re: Question for those Louisiana natives over 35...

I was pretty young at the end of Jim Crow.

I do remember separate schools, waiting rooms, etc.

In the small town in S. LA., where I grew up, there were some people who took it upon themselves to integrate before it was mandated by the CRA. A lot of that occurred because of the Catholic Church, which integrated its schools, though some historic ones, like St Augustine are still around.

LA has always been a little different from the rest of the South. Not to say that there weren't abuses and grave injustices, but because there were also inheritance laws dating from the French and Spanish, that gave property rights to a child born to a black mother, fathered by a white man. If these men acknowledged the child as their's the child was entitled to an equal share of his estate. Surprisingly, many of these men acknowledged these children, and so there were some mixed race "free people of color" who owned property and businesses.

I asked my mother,what was the turning point, leading to the end of Jim Crowe for her, and many others. She replied, "When those little girls were blown up in the basement of the Church". They knew Jim Crowe was unfair to the AAs, they knew about the Klan, though where she came from, membership in her circle was considered a sin, but it was accepted. But when those little girls were killed, they knew the separate but equal thing was just a mask for a deeper injustice.