Unable to countenance the idea of sharing the pool with black people, city leaders eventually formed a private “Park Association” whose sole job was to administer the pool, and the city leased the public asset to the private association for one dollar. Only white residents were allowed admission. Warren and Montgomery were just two of countless towns—in every region in America, not just the South—where the fight over public pools revealed that for white Americans, the word public did not mean “of the people.” It meant “of the white people.”
