Bobby Cain was a student who had grown up in East Tennessee attending segregated schools. In 1954 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in the case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, that segregated schools were unconstitutional. This reversed the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision that had established the doctrine of “separate but equal” accommodations that justified school segregation for decades. A short time later, the push for desegregation came to Clinton, Tennessee, and Bobby Cain turned from a reluctant participant to a confident member of the Clinton High community. His story was captured by George McMillan for Collier’s, a magazine known for its investigative journalism and focus on social reform.