Little Rock Nine Integrate Central High School

In September 1957, nine Black students enrolled at the all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, in compliance with the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board ruling. Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus deployed the National Guard to block their entry. After weeks of crisis and a mob assault on the students, President Dwight Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard and sent the 101st Airborne Division to escort the nine students — the first use of federal troops to enforce civil rights since Reconstruction.