Gwendolyn Elaine Armstrong was a black

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

pioneer in the

Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the Unite ...

. In September, 1965, she and

Raylawni Branch Raylawni Branch (born 1941, Hattiesburg, Forrest County, Mississippi, United States) is a black Mississippi pioneer of the Civil Rights Movement, a professional nursing educator and US Air Force Reserve officer. She is best known for her leadi ...

, both local natives, integrated the

University of Southern Mississippi The University of Southern Mississippi (Southern Miss or USM) is a Public university, public research university with its main campus located in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools to a ...

at Hattiesburg. They thus completed the process of breaking the

segregation Segregation may refer to: Separation of people * Geographical segregation, rates of two or more populations which are not homogenous throughout a defined space * School segregation * Housing segregation * Racial segregation, separation of humans ...

barriers at Mississippi's universities which had been begun by

Clyde Kennard Clyde Kennard (June 12, 1927July 4, 1963) was an American Korean War veteran and civil rights leader from Hattiesburg, Mississippi. In the 1950s, he attempted several times to enroll at the all-white Mississippi Southern College (now the Univer ...

at (then) Mississippi Southern College (1956–61) and carried forward by

James Meredith James Howard Meredith (born June 25, 1933) is an American civil rights activist, writer, political adviser, and Air Force veteran who became, in 1962, the first African-American student admitted to the racially segregated University of Missi ...

at the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi ( byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment ...

(September, 1962) and Richard Holmes at

Mississippi State University Mississippi State University for Agriculture and Applied Science, commonly known as Mississippi State University (MSU), is a public land-grant research university adjacent to Starkville, Mississippi. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Univ ...

(July, 1965).

Biography

Armstrong was a 1965 graduate of Hattiesburg's Royal Street (then Rowan) High School. She wished to attend college but had to stay at home to care for her invalid mother. The

NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&n ...

offered to support her entry into the local segregated white university, and recruited local civil rights activist

to enter with her as moral support. This required considerable physical courage for both, but especially the inexperienced 18-year-old Armstrong. Having grown up in the black community of Hattiesburg, she was well aware of the notorious miscarriage of justice in which the last black (Clyde Kennard) to attempt to enroll at the university had been falsely sent to prison and an early death.Neo-Confederacy: A Critical Introduction, by Euan Hague (Editor), Heidi Beirich (Editor), Edward H. Sebesta (Editor), University of Texas Press (December 1, 2008) pp. 284-85 By this time (September, 1965) both Ole Miss and

had been integrated – the former violently, the latter peacefully. The

Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission The Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission (also called the Sov-Com) was a state agency in Mississippi from 1956 to 1977 tasked with fighting desegregation and controlling civil rights activism. It was overseen by the Governor of Mississippi. T ...

and University of Southern Mississippi leaders, such as President Dr. William David McCain, had earlier fought vociferously and successfully to thwart

's attempts to enroll at (then) Mississippi Southern College. They had now come to realize that the battle to maintain segregation was lost. Therefore, McCain and his staff made extensive confidential plans for the admission and attendance of Armstrong and Branch. A faculty guardian and mentor was secretly appointed for each. The same campus police department which in 1959 had attempted to railroad Kennard to prison when he attempted to enroll, now had very strict orders to prevent or quickly stop any incident involving the two black students. Student athletic, social, and political leaders were recruited to keep the calm and protect the university from such bad publicity as Ole Miss had suffered from its reaction to

. As a result, Armstrong had only very minor negative experiences. She studied music and singing, and helped the university choir win a championship. According to Branch, they were "treated just like everybody else.". In 1968 Armstrong (as Elaine Armstrong) pursued a brief career as a jazz styled singer recording in Nashville for a release on King Records. The two women were accompanied by six bodyguards when on campus. The university administration appointed Dr. Geoffrey Fish, an oceanographer who taught biology as her guardian and tutor. Fish took a genuine interest in both women, gave them advice and jobs in work-study. He was very kind, listened to them, and was like a father figure to them.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Armstrong, Gwendolyn Elaine Living people Mississippi State University alumni People from Hattiesburg, Mississippi School desegregation pioneers Place of birth missing (living people) Year of birth missing (living people) Education segregation in Mississippi