By Jay Fitzgerald – A blog about Boston, Hub of the Universe, and everything else.


Forgotten Boston history: A story about a student protest, a riot, and a photo worth a thousand words

Universal Hub’s Adam Gaffin has an amazing post that captures an important part of Boston’s history, mostly a forgotten history, by telling the story behind one black-and-white photo taken in old Dudley Square in 1968. The photo appears to show one thing, then transforms into another as Adam describes how a Black student protest over a school dress code led to rioting that spread from Egleston and Grove Hall and into Dudley Square, all of it foreshadowing the school busing crisis in Boston six years later. … An accompanying photo of Louise Day Hicks, a Boston School Committee member at the time and a staunch opponent of school desegregation, is eerie. She’s just standing there, far off, all alone, monitoring events. … Definitely check out the post. It’s a piece of city history that deserves to be remembered.

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