Paine group's actions, success go unheralded

It's been more than 40 years since the Paine College Steering Committee led the local student movement in the struggle for civil rights. Now most of its efforts have faded from memory.

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"I'd be surprised if anybody had a clue," said former steering committee member Charles Pryor, who left Augusta after graduating from Paine in 1963. "We've gotten past it and haven't had anybody ask or remind us of what we did or how we did it."

Before being contacted by The Augusta Chronicle, Mr. Pryor said, he had not been asked about his role in the steering committee in four decades.

Part of that can be attributed to the passage of time and how troubling those times were, said member Jimmy Dukes, now a McBean resident.

"This is the sort of struggle that people like to forget about," he said.

Forgetting might be easy, especially with the group's lack of preserved history. There are few if any pictures of the group in action, members say, particularly because they never thought to take any. Neither did local journalists.

"It just didn't occur to us that we needed to see it as history," Mr. Pryor said. "It was history in the making, and we didn't take time to record it."

And where memory leaves off, modesty sets in.

"We just did what we had to do, and there were literally thousands of us, thousands of young black men and women supported by some white men and women, and we did what we had to do. Fortunately, it has worked out pretty well and we're better off for it," he said.

Silas Norman, the group's one-time chairman and now a Detroit internist, said it was a time for change and there was never any thought of recognition as much as transition.

"There are points in history where we have things that can change, if we step up. It was at a moment in history where we had a choice to decide if we were going to stand up for what was right. And we did that with no hesitation," he said. "I don't feel we've been celebrated, nor do I feel we've been ignored. I'm not sure that we've expected anymore than what has happened."

But that doesn't mean the members want their struggles relegated to a footnote in history.

"For our children, I don't guess we should dwell on it, but we should certainly be reminded it wasn't always this way," Mr. Dukes said. "There's a lot of blood, sweat and tears that have allowed us to live the way we live now and enjoy all we enjoy. And all that we enjoy, none of it was given to us. It was fought for."

Special Section: Augusta's Black History

The importance of Augusta's place in the history of black Americans is hard to overemphasize. Individuals who called Augusta home and institutions that sprang up on its soil left indelible marks on American culture. Their influences continue to resonate and extend beyond the lives of any who live here today.

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--From the Sunday, February 6, 2005 printed edition of the Augusta Chronicle