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Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview C-0297, in
the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical
Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill”
This is the first of two interviews with African American photojournalist
Alexander M. Rivera. Rivera was born in Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1913. His
family settled there after fleeing Wilmington following the race riot of 1898.
Rivera recalls his father's involvement in the NAACP during the 1920s and 1930s
and the influence of his progressive racial views. Following in his father's
footsteps, Rivera became a student at Howard University in the early 1930s but
had to leave school to work during the Great Depression. It was during these
years that Rivera first began to work as a photojournalist in Washington, D.C.
His coverage of Marian Anderson's concert at the Lincoln Memorial was the first
major event he covered. In the late 1930s, Rivera returned to North Carolina and
finished his education at North Carolina Central College. During World War II,
Rivera worked for Naval Intelligence in Norfolk, Virginia. Shortly thereafter,
he began to work for the Pittsburgh Courier, covering events
in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia. As a photojournalist for the
Courier, Rivera covered such events as the Willie Earle
lynching in South Carolina, the Isaiah Nixon lynching in Georgia, and the school
desegregation cases of the 1950s. In recalling these events, Rivera illuminates
the nature of race relations and racial violence that characterized Jim Crow
segregation; the impact of the Brown v. Board of Education
decision and the role of key players such as Thurgood Marshall; and the changing
social landscape. Finally, he recalls his travels to Africa with Richard Nixon
in 1957.
African American photojournalist Alexander M. Rivera describes the civil rights
movement from his perspective as a reporter for the Pittsburgh
Courier. He focuses on the nature of race relations and racial violence
and describes the impact of the Brown v. Board of Education
decision on the changing social landscape.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
What I've done I've done and if it's worth anything, that's it. But I don't plan on writing anything.
Well, this might be a poor substitute for a book but maybe necessary.
No, if I had known that I was doing, what I was doing was important, I would've kept some better notes about what I was doing. But at the time I was a young reporter, and I was just enjoying what I was doing day by day. When night came, I did what most reporters at that time were doing, looking for a bar somewhere. So the day was over and I waited for the next day. But it wasn't until I covered the Marian Anderson story in Washington that I realized that I might be onto something important. Other than that it was just a daily routine.
I was wondering, maybe if we could go back to the beginning and just start out—
Go anywhere you want to go.
For the sake of the tape recording, if you could just say your name and when and where you were born.
My name is Alexander Rivera, born in Greensboro, North Carolina, and this was October the 4th, 1913. Very few people think that I'm as old as I am. My father was a dentist. So we realized that with his position and income we had a really good life by comparison. In those days in 1913 we had steam heat in the house and a car, a telephone. A lot of people didn't. I'm just saying that to give you background to the kind of life I had.
Right.
My father would be considered now a radical because and I never knew what his interest was until later in life. He at fourteen years of age was, he and his family were run out of Wilmington, North Carolina, during the Wilmington Riot.
In 1896? [1898]
Yeah, and that affected him. Of course it affected his father too because his father was a very prominent undertaker. When he was run out of Wilmington in the Wilmington Riot of 1898, he never got over it. I mean his father never got over it and I'm sure he didn't either because he became very race conscious. He was a representative of the NAACP in Greensboro. I say that to say that I met as a boy a little child I met all of the NAACP representatives Walter White and William Pickens and James Weldon Johnson and all those people because to belong to the NAACP was almost a sure loss of a job. With him being professional he didn't have any job to lose. So he didn't worry about it. The people that came to Greensboro could not find places to stay because they didn't have any hotels that would accommodate them. So they all stayed at our house. It was just known that when they came to Greensboro that they were going to stay. This was my background as a child.
So your grandfather was an undertaker in Wilmington?
Great grandfather too.
And your great grandfather in Wilmington.
Great grandfather and grandfather. But my grandfather was Thomas A.
Rivera, and his family were run out of Wilmington. My great grandfather
was not. He was too old. They did not think he was any problem. So they
didn't bother him. My
Did you know your grandfather?
Oh yes.
Okay. So when you were growing up you would've talked to him.
I didn't. When I was coming up, I didn't know about the riot. My father
didn't make any about the riot. So we didn't discuss it. It wasn't until
Helen Edmonds was doing a book called Fusion Politics in
North Carolina that she came around to interview my
grandfather. I was in college at the time. Then I realized that he had
something important to say, but it was too late. I had, she interviewed
him, and I have the book somewhere around here. But instead of sitting
down and talking to him about it and all because he was very talkative.
He would've talked about it. My great grandfather would not talk about
it at all because he jumped ship, and that's the reason why he was in
this country illegally.
Is that right?
Cut it off.
[Recorder is turned off and then back on.]
My great grandfather would not ever talk about it. He wouldn't talk about it. He was always afraid that somebody would come and send him back.
Now you say he jumped ship.
Yeah he was on, I guess he was a sailor because as I say he wouldn't talk
about it. So I didn't know to ask him because I didn't know him, my
great grandfather. I knew my grandfather. He had jumped ship that was—.
Wilmington was an outstanding port, and he came in from Cuba, and when
the boat docked, he decided he wasn't going
Do you have any idea about when that would've been that he settled in Wilmington?
Cut it off there. He, let me see. refers to picture of the church in Clarendon County South Carolina
where civil rights organizing occurred]
Liberty Hill.
These are the fighters—
Oh okay.
The freedom fighters I was talking about. It was some mess. Oh oh oh oh.
Let me put it off.
They came—
Was your father born in Greensboro?
No, he was born in—
So he was born—
In Wilmington.
In Wilmington.
Yeah, where the family was.
Now how about and your grandfather was born in Wilmington.
Yeah.
It was the great grandfather that—
I have an article in the Long Leaf Pine. That was a
state—
Would you have grown up with anything that you could identify as Cuban traditions? Does anything remain in the family over the generations?
No. This is my father was Dr. A. M. Rivera. They'll have a picture of him in here, but he led this fight to defeat Judge John J. Parker in 1930. That was the first national NAACP. I was telling you before that they all came to my house and so forth. He lead the first national victory that they had in 1930. There was, the field judge, Judge John J. Parker was as you see was led by my father. My father felt that he was a racist. He fought it, and they won the case. Parker never got to be a Supreme Court justice. They have always given my father credit for defeating him. Of course he had everybody on his side I think besides the NAACP. My father was behind that. So that was something that you could see.
Now—
I guess I was trying to give you a background and that got us all into this hassle. He never prodded me to do it, and as far as I know my grandfather and father never encouraged him to be an activist, but it got to him being expelled from the city because of the riots at fourteen years of age. It got to him, and you could see the things that he got into up until his death.
Now where would you father have studied for his dentistry after—
Howard.
So he went to Howard.
Howard University. Graduated in 1909.
Then when you got ready to go to college—
I was naturally going to Howard.
You were going to Howard.
That's his alma mater. The girls went to Fisk and the boys went to Howard. It was during the Depression. So my second year there he lost his property and stuff. He said, ‘Well he said I'm going to have to keep the girls in school. I've got to protect them. So you'll have to get a job.’ So I got a job in Washington.
Do you remember going up to Washington, was that a big change for you just being so far from home?
It was a delight because I had a very strict father. Getting that far away from him was really ideal because when I got to that Fourteenth Street Bridge, I was like Martin Luther King. I said free at last. I was—he always, he felt that the idle, they had an expression about idleness is the devil's workshop. He always saw to it that I had a list of things to do. A list when I got home from school, I had a list there. Things that I was to do. So when I graduated and was going to Howard I said, ‘Well I'm free at last.’
Then you were telling me, so you got work. You were basically forced to take a job. Right because of the Depression.
As a means of survival. Bison which was the yearbook at
Howard. The yearbook was published by the Washington
Tribune, which was a local weekly. The paper also had printing
department. So the newspaper printed the yearbook. I used to have to
bring my reports and clips into the paper to the yearbook section, the
printing division. They saw it and wondered if I wanted a job. Well, I
need one right then. So I said yes I want a job. So I took a job with
the Washington Tribune as a reporter. That wasn't
enough. I got a second job. William B. Umstead was our congressman here.
I got another job through him as a messenger for the Treasury
department. So with those two jobs I was able to make it.
Would you remember what kind of stories you covered in the beginning? What sort of assignments would they give you?
Police. See when you start out you get very, because I didn't know reporting.
Right.
The police department was two doors from our building. I was assigned to cover the police report.
So the DC police beat, huh?
Well just the black part of it. So I would go in, and I would read the
register who was arrested and for what and so forth and so on. If it was
a big enough story, we would enlarge it. Otherwise we would just do a
rundown of it. But that's how we got started. Then I got to work with
Sam Lacy who is in his nineties now and is still living. He is with The Afro-American Newspaper and still working. But
I got with him, and fortunately he liked the horses. He liked to go to
the racetrack. So some of his
So he was at the Tribune at that time.
Yeah he was at that time. He is with The
Afro-American now. Tribune I think is out of
business as a paper it's out of business.
Yeah.
Yeah. It's out of business all together.
Yeah.
Now, at what point, about how long, I know you had covered one of the early stories was the Marian Anderson story.
That wasn't until 1938-39.
Okay, so that was significantly later.
I was about ready to leave Washington and come down here and go to
school. It was a big story. I was assigned to cover it because first of
all I could write and also take pictures. I was one of the early
photojournalists, black in the country. There weren't very many. Most of
the fellows would either write or take pictures. See you have to
understand the development of photography had not produced the
thirty-five millimeters for us around here. We were still using the Life reporter. So we got
a chance to chat.
Now by the time you interviewed her at the Washington station had the controversy already taken place?
Oh, the controversy ran almost, it ran for months. This was a solution.
She was coming to sing at the Lincoln Memorial. This was a solution that
was brought about by Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt and Harold Ickes who was secretary. So they decided that she couldn't
sing at Constitution Hall, she'd sing at the—
The memorial
The memorial. That's the same memorial that King, in front of which King spoke. Oh yeah it had run for months and months. Of course in the first place you see she was a nationally known singer, and Howard University was promoting her. They didn't think they'd have a problem. The only place really large enough to house the concert was the DAR.
The DAR, yeah.
So Mrs. Roosevelt being a member. She got upset when they decided that they couldn't have them, and she withdrew her membership. She wrote a column called, ‘My Day’. In her column she denounced it there, and a lot of her friends who were also members of the DAR pulled out. But the actual concert in front of the Lincoln Memorial was the solution I think. It had been running hot and heavy for months. Ever since the DAR said no, it ran immediately papers and all.
So you attended the actual concert as well.
Oh yeah.
Were you taking photographs at the concert?
Yeah.
Wow.
I've got a picture that's run all over and everything, famous picture of her singing.
Isn't any need for me to go back down here because I've got it. I don't know exactly where it is.
That's all right. And you said that was about the time—I wanted to ask you. How did you get into photography? Did you know photography, did you learn photography in Greensboro?
No.
It was just as a student and as a reporter that you picked it up.
Yeah. To have something to do with—they didn't run it. They didn't run that picture. To have something—
I didn't see it in there.
To have something to do with the yearbook. That was my way of getting into the yearbook. Because I didn't get my first photography, my first camera until I got to the newspaper. I was just using a little camera, what you called a Kodak
So you said that the Marian Anderson story took place just as you were about to leave Washington. What happened, why did you leave Washington?
Well, my father was—see I was a dropout. Him being a dentist. I'm sure he wanted me to be a dentist. I'm sure that he expressed that he wanted me to take his practice over.
So he wanted you to study for the dentistry.
Well, for me to stop school that second year of college was calamitous to him. But I was enjoying it. I was a reporter, and he could tell that I wasn't going to do anything. I was satisfied with myself. I was having fun and also able to support myself. That's all I could—but he had a friend here who was president of the North Carolina College. He was his dentist and good friend. He used to go all the way from here to Greensboro to have his dental work done, which was like an all day trip in those days. So my father and Dr. Shepard got together—
This is Doctor James—
James E. Shepard president of North Carolina College. They got together. I didn't know this. They got together and conspired to get me back into school. So Dr. Shepard offered me a scholarship if I would organize a news bureau for the college. So I was quite excited about the whole thing. I left Washington, came to Durham to organize this department and also to continue my schooling. That's where I got back in college and that's where I, I did organize the department and got back in school.
When did you figure out that they had been conspiring?
Well, early because when I first started to write for the school, Dr.
Shepard came to me and says, ‘Now before you send anything to the paper,
I want you to send it to the English department.’ I said, ‘Oh no.’ I
said, ‘This won't work.’ I said, ‘Oh no. This won't work.’ So I'm going
back. I said, ‘Shit, I'm going back to Washington. I think I can still
get my job back.’ So he knew then that his part of the bargain would've
fallen through. He said, ‘Well just try it. Let's just try it.’ I knew
then that it was something fishy. So I tried it. He was happy, and I was
quite successful with the—I have in this pile of junk down here
somewhere. I've got a recommendation from him to the local paper
recommending me for a job without any reservations. I've just got that
to put it in my file and never did use it. But until the day he died Dr.
Shepard was very, very happy about the fact that I—he never did have a
son. He always said that if he had a son, he wished he'd be like me. But
I was very frank with him, and even at my age that was unusual because
people on the faculty were afraid of losing their job if they were
frank. I was never afraid because I knew him as a, he was like an uncle
to me. I knew him as a tot. So he would ask me, he says, ‘You know I ask
you because they won't tell me the truth.’ They being the faculty. He
said, ‘They fish around to find out what I want to
Like it is.
How you think it is anyway. I said, ‘Yes, that's the only way I know to
do.’ So that's how I got back in school. I graduated in '41, started
college in '31 and graduated in '41, ten years. I wasn't in school
Upon graduation what did you do next?
I went to work for the school.
You were still working with the school right.
I still worked for the school. One day the executives of the Pittsburgh Courier came to town. They wanted to see
me because see in the work that I was there for the school I was sending
material, pictures and stories, to all the black newspapers, southern
white newspapers, all of them. So they knew of my work. So these
executives of the Pittsburgh Courier came to town
and said, ‘We want to meet Rivera.’ So Dr. Shepard sent for me. I went
into his office, and they were all in there. He says, ‘Now I want you to
know that I've got the best reporter in the country.’ When they left the
office and went back to the hotel, they sent for me and asked me how
would I like to have a job.
Now would this have been Mr. Vann or his assistant?
His wife. Mrs. Vann. Vann was dead but she was running the paper.
She did. Okay.
Mrs. Vann. Yeah. So I said, ‘Sure I'd like to’—of course there was a nice
salary and all. I said sure. Shepard was mad as he could be. Ohh. Mad at
them for Courier. I worked with the Courier covering North Carolina, South Carolina and
Virginia.
So what year would you have started then with the Courier? It's before the war right?
No.
In the war I was in naval intelligence. I was at Norfolk, worked out of Norfolk. This was '45-46.
Okay so this was after. So shortly after you graduated then you went into Naval intelligence.
The war was on. I went, shortly after I left here Dr. Shepard and I were
always fussing and fighting about something. I fell out with him about
something. I don't know what it was. It may be inconsequential but—. The
Norfolk Journal Guide newspaper heard that we
were having difficulty. So they offered me a job. So I was in Norfolk.
This was during the war 19—see I graduated in '41. Early I went to work
for The Journal Guide newspaper in Norfolk. It
wasn't any time before the Navy interviewed me for a job with Naval
Intelligence. So I worked with them until the war was over.
What kind of work did you do for Naval intelligence? Was it journalism?
No. Intelligence. See I had a, I was a commander class. It was captain,
captain class, but I was arrested one day and carried to the police
station. In the back of the police station were these Navy officers. As
soon as I walked in one of them says, shook his head and said, ‘No, no,
no. He won't do. He won't do.’ I said, ‘Now just a
But that's how they recruited is they went around and arrested people, took them in and did an interrogation.
Well you see, across from the police office, police department there was a theatre, right across the street a theatre. The girl who took up tickets saw everybody who went in the police department. She saw them take me into the police department. By the time I got out of the police department it was all over town that I'd been arrested because she sat up there with a phone and she can call everybody in town and tell them I was arrested. I wasn't supposed to tell anybody. They had some others in the Army, the G2. Their secret service was called G2. We were just called Naval intelligence. But we weren't supposed to know each other, but we got a chance to know most of each other.
Did you ship out?
No, I stayed in Norfolk.
You stayed in Norfolk.
We went as far as Richmond, Virginia. I worked in Virginia.
What kind of work were you doing with intelligence?
Trying to find out if anybody was talking or saying anything. I got a job with a night club photographing sailors with the girls sitting all on their laps. They had the expression loose lips sink ships. I was finding out where they had a house of prostitution. I worked several houses of prostitution, several houses. It was our job to find out if they were any, if these sailors were talking because they didn't know how much the girls would tell about ship movement.
Sure. Did you ever find any kind of incidents of spying or at least any incidents of sailors who were loose with the tongues—
Well, we were, we were like that but no specifics. We would get a general way they were talking too much. You see at the night club they were drinking whiskey. A girl sitting in your lap and they would say most anything. But most places were being watched and I didn't have any—
But never any kind of German presence in the clubs or anything.
No. No. So I was there until I left and came back to Durham to go to work at North Carolina College.
How long were you at the college again before—
The Courier.
Yeah, before Courier came.
Wasn't long, two years. About two years.
Two years.
Because Willie Earle, I can remember about the Willie Earle case. That was a lynching case. Willie Earle was in 1947. War was over in '45.
The Earle case was which one? Was that one in Georgia?
No, it was South Carolina.
That was South Carolina.
A man who was writing a book—wait a minute. Here it is. A man was writing a book wanted to use an interview that he had done of me. The school would not let him use any report or interview without my written—
Written permission.
Permission. So he wrote to me, and he sent all this stuff. I hadn't even bothered to write it. I mean, to read it. It's a whole bunch of stuff on the Willie Earle case.
On the Earle case. Is he just writing about the Earle case? Is that his focus?
Book, he's writing a book on it. Willie Earle is a, he was a young black guy. This is a transcription of the—
Of your interview on the Earle case.
You want it?
I'd like to look at it. Maybe before I leave, I'll take a look at it. That'd be great.
You can take all of it, bring it back.
Okay, phenomenal.
Willie Earle was a young black guy. He left South Carolina and went and
lived in New York. He came back to South Carolina. As the story goes he
made a proposal to some white girl. She reported it, and nothing really,
nothing happened. He was locked up, but then they came to the prison.
The person in charge of the prison to
Do you remember when you first went over to, when did you first hear about the lynching and—
The next day.
You heard about it the next day. And were you in Greenville the next day?
No, I was here. But the paper said go immediately. So I went immediately. We got a chance to do some investigation. I went of course, we didn't have any hotels. So I knew, I didn't know. I knew a person who knew a lady there whose husband was an undertaker. This guy said, ‘Well now she got a big old house and I'm sure she's got some extra room.’ So she said now you go and I'll tell them you're coming. He didn't tell her why I was coming. So I went and I stayed in a beautiful house, a big old house. The next morning she came, and she said, ‘I didn't know you were involved in this case.’ She says, ‘I'm sorry.’ She said, ‘I'm really sorry but being involved in it, I'm by myself.’ And she said, ‘Anything could happen to me.’ So she had asked me to leave. So I didn't know anybody else there. In fact I didn't know her until I got there. So she referred me to this minister who also was president of the NAACP. So I went over and talked to him, and he said yeah you can stay in my house. He said take whatever fare I had and said fine. So I went over to his house and I stayed there. Most of the reporters, the black reporters who came to town also came there. So it was, that was headquarters for us. I went to see, I went to the courthouse to present my credentials—
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
So he slammed the door. I stood out there a long time waiting on him to come back. He came back in and says, ‘Judge Martin wants to see you.’ I went in. He says, ‘It's going to be a tough case.’ He says, ‘I'm going for a conviction.’ There were thirty-two taxi cab drivers involved in it. He said, ‘I'm going for a conviction.’ He said, ‘South Carolina law requires that anybody being charged with a capital offense is eligible to have a kin sit with them.’ So instead of thirty-two it was sixty-four. So he says now, ‘I can't give you, I can't give you any kind of protection. You are walking around here with this camera around your neck, it looks like an expensive camera.’ He said, ‘These people have an idea that you can use it.’ I said, ‘I can.’ So he said, ‘It's going to be a very dangerous place.’ He said, ‘I don't want you sitting down on this lower level here. I want you to go back out—’ I said, ‘Oh no.’ I thought, ‘Oh Lord. I'm not going to be sitting down.’ He said, he said, ‘Really you would help me a lot if you would sit in the balcony.’ I said, ‘I don't think I can hear it.’ He said, ‘I'll see to it that you can hear everything.’ So if I did as much as that, he said, ‘Speak up.’ So I stayed up there until the trial was over. The FBI got into it.
They were down there huh?
Oh yeah, they had gotten into it. They had investigated it. So it was
well investigated from the inception to the leaving the scene of the,
the FBI had everything. They had who rode in each car and where they sat
in each car and all that. One car had a flat tire. The people in that
car had to get out and get in another car. They had the rearrangement.
The FBI had everything. This foreman of the jury was from seminary down
there. When the trial was over, the Courier told me
to stay there and get some
Why was it the taxi drivers they had organized amongst themselves?
The girl, the girl was related to a taxicab driver.
Oh okay.
I had a stroke. Last October, not this past but last. I had no paralysis except in my throat. For a long time I couldn't swallow. The doctor didn't think I was going to swallow again. But they were trying to figure out some kind of operation. I said, ‘Give it time. Give it time.’
Yeah.
It makes you tired. So I'm able to swallow better. I can eat most anything I want.
Great. You got it back. But it was the taxi drivers that—it was one of the, she was related to—
It was one of them.
One of the drivers.
All of the taxi cab drivers got involved with it. That's what you call a lynching party there. The FBI, the FBI knew everything that went on. They'd interviewed them all. They had interviews from everybody. That didn't make any difference.
No question about who did it or—
No. No. They knew. They knew everybody and who did it. There was no question about it. For the foreman of the jury to have said that they did what anybody, what any red-blooded American would've done. That was it.
So during the trial did you, you said you did your own investigating and you're I'd imagine you were talking to people in the black community. What kind of reactions were you getting? Were people willing to talk to you first of all? I'd imagine there would be a lot of fear.
There was a lot of tension in this town. First, when I first got there, I
didn't recognize the tension. I said to a guy a guy who came in later,
Henning, Robert Henning later. I said black people talking about
tension. I don't feel it. He had covered the Scottsboro case. He had. He
said there's more tension in this trial than anything I've ever seen. So
then I got afraid because if it's here and I don't see it, then I'm
subject to get hurt. Because I was moving around and asking everything.
I remember going to ice cream parlor to get some ice cream. The guy who
was working on the counter leaned over to pick up some ice cream and
when he leaned up, I could see a pistol sticking out of his back pocket.
I said Oh Lord. So the minister that I was staying with there, two
incidents, first I was sitting up. It was hot weather. I was sitting up
in the window with the window open and I was typing. He came in to me
and he virtually tackled me. ‘Are you crazy?’ I said, ‘What do you
mean?’ ‘You're sitting right in front of that window. Anybody could
shoot you. A sniper hit you. You wouldn't even know anything about it.’
That frightened me. I pulled the blinds out and typing away from the
window, stay away from the window. So we got ready to go to church, and
he wanted all of us to go with him. I think he wanted to show off
reporters Bible that says I can't take care of myself until
God gets here.’ So we all went to church and he preached. I never will
forget it. He preached on the church to get a gun. Get a gun. He said,
‘
So he told them.
Do you remember the minister's name?
No. It would be in … no, you could find it.
Because he was head of the NAACP in Greenville.
Greenville, South Carolina. I mean the whole account is in the archives
of both Courier archives. That was in
1947. It would be easy to find.
What are other big events that you covered in those days before Brown?
The next one was a lynching in Georgia. Isaiah lynching.
Another lynching.
Then we went down to investigate that one. That was the one that I was
sure that my luck had run out. Something happened that had never
happened before in my whole life. Something told me, I don't know what
the something was to go dressed as a chauffeur. It was easier traveling
as a chauffeur because everybody figured that you worked with somebody
important. They didn't want to have any problems. So I got to Pittsburgh
Courier. Well they came out and said you can go. I still don't know
whether it means that I, we can go until we get back down in those
turpentine district with the trees and what not. We went all the way out
to where my car was. Well I got to the car and I said, ‘Atlanta's
closer. It's the closest big town. That's what I wanted to get to.’
Atlanta was the closest big town. I'd have to go all the way through
Georgia, South Carolina, until I got to North Carolina.
I said, ‘I'd better go into Atlanta.’ So I struck out heading to Atlanta.
When I got to Atlanta, I said, ‘Well who do I know in Atlanta?’ Bishop
at my church was from Atlanta, Bishop Fountain. I'd seen him a long
time. Of course when we had been at the church I'd take pictures
Did you say Bishop T.F. Fountain?
Fountain. I don't know the first name. I'll let you see them later. So anyway when I got to the door, he said, he looked at me and he said, ‘Yes.’ I said Bishop Fountain. ‘Yes.’ Then it dawned. He said ‘Alex. What are you doing with that get up on?’ I had forgotten. I forgot I had the chauffeur cap on. I said ‘Bishop I need some whiskey.’ I need a drink of whiskey right bad. I told him that I had been covering a lynching. He sat down and got some whiskey and I sat down and told him the story. I got through that next day and left and then came on back to Durham. But it was touch and go.
That's the one huh? Wow. Whereabouts in Georgia was this?
Montgomery County. It wasn't in a city. I don't know what the city
would've been. Montgomery county.
That was enough.
That was enough. Uppity. Well I had another case Mack Ingram, Mack Ingram. You know about that case.
Umm huh.
Reckless eyeballing case. Over here in Yanceyville. Out from Yanceyville.
They were on a farm. This girl was way out quite some distance. He was
arrested for
Leering.
What did he do to her? He was leering. Well what is that? I had to look it up. It means to stare and—
It sounds a lot worse when you don't know what it is.
At any rate he was convicted in two courts, and when the Courier sent me over, and by that time the national press had
gotten into it. They decided that he wasn't guilty of anything. But he
was across a field. They gave the distance, and his lawyer had him to go
to the back of the courtroom. It was a distance of probably about half
of this
During this period, the late '40s, early '50s did you have a sense that things were going to change? What was—no—because it seems like too much of what had already taken place.
Well the law. The law had two, when you go to court. When you went to court, white people on this side, black people on this side in a court of law. If there was an interracial event, you didn't have a chance. That's what it was. That's the reason why most blacks got a white lawyer because if they got a black lawyer when they came into court, they were in trouble.
Right.
My wife.
But you had no sense that things were about to, that about to dramatically change.
Come here. Brown
versus Topeka Board of Education. That changed everything
because that changed the law. It was no longer the law. That changed but
up until that time as long as we were, you were going to be lawful,
segregation was the law of the land.
At what point did you learn about the folks in Clarendon County and what—did you know what they were up to from the beginning or was it only as that case became part of the larger Brown case that you became aware of that?
See the first case, the first time the case came to court it came to court under a lawyer named Harold Boulware. Harold Boulware was a friend of mine. I knew him from the—we had all these, always had cases coming up, always cases. He had school cases and most cases were either school cases or transportation cases. So I said well here we have just another case. Sure enough the first case he lost it. Said it wasn't lost on its merits. It was lost because it wasn't brought in the right jurisdiction. So I said well, he didn't even know what jurisdiction to bring the case in. Well it wasn't that simple. But at that time they had already gotten, they were already persuaded that this was the right thing to do and continue. But he went to see NAACP. Harold Boulware took some cases from the NAACP. He stayed on the case because I was with him.
The one where they're all on the hotel room there.
They're out on the bed.
Yeah.
That wasn't a hotel. It was a bed.
Okay.
This woman turned her house over to them and I had a name. Was looking for it for something. But anyway she turned the house over to them, and they did all their work right there in the house. I had it here. She no longer lives there. She moved anyway then. But I had it. I didn't get it. But any rate that's where they were.
Where they built their case.
Right there. They went to see Thurgood Marshall.
Thurgood Marshall told them if they could get twenty defendants, the
NAACP would take the case. But you see he wouldn't take the case with
one defendant and that person would get scared of getting killed and you
wouldn't have a case anymore. He didn't expect they would get twelve
defendants. I was almost sure he didn't. But they got twenty some odd
defendants. They were having meetings at that church, the (Liberty Hill)
AME church and they raised money. The principal of the school had lost
his job. The assistant had lost her job. They burned his house down, but
those freedom fighters stuck right in it. When the case really got rough
some people would pass Thurgood Marshall in the hall of the court and
say you better not ever come back. You better not ever come back here.
But of course see it was a case that had many, many twists. The judge
himself, Julius Waring had had his experiences before this kind of case.
He had had two or three. I know he had, one was a bus case during the
war but a solider who had been harmed and I think he'd been killed. He
lost that case and he got determined. The next case they had went after
he became a John Wrighten I think his name was Wrighten. But
anyway he sued to go to the University of South Carolina. All of this
you could check on, but he Judge Waring ruled in that case that South
Carolina either had to admit him to the University of South Carolina,
build another school or put a law school at the black school South
Carolina State. The white people there said here was a native South
Carolinian ruin like that. Then the other case was the Elmore case,
George Elmore, I knew him when he sued to vote. He sued to vote. There's
George Elmore right there. Judge Waring ruled that they were eligible to
vote, and he said anybody that did anything to circumvent his ruling
would be in trouble, serious trouble. He said on the day of the voting,
I'll be in my office and I'm going to stay in my office until this
voting is done. They voted. That was the first time they had voted in
South Carolina since Reconstruction.
So Judge Waring had shown some indications that—
Yeah. Thurgood Marshall too had been in that case, but they'd been
together before. They were together in that case. They were together. So
they knew each other. Judge Waring knew about Clarendon County. He knew
all about it. He knew the school conditions in Clarendon County. So he
was well aware. This is the key thing. When they went, one day one
morning the court started. He called Thurgood and told Thurgood, he
says, ‘Come here. I want you to come into my chambers.’ So when he got
to his chambers he stayed a few minutes. He went back out, and when he
came back out, he was flabbergasted. You could tell that whatever Judge
Waring told him was momentous. Thurgood wasn't the kind of guy that
would get upset by anything. He was always jovial and he was always in
command. He was never very upset. His appearance
Waring was pushing Marshall even further than Marshall wanted to go.
At that particular time and Marshall told him, said that this is on our
agenda but it's not tonight. We don't think this is the case. We don't
think this is the time. The judge said, ‘This is the case and this is
the time. I don't want to hear another separate but equal case.’ So down
at Washington and all that, the press gave Marshall hell for
capitulating to the judge. He was, 'Nothing I could do about it. Said,
‘The judge said he didn't want to hear it. Don't even bring it up as a
separate but equal case.’ So the papers said told Thurgood he's going to
lose and all that. Thurgood said, ‘Yeah I know.’ Sure enough. This is
what happened. Then they got to the appellate court, three-judge court
they lost just like Judge Waring said they would. Then they were in the
Supreme Court, but see I don't follow enough
Briggs versus Elliot.
It should've been Briggs. No. It was the case here was—
Oh Briggs versus The Clarendon County Schools.
Yeah. They decided that they didn't want another South versus North case.
I see.
So there were five cases, companion cases all in one, but alphabetically
the cases in a companion case suit the cases were named alphabetically.
So alphabetically Briggs comes before Brown. Instead of Brown versus the Topeka Board, it should've been Briggs versus
the Topeka Board.
[Jack] Greenberg.
Greenberg, right. He was a Jewish lawyer. He was the lawyer at Briggs. But the case that where the most of the stuff was done, the precedent set was in Clarendon County.
Do you remember the reaction to the decision?
What?
The reaction to the Brown decision and I'd imagine you wrote about that how people responded.
You see that was one of the greatest cases in the history of this country
because it completely changed the lifestyle of a nation white and black.
See when it said all legally Plessy versus Ferguson was dead. That was the case
that Courier, the Courier went out along with
a lot of other newspapers went out. The Afro is
still in existence.
Defender is still around.
Journal-Guide is out.
Do you remember where you were when you heard the decision? You were here in Durham and you remember any kind of—hearing actually hearing the news—
You see the case was a funny case to start with. It was in two parts. It was first heard and then they had a recess. Only God knows why they were having a recess or had the case been decided at the recess at the time of recess Thurgood said, ‘We would've lost it, lost it.’ Then they had a recess. Are you familiar with that?
Um hmm.
You know what happened at the recess?
Well, I've heard bits but you should—
[Frederick Moore] Vinson died. The Chief Justice from Kentucky, Vinson died. The Lord put his hand in there. We would've lost it sure enough. Then Earl Warren from California was appointed judge Chief Justice, and he was the one who engineered the whole case through, and he got, until he got a unanimous decision. Even when he got a majority, he said don't want it. He wasn't satisfied with a majority. He got a unanimous decision, and Eisenhower who had appointed Warren, said worst decision, appointing him was the worst decision I ever made in my life. So you want to know, that was a funny decision. Those two things happened. The death of Vinson and the appointment of Earl Warren because we would've lost it in the first, if it would've been decided without a recess. We'd have lost it. We'd still have been in the separate but equal.
To what degree did it bring about immediate change in say North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia where you were.
Well, they all fought it. All fought it. Virginia, North Carolina South, Georgia they all fought it. All said they were—Virginia was terrible. Virginia closed the schools. Virginia said they were going to private schools first. Georgia said the same thing. Of course North Carolina was timid. They weren't very, said well most of them said it was the law. They weren't anxious to abide by it, but said it was the law. This anyway, it was a little inconceivable that the poorest sections of the country the South had to have two of everything.
In Lumberton they had to have three. Down in Robeson county they had to
have three. That's why I got arrested. I was taking pictures at the back
of a theatre down there. The whole back of the theatre wasn't anything
but toilets because they had Indians. They had Indian men and Indian
women, white men, white
I know that before the national, well the sit-ins started in Greensboro there were some attempts here with Reverend [Douglas] Moore.
There weren't any.
Nothing.
Attempts. Greensboro got the idea. We were years before Greensboro.
That's what I thought.
We had the sit-in. I mean we were at the court. We went all the way to
the state supreme court with that case. Five years, I think it was five
years before A and T did anything. It was at the Royal Ice Cream Parlor
that was located in the black
Now who would've organized that? Who would've put that together or lead that?
You just named him.
Was it Reverend Moore, was Reverend Moore a part of that?
He was the organizer.
Yeah, that's what I thought.
He organized it. Moore, Elaine Moore. First name was Elaine. Douglas Elaine Moore.
Douglas.
Now it all comes back to me. Douglas Elaine Moore. Douglas Elaine Moore went to school in Boston, same school that Martin Luther King went to. He got an idea that he was Martin Luther King or something, but anyway he organized the sit-in, and it was the first sit-in. A and T came years after. This case, this wasn't just an ordinary sit-in. They had judges the only lawyer living now is William Marsh. William Marsh is still living. The other lawyers are dead. There was M. Hugh Thompson, and I don't know who the other lawyer was. But they're dead. This case went all the way to the Supreme Court.
Now did you cover that as a journalist?
I wasn't here.
You weren't here at that point.
Great.
All that.
I'm sure there are people you would have—
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
[START OF TAPE 2, SIDE A]
As I told you the first one that we had here for the Royal ice-cream
company. That was the one Reverend Moore and several students he got
together. Then of course we had A and T started the sit-ins at the
counter of the Woolworth's store. Our students then started copying that
so he went to the Woolworth's store here. They had a counter here and we
sat in. But we didn't pay too much attention to that because we already
had our sit-ins. As I told you it went all the way through the courts. I
had a friend named Louis Austin and Louis Austin was the editor and
publisher of the Carolina Times newspaper. Good
friend of mine and I used to work around with him. Never charged him a
dime for anything.
But as far as taking pictures for the Courier would
you have, would they have wanted some photos?
We did some, but they weren't really interested in. The movement was in
Greensboro as far as they were concerned. We never got, we never got
(the go ahead) in this town for the sit-ins. I went to the News and Observer and gave them the history of
it.
Now who would've been the editor of the Courier at
this point?
Mrs. Vann. It was either it was, yeah, Mrs. Vann was still, Daisy Lampkin. I worked for Bill Nunn. Bill Nunn, Sr. because there was a Bill Nunn Jr. who wrote in the sports department. I reported to Bill Nunn, I reported to Bill Nunn, Sr. So I would've reported to him. All of them are dead now, Mrs. Lampkin, Mrs. Vann.
I just would've thought that they would've assigned you to go over to Greensboro and get some pictures but no.
I don't know. I don't know how they got over there. As I said we had had our experience here with it so—
It had played out to the Supreme Court you were saying.
Yeah. Hadn't done anything. See Hugo Black, Hugo Black there was, he came
in, he came into the Washington scene while I was there working as a
reporter. It was revealed that he had been a member of the Ku Klux Klan,
and of course the black community
The journalist?
He wrote a story—I don't know if he wrote it. He wrote a story on the case—that's all right. Is that it?
I don't think so.
But he did write a story about the sit-ins, and he put it, he
I know that a couple of months after the sit-ins then the students got together, met at Shaw in Raleigh for the organizations of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and I'm wondering if that's something you might have been over to cover as a reporter.
Uh uh.
No.
A lot of that I wasn't working. A lot of that I wasn't working for the
Courier.
This would've been April '60. You were gone from the Courier by then?
I think so. I was trying to get, I was trying to make some money. I went to work for the Joslen, Joslen Jewelry Company.
Okay, sure.
See August 1969. But I went to work for the Courier
because I
I believe that yeah.
We didn't have any fires. We didn't have any shootings at North Carolina College. We didn't have any of that. Lot of noise, a lot of protests. Students left the campus went out to protest in the city but the, it was an odd thing about the kids at North Carolina College. They seemed to want to protect their school. They didn't want to burn it down like some places had fires. We had small fires in some wastebaskets and bathrooms and things but no big fires and no shooting.
I want to go back to the 1957 trip with Richard Nixon, and I'm wondering how that came about. How, why did you get to go with Vice President Nixon?
Well, I was, just a second. I have so much junk there. Cut that off just a second. Do you have it cut off?
Yeah.
All right. 1955 we received an award, a journalism achievement award by
the Global News Syndicate Incorporated. I received one, a joint award
with Robert Radcliffe. We worked together at the Courier, and Nixon received an award, a distinguished public
service award. So we were at this meeting. We received the award
together. So that was, what date was that?
June 24th, 1955.
All right. In 1957 one morning I was getting ready to go to work about
eight-thirty, eight or something. I got a call from the State
Department. I didn't know it was the State Department and said Mr. Nixon
wanted me to go with him to Africa. I thought it was a prank. I was
rushing to go to work, and I figured somebody was playing a prank on me.
So I said, ‘Yeah. Yeah. Well you tell Nixon to take his mama to Africa
with him.’ I hung up. So about as soon as this guy called back and the
phone rang again
Okay.
So we got our shots and everything and got ready to go to Africa.
Nixon had an entourage right on the plane.
Oh yeah. We had a plane.
Who all was on that plane?
See we had a plane and he, of course had Air Force number two
Would [E. Frederic] Morrow have been working in the—?
Yeah.
He was there.
Yeah, Morrow was one. A guy named Barnett.
Claude Barnett.
Claude Barnett was there. Barnett of the Associated Negro Press.
With his wife Etta Moten Barnett.
Yeah, she was a hundred years old. I got an invitation to her hundredth anniversary.
Is that right?
Etta at a hundred.
Wow.
Johnsons were there. Johnson Publications.
Johnson, yeah.
He had Moneta Sleet. Moneta Sleet was there. He was the first black I know that won a Pulitzer prize in photography. He was there. Had another reporter from Washington worked with the Johnson Publications. Booker, Simeon Booker.
Simeon Booker.
I can't think of—oh, oh. I should never forget him. His name was—he
worked for Afro-American.
Lomax.
No. A little guy. He was there too. Lomax went, but this guy was. I'll
think of it after a while. He reason why, oh gosh I can't think of his
name. But
Any politicians with Mr. Nixon? Like I assumed Powell would've gone a different plane, Adam Clayton Powell
No, he wasn't on there.
Randolph. Dr. King, I think traveled separately.
Yeah they were on, they didn't go with us.
Now was the first step, was the first, you flew from New York to Gold Coast.
No, Rabat, Morocco.
First to Morocco. Was that just a stop over?
Yeah.
What was the first destination point?
I don't even know. I think we were, because we stopped and refueled once and went into Morocco. Louis Lautier.
Okay.
I knew I was going to think of that name. The name was Louis Lautier.
That's right.
He did shorthand and he was quite popular.
I assume this was your first trip to Africa.
Yeah. And only trip to Africa.
Only trip.
First and last trip to Africa I think. Yeah, we went into Canada and on around.
What was that like, I mean, your first experience of Africa? Do you have any memories of what that?
Yeah. All my memories of Africa were good until I got to Liberia. I think
Liberia would've been okay if I hadn't already made up my mind that, as
long as I can remember I've always wanted to see a country that was run
independently by blacks with a record of at least a hundred years. Here
this was perfect. Liberia had been black operated over a hundred years
independently. When I got there, it was terrible. It was the most
What about in Ghana did you meet Nkrumah? Did you have a chance to?
Oh yeah.
What was that like? Where was that? I mean there were a whole series of inauguration festivities.
I don't know exactly what the occasion was. But you see he had gone to school here in this country. Liberia, I mean in Ghana there was Nkrumah. In Nigeria there was Azikiwe. Both educated in the States and both as far as England was concerned were radicals. So much so that England said we're not going to send any more people to the States for education because when they pass, see the Statue of Liberty something happens to them. But those were the two that I remember from the States, Azikiwe and Nkrumah
Did you happen to see Dr. King when you were in Ghana?
Just saw him—
Just in passing, yeah. Would that have been the first time you had seen him or had you ever seen him before if you can remember?
Not that I can remember. He wasn't that famous. He was at my estimation at that time he was just regarded as a good speaker. It was after that that he blossomed out and became the spokesman.
There's that famous photograph of Dr. King shaking hand with Richard Nixon and that was their meeting where Dr. King had been attempting to get a meeting with Nixon.
Said I had to come all the way over here to meet you. Yeah, I remember that.
I was wondering. Maybe we should stop right here because I think we pretty much—
END OF INTERVIEW