Thelma Mothershed Wair passed away on October 19 at a hospital in the capital city of Arkansas. She was one of nine Black students who integrated a Little Rock high school in 1957 while a group of white segregationists shouted threats and insults. She was eighty-three. According to Grace Davis, her sister, the cause was complications from multiple sclerosis. The Little Rock Nine were the teenagers that integrated Central High School with the assistance of Daisy Bates, the leader of the Arkansas NAACP.
Three years after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregated classrooms were unconstitutional, Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus utilized the National Guard to prevent Black pupils from enrolling at Central High for three weeks in September 1957. On September 25, 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower dispatched soldiers from the Army’s 101st Airborne Division to accompany the pupils to school.
Davis recounted her sister’s experiences, saying, “I think one time somebody put some ink on her skirt or something when she was coming through the hallway.” Naturally, there was also constant name-calling. She never actually got into any physical altercations with any of the students up there, though.
In 1958, Faubus closed Little Rock’s schools in an effort to prevent further integration. She completed her remaining high school coursework out of state, going by the name Ms. Mothershed during the time. She finally graduated from Central High School with the academic credits transferred back to Little Rock.
She graduated from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville with a master’s degree in guidance and counseling and Southern Illinois University Carbondale with a bachelor’s degree in home economics instruction. In 1965, she wed Fred Wair. Before retiring in 1994, Mrs. Wair taught home economics for ten years and served as an elementary career education counselor for eighteen years in the East St. Louis, Illinois, school system. She also taught survival techniques to women at the American Red Cross and worked at the St. Clair County Jail’s Juvenile Detention Center in Illinois.
Regarding her sister, Davis remarked, “She was always a fighter.” She has been ill all of her life. She was informed at birth that she had a congenital cardiac problem. She was informed early on that she would never outgrow her teens due to a congenital heart condition. I recall Mother talking about how scared she was because she believed she was going to die as she got closer to turning sixteen. However, she followed her own desires. She liked life.
After her spouse passed away in 2005, she returned to Little Rock. Survivors include her sister, two granddaughters, two great-grandchildren, and a son, Scott. The Little Rock Nine gave their Congressional Gold Medals to the William J. Clinton Presidential Library and Museum in Little Rock in 2011 after each member received one.
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