Local media vehicles circled the high school campus frantically, just minutes before the march was scheduled to begin. Tipped off by an anonymous fax early that morning, they had little understanding of what was to ensue. They knew only to anticipate a very real protest march.

The clock struck noon, and the doors of the William Penn auditorium burst open as a progression of students armed with picket signs and Dr. Martin Luther King photo placards braved the biting-cold day to begin their solemn march on Harrisburg. They walked, two-by-two, in a regiment fashion across the frozen campus, chanting in unison, “We will vote!” and “Freedom! Justice! Equality!” while they began down Sixth Street to their final destination. News vans whizzed up and down the street while their cameramen and reporters chased the protesters for photo-ops and interviews. The students continued marching, unimpressed by the attention, focused on their goal.

Traffic on North Sixth Street slowed to a crawl as passersby honked their horns in approval and support. Soon the Harrisburg Police took up residence at a “safe” distance from the march, watching, monitoring, waiting. Is this 1999 or 1964?

When asked why a protest march, organizer Eric Waters, a third-year Social Studies teacher at William Penn, told MODE that it started as a small class exercise for February, which is, of course, Black History Month. “We were studying Civil Rights at the time, and I wanted the students to understand what their parents and grandparents fought for.” Waters said. But, as he and his class discussed the project, it grew. As they began to explore the five God-given freedoms (press, speech, assembly, religion, and petition), the students wanted more and more to make the march meaningful.

By the time approval came down from William Penn Intermediate School’s Principal Mrs. Evangelyne Kimber, and all of the participating students had their parents’ permission, the congregation had chosen WHP-TV21 as the target of their march. Waters commented, “We knew that there were several local media stations just down the street from the campus. This coupled with the fact that during discussions in class it was unanimous that those same stations did a poor, if not purposely void, job of covering the ethnic diversity that is Harrisburg. As a group of concerned Americans, we decided we would go to the media because they never seemed to come to us.”

And go they did. It was impressive and at times imposing. 120-plus students form a procession two deep and a city block wide, and when they started chanting “We Are America! We Will Vote!” it was almost deafening.

At one point the entire group stopped waving their signs and chanting and fell eerily silent. They joined arms, like a human chain, each with their right hand over their heart. Even the television crews were surprised at their organized unity. Then, in one resounding voice, the student protesters from William Penn Intermediate began to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

So, you say to yourself, how “cute” of them to go to all that effort, rolling the true meaning of the event right off your back as so many modern Americans still do. Even WHP 580AM talk show host Bob Durgin stepped up to the plate to indelibly secure his place in history as a backwards and truly stereotypical ignorant American. As influential and prolific as Bob Durgin can be in Central PA, it was a rare occasion to hear him toss out his sensibilities and refer to this march as ridiculous and causing hate. As these students re-enacted one of the most pressing times for their heritage, Bob Durgin sat in his ivory studio, watching the propagandized commercial version of the event (on television, no less) and proceeded to paint the students as having “I hate white people” looks on their faces.

Organizer Waters, uncaring of Durgin’s blathering, commented, “During the summer, Central PA is riddled with Civil War reenactments that are coveted and praised by the local community as good and beneficial. But a historically accurate representation of a turning point in the history of black America is considered unpatriotic and disruptive. It draws an ever familiar conclusion that even today, as in the ’60s, people’s perception had not changed one bit. 30 years of striving for equal rights, and someone like Bob Durgin calls me racist.”

Some things never change.

Although it is still but a rumor, MODE has heard talks about a school district wide re-enactment march being planned for next year involving not hundreds, but thousands of students, and targeting not the local media, but the Capitol or the Governor’s Mansion.