The Complexities of Complexion in America

TALKING POINTS MEMO: SKIN TROUBLE

Complexion in Jim Crow America could be a tricky thing. In the spring of 1955, Ebony Magazine ran a curious story about The Platts, a family of Florida orange-pickers who had been "barred from the best schools because of a nose and ostracized because of the tint of the skin" despite their claims of being white. According to teachers and law enforcement officials in Lake County, FL, six of The Platts’ seven children had dusky complexions and "broad noses" befitting Negroes. Thus, the family had no place in the "whites only" community to which they belonged. Local authorities expelled The Platts' kids from Lake County's white schools and forced the family to move out of their white neighborhood and into a house without running hot water and other basic amenities. Click on the magazine page or text link underneath to read the full story.