“W-A-L-K-O-U-T!”: High School Students and the Development of Black Power in L.A.

Abstract

During the first week of March 1968, high school students staged a fiveday walkout in six Los Angeles high schools—Garfield, Roosevelt, Lincoln, Wilson, and Belmont High Schools, all predominantly chicano schools in East Los Angeles, and Jefferson High School, a black school in South L.A. These dramatic school walkouts highlighted curriculum and dress code issues; dramatized the lack of resources and inferior schooling conditions in schools that educated black and Latino children; pressed for college prep courses and more black and Latino teachers/administrators; and demanded more community input into how the school was run. The Mexican American newspaper La Raza proclaimed the significance of these events, “The first 15 days of March of the year 1968 will be known in the ‘new’ history of the Southwest as the days of the BLOWOUT... These days became the moment of truth to many people.“³

We waited a long time for those folks to do something to improve our schools, but they let us down and so we have decided to do the job ourselves. —Jefferson High School student, March 1968²

I am deeply grateful to Steve Lang whose experiences as a student at Fremont in the 1960s and as a teacher there for more than thirty years have helped me see this history in new ways. All mistakes are, of course, mine but if I have managed some fundamental truth in this narrative of high school activism, it is due in large measure to Steve’s support and insights. Matthew Ides, Mark Wild, Peniel Joseph, Alejandr a Marchevsky, Prudence Cumberbatch, and Komozi Woodard offered crucial insights and feedback on this work. A Rockefeller Humanities Fellowship, a CUNY Scholar Incentive award, and a Tow Travel Fellowship supported this research.