Red, White & Black Virtual Tour<\/h3> Join Toni Harris Thorpe, former program director at the African American Cultural Center, on a virtual tour. Revisit campus locations that helped give voice to the Black experience at NC State. Plus, meaningful places and the importance of looking to the past to help us move forward. This event was originally held February 24, 2021.<\/p>
Watch the tour\u00a0 Talley Student Union<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nIn September 2016, Talley Student Union was home to a protest that was part of the Black Lives Matter movement. The protest followed the deaths of Terence Crutcher, a Black motorist shot and killed by police in Tulsa, Okla., and Keith Scott, who was shot and killed by police in Charlotte, N.C., four days later. Three hundred NC State students wore black, and sang in unison and walked to Talley, where they lay down in the atrium, staging a die-in. \u201cWe want to take a moment of silence and let the voices of the victims speak loudly,\u201d said Student Body Vice President Brayndon Stafford \u201918, according to the Nubian Message<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nHillsborough Street<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nFor much of the 1960s, Black students at NC State could not eat at restaurants on Hillsborough Street. According to an April 29, 1963, Technician article<\/em>, the first three restaurants to seat Black patrons were Baxley\u2019s Mignon, Baxley\u2019s \u201cTin Box\u201d and the A&W Root Beer restaurant. The article also reported the Varsity Theater had integrated, but noted that other establishments would recognize only take-out orders from Black patrons. Days later, the Technician<\/em> reported the S&W Cafeteria and the Sir Walter Raleigh Hotel Coffee Shop denied service to Angie Brooks, assistant secretary of state for Liberia who had spoken at NC State, and her nephew, a student at Shaw University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n104<\/h2> Number of Black professors employed at NC State.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n\n\n\n
Free Expression Tunnel<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Free Expression Tunnel has a storied history at NC State, serving as a place where students and visitors have celebrated wins, promoted various causes and shown off their art. But there\u2019s a painful side to that history, as well, as it\u2019s also been a home for the expression of hate. In 2008, students painted racist messages and threats against then president-elect Barack Obama on the night of his election. Again in 2010, Obama was the subject of a demeaning and racist image. \u201cSome people think this tunnel is necessary, others see it as a tunnel of oppression,\u201d Tracey Ray \u201993, \u201997 MS \u201901 PHD, then director of multicultural student affairs, told the Technician<\/em>. \u201cWe want to foster and nurture innovative thought and growth at NC State, but we also want to foster personal and professional growth. I\u2019m not sure the [F]ree [E]xpression [T]unnel does that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nReynolds Coliseum<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nBarack Obama spoke as president at the Old Barn in September 2011. But decades earlier, Reynolds Coliseum was home to the first Black female basketball players at NC State, part of the varsity team that formed in 1974. That initial squad, coached by Peanut Doak, included two Black players: Gwen Jenkins and Cynthia Steele (now Exum) \u201976, whose ball-handling abilities Doak celebrated heading into the team\u2019s first game that season against the Virginia Cavaliers.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSome NC State landmarks, like the Free Expression Tunnel (center) have brought anguish to Black students, faculty, staff and alumni. Others, like Reynolds Coliseum and Carter-Finley Stadium, have provided front-row seats to trailblazers, like (left to right) Cynthia Steele (Exum) \u201976, Mary Evelyn Porterfield and Irwin Holmes \u201960.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nCarter-Finley Stadium<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nOn Nov. 7, 1970, Mary Evelyn Porterfield was crowned NC State\u2019s first African American Homecoming queen, or \u201cMiss Wolfpack,\u201d at halftime of the NC State-Virginia football game at Carter-Finley. \u201cI think State is three years behind in the trend,\u201d she told the Technician<\/em>. \u201c. . . I realize that this is a victory for blacks on campus and particularly for the black female.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nRiddick Hall<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nNC State integrated in 1953, when two Black graduate students entered the engineering program, housed in Riddick Hall. One of those students, Robert Clemons \u201957, is the university\u2019s first Black graduate. Three years after it accepted grad students, NC State admitted the first four African American undergraduate students. They too studied engineering. They were Ed Carson \u201962, Manuel Crockett, Walter Holmes \u201962 and Irwin Holmes \u201960. Walter Holmes went on to be the first Black student to join the marching band at NC State. And Irwin Holmes, in 1958, became the first Black student to join a varsity sports team at the university, playing for the tennis team. Two years later, he would become the first African American to serve as a team captain at NC State and in the ACC. Built in 2007 and dedicated in 2018, Holmes Hall is now his namesake.<\/p>\n"},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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