President Pam Tubbs (left) shows Dr. Patricia Turner the book about Turner's life the club will give in her honor to Blair Middle School where she taught for 16 years.
Dr. Patricia Turner, a retired Norfolk math teacher, took Rotarians on a trip back in time to 1959 when she was among the first 17 students to desegregate Norfolk Public Schools.
Four years after the Supreme Court decided in Brown v. Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, not one public school in the city or state had been integrated. At age 13, Patricia Turner was asked by her mother if she’d rather continue taking two buses to get to Ruffner Junior High School or walk 1.3 miles to Norview Junior High, her neighborhood school, which had just been for white students.
Turner recalled that Ruffner was a “broken down school” with facilities that weren’t reliable and outdated textbooks. It was cold when it was supposed to be hot, and hot when it was supposed to be cold. All
Turner wanted to do "was to walk to school." But, she was told she wasn’t smart enough to go to school with white children. She was told she would never amount to anything.
To attend her neighborhood school, Turner had to take three tests (not only the test for eighth grade for which she was going into, but also for ninth and tenth grades), see a psychiatrist to
have her mental health tested, and go before the school board to answer questions about what would she do if someone spit on her, threw her down the stairs, or hit her with a
brick.
Turner ended up being among the first 17 African American school kids to enroll in six different Norfolk schools. This came after the governor ordered that schools shut down in 1958 rather than admit
black students. Turner recalled that the 10,000 Norfolk white children put out by the closure wanted an education just like her and didn’t care who they went to school with. When the Virginia state Supreme
Court and Federal District Court finally declared the school closing unconstitutional in February 1959, Patricia Turner was the only African American attending eighth grade at Norview Junior High. She wen to graduate near the top of her class at Norview High School.
Turner, identifying each of the Norfolk 17 students in a picture from 1959, noted that six, including her younger brother, are deceased, adding “We were family then, we are family now”.
Although she walked that 1.3 miles to school for the next four years, and people spit in her face, knocked her down steps, and hit her with sticks, she doesn’t remember who did this. She spoke highly of her Norview classmates, whom she still meets up with regularly and who as adults threw a prom for her.
To the ones that said she was never going to amount to anything, Turner relished in proving them wrong, proudly claiming that she earned a CPA, a bachelor’s degree in mathematics,
a master’s degree, and an honorary doctorate and became a pediatric nurse, a math teacher, and a school director.
Guests:
Dick Gresham, visiting Rotarian; an ODU Rotaract guest of Michelle Tapia; Luke Hartman, son of Sally Hartman; her colleagues Adia White and Vivian Oden, and Erica Venezuela, our former social media intern.
Announcements: - Blair Middle School was our school of the week and will receive a book about our speaker, Dr. Turner, who was a math teacher there from 1992-2008.
- Bill Gough reported Joe Massey is being treated for kidney stones.
- Jane Dembert was diagnosed with a brain tumor and is scheduled for surgery next month.
- Pam Tubbs' mother-in-law passed away recently.
- Our holiday social will be December 13 starting at 5:30 p.m. at the Mambo Room in Norfolk. Sign up now online: https://rotaryclubofnorfolk.org/event/annual-rotary
holiday-party/ - Erica Venezuela, our former intern, won an award from the Public Relations Society of America for the work she did for our club for Suds and Buds last spring.
- A satellite club member will represent us at the planning Pints for Polio, a new fundraiser to be held in February via a consortium of Rotary clubs
- Pam encouraged everyone to check out and like our club's Facebook page.
- Michelle Tapia, ODU Rotaract Club president, announced that her club went to the Rotary leadership summit for the first time and helped make 100,000 meals assembly line style for Rise Against Hunger.
- ODU Roteract is looking for meeting speakers.
- Bob Latimer announced his annual hot dog day is coming up on December 14 with free hot dogs for everyone coming to lunch at Doug's Hot Dogs in Ocean View
- Crystal awards presented to major Rotary Foundation donors recently have been sent to Pam. She has started the tradition of presenting them publicly. Previous major donors may not have bee
publicly recognized. Pam is working on a way to recognize all of them individually. - Lois Kercher, assisted by Dyteya Lewis, gave a pitch for giving to Rotary through both the RI Foundation and our own cub endowment. She noted the options for making recurring donations, in addition to donating by check, credit card and online.
Happy Bucks/Fines:
- Collins Gooch paid for forgetting his pin.
- Sally Hartman paid for writing a piece in Inside Business and for or winning three awards from the Public Relations Society of America.
- Jim O’Brien was interviewed in the article in Inside Business that Sally wrote about IRA charitable transfers.
- Jim Kitz paid for Army football finally breaking into top 25. He challenged Jim O’Brie to a bet on the Army Navy game.
- Cy Grandy paid in honor of his 35th wedding anniversary on 11/19/18.
- Jos Hekking paid as the Netherlands (Dutch) soccer team tied Germany
Next lunch meeting: Tuesday, December 4 with ODU President John Broderick speaking.
