Sixty-seven years have passed since Georgia Robertson Walton walked the halls of Royal Street High School, Hattiesburg’s high school for the African American community at the time. Its white counterpart was S.H. Blair, better known as Hattiesburg High School.
Royal Street was built following the end of World War II to help alleviate overcrowding at Eureka School, where enrollment had grown from about 80 students in 1940 to approximately 1,400 in 1947. Royal Street opened its doors in 1949 at the current site of Rowan Elementary. Walton said she feels like she received a good education at Royal Street. “We felt equal to the other high school to an extent,” she said. “People would say, ‘You need to change schools and go elsewhere,’ but there was nowhere else for us to go. We had to go to our neighborhood school. We had to go because that was the only school in our area.”
Walton doesn’t remember any type of advanced classes being offered. “If they were, I was never in them,” she said. And when they dated, there really wasn’t anything to do but meet each other at the ballgames. “To me, that was fun because I didn’t know anything else and didn’t have anything else to do.”
Walton served as manager for a couple of the athletic teams – basketball and track. She said at that time they did not have baseball.
She also participated in the band, where she played an alto horn. “We performed in parades and football games,” she recalls.
Walton recalls there were 72 members in Royal Street’s Class of 1952. Graduation was held in the school gymnasium, where most of the school’s activities were held. Following the commencement exercises, a reception was held for graduates and their parents.
“It was a big thing as far as we were concerned,” she said. “Right now it wouldn’t be considered a biggy. But we did have fun. I guess these kids are having fun today, but we really had fun because there wasn’t a whole lot to do. We thought we were in heaven, especially when we walked down the aisle of that gym. I was in hog heaven.”
Walton feels like she received a good education. “I didn’t feel deprived of anything,” she said. “At that particular time, it wasn’t an issue. People would always say that the high school elsewhere was much different; we didn’t have the books. But I do feel like I got a quality education even thought some people don’t think that way. It didn’t bother me as long as I was able to go and have the education and get a job. That’s all my parents required.
Walton started her schooling in Hattiesburg at what was a 16th Section School, which then became an elementary school and now serves as the alternative school. Walton then made her way to Grace Love, Lillie Burney, Rowan and Royal Street.
Even though Walton’s trek down the halls is a distant memory, she can’t get away from the school where she earned her education. In fact, she lives right across the street from the now Rowan Elementary, but she also grew up in the Royal Street neighborhood.
Before integration, Walton said that students, the black and white, were separate from one another – both in school and in the community.
“Everybody stayed separately,” she said. “We didn’t have white friends. I didn’t get any friends, really,” but when she did it was the children she taught after she completed college and came back back to work at Rowan, where she did most of her teaching. Really it wasn’t until after integration that I had any white friends.”
After high school graduation, Walton made her way to Alcorn State University with the support of her parents and other family members. “At that particular time, it was Alcorn State or Jackson State,” Walton said.
Walton said it really wasn’t a struggle since her mother’s sister and her family helped contribute to her education. “But I couldn’t get a whole lot of things,” she said, “as long as they paid the tuition.” Walton said at that time she remembers only having to pay about $35 a month. “That’s like paying a light bill now.”
There were also times when her parents and relatives would send her an extra $10 spending money, “and that was plenty of money as far as I was concerned. It was my spending money for The Grill and everything. Stretching it went quite a long ways.”
Without a car, her family would carry her to school and come back and pick her up. However, a Hattiesburg woman, who would later marry Jesse Brown, was also attending Alcorn at the time.
“She was older than us,” Walton said, “but luckily she was in my neighborhood and when we got ready to come home or go back, my parents made connections with her parents and she would bring me from Alcorn to Hattiesburg, so that was a blessing. And she didn’t charge us a penny.”
Walton wasn’t the only one to catch a ride, saying there were at least three of them who took advantage of the transportation. “We had fun just coming home, but we’d have to leave going back on Sunday morning.”
Walton graduated with a teaching degree and taught in Lucedale for two years before making her way back to the Hub City. “I did very well teaching down there, but my father became ill so I had to move home to see after him.
Once she started teaching back at home, she never left.
Walton coached and taught physical education. “I chose that field because I was interested in health,” said Walton, who gets up every morning and walks. “In order to get a degree in health, I had to go into the field of sports and physical education so that’s what I did.”
Walton taught for 35 years before she decided to retire. Upon retirement Walton made the mistake of saying, “if I can do anything for the school system, I’m available.” Walton admits to telling them that, if though she didn’t mean it 100 percent.
And they kept her to that. When the very first day of school started in the fall they called her and asked her to come back to handle in-school suspension, as well as serve as a substitute. She did that for the next seven years.
Walton doesn’t remember the trouble in schools back then as we see now. “It was a different world back then,” she said. “You were afraid to get out of hand. Now I understand, these children could care less, but I don’t want to knock the system down.”
When Walton truly retired, then she was able to sit back.
“I finally got a chance to relax,” she said.
She cooks occasionally, if somebody brings her some fresh vegetables and she has cousins or other family members coming over to eat. Other than that, that’s it. She does attend church at Antioch Baptist.
She still has students from the past come up and ask if she misses them.
“Sometimes I tell them, ‘no, I don’t miss you.’ That’s exactly what I tell them,” she laughed.
There have even been those students who questioned why she made them stand up in class.
Her reply was simple, “You’re sleepy, so am I. I can’t go to sleep, but when you sit down, you want to put your head down and I can’t put mine down. So that’s why I made you stand up. If I let you come in here every morning and put your head down, you wouldn’t wake up until lunch time.’
“It was fun and got aggravating at times, but I seemed to have a rapport with some of them.”
Her advice to today’s seniors?
“Continue go to go school and do the best you can while in high school. And try to always get a chance, if possible, and go to college,” she said. “Right now, to a certain extent, they have a better chance of going to college now than we did. They they have all these scholarships. They also have these funds they can get, which we could not do. That’s a plus as far as I’m concerned.”
These days Walton sits out in her yard at times and watches the children across the street, who sometime use her yard as a pass through to elsewhere in the neighborhood. She watches teachers herding students outside to wait for the bus or their parents to pick them up.
“It’s amazing to me. I sit out there in my yard and say, ‘I’m glad that’s not me.’”
