The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 103, July 1999 - April, 2000 Page: 70
554 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
September 19, 1956. To avoid racial conflict, McCown proposed the
elimination of wrestling as a competitive sport and swimming as a co-
recreational sport for women's intramurals. McCown noted that "fortu-
nately no Negroes attempted to participate in rush week for either
fraternities or sororities." McCown worried as well about interracial danc-
ing. For patients at the Student Health Center the policy was one of im-
plicit segregation: "Negro and white students will not be assigned to the
same room so there should be no problems."8
In his memorandum, McCown considered the possible issues that might
arise from the College of Fine Arts. He did not expect any trouble from in-
tegration during performances within the college or from its audiences.
He argued that public appearances by "Negroes" would not occur because
first-year students would not have the experience to win parts in produc-
tions. McCown did not take into account that talented African Americans
would enter the University of Texas as transfer students.9
In the fall of 1956 an African-American student did just that; Barbara
Louise Smith, then a student at Prairie View College, transferred to the
University of Texas at Austin. Born on August 11, 1937, in Cass County,
Smith was the youngest of five children of Mr. and Mrs. Conrad Smith.
(Later in life Barbara Smith's last name was changed to Conrad to avoid
professional confusion with another Barbara Smith.) When Barbara was
only four, she began singing spirituals in her hometown community of
Pittsburg in northeast Texas. After high school, Smith enrolled at Prairie
View and studied there from September 1954 to May 1956. Anxious for a
professional career, she decided to transfer and study music education at
the newly integrated University of Texas at Austin. As she later told a re-
porter, she "came to the university solely for educational purposes" be-
cause she was "aware of the great need for better trained musicians for
my people and felt that the University was the school in Texas that was
best equipped to prepare me for this work." She became a music educa-
tion major in the College of Fine Arts.1
Soon after her arrival in Austin, Smith auditioned for the student
opera workshop production that the College of Fine Arts staged each
year. The opera was a collaborative effort between the Departments of
Music and Drama. In 1956 the opera selected was Henry Purcell's late-
seventeenth-century work "Dido and Aeneas." From the point of view of a
s H. Y. McCown to Logan Wilson and C. P. Boner, UT Office of the Dean of Student Services
Records, Box VFa9/D.b. (CAH).
9 Ibid.
10 Nancy McMeans, "Barbara Smith Came to UT for Education," Dazly Texan, May 9, 1957;
"Negro Girl Sings Recital on Campus," Austin American, Nov. 15, 1958; Seale, "Barbara Smith
Conrad," 26-27.July
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 103, July 1999 - April, 2000, periodical, 2000; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101220/m1/96/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.