Through drama and a firsthand account of history, Columbia High School students learned about the school’s peaceful integration during a black history month program Thursday.
Coach Charles Boston shared his recollections from the 1970-1971 school year, and students acted out a dramatized scene of a halftime speech from that season that helped bring black and white students together. The football team’s successful run during the 1971 season, led by future NFL Hall of Famer Walter Payton, was credited with helping smooth the process of combining the all-white Columbia High School with the all-black Jefferson High School.
Boston, a Laurel native, had moved to Columbia in 1963 from Bassfield and was the head football coach at Jefferson. In the spring of 1970, students from there came over to CHS.
“That first year we stayed in classes. The seventh grade class from Jefferson went to class together. The seventh grade class from Columbia went to class together. So really we were really almost the same way we were at Jefferson for one semester,” Boston recalled. “But we move on to the fall, football season. Football practice was starting. We had some skill people from Jefferson and some good ballplayers. We had some good linemen from Columbia High School. Put them together, it was a thing of beauty.”
The team reeled off an eight-game winning streak with its 20 players from Jefferson and 16 from CHS uniting as one team.
“I don’t remember, as I said earlier, us having any problems. In fact, we had less fights that year than we did when we were all-black at Jefferson. I don’t know how it was over here at Columbia. But we got along fine,” he said.
However, there were hurdles, namely that Boston, who in later years would serve as athletic director and as a school board member, was not made head coach.
“It still stings a little, too, that I couldn’t get the head coaching job because I had been a head coach for 12 years, had never been an assistant,” he said. “But you all have read stories about the dinosaur. You know, he’s no longer around because he couldn’t adjust. You have to sometimes change a little, so I guess I was able to adjust. And I’m still here, and I still love being around the students.”
He closed his speech with this message to students: “Stay together. Remember that you represent Columbia High School, and any time if I can help you all you’ve got to do is call. I’ll get out of my bed to help a Wildcat.”
CHS Principal Braxton Stowe called Boston “truly a living legend” and said they were fortunate to have him speak about things he went through.
He encouraged students to remember a quote from a video played during the program that said, “Where there is unity, there is always victory.”
“The one thing that is so beautiful about our school is that, take a look around, we’re different. And that’s beautiful. We can respect each other’s differences, and the thing is we can be victorious in doing those things,” the first-year CHS principal said. “We won a state band championship. We won a cheerleading championship. Had an amazing football season, having a great basketball season. Look at all the things we’re doing together. And we’re killing it in the classroom. Remember, where there is unity, there is always victory. And that’s the beauty of this campus. To me that sums up Columbia High School.”
Pictured Above: Columbia High School student Kennedy Newson leads the crowd in “We Shall Overcome” Thursday during a black history month program in the Crystelle Ford Auditorium. Singing, from left, are CHS choir director Kim Walley, guest speaker Charles Boston, the Rev. Edward Hanshaw and Principal Braxton Stowe. | Photo by Charlie Smith
