School May Be Named for 1st Black Teacher

By Keila Torres, Connecticut Post, Bridgeport

Mar. 23–BRIDGEPORT — She was one of the first African-American women allowed to attend what was then called the Bridgeport Normal School, which trained unmarried girls to be teachers. She then became the city’s first black public school teacher.

Can you name her?

If her name doesn’t instantly come to mind, it soon will likely become a lot more familiar. At least that’s what local activist Laurayne Farrar-James hopes for.

Farrar-James is the niece of Lillian M. Whiting Hamilton, who taught four years at McKinley School after fighting to break racial barriers in education. Farrar-James, a former City Council member, is promoting efforts to name one of the city’s new schools after her aunt. Farrar-James and her sister, Geraldine Johnson, credit their aunt with inspiring them to become teachers. In 1976 — more than 50 years after Whiting Hamilton fought to be allowed to teach — Johnson became the first African-American, and first woman, to become superintendent of the city’s schools.

Farrar-James said the most likely choice is the North End school being built on North Avenue. She said she decided to focus on that school because she heard that several names are already under strong consideration for the new Barnum/Waltersville complex on the East Side. In January, the principal of Webster School, which will be closed in June, was chosen to be principal at the new North End school, which will capacity for 750 students from kindergarten-through-eighth-grade. The school board this month established two special committees to narrow down the names for the new schools. Farrar-James is an adviser to the North End school naming group.

A date has not been set for final decisions on the names, although the committee is supposed to consider no more than five names of people who “have attained prominence locally or nationally.” The Board of Education will make the final decisions.

Farrar-James said she is organizing efforts to pay tribute to Whiting Hamilton because her cousins, Whiting Hamilton’s four children, are no longer alive.

Whiting Hamilton was born in Virginia in 1901, she moved to Bridgeport with her parents, Samuel and Mary Whiting, when she was 2.

She lived with her parents and siblings — Harold, Alice, Lillian and Willie — in a house on Wilmot Avenue well into her adult years. Farrar-James remembers living in the multi-family house on Wilmot Avenue, where her mother, Alice, and aunt, Lillian, were raised and then reared their own children. At 17, after graduating from Central High School, Whiting Hamilton talked the school district into letting her enroll in the Bridgeport Normal School. But even though she graduated near the top of her class in 1920 — and had done well in her position as teaching assistant in McKinley School — Normal school officials did not help her find a job, like they did for other students.

But with support from her family and the McKinley School staff, Whiting Hamilton became the first black public school teacher in Bridgeport. “Her friends and people in politics had to speak highly of her to accomplish that,” Johnson said, adding that she was too young at the time to remember the details. Whiting Hamilton taught special education classes at McKinley School for the next four years, until she was forced to retire because she was married. In the early 1900s only young, unmarried women were allowed to teach in the public school system. But Farrar-James said her aunt never stopped teaching, tutoring and sharing her knowledge of the world with people she came in contact with.

“She knew everything,” said Farrar-James. And in the rare instances when her aunt did not have an answer, “she could send you where you needed to go to get the rest of the information.” Johnson said when they all lived on Wilmot Avenue she recalls going upstairs to her aunt’s second-floor apartment to “learn how to recite poetry and how to speak properly.” Farrar-James said Whiting Hamilton began helping immigrants become assimilated into American life. She said her aunt taught immigrants how to speak, read and write English, and also shed light on every-day tasks, such as handling their money and the importance of having children vaccinated.

Johnson said her favorite memories of her aunt include her elaborate storytelling. She said her aunt even read and told stories on the radio. Despite the accomplishments of Whiting Hamilton, the only trace of her existence in the city’s library lies in directories and census data. There is no mention of her community-based activism, however. The only other information Farrar-James has of her aunt’s career in education is a short biography of her life written for SNET’s black history month program in 1989. Even books written throughout the years on Bridgeport’s history make no mention of Whiting Hamilton.

Farrar-James said she has been trying to find a newspaper clipping she recalls of her aunt standing on Boston Avenue in front of the General Electric factory. She said that about 20 children surround her. Whiting Hamilton and her husband, Harold Hamilton, bought their own home on Central Avenue, which is where she lived until her death in 1966. Farrar-James said her aunt, who suffered from rheumatoid arthritis, suffocated while lying in bed because she could not call for help or lift herself up to cough up phlegm that built up in her throat. Farrar-James said she has spoken to Mayor Bill Finch, Supt. of Schools John Ramos, and state Rep. Charles “Don” Clemons, D-Bridgeport, about naming a city school after her aunt. She said they all showed enthusiasm about the prospect.

Finch said, through his press secretary, that although he had never heard of Whiting he thinks she sounds like a good role model for the city’s children. Several City Council members, including Susan T. Brannelly, D-130, Richard Bonney, D-135, and Andre F. Baker, Jr., D-139, have also expressed support.

Farrar-James said she doesn’t want to cause controversy with her effort to name a school in her aunt’s honor because it’s not something her aunt would have wanted. She just wants to see her aunt’s accomplishments recognized and help educate students about a part of Bridgeport’s history that few people know about.

“We’re not just talking about naming a school,” said Farrar-James. “It’s history that has not been told.”

—–

To see more of the Connecticut Post, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.connpost.com/.

Copyright (c) 2008, Connecticut Post, Bridgeport

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.

NYSE:GE,