Civil rights activist led sit-ins in Houston
After being beaten by Houston police in 1959, Eldrewey Stearnes dedicated his life to civil rights in Texas and beyond.
“We wanted change, and it was something you had to be willing to die for,” Stearnes told the Houston Chronicle in 2008. “And, I was willing to die for a noble cause.”
The civil rights activist known for leading sit-ins and demonstrations to desegregate Houston, died Dec. 23, at 89.
Stearnes had been ill and weak in recent months, said his youngest brother, Rudolph Jovan Stearnes, 75. He died at HCA Houston Healthcare Mainland in Texas City. While the official cause of death has not been determined, Rudolph Stearnes said his brother’s death is not COVID-19 related.
Stearnes was born in Galveston in December 1931 to Rudolph Stearnes, who worked as a paint contractor, and homemaker Devona Juanita Stearnes. The oldest of six, he attended Central High School in Galveston before enlisting and serving two years in the U.S. Army starting in March 1951. After an honorable discharge in 1953, he attended Michigan State University, where he studied political science. Stearnes later attended law school at Texas Southern University’s Thurgood Marshall School of Law, where his career in the civil rights movement
and efforts to desegregate areas of Texas began.
“He had a strong, humanitarian desire to make this a better world. Every fiber in his body was always, ‘I’m going to get this done and it’s going to make this better,” Rudolph said.
In 1959, Stearnes was beaten by police during a traffic stop and taken to jail. Shortly afterward, he launched the sit-in movement West of the Mississippi and in Houston. On March 4,1960, Stearnes and about a dozen Texas Southern students protested at Weingarten’s Supermarket about a mile from campus, demanding service at the lunch counter. Though they were denied, the protest served as a catalyst for other sit-ins throughout the city. By the end of the year, Houston businesses were largely desegregated, although the feat got-minimal exposure due to a historical media blackout coordinated by businessmen who coerced media to not report on the sit-ins, according to a local historian.
The site of the first sit-in was celebrated with a historical marker in 2010.
Stearnes thereafter dedicated himself to civil rights and bettering the lives of Black people — believing that it could make life better for everyone, his brother said.
“He believed Black history should one day become American history. It should be one,” Rudolph emphasized.
Stearnes, whose name is more commonly spelled “Stearns” without the last “e” — a change his brother said was made partially due to it being commonly misspelled — led with his passion for equality and eventually gave up his successful private law practice to devote himself full-time to his efforts — a move most lawyers wouldn’t have made without financial compensation.
“He never had any personal life of his own,” his brother said. “He never said ‘I want this for me’ — never money, cars, houses or luxury. It never meant nothing to him. It was always a bigger desire than what we cherish on a daily basis.”
Others realized his dedication, Rudolph said, adding that Stearnes’ former fiance broke off their engagement, telling their mother that he “belonged to the world.”
After 1963, Stearnes’ life began to change, said Thomas Cole, a friend who is also a historian and director of the McGovern Center for Humanities and Ethics at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.
The student movement was largely co-opted by older businessmen in the city who made deals to quietly integrate — a move that would ultimately undercut the momentum and many efforts of younger activists, Cole said. Stearnes’ mental health also declined, he said, with the activist experiencing several psychotic breaks as a result of bipolar disease and a struggle with alcoholism.
“He was courageous. He was brilliant. He was the person who sparked the sitin movement that led to desegregation, and he was flawed and troubled and suffered,” Cole said.
Stearnes, however, was still valued and respected for his mind and ideas, with many businessmen and entrepreneurs seeking him out to assist them in their ventures.
“He did that for little to nothing. Sometimes, maybe just for a couple of drinks,” his brother said.
Cole added that Stearnes tried to get back into the mainstream. “There was this magic about him that people paid attention to, but it never went anywhere.”
Harry Stovall, 88, who grew up with Stearnes, said he remembers his friend as a studious young man. He also remembers the marches and news of Stearnes being arrested and beaten by the police.
“He was a young man who didn’t back down. He’d heal and go right back to the same thing. He was a deep, deep believer — and rightly so — of equal rights,” Stovall said.
Stearnes also knew the importance of his story and was planning to write an autobiography about his life, his brother said. “That was his energy,” Rudolph Stearnes of the project. “It kept him going.”
Cole, the historian, did write a book about the activist.
Cole, who met Stearnes in 1983, emphasized his intensity, great heart and desire for equality.
Stearnes was a patient in a hospital while Cole was presenting at a case conference for students. When Stearnes claimed to be the first integration leader in Houston, Cole said he “chalked it up to grandiosity.” But after learning more, he became fascinated with Stearnes’ story. An unlikely friendship developed between the two and eventually yielded the biography “No Color Is My Kind: The Life of Eldrewey Stearnes and the Integration of Houston” published by the University of Texas Press.
“It was an incredible amount of time I spent with him — interviewing, transcribing, hearing every single story three to four times,” Cole said. “There was nobody like him.”
Funeral services will likely be small due to COVID-19, but Rudolph Stearnes said he has begun contacting his brother’s old colleagues and family friends in the hope of erecting a permanent monument or statue to celebrate his brother’s unsung legacy. A military salute will be announced in the near future.