Annetta Streeter Gary

HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mrs. Annetta Streeter Gary for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. I'm Dr. Horace Huntley. We're presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Today is June 4, 1998. Mrs. Gary, I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come and sit and talk with me about the movement and really Birmingham today. Welcome to the Institute.

GARY: Thank you.

HUNTLEY: Let me just ask you. Were you born in Birmingham?

GARY: Yes, I was born in Birmingham.

HUNTLEY: Were your parents born in Birmingham?

GARY: Yes, my parents were born in Birmingham also.

HUNTLEY: What part of town did you live in while you were growing up?

GARY: The majority of my youth was spent in Titusville.

HUNTLEY: In Titusville?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters do you have?

GARY: I have two sisters. I'm the older of three.

HUNTLEY: Now your mother and father, what about their education? How much education did they have?

GARY: My mother was a graduate of Tuskegee Institute and my father completed two years at Miles College.

HUNTLEY: What kind of work did they do?

GARY: My mother was a youth director for the Y, for the Black YWCA. My father was a barber, self employed.

HUNTLEY: Where was his barber shop?

GARY: In West End on Long Boulevard.

HUNTLEY: Oh, is that right? Where on Long Boulevard?

GARY: 800 Long Boulevard, I think Taco Bell is right next to that area now.

HUNTLEY: 800 Long?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Is that down near the hospital?

GARY: Right, exactly, the parking lot sits right...

HUNTLEY: Oh, yeah, ok. Tell me do you remember your first grade teacher?

GARY: I went to Catholic School in the first grade.

HUNTLEY: What school?

GARY: St. Mary's in Fairfield.

HUNTLEY: What kind of memories do you have of your elementary school years?

GARY: Fourth grade I was allowed to transfer to public education. I went to Washington Elementary School where W. C. Madison was my principal. A very fine man. I have several teachers that I remember during that time. Ms. Towns, who was my eighth grade teache; Ms. Baldwin, who was my 7th grade teacher; Ms. 00:03:00Boones, my sixth grade teacher. Those are just some of the ones that come to mind.

HUNTLEY: Do you remember any of the nuns that taught you in those first few years?

GARY: Not by name, but I remember the experience. At that time Catholic Schools were very, very strict and at one time I thought I wanted to be a nun.

HUNTLEY: Oh, is that right?

GARY: Yes, because of the influence of the teachers. I knew at a very, very early age that I wanted to be a teacher. Then that kind of runs in my family also. I'm from a family of educators.

HUNTLEY: Right, right. Your mother was a graduate of Tuskegee. Did you go to Tuskegee?

GARY: No, I was the first one in my family that chose to go somewhere else.

HUNTLEY: Is that right?

GARY: I'm a graduate of Miles. I graduated from Miles in 1970, then I did further studies at UAB. I got my masters from UAB.

HUNTLEY: Now, in those early days you went to Catholic School. What was the transition like from Catholic School to the public schools?

GARY: One difference was I was used to White teachers. When I was in Catholic School none of my teachers were Black. All of them were White nuns. When I went to the public school it was completely different.

HUNTLEY: All of them were Black?

GARY: All of them were Black.

HUNTLEY: What kind of difference did that make?

GARY: Well, I was looking out the eyes of little people so...

HUNTLEY: Oh, yes. I understand.

GARY: So, it didn't make a lot of difference.

HUNTLEY: What about the school itself? Was Washington a lot larger than St. Mary's?

GARY: Yes, Washington was larger. Classrooms, even at that time the classrooms were larger... the number of children in the classroom. I remember when I first started at St. Mary's we were living in Powderly Hill and we rode the school bus. We made a move to Titusville and we had to walk across from Titusville to over to 3rd Avenue to catch the bus to go to St. Mary's . We would pass Elyton Elementary School. My father would always say, "One day Black children will be 00:06:00able to go to Washington."

HUNTLEY: You mean to Elyton?

GARY: To Elyton.

HUNTLEY: Because Elyton was an all White school.

GARY: Right, right, but we didn't see that.

HUNTLEY: You didn't see that, that would ever be a possibility that you would be able to go to Elyton schools.

GARY: No.

HUNTLEY: In walking from Titusville to 3rd Avenue, that was a pretty good distance.

GARY: That was a long walk.

HUNTLEY: Did your father walk with you everyday?

GARY: Well, from the beginning they would, but from the beginning my mother or father would walk us across to 3rd Avenue, but then...there was two of us going, my sister also went. Finally, they let us do it alone.

HUNTLEY: After you had become accustomed to that walk.

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: Now, at Washington School, being a larger school. Did that have any 00:07:00impact upon, again, you're viewing this from the eyes of a child. Were there any differences in the instruction or differences in the ways that you were treated?

GARY: No, we were treated with love at Washington. We were like a family. I guess the same thing was true for St. Mary's. I do remember that, at St. Mary's, we had more equipment than we did at Washington. My instructions I don't feel were any less.

HUNTLEY: Do you know why your parents decided to send you to Washington school?

GARY: Because after we moved to Titusville the majority of the kids in the 00:08:00neighborhood were going to Washington and, of course, we had a fit. We wanted to go to Washington. As you said it was a long walk across from Titusville across to 3rd Avenue. That was a good little walk. So, I think it was a number of reasons that we were allowed to transfer.

HUNTLEY: Then after Washington where did you go?

GARY: To Ullman High School.

HUNTLEY: Ullman High School.

GARY: George Bell was my principal. I have one teacher that really stands out in my mind.

That's Ms. Odessa Woolfolk. She was my 11th grade American History teacher and my 12th grade World History teacher. We had...she was a little woman that made a 00:09:00big impact on my life.

HUNTLEY: Why were you so impressed with Ms. Woolfolk?

GARY: First of all she is a very, very intelligent woman. She was able to, I mean her classes were...she made them so life-like. Like you were there. She was just a good instructor. I remember that was during the civil rights movement. A lot of teachers, after they found out that I had gone to jail, they did not look to highly on that. Ms. Woolfolk made a big to do about it. She made me feel like a hero. It was just her demeanor. The way she treated us, it was like we were a 00:10:00part of her. I know a lot of things she could not say and not do because her job was at stake. She would just casually turn her head and pretend she didn't know what was going on.

HUNTLEY: Let me just ask you about the neighborhood and growing up in Titusville. What kind of community was it?

GARY: Ok, Titusville was a middle-class community for Blacks. We had teachers, doctors. It was a good community for Blacks at that time.

HUNTLEY: What part of Titusville did you live?

GARY: I lived right off of Goldwire.

HUNTLEY: Birmingham in the 50s, 60s was termed the most segregated city in the country. What was it like growing up in Birmingham at that time?

GARY: In the 50s I can often remember going to movies with my father on Sundays. No one would be on the bus but us but, yet, we had to go to the back of the bus. We were very inquisitive girls and we wanted to know why. I never will forget...I guess I had to have been about 11 or 12 years old, maybe not quite 00:12:00that old. We got up on the bus on 6th Avenue, on downtown, to the movie. My daddy decided that we weren't going to sit on the back of the bus that day. He got us and he sat us up in the front. He sat there with us. The bus driver pulled over right there where Annie P's Store used to be. He pulled over and he told my father that either he was going to move back or he was going to call the police. I remember there were several older women on the bus and they told my daddy that you don't do anything like that when you have children with you.

HUNTLEY: Like when...

GARY: Right. They kind of chastised him because we were crying. We were kind of 00:13:00upset. All we knew was that the bus driver was going to call the police on our daddy. It was very, very devastating to us. So he got us and he moved us back to the back of the bus. The bus driver went on. He never did call the police. My daddy often told us that we could have made history if ya'll wouldn't have cried.

HUNTLEY: Yes.

GARY: We were so young and we did not understand. It was a thing in our house where my mother and father always taught us that regardless of the color of our skin or our race, because you can look at the color of my skin and see that, unless you just knew that I was Black, you would not be able to tell. But they always taught us that we were as good as the next man. This was the way that we 00:14:00were taught. We were from a loving family. A family that did not think that race should have been an issue.

HUNTLEY: Were both your mother and father light skinned?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Were there any problems as a result of you being so light skinned and living in a Black community?

GARY: Right, right. You know especially with me being so involved in the civil rights movement it would really, really hurt my feelings when my good friends would get angry. As long as we were ok it was fine, but when they would get angry they would call me half White or something like that. It really, really bothered me as a child. Like I said we had parents that were able to sit me down 00:15:00and explain that we don't control our color. That's just like the White man holding us down because we are Black. We are not in control of our color. Like I said, my mother and my father were both light skinned. My genes, I had no choice but to be light complected. Yes it was always as a child and even now I have people to question me about my race.

HUNTLEY: I know that there were people that were lighter skinned that actually went to the Alabama Theater. One of the things that I always wanted to do. I wanted to go to the Alabama, but never could, but I had friends who would pass and they actually went to the Alabama Theater. Did you ever do anything such as that?

GARY: No, I mean that was something that was just, I was just [inaudible] about. I wanted...I was Black and it was no doubt about it in my mind. Regardless of what others said, you know. No, never had any desires to pass. I have not ever had problems with my heritage.

HUNTLEY: You never thought about using that to your advantage just to get back at White folk by going into something that you know, as a Black person, you never would have been able to, but because they would not know it you never thought about doing that?

GARY: No. Ironically, I was one of the first to go to the Alabama Theater after the civil rights laws were passed.

HUNTLEY: Ullman was a real institution and there was always this big rivalry 00:17:00between Ullman and Parker. Why did you decide to go to Ullman rather than go to Parker? I know that there were some that lived in Titusville that did go to Parker.

GARY: I guess, maybe, because I went to Washington. The majority of my classmates went to Ullman. I had enrolled for Parker and at the last moment decided I was going to go to Ullman. I have no regrets.

HUNTLEY: How did you get involved with the movement?

GARY: I was in a Social and Savings Club at the time. Charmettes, no, I'm sorry, that wasn't the club that I was in, the Peace Ponies.

HUNTLEY: The Peace Ponies?

GARY: The Peace Ponies, not because of the movement, that was just the name of 00:18:00our little club.

HUNTLEY: Do you remember why you named it the Peace Ponies?

GARY: No I don't. I don't remember how we came up with that name., I do remember there were eight of us.

HUNTLEY: Girls and boys?

GARY: Just girls. We were 10th and 11th graders. They were all from Titusville. All of us grew up right around.

HUNTLEY: Like a social and savings club.

GARY: Yes. The first time...the way we got involved we came to a couple rallies over at Sixteenth Street Baptist Church.

HUNTLEY: The group?

GARY: The group, the club. Then we got so that we were following the movement around.

HUNTLEY: Why did you decide to go the first time that you went? How did that happen?

GARY: I really don't remember exactly why we went to that first meeting. I know after we went to that first meeting we decided that this was something that we were going to do as a project, our club. We would go to the meetings, to the rallies, on Saturdays they would have training. We would come to the training.

HUNTLEY: So, you went to the mass meetings regularly?

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: How would you describe a mass meeting?

GARY: I remember the first time I heard Dr. King speak. It was as if he was hypnotizing you. I would look around and the people in the audience and even as 00:20:00young teenagers, my other friends and I we would just be...when we would leave out of the meeting, you know it was just like we needed to do something right then. We were sitting back and we could hardly wait until they started the demonstrations. Like I said, we were going to the training. Tell you another adult that would pick us up and take us. She was a friend of my mother, Lucinda B. Roberson. Ms. Roberson would take us down, on Saturdays, to the meetings if we didn't have a way.

HUNTLEY: So, this then simple became a part of you.

GARY: A part.

HUNTLEY: You look forward to doing it and it appears that if that had been ended 00:21:00prematurely you would have missed that part of your life.

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: Now you went to the training sessions. What were training sessions like?

GARY: They were...I remember Jose, I can't think of his name.

HUNTLEY: From Atlanta?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: I have a friend named Jose Nixon, but I know who you're talking about. I'll think about it.

GARY: Ok. Well, he was one of the ones that was training us. What we would do, they would talk to us about non-violence. How, regardless of what someone did to 00:22:00you then, you were to just resist them.

HUNTLEY: You were to resist them or you were not to resist them?

GARY: You were not to resist them. They also showed us how...we made signs. They talked to us about what we were to say when we were arrested, if we were arrested. At that time a lot of parents lost their jobs because children were participating.

HUNTLEY: Did you know anybody personally that lost their job?

GARY: No, I didn't know anybody personally, but I was told that.

HUNTLEY: In the meetings, the mass meeting?

GARY: Right, in the mass meetings they would have different ones, that had already been arrested, come up and tell their stories and tell what had happened 00:23:00to them.

HUNTLEY: You said you were really impressed by Dr. King.

GARY: Really impressed by Dr. King.

HUNTLEY: Did you see him more than once?

GARY: More than once, I cannot count the number of times that I've seen Dr. King. I tell my children that at school a lot of times people who were not involved in the movement, you know after everything was over with then, of course, Dr. King became a hero to them. But he was a hero to me even before this. It was just something about him. I knew that he was God sent. That meant a whole lot.

HUNTLEY: Do you remember your first demonstration?

GARY: Yes. Well, the first demonstration I was involved in, I was not arrested. 00:24:00It was on...it was during a time when Dr. King was in the county jail. We went, there wasn't very many of us, we went down along with some preachers. I guess it was a group about 25- 30, somewhere in there, it wasn't a very large group. We went down and we kneeled on the steps and the preachers prayed and we sung. I never will forget that the fire chief came up, but for whatever reason they did not do anything. They just stood by the side. They did not do anything on that particular day. It was on a Sunday. They didn't do anything. After we prayed we 00:25:00disbanded. I think it was maybe the next Saturday that I was arrested for the first time.

HUNTLEY: What were the circumstances of your arrest?

GARY: We marched down, we left Sixteenth Street, no, no, let me take that back. We were dropped on 3rd Avenue right there by Loveman's and we marched from that corner up to the alley that was in between Loveman's and Newberry's. That is where we were picked up. We were taken to Jefferson County.

HUNTLEY: Did you have signs?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: What were the signs saying?

GARY: Freedom Today, Tomorrow.

HUNTLEY: Had you all planned to march? Or were you just going into Newberry's?

GARY: What we were trying to do was to keep people from going in. We were marching because that was after they refused to let Blacks eat at the lunch counter in Newberry's. What we were doing was picketing so that Blacks would not go into Newberry's.

HUNTLEY: So when you were arrested what do you remember about the arrest?

GARY: I remember when we were taken to the county jail. We were fingerprinted; they took our pictures, then they began to question us. They asked our name. 00:27:00Well, let me go back a step. The first thing that was asked of me when I got up there, the matron, the police matron or whatever she was called, looked at me and said, "What are you doing in here?" I said, "I want my freedom." She just laughed, that was so funny to her. When I said I was Black she called several other people in to see me. At that time I was a little girl with long pigtails, you know. She just had no idea that I was Black. What they did, they separated us. They took the ones with my complexion, I guess almost down to your complexion. They put us in a separate group from the rest of them. They put us in a day room that had no facilities for sleeping or anything like that. It just 00:28:00had a big iron table and iron benches. They said that's where the prisoners would come during the day.

They put the others back in the cells.

HUNTLEY: So, they separated you by color?

GARY: By color.

HUNTLEY: So, the darker ones they put in cells, is that right?

GARY: That's right.

HUNTLEY: That's interesting. Every time I interview somebody I find out something a little bit different. I've never heard that before.

GARY: Yes, they did. This was at Jefferson County jail. Not many children went to Jefferson County. This was before D-Day, before May 3rd. It was in the later part of April, maybe about the middle of April.

HUNTLEY: How long did you remain in jail?

GARY: I was arrested on Saturday morning and I stayed until Monday night.

HUNTLEY: What was it like?

GARY: It was an experience that just can't be...you know, I remember the closing of the doors. Those doors closing. I really thought, my mother and father told me that I was too young and all of this. I think they were more worried about us getting hurt.

HUNTLEY: Your safety.

GARY: Right. Like I said earlier my father definitely believed in integration. It was just he didn't want to see us hurt. I kind of thought at the time that maybe they were right.

HUNTLEY: While you were there?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: So, you had second thoughts about it?

GARY: I had second thoughts. We had one matron that came on in the evening shift that was not so bad as those other jailers or whatever they were called.

HUNTLEY: Now, were they Black or White?

GARY: They were White.

HUNTLEY: And they were tough?

GARY: They were tough. The food, could not eat the food, period. There was no way to eat the food. They had us scrubbing, gave us rags to scrub along the front of the cells. If you were too loud or whatever, you were given extra duties, extra things to do.

HUNTLEY: Now how many people were in the day room with you? Was there a large...

GARY: It was a large day room. It wasn't but about...the eight of us, my club members also.

HUNTLEY: All of you were together?

GARY: All of us yes. All of us went.

HUNTLEY: So, all of you were light skinned?

GARY: No, all of us were not in the dayroom.

HUNTLEY: Oh, ok.

GARY: The eight of us, when I was trying to figure out how many children were locked up that day. I guess it might have been about 20 of us. Eight of them were my club members and myself. No, I take that back there were seven of us because we had one that didn't go the first time. In the day room I guess there might have been about eight of us.

HUNTLEY: Were there beds in there?

GARY: No.

HUNTLEY: No beds.

GARY: There was just a table.

HUNTLEY: Where did you sleep?

GARY: What happened was that at night when the night matron came on--remember that I said

she was nicer to us. She allowed us to bunk up with the ones that were in the back. So, what we did was kind of double up so that everybody could have somewhere to sleep.

HUNTLEY: You were there until Monday?

GARY: Monday night.

HUNTLEY: Monday night. What were the circumstances of your release?

GARY: They came up, the civil rights movement had gotten people to put their houses up. They came up and called our name. I had on a new sweater. I ran off and left that sweater.

HUNTLEY: Never looked back.

GARY: Never looked back.

HUNTLEY: It sounds like you were glad to hear your name called.

GARY: I was glad to hear my name called.

HUNTLEY: Did they take you home after you were released? Or did you go back to the movement to a meeting?

GARY: We went, I think we went to a meeting the next night because it was so late that night we went home. Then we reported to the meeting and this time we went to Bethel Baptist Church over in Collegeville, Fred Shuttlesworth's church. We gave an account of what had happened to us at that time.

HUNTLEY: In the meantime now, you went to school Monday morning. No, you didn't get out until Monday night.

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: So, you went to school Tuesday morning?

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: Now, what was that reception like? I know you mentioned that there were some teachers, like Odessa. What about the students?

GARY: They were real interested about what had happened. You been to jail, you know. We were 15, 16 years old and it was impressive to them. We had several 00:34:00kids that were beginning to become involved in the movement. This was, like I said, before D-Day. Well, in my class it was not as many, because I was in an accelerated class and for what- ever reason the kids in that class did not participate like other students at Ullman High School.

HUNTLEY: D-Day, did you go to school that morning?

GARY: I went to school.

HUNTLEY: Tell me about that. How did that day start?

GARY: Ok.

HUNTLEY: Wait, before you tell me about the day. Tell me about the night before.

GARY: The night before we had gone to the demonstrations and they had told us 00:35:00that they were going to come around to various schools and they encouraged us to go to school. Because a lot of kids were talking about just not going to school. That was not the effect that they wanted. They wanted you to go to school and then...so we could really help to turn the children out of school. I remember, as the day wore on, no one showed up. We're thinking, what's going on. It was like we...

HUNTLEY: No one from the movement showed up?

GARY: Right. Finally they got over to Ullman. I think it was about 1,000 and something children that came out of Ullman High School on that day. You know, when I think about it, I had never just really thought about that day until you asked that question. I can remember, now, the feeling, you know, it was just 00:36:00like it's here, it's about to happen, you know. And the joy of seeing all of these children coming out to participate in the movement. It's a feeling that you just can't describe.

HUNTLEY: One of those feelings that you enjoyed it so much, that there's just not words to describe it.

GARY: Exactly.

HUNTLEY: What did the teachers and Mr. Bell do that day?

GARY: Mr. Bell was running around like a chicken with his head cut off. Mr. Bell did not want us to leave that school. One teacher, like I said, Ms. Woolfolk, turned like she did not see. Ms. Goree was another teacher that acted as if she did not see. Now we had a number of teachers that told us we were wrong. That we 00:37:00were breaking laws and we were putting our parents' jobs in jeopardy. That we would be penalized.

HUNTLEY: That didn't stop you?

GARY: That did not stop us.

HUNTLEY: So, then you left Ullman in mass and marched where?

GARY: We went down, we came down to Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. They were going out in groups. We went out in groups. As soon as one group cleared then another group. The idea was that they were not going to be able to, they did not have enough police to stop.

HUNTLEY: All those number of people.

GARY: Exactly. Kelly Ingram Park, as far as you could see was just people, people everywhere. Which was a difference because, like I said, when we first started, the first couple of demonstrations that I took part in, there were 15 to 20 people. So, that was...

HUNTLEY: The children had not been enlisted when you first started.

GARY: Right. Well, they were using the college students at that time, Miles College students.

HUNTLEY: Then when they started to get all of the high school and junior high school students involved, that's what overwhelmed the city.

GARY: Exactly.

HUNTLEY: Jose Williams, was who you were talking about.

GARY: Jose Williams.

HUNTLEY: Who came to Ullman that day?

GARY: Jose Williams.

HUNTLEY: Jose did?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Explain to me, if you can remember, what it was like leaving Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in the group of folk that you left with. What did you see and how did that impact upon you?

GARY: Leaving out of the basement because that's where we left from, down in the basement. As we came out and we had our signs and all, I remember that I started crying. When I looked up and saw all of the people, I guess it was just the idea of what was about to take place. The things that we had heard about, that Dr. King had talked about. How the movement was just moving forward. It was just overwhelming.

HUNTLEY: Were your club members with you that day?

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: Were all of you together?

GARY: No, we were separated. I think it was two, three or four of us together in one group and three or four in another.

HUNTLEY: When you got out onto the street what did you do?

GARY: We went around the corner and I guess that must have been 17th Street. We got right around the corner from 17th Street, that was when the water hose met us.

HUNTLEY: Were you hit with the water?

GARY: Yes. By me being small I was one of the first ones in line along with one of my club members, Jackie Rep. We had been taught, that if they put the water 00:41:00hose on you, to sit down and cover your face so that the pressure of the water would not hurt your eyes. We were taught to sit down and if we balled up into balls, then the water would not hurt as much. But that was not so. That water washed the two of us, I can remember us balling up, hugging together and the water just washing us down the street.

HUNTLEY: And you were sitting?

GARY: Sitting and balled up and the water just washed us down the street.

HUNTLEY: Forceful?

GARY: Forceful. It was like pins maybe, sticking you in your arms and legs and things. Water was very, very forceful.

HUNTLEY: Did you then find yourself, eventually, getting up and then going back to the church?

GARY: Going back to the church. What I did was to leave the church and go home and changed clothes. My other club member did not leave and she was arrested on that day. She was arrested again on that day.

HUNTLEY: Oh, she had been arrested with you before?

GARY: Right.

HUNTLEY: She got arrested again prior to getting back to the church?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Did you know that she had been arrested before you got back?

GARY: No, I didn't know until I got back. I thought she was going...I looked up and saw my parents. My parents had come down and, like I said, I went home to change clothes because I was soaked.

HUNTLEY: Did you come back?

GARY: Came back down.

HUNTLEY: Did your parents bring you back down?

GARY: They brought me back.

HUNTLEY: They were apprehensive...

GARY: They were apprehensive, but ,yet, they knew that this was something that I truly believed in. I guess they felt like, well, she's been to jail before so...

HUNTLEY: Were they involved? Were your parents involved?

GARY: No more than like I told you. My father had us to sit on that seat. No, they did not.

HUNTLEY: Did they attend any of the mass meetings?

GARY: Yes, they began to attend the mass meetings after the first time I was arrested. Then they began to attend the meetings, because the day that the water was put on me, they did not even know that I had come down. They just happened 00:44:00to be standing out around.

HUNTLEY: Oh, so they were not aware, you did not tell them that you were going down there that day?

GARY: No, I did not tell them that I was going that day. They took me home and I changed clothes and they brought me back downtown.

HUNTLEY: Were you ever arrested again after that first time?

GARY: No, I was never arrested again. I tried, especially when all my other club members were in jail, because all of the others managed to get arrested on D-Day for the second time.

HUNTLEY: Do you remember the night that A. D. King's home was bombed and A. G. Gaston's Motel was bombed?

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Where were you that night? Were you at home?

GARY: I was at home, but we got in the car and we came down.

HUNTLEY: With your mother and father?

GARY: My father, my father brought us down. That's also the night that Attorney Shores' house was bombed. Is that not correct? Because I remember going over there when we left from downtown.

HUNTLEY: There were guards at the various homes and churches and, in fact, in communities as well.

GARY: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Do you remember anyone in your community standing guard?

GARY: My father and several other men in the neighborhood set up night patrols. They would, they had someone posted right there on the corner of Greensprings and Goldwire. They had someone posted right at the entrance on 15th Avenue, off 00:46:00of Greensprings, down the hill, because that's the area. Some were round by Western Street School, just all over the neighborhood. Anywhere where a car could come in, they had someone posted.

HUNTLEY: Do you know if they were armed?

GARY: Probably, probably they were.

HUNTLEY: I've talked to various people and some say yes and some say no. I had one person to say that I was not, but others that were.

GARY: That's the way it was. My daddy did not believe in weapons. I know that he was not, but like I said, I know that some were.

HUNTLEY: Right.

GARY: Because everyone did not believe in non-violence.

HUNTLEY: That's right. September 15, 1963, Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombed. Where were you?

GARY: We were home that Sunday. When the church was bombed it was like a dark 00:47:00cast on that day. Just looked like a gray day. It happened that Cynthia Wesley was in my sister's class. Denise McNair's father and my mother finished Tuskegee together--was a music teacher at Washington Elementary school. The only one that 00:48:00we were not connected to, in some kind of way, was Addie Collins. My grandmother was a member of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church before her death. So, I was familiar with the church and everything. It was a sad day.

HUNTLEY: Where were you a member? Where did your family go to church?

GARY: We went to Our Lady Phantom, a Catholic church.

HUNTLEY: That was a...you know the picture that I get of that day and someone else has said that it was a gray day. It was a gray day in Birmingham.

GARY: It was.

HUNTLEY: Spiritually it was one of those creepy days. Know if you knew the 00:49:00children that died then it had to have been...Did you attend the funerals?

GARY: Yes, I did. I attended, again, along with my club members. We attended the funerals.

We did not attend Carol Robinson's funeral. We went to the three funerals that was held together at 6th Avenue.

HUNTLEY: Turbulent times. What did you do after finishing at Ullman High School?

GARY: After finishing Ullman High School I attended Miles College. I received my 00:50:00B.S. in 1970. I later forwarded my education at UAB. In 1970 I became a teacher for the Birmingham City Board of Education.

HUNTLEY: Where did you teach? What school?

GARY: I taught one year at Patterson, two years at Coleman, which was predominately White. For the last 25 years I've been at Hudson Middle School in Collegeville.

HUNTLEY: What was it like going to Coleman?

GARY: My first year of teaching I taught at Patterson, up under Dr. John Campbell. I had a blackboard and 50 children in a classroom. The next year, 00:51:00because of integration, I was moved to Coleman, because we had to have a certain ratio of Black to White teachers. So, I was moved to Coleman Elementary School where it was maybe, maybe two Blacks per classroom. This was a very, very small neighborhood school in Crestline. It was a middle-class school where, as Patterson, was a low- poverty area. At Coleman we had everything that we could think of to work with the children. Where at Patterson we did not. Even at that time the classroom load was 25.

HUNTLEY: Versus 52?

GARY: Versus 50. All you had to do was, if you wanted to do the job, all you had to do was to tell them what you wanted to work with and those parents provided it for you to work with those kids. I asked to be transferred back to a Black school because I felt like, if I was going to work with children, I wanted to work with my own children. And I was sent to Hudson Middle School, well, it was Hudson Elementary School at the time. It was the largest school in the city of Birmingham, at the time we had 1,800 children.

HUNTLEY: In an elementary school?

GARY: An elementary school. Again I was back to the 40 something in a classroom 00:53:00versus the way schools are now.

HUNTLEY: Were you still in Titusville at the time?

GARY: No, I had married and we moved away from Titusville.

HUNTLEY: How would you characterize Birmingham, the changes in Birmingham over time based upon what we've talked about today?

GARY: I think, as far as integration is concerned, I think that it has helped us in a lot of ways and that we're able to, the opportunity is out there and all we 00:54:00have to do is take advantage of them. I think it had hurt us in other ways. The ways I think that it has hurt us is that we have lost the closeness of our communities. We've lost the closeness of our families. Our children have lost their heritage. They don't realize how far we've come and they're not taken advantage of it. I feel like with the grace of God and education, that the children can do anything that they want to do. However, they're not taken advantage of the situation. I think our parents need to wake up. When I was a 00:55:00child the parents, we could not go everywhere, we did not have a whole lot but that, that we had our parents taught us to appreciate and they taught us the value of an education and they gave us love. Now the parents, well, it's not all of them, you know that, but I feel like we have a lost generation and if we don't reach back and pull our children up, then we're going to be in a worse shape than we were 25, 30 years ago. At that time they had our bodies, where in now they have our minds.

HUNTLEY: I want to thank you for taking time out of your schedule. You've been 00:56:00very helpful.

Your analysis is very enlightening. I want to thank you for coming. Is there anything else that we did not cover that you would like to leave with us.GARY: Yes, I would like to state that I was one of the very first, I was fortunate to be one of the first to integrate the Holiday Inn on 3rd Avenue. Also, this hot dog stand that was on the same street as Newberry's, I can't think of the name of it.

HUNTLEY: 19th Street.

GARY: 19th Street. I was first to integrate that hot dog shop. The Leary Theater.

HUNTLEY: You mean you went downstairs in the Leary?

GARY: I went downstairs. The Melba Theater up on 3rd Avenue and also the Alabama 00:57:00Theater. And that was due to Ms. Roberson chose other kids, as well as, myself to test the law after it had been passed. So, I got a chance to do that.

HUNTLEY: A pioneer.

GARY: A pioneer.

HUNTLEY: Certainly, appreciate it.

GARY: I thank you.

HUNTLEY: You really enlightened us and this tape will be a part of the collection of many others. It simply can only enhance what we've done.

GARY: Thank you so much, Dr. Huntley.

HUNTLEY: Thank you very much.