The hallways of Broughton High School have been walked by future leaders. Its hardwood courts have been crossed by future professional athletes. And its stage once hosted a town hall with President Barack Obama. But before any of that, it was the center of a quiet, courageous battle that helped shape the course of civil rights in North Carolina.
“It was just an enormous place,” Holt recalled. “An astounding place, compared to the kind of schools that we had been attending.”
In 1958, Holt’s parents made a decision that put their family in the crosshairs of racial hostility. They sought to enroll Joe at Broughton – then an all white public school – making him what would have been the first Black student to attend the institution…