Mardon Walker and Naomi Graver
Recorded
August 24, 2021
40:44 minutes
0:00 / 0:00
Id:
mby021005
Description
Mardon Walker (76) talks with conversation partner Naomi Graver (22) about her experience as an exchange student at Spelman College in the fall of 1963.Subject Log / Time Code
Mardon Walker (76) remembers applying to be an exchange student at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, for the fall 1963 semester. Mardon says she was 18 years old and had just completed her freshman year at Connecticut College.
Mardon says she was one of only 4 white students at Spelman. She remembers having future author, Alice Walker, as a classmate.
Mardon says Atlanta was not an integrated city in 1963. She remembers being angry about the denial of access to public accommodations for all people.
Mardon talks about becoming involved with SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) while at Spelman. She says she was first arrested while participating in a lunch counter sit-in at a Krystal.
Mardon remembers singing during the demonstrations. She says the jails were segregated.
Mardon talks about being arrested at another Krystal on January 13, 1964. She says she was the only white person arrested that day and that she was taken to the Fulton County Jail instead of the city jail. She remembers being beaten and dragged.
Mardon says she was back at Connecticut College when her case was called in Atlanta. She remembers arriving late and being sent back to jail. She says Martin Luther King, Sr. visited her there.
Mardon says the trial generated a lot of publicity. She says she was found guilty and that Judge Durwood Pye gave her jail time, public works labor, and a $1,000 fine.
Mardon says the case was appealed and the verdict upheld by the Georgia Supreme Court. Mardon says the US Supreme Court reversed her conviction in May of 1965. She says Judge Pye then brought new charges against her which resulted in a second US Supreme Court Case.
Mardon talks about spending the majority of her career at an inner city college working with the black and gay communities.
Mardon says that having had this experience at 18 years of age was life changing.
Participants
- Mardon Walker
- Naomi Graver