 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Long Island CORE (part 3)
And In Between...
LI CORE also played a large part in the Jamaica NAACP’s
demonstration at the Rochdale Village construction site in Queens that
summer. As with the Brooklyn CORE’s demonstrations at the SUNY Downstate
Medical Center construction site, LI CORE members formed human chains
to block cement trucks. Lynch was arrested and reportedly ‘wrestled
into a patrol car after he ran to aid picket Diane Lewis (White, 21) who
was also arrested. Ruth Schwatrz (White, 30) was also arrested while protesting
the arrests of Queens CORE members who had chained themselves to construction
cranes. This action marked the beginning of Herman Ferguson’s involvement
in the civil rights movement and his participation in CORE.
As school started in September, LI CORE joined a coalition to fight against de facto school segregation in the Malverne village school district. At the Davison Avenue School, Lynch showed up with four mothers and their children demanding that they be enrolled in the mostly White school. Lynch and the mothers were arrested when they refused to leave after being denied. Harold Trent carried out the exact same action the next day and was also arrested. While the campaign led to the state commissioner of education directing the local board to take immediate action to desegregate the school system, it was only the start of a much longer struggle.
Mall of Justice
That fall, an even more successful series of employment
campaigns focused on retail shopping centers starting with the Roosevelt
Field shopping center. Out of eight hundred employees, only fifty were
Black and as with the banks, they were all in non-visual, menial jobs.
Because the company would not negotiate, LI CORE went to direct action.
Assisted by Brooklyn and New York CORE, the chapter’s picketing
and leafleting led to a sit in at the shopping center.
By the end of November, the chapter won concessions including: two hundred temporary hires for the holiday season, 50% of which were to be kept on permanently, not in menial, non-visual jobs; Blacks and Puerto Ricans to be hired in any new construction on the site; job ads to be placed in local Black newspapers.
James Farmer and Bayard Rustin appeared at a LI CORE rally in front of three thousand people at end of the year and suggested a nationwide boycott against segregated stores after Christmas in the form of a selective buying campaign.
In March of 1964, LI CORE took on the Green Acres shopping center in Valley Stream. At the time, it employed four hundred people of which less than 25% were Black and/or Puerto Rican. Opting to negotiate, the shopping center agreed to hire ten Blacks and Puerto Ricans immediately, ninety more over the year and to recruitment. The same deal was made with the Mid-Island shopping center and followed by a campaign against the Nassau shopping center. Suffolk County CORE followed in LI CORE’s footsteps by leading successful campaigns against two banks, three shopping centers and starting campaigns against two others.
Based in Amityville, Suffolk County CORE started in 1961 primarily to support the Freedom Rides. Calvin Cobb, a Black attorney, was one of the founding members and its first chairman. A second version of the chapter, led by LI CORE member Delores Quintyne (Black), was resurrected in 1963. Henry G. Smith (Black) was chairman in 1964.
And In Between, part 2...
LI CORE moved offices once again to 82 South Franklin
street in Hempstead. It was so small general meetings were held in different
churches such as the Jackson Memorial Church, founded and pastured by
LI CORE member Reverend V. L. St. Clair. He led a successful voter registration
drive a few months prior focused on Hempstead. LI CORE followed it with
a campaign to register all of Nassau County’s fifteen thousand eligible
Black voters. Working with local chapters of the NAACP, the campaign was
said by Lynch to represent the first such concentrated effort in the north.
These campaigns also represented early efforts at helping Blacks get elected
to local political offices. By the end of 1964, both LI and Suffolk County
CORE began endorsing candidates for town and village elections. By 1967,
both chapters had run members for office.
Rev. St. Clair and Harold Trent led the opposition slate that June for
chapter chairman. It was indicative of an inner conflict in which Lynch
was essentially blamed for running CORE like a military officer. Among
those making complaints were many of the original members of the chapter:
Mark and Jo Dodson, Alvin Petrus, Evia Muise, Louis Katz and Lynch’s
former vice chairman, William Ericson. While approximately thirty members including the Dodsons resigned from the chapter, Lynch was re-elected again.
Dave Thompson (21) was his vice chair. Other officers included Ruth Schwartz,
Alice Freedman, John Connor and Nicholas F. Smith.
LI CORE does not seem to have been an especially strong
supporter of the World’s Fair but it did participate. Members
Richard Gordon, Karen Redic and Russel Martin were arrested. Former Suffolk
County CORE chairman Delores Quintyne was also arrested. LI CORE did support
Brooklyn CORE’s position on the Stall-In, but only ‘within
the framework’ of CORE’s constitution. Members were allowed
to participate in the Stall-In if they saw fit.