Mother to Son, by Langston Hughes:

Well, Son, I’ll tell you. Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair. It’s had tacks in it, and splinters, and boards torn up, and places with no carpet on the floor, bare. But all the time I’se been a-climbin’ on, and reachin’ landin’s, and turnin’ corners, and sometimes goin’ in the dark where there ain’t been no light. So boy, don’t you turn back. Don’t you set down on the steps. ‘Cause you finds it’s kinder hard. Don’t you fall now, for I’se still goin’ honey, I’se still climbin’. And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.

In 1938, Lloyd Gaines filed a lawsuit when the University of Missouri Law School denied him admission in 1935 because he was black.

The court ruled in his favor, mandating Missouri to admit him or establish a separate law school for black students. Tragically, he disappeared 3 months later, never to be found.

Lloyd Lionel Gaines was born in 1911 to the Gaines family in northern Mississippi, one of eleven children, seven of whom survived various challenges. After their father's untimely death, Lloyd, his widowed mother, and siblings relocated to St. Louis, seeking a better life in Missouri. Despite the hardships, Gaines excelled academically, becoming the valedictorian of his 1931 class at Vashon High School. He continued his education at Lincoln University in Jefferson City, where he graduated with honors. During his time at university,he actively participated in extracurricular activities and worked to fund his education while serving as the President of the senior class. Despite his exceptional academic achievements, Lloyd Gaines faced denial from the University of Missouri School of Law in 1936 due to the state's segregationist policies. These policies were based on Missouri's Constitution mandating segregated education. While state law would have funded his education in neighboring states, Gaines was determined to fight for his right to attend law school in his home state. Seeking legal assistance from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), he joined forces with them to challenge the discriminatory admissions policies of the University of Missouri, as part of the broader effort to overturn the "separate but equal" doctrine established in Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896. In 1938, Lloyd Gaines won the case before the United States Supreme Court with the case State of Missouri ex rel Gaines v. Canada, a landmark decision that set the stage for subsequent cases including Brown v. Board of Education, which then banned segregation in public education. In March 1939, three months after his Supreme Court win, Lloyd Gaines vanished in Chicago at the age of 28. His dream of attending law school remained unfulfilled, and he was never seen or heard from again.

Two police officers transport prisoner George Armwood from Baltimore on October 17, 1933, the day before he was lynched.
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On October 18, 1933, a mob of at least 2,000 white residents of Princess Anne, Maryland, beat, hanged, dragged, and burned George Armwood to death. Armwood, who was reportedly intellectually disabled, had been accused of assaulting an 80-year-old woman who was also the mother of a local white policeman. Shortly after being arrested, Armwood was dragged out of the jail and an 18-year-old boy immediately cut off his ear with a butcher knife.
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The growing mob then beat George Armwood nearly to death and dragged him to a tree, where he was hanged. Afterward, the mob cut down his corpse, dragged it through the streets, hanged it again, and then staged a public burning. The New Journal and Guide reported that “[m]en, women and children, participated in the savage orgy.” The Afro American reported that the mob danced around Armwood's charred remains. The report quoted one white man, who said, "It would have cost the state $1000 to hang the man. It cost us 75 cents."
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Armwood’s lynching sparked a national outcry and calls for prosecution of the lynchers, yet investigations at the county, state, and federal levels faced obstacles and delays. Inquiries following the lynching were marked by residents’ refusal to identify participants as well as mockery and intimidation of black witnesses. The American Civil Liberties Union, frustrated with the silence, began offering a $1,000 reward to people willing to name leaders of the mob.
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Even when finally presented with identifying evidence, the county prosecutor refused to act. When the Maryland Attorney General ordered troops to arrest eight named participants, white residents who supported the accused lynchers waged riots of protest. Four white men were ultimately tried for the lynching of George Armwood and acquitted by all-white juries.

I love family photos, but why is the baby's outfit white though? 👀

Little known fact: Vanilla is NOT white.

Thankfully, all my brothers and sisters were breast fed and never had any "formula." 😊😊😊

Fact