- Connect
- Login
- Print Subscription
|
Welcome,
| |
| |
- Most Commented
- Most Commented
- Most Emailed
- Most Emailed
- Popular
- Popular
« News Home
Change name of new middle school because President Wilson was racist, some argue
By Harold Gwin
YOUNGSTOWN — City school leaders gave no thought to changing the school name as they razed Woodrow Wilson High School and began construction of Woodrow Wilson Middle School on the same site at Gibson Street and Indianola Avenue in Youngstown.
After all, the school named for the 28th president had existed since 1928, first as a junior high and then as a high school, resulting in a long history and tradition for the school, and the Wilson alumni have proven to be a very loyal group.
Wilson High School closed in 2007 and was torn down as part of a $190 million school rebuilding program. Part of that plan called for it to be replaced by a middle school and keeping the name just seemed to be the natural course, said Lock P. Beachum Sr., vice president and long-time school board member. There was never any suggestion or discussion about changing it, he said.
But such a suggestion has surfaced now.
Gregory Warren of Monticello Boulevard addressed the board recently, saying that Wilson was a confirmed racist and that the district might find a better hero after whom the new school, which will open next fall, should be named.
Warren wasn’t speaking only for himself. He represented the Community High Commission On Closing the Academic Standards Achievement Gap for Afrikan Students in the Youngstown City Schools, a grass roots organization that wants to be an equal partner in the education of its children. The commission has a number of groups in its membership, including the Parent-Student Union, the Afrikan Village of Youngstown and the Muhammad Study Group.
Woodrow Wilson was a very influential and knowledgeable man who received the Nobel Peace Prize, but he was a confirmed racist who, as president of Princeton University, fought against the admission of black students, and, as president of the United States, instituted segregation in the federal government, Warren told the board.
The school district (which has a 69 percent black student enrollment) should pick more appropriate heroes, Warren said, suggesting that the name for the new school was selected without any community input.
Read the full story and an accompanying related story Monday in The Vindicator and on Vindy.com.
- Requires free registration.
Comments
Absolutely. Call it the DuBois Middle School or the Robeson Middle School, named after the greatest of all African-American scholars, W.E.B. DuBois, or the best known American on the face of the earth in the late 1940s (before he was crucified), Paul Robeson.
Obuma is a racist and they gave him the Nobel Peace Prize. Stop looking backwards and stop playing the race card every time you don't like something. Stand on your own two feet and don't expect handouts. I am sick and tired of the race card being played you have worn it out.
Woodrow Wilson, like much of the history of the Democratic Party, is replete with racism.
W.E.B Du Bois was a brief member of the Socialist Party, a member of the Communist Party, and denounced his US citizenship when he moved to Ghana.
Instead of naming the school after a false idol, why not call it Youngstown Center for Excellence and Responsibility, Gibson Achievement School, or simply Indoctrination Central.
Go Woodrow Wilson.
Let me guess
MLK or Obama middle school
Why is community input necessary in the first place?
Hey why don't we change our state capital's name or Washington State's? Christopher Columbus wasn't that great and Washington owned slaves. Where does it end?
"self-preservation [forced whites] to rid themselves, by fair means or foul, of the intolerable burden of governments sustained by the votes of ignorant negroes."
-Woodrow Wilson
He described the formation of the terrorist arm of the Democratic Party (the KKK) as "understandable".
It's ok to ban the rebel flag but name a school after yet another racist Democrat?
How 'bout Al Sharpton ... :D
Ytownnative:
MLK would get confused with the street named after him . Barack Obama Middle School would be a hit . To identify better with The Muhammad Study Group perhaps it should be called The Barack Hussein Obama Middle School .
THE SIGNS ARE READY
http://i38.tinypic.com/n32nif.jpg
After reading these comments Hillbilly High seems appropriate.
The Blacks now own the Whites. They own our freedom of speech,our history and our money. They also control where we can go (try to visit Hillman St.), our ability for advancement based on ability and perhaps of most importance,we've lost our right to dissent,lest we are then called racists. The worst word you can be called. For those of you that want to label me as a racist,go ahead. I can honestly say I was never a racist,but after years of taking away my white ownership,I'm on the verge. I won't print the n word here,lest my comment be taken off this board,but until it becomes a law not to say it,everybody should be able to say it. And when it becomes law that you can't say that word,it should apply to everybody. Everybody,regardless of race.
why would it have to be named after and African American hero? they could vote on any person they would like. but no one is suggesting a Caucasian hero. when if 69% of the population is African American then the 31% of multi cultural families are also going to be left out. Don't name the school after a "hero" cause no one will be happy when this all ends
bor-Y-lie....Do you actually believe that if you woke up black tomorrow living in the Moaning Valley you would some how have a better life? Since you suggested it and since I've read previous posts of yours I believe I will call you a racist.
Just call it Youngstown or South Side Middle School. If you favor naming it after a known racist you need to check yourself.
Cambridge, Thank you for the moniker. I can wake up purple with yellow stripes and I would still be me. I control my own life and It's always good. That's what I've worked and planned for it to be,and I don't need some 150 year old excuse to not be a better person. I had nothing to do with slavery and it's very wrong. But,on the other hand I don't want slavery to exist today when I'm not free to be me.
Now that we have our first "black" president in the White House we think it is appropriate that we try to erase all the "mistakes" that were made in the past to appease and make amends in someone's mind. If we try to erase all the mistakes everyone made in the past we would have to live in another world because this world would not exist. And really we would not exist because which one of us has done everything Politically or any other wise correct. MIstakes and doing things right are what make this country great. We need to stop trying to rewrite history and enjoy where we are now.
Did you know that in National Statuary Hall in Washington D.C. they are trying again to rewrite history and take William Allen out and put in the Wright Brothers because of the same LAME reason. When you look up William Allen on the internet he was a lawyer, a state senator, a congressman, a senator and the Governor of Ohio. If you look deep enough you can find that numerous people in high places were racists. Including those that looked the other way when Hitler was murdering JEWS.
It is time to stop the insanity!!!
As an alum of Woodrow Wilson High School, I am SICKENED by these comments. What is wrong with you people?!?!?!?!?! You are MAKING it a racial issue. It is NOT a black or white thing, but you ALLLLLLL are making it a black or white thing with this entire discussion! Those of us who attended the school over the 79 years it existed merely want the name perserved because of the legacy of the school. GROW UP AND STOP MAKING EVERYTHING A RACE ISSUE!!!!!!!!
http://www.rateitall.com/i-2686049-young...
I can not believe how stupid some of our young adult are. For years, many years, the name Woodrow Wilson and the school Woodrow Wilson has been the pride of every WHITE & BLACK students that have walk the halls during our classes through out our school years in the past. It was never an issue what color we were & for thoses of us with brains, it will never be an issue! We can continue to look up every president we have elected in the past, and belive me, there is something in all their past. You fools, we do not live in the past!! It is time to live as today or the future of our children. WHY spoil the minds of our young with eveil thought of the past.THE PAST IS THE PAST! long before the poison started in be put into the minds of our young. Now we feed our children with all the wrong information. We have all come into this country as one or another Nationality, we all have worked very hard to become one NATION. if this change is done. you are giving your minds to the WEAK!!