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Clyde Kennard Comic
Clyde Kennard Comic
3 In 1955, Kennard was in his third year of studies 4 But one day he got a call
in political science at the University of Chicago. from home.
He had moved there from Hattiesburg at
age 12.
Son, your stepdad -
hes passed away.
I just dont know
how Im Im
going to - coming
home,
Mama.
1
But Kennard wanted to get his degree. The closest
Mississippi in the 1950s was a school was Mississippi Southern College, now known
as the University of Southern Mississippi.
brutal place for young black
It was only 15 minutes
men. Kennard returned home away by car.
to help on his mothers farm
the same year that 14-year
old Emmett Till, a young boy
from Chicago, was murdered
in Mississippi for allegedly
making a pass at a
white woman.
2
In 1954, the Supreme Court had ruled in the The state responded to Brown v. Board by
landmark Brown v. Board of Education case creating an agency called the Mississippi State
that having separate schools for black and Sovereignty Commission to fight desegregation
white students was unconstitutional. and track any threats to the states segregated
way of life. They hired and paid
But for Missisissippis leaders, a segregated informants and infiltrators to spy
educational system was a pillar of a Jim Crow on the civil rights movement.
society.
3
Privately, McCain was talking to the Kennard took his fight public. He wrote a
Mississippi Sovereignty Commissions letter to the local newspaper, the
investigative team, led by a former Hattiesburg American.
FBI agent, Zack VanLandingham.
He even paid
agents in Illinois
to dig up his files
there.
4
A local attorney named Dudley Conner who
But there was a problem. served on the sovereignty commission offered to
They couldnt come up anything. take care of Kennard by other means.
Clyde Kennard had committed no crimes.
He paid his bills on time. He had no Kennards car could be hit by a train
hidden vices. He sang for his church choir, or he could have some accident on
and mentored young people. the highway and nobody
would ever know the
difference.
But they feared the bad publicity from such Mississippi governor J.P. Coleman even met
tactics. So VanLandingham recruited directly with Kennard to convince him not to
conservative black educators to persuade apply. Kennard agreed to withdraw his
Kennard to not apply to the school. application.
5
In 1959, after the election of a new governor, Other tactics were used on Kennard.
Kennard notified McCain that he would apply The insurance company canceled the
for the fall semester. McCain tried again to insurance on his car, citing fears of foul
persuade him not to apply. play. The local cooperative foreclosed on
his poultry farm and took all his poultry.
But Kennard persisted. He went to meet McCain McCain told Kennard he was denied
again. It was his third attempt to enroll. At the admission again. This time, he had
restaurant he dropped by before the meeting, another excuse.
everyone was worried.
But I did!
6
After the meeting, Kennard left out of a side Kennards friends suspected that he had been
door since McCain wanted to avoid having him set up since the devout Kennard never drank.
speak to the press. But when he got to his VanLandingham reported as much to the
car,two policemen waiting for him. governor.
And illegal
possession of
Whats the rush, boy? whiskey-
Youre under arrest
for excessive
speeding.
It appears to be a
frame-up, with the
evidence planted by
the county constables.
This appears to be
their idea.
Kennard wrote another letter to the In September 1960, the last attempt
Hattiesburg American. This time, he appealed to to stop Kennard was carried out.
the ideals of the American political tradition. At the local cooperative
that had foreclosed on
Kennards farm, a young
If there is one quality of Americans which employee named Johnny
would set them apart from almost any Lee Roberts was caught
other peoples, it is the history of stealing five bags
their struggle for liberty and justice of chicken feed
under the law. Truly the history of worth $25. He
America is inseparable from the
claimed that
ideals of John Locke, John Stuart
Mill and Jean Rousseau.
Kennard had
planned it all.
7
We find Kennard was sentenced to seven years in state
him guilty, prison, the maximum term. As a felon,
your Kennard was now no longer eligible to apply to
Honor. any of Mississippis colleges. Roberts was
returned to his job.
8
32 33
Thurgood Marshall appealed on behalf of
Kennard at the U.S. Supreme Court. But the Meanwhile, Kennard
Justices would not hear his case.
was toiling in the cotton
Your honors, Kennard was fields at Parchman
tried in a jurisdiction where
juries are prejudiced against
Penitentiary. The state
African Americans! He prison was notorious, a
deserves a fair trial.
violent place where state
officials sent civil rights
activists to break their
spirit.
34
But even in prison, Kennard was
committed to education. Every Sunday,
the only day of rest, he taught illiterate
inmates how to read and write.
9
In 1962, a medical record librarian noted
After a year of hard labor, Kennard complained that doctors gave Kennard less than a 20
of severe stomach pain. Doctors found a large percent chance of living five years.
lesion in his colon. But he was sent back to
Parchman without any treatment. I recommend Kennard
be given parole,
on humanitarian
grounds.
10
37 38
A reporter posing as a visitor visited Parchman
Kennard lost forty pounds. and smuggled out pictures of Kennard looking
skeletal. It showed that officials who insisted
He grew too weak to pull that Kennard was treated well were lying. The
campaign to release him continued in earnest.
his shoes out of the mud or
stand without falling down.
11
Kennards story was soon overshadowed by oth-
er school integration fights, the Birmingham
church bombings, and high-profile killings.
Medgar Evers was murdered just one month
before Kennards death, and John F. Kennedy
was assassinated in November of that year.
12
Civil rights groups, University of Southern Finally, in 2006, the judge of the court
Mississippi students, and an Illinois high school where Kennard had been convicted
teacher named Barry Bradford, along with his declared him innocent, more than
students, demanded Kennards name to be four decades after he had died.
cleared. But the governor declined.
13
Why did Kennard fight so
hard, against such formi-
dable obstacles, to integrate
Mississippi Southern?
Was it because he
had lived in Or was it because the state had closed the
Chicago, where local black school in his hometown in 1958,
forcing black children to travel 11 miles
blacks were more away to the nearest black school while
free to vote and passing a white school in the town?
14
In 1965, she became one of the first two
black students to attend the college Kennard
fought so hard to integrate.
Because of Kennard,
we werent jailed. We
didnt suffer.
15