I like learning about other people.
Michael Garner was born and raised in Alamance County. He is a gospel music enthusiast and avid collector of historical objects related to Black history.
Growing up in Southern Alamance, he witnessed racial tensions firsthand. He recalls the difficulties of integration, when he and other Black children he grew up with were removed from their familiar elementary school and sent to integrated schools. Racial progress came with personal challenges.
Mr. Garner would later go on to attend Southern Alamance High School. Garner stated that the school had changed its mascot from the “Southern Confederates” to the “Patriots” a few years before he had started high school, however, Confederate sympathies were still very present.
Mr. Garner became aware of how emotional issues of race could be while in high school. A white student in his class was wearing a denim jacket with a Confederate flag patch on the back. His cousin snatched the flag off the jacket, and the principal separated the students by race into the gym and music room as an attempt to defuse tensions.
Mr. Garner’s story is an important reminder that Alamance has a history marred by racism, an issue the county continues to struggle with. Continued community tensions surrounding the confederate monument in downtown Graham poses as a reminder of the county’s past, and tense racial climates and a tumultuous political atmosphere still plague Alamance County school systems today. The efforts of Mr. Garner to preserve and share Black history and culture are vital in this context.