Fire from the Rock

Sylvia and the other ninth graders attend their last day of school before graduating from junior high and heading to high school. Sylvia and her classmates participate in many traditions and an awards ceremony. All the girls wear fancy dresses, and the boys wear suits and dress shoes. Every student has an autograph book, and they pass them around to get every signature they can. Miss Washington meets with each student one-on-one and says something nice about them as she signs their autograph book. She tells Sylvia that she knows she will be very successful in life. Reggie signs Sylvia’s book saying that he wants a future with her. At the awards ceremony, Reggie gets awards for math and science, and Sylvia gets awards for sewing, English, history, spelling, and poetry. She also gets inducted into the Junior National Honor Society, and her mother cries because she is so proud. In her diary, Sylvia writes two poems that have to do with Reggie.

Sylvia and DJ discover the television dance show American Bandstand and comment on how half the top 10 songs are by “colored” singers, but all of the dancers are white. Sylvia tells DJ that there are 12 or 13 students left on the list to integrate Central High. The group attends meetings to learn non-violent techniques for dealing with harassment. DJ mentions she heard Gary talking about explosives on the phone. The girls decide that telling their parents would not make a difference, so they keep the information to themselves. Sylvia tells DJ that a white man placed a huge ad in the newspaper to try and scare white people about school integration. The ad suggests that there will be racial mixing in theater, on field trips, and at dances. Sylvia thinks it sounds like going to school with martians.