LaVerne Summerlin

“The West End story that I want to tell is related to my book, ‘Gems of Cincinnati's West End: Black children and Catholic missionaries from 1940 to 1970.’ We had great orators at school, we had great leaders. Many of our parents had not even graduated from high school. They put us in those schools, because they wanted us to graduate and go to college or get a livable wage job. Those nuns and those priests, . . . you know, we've got all of those people made us believe they let us know, regardless of what all these other people in society saying about black children, we believe in you.”