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calsfoundation@cals.org
Neighborhood Thoughts: Surrounded by Greatness
It’s the time of year when I consciously review, remember, and recognize significant portions of my life that focus on my neighborhood, my family, and the friends I’ve met along the way. I am a sixth-generation Arkansan on my maternal side. The five generations before me are the reason I exist and the reason I have the courage to be who I am. It is my belief that they passed the best of themselves to me.
My immediate family were my first teachers. I have memories of sitting on my grandmother’s lap reading the newspaper at age two. I have memories of watching my mother and her sisters get dressed to go to a nightclub when I was a toddler. I was sitting on the bathroom sink in my pajamas and asking questions about why they were “coloring” their faces.
It didn’t occur to me that I was born into a historic family. My grandfather and five of his children are included in the Aaron v. Cooper court case to integrate Little Rock public schools. My grandparents were parents to fourteen children who lived to see adulthood. My grandfather experienced the death of two sons who died in infancy and that of his second wife. Without the luxury to give up on his future, he continued to build the nest that would nurture me.
At my birth, we lived at 1111 Jones Street, a few blocks from Little Rock Central High School. By age three, we had moved to 3123 Marshall Street. The move proved to be a pivotal moment in my life. I was surrounded by makers of history in Little Rock, most known to me as neighbors. My older siblings and relatives attended Capitol Hill Elementary School. I attended Ish Elementary named for Dr. George William Stanley Ish, a black physician in Little Rock. I would later attend St. Bartholomew Catholic School across the street from the church that opened in 1911.
Most of my life was spent around Little Rock in an area described as the South End. The South End is defined as east of Interstate 30, south of Roosevelt Road, west of the State Fairgrounds, and north of Fourche Creek. It is where Thrasher Boys Club, with the inside pool, opened its doors to girls around 1970. Luther Armstrong taught many children in Little Rock how to swim. I played with the daughters of Dr. William Henry Townsend, state legislator. It is where I attended my first concert at the Barton Coliseum in 1972 to see the Jackson Five. It is where I met Sidney Moncrief prior to his success in professional basketball. He was friends with my eldest brother, Raymond Dean. Clarence Finley (Coach), David Wyatt, Ron Burk, and Ural Crutcher were often at the house playing dominoes or socializing. Sidney’s younger brother, Doyle Moncrief, played basketball with my brother Mahlon Stewart, competing against each other at different high schools while living just two blocks from each other. Professional football players from the neighborhood include John Simmons, George Stewart, Leslie O’Neal, and Keith Jackson. Tyrone Phillips is a neighbor who often fished in Fourche Creek and became a professional fisherman as an adult.
Horace Mann Junior High school is where I experienced Sue Cowan Williams as a teacher, as she was a regular substitute. The tenth library in the Central Arkansas Library System (CALS) is named after her. It’s also where I met Amanda Ausbie, daughter of Harlem Globetrotter Hubert “Geese” Ausbie—so I officially knew someone who knew someone “famous.” Horace Mann is on the north side of Roosevelt Road.
Dr. Patricia Washington McGraw was introduced to me through my church: Reed Memorial CME Church at 3101 Izard. I knew of her because her nieces and nephew lived a block from my house. I knew she was an educator, and she often shared black history facts whenever children were gathered. The church is also where I interacted with various educators like Sanford and Sammie Nell Tollette, who lived three blocks west of my home. I would later work for their son Sanford at the Joseph Pfeifer Kiwanis Camp. Marion Taylor, the first black Arkansas State Trooper, married my mother’s sister, Betty Jean Toombs. The current sheriff of Pulaski County, Eric Higgins, is the youngest of his siblings who lived a block from me.
Daisy Bates and Little Rock Nine member Thelma Mothershed lived down the street from me on Twenty-eighth Street. I remember kids in the neighborhood going to the Bates door and asking for water. She brought it out on a tray in Dixie cups. We’d heard she had a refrigerator that had water coming out the door.
Charles Bussey, the first black mayor of Little Rock, brought a pilot program to Little Rock under the Carter presidency that allowed me the opportunity to attend college for two years without debt. Lottie Shackelford’s husband and my bonus father often worked together, and members of her extended family were friends with my family members. She is the first woman to hold the title of mayor of Little Rock.
Edward Coleman and Freeman McKindra Sr. are military veterans who served their community after serving their country. They shared their knowledge of service with me. Katherine Phillips Mitchell directed the Career Advancement Voucher Demonstration Project that began my college journey. She served on the Little Rock School Board and led the Black Access Television station for Storer Cable. She became the first female president of Shorter College. Ozell Sutton is the first black journalist for the Arkansas Democrat newspaper, and his wife taught my second-grade class at Ish Elementary. They lived a few blocks from my grandparents.
These are a few names who are part of my community history, yet their impact on my life is immeasurable. Growing up around “history makers” was so commonplace there was no pressure to achieve greatness because it was already part of who we were.
By Rhonda Stewart, genealogy and local history specialist for the Central Arkansas Library System’s Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, housed in the CALS Bobby L. Roberts Library of Arkansas History & Art
