Hey, history lovers. I'm Mike Rosenwald with Retropod, a show about the past, rediscovered.

Let me start this episode with three stipulations. One, segregation is one of this country's worst stains.

An evil system, Martin Luther King Jr. once said, a new form of slavery.

Two, Linda Brown, the child at the center of Brown v. Board of Education, is an American hero.

Three, the details of history are often very complex.

Now, let me put this all together.

We all know the heroic story behind Brown v. Board of Education,

one of the most important cases in Supreme Court and Civil Rights history.

It's 1950 in Topeka, Kansas.

Oliver Leon Brown, an African Methodist Episcopal church pastor, wanted to enroll his

seven-year-old daughter, Linda, at Sumner Elementary School, an all-white school.

Sumner was closer to their home than Linda's current school was,

and the Browns didn't think it was right to make Linda walk further every day to school

because of her skin color.

Sumner said no.

The resulting fight ultimately led Reverend Brown to become the lead the lead plaintiff in Brown v. Board of Education, one of the most important cases in history.

Today, Brown and his daughter are justly lauded in history as civil rights heroes.

But, like with most stories from history, the story of Linda Brown and her father is more

complicated than you probably learned in school.

Cherise Cheney, a University of Oregon ethnic studies professor, recently wrote that Linda

Brown's father was initially reluctant to get in on the legal fight.

In fact, he had to be convinced to sign

...