Rev. Lamar Weaver Interviewed on March 16, 1995

HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Rev. Lamar Weaver for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project by Dr. Horace Huntley, at Miles College. Today is March 16, 1995 and Rev. Weaver, I want to thank you for driving all the way from Atlanta this morning to come and sit and talk with us about your experiences here in Birmingham.

WEAVER: I'm happy to be here.

HUNTLEY: Thank you again. I'd just like to start and get a little background. Where are you originally from...your birthplace?

WEAVER: I was born in Cassville, Georgia. That's in Bartow County, Cartersville area, just above Atlanta on January 11, 1928. My mother and father were on a visit to an uncle of mine in Cassville and I was born there, at home and then we 00:01:00travelled back to a place where my father was working in Holly Pond, Alabama. He was a sharecropper there and worked in a sawmill. My mother and father had lived in Holly Pond, Cullman and Arab. That's where my father was from. My mother was from Georgia, Cassville, Georgia.

HUNTLEY: How old were you, when you came to Birmingham?

WEAVER: I think the first time that I came to Birmingham was...I was 8 or 9 months old, was in 1928. I remember that my mother and father weren't getting along too well and as I grew up in my tender years, they split, I think about when I was about six years old, because I remember, my mother enrolled me in 00:02:00Hendley Elementary School down on, I think 7th, 17th Street across from Kelly Ingram Park and there I spent several years in school at Hendley.

HUNTLEY: 6th Avenue and 17th Street.

WEAVER: Right.

HUNTLEY: So, then your mother and father had separated by then?

WEAVER: And divorced.

HUNTLEY: And divorced. What kind of work did your mother do?

WEAVER: My mother was a nurse, but she wasn't a licensed nurse. She was going to the Old Hillman Hospital and taking a course about that time to become a nurse, which she later did. But, it took her several years and, in the meantime, I just went to school and roamed the streets and played in the...in that 8th Avenue, 7th Avenue, 16th Street, 17th Street area. I used to walk back and forth to the old Boys Club which is up 26th Street and ran with a real bad crowd. Back in 00:03:00those days we had gangs and had gang fights, didn't have any guns, but mostly bricks. We called them brick bats.

HUNTLEY: Brick bats. How much...tell me a little bit about the education of your mother? Did she, was she a high school graduate?

WEAVER: She attended high school in Georgia, in Cartersville, Georgia.

HUNTLEY: And, then she...she eventually then would become a nurse right here in Birmingham?

WEAVER: Yes.

HUNTLEY: The community that you lived in was really on the edge of downtown. How would you describe that community?

WEAVER: Well, it was a poor neighborhood. There was a Jewish school nearby. It 00:04:00was a mixed neighborhood of....

HUNTLEY: How do you mean mixed?

WEAVER: Well, it was. everybody was poor, but it was some Blacks, Italians, some Jewish. It was just a mixture of all kinds. But, like I said, they were all poor, cause we pretty well ran together.

HUNTLEY: Did you live on the same streets? Was there a street that Blacks lived on or were the homes intermixed?

WEAVER: We weren't separated by many blocks...maybe a block. I was very close to the 16th Street Baptist Church. That was kind of a landmark back in those days of the Black community. And I remember that one of my very best friends was a Black boy, his name was David, and David and I used to go down to a grocery store at 8th Avenue and 17th Street and sometimes we would.if they had their fruit out in the front, we'd grab a

banana or two and run. David, at some point in time, in those early days, got 00:05:00killed. He got run over by a trolley car and I remember the man had just caught us stealing some fruit the day before and gave us a pretty good beating and David got killed and they had him laid out at one of the Black funeral homes. They were like in a cluster right there around that area and I went to the layout and I went back by the grocery store and took a brick and threw it through the plate glass window. I said "David, this is for you."

HUNTLEY: Tell me, when I grew up in the western section of Birmingham and there were Whites, Italians and Blacks. Prior to going to elementary school, we all played together and were best friends and all. But once we went to school, we each went to our different schools, which affected our relationship because 00:06:00then, we didn't have that same kind of opportunity to get together. Did you have the same kind of experience?

WEAVER: Yes, I've always found in life that young children, especially the elementary children, they enjoy the mixing of the races and they get along fine. They have friends in every area, but as they grow older, I think a lot of what they get at home, from their parents, rubs off on them and they go on their own respective ways. My mother taught me to be color blind and she never did try to restrict me from running around with any particular person and I guess that's why...not to say that we weren't prejudiced, I think most people are born with a little prejudice and as they get older, they become more prejudice. But my 00:07:00mother taught me to be color blind.

HUNTLEY: Yeah, you raised the issue of color blind. Explain that... what do you mean by "color blind?"

WEAVER: Well, she said there was no difference in a Black and a White, an Italian, and a Jew.

They were all the same, created by the same Master Planner and, that beneath that skin, everything was the same. The pigment of the skin might be different, but the inside was a lot... was the same and that every person was different. And, I...I've found that to be true.

HUNTLEY: Did you get the impression that the same things was being taught in other White homes at the time, or were there differences in your home and other homes?

WEAVER: Oh, there was a great deal of difference. I was even asked by some of my White friends, and some of their parents. Their mother...one woman asked me one 00:08:00time why I ran around with this Black boy, that I should stay with my own kind.

HUNTLEY: So, you were really probably the exception rather than the rule, at the time, it appears?

WEAVER: I think so.

HUNTLEY: I've asked this question a number of times...a number of people that I've interviewed, but what was your community's relationship to the Birmingham Police Department?

WEAVER: Well, we were...I was never, that I can remember, arrested. I think at one point in time in my young life I might have been arrested as an ambulance driver in some feud I was having about whether I could drive an ambulance or not. But, I never really had any trouble with the police. I guess it's because I had long legs and we were able to outrun them. But the community and the police...the police seemed to always be down in the community looking for people 00:09:00and for something to take you in for. And, they were always chasing us, I can remember that.

HUNTLEY: So, you were with a group of juveniles who were rather active?

WEAVER: Delinquents.

HUNTLEY: Juvenile delinquents who were rather active in the community and always into something?

WEAVER: Right, we didn't mean any harm, but we didn't have any money and what we got, we got by picking up bottles and doing odd jobs and just making it the best way we could on the streets.

HUNTLEY: Now, was this a White gang, as you refer to?

WEAVER: This was a mixed gang.

HUNTLEY: A mixed gang, in Birmingham in 1940s?

WEAVER: In the 30s and the early 40s.

HUNTLEY: That's interesting. Would there. in your growing up, and of course, as I said, you are on sort of the periphery of the downtown community, so I figure it's probably a rather unique community. Were there community organizations 00:10:00after you grew up? Obviously, during your teenage years, there probably were just those that you and your well I hesitate to say gang members, but for lack of a better term, gang members. But were there community organizations that your mother could participate in and other grown-ups of the community? Were there any mixing of the grown-ups?

WEAVER: Well, I can remember that I went to school. Of course, I went to Hendley and then I went to Ensley High School and Phillips High School because we moved a lot. I was on the south side, the north side, the east side, the west side, Ensley and even Fairfield at one point in time. As far as the organizations, as I became older, we graduated from the close knit in that area where we lived on 00:11:0017th Street, 18th Street, 19th Street North, downtown, we could easily walk to the Boys Club...and the Boys Club was available up on 26th Street and we'd go there because they had swimming facilities, they had basketball facilities and we could get into a lot of things, and we did this.

HUNTLEY: You lived on the periphery of Kelly Ingram Park?

WEAVER: Yes.

HUNTLEY: Can you tell me anything about Kelly Ingram? How it changes over time?

WEAVER: Kelly Ingram was a playground for Hendley School and it was also an area for people to hang out. We had our playground... and I remember we had a wrestling area where we would go over and wrestle and just play in general in Kelly Ingram Park. It was just a hang out. But, as I got older, it was easier to 00:12:00walk up to the Boys Club because we had all of the facilities that we didn't have at Kelly Ingram Park. But, Kelly Ingram Park was a notorious hangout area, play area for gangs and there were a lot of fights out there on Kelly Ingram Park with different gangs. We'd come, a lot of times with sacks full of bricks and wait until the other gang got there and then we'd start throwing those rocks.

HUNTLEY: At that point, I guess we are talking about the 30s and 40s. Was the periphery of Kelly Ingram...were those homes right around Kelly Ingram...were they Black or White?

WEAVER: Well, they were Black and White. That was mostly... the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, was kind of the landmark of the Black community. And, then, there was...I believe an Italian grocery where the Civil Rights Museum is today. And, then of course, there was A. G. Gaston Funeral home which was on the other 00:13:00corner. That was the center of the Black community. But then, you turned and went up to the Mecca Hotel and you gradually got away and into the downtown area, but the Black community came up to that line because of the Masonic Temple building and the other buildings where Blacks had offices.

HUNTLEY: Some have suggested that Kelly Ingram was really a White park...that Blacks were not allowed in the park.

WEAVER: There were a lot of gang fights over that and, some of us who were in a mixed gang, fought the other gangs for the turf, so to speak. Because...Blacks at that point in time, especially in the 30s were not welcomed in Kelly Ingram Park. It kind of changed in the 40s because of the neighborhood.

HUNTLEY: Was the neighborhood changing at that time?

WEAVER: Yes.

HUNTLEY: So, you were getting more Blacks into the area, so therefore Kelly Ingram would become accessible then to Blacks?

WEAVER: I would think so, yes.

HUNTLEY: In 1954 when Brown v. Board of Education decision was made by the Supreme Court, what were you doing at that time?

WEAVER: I was working at TCI. I also had a part-time job driving an ambulance and was also still going in and out occasionally at Southeastern Bible College.

HUNTLEY: So, you attended Southeastern Bible College after you...

WEAVER: All during...from the 50s...early 50s I was at Southeastern Bible College. The Lord had saved me in '49 and I was...I was a Christian then and um, 00:15:00of course, everything changed for me. My life changed and I was really seeking to make money to pay the bills and do what I could on at Southeastern because I felt that the Lord had called me to be involved in the Civil Rights Movement and I had become I was asked to come to A. G. Gaston Funeral Home and speak to their group of employees as a young minister and student and I went there and got to know a lot of the Blacks and it just became a challenge to do more.

HUNTLEY: Tell me a little about. before we get into the Civil Rights era, tell me a little bit about after you finished high school. Did you go right into bible college at that time, or did you find a job?

WEAVER: Well, I did both really, I both.

HUNTLEY: Okay, and, what year did you finish. Phillips High School?

WEAVER: No, I didn't finish Phillips, I went back to Cassville to finish my last year. I went over there for six or seven months to finish high school.

HUNTLEY: Why did you go back to Cassville?

WEAVER: Well, my mother was having trouble then with her studies to become a nurse over at the Old Hillman Hospital and I would make frequent trips back to Cassville to an uncle's farm. During the summer a lot of times, I would go over there and work, and I joined a church over there, and I decided to go back to Cassville and pick up what I needed to finish, and I did.

HUNTLEY: Okay, so what did you do then right after finishing at Cassville?

WEAVER: I came back to Birmingham. I had really never left it. It was just a 00:17:00short bus trip from Cassville to Rome, Rome to Gadsden, Gadsden to Birmingham. I came back and just picked up my activities.

HUNTLEY: And those activities included what?

WEAVER: Part-time ambulance driver, working at the TCI.

HUNTLEY: How did you initially get the job at TCI? What was your job at TCI?

WEAVER: I was in the metallurgist department out there.

HUNTLEY: How did you get that job?

WEAVER: To tell you the truth, I don't remember. I think I just went out there and they needed somebody, and they hired me.

HUNTLEY: And, how long were you there?

WEAVER: I want to say a year, but it could have been less. I left there abruptly.

HUNTLEY: Why, any particular reason?

WEAVER: Well, when I had become involved in the Civil Rights Movement, I had also become involved in politics and I had run for city office and I had gone 00:18:00with two ministers from Southeastern Bible College and registered people to vote in several states, and and Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth who I had got to know, had told me that he was going to sit in a White waiting room at the terminal station, the Union Terminal Station. And, I told him I would come and join him. But, Whites could not sit with Blacks and Blacks could not sit with Whites.

I did not know that Fred had notified the media and they...he really garnered a crowd and when I got there, I had to park a block away and I went in and sat with him and of course, he had sense enough to get a ticket and I didn't. I didn't think about buying a ticket. I didn't think I needed one. I was going to stay there, it was my home. But, the mob gathered, and the police came in and 00:19:00wanted to know if, if they had tickets and he and Ruby, his wife did. I had no ticket, so they escorted me to the door and several persons heard the remark that "well what are you going to do with him." They said, "we're going to turn him over to the mob" and they did...they put me right out the front door. The guy grabbed me just as soon as I got out and hit me with a suitcase and knocked me to the floor...to the ground and kicked me a couple of times, but ABC was there taking pictures.

HUNTLEY: What's AB..oh, the network?

WEAVER: Yes. So, I think it saved my life 'cause they don't like to have the Klan then never did like to have their pictures taken. So, I got up and walked to my car, a block away slowly because I knew to run would be a disaster but scared to death. got in my car and as I got in my car and got the key in the 00:20:00ignition, there was construction going on right there and they picked up cement blocks and started knocking the top in and busting the glass and then trying to rock and turn my car over. About a dozen got on each side and they were rocking my car but I managed to get it started and leave the area where I went straight to the City Hall, where I was arrested and given a speedy trial because they wanted me to leave town, for my own safety.

HUNTLEY: There was a report that in, in your escaping the crowd, that you actually ran over someone?

WEAVER: Someone said I did. That I actually hit them. Actually, I think I just pushed them out of the way with my fender. There was no real injury, but, I ran a red light and that was the thing to get away from them I had to run a red light.

HUNTLEY: And, you were arrested?

WEAVER: For running a red light and fleeing a mob. And, that necessitated me to 00:21:00immediately resign at the TCI and go out and get my last check which a Black funeral director, Ernest Poole and John Poole took me. They also hid my car and hid me and they took me out to get my last check and there was a mob out there at TCI. People were hollering at me and calling me names, but I got my last check and I left TCI that day.

HUNTLEY: Why did you think it was necessary for you to leave TCI?

WEAVER: I was told to resign, that they didn't want me out there anymore.

HUNTLEY: Now this is in '57.

WEAVER: '57.

HUNTLEY: Fred Shuttlesworth starts the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights in 1956.

WEAVER: Right.

HUNTLEY: Were you involved in that?

WEAVER: I was told I was an early member of SCLC and I attended a lot of the Monday night meetings. But I met Fred either in '53 or '54. Also, that year, I 00:22:00met Dr. King when he came to Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery and I had gone down in '52 and spent a day and a half with Vernon Johns who was the pastor at that particular time, and I have to say, looking back over the years that my motivation came more from those two men, Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and Rev. Vernon Johns and of course, Dr. King had a part in it. But Vernon Johns was the one who wanted to start boycotting the buses, which later Dr. King did, and Vernon Johns felt that Blacks should establish businesses so that all the money wouldn't be going to White folk and White businesses, and he was right. And, he even started a fruit stand down there in front of his church.

HUNTLEY: Why did you initially go down to visit with Vernon Johns?

WEAVER: Because of the publicity he was getting. I had heard about him and then I met Fred because of the same thing. I went over to Bethel Baptist Church one day and met a young minister. I said "you know, we're trying to talk to Black churches and Black people about registering to vote and council with them", and he said "well let me show you a list," and he took me into the front of the church and showed me this long list of people that had registered to vote and becomeHe said "I tell my folk that they're not first class citizens until they register to vote. become voters."

HUNTLEY: Did you get your initial impetus to get involved in the movement while you were at the bible college, when you and the other two student ministers 00:24:00decided to help register people to vote?

WEAVER: I think my interest really started when I went over and spoke to A. G. Gaston's group at the Smith & Gaston Funeral Home and got to know him and his wife, T. J. Gardner, his son-in-law and their family and some of their people and through them I met P. A. Welch and some of the other business leaders in the Black community. Virgil Harris who later managed my campaign when I ran against Bull Conner. Virgil was a great man. And I had thought long and hard about the Civil Rights Institute and what you're doing and frankly, the reason I'm here today is because I want people to remember those people for what they did, 00:25:00because without them, we would have never gotten as far as our goals are, and I always tell people to thank God for Bull Conner because, had he not turned the dogs loose and the fire hoses and had he ignored us, in those days, the movement never would have gone forward and I would like to pay tribute to those four young ladies who were in the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church because their sacrifice. You know they're saints now, but they could have been mothers and grandmothers and business professionals, but God chose to make angels out of them and they made a tremendous sacrifice because, at that point, the Civil Rights Movement had come to a slow walk, you might say, and that spurred things to really start happening. Blacks got elected to public office. We got judges 00:26:00and the Civil Rights Movement really moved forward after that.

HUNTLEY: Let me take you back just a bit, though, before we get to that point. Let me just ask you, well firstly. the first issue that was developed by the Alabama Christian Movement was the issue of the hiring of Black policemen. Your campaign, around the same time, you were campaigning on the issue of hiring Black policemen. Was there any connection?

WEAVER: Well, like I said, when the Lord saved me, my life changed. You know a lot of people say, Lamar, you made a Christian decision. Well, I wasn't thinking about the Christian decision, I was thinking about the right decision and then when somebody suggested well you're getting around now, why don't you run for public office, so I decided to take Bull on. And, and...

HUNTLEY: What year was that?

WEAVER: This, I believe was in '55. It could have been '54 but I think it was in '55 and it could have run over into '56 because I ran twice. I ran as a write-in candidate after I came in third in the first campaign. But, my feeling was and knowing people, such great civil rights leaders like Arthur Shores and Orzell Billingsley and Peter Hall and Emory Jackson, the fearless editor of the Birmingham World. You know, the problems in Birmingham, it had been a segregated city for so long and that there were no Blacks on the police force or the fire department and so, right away, I was the only candidate out of five that said, the headlines were "the only difference in this whole campaign, is Weaver wants to hire Blacks," so I'm proud of that because I think I did make people think.

HUNTLEY: What was the response of the police and the firemen?

WEAVER: Well, Virgil Harris came up with an idea...he managed my campaign. He said "let's give the police and the firemen a raise, they're not making very much money." So, I suggested that and I was the only candidate that did. The White police and firemen forgave me for wanting to hire Blacks because every time I'd get out on the street, they would congratulate me and wish me luck and I think they...a great deal of them supported me in the campaign.

HUNTLEY: You suggested that Virgil Harris managed your campaign?

WEAVER: Virgil Harris did manage my campaign.

HUNTLEY: This is a Black man?

WEAVER: He put up a lot of money. In those days $500 was a lot of money, but we got some TV time and some radio ads that I would have never gotten had Virgil not got in it and helped me...help me financially. Virgil Harris was one of the 00:29:00greatest thinkers and one of the greatest brains that I ever knew. He actually came up with the...he was the originator of the recycling program to recycle bottles, to recycle glass, to recycle cans, to recycle paper. And, he had a plan and I adopted it for my campaign, that he would...that we were going to recycle everything and save the city tons of money. And, it would have worked too, but Birmingham wasn't ready for that.

HUNTLEY: So, you're suggesting that Virgil Harris really is the initiator of what we determine today as "Earth Day?"

WEAVER: I believe so. I really think so, yes.

HUNTLEY: What was the reaction of your mother to your involvement in the Movement?

WEAVER: Well, my mother was a good Christian woman. And, my mother, of course, did not advise me one way or the other. She was fearful of my activity because she had married a man who was in the Air Force and they travelled around to different air force bases, but they were here when Rev. Shuttlesworth and I were involved in the mob scene at the terminal station. And, the great thing about my mother...and I'll tell you how...how great a Christian she was, I said "momma," I said "now I'm going to tell them that I'm going north, but I'm really going south" and when the newspaper... and they contacted her, she said "well, to tell you the truth, my son says he's going north, but he's really going south." And another thing about that, they were in Crestview, Florida when just a little later after the terminal station episode, I was spending the night with them on 00:31:00Eglan Air Force Base in Fort Walton Beach, Florida and the Klan had followed me. They knew I was going somewhere down there, but they didn't know where. They found my car and in the middle of the night, my mother woke up screaming that the flames were attracting so much light out front, she said "the house's on fire." Well, the house wasn't on fire, it was my car. The Klan burned my car in front of my mother's house.

HUNTLEY: In Eglan Air Force Base?

WEAVER: In Eglan Air Force Base.

HUNTLEY: You did take part in the mass...the mass meetings of the Alabama Christian Movement.

WEAVER: Yes, on Monday nights.

HUNTLEY: Can you describe what one of those meetings would be like?

WEAVER: Well, as people who are here now in Birmingham, like Abraham Woods, Jr., a great worker in the early days, would tell you all the churches would not open 00:32:00their doors to the movement. There were some Black churches that closed their doors. Some Black ministers forbid them to meet and would not cooperate in anyway. But, some did and those few, I can remember Rev. Alfred. Alfred who is now deceased, over in North Birmingham opened the doors of his church. And there were several churches.I think

Sixteenth Street opened their doors. People would come, the church would always be packed and there would be a lot of speakers and, Rev. Shuttlesworth was the leader of those meetings. And, they would threaten, the Klan would threaten that they were going to have snipers out there to shoot as we come out of the door and, as a matter of fact, a man did take a shot at me at 29th Street North on 00:33:00the porch of a house over there. We dug the 22 out of the wall, but that wasn't coming out of the meeting. The meetings were....

HUNTLEY: Did y'all find out who that person was?

WEAVER: No, no, I knew it was somebody next door, but we never knew who. The police would not even come out there. Well, I think they came, but nothing happened. And, the meetings...people...they would last late, 11:00 to 12:00 sometimes. And, people was all fired up, you know, and about time to break, I remember Abraham Woods was called the "lookout man". Now, I know you've heard the expression "the bag man," please ask me about that of Bill Shortridge, but Woods would go out the back door and go around the front door and look out into the dark night to see if he could spot anything that was going on out there that 00:34:00might be dangerous for us to come out. And we were always afraid that they were going to shoot somebody or fire into the crowd as people came out of the churches. I did not stay for all of the meetings. I left in '57 and the meetings continued.

HUNTLEY: How many Whites were involved in the meetings?

WEAVER: Well, to tell you the truth, up to '57 I never saw any White people there. There could have been some, but I never saw any. After '57, I can't speak for those who might have become involved or sympathetic later on. I know that there were a lot of people sympathetic to the meetings, but they didn't come out prior to '57.

HUNTLEY: There was mention of police who actually attended and recorded meetings. Do you remember that at all?

WEAVER: Well, I've been told that and I'm sure it happened because the people have told me the same stories, that the meetings were recorded. But I actually never saw a White face in any of the congregations.

HUNTLEY: So, you were the exception. Tell me about Mr. Shortridge.

WEAVER: Later in the Movement, when people were becoming frequently arrested and, they would need to be bailed out, Shortridge was called on to get the money together and he was called "the bag man," and his wife I think is on the Civil Rights Museum now. He was as White as I am. You know, a lot of people couldn't believe he was Black, but he was a great man and had a great sense of humor and he would always go out and get the money and come down, put up the bail. We called him "the bag man."

HUNTLEY: So that was...I talked with his wife and she said that he was never 00:36:00arrested. She said if he had been, they would not have been able to get the money, because he was the man who handled the money.

WEAVER: And there'd been a lot of them stayed in jail.

HUNTLEY: What church did you attend at that time?

WEAVER: Well, I attended the Norwood Baptist Church occasionally. I, I shifted around. I've never really attended a church on a regular basis. When I left Birmingham and went to Cincinnati, I joined the largest Black church up there, Revelation Baptist Church. But, I did not attend regularly. I still don't attend church regularly.

HUNTLEY: You joined Revelation Baptist Church?

WEAVER: In Cincinnati, Ohio, right.

HUNTLEY: This was a Black church?

WEAVER: Yes, and my membership has been there since '57, still there.

HUNTLEY: Were there other White members?

WEAVER: No, I was the only White member there.

HUNTLEY: You sort of stood out in your, in your career then?

WEAVER: Well, I just asked the Lord to tell me the right thing to do and I tried to do it. I tried to be an example for my children, I tried to be an example for my friends.

HUNTLEY: What did you do when you went to Cincinnati? First, of all, why did you leave Birmingham to go to Cincinnati?

WEAVER: Well, some of my friends told me, after the episode at the terminal station, that my days were numbered and, especially after it became known that I had been hiding out here and that I went to Washington. Senator Tom Hennings, who was a senator from Missouri had asked me to come up prior to that and speak to the first committee talking about the first civil rights bill in Washington. A bill that later passed, I think in '60. It finally passed the Senate and the House. I went up there right after the episode at the terminal station and 00:38:00arrived amid, a bomb threat at the airport, leaving Birmingham. And, in getting there, my congressman, who was George Huddleston at the time, made it a point to meet me in the hallway when I was going to give my testimony. And called me every name in the book, told me never to come back to Birmingham, that I was the most despised man in the south. Ebony even ran an article, in June I think of '55, "56 or "57 that had already called me the "most wanted man in the South."

HUNTLEY: So, you're the White man...southern White man to...

WEAVER: Testify before the Senate Sub-committee on the civil rights bill. I was the only one thatnshowed up from the south. My statement that I gave them is a 00:39:00matter of record in the Congressional Record. And, the man who helped me with my statement was Emory Jackson who was the editor of the Birmingham World then, and Virgil Harris.

HUNTLEY: Virgil Harris keeps popping up. Then, your days then, were numbered?

WEAVER: Numbered here and I left...that's why I left Birmingham and got on a train and rode it to the end of the line and that was Cincinnati. That was the L&N and their last stop...the end of their...the train...their route was Cincinnati, Ohio. And, I was met there by Rev. George Sangster and Rev. Aaron Bland who were ministers at Revelation Baptist. They had been alerted that I was coming, and they met me with open arms. I had my typewriter, I was writing some short stories for Ebony and New Amsterdam News. I had my typewriter and my underwear. All I had was a sack, that's all I had 00:40:00when I got there. I checked into The YMCA...stayed there two nights until Rev. Sangster took me into his home. Shortly after that, I got a job at a funeral home up there and worked for that funeral home for five years.

HUNTLEY: Well, speaking of funeral homes, prior to leaving Birmingham, you, in fact, were somewhat of a fugitive in the context of being searched for...by a number of entities in the city.

WEAVER: The night after the episode at the terminal station, Ernest and John Poole hid me out in the Poole Brothers Funeral Home. And, I actually got in a casket during my stay there. Aubry Bushleon who has the Bushelon Funeral Home now, was there at the time and could testify to that. But, they hid me out. 00:41:00Saved my life.

HUNTLEY: Were people...did people come looking for you?

WEAVER: Yes, they came looking for me because someone had told them (the KKK and others) that I was there. I slept at the funeral home and I actually got in a casket several times to hide during my stay there. John and Earnest Poole protected me. We were told that there was a leak somewhere and someone was giving information as to my whereabouts. We never found out for sure who did it.

HUNTLEY: So, there was someone that was actually...

WEAVER: Tipping them off.

HUNTLEY: Tipping them off as to your location...

WEAVER: My whereabouts, yes.

HUNTLEY: So, when you arrived in Cincinnati, what did you do? What kind of work did you do?

WEAVER: I went to work for the Witt-Good & Kelsch Funeral Home. My Civil Rights activities pretty well came to a halt except for some writing that I did. Occasionally, I would do something for Ebony and I did a few articles for the New Amsterdam News. Most of this was material that I had gathered throughout Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Florida from County seats where I questioned voting registrars as to how many Black voters were in their counties. I attended occasionally my church, Revelation Baptist Church where the Rev. George Sangster was pastor. The Rev. Aaron Bland was the assistant. Rev. Sangster dropped dead 00:42:00in the pulpit one Sunday morning. I encouraged the pulpit committee to ask Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth to come up from Birmingham and they did and they called him to be their pastor. I later went to work for the John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Company where I worked for 24 years.

HUNTLEY: You left Birmingham in 1957.

WEAVER: '57.

HUNTLEY: Did you ever visit, return, at any time?

WEAVER: Maybe once or twice. But, to come back and visit. I came back well after '78 I'd come over often to visit.

HUNTLEY: There was one thing I wanted to take you back just a bit, because in addition to...when you were running for office...in addition to running on the issue of hiring Black policemen, you also ran on the issue of integration.

WEAVER: Well, I really didn't just get up and make that statement in front of 00:43:00the cameras. I didn't say that to Black audiences, and I didn't say it to white audiences. My emphasis was more on let's hire Blacks for the police force. Let's hire Blacks for the fire department. Let's give them a piece of the action. Let's have a slow integration. Let's do it because the Supreme Court is going to eventually say that it had to be done, should be done. So let's, you know, after '54 it was just a thing of 'how long is it going to be?" And I said, you know, let's do it and let's show some good faith and do it gradually.

HUNTLEY: What was the reception?

WEAVER: Not good--threats. I was surprised the Birmingham News published one of my letters about let's start now on a slow basis.

HUNTLEY: So, in effect, you have always sort of stood out because of the positions that you've taken where race is concerned in Birmingham. You obviously were a unique white man in 1955-56 talking about a gradual approach toward integration, because in the main, that simply was not being done. In 1956 the NAACP is outlawed from operating in the State of Alabama and here, you, a young white man at the time, talking about the necessity to move forward in terms of integrating the society.

WEAVER: My very dear friend, who is gone on to her reward, Ruby Hurley, who was a champion with the NAACP,.... we used to talk quite a bit at Arthur Shores 00:45:00office about that. She and Fred Shuttlesworth, just two weeks ago when I was in his church in Cincinnati, Greater New Life, we talked about those days, Rev. Shuttlesworth and I....if you get as old as I am, you start thinking back to your first Christmas, if you can remember back that far...my mind comes and goes, to be honest with you, I don't remember everything, but I remember, a little red wagon and some raisons and, you know, a few tangerines, and oranges and apples. And, now, I know after health problems, that my time is limited, 00:46:00it's a cycle. So, as a Christian, we like to think that we have done the right thing. Whether it was a Christian decision sometimes, I don't know, but we'd like to think that it was a right decision. I'd like my children to think it's a right decision. I'd like people to just think of me as a person who tried to do the right thing and make the right decision at the right time.

HUNTLEY: Did you ever have any relationship with W. C. Patten? Did you know W. C. Patten? He was involved with the NAACP, voting rights and they may have been...well I know it was prior to your leaving, but also, he was active...

WEAVER: Was he in the funeral business too? Did he have a funeral home?

HUNTLEY: I don't have...I don't think so.

WEAVER: The name is very familiar, and I can't remember.

HUNTLEY: Right, but he was very active with the NAACP and with ...

WEAVER: Ruby Hurley was my main person to contact with the NAACP.

HUNTLEY: Okay. What impact do you think the Birmingham Movement had upon this community and the nation?

WEAVER: Well, I've said all along that I think in Birmingham is where it all started. The most impressionable things that have happened in the Civil Rights Movement, to my mind, and I don't want to sound morbid, but were the killing of the four children and the assassination of Dr. King. Those were the things that stand out. But, we all know that in Birmingham, the movement started and especially around Bessemer and Brookwood in some of those mining shafts. The truth will never be known until the judgment day and all these holes and wells 00:48:00and shafts give up their dead because a lot of people died in those early days, a lot of people disappeared. I think that Birmingham and the Movement in Birmingham really started people thinking. I know that...and this can be found in some of the newspaper articles which I have and which I've submitted. Eleanor Roosevelt even said that the civil rights movement got a tremendous push by the efforts in Birmingham especially with Fred Shuttlesworth, with the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, with those early meetings, spread to Montgomery, and we think it did spread to Montgomery. And then of course, Dr. 00:49:00King came along and came at the right time, at the right place and was a great man and he's a saint now. He made his mark and led the demonstrations nationwide, the march on Washington, but in my heart and in my autobiography, Bury My Heart in Birmingham, I'm going to talk a lot about the Birmingham Movement and those who were involved and where credit should be given.

HUNTLEY: How far are you along with your autobiography?

WEAVER: I'm almost finished with it. I wanted to share some with you today, but I didn't bring it, but I'm almost finished. I'm taking some pictures...I want to have some pictures in there. I can't take the picture of some of these people, but I can take a picture of their gravestone and tell about their sacrifices and what they did in the early Movement. Viola Liuzzo, the woman who was shot on the bus, the Lutheran minister who came down on the bus from the north, never to go 00:50:00back alive, who was beaten at Selma and who had to be taken to a Birmingham hospital where he died four days later. The young man, Jimmy Johnson, who really stirred up the march in Selma because he was killed trying to help his mother in a mob attack. There's just a lot of people that we've got to remember that should be remembered for their families..for their family trees, 'cause somebody always wants to know, why...how did it happen...where. So, we got to make some statements.

HUNTLEY: Well, we're looking with great anticipation to your autobiography, and what we're doing at the Civil Rights Institute, is simply to attempt to gather the information for the real story of Birmingham and of course, you've played a tremendous role in that.

WEAVER: Well, let me just say this too, that when the thought came up and was 00:51:00promoted by Dr. Arrington to build the Civil Rights Museum and I understand they spent $15 million?

HUNTLEY: About $10 million.

WEAVER: Yes, this was heard around the world. This was heard in Atlanta like a bombshell, in Cincinnati like a bombshell. These tour buses are converging on Birmingham and they want to see this museum and I think that this has done a tremendous amount of good and the people behind this are to be commended. There've been little museums started here and there, but nothing of this magnitude and what you have here and you're to be commended and its great. And, it's a pleasure to even have a mention in the museum if nothing else, Lamar 00:52:00Weaver was a worker.

HUNTLEY: That's for sure. That's an understatement. Let me just ask you one other question that relate to a person who was very instrumental in the development of the Birmingham Movement, but also had to leave Birmingham and that's Fred Shuttlesworth. And, I hear that you were instrumental in his eventually coming to Cincinnati. Can you tell me a little about that?

WEAVER: Well, always let it be said that I'm privileged to stand in Fred Shuttlesworth's shadow. I could have been called in the early days as a follower of Fred and I don't want to take anything away from anybody else who worked in the movement. But, Fred Shuttlesworth was a great person, and as a member when I left here and joined the Revelation Baptist Church in Cincinnati, our pastor dropped dead of a heart attack and I recommended to the pulpit committee that 00:53:00they talk to Fred and they asked Fred to come up there. As a matter of fact, I even sent Fred some money to come and he came, he spoke and they fell in love with him. They called him on the spot and he became the pastor of Revelation Baptist Church, and I told him two weeks ago, when I was at Greater New Life, he was my pastor for a while, you know, because I was a member there, and Fred Shuttlesworth had chose to take a dissatisfied division of the church and go to another site and they built a beautiful new church and he is still there, pastor of Greater New Life and doing great work in Cincinnati...has done a great work.

HUNTLEY: Okay, well I want to thank you for taking your time and driving over from Atlanta this morning to come and sit and talk with us to give us your 00:54:00perception of what took place in Birmingham because that's a rather unique perspective that you have, being one of the few whites that were actively involved in the struggle. Again, thank you for coming.

WEAVER: Thank you.

HUNTLEY: I thought that went very well.

WEAVER: Well, you made it...my mind comes and goes and I have to confess to you, I would have like to have said a few words about my children, there are six. My first and second children both were girls, their mother remarried and changed their names, but when one got 18 and one got 21, they set out to find me and find me they did. And one of them lives in Huntsville, and one of them in Huntsville, is a volunteer for the AIDS community up there.

HUNTLEY: What are their names?

WEAVER: My daughter's name down here in Brookwood is Mrs. Joyce Lewis and my daughter in Huntsville is Christine Huggins and they call me at least once a month and say "daddy I love you," and the one in Huntsville says "I am so happy that you made the decision that you made," and she said "my mother was wrong and my grandpa was wrong," and she said "and you were right, and I'm so proud of you daddy." So, I get this kind of love from my family and this makes me feel good. My other children are Robert Charles Weaver, Sheryl Ann Weaver, Debra Joyce Weaver, and David Lamar Weaver, all are living in Atlanta.

HUNTLEY: That's great. That'll be part of the transcript, if you don't mind.

WEAVER: I want you to know that I am grateful for this opportunity and I want you to know that Lamar Weaver is nothing but one of the workers and that I never thought of losing my life. We weren't afraid back in those days. Now, we're afraid, see. Somebody told me the other day, said that "you come back down here, they been asking about you in Bessemer." And they said "be careful." But, now we think about that, but then, we didn't think and you know the greatest thing to me is, I was a part of change. I helped bring about change.

HUNTLEY: You certainly did.