ERIK SANZENBACH / L’Observateur / February 26, 2000

RESERVE – Way in the back of the Sept. 2, 1965 issue of L’Observateur is avery short article about a very historical event. The headline read: Negro GirlEnrolls at Leon Godchaux High in Reserve.

There was no mention of the girl’s name. In the article, she is only describedas “a lone Negro student.”That student was Christina Green. On Aug. 30, 1965 she became the firstAfrican-American to integrate St. John Parish public schools under orders ofa federal court. She was also the first African-American to graduate fromLeon Godchaux High School a year later. And she did it with honors.Now retired, married and living in a comfortable ranch-style house in Reserve, Christina Green Davis looks back on that first day.

“It wasn’t a planned thing,” Davis said.

Davis was going to the all-black Fifth Ward High School, and at the end of her junior year students had been informed they would be allowed to attend Leon Godchaux High as seniors. Davis didn’t really think about it and went off tovisit relatives in Brooklyn, N.Y., for the summer.When she got back she still hadn’t decided what she wanted to do until the morning of the first day of school.

“I told my parents I was going to go to Leon Godchaux High.” said Davis. “Myparents didn’t force me to do anything. My dad always said, ‘be the first;don’t do something because someone else did it.'”Davis’ decision was based on her desire to be educated. At the time shewanted to be a mathematician and to get into college. She discovered thatLeon Godchaux High offered physics and chemistry, two subjects not offered at Fifth Ward High.

“I wanted a better education,” she said simply.

So, on Aug. 30, 1965, Davis, her mother, Lillie Mae Green, and threemembers of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People walked into the principal’s office at Leon Godchaux.

According to the L’Observateur article, “Registration and assignment went without incident.” But when Davis was led into the school gym for theassembly, she knew she had done something unique.

“You could have heard a pin drop in that assembly,” Davis recalled with a smile.

She said at first she was surprised by the reaction of the students.

“We weren’t subject to a lot of racism as children,” Davis said. “I had beenaround whites because my Uncle Triche, who helped rear me, was friends with a lot of them, so I didn’t feel any apprehension.”But all that changed when she walked into Leon Godchaux.

“I was treated very rudely that first day,” she said, “and there was seldom a day that passed when I didn’t hear a racial slur.”Fellow students wouldn’t walk with her in the halls, and some wouldn’t even sit next to her in the classroom. Davis said she met some nice people, but alot of them gave her the excuse “I would like to talk to you, but my parents won’t let me.”She said she was subjected to all sorts of rumors and lies. She was told theNAACP was paying her to attend school. Originally from Brooklyn, Davis wastold she was just a northerner who was causing trouble.

Then there were the tricks.

Once, lipstick was smeared on her seat in a class, and she sat in it while wearing a light-colored dress.

“I had to go to the home economics class and wash out my dress,” Davis said.

Later, her mother told Davis of threats phoned to her house.

“She kept that from me for years,” said Davis.

Davis never ate lunch in the cafeteria with the rest of the students because she did not feel welcome there. She ate her lunch with a teacher namedAlthea Cambre.

“Miss Cambre was very nice with me,” said Davis. “She went through theridicule with me because of her kindness.”Davis said many teachers were nice to her.

“Not one teacher at Leon Godchaux High ever said anything negative to me,” Davis declared.

Going to Leon Godchaux High was a sacrifice for Davis on several fronts.

If she had stayed at Fifth Ward, she would have been valedictorian.

“It was a sacrifice for me,” she admitted, “but I did make the honor roll at Leon Godchaux.”She was also on the girls’ basketball team at Fifth Ward, but there was no girls’ athletics at Leon Godchaux. To help out, the girls’ physical educationteacher, Ms. Barnes, would shoot hoops with Davis to keep her in shape.Because of her schedule Davis was forced to take ninth-grade P.E., and thereshe made some friends with the younger students.

“I did make friends there,” Davis said. “There were some friendly, cordialpeople.”Not only was Davis on the honor roll, but she participated in field and track, was a member of the Science Club, won first place in the softball throw, got second place in the school spelling bee and was second overall in school candy sales.

Getting to school every day was also a bit of an adventure for Davis. Atfirst her parents said they would take her to school, but the St. John ParishSchool Board insisted she take the school bus like all the other students.

Unfortunately, the school bus for her neighborhood was driven by an African- American, Norma “Hots” Alexander, and he was instructed to drop Davis off a block from school because school board officials were afraid of violence if a black school bus driver came on campus.

So Davis would walk the extra block on River Road to get to school each day.

Strangely enough, going home was no problem. She could get on the bus withall the other white students, and the white bus driver would get her home.

Usually no one would sit next to Davis.

“Most students would rather stand on the bus all the way to Garyville,” Davis recalled.

She remembers one day when a younger girl did sit next to her. Despiteharassment and name-calling from other students, the girl would not give up her seat next to Davis.

“I still remember her, because of the courage she displayed,” said Davis.

Despite her treatment that year, Davis said other African-Americans who followed her were treated worse. The eldest of five children, Davis’ sistersand brothers went to Leon Godchaux after she graduated.

“There was a lot more hostility and fighting when they were there,” Davis said. “In the cafeteria, at lunch, people would dump food on them. It was verysaddening to me.”But going to Leon Godchaux High did have its benefits, and it helped to decide Davis’ career.

“It really helped me out,” Davis said. “There was divine guidance in mydecision.”She and nine other Leon Godchaux students were picked to take the Federal Civil Service exam. She said if she had still been at Fifth Ward High shewouldn’t have had this chance because the Civil Service Exam wasn’t given at black high schools.

Davis scored very high on the test, and the federal government offered her a job. But she wanted to go to college, and she enrolled at Queens College inNew York.

However, she discovered she didn’t like the cold winters up north, so she came back to Reserve in 1967 and waited to get into Dillard University at the start of the next semester.

The federal government kept offering her a job, and instead of going to college she accepted employment in the Veteran’s Administration as a file clerk.

Thirty years later Davis retired from the VA as one of six supervisors in the claims division. In her tenure at the VA she received several promotions andhad carved out a lucrative and satisfying career.

“Yes,” Davis repeated, “it was divine guidance.”Davis said she has no regrets.

“I’m glad I did it,” she said. “A lot of people tried to discourage me, but it onlymade me stronger.”She said she got hostility from the black community as well as the whites.

“I got it from both sides.” Davis said, shrugging. “But there are some peoplewho just aren’t ready for change.”Looking back on that year, Davis knows something big happened.

“I felt I was doing something important,” she said. “I was helping to giveothers like me the opportunity.”It was the education that was important to Davis. She wanted to get thebest education she could.

“People don’t understand the severity of the situation in black schools at that time,” Davis said. “We were using old, tattered books, and the systemwasn’t the same.”Davis’ husband Ernest, a retired millwright and her high school sweetheart, remembers going to the senior prom with Christina. Because of her, therewere a lot of policemen at the dance.

“People treated us very rudely at the prom,” recalled Davis. “People keptbumping into us on purpose.”But Ernest Davis feels his wife’s experience at Leon Godchaux High helped her a lot.

“My husband always told me that I led a sheltered life,” Davis said. “Theexperience helped me to confront people and stand up for myself later on in life.”Married for almost 32 years, a mother of one daughter and a grandmother four times over, Davis now spends most of her time as the business administrator for her church, the Greater Plymouth Rock Church. She seemshappy and content with the way her life turned out, despite what happened to her in high school.

“I didn’t come out of this with any hate,” Davis said. “I was taught not tohate, and I’m glad that was instilled in me.”She pauses for a second, then continued. “I don’t have any animosity towardany of those people. I would always laugh at them. I was 17 at the time, and Ithink I was a lot more mature than they were.”

Return To News Stories