Filling the Gaps in our Students’ Local History Knowledge
By: Matt Vriesman, AP U.S. History Teacher at East Kentwood High School
Just about every student I’ve taught knows the name Rosa Parks, as they should. They can all articulate that she refused to give up a bus seat and that this played a major role in the fight against Jim Crow. However, I have yet to talk with a student who knows about the people who fought to end racial segregation in our own community decades before the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
As a high school history teacher, I have made it my goal for each of my students to understand that Jim Crow was not just a southern problem; our own city was culpable in the nation-wide crimes against Black human rights.
In 1925, Emmett Bolden — the first Black dentist in Grand Rapids — went to the Keith’s Theater downtown to see a show with friends and was denied a ticket to the main floor because of his race. According to the Michigan Civil Rights Act of 1885, discrimination in public accommodations in any form was unconstitutional, but many business owners in the state continued to practice unjust segregation. To fight this discrimination, a local lawyer, Oliver Green, filed a lawsuit against the theater. Green even recruited the NAACP and the famous W.E.B. Du Bois to help with this case. Green and Bolden eventually won their case in the Michigan Supreme Court, setting a precedent that helped end segregation by private business in Michigan!
Emmett Bolden and Oliver Green are local legends who, like Rosa Parks, made a huge impact on history. This school year, I wanted to develop a lesson to highlight their wisdom and courage, and I thought the GRPM would be an excellent partner. It can be difficult to find quality materials to teach local history, but I knew that the Museum had the resources to tell this story in their Archives and Digital Collections.
While developing this curriculum, I collaborated with curatorial and education staff at the Museum. They were so helpful in providing feedback at every step of the process and recommending primary sources that could help tell this story and set the historical context. I also pulled in the expertise and work of authors Dr. Randall Jelks and Dr. Todd Robinson as my guiding light through the narrative. As a history nerd, my favorite day of the summer was going to meet with the GRPM’s Chief Curator, Alex Forist, and Director of Education, Erin Koren, at the Community Archives and Research Center. We were able to pull together photographs, newspaper articles and records from old city directories to bring the story to life.
My students crave lessons that are relevant to their lives, involve personal inquiry and choice, and conclude with a powerful discussion. We tried to do just that with this curriculum. We situated many of the primary sources into a virtual ‘tour’ on an old city map so that students could explore how American history played out right here on our own streets. I hope that the materials we developed are beneficial for other teachers in the community.
After all the support I got from the Museum staff, I would tell any teacher, if you have an idea to make history more relevant and local, reach out to the Museum. They have the resources we need and the expertise to help make the idea come to fruition!
These lessons are available to the public and can be found on the GRPM’s website, grpm.org/Schools or on the Collections website.