A Mississippi Restaurant Has Been Beloved for Decades. But There’s Another Story to Tell. – The New York Times

Years later, Ms. Pinkston learned from Ms. Gory what happened at Lusco’s the night the TV documentary aired. The family’s story, as Ms. Pinkston tells it, centers on the kindness they believe they showed Mr. Wright, who was hired as a teenager, and how his remarks humiliated white residents.

The people who watched Mr. Wright on television at the restaurant were “hurt and upset, because it made them look so bad,” Ms. Pinkston said.

Mr. Wright was working that night and, according to Ms. Pinkston, apologized and left. He never returned to the job. “Ms. Gory told me that it broke her heart,” Ms. Pinkston said.

For her part, Ms. Pinkston likened the treatment Mr. Wright suffered on the job to the impertinence all restaurant servers endure, regardless of race. “It was just a thing where people think they’re better than a server,” she said. “That could happen to anybody.”