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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
K-0201, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern
Historical Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill”
James Atwater discusses life in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, from the 1930s to the 1950s. Atwater grew up in Chapel Hill, as did his parents and grandparents. In this interview, he discusses how neighbors in the black community interacted in various social, religious, and academic activities. He also talks about the impact of segregation on this community and on the schools. White supremacy in Chapel Hill was easily maintained by the community's reliance on the University of North Carolina. Atwater's parents worked for UNC, as did many other black residents, so they were directly dependent on white University officials for their finances. Much of his consciousness about segregation in Chapel Hill came from comparing it to places such as Durham, Carrboro, and Philadelphia. He left Chapel Hill in the 1950s.
James Atwater discusses life in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, from the 1930s to the 1950s. He describes the black community, the impact of segregation on schools and neighborhoods, and experiences of African American staff at the University.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
So, this is Jennifer Nardone, here with James Atwater, February 28, 2001, in Tysons Corner, Virginia. Mr. Atwater, can you just tell me a little bit about your family and your growing up in Chapel Hill, were you born there?
I was born in Chapel Hill, one of five, one brother, three sisters. I
was born in Chapel Hill, and I think I might have mentioned to you, I
was in Chapel Hill until the early 50s, lived regularly in Chapel Hill
until the early 50s. Eventually I moved onto the campus at North
Carolina Central where I did my undergraduate work, and after I left
North Carolina Central, I went to Philadelphia for a short while, at
University of Pennsylvania, but I was drafted at that point, and went
into the service, and since that time, I have not lived regularly in
Chapel Hill. I have been back on numerous occasions when my mother and
father were still living there. I still have three sisters who live
there now, so I go back to visit them, and obviously I tried to stay in
touch with what was going on in Chapel Hill. But of the five of us, I
was the eldest, and the five of us attended Lincoln/Orange County
Training School, from first grade through—well, I can't say
that all of us attended it through twelfth grade because by the time it
moved some of my younger sisters may have gone down to Lincoln on
Merritteville Road. But in any case, we were residents of Chapel Hill, I
was a resident for that long a period. And during that time, it was
primarily a matter of, we can say, living in the African American
community, and some of the things
Did you, did one your parents work at the university, or did you have an affiliation with the University?
Yes, my father worked at the University, and during most of the time that I was growing up. Prior to that he had worked for some of the private firms in Chapel Hill, at one point he had owned a business, he had run a business with one of my uncles. But for the most part he worked at the university. Most of the time that I was growing up he was working at the university. And my mother also worked at the university after we had grown up because she had worked for a while prior to her marriage in Durham for North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company.
Oh really?
Yes. After she married, I think she may have stayed in Durham for a short while, but, continued working for them for a short while but eventually she became an insurance agent for them, she was working out of our home and in Chapel Hill, selling insurance for North Carolina Mutual there. As I said, after we, all of us, practically all of us, were at least in high school I think, maybe a little earlier, she worked for the University, for the hospital. She was at the hospital —
Oh, okay, over at the university.
Yes right, yes. Because of course the hospital, I don't know the exact
date, but I'd say it's relatively new for me because it was not there I
think probably, I may have been in college by the time the hospital was
opened [unclear]
What did your father do at the university?
Variety, a wide variety. His primary job was as the porter for the three women's dormitories: Alderman, McIver, and Kenan.
Really?
Yes, and of course he was responsible for some of the cleaning, we can say sort of the heavy cleaning, because they also had maids there, women who were there. But he was, his primary responsibility was to stoke the furnaces in those dormitories, because they were still coal burning, he was responsible for keeping that going. At the same time, he did one or two or three other things on a part time basis. He was the, I suppose his title would have been headwaiter, or manager of the Chapel Hill Country Club.
Oh, okay.
Because the country club at that time, was primarily for their, say,
dinner dances on weekends. So on the weekends he was responsible for
hiring the staff that would work there, cooks and waiters and so on, and
getting the club ready, and getting the club cleaned up after that, so
on Sunday—usually they'd have something on Saturday night,
we'd clean up on Sunday. And in addition to that, he had I don't know
how many responsibilities with individual families sometimes to stoke
their furnaces. And he did that for a couple of people. He [unclear]
Wow. So he worked a lot. Sounds like he worked a lot.
Just a little bit.
So you were pretty deeply connected with the university then when you were growing up.
Well, yes, from that standpoint and of course most of the people at the country club were people from the university, so that was a connection. And then the people that he worked for, we can say, part time, on the side were also people from the university.
Now, can you sort of tell me—I'm relatively new to Chapel Hill, been there since last summer—where you lived?
Okay we lived on Church Street—
Oh, okay. I know where that is. That was easy.
Yes, okay. And ah, well, if your familiar at all with Caldwell Street, we were almost to Caldwell Street, I mean, we were south of that.
So you lived very close to the Caldwell's cause they live on Caldwell street.
Oh yes! Yes, yes, yes, yes.
That's wonderful. That's great.
Oh no, we were neighbors, contemporaries.
Went to school together—
Went to school together, sports, basketball, football, and other things. No—.
So when you first started going to school, elementary school and junior high, prior to Lincoln, you went to the—.
Well, that's just it. You see, everything was done in that one building.
Oh really? Oh, okay.
Well, I say everything—
I thought there was a county school as well, that may have been later.
Well, there may have been a county school, but for those of us in Chapel
Hill, that was our school, from first grade. Now kindergarten, I went to
kindergarten, which was a private kindergarten, across the street from
my house, and it was operated by, say a friend of the family, or someone
that we knew, we had known, by the daughter who had – she had been to
college, came back from college and she opened a kindergarten in her
parents home. And I don't know what the enrollment was, but I think it
was probably ten or twenty
Really? So did you graduate after eleventh grade?
Well people, those people who were there before, and I'm not sure when that ended, but that was one of the—.
That's interesting. I hadn't heard that before.
Oh really? That's one of the—
So what are your earlier memories then, of going to Lincoln, when you were young? When you first started going.
Well, I remember one or two things from the first grade. I remember going to first grade. And I remember some of the things from kindergarten, not much but some. But, going to first grade, the name of my first grade teacher—
Who was it?
Her name was Humphries.
Oh, so Mrs. Humphries?
Ms. Humphries. Ms. Humphries. But the other thing about going to Lincoln
was from those earliest days, we often knew the teachers because they
may have lived in our neighborhood and we at least could recognize them.
We knew them, we saw them after school. We saw them before school and so
on. And for me, Lincoln was a five minute, ten minute walk from home, so
it was a
Around the gymnasium.
Around the circle, until we got there, till we got to the end, and then went on to high school. I think the other part of it was, that way, because we were all in that same building, we at least saw the other teachers at the upper levels, and we knew that eventually, once we went into those classrooms, they were not complete strangers to us because we had seen them around the building, we'd seen them around town. And one year, I don't know how many times this happened, but I remember one year, the teacher who was teaching the third grade, moved up to the fourth grade with the students.
Oh no.
Students were in the third grade with her, and when they came back in the fall, they were still with her.
Still had the same teacher.
So, maybe for some of them that was a wonderful experience. For others
it was [unclear]
Even when you were really young. So, we had heard in the research we've done and the people we've spoken to so far in the class, that Lincoln High really was a very tight knit community, and that there was a sense of family. Can you give idea of or maybe some examples of how you remember that atmosphere?
Well, I think it's, again it comes back to the physical, because one of
the coaches for example, [unclear]
So, you felt like your professors, or your teachers at Lincoln really encouraged the students to pursue college.
Oh yes. Yes.
But still at this point, your being so close to UNC, UNC was not desegregated.
It was, it was still segregated.
It was still segregated, right. It wasn't desegregated. I was double negativing. Negating, I guess. So, it was still segregated, but you were still so close to this university, was there any—did you talk about that at all? Do you remember talking about how your options might have limited or not limited because of—
Well, I don't know that we talked about it to a great deal, it was the
status quo. And we knew that there were African American or black
universities within reasonable proximity, and there were some that had
reasonable reputations because our teachers had come from them. So there
wasn't the idea that we were necessarily being deprived of something,
other than the fact, well, this is an outgrowth of segregation. And
we're part of it and we'll go along with it, we can say for now, but by
the same token, and this is something I mentioned to Bob Gilgor, many of
us had relatives who were say in the North or West somewhere, and
we—our family had relatives in Philadelphia, we went to
Philadelphia, my grandmother lived in Philadelphia, couple uncles,
aunts. So, we went to Philadelphia from time to time, and we saw the
difference. I mean, when we were kids, we saw the difference in the
things we could do in Philadelphia we couldn't do in our hometown. So,
we knew there was something else other than what was going on in our
[unclear]
And for college?
For college. For college.
Wow. No I hadn't heard of that.
I don't have extensive that program was—
But it to a northern school.
It took you to a northern white. And this was, the idea was, they would keep us out of their schools.
Right.
But they would let us get an education. So, it may have lasted only a
short while, but I know that that was a program. And I heard for a short
while people talking about it, because I also worked as a waiter at the
Carolina Inn, and the conversations, well, we can get into that. But
anyway, I remember hearing some person say, a white person, I don't
remember who it was, but they said, "well who won't take
that," rather than going, staying here and going to UNC, when
you can go to the University of Michigan on a scholarship. Well, all
right. Well, that gave us an opportunity to get out, but it also kept
them out. Kept us
No, that's what we're here for.
Well, I know that—in any case, I was nominated for a couple of
fellowships, when I was at North Carolina Central, and one of them was
the General Education Board, and the other was the Woodrow Wilson
Fellowship. And at the time, one of the members of the committee . . .
well, I don't want to go that far, because I—the details are a
little hazy, but at that time, my father was working, I think it was the
dental school, or one of the other schools. He was no longer at the
dormitory. He'd been moved to—one of the professors there knew
about where I was at that point and time. And he mentioned to my father,
that I had a pretty good chance. I don't think he, I don't think he did
anything but obviously he was aware of some of the things that were
going on in making that decision. So, I don't want to say that the fact
that he knew my father played any role, because I don't know that, but I
know that he did say to my father that he thought I had a fairly good
chance of getting one or the other. And in addition to that, related to
one extent, after that happened, after the decision was made, my picture
was in the newspaper. And, one of the businessmen in Chapel Hill, white
businessman in Chapel Hill, long time, born and bred in Chapel Hill, had
run a business for years and years, knew everybody, knew everything. Saw
my picture, and of course he stopped my father on the street, and said,
Go ahead.
No, no, he said, "oh I know who that is," he said, "those are the Smith N-word's." Meaning, my family origins came from a white family named Smith, which, the slave origin, was with a white family named Smith.
And that's how they would describe that—inwards. That's—
I'm sorry.
Inwards. Smith inwards—is that what you said?
No, the N word.
Ohhh, the N word. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I hope this isn't the part I have to play for my class! I'm sorry, I misunderstood what you said. Oh, okay. Oh, wow, that's a whole different—
Well, that's the was the way you knew about the family, you knew about this black family, once you've been given these details from my father.
Right.
This was somebody, I don't know if he's the unofficial historian of Chapel Hill or what.
Can you say his name?
Oh yes, yes. His name was Eubanks.
Eubanks.
He had a drug store. Eubanks drug store.
Where was that?
It was on Main Street, and it's near where, I think one of the banks is there now, it's about midway—it's across the street—between Jeff's—you know where Jeff's is? Old Jeff's?
I don't, I'm sorry.
Okay. Well, anyway, it's about in the middle of the main block of Main Street, and the theater, the Carolina Theater—
Oh, I know where that is.
It's just east of there. And there's bank, a bank building there now, and I think there might be another movie theater, and that building. There's building parking on the other side, on Rosemary Street, and so on. But it was just about—it was one of the main drug stores in town, it'd been there for years and years. And the other was Sutton's.
Sutton's.
Sutton's was there. But that's the kind of thing, that is if, people
knew about, you could say, about us, they knew about the black
community, they didn't have all the details. But they, I think, kept up
with it to a certain extent. And this was because often the people who
were working for them were from the African American community [unclear]
Well that sort of leads me to one of the areas that I'm interested in, which is, you said you walked to Lincoln, the whole time you went. Can you tell me just at that time, Chapel Hill—Chapel Hill's small now, it was even smaller then,
Oh, it was small.
About some of the kinds of the interactions you would have maybe coming to and from school. Did you ever pass white students walking to Chapel Hill school? Did you walk with other Lincoln high—?
Very seldom. Very seldom. Because the residential pattern was such that we were all—that area's called Potter's Field. And we were Potter's Field and Sunset. Students came mostly from Potter's Field and Sunset. So, whites were east of Caldwell Street. Some of them were on the eastern edge, eastern end of Caldwell Street. Airport Road. Out in that area. So I did not. Now, some of the students came from an area called Windy Hill, I don't know if you've heard about that. Okay, well, Windy Hill is east of Airport Road, and mostly, they walked from Windy Hill to school. Course they probably walked past our schools on the way to Chapel Hill High. But I did not. I mean, normally, no, we didn't see any.
Can you think of any kind of interaction that you might have had with the white students at Chapel Hill high?
Oh yes. Well we, as I said, whites were living east of Caldwell Street,
actually they were a little bit east of Church street, on the eastern
side going toward Airport Road. Wasn't quite Airport Road. And there
were a couple of time we – cowboys and Indians, we played together. And
so, that -sure, we did
So when you were younger you would play, with whites. Black and white students, children would play together.
Yes.
And then, can you remember a time maybe when that stopped? Around a certain age, or—.
Well, I don't remember specifically, but I think probably by the time we got to high school, we didn't do it very much. I think it was probably—
And do you think that was a result of just growing awareness of the differences? The racial differences?
I would think that it probably was. It probably was. But it's difficult to say that that was conscious. And on our part, we were in a position where we would accept an invitation, but we wouldn't necessarily invite them to play with us. So I think they may have made more of the decision than we did.
So, what about when you did get to high school. I didn't mean to cut you off.
From a standpoint of—
Well, were there certain events or celebrations or anything that you can remember where the students would come together from the two high schools? Or was it basically completely separated?
Well, I don't want to say completely separated, but there are very few things that I can recall we did together. Now, again I go back to the younger days. I know when I was a Cub Scout, as a Cub Scout, one of the churches, one of the white churches, and the church—the pastor of the church was a controversial individual because he—he eventually became a controversial character in Chapel Hill and I'm sure there are things written about him—Charles Jones. And he invited our Cub Scout troop to a Christmas gift exchange between a white— between our Cub Scout pack and a white cub scout pack. And that was fairly unusual, as far as I knew, that wasn't a regular thing. You did that, I think it probably worked out only that we did it at that Christmas party. I don't know if very much came of it after that. But, of course that's at the Cub Scout age, which is pre-twelve, before age twelve. Otherwise, I just don't remember very many organized things. I mean, unorganized, playing basketball somewhere in the neighborhood, and we got together, but formally between the teams, none that I have. You did—the university of course, again, because of the personal connections, the trainer, or you could say, the waterboy, for the university team was an African American, Morris Mason. And he worked out things so that the university helped us with equipment, neighborhood facilities. It's personal, his personal relationship with the coaches at the university and the administration.
Which sport did you play? Which team did play on?
Well, I tried basketball, football.
Wow, so you were class president, your senior year?
Well, student body president.
Student body president. So that was 1948, 47-48?
Actually I graduated '49.
Oh, okay. So it was 48-49. And you played basketball and football. Were you involved in other activities at Lincoln?
At a school like that people can't escape multiple—but, no, the choir, the band, the drama club—
Wow, all on top of the classes.
Well, yes. And, as I say, many of us did that, because, at my graduation, we were sitting there in rows, we got up, sang in the choir, go sit in the band, go back—
Like musical chairs.
Yes, because the school was so small.
Yes. Well, you say that you don't remember there being a lot of organized interaction between Chapel Hill and Lincoln. Do you remember how you sort of viewed Lincoln, I mean Chapel Hill high when you were in high school? Did you know about what was happening at Lincoln high? Did you care about what was happening?
You mean Chapel Hill?
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, yes. At Chapel Hill High.
Well, not to a great extend, but it was easy to see—bigger building, seeing that the facilities seemed to be much better than ours.
Did you ever go inside Chapel Hill high while you were a student?
I don't think so, I don't think I ever was in the building. I think I may have been on some of their athletic fields, outdoor, but I do not remember going into the building, but it was on Main Street, of course we saw it all the time.
So you don't remember really having a lot of knowledge about what they were doing as students or—
No, no. Not really.
Well, a couple of years after you, well, you graduated and you went to Central. What did you major in while you were there?
English.
English.
Well, I started out in business, and took a couple of courses, a couple of required courses in English and the instructor, my instructor, who was also chair of the department was also my, well he wasn't my advisor, but he told me one day, the kinds of things I was able to do, I should maybe think about changing my major. And I liked it. Reading and writing I've always enjoyed anyway, but I was looking at business more from the standpoint of, maybe this is something that would offer more opportunities than being an English teacher. But I became an English major.
So, did you become an English teacher?
Well, yes, I spent a few years teaching English. I taught for a couple of years at—I taught for a couple of years in Africa, in a French speaking country. Then I taught for a couple of years at Howard. After that, I went into the Foreign Service and spent over, well, over twenty years in the Foreign Service. I retired in 1988, and I taught from 1988-89 until a couple of years ago at another university in the Washington area, Bowie State University.
So you went to Penn for your Ph.D.
Graduate yes, Masters.
For your master's. Were you in Durham when Brown vs. the Board of Education came down in '54 or had you already—
I was in the service.
You were in the service.
I went into the service in '53, and I was in the service until '55, until 1955.
So you, well, I don't know. Did you have any reaction to that when you heard about it?
Oh yes. I had a reaction—
You obviously had younger siblings who were in school still at the time. Do you remember feeling like okay, now, it's all going to it's all going to merge together. It'll happen, now it's going to happen.
I think I can say that was my general feeling, but I also had some
misgivings about it, from the standpoint that I was no entirely sure how
it would be
Right. Right. There's been a lot discussion—in the discussion we've had in class about this sense of how important the black schools have been to the black community. At the same time, this knowledge that there's something missing, just in terms of numbers and financing, and things like that. But it had somehow transcended that and become something more important.
Well, I think that the, well, I want to say time will tell, but, I think that again, from a personal standpoint, we, meaning the North Carolina Central family, is going through that process now—where do we go from here? Because North Carolina, the state of North Carolina legislature is saying you have to justify your existence, you have to diversify, etcetera , etcetera, and many people use the example of West Virginia State University, I don't know if you're familiar with that or not.
I don't know—
Okay, West Virginia State University was an African American school, at the same time that NC Central was, but once desegregation occurred, I think now it's a predominantly white university. And of course, they're serving the area, and its history, African American, blacks, were coming from wherever to attend West Virginia State. But now, so, the good or bad, it's part of progress, but I think it's a matter of weighing which is done in extent—still questions.
Well, you know another discussion, ongoing discussion we've had in our class, and there's a bit of a disagreement among some of the people who have come in and talked to us, about whether or not Chapel Hill during segregation and desegregation was kind of typical of the South or not. Some people say well, segregation is segregation, and there's you know, that the oppression that was felt in Chapel Hill was same as it was, there's an overall quality. Other people have said though that the black community was able to fight for rights, and actually achieve some of them, long before the South in general did. What are your thoughts on that?
It's difficult for me because I wasn't there during that period.
Well, when you were there, what was your sense—
When I was there, I think when I was there, I think there was no doubt
that there was an atmosphere that seemed to be more conducive to
establishing relationships and using those relationships to help each
side. Now, what I think happens is, the problem is that some people put
limits on that without saying so
Go ahead.
Well, but it was a bit of a paternalistic approach because almost all of the African Americans in Chapel Hill were either working directly for the university, or indirectly. So the people at the university, the university we can say felt it was a global entity, felt it had enough control to do whatever it really wanted to do. So, because they felt confident of that control, they were willing to let people do a few more things they might have been able to enjoy. At that time, some people would contrast Chapel Hill with Carrboro, cause of the economic, social not quite the same level. So the people in Chapel Hill thought that they were a little more confident with where they were and their status, they didn't feel that threatened by African Americans as probably people in Carrboro. Cause people in Carrboro, not quite the same economic level, the jobs that they had, not really jobs that African Americans couldn't do. The ones in Chapel Hill probably thought that way, so they thought they had a little more leeway. And, I think that was what perhaps helped Chapel Hill more than many other cities, and you have to say, a university, people at most universities, they're more liberal in their outlook.
Well that's the sort of image of Chapel Hill that we play with when we think about how things really work. Well, can you remember when you were growing or when you were a teenager, feeling, not so much fear, did you have this sort of knowledge, this awareness of where you could go, where you couldn't go, where your limits or boundaries were because of segregation.
Oh, pretty much. Pretty much.
Was that something you talked about out loud with your family or with brothers and sisters or with your friends, or was it something that you just sort of took in?
Well, you took it in, from the standpoint that we knew these were limits we had to learn, we had to respect. And of course, we talked about it, talked about it from the standpoint of making sure that we understood exactly what they were, and where they were, and so on. But I don't think it was oppressive, from the standpoint that you're always worried about the wrong step or doing the wrong thing.
Physical danger or something.
Or going to the wrong place. Just be careful. You want to be careful. Of
course the other thing was that there were always, there really was a
clear demarcation. White entrance, colored entrance. Or
restaurant—restaurant would have tables in the front for
whites, and back entrance for blacks and black tables back there.
Was that the city? Durham?
Yes.
No, I mean you thought of it as the city.
Yeah, they had a partition down the middle of the restaurant. Blacks on this side, whites on the other side.
Do you remember what restaurant that was? I'm just curious.
Yeah, well, I don't remember the name, but I'm sure it was a Greek restaurant. A Greek who ran it. It was fast food, had hot dogs, that sort of thing.
Now your mother must have gone to Durham a lot if she worked for Mutual.
Oh yes, yes.
So you went back and forth a lot between Durham.
Yes, well, there were times, almost every weekend, because for shopping. There was just not that much of a choice in Chapel Hill, so.
I'm curious also sort of about the differences between what students learned in, at Chapel Hill and at Lincoln. I wonder, when you were at Lincoln, did you take anything like African American history or did you read African American literature? Did you feel that there was a sense of trying to give you a sense of history, and teach you. You said your mom used to point out to you when there was step in the color—
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
(he was talking about taking African American history) . . .it was a week. So, there was that. I don't think we had any classes as such. But during that week, of course during that week, of course there were events, library exhibits and so on that made a special effort to let us know about things there. Definitely.
Did you read African American authors? While you were in school?
Well, yes. One of my classmates did a—it was a regular presentation that she did. Either Langston Hughes or Countee Cullen. And she would do it, she would memorize it and she would act it out on stage. And of course, she was very good at it, very good.
Well you said you were, I'm sorry I didn't mean to interrupt. You said you were in the Drama club. What sort of plays would you do?
We did some one acts, some three. Usually, I think probably, we would say, straight forward, slice of life kinds of things.
Musicals? Did you ever do musicals?
No.
No?
Well, musicals we probably did probably very early, first grade, second
grade, third grade that kind of thing. I didn't do any musicals myself
in high school, I know. One of the things I did in high school, was a,
it wasn't Thomas Wolfe but it was a kind of You Can't Go Home Again,
where a guy leaves his home town, goes to the big city, doctor,
physician, well known, comes back
Oh wow. Now when you did things like that, did you ever do that with the chorus or anything else? Go to a state wide—or with the athletic team, go to a statewide competition?
Well, a couple of things—the basketball team played in some tournaments at state, or regional tournaments. The football, no, but the band, the band was fairly new when I was, I think the band started when I was probably a junior or a sophomore, so we'd only been a couple of years. I was only there a couple of years with the band. But the band, I don't remember that the band went anywhere. I once went to what was suppose to be a statewide competition to become a member of a band representing the state of North Carolina. And we would have gone, if I had been selected, would have gone to Tuskegee, for what I think was then called the New Farmers of America. But that was the year we had a polio outbreak in North Carolina. And they cancelled all kinds of things like that—kids getting together.
Well, do you remember those events, like say, plays and concerts and football games and things like that, was there, were those important to the general African American community in Chapel Hill, would you say?
Oh, very much. Very much.
Even people that who didn't have children or who had older children. Was that, those were community events?
Oh yes, very much so. And I think that the athletics always attracts
people. Attracted people who had played themselves or had kids on the
team, but I think the others because it was an opportunity to watch a
game and so on. And I think the plays especially because not that many
of us had that many of us had much of an opportunity to go to the
theater. So even though it was their kids, or maybe they had a kid or
maybe they didn't, but they did get to see a play, so I think that
attracted them in a large [unclear]
Do you remember if the white community ever came to those events? At all, just as spectators? To the sporting events even?
I think some of them may have come say to the football games, cause football obviously is outdoors. I think we have had a few people there. Basketball, indoors, I don't think, I don't recall.
So it really was sort of an insulated community event.
Yes, yes.
Do you think there was—this may be speculation asking you this
question, but do you think that the rest of Chapel Hill, the white
community, understood what was going on in the black community? Or not?
Do you think that they were generally interested in what was going on or
do you feel like there might have been, I guess a better way to say it
is—a little bit of freedom there to, sort
Difficult to say. Difficult to say. I think though that you go back to this idea, that practically everyone in the black community—
Was connected—
Was connected either directly or indirectly to the university. And I think many of the people did, say ask, how the families were doing, and I think they had a general idea of what that family was doing. Now, some of them probably went into more specifics to try and get an idea what that family was doing in the context of the black community and say, have kind of a picture of what was going on in the black community. But, I would have to say, people who had probably more interest than anybody else—law enforcement. They probably wanted to know. At that time, no black was on the police force, so they probably wanted to keep up with the kinds of things that were going on.
Do you think that that worked both ways? Do you think that the African American community had a sense of what was going on in the white community?
Oh, I think they did, yes, I think they did. Because again—
You had to—
Well in a way, yes, you had to, but from the standpoint that domestic
servants—some people, perhaps occasionally, that the servant
doesn't really understand what we're saying or what we're doing. But,
often, the servant does.
Right. Right. Well you said that you worked for a while at the North Carolina Inn yourself. Did you experience that while you were there? That sort of, hearing and knowing what was going on or being—
Yes, that's what I was saying. That's what I meant a while ago because a couple of time maybe the political discussions of what we need to do and so on, and this waiter doesn't know, he's not paying attention to us. Or they don't even see the waiter. Yes, have you read Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison?
I've read it several times.
It's that same kind of thing. Well, that's not exclusive to whites or anyone else, but I think in the southern, I think we can say at one point in the South.
It was like that. Well, I wanted to ask you, just sort of a few more questions about life at Lincoln. What do you remember as or who do you remember as your favorite teacher? Or a beloved teacher who was there that you might—
Well there were several, but one that really stands out is Mrs. Turner. I don't know if you've heard that, in reference to her—
Vaguely.
Okay. She was the English teacher. She was also the French teacher. She
was also the Drama Club advisor, and she certainly encouraged me from
the standpoint of writing and academics in general. And we stayed in
touch after I graduated. I went to see her after she retired, we
corresponded until her death
So did she stay in touch with a lot of the students after they left? Do you know?
I don't know about a lot, but I think she did stay in touch with several. I think she did stay in touch with several. And she was available, or she let it be known that she was available to those who would come to see her or would get in touch with her. When she retired, she moved to Raleigh. She had come to Chapel Hill from Raleigh, because she, I think it was her husband who was either a professor or a dean or maybe the president of Shaw. My memory fails me exactly but, you know, she had had a long relationship with Shaw and she went back to Raleigh after she retired.
Well, you were, president of the student body, which says to me that you must have been very well known among the students probably, knew everybody, knew what was going on. Can you tell me a little bit about what was going on at Shaw (meant to say Lincoln). What it a cliquey place, were there a lot of groups, or was there a general feeling of everyone knows everyone and everyone's friends with everyone, or, were the athletics in one group and the really smart kids in another?
No, I don't think so, I think, I have to think about it a moment. But I
don't
It'd be like, you and me—do you remember how many students were in your graduating class?
We were in the twenties, twenty-two or twenty-three.
So, did you have a lot of interaction with the other grades and students. For example, would high school students ever do something with the elementary kids, or help them or tutor them or anything like that.
Not a great deal, I don't think. I don't remember any organized program. I think we were always available if someone were to ask us something specific, but that's, we can say, just from the general perspective. But I didn't, I don't want to say I didn't have any choice, but all of my siblings were younger, so I probably helped them or be available to them when they were in elementary school.
What about your parents? Were they very involved with what was going on at school?
Very much so. Very much so.
Was there pretty much an open line of communication between the teachers and the parents and the community?
Yes, yes.
Did that keep you in line? Keep the students in line, to a certain extent?
Yes, that the community, really. Because, we can say, everybody knew
May I ask you, what church you went to, while you lived there?
I was at St. Paul AME.
I'm not sure where that is.
Well, it's on again, Main Street by the car wash.
Oh, okay, I know where that is.
Crook's Corner.
Oh, love Crook's Corner! Love Crook's Corner!
Yeah. It's right across the street from there.
Okay, well let me think, is there anything I haven't asked you about, that you want to talk about?
I don't think so, excuse me, I made a couple of notes, after your email. (PAUSE)
Well, actually, let me ask you one more thing, I may be digressing, but I'm just really interested in how life moved on under segregation. When students from Lincoln High would on dates, say, where would you go?
Oh, well—
I'm sure you had dances and proms and things like that—
Yes, dances and proms. We had a community center. You know the history of that, it was built—the African American community began building it just before World War II. During World War II, the Navy used the university for naval pre-flight training. The Navy had a band, which was African American. All of them were African Americans. They needed a place to house that band. Couldn't put them on the campus, so they asked us, if you give us permission to house our band in the building, we'll finish it for you. And they finished it. And after the war, it became a community center. But even while the band was there, the band made it a kind of a community center. They were open to us, the African American community. And after the war, of course we used it, and we've been using it since then. And there were dances and parties and so on there. The other thing was we had an African American movie theater in Carrboro. Well, it was on the line. Again the car wash, leaving the car wash going west on the right is an import car garage, anyway, before you get to the intersection of Rosemary and Main Street, right along there was an African American movie theater.
So—
Which was owned and operated by whites.
Oh, really?
One of my cousins was the manager.
Wow. Did they movies at the same time that the other theater would? I
I don't think so. I think it was probably a little later. But the main thing was that Friday and Saturday, cowboys and Indians. One of the first movies I saw there was the original Imitation of Life. I remember seeing that. But I don't think they got the first run.
I'm sure getting my second wind now, but I won't keep you over, so just let me know if we need to stop. But, you know, a lot of what scholars and historians and people who think about segregation talk about as one of the, or cite as one of the important, kinds of cultural tools that African Americans had was music and performing arts, you know, more cultural sort of things. Do you remember what kind of music you listened to when you were in high school? Did you buy records? Was there a place where you could go buy records?
Oh yes. I don't think I bought a great many, but there was a place there where you could buy them. I had a 45 collection, and probably the most that it was in high school was and it continued while I was in college, was, we had some 78s. We played them on the Victrolla at home, and of course you had the radio.
What kind of music was it? Was it jazz or blues?
A good bit of jazz, but I also had some opera, I had Carmen. I had heard those, so some of those. And a good bit of it was jazz. Jazz started more in college than when I was in high school.
Do you remember, did you have a television while you were growing up?
Well, growing up, again—
Or do you remember getting a television?
I remember we did get a television, yes.
Do you remember when that was?
I don't remember the year, but I know that, it goes back to probably the beginnings of Ed Sullivan, Jackie Gleason, I remember especially watching Jackie Gleason. And Milton Berle.
Do you remember seeing African Americans on television at all? And that being a huge deal?
Well yes. I think—
That was one of the things your mother pointed out to you.
Yes, because the specifics was, the June Taylor dancers, with Jackie Gleason, when they had their first black dancer. She would point her out to us. And I don't know what year that was. And of course, Nat King Cole had a show, but that was fairly late.
I think that was in the 50s.
And of course, on the radio, we used to listen to Jack Benny, because of
[unclear]
Wow. So you would listen to those radio serials that they had.
Oh yes, the serials. But the other thing, a couple of Robert Penn Warren
pieces were done on the radio. One regular radio show, I think it might
have
Was that something students would do? Was that something that kids would do together, was listen to those shows? Or was that just—
Well, I think some of them would, but you know, also at that time, the soaps began. Many of them were regular soap opera—
Listeners. Not watchers.
No, listeners, listeners.
No, to the radio. When they were on the radio. One other thing that struck me, at the beginning of the interview you said that you had family that lived in the North, in Philadelphia, your grandmother, and you went to see her and you could tell differences from the South.
Yes.
Can you talk a little bit about what those were specifically, or maybe if there was one particular thing that stood out in your mind as "wow, this is different here." We don't have this at home.
One thing was, the amusement park outside Philadelphia, which is, it was
Woodside Park, I think. And we would go to that park and get on any ride
that we wanted to, at any time. Carnivals would come to Chapel Hill, for
two or three days or a week or whatever, and I don't remember that the
carnivals really segregated—we got on the Ferris wheel, we got
the ride or whatever, but I think
Really? Did anything happen?
Nothing happened. Nobody was there.
You were alone?
No, I think I was with somebody at the time.
Did they say something to you, do you remember?