My first impression upon reading “Race and the University” was the author had to be exaggerating. A University of Oklahoma that not only lacked diversity, but also excluded minorities from campus life seemed ridiculous to me. The time period that OU professor emeritus George Henderson describes in his memoir (1967-1971) was a whopping 17 years after the first black student was admitted into OU. I was sure that race relations had improved in 20 years, but the racial attitudes that had prevailed for so long still lingered.

My mother attended OU during the time period that Henderson describes in the book. She went potluck her freshman year, and roomed with a black roommate. Though she couldn’t remember flak from anyone on campus, the town she grew up in in Southeastern Oklahoma thought that she should “do something about 'that situation.'"

This kind of attitude coming from a small town in Oklahoma during that time did not surprise me, but the OU that Henderson describes in his book at the same time reveals many of those same attitudes. Though outwardly integrated, the university was far from it when it came to the nuts and bolts of relations between black students and white students. OU would have to go through what the rest of America had to go through and may still be going through today — accept the wrongdoings of the past toward blacks, accept the gravity of the responsibility to do things different and move on toward a more fair and just community.

This is where Henderson steps into the picture. Not a native Oklahoman, he was originally discouraged from coming to “a small redneck school in a backward state," as one of his colleagues so eloquently described it. Refusing his advice, Henderson stepped foot upon Norman soil and became the second black professor at the university.

From the moment of his arrival in Norman, Henderson was barraged with pressure from the black community in Norman and Oklahoma City to be a social activist at OU, and he accepted this pressure and tirelessly worked for the welfare of the black students on OU’s campus. The ASU (Afro-American Student Union, now the Black Student Association) was formed with support from Henderson and fellow OU activist Melvin Tolson.

This group was revolutionary in bringing black students' causes to the limelight when they presented a “Black Declaration of Independence” to President J. Herbert Hollomon. Among a long list of grievances and demands, the ASU demanded a black studies program, a change in entrance requirements for black students and a black head coach in a major sport. Though Hollomon’s reply did not satisfy the desires of the black students of the university at that time, black students were no longer silently ascribing to the oppression that they had so long endured, and were finally gaining a voice.

The “Black Declaration of Independence” set the precedent for black students at OU to delve into the often ugly reality of their position and demand equality. The raw intensity of this movement at OU lasted until 1971, but the seed that was sown by Henderson and others like him at OU continued and has produced tangible results. Many of the demands made by the ASU Declaration have been fulfilled today (among them a black vice president of student affairs — fulfilled in 1991— and black studies program — fulfilled in 1994.)

Henderson is truly a lesser-known hero of the African-American cause, and OU students should take great pride in the fact that he resides right here, in a “small, redneck school, in a backward state.”

Henderson will sign copies of his book from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Tuesday in Beaird Lounge in the Oklahoma Memorial Union.