BILOXI, Miss. — After years of resistance, Mississippi today [Aug. 31] desegregated its public schools for the first time. Sixteen Negroes were accepted in four elementary schools here and by 10 a.m. this morning 14 were in first-grade classes. One of the two remaining Negroes was rejected when it was learned that the child’s parents live outside the state. The other is to attend a school that starts classes later. The fact that there were no incidents today contrast sharply with the rioting that claimed two lives when Negro James Meredith enrolled at the University of Mississippi at Oxford two years ago. White parents sat in their cars in the vicinity of the four Biloxi schools long after their children had entered, but there was no attempt to interfere when the Negro youngsters appeared and walked shyly, holding their parents’ hands, into the schools. The mother of one of the Negro pupils later told a reporter: “Everything is OK, but it ain’t over yet.” School desegregation also came peacefully today to Columbia, S.C., for the first time as six formerly white schools in Columbia enrolled 22 Negro students. — New York Herald Tribune, European Edition, Sept. 1, 1964