Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The closing of Jay Cooke Jr. High

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The closing of Jay Cooke Jr. High:

The closing of Jay Cooke Jr. High

by Mike Klonsky

Philly activists pack a City Council hearing on school closures. (City Paper)

Now it's Cooke K-8 in the Logan neighborhood of Philadelphia. I was transferred there in 1956, when it was Cook Jr. High, because I was a white kid, one of the last in my North Philly neighborhood, about to attend all-black, segregated  Fitzsimons Jr. High. But after a minor scuffle with a group of kids over lunch money (mine), the system decided that the all-white Cooke would be a better place for me. So instead of walking to school, I had to