Robert Smith felt the spirit of his mother Saturday.
Her name was Mildred Smith. A Black woman working as a nurse in Hampton during segregation, she and colleagues Patricia Taylor McKenzie and Agnes Stokes Chisman became known as the Dixie Three.
The three nurses in August 1963 refused to follow racist policies at Hampton’s Dixie Hospital, later renamed Hampton General Hospital before being demolished in 2002. Rather than eating their lunch in the hospital’s cramped basement cafeteria for Black employees, the three decided to sit and eat in Dixie’s whites-only cafeteria.
The act of resistance led to the women being fired, who then sued for racial discrimination. It took two-and-a-half years, but a U.S. appeals court ordered the women be reinstated with back pay in April 1966. They became known as the Dixie Three.
“Those nurses made many sacrifices,” Robert Smith said. “Not looking for recognition, but for equal treatment.”
Hampton recognized the women’s career-risking protest on Saturday, dedicating a historic marker commemorating the protest and court case outside Hunter B. Andrews School, where Dixie Hospital once stood.
“Just like the men and women at lunch counters all around the South, these three ladies made a profound statement with a simple act of sitting down to eat,” said Hampton’s newly elected Mayor Jimmy Gray. “You won’t find the Dixie Three in all the history books at this time, but they did make history.”
Mildred Smith died in 2013, but Patricia McKenzie and Agnes Chisman were both there on Saturday. Advanced in age, family members spoke on their behalf. Chisman’s daughter Pamela Chisman-Haynes thanked her mom as well as Smith and McKenzie for “their determination, for their strong will and being a voice for those who cannot speak for themselves.”
“If you have a voice that you know is right, take a stand; because you never know the impact that you’ll leave on the world,” Chisman-Haynes said.
Deirdre Harvey, McKenzie’s daughter, called it a “historic moment.”
“These three ladies took a chance, were courageous, stood up knowing that there would be consequences for their actions,” she said.
“I remember asking my mom how she felt doing that, and she was like ‘We had to do it – not just for them, but for the future generations and students at the hospital.’”
Dixie Hospital first opened in 1891 on the campus of the then Hampton Institute, now Hampton University, and moved three times before settling in its final location on Victoria Boulevard. It was affiliated with the Hampton Training School for Nurses, later renamed Dixie Hospital Nurses Training School, one of the earliest nursing schools to accept Black students.
Mayor Gray compared the Dixie Three to Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson, the Hampton-based Black NASA mathematicians featured in the biographical film “Hidden Figures.” The sentiment was shared by Councilmember Steve Brown.
“This hospital … turned into a great hospital for Black and brown folks who needed medical attention,” he said. “Their sacrifices opened the doors for others who may not have gotten that opportunity to go to nursing school, get a nursing degree, get a good job, make a good wage, take care of their families.”
Like the “Hidden Figures” behind the U.S. space race, a recent film has helped raise the profile of the Dixie Three.
Denetra Hampton is a retired Navy nurse from Suffolk, and the filmmaker behind the 2022 documentary “The Dixie 3.” Representatives from the city and the families of the Dixie Three paid special credit to her on Saturday. Hampton said she learned about the Three while doing research during the height of the COVID pandemic.
“I was blown away, and I knew that was going to be my next film,” Hampton said.
The dedication on Saturday drew more than 50 people into a small tent on the cold, windy morning.
“It’s a great opportunity to bring people together and to educate, because education is the foundation for progress,” Hampton said.
“The Dixie 3” will be screened at Norfolk’s Chrysler Museum on Feb. 22 at 3 P.M.