Celebrating Ruby Bridges

I had already gone to kindergarten at an all-Black school where everybody looked exactly like me, my teacher and all of the other kids and all of the other teachers and principal. So I was accustomed to school. I knew pretty much what to expect, I thought. But I remember these four very tall white men knocking on the door and saying, That indeed did not happen on my way to kindergarten. They were raising their hands, some of them were holding signs up, but it looked exactly like Mardi Gras. I really thought that we had stumbled into a Mardi Gras parade that day. So the innocence of a child, that's really what protected me that day. Mrs. Henry was the only teacher that would teach me. I mean, I didn't know what to expect from her. She looked exactly like the mob outside. She was an amazing teacher and I knew she cared about me. And so the real lesson that I took away in first grade in that classroom is that it's the same lesson Dr. King tried to teach us. You can't judge a person by the color of their character. That lesson has shaped me into the person that I am today. You can't tell the story of history just by leaving out certain things that you don't want them to know or see. You can't do that. You can't tell part of the truth. You have to tell the whole truth. You have to show it to them so that they do understand. And that is our responsibility. I've seen hope in the eyes of our children for 25 years. Hope that most people haven't seen, but I get a chance to see it every day in every school across this country. So I just think there's so many, so many opportunities to change now to do better and to do better by our young people. And so what I would say to kids today is that's exactly what we see playing out before us. It may have taken 60 years for this to resurrect all over again, but the young people have taken to the streets. I do believe that it's a new generation. What we did back in 1960 moved us to this point.