from students and faculty toward integrating the first two African-American students into UGA. This excerpt takes quotes from students explaining that they have been integrated for a majority of their lives, but African-Americans were always in lower positions of servitude, and the fact that Hunter and Holmes were pushing this new boundary was upsetting to many. But current students recognized this, and some embraced the courage that these two students were showing. Aside from the hatred by locals and some groups within UGA, many were becoming okay with integration, and some were even in support of it. As expressed by Charlayne Hunter in her article for JET, tensions were dissipating and school was becoming more normal for her and other students understanding and experiencing UGA’s integration.

Jet Magazine, Charlayne Hunter

UGA Special Collections Library Database

Johnson Publishing

January 1961

UGA Special Collections Library

Cohen, Robert. “‘Two, Four, Six, Eight, We Don't Want to Integrate’: White Student Attitudes Toward the University of Georgia's Desegregation.” The Georgia Historical Quarterly, vol. 80, no. 3, 1996, pp. 616–645. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40583493.

Physical Magazine

English

Nonfiction, news media