The Springfield News-Leader recently published a story about how future U.S. President Richard Nixon’s stand at a Route 66 hotel in Springfield, Missouri, in 1960 helped pave the way for racial desegregation in the region.
Nixon was vice president at the time and was campaigning as a Republican candidate for president. It was September.
The newspaper reported on the details:
Nixon planned to stay at the Kentwood Arms Hotel but there was an issue: Two reporters traveling with Nixon were Black and the Kentwood, like many hotels and restaurants in southwest Missouri at that time, was still segregated.
The future president — who lost the 1960 bid but won the office in 1968 — made it clear, through a spokesman, that if the Black reporters were not allowed to stay at the hotel, he would bypass Springfield. […]
As a result of Nixon’s ultimatum, Kentwood owner Earl Moulder agreed to end segregation at the hotel, according to a front-page story in the Sept. 20, 1960, edition of the Springfield Daily News, a precursor to the News-Leader. A slew of other businesses, including Heer’s Department Store, made the same decision. […]
The historic turning point — and a partial but temporary return to segregation at the Kentwood in 1962 — will be the subject of the next marker on the Springfield-Greene County African American Heritage Trail. The No. 11 marker is expected to be installed this fall.
KMSU radio also published a story a few years ago about the hotel’s role in desegregating businesses in Springfield. It details how the hotel reversed its desegregation policy, then relented again in 1962.
Because of the Kentwood’s policy reversal, the Missouri Federation of Republican Women’s Clubs announced they were transferring their 1962 convention from Springfield to Kansas City.
On September 9 and 10, 1962, the Springfield Leader and Press reported that some 18 picketers, consisting of Black and white residents, “paraded in front of the Kentwood Arms Motor Hotel, which recently announced it would not serve Negroes in its public dining rooms.”
One of the demonstrators carried a sign reading, “Springfield lost $10,000 today,” referring to the loss of the Republican Women’s Clubs’ annual convention opting to bypass Springfield altogether.
The Kentwood, now a Missouri State University residence hall, opened in 1926 at 700 E. St. Louis St. (aka Route 66).
As the Route 66 Times reports, John T. Woodruff built the Kentwood, which was the site of many National Highway 66 Association meetings. Woodruff played a key role in the federal designation of number 66 for the Chicago-to-Los Angeles highway in 1926.
(Image of Vice President Richard Nixon via public domain; postcard image of the Kentwood Arms Hotel in Springfield, Missouri, courtesy of 66Postcards.com)