Free The Gathering by William X. Kienzle Page A

said, “do me a favor: Soon as you can, find out whether the seminary lets the kids play in summer leagues.”
    “Sure, Pop. First thing.”
    Summer leagues in the Detroit area were extremely popular. There wasn’t much going on otherwise. Not infrequently these leagues were covered by the press, and one could find sports reporters and even scouts in attendance.
    This might not be a lost cause after all. As he himself had remarked earlier tonight: “It’s an even longer road getting to be a priest than it is getting to play ball in the majors.”

    EIGHT    
     
    T WO DAYS LATER AND THE NEWS WAS OUT. Now everyone knew.
     
    The archdiocesan education department had tried to keep the decision under wraps as long as possible. The purpose was to buy time. Every day the transition looked better to them.
    There were interminable meetings involving administration people from the archdiocese as well as from Redeemer.
    Sister Mary Gracia, IHM, was now principal not only of the segregated boys and girls in the first six grades, as well as the girls from grades seven through high school, but of the boys too. The whole shebang. Grades would be divided not by sex, but in good old alphabetical order.
    Sister Mary agreed that the entire school should be integrated. If only she had more time and help to get the job done before school opened in September!
    With the announcement of the change picked up by the Detroit press—
News, Times,
and
Free Press
, and the neighborhood papers—it was the talk of the town. The corner of Vernor and Junction, the entire southwest side of the city, was buzzing. Seemingly everyone had an opinion.
    There was no poll taken. But if there had been, the citizenry would have been split roughly fifty-fifty. Most of the argumentation was philosophical. Segregation (long before it became a racial consideration) or integration: Which was the better means of education?
    The principals in this movement had little time for debate. For them, it was full speed ahead.
    Now that they had had their way in making the announcement, the Brothers could take their own sweet time moving. Those in the archdiocesan administration who had no luxury time and were not frantically involved in the logistics of nitty-gritty busied themselves in trying to light a fire under the Brothers. Their presence had become awkward. They, as far as Redeemer and Detroit were concerned, were the past. The IHM nuns were the present and the future.
    By and large, the transformation was going as smoothly as possible.
    There was little mutiny. After all, the school was not circling its wagons. It would be the same size. The classrooms would be as large as ever. And filled. There just would be no Brothers of the religious persuasion. There would, in fact, be no male teachers at all. Not at first, anyway.
    Mr. and Mrs. Smith were stunned. They’d had no inkling such a massive change was in the offing. They were aware—everyone was—that the debate over sexual segregation and integration was alive if not particularly well.
    They puzzled too that their twins had known of the change before the decision was made public. Odd, particularly, that the twins should have heard it from Emmanuel Tocco.
    The Smiths were not all that fond of Manny. But as he and Michael had hit it off so well and had become pals, the Smiths had decided to go with the flow. All the while, they would keep a weather eye on the relationship.
    The recent fight that was rapidly achieving legend status was a case in point. The Smiths made it clear to Michael that they were not pleased. They were grudgingly grateful that Manny had saved the day. But they impressed upon Michael that they would have much preferred that he had just given the ruffians the stupid ball, thus making even the slightest altercation unnecessary.
    As for the teaching change, the Smiths actually were more pleased than not. They had affection for the nuns—more so than for the Brothers.
    Michael’s parents