The Nine O'Clock Whistle
The Nine O'Clock Whistle
Stories of the Freedom Struggle for Civil Rights in Enfield, North Carolina
Between the years of 1963 and 1965, civil rights protests rocked rural communities like Enfield, a small North Carolina town where segregationist and white supremacist attitudes prevailed. Whites in Enfield enforced a variety of racist norms and employed a range of racist practices, including the sounding of a siren on Saturday nights meant to order Black residents to leave the downtown streets at nine o’clock. On August 28, 1963, hundreds of people, including Willa Cofield—an English teacher in the Black, segregated high school—and two of her students, Cynthia Samuelson and Mildred Sexton, protested these conditions as masses of Black people ignored the whistle.
After firemen used high-powered water hoses to drive people off the streets, the Black community continued to resist by organizing a successful three-month boycott of the white-owned downtown stores. The movement quickly spread into the surrounding county, morphing into a voter registration campaign, a school integration effort, and a legal battle over author Willa Cofield’s First Amendment rights, after she was fired from her position as a public school teacher.
The Nine O’Clock Whistle covers a range of historically and contextually significant stories, including details from Cofield’s grandfather’s early life as an enslaved person and her family’s rise to prominence in the Enfield Black community, to the roles the authors played in the local protest movement during the 1960s. Ultimately, Cofield, Samuelson, and Sexton squarely repudiate the assertion that the civil rights movement bypassed communities in northeastern North Carolina, and prove instead that the movement drastically changed the lives of people in towns like Enfield forever.
Willa Cofield is a retired educator with a deep devotion to community uplift. She previously held positions at the North Carolina Fund, Livingston College, and the New Jersey Department of Education. She produced The Brick School Legacy, and, with Karen Riley, The Nine O’clock Whistle. Cynthia Samuelson spent more than twenty-five years leading public and private information technology services organizations. She formerly worked for the Department of Defense, the Department of Transportation, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Mildred Sexton retired after forty-three years as an educator, having worked for the Halifax County, North Carolina, public schools; the Virginia Department of Juvenile Justice; Hampton University; Old Dominion University; and the Hampton, Virginia, city schools.
Contents
Maps
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I: The Nine O’Clock Whistle
Willa Cofield
1. Preface to Part 1: Blowing the Whistle
2. And Some Fell on Good Soil
3. Early Beginnings
4. The Entrepreneur
5. Sundays
6. The Cofields
7. Grandmama and Grandpapa George
8. My Early Love Affair with School
9. Attending Brick Tri-County High School
10. Following My Star
11. Reaching for Young Womanhood at Hampton Institute
12. Teaching in Halifax County
13. The Brick Rural Life School: Doing Common Things in an Uncommon Way
14. My Year at the University of Pennsylvania
15. Resuming Life in Enfield
16. Living the Dream of Teaching in My Hometown
17. Politics Change My World
18. Reed Johnson Runs for Town Commissioner
19. Inborden Students Challenge Segregation
20. The Protest Spreads
21. North Carolina v. Robert Blow and North Carolina v. Marie Davis
22. The March on Washington Sparks Events in Enfield
23. Ninety-Day Boycott of Enfield’s White-owned Businesses
24. Danger Signals at Inborden High School
25. Breaking the Back of Racism at the Ballot Box
26. The Halifax County Voters Movement
27. The Principal Turns Up the Heat
28. The Voter Registration Campaign
29. County Registrars Stage Voter Registration Slowdown
30. The May 30 Primary
31. The Political Becomes Persona
32. No Contract for You
33. The Community Shows Support
34. The Literacy Class
35. The KKK Burns Crosses
36. The Hearing in Eastern District Court
37. Six Black Children Integrate the “White” Enfield School
38. The Second Hearing of Johnson v. Branch
39. NEA to the Rescue
40. Halifax County Board of Commissioners
41. My Interrogation by NEA Panel
42. The Third Hearing of Johnson v. Branch
43. Judge Larkins Rules on Johnson v. Branch
44. Building a New Life
45. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals Reverses Ruling of District Court
46. The Settlement
47. Ending Notes
48. My Legacy of Struggle
49. Epilogue
50. The Whistle Today
Part II: Next in Line
Cynthia Samuelson
51. Preface to Part II
52. Growing Up in Enfield
53. Dixie Street
54. St. Paul Baptist Church
55. Grocery Stores
56. Inborden School
57. Introduction to the Arts
58. Confidence and Optimism
59. Southern Racism Exposed
60. Brown v. Board of Education
61. Emmett Till
62. Rosa Parks
63. Montgomery Bus Boycott
64. Little Rock, Arkansas
65. Greensboro Sit-Ins
66. Freedom Riders
67. Jackson, Mississippi Sit-In
68. Sixteenth Street Church Bombing
69. Racism in Enfield
70. The Doctor’s Office
71. Harrison Drug
72. The Friendly Grill
73. Rose’s Five and Dime
74. The 9 O’Clock Whistle
75. The Public Library
76. The Park
77. Fighting Racism
78. The Klan
79. The Boycott, Picketing, and Jail
80. People Who Joined the Fight
81. John Salter
82. JV Henry
83. Robert Blow
84. TT Clayton
85. The March on Washington
86. Retaliation
87. Enfield after the Sixties
88. School Integration
89. The Public Library
90. Downtown
91. Population and Demographics
92. Black Officials
93. Highway 301 and Interstate 95
94. Dixie Street
95. Farming
96. Impact of the Sixties on My Life
97. Mentors May Not Support You
98. You Must Overcome Obstacles
99. Do Not Hate Anyone
100. Life Isn’t Fair
101. Perception Can Become the Reality
102. Change the System
103. Get a Good Education
104. Overcome Adversity
105. Let No One Intimidate You
106. Be Yourself
107. You Can Learn from Anyone
108. They Walked the Walk
109. Willa Cofield Johnson
110. Lillie Cousins Smith
111. Ira D. Saunders
112. William “Bill” Jones
113. Going Home
Part III: The Clarity of Retrospection: Remembering the Vacuum of Segregation in Enfield, North Carolina
Mildred Bobbitt Sexton
114. Preface to Part III
115. My Family
116. My Paternal Grandparents
117. My Father’s Military Service
118. My Parents’ Wedding
119. My Birth and Birth Place
120. Places Lived and the Births of My Brothers and Sisters
121. My Grade School Days
122. Inborden School: Segregated Beginnings
123. Dawson Elementary School: A Family Legacy
124. Back to Enfield and Inborden Elementary School
125. My Neighborhood
126. Protection of Children
127. Hannon Street
128. Caring Community
129. My Intermediate Years
130. Seventh and Eighth Grades
131. My Hometown of Entrepreneurs
132. Black Businesses
133. My High School Years
134. Starting My Teens: 1960–61
135. News of Current Events: 1961–62
136. The Protests Begin: 1962–63
137. The Nine O’Clock Whistle
138. Picketing and Threats: 1963–64
139. A Time of Courage
140. My Life Continues
141. North Carolina College: 1964–68
142. My Return to Enfield: 1968–70
143. Integration of Enfield Schools: 1970–71
144. Black Soldiers in the 1960s
145. True Integration: 1970–74
146. My Professional Career Blossoms
147. My Tenure in Hampton City Schools
148. Conclusion
149. Epilogue
150. Enfield Today
Notes
