At Central H.S., a history exercise summons a memory

Central High School capped its Black History Month recognition on Feb. 26 with students presenting to their classmates famous historical and contemporary black figures they had researched. One of the last to go was Fatima Lockett, 17, who fought back tears to recall an experience of her own.

Lockett chose to present Olympic runner Jesse Owens, who won four gold medals at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany and earned a legacy as one of the most skilled athletes of the twentieth century. Lockett related Owens’s accomplishments despite the discrimination he faced, then shared one of her memories from the track.

“I will never forget when I was at counties for cross country and was running the 5k, and a girl came up to me,” Lockett remembered, her head bowed as she read from an index card. “These were her exact words: ‘I didn’t know your kind ran distance. I thought you would be a sprinter.’ I was so ashamed and embarrassed, and just walked away. I saw her during the race and I said to myself, I’m going to pass her in the last 800 meters.”

Lockett ‘s voice wavered with emotion, but she continued. “After the race, I went up to her and said, ‘I guess my kind just beat you.’ As a future distance college runner, Jesse Owens inspires me every time I put on my spikes. He reminds me that the color of my skin should never be an excuse for me to not succeed in life.”

The audience broke into applause, and Lockett quickly turned around to gather her papers from the top of the bookcase behind her. As she returned to her seat, her gentle sobbing was audible above the clapping.

Lisa DiChiara is the library media specialist who organized the event, which is held in the library each year. She reviewed each presentation with each student beforehand, and said that Lockett’s story wasn’t part of the original written plan. “I thought she really expressed her feelings, and we’re really happy that she told everyone how she feels,” DiChiara said.

Lockett said that her emotion caught her by surprise. “I thought it was going to be easy,” she said. “At that moment while I was up there, I realized what other black people had to go through back then, and it just touched me.”