A Mighty Long Way (pgs.163-205)

Summary:  Carlotta got home from Chicago and immediately started school-her last year at Central.  She recieved a school ID card in the mail because now they wanted to kow who was going in and out of the school.  One of her teachers she recieved didn't really like blacks, so whenever the white students did something, the teacher just turned around and looked the other way.  She felt lonely and she began missing the way her life was when she still had attended Dunbar.  She couldn't participate, in sports or anything.  Labor Day weekend came.  Carlotta was in her bedroom sleeping.  The red, cityowned station wagon used by the fire chief, exploded.  This led to flames in his driveway.  minutes later a second explosion happened.  The glass front of a building blewout.  Minutes after that, there was a third explosion.  Fire damaged the ground floor of an adminitrative office.  There were sirens.  Soon investigators found out that the suspects threw sticks of dinamite to cause the explosions.  They got arrested.  None of this was that shocking to Carlotta.  Later she gets an explosion of her own on her house.  Once again, it was dinamite  sticks.  Her father got accused of sending 2 black men to explode his house, so that he could get insurance money.  The 2 black men are Herbert Monts and Maceo Binns.  Carlotta knew Herbert ever since she was small.  They were innocent.  The authorities had no evidence.  Carlotta feels guilty for all the problems.  She is determined to keep going to Central.  Court was in session.  The jurors were all white.  The 2 black men were found guilty and were arreseted.  They got five years prison.  The school year was ending  and graduation  was coming.  Soon it came and she accomplished her goal of graduating.
Quote:" I had a driver's license" ( Lanier 166).
Reaction:  She began driving when she was young and that is very young.  She began around 12 or 13 years old.   

A Mighty Long Way (pgs 124-162)

Summary: There are eight of the students left in Central High School.  Segregationists have failed with their telephone threats and more to try and get the students out of Central.  They now begin to target their parents.  Money becomes low to them and many lose their jobs.  Carlotta says when she came from school one day, she overheard her father saying how he got laid off.  Many of the other 7 students' parents had problems with their jobs too.  The segragationists also targeted the Arkansas Gazette newspaper because it supported intergration.  One day, the newspaper puplished an unsigned letter that was going around the neighborhood, on the front page.  The segregationists considered the stores, that were advertised in the newspaper, as being supporters too. They were going to go against these stores.
               Ernie, one of the nine, was graduating from Central.  He had persevered.  Carlotta wanted to go to his graduation, but everyone only got 6 tickets for the closest family members.  Carlotta listened form the radio instead.  Once Ernie got on stage, there was total silence everywhere, but he got his diploma anyway.  The media also mentioned that Martin Luther King was there too. 
               Soon summer arrived.  The eight took a plane to Chicago to be honored by the Chicago Defender.  Minnijean met up with them there making that nine of them.  They were honored in many different states and cities that summer like New York and more.  They traveled all over the place.  Carlotta says it was the best summer ever. Later, she went to Camp Minisink that same summer and enjoyed it a lot.  Washington D.C. was their last stop before their summer ended and then they went back to Little Rock. 
                Carlotta's junior year was delayed because of intergration issues again.  Faubus was determined to not intergrate Central.  Many of the eight moved and now only Jefferson, Elizabeth,Thelma, Melba, and Carlotta was to attend Central.  The sports schedule of  the school continued, but their was no education going on for anyone, not even the whites.  The Dunbar community center arranged for students to study courses there.  Carlotta worried about her education.  Later, she gets sent to Cleveland on a new adventure, to finish high school there with the Christopher family.  Soon, because the Christophers want to help a child with no support, Carlotta gets sent to Chicago. She still doesn't have enough credits from the courses to complete 11th grade, so she goes to Chicago to attend summer classes.  She stayed with her relatives.  Here in Chicago she falls in love with music and goes to many of the music events.  She's having so much fun.
                 Central allows intergration again and now it starts very early in August.  Only Carlotta and Jefferson are left at Central.  Carlotta's summer classes don't end untill the last few weeks of August, so she begins her senior year a little late.  Jefferson is left to comfront the school by himself but Elizabeth tags along even though she already completed high school, just so he won't go alone.    
Quote: "Much of white Little Rock blamed Mrs. Bates and our parents for the crisis" (Lanier 147).
Reaction: The economy of Little Rock was suffering.  There was no education going on and Faubus kept telling the whites that if it wasn't for them, the schools could have been opened.  It isn't their faults, it's Faubus' fault.

A Mighty Long Way (pgs 82-123)

Summary:The nine students are now allowed to go back to school.  They are dropped off  at Mrs. Bates' home and escorted to school in cars with the NAACP.  A police officer had called them and told them to enter through the side door.  They did and then went to their classrooms.  That same day while they were getting escorted, journalists were beat up by the mob out front.  One of them, Wilson was hit with a brick in the head, causing him to get a disease with a nervous condition.  He died 3 years later.  That first day she got pushed and more.  Later that day, the nine were all escorted out of school while school was still in session in a hurry.  They were in danger because of the angry mob.  They had to cover up with blankets in the car so no one wouldn't see them.
               That night Carlotta, watched television where President Eisenhower, gave a speech saying how he will try his best to protect the nine and that there should be peace.  He also said how he was going to send the military force troops to Little Rock to escort the nine throughout the whole day of school.  They nine, ready to go to school again, met at the Bates' home.  The troops got there and escorted them to school. This time they walked into the front entrance of the school.  There daily lives as students at Central was a battle.  They got called names, they got pushed and spit on.  Carlotta struggled with this and had to learn how to protect her own self.  Her guard seemed to not see or hear anything, like the spitting, so she had to learn different techniques of defending herself.  Once her books got pushed out her hand and as she bent down to get them, another kid kicked her from behind making her fall on her face.  She learned things like walking close to the wall really helped.  Carlotta hated speaking about her day at school because it made her relive something she didn't want to.  It made her lose energy and feel down.
             One of the people who bothered Carlotta was a redheaded girl.  She would constantly step on Carlotta's heels over and over again on purpose, which caused her to bleed.  The nine were warned not to do anything back to them, so she just kept on walking.  One day, though, as the redheaded girl did her daily routine, Carlotta turned around and the girl froze in silence.  The girl She walked away.  
              Minnie, one of the nine, got suspended because she dumped chili on a boys head.  The boy was bullying her and she let her anger take over her.  Later, that year, she got suspended again and eventually expelled.  People were so angry about intergration, there were many bomb threats of the school. There were sympathetic kids at school and also the trouble makers.  The sympathetic ones were nice to the nine, but were never seen with them. 
Quote: "So without a word, I just wiped my face against the sleeve of my dress and kept on trekking."(Lanier 100).
Reaction:  This was after the kids in school spit on her face.  She stayed calm and just wiped her face.  This shows she tried her best not to stoop to their level. Its a very hard thing to stay calm like that if someone spit on you.

A Mighty Long Way (pgs 44-81)

Summary: The big news came while Carlotta was attending school one day.  Central High School was now ordered to be intergrated.  Carlotta without thinking wrote her name down on the list of students that wanted to and qualified to attend Central.  She didn't mention it to her parents.  To her it was just any regular decision. 
                 Her home was getting remodled and her father worked 3 jobs in order to give the family whatever they needed.  Her father built many things and even the new master bedroom in there house.  They gave Carlotta the present of keeping the room.  They even bought a really nice television to now watch the latest news.
                When she went to register day a lady sent her home with a card saying that they had to attend a meeting with the superintendent in order to be accepted with her parents.  When she got outside Ms Bates, president of the Arkansas state conference, was waiting there. They soon attended the meeting and they went over the rules that no black boy can look at a white girl.  School was about to start and that night Governor Faubus made a speech about how all should attend school the next day and there would be guards there to keep the peace.  Then the next day they got an announcement that told them that there has been a delay on integration.  A couple days later another announcement was made to go to school.  The kids should meet a block away from school and they would get escorted to the school. When they got there, there was an angry  mob and the guards wouldn't let them into the school because of Faubus' orders.
                 They stayed out of school for a while.  Then they went to court where the attourney Marshall won the case for them.  Now they would just have to wait and see what would happen when they did go to school.

Quote:  "nigger ....nigger....nigger.  It shot out of angry mouths like bullets and pierced my ears again and again." ( Lanier 70).

Reaction:  The mob was very ferocious after seeing the black students walk towards the entrance of the school.  You can just imagine the scene.  She says it shot out like bullets which shows the amount of tension there could have been.  She also said it pierced her ears which shows how strongly the words affected her.

A Mighty Long Way: My Journey to Justice at Little Rock Central High School (1 to 43)

Summary- Carlotta begins to explain how growing up she didn't really think about all the rules society had, she just followed them. She didnt think about why blacks had to be separate from whites.  She tells about how she really loves her family which includes grandpa Big Daddy, grandpa Cullins, her father, her mother and more. She grew up in Little Rock where her parents tell her to never act with ignorance like the whites.  Her family thinks of education as a big thing.  One summer she goes to New York to spend time with her aunt Juanita.  There she experienced a life she never experienced before.  There was no separation in where blacks could go and where whites could go.  It was like they were all equal there. She loved the city lights and more.  Then she goes back to her hometown to find that they are trying to integrate schools.  Then something very shocking happens in Mississippi where a teenage boy, Emmett Till, gets violently killed by whites and the photos are very disturbing to Carlotta. She is yet to face her own problems.
Quotation- Her mother told her this. " ' Carlotta, we must be patient with ignorance and never, ever bring ourselves down to their level.' " (Lanier 17).
Reaction-  She is saying how the whites act with lack of knowlegde towards the blacks and how she should never do the same in act of revenge- to just be patient. This quote caught my eye because my parents always tell me the same thing - to be the bigger person.