Wit Will and Walls
By Betty Kilby Baldwin
I stand now as a person in charge of my life, but I often reflect back on how I survived the most traumatic circumstances that could have jeopardized this reality.
September 11th has been a day of remembrance in my life for 50 plus years. It was this date in 1958 that the judge made the final decision in my case of Betty Ann Kilby vs Warren County Board of Education that forced the desegregation of my high school. The date is as significant to me as my birthday. As the events of September 11, 2001 unfolded, that date brought to me an entirely new significance. As a result of the 911 terrorist attacks, I lost my job. The idea of looking for a job at age fifty-seven was not something that I was going to do. Besides, God was calling me into my purpose. I knew that God was not going to let me leave this world without telling my story. Some ten years prior, I bought a word processor, with the intention of sitting down and writing my story, but all I could do was sit in front of the computer and cry from the painful memories. After the second coincidence of life-changing events on 9/11, I knew it was time. I knew that I had to tell the story of me in order to keep history accurate. And thus I wrote, Wit, Will & Walls my historical autobiography.
This book crosses generations and illustrates my rise from a sharecropper’s daughter to a corporate executive and motivational/ historical speaker. It has generated two documentaries, Wit, Will & Walls the Betty Kilby Story and __From Betty to Barack __a depiction of how far education has brought African Americans.
The book provides a first hand account of the desegregation of the schools based on the implementation of the Landmark Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education. This case brought about the first school closings as resistance to Brown vs Board.
My story tells why and how my father willingly risked the safety, peace and lives of his family to educate his children. It illustrates how the determination to succeed was passed from one generation to the next, particularly evidenced by my journey to lead the battle for education sacrificing my youth and innocence. Years later I would go on to battle corporate America becoming the highest ranking African American female in one of the fortune 500 companies. Even after succeeding against all odds I was brought to my knees when my daughter became addicted to crack cocaine and confessed that she too had been raped as a teenager forcing me to reach into the depths of my soul to deal with my own past.
In telling my story I discovered that my struggles didn’t extinguish my self-respect, crush my ambition or paralyze my efforts to pursue my dreams. It was the struggles that gave me the will to achieve my dreams and to find God’s purpose in my life.
My story has been, and still remains, an inspirational and healing to others; however, it enabled me to start on a journey of my own healing. I find that each time I tell my story, though painful, as it is I began to acknowledge the past and talk about the trauma, and the healing continues. Because the trauma took place at multiple levels so must the healing. The inequalities, racism, and oppression that continue to exist even today trigger reactions. But with each reaction the healing continues. There is a freeing of the spirit and there is peace deep down in my soul.
