When Leona Tate was 6 years old, she found out she would be going to a new school. She was happy about the change, but she didn’t fully understand why it was happening, at least at first.
“I didn’t like my old school because it was very overcrowded,” she told Verite News. There was a lot going on at the school, a lot of people moving around, she said. “I was very uncomfortable.”
But the preparation for the change suggested that it was something important. She had a shorter recess than the other kids in her class. She spent time on the weekends working with her teacher. She did extra homework.
“Things just started changing, so I knew something was about to happen,” Tate said.
The new school she would be attending was McDonogh 19 Elementary School, which at the time was all-white.
Tate, who is Black, would be one of four New Orleans students who would begin the process of integrating the city’s schools. On Nov. 14, 1960, she and two other Black girls — Gail Etienne and Tessie Prevost — were escorted into the school by U.S. Marshals, who were there to protect the girls from an angry mob protesting outside of the school. On the same day, another young Black student, Ruby Bridges, integrated the all-white William Frantz Elementary School about two miles away.
The historic moment is commemorated in an exhibit called “The Trail They Blazed” — which opened on June 5 and closes Friday (Aug. 23). The exhibit, curated by Eric Seiferth of The Historic New Orleans Collection, will then move to the REACH Center in the 7th Ward, where it will be open from December through March 2025.
Tate spoke with Verite News about her experience as a member of the “McDonogh Three,” her mixed-use housing and civil rights center that’s inside the former McDonogh 19 building in the Lower 9th Ward and the current state of racial equity in the United States.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Verite News: Can you talk a little bit about your experience in integrating McDonogh 19 Elementary School? What was it like and how did you feel at the time?
Leona Tate: We entered [the school] calmly. …They asked us to take a seat on the bench outside the principal’s office, and we must have sat on that bench half the day before they decided to place us in a classroom. When we did get placed in a classroom, the white parents started coming in and pulling their children out. We were the only three people in this building at the end of the day. That lasted a year and a half. And then [in] second grade, 25 children came after Christmas, but only two were white, so at the end of that school year, McDonogh 19 was becoming a school for Black children.
They wanted to keep us in a white school, so that’s when we went to T.J. Semmes Elementary School. Well, we didn’t have the marshals or police protection at Semmes. We endured a lot. That’s where we faced integration. You know, we didn’t face it here [at McDonogh] because everybody was gone. We faced integration at Semmes, and it was horrific. We had to endure a lot for it to work. And I don’t wish that on nobody’s child.
Those children were monsters, but they were doing what they were told to do — nobody’s born with that kind of hate. Even some of the teachers were coercing them to do us things, call us names. They would share things with the white students that they wouldn’t share with us, and things like that. But the encouragement was the people that we had at home and behind us. We just had to stay focused and do what we were supposed to do. And that’s the way we made it. We knew that we had to stick together. We couldn’t go off and be by ourselves or anything like that, because it was really dangerous.
Verite News: You mentioned that you had the support of your family during integration. Was there anyone else who helped you along the way?
Leona Tate: The NAACP office, the churches, we had like a surrogate godmother, her name was Leontine Luke. She was like the liaison person for our parents with the NAACP office. But we had a lot of support. I remember that first year, that Christmas time, [Delta Sigma Theta sorority] gave us a big Christmas party at the [International Longshoremen’s Association union hall]. That was one of the biggest halls that a Black person could use for an event. And it was awesome. There were enough toys to give away, it was just really nice. We had a lot of support.
Verite News: Please tell us about your own racial equity organization, The Leona Tate Foundation, and the Tate, Etienne and Prevost Interpretive Center in the Lower 9th Ward? What do they do and why did you choose to start them up?
Leona Tate: It was never my intention to start a foundation, but when I came back after Katrina — Tess, Gail and I were always sentimental about this building. When we talked and we’d all be on the phone together, we would always talk about McDonogh 19. So when we were allowed to come back to this area … to see the damages to your house, it was a must that I come see what the building looked like. And it looked fine. And I found out that they were only bringing one school back in this area. My focus was to try to get it open as a school again, because it had closed the year before Katrina, it closed in ‘04.
And [potential partners in developing the building] kept saying, “Well, what’s your foundation about?” And I kept saying I didn’t think about doing a foundation, I was just trying to get it open as a school again. So we formed a foundation, it looked like we couldn’t get any answers without having a foundation. So I finally formed a foundation [in order to buy the building].
[The TEP Center] is strictly educational. We can’t say a museum because we don’t archive. …The TEP Center is really the Tate, Etienne and Prevost Interpretive Center. We do anything with racial equity. We try to teach the history of the desegregation of public schools. We try to get the schools to come in so the students can see this because they know nothing about this.
Verite News: A major theme in your life has been education, specifically with regard to educating people on race. In recent years, we’ve seen book bans and bans on what is often misunderstood as critical race theory, bans on teaching race and gender within classrooms. What do you think these bans mean for children, Black or white?
Leona Tate: People don’t want to talk about the things that their race did in the ‘50s and the ‘60s. …They really don’t want to talk about it, but they’re erasing important history. When I see students come here and they find out about this history, they seem to appreciate school a little better.
We just got to keep telling those stories. They can try not to put it in the books, but if they don’t want to put it in the books, allow us to be a part of that curriculum, where they can come here and learn that. That’s the thing that I want to do, is to make this a part of the curriculum.
The children think that happened long ago. They don’t think it’s important anymore. They think that happened during slavery. They come here, they tour the building, just the way Tess, Gail and I came in the building. They tour the building, they go in the movie room, and they watch the film of those times and people discussing what was going on during those times. But they don’t see me until after they see the film. And when I walk in, it’s like a ghost walked in. I’m serious, their faces light up. When I see that, that’s my push to keep going, because I feel like if you understand that I’m still here, history is still here. It’s not that long ago.
Verite News: In recent decades, most recently in 2020, the country exploded with protests against racism and police brutality. Groups like Black Lives Matter have drawn attention to the police killings of countless Black people. How do you view these protests and continued calls for racial equity?
Leona Tate: When the killing of George Floyd happened, I had never seen so many races together supporting Black Lives Matter, like I saw them [then]. I was very proud of our young students and college students and all of those out there protesting. [They didn’t do it] violently. They were peacefully protesting, but they were all together, all races together, and I thought that was a wonderful feeling.
Verite News: What direction do you think New Orleans is headed in when it comes to enacting policies that promote racial equity?
Leona Tate: As far as New Orleans, I don’t know, I see some great things, and then [I] don’t. So how do we get these people [in the local community] to understand and to be involved in this kind of stuff? It’s hard, it’s not easy. Right here in this community, people don’t know what’s going on in this building. It’s because they don’t try to come and see. We get people from all over the world in here, and I can count the locals that come in here.”
Verite News: What advice do you have for activists still fighting for racial equity today?
Leona Tate: Just fight with your brains and not with your hands. The pathway is there. And I feel like we set this pathway for everybody to take advantage of this. It can go anyway you want to go. They can’t tell you no. I encourage the students, if anybody ever tells you, come get me. Let me help you. [And] just stay focused and stay on the right path.
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