On Friday September 17th, former LREI student Faith Holsaert came to visit our class. Faith attended LREI from the fours until 6th grade. During her time here, she invited the music teacher, Charity Bailey, to live with her family when she was in the fours. Charity lived with her family for many years. Charity had trouble finding an apartment in the neighborhood because landlords would not rent to African American people. Faith told us about living through the landmark Civil Rights legislation cases of our time and how deeply her time at LREI impacted her view of the world.

We learned so much about what it means to fight for equal rights. During our Q and A, our class asked lots of great questions about her life. Below are some examples of questions we asked.

Sophie: Did you know Martin Luther King?

Faith: I did meet him, in planning for the march on Washington. I was living in Georgia registering voters.

Luca: How was LREI different then and now?

Faith: The rooms are confusing to me even! When you’re on Bleecker, there’s Little Red and then two houses. It was very narrow building, but we did have the roof.

Samuel: What happened to your music teacher? Does she still live with you?

Faith: She died when I was in my 30s. She ended up moving to a different part of NYC, she had taken a job teaching in Scarsdale.

Samuel: Who was the president when you went to Little Red?

Faith: Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower.

The next school day, we wrote Faith some thank you notes. Enjoy reading a small sampling of the thoughtful letters the students wrote.