Special Events Recognize the 50th Anniversary of the Desegregation of Pack Memorial Library

Members of ASCORE present (l-r): Jesse Ray, Al Whitesides, Willette Burton, Millus Turman, Viola Jones Spells, William Young, Sandra Burton Hughes, Oralene Graves Simmons, Marvin Chambers, Barbara Turman Ferguson, Attorney James Bo  Ferguson. Photo: Urban News

Staff Reports

The ASCORE Youth Leadership Committee, a community-wide committee headquartered at the Center for Diversity Education at UNC Asheville, recently commemorated the 1961 desegregation of Pack Memorial Library with a series of special events.

The event was cosponsored by the Martin Luther King Association, the Stephens-Lee Alumni Association, the Buncombe County Library System, the Asheville Art Museum, and the Center for Diversity Education at UNC Asheville.

“From 1929 through 1961, the Market Street Branch Library was
identified as the “Colored Public Library” and was housed at the YMI
Cultural Center. The “Whites Only” Pack Memorial Library was around the
corner in what is now the Asheville Art Museum,” said David Miles,
ASCORE Youth Leadership Committee event cochair and Asheville Middle
School assistant principal.

“After being denied equal access to educational resources at Pack
Library simply because of their race, high school students from
Stephens-Lee and Allen School approached the members of the City of
Asheville Library Board and requested that they desegregate the main
branch of Pack Memorial Library, which was on Pack Square. The students,
Oralene Graves Simmons and Viola Jones Spells, were members of the
Asheville Student Committee on Racial Equality or ASCORE. Their request
was approved by the library board on September 15, 1961.”

ASCORE member James "Bo" Ferguson stands outside the former Pack Memorial Library, now the Asheville Art Museum, next to a statue commemorating Thomas Wolfe’s famous first novel Look Homeward Angel.  Photo: Urban News

The commemoration began with talks by ASCORE members at the YMI on
Market Street in downtown Asheville. Following the talks a commemorative
walk was held from the site of the colored library to the site of the
old Pack Memorial Library on Pack Square.

The commemorative event will continue through November 1, the
anniversary of the day when the library opened to all citizens
regardless of race. There is an exhibit in the North Carolina Room at
Pack Library, and there are commemorative posters at each site of the
Buncombe County Library System.

A series of commemorations concerning desegregation in Asheville will
be held over the coming five years and will include a summer youth
leadership development program. The 2012 event will focus on the
desegregation of Asheville Parks and Recreation, including the swimming
pools, along with UNC Asheville. Plans are currently in the works for a
Summer Youth Leadership Conference for 50 AMS students and 30
high-school students that will build on the skills that ASCORE leaders
learned and later put to use in their professional careers.

Namurah Blakely, a volunteer in the Asheville City School system and
Youth Leadership Committee event co-chair, said, “As a mother of two
young men who attend (and attended) Asheville High School, it is
important that our future leaders see and acknowledge the past and
present leaders of our community. This knowledge will stay with them
forever to help shape and mold them into our leaders of tomorrow.”

For more information email [email protected] or call (828) 232-5024.