The volunteer here deftly explained to me why the NAACP chose an elementary school in Topeka Kansas as part of their legal battle against segregation. The NAACP had tried various cases in other states, where white schools like John Philip Sousa Middle School in DC were superior and where black schools like Hockessin #107c in Delaware were inferior, but here in Kansas, the two schools were almost identical in terms of facilities. In fact, the teachers in the black school were more qualified, due to lack of opportunities elsewhere. Because of the superficial “equality”, the NAACP was able to argue that segregation itself, no matter how “equal”, is unfair and damaging.

It’s not that Kansas was all or always fair-minded. Violent racist agitators in Kansas both predate the Civil War and still exist today. At the time, racist policies were implemented either broadly by law in states like South Carolina or locally and selectively in states like Kansas. Perhaps because Topeka is the state capital, the schools here were segregated with substantially equal funding.

The key to the case was the Clark Doll test, where black children often identified with and preferred to be like a white doll rather than a black doll. The evidence made it to the Supreme Court, where it was cited by Chief Justice Warren as revealing the permanent damage done by legal segregation. One of the original dolls used in the test is here.

It is a privilege to be able to visit and feel connected to such an important site in the Civil Rights movement. The nation has many sites devoted to war, especially Civil War memorials, and I wish it had more sites devoted to the other kinds of fights we had for moral progress. The mural outside pictured above was done in 2018, and at the bottom local kids added their own colorful illustrations showing what Brown v. Board of Education means to them.