DeAnna Beane talks about her involvement in the Civil Rights Movement in Arlington, Virginia in the 1960s

Item

Subject of Research: DeAnna Beane talks about her involvement in the Civil Rights Movement in Arlington, Virginia in the 1960s
Story: A portion of the interview transcript, which relates to Arlington, VA:
"I guess Chicago was where the activist in me began to emerge. No I guess it emerged before then. Hadn't thought about it but when we lived in Arlington, that was during the beginnings of the Civil Rights Movement. And Arlington, Virginia was very segregated. That's where our church was, very segregated.

Okay, now wait a minute. I want to try to follow chronology. I'm not sure where--so after you left Chicago, after he got his Ph.D. [degree] in Chicago, you all moved to New Jersey first?

Yes, but what I want to say is I missed a piece of life. I don't know if it's, if it doesn't matter. I mean we can leave it out.

Okay.

When, when I was--those years when I was at Howard [University, Washington, D.C.] and I was a minister's wife, our church was in Arlington, Virginia. So we were there four years. And in that four years, the Civil Rights Movement came to Arlington. And we were asked what do you want to change in your community? I can't remember if it was my husband's influence or what, but the group decided we want the movie theaters open to our children. And so that's what we did. You know we picketed and demonstrated. And the American Nazis party had its headquarters about a half a mile down on Lee Highway from our church.

Now this is led by the infamous George Lincoln Rockwell.

Rockwell, yes. I had the pleasure of being tormented by him and his Nazis. They would picket opposite us with signs that said Niggers go back to Africa and all sorts of things. And then the state legislature in Virginia passed a law saying picketing was illegal. And we decided to test it. I'm trying to remember if we were working with SNCC [Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee] CORE [Congress of Racial Equality], I cannot remember, it was one of the two.

So do you--now this would have been in 196--what?

'62 [1962].

Two, okay, now I'm, I'm wondering if--now who actually came to Arlington to represent the movement? Was it someone from--is that what you're trying to--

Yeah, it was either SNCC or CORE, and I--

I'm thinking it sounds like CORE to me, but I don't--

Okay, I, I just cannot remember. They asked what is it we wanted to change. And once we told them, then they told us the strategy. And the thing that I was trying to remember was who helped us. I was arrested. They had--we had to pick a couple of people from the community to test the new law. And they decided the minister's wife would be a good candidate. She had some credibility. And there were a couple of us, another woman and I think two or three men. And so we were arrested while we were picketing, treated very kindly by the police. Fingerprint--taken to the station and fingerprinted, all of that. And the, the organization that was helping us said don't worry, we'll have a good lawyer. And I, I'm drawing a blank on his name."
People: Informal science educator DeAnna Beane (1940 - ) was director of Youth ALIVE! (Youth Achievement through Learning, Involvement, Volunteering and Employment) at the Association of Science and Technology Centers, Inc.
Source: DeAnna Beane (The HistoryMakers A2013.020), interviewed by Larry Crowe, February 12, 2013, The HistoryMakers Digital Archive. Session 1, tape 5, story 7, DeAnna Beane talks about her involvement in the Civil Rights Movement in Arlington, Virginia in the 1960s