Ruby Bridges

It was Monday, November 14, 1960, in New Orleans.

A six-year-old girl was arriving at William Frantz Elementary School, until then reserved for white children. Federal marshals escorted her.

Her name was Ruby Bridges.

In front of the school, there was a crowd. Later, she would say that as they drove up, she first thought it was Mardi Gras.

Ruby was born on September 8, 1954, in Tylertown, Mississippi. That year, the Supreme Court had put an end to legal segregation in schools.

When Ruby was about four, her family moved to New Orleans. Her parents were Abon and Lucille.

In early 1960, Black children took an entrance exam for that school. The exam was designed to keep them out. Six Black children in New Orleans passed. Ruby was one of them.

The NAACP asked her parents to let her go. Her father hesitated at first.

A federal judge, Skelly Wright, had ordered desegregation.

She spent the first day with her mother in the principal's office.

Many white parents took their children out of the school. Only one teacher agreed to teach Ruby. Her name was Barbara Henry, and she came from Boston.

For the whole school year, Ruby was the only pupil in her class. She never missed a single day.

She brought her lunch from home. For her, there was no cafeteria and no recess.

Years later, she would say of Barbara Henry that she had shown her her heart.

Her family paid a high price. Her father lost his job at the gas station. The neighbourhood grocery store refused to serve them. Her grandparents were evicted from their land in Mississippi.

On January 14, 1964, Look magazine published a painting by Norman Rockwell. It recalled that first day, November 14, 1960. Its title: The Problem We All Live With.

Ruby grew up. She worked for fifteen years as a travel agent.

In 1999, she created the Ruby Bridges Foundation, to promote tolerance and respect. That same year, she published her memoir, Through My Eyes.

Her conviction fit in a few words:

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina damaged William Frantz. Ruby fought to save her old school.

On July 15, 2011, she was received at the White House by President Barack Obama. The Rockwell painting was on display there.

On November 14, 2014, a statue of her was unveiled at the former Frantz school. It stands in the courtyard. She thought that children, seeing it, would think: I can do something great too.

In 2024, she was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.

Her life echoes Ubuntu without merging with it: no one grows up alone. Ruby said it herself, in 2021: all of us are standing on someone else's shoulders.

There remains a statue, in the courtyard of a school in New Orleans.

It was there, in 1960, that a six-year-old girl led the way.