NORFOLK -- Seventeen students are being honored at the church that educated them when six all-white public schools closed rather than integrate 50 years ago.

Ten of the 14 surviving members of the "Norfolk 17" attended today's service at the First Baptist Church, where they were remembered as fearless civil rights pioneers.

The 17 were among thousands of black students who were denied a place in the classroom after Virginia's state-sponsored "Massive Resistance" to court-ordered school desegregation.

Courts later ruled the school closings unconstitutional and the 17 were allowed to attend.

Patricia Turner, who along with her late brother James Turner Junior were among the 17, asked that their stories be told.