VIOLA MARY DESMOND

·   Ran beautician’s business

·   Owned and drove her own car

·   From Halifax

·   Trip Halifax-Sydney on business, sedan (car) broke down from overheating in New Glasgow

·   Went to the Roseland Theatre to watch the movie in November, 1946.

·   Chose lower level to see the screen better

·   Did not know she was to sit in balcony.

·   Offered to pay the extra penny to sit in the orchestra section

·   2 cent ticket for balcony, 3 cent ticket for orchestra seat

·   Sister Wanda Robson, 79 years old, tells the story

·   Manager (Henry MacNeil) was a burly guy, usher (Prima Davis), and police were involved in removing her from the movie theatre

·   Taken to jail overnight

·   Next morning to court, no legal representation for her was available

·   No sign existed in the Roseland Theatre forbidding blacks to sit in orchestra seats

·   Fined $20 and $6 for costs for tax fraud

·   Wanda was embarrassed at first, now she is proud

·   Viola concerned and generous and tenacious

·   Wanda’s husband abandoned her in house in dreadful condition in Winthrop , Massachusetts

·   Viola arrived and referring to the condition of the house said: “This will never do.”

·   Viola went to Town Hall meeting on Saturday and threatened to bring the press in to take pictures of the condition of Wanda’s apartment. 

·   Viola’s response to, “…but it is the week-end,” was “People burn on Saturdays, too!”

·   The house was repaired instantly for Wanda.

·   Viola met Ms C Walker who invented the “straightening comb”

·   Teacher at QEH failed Viola’s paper saying it was too good for a negro to have written.

·   Viola modelled her business on Mrs C Walker

·   Negroes were not permitted to become nurses in Halifax

·   The Lord Nelson and Nova Scotia Hotel (now the Westin, by the train station) did not serve blacks at this time

·   One person said: “… return to your mongrel north end home.”

Apartheid = system of segregation controlled by whites that forced blacks to live in the worst conditions

Casual assassination of Negro souls (turn of phrase)

To nullify (reduce to zero) her into balcony silence (turn of phrase)

Negress = a black woman