Dorie was denied entrance at Mammy's Cafeteria. Ironic.

In 1959, prejudice and hatred were alive and thriving in South Texas, far away from Little Rock, Montgomery and other hot spots of the Civil Rights Movement.

That spring, another teacher and I chaperoned the Pleasanton High School Eagle band to San Antonio for a University Interscholastic League concert competition. 

We took the weary and hungry group after the performance to the now defunct Mammy’s Cafeteria in the Sunset Ridge Shopping Center on North New Braunfels Avenue.

Sophomore Dorie Monroe, a bass horn player and the only African-American in the band, lagged behind as his white buddies rushed into the cafeteria, chattering happily and lining up to get their food. 

When Dorie strolled hesitantingly into the building at the back of the line, a cafeteria employee raced toward him, shouting, “That boy can’t come in here.”

Dorie’s fellow bandsmen gasped in disbelief at the employee’s scream and then  — as if part of a halftime drill —they turned and marched out of the building.  

I was heartsick for Dorie, but I swelled with pride at the action of his band buddies.