Letter from G.L. LeBon to Norman Rockwell in regards to the painting, “The Problem We All Deal With.” (from the Norman Rockwell Museum).

TRANSCRIPTION OF LETTER:

January 5, 1964

Mr. Norman Rockwell,

care LOOK.

Sir:

Your drawing of the negro child being accompanied by U.S. Marshals is just some more of the vicious lying propaganda being used for the crime of racial integration by such black journals as Look, Life, etc.

If God and Nature didn’t segregate white from black, who did? Every man who signed the Declaration of Independence and Constitution were white men and segregationists. So were Washington, Jefferson, Mason, Franklin, and especially Abraham Lincoln who said repeatedly he was opposed to integration.

It is nothing short of a heinous crime to mix little white and black children and brainwash them with the infamous lie that the only difference between the white and black races, is the color of skin. Any biologist worth the price of the paper on which his diploma is written, can point out numerous differences between white and black. All the facts of history, past and present, prove overwhelmingly that the negro is, by nature, inferior to the white and yellow races.

Why don’t you draw a picture showing that 15 year old negro savage in St. Petersburg Flo raping and killing three elderly white women aged 65 to 80, and raping two more; or, a picture of the two black savages murdering a young mother at a supermarket here last year, leaving two babies motherless. Or, Holden Roberto and his negro savages disemboweling pregnant white women in Angola last March 15, and using their dead babies for footballs. Or Earl Warren and W.O. Douglas releasing negro savage Mallory in Washington DC after his conviction for viciously raping a white woman, NOT BECAUSE HE DID NOT COMMIT THE CRIME, but because he was held 7 ½ hours before arraignment—which they “DECIDED” was too long. These ought to be some excellent subjects for your talents.

Anybody who advocates, aids or abets the vicious crime of racial integration is nothing short of a traitor to the white race, and a traitor to the illustrious white founders of this country.

I challenge you or any other race-mixer to face-to-face equal time debate on the subject “WHY RACIAL INTEGRATION IS A VICIOUS CRIME” and will donate $5,000 to charity if my opponent will do the same.

THERE CAN BE AND THERE WILL BE, NO COMPROMISE WITH THE VICIOUS CRIME OF RACE MIXING AND INTEGRATION. THE WAR HAS JUST BEGUN!

G.L. LeBon

916 Poydras,

New Orleans, La 70113

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS: Spend a few minutes examining the poster on the front and the letter above (Transcribed in the first two columns).

1. What descriptive words could be used to describe this image?

2. What do you think is taking place in this painting?

3. Where do you think the young girl is going?

4. What do you think the girl is thinking and feeling?

5. Who do you think the men in the painting are? What relationship do you think they have to the girl?

6. How does the painting make you feel? What makes this image powerful?

7. When and where do you think this scene may have taken place?

John Steinbeck was there. He wrote about it in Travels with Charley in Search of America (1962): The big marshals stood her on the curb and a jangle of jeering shrieks went up from behind the barricades. The little girl did not look at the howling crowd but from the side the whites of her eyes showed like those of a frightened fawn. The men turned her around like a doll, and then the strange procession moved up the broad walk toward the school.

But Ruby Bridges was not the main attraction: The papers had printed that the jibes and jeers were cruel and sometimes obscene, and so they were, but this was not the big show. The crowd was waiting for the white man who dared to bring his white child to school.

When the white man and the white child arrived: A shrill, grating voice rang out. The yelling was not in chorus. Each took a turn and at the end of each the crowd broke into howls and roars and whistles of applause. This is what they had come to see and hear. No newspaper had printed the words these women shouted. It was indicated that they were indelicate, some even said obscene. On television the sound track was made to blur or had crowd noises cut in to cover. But now I heard the words, bestial and filthy and degenerate. In a long and unprotected life I have seen and heard the vomitings of demoniac humans before. Why then did these screams fill me with a shocked and sickened sorrow?

Discuss: Imagine that you are a newspaper editor or the director of a TV news program. What are the pros and cons of printing or allowing these “indelicate” words screamed by the women to be heard?

Additional reading: People watching Ruby Bridges go to school that day saw her lips moving and a psychologist later asked her what she was saying. She said she was praying for those screaming people. As you read more about Ruby Bridges, look for evidence that her religious beliefs influenced how she responded to the violence around integration.

More about the Artist: Some people have claimed that this painting is the best that Norman Rockwell ever painted. Find other painting by Norman Rockwell (the Four Freedoms series and other patriotic paintings) and analyze them for what they say about diversity in America. How are minorities depicted in his work? What kind of America do his paintings portray?

About the art: No faces are shown on the men marching around Ruby Bridges. In what ways does the artist hint at how they might be feeling? What does the artist imply about the people who are watching Ruby Bridges go to school that day? Why do you think the artist only shows us Ruby and not the crowds shouting at her? How might depicting the screaming crowd have changed the focus of the painting?

About the history: Ruby Bridges was the first Black child to integrate a White school after the courts found "separate but equal" to be unconstitutional. What arguments were used to convince the Supreme Court that segregation (separation) of the races was unconstitutional? In what ways could segregation be considered a violation of human rights?

Compare the arguments for and practice of racial segregation in other countries such as anti-Semitism in Germany and apartheid in South Africa during the twentieth century. How did the U.S. respond to these practices? In what ways was Ruby Bridge's experience similar to or different than the experiences of school integration in other regions of the U.S.? How did Northern communities respond to school integration?

Rockwell was a genius not just because of the technical skill of his artistry but because of his eye for the telling detail. And in “The Problem We All Live With,” the key detail is how he framed the four U.S. marshals who are accompanying that child to school. We do not see their faces; in the painting, the men are copped at their shoulders.

That is the power and the story of the painting: Four men were accompanying Bridges to school, yes, but the point was, the United States of America was accompanying her. We see the men’s “Deputy U.S. Marshal” armbands, and that is what matters. The painting tells us: This country may have its flaws, but when right and wrong are on the line, the nation, in the end, usually chooses to stand for right.

—Bob Greene, “America’s Glory in a Civil Rights Painting”