Kenneth Norton remembers being a student at the segregated Ada Jenkins School in Davidson, North Carolina, in the 1930s.

Sam Holton explains his role in the desegregation of Chapel Hill schools during his tenure on the school board from 1968 to 1974.

Robert Yost discusses coaching chess and teaching English at West Charlotte High School in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Martha Cooley describes her childhood in rural Granville County, North Carolina, during the early part of the twentieth century.

A white student reflects on race and racism at West Charlotte High School.

Former West Charlotte student muses about the school and the uncertain legacies of integration.

J. W. Mask describes his stewardship of a segregated black high school and his struggle to provide his students with adequate resources.

Charlene Regester assesses the costs to blacks of school integration in Chapel Hill.

Environmentalist MaVynee Betsch remembers her childhood in an African American neighborhood in Jacksonville, Florida, and her experiences with segregation and development.

Barbara Lorie describes her experiences and teaching philosophy as a teacher at newly integrated, racially charged schools in North Carolina.

George Miller describes his career as a black administrator in desegregated schools.

Marguerite Tolbert worked throughout her life as an educator in South Carolina public schools and universities for adult education. She describes her education and high school graduation through stories from her book, South Carolina's Distinguished Women from Laurens County. She recounts how she earned a scholarship to Winthrop College and met her teaching colleagues Wil Lou Gray and Dr. D. B. Johnson; describes local activism for women's suffrage between 1914 and 1920; and recalls encounters with leaders, including President Hoover and Jane Addams. She concludes by discussing the controversy at Winthrop College over a discrepancy in female teachers' salaries.

Geraldine Ray has lived in Barnardsville, North Carolina, nearly her entire life. In this interview, she describes growing up on her family's farm, attending all-black schools, and caring for sick relatives and friends. She describes racial segregation as a problem that seemed less difficult to avoid than segregation and prejudice between local black residents. Geraldine learned several essential skills of farm life from her grandmother and then used them to support the family through illness. The interview concludes with a description of her husband—a childhood friend—and how they chose to raise their children.

One of the first African American students to attend Chapel Hill High School discusses his continuing ambivalence about integration and its effect on the black community.

Tawana Belinda Wilson-Allen recalls her community activist work and her service as a congressional liaison for Congressman Mel Watt. She assesses the tensions between lower-income and wealthier residents in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Activist, leftist, poet, and ordained minister Don West remembers a lifetime of union and civil rights activism.