60 Years Ago Tomorrow, on New Year's Eve: The City of Montgomery Closed ALL Parks, Pools & The Zoo

     U. S. District Judge Frank Johnson found the city's segregated public recreation facilities unconstitutional in September of 1958. 
     Rather than let black children use the facilities, the city closed all of the parks, pools, and the children's zoo, then located at Oak Park, at New Years.

The head of the commission that ran the city at the time was W.A. Gayle, for whom the planetarium in the park is now named.

  

     

I'm told the pool was located on land that now offers horseshoes.

    Inexplicably, the current official history timeline of the Montgomery Zoo reports "Oak Park was closed because of racial violence". 
     A sign in Oak Park, outside the city Park and Recretion Offices, is only slightly clearer. It explains the park, including the zoo and the pool, "was closed and largely dismantled in 1959 following a Federal Court finding city recreational policies to be unconstitutional". Not a word about why.

     To put the December 31,1959 events into historic perspective, the decision ending segregated public schools, Brown v Board had been decided in May of 1954. The Montgomery Bus boycott had ended in December 1956.
     One editorial at the time supported the dismantling of the park...pointing out the city's legal authority to do so, and...


"...even a visionary like Dr. King must realize that race mixing in Oak Park is not to be."

     In an earlier city subterfuge to keep black children out of the city pools, the city commission transferred pool ownership to the YMCA, reasoning that it was a private organization and could be as racist as it wanted without interference from Federal Judges. You won't find that story in the online Montgomery YMCA history. But the details are in the Encyclopedia of Alabama HERE,

     It took a decade for the city to give in. On February 24, 1971, the parks, pools and the zoo...were reopened to all people.

These days part of Oak Park is being transformed into a botanical gardens.

     Montgomery wasn't alone, of course. Lots of other places made the same decision. 
     Birmingham closed its eight public pools in 1962...filling some of them in with dirt.