BULLETIN | FALL 2015 19
In 1968, Choate’s Board of Trustees adopted a goal: within five years, 8 to 10 percent of all boarding students would come from non-white or disadvantaged backgrounds.
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African American students in the late 1960s. From left: Phil La Viscount ’69, Tony Legrand ’71, and Lafayette Rose ’69
Chapel Service 1964. By the start of the 1970-71 school year, mandatory chapel would end.
Conflict wasn’t always neatly managed. In 1969, Choate’s eight black students used a two-page spread in the Choate News to call for more black studies options and fewer white authors on reading lists. “These stupid honkies who try to tell us that our culture is not as good as theirs and won’t allow us to do our own things,” the group’s statement said, “these people in their ignorance are the causes of violent outbreaks among black students.” In response, St. John again took the pulpit, where he called their phrases, “deeply disturbing.” “We are not intimidated,” he told the assembly. “To follow your unhappier intimations. Of course buildings can be destroyed; even lives taken. But we are all ephemera, and there are far greater values to lose than life and property.” With tensions boiling, Choate scrambled to build and embrace a more diverse community. In 1968, Choate’s Board of Trustees adopted a goal: within five years, 8 to 10 percent of all boarding students would come from nonwhite or disadvantaged backgrounds. To get there, Choate would raise scholarship funds that would be matched by A Better Chance, a five-year-old non-profit organization that was helping students of color attend private schools. In 1969, Choate established an Afro-American Studies Center to encourage more study of black cultures and arts.
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