WWTBAM Bored

Dr. Charles Akins, Austin’s first black teacher in integrated school, dies

Dr. Akins was my high school principal, the first black high school principal in Austin. (or so I thought, other sources say not)

There have been two Anderson High Schools in Austin. The first was an all black school. Dr. Akins graduated from there in 1950. He later taught there. They closed that school in 1971. They open my high school, the "new" Anderson High School, in a very white part of town, in 1973. Dr. Akins was our principle. Our school was overwhelmingly white but we were "integrated" by having some kids bused in from the other side of Austin, maybe 10% of our total enrollment. Dr. Akins did an outstanding job of "integrating" our school, not that 10% was integrated, but we never had any racial problems like many of the other schools had. In fact, as far as I can remember, race was never an issue or thought for me during those years.

Last year a friend passed away from pancreatic cancer. At the party celebrating his life I visited with two of his cousins and older sister. They all went to the old Anderson and were taught by Dr. Akins. They are the only former student of the old Anderson I've ever met.

A profile write up on Dr. Akins at the 40th anniversary of my high school's opening

Akins is 80 years old now. And he is largely unknown — not just to schoolchildren, but to so many 21st-century residents who never knew old Austin, segregated Austin, and the hard work of integrating Austin’s public schools in the 1960s and 1970s. But for those who do remember, Charles Akins is a hero.

Back in 1973, Akins — an African-American who grew up in segregated East Austin, a descendant of Austin sharecroppers — became the first principal of a brand-new L.C. Anderson High School in white, affluent, West Austin. It was a hard job, in a volatile time, for “new” Anderson High was the focal point of court-mandated integration