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Jefferson Thomas Passes Away, Member of The Little Rock Nine, Vietnam Veteran

09/06/10-by Bridgette P. LaVictoire
Jefferson Thomas is not exactly a household name, but what he did is embedded in the history of America. Thomas went to school. He went to school in Arkansas in 1957. It required the intervention of President Dwight D. Eisenhower and the 101st Airborne to allow young Jefferson Thomas to attend school. Yesterday, he passed away at the age of 68 in Columbus, Ohio after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.

As part of the Little Rock Nine, Jefferson Thomas along with Minnijean Trickey Brown, Elizabeth eckford, Carlotta Walls LaNier, Gloira Ray Karlmark, Thelma Mothershed Wair, Terrence Roberts, Melba Patillo Beals and Ernest Green became the first Black students to attend Little Rock Central High School. While the school board was willing to comply with Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, Governor Orval Faubus refused to and tried to prevent these nine teenagers from enrolling at the school.

Thomas went on to graduate from Central High and eventually moved to Los Angeles. He later went on to serve in the US Army where he was a Infantry Squad Leader. In 1968, he narrated Nine from Little Rock.

“If Little Rock taught us nothing more, it taught us that problems can make us better. Much better,” he said in the film.

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