Reginald Hildebrand - Racism and Quaker School (clip)

Reginald Hildebrand (RH): In the 4th grade, go to my parents, there was a Quaker school in Atlantic City. They had a good experience, thought it was worth the investment sending me to a Quaker School in Philadelphia, they wanted to do the same there.

I went there, took exams, and the head mistress said, “You know this is great, good you know, the school you came from is great, and it’s reflected in the scores on these exams, and we would love to have you as a student here, but …..if we were to admit you…,” she told my parents it would have an impact on the white parents of students attending the school now. And they might withdraw, and it was a small private school in Atlantic City. They couldn’t really risk that. And so that’s…it was, “nice we wish we could, but this isn’t going to be a good situation.”

Well, what I had imagined, I don’t know. Purely speculating on this, because I, you know, I had taken a tour of the school, played on the gym stuff, the rest of that. But, what I imagined happened was that she thought it was going to be okay, but probably began to hear from people after this became a real possibility.