Miami Proud: Pastor Lorenzo Johnson Sr. recalls the desegregation of Miami-Dade Schools
MIAMI - Nearly seven decades ago, the United States Supreme Court outlawed segregation of schools by race.
The landmark 1954 ruling in Brown v. Board of Education would require schools to integrate all students, eliminating separate schools for white and Black children.
It would take five years until the first Miami-Dade school allowed Black students in.
Pastor Lorenzo Johnson, Sr., and his siblings were among the first Black students to enter what was then an all-white elementary school, Earlington Heights in Northwest Miami-Dade.
"The most important thing I remember is the braveness of my mother," Johnson recalled.
It was early September 1961, when he as a third grader walked through the door. Johnson remembers that it was a rather chaotic scene, with law enforcement and media present.
"We knew that we had police officers on the side watching and we are walking in and it felt kind of creepy at the beginning, but once we got in and started meeting the kids it was great," he said. "My mother stood tall, walking up looking tall, she didn't look down she walked tall protecting her kids."
That day the Johnson family, Frances and her children, became part of history.
It was two years after Miami-Dade's first school integrations.
In 1961, there were 165,000 students in the county public school system.
The first schools to be integrated were Air Base Elementary in Homestead and Orchard Villa Elementary in Liberty City.
When Frances passed away in 2021, that image of her and her kids at the school featured in the Miami Herald, remained etched in her son's mind. It sparked an idea.
Johnson and the school principal had a mural created memorializing his mother's bravery and encapsulating that moment for all who enter the school.
"I want them to think about that we are all equally inclined and we all have equal rights in all things. Our parents went through the struggle but got through it," said Johnson.
It would take several years for all of the schools to be integrated. Today, 62 years later, Johnson stays involved, speaking to students and reliving his story.
"I want Black kids to realize and understand the history, and where we came from," he said.
