VIVIAN CARTER MASON: LATE LIFE

In June 1958, Mason traveled to Israel as a member of the New Frontiers Tour. The tour was sponsored by the Israeli government and it gave members of the tour an opportunity to learn more about the people of the Middle East and the basis of the conflicts among themselves. As an activist and educator this experience was an edifying one for Mason because it gave her an opportunity to observe how women worked in those countries to resolve their problems, the nature of their politics, and their influence and experiences as second class citizens. Upon her return home from the New Frontier Tour Mason's top priority was to ensure that the 1954, Supreme Court ruling that segregation in the public schools were unconstitutional was enforced in Virginia. As a veteran activist in the NAACP and NCNW, Mason was aware of the intransigency of the opponents of the Brown decision and was prepared with the local NAACP to develop strategies to ensure the failure of the opponent's ingenious means of stymieing and thwarting the intent of the court decision. In Virginia the White politicians who opposed the Brown decision legally enacted a lot of “massive resistance” laws aimed at blocking integration anywhere in the state. These laws made it unlawful for any public school in the state to enroll children of both races. Under its provisions, the Governor could close any school when a court orders the admission of a single Black child to enroll in a White school. For Mason and the NAACP the massive resistance laws had to be challenged. So in August 1958 the NAACP, in consultation with the parents of 151 Black students, applied for admission to six White junior and senior high schools. The Norfolk School Board then rejected all the Black applicants. The NAACP then took their cases to the Federal court where Judge Walter E. Hoffman of Norfolk sent back the case to the Norfolk School Board with order to reconsider their earlier decision. The School Board then assigned seventeen Black students to attend six White schools. Upon this decision Governor Almond then used a ruling over the six White schools and closed them as provided by state laws. While the schools were closed for five months, Mason acted as the administrator for the seventeen shut-out students, ensuring that they received instruction, in handling racial conflict, and meeting academic challenges. Thus ensuring that the students were mentally ready for the stress they would face when integration finally happened. When the schools were finally reopened after the Virginia Supreme Court ruled that massive resistance laws were unconstitutional, and the Federal Court ordered the schools be reopened. The seventeen shut-out students entered their designated school without any physical harm done to them.[1]

With the school crisis ended, Mason was keenly aware that full desegregation was not accomplished. It was only initiated incrementally, for that was the usual mode of operation of southern politicians. They always used every means at their disposal to frustrate, delay or defuse the impact of any court order that was not favorable to them. So to help Black students better prepared academically for the eventuality of full desegregation, Mason and several educators in 1961 started the Norfolk Committee for Improvement of Education (NCIE). The organization provided tutoring and self-help programs for school children. The program emphasized racial pride, achievement, and autonomy, in an effort to help raise student morale. It was an after school study and learning center opened in churches, recreation departments, and even in some schools. In addition to the creation of the NCIE, Mason advocated for students academic success by articulating her visions for them sometimes in her weekly column in the Norfolk Journal and Guide . In one such column, Mason articulated her hope for the children and their future in the following quote, “Too many Negroes have only a faint idea of what education is and any old excuse to keep children out of school is sufficient…The first stronghold to be attacked is the home. Parents and guardians must teach the importance of and necessity for regular attendance by their children…The children must be reached not when they are in high school, but as they enter school. Part of the Negro teacher is to interpret to their students why they must secure an education equal to their fullest capacities…For the day of unskilled, untaught laborer is rapidly disappearing. This age and the age to come will require more than ever people who have a solid foundation of the essentials, plus specific training for a high order.” In the 1960s Mason was a strong public advocate for Blacks civil rights and education. She served as the Chairman of the Education Committee of the NAACP in Virginia . As chairman, Mason pushed for the implementation of full school integration throughout the state by calling for: increased Black applications to non-integrated schools and those already integrated; making education the Black community top priority; and promoting Black Culture as a bulwark against social and economic deprivation. In the 1960s as college students emerged as the dynamic vanguard of the civil rights movement, Mason retained her relevancy in the civil rights movement by continuing to formulate strategies in attacking segregation and discrimination.[2]

In 1971 Mason was appointed to the Norfolk School Board. During her tenure on the school board from 1971-1978, Mason did not back down from fighting for reforms. She advocated for academic reforms because she did not believe that student were being well prepared in high school for college or a vocation. Mason also pushed for the inclusion of Afro centric history and culture in the city's schools, and for more busing to achieve school desegregation. Mason was no stranger to controversy on the school board. In 1972, she attended a rally in support of Black revolutionary leader Angela Davis, and the President of the North Side Civic League asked that Mason be removed from the School Board for attending and speaking at the rally in support for Angela Davis, because in her opinion, Angela Davis represented a faction in society that was un-American and uncivilized, and as a member of the school board Mason had no business supporting such a person. Mason then responded that she was not prejudging anyone but she attended the rally simply to remind people that any person irrespective of color, race or class is due all the legal rights of an American citizen. The request to remove Mason from the school board was never granted. Nevertheless, Mason continued her agitation for educational changes as a school board member while simultaneously working to secure rights for women by being actively involved in several local and state-wide political organizations such as the Norfolk Democratic Committee, Southern Regional Council, AKA Sorority, and a member of the National Women's Political Caucus Council (NWPC), where she diligently worked for Black and women's political advancement. The main purposes of the NWPC were to educate women to realize that they have a right to share in the legislative process, and to formulate qualifications for women candidates for public office, lifting the quotas for admitting women to all colleges and universities, abolition of discriminatory tax laws, request for more day care facilities, and the appointment of women to policy making position.[3]

In 1971, Mason was awarded the Virginia Press Women “Newsmaker of 1971,” citing her work with Black and White women to achieve equality and her demonstrated belief in the American political system. Mason responded to the Virginia Press Women presentation by expressing deep appreciation for the honor and commending the group for helping to destroy the myth of the inferiority of Black people by selecting her for the award. Always a dynamic orator Mason always took an opportunity to extol the virtues of Black women in her public lectures. In one such lecture in 1974, at a women's equality week program, Mason delineate that even though Black women were the foremost victims of discrimination in employment in America . They never acquiesce to discrimination but rather developed a spirit of independence and a keen sense of personal rights that allowed them to work in unison with the Black males to institutionalize their claims to political, economical, and educational equality. After serving several years on the school board and being frustrated with her efforts to reform it, Mason resigned in June, 1978, primarily to concentrate on formation of the Tidewater Chapter of the National Urban League. With her success in the formation of the Tidewater Chapter of the Urban League in 1978, Mason began slowing down her activist lifestyle and retreated to her home and gardening.[4]

Reflecting over her lifetime of activism Vivian Carter Mason helped influence Virginia 's civil rights movement. Her personal refusal to abide racism or sexism propelled her to challenge the most egregious aspects of Jim Crow in Virginia from the 1940s to the late 1970s. During that time Mason engineered a strategy of working as an individual or in a group to help dismantle the forces that worked to subordinate, define and treat Blacks as inferiors. Through this strategy Mason was able to effectively advocate for Blacks and women by personally initiating protests, organizing political councils, and contributing to pressuring the United States government to save face abroad during the Cold War era by enacting major civil rights legislation that hastened the demise of Jim Crow and allowed its Blacks population and women to secure their constitutional rights as citizens. With Mason's passing away on 10 May, 1982 , the people of Norfolk lost one of its most respected and articulated citizen who left an equalized legacy of opportunities for Blacks and women.

[1]Virginia-Pilot ( Norfolk ), 22 June 1958 ; Benjamin Muse, Virginia's Massive Resistance (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1961), 7; Robert C. Smith, “Desegregation's Tortuous Course: Breakthrough in Norfolk ,” Commentary vol. 27, (March 1959): 188; Luther J. Carter. “Desegregation in Norfolk ,” South Atlantic Quarterly 58 (Autumn 1959): 513-514; Earl Lewis, In Their Own Interest , 203-204.

[2] Vivian Carter Mason, Interview I by Zelda Silverman; Forest R. White, “School Desegregation in Norfolk , 424-429; Virginia-Pilot ( Norfolk ), 25 May 1980, sec. G, GI; Journal and Guide ( Norfolk ), 14 February, 1959, 8; Ledger Star ( Norfolk ), 22 February 1972, sec. B, BI; Virginia-Pilot ( Norfolk ), 24 February 1971, sec. B, B2; Annual One Day Conference, 21 January 1961. Education Committee Program, Virginia State Conference NAACP.

[3] Virginia-Pilot ( Norfolk ), 04 October 1971 , A16; Virginia-Pilot ( Norfolk ), 28 August 1974 , A6.

[4] Virginia-Pilot ( Norfolk ), 30 January 1997 , Z21, Z26.