Integration: How Long Till the Last First?

In Jackson, Miss., 43 Negro first-graders peacefully registered at eight tightly guarded previously all-white schools — a first for Mississippi, the last all-white holdout against even token school integration. It came after hundreds of earlier Southern integration "firsts," and ahead of hundreds more yet to come (first across-the-board integration, first statewide, first high school football team, etc.); for in the Deep South only 1% of the Negro pupils yet sit in class rooms with whites. A long time will elapse between the first first a decade ago and the last first years ahead.