A necessary education

Monroe Elementary School, Topeka

Less than 10 blocks south of the Kansas State Capitol in Topeka, there stands a stately, century-old building. 

I am not talking about the Evel Knievel Museum, but the former Monroe Elementary School. The existing building is the third Monroe school on the site, and dates to 1926. Its Italian Renaissance Revival architecture gives it a design most American school would not dare consider today.

The other Black-only schools that once operated in Topeka have been sold or torn down. Preservation of Monroe turned the old school into the home of the Brown vs. Board of Education National Historic Site, which recounts the history of the monumental 1954 Supreme Court decision that unanimously ruled school segregation unconstitutional.  

Getting to Monroe Elementary before it closed took some unexpected travel changes. A special event in Wichita closed the botanical gardens to normal visits, and that time 

The quality of the schools was not in question, but that Monroe was a school for Black students only. Students who could not attend white schools that were often closer to where their families lived. Oliver Brown's daughter had to walk six blocks to a bus stop before a mile ride to Monroe, although there was a white school seven blocks from the Brown home. Brown, a welder for the Santa Fe Railroad and assistant pastor, became the lead plaintiff.

The park service has added other schools that were part of the Brown lawsuit (schools in five states filed together, which will form Brown vs. Board of Education National Historical Park when complete.

The displays in the Monroe school include a history of events prior to the Brown decision, a history since the Brown decision, which came almost 60 years after the infamous 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case that declared Black Americans were "separate but equal," cementing the Jim Crow for several more generations. 

The recreated classroom speaks to a different time in education. The children in this room had no desks but shared small tables. In the corner was a fireplace. A record player sat on the teacher's desk. 

A day before, the Supreme Court had made a momentous ruling, one years in the making. I looked around the Brown vs. Board of Education site and wondered what other court decisions might be revisited and shake up people’s lives again. 

The school segregation might feel settled to many, but another national historic site, Little Rock Central High School, displyed the difficulty in desegregating. The South fought for a generation, and while codified segregation might be illegal, it exists in other ways. Our schools are often still segregated by income, which can often run along racial lines.

All that says nothing about the Supreme Court, which can change its persuasion at any time. 

Restored Monroe classroom