Attucks

!e School !at Opened a City

A new documentary by Ted Green Films and WFYI

When black students were forced into Crispus Attucks High School in 1927, the Ku Klux

Klan ran Indiana and its capital. The Klan was bigger in this state than any other. The governor, the majority of Congressmen, the mayor, most of the Chamber of Commerce and the entire School Board were Klan members or Klan-­backed.

Attucks was built to separate, to isolate, and to fail. A school designed for 1,000 housed 1,380. Desks, other equipment and musical instruments were beat-­ up castoffs from white schools. There was no gym, which was no matter;; the IHSAA ruled that Attucks couldn’t compete in the association because it wasn’t a public school, because it had no whites.

For 22 years by law and 20-­some more in practice, Attucks was black Indianap-­olis. Just as the exploding black com-­munity was kept penned into the city’s least desirable areas by hate groups such as the White Supremacy League and the White People’s Protective Asso-­ciation, virtually every African-­Ameri-­can in Indianapolis came of age inside Attucks’ brick walls. Every one of their faces still adorns those hallways in class portraits -­-­ the mothers and fa-­thers, grandmothers and grandfathers, great-­grandmothers and great-­grandfa-­thers of today’s black residents.

Those students overcame a system designed to belittle them. They became surgeons and teachers, scientists and authors, world-­class musicians and athletes. Oscar Robertson, Julia Carson, David Baker, Janet Langhart-­Cohen and Maj. Gen. Harry Brooks only scratch the surface of success stories. Over time these successes -­-­ and the grace that accompanied them -­-­ became a grass-­roots agent for integration, winning over the younger generation of Indy’s whites, changing the way many thought about race. Changing the face, quite literal-­ly, of a society. A 1945 graduate was asked why Attucks achieved so much. She replied, “Because they told us we couldn’t.”

It’s not an easy story. It’s at times an outrageous story, at times a beautiful and uplifting one. It’s ultimately a nationally important story, a microcosm of the injustices faced and overcome by African-­Americans in that time frame in general, and it’s time it was told -­-­ pegged to Indiana’s 2016 bicentennial celebration and while some of the earli-­est graduates are still here to tell it. Not the story of the Crispus Attucks bas-­ketball team, though its triumphs will be prominent, but the story of Crispus Attucks High School: the school that opened a city.

A new documentary by Ted Green Films

and WFYI.

Sooner or later it will be necessary to

remove the colored children

from the present high schools.

– C.N. Kendall, Superintendent of School

s -­ Oct. 27, 1908

Asked how Attucks was able to achieve so much, a 1945 graduate said, “Because they told us we couldn’t.”

Maj. Gen. Harry Brooks Jr.A 1947 Attucks graduate, Brooks capped off a groundbreaking military career by being promoted to Major

American Hoosier to attain the rank, and the sixth in history. “Attucks was my foundation,” he says. “Without Attucks, none of this would have happened.”

Janet Langhart-CohenA 1959 graduate, Mrs. Langhart-­Cohen gained international fame as a model, newswoman and author. She recently co-­authored Race and Reconciliation in America with her husband, former U.S. Secretary of Defense William Cohen. She speaks of an early run-­in with the KKK and her deep pride in attending Attucks. “It’s my home,” she says. “It’s my heart.”

Oscar RobertsonCalled by many basketball’s greatest player ever, Robertson’s favorite years were at Crispus Attucks. He led the Tigers to the 1955 and ‘56 state championships,

a segregated school won an open state title anywhere in the nation. “Attucks (gave me) a sense of optimism,” he says. “A sense of life and joy.”

Edwena Bell Payne“That Tech is tough / That Tech is rough / They can beat anybody / But they can’t beat us!” Those words from the Crazy Song, penned by Mrs. Bell Payne in 1945, did more than signal another basketball victory. They sounded Attucks’ coming-­out party in general after years of being belittled. “Heart,” she says now, looking back. “That’s what Attucks had. Heart.”

David BakerDr. Baker has won nearly every jazz honor imaginable, including the Living Jazz Legend Award from the JFK Center for the Performing Arts. The 1949 graduate glowingly recalls his days at the school and on Indiana Avenue, and proudly speaks for Wes Montgomery, J.J. Johnson, Jimmie Coe and the scores of other famous Jazz musicians Attucks produced.

Joy Nolcox Shepherd

principal, Matthias Nolcox, Mrs. Shepherd vividly recalls her father openly defying the KKK-­backed school board to ensure his students received the same advantages as white students. “He was determined that black children should be educated,” she says, “even if it meant his life.”

A’Lelia BundlesThe great great-­granddaughter of Madame C.J. Walker, Mrs. Bundles has been a national advocate for civil rights for decades, as an author, TV producer and president of the Foundation for the National Archives. Her father and several other family members attended Attucks. “Attucks,” she says simply, “is a story that needs to be told.”

Albert SpurlockMr. Spurlock, 101, began teaching at Attucks in the early 1940s and later was the assistant basketball coach during the Tigers’ championship years. In between, he served in World War II and helped persuade IU to break the Big Ten’s basketball color barrier. “Attucks was everything to me,” he says now. Says Oscar Robertson: “Mr. Spurlock is living history.”

Alberta Stanley WhiteTired of picking cotton in Georgia, Mrs. White’s parents moved to Indianapolis in 1923, and she started at Attucks in 1930. She dropped out during the Depression but returned and graduated in 1937, and went on to serve as a WAC in World War II. Now 97, she fondly recalls Attucks’ greatest resource, its teachers. “Our school was supposed to fail. They were bound and determined that we wouldn’t.”

Partial Cast

MORE INTERVIEW COMMITMENTS• Dr. James Madison• Wilma Moore (’69)• Dr. Stanley Warren (’51)• Nancy Johnson (’37)• Gilbert Taylor (’55)

• Dr. Richard Pierce• Betty Crowe (’48)• Fmr. Ind. Supreme Ct. Justice Ted Boehm… and many more.

ATTUCKS

The School that Opened a City

Project details

What: A 90-­minute documentary about the history of Crispus Attucks High School, co-­produced by Ted Green Films and WFYI.

When: To be released in 2016 as part of the state’s bicentennial celebration.

Starring: Oscar Robertson, David Baker, Janet Langhart-­Cohen, Maj. Gen. Harry Brooks, A’Lelia Bundles (Madame CJ Walker’s great great-­granddaughter), historians James Madison and Richard Pierce and many more. The music will be composed and performed by Dr. Tyron Cooper, who learned under Dr. Baker at Indiana University.

Premiere: Special screening in a major Indianapolis theatre TBD. The most recent Ted Green-­WFYI

of 2014.

Distribution platforms: Broadcast (aiming for national distribution), DVD

Production budget:

Sponsorships: Title sponsorships offered at the $100,000 level, contributing sponsorships at the $50,000 and $25,000 levels.

Sponsor recognition: Prominent, custom spots, commensurate with funding level, at the front and

and Green appeared on several local TV and radio shows.)

Production company: of 501c3 donations.

ATTUCKS

The School that Opened a City

About the producer

Undefeated: The Roger Brown Story and Bobby

“Slick” Leonard: Heart of a Hoosier, all in collaboration with WFYI. Undefeated was recently licensed by ESPN.

Ted’s honors include:

– Five regional Emmys, including for Best Documentary.

– First place in the national Associated Press Sports Editors contest.

– The Fourth Estate Award from the national American Legion.

– The Dick Schaap Award of Excellence from the Center for the Study of Sports in Society. That was for a print project on Crispus Attucks High School, which culminated in a town-­hall meeting

Basketball Hall of Fame. He holds a BA from Princeton University and a Masters from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Ted and his wife, Jenny, the sports editor at the Indianapolis

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