Eddie Bernice Johnson grew up in Waco and moved to Dallas after
graduating from Notre Dame, St Mary’s College of Nursing and took a job as a VA
nurse. She got into politics after a trip to buy a new hat. She didn't buy the
hat. Instead, she organized a boycott and took her first step into politics.
"I had
just finished nursing school [at Notre Dame] in South Bend. My father worked
for the V.A. in Waco, and two members of the same family couldn't work for the
same federal facility, so I applied for a position in Dallas, and they accepted
me.”
"When I
showed up, they were shocked that I was black. They hadn't had any black
professionals at all at that time in Dallas. Suddenly all the nurses residences
were 'full' and the rest were 'under construction.' I found housing in a
rooming house. That was very prevalent among blacks, because there were very
few apartment buildings."
"In Waco I
had never witnessed the kind of extreme separatism I did here. In Waco they had
'Colored' and 'White' signs all over, and there was a history of lynchings.
But, in Dallas, the overt racism immediately became clear.”
"After beginning
work at the V.A. I was planning a trip back to South Bend for a friends
wedding. I was going by train, and I wanted a small collapsible hat to put on
my head. We were always raised to buy quality. My parents taught us that, even
if you couldn't buy much, you should buy the best, so I went to one of the best
stores downtown, A. Harris."
"I learned in just a very stark shock that I could not try
the hat on. I never experienced that in Waco. We could try on clothes. I found
that Black women in Dallas could not try on shoes. People tried them on for
you, or they would measure your foot and guess your size."
"That was
the first realization, I had never experienced anything like that, even in
Waco. But it was that way everywhere in Dallas."
In 1957, determined
to change the status quo, Eddie Bernice Johnson along with Yvonne Ewell, Imelda
Brooks and Marion Dillard formed a group called '50 Sensitive Black Women' .The group, whose sole purpose was to integrate downtown Dallas, first met at Maria Morgan YWCA
and began to organize a boycott of downtown Dallas stores including Sanger
Harris, Neiman Marcus, and H.L. Green among others.
"It taught me that unity can make a difference. We bought cameras and took pictures for the newspapers of people that patronized stores we were boycotting. Eventually stores closed."
"It taught me that unity can make a difference. We bought cameras and took pictures for the newspapers of people that patronized stores we were boycotting. Eventually stores closed."
The boycott
went on for over five years until on July, 26, 1961 over 49 stores, restaurants
and theaters in Downtown Dallas were finally desegregated.
