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North Carolina History Digital Textbook Project

Civil rights protests and dilemmas

By Kristin Post

1.2 Using the interview “Joanne Peerman and youth protest”

Introductory script

As an African American child growing up in the 60s and 70s in Chapel Hill, Joanne Peerman experienced desegregation first-hand. She attended an all-black elementary school, but her middle school and high school were recently integrated. Tensions arose as the student populations were first merged, especially in the high school where African American students staged marches and protests.

When Joanne recalls her childhood, she remembers joining in with these protests, and believing fervently in integrating any club or organization that had previously been “all white.” But she also remembers what it was like to be the child of a respected and feared high school football coach, known and remembered by everyone as “Coach Peerman.” As Joanne became more and more involved civil rights protests, she found herself at odds with her father, who was counted on by the school to act as a disciplinarian. In particular, the struggle that she describes in this oral history takes place in her ninth grade year at Phillips Junior High School in 1970.

Taking notes

As students listen to this excerpt of Joanne Peerman’s oral history, they should take notes on the following:

  • Over what issues were students protesting?
  • What were Peerman’s views on authority figures?
  • What outside influences contributed to the student protests?
  • What was Peerman’s relationship with her father?
  • What kind of civic or organizational result did the student protests have?

The recording

Play the Joanne Peerman and Youth Protest oral history excerpt. Running time: 4 minutes 45 seconds.

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Transcript

JoAnne Peerman
When I was at the junior high school, the nation was full of racial tension at that time. A lot of the schools were having marches and sit-ins and protests. We, too, were doing the same. That was early integration. The blacks and whites had only been together maybe two, three years prior to my junior high school years. And so we still felt that we were not being fairly represented on cheerleader squads or having enough black teachers that we could relate to. These were some of the things that our little marches were about.

When we did have marches, a lot of times the principal, the people there didn’t know how to handle us. They were always peaceful, they were always non-violent, but it was just a matter of us refusing to go to class and sitting-in. It was more like a sit-in. We’d just be out in the hall, in the lobby of the main school, sitting there and singing some Black Power songs we’d heard off of TV that didn’t even relate to the situation. But we felt this is how it was supposed to be done. But we were young—seventh, eighth, ninth grade. Just refusing to go to class.

And of course, that created an uproar. The bell would ring and the white students would have to walk between us and try to get to their classes. We’d be sitting in the hall singing and picking our Afros. Eventually, after about two hours, the school system often called somebody that they thought could drive the students back to class or come to some solution. Oftentimes, that was my dad. And that would embarrass me. That would make me feel like, “Wow, he’s the Tom. Here he comes. He’s going to mess up everything.” For a while, I was seriously militant. I was seriously revolutionary. I was against even them, because they were part of the establishment.

I was embarrassing him. I remember one night coming home from school and he was coming home from whatever, practice. And he said, “I don’t want you participating in any more of those marches. If you do I’m going to tie you to a tree and shoot you with my shotgun.” That was the maddest that I had ever seen him at me. I think, just like I was embarrassed that he came to break up our sit-in, he was embarrassed that I was participating. He just looked at me and shook his head and said, you know, “You need to go on back to class, now.” And that created tension in the home, that he was part of the establishment.

Bob Gilgor
Did you perceive him as wanting the same rights for black people that you wanted? Maybe you didn’t. How did you perceive him?
JoAnne Peerman
At that time I just perceived him as a disciplinarian and part of the other side that was just trying to break us up and send us back to class and not listen to what we had to say. And eventually, two or three months down the road, everybody came to the realization—probably not him, but probably their discussion of how we’re going to handle these students who keep having sit-ins—they made us form a committee who wrote down demands. What is it we wanted and all that. So, they would meet with a smaller group of the black students. They felt like that was a better way of handling it. And it was, to a degree. As I said, we were just young and we were following in the footsteps of what we heard was going on at the high school. It was just more or less, we were just following a pattern. Sometimes we didn’t even have a purpose or anything. And that’s what these student representatives showed us, by, you know, “OK, five students will meet with the principal and two teachers and we’ll write down your demands.” And they had those little meetings. We didn’t even have any great concerns. Or if we did, a lot of them were resolved.

Even the players on some of the teams participated when we were trying to get more black cheerleaders. Because they had cheerleader tryouts. All the cheerleaders were white, and all the team was black, with the exception of a few. It was like 80:20. We really felt like we should have more black cheerleaders to support the team. And so even the team said that they would not play if we didn’t have more. It got to be more organized. It came together for a purpose.

Follow-up questions

Review the answers to the questions listed above, and continue discussion with questions below.

  1. Joanne Peerman mentions she saw her father as “the Tom.” This is a reference to a pre-Civil War novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. What did she mean with this reference?
  2. Peerman speaks about her embarrassment and her father’s embarrassment at their being on opposite sides of these civil rights issues. Discuss the dilemmas that Joanne’s father may have faced in his position. Why do you think he yelled at her that night he came home from practice? What were the dilemmas that Joanne faced?
  3. We can tell from Peerman’s words that she saw herself as a “militant” at the time, but now she looks back and sees herself as “young” and “following a pattern.” Cite references where she describes her youthful actions, and describe what her attitude is toward her younger self.
  4. What does Peerman say her “little marches” were about? Later on, Joanne describes their broader demands—that they were looking for “more black educators, more black guidance counselors, more black principals.” Were these important things to fight for? Why do you think the students had to make these demands? How do these demands fit in with your previous perceptions about what integration and civil rights protests were about?
  5. Why do you think Peerman stressed that these marches were non-violent? Consider other famous civil rights protests in the late 60s and 70s in the Unites States. Can you name any that remained non-violent and any that became violent? Who were some of the prominent African Americans who espoused a non-violent or militant approach?