A dream deferred?

The nation marked the 40th anniversary of the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 4. We didn’t know at the time, of course, that his assassination would be but the first of two killings of national figures, and heroes to many, that would mark our last several weeks at BC.

The Heights of April 9, 1968, reported that a memorial service for Dr. King was to be held that morning on Bapst Lawn. Classes scheduled for 10 and 11 am were cancelled and, following the memorial, there were to be all-day workshops on “Racism and the Black Rebellion” sponsored by the “University Committee Against Racism.”

There were several columns in the same issue of the Heights that discussed the issue of race relations in the US, and just about all of them saw a grim future ahead. One commentary carried the headline “This is the end of non-violence.”

We weren’t a diverse campus back then, unless you consider coming from different parishes in Boston or from New Jersey among the criteria. BC was very white then. When you look through editions of Sub Turri, just about the only black faces you see are those of performers who came to campus. It seems almost incredible now to look at pictures of BC football and basketball teams and see no African-Americans. (John Austin was BC’s first black basketball player and first all-American, but he graduated in 1966.) Not that nearly all-white student bodies were terribly unusual, cf. Animal House, for example, but this should be a topic we discuss in another thread. Why was it like that? What did it mean for us, in those times and as we grew older?