This Month in W.Va. History: A debate of school textbooks turns violent

The debate over school curriculums or textbooks has been a part of the American culture for much of the last century, but nearly 50 years ago one county in West Virginia became ground zero for a textbook debate that turned violent and forced schools to close.

It all started in May 1974 when the Kanawha County Board of Education met to discuss a new set of textbooks that were mostly chosen to comply with a new state mandate aimed at adding a multiethnic representation in curriculums. The books weren’t really considered controversial and were from mainstream novel and textbook publishers, but one board member didn’t see them that way and sounded the alarm.

Alice Moore, the wife of a pastor, described the books as anti-American and anti-Christian and, whether she fully intended to or not, rallied thousands of rural white parents against their introduction. Part of their argument was that parents should have had representation on the committee that chose the books, some of it was a misinformed opinion of what the textbooks actually consisted of and some of it was just flat out racism and ignorance. Moore was on record during that time claiming the textbooks would teach students a “ghetto dialect.”

Kanawha County Board of Education member Alice Moore addressed the board in 1975. (AP Photo/Barry Thumma)

While Moore was unsuccessful in her attempt to block the purchase, her characterization of the books -- admittedly without actually reading them -- and her call for parents’ choice in their children’s schooling had gained traction. During the summer, thousands of protesters, both residents of the county and from elsewhere, mobilized to object to the books and the board’s selection process. In June 1974, the school board voted 3-2 in favor of purchasing the textbooks after listening to nearly three hours of debate from residents.

Feeling spurned by the decision, Moore and protest leaders ramped up their efforts even more heading into the school year. By August, thousands of parents had agreed to boycott the schools and some businesses. Local news reported at the time that nearly 25% of the county’s 45,000 students did not report to school on the first day of classes.

By this point, dozens of church leaders in and around Kanawha County had voiced their opposition to the textbooks. The movement even crossed over to the mines, where thousands of coal miners walked off the job. Protesters in Charleston shut down the city’s bus system.

With tensions reaching a fever pitch, the school board closed schools in the county for three days beginning on Sept. 13, 1974, removed the textbooks from classrooms and called for a review of the books from a group of citizens and parents -- an answer to one of the complaints from protesters.

The controversy turned violent in the weeks and months that followed when gunshots were fired from both sides of a picket line, arsons and bombs briefly closed four elementary schools and 15 sticks of dynamite caused significant damage to the board of education office building. A federal grand jury indicted several men for conspiring to blow up more schools and television and radio towers.

A crusader against textbooks sat curbside during a protest in Charleston, West Virginia, in 1974. (AP Photo)

The debate eventually morphed into a class and culture war, drawing out the likes of the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis who seized the opportunity to oppose something that even hinted at something other than white exceptionalism. Suddenly, Kanawha County had become the focal point for extremists who’d hijacked the movement.

By the time the new year rolled around, though, the protests had died down. The committee picked to review the books could not come to a consensus but a majority had agreed that 35 books should not be part of the curriculum. The school board voted to remove the books and put them in school libraries where students could read them with parental permission. The remaining 290 textbooks became part of the Kanawha County School curriculum.

Despite a majority of the textbooks being introduced into the Kanawha County school system, the nearly yearlong controversy laid a new foundation for a conservative identity and political evangelism that would really blossom in the 80s with the national rise of the Christian right.

As for Kanawha County, the schools didn’t crumble to the ground with the introduction of the multiethnic textbooks.