Good morning on this cloudy Wednesday.

The Newark riots began 50 years ago tonight.

The violence, which lasted for almost a week, started when a rumor spread across the city that white police officers had fatally beaten a black cabdriver. The resulting unrest left 26 people dead and hundreds injured.

Harriet Knevals was a 24-year-old schoolteacher in Newark at the time.

Each morning, in Room 109 at Quitman Street School, Ms. Knevals — then using her maiden name, Harriet Dolcemaschio — would ask her class of 20 prekindergarten students to sign in so they could learn to write their names. She’d host circle time, fill the classroom with art or music, and give lessons on the A B C.’s.

Ms. Knevals, who is white, was teaching a Head Start summer program, and her students came mostly from black, working-class families.

One morning, as Ms. Knevals and the children went about their daily activities in the room, which faced West Kinney Street and the Scudder Homes, they heard gunshots.