Product Description

When fourteen-year-old Carlotta Walls walked up the stairs of Little Rock Central High School on September 25, 1957, she and eight other black students only wanted to make it to class. But the journey of the “Little Rock Nine,” as they came to be known, would lead the nation on an even longer and much more turbulent path, one that would challenge prevailing attitudes, break down barriers, and forever change the landscape of America.

Descended from a line of proud black landowners and businessmen, Carlotta was raised to believe that education was the key to success. She embraced learning and excelled in her studies at the black schools she attended throughout the 1950s. With Brown v. Board of Education erasing the color divide in classrooms across the country, the teenager volunteered to be among the first black students–of whom she was the youngest–to integrate nearby Central High School, considered one of the nation’s best academic institutions.

But for Carlotta and her eight comrades, simply getting through the door was the first of many trials. Angry mobs of white students and their parents hurled taunts, insults, and threats. Arkansas’s governor used the National Guard to bar the black students from entering the school. Finally, President Dwight D. Eisenhower was forced to send in the 101st Airborne to establish order and escort the Nine into the building. That was just the start of a heartbreaking three-year journey for Carlotta, who would see her home bombed, a crime for which her own father was a suspect and for which a friend of Carlotta’s was ultimately jailed–albeit wrongly, in Carlotta’s eyes. But she persevered to the victorious end: her graduation from Central.

Breaking her silence at last and sharing her story for the first time, Carlotta Walls has written an inspiring, thoroughly engrossing memoir that is not only a testament to the power of one to make a difference but also of the sacrifices made by families and communities that found themselves a part of history.

Complete with compelling photographs of the time, A Mighty Long Way shines a light on this watershed moment in civil rights history and shows that determination, fortitude, and the ability to change the world are not exclusive to a few special people but are inherent within us all.


From the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #48125 in Books
• Published on: 2009-08-25
• Released on: 2009-08-25
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780345511003
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Amazon.com Review
Book Description
When fourteen-year-old Carlotta Walls walked up the stairs of Little Rock Central High School on September 25, 1957, she and eight other black students only wanted to make it to class. But the journey of the “Little Rock Nine,” as they came to be known, would lead the nation on an even longer and much more turbulent path, one that would challenge prevailing attitudes, break down barriers, and forever change the landscape of America.

Descended from a line of proud black landowners and businessmen, Carlotta was raised to believe that education was the key to success. She embraced learning and excelled in her studies at the black schools she attended throughout the 1950s. With Brown v. Board of Education erasing the color divide in classrooms across the country, the teenager volunteered to be among the first black students--of whom she was the youngest--to integrate nearby Central High School, considered one of the nation’s best academic institutions.

But for Carlotta and her eight comrades, simply getting through the door was the first of many trials. Angry mobs of white students and their parents hurled taunts, insults, and threats. Arkansas’s governor used the National Guard to bar the black students from entering the school. Finally, President Dwight D. Eisenhower was forced to send in the 101st Airborne to establish order and escort the Nine into the building. That was just the start of a heartbreaking three-year journey for Carlotta, who would see her home bombed, a crime for which her own father was a suspect and for which a friend of Carlotta’s was ultimately jailed--albeit wrongly, in Carlotta’s eyes. But she persevered to the victorious end: her graduation from Central.

Breaking her silence at last and sharing her story for the first time, Carlotta Walls has written an inspiring, thoroughly engrossing memoir that is not only a testament to the power of one to make a difference but also of the sacrifices made by families and communities that found themselves a part of history.

Complete with compelling photographs of the time, A Mighty Long Way shines a light on this watershed moment in civil rights history and shows that determination, fortitude, and the ability to change the world are not exclusive to a few special people but are inherent within us all.

From Publishers Weekly
At 14, Lanier was the youngest of the Little Rock Nine, who integrated Little Rock Central High School in 1951; she went on to become the first African –American young woman to receive a diploma from the school. Her memoir provides a firsthand account of a seismic shift in American history. She recalls the well-reported violence outside the school and daily harassment and ineffective protection from teachers and guards. Away from school, the Nine were honored and feted, but their parents found their jobs—even their lives—in jeopardy. Lanier's house was bombed, and a childhood friend, Herbert Monts, was falsely accused and convicted. Monts's account of his experiences, shared with Lanier, 43 years later, is historically newsworthy. Lanier's recollections of family history and her relatively pedestrian experiences after high school graduation (graduate school, job hunting, marrying, finding her new home in Denver) lack the drama of her historical moment. In a sense, Lanier didn't make history, history made her. Her plainspoken report from the front line is, nevertheless, a worthy contribution to the history of civil rights in America. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post
From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by Kevin Boyle A few weeks ago my younger daughter started high school. My wife and I stood in front of our house watching her march up the block, a whippet-thin 14- year-old dressed in the outfit she'd picked out weeks before, weighed down by her overstuffed backpack and the nagging fear that she wouldn't remember her locker number. A little girl, the same age Carlotta Walls LaNier had been on the day she began high school in Little Rock, Ark. 52 years ago, the day she walked through a mob of racists so rabid they would have killed her given half a chance. LaNier was the youngest of the Little Rock Nine, whose terrifying experience at Central High in September 1957 became one of the civil rights movement's most pivotal moments. In the mid-1950s Little Rock officials decided that, rather than fight the Supreme Court's landmark ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, they would voluntarily desegregate the city schools. After several years of careful planning, the school superintendent hand-picked nine African American teenagers he thought particularly well-suited to the dangerous job of breaking the color line at all-white Central, Little Rock's most prestigious public high school. As she makes clear in her affecting new memoir (written with The Washington Post's Lisa Frazier Page), LaNier took on the assignment with a 14-year-old's naiveté. She thought she had been selected simply because she filled out a form in her ninth-grade home room. She imagined herself settling into Central High, making new friends, going to football games, maybe even joining the cheerleading squad. Not until Sept. 3, the day before school was to start, did she realize that something was wrong. That's when Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus -- playing to the segregationist vote -- announced that he was calling out the National Guard to block the African American students' entry into the school. On the first day of class 400 whites jammed the streets around Central, screaming racial epithets as the Nine walked stone-faced up to the line of guardsmen, who turned them away. "I was completely stunned," says LaNier, not because she was suddenly at the center of a constitutional crisis -- that thought didn't cross her mind -- but because she'd never missed a day of school in her life. For two weeks the crisis festered, until a federal judge ordered Faubus to withdraw the troops. On Sept. 23 the Nine tried again. This time there were a thousand people on the streets -- and no guardsmen to maintain order. The Little Rock police managed to slip the teenagers into Central through a side door. But that only enraged the mob. Fearing that the crowd would soon storm the school, officials decided that the black students had to be removed. Three hours into their first day, they were hustled into the back seats of two patrol cars, told to keep their heads down, and sped home. Only then did the Eisenhower administration decide that defiance of federal power would not be tolerated. The following morning the 101st Airborne escorted the Little Rock Nine into Central High. But LaNier's ordeal had barely begun. For the remaining three years of her high school career, she and her family endured constant harassment and abuse, much of it petty -- one white student delighted in following LaNier down the hall, stepping on her heels -- some of it stunningly vicious. In the memoir's most moving passages, LaNier describes the burdens of those years, as an ebullient teenager stoically marching through long, hard, lonely days, dutifully suppressing the seething anger she had been told never to express, desperately waiting for her life at Central -- the life she'd once dreamed of having -- to end. She graduated on May 30, 1960. The next day, she left Little Rock forever. "A Mighty Long Way" isn't a tragic story. After almost 30 years of silence, LaNier gradually started to talk about the experiences of the Little Rock Nine. Now she's one of the group's outspoken members, a symbol of the courage it took to crack the Southern system of segregation. As I read this simple, powerful memoir, though, I couldn't stop thinking of my own 14-year-old -- and grieving for that other little girl heading off to school half a century ago.
Copyright 2009, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Customer Reviews

Walking the walk in Montgomery with a true civil rights pioneer Carlotta Walls LaNier.
When Carlotta Walls of Little Rock, AR was 8 years old she had a life changing experience. The year was 1951 and Carlotta's parents Cartelyou and Juanita Walls decided it would be a good idea for their young daughter to spend her summer vacation visiting an aunt in New York City. It was a thrilling experience for young Carlotta. She visited Radio City Music Hall, saw a ballgame at Ebbets Field, and paid a visit to the Statue of Liberty. Perhaps more important than any of these experiences she befriended a young white boy by the name of Francis. Such a relationship was simply out of the question in her hometown of Little Rock. When young Carlotta packed her bags and returned to Little Rock in the waning days of August she was no longer the same little girl. Through her experiences that summer she suddenly realized that every place was not like the Jim Crow South that she and her family existed in. She could not have known it at the time but her new worldview would have a profound impact on a monumental decision she would make just a few years later.

In the 1954 decision "Brown v. Board of Education" the U.S. Supreme Court declared that "all laws establishing segregated schools to be unconstitutional" and furthermore ordered the desegregation of all schools throughout the nation. By the time the State of Arkansas got around to complying with the Supreme Court ruling it was 1957. Governor Orval Faubus was a self proclaimed segregationist who fought integration tooth and nail from the get-go. He was not happy about but plans were moving forward to integrate the schools including Little Rock Central High School. Nine courageous young black students registered to attend Little Rock Central High in the fall of 1957. One of them was Carlotta Walls. "A Mighty Long Way: My Journey To Justice At Little Rock Central High School" is Carlotta Walls LaNier's gripping first person narrative of the historic and painful events that took place in Little Rock back in 1957 and the effect that the experience would have on the rest of her life. It is a compelling story.

While reading Carlotta's gut wrenching account of her days at Little Rock Central High one cannot not help but feel empathy for this smart, courageous and determined young lady. Carlotta and her 8 comrades put everything on the line in order to advance the cause of integration in her hometown. But I don't believe that any of these youngsters had any idea what they were up against. As is made clear in the pages of "A Mighty Long Way" the odds were clearly against them. The political establishment in Arkansas would do everything in their power to obstruct the process. Ultimately, President Dwight Eisenhower would be forced to send in federal troops to take control of the situation. It was an ugly time in Little Rock. Racial epithets were flying everywhere and the threat of violence lurked around every corner . One wonders how these young people garnered the courage to face this situation. Indeed, not all of them would make it to graduation.

After much heartache and pain Carlotta Walls did manage to graduate from Central Little Rock High in June of 1960. The very next day she left Little Rock and never looked back. She was tired of the notoriety and controversy and just wanted a fresh start elsewhere. She had never sought the spotlight. "A Mighty Long Way: My Journey To Justice At Little Rock Central High School" goes on to tell the rest of Carlotta's fascinating life story. Although she went to great lengths to put the events of her past behind her Carlotta would eventually have to come to terms with it. One cannot help but admire what Carlotta and the rest of the group that history would dub "The Little Rock Nine" would ultimately achieve. I found "A Mighty Long Way" to be a terrific read. Recommended.

Would assign 10 stars if I could
A Mighty Long Way is one of the best books I've received through the Vine program. Carlotta Walls was one of the original Little Rock 9: the first nine teenagers who dared to enroll at Little Rock's premier high school. She describes her experience in a simple, straightforward style, which ironically makes her story even more shocking than it might otherwise.

It's hard to imagine many teenagers who would handle themselves as well as Carlotta did. Every day was torture. She didn't just dodge insults; she dealt with physical harassment. Kids would knock her books over, then kick her when she bent to get them. A female student stepped on her heels, drawing blood. Through it all, Carlotta held firm. She didn't cry. Occasionally she reported instances of misconduct. But mostly, after the troopers left, she was on her own.

Carlotta's family supported her decision at great personal sacrifice. The community helped; I hadn't realized how much the NAACP was involved. The school kept closing when the governor would rather have no schools than integrated schools.

Carlotta and her friends sacrificed a large part of their teenage years. Forbidden to attend after-school activities, she joined some events at Mann, were African-Aemricans were welcome.

The most moving part of the book comes at the end, when the Little Rock 9 finally get recognition. Carlotta returns for an anniversary in Little Rock, where the president and Mike Huckabee (a very different governor from Faubus, she notes) hold the doors while she enters Central High. Later she watches Barack Obama win the election. Because she bravely walked up the steps of Central High, she says, now Barack and his family can walk up the White Hosue steps.

It's hard to believe the Little Rock events took place in 1957 - just over 50 years ago. When Carlotta returned for her reunion, the student body president of Central High School is African American.

A Mighty Long Way is hard to put down. It's a painful story yet Carlotta never loses optimism. She gets breaks (especially after her first year, when she wins a scholarship to camp). She travels and meets some very famous people. Because you had to be truly outstanding to get into those college
(especially if you were African-American), Carlotta makes some pretty amazing friends, from pro football players to politicians.

What would happened if the Little Rock 9 had refused to play their part? What if they had all escaped to California, New York or the Midwest? Central would eventually have been integrated, but the process would have taken years. All nine students have enjoyed exceptional success.

This book should be required reading for America history classes in high sc hool and college.

Perseverance and Justice
History tells a story as well as revisits events that leave a lasting impression on those who study the subject. For those who remember American history class in junior high or high school, Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas may have merely been a paragraph in the textbook. But I can recall the television movie "Crisis at Central High" with Joanne Woodward, which would further enhance my understanding of this part of history and conjure emotions. However, a movie can only do so much. And Carlotta Walls LaNier, one of the youngest members of the Little Rock Nine tells her moving story in A MIGHTY LONG WAY: MY JOURNEY TO JUSTICE AT LITTLE ROCK CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL.

Only fourteen-years-old, Carlotta Walls's childhood before Little Rock was as innocent as any young girl's childhood during the 1950s. She lived the typical life of a young girl, somewhat a tomboy who loved to play baseball, laughing end enjoying time with her friends, family, and classmates. But September 25, 1957 would be no other day for Carlotta. Indeed, it would be a life changing moment frozen in history. Carlotta accounts her childhood leading up to that fateful day. However underneath it all, she lived during a time of social upheaval, Brown v. Board of Education and the shadows of Jim Crow laws in the South rearing its undesirable head. But several pivotal moments within her narrative show a young girl aware of what was happening, especially within every news headline that crossed her eyes pertaining to Emmett Till and Rosa Parks. It would be those unfortunate circumstances that would paint a lasting picture of irony in her mind as well as breathe a voice and appeal to end segregation, prejudice, and injustice towards African Americans within American society. But Carlotta would be a part of that process towards equality as she retells the days she entered Central High School confronted with cruelty and violence.

The book contains numerous incidences that depict the most daunting moments that Carlotta had to endure. Met with fiendish eyes and onlookers who did not believe she should go to the high school, being the center of attention was not what Carlotta had in mind, but with each taunt and spit in the face, her main concern was to survive and attempt to receive an education amidst the military guards who escorted her to school and class and the bully offenders; undeniably, she along with the other eight students experienced utter humiliation.

As one reads Carlotta's memoir, many images and thoughts may arise. Over fifty years has passed but her story still peels fresh wounds that have not healed. Indeed, this book may serve as a teaching moment for those who read it or breathe further discussion. This is a part of history that still needs to be learned and understood.