On November 6, 1998, Congress established Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site. The National Historic Site is administered in partnership with the National Park Service, Little Rock Public Schools, the City of Little Rock, and others.
The Visitor Center for the site is located diagonally across the street from the school and across from the memorial dedicated by Michael Warrick, and opened in fall 2006. It contains a captioned interpretive film on the Little Rock integration crisis, as well as multimedia exhibits on both that and the larger context of desegregation during the 20th century and the Civil Rights Movement.
Opposite the Visitor Center to the west is the Central High Commemorative Garden, which features nine trees and benches that honor the students. Arches that represent the school's facade contain embedded photographs of the school in years since the crisis, and showcase students of various backgrounds in activities together.
Opposite the Visitor Center to the south is a historic Mobil gas station, which has been preserved in its appearance at the time of the crisis. At the time, it served as the area for the press and radio and television reporters. It later served as a temporary Visitor Center before the new one was built.
Read more about this topic: Little Rock Central High School
Famous quotes containing the words rock, central, high, school, national, historic and/or site:
“Safe upon the solid rock the ugly houses stand:
Come and see my shining palaces built upon the sand.”
—Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950)
“Friends serve central functions for children that parents do not, and they play a critical role in shaping children’s social skills and their sense of identity. . . . The difference between a child with close friendships and a child who wants to make friends but is unable to can be the difference between a child who is happy and a child who is distressed in one large area of life.”
—Zick Rubin (20th century)
“Like other high subjects, the Law gives no ground to common sense.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“Loosed betwixt eye and lid, the swimming beams
Of memory, blind school of cuttlefish,
Rise to the air, plunge to the cold streams....”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“Universal suffrage should rest upon universal education. To this end, liberal and permanent provision should be made for the support of free schools by the State governments, and, if need be, supplemented by legitimate aid from national authority.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“The first farmer was the first man, and all historic nobility rests on possession and use of land.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The present hour is always wealthiest when it is poorer than the future ones, as that is the pleasantest site which affords the pleasantest prospects.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)