Did You Know Series...The Fearless 11

Did you know that in 1956, in West Jackson, Provine was established and named for chemistry professor John W. Provine. Provine High quickly became “Ram City,” serving grades 9 through 12. In the fall of 1965, eleven courageous Black students, Christopher Stevens, Don Gibson, Georgia Gustavis, Hazel Jordan-McLaurin, Melba Sue Chambliss, Vernon McLaurin, Louis Smith, Joe Ann Robinson, Morris Lewis, Roland Dotson, and Jacqueline Crossley became known as the  “Fearless 11” voluntarily integrated the formerly all‑white school, facing harsh resistance. At the time, Brinkley, Jim Hill (1912), and Lanier (1925) High Schools were the only public high schools for Black students in Jackson, MS. Although the U.S. The Supreme Court ruled to end segregation in public schools on May 17, 1954. It wasn’t until later court decisions—particularly Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education in 1969—That schools were ordered to desegregate immediately rather than gradually.

(Brinkley started as an Elementary School and sometime in the 1950s, it became a High School)