The Black Side of Desegregation: The History of Paul Breaux High School, Part 1 | Folks (1982)

This episode of the series “Folks” from February 4, 1982, features Sharon Elizabeth Sexton’s report on the history of Paul Breaux High School in Lafayette Parish, Louisiana, the only public high school available to African American students during segregation. This report covers: the opening of the elementary and high school by Paul Breaux following the 1896 U.S. Supreme Court decision in “Plessy v. Ferguson”; the inferior resources available at the school; the fight for desegregation in the case of “Alfreda Trahan v. Lafayette Parish School Board”; the school board’s initial desegregation plan; the integration of the Lafayette Parish public schools; and the school board’s decision to close Paul Breaux High School in 1970. Sexton interviews: J. Carlton James, the former principal of Paul Breaux Elementary School; Eva Domingue; Lloyd Foote, the former principal of Paul Breaux High School; Mrs. W.D. Smith, a former teacher at Paul Breaux High School; Walter Trahan, the father of Alfreda Trahan; Allen Willturner; Roosevelt H. Hill, a coach at Northside High School; Robert Henderson, the principal at Paul Breaux High School; James C. Jackson, the Director of Community Affairs for the Lafayette Board of Education; and Louis Benjamin, Jr., the Assistant Supervisor of Census and Attendance for the Lafayette Board of Education.
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[@deloreswillis9224]

Very interesting clip … LUV THIS!!!! Thank you!!

[@justinlee9053]

Love these history pieces ❤

[@roxannematthews5444]

My mother & her siblings went there, her & her sister played basketball my mama was a star player bcse she stood 6'1 her sister 6' she use to tell me stories about Paul Breaux ❤❤

[@KiAirah87]

Segregation may not be enshrined in law anymore, but it lives on in banking, employment opportunities, real estate, and school funding. Less severely, but it still exists.

[@georgepops5590]

That's right

[@georgepops5590]

My dad said when they stayed in dekalb Texas In the country they were farmers living in the red river bottoms they had to walk three to five miles to macidonia almont community to the school called almont for our black families the pops hooks Johnson's Neal family the Easter family cheatums Traylor family ganaway we in that thang