Miss Jane Pittman Drinking Fountain

Twenty-five years ago next month, the city of Rochester, New York dedicated the Miss Jane Pittman Drinking Fountain. One day, Midge Thomas needed a drink of water in Rochester. Upon entering a restaurant, the proprietor charged her ten cents for water in a disposable, plastic cup. Being charged for the small drink of water sparked Midge to action. As the president of the Freddie Thomas Foundation, Midge approached Rochester's government about a public drinking fountain in the downtown area. The city government agreed, and on July 30, 1989, they dedicated the Miss Jane Pittman Drinking Fountain in downtown Rochester's Liberty Pole Plaza. 

In the previous post, I discussed how Gaines became inspired by Miss Jane's Oak Tree. Here, the text that Gaines created from that inspiration becomes the inspiration for someone else. Midge and the foundation chose to name the fountain the Miss Jane Pittman Drinking Fountain because at the end of the film version of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, Cicely Tyson, as Miss Jane, drinks from a "whites only" water fountain as a form of protest. This does not occur at the end of the novel; however, Jimmy Aaron enlists one of the Hebert girls to drink from the fountain in Bayonne. 



Even though the scene does not occur in the novel, it does occur in the movie. Talking about the Miss Jane Pittman Drinking Fountain, Midge informed reporters that "[Miss Jane's] story fit right into our project. . . She took that drink--the fountain will symbolize humanity, liberty, and equality" (article in Gaines' papers). Miss Jane embodied these attributes, and they can be seen in the symbol for the Freddie Thomas Foundation and the fountain above. Next month, nearer to the celebration, I will post more information about the fountain and about Freddie Thomas.

Will all of this information, can anyone answer why Rochester, NY serves as a fitting place for the Miss Jane Pittman Drinking Fountain?