Morgan State Student Activism
By Jade Thompson

In the 1950s and 1960s, Morgan State University students participated in many civil rights protests in Baltimore. They risked arrest and criminal records at a time of their life when they were preparing for their life in the “real world.”

One of the protests was the integration of the Northwood Theatre located across from the campus. Northwood was integrated on February 22, 1963. In an incident that led to integration of the movie theatre, 343 students were jailed while protesting outside the theatre. They were charged with disorderly conduct and trespassing and bail was set at around $600.1

This was not the first rally Morgan students participated in in Baltimore, for they had been protesting conditions in Baltimore for at least 10 years. On May 9, 1953 the Afro-American newspaper reported that an organization known as the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), persuaded two large downtown department stores to relax color bars at their lunch counters and blacks could eat just as any other customers.2 Morgan students were directly involved in the downtown protests at Hooper’s Restaurant, Ford’s Theater and at Hochschild, Kohn & Company. Another example of Morgan student involvement was when Arundel Ice Cream opened its doors to African Americans on March 21, 1959.3

Morgan students and their role in integration is overlooked in history. Morgan students, along with students from Coppin State, Goucher College and Johns Hopkins University and high school students protested segregation policies before more famous protests garnered national attention like the Woolworth sit-in in Greensboro, North Carolina on February 1, 1960.

Another key result of the Morgan students’ involvement in the struggle to change Baltimore laws, was the creation of the Civic Interest Group (CIG). Throughout Baltimore and its suburbs were many students who were willing to protest the laws and policies of the Baltimore region. The problem was how to organize them all and this was one of the roles CIG played. According to historian Robert Palumbos, “[t]he Civic Interest Group stood out because it managed to unite student activists from different colleges throughout the civil rights movement. Led entirely by African-American Morgan State College students, CIG drew students from other schools, such as whites from Hopkins and Goucher, and from the city’s community of concerned citizens.”4

In order to demonstrate the impact students had on the integration process in Baltimore, I attempted to document some of the key events and words of the time when Morgan State students, along with national and local organizations, attempted to change laws to make it equal for all races.

“Since last Friday night, when the first demonstration occurred, the theater has displayed a sign saying: ‘Until the Motion Picture Theater Owners of Maryland, of which this theater is a member, and the courts of Maryland advice otherwise, this theater reserves the exclusive right to restrict its patronage…”
The Sun,  May 4, 1955.

The 1960s

“Our major premise is that even if the Hecht Company has a right to keep people out because of their race, as the law is now constituted, the State is prohibited under the Fourteenth Amendment (of the United States Constitution) to use its power to arrest through the Police Department, and its subsequent power of conviction to aid the private individual in his private discrimination…”
Attorney Robert B. Watts
The Sun. Sunday March 7, 1960 pages 40 and 35.

“Two persons were arrested late yesterday afternoon in the four day-old anti-segregation demonstration at Hecht’s Northwood restaurant and the restaurant closed for the day soon afterwards.”
The Sun, March 19, 1960, page 28.

Executive Walter Sondheim recalls how Morgan Students integrated his downtown department stores restaurant, “We had a restaurant on the 6th floor of Hochschild-Kohn, a dining room. Someone called me in the morning and said a group of Morgan students were going to come down and sit down in our lunch room which was a technique being used and I sat down with my two colleagues and we decided that the time has come not to participate in their battle anymore. So we decided to serve these kids when they came in. They came in expecting not to be served. We served them but they didn’t have any money to pay for their food (Sondheim laughs as he says the last comment). Of course, we didn’t care.”
Walter Sondheim interview conducted May 3, 2006

“About 120 Negro men and women, most of them Morgan students, milled around the entrance and picketed the restaurant, which will not serve them.” Comment about the Hecht’s Northwood Restaurant
The Sun, March 21, 1960. pages 30 and 21.

“On Saturday, March 26, 1960, the first day of the downtown department store demonstrations, Hochschild-Kohn & Company politely seated the CIG/Morgan student protesters and asked for their orders.”

Examples of Signs Held by Protestors
”Northwood Go South.”
”We’ll Walk, Walk, Walk, Walk, Walk.”
”We Want Equality.”
”We Will Never Stop Until You End Segregation.”
The Sun, March 26, 1960.

“A Hochschild official said later that ‘if the community allows it, and this includes our competitors, we’ll continue to serve Negroes.”
The Sun, Sunday, March 27, 1960, pages 40 and 35.

Martin Kohn, President, Hochschild-Kohn & Company, stated, “Our conviction is that decent people should be served, and if the community accepts it, and that of course includes our competition, we will continue the policy.”
Baltimore-American, Sunday, March 27, 1960, page 3M.

”Students were cordially greeted by waitresses and their orders taken promptly. Martin B. Kohn, Manager, issued this statement: We make the same statement that we made to the Governor’s Commission (Maryland Commission on Inter-racial Problems and Relations) a year ago: Fundamentally decent people should be served. If the community accepts it, we will continue.”
Baltimore Afro-American, March 29, 1960, Five Star Edition, page 1.

“On Friday, February 15, 1963, while some fifty students marched with picket signs in front of the theater, Miss Morgan and twenty-five other students were escorted from the theatre lobby to a paddy wagon and a precinct station for the night. At the hearing the following morning, they requested jury trials and were released on their own recognizance by Municipal Court Judge Joseph P. Finnerty, who advised the students that it was best for them to stick to their studies.”
August Meier, A White Scholar and the Black Community, 1945-1965. 1992. Page 139.

“The police treated the protestors with a sort of disdain that the demonstrators shouldn’t have been there anyway.”
Charles Mason, former Morgan graduate, quote from an interview conducted on March 14, 2007 by Towlya Key.

“I was arrested along with about 300 people. Within that 300, I was arrested in my group of about 10 of us. When we were arrested, everyone was crying and scared because they had us in jail with the real criminals. After we had been there a day or two, we were there a total of four days, by the second day everybody had calmed down and we were interviewing the inmates and asking them what they were in for? My father came to visit. He didn’t have the money to get me out because we were poor. The NAACP finally got us out.”
Julia Davidson-Randall, Morgan graduate, quote from an interview conducted on March 31, 2007 by Maryland Shaw.

“Ladies, tomorrow at 1 o’clock you will all be able to go to Northwood Theatre.”
Words of Moses R. Lewis, president of the Civic Interest Group to Morgan female students in jail for protesting the Northwood’s policy.
The Sun, February 22,1963.

“We believe our action is in the best interest of the community and sincerely hope that the results will be peace and tranquility in the area. We have always maintained an attitude of willingness to solve the problem.”
Aaron B. Seidler, general manager of the Northwood Theatre, on the decision to allow African Americans to attend movies at the Northwood Theatre.
The Sun, February 22, 1963.

“I told you we’d win.”
Words of Sandra Upshur, an 18-year old African American who was executive secretary of the Civic Interest Group and president of the Morgan State freshman class.
The Sun, February 22, 1963.

With photo credit by Towlya Key

Paul A. Kramer, “White Sales: The Racial Policies of Baltimore’s Jewish Owned Department Stores, 1935-1965,” Enterprising Emporiums: The Jewish Department Stores of Downtown Baltimore (Baltimore: Jewish Museum of Maryland, 2001).