Traditional research often excludes the voices of marginalized populations such as African Americans, who are usually written about instead of being allowed to tell their own stories (King, 2005). This research gives African Americans the opportunity to "tell their stories" of segregation and integration. Leaving the telling of our stories to others may have already had severe consequences, such as the perpetuation of stereotypes of African Americans, their communities and their academic abilities (Brown, 2009). This research hopes to shine a different light on the cohesiveness of the Black community and the Black academic experiences these participants had during the 1950s-1970s. There were 20 participants identified from yearbooks, social media and snowball sampling; from the 20, nine were selected to be interviewed. All participants were African American, male or female, and were selected based on other criteria such as age and where they attended school between the years 1950 and 1970. The researcher included a personal narrative which orients the reader to the context for events recollected by the participants in this phenomenology utilizing historical narratives based on the researcher's personal experience and oral histories from other African American individuals from the community. Critical Race Theory was used to guide the research to answer how African Americans who attended Black neighborhood schools in a Southeastern Pennsylvania town during the 1950-1970 eras describe the influence of forced integration on their community and the Black academic experience. The findings from this study are that racial and cultural identity and the Black academic experience were important to student connectedness to the participants' schools and neighborhood; and the teachers, extracurricular activities and relationships were critical characteristics influencing these participants' perceptions of their segregated schools. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]