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https://bcriohp.org/files/original/4106f53ece6b36501f96b9e4e41af04a.jpg
9c4ecc705a952156b44a6156304d8e6b
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
Interviewee
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Margaret Askew
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http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=MAskew1994.xml
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Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011
Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.)
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5.4 December 16, 1994 Margaret Askew Interviewed on December 16, 1994 19941216A 0:44:14 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Emily Reynolds Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department Adams, Oscar W. Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) Margaret Askew Horace Huntley Video 1:|3(14)|25(2)|49(10)|66(13)|87(5)|101(12)|114(8)|132(5)|154(11)|174(7)|187(9)|194(9)|206(15)|221(3)|231(8)|247(11)|257(5)|269(2)|285(9)|294(1)|315(7)|327(2)|348(5)|364(8)|379(8)|389(7)|403(14)|412(4)|429(5)|442(9)|455(8)|463(12)|472(15)|479(10)|499(11)|516(6)|528(13)|543(11)|558(12) 0 https://youtu.be/NVBaSwnyUTQ YouTube video English 0 Interview Introduction This is an interview with Mrs. Margaret Askew for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute and I'm Dr. Horace Huntley. Interview Introduction Civil rights movement 33.516200, -86.813870 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ The homepage of the BCRI 64 Community, Family, and Childhood Let me ask you a general question, Mrs. Askew. First, where were you born? Askew describes her childhood, her parents, and what it was like to live in the Southside (Birmingham) community. African American youth ; African Americans--Employment ; Birmingham (Ala.) African American families ; African Americans--Southern States 424 Police and Community What about your community's relationship to the Birmingham Police Department? Askew discusses her community's relationship with the police department, including police brutality. African Americans--Crimes against ; Law enforcement--United States--History ; Police brutality--United States Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department 544 Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights You were also a member of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights? Askew discusses her involvement with and attending the meetings of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. African Americans--Civil rights ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Civil rights movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights 817 Arrest and Jail Experience But, did you go to jail? Askew discusses her experiences being arrested and being in jail as a participant in the Civil Rights Movement. Adams, Oscar W. ; African American prisoners ; African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Crimes against ; African Americans--Medical care ; Imprisonment--United States African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States 1446 Movement Involvement: Decisions & ; Risk Well, now there was some individuals, many individuals, who were older and working and they were basically afraid to participate. Askew discusses her her decision to be involved in the Civil Rights Movement, feedback from her employer, and motivations for participating. African American families ; African Americans--Employment African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States 1577 Fire Department at Civil Rights Marches I know that you participated in the marches. You probably would have something to say about the way that during the marching, how the fire department used their water hoses. Can you describe any of that? Askew describes how the fire department used water hoses against Civil Rights Movement demonstrators. African Americans--Civil rights ; Birmingham (Ala.). Fire Department ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--Crimes against 1727 Church's Resistance to Involvement What church were you a member of? Askew discusses her church's resistance to Civil Rights Movement involvement as well as the actions of her church's pastor. African American clergy ; African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Religion African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States 1839 Movement Reflections What is your assessment of the Birmingham movement? Was it successful? Was it a failure? Askew reflects on the impact of the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham. African American youth ; African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Race identity African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States 2049 Youth Involvement in Movement I failed to ask in one area. I know that you were instrumental in helping to get the children in the movement in May of 1963. Askew discusses her work to engage African American youth in the Civil Rights Movement. African American youth ; African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Education ; Civil rights movement African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States 2172 Reflection on African American Community Today Is there anything else that...any other question I haven't asked you, or something else that you would just like to include in this that we may have overlooked that could highlight what the Movement was about and how it actually impacted upon the lives of people? Askew reflects on her wishes for today's African American communities. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--History ; African Americans--Social conditions African Americans--Race identity 2502 Civil Rights Movement Lawsuit Can you just give us a brief description of what happened a couple of times in the court room, because you were involved in a number of lawsuits as well? Askew describes her courtroom experience during a Civil Rights Movement lawsuit. Adams, Oscar W. ; African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 African Americans--Civil rights Oral History Margaret Askew discusses being involved with the Movement through ACMHR and her church. She encouraged local youth to get involved and she was arrested multiple times. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mrs. Margaret Askew for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute and I' ; m Dr. Horace Huntley. Thank you, Mrs. Askew, for consenting to sit down with us today to give us information that you have about the development of Birmingham in the Civil Rights Movement. Let me ask you a general question, Mrs. Askew. First, where were you born? ASKEW: I was born in a little town they called Prospect, Tennessee out from Nashville, Tennessee. I usually tell people Nashville, Tennessee, but originally my birthplace is Prospect, Tennessee. HUNTLEY: How old were you when you came to Birmingham? ASKEW: Oh, off and on and when I came to stay in Birmingham, I was about twelve years old, twelve or thirteen. But off and on I stayed in Birmingham and Tennessee. HUNTLEY: You had relatives here? ASKEW: My mother was here and most of my relatives was in Tennessee. HUNTLEY: I see. So you stayed with other relatives in Tennessee and then when you were twelve you came to Birmingham? ASKEW: Yes, that' ; s right. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters did you have? ASKEW: I have seven, with myself makes eight. My mother had eight children. HUNTLEY: Where were you in the line of the children? Were you the youngest? ASKEW: I' ; m the oldest. HUNTLEY: You' ; re the oldest! Okay, so then you had a lot to do with the others growing up, I assume. ASKEW: I hope so. HUNTLEY: What about the education of your parents? ASKEW: Well, my father, he could just write. He loved music, but he and my mother divorced when I was a kid, when I was real small. HUNTLEY: And your father was a bandleader? ASKEW: Yeah, he played instruments. You can say he could play practically anything. HUNTLEY: Was he in Tennessee or in Birmingham? ASKEW: No, in that time-- He was born in Tennessee but during my teenage years he lived in Wheelington, Virginia1 and that' ; s where he organized his band during my teenage years. That' ; s all I knew. He left Tennessee because he said he wasn' ; t gonna' ; chop no cotton and so that' ; s where he took up, in Virginia. HUNTLEY: Did he have another job as well, or was he just a Musician? ASKEW: No, he worked at a cleaner' ; s part-time too. HUNTLEY: Okay, what kind of work did your mother do? ASKEW: My mother worked, did housework, here in Birmingham for the whites, Miss Davis-- Catherine Davis. HUNTLEY: Tell us about your education, your background in terms of education. I know you went to Lane [Elementary School]. ASKEW: I went to Lane Elementary School. I graduated from Lane and then went to Ullman two years and from Ullman to Parker High School. HUNTLEY: And what kind of work did you do after you finished high school? ASKEW: Housewife. I was a housewife, mostly, after I finished high school, with eight kids. HUNTLEY: Oh, with eight children. I see. Your mother had eight children and you had eight as well? ASKEW: That' ; s right. Un huh. HUNTLEY: What community did you live in? ASKEW: Southside. HUNTLEY: How would you describe the south side of Birmingham as you were growing up? What kind of community was it? What kind of people lived in your community? ASKEW: Southside was the warmest community you' ; d want to know about. We loved each other. We all knew each other from 18th Street to the Southside viaduct. We was a loving community. HUNTLEY: Now the Southside viaduct is where? ASKEW: It' ; s on Sixth Avenue--that viaduct just before you hit, go into, Titusville. Even though Titusville is on the south side, this is our community of the Southside I' ; m talking about. HUNTLEY: The viaduct just below the Jefferson County Board of Education? ASKEW: Yeah, that' ; s right. You' ; re right. You know about the Southside don' ; t you? Yeah, we were a close knitted community. It wasn' ; t like children didn' ; t have anything to eat, because you could eat at anybody' ; s house, anybody' ; s home. They [neighbors] treated our children just like it was their children, you know. And, the children at that time--they call it harassment now--but, at that time, if they did something out there in the street, they would get a spanking and when they got home they would get another one. But now, they don' ; t do that. HUNTLEY: What were some of the occupations of people living in your community? ASKEW: Well, we had schoolteachers. We had plumbers. We had postal workers, an ice cream parlor, grocery stores. That was all in our community. And churches ; don' ; t forget the churches. HUNTLEY: What about schools in the area? ASKEW: That' ; s right. Lane School was in that area and Cameron School was in that area. HUNTLEY: What about your community' ; s relationship to the Birmingham Police Department? Was there any relationship at that time? I' ; m speaking now prior to the Movement. ASKEW: Oh, well the kids was afraid of the policemen at that time. HUNTLEY: Why were they afraid of the police? ASKEW: Oh, they would beat them. They [policemen] would have a, what you call it, a club or strap in their car or something and they was afraid of policemen. Because no matter what the age were, at a time, if a policeman saw one of our children, maybe not in our neighborhood, they would pick them up and give them a good whipping. Policemen would do that. HUNTLEY: For any particular reason? ASKEW: No reason at all. HUNTLEY: Just harassment? ASKEW: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: So then, would you suggest that the police were not in the community to protect and serve? ASKEW: No, the kids called them the ' ; Bucket of Blood' ; . They had red cars and the children called them a ' ; bucket of blood.' ; ' ; Here come the Bucket of Blood' ; . They had cars that had a cat on it, a black cat. They called him ' ; Black cat 13' ; and some of those policemen was nice. I have to give them that credit, because I was at the Bonding Company and I know some was nice, but there were some up there that wasn' ; t too nice, not to blacks. HUNTLEY: You worked at a bonding company. Can you tell me a little about that? ASKEW: No more than I had to clean up, do some cleaning up. HUNTLEY: What bonding company? Who was the individual? ASKEW: H & ; M Bonding Company. His name was Wendall Dowdy. I worked at his bonding company and at his home. HUNTLEY: You were also a member of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights? ASKEW: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: How did you get involved with the group? ASKEW: My mother-in-law, before she moved to California, she started us going to the Christian Movement with her. I think they moved that church, it' ; s not there now, but it was a church. HUNTLEY: On the Southside? Sixth Avenue? Was it Sixth Avenue Baptist or Sixth Avenue--? ASKEW: No, it was north. I think her church was on the north side. I think it was Sixteenth Street. It wasn' ; t the Sixteenth Street [Baptist] that the children got bombed at. It was another, and she started me to going to the meetings, some meetings that they used to have and to that church some Sundays. HUNTLEY: What did you first remember about the mass meetings of the Alabama Christian Movement? Why did-- When she started you to going, why did you continue to go? ASKEW: Well, I was interested in elevating our children. My children in that church, they was called Little Sunbeams, Sunbeam Band, and we was at that church at that particular time. They was trying to do something for the black children. They was talking about getting better books for them and other things that the blacks needed that were supposed to be in a school that wasn' ; t there. And that' ; s why I got interested, because I had children too. HUNTLEY: Well, describe to me what a typical mass meeting would be like. ASKEW: Well, the mass meetings that I have been able to attend, it' ; s religious, and the biggest part is they tell about the conduct and the mistreatment of the blacks and try to get that straightened out where blacks would be able to do things that needed to be done, not because the whites make them do it. Like if they wanted to be a clerk or a doctor or lawyer, they could be that here in Birmingham. I know some kids that was qualified to do. Even my daughter, when she came from Hawaii, she was qualified to do things that other people, you know-- But that' ; s way up in the line, but that' ; s what I was speaking of. That they be able to walk in places where they can be served and not pushed back in the back room and that could drink out of a fountain that don' ; t say ' ; white' ; or ' ; black' ; and that they could walk the street without being harassed by a policeman. And there were a lot of things like that the children wanted, too. They wanted to elevate themselves. They want to be considered as another man or woman or human being. HUNTLEY: Now at the mass meetings, it' ; s also evident that there were policemen--white policemen--that attended the meeting. Why were they there? ASKEW: They mostly was there to find out our plans, what we was gonna' ; do, where we was gonna' ; meet next, and what they should do to us if we step out of line. They was there to find out, they wanted to know where were we...and then Dr. King would tell them where we was gonna' ; be. Dr. King was the kind of person that would welcome them. He didn' ; t care about them knowing that he was trying to straighten out the system in Birmingham. He would let them come in. We wasn' ; t doing anything wrong and they was there, in other words, to keep the blacks in check. HUNTLEY: But, did you go to jail? ASKEW: Five times. HUNTLEY: Five times. What were the circumstances? Do you remember the first time that you went to jail? ASKEW: The first time I went to jail, it was uh--I was leading Al Hibbler.2 That was the first time going to jail. I led Al Hibbler up by the Greyhound Bus Company and there was my first time of meeting Mr. Bull Conner up there by the Greyhound Bus Company, and that was my first encounter with him. HUNTLEY: Did you have the honor of being arrested by Bull Conner himself? ASKEW: Oh yes, the group of us was arrested and one of the girls, I think her name was Hattie, her foot was closed up in that steel door on the paddy wagon and we was hollering for him to open the door so she could take her foot out of it. And, uh, we went to the City Jail and when they did let us out, ooh her ankles were so large. And that' ; s when Matron Williams had some kind of medicine to give her, which I told her, ' ; Not me. You might poison her.' ; They should have carried her to the hospital and that' ; s where she went, to the hospital. HUNTLEY: You also mentioned that when you went to jail, there were efforts made by the matrons in the jail to give shots to those of you who were arrested. Can you tell me a little about that? ASKEW: Well, everybody that was arrested-- I guess it was a routine of the jail, because it was very few whites that went to jail. Now I' ; m sure they weren' ; t given any shots, but uh, they gave everybody [black] that was arrested shots I guess because they thought we was nasty and had diseases. The matron was giving shots with the same needle. She didn' ; t change no needle. HUNTLEY: Each individual was being injected? ASKEW: Each individual was given a shot with the same needle--no change, no more than refilling it. And I and uh Marie Pettyway and Louella and Miss Adams, we refused to take the shots because we told them we was under our doctors' ; orders. HUNTLEY: Now, was that when they took Mrs. Adams out and interrogated her and she returned? Can you tell me a little about that? ASKEW: Well, this was another day we was arrested--another week we was arrested--when they came up and got Willa, I think that' ; s her name. I' ; m hoping I' ; m not saying the wrong name, but anyway they came and got Miss Adams and they asked her why did she want to be white. And said, ' ; This nigger think she' ; s something because her husband is a lawyer.' ; HUNTLEY: This is Oscar Adams' ; wife? ASKEW: That' ; s Oscar Adams' ; wife. And [the policeman] said, ' ; We' ; re gonna' ; show her.' ; Said, ' ; Her husband ain' ; t nothing.' ; Said, ' ; We' ; re gonna' ; show her.' ; And they carried her from us into some other place. I don' ; t know where it was, but when she came back, her clothes were ripped off and everything. She was crying. But I don' ; t think they-- I think they just-- because she would have told it if-- I don' ; t know what they did, but I think Oscar had a suit in against the City for manhandling his wife. If he didn' ; t, he should have, because they really manhandled her. HUNTLEY: Tell us something about the food you received while in jail? ASKEW: Hmm, we got some white bread, fried white meat and some syrup. HUNTLEY: Now you were in jail at least once for at least five days. Is this all that you had to eat? ASKEW: That' ; s about it. They weren' ; t feeding us. And, they told the inmates, they brought the inmates in from the laundry and told them that we niggers was the cause of them not being able to go to the laundry and eat and, ' ; Now go in there and beat those niggers' ; you know what. HUNTLEY: These are white inmates? ASKEW: No, these were black inmates that was locked up for a crime that they did on the street. They was already in jail. They told them to go in there and when they came in, razor blades was coming out from the hem of the dresses, and razor blades was coming from everywhere. There was one inmate in there I never will forget. Her name was Emma Lou and she was one-legged and she came out the hem of her dress with some kind of a weapon that was long and sharp. She said, ' ; Iif any one of y' ; all SOB' ; s touch these workers, you got to answer to Emma Lou.' ; And Emma Lou protected us while we was up there, because she said if it wasn' ; t for us half of them wouldn' ; t be in jail now. And so, after that incident, we didn' ; t have any more trouble. They went to jail, and nobody bothered them. They cut off the inmates' ; privileges, but they didn' ; t care after they found out really what we was there for. HUNTLEY: Did they segregate the men from the women? ASKEW: Oh yes, they did. HUNTLEY: The women were in an area and the men were in another? ASKEW: Yes, the women were one place and the men were in another area. HUNTLEY: I know one of the things that happened consistently was that during trying times, people would sing. Was that part of the regimen while you were in jail at any time? There was a woman named Lou Ella? ASKEW: Lou Ella Givens, she could sing. HUNTLEY: Can you tell me a little about it? ASKEW: Well Lou Ella was singing one of our civic movement songs and she could really sing and one of the guards told her through a mike or intercom or something, said, ' ; Shut up, nigger,' ; and she continued to sing. And he said, ' ; Nigger, didn' ; t I tell you to shut up?' ; She didn' ; t shut up, so he came up and got her and carried her to another room which consisted of air and heat. They put her in a room that was so hot that she could hardly breathe. Then they turned the water on her. And the next morning when Lou Ella came back to us in the cell, she couldn' ; t talk. She could not talk, and she would sing, she could really sing. She was one of the Christian Movement, she was in the Christian Movement Choir. HUNTLEY: Was she the only one that was singing at the time that wouldn' ; t stop? ASKEW: Yeah, she was the only one at that time that was singing. HUNTLEY: Did anyone else in your family participate to the same level that you did during the demonstrations? ASKEW: Only one other, my daughter Juanita. She was taken to the City Jail. HUNTLEY: And at that time, she was a teenager? ASKEW: She was a teenager in Ullman [High School]. HUNTLEY: Was she suspended from school? Or did she leave school? ASKEW: She left school and they didn' ; t march, but they got their diploma. They weren' ; t allowed to march. HUNTLEY: Tell me, in my research Atlantic Mills comes up a number of times. Can you tell me anything about Atlantic Mills and the efforts there to get service? ASKEW: It was a like a department store. HUNTLEY: Where was it located? ASKEW: It was located on the north side. HUNTLEY: On Eighth Avenue, I believe? ASKEW: Yeah, and it was almost in the midst of the black neighborhood and we was trying to get people to stop buying. You know, we didn' ; t want them to buy anything out [of] the store. This particular time, we were inside the store to try to contact some blacks that was in there and try to pull them out and, you know, just tell them that we are not buying anything, we just come in to help the blacks to get a better education and all, and some of them left. I left--me and the children--in the paddy wagon. HUNTLEY: Arrested again? ASKEW: Yes, I left in the paddy wagon again because they said we was causing a riot. HUNTLEY: Well, now there was some individuals, many individuals, who were older and working and they were basically afraid to participate. You worked for a white man at the bonding company. How, why, did you make the decision to get involved although you were also working? Your livelihood was dependent upon a white individual as well. ASKEW: Well, my decision was my children and the other children. I used to work at the school a lot. I was the president [of the Parent Teacher Association] one time and then I was the secretary. I was with my children until my last child graduated from high school. HUNTLEY: So you were real active in the PTA? ASKEW: Yeah, I just never missed a meeting, I never missed a concert that they gave at the schools, you know. And I just got to thinking and I say, ' ; Well, the books my kids use are no good, half of the pages are torn out, no backs on them or anything like that,' ; and I say, ' ; The only way we' ; re gonna' ; get something done for all our children, regardless, is to get out there and get arrested for it. Boycott them.' ; I had heard this pastor, I done forget his name, talk about how the only way we was gonna' ; get something done is to just pull the workers for whites, the buyers from whites and then we can get something done. [The pastor] said it will work. HUNTLEY: Well, what was your employer saying about your participating in the movement? ASKEW: Well, my employer said that he wouldn' ; t have too much respect for me if I didn' ; t try to help my people. HUNTLEY: Oh, he actually told you that? ASKEW: He actually told me that. HUNTLEY: I know that you participated in the marches. You probably would have something to say about the way that during the marching, how the fire department used their water hoses. Can you describe any of that? ASKEW: Yeah, we was at Sixteenth Street Baptist Church and I think it was Reverend Shuttlesworth. I forget what pastor it was, but there was a child lost, and we carried this child to the end of the corner to send her to Wyatt T. Walker who had a whistle and so he could find her people. Well, when we went to the corner, we got the child across the street and told her where to go. Wyatt T. was coming the direction we were in and we told her where to go and about the time I turned to go up the step, I think it was Reverend Shuttlesworth who turned to go down the step. But, anyway, they turned the hose on him, the fire department did, and he just splattered like he was a piece of paper. HUNTLEY: That was Shuttlesworth. ASKEW: And he fell to the ground and we had to rush him. One fireman, one white fireman, I' ; ll tell you exactly what this fireman said, ' ; cause I heard it. He said, ' ; I will be damned if I could do another human being that way,' ; and he laid down his hose and walked off. That was one man that did respect Reverend Shuttlesworth and the other blacks with what they were doing. HUNTLEY: So that was obviously unusual to see a fireman put his hose down? ASKEW: It was unusual, and I never did get to find out whether they hired him back or not, but he walked off. HUNTLEY: What church were you a member of? ASKEW: At that time, I was a member of Tristone Baptist Church. HUNTLEY: Where was that located? ASKEW: No, I was a member of Calvary Baptist Church on Center Street. I was previously a member of Tristone but my mother got real ill and she wanted us to go to her church and we thought that she wasn' ; t gonna' ; pull through and she had a slight heart attack so we joined her church to please my mother. We all went to Calvary Missionary Church. HUNTLEY: What was the involvement of your church and your pastor in the movement? ASKEW: Well, uh, they didn' ; t want no parts of it. The deacons didn' ; t want any parts of what we was trying to do. I carried some brochures out to them. They didn' ; t want me to bring no papers or anything in there with anything with the civil right movement on it. You wouldn' ; t believe it. The first time the golf course was integrated I saw one of our deacons on it. HUNTLEY: So he took advantage of it? ASKEW: Yes, they' ; d taken advantage of it. I looked and I said, ' ; One of my deacons is on the golf course,' ; which he was one of the ones that said we couldn' ; t bring those papers inside. So I don' ; t know how the other churches took it. I only know about my church. HUNTLEY: What is your assessment of the Birmingham movement? Was it successful? Was it a failure? ASKEW: It was successful for a limited time. It' ; s not too well now because we don' ; t have total integration. I' ; m just repeating what one of the pastors said. He said, ' ; They just gave us a pacifier.' ; They' ; re pacifying us now. And what hurts is that so many of our people are doing just what the whites want them to do, that is to mistreat their brothers and sisters, to talk down to them, the white collar blacks, those that have the construction company and especially some of the clerks. I had an incident at UAB [University of Alabama at Birmingham] Hospital. I was up there with a friend of mine and it was a real, real old lady and an elderly man. He had brought his wife to the hospital and there was a black clerk where you fill out the applications. And this black lady was up there, her and her husband, trying to fill out the application. Well this girl filled out most of it but they asked her to sign her sign name and she made an ' ; x' ; , and this here clerk said, ' ; Is that the best you can do? You can' ; t make no more than an ' ; x' ; ?' ; And she said it out loud. And I stepped up and I say, ' ; It must be the best she can do, because she did it.' ; And I said, ' ; I want you to know that when you were in school, think about the years that she wasn' ; t and couldn' ; t go to school that she was trying her best to make it to the stage she is now,' ; and I don' ; t think the other blacks had too much trouble with her signing things. But some of them now is awful. They think they got a job. They don' ; t respect the poor. They don' ; t respect. They give so many, many dollars to different organizations which consist of mostly whites, when some of our black organizations, where our children are, that needs it, some of our schools now are not up to par. We need our black colleges. Some of them need help. They need money. I notice in golf, they give a tournament for the whites to help, and I don' ; t see why some of our men can' ; t do that. You know, give a tournament like Jesse Lewis used to give them. HUNTLEY: You are a golfer by the way, right? ASKEW: Oh yeah, yeah! HUNTLEY: You know, I failed to ask in one area. I know that you were instrumental in helping to get the children in the movement in May of 1963. Can you tell us a little bit about that? How did that process work? ASKEW: It was fine. It worked fine. The children, I tell you, the children of the South side is with anything they think is right. Not only my children, but other children of the South side. We trained our children that way. HUNTLEY: So what did you do to get them involved? I know that there were actually individuals, were you one of the individuals that went to the schools? ASKEW: Yeah, I went to the school. HUNTLEY: Tell me about that? Did you talk with the principal? ASKEW: I talked with Mr. Bell and he said that there was no way that he could see himself letting the children get involved in that because it would mean his job and some more jobs. Some of the children saw us in there and saw us in there talking with Mr. Bell and I guess whoever that boy was, or the girls, that saw us they went around and told the other children in the school that the civil rights movement was out trying to get them out to help break up segregation. And I think that' ; s the reason the children...now we was hollering out there, we was singing and they knew the civil rights songs. HUNTLEY: You mean, you were singing? ASKEW: Singing, ' ; We Shall Overcome.' ; HUNTLEY: Outside the school or in the school? ASKEW: No, outside the school. We didn' ; t disrupt the school. The children came out of the school and then we marched downtown, all the way downtown. HUNTLEY: Is there anything else that...any other question I haven' ; t asked you, or something else that you would just like to include in this that we may have overlooked that could highlight what the Movement was about and how it actually impacted upon the lives of people? Anything else that you would like to add? ASKEW: Well it' ; s not too much that I would like to add, but I would like to say the blacks need to sit up and take notice of what is going on now. After the death of all those people that tried to get us a proper education, better homes, better houses, better pay, don' ; t let them be laying there, don' ; t let them die in vain. Do something now to help the schools. There are a lot of them out there that can help the poor, the schools, the [housing] projects. You never know what goes on in that project until you have a chance to visit them. Now, I had a chance to visit them during the campaign and it' ; s pitiful the way those people live in the projects. HUNTLEY: So you are still active. You' ; ve been active in the movement for a long time. ASKEW: I was active until the Good Master told me to slow down some, but I' ; m gonna' ; still be active. I' ; m going to civil rights. HUNTLEY: What organizations were you involved in? ASKEW: Well, I was in the Southside Planning Committee, the NAACP, AARP, and the school. HUNTLEY: The Alabama Christian Movement? ASKEW: The Alabama Christian Movement, yes. HUNTLEY: And you were a member of SCLC? ASKEW: That' ; s right, I called Rev. Woods. Recently, I haven' ; t been to the SCLC meeting. I went to the NAACP meeting because I feel like a meeting is not supposed to NAACP doesn' ; t start a riot. They try to help prevent them, and I think that' ; s the reason why I prefer being active with them [more] than with the SCLC. HUNTLEY: Okay, Mrs. Askew, I certainly appreciate the time that you' ; ve taken out of your busy schedule to come over and talk with us, because this kind of information is so vitally important because most young people simply have no understanding. ASKEW: [They] don' ; t know nothing about what their parents went through. HUNTLEY: And what we are hoping to do at the Civil Rights Institute is to develop the real history of what happened in Birmingham and of course, you would be a very prominent part of that and again, I say thank you for coming out here. ASKEW: Thank you for letting me speak to some of our children out there, let them hear some of this in the high schools in the colleges and do something. Do something for us. Don' ; t let us slide back where we were. HUNTLEY: Thank you very much. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=MAskew1994.xml MAskew1994.xml
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Margaret Askew
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Margaret Askew discusses being involved with the Movement through ACMHR and her church. She encouraged local youth to get involved and she was arrested multiple times.
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19941216A
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department
Adams, Oscar W.
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1994-12-16
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video
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Binnie Myles
Interviewee
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Margaret Givner Brown
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Viewer).
http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=MGBrown1996.xml
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included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration
between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record.
Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011
Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990
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5.4 June 13, 1996 Margaret Givner Brown Interviewed on June 13, 1996 19960613B 0:31:14 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Emily Reynolds Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham. Police brutality--United States Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990 Margaret Givner Brown Binnie Myles Oral History 1:|41(3)|74(4)|91(5)|110(1)|132(4)|152(7)|164(5)|173(11)|184(14)|197(10)|213(9)|223(3)|248(13)|281(10)|298(2)|312(5)|323(11)|339(12)|362(15)|376(10)|395(1)|404(2)|420(10)|432(5)|447(5)|463(13)|481(9)|497(11)|512(8)|532(3) 0 https://youtu.be/2bkOJuiPpqc YouTube video English 1 Interview Introduction This is an interview for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project with Margaret Givner Brown on June 13, 1996 at 2:00 p.m. at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Interview Introduction 33.516200, -86.813870 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ The homepage of the BCRI 19 Childhood and Family How are you? Fine. Good. Did you grow up in Birmingham? Brown discusses her family, her parents' work, and her childhood neighborhood. African Americans--Employment ; African Americans--Southern States ; Birmingham (Ala.) African American families 270 School & ; Church Movement Involvement Were you very active, your family, were you very active in any particular church? Church involvement and church participation in Civil Rights Movement. Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990 ; African Americans--Education ; African Americans--Southern States ; Civil rights movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Religion 537 Movement Demonstration & ; Family Response Did you recall your parents saying anything about the meetings? Perhaps after the meetings were over with, or when you came home? Brown discusses her involvement in a Civil Rights Movement demonstration, and her family's response to Movement activity. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Civil rights movement ; Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) African American families ; African Americans--Civil rights 958 Arrest & ; Jail Experience To Kelly Ingram Park? To Kelly Ingram Park. Yes, we had made it to the street over from Kelly Ingram Park. And there, that's when the police stopped us. Brown describes her experience being arrested and put in jail following her participation in a Civil Rights Movement demonstration. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; Civil rights movement ; Police brutality--United States African Americans--Civil rights ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department 1271 Reflection on Experience Impact So as you came out of that experience and different things happened to the South, particularly in Birmingham, did you ever look back at it and say, " ; Boy, you know I was really young, but I did make a difference." ; Brown reflects on her experience as part of the Civil Rights Movement, and how she has shared that experience with children of today. African Americans--Civil rights--History ; African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--Race identity African Americans--Civil rights ; Civil rights movement 1543 Visiting BCRI How was it for you when you came to the Institute? Did you have flashbacks? Was it an emotional time for? Were you with somebody or by yourself? Brown describes visiting the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute for the first time. African Americans--Civil rights--History Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) 1637 Community Leadership What about your involvement, and when you look at your church? They also played a very big role. I guess that made you very proud of your church. Brown describes living in her community during the Civil Rights Movement, and shares thoughts about the role of church and organizations on the Birmingham and the African American community. African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Crimes against ; African Americans--Religion ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States 1793 Advice for Future & ; Conclusion Before we close, how would you say they can get 'in touch' with the Movement? Brown shares her advice for future generations of African Americans. African Americans--Civil rights ; Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) African Americans--Race identity Video Margaret Givner Brown discusses growing up in Birmingham before getting involved with the Movement as a child. She was arrested at 8 years old for marching. MYLES: This is an interview for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project with Margaret Givner Brown on June 13, 1996 at 2:00 p.m. at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. How are you? BROWN: Fine. MYLES: Good. Did you grow up in Birmingham? BROWN: Yes, I did. MYLES: What area? BROWN: In Titusville. MYLES: Where did you live in Titusville? BROWN: On Kappa Street. MYLES: Do you have brothers and sisters? BROWN: Yes, I have five sisters, no brothers. MYLES: What do you remember about your childhood growing up? When do you remember yourself, at the age of 5, or 7 or what? BROWN: Well, I was a happy, normal, regular five-year-old. MYLES: So you can remember back as early as five? BROWN: Yes. MYLES: What was your community like where you lived? BROWN: It wasn' ; t the suburbs or anything, but it was nice. At that time, it was just an ordinary community to me. MYLES: Did your mom work outside of the home? BROWN: She did small work. Nothing too much. She would work in the school. MYLES: What school did she work in? BROWN: I think she worked at Gary. She worked in the nutrition department where they cooked the food. MYLES: What did your dad do? BROWN: He was a porter at A& ; P. MYLES: What does a porter do? BROWN: A porter does a little of everything, whatever needs to be done. There were certain times when he would unload the trucks when they would come into the warehouse part, or he took mail. Whatever needed to be done, he was there to do that. MYLES: Did he stay there a long time? BROWN: Twenty-seven years, I think. MYLES: Did he? BROWN: Yes, he stayed a long time. MYLES: Did he retire from there or did he go to another job? BROWN: No. The A& ; P closed suddenly so he was left without a job. MYLES: That must have been very difficult. BROWN: It was. MYLES: Do you remember about what age you were when the store closed? BROWN: I was about 15. MYLES: So, in terms of the number of kids, where did you come in, older, younger? BROWN: At the end. MYLES: You' ; re the baby. BROWN: I' ; m the ' ; knee' ; baby. MYLES: Does that mean you came to the knees? BROWN: I was almost at the end. There was one born after me. MYLES: What did you over hear your parents say when the store closed? BROWN: Well, at that time it was hard, but that was years after the demonstrations and all of this. It was hard, but we managed to get on and eventually they had a suit against the company so that way money came in. MYLES: So he and some other people sued A& ; P because of what? BROWN: Because the way in which they ended the job without letting them know anything about it. MYLES: Was your family very active in any particular church? BROWN: Yes, we were all members of New Pilgrim Baptist Church. My father was deacon. He was head of the deacon Board and my mother was a deaconess. MYLES: So that meant the kids were active in church, too. BROWN: Oh, yes. My oldest sister sang in the choir. I was an usher and we were very active. MYLES: Was this something that you wanted to be, an usher? Was that something to really be proud of, " ; When I get a little older, I would like to be an usher," ; or one says, " ; I' ; m going to sing in the choir." ; Or, was it something that parents said, " ; Well you' ; re going to be an usher and you' ; re going to sing in the choir?" ; How did that work? BROWN: Oh, no. That was something that I wanted to do. I enjoyed standing up watching the people as they come in. I like serving so I enjoyed seating people and things like that. MYLES: What about school? Where did you attend elementary school? BROWN: We all attended Washington Elementary. MYLES: What kind of experience did you have there? Do you remember your principal or any of your teachers? BROWN: My principal' ; s name was Mr. Moore and I remember Mrs. Jones-- she was one of my favorite teachers along with Miss Peagues and several others. MYLES: After you finished Washington, did you go to high school or was it a middle school after that? BROWN: I went right into Ullman. I attended Ullman for two years. And, then they closed Ullman so I had to go to Parker to finish up my other two years. MYLES: Were you sad? BROWN: I was sad until I got there and I fit in. MYLES: Your church, you said you were an usher and your family was very active in the church. What kind of community, at home and at the church, was it as it relates to the Movement? Do you remember anything about the Civil Rights Movement or SCLC or NAACP? BROWN: Do you mean as I grew older or when I was younger? MYLES: When you were younger. BROWN: Yes, I remember (Inaudible) participating. Our church was one of the churches that I believe they started in. And, therefore we came to all the meetings that they had in the evening time. It was really exciting. MYLES: What do you recall at the meetings? Was Rev. Smith over the meetings or was he the pastor then or was it somebody else? What were some of the things that the men and women talked about? BROWN: I remember Rev. Smith would turn it over to Rev. Shuttlesworth. I remember Rev. Abernathy would come up and get the crowd roaring for Dr. King. MYLES: What do you recall him saying? BROWN: I remember he would say, " ; fireball" ; and, being a child that drew my attention. I remember the excitement that the people would have. MYLES: What do you remember about Rev. Abernathy, King and Shuttlesworth? BROWN: Well, I remember them being very outspoken. I remember it would be exciting. All I remember is when they talked, we listened. They had a way about them that they could calm a crowd. And, what they had to say, even to a child it was interesting. MYLES: Do you recall your parents saying anything about the meetings? BROWN: I remember it was scary and exciting at the same time, because when they would come home they would tell us to be very careful and that things would probably happen that we wouldn' ; t understand right off. But if we had anything that we wanted to ask them about, we could always ask them about it. It was just exciting to me. MYLES: Why were you scared? BROWN: I remember them telling us that, I guess when the marches were getting started, that they had come on the job and they were asking was anybody a part of it and it was hush, hush among the Black men that were there. As the Movement began to grow and develop more and more, they would, by us being a part of it, my father said the Black employees were drawing away from him. I guess they disassociated themselves with him because they were afraid at that time. All I remember is that there was a lot of fear because they didn' ; t know what would happen to them. MYLES: So, you said, " ; They came on the job and wanted to know who was involved." ; When you say " ; they" ; , who came? BROWN: No, no. I mean they were discussing it on the job. I remember hearing my father when he came home, telling my mom that it was a part of their discussion as to who was in it and who would not participate. MYLES: His employers, his boss? BROWN: Exactly. MYLES: So they would be people that were Caucasian or Black people? BROWN: Black. Because they didn' ; t know whether or not they were participating. They just saw some were for it and some were against it. MYLES: As youngsters, did you girls get together and discuss what might happen? BROWN: Now, my older sisters would say something about it. But my sister who was three years above me, she would ask me if I wanted to participate. And she told me, " ; I want to go." ; And I think talking to her kind of motivated me to want to go. I remember the day that I did march we had talked about it the night before. MYLES: What did you say? BROWN: We were out and had been playing earlier that day. Later on that night when we were in the room getting ready for bed my sister told me, she said, " ; Well, I want to go. I really want to participate." ; She said, " ; I' ; m not afraid." ; And, so I said, " ; They say dogs are there. I' ; ve seen the dogs." ; And, she said, " ; But I' ; m not afraid." ; And, so she said, " ; I just believe that I' ; ll be all right." ; I remember saying, " ; Well, if you go, I want to go." ; I guess by the confidence that she had, and she didn' ; t have any fear, made me not have fear and made me more curious as to what it was all about. MYLES: Did you say anything to your parents? BROWN: The next morning we both went to my mom and my sister told me what she wanted to do because we heard that there would be a march the next day. We asked her if we could go. She was a little reluctant. She kind of pulled back. She said, " ; Not both of you." ; But my older sister said, " ; Well, I' ; ll take care of them." ; And, then she gave us permission to go. MYLES: Your dad had probably already gone to work? BROWN: He was at work. MYLES: Where were you in school at that time? BROWN: I was attending Washington. MYLES: Oh, you were a little girl. You were still in elementary school. BROWN: Very young. MYLES: What age were you? BROWN: I was eight years old, but I was so small that they thought I was younger. MYLES: What age was your sister? BROWN: She was 12, I believe. MYLES: So, this was during the school time? BROWN: This was in the summer. MYLES: So you went down, you knew what time the march was going to take place, do you remember about what time it was? BROWN: We went in the morning. I think it was about 8:00 or 9:00. MYLES: How did you get there? BROWN: My mom had a friend to drop us off and that' ; s how we came. MYLES: Where did the march take place? BROWN: Right at 16th Street Baptist Church. MYLES: When you got there were there other people there? BROWN: Oh, yes. MYLES: A lot of people? BROWN: Yes. MYLES: How did you feel then as you approached the church? BROWN: It was very exciting. People had began to come and I guess waiting for the time seemed like it was the longest time just getting prepared to go, but during that time we sat in and listened to instructions. MYLES: Who gave the instructions and what were they, do you remember? BROWN: I don' ; t remember exactly who that person was. But, I do remember him saying " ; No Comment." ; If somebody come around and ask you something, like who are your parents, say, " ; No Comment." ; I do remember that was part of my instructions. MYLES: So they got everybody together to do the marching. You marched from the church to where? BROWN: We were on the other side of the park. MYLES: To Kelly Ingram Park? BROWN: Yes. We had made it to the street over from Kelly Ingram Park and that' ; s when the policemen stopped us and me and my sister went together. Right as we turned the corner, that' ; s when the police stopped us. MYLES: Do you remember what they said? BROWN: They asked the people that were in front of us did we have a permit and I don' ; t know what the response was, but I remember them telling us then to line up against a fence. MYLES: So now you' ; re like a criminal, an 8 year old criminal, you' ; re lining up against a fence, at least that' ; s the way they looked at it, and they thought you were doing something wrong. Were you scared then, yet? BROWN: No, I was excited. This is really happening. We were going to jail was going through my mind. I know I did everything they said. I lined up against the fence, but I was very excited and a little curious as to what would happen. But, I guess more excited than anything. MYLES: Then what happened? BROWN: Then they had these paddy wagons. They put us in the back. There was a little window so you could see out the back. There was another one on the side. I remember looking out, but they took us down to a big place. At that time I didn' ; t know where it was, but then later, because they took us the back way. I was used to seeing the jail the front way, but they took was the back way. Later I found out that it was the City Jail. When we got there, and I guess they noticed that we were small, they took us to a room. We weren' ; t there long then a bus came. We loaded back up, got on the bus and they took us then to juvenile hall. MYLES: What happened there? Were your fingerprinted and all that? BROWN: No, I don' ; t remember being finger printed. I remember being placed in a room with some more girls. They were much older than I was. As a matter of fact that was exciting for me because they all petted me, I was so small. They were all like big sisters for me. MYLES: So they kind of took you under their wing? BROWN: Oh, yes. They were very sweet to me. I remember we stayed up there until later that evening. I guess they were trying to decide what to do with us. It was a lot of us. I remember looking at the news, because they had a TV in there and we could see everything that was happening on the news. MYLES: On the news, did they mention about the march? BROWN: I remember them saying they wanted to get my attention. They wanted me to see because I imagine, at that time by me being so small, that they filmed me and they wanted me to see it, but it was so many of us and by the time I got a chance to see it, it was over. MYLES: Did anybody call your parents? BROWN: They asked us who our parents were and where we lived. They said they wanted it so they could call our parents, but we didn' ; t tell them anything. MYLES: So, how long did you stay in jail? BROWN: Five days. MYLES: You and your sister? BROWN: Yes. MYLES: What was she saying? Did she say, " ; We' ; re going to get in trouble" ; ? Or " ; Mom and Dad are going to be worried about us." ; BROWN: Oh, no, because we had talked with our parents before we left and they told her to look after me. So they knew where we were, and we knew that they knew where we were. We weren' ; t wondering about whether or not they would be upset. While we were there, it was fun for us. We had to pass the time by singing and playing, little things like that. So, it wasn' ; t fearful as far as passing the time. MYLES: What was the food like? Were you really hungry? BROWN: We had a routine that we went through. We were fed three meals a day and it was a rule that if we were late, when it was time to go, like if they came that morning at 6:00 to get us and we weren' ; t ready to go, then they wouldn' ; t let us come down to eat if we weren' ; t in the line ready to go out. MYLES: So you had to follow the rules and be on time for everything? BROWN: Exactly. MYLES: So as you came out of that experience and different things happen to the South, particularly in Birmingham, did you ever look back at it and say, " ; Boy, I was really young, but I did make a difference." ; BROWN: Yes, I did. I really did. Even with my own kids as I grew older I told them about what had happened. Even though I think what I did was a very small part, I knew that it was important as the years went on because of all of the things that have happened since then. MYLES: But, if you look at it and say it' ; s a small part, it is a big part because if everybody who did just that one small part, it makes the whole one and it does make a difference no matter how insignificant it may seem to ' ; the doer.' ; That' ; s a great responsibility to take upon oneself to march during those times. BROWN: I just wanted to say that it was time. I know that one incident that made me know afterward how important it was and how dangerous it was, but I thank God he brought us through. I have five other sisters, as I said. And, all but one of them went to jail. And, when I got out, when our incident was over with, we would always share what had happened to the other. I had one sister that was put in a sweat box and she had a rough time. I had another sister that fire hydrant was turned on and the dogs were there. So, I knew what I was doing was important. It was a small part at that time, but I knew that it was important. MYLES: When you look back at that, and I don' ; t know whether you' ; ve shared that with other children, and when you see the file film or even if you' ; ve been to the Civil Rights Institute ; have you been to the Institute? BROWN: Yes, I have. MYLES: When you look at all that, first I want to ask you, what about when you talk to your relatives' ; children or your own children and you see an old movie or some file film and say, " ; Yes, I participated, I did so and so." ; What do they say, " ; Oh, that was in the olden days. You didn' ; t really do that." ; Or do they ask you to tell them about it? BROWN: The very first time I shared my experience with any other child was when I was young myself. I remember doing it at school. I had to give a report and that was my report. I wanted to tell them about my incident. When I went up first the kids made fun of me, but later on they were just spellbound. And, as I grew older with my own kids, like I said, they listened. A lot of times, in school systems when I talked with them, they said, " ; Oh, Mrs. Brown, it wasn' ; t that bad." ; The kids just can' ; t imagine that things went on though they did. They just couldn' ; t imagine that ever happened. MYLES: What about when they' ; ve seen the Institute and they see the bus, they see the fountains, do they say, " ; Is this for real, or is this like a movie?" ; What do they say? BROWN: They are really amazed. When the museum first opened I brought my middle son. He was really amazed. He was just saying that, " ; The law--the law should have been able to help. I can' ; t see where the law would allow them to do that." ; But, I told them that at that time it was the law, that we couldn' ; t go different places. It' ; s hard for all my kids. Now, they understand it better. But, earlier they didn' ; t. They didn' ; t understand that the law could do that. MYLES: And the thing about it too, I guess you could look at it and say, well, when you look back, even though you have children, it really wasn' ; t that long ago. BROWN: No, it wasn' ; t. MYLES: How was it for you when you came to the Institute? Did you have flashbacks? Was it an emotional time for? Were you with somebody or by yourself? BROWN: When I first came I was with my husband and it was exciting. It brought back a lot of memories. MYLES: We' ; ve talked to some people who said that it was very emotional. Even men said it brought tears to their eyes when they came here to the Institute. Did you experience any of that? BROWN: All of that, everything that you mentioned. There was sadness, but, like I said, it was time that we had to go through with, it had to be. MYLES: When you talk with your husband about it, did he know you when you were a little girl? BROWN: No. MYLES: So, when you tell him, did he say, " ; Oh, girl, you didn' ; t do that?" ; BROWN: No. He wasn' ; t like that all. All he would say is that he hated that he couldn' ; t participate and he hated that he missed out on that chance, but he was so small his parents didn' ; t allow it. But, he didn' ; t talk to me as though I did not participate. MYLES: What about your church' ; s involvement? When you look at your church, they also played a very big role. I guess that made you very proud of your church. BROWN: It did. MYLES: What about Rev. Smith? Did your father or did you ever overhear about him being threatened or his house being bombed? BROWN: Oh, yes. MYLES: What did they say? BROWN: Especially when we had a member that was beaten. I remember him talking about Rev. Billups. He and Dr. Smith were close. I remember him saying that they had beat him to death. They had found his body in a car and that they were (Inaudible). And, it was just a constant fear that all their lives were in danger, but at the same time we were still motivated to go on. It wasn' ; t the fear that kept us from doing it, it was the fear that made us want to do more. MYLES: Sure, that if we didn' ; t, it would never be. BROWN: Right. It would be even worse. MYLES: What about the Movement in your opinion, then, when you look back at organizations like SCLC and the NAACP then, do you think they were worth it? Was it worth it being involved? Were they good? And, then when you look at the Movement today, you look at SCLC, NAACP, those kinds of organizations, what is the difference or is there any difference in your opinion, then and now? BROWN: Yes, it' ; s a difference now. Then, it was very needed and it is needed today. But we put more faith and confidence in it then because they were right there with us. Now, the kids today don' ; t know about it. Very few do. My daughter, since, was involved in the Movement, the NAACP, but she was telling me about a lot of the kids that weren' ; t aware of it. They didn' ; t know what was going on and I know when we were coming up that was all we talked about--the NAACP, the Movement and the marches and things. So, now, the young kids are kind of out of touch with it. MYLES: Do you think they need to be in touch? BROWN: They do need to be in touch, exactly. MYLES: Before we close, how would you say they can get ' ; in touch' ; with the Movement? BROWN: Through the school system. If they would have different programs to involve them, I believe that would help. That' ; s my opinion. Then, through the churches, that would help a lot, too. MYLES: Do you think that some churches have gotten away from those kinds of things and doing other kinds of things? BROWN: Yes, exactly. MYLES: Is there anything that I didn' ; t ask you that you wanted to share with us? BROWN: Well, I think we covered it all. MYLES: If you could say something to encourage somebody to come to the Civil Rights Institute and see a part of history that took place, how would you invite them? BROWN: I would really advise them to come because this is history and this is something that really, as a matter of fact when they look at where they are today, and they have a long ways yet to go, but if they think about the struggle that we had, in the back and before all of the fine cars and the nice houses came about, they need to know where they came from, to appreciate where they are and where they' ; re going in the future. So I' ; d advise them to please come. MYLES: We certainly thank you for sharing with us today. BROWN: It was a pleasure. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Margaret Givner Brown
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Margaret Givner Brown discusses growing up in Birmingham before getting involved with the Movement as a child. She was arrested at 8 years old for marching.
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19960613B
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham.
Police brutality--United States
Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.)
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1996-06-13
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Mary E. Streeter Perry
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5.3 January 14, 1998 Mary Streeter Perry Interviewed on January 14, 1998 19980114P 0:49:41 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Emily Reynolds Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham. King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 African Americans--Politics and government--20th century Mary E. Streeter Perry Horace Huntley Video 1:|9(7)|54(8)|77(6)|98(4)|111(10)|124(12)|138(13)|152(15)|179(12)|192(9)|214(13)|232(3)|249(10)|264(15)|288(14)|315(5)|334(4)|358(10)|380(1)|398(5)|413(6)|434(5)|447(10)|459(12)|479(3)|493(14)|510(13)|530(5)|546(18)|562(2)|574(2)|589(1)|602(9)|614(11)|631(14)|647(11)|657(6)|667(2)|676(14)|698(9)|729(4)|732(16)|745(6)|761(2)|779(4)|793(15)|809(13)|816(1)|825(9) 0 https://youtu.be/E-Dfx0bgDqg YouTube video English 0 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with Mary E. Streeter Perry ; I’m Dr. Horace Huntley presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. This is an interview for the Oral History Project ; today is January 28, 1998. 33.516200, -86.813870 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ The homepage of the BCRI 57 Upbringing & ; Grade-School Education Were your mother and father from Birmingham originally? Details of early education and family life in Alabama. African Americans--Education (Elementary) ; African Americans--Education--Southern States ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Family life African Americans--Education--Southern States 411 College Education and Early Work Experience What did you do after you finished Parker? Perry describes educational experience and early career. African Americans--Education (Higher) ; African Americans--Education--Southern States ; African Americans--Employment African Americans--Education--Southern States 523 Initial Movement Involvement How did you get involved in the Movement? Details on initial personal involvement with the Civil Rights Movement. African Americans--Civil rights ; Civil rights movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement African Americans--Civil rights 727 Repercussions from Movement Involvement Were there any repercussions as a result of your involvement in the Movement at the University Hospital? Perry describes how she was fired from her job following her arrest. African Americans--Civil rights ; Arrest--United States ; Civil rights movement African Americans--Civil rights 765 Demonstrations, Arrest, and Jail Time Do you remember the first time that you demonstrated? Details regarding involvement in Civil Rights Movement demonstrations (including demonstration at Woolworth's), arrest, and jail time. African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--Segregation ; Arrest--United States ; Civil rights movement ; F.W. Woolworth and Co. ; F.W. Woolworth Company Civil rights movements--Southern States--History--20th century 1147 Voter Registration Efforts Were you a registered voter at the time? Perry describes her participation in voter registration efforts. African Americans--Politics and government--20th century ; Voter registration--United States African Americans--Politics and government--20th century 1192 Family & ; Community Response to Movement Engagement What was the reception that you received at home once you released from jail? Perry describes her family's reaction to Civil Rights Movement engagement and arrest, as well as their support. African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Civil rights movement African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century 1313 Non-violence Education Trip and SCLC You had the opportunity also to go to Dorchester (sp?)? Perry describes a trip she took with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference where she learned about peaceful demonstrations. African Americans--Civil rights ; Civil rights movement ; Nonviolence ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference African Americans--Civil rights 1392 Living in Chicago Now, you were dismissed from your job at University Hospital. Where did you work after that? Discussion of moving from Alabama to Chicago, Illinois, and continued activism and awareness of Civil Rights Movement after relocation. African Americans--Civil rights ; Chicago (Ill.) ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 African Americans--Civil rights 1940 Political Involvement There are the occasions where some Blacks that found that you were from Birmingham and they look at you different than they would if you were from New York or Chicago or some places? Political involvement in Chicago. African Americans--Civil rights ; Chicago (Ill.) ; Committee to Elect Harold Washington Mayor of Chicago ; United States--Politics and government--20th century ; Voter registration United States--Politics and government 2076 Progression of the Movement So, the Movement, then, in your mind, body and soul, has gone from Birmingham in 1961-62-63 to Chicago in the 90s and you sort of epitomize that Movement. Migration has always been a key issue in the history of Black people in this country. Discussion of the progression of the Civil Rights Movement. Affirmative action programs--Law and legislation--United States ; African American youth ; African Americans--Civil rights ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 African Americans--Civil rights 2288 Reflection on Movement Leadership What do you think were the emphasis of the leadership in the Movement at that time? Discussion of experience with and opinions on leadership and Civil Rights Movement progress. African American leadership ; African Americans--Civil rights ; Black Panther Party ; Black power--United States--History--20th century ; Chicago (Ill.) ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference African American leadership 2610 Vietnam War In 1963, ’64, SNCC was going on record against the Vietnam War, against Americans being in Vietnam— Opinions on Vietnam War. King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Vietnam War, 1961-1975--African Americans Vietnam War, 1961-1975 2672 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Assassination We all grieved from Dr. King’s assassination, why do you think he was killed? Remembering the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Assassination--United States ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 2783 Movement Long-Term Impact Do you think that there has been any, I guess—any other things that we experience that were positive that we—just a feeling of victory that we felt during the Civil Rights Movement? Has any of that impacted up on us in the 70s, 80s and 90s and going up the 21st Century? Reflection on Civil Rights Movement and on personal opinions on its impact and influence over time. Affirmative action programs--Law and legislation--United States ; African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--Education ; African Americans--Employment African Americans--Civil rights Oral History Mary E. Streeter Perry discusses growing up in Birmingham, including attending Booker T. Washington Business College, before getting involved with the Movement. She was a part of a sit-in at Woolworth's, voter registration efforts and SNCC. After her involvement in the Movement in Birmingham, she moved to Chicago and became politically active. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mary E. Streeter Perry ; I' ; m Dr. Horace Huntley presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. This is an interview for the Oral History Project ; today is January 28, 1998. Mrs. Perry, I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule and really, while you' ; re on vacation from Chicago, to come to sit and talk with us about your activities in the Movement. As you said, you slept, ate and drank the Movement at that time as a young person ; so, we' ; ll be very interested in getting into that. But, before we get there, let me just raise a couple of questions about you and your family. Were your mother and father from Birmingham originally? PERRY: Bullock County. HUNTLEY: Bullock County, okay. Were you born here? PERRY: I was born here in Birmingham, Alabama. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters did you have? PERRY: There were five of us. HUNTLEY: Where do you fall in that? PERRY: I' ; m in the middle. HUNTLEY: Right in the middle. PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: Okay, so you had the best of all worlds, huh? PERRY: Yes, I did. HUNTLEY: What neighborhood did you grow up in? PERRY: Smithfield. HUNTLEY: Smithfield. How much education did your parents have? PERRY: My mother--they all went to elementary school and at that time, they couldn' ; t afford to go to high school or beyond that, so--. HUNTLEY: Both your mother and your father? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did they do? PERRY: Domestic ; my mother was a housewife and my father worked for the steel mill here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Did your mother work outside of the home? PERRY: No, she worked in the home because at that time, mothers were at home raising children, taking care of things at home. HUNTLEY: Did you know what you father did in the steel mill ; what kind of work? PERRY: He worked in the nail department, making nails. HUNTLEY: Those days of growing up in Birmingham, you know, many people look at a person who lived and grew up in Birmingham as being somewhat of an aberration because you grew up in such a repressive society-- PERRY: Sure. HUNTLEY: What was that time like for you? Let me just ask you about your elementary school days. Do you remember your first grade, where you started first grade? PERRY: Oh yes. HUNTLEY: What school? PERRY: It was Lincoln School and it was very exciting to me as a child because you assumed that all the other children go to the same process you go through ; home, church, school, your community comes just in that order. And, you' ; re taught to respect each area and to love, to care for, to nurture you for future development. HUNTLEY: Where did you live in Smithfield? PERRY: At the time, we lived in 8th Avenue. In fact, we were a block away from Lincoln School at that time. HUNTLEY: So, you didn' ; t have far to walk to school? PERRY: I didn' ; t have far to walk. HUNTLEY: Okay. From Lincoln School, where did you go? PERRY: Parker. It was Parker Annex at the time. I think it was director and faculty at the school at that time. HUNTLEY: Parker, in those early days was termed the ' ; Biggest Negro High School' ; in the world. PERRY: Oh, it was. It was very exciting ; it was academically exciting, there were so many activities the children were involved in at the time. We were taught to be involved in school activities, which were, again, part of your development. HUNTLEY: What kind of extracurricular activities were you involved in? PERRY: I was in the band. I joined the Gymnastics, I was into--the classroom activities, I was a secretary, I was a treasurer, and it was very exciting and I was into--went to all the games and there weren' ; t any drugs involved or anything like that at that time. So, we were considered very normal children in normal activities in school. HUNTLEY: Do you remember any gangs at Parker or in your community? PERRY: Oh no. At that time, we never heard of anything like that. We didn' ; t have to worry about gangs, drugs, and killings. It just wasn' ; t in our era, thank God it wasn' ; t. HUNTLEY: You never heard of the knives that were carried? There was something-- PERRY: Well, that were times when boys would get into those fights and little scuffles, but is was nothing like it is today. No, we didn' ; t have anything like that. HUNTLEY: How would you say Parker impacted upon you in terms of your development? Were there individuals that you remember that had an impact on your development? PERRY: Everybody had an impact because we were like a family at school. School was home away from home and you were treated that way, you were respected that way and you were educated that way. So, everybody knew everybody, respected everybody ; the teachers were like moms, dads and so was the principal of the school. So, there was that close communication, understanding, love and respect. HUNTLEY: Do you remember any particular teachers that would have more influence on you than others? PERRY: My principal, Mr. R. C. Johnson. He was bigger than life and he really impressed me. He was my father away from home. So, what he said was ruled, law and we all abided by it and I remember him to that day, he really impressed me. It' ; s been the leadership at school that followed me all through life. HUNTLEY: What did you do after you finished Parker? PERRY: After I finished Parker, I went to Booker T. Washington Business College, which was an extension of high school, of course, it added onto my education experience. HUNTLEY: What did you major in? PERRY: Secretarial Science, which was consisted of Typing. HUNTLEY: What did you do after that, did you go to work? PERRY: I worked and I was going to school and shortly after that, the Movement came. I was very active and participated and I started working at University Hospital. I got involved with the Movement, lost my job at University--. HUNTLEY: Before you get there, let my try to direct the traffic a little bit. You went to Booker T. Washington ; what was your first job after Booker T. Washington? PERRY: I worked as a waitress. HUNTLEY: Where? PERRY: It was a little--in the Black community, I can' ; t recall-- HUNTLEY: Was it in the business district ; the 4th Avenue Business District, near the school? PERRY: No, it was more near Parker. HUNTLEY: It was in Smithfield? PERRY: It was in Smithfield. Because at the time, we couldn' ; t get jobs at Woolworth' ; s and there were no McDonald' ; s and so, we got jobs where we could. HUNTLEY: How long did you work there? PERRY: Up until about, I think about a year and a half and I went to the University Hospital and was employed there. HUNTLEY: How did you get involved in the Movement? PERRY: We heard about it by word of mouth, of course, at church and all that. We were very interested, like, all of the kids and we wanted to do something for our community. We were very excited about Dr. King coming to Birmingham. Of course, we already had the Alabama Christian Movement and they merged together to do what they had to do. I went to the mass meetings. HUNTLEY: How would you describe a typical mass meeting? PERRY: Oh, it was packed. There was singing ; praying, Dr. King and his staff would speak about desegregating the public facilities at that time because everything was of course, you know, not integrated. So, what we had to do to was solve those problems at that time. We were so excited, the children were all motivated. In fact, they were all getting out of school to join the Movement. Everybody was joining the Movement-- HUNTLEY: Now, you' ; re already out of high school, right? PERRY: Oh yes. HUNTLEY: Were you at that time, working at University Hospital? PERRY: Yes, at that time I was working at University. HUNTLEY: How did that conflict with your involvement with the Movement and you working at University? PERRY: Well, like I said, I was so excited. I just automatically joined the Movement and we all signed up and went to 16th Street Baptist Church to learn how to demonstrate and what to do and what not to do. The dos and don' ; ts--how risky it was and how we had to be nonviolent. Dr. King always said that if you felt that you couldn' ; t handle the nonviolent aspect of it, not to join. But, we weren' ; t afraid, most of us. Those who were fearful didn' ; t join of course. I was so excited, we didn' ; t care about that, and we just wanted to do something for our community. HUNTLEY: Were other members of your family involved? PERRY: Yes, my brother and I have a little sister who was involved. HUNTLEY: What did your parents say about your involvement? PERRY: They were nervous and scared like the rest of the parents. HUNTLEY: Did they raise any questions about your not participating? PERRY: Yes. There was some controversy, a lot of arguments about it. But, we knew what we had to do. It was very important for us at the time to do, to participate and to do something. HUNTLEY: What was the training that you received? PERRY: Well, it was very educational, I must say. We were taught to be nonviolent, if someone was to attempt to be violent against us, we had to group in, get close together, protect each other, not to say anything, but to just demonstrate, carry our signs in a nonviolent manner and walk and talk in a nonviolent manner. Just to protect ourselves, of course, the staff was close by to help us and assist us. HUNTLEY: Were there any repercussions as a result of your involvement in the Movement at the University Hospital? PERRY: I was fired from my job. HUNTLEY: What was the rationale? PERRY: Well, they found out I was in jail, I went to jail and of course they immediately fired me without every getting rehired if I participated in the Movement. If they had anything to do with Movement, they would not be rehired. HUNTLEY: Do you remember the first time that you demonstrated? PERRY: Oh yes. I was at a sit-in counter at Woolworth' ; s and we had to sit at the counter and there so many booths. It was quite interesting they were all so motivating to us because we felt assured that we would take it, we weren' ; t afraid of anything. We' ; d sit at the counters and we would sit like 30 minutes, then the White people walked around and wouldn' ; t serve us, they would call us ugly names. So, after about 30 minutes, we would move and another group would come in and that process continued. HUNTLEY: Were you ever arrested? PERRY: Yes, I was arrested. When I demonstrated in front of Love' ; s Department-- HUNTLEY: This was not at the sit-ins? PERRY: I was arrested during a demonstration, picketing. My brother at the time was demonstrating in front of Pizitz Store. With my group, the police came up with the paddy and asked us if we had permits and we said no and they put us in the paddy wagons and we sang songs of praises all the way to jail. HUNTLEY: How many were in your group? PERRY: There were approximately, I would say 20 to 25 people. HUNTLEY: And, they put all of you in the same paddy wagon? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: It was rather crowded in there. PERRY: Oh yes. But we managed. HUNTLEY: What was going through your mind when all of this was happening? Why do that at that time? PERRY: We were doing something positive and that it was going to help our community for future generations as well as at that time. That' ; s what made us so excited. HUNTLEY: Were there other friends of yours, close associates of yours that were with you when you were demonstrating? PERRY: There were a few neighbors and friends of mine that I knew. We were all close communities and everybody got involved. HUNTLEY: When you went to jail, was there anyone in jail with you that you knew from your immediate surroundings like school or from your neighborhood? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: So, you knew most of the people that were in jail with you? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: What was jail like? PERRY: It was a wonderful experience. HUNTLEY: Jail was a wonderful experience? PERRY: Because, we knew why we were there and that' ; s what made it wonderful. We had an opportunity to learn about an experience we never experienced before. We got friendly with the prisoners. We stayed in the group as we were taught. HUNTLEY: The prison authorities didn' ; t attempt to separate you? PERRY: Oh no. The women were in the prison with the women and of course, the men with men. HUNTLEY: Where were you housed? PERRY: We were housed actually in prison downtown. We just started having church service, singing, praying and of course, the inmates joined in with us. It was a wonderful experience, very, very, very enlightening. HUNTLEY: Were there any efforts to make you be quiet? PERRY: No, we weren' ; t brutalized or--they respected us and we followed the rules and regulations so, we didn' ; t fear anything. HUNTLEY: How long were you there? PERRY: I was there two days and one night. Dr. King would come out and check on us and we could see him through the window and he would holler and ask us how we' ; re doing. HUNTLEY: So, it was very memorable occasion? PERRY: Yes it was. HUNTLEY: Do you remember the food? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: How was it? PERRY: We ate out tin plates, one tin cup and one tin spoon. We had something that looked like grits, something that looked like soup, we couldn' ; t tell. We ate out the vending machines, potato chips, peanuts and candy. HUNTLEY: So, you had money? PERRY: We had a little bit, nickels, quarters and dimes with us. We just couldn' ; t eat the food, it was--that was the worst experience right there. HUNTLEY: So, the food was the worst? PERRY: Was actually the worst experience, yes. HUNTLEY: Do you remember when you were released? PERRY: Yes, the day that I went to jail, we stayed that night and the next day, we were released that following evening. Reverend Billups and Bernard Beatey (sp?) came to get us out of jail and we immediately went to the mass meeting at 16th Street. HUNTLEY: So, you didn' ; t go home? PERRY: No, we went directly to the mass meeting. HUNTLEY: What was your reception when you arrived? PERRY: Oh, the church was packed, choirs singing, standing ovation and everybody applauded when we walked in. We sat down front and different ministers would get up and we had the experience of expressing our experiences in jail. It was very exciting. HUNTLEY: Sound like you wanted to go back. PERRY: It was one of the most exciting times in my life and if I could do it all over again, I really would. HUNTLEY: Were you ever arrested again after that? PERRY: No, I wasn' ; t arrested again. Of course, I participated making signs, answering phones and just doing what ever they needed me to do and then later on, work in voter registration. HUNTLEY: Were you a registered voter at the time? PERRY: I wasn' ; t quite, age wise. HUNTLEY: What did you do in terms of voter registration? PERRY: Well, at Thurgood CME Church, which is now relocated, but at the time, it was close to all the funeral homes and we would sign the community up and everybody would come out and sign up and we' ; d show them how to fill the papers out and then they were given free transportation by anybody in the community who could volunteer and including funeral homes, they would offer their services to give free rides to anyone who wanted to go down to the courthouse to registered. HUNTLEY: What was the reception that you received at home once you released from jail? PERRY: Well, my parents were relieved of course and they were happy and I explained to them what I wanted to. So, after that, they accepted what I wanted to do and without any arguments. HUNTLEY: Was your brother arrested? PERRY: No, he wasn' ; t arrested and he continued to demonstrate, but, he wasn' ; t arrested. HUNTLEY: After your arrest, you have become a veteran then. How did your peers relate to you as a result of your activities? I' ; m sure there friends who were not involved in the Movement, how did they relate? PERRY: To tell you the truth, the ones that I saw and ran into, they immediately wanted to join the Movement. You see, the children had to because the parents had to work. So, everybody couldn' ; t go to jail and this is what Dr. King said, " ; The children have to do this." ; We were willing and as well as able to respond to the call. HUNTLEY: Were there--many--in interviewing other people, many of them have suggested that the children were very actively involved and participated during this breached period, say from the beginning of May until for about a week or so. But, activities after that then sort of dwindled. Was that your experience as well? PERRY: No. HUNTLEY: Was that level of involvement, did that continue? PERRY: No, the children were very active through the whole times of the demonstrations, it was very active. We went from the demonstrations with into the voter registration. HUNTLEY: Had the opportunity also, to go to Dorchester (sp?) PERRY: Dorchester (sp?) Simon(sp?), yes. HUNTLEY: Tell me about that. PERRY: There was busload of us, volunteered to go to Dorchester to learn more about the Movement, to learn about Gandhi, who started the Movement in India and had classes of course. I think we stayed like a day or two, of course everybody had to get permission from their parents and it was a wonderful experience. We really learned a lot about the Movement and of course we were very excited about learning about Gandhi and how his movement got us motivated. HUNTLEY: Did you join the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights or SCLC? PERRY: I joined SCLC. HUNTLEY: Did you work with them in any other city, other than Birmingham? PERRY: No, I did not. Because I lived in Chicago and there' ; s not an office. HUNTLEY: Now, you were dismissed from your job at University Hospital. Where did you work after that? PERRY: I moved to Chicago. I followed some relatives to find a job and to go back to school and to get myself ready for my future because I felt that I did something that would add onto to my education that would help me along in life. So, I felt very good about it and I still feel good about it. So, I moved to Chicago and found a job and start taking classes and working and going to school. I would come home whenever I could to visit my family and I think I didn' ; t come back until my father got sick and he was so sick, I just dropped everything. HUNTLEY: You were away for 10 years? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: How, then, would you compare Chicago with Birmingham? When you first arrived there, was this the first time that you had been to Chicago or had you been going? PERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: So, how was that transition from Birmingham to Chicago? PERRY: Well, they needed what we did. They needed--it was very different. HUNTLEY: How do you mean, different? PERRY: Well, I noticed that the young people, they didn' ; t have what we had here, the close knit families, the motivation to work together for the betterment of your home, family, community, period and it was desperately needed and of course, I couldn' ; t single-handedly do it. But, that' ; s the first thing I notice, how divided the Black community was. HUNTLEY: Did you get involved with Dr. King came to Chicago? PERRY: Yes I did. I participated in demonstrations, I didn' ; t go to jail but I did demonstration. HUNTLEY: How were demonstrations different in Chicago than Birmingham? PERRY: It was very much more powerful because there were different circumstances, you have people who really didn' ; t understand our plight because they were born and raised there. The Blacks were so divided there ; it' ; s not the close communication like it should be because it' ; s a larger city, perhaps. At the time I felt that all Black communities were alike and it was not. It was just the opposite. HUNTLEY: So, did that create a problem for you? PERRY: I was disappointed, very hurt. HUNTLEY: Did you every consider coming back to Birmingham? PERRY: Well, I considered, but the jobs were so plentiful there, much more here for the Black community and I felt if I stayed a little bit longer and made a little more money and of course, I was helping my family at that time. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did you do? PERRY: Oh, I did clerical work. I was mostly attracted to the departments where I worked, in fact a couple of them closed. But, that was interest at that time and still is. HUNTLEY: Well, Chicago being much different from Birmingham and when Dr. King came to Chicago, he made a statement. That he had never seen the viciousness on the face of the people in Alabama and Mississippi that he witnessed in Chicago. You had mentioned earlier that you were not afraid, here in Birmingham you were demonstrating, because you knew that it was for something that was gonna benefit the community. Did you have that same sense of a struggle when you demonstrated in Chicago? PERRY: Yes, I did. HUNTLEY: What about the PERRY: The violent aspect? HUNTLEY: Right. PERRY: I wasn' ; t afraid personally, but, I was afraid for the children who were not familiar with what they were doing. They really didn' ; t' ; have a sense, they just wanted to do something because Dr. King was there. But, I don' ; t think they were prepared because there was no environment comfortable enough that would understand what they were doing. HUNTLEY: In Birmingham, the demonstrations never really went into White communities per se-- PERRY: Yes-- HUNTLEY: But, in Chicago, the march went to Cicero. PERRY: Right, they were a racist community. HUNTLEY: And that is when he talked about the differences in how it impacted upon him as a person and being afraid and if you view the film, you can see the fright in his face and in others' ; faces as well. It was a different world in Chicago. PERRY: Still is. HUNTLEY: Still is? PERRY: Yes. Because you have people coming from all over the world and they don' ; t understand nor do they care about the plights of the Black community. So, this is where the violence comes into play. HUNTLEY: How did the Movement prepare you for your life in Chicago and beyond? PERRY: It made me a strong person. It made me face life better and the reality to accommodate myself with the world around me, no matter where the people come from ; you have to learn to live with other parts of the world. It educated me to handle myself in situations that I might come across that would encounter prejudice in particular. I think I' ; ve done quite well. HUNTLEY: You said that if you had the chance to do it all over again, you would? PERRY: I would, I would do it all over again and I' ; d like to add that I' ; m kind of disappointed that our Blacks don' ; t have a sense of pride and I blame that part on the parents. I want the whole world to know what we did, because we had an impact on the world and we didn' ; t realize it at that particular time and I' ; m very extremely proud of it. The world has copied off us and with the children and their children the future generations to not forget where we come from, particularly our ancestors because if it wasn' ; t for them, we wouldn' ; t be here to do what we had to do. Each generation have to play a part and be proud of your community and not to forget where you come from, where you are now, so you can go on with your future and know where you' ; re going. So, I want the young people to really, very seriously participate in their communities, to be a positive impact no matter where you are and what part of the world you live in, you' ; re still part of the Black community and not to ever forget where you come from. Where you' ; re from is very important because if you don' ; t know where you come from, you' ; ll never know where you' ; re going. HUNTLEY: I know Northern cities or Western cities or wherever you meet people and you tell them that you' ; re from Birmingham, Alabama, what has been the reaction? PERRY: The Black community of course, they' ; re interesting and very proud. I expressed in the White community while I' ; m in Chicago and the fact that I was part of the Movement and they gave me sort of the half smile and which is okay because I want the whole world to know about what we did in Birmingham, so I continue to carry the message. HUNTLEY: There are the occasions where some Blacks that found that you were from Birmingham and they look at you different than they would if you were from New York or Chicago or some places? PERRY: Occasionally, but I got my most positive results from the Black community. In fact, I joined Harold Washington since I been there. I' ; ve even went to some community leaders' ; party for Harold Washington and Judges at a party and it was very interesting and they were all very proud of the fact that I was part of the Movement here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Tell me about the Harold Washington party. PERRY: Harold Washington was THE MAN, of course you he died tragically a few years ago. They wanted to memorize him in as many aspects as they could. So, they organized this Harold Washington party, to be part of the permanent part of the Black community, it was very exciting to be in. Everybody was very cordial, something like here, but not on a vast scale. I feel it should have been, but-- HUNTLEY: So, you worked with voter registration, anything else? PERRY: I helped the political parties, worked with different mainly Black offices. HUNTLEY: Are you still working with that group? PERRY: Not as active as it was initially, but I' ; m still part of the Harold Washington party. HUNTLEY: Judge Penchman(sp?) just ran for an office. PERRY: Yes, he did. He didn' ; t win but you can' ; t keep a good man down. HUNTLEY: You know his daughter lives here. PERRY: Oh really, I didn' ; t know that. HUNTLEY: So, the Movement, then, in your mind, body and soul, has gone from Birmingham in 1961-62-63 to Chicago in the 90s and you sort of epitomize that Movement. Migration has always been a key issue in the history of Black people in this country. PERRY: It' ; s a part of me for the rest of my life. HUNTLEY: And you would like for everybody to know that and know what it has meant to you? PERRY: Yes, what it was meant for our communities in the future. HUNTLEY: Where are we now in relationship to the Movement of the 60s? PERRY: We' ; re not where we should be. I think that everybody should take a part and revitalize our community to the point where we can change the laws to benefit us. We can practice those laws to benefit us, to better our communities because things are not getting, in a sense they' ; re getting worse. They want to get rid of Affirmative Action, I think that' ; s a terrible mistake ; it would hurt us in our community. I want our leaders to be leaders like Dr. King, Rev. Walker and Rev. Shuttlesworth. If we can find leaders like that in our younger generation, it really would help our community. I can' ; t see whey that can' ; t be done. I can' ; t see why young people don' ; t really have an interest in that area like they should, to make a national impact, a national statement. I hope that is something that can motivate them to want to participate in their communities because I' ; m so afraid that other people from other parts of the world are just gonna come over here and just take total control and take all our jobs. HUNTLEY: What were the successes of the Movement? PERRY: Affirmative Action, every aspect of the community, period, there were jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. You could go to the school you want to. Everything opened up publicly and I' ; m very proud of that because it makes me feel that our works was not in vain, our efforts--even though some of the scars are there--one of the things that hurt me the most Dr. King was killed, it hurts me now to even talk about it because it just devastated our community. He was a parent to all of us as well as our leader and -- HUNTLEY: What do you think were the emphasis of the leadership in the Movement at that time? PERRY: To show courage, intelligence and to show that we were educated people, we have a beautiful history and we' ; re the first people here on this earth. We have attributed everything to mankind and we have not reaped the benefits of our contributions to this country and to the world. We should be recognized throughout the whole world of a Black people, what we' ; re about, who we are, what we represent, what we bring forth and we' ; re still the most brilliant people in the world. And if nobody appreciates us, we should appreciate ourselves. HUNTLEY: Were there any mistakes made during the time from the perspective of our leadership? PERRY: There weren' ; t enough leaders. HUNTLEY: Not enough leaders? PERRY: Not enough leaders. HUNTLEY: What could more leaders have done that was done? PERRY: Well, if they had the leadership that we were brought under, it would have spread worldwide. HUNTLEY: You don' ; t think it spread worldwide? PERRY: Well, it did, but SCLC would have been all over the world. HUNTLEY: You' ; re saying SCLC should have had more leaders? What about the other organizations such as SNCC or CORE? PERRY: Oh sure they contributed, but I was such a part of SCLC, I' ; m not dismissing their contributions. If it had been more leaders, we could have changed the whole world to a better place to live. HUNTLEY: Now, you mentioned Dr. King, Fred Shuttlesworth, were there other people that you looked upon as being leaders? PERRY: Oh yes, Reverend Gardner, Wyatt T. Walker, Dorothy Cotton, Annie Young, Reverend Charles Phillips-- HUNTLEY: What about-- PERRY: Many local leaders-- HUNTLEY: What about national leaders like Stokely Carmichael? PERRY: Stokely Carmichael, oh yes. Of course, Malcolm X. HUNTLEY: There are different areas of the Movement and the nonviolent direction action, of course, was led by the SCLC. PERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: Then, you had the college students that were led by SNCC. PERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: Stokely Carmichael and people of that nature and then of course, you did have Malcolm X and others. The Movement sort of escalates in the mid-60s and you' ; re in Chicago and the Black Panther Party is organized. How do you view that with your background, coming from Birmingham and having your experiences with SCLC and when you get to Chicago, you say that SCLC are really that active in the urban center-- PERRY: I think they should have merged ; they would have been more powerful, more positive and generating more. More community activities and participation would have been great. HUNTLEY: You don' ; t think that they were searching for different things? PERRY: I think they were searching for the same thing. I think we would have been more powerful--when you' ; re--together we stand, divided we fall, we can' ; t afford to have any kind of division in our communities, we just can' ; t afford it. HUNTLEY: How did you view the whole concept of Black power? PERRY: I think it was a good thing all the way around. But, it could have been more powerful had they merged. HUNTLEY: In 1963, ' ; 64, SNCC was going on record against the Vietnam War, against Americans being in Vietnam-- PERRY: It was a terrible mistake. HUNTLEY: Dr. King did not agree with them at that particular juncture or he did not publicly agree with them. By 1967 though, he did come out against the Vietnam War. PERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: How was that viewed by you and people in your particular area? PERRY: Well, we agreed with Dr. King. Of course it was a terrible mistake, it was a terrible time, it was unnecessary. HUNTLEY: What was a terrible mistake? PERRY: Getting involved in the war, period. Our men getting killed, for what? There were a lot of Black communities hurt by that war. HUNTLEY: We all grieved from Dr. King' ; s assassination, why do you think he was killed? PERRY: Because of all the wonderful things he did. HUNTLEY: Why would he be assassinated for the wonderful things? PERRY: Jesus was assassinated, so, Dr. King was assassinated and Malcolm X. At that time when the Black community tried to do something positive, your life is automatically on the line. I think we take a risk on your family as well. They understood this and accepted. He knew and he often talked about the fact that one day he might get killed and it happened. I can' ; t elaborate because it' ; s just too-- HUNTLEY: Where were they day you heard of Dr. King--? PERRY: I was in Chicago-- HUNTLEY: Do you remember where you were when you actually got the news? PERRY: Yes, I was with my other relatives there. HUNTLEY: I was in Minneapolis at the time and it was in the evening like 5:30, 6:00 when we received the message and I think most people can probably remember exactly what they were doing when they got the news and not believing it. That created a real difficulty for the Movement as a whole and some say it actually ended the Movement. The Movement actually ended as result of that, would you agree with or not? PERRY: Yes, I do. HUNTLEY: You think the Movement ended with the death of Dr. King? PERRY: It shouldn' ; t have, but somewhat, it did. HUNTLEY: Do you think that there has been any, I guess--any other things that we experience that were positive that we--just a feeling of victory that we felt during the Civil Rights Movement? Has any of that impacted up on us in the 70s, 80s and 90s and going up the 21st Century? PERRY: I think so, jobs. Doors opened up and public doors opened and that was a wonderful thing and it still is. This is why I' ; m so afraid of Affirmative Action is going to be destroyed because it would cripple our community and our efforts. I think the Black community should press the Government and we should also fight for Affirmative Action. HUNTLEY: Do you think we' ; ll do that, collectively? Do you see that we' ; re doing-- We' ; ve gone from Smithfield to Lincoln School to Parker Annex through Parker High School all the way to the Southside of Chicago. Is there anything else that you would like to include in this tape before we conclude? PERRY: Well, I hope what I said will encourage our people to continue the struggle for our communities. If we don' ; t, we won' ; t have a community. It is very vital, it' ; s a matter of life for us to survive. It is a matter of life for us to continue educating our children. We must continue fighting for our rights. We must continue working together, collectively as a community. We must be better people so our homes can be better, our schools can be better, and our communities can be better to, to better the whole world. I think we can do that if we really set our minds to it and I' ; m really reaching to young people to please work in your communities. HUNTLEY: I want to thank you for coming back home and sitting and talking with me today and maybe we' ; ll get a chance to do this at some later date. Because, I know that you' ; re gonna continue to pass this word ; I can feel the spirit as you talk. PERRY: I do it all the time. HUNTLEY: I can tell that you do. PERRY: Thank you. HUNTLEY: Thank you. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=MESPerry1998.xml MESPerry1998.xml
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Mary Streeter Perry
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Mary E. Streeter Perry discusses growing up in Birmingham, including attending Booker T. Washington Business College, before getting involved with the Movement. She was a part of a sit-in at Woolworth's, voter registration efforts and SNCC. After her involvement in the Movement in Birmingham, she moved to Chicago and became politically active.
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19980114P
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham.
King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968
African Americans--Politics and government--20th century
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1998-01-14
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video
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Nettie Flemmon
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http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=NFlemmon1996.xml
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16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963
Wren, Tony
Voter registration--United States
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5.4 June 5, 1996 Nettie Flemmon 19960605F 0:56:28 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Madeline Jenkins Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.) 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 Wren, Tony Voter registration--United States Nettie Flemmon Horace Huntley Video 1:|22(10)|39(11)|57(9)|77(8)|101(5)|112(10)|133(7)|144(8)|157(6)|170(1)|187(4)|207(4)|226(6)|237(14)|252(5)|268(2)|288(2)|306(7)|318(1)|329(16)|343(7)|357(12)|374(2)|383(10)|404(10)|420(11)|441(5)|449(18)|475(17)|490(10)|505(13)|517(1)|535(9)|548(4)|566(16)|577(15)|599(9)|615(6)|621(14)|634(5)|655(5)|662(4)|685(1)|703(11)|720(8)|736(7)|750(12)|767(6)|786(1)|800(8)|812(6)|826(13)|845(4)|858(7)|866(8)|879(12) 0 https://youtu.be/n3-ZSd1pm_g YouTube video English 0 Introduction of Interview This is an interview with Mrs. Nettie Flemmon for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's oral history project. I'm Dr. Horace Huntley we're presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Interview subject is introduced. 33.516200, -86.813870 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 41 Background and Family Life Where were you born? Flemmon discusses where she was raised in Birmingham and how her mom moved up north when she was a teenager. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Michigan African Americans--Michigan--Detroit 295 Growing Up in Birmingham in the 1920s Is that right? So, tell me what it was like growing up in Birmingham in the 1920s. Flemmon recalls how rough it was living in Birmingham in the 20s ; but despite that, her and her husband decided to raise their family in Birmingham. 1920s ; Birmingham (Ala.) Collegeville (Ala.) ; Sloss Furnace Company ; Titusville (Ala.) 490 Memories of the Great Depression Do you remember the Great Depression? Flemmon recalls how her and her mother did not experience too much hardship during the depression because of her mother's job. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Hoover, Herbert C. Domestic work ; Great Depression 620 Her and Her Husband's Work Life And you...when you got out of school and got married what did your husband do? What kind of work did he do? Flemmon talks about how her husband was self-employed and how all of the neighbors looked out for each other. Birmingham (Ala.) ; United States Navy Domestic work 868 Status Quo in Birmingham Before the Movement Well, before the movement got started what was Birmingham like? Flemmon discusses segregation in Birmingham before the movement and how blacks were treated by the police. Blacks--Segregation ; Bull Conner Birmingham (Ala.) ; Police brutality--United States 1168 Personal Involvement with the Movement Now when the movement started how did you get involved with the movement? Flemmons recalls her involvement with mass demonstrations and how she hauled people from demonstration to demonstration. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Civil rights movement ; Mass demonstrations 1566 63 Day Casket March with Tony Wren One time, when we were marching with Tony Wren, 63 days I think we were marching with a casket. Flemmon talks about when she marched around Birmingham with the casket and how people treated her at the demonstration. Miles College ; Wren, Tony Birmingham (Ala.) 1809 Efforts to Recruit Children for the Movement Were there efforts, did you participate in any of the efforts to recruit children from the schools? Flemmon recalls how they went to high schools with the help of SCLC to recruit children for the movement. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference Civil rights movement ; Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) 1994 Discussions of the Movement with Her Family What were the discussions like at home about the movement, since you and your children and husband were involved? Did you ever talk about the movement at home? Flemmon talks about how her whole family was supportive of the movement. Birmingham (Ala.) Civil rights movement 2054 Personal Encounters with the Police and Meeting Hubert Humphrey I know some people that did that they were sometimes approached by policemen. Flemmon recalls her experience with the police while she was heading to the airport to meet Vice President Hubert Humphrey. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Police brutality--United States Humphrey, Hubert H. (Hubert Horatio), 1911-1978 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 2251 Recollection of an Accidental Shooting of a Black Man and Its Impact What is the most important issue of the time that you remember, like any events that took place that stand out in your mind about your participation and your involvement in the movement? Flemmon recalls a black man being shot by a white man, and because of this, more people became involved in the movement. Birmingham (Ala.) ; St. James Baptist Church Racism--United States 2552 Becoming a Registered Voter Were you a registered voter? Flemmon recalls how local government workers targeted Black people and made it hard for them to become registered voters. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Racial discrimination Voter registration--United States 2623 Remembrance of the March on Washington, Freedom Riders, and the 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing Did you participate in any other demonstrations outside of Birmingham? Flemmons recalls where she was during some of the major events in the Movement. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Freedom Rides, 1961 ; March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.) 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 2775 Importance of the Movement in Birmingham So, what did you think was the significance, how important was what was happening with the movement for Birmingham? How important was the movement? Flemmon recalls how the movement brought people closer together and the people united for a common cause. Birmingham (Ala.) ; New Pilgrim Baptist Church Civil rights movement 2905 Churches in Birmingham Involved in the Movement I know New Pilgrim was ministered and a lot of people were involved. Was Tabernacle involved in the movement, was the pastor? Flemmon recalls how several of the churches in Birmingham attended the demonstrations and supported the movement. New Pilgrim Baptist Church ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 A.G. Gaston Motel (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) 3088 Supporting the Movement Through Different Means Is there anything else that we have not talked about, that you would like to share with us that relates to the movement? Flemmon discusses how people contributed to the movement in different ways but every way mattered. Birmingham (Ala.) Civil rights movement 3351 Conclusion of Interview Mrs. Flemmon, I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come and talk with us and you've been quite helpful. Interview is concluded. Oral History Nettie Flemmon discusses devoting her life to the Movement in every way. She, her husband and her children coordinated, assisted and demonstrated all around the South, including two of her children attending the March on Washington. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mrs. Nettie Flemmon 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 5, 1996 at 2:00p.m. Ok, would you state your name and your birth date. FLEMMON: My name is Nettie Flemmon, oh, you mean my married name? HUNTLEY: Yes ma' ; am. FLEMMON: My birth date is August 4, 1918. HUNTLEY: Where were you born? FLEMMON: In Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Where were your parents from? FLEMMON: From Wilcox County. HUNTLEY: Wilcox County? FLEMMON: That' ; s where they were born. Eventually their brother brought them here to Birmingham and they were reared here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Oh, they were reared here in Birmingham? FLEMMON: They were young children, the oldest brother taken over as a father for them after the death of their daddy and mother. The daddy would tell the oldest son to see after the children after their death. And he did that, my uncle did that and raised his two brothers and two sisters. HUNTLEY: So, then your mother was small, so, she really was like she was from Birmingham. FLEMMON: Yes, she was small, they were small children when their parents died. HUNTLEY: Was your father also from Birmingham? FLEMMON: No, my father was raised in Wilcox County, but see I didn' ; t never know my father till I got 21 years old. I was 21 years old when I seen my father and I had four girls. HUNTLEY: Is that right? Did he stay in Wilcox County? FLEMMON: No, he left when he was a young man and came to Birmingham. You know how boys in the country will leave and come to see people they know in town and stay awhile and then finally he left and went up to Michigan. HUNTLEY: Oh, ok, so he left Birmingham and went to Michigan. FLEMMON: That' ; s right and that' ; s were they resided the rest of their life, in Detroit, in Muskego. HUNTLEY: But your mother stayed here? FLEMMON: My mother remained here until a later year then she went to Detroit to find her brother and that' ; s where she decided to stay in Detroit after she met her brother. She lived there for 28, she worked there for at the [inaudible] laundry for 28 years. HUNTLEY: In Detroit? FLEMMON: Yeah, and then she stayed there for 32 years she lived till death came and took her away. In 1981, my mother died. HUNTLEY: Oh, ok, and she died in Detroit? FLEMMON: Yes. HUNTLEY: You were grown when she left her going to Detroit. FLEMMON: Oh, yeah, I had my family. I was married. I married at the age of 15. Then I was a mother of 13 living children beside I had a still born. Then I had a small miscarriage, that would have been 15 children. I raised 13 children. HUNTLEY: You raised 13 children. How many boys and how many girls? FLEMMON: I had, um, it was 8 boys and 7 girls, but the still born, you know. HUNTLEY: You now were raised up on the north side or the south side? FLEMMON: I was raised up over on the north side. HUNTLEY: When you were born, you were born on the south side? FLEMMON: I was born on the southside, but they moved from over there and moved back over on the north side. I recall back in the 20s is when they moved back over on the north side. HUNTLEY: So, that was before you started school then. FLEMMON: Yeah, I was a little girl at that time. HUNTLEY: What school did you go to? FLEMMON: Thomas, I got to the 8th grade. Then me and my husband married young. HUNTLEY: Was he at Thomas too? FLEMMON: Yeah, we all attended Thomas school. HUNTLEY: Is that right? So, tell me what it was like growing up in Birmingham in the 1920s. FLEMMON: Well, it was pretty rough. It wasn' ; t no roads then, but we made it. We made it. You know the old Sloss Furnace, lots of men came from down home and got jobs over there at the Sloss France and worked over there. They worked them pipe shops. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did your mother do? FLEMMON: My mother was a domestic worker. She worked at the laundry, she worked at the Number Eight Bottling Company a long time ago. Just from one job to another. Then she decided to leave Birmingham and go north. Most of the colored people would do better up north, they would leave and go north, to Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland. HUNTLEY: Why did you decide not to go up or did you ever go north to live? FLEMMON: To live? No, we just remained here. This was our home and we had a lot of children, we couldn' ; t go. Where could we go with all them children? People didn' ; t have no room for us. HUNTLEY: That' ; s what kept you from going cause you had... FLEMMON: I was confined with my family and I had to stay with my family. HUNTLEY: Right. So, if you didn' ; t have any children or that many children... FLEMMON: Probably I may have left, my husband probably would have to, but after we got stuck here with a family we decided to make Alabama our home. HUNTLEY: What community did you raise your children in? FLEMMON: Well, I raised them right around ordinary people. In the community over there. HUNTLEY: Was it Collegeville? FLEMMON: No, just over here. Most of them were born on the north side where I was raised at until we moved in 1949. We moved to Titusville, out there at 106 and my husband had a house built. The man drawed the plans up and made the house too small. So we had to get another house out there in Collegeville. They were raised over there in Collegeville, in 1951 we moved, October 10th, out there in Collegeville. So we raised them up there. They attended school there at Hudson School and Carver High School. Some went over to...the chose the high school they wanted to go, so they went to the other [inaudible]. They just chose the school they wanted to go to. HUNTLEY: Do you remember the Depression? FLEMMON: Why sure, 1928, ' ; 29,' ; 30, and ' ; 31. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about it? FLEMMON: I don' ; t remember it was a Great Depression at that time. People was..it was a depression all over the world. Hoover was the President and it was tough. They had soup lines and they had milk, white milk was given to poor people, milk for their children to feed the children. Up there on 26th Street and 2nd Avenue, the White Dairy was up there. Bessie Roth' ; s Bakery would give the poor people bread. HUNTLEY: Your family was a large family, no, you were an only child. FLEMMON: I was an only child. My mother worked and mostly I worked with my mother in the White folks house. After I got out of school, I had to go help my momma go set the table and help her prepare their food, breakfast and supper for the evening you know. HUNTLEY: How did the depression affect you and your mother, your family? FLEMMON: Well, my mother worked all the time and it really didn' ; t strike us as hard as it did lots of people. My mother was a smart woman and she believed in work and she worked and made an honest living. We never had to get on no kind of help. HUNTLEY: She was always able to find a job. FLEMMON: My mother was always able to find a job and she always kept a job. She would work. HUNTLEY: And you... when you got out of school and got married what did your husband do? What kind of work did he do? FLEMMON: He went into business. He was working with a colored man at the time then. HUNTLEY: Doing what? FLEMMON: He was selling, the colored man, was selling coal and ice. An old man, they called him Bear John on 28th Street and 5th Avenue, he had a place there, a colored man. My husband started working young as a boy working for him. He went to school and he worked in the evening for this fellow and sold coal for him on a wagon and sold ice until he got able enough to get him a truck on his own and then he started business for himself. HUNTLEY: Is that right? That' ; s what he did from then on. FLEMMON: From then on that' ; s what he did. Raised his children from his own self-employed, he was self-employed. My husband was a very industrial man and he had a business mind about him. You know what I mean? HUNTLEY: Right. FLEMMON: After they put him in the army he still came back to that same job. Worked a little while at the Turner Station when he came back from the army. HUNTLEY: Did he go overseas? FLEMMON: Oh yeah. Stayed over there two years. South Pacific, that' ; s where they were stationed. HUNTLEY: Was he in the army or the navy? FLEMMON: He was in the navy. HUNTLEY: My father was in the navy. FLEMMON: I had two boys that were in the navy and I had two boys that were in the army, but they all got honorable discharged. My husband just recently died February 14th this year. HUNTLEY: You then? FLEMMON: I was a housewife, I took care of the children and I seen after them. I worked sometime, part-time, at that time you could go and leave the children and they were in safe hands, but now it' ; s a different time we' ; re living in. HUNTLEY: You can' ; t do that anymore. FLEMMON: No, people aren' ; t as close. The mother was more dedicated to the children' ; s safety than they are today. We took care of our neighbors children. We seen after them, if they tell the children and leave them in our hands. We would keep the other children just like they were our own children. They would mind us and obey us while their parents were away. We were poor people and we had to work and they had to work, but they left their children in protected hands that their children would be safe when they got back off their job, cause when they would go to work at 6 in the morning and would get off late in the evening, and stayed there all day. They had to take care of other people' ; s children and they couldn' ; t come home until a certain time until the people returned from work to see about their children. Sometime that would be dusk to dark. You know all day long. Some of them would work there and come home during the day and go back at a certain time between 1 and 2 o' ; clock in the day to be there at their house to prepare their supper. You know. HUNTLEY: So, the children were always in safe hands, cause the neighbors would help. FLEMMON: That' ; s right. We looked out for our neighbors. We were concerned about other folks children. They had mother' ; s who had children, they would be mother' ; s for other peoples children as well as theirs. We were lovely people, we watched and seen after your children. HUNTLEY: Well, before the movement got started what was Birmingham like? FLEMMON: Well, it was real. You know how it was... it was [inaudible], segregated, you know all of it. The Black man had a hard way to go. It was kind of bad for Black folks. When White people had more freedom than we did, you know we didn' ; t have no freedom. The only freedom we had, we' ; d go to church come back home sit in the yard or the front porch. HUNTLEY: Were there any incidents that you remember that happened in your family that was related to the way the status quo in Birmingham treated black people? Were there ever any times when policemen, that your family or people that you knew were involved with the police at all? FLEMMON: Police officers? HUNTLEY: Yeah. FLEMMON: No, lots of people had trouble, but seemingly though we didn' ; t have no, we always tried to live by the law and obey the law. You know how it was, the White people had the privilege, beating up colored people and doing what they wanted to do to them. I remember when I was quite young a lady her husband was beat up over there in [inaudible] by some White people and killed, you know shot and killed a man. HUNTLEY: Who shot and killed a man? FLEMMON: Some White people went there and shot him one day in the morning they told me and killed him, Mr. John Henry. His name was John Henry and they just had the privilege to come to your house and beat colored men up, drag them out of their house, you know. HUNTLEY: What did the community do? FLEMMON: They couldn' ; t do nothing but keep quite. That' ; s all they did, they had color. The White people didn' ; t believe what the colored people would say. They couldn' ; t talk cause they were afraid. You know they were afraid. HUNTLEY: You could take care of your children and take care of your neighbor' ; s children when there was nothing else involved, but when the White people were involved you didn' ; t have any say. FLEMMON: No, we always told our children obey, be obedient. That' ; s what we told our children and that' ; s all we could tell them, you know, then if anything went on they couldn' ; t talk about it, they just kept it on a low profile. HUNTLEY: You didn' ; t encourage them in those early days before the movement when they got on the bus to sit in the front of the bus or to.... FLEMMON: Oh yeah, we asked them to cooperate with the system, you know, we never tried to keep them away from it, because you know, we couldn' ; t. Cause if they' ; ve seen other children going, they' ; re going to join them to. HUNTLEY: Did they ever ask you any questions about segregation? FLEMMON: Are you talking about my children? HUNTLEY: Yes ma' ; am. FLEMMON: Oh yeah, they asked me questions. I told them. They asked me lots of times why they couldn' ; t go certain places. HUNTLEY: Like where? FLEMMON: Well, to the ball game with the Whites. I told them we wasn' ; t allowed to go there we just had to stay where they put us over on our side. We had ball games but the children played in the neighborhood in the field. Played ball in the afternoon, but they could never go to a ball game or couldn' ; t go to a theater. We had one theater, was the Famous Theater, [inaudible] , but they had a Vaudeville theater you know the colored people could go to them but such as these other theaters they couldn' ; t go. They didn' ; t allow Blacks to go. They did have one theater here I think it was the Pantava, sometime they let them go upstairs, they had to go way upstairs. That was during the time I believe when Bull Conner was, what was he... HUNTLEY: He was the police commissioner. FLEMMON: Police commissioner, Bull Conner, he was real cruel you know to Black people. HUNTLEY: Now when the movement started how did you get involved with the movement? FLEMMON: Well, I just made up my mind that I was going to go with them and join them and try to help them out. If it took my Sunday' ; s I just started and said well, I' ; ve got to go out here and represent my children and so I just decided I would just cooperate and get involved with the movement. Reverend Shuttlesworth was the only person whom we had to speak out for us at that time. You know it was rough, but he had the courage to go out there and face whatever obstacle. HUNTLEY: Were you involved when they first got started? FLEMMON: No, I wasn' ; t involved when they first with the integrating the bus, you know, cause I just had to be at home with the children. Later years we joined up with him when he was integrating the school, gotten involved with that and all of that. HUNTLEY: Was your husband involved? FLEMMON: Well, yeah, he supported it. He marched. HUNTLEY: Did you attend the mass meetings? FLEMMON: Oh yeah, rain or shine we were there. HUNTLEY: Tell me what a mass meeting was like. FLEMMON: The mass meeting was beautiful. It was beautiful. People loving everybody and everybody knew everybody and everybody would just get together and get ready for their movement meeting. They were there on time and they were there. They would go there and help do what they could to help the spirit of the movement. They would go there and pray, sing and pray. Then they would have preaching, the preachers would preach the gospel and everybody would give an amen to what he was saying and people would just pour in and they just begin to meet, get ready for the Monday night movement meeting. HUNTLEY: Did you ever have any problems in getting to the meeting? Or when you left the meeting? FLEMMON: No, nobody bothered me. Some of us had to walk, but we would get there. We never had no trouble, but that was just me. Some other people were having trouble, but I never had any trouble. HUNTLEY: Did you participate in the demonstrations? FLEMMON: All the time. HUNTLEY: Do you remember the first time you got involved in a demonstration? FLEMMON: Well, I' ; ll tell you I got involved with the movement going into the mass meeting and then when they started the picking these places that break down the barriers we continued to join up with them. Those who were leading the marches, we would join up with them. HUNTLEY: Tell me what it was like being on a march? FLEMMON: It was something, it was really something that you just couldn' ; t get away from it. It would just draw you and you would see, it was a spirit they had, that they were just going to look up, but it was wonderful. Now we was in the demonstration when they started opening up the lunch counter. When I went in there, but there were other children that was joined in. We couldn' ; t go and get food like other people we had to go to the back door. Men at this time had money, but they had to go to the back door, to get food out of the cafeteria. HUNTLEY: Just because they were Black. FLEMMON: People were in there cause you know, cause all White people were in there. We couldn' ; t go in there to eat a sandwich or nothing. HUNTLEY: Were you ever attacked during any of the demonstrations? FLEMMON: No, I wasn' ; t ever attacked, no. HUNTLEY: Did anybody ever.... FLEMMON: Kick me or anything. HUNTLEY: Pull a gun on you. FLEMMON: Oh yeah, I had two guns pulled on me at Pizitz while we were walking. See eleven people went to Pizitz there. They were there in the morning when they opened up and they weren' ; t expecting those people. HUNTLEY: Were you one of those? FLEMMON: I wasn' ; t there to march, but I escorted them there to the store. HUNTLEY: So, you escorted them to the store. FLEMMON: Yeah, I had a station wagon and they got in my station wagon from down there on 5th Avenue and that' ; s when we were on 5th Avenue across from Gadsden Motel. I carried them up there and they were arrested. HUNTLEY: So, you usually drove people to various places. FLEMMON: Yeah, I did that. Hauled them around to different places, wherever they had to picket. We' ; d put them out with their picket signs. Then I would go on back and park my car. HUNTLEY: Were you ever arrested? FLEMMON: One time, when we were marching with Tony Wren, 63 days I think we were marching with a casket. HUNTLEY: What did the casket represent? FLEMMON: Well, the police men were shooting the Black men, black boys so bad and Tony Wren was trying to show the White man what they were doing and we toted the casket, I think, it was 63 days here in the city of Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Everyday for 63 days? FLEMMON: The casket? HUNTLEY: Yes. FLEMMON: We had a reaper on the casket, I think the first time the casket was a paste board box made like a casket and then somebody got one at Miles college and brought us a wooden box casket. So, Ms. Delta Brooks she put a reaper on that casket. And we marched all up and down the streets, you know all over the town with the casket. The White folks got so mad, boy, he was talking real bad to us about that casket. We kept on marching. At Loweman' ; s I had a gun on me when they had those two White boys and that colored boy down there in Mississippi, when they killed them. The lady come up here from Mississippi, she throwed a gun on me at Loweman' ; s, but they put her car in cause Rev. Oliver was over the line and they pulled her car in to the city down there to the city yard and she was there that evening talking to the police officer and he told her she had to go down to the city hall. HUNTLEY: Why did they pull her car in? FLEMMON: They pulled it cause they found the gun she had. See, she throwed it on me and put it back in her car. HUNTLEY: Why did she point the gun at you? FLEMMON: Well, she was just mad cause we were out there picketing. HUNTLEY: This was a White woman? FLEMMON: Yeah, White, two coming from Mississippi. HUNTLEY: They were coming up here to shop? FLEMMON: That' ; s right coming up here from Mississippi. HUNTLEY: I see. FLEMMON: She told me, she ought to blow my brains out, but they got Rev. Oliver to over see our line and he checked out everything to see if all was well and so they pulled their car in. And she asked the police officer how could she get her car and he told her to go to city hall and talk to the authorities down there. HUNTLEY: So, you were very active in the movement. FLEMMON: Yeah, I was active all day long if they were marching. Lots of times I was out there by myself cause they were marching and someone had to leave and go and leave one person out there till some more come. HUNTLEY: You mean you were left out there alone? FLEMMON: Yeah, by myself, but I marched right on. I kept the faith and kept going and soon they would send someone that could get some more marchers to come up. Some would march alone and some had to work and then they would come out and march. I stayed out there trying to keep the line going. I marched from the city hall to the county court house. We marched up the government street, Calvin Woods and all of his children would come and help. HUNTLEY: Were any of your children involved? FLEMMON: Yeah, I had some children, they would come in the evening and march after school. HUNTLEY: Were there efforts, did you participate in any of the efforts to recruit children from the schools? FLEMMON: Why sure during the time when 1963. We recruited children because we went round and sang songs, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference came in here and the children hear singing and they decided they would just, we heard on the radio a guy was talking, we had the radio. See Jose Williams down from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference come here to help us in this demonstration. We couldn' ; t do it by ourself we had to have some help. HUNTLEY: What schools did you go to? FLEMMON: Well, we went to Carver High School, we went to Ullman and they had different marches going to different schools getting the children prepared to come on in down to Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. They sang and the children wouldn' ; t stay on the school grounds. They were leaving and there was nothing the teachers could do. They couldn' ; t hold them. So, they marched on down there from the school to Sixteenth Street. They had marches on the highway to protect them children to keep people from running through there with cars, you know some of the White people are kind of mean and would do anything to try and stop the march. Weren' ; t none of them hurt because we had good marchers. We had Rev. Podem and Rev. J. H. Callaway, they helped me to bring the children from Collegeville on down to Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. They would march on the highway. HUNTLEY: Did any of your children ever leave school to demonstrate? FLEMMON: They only left school when they started the demonstration. They were at school and then they came off the school premises. They had went to school, but the minute they heard the singing they just joined on in with the other students and they went to marching. HUNTLEY: What did you feel about that? FLEMMON: What? HUNTLEY: What were your feelings about your children leaving school? FLEMMON: My feelings were real good, cause they had to do what they had to do and I couldn' ; t stop them and I wasn' ; t gonna hinder them cause they never laid a day out of school, but they went to school. When ever they said they needed these children they just decided to leave the school. I didn' ; t try to prohibit them from going. HUNTLEY: What were the discussions like at home about the movement, since you and your children and husband were involved? Did you ever talk about the movement at home? FLEMMON: Oh yeah, we talked about it and then we cried over it and we prayed over it. Oh yeah, it was a big one that you just couldn' ; t shake off. After they [inaudible] was straight we just didn' ; t hold our peace cause we know we had to do something that helped cause we were a part of it. It was concerning about us so we joined in. HUNTLEY: Then your activity in the movement was real supportive so you were one of those that transported people from different places to help them get to a place to demonstrate. FLEMMON: Yeah. HUNTLEY: I know some people that did that they were sometimes approached by policemen. FLEMMON: Oh yeah, I was approached by policemen. The day Hubert Humphrey came to Birmingham, one of the police officers on the motorcycles he wanted to put me in jail for some reason, I hadn' ; t broke the law. The marchers were going, they were in my station wagon, they were going to the airport. HUNTLEY: To meet Humphrey? FLEMMON: To meet Hubert Humphrey coming in on the plane. So they wanted Hubert Humphrey to go out on the front. So, he told them that he had some friends on the back and he wanted to go out the back, but the national guard moved. So, they had national guardsmen all up there in the woods and up on top of the buildings, you know, to see that we would be safe and wouldn' ; t be harmed by the other group of people. So, we got a chance to see Hubert Humphrey when his plane come in we were back there on the airport road waving. HUNTLEY: So, why did the policeman want to arrest you? FLEMMON: Well, they wanted it stopped. So, if they stopped me with my station wagon full of all of those people they would stop the march, but they didn' ; t stop it, cause we still went on to meet Hubert Humphrey downtown at the motel. We still picketed down there. HUNTLEY: Why were you picketing? FLEMMON: Well, they told us to picket to let him see what was going on. And he seen what was happening. HUNTLEY: So, you were demonstrating to show him what it was like in this town? FLEMMON: That' ; s right. They wanted to him to go out in the front of the airport but he told them no, I got some friends in the back and want to see them. Rev. Shuttlesworth and all were back there. We were out there with Rev. Shuttlesworth, they knew what time the plane was coming in. HUNTLEY: So, he knew you all were there. FLEMMON: Yeah. HUNTLEY: So, that' ; s what he was referring to when he said he had friends. FLEMMON: Yeah, yeah, so, we all got out there during the time when the plane was coming in and landed and we were there, see. Then we followed the escort back to downtown. HUNTLEY: Did you get a chance to meet him? FLEMMON: Oh yeah, my baby she shook his hand, she got a chance to. He talked to a lot of us. HUNTLEY: Did he come to any of the meetings? FLEMMON: I don' ; t recall about the meeting or not, but anyway we got a chance to speak to him. HUNTLEY: What is the most important issue of the time that you remember, like any events that took place that stand out in your mind about your participation and your involvement in the movement? FLEMMON: Well, the most important issue was when we were really marching around with that casket in Birmingham. Them days, you know, to show the world and the world did see what was going on. That was very important cause so many of our young Black boys were getting shot down and nothing would be done about it. And Tony Wren decided he was going to demonstrate and show up and he carried us all up and down alleys all down and the police were on the motorcycles and he said follow me. He took us all up and down the alley and all around. HUNTLEY: Did you.... FLEMMON: Oh, I' ; ll tell you another evening happened. The night we came out of St. James Baptist Church down back down there in Smithfield and we went to Liberty Market there was on 5th Avenue they had a shooting as we got up there they shot a young colored man. HUNTLEY: Who shot him? FLEMMON: A White man shot the man. He was shot accidentally, we left the church coming up there to picket and they shot this colored man as he was going over to the Shoe City to get one or two of his children some shoes. He accidentally shot him, a White fellow shot him. HUNTLEY: Accidentally shot him? FLEMMON: Yeah, but they thought they had done shot Rev. Shuttlesworth, but he shot the wrong man. The poor man was going over there to buy some shoes for his children. HUNTLEY: They shot him intentionally and thought he was Rev. Shuttlesworth. FLEMMON: Yeah, and that really disturbed the people real bad, upset them. HUNTLEY: What did the people do? FLEMMON: He' ; s probably out today wherever he is, I didn' ; t know the guy, we just had left the church and they said well, we are going up here to Liberty and picket a while. HUNTLEY: After the shooting, that' ; s what you all did was to picket? Did you get cooperation from people that were going in the stores? FLEMMON: Oh yeah, they cooperated. Some shed a dime too. Then they had another incident down there one night, a colored man was in the store and he was talking to his wife and a police officer come in there and talked real bad to the colored man and him and some of his relatives them they started confusion there at the cash register and he asked his wife, he said, he called her some sweet name, and said you got what you want and so they thought he was talking to that White woman. And boy, they had a big fight down there that night, jelly, and the cashier burned some stuff and they were throwing jelly down there and they had a big one. HUNTLEY: Who was throwing the jelly? FLEMMON: Just the people started fighting down there. The police officer. HUNTLEY: Was this at Liberty? FLEMMON: Yeah, down there downtown at Liberty Store. They had a big thing down there. People were running and hollering scared the police were going to shoot, you know. In fact, they drove the man' ; s wife out of the store and they beat the man up, too. Sent him to the hospital, oh, it was terrible. HUNTLEY: Were you a registered voter? FLEMMON: Oh yeah. HUNTLEY: Do you remember when you registered? What was it like when you registered? FLEMMON: Oh, it was tough when I went there and registered. They asked you all them questions and some of them I didn' ; t even know. About the military service and all of that, you know. Old man Briar, he was down there at the time, he was tough. He tried every way he could to keep me from getting registered to vote. He tried to put every block he could in your way. HUNTLEY: Did you pass the first time? FLEMMON: Yeah, I passed it. HUNTLEY: And did you know other people that had to go back to take it? FLEMMON: Oh yeah. Many times they were turned down and they went back. They didn' ; t get discouraged they just kept on going till they got it right, you know. They just did that to keep the blacks from voting, that was before the voting right bill was passed in 1965. Then after they passed it, it was easy then, much easier for them to go in there, than it was for us. HUNTLEY: Did you participate in any other demonstrations outside of Birmingham? FLEMMON: No, I couldn' ; t go. I had the children. I had to stay there with the children, but we just did what we had to do here. My children, two of my children, they went to the demonstration in Washington, D.C. to that march with Dr. King. I still had to stay here in Birmingham cause all of us couldn' ; t go cause we didn' ; t have the money to send all of them. We had to pay their way. HUNTLEY: Do you remember when the Freedom Riders came through? FLEMMON: Yeah, I remember. HUNTLEY: Were you involved at that time? FLEMMON: No, we were still with the movement, but we didn' ; t get in there with the Freedom Riders. HUNTLEY: What about the morning the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was bombed? FLEMMON: Oh, yeah, that was a terrible time. Talking about the water hose and the dogs, yeah, we was involved with that. I didn' ; t ever get down there in time for them to put water on me. At the time I got ready to go down there it was all over with, but I' ; d seen it on the TV. HUNTLEY: What about the Sixteenth Street bombing that killed those four little girls? FLEMMON: That was terrible. HUNTLEY: Do you remember that morning? FLEMMON: Yeah, I remember that Sunday morning cause I was over there at Bethel' ; s Church over there in Sunday school when they had that bombing. It shook us. The Sunday school teacher that was teaching us, he got a call that Sixteenth Street Baptist Church had been bombed. That was a critical day. Sad day, terrible about them children. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about it? FLEMMON: I don' ; t know who had the heart to do it, but they did it. HUNTLEY: They did it. That morning you were in Sunday school. FLEMMON: I was at Sunday school, we was at church, all of us were at Sunday school. HUNTLEY: So, what did you think was the significance, how important was what was happening with the movement for Birmingham? How important was the movement? FLEMMON: I think it was very important for the people to get involved and to try and make it better for all people, you know, for all people, cause most of the people was under a depression and there was a press and the movement just made it better for people to come together and unite together, you know. They couldn' ; t come together before the movement, they had to be separated, divided, you know. HUNTLEY: So, you are saying the movement then brought people closer together. FLEMMON: That' ; s right, brought them close together. HUNTLEY: Although you had previously said that neighbors were real close to each other cause they would take care of each other' ; s children. So when the movement came along this even made them closer? FLEMMON: Closer together, they got more close together and began to get more love for each other and had their mind made up to get ready for the movement, the meetings, mass meetings. They would be calling me up and want to know if you' ; re going to the mass meeting, and some didn' ; t have any rides and those that did would say you can go with me. Some would walked cause you could walk then and no one would bother you. HUNTLEY: What church were you a member of? FLEMMON: I was a member of New Pilgrim Baptist Church at the time then. When they had the great march over there at New Pilgrim Baptist Church, you see they go round to different churches, the movement. See, I was originally a member of the Tabernacle Baptist Church. HUNTLEY: I know New Pilgrim was ministered and a lot of people were involved. Was Tabernacle involved in the movement, was the pastor? FLEMMON: No, they weren' ; t involved because most of those people had jobs. You know how that was they didn' ; t take an active part, like they wanted to, cause of their jobs and they had families to see after. HUNTLEY: What about the congregation at New Pilgrim? FLEMMON: Oh, they were very active people over there. They were just the type of people that believed in and they just had the spirit of wanting to be free. HUNTLEY: Do you think it had something to do with their leadership? FLEMMON: Why sure it had something cause some of the preachers were non-violent and they had to use non-violent people. HUNTLEY: So, some of the ministers then would decide they were not going to be involved? FLEMMON: Why sure, lots of them didn' ; t take an active part until things got better, unlike when the heat was on, they played it cool. When the heat was on they wouldn' ; t come out there, Rev. Shuttlesworth was out there and he had some cooperation with some strong men, you know. HUNTLEY: Rev. N. H. Smith was real active. FLEMMON: Yeah, he was one and Rev. Phifer, and Rev. C. H. George and Rev. J. W. Pruitt, and Rev. Frankie Lane. HUNTLEY: What about Rev. Porter? FLEMMON: Well, I didn' ; t know Rev. Porter at that time real good. He was quite young, but he got involved, you know. It had to take something to shake lots of people up to get them woke up. I think the bombing, when they bombed the Gaston Motel, you know, that kind of shook them up, they thought that night when they had that big thing down there, you know. Then they kind of got the courage that they were gonna take a stand, you know. And stand as men and brothers together. They got them in, but it took something to shake them up, wake them up, you know. HUNTLEY: Yes, yes. FLEMMON: Lots of them said they were violent and they would fight and they said I' ; d fight. That kept lots of them away. They didn' ; t need nobody there that would mess up. HUNTLEY: Is there anything else that we have not talked about, that you would like to share with us that relates to the movement? FLEMMON: Well, the only thing that I can honestly say is that the foot soldiers went through lots of storms here in the city, walking trying to get the people to wake up. You know, they had foot soldiers. Then lots of people cooperated with the movement, but they couldn' ; t come out openly, you know. We understand, cause when you got to do what you got to do you can' ; t just come out like you want to but you wouldn' ; t and then you would take turns to help support it. Lots of people didn' ; t get out there and demonstrate it, but they supported it. HUNTLEY: Financially? FLEMMON: That' ; s what I' ; m talking about, and spiritual. HUNTLEY: Were you able to participate cause your husband was an independent business man? FLEMMON: That' ; s what it was cause I was able to walk out there because nobody was his boss, yeah. You understand? When you got your hand in the lion' ; s mouth you got to.... HUNTLEY: Ease through there. FLEMMON: I was able to do lots of things for some that were unable to do what I could do and I went out there in good faith, but there were lots of good people in Birmingham that did well. They supported it very well. Financially. I give them credit. Now, all the people wasn' ; t with us, but all of them wasn' ; t against us. HUNTLEY: You never got all to be for or against. FLEMMON: That' ; s right. Some went and some stayed and died in the wilderness. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. FLEMMON: So, that' ; s the way it is. You got some that will cooperate and some won' ; t cooperate, but they were still with us. I give them credit, they really supported the thing we were involved with. It probably wasn' ; t every time the meeting was going on, but they sent that money. They money come from different churches, you know what I mean. Different churches cooperated. Lots of churches they were afraid that they were going to be bombed and all of that. It was quite natural, you know. Everybody don' ; t have the same spirit about life. They are not as strong maybe as other would be. You got to have faith to walk out there amongst them mean folks, you got to have God in front to lead and guide you. And keep you from getting angry cause we went through lots of bad things. Them foot soldiers went through something, but they was able. Them guys, some of them White guys, they were rough on us walking out there with them signs. The signs is what made them so mad, so angry. Just to read it, they couldn' ; t take it so they would say some harsh things, but we took it. We took it, told them God Bless Them and we went on. It wasn' ; t no easy going out there, I can tell you that. HUNTLEY: Took strength to be able to do that. FLEMMON: Yeah, and you had to pray to. See what I mean about the prayers about the people praying gives us strength and we prayed to and that gave us double strength. So we made it. HUNTLEY: Mrs. Flemmon, I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come and talk with us and you' ; ve been quite helpful. FLEMMON: Well, I hope what I said will be beneficial to you and others, I hope. HUNTLEY: I' ; m sure it will be. FLEMMON: I hope. HUNTLEY: This will all be housed here at the institute. FLEMMON: Yeah. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=NFlemmon1996.xml NFlemmon1996.xml
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Nettie Flemmon
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Nettie Flemmon discusses devoting her life to the Movement in every way. She, her husband and her children coordinated, assisted and demonstrated all around the South, including two of her children attending the March on Washington.
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19960605F
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.)
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1996-06-05
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Nims E. Gay
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5.4 April 6, 1995 Nims E. Gay Interviewed on April 6, 1995 19950406G 0:51:11 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Lessie Dingler Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 The National Association for the Advancement of Color People WJLD Nims E. Gay Horace Huntley Video 1:|1(2)|19(6)|48(8)|71(2)|88(6)|106(4)|124(9)|137(9)|156(15)|169(6)|187(7)|211(7)|227(11)|240(11)|258(14)|275(7)|296(13)|312(3)|332(6)|362(7)|379(8)|394(12)|407(15)|427(5)|447(14)|463(2)|479(2)|498(14)|508(11)|529(2)|550(13)|576(14)|594(11)|611(13)|629(4)|643(1)|656(1)|673(9)|689(8)|702(12)|715(11)|734(4)|750(10)|772(1)|786(10)|800(5)|820(2)|835(9)|849(4)|866(11) 0 https://youtu.be/oE-KsmkuSG4 YouTube video English 66 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with Mr. Nims E. Gay for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College, April 6, 1995. Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) 33.5161, -86.8145 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute 33.4810, -86.9089 17 Miles College https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 99 Family Background Good. Let me just start by asking a couple of background questions. I want to ask you about your parents. What part of the state were your parents from? Nims E. Gay talks about where his parents were born, when they came to Birmingham to start a family, and what line of work they were involved in. Agriculture ; Family ; Higher Education ; Housewife Anniston (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Calhoun County (Ala.) ; Choccolocco (Ala.) ; Cleveland (Ohio) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Pharoh's Foundry ; Tuskegee Institute 232 Early Education Okay. Tell me a little about your education. What elementary school did you attend? Nims E. Gay talks about going to elementary school, then 2 different high schools in the Birmingham area. African American schools Jenny Hills Elementary (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Phillips High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Ullman High School (Birmingham, Ala.) 275 Working to go to School at Age 13 Well, why didn't you graduate? Nims E. Gay explains about how he had to have help from the community and an extra job in order to put himself through high school early on. Child labor ; Community ; Financial crises ; Living alone Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham Country Club ; Cleveland (Ohio) ; Greenwood (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Stockham Pipe & ; Fittings Co. 383 Working At WJLD Okay. What did you do after high school? Nims E. Gay talks about his job at the radio station, then switching from there to working for L & ; N Railroad because it paid more a week. African Americans--Marriage ; America--Race relations ; Bakery ; Prejudices ; radio announcer ; railroad ; WJLD Bessemer (Ala.) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company 545 Work At L & ; N Railroad Okay. So what did you do at L & ; N Railroad. Nims E. Gay explains his time working at L & ; N Railroad and having to go down to Ozark, Alabama to help work on the cars for the wars. Car Mechanics ; Coal Engines ; Diesel Engines ; German Prison ; Manual Labor ; Steam engines ; War Boyes (Ala.) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Ozark (Ala.) 673 Community Background Okay. What community did you live in at the time? Nims E. Gay describes his community and the working opportunities they had with various industries in Birmingham. African Americans--Segregation ; Blacks--Segregation ; Community ; Domestic Work ; Firemen Greenwood (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Inglenook (Birmingham, Ala.) ; McWane, Inc. ; Standard Iron and Metal Company (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Stockham Pipe & ; Fittings Co. 754 Community's Relationship With Birmingham Police Department What was your community's relationship to the Birmingham Police Department? Nims E. Gay discusses how his communities relationship with the Birmingham Police Department was more of a threat rather than a security. Bootlegging ; Community Threats ; Gambling ; Prostitution ; Racial Slurs Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department 861 Recreation in the Community That's very interesting. What kind of recreation did you have in your community? Nims E. Gay talks about how they would go down to Stockham Park to play baseball, but how the black baseball team didn't have lights on their field until he went down to the Birmingham City Hall to ask for it. Corn Field ; Steet Lights ; Youth league baseball--Coaching American Cast Iron Pipe Company ; Birmingham (Ala.)--Maps ; Birmingham City Hall ; Ensley (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Jabo Waggoner (Alabama State Senator) ; Stockham Park (Birmingham, Ala.) 1016 Communist Party Influence Were there any type of organizations in your community at that time? Nims E Gay talks about underline influence of the Communist Party in organizations around Birmingham. Mill workers ; Presidential Elections ; Smelter workers Birmingham (Ala.) ; Communist Party of America ; Ku Klux Klan ; Scottsboro Trial, Scottsboro, Ala., 1931 ; Steel Workers Organizing Committee (U.S.) ; The International Union of Mine ; United Mine Workers of America ; Vanderbilt Furnace 1189 The Civil Rights Movement- NAACP and ACMHR Nims E. Gay discusses the NAACP, how they were outlawed from Alabama, then Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth coming in with the Alabama Christian Movement to help bring people back together in the Movement, along with his experience of registering to vote. Outlaw ; Voter registration--United States Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Henry, Patrick ; History of the civil rights movement ; Paul Revere ; Robert Durr ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; The National Association for the Advancement of Color People 1457 Alabama Christian Movement Involvement What was your role in the Movement? Nims E. Gay explains his role as Director of Music for the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights Director of Music Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights 1515 Musical Background What was your background in music that you were the director at that time? Nims E. Gay talks about his time gaining musical training and working around different groups in Birmingham, such as famous people like Dorthy Love Coates and Sam Cooke. African American gospel singers ; Choir ; Musical notes ; Singing A.G. Gaston Motel (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Birmingham News ; Birmingham(Ala.) ; Blevins, William, 1895- ; Cooke, Sam ; Dorthy Love Coates ; Evergreen Bottom ; Gay Harmoniers ; Gospel Harmonettes (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Howard, Mildred ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Odessa Edwards ; Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Singing 40s ; Wenonah High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; William Blevins 1751 Meetings at Alabama Christian Movement Tell me about the mass meetings of the Movement. Nims E. Gay explains going to the meetings at the Alabama Christian Movement and having police come to hear in on their business. Churches ; Police Presence 46th Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 1835 Family Involvement in Marches Did you participate in any of the demonstrations? Nims E. Gay talked about being involved in demonstrations and marches with his family in Birmingham, Alabama. Family ; Jail ; Protest movements--United States ; Water Hoses Birmingham (Ala.) ; Fair Park (Birmingham, Ala.) 1942 Involvement of 46th Street Baptist Church What church were you a member of? Nims E. Gay discusses his time being the Minister of Music at the 46th Street Baptist Church. Bible Class ; Bomb threats ; Chairman of Board ; Choir ; Church ; Minister of Music 2017 Helping Out the Freedom Riders Do you remember anything that stand out in your mind as related to the Movement that you may have been involved in that you saw happen during the Movement? Nims E. Gay Explains how he helped the Freedom Riders out of Anniston when they got attacked, and brought them to shelter at Fred Shuttlesworth's home. Blacks ; Bus Burning ; Jesus Christ--Presence ; Police ; Smoke Bombs ; Whites Anniston (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Bull Connor--Public Safety Commissioner--Birmingham (Ala.) ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Freedom Rides, 1961 ; Pell City (Ala.) ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 2170 The Power of Prayer in Demonstrations During the demonstrations -- well actually between 1960 and 1963. In 1961 the Freedom Rides. I believe in 1962 you had the Selective Buying Campaign in downtown. Can you tell me anything about that? Nims E. Gay talks about how the power of pray helped spare some of those being attacked by hoses and dogs brought onto them by the police. Children ; Fire Hoses ; Firemen ; God (Christianity)--Omnipresence ; Jail ; Police dogs ; Praying in the presence of-- ; Water Hoses 16th Street (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Bull Connor--Public Safety Commissioner--Birmingham (Ala.) ; New Pilgrim Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) 2268 Benefits from Movement Well, after all of this, what benefits you think your family, the community realized as a result of the Movement? Nims E. Gay explains how he was the first Black manager at Bluecross Blueshield of Alabama due to the effects of the Movement. Black Managers ; Civil rights demonstrations--Alabama ; Tax Accessor Bluecross Blueshield of Alabama ; Civil rights movement ; Jefferson County Courthouse (Birmingham, Ala.) 2536 Arrest and Injury of His Children in the Movement You said two of your children went to jail? How long did they stay in jail? Nims E. Gay discusses the times his kids went to jail and his son being sprayed by the fire hoses. Children ; Community ; Fire Hoses ; Jail ; Police brutality--United States ; Self-control ; Water Hoses George Washington Carver High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; James Bevill 2663 Change of Movement Over Time How do you think the Movement has changed over time? Nims E. Gay explains how some young people are educating themselves but about how young people have it made and it takes more than just throwing jewelry around your neck to create something more. African American young adults ; Generational accounting ; Strength in Numbers 2751 People Who Guarded the Homes Do you ever remember any of the people who were associated with those that guarded the various homes? Nims E. Gay talks about the time John Lewis had to combat a bomb neing thrown at Bethel Baptist Church. Bomb threats ; Bombs ; Mass Meetings Bethel Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Lewis, John R. 2818 Loss of Strength in People Is there anything else you would like to add that we really hadn't dealt with today? Nims E. Gay discusses the need for all people to still come together to fight against White people creating blockades for people of color. Community Strength ; Gospel ; Inferiority complex ; Radio ; Unity ; White Privilege Civil War ; WAYE 2942 Pacification Programs There is one other think that I wanted to ask you. You mentioned that L & ; N supported gospel singing. Did you say that? Nims E. Gay explains how industries around Birmingham created programs for African Americans in order to keep them happy and silence their issues, this was known as the Pacification Program. African American gospel singers ; African American Programs ; African American Recreation ; Choir ; Industrial ; Pacifying American Cast Iron Pipe Company ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Stockham Pipe & ; Fittings Co. 3022 Conclusion of Interview Well, Mr. Gay, I certainly appreciate you taking the time out today Oral History Nims E. Gay discusses his whole family's involvement in the Movement. Gay and his children attended meetings and demonstrations that included his children being hit with water hoses and arrested. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mr. Nims E. Gay for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College, April 6, 1995. Mr. Gay, I want to thank you for coming out and spending your time with us this afternoon to talk with us about civil rights and Birmingham because we know that you were very prominent in the Movement. Again, thank you for coming out. GAY: It' ; s a pleasure to be here, Dr. Huntley. HUNTLEY: Good. Let me just start by asking a couple of background questions. I want to ask you about your parents. What part of the state were your parents from? GAY: Well, my parents were born in Chocolata, Alabama. That' ; s in Calhoun County. HUNTLEY: Calhoun County. That' ; s near Anniston? GAY: That' ; s right up from Anniston. HUNTLEY: Okay. Were you born in Birmingham? GAY: I was born in Chocolata but they brought me away at the age of one. HUNTLEY: Okay. So Birmingham, then, is basically home. GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: I am sure that you have gone back and forth between here and Chocolata quite a bit? GAY: Oh, yes. Quite a bit. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters did you have? GAY: It was -- I had one brother and one sister. My oldest brother is deceased but, my sister is still living. She lives in Cleveland, Ohio. HUNTLEY: Are you younger or older than your sister? GAY: I was the youngest one. HUNTLEY: Oh, you' ; re the baby of the bunch. So they must have spoiled you then. GAY: No. They didn' ; t take time for that. HUNTLEY: Didn' ; t take time. What about your parents. Tell me a little about your parents -- your mother and father. What about their education and their occupations? GAY: Well, my mother, she was a housewife. My father -- he attended Tuskegee but coming off the farm and looking at big words, when he got to Tuskegee, he saw the word agricultural up there and he thought that is what he wanted to do. But after he found out was farming, he decided that wasn' ; t for him. So he came on to Birmingham and became a brakeman on the Louisville National Railroad. And, then, he brought his family to Birmingham. HUNTLEY: So he then was a brakeman and that is what he retired as -- a brakeman on the railroad? GAY: No. When he retired -- when they laid off so many here in Birmingham, he migrated to Cleveland, Ohio and he became an employee of Pharaoh' ; s Foundry there. And after -- when he became of retirement age then he came back to Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Okay. Tell me a little about your education. What elementary school did you attend? GAY: I attend Hills in East Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Hills in East Birmingham. And, after that? GAY: After that -- I say we were the first to enter Ullman High School. Because you see at that time you only had Parker and when the Blacks were able to go to another school, which was Ullman, and Ullman we could only go there until the 10th. Then, at the 10th grade we would have to go over to Parker. So, then after I -- in the 10th grade I went on over to Parker and I stayed at Parker like two months before graduating from there. HUNTLEY: Well, why didn' ; t you graduate? GAY: Due to the fact that was beyond my control. I was financially unable to do so because from 13 years on up I put myself through school anyway. HUNTLEY: Okay. So, you were working? GAY: I had three men who was instrumental in helping me go to school because at 13 turning 14, they encouraged me to go on to school if I wished to go. West Scruggs, Johnny Norris and the man called (?), they said " ; we will give you fifty cents a day if you go on and complete your education." ; So they were instrumental in helping me to do so. HUNTLEY: Who were you living with at that time? GAY: I was living by myself because my mother took sick and she had to go to Cleveland where my daddy was and so I was left in the house because I didn' ; t want to leave Birmingham. HUNTLEY: So, at 13 years old you were living alone -- GAY: Living alone and then my aunt eventually came over to stay with me. But, what I was doing -- I would go out to the Birmingham Country Club and caddie on the weekends and afternoons. That way I was able to keep a place to stay and then they would send me money back to help pay the rent. The rent at that time wasn' ; t too much. At that time you could get any kind of old house for $6.00 a month rent. So, back in those days, things were cheap. HUNTLEY: So you weren' ; t paying $500.00 a month to live? GAY: No. $500.00 a month would have bought the place. HUNTLEY: What community did you live in? GAY: I lived in Greenwood, East Birmingham area. That was out there right at Stockham Pipe and Fittings. HUNTLEY: Okay. What did you do after high school? GAY: After high school -- my first job after school that was WJLD. I was the first announcer they had over there and that was 52 years ago. Then, after I left WJLD, I wasn' ; t making enough money there. The radio was paying $17 a week and the railroad was paying $25 and my wife having children, you know where I decided to go -- I went to the railroad. HUNTLEY: Well, tell me a little bit about WJLD. What did you do there? GAY: At WJLD see -- you' ; re coming into the stations then Bob Umbach was the chief engineer and what you said then to Bob was he did some of everything there. By me coming in he told me, he said, " ; well you have the voice of radio." ; So what he started me doing...coming in bringing on the best(?) and all those different (?) and all was there and he had me doing it so frequently, I said, " ; now wait a minute what kind of money do I get?" ; He said, " ; well I give you ten dollars." ; I said, " ; no, I can' ; t do that." ; So they raised it to $17 a week and then I stayed there for three and a half months. And, then, I had to leave there because the station was in Bessemer over the court house at that time. And things were prejudiced then as you could find it to be. Jeff Bryant owned the station and they didn' ; t want a Black man to even wear a tie at that time. (?) told me, he said, " ; you on radio, you gonna wear a tie?" ; " ; We cut --," ; they used the word nigger -- " ; we cut their ties off they wear it here." ; I said, " ; yeah and I am going to cut yours off too." ; He said, " ; well, now wait a minute, I thought you was a Christian?" ; I said, " ; So was Peter, but he cut the man' ; s ear off with Christ standing there." ; HUNTLEY: So you made sure that you got respect from the very beginning? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: How old were you when you got married? GAY: Nineteen. HUNTLEY: Nineteen. You were then working at WJLD. GAY: No. When I got married, I started there at 19. When I got married, I went to the Louisville National Railroad. So I left out of WJLD -- well, let me see, I was working at a bakery, too when I was trying to work at WJLD because actually that wasn' ; t a desire that I wanted to have. I wanted to do something that I believe could help me to progress in life. HUNTLEY: Okay. So what did you do at L & ; N Railroad. GAY: I started first as a helper. That was bringing those engines from Boyes, Alabama to downtown. And we would have what you called a round table down there. You would put that engine on that table and you do labor to turn it around. So what we would do, we would carry it down there and then they decided they wanted to send me downtown. I was a coach cleaner down there. There was a towel they give us. But what we were really doing, we were fueling up those diesel engines. It come out from coal engines to diesel then. And we would have to ice up those cars and, then, after that I went into -- well the war broke out and you had troop men. So they deferred me there to stay there and work as -- helping prepare the cars for the soldiers to go backwards and forward to Ozark, Alabama because that' ; s where the German prison was stationed here -- in Ozark, Alabama when they would bring them over here. HUNTLEY: So you then -- they would bring the engines in and you would work in the shop in preparation of the -- GAY: That' ; s what I would do when I was a helper, I prepared them, coal them up and everything. And, then, after that when I got downtown I didn' ; t have to do that. All we would do when the troop trains would come in bringing in the soldiers, bringing in the prisoners and bringing whatever was going to Ozark, Alabama where they had all the German prisoners stationed, then my job was to see that the coaches were serviced and all. HUNTLEY: What do you mean by " ; coaling them up?" ; GAY: When I say " ; coaling them up," ; that is when you had those old steam engines, you would run the engine up under a shot. And that shoot would let the coal come down and fill up the hopper back there. That is where the fireman would get the coal and all that the -- to fire the boiler up where (?). HUNTLEY: Okay. What community did you live in at the time? GAY: I was in the Greenwood, East Birmingham area. HUNTLEY: So you still live in the same area? GAY: Yes. HUNTLEY: How would you describe your community? GAY: During that time Greenwood, in Inglenook, was just separate. That' ; s why it was called Greenwood and Inglenook was called Inglenook. Because on the one side of the track was Black -- that' ; s where the Blacks lived. And on the other side of the track was where the Whites was living. HUNTLEY: Okay. What were the occupations of the people that lived in your community? In Greenwood. GAY: Most of the occupations for them -- if they hadn' ; t been -- they thought was a blessing when you was a railroad man like my daddy was a fireman or something like that. But most of it was domestic work. They mostly would go out and work for the -- the ladies would work in these different White peoples homes. And, the men, they would work around Stockham, McWane and Vanderbilt furnaces and different places like that. HUNTLEY: Did your wife work outside of the home? GAY: No. She never worked. HUNTLEY: Okay. How many children did you have? GAY: We had eight children but my oldest son got drowned when he was seven years old. HUNTLEY: What was your community' ; s relationship to the Birmingham Police Department? GAY: Now the Birmingham Police Department relation to -- the police was just about like insurance men. If you had a shot house or gambling place then, he would just drive through there and you would pay him off ; or either a prostitute house -- you just pay him off and that was it. Because some of the prominent men you have now in high positions, they used go to collect money just like a policy agent from different people who was -- if they was bootlegging, running a gambling house or had those Saturday night fish fries and all of that. See home brew was bad then. But now, people have beer. But back then they made their own home brews, they called it. HUNTLEY: But that was illegal so the people had to --- GAY: It was illegal so all they was doing -- they was just dressing their pocket and didn' ; t care which way. And see that' ; s why we used to say back in those days when the police would come into our communities -- when you see that sign " ; MUN?" ; We used to say that " ; MUN" ; meant " ; Murder You Niggers" ; that' ; s what we felt that it was. We had -- you couldn' ; t have no respect for a person who didn' ; t have any respect for themselves. HUNTLEY: So you didn' ; t look at a police then as being protectors and servers of your community? GAY: No. I looked at them as being more an enemy of the community. HUNTLEY: That' ; s very interesting. What kind of recreation did you have in your community? GAY: Well, what we would do. Stockham Park was there. That is where we mostly go to play ball and various things out there. And, then, when we wasn' ; t at Stockham there was a big old corn field in our community where the boys and girls would go out there and play. But what we was trying to do, and by me managing the girls ball club and all and the boys ball club, we couldn' ; t play under the lights. And we would see the White people playing under the lights down on 10th Avenue. So, I went down to City Hall and talked to Mr. Wagner. I said, " ; Mr. Wagner, don' ; t you realize that --" ; the park then for the white people was on 10th Avenue and 35th Street where the trucking company is now. I said " ; you know playing out there in a... They had Black folks and you got some good White folks, good Black folks like me who ain' ; t going to throw over in there. But some of them might get the idea that since they -- that y' ; all come out here and play and they see y' ; all come on, drive in and out, and we can' ; t play under the lights." ; So then they decided to let us play under the lights. We were the first community that played under the lights. They would come from Ensley and everywhere over there to play under the lights because they began to let us play. HUNTLEY: Were there special days that you had? GAY: Friday and Saturday nights were our days. HUNTLEY: And every Friday and Saturday night, Black people from all over Birmingham would come over there to play? GAY: They would come over there. The teams we would have set up. Because some of the girls played for our teams they would become a part of East Birmingham in order to get a chance to play under the lights. I had some girls out of Ensley who played with my girls clubs. And, so we become united and other churches and clubs would come over to play us -- from ACIPICO and all those different places. Well, they got a chance to come over there and play under the lights which we though was something very interesting at that time. HUNTLEY: Well, when you went down to talk with Wagner, was that Jabo Wagner? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Did you just do that on your own or was that an organizational thing? GAY: No. I did that on my own. Just whatever I thought that I ought to do. Just like when I went in radio. I just decided. I would say, " ; now look, if somebody gonna do it..." ; I was always taught if you want to do something, try to do it yourself, not try to send nobody else. HUNTLEY: Were there any type of organizations in your community at that time? GAY: No kind of organizations we had at that time. The only thing that you had at that time was the communist party. The communist party was trying to come in and take over and get the Black people to cover and be with them. The Ku Klux Klan, you know, they were already raging. So, but our parents would tell us all the time, say, now, " ; you know what' ; s over here, but you don' ; t know what' ; s over there in the communist countries." ; So, they would tell us not to sell out because the communist people who would come over, they would try to get us -- At one time my father and different places he was working around, different men who was playing at plants, they would come to me and they would tell you, they' ; d say " ; now, what you got to do is help blow these places up." ; But, the Black people would not go for it. HUNTLEY: So the communist were attempting to -- GAY: Overthrow the -- HUNTLEY: -- to overthrow the government? GAY: That' ; s right. And telling us what communist was and how good it was for us and everything. But, in the end they wanted to really control America, the way I could see it. HUNTLEY: Were the communist then, involved with any of the labor organizations? GAY: Well some of them they was, undercover. But, see the main thing where the communist really began to get a hold over here was that Scottsboro case. When the Scottsboro boys -- when they took them off those trains and pretend that they raped those white women and so forth and then that give them a chance to get a better view of what was going on. HUNTLEY: During 1930 or so, Birmingham became sort of the regional -- the southern regional headquarters for the communist party and they then went from Birmingham to many of the organized -- you know, the SWOC was starting to organize, the steel workers, United Mine Workers, the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter workers, all those were organizing and evidently the communist were good organizers. GAY: They were because Mr. Hall that you read so much about, he stayed at my uncle' ; s house so many times. When he' ; d come, he would come there. HUNTLEY: Was this the -- what' ; s his first name. I can' ; t think of his first name. But anyway, this is the " ; Hall" ; that ran for president for the communist ticket? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: And he stayed with your uncle? GAY: Uh-huh. HUNTLEY: Was your uncle involved with the communist at all? GAY: He said he wasn' ; t, but I thought he was. HUNTLEY: But he was a worker though -- GAY: That' ; s right, he was a worker. HUNTLEY: And, therefore, they usually related very closely to workers. GAY: He was working at the Vanderbilt Furnace which later was torn down. HUNTLEY: This of course, was a -- we' ; re talking about the 30s and 40s. What' ; s happening in civil rights at that time? GAY: The only thing that was happening in civil rights at that time, you was -- a regular started the NAACP talking about the NAACP, The National Association of the Advancement of Colored People, and that was something that we felt that was giving us a chance to really move out. So many people that work for these different white organizations and all, they say " ; well, if you work for that, you can' ; t work for me." ; In other words, they always tried to hold you down through some kind of money terrifying you -- where you couldn' ; t make it -- that they figured. HUNTLEY: Were you a member of the NAACP? GAY: Yes I was. HUNTLEY: You know in 1956 -- GAY: That was back there when Robert Durr was -- Robert Durr was over it at that time and then later on Patton and all of them come along. HUNTLEY: Right. Well in 1956 the State of Alabama outlawed the operation of the NAACP. GAY: And when they outlawed it that' ; s when Rev. Shuttles worth came in with the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. That' ; s when we got a chance to start. But the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights was because they wanted to outlaw it and Shuttles worth wasn' ; t going to hear that. And, when, Dr. Patton and them was telling them what was happening and talking about they outlawed it, he said " ; hell, we with y' ; all." ; That was true in our day, so that' ; s why the Alabama Christian Movement was started. HUNTLEY: It was started to fill this void that would have been left by the NAACP? GAY: That' ; s right. And what we had -- we had a lot of people at that time. They didn' ; t know exactly which way to start because see, during that time, right after that, we was trying to start us a voters drive. At that time, W. L. Williams come over and helped us people give credit to somebody else who didn' ; t in East Birmingham. W. L. Williams come on and help us to get the voters rights set up among the people over there where they could become qualified voters. Because when I become a voter, you know, you had to pay a poll tax at that time. And, they had different ways to try to keep you from becoming .. HUNTLEY: Well, when you went in to register to vote, what happened? GAY: Well, when I first went in, they told me, say, " ; boy, you know, what you want to vote for?" ; I said, " ; because where I' ; d have a right to protect my taxation without representation. That' ; s what I feel that I' ; m having but at least I can vote what has happened." ; And they say, " ; you don' ; t do it like that." ; So one thing about that -- I knew they told me how many questions they were going to ask me. So, you had to be able to talk to them so when they was talking to me, I said, " ; I tell you what." ; I say, " ; well I know, I want to ask you a question, because I know smart White folks like you know it." ; So I told them, I say, " ; I here about Paul Revere and the midnight riders and all of that and I hear about the British was coming." ; I said, " ; would you mind telling me a little something about that. I heard where they said where Patrick Henry said (?). I said " ; were White folks ever a slave?" ; He said " ; I ain' ; t got time to talk to you, go on, you pass." ; HUNTLEY: So that' ; s the way you got your .. GAY: That' ; s the way I got in there. HUNTLEY: Was that the first time that you had gone? GAY: First time. And, me and my wife went back the next week. HUNTLEY: Did she pass? GAY: Didn' ; t have no problem. HUNTLEY: Was that right? What year was that, do you remember? GAY: I can' ; t tell you exactly what year, but... HUNTLEY: Was this in the 1950s? GAY: That' ; s right. In the 1950s close to the ' ; 60. HUNTLEY: As Movement is starting to develop? GAY: Develop into what we knew that we wanted to do. HUNTLEY: What was your role in the Movement? GAY: Well, in the Movement was started, all of us was trying -- wanting to do something but, by me working with music as much as I had, then (?) Brown and I, we were first directors of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. And, then, Bernard Sneed and Carlton Reese came on the scene and we always wanted to be able to have the best qualified person for the job. That' ; s what we trained to do in the beginning of the civil rights movement. Let the man who could do the job, do it, and we would be followers. So that' ; s how Carlton took over as director of the Movement choir. But, in the beginning, it was Nathaniel Lee and Johnny L. Frazier and Mrs. (?), the musicians. And Mamie Brown and myself was the director. HUNTLEY: What was your background in music that you were the director at that time? GAY: Well, Dr. Henry over at Parker had turned around and taught us the Negro spirituals and music as it was supposed to be. And, then, I went with Streeter and he taught us whole notes -- that' ; s was note singing and all of that. And, so, the rest of it just was a gift from God. HUNTLEY: Did you sing with any of the gospel choirs? GAY: Well, during that -- after singing with Parker High School Choir, then we went with the Singing 40s at the L& ; N Railroad. You see, all these places wanted to keep Black folks satisfied and so we were singing under Dr. Whetstone. Now, after Dr. Whetstone we went -- we started singing around with Arthur Love out at Evergreen Bottom and after the Gospel Harmonettes was organized and we were all listening to their style which they adopted from the original (?) Singers. We all began to understand -- we formed the Gay Harmoniers then. And, people thought we were so good they wanted us to go somewhere. But we wouldn' ; t follow no where -- Sam Cooke and all of them used to come and sit down and tell me " ; man, you can do this and you can do that." ; But it was not my desire to move so we stayed right here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: So you had the Gay Harmonettes? GAY: We were the Harmoniers. In fact, we sung together for about 29 years. HUNTLEY: Just around in Birmingham? GAY: We would go out of town in various places, Birmingham, Andulsia and various places, Tennessee or somewhere like that. But we never wanted to migrate any further because according to what they would say we could do and everybody seemed to appreciate the style of music that we were doing. Because some of this music we were doing, national groups started recording it, but we never took, undertook to the ... HUNTLEY: So you knew Sam Cooke? GAY: Yeah. I knew Sam down at Gaston Motel and talked to Sam when he was gospel before he went into secular music. HUNTLEY: So, your group then, was sort of in the forefront? GAY: Of the Movement? No. HUNTLEY: Of the development of gospel music. GAY: Yeah. We -- the original Gospel Harmonettes was the first and Dorothy Love Coates came on the scene later. And, now, the first people that was attracted in Birmingham was William Blevins. William Blevins, he was the first Black that ever sung on radio in Birmingham. He would come up and he would, although he was working for the Birmingham News, see WSGN was a News H. Herald station at that time. But all Black folks had to go up on the freight elevator. Even then, people everywhere were listening to them. And, then, the Gospel Harmonettes with Odessa Edwards and Mildred Howard and all of those became the Gospel Harmonettes because they had Vera, Odessa, Willie Mae and they were the original Gospel Harmonettes. But, then, Dorothy Love Coates joined them and they become a power house. Went all the world and everywhere singing, but all of them -- they all come back home. All of them living here. They never left the city. HUNTLEY: Odessa Edwards was a teacher of mine out at Wenonah High School. GAY: She was something else. She was really fireball and a speaker. HUNTLEY: Tell me about the mass meetings of the Movement. GAY: We would meet every Monday night and we couldn' ; t hardly wait for Monday night to come. And, when, something would happen, we got where we have to call meetings in the middle of the week. But the churches, you couldn' ; t get in them. You didn' ; t have -- and some of them churches wouldn' ; t accept you. In my community the 46th Street Baptist Church where I was a member was the only one would let you meet over there. So you still had a lot of " ; Nervous Nillies" ; and " ; Uncle Toms." ; HUNTLEY: So, then, the mass meetings were accepted in some churches and other churches they were not accepted? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: How would you describe a typical meeting? GAY: A typical meeting would be very hyped up. Because when Dr. Rev. Shuttles worth would come in and speak and they were speaking the facts. And anytime you are telling the truth, the people have to accept it. And, then, of course, you had the police would come in and sit in the back of the meetings but that didn' ; t scare nobody because.. HUNTLEY: Why were they there? GAY: They were there to try to find out what was going on, where they could go back and carry reports back to city hall. But, that didn' ; t mean nothing. HUNTLEY: Did you participate in any of the demonstrations? GAY: No. But, I would go to a lot of the marches -- I was in a lot of the marches downtown and all of that stuff. And, I was able to watch them.... HUNTLEY: Did you ever go to jail? Were you ever arrested? GAY: No. I never was arrested because, I don' ; t know. Well, a lot of times when they said let' ; s go, and I' ; ll be the first stand up in there, they never did put me on the line, I didn' ; t know why. But, eventually I found out why later on. But, my two children, my son, my oldest son, Cardell, I would stand there when they washed him down the street with a hose. And my daughter, both of them were in jail. they went down there to Fair Park at the same time where they kept them, you know. HUNTLEY: So you had two children to go to jail as a result of demonstrating? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Were they school age at the time? GAY: That' ; s right. They were. HUNTLEY: Did they leave school? GAY: That' ; s right. They left school. Because, see, one thing about it, what they would do, they would just leave school anyway. Because a lot of the teachers who are afraid, they didn' ; t want to let the children out. But, the children would leave anyway. HUNTLEY: Did you encourage your children to get involved? GAY: That' ; s right. I told them " ; a scared person never won nothing." ; HUNTLEY: How did other members of your family react to you and your children being involved? GAY: Everybody was in accord with it. My daddy, when he came here, he said, " ; I didn' ; t go back to Cleveland, because he said, " ; down there getting on them buses--going to get everybody killed." ; But, then, eventually, he come around to understand what it was all about. HUNTLEY: What church were you a member of? GAY: 46th Street Baptist Church where I' ; m a member now. HUNTLEY: What was the level of involvement of your pastor and your church at the time? GAY: Well, the church, as we come along, as the choirs and all would come up, I was a minister of music working with the choirs. And, in later years I became, as now, Chairman of the Board, but I think they should have a younger chairman because -- what you need to do is lay a foundation for somebody else to come along. And, I teach the adult - the men' ; s bible class there now. HUNTLEY: So, your church then was actually opening the doors for the Movement? GAY: That' ; s right. Rev. Hester was the pastor at that time. He said, of course we had a Chairman of the Board who didn' ; t want to meet. So. Rev. Hester say " ; they gonna blow our church up." ; Rev. Hester say, " ; well it just be blown up." ; So that was all it was. HUNTLEY: So there was some dissension within the church? GAY: Oh, yeah. About one or two, that' ; s all. Everybody else was in accord. HUNTLEY: Do you remember anything that stand out in your mind as related to the Movement that you may have been involved in that you saw happen during the Movement? GAY: Well, when they burned the buses at Anniston, Rudolph Bailey and myself we were one of the first to get up there and Joe Hendricks and I don' ; t know who was in the car with Joe. But, somebody came on and we all came to Anniston where they had the Freedom Riders. And, when, we got up there, the police, the highway patrolmen say now " ; we can' ; t go on the highway with you, but we will take you here in the city." ; And they wanted to know how to -- who was going to take-- He had some -- we had got some protectors to carry us. Because they didn' ; t know we was talking about the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That' ; s who we was talking about. And, so, Joe Hendricks, put them on the floor of his car. HUNTLEY: These are the Freedom Riders? GAY: The Freedom Riders and Bailey and myself, we went on in one car ahead of them and they come right behind us. But, if they had of been thinking, all they had to do, you had to go through Pell City, all they had to do was block that road and we couldn' ; t have gotten through. HUNTLEY: Where did you take the Freedom Riders after you got them back to Birmingham? GAY: They brought them on down to Rev. Shuttles worth. Bull Conner was ahead of him. But when he got to the church there, say " ; Rev. we got them in." ; But the only reason he didn' ; t stop us was because they had foresight to go down 50th Street. Down by--and then come on over in Collegeville where the church was. And, they had on way to catch them then. When they caught up with them, they was already there. And Bull come, told Rev. he was watching for them for to protect them. But that wasn' ; t the idea, but they just got by them. And, then, of course, it' ; s all right now. But, Brother Hendricks carried them over to his house. That' ; s where they stayed. But during that time, you had to be very careful what you let anybody know. Because you had people come to sessions just for that. HUNTLEY: Were these both Black and white Freedom Riders that you picked up? GAY: Oh, yes. They were both Black and White. They had quite a few White in there. And, when they got through with those smoke bombs they threw in there, they were about as Black as we were, but they were White. HUNTLEY: During the demonstrations -- well actually between 1960 and 1963. In 1961 the Freedom Rides. I believe in 1962 you had the Selective Buying Campaign in downtown. Can you tell me anything about that? GAY: You see, during that time when they was trying to keep, you know, from going on and buying anything--they tried everything they could even, you know, when they put the fire hoses on you and sic the dogs on you. Out there on 6th Avenue when the firemen turned the hoses on it and Bull was telling them to turn the hose on them, we prayed and Billups was sitting down there praying. And, only God kept that water from coming. The firemen were trembling more so than we were because the water would not come out of those hoses although they turned them on. And, then, when we got through praying and went back across the street, the water come everywhere. Now why the water didn' ; t run, I don' ; t know. It had to be someone bigger than you and I to . HUNTLEY: This was as a result of the children marching out of 16th Street into the park? GAY: We left out of from New Pilgrim Baptist Church and went over across down there in the park on 6th Avenue to have a mass prayer on account of they were putting children in jail and discriminating against us in every way. And, we knew the power of prayer because if it hadn' ; t been the power the power of prayer, a lot of us wouldn' ; t have made it. HUNTLEY: Well, after all of this, what benefits you think your family, the community realized as a result of the Movement? GAY: Now realizing after the results of the Movement, there is some negative and there some positive. The positive things is for me for instance. After I got through demonstrating, when -- being one of the first Black managers in Blue Cross was because of the Movement that we got an opportunity for those jobs. Although we began to see, like my daughter now, she' ; s one of the tax assessors at the Jefferson County Courthouse. She wouldn' ; t have had the opportunity if it had it not been for the Movement stepping out. You see, some people say well, it would have been anyway. Yeah, God intended to it, but he didn' ; t intend for you to get off and do something yourself. So that is the way -- that has actually happened and a lot of positions that we have, that we can do, we at least -- you get a chance to meet the man on equal basis. HUNTLEY: So, were you one of the first managers for Blue Cross Blue Shield? One of the first Black managers? GAY: Yeah. I was one of the first after we had about two come in there for a token and then what they wanted me to do was when they really, in a way, had to make me a manager because they -- Mr. Chamblin what had put the inserters into Blue Cross and you understand, he was just showing me how you do it, but they didn' ; t have no intention of a Black man running it. HUNTLEY: What are the inserters? GAY: That' ; s where you put -- they call it -- they inserts your rate changes and also insert your checks or whatever has to go out in the envelope. You have four to five stations there. In one you put a card, the other you put a letter and the other one you might enclose a check and the end of it, an envelope opens up and it automatically puts it in there, then you run it on through and it' ; s stamped. It' ; s ready to go. And, so, by me being able to -- they first couldn' ; t find nobody to run it because the White fellow who was supposed to run it, he messed up and wasn' ; t able to run it and they had to get a rate change out, which was a 100,000 policy holders, because Blue Cross had most of holders in Alabama. So, what they did, he come and ask me could I do it. Mr. Gentry saying " ; he didn' ; t know nobody who could do it." ; He said, " ; you know it?. I said " ; no." ; He said " ; well, I guess we gonna to lose it, Mr. (?) wasn' ; t there." ; Mr. Singer, one of the presidents come in and I said " ; I could do it." ; He said I was playing with him, but I wasn' ; t playing with him, I could do it. And, so, he had me to do it and I was able to run 95% of the letters without even having a hang-up. Then he wanted me to do it. I said " ; no, I will not do that, not for the same salary that you are paying me." ; So what they decided they would do then, they make me a " ; Spec 10." ; They would rather make me a specialist rather than make me a manager. HUNTLEY: What year, approximately was that? GAY: Oh, that was approximately, I reckon I worked as a specialist from about ' ; 69 until about ' ; 80. HUNTLEY: So this, in fact, is as result of the Movement. GAY: Then, after -- see all of that helped me along because then they didn' ; t find out that I was active as I was until it was too late. HUNTLEY: Do you think that if they had know that you were active would you have had a job? GAY: Really, seriously, I don' ; t believe that I would have. Because the thing about it, always being able to meet a person with a smile and treat them like you want them to treat you. That helped me to be able to meet a man and meet him on his same basis and didn' ; t hate him for the things that I knew that he had done that was detrimental to my welfare. But, so, anyway, they thought, I guess I was one of the good old boys. HUNTLEY: You said two of your children went to jail? How long did they stay in jail? GAY: They stayed in there four days. One of them stayed five. HUNTLEY: And you actually saw your son hit with the water hoses. What was that like, seeing your son? GAY: You know, that is the time you have to really control yourself. Because it wouldn' ; t have been nothing to run up beside those firemen and policemen' ; s heads. I figured we could have won that battle with violence. But, see there' ; s a hereafter that tomorrow you have to start with the same thing. HUNTLEY: So you had to have a lot of self-control to see your child hit with the water? GAY: More so than ever, then. HUNTLEY: Was that the hardest thing for you to do during the movement? GAY: That was one of the hardest things to accept. Although bringing, sometimes getting the children out of these different schools, Carver and all of them and bringing them over there, where they can get in the demonstration, that wasn' ; t no problem. We just do that anyway because James Bevill needed help. But one thing about it, the communities were more together then. You didn' ; t find many -- you find more people I feel, today, afraid of their jobs and their welfare than you found people back then. HUNTLEY: You found more today that are afraid of their jobs? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Afraid of losing their jobs than you did at that time? GAY: That' ; s right. That' ; s my opinion because you go into so many establishments and things where people are trying to do something and what do you find? You find us selling each other out just for a position or what they think is a position of monetary values. When I feel that each and every one, if you got something, that if you are right, stand on right and reach out and touch somebody' ; s life and that same touch will come back to you. HUNTLEY: How do you think the Movement has changed over time? GAY: It' ; s changed because it don' ; t have the strength or the will power or the people. Anything you have, the people has to be a part of it. There is strength in numbers. And so many of our young people today, they think they got it made. All they want to do, a lot of them, now we have a lot of young people who is trying to educate their head and sanctify the house but you find so many that' ; s not. You find so many young people they think because they can ride around in loud cars and all of that stuff and put a piece of jewelry around their neck that that' ; s the answer. And, the parent, in my opinion, the reason the children is not doing no more than they are, is because the parent who came along in my day and afterwards, they are trying to relive the life that they didn' ; t live. And, see, anytime you don' ; t live a decent life in front of a child, the child is not going to live a decent life in front of nobody else. Because I, people ask me, a lot of times, " ; how come your children never been in any trouble." ; I say, " ; they are not my children in the first place, they' ; re God' ; s." ; And when you let them know that and let them know that he' ; s the only one that can do anything for you and don' ; t let them run you, then you will be successful in keeping them from doing what they should have done. No, don' ; t get yourself the credit, because it' ; s not you. HUNTLEY: Do you ever remember any of the people who were associated with those that guarded the various homes? GAY: Yeah. John L. Lewis he was right there when they blowed -- he was one of the ones throwed the bomb from up against Bethel Baptist Church when it was blown up there. Colonel Stone was there but those guys were the ones who throwed it away and this other guy, he was there. His name won' ; t come to me right now and me and him meet each other all the time. HUNTLEY: But you are familiar with those guys who were... GAY: Yeah. Most all of them because I was at every meeting. HUNTLEY: You were at every mass meeting? GAY: Every mass meeting. HUNTLEY: Never missed a Monday night? GAY: Didn' ; t miss a Monday night. Looked forward to the Monday nights and was trying to do what can we do to help the cause. HUNTLEY: Is there anything else you would like to add that we really hadn' ; t dealt with today? GAY: The only thing that I would add that we haven' ; t dealt with today, is now we know what the problem is now let' ; s do something about it. You know, we need to eliminate the problem. The problem now is we have lost strength as people, I won' ; t say Black people, as people whole, we have lost strength. We need to come together and progress as America should and stop trying to fight the civil war all over again. HUNTLEY: What do you mean by " ; stop trying to fight the civil war over?" ; GAY: All right. When I was saying about fighting the civil war all over again, you got the White man still trying to push you back because he feel you are inferior to him and you know that you' ; re not and you retaliate by doing something that is detrimental to you and him. And, that way, nobody is doing anything. In fact, we are holding each other down in America. Everything you see now, that' ; s why it' ; s going out of the country and going to other people because we have become greedy and I think that we have an ego crutch. HUNTLEY: An ego crutch? GAY: That' ; s what I feel as I go about from day to day and see so many people in so many things and sometimes now being -- doing this old time gospel at WAYE radio, say I do that on the weekend from 5:00 - 8:00 because we have turned around and we have let everything that we have -- we trying to let the Negro spirituals go. We trying to let the folk songs go. We are throwing everything away even when you used to come to colleges, you know you was going to find the history of music there. You don' ; t find it anymore. HUNTLEY: There is one other think that I wanted to ask you. You mentioned that L & ; N supported gospel singing. Did you say that? GAY: They had a choir -- they had a mens choir with W. W. Whetstone directing it. Rev. (?) all of us was a part of that group. And that was -- the plant -- they supported that. HUNTLEY: Did other businesses, other plants have choirs as well? GAY: ACIPICO had one and I don' ; t know whether Stockham had...yes Stockham did have one. Because, you see, that was giving different activities for you to do to keep you satisfied see. The White man thought then that if you was in church, you was good. If you was singing spirituals you weren' ; t going to do him harm. But see... HUNTLEY: So you are saying that' ; s part of the pacification program? GAY: They were just putting a pacifier in your mouth like you put a pacifier in a baby' ; s mouth. GAY: So, they sponsored singing groups and they sponsored baseball teams? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: And this is all part of that program that you feel is part of the pacification program? GAY: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Well, Mr. Gay, I certainly appreciate you taking the time out today. GAY: It was a blessing to be able to come out Dr. Huntley and maybe one day we will be able to see a brighter day ahead. I know it' ; s a brighter day ahead, but the main thing, where can we grab on and stop this riding because we can' ; t (?) HUNTLEY: Thank you very much. I appreciate you taking the time. GAY: All right. Thank you. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=NGay1995.xml NGay1995.xml
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Nims E. Gay
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Nims E. Gay discusses his whole family's involvement in the Movement. Gay and his children attended meetings and demonstrations that included his children being hit with water hoses and arrested.
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19950406G
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company
Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department
Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011
The National Association for the Advancement of Color People
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1995-04-06
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video
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Patricia Powell Berry
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Voter Registration
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5.4 August 13, 1997 Patricia Powell Berry Interviewed on August 13, 1997 19970813B 0:42:00 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Raines Whittaker Civil rights movements--Alabama--Birmingham Seward (Neb.) Lutheran Church Voter Registration Patricia Powell Berry Horace Huntley Video 1:|16(6)|41(10)|65(16)|92(4)|111(8)|132(4)|157(7)|172(7)|185(2)|199(4)|226(8)|242(12)|264(7)|276(11)|288(2)|298(7)|325(9)|338(13)|349(9)|365(5)|377(2)|400(3)|419(10)|448(8)|474(4)|487(11)|511(5)|532(6)|551(2)|564(9)|581(5)|596(11)|614(1)|634(14)|653(1)|673(4)|688(5)|707(3)|720(16)|730(9)|739(2) 0 https://youtu.be/HxfKDYX6g7k YouTube video English 0 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with Patricia Powell Berry for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. African American history ; African American women ; Alabama--History 33.516200, -86.813870 18 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute http://www.bcri.org The website for the BCRI 39 Biographical Background I just want to start by asking you some general questions about your family ; like background ; your mother and father. Employment and educational background of parents. African American coal miners ; African Americans--History ; African Americans--Southern States ; Birmingham (Ala.) 303 Elementary School Do you remember your first grade? Her experiences in elementary school and transition to high school. African American children--Education African American elementary schools ; African Americans--History 631 High School What was that transition like for you, elementary to high school? Participation in high school and experiencing discrimination at businesses. African American high school students ; African American teenagers ; Discrimination against African Americans, [Mexican Americans, etc.] African Americans--Education ; African Americans--History 878 Gangs Around Town All the time between Smithfield and Titusville between the southside and Titusville. The presence of neighborhood gangs, dating, and the feelings of community. African American gangs African American history ; African American neighborhoods 1091 Social and Class Composition of School I was in what they called an accelerated class. More specifics about high school classes and the economic class composition at school. African American high school students ; African Americans--Segregation ; Race, class and social structure African Americans--History ; African Americans--Segregation ; Middle class African Americans 1257 High School Graduation and College In 1960, you graduated from high school in 1960. High school graduation in 1960 and Lutheran college in Selma, AL. African American Christians ; African American college students ; African American Lutherans ; African Americans--History ; Lutheran Church ; Selma (Ala.) 1293 Involvement in St. Paul Lutheran Church Alabama Lutheran Academy and College now it's called Concordia College, community college in Selma, Alabama. Her time in the church as a youth among the black congregation with a white pastor. African American churches African American Lutherans ; African Americans--History ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Lutheran Church ; Selma (Ala.) 33.494427, -86.827314 17 St. Paul Lutheran Church 1490 Voter Registration Work Now you also helped to register or prepare people for registration. Her work doing voter registration through the St. Paul Lutheran Church and facing racism for it. African American civil rights workers ; Civil rights demonstrations--Alabama ; Discrimination against African Americans, [Mexican Americans, etc.] ; Discrimination--United States ; Voter registration African Americans--History ; Alabama--History ; Civil rights movement ; Freedom Rides, 1961 ; Voter registration 1692 Racism and Isolation During College in Nebraska I was away in school. I was in Nebraska. While away during college she was isolated from her community and encountered racism. African American college students ; African Americans--Segregation ; Racism--United States--History African Americans--History ; Racism--United States--History ; Seward (Neb.) 40.907782, -97.098801 10 Seward, NE 1824 Siblings in Civil Rights Movement My sisters, every one of them. All of her siblings were involved in civil rights. She also reflects further on the few black students at college. African American families ; African American women college students ; African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States African American families ; African Americans--Civil rights ; African Americans--History ; Civil rights movement 1987 Return to Birmingham after College What did you do after you finished [inaudible]? Upon returning, she was employed as a teacher in a Lutheran school for one year. African American teachers ; African Americans--History ; Birmingham (Ala.) 2074 Marriage and Teaching What did you do after that year? She taught at and became principle of Zion Lutheran School. She also reflects on coming back to a black community after college in Nebraska. African American teachers ; African Americans--History ; Bessemer (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) 2321 Reflection on Experiences Basically, all of that was a learning experience. Her final message on education and success. African American families ; African American poor families ; African Americans--Employment ; African Americans--History Oral History Patricia Powell Berry discusses growing up poor in Birmingham, moving to Nebraska, and ultimately returning to Birmingham. She was heavily involved in voter registration during the Movement. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Patricia Powell Berry for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project. I' ; m Dr. Horace Huntley and we' ; re presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Today is August 13, 1997. Ms. Berry I want to thank you for taking time out of your schedule to come and sit and talk with me today about Birmingham, growing up in Birmingham and the Civil Rights Movement. Welcome to the Institute. BERRY: I' ; m glad to be here. HUNTLEY: I just want to start by asking you some general questions about your family ; like background ; your mother and father. Were they from Birmingham ; both born in Birmingham? BERRY: No, my father was born in Bessemer and my mother came here from LaGrange, Georgia. She lived with her uncle and aunt at that time her uncle was working at the mine. So, they were considered very fortunate cause she was an only child. If you worked in the mine, you know, you were fortunate to do that. He came here first to work at TCI and in that area and then he sent for her. Then she grew up in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Did he work in the ore mines or the coal mines? BERRY: The coal mines in Bessemer, you know out there. Somehow they met and got married and he' ; s from Bessemer. His people migrated from Georgia for the same reason. HUNTLEY: So, both of your parents were originally from Georgia. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: But they didn' ; t know each other. BERRY: No, cause all of them came here for those jobs at TCI and in the mines. HUNTLEY: What part of Georgia was he from? BERRY: I don' ; t remember exactly what part he was from. HUNTLEY: She' ; s from LaGrange? BERRY: Right, her folks are from LaGrange cause we went back down there to visit them but we never did go to visit his people. HUNTLEY: How much education did they have, your parents? BERRY: My mother, I think, she got to the 11th grade at Parker. My daddy he didn' ; t finish at Parker but he went there. HUNTLEY: He went to Parker also? BERRY: Both of them went to Parker. So, they decided to get married and start a family which I was the first born. They settled right over there in that area. HUNTLEY: In Smithfield? BERRY: In Smithfield projects. HUNTLEY: Did he work for TCI, also? BERRY: Daddy worked various places. Golden Flake Potato Chip Company ; that' ; s the one I remember most, that he worked for ' ; cause he used to bring potato chips home. HUNTLEY: We' ; ll always remember those treats. Did she work outside the home, your mother? BERRY: She didn' ; t start working outside of the home until after things got kind of tight and we had all these kids and she would do day work. I was old enough to keep the kids then. HUNTLEY: What is day work? BERRY: Cleaning White people' ; s houses, ironing she would take in ironing. HUNTLEY: Did she ever take you to her place of employment? BERRY: No, I had to stay home and babysit. HUNTLEY: Oh, ok. How many brothers and sisters did you have? BERRY: I had five sisters and two brothers of which I was the oldest. So, soon as I got big enough then she went to work. HUNTLEY: Oh, I see. BERRY: Then I stayed home and took care of the house. HUNTLEY: And you lived in Smithfield? BERRY: Yes, at that time I was very young. I went to Lincoln. As the family grew the apartment was too small, we were in the largest apartment they had in Smithfield. So, the family kept growing so they built Loveman' ; s Village with more rooms cause you had a bedroom downstairs and three bedrooms upstairs. I remember that very clearly and you had two bathrooms. We were very excited about that. So, they said we' ; re going to move into some new apartments and only the families that were big had all these rooms. The place was brand new and we went over there and we just loved it. HUNTLEY: That must have been exciting. BERRY: It was very exciting. We had more room than we could use. HUNTLEY: I' ; ve talked with several other people and they talked about the move from Smithfield to Loveman' ; s Village and there was a step up. BERRY: It was ; it really was cause you had, you know, Smithfield was built years before, many years before we were born ' ; cause you still had the coal bin and you had the coal stove. When we got to Loveman' ; s Village we had gas space heaters. HUNTLEY: You didn' ; t have to go out and get coal anymore. BERRY: Right. It was a step up and you had two bathrooms instead of one. HUNTLEY: That' ; s really moving up to high cotton. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: Do you remember your first grade? Where did you start first grade? BERRY: At Lincoln Elementary School, I remember that. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about Lincoln? BERRY: I remember being in talent shows and being in plays. We used to have a talent and variety show and the teachers would make us costumes and we would be so excited. Our parents would come to see the show and you just felt like a celebrity ; made you feel real good. So, that' ; s why I can relate to kids being active in programs and plays because it really builds your self-esteem cause it built mine. I just felt like a superstar. (Laughing) HUNTLEY: Especially when you dressed up. BERRY: Right. I think we were little Dutch girls and tulips and all that. I remember the teacher decorating the stage. My mother made me the apron and starched it real stiff and we had the little hats and she made the little clogs. I remember that so vividly because it was such a beautiful time. HUNTLEY: Did you have Mayday at Lincoln? BERRY: Yes, we did. I loved that too. We had Mayday every year. We wore all white, white shorts, white T-shirts, white tennis shoes, and white socks. We had to plait the Maypole, everybody knew what they had to do and you did what you had to on cue. I don' ; t remember any confusion. I don' ; t remember that. HUNTLEY: I can remember actually rehearsing for plaiting the Maypole. You had to go down and rehearse. Then on that day, that was the biggest day of the year. BERRY: Sure and your parents, sisters, brothers, and everybody ... HUNTLEY: Everybody in the neighborhood was there. BERRY: Sure was. It was a happy time. HUNTLEY: Yes, it was. How long were you at Lincoln? BERRY: I guess until the 3rd grade. HUNTLEY: Then you moved to ... BERRY: Loveman' ; s Village and went to Washington. HUNTLEY: How was Washington different from Lincoln? BERRY: It seemed to be a little larger to me. The thing I remember most about Washington was my music classes, my art classes, home economics classes and I had a teacher, I remember her she was just out of college. She was so energetic and we learned and we sang, she had an open classroom. We didn' ; t sit still all day. I remember her cause she was my first teacher at Washington. HUNTLEY: How did you get back and forth to school? BERRY: We walked every day. We walked to school come rain, come shine, come snow, whatever we walked. Even if your shoes had a hole in it your momma would cut a piece of cardboard out and put it in the bottom of your shoes and you walked to school. You can-ied a lunch at that time, you didn' ; t have free lunches, so you carried sack lunches or you had to buy lunches. You could work in the lunchroom at that time and they would give you a lunch if you were old enough but you had to be about in the 6th, 7th, or 8th grade to work in the lunch room and taking home economics. You would wash the dishes or clean the tables and you would get a free lunch. By us carrying lunches, we were considered as being poor, so we would carry our lunches but it was a treat to eat in the lunchroom at that time, or either to just buy some ice cream. Now we would stop at the store sometime when we had a nickel or dime cause when you go to the store for people they' ; ll give you a nickel or dime for running to the store for them. And you take that money and you can buy some treats with it. HUNTLEY: What I remember most about eating at Riley School, we didn' ; t have a lunch room, but I remember we would have milk and we would want chocolate milk. I remember that chocolate milk. They didn' ; t have enough chocolate milk so we would race for the chocolate milk. BERRY: You were talking about the milk when we were growing up, at lunch time if they had fish, I don' ; t remember how the rumor got out, that if you drink milk and eat fish or eat ice cream and fish you would die. So, when the children would have fish for lunch then we would wait outside and they would have ice cream we would tell them that you had fish you can' ; t eat ice cream and they would give that ice cream and milk away. That' ; s when we would get that milk and ice cream cause they were afraid that if they put it together they would die. Now, where it originated from, I have no idea. I wonder to this day how did that ever happen and how did it ever start. HUNTLEY: It was out all over town cause the same thing happened at our school. BERRY: Fish and milk and fish and ice cream. HUNTLEY: There was something else, eating watermelon and ... BERRY: If you drink anything and eat watermelon that would kill you. HUNTLEY: Yeah, something like that. BERRY: Some man drank some whiskey and he ate some watermelon and he dropped dead on the front porch. (Laughing) HUNTLEY: And the watermelon had nothing to do with it. BERRY: Yeah, that used to be a rumor. HUNTLEY: Now, you left Washington and went to Ullman. BERRY: Went to Ullman, right. HUNTLEY: What was that transition like for you, elementary to high school? BERRY: It was beautiful. I remember graduating from Washington School. It was a ve1y big to do. Everybody had the same pattern dresses. My mother had made all of our clothes. She would get the material from Newberry' ; s at that time or wherever they could get it for little or nothing, 3 yards for a dollar. So, after we graduated, we were looking forward to going to Ullman High School. We had been very well prepared so you weren' ; t afraid of your education cause you knew you were ready for that. So, you became more independent. We used to walk downtown from Titusville ; you would make your little change and we' ; d buy mascara, you know with the little brush. You would buy eyebrow pencils and lipstick. At that time they only sold you powder and we had no makeup we used powder. The only color powder they would sell Black people was called nutmeg. HUNTLEY: What do you mean the only color they would sell? BERRY: That' ; s the only color they would sell to Black people. HUNTLEY: You couldn' ; t just go in and buy. BERRY: You could not buy any other color. I don' ; t care how light you were, how dark you were Black people used nutmeg powder, they wore red fox stockings, you had no choice. You wore red fox or you didn' ; t wear none. You didn' ; t have a choice, you couldn' ; t look at the other colors and say I think this would look better on me. If you want stockings you would walk in and say I want a pair of stockings and they would give you red fox. HUNTLEY: That' ; s interesting, I' ; ve never heard that before. BERRY: You didn' ; t have a choice. HUNTLEY: Is that right? BERRY: Yeah. I think the lipstick, I don' ; t remember what color the lipstick was but see you asked for it. They wouldn' ; t go through any changes to ask you what would you like because it didn' ; t matter what you liked. HUNTLEY: So, whatever ... BERRY: The salesperson wanted you to have that' ; s what you would get. They would tell you that, they were working in department stores, five and dime stores. So, these White people at that time they didn' ; t have much more than you but, you know, this made them feel good to look down on you and to pull you down and whatever means that they could lower you that' ; s what they did. I understand that now but I didn' ; t understand that then. We had no choices. We had none. HUNTLEY: Was Ullman, we' ; re you still as active at Ullman as you had been in the elementary schools? BERRY: Yes cause the first thing I did I joined the choir and we had variety shows that we had every year. They sold tickets and we would practice for two or three weeks. I would always get in the dances, you know. The first dance we were in we had the little frilly skirts, our parents made them, it was no problem they just made whatever you had to have. Our teachers would tell them what they wanted and they were proud cause their child was on stage. So, we had little shoes and we would dance. Once you were in the variety show every year you were in it and you would approximately be with the same kids. Then I got in the choir with Mrs. Gregory White, which was a very good experience and I' ; ve been in choirs ever since then. We would sing. I loved to be in programs. Even though we were poor, it was just something I was just proud of doing. It just really built my self-esteem. It really did. HUNTLEY: In attending Ullman there was always this big rivalry between Parker and Ullman. BERRY: All the time between Smithfield and Titusville between the southside and Titusville. That' ; s why gangs are not new. The gangs have been around ever since I was a child. Southtown had a gang, Titusville, Loveman' ; s Village had a gang and Smithfield had a gang. You could not come off of your turf like when we started dating I made the mistake of dating a guy that lived in Smithfield. He walked to my house and he ran back home (Laughing) because he was off his turf. So, your safest way, your dad didn' ; t like you to date guys with cars, cars were just off limits, you rode the bus wherever you went. Then Southtown project they would ride through the alleys and they had guns, I don' ; t kmow where the guns came from, and my daddy, I remember they would tum the lights out cause everybody knew they were going to ride that night. It was the gangs and he would make us lie down on the floor, I remember that ve1y well. It didn' ; t happen over and over again but every now and then it would. The biggest violence they had at that time they used knives and switchblades that was the thing. HUNTLEY: Maybe one or two people had guns but everybody had a knife. BERRY: Everybody had a knife. You fought with a knife and it seems that they were trained to use those switchblades and how to use those knives. HUNTLEY: Practiced. BERRY: Practiced with them, right. So, you always had gangs. HUNTLEY: Just didn' ; t have the dope, the drugs that people are now fighting over. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: You simply were protecting your turf. BERRY: You were tough. HUNTLEY: In a sense you were protecting the community cause you didn' ; t let anybody else come into the community. BERRY: Right. They didn' ; t want the guys from our community dating the girls in their community. They didn' ; t date you but they didn' ; t want anybody else to date you. HUNTLEY: Right. BERRY: So, they protected what they call their turf. They wouldn' ; t hurt you. You didn' ; t have to be afraid. Your doors would be open. You could sit out on the porch all night. You could go to sleep on the porch at night. Even at Loveman' ; s Village at that time because the neighborhood was a family. Like if you had one potato and you needed two you would just send someone next door and you would get the other potato or you needed eggs, or grits, or onions. If the neighborhoods heard that Mrs. Josephine, she had about five or six children, and they didn' ; t have anything to eat, the women would get together and take food over there so they could eat. The community was just a family. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. That is a difference in then and now. BERRY: Now cause there is so much pride, if you don' ; t have, you don' ; t ask. There' ; s just too much pride. At that time we were all in the same boat. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about your days at Ullman? In terms of your instruction, teachers, principal? BERRY: I was in what they called an accelerated class. You had section A and section B. Section A and section B are supposed to be the kids that are possibly college bound. They call them the smaii kids. The average kids . . . now we took academics like biology, chemistry, and geometry, you know. The other kids were more into language arts, business, or vocational studies like they had beauty culture, they had art, they had sewing. We took those too, but they were more so into it than the academics. They had woodshop, tailoring, they worked in the lunchroom. HUNTLEY: Did they have shoe repair? BERRY: I believe they did. They were more vocational and our class was more into academics. So, they had prejudice because if you' ; re in the smart class then the children that weren' ; t in the smart class thought that you were more than they were. I guess there were five or six ofus out at Loveman' ; s Village in those classes. The majority of them came from what we call Honeysuckle Hill. One side of 6th Avenue was considered the poor people' ; s side and the other side of 6th Avenue was the more ... HUNTLEY: More well-to-do. BERRY: Well-to-do Black people like the teachers and the men that worked at TCI. Like you had a husband that worked at TCI and a wife that taught school, or nurses then they are considered to be well-to-do. So, they lived on the other side of 6th Avenue. So, about 75% of your class was from the well-to-do side and 25% would be from Loveman' ; s Village and the other side. So, we would be in those classes and we didn' ; t feel any less than they did. That' ; s one thing, I don' ; t think they made ... they didn' ; t make us feel any less. It' ; s what you knew that made you in those classes. Who you were, it was how you did your lessons, what grades you made. I remember we had geometry was the class that girls at that time, most ofus had problems with geometry. So, the boys would do our geometry for us and help us with our geometry to get through that class. HUNTLEY: In 1960, you graduated from high school in 1960. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: 1960 was the year that the movement here, of course was established. In 1956 the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights with Fred Shuttlesworth and then in 1960 college students started getting involved with the movement. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: And they did that through voter registration. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: When you left Ullman what did you do? Did you go on to school? BERRY: Yes, I went to school in Selma, a Lutheran college, I got a scholarship from a church. HUNTLEY: What' ; s the name ofit? BERRY: Alabama Lutheran Academy and College now it' ; s called Concordia College, community college in Selma, Alabama. It was a few blocks from Selma University. So, we intermingled the campuses did, the kids anyway. I was a member of the St. Paul Lutheran Church. So, my pastor was Elwain, Pastor Joseph Elwain. His father ran the school in Selma. HUNTLEY: Is that right? Elwain was a White minister, right? BERRY: Right. He was a White minister and he was totally, fully involved in the movement. Therefore his members became involved, especially young people. HUNTLEY: So, the Lutheran Church that he was the pastor of was a Black... BERRY: Yeah, it was Black and that' ; s what our membership was. HUNTLEY: And that was on 6th Avenue. BERRY: 6th Avenue right, 6th Avenue South. He had... he worked with the youth he had a youth department. We were involved in so many things with him and we learned so many things with him. His father was the president of the college in Selma, so, he was reared with Black people although he lived in Selma. The people he mostly knew were Black because his father was, what they called at that time, a missionary sent to Alabama to start schools for Black kids. HUNTLEY: You said you were involved with so many things with him and you learned so many things, give me some examples of those. BERRY: Ok, we had a youth group, we would visit White churches, mostly Lutheran churches. HUNTLEY: Here in Birmingham? BERRY: In Birmingham. HUNTLEY: This is in 1960, early 60s? BERRY: Yes, early 60s. In the 50s, we would go, he would drive ok, and we would go to Selma, he' ; d take the youth to Selma. He would take us to Illinois and different places. We were Black kids with White pastors in the cars. I remember we got pulled over in Kentucky, I believe, and the police took them to a little town, there was a little jail there. HUNTLEY: The pastors? BERRY: The pastors they took them to the jail. HUNTLEY: What about the children? BERRY: We were still in the car. HUNTLEY: They left you in the car? BERRY: We were in the car. I remember we didn' ; t know what was going to happen to them but we just prayed and he came back out. He was really brave in our sight. He taught us songs and we would just go different places. It was just as if he was a father figure to us. HUNTLEY: And he would take you to churches here in Birmingham? BERRY: Yes. HUNTLEY: Black kids to White Lutheran Churches? BERRY: Yes, right, he sure would. HUNTLEY: Were there ever any difficulties? BERRY: We had no incidents at all. I think the Lutheran Church was a little more liberal. We had White ministers and it was nothing to send a White minister to a Black congregation. Right now they have a White minister, Pastor Noon and he' ; s active in most organizations. HUNTLEY: Now you also helped to register or prepare people for registration. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: Do you remember when you went to take the test yourself? BERRY: Yes, I do. They had somebody to train us for the test because they had gotten a copy of the test. It' ; s like preparing a soldier for war. They prepared us and showed us what to do. They told us when we went down to not be nervous, don' ; t look at anybody cause they would intimidate us and they didn' ; t want us to forget what we had to do. HUNTLEY: You were not to look directly at the person. BERRY: No, cause they would intimidate you. I remember looking at one White man, he was..I can see his face now, he was fat White man, he had dark hair and I could see him just as clear as day and he snarled at me. I remember that they told us not to look and then I knew then why. So, when we got there and we sat down to take the...oh, they would just throw the papers at you. They didn' ; t treat you nice, we were prepared for that, we knew it. HUNTLEY: You anticipated it. BERRY: Right, but we were supposed to be submissive, do whatever they told us to do, pay no attention to their ignorance. We took the test and when we came out, I remember coming out, and there were White people down at the bottom of the steps. I remember not looking at them, I remember just going on. We would always stay in a group. HUNTLEY: Was this while you were in high school? BERRY: It was between high school and college, somewhere between there. You know I would come home every summer. One summer I worked for my church. HUNTLEY: St. Paul? BERRY: St. Paul, right. I did a lot of different work for them, filing, running church bulletins and stuff. So, it was in between those times that I wasn' ; t in school I was at home. HUNTLEY: When you went to take the test did you take an oral test or written test? BERRY: Written test. We were prepared for the written test. We were prepared for the tricky questions and everything. So, once we took it we came back and we trained others how to take it, at St. Paul church. Then they would take them down in cars. I do remember we had some freedom workers to come to our church too. I remember that. HUNTLEY: Freedom riders? BERRY: Yes, I remember them coming to the church. HUNTLEY: Yeah, cause in 1961 the freedom riders did come to Binningham. BERRY: Yes, I remember them. HUNTLEY: There was a lot of turmoil around then. BERRY: That time right. I remember them standing with some of the people of our church. I remember that. HUNTLEY: In 1962, Miles college students along with the Alabama Christian Movement organized a selective buying campaign downtown and they kept people from going in to various stores because what they were attempting to do was to get Black people hired as clerks and in various capacities at various stores cause there were none at the time. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: OF course in 1963 was when the demonstrations took place. Were you here then or were you away at school? BERRY: I was away in school. I was in Nebraska. I got a scholarship again from the Lutheran church. My parents were poor and I knew I wanted an education and I knew I had to get it one way or another. That was just in me. If I had to go into the military, I was going to get me an education. So, I was a diligent worker in my church and they sought scholarships for me and I got scholarships from the White church. HUNTLEY: So, how long were you in Nebraska? BERRY: I was there for two and a half years. Ok, in Seward there are absolutely no Black people. We got there and I wasn' ; t used to snow first of all. There were a lot of foods that we had never eaten as poor Black people that I had to get used to eating. It' ; s just like you were in a foreign land. When we would walk down the street the little children would be hiding out and saying hey there' ; s a nigger. They only saw us on TV and they only knew what their parents told them. They would say there' ; s a nigger, there' ; s a nigger. I remember shopping at JC Penny' ; s and a little girl was going through the clothing and peeking out going nigger, come here, there' ; s a nigger. So, I looked and said BOO! and she flew. That was funny to us cause they didn' ; t know. HUNTLEY: Now, this is in Nebraska? BERRY: In Seward, Nebraska. So, the thing was not only in Birmingham, it was everywhere. We thought we were the only ones. In the 60s, Birmingham, it just wasn' ; t Birmingham. These people weren' ; t used to Black people and the only thing they knew to call us was niggers. HUNTLEY: Well, in 1963 you were in Seward, Nebraska and there' ; s a lot of activity going on here in Birmingham. How did that impact upon you being from Birmingham and seeing, I' ; m assuming that you saw it on the news and in newspapers? BERRY: Yes, I did. HUNTLEY: Were people talking about it then? BERRY: My sisters, every one of them. They were old enough and in high school and my brothers, they were all involved. So, that in terms involved me. They all went to jail. Some of them went to the fairgrounds to jail. I remember when I would come home for Christmas they would fill me in on what was going on. How my daddy was afraid that if anybody found out he was going to lose his job, cause he had to feed us. Once they got to school and walked off there was nothing that he could do, you know. Then it was to many at that particular time. HUNTLEY: All of your brothers and sisters were in it. BERRY: Every one of them that was able participated. My oldest brother, he' ; s dead now, I remember he had an encounter with the dogs ' ; cause he told me about it. So, all of us were involved. Chris McNair was a member of our church also. So, when Denise got killed I was in school and I remember Denise cause she went to our church sometime and that was a hard thing for me to take and being there on campus with all these White people. There were only five Black people on the campus. HUNTLEY: Only five. BERRY: And you had about four Africans. At that time the Africans thought they were more than the Black people. So, they didn' ; t associate with us. So, we were the only Blacks on campus. I had a hard time dealing with it at that particular time. These people treated me nicely but it was the idea that I missed my people and I wanted to be at home. HUNTLEY: Did any of your friends there ever ask you about Birmingham? Any of your White friends ever talk about it? BERRY: They never did. They only said they were sorry that things were the way they were. They couldn' ; t even begin to visualize it. HUNTLEY: The five Blacks that were there on campus, were they all from Alabama? BERRY: Yes, they were all females from Mobile ; Birmingham. HUNTLEY: So, there were no males on campus. BERRY: No Black males. The scholarships were given to the females. If you had males they usually went to the Seminary to become pastors and the females became teachers but they didn' ; t get the scholarships, we got the scholarships. It was Black females. HUNTLEY: What did you do after you finished [inaudible]? BERRY: Well, I went to work. They guarantee you a job at the Lutheran School. HUNTLEY: Did you come back to Birmingham? BERRY: I came back to Birmingham. I went to work in the country, I think it was Catherine, Alabama. HUNTLEY: As a teacher? BERRY: As a teacher in the Lutheran School. See, these Lutheran schools were set up by White people to educate the Blacks in the country, you know, in the fa1ming areas. They were White only school houses at that time which was new to me. So, that was a history lesson for me. We had a big pot belly stove, you had all the children in one room. They didn' ; t come to school when they had to pick cotton but they came later. In the meantime, the Lutheran church was building a brick school for them in which I was supposed to go ih and teach. So, if it rained to hard or it was muddy you didn' ; t go to school cause the bus, we had a school bus, couldn' ; t go up to the school so you didn' ; t have school on those days. So, I got in on a little of that history. HUNTLEY: How long were you there? BERRY: A year, but when I got in there on that part of history I thank God that I did. Then I saw how it was to teach in a one room school with the little desks with the ink wells. The public schools had those buildings like Washington school, but the Lutheran school was still in a one room school. HUNTLEY: What did you do after that year? BERRY: I came back and I got married and I worked at Zion Lutheran School in Bessemer. Later I became the principal of the Zion Lutheran School in Bessemer. The school began to grow and I began to raise my family. HUNTLEY: So, Birmingham then has been an attraction to you. Did you ever consider to not live in Birmingham or moving to other parts of the country? BERRY: The only other part of the country I wanted to live in was Denver. As a student I taught in Denver and it was an all White school. I was the only Black then. So, Denver was friendly to me they didn' ; t have many Blacks but at that time they treated Blacks differently than they treated Blacks in Birmingham. They had a lot of Hispanics there. The Blacks that were in Denver were the Blacks that were doing well. I saw very few Blacks that weren' ; t doing well. HUNTLEY: Did you student teach in a Lutheran School? BERRY: In a Lutheran School, all White. HUNTLEY: How long were you there? BERRY: About 3 or 4 months. HUNTLEY: So, that was the only consideration outside of Birmingham? BERRY: Right, was there. See, I even experienced integration there. We as a group, we went to, there were five Black girls, and we went to White churches in Nebraska and sang and they gave us money. When I think about it these people didn' ; t know what Black people was, they hadn' ; t even talked to Black people. Really we were ambassadors in Nebraska, in that part of Nebraska. We went to Omaha where they had more Blacks and they had Blacks in Lincoln. HUNTLEY: How far were you from Lincoln and Omaha? BERRY: Ok, Seward was about 35 to 40 minutes, about as far as it if from here to Tuscaloosa, from Lincoln. HUNTLEY: So, you were isolated then from any Black community. BERRY: Right. So, when I got home I loved my people even more because it just gave me a deep love for my people being in this world where there were none. There was only five ofus. So, I would be so glad to come home. HUNTLEY: So, you would come home twice a year? BERRY: Once or twice a year. Some time we wouldn' ; t. There was a White family that would put us up for short breaks, like spring break. We would come home for Christmas and we would go home for summer. HUNTLEY: So, that then must have been quite an experience for you being from Birmingham and a school in Selma and knowing the whole system of segregation as it stood. Then being sent up to Nebraska where I guess you assumed that it would be a lot different. BERRY: Right. HUNTLEY: It turned out that it really wasn' ; t. BERRY: That we were the odd man out. They treated you differently. Some of them thought we were foreigners. I remember going to the grocery store and I was getting some lemons and this little old White man asked me, " ; they don' ; t have that in your country do they" ; , you know. I began to realize how far removed from them we were. They didn' ; t know us as people, they only knew what they were told. HUNTLEY: Exactly. BERRY: I said isn' ; t this odd. HUNTLEY: We covered a lot of territory talking about your experiences. Is there anything else that we didn' ; t cover that you would like to mention before we conclude? BERRY: Basically, all of that was a learning experience. Through all the trials and tribulations my will did not....I did not lose my will to succeed. This is what I want to plant in my children. The children I teach in school, I tell them no matter where you are you don' ; t have to stay there, you have to just keep your will and don' ; t let nobody take your will from you. We were very poor, I mean poorer than dili. My daddy became an acholic and we would move from place to place in the same neighborhood therefore you stayed in the same school. We would move from place to place but I never lost my will. My aunt lived in Bessemer, she was a nurse, and she had the nicer things and just visiting her instilled that in me. That I don' ; t have to live this way that I can do better. So, we made a pact that if I go to school I' ; d help my sister and my sister would help the next and so on. Through all that and I still tell my kids in school that I was in the projects, I worked, I cleaned White people' ; s houses. HUNTLEY: So, during the summers you did whatever... BERRY: Whatever I could to make a dime. That was keeping kids. Through it all the will was still there, they couldn' ; t kill that. HUNTLEY: Well, Mrs. Berry, I want to thank you for taking time out of your schedule. You' ; ve been very enlightening and very helpful for the project. We just appreciate your time. BERRY: I appreciate you having me and sometimes it' ; s nice to go back down the road from which you came. HUNTLEY: Thank you. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=PPBerry1997.xml PPBerry1997.xml
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Patricia Powell Berry
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Patricia Powell Berry discusses growing up poor in Birmingham, moving to Nebraska, and ultimately returning to Birmingham. She was heavily involved in voter registration during the Movement.
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19970813B
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Civil rights movements--Alabama--Birmingham
Seward (Neb.)
Lutheran Church
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1997-08-13
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Pinkie Shortridge
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Funeral Directors
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5.4 February 10, 1995 Pinkie Shortridge Interviewed on February 10, 1995 19950210S 0:44:56 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Lessie Dingler Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham National Funeral Directors Association of the United States Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 Southern Christian Leadership Conference Funeral Directors Pinkie Shortridge Horace Huntley Video 1:|3(3)|21(14)|48(3)|68(10)|90(2)|107(1)|127(5)|151(2)|174(11)|192(8)|208(5)|223(2)|244(3)|256(1)|273(8)|283(3)|304(8)|316(4)|327(5)|343(2)|362(4)|375(5)|382(14)|400(4)|427(8)|452(4)|472(10)|496(4)|514(7)|522(14)|534(5)|559(5)|577(6)|588(9)|610(16)|630(14)|649(5)|667(3)|687(13)|705(4)|717(7)|736(10)|753(7)|767(3) 0 https://youtu.be/YHop5rj74-Y YouTube video English 62 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with Mrs. Pinkie Shortridge. I am Dr. Horace Huntley, today is Friday, February 10, 1995 and we are at Miles College. I just want to say again, good morning to you and welcome and I'm glad you could take time out of your busy schedule to come out and talk with us. 33.5161, -86.8145 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 104 Family Background First what I'd like to do is just to get a little background. Tell me a little something about your parents. Where were they from? Mrs. Shortridge discusses her parent's origins and education. college ; education ; farming ; Father ; Mother ; Parents ; Parker High School Birmingham (Ala.) ; Education, Higher--New York (State) ; Kewanee (Miss.) ; Livingston (Ala.) 256 Early Education " ; What about your schooling?" ; Mrs. Shortridge discusses her early education and time spent at various colleges in the Birmingham area. She also briefly mentions her time working for the insurance department at Booker T. Washington Business College. funeral director ; insurance ; Jeff State Mortuary Science ; Shortridge Funeral Home Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham-Southern College ; Booker T. Washington Business College ; Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) 328 Community Background When you were growing up, what community did you live in? Pinkie Shortridge talks about the make up of her community. community ; Hospital ; Steel Mill ; University Avondale (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Ensley (Birmingham, Ala.) ; New York ; Tennessee Coal, Iron, and Railroad Company 473 Relationship to Birmingham Police Department I see. What was your community’s relationship to the Birmingham Police Department? Pinkie Shortridge discusses her communities relationship with the Birmingham Police Department. Blacks--United States ; Community ; Confrontation ; Whites--United States--Attitudes Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Bull Connor--Public Safety Commissioner--Birmingham (Ala.) ; Ensley (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Howard University 600 Bill Shortridge's Educational Background He's a ... tell me about his educational background. Did he finish from Parker? Pinkie Shortridge talks about her husband Bill Shortridge's educational background. Private school Alabama State College ; E. J. Oliver ; Fairfield (Ala.) ; Howard University ; Montevallo (Ala.) ; Pratt City (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Selma University (Selma, Ala.) ; Tuskegee Institute ; University of Montevallo 698 Involvement in the Civil Rights Movement You became actively involved in the civil rights movement. Why? Why did you become involved? Pinkie Shortridge talks about being involved in the movement because of her husband. Advocate ; Voter registration ; Voting rights African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; NAACP ; Scottsboro Boys 816 Meetings with the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights In 1956, when Alabama outlawed the NAACP from operating, what happened then? Pinkie Shortridge explains her and her husbands role bailing people out of jail from the movement. African American churches ; Bail Bonds ; Detectives ; Fund raising ; Funeral Directors ; Lawyers 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 ; Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Demetrius Newton ; Jacksonville (Fla.) ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 1181 Threats to Stop the Movement Are there any...? Were there ever any attempts to stop you and your husband from being involved with the movement? Pinkie Shortridge talks about the times that her and her husband faced threats to keep them from continuing the movement. Harrassment ; Pistol permit ; Threats FBI 1295 Assassination Attempt on Husband What happened? How did they attempt to assassinate him? Pinkie Shortridge explains the time her husband was almost assassinated. Assassination attempts ; Bombed ; Guards ; Gunshots ; Phone Calls ; Police Absence United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation 1527 Protections for People in Movement What about other people whose homes were bombed? Did they have the same kind of protection that you had? Pinkie Shortridge talks about the protections that people in the movement had. Bail Bondsman ; Bombs ; Connections ; Guards ; Non-violence ; Protection King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 1625 First Meeting With Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. How well did you know Doctor King? Pinkie Shortridge talks about the first meetings and encounters with Dr. King. Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity ; Howard University ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Montgomery (Ala.) ; National Funeral Directors Association of the United States 1681 Husband's Role in the National Funeral Directors Association What was your husband's role with the National Funeral Directors? Pinkie Shortridge mentions husbands role in National Funeral Directors Association. President National Funeral Directors Association of the United States 1730 Marriage to Bill Shortridge When you got married, you married Mr. Shortridge... Pinkie Shortridge talks about how her and Bill Shortridge came togehter. Age Difference ; Attraction 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 ; Booker T. Washington (Insurance Company) ; Kennedy, Bobby 1916 Dealing With Police Brutality Your children... You had how many children? Pinkie Shortridge talks about about police brutality against blacks started to slow down when Richard Arrington came aboard. Blacks--United States ; Police brutality--United States ; Whites--United States--Attitudes Arrington, Richard ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Deutsch, Arthur ; Fraternal Order of Police 2185 First Days of the Movement Do you know of any of the things that were taking... I know you know of them, but things that were taking place during the first days of the movement when they were trying to integrate the buses? Are there any incidents that you remember during that time? Pinkie Shortridge talks of her husband being the man with the money to help bail people out. Bail Bondsmen ; Certified Public Accountant ; Money Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 2272 Relationship Between Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Alabama Christian Movement What about the relationship between the SCLC [Southern Christian Leadership Conference] and the Alabama Christian Movement during the times that... in 1963, when they were raising money? Pinkie Shortridge talks about how SCLC and ACMHR helped one another. Fundraising ; Money Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity ; Civil Rights Movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; National Funeral Directors Association of the United States ; New York ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference 2415 Impact of the Movement on Community What would you... If I asked you the question, ‘What did the movement do for the community?’ what would be your reply? Was it a positive influence or...? Pinkie Shortridge discusses the impact of the movement on her community. Community ; Education ; Voter Registration ; Whites--United States--Attitudes King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 2509 School Integration Pinkie Shortridge mentions how when integration happened the funeral directors would bus the kids in. Bus ; Funeral Home Director ; Harassment ; Integration ; School Children ; Secondary Education Birmingham News ; West End High School (Birmingham, Ala.) 2651 Interview Conclusion Okay. Mrs. Shortridge, I certainly appreciate your taking time out of your busy schedule. I know you are still running your funeral home and other kinds of activities. You are still involved in many things, so, again, thank you again for taking the tine out, for coming out and spending the time with us this morning. Oral History Pinkie Shortridge discusses working with her husband Bill to bail demonstrators out of jail through the ACMHR. They continued their involvement with the Movement with Dr. King and the National Funeral Directors Association. HUNTLEY: Good morning. SHORTRIDGE: Good morning. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mrs. Pinkie Shortridge. I am Dr. Horace Huntley, today is Friday, February 10, 1995 and we are at Miles College. I just want to say again, good morning to you and welcome and I' ; m glad you could take time out of your busy schedule to come out and talk with us. Obviously, what we are doing is attempting to develop profiles of individuals who have been instrumental in the development of Birmingham and particularly, the development of the civil rights movement. I know that you and your husband were very much involved in that, so again, I want to say thank you for coming out and sitting with us this morning. SHORTRIDGE: Glad to be here. HUNTLEY: First what I' ; d like to do is just to get a little background. Tell me a little something about your parents. Where were they from? SHORTRIDGE: My mother was born in Livingston, Alabama. My father was born in Mississippi. HUNTLEY: So, your father, was he a farmer? SHORTRIDGE: Yes, he was a farmer. HUNTLEY: So, he had his own farm. Where were you born? SHORTRIDGE: I was born in Kewanee, Mississippi. HUNTLEY: Kewanee, Mississippi. And how old were you when you came to Birmingham? SHORTRIDGE: Ten years old. HUNTLEY: Ten years old. So, do you remember much about Kewanee, Mississippi? SHORTRIDGE: Well, we would go back there about once a year to visit my father. HUNTLEY: So, in visiting back in Kewanee, you really never left, then. You went back periodically, so you still had friends and relatives there? SHORTRIDGE: Well, we didn' ; t have too many relatives there. HUNTLEY: Is that right? SHORTRIDGE: No. We' ; d just go back to see my father. HUNTLEY: I see. How many brothers and sisters do you have? SHORTRIDGE: I have only one sister. HUNTLEY: Is she older or younger? SHORTRIDGE: She is younger than I am. HUNTLEY: What about your parents' ; education? How much education did they have? SHORTRIDGE: Well, my mother finished Parker High School after she came to Birmingham. She left Birmingham and went to New York. She attended college there and she received over twenty degrees, including degrees in nursing and decorating. HUNTLEY: So, your mother was rather active? SHORTRIDGE: Very active. HUNTLEY: Maybe that' ; s where you got your activism? SHORTRIDGE: I don' ; t know about that. My mother also did private duty work. HUNTLEY: So, she actually lived in New York for forty years. SHORTRIDGE: Yes, she lived in New York for forty years. One of her grandchildren had been injured, and she took care of him for about 25 years. HUNTLEY: What about your schooling? SHORTRIDGE: I finished Parker High School. I then went to Booker T. Washington Business College. Later, I attended Jeff State Mortuary Science. I have also taken classes at Birmingham Southern. I need about four more quarters before I can finish Birmingham Southern, if I ever go back. HUNTLEY: So, you are a chip off the old block? SHORTRIDGE: I don' ; t know about that. It' ; s something to do. HUNTLEY: What kinds of work have you done? SHORTRIDGE: Like what? HUNTLEY: When you finished Booker T. Washington? SHORTRIDGE: Well, I worked at Booker T. Washington in the insurance department for about twenty years. After my husband died, I took over the business. HUNTLEY: And that business is? SHORTRIDGE: Shortridge Funeral Home. That was in [19]64. HUNTLEY: So, you are a funeral director? SHORTRIDGE: Right. HUNTLEY: When you were growing up, what community did you live in? SHORTRIDGE: Well, we lived in a shotgun house in Avondale. We lived there until we moved to Ensley on Eighteenth Street and we bought a house from Mr. Pritchett, who was a well-known musician here in Birmingham. They moved to New York. HUNTLEY: So, how would you... Let' ; s look at the two communities. Avondale community...what was the make-up of it? SHORTRIDGE: Well, there were nothing but shotgun houses in Avondale, and Ensley offered a better living condition in a sense. HUNTLEY: What kind of occupations did the people have in the two communities? SHORTRIDGE: Well in Ensley, it was mostly TCI, Tennessee Coal and Iron. HUNTLEY: Steel mill? SHORTRIDGE: Yes, steel mill. HUNTLEY: What about in Avondale? SHORTRIDGE: Private home, most of it. HUNTLEY: Did you have any people that worked in the steel mills from Avondale, like maybe Sloss? SHORTRIDGE: I had an uncle who worked in the steel mill that lived in Avondale, and that was the reason we moved to Ensley, to be near his job. HUNTLEY: Were there men in the community that actually worked at Sloss? SHORTRIDGE: I don' ; t know, because I worked at the hospital. HUNTLEY: What hospital? SHORTRIDGE: University Hospital. I worked in Central Supply for years. HUNTLEY: This was before or after... SHORTRIDGE: At night. HUNTLEY: While you were working at Booker T. Washington? SHORTRIDGE: No, while I was in school. That was before I started working. HUNTLEY: I see. What was your community' ; s relationship to the Birmingham Police Department? SHORTRIDGE: Well, at that time, it was just a police department. Bull Conner, we all knew him and .... HUNTLEY: Why did everybody know Bull Conner? SHORTRIDGE: Well, I guess because of his reputation, especially with respect to Black people. HUNTLEY: Was the relationship between the police department and the community one where the SHORTRIDGE: community looked at the police as being there to protect and serve the community? I guess, in a sense. Yes. HUNTLEY: But, in another sense? SHORTRIDGE: No. HUNTLEY: Can you give me some detail? SHORTRIDGE: Well, when we moved to Ensley, it was altogether different. That' ; s when I met my husband. So, he was very active in different organizations and civil rights and I think his family had a confrontation with the police department back then. HUNTLEY: What kind of confrontation was that? SHORTRIDGE: Well, one of his sisters had a confrontation at a drug store there in Ensley, and I believe the whole family got involved. HUNTLEY: What actually happened? SHORTRIDGE: I believe they said the man who ran the drug store slapped her. She later moved away and that' ; s when my husband became very, very active. HUNTLEY: Is that what got him involved as a result of that incident taking place? SHORTRIDGE: In a sense, yes. I think he was at Howard at the time-- HUNTLEY: He' ; s a ... tell me about his educational background. Did he finish from Parker? SHORTRIDGE: No, no. He went to private schools. His whole family did. He went to Selma University and he left there and went to Howard University. He had a sister who finished Tuskegee and his brother finished Wilberforce. He had another sister. I think she finished Alabama State. She married Dr. E. J. Oliver. HUNTLEY: Oh, is that right? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. They didn' ; t have any kids and I don' ; t know how long they stayed together, but they are divorced now. HUNTLEY: Dr. E. J. Oliver was a legend within himself. SHORTRIDGE: Yes, in Fairfield. HUNTLEY: So, your husband, then, was he originally from Birmingham? SHORTRIDGE: He was born in Pratt City. I have a picture of the house where he was born. It was a three-room house. HUNTLEY: So then, his family was rather well off? SHORTRIDGE: Well, they were really from Montevallo. They had a lot of property there. I think they sold some of the property to Montevallo College, where the school was built. He has quite a few relatives there in Montevallo now. HUNTLEY: You became actively involved in the civil rights movement. Why? Why did you become involved? SHORTRIDGE: Well, my husband was active, and I would go with him. He made all of the arrangements for each Monday night for the meeting for the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. HUNTLEY: Tell me a little about his involvement even prior to the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. SHORTRIDGE: Well, there was so much that he was involved in. HUNTLEY: Was he involved with the NAACP? SHORTRIDGE: He used to be president of the local branch here--the NAACP. The Masons, the American Workers, everything you could name, he was in it. HUNTLEY: So, he has been a very active person? SHORTRIDGE: Very active. He was also active with the Scottsboro boys. HUNTLEY: Are there any specific incidents that you remember that sort of stand out in your mind that took place prior to the development of the Alabama Christian Movement? Was he involved in voting rights? SHORTRIDGE: Oh yes. I think he set up two or three places. At that time, it was hard to vote and he would have classes there at his place teaching people the fundamentals of how to vote. HUNTLEY: So, he was involved in many phases of what was taking place with the movement. SHORTRIDGE: Yes, that' ; s right. HUNTLEY: In 1956, when Alabama outlawed the NAACP from operating, what happened then? SHORTRIDGE: Well, they organized the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Reverend Shuttlesworth called a meeting and my husband was asked to come. Reverend Shuttlesworth was president, Reverend Gardner vice president, and my husband was treasurer. They would meet every Monday night at different churches, not all the churches. HUNTLEY: Why not? Were there some churches that were--? SHORTRIDGE: Well, they were really afraid, I think. HUNTLEY: So, you attended the mass meetings on a regular basis? SHORTRIDGE: Every night, to be with him, because he needed somebody to go along with him. HUNTLEY: How would you describe a typical meeting of the movement in those early days? SHORTRIDGE: Oh, it was great. It was great, the religious side of it. You would forget about what would happen on the outside. Every night we would have a dynamic speaker and it was just... something would just go through you. I mean, I can' ; t explain it. And Reverend Shuttlesworth was really the man for the job, not to be seen, not money wise. He was a dedicated man. He didn' ; t worry about the money. He didn' ; t worry about doing anything but making it better for everybody in Birmingham. I admire him. HUNTLEY: How were those meetings set up? When you' ; d first start the meeting, what would happen? SHORTRIDGE: They would start with a prayer. The meetings got so large that they had to have two detectives come out every Monday. HUNTLEY: Two White detectives? SHORTRIDGE: Two White detectives would come out every Monday night and we didn' ; t worry about nobody bombing the church because the two detectives were there and they enjoyed it also. HUNTLEY: Is that right? Why were they there? SHORTRIDGE: I guess to see what was going on. They had to take a report back to City Hall. HUNTLEY: So, they were basically there to spy on the movement? SHORTRIDGE: Absolutely. They were there to spy on the movement. HUNTLEY: Did you go to jail? SHORTRIDGE: No, I didn' ; t go to jail. We got the people out of jail. We were out raising money trying to get them out of jail all times of night. We had over four thousand students and different ones in jail. We were the ones that had to go to the bonding company, my husband and I, to get these children out of jail and whoever was in jail. But we had to try to get some money, too. HUNTLEY: Where did you do most of your fund raising? SHORTRIDGE: He would write letters, go to different states to funeral directors and raise money. He would go to different organizations that he belonged to and tell them that it was necessary, that we' ; ve got to have the money. It takes money to do anything, so that was his job. HUNTLEY: Did he assist in finding the attorneys that would help with the legal part of the movement? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. Well, I think Shuttlesworth had the first case and I don' ; t know what happened, but something came up and most of the lawyers here turned him down, so he had to try to find lawyers from somewhere else. So, he got a lawyer from Jacksonville, Florida to come in to associate with some of the lawyers here to try to get things going again. HUNTLEY: Why did those that were here decide not to work with the movement? SHORTRIDGE: I' ; m not too sure, but I think money was involved. They wanted a certain amount of money for this and that, and the organization didn' ; t have it. HUNTLEY: There was a need for... they... If you had a lawyer from out of town, then there' ; s a need for a local lawyer to work with that lawyer.... SHORTRIDGE: You had to get a local lawyer to participate. HUNTLEY: Was that difficult, to find someone here to assist? SHORTRIDGE: I think we finally got attorney Demetrius Newton. I' ; m not too sure now, but I think he joined in with the lawyer from Florida, yes. HUNTLEY: Are there any? Were there ever any attempts to stop you and your husband from being involved with the movement? SHORTRIDGE: Well, we would get so many calls. He had. My husband had been active so long, he had gotten accustomed to being harassed and we had to park our car so many inches from the sidewalk or we' ; d get a ticket. Just so many things happened. It really didn' ; t bother him and he finally got a permit. They gave him a permit, but after everything had gotten so rough. HUNTLEY: What kind of permit? SHORTRIDGE: A pistol permit, because he would be out late at night. HUNTLEY: Were there threats on his life? SHORTRIDGE: Yes, many times. They called him the brains of the movement. So they would call there and say, I know this. We got letters that were written to the FBI and things like that. We never heard any more from it. HUNTLEY: Were you ever attacked--you or your husband? SHORTRIDGE: No, we were never attacked. HUNTLEY: Do you think that was because of him having..of him carrying his pistol with him? SHORTRIDGE: I think so, but they finally lifted his permit. They said, they. At the movement one night, they said his coat was up and they got a glance of his pistol and that next day they sent out and took his permit. One or two days after that, they tried to assassinate him. HUNTLEY: What happened? How did they attempt to assassinate him? SHORTRIDGE: Well, he had planned to go to a meeting that night and we asked him not to go. We had gotten so many calls that night. He said, ' ; Well, let me go out and lock the car up.' ; He said, ' ; You want a ride?' ; I said, ' ; No, the baby' ; s not feeling too well,' ; so I stayed home. So he decided to stay home, too. So, when he went out to lock the car up and started back in the house, he said this car passed down Nineteenth Street real slow, turned around and came back up and started shooting. He had gotten back up on the porch when they shot about three or four times and he fell below the brick wall, and the door... The front door was a French door, you know, with the glass in it, and I was sitting right there in front of that door with the baby in my lap, talking on the telephone. We heard the shots and the first shot knocked the telephone out of my hand. The baby fell to the floor and I fell to the floor. The other shot hit the mirror over the chair I was sitting in. It didn' ; t break the mirror, didn' ; t hit my child, didn' ; t hit me and did not hit him. So, you know there' ; s a God somewhere. HUNTLEY: It knocked the phone out.... SHORTRIDGE: Knocked the phone out of my hand onto the floor and I started yelling for the other part of the family to come up, and nobody got a scratch on them. HUNTLEY: Was this the only time that you were attacked? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. We called the police department. They came out and checked and said, ' ; We' ; ll get back with you.' ; We didn' ; t hear any more from them. HUNTLEY: You never heard anything else? SHORTRIDGE: No. So, my husband filed a report with the FBI and we didn' ; t hear any more from them. HUNTLEY: So, were there any indications that he was going to be attacked that night? SHORTRIDGE: No. HUNTLEY: Were there any calls? SHORTRIDGE: Well, we had.We would get so many calls. HUNTLEY: So, they became rather routine? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. We didn' ; t think too much about it. Well, we had guards too. HUNTLEY: Tell me a little about the guards. SHORTRIDGE: After the attack, the men from the movement volunteered to take shifts to come out and sit around the clock. We built a little room on the front porch for the guards to stay in, so they stayed in that room at night to try to protect us. HUNTLEY: Were they armed? SHORTRIDGE: Yes, they were armed alright. HUNTLEY: And they...they were there all night? SHORTRIDGE: All night. Some would come on around eight o' ; clock and stay until around eleven o' ; clock. Another shift would come around eleven o' ; clock and stay until that morning. HUNTLEY: You lived on the Bush Hills? SHORTRIDGE: No. We lived on Nineteenth Street, the home house. HUNTLEY: Your home was never bombed then? SHORTRIDGE: No. It was never bombed. HUNTLEY: What about other people whose homes were bombed? Did they have the same kind of protection that you had? SHORTRIDGE: Reverend Shuttlesworth? Oh yes, sure, right... HUNTLEY: Reverend Shuttlesworth and people that lived all along... SHORTRIDGE: Right, because a lot of the guys who worked for my husband, they would help guard Reverend Shuttlesworth. HUNTLEY: So, then, there was a need, a real need, although this was a non-violent movement, there was a need for.... SHORTRIDGE: Well, they said that my husband was violent. HUNTLEY: Your husband was? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. Well, that' ; s what they said about him. HUNTLEY: Well, he must have been a man, then, that...since he really never participated in the marches himself... SHORTRIDGE: No, no. Reverend Shuttlesworth made him the standby person. When he got into things, that' ; s who they would call. He would be the one to see about the money and see about those who were in jail, see about lawyers and try to get those...whoever' ; s in jail, try to get them out of jail. HUNTLEY: So, he was one of those that needed to be free to do his work? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. Doctor King used to call him ' ; the connection man.' ; HUNTLEY: Why did he call him the ' ; connections man?' ; SHORTRIDGE: Because all he had to do was just call my husband and he could connect him with anybody. HUNTLEY: How well did you know Doctor King? SHORTRIDGE: Very well. HUNTLEY: When did you first meet him? SHORTRIDGE: We used to go to Montgomery and attend all the different meetings where he would be speaking. And, you see, Doctor King was an Alpha. My husband was a diehard Alpha. HUNTLEY: An Alpha man? SHORTRIDGE: Oh, Lord, he loved it. HUNTLEY: So he and King, then, were rather close? SHORTRIDGE: Yes. A lot of the judges and things that he went to school with at Howard University, well, they were all involved in the movement. And so, he had Doctor King speak to the National Funeral Directors Association and just got them involved and they would give nice sums of money to the movement. HUNTLEY: What was your husband' ; s role with the National Funeral Directors? SHORTRIDGE: Well, he was once the national president. HUNTLEY: Were they active in terms of supporting the movement? SHORTRIDGE: Very much so. They had to be. HUNTLEY: How do you mean, they had to? SHORTRIDGE: Well, he was a guy that... He believed in freedom. He tried to instill in them that you' ; ve got to pay for it, and they believed in him, so they were very supportive of whatever he asked them to do. They would try to do it. HUNTLEY: When you got married, you married Mr. Shortridge... SHORTRIDGE: In [19]58. HUNTLEY: In 1958. What was the attraction? SHORTRIDGE: I don' ; t know. I was about 33 or 34 years old when I got married. I was working at Booker T. Washington [Insurance Company] and had a lot of friends who had gotten married and they were having problems. I always wanted a guy who was a man, you know what I mean--who was intelligent, nice to his family, who knew how to get things done, in a sense, and is concerned about people. They called my husband a missionary, because he devoted all his time in trying to help the less fortunate people, the boys and the girls... money wise, in school and all those kinds of things. He had been doing it all his life and somebody told him that he should have been seeing after his business and that' ; s what somebody told him. He said, ' ; You should be there, trying to see after your business instead of running around here seeing after everybody else.' ; But, that was his... That' ; s what he liked. As a missionary-- He went to see-- I think President Kennedy had the... I don' ; t know if it was the movement or some organization... They all went up and had a conference with Bobby.4 I don' ; t know if this time the girls were bombed at Sixteenth Street [Baptist Church], but they had a delegation to go there. They had asked for them to come up and he was one of those... HUNTLEY: Part of that delegation? SHORTRIDGE: Part of that delegation, ... No, when the school-- Autherine Lucy-- HUNTLEY: Was he involved in that? SHORTRIDGE: Oh, Lord, yes. Anything that went on-- Well, she used to visit us a lot, Autherine Lucy. HUNTLEY: So, your husband, then, he was several years your elder. SHORTRIDGE: Very much so, but he was a gentleman. Age didn' ; t mean anything. He was the type of person I was looking for. HUNTLEY: I guess there were probably others that were sort of looking for him as well. How did you happen to...? SHORTRIDGE: Well, I was a little quiet girl working hard and I guess he... HUNTLEY: Saw something in you. SHORTRIDGE: I guess so. HUNTLEY: Your children-- You had how many children? SHORTRIDGE: I have one daughter. HUNTLEY: Your daughter, was she... Well, she was really too young to,.... SHORTRIDGE: Yes. She was about three years old when all this happened here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: How did other family members react to your participation in the movement? SHORTRIDGE: Well, there was a lot of police brutality. They didn' ; t care for my husband too much. He was on that police brutality long before, you know, up on Sherman Heights and different ones with letters in the file now where he would write letters to different ones about police brutality and this and that. He had just been a part of it for a long time. HUNTLEY: So, he precedes, then, Richard Arrington? SHORTRIDGE: Oh, yes. He' ; s a jewel. HUNTLEY: You know Richard Arrington started to take on that idea of police brutality. SHORTRIDGE: That' ; s why I admire Doctor Arrington. He said one thing when he got on the council. He worked on that police brutality. HUNTLEY: Did he consult with your husband? SHORTRIDGE: No, I think-- Let' ; s see-- [19]64. My husband was dead when he [Arrington] really got active. But, he said one thing: If he didn' ; t accomplish anything else, he was going to stop these policemen from beating up the Negroes. After he got in office and got on that council, it was kind of rough at first, but he stuck with it. They gradually started listening to what he was saying. So, the Birmingham-- What is the Birmingham Police...this organization they' ; ve got? HUNTLEY: The Fraternal Order. SHORTRIDGE: Oh, they were rough. They were real rough. But, when Arrington hired...what' ; s the police chief' ; s name? HUNTLEY: Johnny Johnson. SHORTRIDGE: No. No. The one before him. HUNTLEY: Deutch. SHORTRIDGE: Yes, Deutch. I loved him. He had a rough way to go and he stuck with Arrington and he stopped. You name me... I bet you can' ; t name over three policemen, I mean three persons, that had been beat up by a policeman after he got in office. HUNTLEY: So you' ; re saying he worked closely with Arrington to see that the police force...? SHORTRIDGE: He worked with him. He had a rough way to go, and I admire him. And anytime that the Birmingham police was turned off... If the police don' ; t like you, you' ; re doing a good job. HUNTLEY: The Fraternal Order of Police didn' ; t like you-- SHORTRIDGE: Didn' ; t like... HUNTLEY: Deutch. SHORTRIDGE: No. They didn' ; t care for him too much. HUNTLEY: Why? Because he was not supportive of wrongdoings? SHORTRIDGE: Yes, because he didn' ; t allow any beating up of the Black men during the time he was in there. HUNTLEY: So, then, the Birmingham police had a reputation for... SHORTRIDGE: Oh, yes. They had a reputation...killing and beating them up. When Arrington got on that City Council, that was one project he really worked on. I admire him. HUNTLEY: You know, one of the first issues raised by the movement was that of there being no Black police. SHORTRIDGE: That' ; s right, and that' ; s when they started looking at Black policemen when the movement got started. HUNTLEY: Do you know of any of the things that were taking... I know you know of them, but things that were taking place during the first days of the movement when they were trying to integrate the buses? Are there any incidents that you remember during that time? SHORTRIDGE: I' ; m trying to see. There' ; s so many things that happened. My husband, they would call him if they got in jail. He would be the one that would have to go bond them out. Shuttlesworth didn' ; t worry about any money, because he knew he would borrow it or do something, you know, get them out of jail, whatever needed to be done. HUNTLEY: He always led that portion of the movement, any time that there were those who were in jail-- SHORTRIDGE: That' ; s, right. My husband-- Shuttlesworth, he didn' ; t... Only thing he was concerned about was making it better for everybody. He didn' ; t care about any money, Shuttlesworth. He was a leader. He was a preacher. You couldn' ; t push him to the side. HUNTLEY: How would you...? SHORTRIDGE: My husband paid all the bills. Every month he would give the movement receipts on what was spent. He had a CPA [Certified Public Accountant] to come and do the books once a year. HUNTLEY: What about the relationship between the SCLC [Southern Christian Leadership Conference] and the Alabama Christian Movement during the times that... in 1963, when they were raising money? SHORTRIDGE: Well, at that time, I think that my husband... I think he thought that if the SCLC came in they would have the money to help get the people out of jail, but they soon got that. That wasn' ; t any problem. Doctor King was the same as Shuttlesworth. They didn' ; t worry about money. They knew the Good Lord would take care of it. He did. HUNTLEY: Did you ever go out with your husband to raise funds? I know he went out... SHORTRIDGE: You mean at churches? HUNTLEY: At churches and away to different cities-- SHORTRIDGE: Yes, right. HUNTLEY: Where would some of the places be? SHORTRIDGE: New York, anywhere the funeral directors would meet. They would have a spring meeting and a meeting in the summer and that was when he would write letters and let them know. And he would have it on the agenda, the funeral director' ; s agenda, ' ; A Night for the Civil Rights Movement.' ; HUNTLEY: So that was an integral part of anything that he was doing. SHORTRIDGE: Any part. The Alpha Fraternity. Nationally, he would go to all of his meetings. Everything that he belonged to. He belonged to everything you could name. HUNTLEY: Did any of your friends or relatives ever question why you were so active in the movement? SHORTRIDGE: No, because they would enjoy it too, when they got a chance to go. He had a sister that would stay there with the mother at night. But sometimes we would take her. HUNTLEY: So, the movement, then, was sort of...was what you were doing in relationship to your business. But the movement seemed to have taken up quite a bit of your time now. SHORTRIDGE: Well, we would go every Monday night and we would go everywhere trying to raise money, writing letters, to different organizations, different clubs. HUNTLEY: What would you-- If I asked you the question, ' ; What did the movement do for the community?' ; what would be your reply? Was it a positive influence or...? SHORTRIDGE: They had a positive influence on going to vote. They encouraged people to think about the election, read about the election and they tried to educate the people to get up and go vote. If you don' ; t know how-- They would have workshops, several workshops, in trying to teach people how to go vote and how to stand up and be proud of your race. Regardless of what color, you are somebody. That is what Shuttlesworth taught and this is what Doctor King taught...' ; I Am Somebody.' ; HUNTLEY: Were there ever any relationship with progressive Whites during this time? SHORTRIDGE: Well, they had quite a few Whites. HUNTLEY: What kind of associations did they have? Did any Whites ever come to your house, for instance, to have meetings with your husband? SHORTRIDGE: No. No. They would meet at the office, if they would. They never did come to the house. HUNTLEY: But there were associations with them? SHORTRIDGE: I think so, but I' ; m not too sure. But I' ; m sure it was. HUNTLEY: Is there anything else that we have not covered that would be of interest to the people who are interested in the movement? SHORTRIDGE: Oh, the time the children...when they integrated the schools-- Let' ; s see. Well, my husband furnished transportation to take the kids to West End High School, and that wasn' ; t an easy job to do. Two of the guys who worked at the funeral home would be the chauffeurs. Before they would get a block to the school, eggs and everything else would be thrown at them. HUNTLEY: These were men who were actually paid by your husband to chauffeur the kids back and forth to school. SHORTRIDGE: Out of his pocket, right. HUNTLEY: And this is at West End High School when they started to integrate. SHORTRIDGE: West End High School, any school. HUNTLEY: And the other schools as well? SHORTRIDGE: Yes, if they needed a ride. But he would see to them at West End and Ensley High too, I believe...if they needed a ride, because most of them needed a ride because they were afraid for them to try to walk or anything like that. HUNTLEY: Well, I know that you are planning to donate to the Institute your papers from your husband and we are really excited about that, because we know that there are a lot of things in there. Eventually we want to see something that can be used for public consumption. Some kind of publication will, hopefully, come out of that material. SHORTRIDGE: Well, they' ; ve been kept. He had a scrapbook. All the clippings from the Birmingham News-- He kept a scrapbook with all those clippings and things for those who came along behind us to see it wasn' ; t easy. It was just putting your life on the line. HUNTLEY: Okay. Mrs. Shortridge, I certainly appreciate your taking time out of your busy schedule. I know you are still running your funeral home and other kinds of activities. You are still involved in many things, so, again, thank you again for taking the time out, for coming out and spending the time with us this morning. SHORTRIDGE: Thanks for inviting me. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=PShortridge1995.xml PShortridge1995.xml
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Pinkie Shortridge
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Pinkie Shortridge discusses working with her husband Bill to bail demonstrators out of jail through the ACMHR. They continued their involvement with the Movement with Dr. King and the National Funeral Directors Association.
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19950210S
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
National Funeral Directors Association of the United States
Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights
Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
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1995-02-10
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video
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Reuben Davis, II
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Asbury Howard
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5.4 April 3, 1996 Reuben Davis, II Interviewed on April 3, 1996 19960403D 1:03:05 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Lessie Dingler Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Dunbar High School (Bessemer, Ala.) Jefferson County (Ala.). County Commission Asbury Howard Reuben Davis, II Horace Huntley Video 1:|9(9)|19(12)|34(11)|51(6)|66(7)|83(5)|98(2)|110(4)|122(7)|142(7)|151(8)|163(4)|174(12)|190(13)|204(8)|227(6)|242(14)|255(12)|266(12)|278(4)|300(1)|313(1)|326(1)|338(1)|351(9)|365(9)|377(11)|389(1)|401(14)|417(10)|429(12)|440(10)|457(10)|470(17)|479(10)|491(14)|515(2)|536(1)|554(12)|565(14)|574(7)|592(1)|601(14)|616(6)|627(12)|636(13)|649(11)|657(10)|670(12)|686(8)|699(6)|717(14)|731(9)|744(4)|756(7)|767(10)|777(5)|791(11)|806(3)|814(11)|825(4)|836(2) 0 https://youtu.be/ul-muzWQs_k YouTube video English 30 Introduction to Interview Mr. Davis, I want to thank you again for taking time out of your schedule to come back because you have so much information. In addition to Movement history, just history of Birmingham and the history of the development of politics in Birmingham. So, again, thank you for coming. 33.5161, -86.8145 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 56 Involvement in Politics Tell me just a bit about your involvement in politics. How did you get involved in politics in Birmingham? Reuben Davis explains how he didn't get involved in politics until he registered to vote, after that he joined a few different organizations. Voter registration--United States Alabama ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; France ; Franklin D. Roosevelt and the era of the New Deal ; Hudson K-8 (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Progressive Democratic Council ; The Civic League (Birmingham, Ala.) ; The Civic Youth Federation (Birmingham, Ala.) ; The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People 434 Economics in the Black Community How did that impact upon your community, the focus on economics? Reuben Davis explains the economic issues for black workers, and how hard it was to advance into higher positions due to discrimination. Economics ; Unions AFL-CIO ; Alabama ByProducts Corporation ; American Cast Iron Pipe Company ; ByProduct ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; McWane, Inc. ; Sloss Furnace Company ; Stockham Pipe & ; Fittings Co. ; United States Pipe and Foundry Company 661 Being Associated with Communist Between 1945 and 1955 or so, it was called " ; The Red Scare." ; The McCarthy Era. How did that impact upon you as a union officer? Reuben Davis explains how when blacks were making progress that sometimes they were be targeted as being a communist. Black Progress ; Communism ; Communist ; Music Ban ; Racist Symbols ; Wrongful Termination Alabama ; Birmingham News ; Federal Bureau of Investigation ; Hudson, Hosea ; Paul Robeson Archives ; Russia ; The McCarthy Era ; The Red Scare 894 Asbury Howard Did you know Asbury Howard? Reuben Davis explains his relationship to Asbury Howard and his impact on the community. Asbury Howard ; Court House ; School field trips Bessemer City Hall (Ala.) ; Bessemer Voter's League ; International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers ; New York ; Philadelphia (Penn.) ; Washington D.C. 974 Interracial Social Interaction What do you remember about it? Reuben Davis explains the social interactions between blacks and whites, and the expectations whites had for being addressed a certain way. Foreman ; Racism Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company 1141 Tractor Incident and Helping Out a Stranger But, while I was working for that company, I was a tractor operator and I made it a habit of checking the oil in the tractor every morning before starting it. Reuben Davis discusses the time his tractor got sabotaged by someone as his work, as well the time when he helped this white man who was stranded in Collegeville. Bible. New Testament ; Sabotage American Salvation Army ; Birmingham YMCA ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Louisville (Ky.) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Tarrant City (Ala.) 1544 Being an Educator In addition to being active in political organizations, active with the labor movement, you also became a teacher? Reuben Davis discusses what it was like being an auto mechanic instructor for the Bessemer School System. Alabama A & ; M University ; Bessemer (Ala.) ; Bessemer High School (Bessemer, Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Dunbar High School (Bessemer, Ala.) ; Flint (Mich.) ; General Motors Institute 1899 Opportunities of Running for Office and Owning a Business As you progressed in developing your techniques for teaching, you also remained in politics. What was the first office that you ran for? Reuben Davis expresses about the times he has run for public offices, as well as the time he thought about starting his own mechanic shop. County Commissioner ; Lawsuit--Discrimination ; Progressives Al Picket Equipment Company ; Arrington, Richard ; Bell, William ; Bessemer Board of Education (Bessemer, Ala.) ; Birmingham News ; Birmingham Trust ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Democratic National Convention ; Jefferson County (Ala.) ; Norwood (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Progressive Democratic Council 2637 Experience Being County Commissioner What was that experience like as a County Commissioner? Reuben Davis discusses the issues he covered while being on the Jefferson County Commission. Bonner, Elizabeth ; Cooper Green Hospital (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Jefferson County (Ala.). County Commission ; Jefferson County (Ala.). Personnel Board ; Jim Gunner ; John Katapodis ; Supervisor of Maternal and Infant Care 3100 Losing Re-election for County Commissioner Why do you think you were not re-elected? Reuben Davis explains why he was not re-elected due to conflicts on taxes and where money should go in the city. Endorsements ; Hospital closures Arrington, Richard ; Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Complex (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Cooper Green Hospital (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Jefferson County (Ala.). County Commission ; Occupational Tax (Birmingham, Ala.) 3309 Million Man March Since then, we've had an event that has been, obviously world renowned that was the Million Man March. What was your opinion of the Million Man March, and did you attend? Reuben Davis talks about attending the Million Man March. American political parties and elections Democratic Party (U.S.) ; Million Man March (1995 : Washington, D.C.) ; Mississippi ; Republican Party (U.S.) 3437 Significance of Million Man March Why do you think that the Million Man March was so significant? Reuben Davis explains how the coming together of black people at the Million Man March can help destroy racism. Black Brothers ; Black Communities ; Destruction ; Racisim ; Strength Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement ; Million Man March (1995 : Washington, D.C.) ; National Association for the Advancement of Colored People 3508 Combatting Racism in Present Day How then do you account for the ways in which White people versus Black people view the Rodney King situation, the O. J. Simpson case and the Million Man March. And, most recently, of course the beating of the Mexican man and woman out in California? Reuben Davis expresses how in today's world we can still combat the acts of discrimination and racism. Discrimination--United States ; Racial profiling in law enforcement ; Racial violence AIDS (Disease) ; California ; Carver, George Washington, 1864?-1943 ; King, Rodney, 1965-2012 ; Million Man March (1995 : Washington, D.C.) ; O. J. Simpson ; Washington, Booker T., 1856-1915 3646 Interpreting Media Coverage of the Million Man March Let me just ask you about, in relation to the Million Man March, the media consistently talked about " ; separating the message from the messenger." ; How did you interpret that? Reuben Davis explains his thoughts on what the saying means about " ; separating the message from the messenger" ; . Religion Farrakhan, Louis ; Garvey, Marcus ; Million Man March (1995 : Washington, D.C.) 3752 Conclusion of Interview Thank you, Mr. Davis. Oral History Reuben Davis II discusses how his work with the labor movement lead to his political career. He served as one term as a Jefferson County Commissioner. HUNTLEY: Mr. Davis, I want to thank you again for taking time out of your schedule to come back because you have so much information. In addition to Movement history, just history of Birmingham and the history of the development of politics in Birmingham. So, again, thank you for coming. DAVIS: I don' ; t think I could have done anything more exciting than being here with you, no question about that. HUNTLEY: Tell me just a bit about your involvement in politics. did you get involved in politics in Birmingham? How? DAVIS: Well, my first interest in politics, and I' ; 11 shall never forget it. I was in (Inaudible), France. It was during the time, in 1945, President Roosevelt was up for re-election and I applied for a ballot to vote for the President. I received a letter from Alabama. It had a title, " ; Dear Alabamian, you are not on our list of qualified voters and you have to apply to be qualified before you can vote." ; And something made me see then this ballot must be very important. That was the very first thing I did after getting out. I was discharged in ' ; 45. This happened in the early part, it was during an election year. I was discharged on the 9th of December, which was a Friday. That following Monday, I qualified to vote. When I qualified to vote in Collegeville, where there was more than 8,000 Black people living within less than a square mile radius, but there were only 11 qualified voters. HUNTLEY: What was the process of your qualifying to vote? DAVIS: At that time I went to the courthouse and applied. I had no problem whatsoever. HUNTLEY: Did they ask you any questions? DAVIS: They asked me no questions whatsoever. I later found that would allow some to go through like that. I guess I came at a time that I was supposed to get by. But, I found the ballot to be power. Immediately I joined with the Progressive Democratic Council, and I knew, sooner or later, the conditions and opportunity to be involved in the political arena would have to change. HUNTLEY: Who were some of the people who were involved with the Progressive Democratic Council at that time? DAVIS: In Collegeville there were Mr. J. R. Hatchett, Mr. L. F. Berry, Mr. Mobile and Bart Washington, you know him. He' ; s in a coma now in the hospital. Those are some names I remember. They were active with the Progressive Democratic Council. HUNTLEY: What was the object of the Council at the time? What did they concentrate on? DAVIS: At that time you had in the communities what was known as Civic League. The Civic League was scattered all over the county and that was kind of a branch of the Progressive Democratic Council. But just looking over the past, it' ; s clear to me that the ballots were very scarce, but we few that did vote would get together and try to select the best White candidate. We had some we would look through the background of individuals and decide that we would cast our votes with the best White candidate. There were no Blacks to vote for. HUNTLEY: How did the Civic League actually work? DAVIS: The Civic League was organized for a community purpose and I have some letterhead. In my community, I guess I was in my early 20s at the time, I was elected President of the Civic Youth Federation. These were young people. HUNTLEY: Within the Civic League itself? DAVIS: Yes, within the Civic League. And, Dr. Macklin, R. B. Macklin was a doctor in the north Birmingham area and he paid for letterhead for our group. And, I still have some now. But, with that letterhead I took on, singlehandedly, that was back in ' ; 46 or ' ; 47, after I got out of the service -- it was a lot of Italian stores in the community. So, I went around to each one of them and tell them that if they would hire a Black clerk, then we would turn the trade into them. I was able to get a Black woman hired on a job like that. HUNTLEY: In each of the stores? DAVIS: Not in each of them. But, I was able to get one at a store right behind Hudson School. HUNTLEY: Now, were you doing this as an individual or was this a part of the Civic League of the Progressives? DAVIS: This was done because the people had elected me as President of the youth element and I decided to just take that on. At that time we had no street lights and no sidewalks. The only sidewalks in Collegeville were if the owners of the property put them there themselves. There was no connection at all with city hall. We had one paved street and my dad lived on 27th Avenue and that was the only paved street. It was for the convenience of the industry coming from north Birmingham to east Birmingham. But, the taxpayers on that street had to pay for that. HUNTLEY: Were you ever involved with the NAACP? DAVIS: Yes, I joined the NAACP and was a member until they disbanded it. You know they outlawed the NAACP after the Movement really got off the ground. In other words, it wasn' ; t permitted to be active in Alabama. But I was a member. HUNTLEY: Did you ever have any activity as far as voter registration was concerned, either with the Progressives or with the NAACP? DAVIS: No. I didn' ; t. I became interested in labor working for the railroad. Mr. Hatcher worked for the railroad. Mr. Berry worked for the railroad. And, after becoming active with the labor organization, then my interest focused then on economics for Black people. HUNTLEY: How did that impact upon your community, the focus on economics? DAVIS: One thing at that time, it was common that practically everyone that wanted a job could get a job. You had industries such as U.S. Pipe shop, you had Sloss, you had By Product, you had the L& ; N Railroad Company. You had ACIPICO, you had McWane and Stockham and all these places, there was no question about getting a job. But the thing about it, all the jobs available were lower end and the most difficult of working. I became active in trying to -- immediately after the Movement-- I became interested then in trying to force and encourage young folks that work at the plants to advance in jobs that wasn' ; t available to them. And, I ran into situations where union contracts were such that they discriminated within its own ranks. They had what was known as departmental seniority. That meant, if I was hired as a laborer in a certain department, I couldn' ; t move out that department to another. It created a problem. HUNTLEY: Rather than company seniority? DAVIS: That' ; s right. This meant that a White person could be hired as a brick layer for U.S. Pipe. A Black man that had experience. In other words, these guys were handling all the bricks and mixing the mortar and the White man was just taking the brick, putting it in place in the hot oven. Well, Black laborers had to put the bricks in order according to where they were supposed to be, but they weren' ; t permitted to become a brick mason until we finally got the government involved. HUNTLEY: So that was another tactic to use to keep Black workers at that minimal level? DAVIS: No question about it. The union itself devised that method. In other words, Black men had praises for seniority, but there weren' ; t any jobs in that department, your seniority had no meaning. HUNTLEY: Was your union affiliated with the AFL? DAVIS: Yes. HUNTLEY: And the AFL had a history of being basically anti-Black? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. HUNTLEY: Did you have any relationship with the unions in the CIO? DAVIS: Well, I did from working with U.S. Pipe and Foundry Company. I think it was District 50, that was the title of it. The head of District 50 was a man named Moffet in Washington. Rayvon Hinton was working for U.S. Pipe and Rayvon, (Inaudible) on a job as crane operator. They had to give him the opportunity to train, but in the process of him cubbing, he and this White fellow had some odds and so the White man struck him and he struck him back, so they fired Rayvon. That' ; s when I became involved. I went to the union headquarters in Washington dealing with that issue. From that I was able to get the government involved in looking at discriminatory practices at U.S. Pipe. I have some letters, you saw the file I have from Washington on that. HUNTLEY: Between 1945 and 1955 or so, it was called " ; The Red Scare." ; The McCarthy Era. How did that impact upon you as a union officer? DAVIS: Well, it is strange that you asked that. When I was fired from the railroad in 1950, I came home. The very next day I received a postcard from New York and this post card had information on it that was telling me that they could help me. That I was fired illegally and a lot of things they said was nice. But I was afraid that it was a scare, in other words, I knew the problem of being branded as a communist. Dr. Ballot, a physician in Birmingham many years ago, spoke at our church one Sunday and he said, " ; Anytime a Black man made any move towards progress, they' ; ll brand him as a communist." ; Well, when I received this postcard, the very next day I carried it to the FBI. They were located down the street from The Birmingham News. I walked in and gave this agent the card. He looked at me and he said, " ; How did your name get on that list?" ; I said, " ; I have no idea." ; He said, " ; Have a seat over there and see if you can' ; t figure out how your name got on the list." ; " ; What organization are you a member of." ; I said, " ; I' ; m a scout master, a member of the labor organization, a mason and a church member." ; You might recall there was some type of training camp. A lot of fellows from the post office went away and they were suspected of being trained to be communists. It was a scary thing. Even Paul Robeson was almost destroyed because of his activities. I remember as a young man, I went to Pizitz to buy a record of Paul Robeson, Old Man River, and the lady looked at me and she said, " ; We do not have his records." ; Well, I really didn' ; t know they were banded. I said, " ; Why?" ; " ; Well, just don' ; t have his records." ; So I walked out. I later found out because he was supposed to be a communist, they destroyed them. They hurt a lot of people in that process. HUNTLEY: Did you know Hosea Hudson? DAVIS: Oh, yes. HUNTLEY: Hosea wrote a book about his life, a Black working the deep south. He talks about his activities with the union, but he was an avowed communist. DAVIS: Yes, Mr. Hudson lived in east Birmingham, Greenwood area. At that time you would wake up in the morning and you would see little leaflets on your porch and you don' ; t know how they got there. But, somebody was always spreading information around. But you know, as I look back at that, I wrote a poem and I' ; ll share it with you. In my opinion, the American government was not fearful of communism ; they were fearful of knowledge of Black people being exposed to the point that they would accept. That' ; s my interpretation. Now, based on the fact that Russia' ; s symbol was a bear, but now the bear is a pussy cat and racism is still alive. But the bear is dead. In my opinion, they weren' ; t fighting communism anymore ; they were thinking that communism would advance the cause of Black people. HUNTLEY: Did you know Asbury Howard? DAVIS: Oh, yes I knew Mr. Howard. HUNTLEY: Can you tell me anything about him? DAVIS: Mr. Howard was a unique person. I knew him. He would sponsor a tour for the kids in the Bessemer school system. And this tour would go to Washington, New York, Philadelphia all the scenic places. The parent would have to pay just a little money. If they didn' ; t have any, somehow they would have a chance to go. I had a chance to go on that tour with the kids as a chaperon for the boys. But he was really strong, civic minded individual, way ahead of his time. HUNTLEY: He was a laborer in the Mine, Mill & ; Smelter Workers Union? DAVIS: That' ; s right, yes. HUNTLEY: President of the Bessemer Voter' ; s League. DAVIS: Right. HUNTLEY: And, he eventually was elected to the (Inaudible). DAVIS: Yes, that' ; s right. I knew him personally. He was a quite a fellow. HUNTLEY: Do you remember when he and his son were attacked in the Bessemer City Hall? DAVIS: Oh, yes. And he had a picture in his office where they struck him and his shirt was all bloody where the police officers attacked him. HUNTLEY: Do you remember that incident actually took place? DAVIS: Oh, yes. I was in Bessemer at that time. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about it? DAVIS: Well, you know it was a no-no for a Black person to make any forward moves that wasn' ; t approved by Whites. Mr. Howard was just a person that had no fear and he was insistent on doing what he thought was right to do. Any White person at that time, more aptly the police officer, but any White person at that time had somewhat of influence to the point that they could attack or threaten a Black man and no recourse. I remember at the L& ; N my foreman, Mr. Mulvaney. You see, I was taught at home that all elderly people was ' ; Mr' ; . and ' ; Mrs.' ; so it was no problem for me to say Mr. to a White person, not because he' ; s White, but because he was elderly. So, what happened, Mr. Mulvaney, the foreman sent me to the back shop to get a 14" ; pipe wrench. So I went to the back shop. He said, " ; Go tell Wade Bradley to send me a 14" ; pipe wrench." ; It was just that simple. If he had said Mr. Bradley, I would have said Mr. Bradley. So, when I arrived at the back shop, the first fellow I saw was a White fellow operating a lathe. I stopped. I said, " ; Can you tell me where I can find Wade Bradley?" ; He looked at me he didn' ; t say one word. I said it a little louder because I thought he didn' ; t hear me operating this lathe. I said, " ; Can you tell me where I can find Wade Bradley?" ; He looked around and he gripped a wrench. He said, " ; You mean, Mr. Bradley, don' ; t you?" ; I said, " ; You heard what I said." ; I had committed myself and I wasn' ; t about to change. So when he gripped the wrench, I picked up a hammer. Now, that was just because I was addressing him by his name. Now, that gives you an idea of the conditions that took place at that time. This was a White man and I was a Black man. I was a safety leader for my department and it was a young White fellow who was an apprentice carpenter. He referred to me as Davis I referred to him as Cobbs. So, one morning in the safety meeting, the foreman, Mr. Dewitt says that " ; Some of you fellows is getting too familiar with these White men, calling them by their first names and you know things haven' ; t changed here." ; So, when he finished his speech, I said, " ; Mr . Dewitt, you didn' ; t call the name as to who might have done that. But I refer to Cobb as Cobb and he refers to me as Davis--You, Mr. Dewitt, because you' ; re my foreman." ; He never said a word. But, while I was working for that company, I was a tractor operator and I made it a habit of checking the oil in the tractor every morning before starting it. And, so one morning I put the dip stick in and checked it and it came out clear. I put some oil in it and put it in again, it was so clear I was somewhat startled. I found out that the crank heads were filled with gasoline. If I had started that vehicle, it would have actually went up. Because being an old foldsome tractor and if you know anything about internal combustion engines, gasoline only started by a spark. Heat won' ; t start gasoline. So, if I had cranked it up and one of those cylinders fired and that gas vapor had come around the type of the cylinder head or piston, it would have blown up like a bomb. So after I found that, for whatever reason I wasn' ; t excited about it. I asked someone to pull it to the back shop and drain the gasoline out and went on. HUNTLEY: There was never an investigation? DAVIS: Never an investigation.No questions about that. HUNTLEY: You didn' ; t carry that any further? DAVIS: No.No I didn' ; t try. HUNTLEY: Did you ever mention it to anybody? DAVIS: Several fellows knew about it. It was filled with gasoline. HUNTLEY: So it was an attempt to get rid of you? DAVIS: Well, I was branded as a trouble maker. What happened, Mr. Berry, was the man that recommended me for hire. My dad didn' ; t vouch for me. I don' ; t know why he didn' ; t want me to work out there. He wanted me to go to school, but I wanted to work. So, Mr. Berry received a letter from an international representative ' ; s office, Mr. Ray Abner out of Louisville, Kentucky. And, Mr. Abner, responding to the master mechanics conversation, asked him how was things at (Inaudible). He said, " ; Everything is fine here but Davis. He' ; s the only trouble maker we have." ; When I found out that the master mechanic had classified me as a trouble maker, I got my committee together and we were going to the master mechanic' ; s office and they asked me where was the problem . I said, " ; Well, I understand that Mr. Mcwilliams referred to me as a trouble maker. I want him to prove it." ; So, the men didn' ; t want me to do that. They said, " ; Son, don' ; t do that." ; I said, " ; That is a gross insult to me and every man I represent." ; I said, " ; I' ; ve only upheld the rules according to their print. I kept an agreement book and a New Testament in my pocket all the time. I read both of them. So, I insisted on going to the master mechanic' ; s office. When I got up there I wrote, " ; I had the Director of Personnel from Louisville, Kentucky come to respond to my request that the master mechanic had accused me of being a trouble maker" ; . So, the first thing the Director of Personnel asked, his name was J. L. Sullivan, he said " ; Davis, did the master mechanic curse, say any bad words to you?" ; I said, " ; No, I never been cursed in my life." ; He said, " ; Well, how did he insult you?" ; I said, " ; It appears that only through curse words can one be insulted." ; He said, " ; Well, you' ; re the local chairman, the company is not going to allow our master mechanics to mistreat our local chairmen and by the same take, we ' ; re not going to allow our local chairmen to insult the master mechanics." ; I said, " ; Mr. Sullivan, it seems as if you only think that a person is insulted by profane language." ; I said, " ; Mr . Mcwilliams is a master mechanic, isn' ; t he?" ; He said, " ; Yes." ; I said, " ; If he was in the back shop among the labor that I represent and I would call him, ' ; Hey Mac, come I want to talk to you a minute' ; , would I insult him?" ; He never said a word and that dismissed that. You see the point in question, Black people were submissive under the spell of power of Whites. Any White man had authority over Black and I couldn' ; t swallow that. I just absolutely could not handle that. I respected them. On one occasion, I was leaving my job at 11:00 that night. On my way home on 27th Avenue, just before you cross the railroad tracks there coming into Collegeville, I saw something move out there. My mind said go out there and see what it was. I went out there. Here was a White man laying out there in the grass. So I said, " ; What' ; s the problem?" ; He said, " ; I was with some friends and they kicked me out the car." ; I said, " ; Friends?" ; He said, " ; Yes . Could you give me car fare to the Salvation Army?" ; Now, at this time car fare was seven cents, so you knew about how long it' ; s been. Tarrant City No. 22 was running from Tarrant. So, when he spoke about the Salvation Army I told him, I said, " ; Well, I' ; 11 take you." ; When I got him up and in my car and he saw my Black face, he asked me a dozen times on our way. I was trying to find the Salvation Army because I didn' ; t know where it was. He said, " ; Why is it you stopped to help me? You' ; re a Black man and I' ; m White." ; I said , " ; I saw a man who need help." ; Finally, I was thinking the Salvation Army was on the south side over by the hospital. So, I came up to the ' ; Y' ; where AmSouth' ; s new building is now there is was a YMCA. I saw the door opened so I walked into the ' ; Y' ; . There was a White gentleman at the desk. I told him there was a White man out there from north Alabama stranded and he needed a bed for the night and if he didn' ; t pay him, I would. So he said, " ; We don' ; t have any beds." ; I said, " ; Where is the Salvation Army?" ; He said, " ; It' ; s on 11th Avenue." ; Well then I went over to 11th Avenue and it' ; s about 11:30 or 12:00 then. After getting him there and this man stated, " ; I' ; m not ready for you to leave." ; Then I explained to him, I said, " ; I could not pass an opportunity of helping a man that was in need of help." ; He embraced me and kissed me on my cheek and said, " ; I' ; 11 never forget you. " ; Now, I wou1dn' ; t know him if I saw him today and I don' ; t think he would know me. But that was just a nature that I have. I found that in order to be effective, you have got to love people. There' ; s no question about that. We cannot win the battle ( Inaudible) without love. HUNTLEY: In addition to being active in political organizations, active with the labor movement, you also became a teacher? DAVIS: Yes. HUNTLEY: You became a teacher though as a result of being dismissed from your job with the railroad. DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: How did you make the transition from labor leader/organizer to educator? DAVIS: Well, what happened, I wanted to be a mechanic. Cars were popular then. Women weren' ; t driving at that time, not much anyway because they had standard shifts. At any rate, I saw a future there. I wanted to be the first Black person to have a service station in Birmingham. I tried to sell cars. 0. C. Hall had a car dealership in north Birmingham. I went to his office, applied for the job. He gave me a little test and I passed the test. And, then he said, " ; You passed the test all right. We' ; re going to make a bird dog out of you." ; In other words, my job was to get a sale and hold it for a real salesman to come by and get the money. I wouldn' ; t accept that. But, however, I wanted to have a business in auto mechanics. I had an interest in auto mechanics. My uncle was an auto mechanic in World War I. I followed him. And, then I went to school for auto mechanics. I attended the General Automotive Institute in Flint, Michigan. When I came back and got fired from the railroad, well, what happened, I went to J. Truitt Payne. I was dressed in a blue suit, White shirt, blue tie and shined shoes. HUNTLEY: You told us about that part of the story. But how did you get to Michigan? Did you decide to go to Michigan for schooling? Or, were you going to Michigan to find a job.DAVIS: I went to Flint after I had started teaching school. MotorsInstitutewasthe only resourceI had instruction materialfor my students.I went to Motors Institute on my own, at my own expense and was General to get General getting different type of literature concerning engines and theory and I still have some information now. And, that enhanced my chances of sharing with my students. HUNTLEY: So you were teaching auto mechanics in the Bessemer school system at Dunbar High School. DAVIS: That' ; s right. But, the see the thing about it, when I went to Dunbar I really never planned to teach school. They wanted me to use obsolete equipment that Bessemer High, the White school, had used up and I wouldn' ; t accept it. And, the results of it were I found out that General Motors was very generous to educational programs. I later found that I could go to General Motors Institute during the summer months and get additional training and theory and instruction materials and that' ; s where I was able to get that. HUNTLEY: So you did that on your own? DAVIS: On my own. I paid for it. HUNTLEY: Then you returned in the fall and how did that enhance your ability to work with your students? DAVIS: Well, Bessemer High School would be in that shop at school. HUNTLEY: This is the White school? DAVIS: Right. Bessemer High was a White school. They could go to Drennan' ; s for hands on work. But the school system was not preparing my students for employment. We had the shop for name purposes only. They never intended for my students to become competitive as mechanics. But I was interested in that. And I was able to turn out some good mechanics. HUNTLEY: Where were they able to work after they finished? DAVIS: Well, I have several young mechanics that are working on their own. They have their own business. The job opportunities were very limited. I never mind starting at the bottom and I taught my students, every one, I said, " ; Anytime you' ; re looking and want to get a job," ; I said, " ; You go ask for an opportunity to prove that you (Inaudible) that job." ; For instance, I said, " ; A man might have a service station. Tell him that you would work for him a week before you decide what salary you" ; re entitled to. Let him know that you can be an asset to him." ; That was the kind of teaching that I shared. You didn' ; t get that at Alabama A& ; M. The results were that my students got a bit of moral character about their work and also I gave them strong instructions. When you see a person stranded, help them. The money is not the primary objective. If you do what you' ; re supposed to do, when the opportunity for money come, people look for you to give it to you. HUNTLEY: As you progressed in developing your techniques for teaching, you also remained in politics. What was the first office that you ran for? DAVIS: The first office I ran for was a delegate to the Democratic Convention. HUNTLEY: What year was that? DAVIS: That was back in 1970. The Birmingham News stated I was the first Black person to run for that position. HUNTLEY: Did you win it? DAVIS: No, no. I didn' ; t win. But, then I became interested in County Commissioner. Eddie Gilmore, a commissioner, died in ' ; 71 and there were about 17 candidates, all White. Tom Groves was among the group and he finally won. When I found out that 17 Whites were involved, and I, being a member of the Progressive Democratic Council, we had quite a bit of votes at that time. It was after ' ; 65. I waited until the last minute on the last day to qualify. The paper was stating whether the governor would appoint a person. But, finally they decided to run it for an elected position. So, after I qualified, just a few minutes before closing time, and it came out in the paper that a schoolteacher from Bessemer qualified. Now, I would have won that election if I had gotten the blessings of the Progressive Democratic Council. HUNTLEY: Now, the Progressive Democratic Council at the time was the leading Black organization? DAVIS: It was the only Black organization politically activated. But, what really happened then and I' ; m ashamed to say, could possibly happen now. Black people are still being sold. You see, Arthur Shores at that time was head of the Progressive Democratic Council, but Bob Washington was a man that I had known, so I went to Bob and told him that I was going to qualify for County Commission. He called me by my street name. They call me Bubba. He said, " ; Bubba, you know if you would be a County Commissioner, you would be handling millions of dollars. What kind of large interest you' ; ve had and money that you' ; d count." ; Now, he' ; d known me all my life. I said, " ; Bob, I built a home. That' ; s far as I' ; ve gone. I can make decisions no matter how many dollars, it' ; s the decisions that counts." ; So, we left it like that and I felt literally that he didn' ; t recognize my interest in people. And the results of it, they elected Tom Grove. But, the White vote was split 17 ways. I found out that it was a gentlemen on the Progressives who was the only real estate appraiser in Birmingham. I can' ; t think of his name right now. But, at any rate, he told me the committee approved me. HUNTLEY: The committee in the Progressives? DAVIS: Within the circle of the Progressives approved to support me. But, when the ballots came out, Tom Grove' ; s name was on it. You see there is a segment among us that some people is satisfied as long as they are advanced personally . But I took a position, I' ; m not secure unless my brother behind me is secure. I can' ; t shake that off. I paid a dear price for that, because when I was working for the railroad everyone was promoted but me. But I considered myself as being successful. If we would just realize that if they come by today to take me, if someone don' ; t do something about it, they are going to come to get you. So, I had an opportunity to work, to go in business and probably would have made a good salary, but I would have been doing it for the White man only and I couldn' ; t do that. HUNTLEY: What was that position? DAVIS: Well, Lee Styslinger owned Al Picket Equipment Company. HUNTLEY: What' ; s the person' ; s name? DAVIS: Lee Styslinger. He' ; s President of Al Picket Equipment Company. He' ; s a very nice man. He has some boys. I think my little boy and his little boy are about the same age. But, at that time I was the caretaker of his property. I was living in an industrial at that time. HUNTLEY: Is that in Collegeville? DAVIS: It was a part of Norwood, where Vanderbilt Crossing is in the area. So, one evening I stopped Mr. Styslinger, I said, " ; Mr . Styslinger." ; He said, " ; Yes, Reuben. " ; HUNTLEY: Can you spell that? DAVIS: S-T-Y that' ; s the way it starts. HUNTLEY: Styslinger? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Okay. DAVIS: I said, " ; It' ; s an excellent opportunity for a Black man to go into business. Because what I had done earlier, I had went to Birmingham Trust to see Mr. Dick. I had my plans for my shop and how I would lay it out and I only needed $2,500. HUNTLEY: This is a mechanic shop? DAVIS: A mechanic shop.And, Mr. Dick stated that " ; You have a good plan, a good idea, but we can' ; t approve your loan." ; He said, " ; You' ; re not asking for enough money." ; Him being a banker all he was supposed to do was advise me and say, why don' ; t you ask for $5,000. But, I told him head up, " ; I don' ; t make it a practice of borrowing money I don' ; t need. So, what happened, when I mentioned to Mr. Styslinger concerning going into business, he readily agreed. He said, " ; Let' ; s go back in the office, sit down and talk." ; Went back and talked and he said, " ; Reuben, let me know how much money you need, how many people you" ; re going to work, how much you' ; re going to pay them and approximately how long you think it will take for the business to turn a cycle." ; So, I had all that in my head. But I gave him the two weeks and I came back. He said, " ; I' ; 11 deposit the money in the bank in your name and you write checks." ; And, when he said that I said, " ; How do I pay you back?" ; He said, " ; You don' ; t pay me back." ; And I was startled then. I looked at him and he said, " ; What' ; s the problem?" ; I said, " ; I can' ; t accept your offer." ; And, I walked away from that. You see, you remember the drive-in theater in Bessemer? HUNTLEY: Sure. DAVIS: Mr. James Bend. That organization, that drive-in, belonged to a doctor in Bessemer. Mr. Bend was running it for him. I could not use Black people like that. And, I didn' ; t. HUNTLEY: So you decided you had to be your own person? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. In other words, if I had accepted his money, I would have been operating his business and if I had gotten it to a point, use my influence as a Black person and using Black people as customers and what not, then I still was his man and I couldn' ; t do that. HUNTLEY: At what point did you run for office again? DAVIS: Well, the next time I ran I ran head up against Congressman Ben Erdich. At that time he ran for County Commission and I ran against him. I had gained a lot of respect from people in Jefferson County because I wrote a lot of editorials. In fact, the Bessemer Board, through the principal, threatened me about writing editorials. I felt it was my privilege. So I had a lot of people' ; s attention by writing. So, when I ran a second time after Mr. Gilmore passed and Ben won the election by 10,000 votes. But, I received about 20,000+. He received about 35,000. He spent about $40,000. I spent less than $300. I didn' ; t think money was actually a factor in the political situation and I think that' ; s another problem that we have. You see, the ballot in America has been almost destroyed. The problems of politics was created in a political arena but it will never be solved there. When the people began to go after special interests, that money was pooled together for a common cause and those elected officials that took that money was locked into that system. So, I really didn' ; t understand that because I was looking, more or less, wanting to be a Commissioner for all the people. There was no room for decent men in politics at the time that I entered. They couldn' ; t handle that. And, I don' ; t regret being re-elected because the fact that I could have given my character away and I would have been a Commissioner for life. HUNTLEY: When were you eventually elected to the County Commissioner? DAVIS: Well, do you remember Walter Jackson, Ron' ; s brother? HUNTLEY: Yes. DAVIS: Okay. Walter and I and Dr. McPherson had gotten together and drew up a charge to file a suit against the county for discrimination. HUNTLEY: What year was this? DAVIS: That had to have been around ' ; 70 or ' ; 71, something like that. But, at any rate, the county contends, and they were going to use me as a witness, that a Black could win county wide. But, they compromised before that. They subpoenaed me to appear in court. But the results of it, they compromised and set up the districts. But, now, when I ran head up against Ben Erdrich, there was a situation, in other words my name was leading the line in Blacks as far as politics was concerned. And, so I then my focus was on the county commission. So, when the districts were set up, Lee Lowder also ran and I ran. At that time, William Bell threatened to run. I was visiting the breakfast (Inaudible) every Sunday morning. And one morning, one of the fellows at the breakfast asked William, he said, " ; You' ; re present of the Council, what do you want to be a County Commissioner for?" ; I saw a little shimmy in his knee and I knew then that something was wrong. So, finally what happened, I was home cutting my grass one Saturday. My wife said Dr. Gaston was on the phone. Dr. Gaston never called me before. So I went to the phone and he said, " ; Reuben?" ; I said, " ; Yes, sir, Dr. Gaston." ; He said, " ; Come by the office, we' ; ll see about winning this election." ; The very next week Mayor Arrington and his wife came by. Dr. Arrington stated, " ; Reuben, I come by to tell you that Bell is not going to run." ; Now, what I gathered out of that. I think that some powers that be was afraid I would win without their support and so they came in at the last stage. I won with overwhelmingly. I had over 90% of the Black vote and 30% of the White vote. HUNTLEY: Were you supported by the Coalition at the time? DAVIS: Yes.I was backed by the Coalition. HUNTLEY: What was that experience like as a County Commissioner? DAVIS: Well, I knew I would get it sooner or later. And, I went in with my head down. Being the first one to sit in that office because they built that office. I even bought the furniture before I was elected. But, I had asked my pastor to come and dedicate that office to God. I went in with my head down to be of service to the people of Jefferson County. Health care was my major interest. And, against crime. You see my interest in those areas was based on the fact that I knew that crime was not inherited. That if parents would accept their responsibility, as I mentioned to you children are perfect psychoanalysts. If a parent lets a child go too far, giving him what he wants, it' ; ll get out of hand and you can no longer hold him. If a parent was responsible to parenting, we could kill crime overnight. So that was a part of program and I later mentioned in the County Commission that we should pass a resolution for parent accountability for conduct of minor children, but they laughed at that. This country cannot exist with a budget for health care, crime and welfare as they exist today. Now, health care, I had about 50 people to get together and develop a program for health care of Jefferson County that goes into the year 2000. And in this I charged them with the responsibility of having a strong emphasis on preventive care. I wanted clinics built all over the county like parks, where kids could walk to a clinic. It didn' ; t have to be a building, it could be a mobile unit, but just where you could be close. It was nothing really new about the idea, because I felt God made the body self-sustaining. Food itself is medicine. If people learn how to eat well and all this bad air we breathing have some effect and the companies are responsible for that, but I felt that we could fight and win the battle for health over a long term with preventive care. The doctors didn' ; t like me for that, so I had to go. HUNTLEY: So you then became sort of a scapegoat? DAVIS: No question about that. You see, one of the major problems that I found and I didn' ; t realize it was being a problem, because I' ; m still thinking I' ; m doing the right thing. In order words, the right thing in my mind is more important than the consequences behind it. And, there was a HRS one million dollars a year plus ten percent of all cash collections. And, I didn' ; t like that. At the time I was elected, Cooper Green was threatening to be closed at any minute. But I was fortunate to get that contract torn. The people that supported me, John Catapotis supported that, and also, Jim Gunner. But, they were thinking that the hospital would cave in on me. But, I gave all the employees of HRS six months' ; notice that they would receive the same pay. But after six months they would have to compete for the job on the county level. As a result of that five suits were filed against me because they didn' ; t qualify for the job. It wasn' ; t my fault. The County Personnel Board had established the requirements. My responsibility was if they sent me three names, to select one. I found that there was one particular case that the county, in fact I accused them of conspiracy and that' ; s in the making right now. The Executive Officer of the hospital asked for a position to be established as a Supervisor of Maternal and Infant Care. The person that was the head of that department was Elizabeth Bonner, a Black female. The only nurse in the hospital that had a degree in midwifery. So, he came in and wanted the supervisory position established and he had a White female' ; s name he wanted to serve in that capacity temporarily. So, I said, " ; John you can' ; t do it like that." ; He said, " ; What do you mean?" ; I said, " ; If you want the position established, you go to that department, starting at the head nurse. And, if all the nurses in the Maternal/Infant Care Department refuse to accept the temporary appointment, then you can appoint anyone you like because that' ; s the only way you can do it." ; So he was all upset. Later I' ; m thinking he' ; s following through on my instructions, but he still had (Inaudible). And, so one Friday evening about two weeks later, he called me about 5:30 at home. He said, " ; Co mmissioner." ; I said, " ; Yes." ; " ; This is John. I want you to come to the hospital right away." ; I said, " ; What' ; s the problem?" ; He said, " ; The doctors want to talk to you." ; I said, " ; It' ; s that important?" ; He said, " ; They are waiting on you now." ; So I dressed and went to the hospital. When I got there, about 14 doctors were in the conference room. " ; Commissioner?" ; I said, " ; Yes . " ; " ; We' ; re concerned about this position in Maternal and Infant Care." ; I said, " ; What about it?" ; They said, " ; We want a qualified person in that position." ; I said, " ; You have one." ; " ; She ain' ; t qualified." ; I said, " ; Document it. Put your concerns in writing to me." ; And one of the doctors, Dr. Goldberg stated, " ; Who is going to delivery these babies?" ; I said, " ; Gentlemen, it seems as if you all have a problem." ; I said, " ; Pardon me." ; And I left them. I knew I was standing on solid ground. Now, the results of it. When I wasn' ; t re-elected the county attorney sent a man out to my home for me to sign an affidavit giving them authority to represent me in settling those cases. I consented with the understanding that I would be involved in the discussion of settlement, because I wanted to protect my name historically, as well as the decisions that I made. I didn' ; t want to be charged with discriminating against White people or harassing Blacks. But, the next thing I knew I received a letter from Judge Acker, William Acker. It stated that " ; all parties to this case is present except Reuben Davis." ; And it further stated " ; that there was no opposition from Davis." ; Then, I hand-delivered a letter to Judge Acker informing him that I was not involved in settling that case and I made it clear that I wanted to be involved in the discussion of settlement. So, Judge Acker wrote a letter to all parties and all lawyers stating that he received a letter from me stating that I was not involved in the discussion of settlement of this case and he didn' ; t know what to do with my letter. The next thing, I received a letter from the county attorney' ; s office stating that " ; Commissioner, we were protecting your bank book and your property." ; I wrote them a letter in response to that. I said, " ; You were authorized to protect my name and my character as a Commissioner, my historical record as a commissioner, not my money." ; So that' ; s a new game. This is in the making right now. HUNTLEY: Why do you think you were not re-elected? DAVIS: The only reason I wasn' ; t re-elected was I didn' ; t have the endorsement from Mayor Arrington.That' ; s the only reason. HUNTLEY: Why did you not have that endorsement?You did have it the first time? DAVIS: I had it the first time.One thing that caused that, in my opinion -- occupational tax surfaced.There were several men from the Coalition who wanted to meet with me one Saturday about the occupational tax. They said, " ; Reuben, this tax will kill Birmingham." ; That' ; s all they could tell you.That was gone over and over again.I said," ; Fellows,the county governmentneedsthismoney.CooperGreenHospitalis threatening to be closed, any minute." ; I said, " ; Occupa tional tax is the salvation for the hospital." ; So, after about two andahalfhoursof deliberation andweweren' ; tgetting anywhere.I said, " ; Look, if you guys can come up with an idea as to how the county can raise some revenue, I' ; ll take it back to the Commission." ; So, we dismissed.That was Saturday. That Monday I met with the Mayor. Mayor Arrington told me the very same thing. He said, " ; Reuben, this tax will kill Birmingham." ; I said, " ; Mayor, the county needs that money." ; He put his hand on my shoulder and said, " ; Reuben, I understand. See if you can de1ay it." ; I never asked him why. So I came back and talked to Chris and David Orange. I said, " ; I had a meeting with the Mayor and he wanted to know do we have to vote on this tax tomorrow. " ; It was Tuesday. So Chris said, " ; Man, you know we need that money and you know it' ; s clean. There are no (Inaudible) about it. Tuesday morning I went in chamber and that resolution was leading the agenda and I voted to support it. At evening the Mayor comes into my office. He was pretty hot. He said, " ; Reuben, I never been so disappointed in my life." ; I said, " ; What' ; s the problem, Mayor?" ; " ; You supported that tax." ; I said, " ; I never told you I wouldn' ; t." ; " ; I can' ; t put up with this." ; He went in circles talking about he couldn' ; t put up with that. I was startled. And later now, you think about it. Later on, even after this, now, I voted to support the Civic Center. If I hadn' ; t supported it, it wouldn' ; t have gone through. Now, it takes three votes to run it. Jim Gunner and Catapotis was not in favor of the Civic Center expansion, but I supported it with the occupational tax money. If the occupational tax hadn' ; t passed, the county wouldn' ; t have had money to put in the Civic Center. So, it was some poor connections there somewhere. My interest was the people. My head was down. I was thinking that the people were watching my back. And, I misjudged the Black people' ; s interest in the political process. I thought they were reading the newspaper and knew of the struggle I was having, trying to keep the hospital going. They knew what I had done and how I was being pressed and what not. Well, that told me that Black people did not have controls (Inaudible). And, I think that' ; s where we are today. HUNTLEY: Since then, we' ; ve had an event that has been, obviously world renowned that was the Million Man March. What was your opinion of the Million Man March, and did you attend? DAVIS: Yes. I attended and that was the most exciting moment of my life to be a part. To be in the crowd was the most exciting thing that ever happened to me. Based on the fact there is a serious problem in this country and the core of that problem is racism. Racism is a germ that it will have to be completely destroyed, otherwise it will surface and rebuild itself. My thinking of a million men all over the country, these men, such as myself, had realized that there was a problem in this country. There is a problem in the Black family. And, I wanted to be a part of the solution to that problem. Going to Washington, when I saw those men coming together that morning early from all directions, by the hundreds of thousands, I knew something very important was in the making here. And the results of it is this. We have had political power, but we blended our political power with White people' ; s dollars. That' ; s a bad combination. That won' ; t hold water. That' ; s like taking a sifter trying to clear out the Mississippi. Especially when you didn' ; t need them. In my district, about 70% Black, if I get Black support, what I need with dollars? But, see that wasn' ; t politics. And, I still hold that America still needs statesmen rather than politicians. Men that will stand on principal and not look back, but due to special interests of being integrated into the political process, it killed the force of the ballot. That ' ; s the reason that the Democratic Party has been destroyed and everybody from the Democrats are going Republican because that' ; s the trend.White backlash is gaining momentum.It' ; s gaining force. HUNTLEY: Why do you think that the Million Man March was so significant? DAVIS: The reason the Million Man March was so significant to me was because this is the first time that Black men had showed that kind of strength. And, the results of it, if we stand together as brothers, for the interest of our country, it goes back to things that have already been said. If America is saved, it will be saved by the soul of Black men, of Black people. So, I feel that once we have completed our work. And when I say completed our work, there will be no present need for the NAACP nor the Movement organizations based on the fact that we have been able to destroy the strong germ and force of racism. This has got to be done. HUNTLEY: Are you suggesting that that is at hand, the destruction of racism in this country? DAVIS: I see it in my lifetime. I see America as it' ; s going to surface. And, it is closer than you think. It' ; s going to surface as Dr. King said, " ; look at a man, at his character rather than his race." ; HUNTLEY: How then do you account for the ways in which White people versus Black people view the Rodney King situation, the 0. J. Simpson case and the Million Man March.And, most recently, of course the beating of the Mexican man and woman out in California? DAVIS: First thing. Human resources, (Inaudible), the country must understand and accept that. In the next place, we have problems that have to be solved by people. And, the solution to that problem is coming to a mind of a child or a person that was born in this world. Now, it becomes the responsibility of government to cultivate every once of human resources that we have available. None go wasted. The jails is not the solution to the problem. Now, I feel that the Million Man March, when all the dust has settled, they are going to have to look at it and say, " ; What is the problem?" ; And, then, look back and realize that AIDS, cancer, a lot of medical problems, diplomacy problems with China and other countries need to be solved, when you only have had sources from the White community dealing with these issues and you don' ; t know who God is going to give the solutions to those problems . Giants like George Washington Carver, Booker Washington was giants that couldn' ; t be stopped. Dr. Carver was a man locked into his world and God has given every man, every child born in this world, come in with a talent that needs to be activated. My interest was to sell to the public. " ; Let' ; s rid ourselves of discrimination for salvation." ; HUNTLEY: Let me just ask you about, in relation to the Million Man March, the media consistently talked about " ; separating the message from the messenger." ; How did you interpret that? DAVIS: Well, first place, the truth is very difficult to accept. Most people have a way of trying to shun the effects of the truth. Minister Farakhan has the personality and knowledge to speak his guts. And, once he says that, if he' ; s not saying the right thing, then, there is a lot of people who are going to be offensive. I feel that he can' ; t change that. But here' ; s the thing that turned the head, one time I was almost skepticable of those fellows that had skin heads and nice Black suits and what not and calling the White men " ; devils." ; I was somewhat skeptical of that. But, here was a man that called for millions of Black men to come to Washington. And, by virtue of his call, and then the response exceeded what he requested, I knew God was working in that. It' ; s not the matter of Minister Farakhan. God can use anybody he so desire. Minister Farakhan was a vessel in God' ; s hand because no man in this country ever -- the only one that has come close to that was Marcus Garvey. And today, if America can' ; t see the handwork of God in this movement, then we are totally lost. HUNTLEY: Thank you, Mr. Davis. DAVIS: Thank you very kindly. I certainly enjoyed the discussion and a lot more will need to be said. HUNTLEY: And we will take time to say them.Thank you very much. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Reuben Davis, II (April 1996)
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Reuben Davis II discusses how his work with the labor movement lead to his political career. He served as one term as a Jefferson County Commissioner.
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham.
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Dunbar High School (Bessemer, Ala.)
Jefferson County (Ala.). County Commission
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1996-04-03
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Horace Huntley
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Reuben Davis, II
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5.4 March 20, 1996 Reuben Davis, II Interviewed on March 20, 1996 19960320D 1:13:39 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Lessie Dingler Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company United States. Navy--Stewards Bethel Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) Reuben Davis, II Horace Huntley Video 1:|15(7)|32(3)|55(12)|72(1)|86(10)|100(12)|112(14)|125(2)|146(10)|163(5)|175(6)|188(15)|202(6)|215(3)|229(4)|244(3)|259(10)|275(1)|297(8)|317(8)|343(4)|361(12)|373(3)|385(7)|401(9)|412(14)|424(12)|441(13)|455(10)|476(10)|486(2)|501(12)|511(2)|522(11)|536(12)|545(10)|559(6)|571(14)|582(7)|597(6)|613(14)|626(3)|637(8)|650(10)|664(12)|677(14)|689(9)|703(11)|715(7)|727(2)|742(7)|756(5)|775(12)|785(1)|800(17)|810(3)|829(7)|853(7)|863(1)|878(10)|891(2)|912(2)|923(6)|939(4)|955(3)|973(17)|990(5)|999(3)|1018(3)|1027(8)|1037(12)|1050(12)|1063(1) 0 https://youtu.be/SzrLfAXbFVU YouTube video English 21 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with Mr. Reuben Davis for the Birmingham Civil Right Institute’s Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College and today is March 20, 1996. Thank you Mr. Davis for coming and taking time out of your busy schedule today. 33.481, -86.9089 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 38 Family Background I would just like to start by asking general questions about your background. Tell me, where were your parents from? Reuben Davis speaks about his family's background coming from Montgomery County, Alabama and moving to Birmingham, Alabama prior to him being born. African Americans--Marriage ; Agriculture ; Coal Mining ; Family Birmingham (Ala.) ; Chrysler automobile ; Detroit (Mich.) ; Montgomery County (Ala.) ; Mount Meigs (Ala.) ; Tuskegee (Ala.) 189 Community Background What community were you raised up in? Reuben Davis explains about his community in the Collegeville neighborhood in Birmingham, where he lived all his life amongst a mostly black community with some Italian presence. African American Communities ; African Americans--Agriculture ; Eligible Voters ; Italians American Cast Iron Pipe Company ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Norwood (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Sarenton Mines (Birmingham, Ala.) ; United States Pipe and Foundry Company 406 Early Education - Hudson Elementary So is that where you started first grade at Hudson School? Reuben Davis explains his first days at Hudson Elementary School (now Hudson K-8) in Collegeville, Alabama, and how he tried to skip, but was punished by his mother and never tried it again. Skipping School ; Truancy Program Hudson K-8 (Birmingham, Ala.) 534 Early Education- Ullman and Parker High School When you left Hudson, where did you go? Reuben Davis speaks about the time he was at Ullman and Parker High School and how Black education wasn't as valued as it should've been. African Americans--Vocational education ; Black Educators ; Black School Systems ; Cable cars (Streetcars) ; Football ; Integration ; Uniforms Bessemer (Ala.) ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Detroit (Mich.). Police Department ; Norwood (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Phillips High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Tuskegee Airmen, Inc. ; Tuskgee (Ala.) ; Ullman High School (Birmingham, Ala.) 886 Relationship With Birmingham Police Department I was going ask you that question about the relationship between the community and the Birmingham Police Department. Reuben Davis explains the lack of relationship they had with the police department, and how the only service they had was waste pick up. African American Community ; Mule ; Street Lights ; Waste Services Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Birmingham City Hall ; Birmngham (Ala.) ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Ullman High School (Birmngham, Ala.) 1006 Working on The Railroad After High School After high school, what did you do? Reuben Davis talks about going to work for L & ; N Railroad right out of high school, and the limitations of the company due to racial discrimination. Black Engineers ; College ; Inspector ; Job opportunity ; Locomotive ; Oiler ; Railroad ; Work place discrimination Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Tuskegee Institute ; Vanderbelt Crossings (Birmingham, Ala.) 1271 Drafted Into the Military Were you drafted in the service? Reuben Davis discusses his time being drafted into the Navy, and discovering that black men were becoming Naval officers, giving him a new perspective on his outlook of his career path. B-12 Program ; Blacks--Military--United States ; Naval officer ; Secretary of Navy ; United States. Navy--Stewards Europe ; Fargo Building (Boston, Mass.) ; Fort Benning (Ga.) ; Great Lakes (Ill.) ; Kennedy, John F. (1917-1963) ; New Orleans (La.) ; Newport Harbor (R.I.) ; Pacific Ocean ; Pearl Harbor (Hawaii) ; United States Military--Army ; Village Creek (Ala.) 1766 Returning to Birmingham, Lawsuit Against L& ; N Did you come directly back to Birmingham? Reuben Davis explains his first discrimination lawsuit he dealt with with L& ; N Railroad, about not being able to advance in the company because of his race. Machinist ; Race discrimination--United States ; Railroad Engineer Birmingham (Ala.) ; G.I. Bill ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; Nashville (Tenn.) ; Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), 1882-1945 ; Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 ; Tuskegee Institute 2076 Serving as Local Chairman For L& ; N Union You became a union representative? Reuben Davis becomes Union Representative and starts to make sure that people are doing what they are suppose to in their designated positions. Bible. New Testament ; Contracts ; Local Chairman ; Union Representative International Brotherhood of Firemen and Oilmen 2210 Fired From L& ; N Railroad How long did you remain after they started getting behind you? You actually lost your job? Reuben Davis discusses being fired from L& ; N Railroad because of not wanting to do certain work due to health issues. Oil Change ; Sabotage ; Tractor Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company 2489 Mechanic School & ; Work for J. Truitt Payne What did you do in the meantime? Reuben Davis talks about his time at J. Truitt Payne working as a mechanic until he leaves. Sick leave--United States Birmingham (Ala.) ; Flint (Mich.) ; Florida ; G.I. Bill ; General Motors Institute ; Industrial Mutual Association of Flint (Mich.) ; The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 2963 Working as the Mechanical Instructor at Dunbar High School Mr. Ephraim taught me auto mechanics and he said that there was an opening for a mechanic instructor at Dunbar. So, I called the principal to see about the job and maybe I'll might be able to get it. So, I called Mr. Abrams, he was the principal of Dunbar High School at the time and he asked me to come out there. I went out there. I had also worked on Ms. Nation’s car and she was crazy about me. Do you know Ms. Nation? Reuben Davis discusses how he was hired on at Dunbar High School in Bessemer, Alabama to teach auto mechanics. Black Educators ; Superintendant ; Teacher Dunbar High School (Bessemer, Ala.) 3118 Conflict With White Staff Member at Dunbar You had a problem between a Black man and a White man? Reuben Davis explains how one of the white staff members at Dunbar High School got into a confrontation with him, and when bringing it up to the black principal didn't help because of the discrimination still going on at the time. Football ; Physical Violence ; School Photographer ; Superintendant Abrams High School (Bessemer, Ala.) ; Miles College 3358 Fired and Rehired After Winning Lawsuits against L& ; N and Bessemer Board of Education From then, I started writing editorials. I have my first editorial I wrote for The Birmingham News. Later on, Mr. Branch called me one morning and wanted to know, “Davis, what about all this editorial writing?” I said, “What about it?” He said, “Davis, you know what I’m talking about.” He said, “Don’t say I didn’t tell you.” He was trying to tell me not to write. But, I continued to write. And, finally in 1970, the Bessemer Board of Education fired me and I won that back and retired. Reuben Davis talks about his lawsuits and winning them up against L& ; N Railroad and the Bessemer Board of Education. Editorials ; Lawsuits ; Teachers ; Termination Bessemer Board of Education (Ala.) ; Birmingham News ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company 3443 Joining the Movement And, we know that this is through the 40s, 50s and in 1956, of course, something very significant happened in Birmingham with the NAACP being outlawed from operating in the State of Alabama. The Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights was organized. Reuben Davis talks about how he got started in the movement, and how he helped bring Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth to Birmingham. Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Ladies Hebrew Benevolent Association (Selma, Ala.) ; Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company ; National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ; Patterson, John Malcolm, 1921- ; Selma (Ala.) ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Wallace, George C. (George Corley), 1919-1998 3578 Bethel Baptist Church Bombing What was your initial duties with the Movement? Were you one of the charter members of the Alabama Christian Movement? Did you join immediately? How did you get involved? Reuben Davis explains that he didn't get involved in the movement until his church was bombed. Bethel Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Montgomery Bus Boycott, Montgomery, Ala., 1955-1956 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 3717 Meetings at Alabama Christian Movement How would you describe a mass meeting? Reuben Davis discusses how he was an armed guard for the movement, protecting the churches where the meeting was held. Armed Guards ; Police officers Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Shores, Arthur D. (Arthur Davis), 1904-1996 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 3865 Incident at Arthur Shores's Home Was there any time that you were Attorney Shores’ home that any suspicious activity took place? Reuben Davis explains how he was protecting Arthur Shores home one night when it got attacked. Armed Guards ; Gunshot wounds ; Terror attacks Shores, Arthur D. (Arthur Davis), 1904-1996 3924 Relationship Between Family and Church Members What was the relationship between you and other members of your church and your family as a result of your activities in the Movement? Reuben Davis talks about how his family was supportive while he was involved in the movement. Armed Guard ; Family Support Birmingham (Ala.) ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 4009 Changes to The Movement As you look back on the Movement and if you had the ability, what would you change about the Movement? Reuben Davis talks about how the movement should've focused on economic rights as well as social Economic Rights ; Social Equality ; Social Rights Civil rights movement 4100 Involvement in Demonstrations Did you take part in any of the demonstrations? Reuben Davis explains how he took part in demonstrations in Bessemer, Alabama. Civil rights demonstrations--Alabama Bessemer (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) 4127 Economic Changes Since the Movement Just in retrospect, as you look back on the Movement, and you talk about the social aspect versus the economic aspect, do you see anything that happened today that would lead in that direction that you would like to see go into? Reuben Davis discusses how Black people were thrown welfare unlike whites, and that from an economic standpoint things needed to change. African American single mothers ; Blacks--Attitudes ; Teen Pregnancy ; Welfare ; Whites--United States--Attitudes Bessemer (Ala.) ; Collegeville (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Mountain Brook (Ala.) 4268 Attending the Million Man March You attended the Million Man March, what did that mean to you? Reuben Davis talks about the need for his black brothers to come together during the Million Man March. Community ; Unity Amtrak ; Farrakhan, Louis ; Mall, The (Washington, D.C.)--Maps ; Million Man March (1995 : Washington, D.C.) 4355 Conclusion of Interview Mr. Davis, it’s really been great having you today. It’s obvious that we have a lot more to talk about. What I’d like to do is to really get you back and talk some more because that period between 1960 and the 1990s you were very active and you became county commissioner and we want to talk about that as well. So, I want to thank you for coming today and we’ll try to do this again. End of Interview Oral History Reuben Davis discusses his advocacy for employment equality, which includes serving in the labor union and filing multiple discrimination lawsuits against L& ; N Railroad. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Mr. Reuben Davis for the Birmingham Civil Rights lnstitute' ; s Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College and today is March 20, 1996. Thank you Mr. Davis for coming and taking time out of your busy schedule today. DAVIS: The pleasure is mine. HUNTLEY: I would just like to start by asking general questions about your background. Tell me, where were your parents from? DAVIS: Both of my parents are from Montgomery County. My dad came out of Tuskegee around Meigs, Alabama and my mother was born in Montgomery. HUNTLEY: When did they move to Birmingham? DAVIS: Well, they married in Montgomery and I was born in 1923. I have an older brother born about 1917, so somewhere in that area they came to Birmingham, around 1915 or 16 they moved to Birmingham for better employment. My dad was living on a farm around Meigs. HUNTLEY: Did he own his own farm? DAVIS: No. His father died early. And, so he had one brother and several sisters and my grandmother lived to be about 115 years old. She stayed there and educated two of her daughters on that farm and finally my uncle and my dad went to Mt. Meigs and brought my grandmother back here. But, my dad worked in the mines at first. HUNTLEY: Coal mines or ore mines? DAVIS: Coal mines. He worked coal mines for a short period of time, he and his brother. His brother stayed with the mines until around about 1950. He left and went to Detroit and started working for Chrysler. But, both of them worked a short period of time. My dad got scared and came out of the mine. HUNTLEY: How much education did your parents have? DAVIS: Well, my father' ; s education was limited. I think he went maybe to the primary grades. My mother was similar. Education opportunities were very limited for both of them. HUNTLEY: Did she work outside of the home? DAVIS: No. My mother never worked out of the home. She was a housewife and a mother. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters did you have? DAVIS: I have two brothers and two sisters. HUNTLEY: Where did you fit in that group? DAVIS: Well, I was the knee baby. In other words, they had to give me a title because when they started to call my baby sister, the baby, then that created a problem for everybody, because then they said I was a knee baby. My brother was the oldest and my sister, then I came in and then my other sister. Two boys and, then the girls followed. HUNTLEY: What community were you raised up in? DAVIS: In Collegeville. I was born within about five miles of where I live today. And the strange thing about it, I' ; ve never had a change of address other than military time. I never had any intention of ever leaving Birmingham. Even during the crises and before and all the hardship that we were going through, I still felt that Birmingham was the place to live. I never did leave. HUNTLEY: Well, how would you describe your community in Collegeville back in the days when you were growing up? DAVIS: When I was growing up, the only White people to live in Collegeville were Italians. But, according to census track, there were 8,000 Black people living within less than a mile square that went from the L& ; N Railroad down to US Pipe and, then from that to (Inaudible) Product, about less than a mile square was 8,000 Black people lived in that area. But, strange as it seems, in 1945, there weren' ; t but 11 qualified voters, all men. HUNTLEY: Out of 8,000? DAVIS: Out of 8,000. Eleven qualified to vote. I could name those men because Dr. A. V. Mitchell, I don' ; t know if you' ; ve heard of him. We had two doctors that served that community. Dr. Macklin and Dr. Mitchell. Dr. Mitchell was a surgeon and Dr. Macklin was a just a medical doctor. There were a few other miners that were qualified to vote, but just 11 men, and I was one of the 11. HUNTLEY: So you had an array of people in terms of occupations that lived in that community? DAVIS: Oh, no question about that. The community at that time, in the mornings about 6:30 you could see men going to work in different directions. L& ; N was to the east, US Pipe and ACIPICO was to the west, Sarenton Mines was to the north and, then, you see ladies going to Norwood, which was where the ladies worked as maids and cooks. Another thing happened at that time. Black ladies would carry baskets on their head. They would put the clothes on their head and walk to Norwood to their jobs. In the evening they would come back, bring those clothes, wash and iron them and carry them back. HUNTLEY: Why don' ; t we see women today with clothes on their head walking? DAVIS: I tell you one thing, I have had quite a bit of experience from traveling. Montgomery was noted for women that worked at some Black farmers garden. They would go and shell butter beans and peas all day long, but they were graceful. They could walk with a bucket of water on their head and not waste a drop. But, I' ; ve never seen a White woman with that. Another thing that puzzled me about the character of Black women in particular, they had a tendency to be graceful. Some of the teachers at Hudson would teach young girls to walk with books on their head. Somehow, we don' ; t look that way now. HUNTLEY: So is that where you started first grade at Hudson School? DAVIS: That' ; s when I first started school. I was wonderful. I was a mamma' ; s boy and I didn' ; t like being away from my mother. My first day at school, Miss Hill was my teacher. I had a midi-blouse on and they had greased me up with lard, had me all shiny and getting to school, I wanted to be at home with my mother. And, so there was a young fellow in front of me, I never did understand how he knew how to get out. I heard him say, " ; Miss Hill, may I be excused?" ; And, so, she said, " ; Yes." ; I saw him walk out. I said to myself, " ; That' ; s the way to get out." ; So, when he came back I asked if I could be excused. She said, " ; Yes." ; I didn' ; t stop until I got home. But in the meantime, after getting home, my mother was hanging (Inaudible). And, so I made up my cry just before I arrived to our home. And she jumped up and said, " ; What' ; s the matter?" ; I said, " ; Somebody took my lunch." ; Well, this was early before lunch period. She said, " ; Wait a minute." ; She went in and got a switch and went across my neck all the way back to school. And Miss McQueen, which I don' ; t understand why we don' ; t have a strong truancy program today, because that lady, Miss McQueen, which was a Birmingham City Truant Officer. My mother said, " ; I' ; m going to give you Miss McQueen." ; So I went over, Miss McQueen was going to take me to Mt. Meigs to the boys reformatory school and she told me if I didn' ; t stay in school that' ; s where I was going. So, I was no more problem. HUNTLEY: Did Miss McQueen live in your community? DAVIS: No. No. I don' ; t know where she lived. But she worked for the City of Birmingham. And, at that time, you didn' ; t find kids out of school. HUNTLEY: You had to answer to Miss McQueen? DAVIS: You had to answer to Miss McQueen. And, when they called the roll, if anyone was absent that was supposed to be in the classroom, those names were turned over to Miss McQueen and she would visit the homes and find out what was happening. That was a holy day for me because I learned then that I had to go to school. HUNTLEY: When you left Hudson, where did you go? DAVIS: Well, you know at that time, Parker was overcrowded. Parker High School was identified as the largest Negro high school in the world. And, Ullman was vacated. It used to be white school, so I had to go to Ullman for two years and Parker the other two to finish high school. HUNTLEY: So, it was Parker High School when you went or was it still Industrial High School? DAVIS: It was Parker High School when I went. I didn' ; t get to Industrial. Dr. Parker had died before I attended. But, one thing that was real strange to me as a lad. I had to ride Norwood streetcar to 11th Avenue South to walk about three blocks to Ullman. That' ; s where Bell' ; s building is on the campus now. That was Ullman High School. Well, I would pass Phillips on the bus, and I was curious, " ; Why do I have to pass a school going to school?" ; HUNTLEY: Did you ever really raise that question at that time? DAVIS: I raised that question. But, I found out that our teachers really wasn' ; t sensitive to their responsibility of enlightenment. I think they were either controlled or something. But, they never could discuss such issues as that. HUNTLEY: Why do you think that they could not discuss those issues? DAVIS: Well, I kind of think that our school system, and I learned to accept it as being a fact, there was a bit of control there. I don' ; t think the system, as such, was interested in the education of black people. They had to have a school just for the sake of having one in name only. If you got an education, it was a by product. But fortunately, we had teachers that were sensitive to our needs and they did what they could to really enlighten us. We lost a lot by integration. Those teachers, at that time, in other words, if you didn' ; t get what you were supposed to do, or do it in the way that you should have done it, then you had a problem. Parents supported that. HUNTLEY: What do you mean " ; We lost a lot because of integration?" ; DAVIS: Well, what happened, I felt that, and I was in the process of working in the Bessemer School system at the time, but the black teachers were pulled out of black schools and put into the white schools. Plus the fact that they also created another area of education called vocational education and that was a dumping ground for kids that were problem kids. It was saying that after they couldn' ; t measure up to a certain point, then it was a dumping ground. I was proud of vocational education, but I felt confident that a child to select a vocation was an asset, but the system itself had it as just something as a dumping ground for kids, because when I first started working at Bessemer, they wanted to give me the equipment that Bessemer High had used for 4 or 5 years and I refused to accept that. So I started there as a problem and eventually was fired. HUNTLEY: Before we get into Bessemer, let me ask you what do you remember about your high school experiences at Ullman and Parker? DAVIS: Well, the thing that stands out in my mind most is the fact that there was pride. We had to wear a uniform, you had to have your shoes shined and everyone who attended Parker High School had to go to general assemblies. We would have programs and they were an enrichment to the student body. There was a sense of belonging and a sense of pride that stayed with me. All the students that was in school, along with me that graduated from high school, during the time that I did, they have been successful. I don' ; t know one that didn' ; t. One friend of mine that lived in Collegeville, Clifton Casey, he finally was in Tuskegee at the time that the airmen was down there, so he was in the Air force at Tuskegee and he later retired as an inspector of the Detroit Police force. He was also the first black person, or first person to fly a helicopter for the City of Detroit Police force. So there was a pride. There was an accomplishment from high school equivalent to my opinion, to college today, just from high school. HUNTLEY: Were you active in any extra-curricular activities during high school? DAVIS: No. I wanted to play football, but I was too small. Coach Collins had selections from all over the city and, therefore, he could pick all big boys. But, I really wanted to play football. My interest in sports was skating. I loved to skate. We lived in Collegeville and the only paved street in the whole community was where we lived, and we' ; d be out there skating during the Christmas holidays. And, the police were driving red cars at that time. And, for no reason, whatsoever, when the police car would come, the kids would run off because police officers were known to get you and call you to the car and wind the glass down and once you put your head in wind it up so you can' ; t get it out and started hitting you upside the head. So, we' ; d run and hadn' ; t done nothing. HUNTLEY: I was going ask you that question about the relationship between the community and the Birmingham Police Department. DAVIS: There was no relationship whatsoever between the city fathers and the Black community of Collegeville in particular. I don' ; t know about any other community. But, the only service that we received from the City of Birmingham was a man that was called " ; the 10 gallon can man." ; And, you know what that was? HUNTLEY: No. Tell me what was that? DAVIS: " ; Ten gallon can man" ; was the man who would take the cans from the outhouse and dump those cans. That' ; s the only service we had. No garbage service. HUNTLEY: Was this a Black man or a White man? DAVIS: It was a Black man. You see, Jerry was our man. He had his wagon and a mule and he would come in the alley and you had this tin can in the outer house. My job at home was dumping the slop jar in the tin gallon can. But we had no connection whatsoever. I remember, after coming out of the service in 1945, I called Birmingham City, at city hall and asked them if they would put a streetlight on 34th Street and 27th Avenue because that was an area where it was dark. The only streetlights were located in the area where they had these Italian stores. The rest of the community was completely dark. So, I talked to a man that was fair and he told me he would look into. The next thing I knew, the street light was there. HUNTLEY: In your experiences in Ullman and Parker you said there " ; was a sense of pride" ; , in their dress, in their well-being in the community? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: After high school, what did you do? DAVIS: After high school, I went to work. I really didn' ; t have any reason or any encouragement at all to go to college. At that time there was no incentive. No matter how much education you had, at that time I finished high school in 1943. You could be a preacher. You could be a school teacher. You could sell insurance or work on the railroad or be a postman. Those were the only jobs available. And, so, I wanted to be a railroad engineer and I was excited about going to the railroad. And as soon as I finished high school, I went to work. HUNTLEY: What kind of work was your father doing? DAVIS: My dad was an oiler for the railroad. He oiled and lubricated each (Inaudible }. In other words, they would have two oilers, they were mostly Black, and their responsibility was to put oil and packing in the (Inaudible) to keep the train boxes from running hot. You see if it would run hot it would cause a wreck. One thing that was real strange about that, later I became seriously concerned about it. The Black men were helpers and the White employees were inspectors or car men. Now, here, a Black man is oiling the box and the inspector is supposed to come behind and check it to see if it' ; s properly oiled. But, even if the box ran hot, the oiler, the Black man was held accountable for it. A lot of them lost their jobs because a box was hot or the train had to pull a car out. HUNTLEY: So the inspectors were never held accountable? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. And, really, it was their responsibility. If they were inspectors, they were supposed to see to it being done right. But, if anything went wrong, it was always the helpers fault. HUNTLEY: So, out of high school you went to work for the railroad? DAVIS: Went to work for the railroad immediately. HUNTLEY: What company? DAVIS: The L& ; N. HUNTLEY: What was your first job? DAVIS: My first job was a laborer. My dad didn' ; t want me to work for the railroad. In fact, at that time, if your parent or father or someone worked at the company and recommend you, you' ; d get hired. So, there was a neighbor that I knew, Mr. Lewis Berry, he worked out there and was the one that got me the job. My dad wanted me to go to Tuskegee, wanted me to go to school, but I didn' ; t want to go to school. HUNTLEY: You didn' ; t want to go to school? DAVIS: No. No. HUNTLEY: You didn' ; t see any need, whatsoever? DAVIS: None, whatsoever. At that time, I didn' ; t see any need for it. I was interested in getting married and, so I wanted a family and I needed a job and I was seriously concerned about a locomotive engineer, but there was no race issue ever discussed in our home. I didn' ; t think about only whites could be an engineer, that never occurred to me at that time. So I started working as a laborer and from that I stayed with the railroad. HUNTLEY: You said " ; it never occurred to you that a Black man couldn' ; t be an engineer?" ; DAVIS: It never occurred to me. I lived not too far from the L& ; N main lines. If you familiar with the Vanderbilt Crossing , it' ; s a fish market right there. That was the main line. And I would see the passenger trains and the freight trains going north and south. At that time they had several passenger trains running around Birmingham daily. HUNTLEY: Were there Black engineers? DAVIS: No. No. No Black engineers. Black firemen. You would see a Black man as a fireman and a White man as an engineer. But, for some reason, in my mind locked on the power of that locomotive, but I wanted to be the one to pull that throttle, I really did. HUNTLEY: You aspired to be an engineer? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. HUNTLEY: So you went to work as a laborer? DAVIS: To start at the bottom. HUNTLEY: How did you progress? DAVIS: Well, I found out that the engineer' ; s job wasn' ; t for me. And, I didn' ; t realize the consequences behind that. I had backed off at that point until I went into the service. HUNTLEY: So you worked for several years? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Were you drafted in the service? DAVIS: Yes, I was drafted. HUNTLEY: Tell me about that experience. DAVIS: Well, when I was drafted, in 1944, I noticed I wanted to be in the Army because I could swim. I learned to swim in Village Creek. We didn' ; t have any pools or parks. But, I never could see myself swimming in the ocean, so I didn' ; t want to go to the Navy, but they put me in the Navy. They sent me to Fort Benning, Georgia and I took an aptitude test and they decided that I would be in the Navy. But, what I noticed about that, going in the Navy, if you had a high school education or above, they would put you in the steward' ; s branch in the Navy. If you had less than a high school education, they would send you to Great Lakes, Illinois, which was a naval base that train seamen for various crafts aboard the ship. The only stewards were cooks, and make beds, clean up the rooms or areas of the officers. So they put me in that area and here I was made for the whole war. I mean, just disgusted the whole time I was there. HUNTLEY: Well, why? Did you expect to be put in another area? DAVIS: Well, I wanted to be a naval officer. And, I felt I was eligible for that. I had 4.0 conduct and I was willing to take training. First, the Secretary of the Navy, whose name was Knox, I shall never forget it. There was pressure from all over the country to have, there was a B-12 program where blacks could go into to become naval officers. But Secretary Knox stated that before he would allow any black man to become a naval officers, they would fly the flag at half mast. And, they did that. After that, they began to have black naval officers. I never did get a chance to get into that area, because I had some serious problems and, from that I had a strange experience of hatred that built in my heart. HUNTLEY: You said, " ; you were angry the entire time you were in there." ; How did that anger manifest itself during the time that you were there? DAVIS: Well, what happened. I was made to shine officer' ; s shoes. To make officer' ; s beds up and to serve them with a little white coat on. I was in PT' ; s. I was in the same outfit that President Kennedy was in. He was a " ; dollar a year man" ; and all of the men in the PT... HUNTLEY: He was what kind of man? DAVIS: Dollar a year. HUNTLEY: What does that mean? DAVIS: That means that he didn' ; t accept a salary from the government. But the government won' ; t allow you to work for them for nothing, so he was identified as a " ; dollar a year man." ; I didn' ; t know him personally, but I knew that he was there at that time and he was PT boat 109. Well the training facilities were at Newport, Rhode Island. I was assigned to that unit to learn how to prepare the tables and cook, and this sort of thing. And I had some experiences at Newport that I think changed my whole life. There was a program where the steward, which was over us, he was a Petty Officer, but he was still a steward. Now, they wouldn' ; t allow us to wear the crow on our arm. We wore a moon. A little white moon to indicate the rank, but White sailors had a crow and, then ranks under there. But, however, the steward told me on this occasion that I was assigned to work in the officer' ; s club. That night, when the club opened around 8:00 or 9:00 o' ; clock, then I was to go up there to work. They would pay you extra money for that but I told the steward, I said, " ; I don' ; t care to work. Give it to someone else." ; He said, " ; You have duty up there." ; I said, " ; I don' ; t care for the money." ; He said, " ; You got to go." ; I said, " ; If I have to go, when the bugles are sounding taps, I' ; m hitting my rack." ; Because I had to get up 5:00 that morning to go in the galley. So, that was the beginning of a serious change in my life. And, so I went up to the officers club and carried drinks from the bartender to the officers. They were dancing and drinking with their guests and what not. So, when I heard the bugler sound taps, I had a drink in my hand, I put it down on the table and walked out. I went by the Executive Officer' ; s office and wrote a note and explained to him what had happened concerning the stewards and steward' ; s mates getting up at 5:00 o' ; clock in the morning to go to work and working until 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning at the club. I told him I didn' ; t care to work at the club and I was forced to go up there and I didn' ; t think that was proper. So, I told my best buddy about that and strangely as it seemed, the next morning my name was called out to report to the Executive Officer. I went to his office, the steward was there and he said, " ; Davis?" ; I said, ' ; ' ; Yes, sir." ; He said, " ; Did you write this note?" ; I said, " ; I Did." ; I told him on the note if it cost everyone to suffer, ask and I' ; ll present myself to you. So he said, " ; What do you mean by this?" ; I said, " ; Well, sir." ; I said, " ; I explained to the steward that I didn' ; t care for the extra work and he insisted that I go up. So at taps, I knew I had to get up early in the morning and started working in the galley so I just come up and went to bed." ; So, the Executive Officer asked the steward, " ; Did you tell him he had to work up there?" ; He said, " ; Yes, sir." ; He said, " ; Well, I' ; m telling you, he didn' ; t have to work up there." ; He said, " ; But Davis, you didn' ; t handle this the proper way." ; And, so that settled that part but within the next two days I was shipped out. They shipped me to the Pacific, to Pearl Harbor. HUNTLEY: You were determined to be a troublemaker? DAVIS: Well, I would say I was determined to be my own person. HUNTLEY: I' ; m sorry. They determined that you were a troublemaker? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. And, so they shipped me out. I went to Pearl Harbor and stayed there for about 7 or 8 months and had to come back to the same place. I was there about two weeks and they shipped me over to Europe. So I served in both theaters of war. After I came back from Europe but they were still fighting in Japan. And, so time I got back to Newport they were going to send me back to the southwest Pacific. And so, I told them I refused to go. They settled down and shipped me to Fargo Building in Boston and I stayed there and from there they sent me to New Orleans and I was discharged . HUNTLEY: So you had made the determination about what you would do and what you would not do? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. I had decided that I was a person. I found out that if I had opportunity I could do anything anyone else could do. Especially in an area that I decided I wanted to go in. I was determined to stand on that and that was my life. I' ; ve always been like that. HUNTLEY: So you mustered out from New Orleans? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Did you come directly back to Birmingham? DAVIS: Back to Birmingham and back to the L& ; N. And, when I get back to the L& ; N now is the time I' ; m pressing for this higher job because I' ; ve seen Black men in the Navy operate cranes and drive trucks. HUNTLEY: Are you pressing at that point for the engineer' ; s job? DAVIS: I wrote a letter to the master mechanic. First I asked for apprentice training as a machinist because I wanted to work up. And, so he called me to his office. He said, " ; Davis, why you want to be a machinist." ; He said, " ; I' ; ll give you a leave of absence to go to Nashville." ; There was a school in Nashville that taught dentistry. He was going to make a dentist out of me. I told him, I said, " ; I can' ; t leave Birmingham. I have a family here and I want to be able to work the top job that I' ; m qualified for." ; What happened, when I applied for the job as an apprentice machinist, that was under the GI Bill. The government would guarantee me an opportunity but they left it up to me to find somewhere to work as an apprentice. So, they sent me to Tuskegee to take an aptitude test. Tuskegee approved that I was eligible and qualified to be an apprentice machinist and, then I come back to the shop and, when I came back, then that' ; s when the ball started turning in a way that I realized that I had a fight on my hands. They never did. I ended up in court. I was the first person, I' ; m pretty sure of this. I have a notebook that my daughter put together for me. Judge Lynn was appointed by President Roosevelt as a District Judge for the Northern District of Alabama, so I filed a discrimination case against the L& ; N. HUNTLEY: Was this as a result of not getting the job? DAVIS: Not getting the position that I was after. And, so we went to court. Now, at that time I' ; m representing a bunch of men out there. HUNTLEY: What year is this? DAVIS: That was in 1946. In my first discrimination case, I knew that the men out there was in the same situation that I was in. I realized that. But, I couldn' ; t afford to ask them to follow me, because I knew I was committed to go all the way. I never did ask anybody to sign a petition or to testify with me or anything of the kind. So, going to court, the company had, there was one friend of mine who was with me in the court, Erskine Pinkens. He' ; s dead now. He was in the court, but what happened, the foreman, Mr. Mulvaney was the foreman at the Round House. That' ; s where the engines were located. And, at that time I was working on the coal shoot, putting coal and water on locomotive engines. Mr. Mulvaney testified in Judge Lynn' ; s court stating that I was " ; hot headed." ; In other words, that no one could tell me anything. Well, see, the agreement was that the promotion was based on ability, merit and seniority. They admitted that I had ability and seniority, but I didn' ; t merit the position because I was a " ; hot head." ; And, Judge Lynn ruled against me. Had I had that case later, I would have won it. HUNTLEY: How long did you stay on that particular job? DAVIS: I stayed at the L& ; N until 1950. The railroad went on a strike and, at that time, I' ; m Local Chairman now, and I had filed a suit against the company. In order for them to maintain their integrity, they had to promote every Black man out there. They had to offer all of the laborers promotions to a higher rate of job. And, then, I felt real happy about it because I was responsible for those men getting those top rate jobs, including my father. My daddy didn' ; t accept it, but they had to offer him a car man' ; s job. And, my brother, he was hired as a car man. In fact, he retired as a car man. But, in order for them to defeat me, and they singled me out and said that I didn' ; t merit the job because I was a " ; hot head" ; and I knew they couldn' ; t say the same thing about everybody out there, so they had to promote them. HUNTLEY: You became a union representative? DAVIS: Yes . I was the Local Chairman. I was in charge of the union at {Inaudible) Shop. Local 1044 was our local. International Brotherhood of Firemen and Oilmen. Being in that position, we had our meetings at the Masonic Temple and I would tell the men that if you do your job, I' ; ll defend your rights. But, if you' ; re caught sleep or if you come to work drunk, or if you' ; re caught stealing, don' ; t ask me to represent you, because I can' ; t defend that. And, I was more or less a good employee because I was encouraging people to be good workers. But the company just couldn' ; t control me. And, just like laborers work, we were cleaning the yard. There was a contract. I kept a copy of the union contract and a New Testament all the time. I read both of them. So, on one occasion, where a car man was cutting a piece of waste material in repairing a box car and, he had a helper with him, which was a Black man. So, what happened , it was reported to me that this helper was picking up scrap. So, I had the privilege of getting off my job to look into any problems in the shop. So, I went up in the area and I talked to the foreman, I said, " ; Mr. Mulvaney, that' ; s scrap material." ; He said, " ; Davis, the car man just cut that and a helper right here, why can' ; t he pick that up and put that in a trash can?" ; I said, " ; Because it' ; s laborers work." ; I said, " ; That' ; s the agreement." ; He said, " ; Davis, you never would make a foreman." ; What happened, he was trying to condition me to accept a position and that would solve the problem. But, what he didn' ; t understand I didn' ; t want to be a foreman. I wanted to be a machinist. And, so, behind that they began to get after me. HUNTLEY: How long did you remain after they started getting behind you? You actually lost your job? DAVIS: Yes, I lost my job. What happened, I was a tractor operator and it was just customary for me to check the oil in a machine before I started. So, I checked the oil in the tractor that morning and found the oil stick absolutely clean. So I put the stick back down to check it and found that crank case was filled with gasoline. If I had started that engine, it was an old Ford some Tractor. If I had started that engine, with the ignition on top and gasoline fumes in the crank case, there' ; s no telling what would have happened. So I didn' ; t make no noise about it. I had the tractor pulled to the machine shop and drained that gasoline out and put oil in and went on about my work. HUNTLEY: Was that an error that someone committed? DAVIS: I don' ; t know if somebody was purposely trying to do me any harm. But I never did made any shout of it. I never did say anything about it, but that happened. But, finally, my job was to keep about 300 car men busy with material. I was carrying material to rebuild box cars. So, on one occasion my tractor was broke down. Well, normally speaking, when a tractor was broke down, the guy would go to the shop and stay until his tractor was ready and, then he would go back to work, but I didn' ; t do that, because I knew they were watching me. So I kept my work going by using an idle tractor. And, so they found out that I was determined to work. Mr. Hollingsworth, my immediate foreman called on the PA system and told me to go to the north end of the shed. So I did. He said, " ; Davis, we want you to roll wheels." ; Now, rolling wheels in the wheel shop was right there in the area. A box car wheel weigh 350 lbs and the axle weight 750 lbs. I had a boil under my arm when I left home that morning, but I didn' ; t lay off work, I came because I got to handle this tractor. But to move that wheel to get that much weight started, you had to exert quite a bit of effort. So, I informed the foreman , I said, " ; Mr. Hollingsworth, it' ; s very difficult for me to roll wheels." ; I said, " ; I came to work because I can handle my tractor, but I got a boil under my arm." ; He said, " ; You refuse to work?" ; I said, " ; I' ; m not refusing to work. I' ; m just telling you I can' ; t roll wheels." ; He said, " ; You' ; re going to roll wheels." ; When he said ' ; it like that, I said, " ; Well, if you insist that I roll wheels, I prefer punching out." ; I had the privilege of hitting the clock any time. So that was the day they were looking for. So he went to the office and the master mechanic called me to the office and sent me to Dr. McGruder for an examination. I knew my fate was sealed in the envelope. He sealed the envelope and I never did try to look at it. I carried it to Dr. McGruder. He examined my arm and sealed it back and sent me back to the shop. So, when I got back to the master mechanic' ; s office. He said, " ; You go down and do anything you want to do." ; I knew I was fired then. So, about 3 or 4 months after that is when the master mechanic came through there, down in the shop and gave me a letter. When he gave me the letter, I put the letter in my back pocket. He said, " ; Davis, I want you to read that letter." ; I said, " ; I' ; ll read my mail when it' ; s convenient. Right now I' ; m busy." ; He was the bossman. He knew that my job was to carry this material back and forth. He said, " ; If you don' ; t mind, read that one now." ; I took the letter out of my pocket. It said, " ; You are hereby discharged from service to the company effective immediately." ; He said, " ; Do you understand the letter." ; I said, " ; Yes." ; He said, " ; Get off the company' ; s premises the quickest way you know how to get off." ; Now that was a change in my life at that point. The only money I had in the world was less than $10.00 and that' ; s what I had on the books. But, I was obedient to him. I knew all he wanted me to tell him, I needed my job, which I did. But, I walked across that train yard, got off his premises and went home and it took me three years to win that job back. HUNTLEY: What did you do in the meantime? DAVIS: In the meantime, the first thing, I was the first black person to serve as a mechanic on new cars. I went to school on the GI Bill to be a mechanic and also attended General Motors Institute in Flint, Michigan. So, I went to J. Truitt Payne. I asked him did he service his used cars. He said, " ; No, we send that work out." ; I was dressed in a blue suede suit, white shirt, blue tie, shined shoes. I asked him, I said, " ; Well, if you have equipment, I could service those cars for you, make a job for myself and save you some money." ; He said, " ; Fellow, I been on this corner 21 years, it wouldn' ; t do for me for a car to go a block and stop running. I said, " ; Mr. Payne, if you have the equipment, I can tune a car better than anybody in town or just as good." ; He said, " ; Come back in two weeks." ; In two weeks I was right there again. At that time, I didn' ; t even own a car. He said, " ; I been thinking about you. I have an opening in the new car department," ; and asked if I had my tools. I said, " ; I have my tools." ; He said, " ; I' ; m going to hire you over there." ; He said, " ; Now you know how things are here." ; He said, " ; You' ; ll be working for a white fellow. If he call you a wrong name, it' ; s one or two things you could do. You can tell me about it or you can pick up a hammer and knock the hell out of him." ; I said, " ; Well, if you hire me, I won' ; t make any problems for you." ; So, he hired me and I worked for him about 3 or 4 years. Then, I left there and started teaching school. I worked at the post office after leaving J.Truitt Payne. I worked at the post office about a year. HUNTLEY: Did you ever have any difficulties at J. Truitt Payne? DAVIS: I did. The gentleman that I was working with at first, he and I worked like two peas in a pod. His name was George. He found out that I knew mechanics and I didn' ; t bother him. He had his stall and I had mine. We were preparing new cars for the show room. When they come off the truck, we had to examine those cars to check them for rattles, noises and put the floor mats, radios and heaters, just any kind of minor work to be done. So, after working with George for a period of time, I never did have problem. So, finally, he became ill and after he was off for about 3 or 4 days, I saw the management and Mr. George had been very nice to me. We had worked together. I felt committed if I could do anything to help him, I would do that. So I asked the management did they have provisions for a man if he was sick, would they pay his salary. He said, " ; No, Davis, we don' ; t do that. Why you ask?" ; I said, " ; Mr. George is off sick. If you agree to pay him while he' ; s off, I' ; ll work whatever time is necessary to keep these cars moving for the sales department." ; He said, " ; It' ; s mighty nice of you, so I checked with Mr. Payne and find out." ; So, later on that evening he came out and told me, " ; Davis, we' ; ve agreed to pay Mr. George' ; s salary, but you need some help over here." ; Now, I kept those cars moving. So finally George came back and he told me, he said, " ; Davis, you know they paid me." ; I never did tell him that I was responsible for that. So finally , he asked that we go to Florida. He said, " ; I can get you a job in Florida, making more money than you' ; re making here." ; I said, " ; Mr. George, I can' ; t leave Birmingham" ; . He said, " ; Well, I' ; m leaving, I' ; m quitting." ; So finally, he quit. And, they hired another fellow. This fellow came in that morning with white trousers and a white shirt and a cup of coffee in his hand. He walked in this area. So, I was working on a car when he came in. And, I finished my car and road test my car and he came back. The minute I came back he said, " ; Davis, you finish this job here." ; That was one he was working on. I did that, because I thought maybe it was something that he had to do. So I found out his game, that he was wanting me to do all the work. So, I began to slow down on my job until he finished his. A doctor purchased two Chryslers. It was a Chrysler 300. That was one that had two four-barrel carburetors. It was a powerful engine, so I had tuned it up and was test driving it. And, so, when I came back, I stayed gone about 15-20 minutes this guy was standing in the alley there at J. Truitt Payne' ; s shop and he cursed me and said, " ; Where have you been?" ; I jumped out that car and told him exactly what I wanted to tell him. And told him, " ; Don' ; t ever ask me where I been anymore." ; HUNTLEY: What did you tell him? DAVIS: I told him, " ; None of your damn business." ; But (Inaudible) have come back and never said a word. But I knew that he didn' ; t know what he was doing. When I would put a radio or heater in a car, in the box where the radio was a template that would let you know where to drill a hole to put the antenna. He didn' ; t know what that was in there for. And, spotlights, you had a template to tell you where the holes had to be drilled. So, I would always get the (Inaudible) and get my round spot there and take my punch and strike and, then drill my hole and it was the right place. But, he never did do that. So an order came in for a spotlight to be on a car and it was another car that had a heater and a radio, which was more difficult. But I knew that he could handle the spotlight, because he could take that punch and kind of guess about where to put it. And, he struck that car and started his drill to moving and I' ; m busy putting a radio and heater in this car that I was working on. And, so, finally he asked me, he said, " ; Davis, would you come over here and see where this drill." ; He had been drilling a long time. When I walked over and he started to drill, the drill came straight through the dash. And I said, " ; The drill has come through the dash." ; So, he knew he had messed this car up. So I went back to my job and later on that evening management came over and said, " ; Davis, who that messed up this dash?" ; I pointed to the fellow. He said, " ; Davis, why did you take that job?" ; I said, " ; I took the hardest job." ; I said, " ; Putting a heater in, I could think he could do that, and putting a radio in a car, I did both of them and I felt that he could do a simple job putting the spot light on." ; He said, " ; Davis be more careful next time." ; When he said that, I knew then it was my time to go. So in a few days I gave Jack Payne a five days notice that I would resign. So, after that I told them that, he came to me and said, " ; Davis, we can' ; t let you go. What' ; s the problem?" ; I said, " ; Mr. Payne, I promised you I wouldn' ; t create a problem for you." ; I said, " ; I see a problem surfacing." ; He said, " ; Well, if you talking about this fellow," ; (I forgot his name). He said, " ; Today is his last day." ; I said, " ; He needs a job just like I need one." ; And so, I quit and I started doing mechanic work around my home. And, finally an option came open. Mr. Ephraim taught me auto mechanics and he said that there was an opening for a mechanic instructor at Dunbar. So, I called the principal to see about the job and maybe I' ; ll might be able to get it. So, I called Mr. Abrams, he was the principal of Dunbar High School at the time and he asked me to come out there. I went out there. I had also worked on Ms. Nation' ; s car and she was crazy about me. Do you know Ms. Nation? HUNTLEY: Yes. DAVIS: Well, she was quite a woman. At any rate, I had worked on her car. She had a clutch that went bad on her and I fixed her car. So, from then on, I was her mechanic. So, when I got to Dunbar High School and Mr. Abrams asked me what kind of work I had done. So, I started talking about the work I did with Payne. And, so, somehow Ms. Nation came up. He said, " ; You know Ms. Nation?" ; I said, " ; Yes, sir." ; He said, " ; Will Ms. Nation recommend you?" ; I said, " ; I' ; m certain she would." ; He said, " ; If you know Ms. Nation, you' ; re alright." ; So he, in turn, told the superintendent that he would accept me. So the superintendent had me to come in his office. He said, " ; Mr. Davis, if we hire you would you move to Bessemer?" ; I said, " ; No, sir." ; He said, " ; Well, if you live in Birmingham, that' ; s quite a ways." ; I said, " ; But, I live in Birmingham." ; He said, " ; Well, we' ; ll let you know." ; So about five o' ; clock that evening he called me and told me if I wanted the job, it was mine. And so I started at that school. But it was because of a recommendation from Ms. Nation and, also a high recommendation from (Inaudible) Payne. HUNTLEY: How long did you teach school? DAVIS: Thirty years. Now, at that time I had no interest in teaching. I had no college training. At that time I realized that they didn' ; t care who taught black children. But, my interest and love for children was such that I was proud to have the job and I made a difference. I' ; m certain I did because I just met some of my former students and we plan to have a reunion of all the boys I' ; ve taught over those 30 years. So I ran into a serious problem out there. HUNTLEY: You had a problem between a Black man and a White man? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Can you tell me about that? DAVIS: Well, Mr. Walter Branch was my principal at this time. Mr. Abrams had passed. They had built Abrams High School and I was one of the first teachers that went in that area in that school. Mr. Abrams really was the first Black man I had ever worked under as my boss, and I was proud of that. I respected that and honored him for it. After Mr. Abrams passed, Mr. Branch was the first principal of Abrams High School. HUNTLEY: He was a Black man? DAVIS: Walter Branch was a Black man. So, I was also the school' ; s photographer. Mr. Branch instructed me at 12:00 get the school' ; s camera, go out on the campus and take pictures of the football team. We had won the championship that year. I was one of the first persons to photograph a football game with a 16mm camera. I did a lot of work even for Miles College. When I came back in my classroom, about three minutes after lunch period, which was 12:00 o' ; clock, Mr. Branch was my principal, and he knew my lunch period was over at 12:00. But, I didn' ; t think about that. He' ; s my boss. He told me to take the pictures. When I walked in the classroom about 3 or 4 minutes after 12:00, Mr. S. C. Porch was my immediate supervisor and the assistant superintendent was in my class with their hats on. When I walked into the classroom, Mr. Porch said, " ; Davis, where in the hell have you been?" ; I knew he had the right to ask me where I had been, but not in that manner. I said, " ; Mr. Porch, I' ; ve been out getting pictures for the football team as I was instructed by the principal." ; He said, " ; I believe (Inaudible) . So I' ; m close to him now. I said, " ; It' ; s a simple matter for me to stay in the shop. You go up and tell Mr. Branch you want me to stay in the shop. Surely, if he tells me to be somewhere else the next time you come, you won' ; t find me." ; At that time he put his hands on my collar. He said, " ; I mean for you to stay in the shop." ; I never moved my hand from my side. I looked him in his face and my class was quiet. No kind of noise. I said, " ; Man, take your filthy hands off of me." ; I said, " ; Take your hands off of me right now, do you understand that?" ; He was not ready for that. He had dropped his hands and started shaking all over. HUNTLEY: This is a White man? DAVIS: And, when he started to trembling all over the assistant superintendent walked over to him and said, (Inaudible). By then I had walked out. But this is what opened my eyes to if we have a prize, this would open my eyes to it. I go into Mr. Branch' ; s office just to relate to him what happened, not to ask him for any assistance. I said, " ; Mr. Branch I was doing what you told me to do. Mr. Porch just handed my collar. I don' ; t play like that." ; Walter Branch looked at me like I' ; m looking at you and walked in his office and closed the door and never said a word to me about that from then or now. Then, I realized what a bad situation we as Black people were in, when our school officials couldn' ; t defend their own words, And, from that I became interested in politics. It didn' ; t hurt me what I was telling him. What I was concerned about, at least he could have said, " ; Well, I' ; ll straighten this out." ; He never said a word. From then, I started writing editorials. I have my first editorial I wrote for The Birmingham News. Later on, Mr. Branch called me one morning and wanted to know, " ; Davis, what about all this editorial writing?" ; I said, " ; What about it?" ; He said, " ; Davis, you know what I' ; m talking about." ; He said, " ; Don' ; t say I didn' ; t tell you." ; He was trying to tell me not to write. But, I continued to write. And, finally in 1970, the Bessemer Board of Education fired me and I won that back and retired. HUNTLEY: So you won the case after three years with L& ; N? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Did you get your job back? DAVIS: I got the job back and was paid for lost time at the L& ; N. HUNTLEY: But, did you go back to the L& ; N? DAVIS: No, no. I was teaching school then. But at the time when I won that job back, it was during the school vacation and I could work at the shop. At that time they had cut a lot of jobs off. So, I was working vacation vacancies, but later a regular job came open and I had to resign from the L& ; N so I could finish my work duties with the Bessemer Board. HUNTLEY: So, all of the time you are still living in Collegeville? DAVIS: Yes. HUNTLEY: And, we know that this is through the 40s, 50s and in 1956, of course, something very significant happened in Birmingham with the NAACP being outlawed from operating in the State of Alabama. The Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights was organized. DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: Were you there? DAVIS: I was there. Rev. Shuttlesworth was my pastor. He was the one that set the motion in Birmingham as to the struggle. In other words, he was the engineer behind that. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about those first days of the Movement? DAVIS: Well, one thing, as you stated the NAACP was outlawed by the state. That was, in my opinion, a bad move on the part of Governor Wallace to take that position.. HUNTLEY: It wasn' ; t Wallace, but Governor Patterson. DAVIS: Okay. For them to outlaw the NAACP, in my opinion was a bad move, however, if they had just put some plugs in their ear to listen to what Black people were saying and, then react like they (Inaudible). But they took a negative attitude. Rev. Shuttlesworth was just a determined person to the point that he just had nerve. When I was working with L& ; N, Mr. Wells, Rev. Shuttlesworth' ; s uncle, had told me at the time Rev. Shuttlesworth was in Selma at the First Baptist Church in Selma and wanted to come to Birmingham. So, our pastor, Rev. Laster had died. Our church was vacant. And, being a member of the church, we had the privilege to ask the chairman of the pulpit committee to invite various ministers in. So, I was the one that put Rev. Shuttlesworth' ; s name in to come to our church. HUNTLEY: So you were instrumental in Shuttlesworth even coming to Birmingham? DAVIS: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: What was your initial duties with the Movement? Were you one of the chartermembers of the Alabama Christian Movement? Did you join immediately? How did you get involved? DAVIS: Well, I didn' ; t actually get involved in the Movement until my church was bombed. When the church was bombed the first time, that activated a whole lot of people . We became seriously concerned. HUNTLEY: I believe it was December of 1956? DAVIS: That' ; s exactly right. When they bombed that church the first time, we were cleaning the church up on a Saturday for Sunday morning church services. My grandmother was living with us at that time. My dad had brought her to Birmingham. She was well into her 80' ; s at that time. {Inaudible) Funderburg was the senior person. Charlie Watson was the chairman of the deacon board, and a senior person. He was the treasurer of the church a dedicated follower of Rev. Shuttlesworth. When I saw those senior people come into the Sunday School after the bombing, I knew something important had took place, because they were supposed to have afraid to get involved. Knowing the nature of black people they weren' ; t supposed to get involved, and, I do believe from the bottom of my heart, that those that were planting those bombs, really wasn' ; t trying to hurt anyone. I think they were trying to terrorize and get us scattered. But they were unsuccessful. HUNTLEY: So you are saying it had just the opposite effect? DAVIS: Yes. In other words, it pulled people together. Very similar to the situation in Montgomery as far as the bus boycott in Montgomery. I guess people had gotten to the point that they was tired, but that was a move that pulled people together and, then, we started moving. Every Monday night when we would have a Movement meeting, they would announce on Sunday where they would have the meeting on the next night, you had to be there early to get a seat. HUNTLEY: Did you attend those? DAVIS: Oh, yes. HUNTLEY: How would you describe a mass meeting? DAVIS: Well, the meetings we had were good. Each night they had a speaker and they had good song services and it was crowded, and, then Rev. Shuttlesworth would have information that he would share as to what was happening, the progress of the Movement. It was just something that kept you occupied. HUNTLEY: I know you served as a guard? DAVIS: That' ; s right, I served as a guard at my church. My church is on 29th Avenue and 33rd Street. It was a dirt road then. Julius Clark' ; s father and I was on duty that night from 12:00 to 6:00. We had rifles that was loaded and was instructed that if we had to use a gun, to fire and leave. But, that particular night about 3:00 or 4:00 o' ; clock in the morning, I heard a car speeding around 34th Street headed toward the church. I knew whoever was driving that car didn' ; t know the area because of the steep curve. And, so, we alerted ourselves. When the car went across and found he was going into a dead end, he backed up and, then went down 29th. At that time Rev. Clark and myself walked out and we saw this car about three blocks down 29th. He was headed this way, headed west and another car was headed east. They stopped side by side, just like this. After a while the car headed to the church, driving slowly. That was a police officer. Now, that' ; s as close as I could get that a policeman was involved. HUNTLEY: Was it a police car? DAVIS: Yes, a police car. They came driving slow and shined their lights all around to see who was around. I saw that with my eyes, right in the middle of the street. HUNTLEY: Did anything happen that night? DAVIS: No, no. Nothing happened that night. But they were intending for something to happen because you could tell the car was up to something and whoever was driving the car wasn' ; t familiar with the area. And, also, I helped Stone Johnson, we also protected and guarded Arthur Shores home on Center Street. HUNTLEY: Was there any time that you were Attorney Shores' ; home that any suspicious activity took place? DAVIS: Well, I wasn' ; t on duty that particular night, but I think Stone might have been there. But someone was hurt one night. Some shots were fired. HUNTLEY: By you or someone else? DAVIS: Fired by us. And, I' ; m pretty sure somebody was wounded but you never hear anything about it. HUNTLEY: Into a car? DAVIS: In a car. HUNTLEY: What happened? What precipitated the incident? DAVIS: Well, they came by as if they were going to throw something of the car and shots started firing. And, I think it was probably in the paper, but at any rate, someone was hurt that night, but it was never known to me. HUNTLEY: What was the relationship between you and other members of your church and your family as a result of your activities in the Movement? DAVIS: Well, my family supported what I was doing. I mean, I never had any complaints from my wife. My children were real small at that time. When I had duty at the church or any guard duty, I just took that responsibility . And got up to go to work the next morning. In my church, I was a Sunday School teacher at that time. HUNTLEY: So, people simply accepted you as being one of those individuals that would really sacrifice yourself? DAVIS: Right. In other words, it was not all the members of the church were really supportive. I can' ; t even think of the names that weren' ; t, but, however, I know that all of them wasn' ; t, just like all of the churches in Birmingham really wasn' ; t supporting Dr. King nor Rev. Shuttlesworth. Some of the pastors in Birmingham didn' ; t support them. HUNTLEY: What about your brothers and sisters, were they active in the Movement? DAVIS: My brother was. My sisters weren' ; t. HUNTLEY: As you look back on the Movement and if you had the ability, what would you change about the Movement? DAVIS: To be frank about it, then, as now, I felt economic rights should have been the focus, rather than social. The sit-ins and the demonstrations, of course there were clerk' ; s jobs, but there wasn' ; t any emphasis put on economics. The Movement was more or less focused around social equality. As I look back then, if we had put heavy emphasis on economics, I don' ; t think the system would have been prepared to defend an economic move as they were a social move. The first thing they were hollering that Black men wanted White women. And, if they went after jobs, they couldn' ; t have said that. So, I even tried to get that opened into the Movement but I didn' ; t have any success there. HUNTLEY: You were not successful in changing the focus? DAVIS: No. I didn' ; t have enough wit to change the focus, but that was my interest then and it made sense then and it make sense now. HUNTLEY: Did you take part in any of the demonstrations? DAVIS: In Bessemer, I did. I was active in Bessemer but in Birmingham my working in the Bessemer school system, I just couldn' ; t get to Birmingham in time to be a part. I walked the streets in Bessemer HUNTLEY: Were you ever arrested? DAVIS: No. I never was arrested. HUNTLEY: Just in retrospect, as you look back on the Movement and you talk about the social aspect versus the economic aspect, do you see anything that happened today that would lead in that direction that you would like to see go into? DAVIS: Well, one thing I see negative that from an economic standpoint, we were thrown welfare. I saw a number of young ladies in Bessemer, and I never witnessed a White girl being pregnant in the school system in Bessemer while I was there for thirty years. But, I' ; ve seen as many as 3, 4 and 5 Black girls pregnant in one classroom. I heard from the little girls talking that if they are pregnant, they could get a check if they don' ; t identify a father. So, to my way of looking at that, the welfare benefits was essential to these people' ; s livelihood and they accepted as being that, and those handouts really retarded our progress and we' ; re still locked into that now. Now, they are fixing to take the welfare away from us, which it wasn' ; t right in the beginning. It wasn' ; t designed to help us. I wrote an editorial once asking why not share the administrative costs of welfare rather than the little measly checks that the people were getting, and you would find that a lot people living in Mountain Brook was on welfare, more so than people in Collegeville. But that was a pitfall for us and I think we are still locked into that right now. We are going to have walk through. The struggle is coming all over again. One advantage I see in the situation right now it' ; s going to bring us back together, and, then we can plot our course from this point on. We are hurting now, far more than we were before the struggle. HUNTLEY: You attended the Million Man March, what did that mean to you? DAVIS: The Million Man March, when I arrived in Washington that morning about 8:30 a.m., I was on Amtrak , I saw all these black brothers moving toward that mall and in my heart I said, " ; What is this?" ; Right now, if I make a move, I might shed tears. Because I went up there basically because I felt there was a need to come together. I had no idea that a million plus men would show up. But, I believe that those men were there because they accept part of the problem and they wanted to be part of the solution. I think it' ; s a force and I would say this, a lot of people have reasons not to admire or support Minister Farrakhan. But, I contend that the minister made that call, but God made the response. It was no way one man could have handled that and get that kind of response on his on and I feel as if something big is coming out of this. We are going to have some more suffering and hard days for some people. But, the results of what the system is moving now, they are going to put us back together, which is something they don' ; t really want, because we are going to come together out of need as we once were. HUNTLEY: Mr. Davis, it' ; s really been great having you today. It' ; s obvious that we have a lot more to talk about. What I' ; d like to do is to really get you back and talk some more because that period between 1960 and the 1990s you were very active and you became county commissioner and we want to talk about that as well. So, I want to thank you for coming today and we' ; ll try to do this again. DAVIS: Okay. The pleasure is mine. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=RDavisII19960320.xml RDavisII19960320.xml
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Reuben Davis, II (March 1996)
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Reuben Davis discusses his advocacy for employment equality, which includes serving in the labor union and filing multiple discrimination lawsuits against L&N Railroad.
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company
United States. Navy--Stewards
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Betty Hanson
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Abraham Woods Jr.
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March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.)
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5.4 April 30, 1998 Rev. Abraham Woods Jr. 19980430W 2:01:49 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexers: Anna Wallace, Alexandra Smith Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.) Abraham Woods Jr. Betty Hanson Video 1:|12(14)|25(2)|35(1)|46(6)|60(2)|72(17)|89(1)|99(4)|111(3)|122(5)|140(10)|161(12)|179(1)|186(17)|204(6)|219(2)|233(1)|244(5)|256(8)|265(11)|274(10)|286(2)|296(7)|308(11)|319(10)|329(14)|343(1)|356(11)|365(2)|382(7)|389(17)|401(16)|411(16)|423(13)|441(4)|454(5)|466(4)|477(8)|490(9)|501(3)|520(3)|529(12)|537(13)|548(11)|558(8)|567(7)|579(7)|582(7)|593(4)|600(3)|614(9)|629(13)|639(10)|647(10)|660(2)|667(3)|676(9)|683(2)|693(4)|701(1)|712(1)|722(16)|741(6)|750(5)|761(6)|771(4)|785(2)|797(1)|804(4)|811(14)|822(5)|836(6)|846(10)|855(4)|863(7)|869(2)|880(9)|893(15)|899(6)|909(14)|919(11)|930(1)|949(1)|963(7)|971(2)|982(2)|993(12)|1001(16)|1014(12)|1025(5)|1036(5)|1051(1)|1065(7)|1077(15)|1090(1)|1093(5)|1103(3)|1112(14)|1123(4)|1135(4)|1146(16)|1158(4)|1170(1)|1182(9)|1192(3)|1202(10)|1212(5)|1225(7)|1233(10)|1248(9)|1257(5)|1267(6)|1274(10)|1287(7)|1298(9)|1310(1)|1320(8)|1328(12)|1339(10)|1348(1)|1355(11) 0 https://youtu.be/Q1JOee1ndx8 YouTube video English 0 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with the Rev. Abraham Woods, Jr. for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s Oral History Project. I’m Betty Lee Hanson and I’m the interviewer. We’re recording it at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute on April 30, 1998. Reverend Abraham Woods in introduced. Oral history Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) 33.516200, -86.813870 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 19 Family Background Let’s talk about those early years, Rev. Woods in growing up in Birmingham. You spent all your early years growing up...Did I read that your father was from Pratt City? Tell me a little about that. Rev. Woods explains how he and all of his siblings are named after American Presidents ; he is named after his father, also Abraham Lincoln Woods. He also details his parents' educational and work background. DuBois, WEB ; East Thomas ; McWane Pipe Company ; Pratt City Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865--Views on slavery, [Views on temperance, etc.] 500 Interest in Black History & ; Educational Background Was it because you had his name that made you interested in history, too? Or was it something you got from your family? Rev. Woods details how taking a course called Negro Makers of History in high school led to his drive to be successful and an awareness of how Blackness affected his life. High School ; Parker High School African American history 702 The Emotional Toll of Social Segregation & ; Discrimination Then, there came a time when you couldn’t play with them anymore, right? Was that typical? Rev. Woods details the process of being able to play with white kids while young, but being separated once they got older. He goes on to discuss the hurt and anger that resulted from segregation. Anger ; Parker High School ; Police African Americans--Segregation ; Jim Dandy 1233 Higher Education Experiences & ; Brown vs. Board of Education After I finished school, I announced to them that I was going to go to college. So, I went to Morehouse. While at Morehouse, I came under the influence of Dr. Benjamin Mays. Morehouse gave me a tuition scholarship. Of course, I made plans to attend and of course, I received a letter from them saying that “we have accepted you and we’re giving you a tuition scholarship with the conditions that you continue to make a ‘B’ average, but we do not have dormitory space for you.” Rev. Woods details his educational journey and the community reaction to the ruling of Brown vs. Board fo Education. Daniel Payne College ; Miles College ; Plessy versus Ferguson Brown versus Board of Education of Topeka ; Mays, Benjamin E. (Benjamin Elijah), 1894-1984 ; Morehouse College (Atlanta, Ga.) 1613 Working at McWane Pipe Shop After I left Morehouse I went to work at the company where my father worked. Rev. Woods discusses working at McWane Pipe Shop, getting badly burned and then moving on to become a janitor as to avoid similar work. McWane Pipe Shop ; Phoenix Building Coal ash ; Manual labor 2008 Atlanta Life Insurance Company I eventually quit, because I wanted to go back to school. I took a job with Atlanta Life Insurance Company. I worked as a Life underwriter for a number of years. Rev. Woods explains that he went on to work as a life underwriter at Atlanta Life Insurance Company. It was there that he was called to ministry. Black owned businesses ; Daniel Payne College ; Ministry Atlanta Life Insurance Company ; Miles College 2167 The Importance of Work Ethic & ; Religion We are going to do that. I want two things. These are fascinating stories. Where did you get your work ethic? Rev. Woods explains how he got his work ethic from his father and the Church. College Hills ; East Thomas ; Work ethic Domestic work 2366 Meeting & ; Working with Fred Shuttlesworth For example, when did you meet Fred Shuttlesworth? When did you start all that? Rev. Woods details how he began working closely with Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth as a Vice-President of the ACMHR after the NAACP was outlawed in 1956. Johnson, Bernice ; NAACP ; Sardis Baptist Church ; Voter registration Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 2790 Committing to Non-Violence in the Movement How did you buy into non-violence when other people were willing to use violence? What made you buy into non-violence with all these human emotions you are experiencing? Rev. Woods explains how he and Rev. Shuttlesworth modeled their non-violent methods off of Dr. Martin Luther King's efforts in Montgomery. Miles Hawkins school ; Montgomery (Ala.) ; Non-violence King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Montgomery Bus Boycott, Montgomery, Ala., 1955-1956 ; Tallahassee (Fla.) 3133 Facing Death with Fred Shuttlesworth There were deaths happening to a lot of Negroes and some Whites that dared stand up. How did you get the courage to accept death as a possibility for what you were doing, Rev. Woods? Rev. Woods describes being inspired by Rev. Shuttlesworth to face potential violence with courage and strength. That courage led him to drive look out for Rev. Shuttlesworth during his attempt to integrate Phillips High School. Courage ; Phillips High School Bomb threats ; Integration ; Violence 3595 Riding First Class on the Bus Nobody’s with me. I’m a first class citizen. One morning I decided I was going to ride first class on the bus. They didn’t arrest me when we rode... Rev. Woods explains his decision to and actions during a Birmingham bus sit-in. He successfully and safely rode the bus to his destination while sitting next to an angry white man. Bus Sit-in Discrimination in municipal services ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 3904 Registering to Vote Let me ask you about when you registered to vote for the first time. How did that come about? These are very momentous things. Rev. Woods details how he helped get the community registered to vote by preparing them for the the extensive poll tests. He passed on the first try. Miles College ; Poll test Conner, Bull ; Voter registration 4045 Death Threats Rev. Woods, lets go back to that time. You said you got your courage, A: watching Fred Shuttlesworth and seeing his and then testing it yourself. How far would that courage have extended, you think, if your wife and your children had been [inaudible]? And were they? Rev. Woods describes how his family was treated, but Rev. Lamar Weaver was the main target as white ally to the Movement at the time. Boutwell ; SCLC ; Weaver, Lamar Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Vann, David 4267 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Comes to Birmingham So, now these things have happened. Shuttlesworth is working with you and several other people independently. What turned the tide and what made King decide to come to Birmingham? Rev. Woods details his experience with Dr. King speaking at the SCLC convention before being assaulted by an agitated white man. Drew, Deenie ; SCLC ; Walker, Wyatt Tee King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 4482 Teaching at Miles College & ; the Role of Dr. Lucius Pitts I finished Miles in the spring of ‘62 and I asked Dr. Pitts for a job and he gave me a job. Rev. Woods describes how he came to work with Dr. Lucius Pitts while he taught at Miles College. Dr. Pitts was one of Dr. King's advisors and Movement planning commonly took place in his office. Bible Education ; Conner, Bull ; Pitts, Lucius ; Voter education Miles College ; NAACP ; Reese, Carlton 5013 The Bombing of 16th St. Baptist Church, Demonstrations, and Jail 1963, obviously the bombing of the church. Do you think that changed everything? Or had it started because of the march in Washington first? Rev. Woods tells his perspective on what led to the 16th Street Church Bombing. He specifically details the sit-in at Loveman's lunch counter and his experience being jailed as a result. Hooper City ; Loveman's ; Lunch counter sit-in ; Newberry's 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Birmingham City Jail 5545 The Use of Children During the Movement How did you feel about taking the children? Rev. Woods describes how he did not know children would be involved in demonstrations, but he believes their arrests were an important tipping point in the Movement. 1963 ; Birmingham City Jail ; Hamilton, Hershel African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Children's Crusade ; Children's March 5943 Violence & ; Counter-Movements After that. It wasn’t going to be till August, the march on Washington. The bombing of Sixteenth Street was in September. We were going to [inaudible]. We went through some turbulent things. Rev. Woods details the tension and anger folks opposed to the Movement felt after the successes of the Selective Buying Campaign and demonstrations. He gives accounts of various events that lead to Birmingham's nickname, Bombingham. Bombings--Alabama ; Ku Klux Klan 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 ; Shores, Arthur D. (Arthur Davis), 1904-1996 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 6579 The March on Washington What brought about the decision to march on Washington? Rev. Woods recounts the moving experience of attending the March on Washington. Demonstration Jackson, Mahalia, 1911-1972 ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968. I have a dream ; March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.) 6974 16th Street Church Bombing The sick minded folk, the Klan, was not going to let us rejoice. They decided that they would show us, that they would pull the ultimate of horror out of their book. This is when the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was bombed on the 15th. Rev. Woods describes hearing the Sixteenth Street Church Bombing and arriving to the scene shortly after. Bombing ; Dynamite 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 ; Ku Klux Klan 7120 Resulting Anger, Violence and Police Brutality When I left there feeling bad, I went down toward my car and there was a group of Black young men with piles of rocks. Every car that passed with a White face they were throwing rocks. Rev. Woods describes the interpersonal violence and police brutality that ensued after the Sixteenth Street Church Bombing in 1963. Police brutality--United States ; Virgil Ware Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) Oral History Rev. Abraham Woods Jr. discusses working in Birmingham before working closely with Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth as a vice-president of ACMHR. He drove Rev. Shuttlesworth during the attempt to integrate Phillips High School, participated in bus sit-ins and attended the March on Washington. HANSON: This is an interview with the Rev. Abraham Woods, Jr. for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project. I' ; m Betty Lee Hanson and I' ; m the interviewer. We' ; re recording it at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute on April 30, 1998. I still keep thinking that we should be earlier then this but 1948, or something. The time is going too fast. Let' ; s talk about those early years, Rev. Woods in growing up in Birmingham. You spent all your early years growing up...Did I read that your father was from Pratt City? Tell me a little about that. WOODS: Well, my father is a native of the city. I don' ; t think we said Pratt City, because we grew up a number of years in what is called East Thomas there. Of course, we moved to other places in East Thomas, but East Thomas was the place where I was born, where I went to the elementary school and where I grew up. HANSON: Your name, interestingly enough, is Abraham Lincoln Woods, Jr. WOODS: Well... HANSON: Explain that to me. How did your father come up with...WOODS: My father' ; s name is Abraham Lincoln Woods. His name was Abraham Nathan at first. He changed it to Lincoln and, of course, my mother named me after him. I was the first son and the first child. So, she named me after my father. However, after that, it appeared that she became somewhat infatuated with Presidents, because all of her boys were named after Presidents. Calvin, of course, was named after Calvin Coolidge. I said, my mother really didn' ; t know history, because she would have known that Calvin Coolidge had some responsibility in the Great Depression. There' ; s another one of her sons she named Frank after Franklin Roosevelt. There' ; s another one she named Dwight. There is a brother who didn' ; t get the Presidential name and he was our first brother to finish college, get his Masters Degree and then go on to the University of Wisconsin and get his Doctorate. When he was born, we asked my mother, " ; what would he be named?" ; She said, " ; Well, I don' ; t feel well. You all name him." ; And Calvin, my younger brother, to me has always been quicker of the lip than I was, so, he said, " ; let' ; s name him Roy." ; We were at that time, we often went to see the western cowboys. Calvin' ; s favorite western cowboy was Roy Rogers. So, he named him Roy and my mother consented to that. So, he' ; s the only one that was not named after a President. We joke about it. I said, " ; Calvin I didn' ; t like you naming him Roy, but maybe I should be thankful you didn' ; t name him Trigger." ; (Laughing) My mother, I think in the fact that she named us after Presidents wanted us to be somebody. I think that was her way of saying to us, " ; I want you to amount to something. I want you to accomplish something." ; HANSON: That' ; s interesting. Your father was a minister, but that certainly wasn' ; t a high paying position. Certainly it wasn' ; t in those days. Did he work at something else at the same time? WOODS: Yes, even before he became a minister he worked at McWane Pipe Company, over in Norwood. He worked there for many years. Even after he had been called into the ministry and started pastoring a small church, he continued to work there, because the church was not able to pay the kind of salary that he could just do that and take care of his family. HANSON: Did your mother work? WOODS: My mother did not have a job outside of the home, but when we were growing up, she took in washing and ironing. I' ; ll never forget she took in washing and ironing from some of the White people in the community. Especially certain White families. I would go over and get the dirty clothes in my wagon and bring them back. She would wash them and not only wash them, but she would iron them. I would carry them back. The pay for all of those clothes was 50¢. HANSON: How did you feel about that? Did it color anything... WOODS: Well, we thought 50¢, you know, was very valuable to us at that time. I guess what we were really more interested in, whenever mother would wash the clothes and iron them...I carried them back and bring the 50¢ back. She would buy ginger bread and she would share the ginger bread with all of the children. I guess we looked more forward to the ginger bread. You could get ginger bread for a nickel, a great big ginger bread. That would go a long way with all the children. So, we were more interested in that, as far as the washing and ironing was concerned than we were what the pay was. I guess at that time we were not mature enough to make comparisons about how little she was getting for how much work she was doing. HANSON: Let me go back a minute. You said, all of your brothers were named after Presidents, except the one, Roy. Those were all White heroes. WOODS: Absolutely. HANSON: Talk about that just a little bit would you, Rev. Woods? Because you, of course, being active in the civil rights movement that comes later but how come all Whites? Weren' ; t there heroes in your own life...W. E. B. Dubois. Why, for example, were there no Blacks? WOODS: Well, my mother, undoubtedly, was not to knowledgeable about them. I imagine she knew about Booker T. Washington and maybe W. E. B. Dubois. I' ; m not sure. I never heard her talk about them. So, these were the people that stood out as great leaders and outstanding men. Of course, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, certainly has gone down in history as the President that embraced African-Americans. Of course, the Emancipation Proclamation was given by Lincoln. However, as a student of history I know that Lincoln said, " ; That if I can save the Union by keeping slavery, I' ; ll do that and if I can save the Union by getting rid of slavery, I' ; ll do that." ; It became a strategically necessary for Lincoln to get rid of slavery. So, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation. He has gone down in history as the President that befriended Negroes at that time. Of course, you know, the South was afraid that if he became elected President that he was going to free the slaves. South Carolina jumped out a little after he was elected. However, Lincoln couldn' ; t have done that unless he had the support and backing of those other politicians that was around him. HANSON: Was it because you had his name that made you interested in history, too? Or was it something you got from your family? WOODS: Well, what got me interested in history and certainly the history of African-Americans was the fact that when I was in high school, I was enrolled in a course called Negro Makers of History. I' ; ll never forget that course. It was a course where we used the book by [inaudible] Woodson. That course was an eye opener to me. As a result of that course, I became very proud to be an African-American. My self-esteem increased because I was thinking that in order to accomplish, in order to be successful, in order to be anybody you had to be White, because that' ; s what we saw around us. The policemen were White. HANSON: Everything was White. WOODS: The firemen were White. People in outstanding leadership positions were White, this sort of thing. So, until I enrolled in that course and matriculated in that class it was [inaudible] to me. I came to recognize that being Black, I still could attain, I could achieve. So, this Black History course really was one of the greatest factors in my life that really caused me to be proud. It caused me to know that if I put forth the effort, that as a Black man that I could achieve. Also, that there were people who put forth efforts to better the condition of Negroes, or African- Americans. So, I was really helped by that course. HANSON: Did you have any contacts with Whites at all? Now you were a student leader at Miles, pardon me, at Parker High School. You were President, I believe, of the... WOODS: Student Government. HANSON: Student Government, right. WOODS: That is correct. HANSON: Did you have any other contact with any of the other schools, Phillips, Ramsay, some of these other schools that were all White schools? WOODS: To my knowledge, at that time, we did not. I don' ; t remember ever having any contact with White students. Of course, you know, separation and segregation was the order of the day. There were laws. HANSON: The laws were very strenuous. WOODS: Against the races mixing and that sort of thing. HANSON: So, there was no kind of cross communication at all? WOODS: To my knowledge, I can not remember, not in the school setting. Of course, growing up as boys we played with some White children and they played with us. My grandmother worked for them and they were the people my mother washed clothes for, but we played with them. HANSON: Then, there came a time when you couldn' ; t play with them anymore, right? Was that typical? WOODS: Well, when they got older, you know. Of course, when we got older, we went our way and they went there way. HANSON: Let me ask you a question here, because it' ; s always puzzled me a little bit coming down into the south. Is it very often when that division comes with kids playing together...there' ; s a commonality, fun, a joyful time together and then there comes a time when you have to stop calling the White fellow Tom. According to the books I' ; ve read, it has to be Mr. Tom. Did you experience that? WOODS: I don' ; t remember experiencing that, but we knew that they were supposed to be better than we were. HANSON: Tell me, you used the word we knew... WOODS: We knew that they were supposed to be better than we were. HANSON: Develop that word " ; knew" ; for me, will you. You understood, did it make you angry? WOODS: It' ; s an understanding. You grew up and you were taught in various ways that they had the upper hand and that you were somewhat [inaudible], you see. Of course, in the play sometime it would come out. I never will forget that on occasion I had the responsibility of finding scrap food to feed our hogs. I would get my bucket, we called it a slop bucket, and go to the White community and we would go through the garbage to find what scraps of food that we could carry back and feed our hogs. I never will forget that one day in the White community some of the White boys turned loose some dogs on us. They seemed to have been very ferocious dogs and we were running and, of course, hollering. I remember the dog jumped on me, you know. He had me down and it was a very terrifying moment. The White boys were laughing, you see. Fortunately, I was not hurt. I think some adults were around somewhere. They called the dogs off. That was a very terrifying experience. HANSON: How old were you? WOODS: I felt so dehumanized and so humiliated and so helpless, you see. They were White and we were Black. HANSON: How old were you, Rev. Woods? WOODS: I don' ; t remember exactly my age and I would hate to try to speculate at this time. I don' ; t think I was in my teens at that time. I hadn' ; t reached my teens at that time. HANSON: Did this develop anger? It would with me. WOODS: Yes, it did. It did. The very fact that they turned these ferocious dogs loose on us and as the dogs attacked they were laughing. They were having fun at our pain, or discomfort, you see. I was very upset but yet had been taught that you had to be careful about venting your anger and your wrath against White people, you see. They took advantage of Negroes. HANSON: Did your anger go towards determination that you were going to do something with your life? You obviously have, along with what your parents have instilled in you. WOODS: Well, obviously things like that built up. HANSON: Sure. WOODS: You know, of course, there is going to come a time...as my think processes matured and I recognized that something could be done and I could be a part of various activities, I entertained the thoughts that I needed to help to better the lot of myself and of my people. HANSON: Did you ever want to get even? These are very negative words, I realize that. WOODS: Well, yes, you have those emotions. HANSON: Sure. WOODS: And, as I said before Whites were in power. They had the authority, they ran everything. They had the police. They had all of this and your word meant nothing against a White person. You better be careful not to sass them, or say they told a lie, or get out of your place. That sort of thing. You had to be very careful. It was a common emotion to want to get even, but it was a thing that you better be careful and not do [it] if you still want to be around. HANSON: What do you think in this emotion that was very common and understandable, what turned you into the path that you went on, which was education, which was the ministry, which was the civil rights movement, as opposed to anything else, a negative kind of behavior? WOODS: Well, I' ; ll tell you what turned me on. Another thing, when I was a boy, my father was trading at a certain White store. I never will forget on payday we used to go to that store and he' ; d get groceries and he' ; d buy some candy and some other stuff for the children. So, we looked forward to that. I never will forget this particular Friday evening we went to Hawkins Store and Mr. Hawkins said my father couldn' ; t get anything. HANSON: Could not get anything? WOODS: Said he couldn' ; t get anything. They were not going to let him have anything. He said, " ; your bill is too high and what do you want to pay me?" ; My dad said, " ; this is all I can pay you, Mr. Hawkins." ; He said, " ; well, I can not let you get anything today." ; My father was so sad, he was pleading with the man for what he needed for his family and children. To see my father pleading with a White man, he' ; s disrespecting him and saying uncomplimentary things to him...I looked up to my father. It hurt me, you see, it was a feeling that I never got over. Of course, there were other situations where my father was humiliated. It' ; s something that hurt, you see. So, after I left Parker High School, where I had been elected President of Student Government, I had received a scholarship to Morehouse. Also, while matriculating at Parker I had some evening work. I was working at Jim Dandy Milling Factory, which was in North Birmingham. I was going there after school and working about four or five hours and maybe sometimes six hours and working on the weekends, saving money to go to school. Of course, there I came in contact with Whites and Blacks, too. Of course, I was a good worker and the White supervisors, undoubtedly, recognized something in me that wasn' ; t in any other workers. So, the owner sent me on special errands and to even do some personal things for him. They thought I was going to stay there at that company. After I finished school, I announced to them that I was going to go to college. So, I went to Morehouse. While at Morehouse, I came under the influence of Dr. Benjamin Mays. Morehouse gave me a tuition scholarship. Of course, I made plans to attend and of course, I received a letter from them saying that " ; we have accepted you and we' ; re giving you a tuition scholarship with the conditions that you continue to make a ' ; B' ; average, but we do not have dormitory space for you." ; HANSON: What did you do? WOODS: They said to me, " ; now we would like to recommend that you go to Payne College." ; That college was in Augusta, Georgia. I didn' ; t want to go to Payne, I wanted to go to Morehouse. So, some neighbors of ours informed us that they had some relatives in Atlanta and that it was possible that I might be able to stay at one of their relatives home. We made contact and it was settled and I did get into Morehouse. After that semester, I was able to move into Graves Hall, where the freshmen were usually housed. We used to rather go to Chapel than eat, some of us, because Dr. Benjamin Mays was going to speak on that particular day. HANSON: He was an influential figure for a lot of... WOODS: Oh, he was an influential figure and I' ; ll never forget on occasion...I can hear him now as he was talking to us. He had sort of a brogue...he said, " ; I would not be a Jim Crow Negro, taking the wings of a bird going up in the gallery in a theater to see a movie. I wouldn' ; t be a Jim Crow Negro, going around to the back of a restaurant, sticking your head in a hole in a wall to get a sandwich. I wouldn' ; t be a Jim Crow Negro." ; You know, he just lifted up and that would just tear us up, because we would go to the theater and you know you couldn' ; t sit on the main floor. You couldn' ; t even sit in the balcony. You had to go beyond the balcony up into the gallery, you see. He said, " ; that' ; s a Jim Crow Negro that would do that." ; When you wanted to order something from a restaurant, you had to go around back in a hole in the wall and order. I wouldn' ; t patronize those kind of situations. It made sense and other things that he would say to us, you see. So, that helped me a whole lot to come under the influence of this great man. HANSON: You were at Morehouse in ' ; 46, ' ; 47. You came back to Birmingham and I think according to your biography here, you went to...what did you do with that interim before you went to the Birmingham Bible College in ' ; 47? WOODS: I imagine I went over to Daniel Payne College, because I was determined I was going to finish my graduate studies. I went there for a while. Then, I went to the Baptist College, I believe. After the Baptist College I went out to Miles College. It was at Miles College that I finished my graduate work with an A.B. major in Sociology and a minor in English. HANSON: I want to deal some more with that period in time, because from ' ; 47 to ' ; 53 it was still a very highly structured segregation environment that you had to fight against in a variety of different ways but not as openly. However, in 1954 something extraordinary happened. The Supreme Court ruled in Brown vs. Board of Education. What did you think that day that came down? WOODS: Well, that was a great day because, as you know, it set aside the Plessy vs. Ferguson decision of 1896. And, of course, it was a time for rejoicing, as far as African-Americans were concerned. There were numerous cases that were going to the various courts seeking to oppose the segregated system that was not equal at all. Whites enjoying the best facilities ; the best books. The Blacks the dilapidated facilities and so, often getting the second hand books the White students had used, even the second hand furniture that they had almost torn up and that sort of thing. So, it was not an equal situation at all. So, it was a time of great hope. Now that the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, has ruled we have hope now. The courts is on our side. HANSON: But, it was a number of years before...how many years? Five? Four? Before in 1958, ' ; 59, when the beginning of Shuttlesworth is coming here, you' ; re meeting up with him. Detail that time from ' ; 54 to ' ; 58. The hope was there, but it was also closed. WOODS: Before I get there I would like to go back a little bit. HANSON: Okay. WOODS: To some years and look at my activities, what I was doing. After I left Morehouse I went to work at the company where my father worked. HANSON: Jim Dandy? WOODS: McWane. HANSON: That' ; s right, you were at Jim Dandy. WOODS: McWane Pipe Shop. They were training me to be a [inaudible] attendant. That was a very dangerous job. I' ; m sure they hired me because my father had been there for many years. So, I stuck a coal bar in the hot [inaudible] on occasion. My duties there and hot irons [inaudible] out and [inaudible] it missed my face. It hit me on the arms and on the legs. Of course, I had some serious burns. So, I had to be off for quite awhile. In the meantime, I decided that kind of work was not for me. So, I decided not to go back to that. However, I had a family coming now and I had to work to support my family. So, after I left McWane I got a job being a janitor, cleaning up the old Phoenix Building at night, where the telephone company was housed. That wasn' ; t enough to keep food on the table and pay the other necessities. So, I took a day job, janitor at H. L. Green Department Store, which was called [inaudible] in the downtown. So, I worked during the day as a janitor at that department store downtown and at night I would go to the Phoenix Building and clean it up. I never will forget that. I saved up enough money to make a down payment on a car. A little old Ford. I started driving it to work to the Phoenix Building, but I would park it around the block. HANSON: Why? WOODS: Well, you just didn' ; t want the White supervisors to know. HANSON: That you had a car? WOODS: Yeah. HANSON: Why? What would happen? WOODS: So, one night I was running late and I drove up in front of the building. I parked the car and got out and the supervisor was going in the building. He saw me and he saw my car. So, I went on in and got ready for my work and proceeded to go to work. He came up on the floor where I was mopping. He said to me, " ; well now, Abe you' ; re going to have to decide which one of these jobs you want." ; Well, I was sort of taken back. I said, " ; what do you mean? You just told me last week that I was doing a good job here and you talked with the people at the store and they said I was doing a good job there." ; I said, " ; now, what' ; s wrong?" ; He said, " ; you' ; re driving a car that looks better than mine." ; I said, " ; is that it?" ; He said, " ; yes." ; I said, " ; ok, you can have your job." ; So, I left him and only had the job at the department store. HANSON: That was an act of defiance then. Would that might not have traveled the grapevine, look out for Abraham Woods? WOODS: Well, no, it didn' ; t, because I was a good worker. I worked well, even when I was cutting grass and going across the mountain cutting grass. I cut grass so well and trimmed shrubbery so well until various people across the mountain was getting upset with each other. This one said, " ; he' ; s going to cut mine next." ; And another one said, " ; no, he' ; s going to cut mine next." ; In fact, they even got in a squabble about my doing their yard. The fuss came so intense I just had to leave it there. They were really on each other about me doing their yard. I did that kind of work. My work was good work. One day one of the supervisors said to me, " ; Abraham we want you to go to the state store and get us a fifth of liquor." ; I said to them, " ; well, I don' ; t go to the state store. I don' ; t drink." ; They said, " ; well, the other fellow we had, he used to go." ; I said, " ; well, I don' ; t go. I' ; m a Christian and I don' ; t drink and I don' ; t go to the state store." ; So, they said, " ; okay." ; That didn' ; t bother me, but that Christmas the manager called me into his office. He said to me, " ; Abraham, you' ; ve been a great worker. I want to call you in to let you know I' ; m going to give you a raise. We appreciate your work." ; He was drinking. So, he said, " ; here, let me pour you a drink." ; So, I said, " ; Mr. Wilkins, I don' ; t drink." ; He said, " ; you don' ; t? Well, sir, them fellows told me that, but I didn' ; t believe it." ; So, he was just testing me out. So, I stayed there until... HANSON: Did you get the raise? WOODS: Yeah, I got the raise. I eventually quit, because I wanted to go back to school. I took a job with Atlanta Life Insurance Company. I worked as a Life underwriter for a number of years. It was hard work, hard work. You had to bring in new business. So, often when you hadn' ; t written up any new business, you would stop at a tree and ask the tree, " ; tree, what' ; s your name?" ; (Laughing) And then write it up, you know. HANSON: Atlanta Life Insurance, was that a Black company? WOODS: Yes, a Black company. It' ; s downtown now. It' ; s in the [inaudible] Temple now. In fact, Atlanta Life Insurance Company is one of the largest Black companies. HANSON: Was it in competition with Booker T. and Gaston? WOODS: Yes, yes, it was. I wasn' ; t making too much money in life insurance, because I would have to take insurance premium out of my pay for the trees and the tree stumps that I had written. (Laughing) HANSON: Was that a bit of a cheat? WOODS: Well, yes, but if you wanted to stay there you had to write business, because Mr. Charlie Green, who was the manager looked for some business. So, I was called to preach while I was working at Atlanta Life. So, I announced it to them that I had been called to preach. So, the next week I was expecting...I worked at Atlanta Life Insurance Company and what the church was giving me and putting them together, you know. Then, the next week in one of the meetings the manager, Mr. Charlie Green said, " ; well, Rev. Woods has been called to preach, been called to the church and he' ; s going to be leaving us." ; I hadn' ; t said I was going to be leaving. HANSON: You wanted both? WOODS: I wanted both, but he said that I will be leaving them and " ; we want to wish him well." ; So, I had the church and so I decided to go back to school. It was tough, but I did go back to school. I went to Daniel Payne College and that' ; s where we come back into the Daniel Payne College. Then, [I] went on to the Baptist College and then, after that [I] went on to Miles College. Let' ; s get back to where we were. HANSON: We are going to do that. I want two things. These are fascinating stories. Where did you get your work ethic? WOODS: I got it from my father. My father had a really good work ethic. In fact, you can go back further than that. We lived in East Thomas and on the hill, back over the hill was College Hills. I often went over there to get scraps, slop for our hogs. But I also, as a boy, worked at some of the homes. I' ; ll never forget one of the big houses up there. The lady hired me to clean her floors. I had to get on my knees to scrub her bathrooms and clean everything. Of course, all day 50¢, you see. I pass that house on occasion now. Blacks live up in there now, but I had a very strong work ethics. I not only did that but cut grass and also served as a delivery boy at a grocery store. The little money that I would make I would have to give it all to my daddy and then he would give me back... HANSON: There was no welfare then, there was nothing that you could go to? WOODS: Not much welfare, there were some surplus food. I never will forget we were on the list to get some of the surplus food. Sometimes it would be powder milk and some cheese. Sometimes it would be peanut butter and this sort of thing. So, you had that during those days. My father was a hard worker and I imagine I took after him. HANSON: How did you keep hope alive? I think it' ; s Jesse Jackson who constantly says, " ; Keep hope alive." ; How did you keep hope alive during that period of time? Did you know that there was going to be something better? Did you just strive for it? It was a segregated time now, you know what' ; s happening in downtown Birmingham. It is more closed and... WOODS: Well, what played such an important role in our lives was the church, you see, the church. The encouragement we got at church and the fact that there was a God, you see. He' ; s a God of justice. He' ; s not going to permit all of this injustice to continue, you see. As the passage, ' ; Be not to see, God is not marked. What every man sows, that shall he also reap. Weaping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.' ; We had hope, we found hope through the church ; in the word of God ; through our religious orientations, you see. HANSON: But, you' ; re still a very young man and you have a family and you want to do alot for them. Hope in the church could translate, then, to being active in the movement. For example, when did you meet Fred Shuttlesworth? When did you start all that? WOODS: Ok, in the 1950s, I met Shuttlesworth sometime after 1954. The Supreme Court, not the Supreme Court, but the state of Alabama had issued an injunction against the NAACP. It could not operate any longer. I remember one of the members of the church I attended was seeking to get Blacks to register to vote. The question I was real long at, great difficulty, but I never will forget Mr. Patterson. He was a member of the NAACP and he was seeking to get Black voters. It was difficult. I never forgot him. I took note of him, because there were not alot of people in our church trying to do things like that. So, he stood out, you see. I always appreciated him. HANSON: Your talking about [inaudible] Patton? WOODS: How is that? HANSON: You said, Patton? WOODS: Patterson. HANSON: Patterson, okay. WOODS: So, after the NAACP was outlawed I decided to work with a group that was headed by Dr. Patton, which was the supervisor and coordinated by Mrs. Bernice Johnson. By the way, Bernice Johnson was the first campaign director for Dr. Arrington. You see, she had played a tremendous role. I consider her as my civil rights mother. She was working for Dr. Patton and he was working for the NAACP, but it was another group. A political coordinating group, Attorney R. L. Billings was a part of it and that sort of thing. They were seeking to register all of the African- Americans that they could register. So, I became a part of those campaigns working with Bernice Johnson. I met Fred Shuttlesworth, because Shuttlesworth had been working with the NAACP, too. It was Fred Shuttlesworth, after the NAACP enjoined, who called a mass meeting at the old Sardis Baptist Church. He said in that mass meeting when there was consent, that a new organization should [be] born. He said, " ; they killed the old hen, but before she died she had some biddies." ; He was referring to the Alabama Christian Movement as one of the biddies. It really turned into a fighting rooster, you see. So, that is where I hooked up with Fred Shuttlesworth. I then became one of the vice-presidents of the Alabama Christian Movement. I remember the inner circle. HANSON: How did you...Why did you do it as opposed to somebody else? What is it about Abraham Woods that made him decide by golly, I am going to work with Shuttlesworth. I' ; m going to stand the wrath of the city fathers. What made Abraham Woods do that? WOODS: What I had been through. The experiences I had and my hopelessness and my fear and my rage at the injustice and the humiliation which Jim Crow, the southern way of life, had forced upon me and my family and African-Americans. I had determined that I was going to do what I could. HANSON: Regardless of the consequences? WOODS: Regardless of the consequences. I had to grow in that kind of commitment, because in those early days Shuttlesworth was the most courageous man I had ever seen. He wasn' ; t afraid of anything. He carried us into all kinds of dangerous situations and I started thinking that we could get killed in some of these situations. Fred didn' ; t seem to have a fear at all. I started thinking to myself this fellow is going to get ya' ; ll killed. I had those kinds of thoughts. Yet I was ashamed to express them, you see. I didn' ; t want anybody to know that I was thinking that. I didn' ; t want to die. I wanted to do something. You know, to give the last measure of devotion, it' ; s something that you come to as you continue to work in the movement. You constantly evaluate what you' ; re doing and the impact it is having. So, it is something I got caught up in. I started accepting the fact then that if I had to make the ultimate contribution because that was the sentiment. That was Fred' ; s sentiment. That was the sentiment of others and the commitment of others, too. We read about what had happened and who sought to lead voter registration campaigns and who sought to do this and that in other places in the South. So, you eventually came to that and your commitment grew. Your courage grew. HANSON: Stop right there a minute, cause we want to deal with that courage and we want to deal about that. I want to know, you said you felt rage, you felt anger, you felt humiliated. These are some of the words you used. How did you buy into non-violence when other people were willing to use violence? What made you buy into non-violence with all these human emotions you are experiencing? WOODS: Well, as you know the Montgomery bus boycott was going on in Montgomery. We admired Dr. King. He had emerged as a charismatic, eloquent, forceful, committed leader, you see. He had embraced the philosophy of non-violence, you see. He was having tremendous success in Montgomery. Of course, as in other places in the south...transportation here in Birmingham. They were being successful in Montgomery. So, Fred Shuttlesworth was leading that struggle here. Some other people were leading it in other places. Jamison was in [inaudible]. [inaudible] Steele down in Tallahassee, you see. Shuttlesworth was leading it here. So, reading about King and then going down to the mass meetings on occasion, you see. It appeared that, that was the way to go, you see. He made the teachings of the Bible come alive. Of course, when his home was bombed, he was in Montgomery. HANSON: Are you talking about Shuttlesworth, or King? WOODS: Talking about King. Negroes came out, African-Americans came out with all kinds of weapons, guns, shotguns, pistols and all kinds of weapons. He told them to " ; go home and put your weapons up." ; They that lived by the sword will die by the sword, you see. So, his being an exponent, or embracing non-violence in the movement, he was having great success. He was being [inaudible] and we had religious orientations. Then, we knew that was the way to go. And, of course, really not understanding still a whole lot about it, but we did have some misgivings. I did until I was enrolled in a course. As they sought to get ready to come to Birmingham, Shuttlesworth had already invited King to come to Birmingham, but prior to their coming, we were enrolled, I believe, in a course called the Power of Non-Violence. I never will forget the author of this book, his name was Dr. Greg, as we sat in the classes. HANSON: Where were the classes, Rev. Woods? WOODS: It was held in various churches. HANSON: In Birmingham? WOODS: Also, I believe we went to a Miles Hawkins school somewhere. Maybe it was in Tennessee. Then, went somewhere over in the Carolinas. A woman over there, I can' ; t remember her full name, Fatina something, but she was a great mother of the movement. So, we were taught these techniques. We saw that it took great character, great strength to embrace non-violence. It was not a [inaudible] sort of weak kind of thing. It took great strength. Everybody couldn' ; t do that, didn' ; t have that type of discipline, you see. To be spit on and not retaliate, to be kicked and a cigarette butt put down your back. Slapped and all that kind...it takes great discipline and strength to do that. HANSON: Were you ever spat on? WOODS: Yes, I was. HANSON: Did they ever put a cigarette out on your back? WOODS: Well, no. Tried to, but I started wiggling before it went down. Some of them did get them put down their backs and that sort of thing. We learned it took great strength in order to keep your composure and not retaliate. HANSON: There were deaths happening to a lot of Negroes and some Whites that dared stand up. How did you get the courage to accept death as a possibility for what you were doing, Rev. Woods? WOODS: Well, as I said, Fred Shuttlesworth had already gone over that hurdle. If he had not, he wouldn' ; t have been doing the things that he was doing. I' ; ll never forget that his home was bombed, his church was bombed. It was Christmas and we were supposed to ride the buses in a desegregated manner the next day. Of course, we were out at that scene. Reporters were around and one of the reporters asked Rev. Shuttlesworth, standing not too far from him, he said, " ; now your church has been bombed, you' ; ve been bombed. You' ; ve been blown out of your house. Of course, you did not sustain any major injuries. You have promised that you were going to ride the buses in a desegregated manner tomorrow. Now since this has happened to you, what are you going to do? Are you still going to ride the buses?" ; What impressed me, Shuttlesworth, before the reporter could get it out of his mouth Fred said, " ; when the buses run, we' ; re going to ride." ; (Laughing). Well, I thought maybe Fred should have said, " ; we' ; re going to meet and we' ; re going to discuss it. We' ; re going to assess the situation and then we' ; re going to decide." ; He said, " ; when those buses run, we' ; re going to ride." ; And ride those buses we did. His little darling said, " ; Daddy, they can' ; t kill us, can they?" ; Because of the attempts that had been made on his life, he looked at her and said, " ; no." ; When he got ready to go up to Phillips High School to enroll his children in Phillips High School, it had been announced. HANSON: Did you go with him that day? WOODS: Yes, and I' ; ll tell you how I went. We were standing around talking and Fred said, " ; well, gentlemen, I' ; m ready to go up to Phillips." ; So, he looked around at us. He said, " ; I' ; ll need somebody to drive me up there." ; He looked right at me. He said, " ; Woods, I want you to drive me up to Phillips." ; Well, I knew that every sick minded fanatic would be there with all kinds of weapons. So, I tried to find some kind of excuse not to drive. I wanted to support him, but I really didn' ; t want to drive that car. So, I just kept saying, " ; Fred, well, you see, well, you know." ; Trying to think of something to say. While I was humming and hooing, another one of the vice- presidents, Rev. J. S. Phiffer said, " ; I' ; ll drive you." ; I said, " ; Well, alright, if Phiffer' ; s going to drive you, I can' ; t drive you. But I' ; ll tell you what, I' ; ll be the look out man. I' ; ll go with you all and I will be the look out man. I will look out one block from where you' ; re going so I can see what' ; s happening." ; So, that' ; s what I did. So, we drove up toward Phillips. I stopped one block from the school. Sure enough, there was this huge, enraged crowd with bats, sticks and chains. Ain' ; t no telling, knives and what not. I said, " ; Good, God, I know, I hope Fred' ; s not going to stop in the midst of that mob." ; I stopped at the block. He told Phiffer to go on. Phiffer drove him on down, his wife was in the car, too. He drove him on down and stopped right in the middle of that mob that was at the front entrance. Not only did he stop, but he opened the door and got out. I said, " ; Good, God, Almighty." ; Of course, as soon as he opened the door and got out they grabbed him, you see. Very quickly, he was on the ground and they were beating him on the ground. They were kicking him, stepping on him and what not. How he got up, I don' ; t know, but he got up and he was backing toward the car door. The car door was open and he was backing toward the car door. Some fellow was about to hit him and before this fellow could swing he fell in the car door and Phiffer pulled him in and somehow shut the door. I don' ; t know how they did that. Mrs. Shuttlesworth was trying to get out and somebody hit her in the side with a knife and stabbed her in the side with a knife. They shut the door. Miraculously, the Lord certainly had a plan. Phiffer started the car and, of course, they were shaking it and they were trying to stop it. He was revving the engine up and the momentum of the car, they had to get out of the way. So, I scooted around the block and I was thinking they had done killed Rev. Shuttlesworth. They had done beat him almost to death. There ain' ; t no telling how bad and they' ; ve gone to the hospital. So, we went to the hospital. After he was examined the doctors told him that he didn' ; t even have a fracture. He said he couldn' ; t understand it. I never will forget what Fred' ; s response was. He told us what he said to the doctor, " ; the Lord knew I had a hard job, so he gave me a hard head." ; He said that sort of thing. That man was incredible and, of course, my courage is going to build up. I decided to just test myself. Nobody' ; s with me. I' ; m a first class citizen. One morning I decided I was going to ride first class on the bus. They didn' ; t arrest me when we rode... HANSON: With Shuttlesworth? WOODS: Right. They arrested some of the persons who rode on various lines. Of course, a White fellow tried to get the driver to have me and the group with me arrested. He just kept telling the driver, " ; don' ; t you see the Negroes here?" ; The driver just kept driving. He told him again, " ; don' ; t you see these Negroes here?" ; The driver didn' ; t say anything. So, that gentleman jumped up and pulled the cord and said, " ; Let me off, this so an so." ; When he got off, the driver just kept driving. So, none of us were arrested on that bus, which went out somewhere towards West End. I think it was a trolley. But they did arrest some of our people in other places. Sometime later, someday, I don' ; t remember how long, but I decided I was going to ride as a first class citizen. So, I got on the bus over near the University Hospital. I had a Bible and an umbrella. HANSON: A Bible and an umbrella? WOODS: A Bible and an umbrella. So, I said I' ; m going to sit here, I' ; m going to sit up front. I' ; m not going to the back. I wanted to be a first class citizen. I wasn' ; t afraid and I was going to sit up front. So, I did sit in a seat up front. A White fellow was in one part of it. So, I just sat in the part near the aisle. I started reading my Bible and I was watching him out of one eye and I was reading the Bible out of the other eye. Of course, he kept swelling up and turning colors, you know. I knew he was going to say something eventually, you see. HANSON: Excuse me, is he sitting next to you? WOODS: He' ; s sitting next to the window. HANSON: And you' ; re sitting in the same seat? WOODS: I' ; m sitting in the part of the seat next to the aisle. You know two persons could sit there. HANSON: In other words, you' ; re sitting right next to him? WOODS: Yeah, I' ; m sitting right next to him. Of course, all at once he said, " ; boy, get on back there where you belong." ; [Inaudible] I read a long time before I realized it was upside down. I guess I was more watching him than reading my Bible. (Laughing) I just didn' ; t move. I just kept reading my Bible. Then he said it again, " ; didn' ; t you hear me boy, get on back there." ; So, I didn' ; t say anything, I just kept reading. I heard a voice from the back. It said, " ; Hun, come on back here with us now. Don' ; t you start no trouble up there." ; So, I ignored that, because people like that we call Aunt Jane, or Nervous Nelly. I wasn' ; t going to let no Aunt Jane stop me from being a first class citizen. So, after a while somebody in the back pulled a cord and then, this little lady was getting off the bus. A friend of hers said, " ; you getting off here? This is not your stop." ; She said, " ; I know it child, but I don' ; t want to be in no mess." ; So, she jumps off the bus. I just kept sitting there. The bus driver didn' ; t say anything. I ignored the White fellow and finally he said, " ; move over." ; I moved over and he jumped up and came out by me an he sat over in another seat. That was the end of that. So, I felt my courage coming. I had decided now whatever happens to me, it' ; s alright. I must do my part in this thing. From then on I had no fear. HANSON: But you had to test it that way? WOODS: I tested it by myself. There was nobody but me. So, I didn' ; t have no more fear, you see. HANSON: Let me ask you about when you registered to vote for the first time. How did that come about? These are very momentous things. WOODS: Well, I really don' ; t remember the year that I registered to vote. I do know that it was a long questionnaire. I had become registered, because I was in charge of a group. At this time I was at Miles College and I' ; m in charge of a group that is going to canvas the African-American city and in the outlying areas to teach them how to vote. Prior to that, I had become a register voter. I imagine I became a registered voter somewhere along the lines when I started trying to work with Mrs. Johnson and Mr. Patton. HANSON: It wasn' ; t hard for you? WOODS: Yes, it was hard, but we had been taught how to fill out the questionnaire. HANSON: Wasn' ; t there also an oral test that they would give you when you would go to register to vote? WOODS: Well, I really don' ; t remember what the oral test was at that time. All I do know is that somewhere, I can' ; t pin point the time, I did pass. A lot of people were not passing. It was a long questionnaire, moral turpitude and all this kind of stuff. If you were an illegitimate child, or if you were the parents of an illegitimate child, then, Bull Conner had come up with some kind of law that you couldn' ; t vote, or something of that kind. They had all kinds of obstacles and what- not in the way of people who sought to vote. HANSON: Rev. Woods, lets go back to that time. You said you got your courage, A: watching Fred Shuttlesworth and seeing his and then testing it yourself. How far would that courage have extended, you think, if your wife and your children had been [inaudible]? And were they? WOODS: Well, eventually they were threatened. We were all threatened. That is when we became a part of the massive demonstrations there in the city after Fred had invited Dr. King to come to Birmingham. He didn' ; t get here the year that we wanted him to come. We wanted to get started, I believe, in 1962 but David Vann and some others had [inaudible] change in the city' ; s form of government. From a commissioner form to a mayor/council form, you see. So, they wanted us to hold up, to see what the promises and the results of that government would be. Bull would no longer be in authority, you see. We decided that we were not going to get the rights that were due us even with a new form of government. Fred Shuttlesworth used to say, the new mayor whose name was Boutwell, he said, " ; he wasn' ; t well, he was Boutwell." ; So, therefore he was not going to give us what we wanted. He was going to be more of a sophisticated Bull. He was going to be a Bull, but a sophisticated Bull, you see. So, with the coming of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, then the [inaudible]. Of course, while we worked with Shuttlesworth, trying to desegregate public facilities and things like that, I never will forget Fred in the early time of the movement to try to desegregate the terminal station. A White minister, whose name was Weaver, wanted to support him. So, he went over as Fred sat in the White waiting room and he sat down beside him. Of course, an angry group of Whites soon gathered. They were more enraged about Rev. Weaver than they were about Fred Shuttlesworth. So, they made Weaver the target. They tried to apprehend him. Somehow he was able to get away. They yelled out threats to him, " ; nigger lover, this and that" ; and said they were going to kill him, you know. The people that day were serious because in the end he had to be hidden in a funeral home. He had to be gotten out of town in a hearse in the wee hours, you see. HANSON: So, now these things have happened. Shuttlesworth is working with you and several other people independently. What turned the tide and what made King decide to come to Birmingham? WOODS: Well, he had promised Fred that he was coming to fight. The convention met here. I believe it was in 1962. HANSON: The SCLC? WOODS: Yeah. The national convention. I' ; ll never forget why the convention was here. It was the convention that was here. King had just finished an address in [inaudible] auditorium. Of course, a great preacher, a great speaker, you know, we were all lifted. We [inaudible]. We sat down and we noticed a White fellow got up and he started down to the stage where Dr. King was still standing. When he got on the stage, frankly we thought that he was going down to congratulate King, shake his hand or something, when he got there he started hitting King with his fists. We were shocked. Of course, when we gathered our wits and good senses, some of the fellows picked up chairs and started bashing them on him. They just about given him a good beating. King said, " ; don' ; t touch him, don' ; t hit him." ; (Voice to low to hear.) Somebody said, " ; call the police." ; King said, " ; No, don' ; t call the police." ; Somebody called them anyhow and of course, when the police arrived, King refused to press any charges against this White fellow. In fact, the White fellow had gotten all nervous and upset by this time. So, King asked one of the ladies to bring him a glass of water. One of them reluctantly, I' ; m not sure if it was Deenie Drew, or who it was that finally brought him that glass of water. King refused to press charges when the police arrived, you see. So, then [the] next year they decided they needed to come. They sent Wyatt T. Walker in as the front man to look at the lay of the land out here. I was one of the minister who took him to the downtown area. We made the rounds to all of the things that we were going to be involved with. Wyatt T. Walker set up the strategy that would be followed and what department stores we would sit in and what not and when we were going to do it, you see. So, the die is going to be cast now for this situation. Also, I was teaching at Miles then. I finished Miles in the spring of ' ; 62 and I asked Dr. Pitts for a job and he gave me a job. I started working at Miles in the fall of ' ; 62 and of course, I' ; ve been there ever since. So, I need to mention that Miles College students were the first group to show us that we could mount a successful selective buying campaign on downtown Birmingham. If I can remember correctly, the Miles College campus became upset, because Bull Conner would not let us go into the community to solicit funds to upgrade our library. He said if we went down he would put us in jail. I never will forget that day that President Pitts was [inaudible]. So, sometime later a selective buying campaign was directed. HANSON: Stop there a minute, because this whole period with Lucius Pitts, who isn' ; t with us anymore and what happened at Miles and you were a part of that is a very interesting time in Birmingham' ; s history. Did Pitts ever tell you, or any other member of the faculty, to try to discourage these young people, or was he very much a part of encouraging it? WOODS: Pitts was very much a part of the encouragement. Pitts' ; background was one that which had him involved in trying to help African-Americans get justice and opportunities. Now he worked with the African-American teachers in Georgia and I think he also worked with the NAACP. So, he came out of a background that he had to face these kinds of things. HANSON: So, he gave you encouragement? WOODS: He gave us all the encouragement. He permitted me to be involved in everything that was going on. He encouraged students to go with me. Even some of the faculty members joined in. Pitts was on the, was a member of the [inaudible] committee. He was one of King' ; s chief advisors. Many of the strategy meetings were held in Pitts office on the campus of Miles College. HANSON: Did the police know about that? WOODS: I don' ; t know. (Laughing) I don' ; t know if they knew that, or not. Miles College would eventually get some threats and, of course, armed guards would have to sit out at the entrance to Miles College. Pitts would tell the White leaders downtown that car loads of strange young men had come in and they were trying to get Miles College students to join up with them. They were militants, the Stokely Carmichael and if something didn' ; t happen, or if something didn' ; t take place, if something isn' ; t done to alleviate the condition of Black folk in this, it' ; s going to blow up. Seemed to be just a matter of time. Frankly, to tell you the truth, Dr. Pitts exaggerated some things. (Laughing) HANSON: How could you teach in an environment like that, Rev. Woods? What did you teach? WOODS: Well, when I first started teaching I was teaching some religious courses, Old Testament, New Testament. I had this group of students...Dr. Pitts had gotten a grant and he used the grant to sponsor a voter' ; s education project. I had some students in it who got some credits for being a part of that group. Also, some White students came from the New England states during the summer to be a part of that group and to go with the Blacks in the communities and out in the lying areas to teach people how to vote. Eventually, some Catholic nuns came, too, to be a part of that group. We would send them out, Black and White together, to go to the various houses. I' ; ll never forget that sometimes people wouldn' ; t open the door. They would look out the window and see a White girl with a Black boy and they wouldn' ; t open the window. That was bad news. You don' ; t do that, you see. They wouldn' ; t even let them in. These New England White young people helped us tremendously. These nuns, I forget where the nuns came from, but I' ; ll never forget the nuns being with us. We got caught in a little rain storm one day. We had been in the outlying areas teaching people how to register to vote. We would line them up to go to the polls. We would send a bus to pick them up and we would sponsor babysitters and we would go with them to the polls. We would be there to give them moral support. We would see that they registered and bring them back. I' ; ll never forget we were coming back to the campus and it was raining. To keep from getting too wet we had to try to run and get to the shelter. One of the sisters with a long old black gown, or habit, or whatever you call it, on. HANSON: Habit, yeah. WOODS: She was running too, trying to get out of the rain. She had pulled her skirt up so she could run better. One of the young men, he was a White young man from one of the New England colleges, he looked around and saw the sister with the habit pulled up showing her legs. He said, " ; Look, look, sister got legs, sister got legs." ; (Laughing) HANSON: So the humor, helped you survive. WOODS: Yeah, that helped us survive. Fred laughed a whole lot, too. Fred kept a lot of humor in the situation. HANSON: Humor, religion and certainly music all played a part in the movement. WOODS: I don' ; t know what we would have done without Carlton Reese. I' ; m telling you that, that music would just lift you, you see. We would get in the singing and we meant it. We meant those songs. We would not sing just to be singing. Those songs strengthened us. We were singing our commitment. We ain' ; t gonna let nobody turn me around, you see. HANSON: We want our freedom. WOODS: Woke up each morning with my mind stayed on freedom, you see. Alot of that, you see. We meant that. HANSON: 1963, obviously the bombing of the church. Do you think that changed everything? Or had it started because of the march in Washington first? WOODS: Well, I think the bombing took place because of the success that we had achieved. I led the first group of sit-ins at the lunch counters. We went to Loveman' ; s and they had a sort of a restaurant type place within the store, not just a lunch counter. We sat down at the tables there. The waitresses, they hurriedly cleaned off the other tables and what few diners there, they finished and they got up and left. Then, the waitresses turned the lights out and they pulled the rope that separated the eating part of the store from the rest of the store. They pulled the chain and locked. We were still sitting up there, lights out. Of course, we knew what that meant. They were not going to bother us. They were just going to let us sit there till the store closed. That was the strategy they had worked out. So, we knew that wasn' ; t going to do. So, I said, " ; now we got to be arrested." ; So, I said, " ; come on, let' ; s go next door." ; So, we went next door, to what was Newberry' ; s then. We went in to their lunch counter and proceeded to sit at their lunch counter. Of course, we got the kind of response we were looking for. One of the ladies said, " ; we can' ; t serve y' ; all. Y' ; all better get out of here. If you don' ; t, I' ; m going to call the police and have you arrested for trespassing." ; Of course, we said, " ; we just want a cup of coffee, a sandwich." ; Customers were in the store. She kept telling us, " ; Y' ; all better get out of here." ; Finally, the supervisor, the manager came up and he said, " ; I' ; m going to warn you. You' ; re trespassing. If you don' ; t leave, I' ; m going to call the police." ; So, we said, " ; go on and call the police. What' ; s taking you so long?" ; Finally, he called the police and the police came. The police said, " ; I want to warn you, you' ; re trespassing. If you don' ; t leave, I' ; m going to have to arrest you." ; (Laughing) So we said, " ; go ahead arrest us. We' ; re not leaving." ; So, finally, he called the paddy wagon. He said, " ; you' ; re under arrest" ; Then, he called the paddy wagon. That' ; s what we wanted him to do. So, we got in the paddy wagon. We loaded it up and we started singing. I' ; m telling you that paddy wagon was rocking from side to side as it was going down the street. We were having a good time. They took us over to the city jail and processed us and put us in a big dormitory type room with bunk beds and that sort of thing. The inmates didn' ; t know who we were. So, we discovered that late that night we saw folks crawling, like they were trying to crawl up to our beds. Well, we didn' ; t understand why these inmates were trying to crawl up to our beds. Are they trying to get in bed with us, or are they trying to take some of our belongings? [inaudible] So, we talked to each other and decided that some of us needed to keep watch. So, some of us slept and some of us watched. Eventually, in a day, or so, they found out who we were, that these people were with Martin Luther King Jr. So, they started warming up to us and they cut out all that hanky panky. We talked with them and tried to enlighten them about what was going on and convert them too and that sort of thing. HANSON: They were Black inmates? WOODS: They were Black inmates. So, they decided to send me and one or two others to the city farm. Since I was one of the leaders, they were going to send us to work on the farm. So, they loaded us up that morning and put us on the truck and took us to the farm. I didn' ; t even know the city had a farm until then. We got out there, somewhere near Hooper City. I' ; m telling you they had a nice farm out there. It was just like putting a rabbit in a briar patch. See, I came up being able to plant corn and sweet potatoes and greens and this sort of thing. So, I even picked cotton at one time with my grandmother. So, I mean, it wasn' ; t any punishment for us. So, they decided to take us out into the woods. It' ; s about two, or three, of us. They said, " ; come with us. Here' ; s some picks and some shovels" ; and they had shotguns. They took us way out in the middle of the woods. We got to wondering what do these people got us out here for, are they going to kill us. So, finally, they stopped and they said, " ; we want to dig here." ; Well, we had thought that they possibly were making us dig our graves and after we dig them they are going to shoot us and bury us way out there in the woods. So, we refused to dig. In fact, I asked them, " ; dig for what? Why are we digging?" ; They looked at each other and sort of smiled and they said, " ; well, we think there is some water out here on this farm. We need water for the crop and the live stock." ; Well, we accepted that and they left and we dug. When they got back, we dug a great big hole for them. They just came and got us and took us on back and put us on the truck and sent us back to the jail. It was just something to do. HANSON: Rev. Woods, I' ; ve always wondered for everybody that went to jail. Did that go on your record? Did it have to be erased from your record? How did that work? WOODS: Ok, it went on our record. What happened is that our lawyers kept fighting that situation and eventually they came to a process. I forget the name of the process, which wipes any kind of conviction, or record, off your record completely. I forget what you call that process at this time. That' ; s what happened to us at that particular time. The courts wiped... HANSON: Unjust arrest, yes. WOODS: The slate clean. So, we didn' ; t even have that on our record. HANSON: How many other times did you go to jail? WOODS: Well, that was the first time I went and stayed like that. The other times that we went we were bonded right on out. What we had to do this particular time was to promise to stay in. Of course, there were many that were arrested and they didn' ; t spend any time in jail that much. They got right on out, because Rev. Gardner had the bonding money and this sort of thing. If you went at certain times, like while we were trying to break the back bone of segregation in this city, even when we turned the children out. Now, it was really Rev. Bevel who had the idea of using the children. To my knowledge, Dr. King did not warm up too much to that idea. HANSON: How did you feel about taking the children? WOODS: Well... HANSON: And where were your children during that time? WOODS: Well, I did have some concern about it, but we decided to go on. We knew that we weren' ; t getting the number of persons, older persons, that we needed to fill up the jails. The movement, seemingly, was going to fail if we didn' ; t get large masses of people going to jail. This seemed to be the hole. I became involved in helping to get the students out of school, you see. They were eager to get out. The word was going around and they were climbing out of windows and jumping over fences. They were coming out every way they could come out. They were eager to come out. They were marching down to Sixteenth Street singing, " ; I ain' ; t gonna let nobody turn me ' ; round." ; So, I got back to Sixteenth Street one morning after I had went to get other students out of school and low and behold my wife was there and several of my children. I was surprised to see them. HANSON: How did you feel about that? WOODS: Well, I was surprised to see them because I didn' ; t know that they were coming. They said, " ; daddy, we want to go to jail, too." ; So, I said, " ; good," ; because I couldn' ; t resist their going to jail and I had been getting other folk' ; s children to go to jail. So, my three girls said, " ; well, we want to go." ; Then, my son, my oldest son, five, he said, " ; daddy, I want to go, too." ; His mom said, " ; no, son, you can' ; t go." ; He said, " ; I want to go." ; She said, " ; no, you can' ; t go. What would you do if one of those dogs got after you?" ; He put his hands in his pocket and came out with a nice size rock. He said, " ; I' ; ll hit them in the head with this rock." ; His mother said, " ; no, you still can' ; t go." ; HANSON: He was only five? WOODS: Well, he had a fit, he went into a temper tantrum, kicking and screaming and hollering that he wanted to go to jail, too. Of course, his three sisters went and his mother still wouldn' ; t let him go. They stayed in a week. Of course, as you know, they filled up the jails, the juvenile detention facilities. They even put them over in Fair Park. This is what broke the camel' ; s back, you see, with the jails being full. HANSON: We were talking about being arrested, Rev. Woods. WOODS: Yes. HANSON: You were saying... WOODS: That' ; s right the children filled up the jails. HANSON: Yeah, yeah. WOODS: That was the straw that broke the camel' ; s back. As you know, there were some businessmen in Japan that were part of that group that saw those dogs attacking the children here in Birmingham. Of course, it was a terrible thing. My job also was to gather up a person who had been bitten by the dogs and take them to Dr. Hershel Hamilton, who was our doctor. He gave them shots just in case the dogs had rabies and that sort of thing. Of course, some of the people had been knocked down by the powerful blast of the water hose. See, we learned just how to stay just out of harm' ; s way and to just enjoy being drenched by the cool water and just dance and jump around. Those who got caught too close you had to develop a strategy in this sort of thing. So, when Dr. King was attacked about the children, of course, you know he stated [inaudible] He said, " ; these children have already been hurt. They' ; ve already been injured by the southern way of life. Now they have an opportunity to change that." ; Now that was a good explanation and, of course, it made sense. HANSON: Give me a time frame. When was the children' ; s march? It was in the spring of ' ; 63, correct? WOODS: Spring of ' ; 63, that is correct. HANSON: Did the march on Washington happen after that? WOODS: After that. It wasn' ; t going to be till August, the march on Washington. The bombing of Sixteenth Street was in September. We were going to [inaudible]. We went through some turbulent things. We went through alot of other bombings in Birmingham, the bombing of Bethel Church and bombs going off in other parts of the city of Birmingham. Some of the bombs, I think, they were set to trap us. One would go off and we would rush to the area and if we would have been close enough another bomb would go off when the crowd gets there. So, some of those bombs were, we felt, were placed to kill and to maim, you see. Of course, Shores' ; home was bombed twice. The Gaston Motel was bombed once. I never will forget that night when the Gaston Motel was bombed. On that Friday night, wine heads and people who were under the influence came out of the various drinking places and their rage overflowed. They turned over cars and set them on fire. They set stores on fire. They bombarded the police and the fire trucks with rocks and things. HANSON: So, you had no control over those people? WOODS: That' ; s right. That was a terrible night. So terrible the police asked those of us who were supposed to be leaders to get in the cars and ride with them so that the firemen could go put out the fire and that sort of thing. It was a little uncomfortable to ride with them that night. I remember being in a police car and, of course, I held my head way out the window and I said, " ; I' ; ve got to take this risk, but I want those folks who were throwing rocks to see that I' ; m a soul brother." ; So, I put my head way out the window so they could see. We were able to get through so that the police were able to do what they wanted to do, which was bring the firemen to put the fire out. Cars were turned over and stores were set on fire. That was a night when African- Americans went crazy. I saw an African-American behind [inaudible] and he came from behind and had a long knife. The policeman was at the other end and he shook his knife at the police and said, " ; come here. I want that suit you got on." ; I thought the policeman was going to go down there like they usually do with his gun and he was going to get shot. The policeman didn' ; t move. He didn' ; t go around there. That was a terrible night. HANSON: Did you ever feel, during that terrible night, that you had let loose of something that you couldn' ; t get no control over? WOODS: Yes, absolutely. I felt that this thing seemed to be slipping some and we might not be able to control those folks. When Shores' ; home was bombed, we had a similar situation. A Black man was killed out there. The Black man, police shot him and he favored Shuttlesworth. We often said that they thought they were shooting Shuttlesworth. Blacks were throwing rocks and Bull Conner' ; s armored car was up there that he drove. They were shooting. It was a terrible situation up there. I never will forget things sort of quieted down and an old drunk lady picked up a rock. I said, " ; Madame, what are you going to do with that rock?" ; She said, " ; I' ; m going to throw this rock at them." ; I said, " ; please don' ; t, don' ; t do that." ; I said, " ; if you throw the rock they are going to shoot." ; She said, " ; I don' ; t care, so and so." ; I said, " ; what do you want to achieve by throwing that?" ; She said, " ; I' ; m going to [inaudible]." ; She didn' ; t pay me any attention. She went on up there and she threw that rock. After she threw that rock, the police started shooting. The bullets were going over our head and hitting the trees. Everybody was running. HANSON: Scared. WOODS: So, I ran and hid behind a tree. So, everybody else was gone and the police [inaudible] they had their guns drawn. They said, " ; you so and so get in the house." ; I said, " ; officers, I' ; m helping y' ; all." ; They said, " ; we don' ; t want your so and so help. Get yourself inside." ; They had the big guns, so I went on down the street. I saw some people looking out the windows. They said, " ; get in the house." ; So, I went up on the porch and knocked on the door. These people would not open the door. I guess they were so terrified. So, they said, " ; get in there." ; I didn' ; t tell them that I didn' ; t live there. So, I just got up in the door and sort of pulled the screen door as close as it would come. A Negro across the street came out with a shotgun. He shot the shotgun and they went over there. They, I thought they were going to shoot him. They beat him up and they dragged him off the porch. It was a terrible night. HANSON: What calmed it down? WOODS: Well, after they stopped throwing and they ran us off out of that area...of course, when I came off the porch, I was afraid to just walk in the street openly, so I kind of maneuvered up under the houses. I kind of made my way toward the project under the people' ; s houses. I didn' ; t want to be out where they could see me. Finally, I was able to inch toward the projects and go to one of the houses in the projects. One of my members lived there and I called my wife to come and get me on the back side. She came after me. We experienced some terrible times during the bombings. I just can' ; t remember how many bombings there were. Also, remember when the state troopers came in here? They came to beat us up. My brother got hit a time, or two. They struck at me. You had to learn to be quick. I guess through my quickness, I avoided alot of licks. HANSON: Did any of you in the leadership, when all of these counter things were happening and you were getting more bombings and were getting people that weren' ; t part of your movement, did any of you think that maybe our strategy isn' ; t working? Maybe we have to reevaluate? WOODS: Well, earlier and, of course, when the threats were coming and they came continuously. HANSON: Yes. WOODS: Nigger you better get out of town. You' ; re going to be next. We' ; re going to get you. The police constantly cruising back and forth. The Klan folk in the cars and what-not. You just didn' ; t know what was going to happen. So, often at night we would get on the floor, because we didn' ; t know the folk meant what they said. They were going to do it then, or not. It was a constant, it was a constant thing. You just had to learn not to be afraid. Answer the telephone, you know, not being fearful. Try to say something nice to them. I guess they had a machine, or something to call up because the phone would just ring constantly. You had to take the phone off the hook.Threats, threats, threats. It just became common place. My wife got used to it. My family got used to it. They were part of the movement. So, pretty soon after quite a bit of that we were baptized. So, we just took it in stride. If they are going to bomb us, or kill us, so be it. HANSON: Did most of this happen after the children' ; s march downtown? Or was it just constant throughout all of it? WOODS: Well, even before King came in here I was working with Shuttlesworth. So, it started from then and it continued throughout. Sometimes worse than other times. It was something you had to learn to live with. If you were fearful you would get out of town, you see. HANSON: What brought about the decision to march on Washington? What was the [inaudible]? Cause you went to Atlanta and worked with... WOODS: After we got the accord. HANSON: The Birmingham accord? WOODS: That' ; s right. It was negotiated by David Vann, who was the go-between man. We would often meet out at Miles College. We thought he was not offering enough. The White community was offering too much and this sort of thing. Of course, he finally worked out an accord. We had a selective buying campaign going on downtown. We had a strangle hold on the merchants. So, the accord was worked out. We got what we asked them for, desegregation of lunch counters and not to press charges and so forth and so on. That sort of thing. After that we got [inaudible] about the march on Washington. Of course, I was asked to come to Atlanta to serve as the deputy director for pulling the march together. I later found out my good friend, Dr. C. K. Steele, who was one of the vice-presidents, recommended me. I had invited him to our church to speak. He spent some time with me and I made some kind of impression on him. So, he told them that I could do the job. So, I worked out of King' ; s office. In traveling around the south, southeast and back and forth to New York, just about every weekend...my job was to mobilize planes and trains, car pools, buses and what-not so we could have a huge number of people up in Washington. That' ; s what we were shooting at. We knew politicians could count and we were afraid. Dr. King' ; s concerns were that we wouldn' ; t have enough people up there. So, I kept him posted as to the progress that I was making with my mobilization. Just about each week we would meet up at the Urban League in New York. [inaudible] Rustin, would be there. A. Phillip Randolph would be there. The head of the NAACP would be there. Head of the Urban League, SNCC, White religious leaders, White labor leaders and what-not would be there. We would then make our report. So, things were looking good. The last thing I mobilized was a train to start in the lower part of Florida and as it moved up the course pick up [inaudible] at the various cities. It was a long train. I rode that train. It was a Freedom Train. I' ; ve got to find my information on it, because no one has talked about it. When we got to Washington and we looked and we saw people coming from everywhere. It looked like a number [inaudible]. We were happy. HANSON: Was it a shock? WOODS: It wasn' ; t a shock. We didn' ; t expect that many folks. We were afraid we weren' ; t going to get enough. To tell you the truth, the park rangers finally gave us 250,000, but we had over half a million folks there. I never will forget being there at the Lincoln Memorial and Lincoln sitting in this huge chair. I was standing right in front of him. King was a little further out with his guards around him. You could see all that massive humanity around that reflection pool. Electric was in the air. [inaudible] Jackson was singing. Then, King got up and gave his " ; I Have a Dream" ; speech. I' ; m telling you, you just should have been there. You' ; ve heard it but not being there you couldn' ; t feel what went on. That huge crowd of people and one voice. I' ; m telling you we were really charged and lifted up. He told us to go on back to Alabama, Mississippi, wherever. HANSON: Come back and do what? WOODS: To go back and to go to work. So, that was a tremendous experience, the march. It was successful. We had gotten an accord. The march was successful. Prior to that, I had also been tapped to go on some of King' ; s speaking engagements. His schedule had gotten so heavy they were asking him to come to various parts of the country. He couldn' ; t fill all those obligations. So, I was honored to be one of the preachers to go and fill some of his engagements, because it was important. They were going to send a good check back. So, my first time out I went to Long Island, New York. I' ; ll never forget that, because the plane had motor trouble. It had to try to get back to the airport in Atlanta and I was praying, " ; Lord, I want to do some more preaching for you." ; We did get back and I was late and wasn' ; t going to get to Long Island in time. They told me to get off and go to New Jersey. They would have a helicopter waiting for me. So, when I got off in New Jersey there was this great big helicopter and I got on the helicopter and they took me over to Long Island. I got there in time to speak. I never will forget that speaking engagement. We had been successful now with the accord and the march on Washington. The sick minded folk, the Klan, was not going to let us rejoice. They decided that they would show us, that they would pull the ultimate of horror out of their book. This is when the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was bombed on the 15th. I heard the blast. I was getting ready to go to church. We had been hearing blasts and what we would do was come out and go near it and finally we would find out where it was and go to it. There were blasts in Birmingham often. That' ; s why we called it " ; Bombingham." ; So, I started toward it and after I got some distance I started asking people. They said they believed it was Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. So, I made a bee-line for it. I had to park about two blocks away, because all the authorities were around it and had it roped off and everything. So, I walked up to the church and you could smell this dynamite smoke. People were wailing, crying, hollering, some were cursing. Some were breathing out threats and what-not, what we ought to do. So, it was a terrible, terrible situation. You had a numb feeling. You felt a little guilt, you say " ; now, if it hadn' ; t been for us these little girls would not be dead," ; you see. If they wanted to kill somebody why didn' ; t they kill us. These innocent little girls. Your righteous rage took over and if you had a weapon you could mow White folk down and you would just mow them down in retaliation. You had to get a hold of yourself. Terrible experience, terrible experience, seeing them hauling out these items and what-not of those little girls. It was a nauseating kind of thing. A traumatic experience. When I left there feeling bad, I went down toward my car and there was a group of Black young men with piles of rocks. Every car that passed with a White face they were throwing rocks. I got there in time, there was a little White lady on the passenger side and a little White man on the driver side. They had knocked his window out and his face was a bloody mess. They were proceeding to stone her. I walked and got in between them. They said, " ; Rev. don' ; t do this. Stop don' ; t do this, you know this is one of them." ; They were mad. They were hot. They picked up stones and started to throw them at me. So, I backed off. I said then that this thing was getting out of hand. We' ; re not going to be able to keep control of Black folk all the time under these kinds of provocative circumstances. So, that is what happened in that situation. You know, that same day instead of there being a remorseful attitude throughout the city, some young White boys shot Virgil Ware off his bicycle on the outskirts of town. Some Black boys, who were upset and angry about the death of these little girls, were doing the only thing that these boys could do, they were throwing rocks. The police came out and the police would pursue them and they would run. This particular time someone threw rocks and the police pursued them and one policeman took his shotgun and shot one of these young boys in the back and killed him. I' ; ll never forget him. He was a member of my father' ; s church. I was asked to preach his funeral. We had his funeral over at New Pilgrim. So, it wasn' ; t just four little girls who died in that blood bath as a result of that hate. It was two little boys, too and we don' ; t say too much about them. Ware and Jackson, this young man who was shot in the back. The policeman didn' ; t have to kill him because he threw rocks. So, that showed you how remorseful some people were. Soon after that, the first interracial committee met. I was one of the persons on that committee. We met at city hall. I never will forget that day. Mayor Boutwell came in, tears were coming down his cheek. I always thought they were crocodile tears, I never thought he was serious. By the same token, we met at a strategy session trying to [inaudible] and some other folk. He was a huge man and he was crying. I said, " ; what is this, I can' ; t believe these White folk are really touched like that." ; You know, we were enjoined to so far as marching was concerned and demonstrations. The judge handed down an injunction and I was part of the strategy committee wherever they met. This particular time, after the judge handed down that injunction, Dr. King' ; s daddy was there, I think Wyatt was there, most of us was there. We were debating that we had never had this before. We can' ; t buck a judge' ; s injunction because we would be guilty of contempt and we would be put in jail. So, the sentiment was that we could not violate the injunction. Dr. King was just sitting there and all at once he got up and I thought he was just going to refresh himself. But he comes back with his marching clothes on and he announces to us that we could do what we wanted to do, but he had to march, injunction, or no injunction, contempt or no contempt. That settled that. (Laughing) HANSON: So you all marched? WOODS: There was nothing else we could do. I think his daddy tried to talk to him, but he said he had to march. So, he did. I believe that was on Good Friday when he went to jail again. So, I' ; ll stop there. HANSON: Let me ask you a question, Rev. Woods. Yours is a incredible story. You partook in history, that is something remarkable. What final message do you want to say to future generations that might see what we' ; re talking about. It was a part of history, it was, maybe, in someways less complicated, cause things were very clear. What would you say to future generations? WOODS: I would say to future generations that if you are not willing to die for something, you' ; re not fit to live. When a struggle is going on in your day and time, take the advice of Dr. King. When there' ; s a good fight going on, get in it. I' ; m glad I got in it. Looking back, if I had not been involved I would be ashamed of myself. But I' ; m proud of the fact that I had enough commitment to be a part of the struggle and to associate [with] Shuttlesworth when they called him the chief fool and called all us little fools following Shuttlesworth. We thought about it sometime and we didn' ; t like to be called that, but we continued to follow him. They said we were crazy, he was crazy and this sort of thing. I' ; m glad that I didn' ; t succumb to the position of status quo but that I was willing to suffer if need be and give my life as an installment payment on freedom. My message to young people is that you' ; ve got to be willing to stand up for something and you' ; ve got to stand up. As Dr. King said, " ; they can' ; t ride you by if you stand up, you' ; re somebody." ; We all had to come to understand that. We had to understand that Black is beautiful. That regardless of the color of your skin, God had endowed us with intelligence. That we were capable of doing anything that anybody else was doing and do some things better. The legacy of Dr. King is that you' ; re somebody, that you have some power to help change your situation. HANSON: Thank you, Rev Woods. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=AWoods1998.xml AWoods1998.xml
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Rev. Abraham Woods Jr.
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Rev. Abraham Woods Jr. discusses working in Birmingham before working closely with Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth as a vice-president of ACMHR. He drove look out for Rev. Shuttlesworth during the attempt to integrate Phillips High School, participated in bus sit-ins and attended the March on Washington.
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19980430W
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011
16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963
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1998-04-30
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video
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acbafe58a23cfb337385b7381c44d440
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Betty Bock
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http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=BBock1997.xml
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American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A
Food stamps--United States
Literacy--United States
Poverty--United States
Birmingham Public Schools (Birmingham, Ala.)
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5.4 January 31, 1997 Rev. Betty Bock Interviewed on January 31, 1997 19970131B 01:07:08 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Emily Reynolds Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Wallace, George C. (George Corley), 1919-1998 Arrington, Richard Birmingham (Ala.) American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A Food stamps--United States Literacy--United States Poverty--United States Birmingham Public Schools (Birmingham, Ala.) Betty Bock Horace Huntley Video 1:|18(8)|47(7)|72(14)|86(3)|103(2)|124(12)|142(15)|158(8)|169(6)|183(12)|197(10)|211(1)|222(12)|236(3)|251(6)|261(11)|274(4)|286(11)|300(3)|317(15)|326(15)|344(6)|361(7)|371(3)|383(13)|396(1)|414(3)|421(12)|433(12)|448(5)|462(2)|478(10)|492(2)|501(6)|512(13)|523(11)|535(10)|550(2)|573(2)|586(4)|596(6)|609(10)|619(17)|631(5)|641(9)|651(6)|656(7)|667(5)|677(2)|688(9)|698(3)|708(12)|722(16)|734(3)|746(12)|759(1)|771(16)|781(17)|792(7)|802(5)|813(8)|824(4)|836(8)|846(6)|864(5)|874(4)|886(11) 0 https://youtu.be/_b_9vmsZpuk YouTube video English 0 Interview Introduction This is an interview with Reverend Betty Bock for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. I'm Dr. Horace Huntley. We are presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Today is January 31, 1997. 33.516200, -86.813870 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 36 Family and Childhood Just want to start by asking you some background questions. Where are you originally from? Bock discusses her family history and her childhood on her family's farm. Agricultural education--United States ; Animals on the family farm ; Education--United States--History--20th century ; Missouri--History Farm life--United States 227 Education in Rural Missouri What was it like growing up on a farm in Missouri in the 50s and 60s? Bock describes her educational experiences in Missouri (elementary school through college). African Americans--Washington (D.C.) ; Central Missouri State University ; Farm life--United States ; Poverty--United States ; Racism--United States--History--20th century ; Rural schools--United States Education--History--20th century ; Education--Missouri 864 Travels through Southern States So you aspired to go into the classroom. After college what did you do? Bock describes her experiences traveling through Southern U.S. states during the 1960s. African Americans--Southern States ; American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A. ; Civil rights movements--Southern States--History--20th century ; Segregation--United States African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Race relations in the United States 1338 Seminary in Ft. Worth, Texas So you then finished up at your college in '64, what did you do after that? Bock discusses her Seminary education and work. Fort Worth (Tex.) ; Religious education--United States ; Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary Religious education--Study and teaching 1484 Exposure to Urban Poverty How did this first experience with the inner city, how did that impact upon you? Bock describes her initial experiences with urban poverty in Ft. Worth, Texas. Fort Worth (Tex.) ; Social services Poverty--United States 1568 Move to Birmingham & ; Work with Women's Missionary Union So you were there in Ft. Worth for two years. After your two years, you were finishing up seminary then what? Bock describes moving to Birmingham, Alabama and her initial work in the city. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; Baptist Women in Ministry ; Southern States--History--1951- ; Southern States--Religion America--Race relations ; Birmingham (Ala.) 1886 Birmingham Social Services Work You got here in Birmingham you didn't waste too much time you got involved in the community. Bock describes her ministry and social services work within the Birmingham community. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--Education--Southern States ; Baptist Women in Ministry ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Food stamps--United States ; Literacy--United States ; Poverty--United States ; Southern States--Race relations--History--20th century Race relations--Religious aspects ; Social services 2221 Efforts for Church Desegregation At this point in Birmingham, there had been efforts to desegregate churches or to integrate churches, what was First Baptists' role in that? Bock discusses divides within the church and community, and attempts to desegregate the church. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--Education ; African Americans--Segregation ; American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A. ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham Public Schools (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Southern States--Religion Race relations--Religious aspects--Christianity ; Segregation in education--United States ; Segregation--Religious aspects 2907 Community Backlash: Threats of Violence Twelve tutoring kids, but that propelled our situation into the John Burchers became involved, the Wallace people became involved, a little bit of Klan, we were never able really to document a lot of Klan involvement Bock describes threats of violence that she and others received following efforts to desegregate the church. Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Bomb threats ; Civil rights movement ; Jefferson County (Ala.) ; Ku Klux Klan (1915- ) ; Police brutality--United States ; Wallace, George C. (George Corley), 1919-1998 African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; United States--Race relations 3163 Resignation, Walk-Out, and Formation of New Church After this motion had been made of being tabled whether Dr. Gilmore and I would be fired or not. He got back first of August and the church conference to decide if they were going to fire us or not. Bock describes events leading to her resignation, as well as a church walk-out and the formation of a new, desegregated church. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; Baptists--United States ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham Baptist Association ; Civil rights movement ; Segregation--Religious aspects ; Southern States--Religion ; Synagogues as community centers African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Segregation--United States 3756 Reflection on Birmingham Community You have been active in the community participation movement. What were some of the highlights of your career with that group? I know your service, but are you still president? Bock reflects on her experiences and comments on Birmingham today. African Americans--Segregation ; African Americans--Southern States ; Arrington, Richard ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Healthy Start Program (U.S.) United States--Race relations 3999 Interview Conclusion Betty we've covered a lot of territory and we're going to have to stop here because I have another person who's coming in. Oral History Rev. Betty Bock discusses her path to helping create a desegregated ministry in Birmingham after growing up in Missouri. She worked with community and spiritual leaders to form a new church after lacking support through First Baptist Church. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Reverend Betty Bock for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project. I' ; m Dr. Horace Huntley. We are presently at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Today is January 31, 1997. Rev. Bock I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come and sit and talk with me today. Since we' ; ve known each other for so long, you can refer to me as Horace and I' ; ll refer to you as Betty, the way we normally do. Just want to start by asking you some background questions. Where are you originally from? BOCK: I grew up in Missouri. I lived on a farm near the town Marshall, that was our mailing address. HUNTLEY: Marshall, Missouri. Where is that in relationship to St. Louis or Kansas City? BOCK: It' ; s about halfway between Kansas City and St. Louis closer to Kansas City but if you drew a straight line between the two cities you' ; d come pretty close to where I live. HUNTLEY: You had how many siblings? BOCK: I had one brother. HUNTLEY: Was he older or younger? BOCK: Four years older than I am. HUNTLEY: Your parents, were they from Missouri? BOCK: Yes, the farm that I grew up on my mother was born there and is now 82 and has lived there all but two years of her life. HUNTLEY: Do you go back often? BOCK: Oh yes, I use all my vacation time to go and see family. My brother lives in St. Louis and I have a niece there and a niece in Arizona and her husband and two boys. HUNTLEY: So only you decided to come this far South? BOCK: Yes. HUNTLEY: Your father, let me ask you this first of all, your mother and father what level of education did they have? BOCK: Mother had a high school education, and my father dropped out of school when he was in the fourth or fifth grade. His father was hurt in an accident and he was the oldest of the boys and it kind of fell to his responsibility to take over the farm. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did your mother do? Did she work outside of the home? BOCK: No, she was a homemaker. HUNTLEY: And your father is a farmer? BOCK: Yes. HUNTLEY: Family owned farm? BOCK: Yes. HUNTLEY: What did you farm? BOCK: Mixed farming, corn, soybeans, wheat, oats, like clover and [inaudible] for hay and usually. We always had some cattle and sometimes had pigs but always had cattle. HUNTLEY: I guess you had the opportunity to work on the farm as well. BOCK: You better believe it. I started milking when I was five years old. When I was seven or eight, I had my first bunch of chickens and saved money from my chickens to buy a cow and saved my money because I was going to go to college and be a schoolteacher. All the money from the calves from my cow went into savings to be able to go to college. I knew my parents couldn' ; t help me go to college if I was going to be able to go I would have to do it on my own. HUNTLEY: How young were you when you decided that, that was what you had to do? BOCK: In the third grade, I had a teacher that I was very, very fond of. I wanted to be like her. HUNTLEY: What was it like growing up on a farm in Missouri in the 50s and 60s? BOCK: We were examples of urban poverty, but I never rarely realized we were poor because pretty much everybody around me lived in the same circumstances and went to a one room country school the first three years. The largest year there was eight in the school. HUNTLEY: Eight in your class you mean. BOCK: No, eight in the school. I was in the third grade before I ever had anybody in the same grade with me. Really wasn' ; t sure whether I was going to like that or not. Little competition there. HUNTLEY: Were there any African Americans in the area that you grew up? BOCK: Well, after the one room school was closed there was a consolidated district, but it wasn' ; t until high school that I was in school with African American individuals. There were three in my high school class. HUNTLEY: Three in your class? BOCK: Right. HUNTLEY: A high school of what size? BOCK: There were 42 in the graduating class. HUNTLEY: A big school? BOCK: Right. HUNTLEY: What did you do after high school? BOCK: I was going to say just a word about the high school experience. One of the big things about high school was that we would go on a senior trip and my class decided to go to Washington D. C. While we were there, we went to a restaurant to eat that refused to seat the two Black students who were with us and the rest of us immediately got up and walked out. But that was probably my first exposure to racial prejudice because in the community they really were a part of the community and everything so that probably was my first sensitizing to the way life was for a large portion of our country. HUNTLEY: What year was this that you were in Washington D.C.? BOCK: 1960. HUNTLEY: So that was your first encounter with segregation because you had not experienced it, you had not seen that rear its head in your community. BOCK: Right. HUNTLEY: What about in St. Louis, did you ever go into St. Louis or Kansas City? BOCK: The only times we went to Kansas City was if my mother had some health problems and we would go to a specialist there. We might stop and shop for shoes or something, but it was 125 miles trip and back in those days 125 miles trip was a big deal. So by the time you got there and waited to see the doctor if you were going to be able to get home to be able to milk the cows and feed the chickens, I can' ; t remember for example of our ever going to a restaurant to eat. HUNTLEY: That' ; s about the size of it with me as well because I never went to a restaurant to eat. I worked in a restaurant, but I never went to a restaurant to eat before I was in the military I believe. BOCK: We would take our lunch along with us. HUNTLEY: We had a standing joke in our family that we would leave Birmingham going to Green County and before we would get to Bessemer my grandmother would always say bring out the bag and give me a chicken wing or something. Betty, how active were you in extracurricular activities in your high school? BOCK: Not all that active because they really weren' ; t that many things at the school because most of the.at least half the students were from farms and as soon as school was out you went home because you had responsibilities there. So, I really can' ; t recall any extracurricular school activities that I participated in. If you' ; re a boy you could play basketball or football, well I did play in the band, I guess that would be an extracurricular activity. HUNTLEY: Just a minute, when you and your class went to D.C. and you all left after your classmates were not served, what kind of discussion went on among you as a result of that? BOCK: Initially we were very incensed. We made some suggestions that we could go back to that restaurant and do in terms of kind of making a scene out of it. Once the anger kind of subsided the sponsors of the trip I think did a good job of bringing us together and kind of talking about it, let Birdie and J. J. talk about what it felt like for them and we spent several hours just kind of talking about the experience and I really credit the teachers for being that insightful to really turn something like that into a learning experience that most of us had first experience with this kind of thing and we just couldn' ; t believe. Birdie had been the star in the senior play, we couldn' ; t believe. HUNTLEY: That, that would happen to Birdie. BOCK: Yes, don' ; t they know who Birdie is. HUNTLEY: What did you do after high school? BOCK: Went to college at Central Missouri State University, it was about 70 miles from home. HUNTLEY: What was that transition like from high school to college? BOCK: Couldn' ; t believe where all of these people had come from. Initially my first year was a big adjustment to those kinds of surroundings. I really had led a very sheltered life in terms of being exposed to just the things about the world. Because finances were so tight for me the college had a house that had been converted into a cooperative living house where there were four kitchens and there were eight of us to a kitchen and we did our own cooking, cleaning and it made the cost of going to college less than half what it would have been had I stayed in a dormitory. With there being only three or two of us and our eating out meals together there was a real sense of community but that was also a smaller arena to move from more remote kind of thing into a college scene as if I had been at a dormitory that had several hundred students in it. HUNTLEY: This was in the early to mid 60s? BOCK: Right, 1960 was my freshman year, I graduated in 1964. HThis was also the period that the sit-ins had started. The Freedom Riders would make their journey here in Birmingham. And other places there would be selective buying campaigns and then in Birmingham the demonstrations in ' ; 63. How did that impact upon your environment at the time? BOCK: Not all that much. I really was not particularly sensitive to social issues. I guess you would term. The situation in Arkansas and Governor Falbus I remember that making an impression and again it was kind of one disbelief that people really did those kinds of things but remote enough. I remember the bombing of the church, but we didn' ; t subscribe to a newspaper, we didn' ; t have a television, generally when we listed to the radio it was more entertainment shows and we didn' ; t really listen to the radio that much. Up until I went to college. . . HUNTLEY: So, you were very isolated? BOCK: I mean our poverty wasn' ; t as bad as for example what you would have found in Appalachia, but we had many of the dynamics of rural poverty. HUNTLEY: When you arrived on campus and you saw all of these other people coming in with different kinds of ideas and cultures how did that impact upon this young woman whose coming from rural Missouri and probably meeting people from the city, the inner cities all around the country. How did that impact upon you? BOCK: You know I don' ; t think there were many from inner city situations. HUNTLEY: So, there were not many Black kids in other words? BOCK: There were a number, but they were very much academically achieving in terms of being in class. I don' ; t remember really what the percentage it was, it would have been a very small percentage because there was not a high ratio of African American individuals. I really don' ; t know what Kansas City was at that particular point. The two African American people that I knew best both came from Kansas City but that was kind of the extent of it. HUNTLEY: So, what was your major? BOCK: Elementary education. HUNTLEY: So, you aspired to go into the classroom. After college what did you do? BOCK: Well there were a couple of things that happened in college that we might want to make reference to. I' ; m Baptist and one of the things that our denomination had at that particular time, I' ; m not sure if they still do or not, was called better speakers tournament, where you were given a selected list of topics that you could develop I don' ; t remember how many minutes, 7 minutes, 8 minutes, 10 minutes, something like that. You could compete on the association level which was kind of the county and then there was a state competition and the winners of the state competition went to Ridgecrest, North Carolina, which is where one of the two national conference centers for the Southern Baptist denominations are located. I entered that speakers contest and went on to win the state contest which meant that I would go to Ridgecrest. I was working in Girls Auxiliary Camps, the girl' ; s organization in our denomination was called Girls Auxiliary. During my summers in college I worked in G. A. camps primarily ones that needed some outside help if there was going to be a camping experience for kids. So, I didn' ; t have to be back in Missouri for camp until Monday and I finished in North Carolina on Wednesday so I decided that this would be a chance to travel through the South and see what that was like. My main interest there being denomination, or the Baptist Home Mission Board is in Atlanta. Women' ; s Missionary Union is here in Birmingham, and I had met people from both of those, I was very active in the Baptist Student Union on campus. At that point I was thinking about seminary as possibly an option, so I was going to go to Atlanta and visit people I knew at the Women' ; s Missionary Union and come to Birmingham and visit Billy Peyton and Elaine Dixson and visit the seminary in New Orleans and head back. Again, I' ; m straight off the farm. So, I rode to Atlanta with a group from La Grange, Georgia and we got in, it was probably about 8 or 9 o' ; clock at night and I had assumed I would go find a hotel or motel and go down to the mission the next morning. Well here were all these homeless people and various people sitting around on the curb and I believed that I would just stay in the bus station all night because I was afraid to go out. The next morning as I asked where there was a restaurant or place to get some breakfast and they gave me directions and it was also the direction of Women' ; s Missionary Union. So, as I rounded the corner to go to the restaurant a group of Black people were being loaded onto this semi-trailer truck, mean it had a load thing. There had been at sit-in at this restaurant and they had been arrested and were being carted off. So, I believed I wasn' ; t hungry for breakfast and went on to the Home Mission Board to visit the people and came home to Birmingham and the Greyhound bus station was just by. The Women' ; s Missionary Union at that time was located at the corner of 20th Street and 6th Avenue North and so it was not long until 5 o' ; clock so I went ahead and left my luggage at the bus station to walk on up to the Women' ; s Missionary Union to see and meet Billie and Elaine. Well they invited me to spend the night with them. So, we couldn' ; t find a parking place, so Billie was going to drive around the block while I went in to get my suitcase. In front of me in line was a Black lady who had a child probably two and a half, three years old and one that she was carrying in her arms. The man at the bus, where you got the luggage, told her to step aside. HUNTLEY: Was this a White man or Black man? BOCK: A White man. I said but she was in front of me in line. He said, she' ; s a dirty nigger she can wait. I said no, she was in line. This I really didn' ; t see it as a racial situation. I had simply been taught when somebody was in front of you in line. . . HUNTLEY: This was not a demonstration? BOCK: No, I' ; m pure naivete off of the farm. So, it never occurred to me, I' ; m your college aged individual who obviously does not have a southern accent in a bus station in 1963. It turned out that guy had a button to push to notify police that something was going on at the bus station. The next thing we knew five carloads of police officer' ; s descent upon the bus station. HUNTLEY: What year was this? BOCK: Summer of 1963. It would have been in June. I' ; m not sure. . . HUNTLEY: Demonstrations just finished. BOCK: Fortunately Billie and Elaine had found a parking place by this time and couldn' ; t figure out why it was taking me so long to get my luggage and came in and identified that yes I was with them that I would be in their presence while I was in Birmingham so they had to sign a paper that they would be my caretakers. The next morning, I had to notify the police department that I was leaving town. There was a police officer standing there to see me get on the bus and head on my way. So, I just couldn' ; t believe this, it just blew my mind so to speak. So, then we stopped in Mississippi, I don' ; t remember the town, it was a small place and I had gone to the restroom first and when I came out to the lunch counter all the seats were filled except one. There were two seats at the end of the counter and a young Black man was sitting in one of them and then there was this vacant seat. So, I go sit down and the waitress says to me if you don' ; t move I' ; m going to have you arrested. HUNTLEY: Talking to you? Was this the Black counter or was it just because you were sitting next to him? BOCK: I said well I don' ; t know what I' ; m doing wrong. And she said well we may not be able to keep the niggers from sitting at the lunch counter so we passed an ordinance that Whites can' ; t sit by them when they' ; re at the lunch counter. So I got up and believed I wasn' ; t hungry for lunch. After Atlanta, Birmingham and Mississippi experience I believed that I was ready to head on back to Missouri. I rode to New Orleans got off the bus, got me a ticket to Missouri and headed to Missouri and said I' ; ll never come back to the South again. HUNTLEY: So that was it. What were the responses when you got back to Missouri to tell people about your experiences? BOCK: I didn' ; t talk about it. I didn' ; t want my parents to be aware that I had been in that kind of danger. That would not have gone over well. I had learned fairly early it was better that they knew some things and no other things, so I really didn' ; t talk to anybody about it. HUNTLEY: So, you then finished up at your college in ' ; 64, what did you do after that? BOCK: I went to seminary at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Ft. Worth. HUNTLEY: Ft. Worth, Texas. And you were there for what two years? BOCK: Yes. HUNTLEY: What was the atmosphere in Ft. Worth at that time? BOCK: We were pretty isolated. I was financially having a very hard time so I generally other than going to church did not go off the campus the first year. We had a cafeteria on campus and [inaudible] there were a I want to say two or three African American students that were not from overseas and then there were several from various countries in Africa, but they represented a pretty small group and were very well accepted on campus. Then my second year I took a social work class and part of the requirements for that class was that you had to do some practical experience kinds of things. Tarrant Baptist Association had a mission center in one of the public housing communities. So, I spent some time working. That was really my first introduction to inner city poverty. HUNTLEY: You had majored in elementary education, why did you determine that you would go to seminary rather than go to teach after graduate school? BOCK: I felt called by God to go into a church related vocation. My expectation was that, I think I made reference a while ago that the program in our denomination for young girls is called Girls Auxiliary and that I would become a Girls Auxiliary director of some state or some way working that way to take advantage of my elementary background. Elementary age kids were what I really enjoyed working with. So that' ; s kind of what I expected my vocation to evolve into. HUNTLEY: How did this first experience with the inner city, how did that impact upon you? BOCK: I don' ; t think I would have been able to verbalize what bothered me at that particular point but it was really an unsettling experience in that it was a very paternalistic program in which I felt like the staff people weren' ; t that they exactly looked down on people in the community but. . . HUNTLEY: You just got a feeling of that? BOCK: Yes, and I ended up not working more than was required for this particular class because there was just something about it that didn' ; t settle right with me and I hadn' ; t been exposed to any other models that might have helped me know, that yes there are other ways of doing these kinds of things. But that was my first experience, you know, the inner city poverty didn' ; t particularly bother me. Again I think I pretty much identified by this time I realized that I had been poor when I was growing up. So I think there was probably some identification there. HUNTLEY: So, you were there in Ft. Worth for two years. After your two years, you were finishing up seminary then what? BOCK: I mentioned a while ago that the national headquarters of the Women' ; s Missionary Union was here in Birmingham and in January before I graduated in May they offered me a position here as the National Director for the Young Women' ; s Auxiliary which was for individuals, young women 16 to 24 years of age and that meant coming to live in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Is that young White women or young period? BOCK: No, White women. HUNTLEY: And when you got this offer to come to Birmingham, what were you thinking about? BOCK: The racial [inaudible] I just didn' ; t know if I wanted to live in Birmingham or not. They said well a lot of progress had been made. Actually, one of the leaders on the White adult side in Birmingham was a Ms. McMurry who was the executive director of Women' ; s Missionary Union. Prior to this time, I think in the 50s on into the 60s.. .she died unexpectedly of a heart attack I want to say two or three years before I came to Birmingham so I never had the chance to meet her but heard many stories of her going to some interracial meetings where she was spit upon as she would go in and come out by White individuals so Women' ; s Missionary Union saw itself to be primarily because of Ms. McMurray and her involvement in the Birmingham racial situation saw themselves to be very progressive in terms of those kinds of issues. HUNTLEY: When you arrived in Birmingham, and of course I' ; m sure you were thinking about what had taken place. How did you deal with that situation with making yourself comfortable with the decision that you had made to come to Birmingham? BOCK: It really wasn' ; t all that bad because in terms of Ms. McMurry' ; s leadership I felt that Women' ; s Missionary Union was an acceptable kind of thing. I was very excited and challenged by it. I mean to come straight out of seminary and be with the national director was certainly an honor to be, in fact I was the first person who they had hired who had not been a state level person before coming to the national office. Also, my job involved a lot of travel so I actually was in Birmingham very little. HUNTLEY: Around the state? BOCK: No, I traveled all through the United States. HUNTLEY: What community did you move into? BOCK: The summer, I moved here in June of 1966 and that summer I lived in a room in a house in Eastlake and a friend of mine from seminary had been in summer mission work in Washington state and we had planned while she was going to be teaching school at. . . A. G. Gaston Junior High? HUNTLEY: Yes, in Roosevelt City. BOCK: Yes, and once she got back from summer missions that we would get an apartment together and live together and we ended up living in Homewood close to where Lakeshore Drive and Green Springs come together. HUNTLEY: What church did you attend? BOCK: I joined First Baptist Church. The reason I joined First Baptist when I was in seminary I took a class in ministry in the metropolitan areas. Interestingly that would have been 1966 because it was the last semester I was there, and it was the first class that had been offered in the Southern Baptist Ministry on urban ministry which now just blows my mind. But this was the best class I ever took in seminary, the teacher was exciting we researched creative and innovative ministries and churches of all denominations throughout the United States and just really turned me onto the inner city. I mean it was kind of from that point on that the inner-city situation was where there was much more opportunity for creative things and new ideas and to try things out than traditional suburban situations. HUNTLEY: You got here in Birmingham you didn' ; t waste too much time you got involved in the community. BOCK: Right. HUNTLEY: What kind of activities were you initially involved in? BOCK: I guess the first and one of the most significant was one of the things that Women' ; s Missionary was producing Mission Action Guides and there was one on internationals, one on juvenile delinquency and one on nonreaders. First I worked on one for economically disadvantaged. Then I was assigned to work on the one for nonreaders and to make a long story short in the process of unloading those Mission Action guides off of the truck and into our storage area I realized that our janitor who was helping unload materials couldn' ; t not read anything that was on the side of the boxes. I thought here I am sitting behind my desk, writing materials, going all over the United States on nonreaders, and here is somebody in my own building. HUNTLEY: What made you realize he couldn' ; t read? BOCK: He asked me something, I don' ; t remember the exact question, but it was something about what was printed on the side of the box. It kind of took me a second to figure out why he didn' ; t know because it was right there in front of him and it actually was a little bit after that, that I realized that Mr. Gooden couldn' ; t read what was there. So, I talked to some of the people in my church and found four or five other people who were kind of interested in a literacy ministry. I contacted our whole mission board in Atlanta, and they identified a lady living in Birmingham who is trained to the Lawbook Literacy Method. So, I began then from the time I was in Birmingham during my lunch hours began teaching him to read and write. That led into a significant experience in that he had nine children and all but one got college educations even though he was a nonreader. He had prided himself that he had never used any form of public assistance, this was really a big thing to him. [inaudible] husband had a spell in which he suffered from amnesia and they ended up finding him in Mobile he didn' ; t know where he was or who he was, and she had three children. He was trying to financially support her and her family during Anthony' ; s illness and decided that he was going to have to apply for food stamps. So, I told him that I would be glad to go with him to apply for food stamps. At the food stamp center, you had to walk down this alley and go in a side door which gave you a great sense of dignity and respect, so it turned out that they were closed during lunch, so we waited until they came back. We were the first people in, three or four White applicants came in after we did and we sat there as the social worker would come pick up the file look out over the group, put the file down, pick up another one and all of the White people were called for service before we were. So finally, our name was called and I' ; m not sure how the case worker became aware that he was not able to write his name. At that point, if he saw his name written out, he could write it but he hadn' ; t completely learned to spell it. So, the worker pushed the paper around and said, okay go ahead and put your O X down here. And I said, he can write his name. I got a piece of paper out of the waste basket and wrote his name out and gave him the pen and he signed his name. This was just a tremendously emotional experience. One, it was the first time I had experienced the prejudice that he had experienced. I knew exactly what was happening with those folders. So, as we went out we were walking back, and I was to struggle with what do I say. Finally, I said, all I can say is I' ; m sorry and for the first time I understand. The bond which we felt together was just tremendous. The very next day, again, the W.M.U. Building was the corner of 20th street and 6th Avenue and the food stamp center would have been at 22nd between 8th and 9th Avenue North. The next day I heard some commotion around lunch time down on the street and looked out and a group of African American individuals were having a march on the food stamp center and tears just streamed down my face because for the first time again I knew, and again it was only one small experience for me where it was much of their experience, but that proved to be a very pivotal point in my life. HUNTLEY: At this point in Birmingham, there had been efforts to desegregate churches or to integrate churches, what was First Baptists' ; role in that? BOCK: Back in, I' ; m not sure of the year, but the pastor' ; s name was Earl Stallings and I' ; m not sure whether it was in the 50s or 60s, I almost want to say it was more like ' ; 58, ' ; 59, ' ; 60, somewhere in there. There were a group of African American individuals who came to the service and Dr. Stallings invited them in. They were seated and did participate in the service. There was a good bit of national publicity of Dr. Stallings standing at the door shaking hands and in a welcoming stance. But that had been sometime earlier. HUNTLEY: So, by the time that you got there, were there Black members of First Baptist? BOCK: No. HUNTLEY: Were there Blacks that attended periodically? BOCK: Well, not until the tutoring program came about. HUNTLEY: Were there every any difficulties between people within the church to accept Black visitors? BOCK: Well, there weren' ; t any. HUNTLEY: There were none? BOCK: There were not any until February of 1970. HUNTLEY: You were also involved with something in Central City, Metropolitan Garden. BOCK: Right, that' ; s all part of the same episode. HUNTLEY: At that point though, Metropolitan Garden was predominately White. BOCK: All White. HUNTLEY: How did that change take place, what was going on? BOCK: In 1968, the pastor who was Dr. James Landus announced his resignation and that he was going to Richardson, Texas, and he was the fifth pastor in twelve years to resign and the church panicked. HUNTLEY: This is First Baptist? BOCK: Right, and so a group of the male leadership went to Dr. Landus and said, if you will stay, we will give leadership to the church moving to the suburbs. To show their commitment to do this, they took an option on a piece of property that I think is where Brookwood Baptist Church is now, I' ; m not a hundred percent on that, that was the exact site but it was to be located in Mt. Brook and I' ; m pretty sure that it was that site. Well he went ahead and left anyway, they had the option on the land I want to say for three or four months before they had to put any money down, so the committee was appointed and one of the things that they did was to visit the Oak Hearst Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, who had saved money to build a new sanctuary and came to decide to make repairs on the sanctuary and to stay in the community and develop ministries with that community. They were so touched by this experience that the committee came back and worded what became known as the 68 commitments which were to stay downtown to welcome all who would come, learned or unlearned, rich or poor, it did not use the terminology Black and White. The committee felt like if those terms were used, it would not pass and they were wanting to buy time. They felt the statement was strong enough that it could be used to get a new pastor who was oriented to ministry in the community and kind of give some time to try to bring individuals along. So those commitments were passed and at this time I was still working at Women' ; s Missionary Union and served as Volunteer, what we called, Youth Coordinator. I couldn' ; t teach a Sunday School class because I was out of town too much so I could plan youth activities when I was going to be in town. We could have a retreat ; we could have Sunday night fellowships and stuff. So, the evening of the day that we voted the 68 commitments, we had a youth fellowship and the kids were all turned on and said is there something youth can do about this or is this another adult only. I said well why don' ; t a group of us go down and talk to the principal of Powell Elementary School and see. So, I took six of the young people down there, I' ; ve forgotten his first name, but Mr. Star was his last name. Of course, the first thing he suggested was a tutoring program, and the kids said yes, we can do that. And that fall was the time, I guess it was during the summer that the first Black families moved into what was then Central City, now Metropolitan Gardens. So, we began a tutoring program on Monday and Wednesday afternoons with kids from Central City. The new pastor Dr. Jeffery Gilmore arrived ; I want to say in September. It was almost exactly at the same time we started the tutoring program. The first Wednesday night that the tutoring kids came, some of the adult members of the church came for Wednesday night church activities and saw these Black children and became incensed and went to the new pastor and said you' ; re to stop this. One of the things that I had done and I didn' ; t really know why I did it but it was a wise move. I had actually presented it to the deacons to vote on and had it voted on at the church that we start this ministry. So, Dr. Gilmore' ; s response was that the church voted to do this, I can' ; t as a pastor change something that the church voted to do. So, things kind of leveled off. Interestingly enough that Sunday school class is called the Cosmopolitan Sunday School Class. In the second Sunday of February, 12 of our tutoring children showed up for Sunday School and 14 teachers resigned rather than teach those children. But we had them all, the teachers, all replaced by the next Sunday, so the children didn' ; t know that they had created a problem. Then in April of 1970, Winnifred Bryant and Twilla visited the church for the first time. At the time, not knowing what was ahead made special effort to keep her [inaudible] we know had recently I was going through some things and came across we have framed our new sanctuary. But they came. Then in May, they presented themselves for membership. Now the by-laws of the church stated if a prospective member was objected to it was to be referred to the deacons and pastor to determine if the objections were scriptural and valid. So, Dr. Gilmore ruled that it had to be a stated objection, it couldn' ; t just be x number of people raising their hands saying that they objected because in order to determine if it was scriptural and valid it had to be a stated objection. So finally, one of the men said, well, I will state my objection to the deacons. I won' ; t state it to this whole congregation. So Dr. Gilmore accepted that and the deacons meeting was the next night and his objection was that her motivation was wrong that she was coming just to make trouble. It ended up that the deacons voted 16 to 14 to recommend Ms. Bryant for membership and 17 to 13, one person changed their vote when they came to vote on the child. As it happened, the Baptist World Alliance was being held in Tokyo, Japan, and the church months before this had voted to send Dr. Gilmore and he was going to take a six-week tour of various countries on the way back. So, a decision was made that they not be present for membership until Dr. Gilmore got back from his trip. So then towards the end of June there was a church conference in which the segregationist had completely organized themselves this was the first time they began bringing in people from who were all segregationists people and the final motion was that Dr. Gilmore and I be fired immediately, that I have 24 hours to clean out my office and that when he got back from Japan he would have 24 hours to clean out his office. The vote, there was a two-vote margin. A motion was made by Judge H. H. Brooms who was the one who ruled in the Autherine Lucy case with George Wallace stood and recommended that the motion be tabled because it was not only un- Christian to fire somebody when they weren' ; t there to answer the charges against them it was also un-American. An un-American helped us, the un-Christian wouldn' ; t have gotten us anywhere. So, by a two-vote margin, I ended up not being fired that night. Let me back up, I forgot something significant. The day that the 12 tutoring children came to Sunday School and totally unconnected in terms of their time, the following Monday was a desegregation deadline for the Birmingham school system. There was a group of White citizens who organized themselves as Parents Concerned who were opposing the integration of the school. That Sunday afternoon there was a big Parents Concerned rally at Municipal Auditorium with George Wallace speaking. He wanted to make the point that if we let Blacks in, they would simply try to take over and said, why just this morning a group of Black people tried to take over a fine old Baptist church. Twelve tutoring kids, but that propelled our situation into the John Burchers became involved, the Wallace people became involved, a little bit of Klan, we were never able really to document a lot of Klan involvement. But it was at that particular point that threats began to be made much of it focused on Dr. Gilmore and myself particularly going on until after Ms. Bryant and Twilla presented themselves for membership. Probably the most creative threat that each of us got was a drawing of a gun but where the thing is that where you cock it the barrel was coming out there so if you pulled the trigger you shot yourself. At the church, bomb threats were called in twice that we had to vacate the church. HUNTLEY: On Sunday mornings? BOCK: No, they were both Wednesday night activities. The first time that I got a threat was the night that my car was going to have a bomb in it. I went out the next morning and the air had been let out about halfway on the tires of my car. The gas cap was missing, and the little flap thing was open, so it was enough to know that somebody had been messing with my car. I called the Homewood police and asked them if they would come and check my car for a bomb. So, the officers wanted to know what I was involved in that somebody might want to put a bomb in my car. I said, well, I' ; m involved in the First Baptist Church situation. To which the guy looked at me and just kind of put his face up against mine and said, if you' ; re a dirty nigger lover you deserve what you get. I hope you won' ; t bother us again. So I knew that I could not rely on the Homewood police to provide any protection or help for me. So that became a pretty significant dynamic there. They would do things such as make it obvious that they were following me home, the scariest one came one night, the parking lot was over to one side of the apartments and there were two or three men leaning against the trunk of their cars. There was a man on each side of my door just leaning up against the wall. They never laid a hand on me but to walk past them after, first of all knowing I was being followed and to walk past them to get to my apartment was a pretty scary thing particularly knowing that I could not count on the Homewood police for any help at that particular point. The thing I think that got to Dr. Gilmore and I upset the most, well for him, he had a nine-year-old daughter and the calls that his daughter would be harmed were the ones that gave him greatest pause. The threats to rape me were the ones that bothered me. I really didn' ; t think they would kill me, but there was a real degree to which I expected to be raped before the whole situation was over. So that was more of the fear that I lived with than being killed. HUNTLEY: Trying times. Did you ever have any physical difficulties with anyone as a result of that? BOCK: No, they never touched me. HUNTLEY: You had the opportunity to meet and hear President Pitts from Miles. BOCK: Yes, that comes a bit later. After this motion had been made of being tabled whether Dr. Gilmore and I would be fired or not. He got back first of August and the church conference to decide if they were going to fire us or not. It lasted eight hours, went until 2:30 in the morning and finally by a four-vote margin, we doubled over the last time, they voted not to fire us. So, then Ms. Bryant and Twilla were presented for membership on September 27, 1970. The by-laws state that if objection had been raised in regard to someone it then took a two-thirds vote not a simple majority for that person to be objected. So, when the vote was taken we had a majority vote, but we did not have the two-thirds vote. Interestingly Baptist prided themselves so much on abiding by the vote of the majority, in actuality both times a majority of the people voted to accept them but the first time objection was raised which threw out the majority vote and in the second case a two-thirds requirement was not reached as compared to a simple majority. So, Dr. Gilmore and I resigned immediately, and Dr. Burn Williamson stood and suggested that all who agreed with Dr. Gilmore and I the stance was un-Christian and unethical to go with him to the education building to close the service in prayer. At that point, approximately 300 people got up and walked out of the service in protest of that. This group had already had a few meetings with the name of the Company of the Committed. Elton Trueblood, about that time, had written a book by the name of The Company of the Committed, and Dr. Williamson had been touched by this book and that' ; s kind of how that name came about. As it happened there had been a covered dish lunch planned for the noon meal of the day that the walk out took place. So, we gathered in the basement of the dinner hall and Dr. Williams said, anybody who just wants to say anything at this point, the floor is open. The one that I remember the most was this lady who had to be in her 80s, Ms. Edny, stood and said, I just want to say I' ; ve been a member of this church for. . .I want to say 55 years, it was just incredible, and this is the greatest day in my life. Part of what have been wondrous about her was that she taught one of the elderly women' ; s Sunday school classes. And in one of the business meetings she had taken a very strong stance and quoted scripture in terms of the brotherhood and sisterhood of all people and her Sunday school class had gotten up and walked out on her that Sunday. In the meantime, I had left Women' ; s Missionary Union and come on the staff of First Baptist, I had forgotten to say that in there, we had one teacher in the youth division who was not open to the African American people coming in so she resigned. The 11th and 12th grade youth voted to have Ms. Edny to come be their Sunday school teacher, so that was just one of the really neat experiences in all of that. So finally, Dr. Williamson said we are going to have to see whether we are going to have the resources to form a church or where do we go from here. In terms of what kind of money, we can look at to operate with, I' ; d like for you to tear off a piece of your bulletin or somewhere and write down how much money you think you can commit to the formation of a new church. And so, people, you know it was no credit cards or things, you just tore off what you had. I forgot what the amount was I want to say it was in the range of $100,000 was committed that day and the feeling was that yes, we can move forward then with forming the church. Dr. Gilmore both offered our resignation as of November 1, feeling that 30 days is appropriate. It became an issue because it turned out that November 1 was a Sunday and were our resignations effect at 12:01 a.m. or 11:59 p.m. because it would determine whether we were going to be there for that service or not. So we made our resignations effective October 31. I specified in mine 11:59 p.m. because we had developed a coffee house ministry that was just going great and if it was 11:59 p.m. we could keep the coffee house open one more night. So, we began to search for a place to have our worship service. We contacted several churches, most of them in the downtown, Southside area and we were told by some that their church could split over whether or not to let us use their facility or not. So, we decided that we would discontinue approaching people. It was obvious from the news media that we were in need of a place to worship and finally on the Wednesday night before November 1, it was worked out for us to use the Birmingham Baptist Association, which at the time was at 20th Street and 8th Avenue South. We had our first service together on November 1, and the next couple of weeks we came up with the name and decided that we were going to incorporate and we wanted to put the executive director of the Alabama Baptist Convention in a stance of being supportive and we proposed a couple of dates to him and it was well known he already [inaudible] So finally Dr. Gilmore said, well you tell us a date that you' ; re free and we' ; ll set the thing for that. So, on the 21st of December 1970, we incorporated and were dedicated as a church. The gentleman from the Alabama Baptist Convention got up and went to great links saying now I can only represent one person. I' ; m not here to represent Alabama Baptist. I came to represent my wife. Dr. Lucid Pitts came right after Dr. Bagley and stood and said I just want to say what indeed an honor it is to stand here and represent the 300,000 Black individuals of our community. The contrast was just beautiful. I mean that' ; s one of the most wonderful moments of my whole life was when Dr. Pitts stood and said, you know I' ; ve jotted down some notes, but I want to speak from the heart at this particular point. There was not a dry eye in that place when he finished. HUNTLEY: What was his topic? What did he talk about? BOCK: He really didn' ; t have a title as such. He just spoke of the pilgrimage of the Black community and made reference to a few of his experiences as a Black person growing up and the call to be brothers and sisters it was somewhat general and then the sermon was delivered by a Dr. Bill Hull, who' ; s been at Samford University more recently. He used the same approach that Susan [inaudible] in her book The Witnessing Community in terms of the called out remnant that remained faithful to God throughout the history and blended the forming of covenant into that change of Biblical group, that remnant group, who were called out to be faithful to God. So that was a great day. Then some of the pastors in the association began circulating petitions that we would not be able to use the Baptist building. So, Rabbi Grafman who at that time who was a Rabbi at Temple Emmanuel called and said we understand that you all need a place to worship. The synagogue would love for you to share our facilities. So, for two and half years we worshiped at Temple Emmanuel. They had Hebrew school on Sunday mornings, so we had five different places in a several block area of Temple Emmanuel were we had Sunday School classes. The Dale Carnegie House was there. They let us use some space. Campfire girls was in the area, they let us use their space. We rented some space in an office building that was used as the nursery because in terms of trying to take down and put up nursery equipment we needed a place where we could keep stuff. So, your family might be having Sunday School in four different places on Sunday morning. HUNTLEY: You have been active in the community participation movement. What were some of the highlights of your career with that group? I know your service, but are you still president? BOCK: No, I gave up being president in 1987 or ' ; 88. I was asked to work with the Woodlawn area in a revitalization program and the time and the evening meeting of my own neighborhood association and the need to meet with folks at Woodlawn was just too much of a conflict because I really felt like they both had to be my first priority so I went ahead and did not run in ' ; 87 or ' ; 88 to continue as president. HUNTLEY: You were here when Mayor Arrington was first in office. BOCK: Right. HUNTLEY: How did your community respond to a Black man coming in to run the city? BOCK: My recollection is that he carried our neighborhood. A number of us who were very active in the neighborhood were very active in support of his campaign and that' ; s a long time ago, but my recollection is that we had a majority. HUNTLEY: Betty, how do you see the city changing over time from when you arrived in ' ; 66 to the present as far as racial issues are concerned? BOCK: Out really there has been progress. HUNTLEY: What do you mean? Explain this. BOCK: Racism is still alive and well. HUNTLEY: Why do you say that? BOCK: It' ; s seen in housing patterns. The transition is taking place in the Huffman and Roebuck area now. You know for a long-time folks could hide behind the economic thing. Well now if there were middle class Black people, we wouldn' ; t mind living next door to them. It' ; s the lower income Blacks that we don' ; t want to live next door to. But now you have African American middle-class families moving into previously White communities and you' ; ve got as much White flight as when it was the inner city. I would even put some of the difficulties with programs such as Healthy Start and some of the stuff with the Citizen Participation Program has some vestiges of those dynamics. HUNTLEY: How is that, those two? Just talk briefly about those two, Healthy Start and Citizens Participation. BOCK: In some ways I would say that the two groups of people in many situations can use the same works and think they were on the same pages, but the reality was that they were worlds apart. And I don' ; t put the whole Healthy Start situation on that. There was one woman who was apart from anything else was a primary factor in the things that happened but that wasn' ; t the sole problem going on. HUNTLEY: Betty we' ; ve covered a lot of territory and we' ; re going to have to stop here because I have another person who' ; s coming in. I' ; m sure though that we' ; ll probably like to get you back to talk more in detail about some of the things that have taken place in the last 10 or 12 years. But I want to thank you for taking time out today to talk with us. BOCK: Thank you. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=BBock1997.xml BBock1997.xml
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Rev. Betty Bock
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Rev. Betty Bock discusses her path to helping create a desegregated ministry in Birmingham after growing up in Missouri. She worked with community and spiritual leaders to form a new church after lacking support through First Baptist Church.
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19970131B
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Wallace, George C. (George Corley), 1919-1998
Arrington, Richard
Birmingham (Ala.)
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1997-01-31
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video
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e524475862f42c6fa58ed0a149abe37d
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Laura Anderson
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C.T. Vivian
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http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=CTVivian2013.xml
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Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011
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5.4 August 15, 2013 Rev. C.T. Vivian 20130815V 0:42:56 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexers: Lessie Dingler, Alexandra Smith Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Southern Christian Leadership Conference Freedom Rides, 1961 Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 C.T. Vivian Laura Anderson Video 1:|32(11)|41(13)|53(2)|61(3)|74(10)|87(14)|88(3)|112(6)|118(14)|139(11)|165(3)|185(6)|205(11)|216(4)|228(13)|242(4)|249(9)|267(2)|275(2)|282(13)|291(2)|312(15)|323(9)|332(11)|340(4)|351(7)|387(3)|414(6)|428(1)|439(5)|446(13)|454(4)|467(12)|478(13)|485(16)|492(11)|509(4)|521(7)|550(6)|562(16)|592(10)|604(10)|611(5)|618(6)|628(11)|636(18)|648(2)|684(10)|721(13)|739(8)|748(4)|761(2)|775(9)|785(10) 0 https://youtu.be/yOctHnV047A YouTube video English 2 Introduction to Interview OK. Welcome to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Introduction to Reverend C.T. Vivian 33.516200, -86.813870 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 14 Family Background And, I want to begin by asking you to please give me your full name, and your date of birth and place of birth. Reverend C. T. Vivian discusses how he was born in Missouri and left to Illinois with his family due to the Great Depression and segregation in the south. African Americans--Agriculture ; Segregation in education Booneville (Mo.) ; Great Depression ; Howard County (Mo.) ; McComb (Ill.) ; Western Illinois University 289 Education and Work Background Hmm. So you went to teachers’ college yourself? Reverend C. T. Vivian discusses going to school for journalism and working as a writer for various places around Illinois after his time in school. Journalism Carver Community Center (Ill.) ; Chicago (Ill.) ; Nashville (Tenn.) ; National Baptist Convention of the United States of America. Sunday School Publishing Board ; St. Louis (Mo.) ; Urban Training Center (Ill.) ; YMCA 431 Going to Nashville Hmm. Well, so when you finally did venture down to Nashville, was your family worried for you? Reverend C. T. Vivian explains how even though the north was better for them, he felt compelled to join the Movement in the south because people were dying. Breakthrough ; Fear--The South--United States ; Grandmother 560 Activism at a Young Age This is what you were convicted to be involved in. Reverend C. T. Vivian explains how he got involved at a young age starting with being the head of organizations at his predominately white school. Integration--Schools Edison Junior High (McComb, Ill.) ; Lincoln Elementary School (McComb, Ill.) ; McComb High School (McComb, Ill.) 676 McComb's Coverage Mmm. You and I were talking on the way up, when we were walking through the Institute, about the media, and about, things that were aired locally, or not aired locally, that were seen by the rest of the country, was McComb’s coverage of what you were doing positive or negative? Reverend C. T. Vivian discusses how even though the schools were integrated, social situations outside of school were still weighted with segregation practices. Integration--Schools ; Social Gatherings--Segregation McCombs (Ill.) ; Peoria (Ill.) 851 Feelings About the Current Racial Climate Hmm. How do you feel about things now? Reverend C.T. Vivian talks about how his concern today is about Black leadership, and having a Black president is a another thing that people are still not completely in favor of. Black Leadership--Black President Confederates ; Obama, Barack ; Tea Party Patriots 932 Birmingham's Role in Civil Rights What role do you think Birmingham played in cracking the egg? Reverend CT Vivian explains his view on how Birmingham affected the whole nation's Civil Rights Movement and how other places was working long before they get credit for. Nonviolence ; Sit-ins Peoria (Ill.) ; Pontiac (Mich.) 1058 Movement Strategies and Training ...starting the movement, but let’s say why. You see, we still didn’t know what to do, all of that was north. Even when, even when the NAACP won the, the school case, in the West, right, is that that didn’t mean anything to the South. Didn’t change the South one iota, right? Reverend CT Vivian explains how the nonviolent strategy of the Movement was intentionally different in the South and lead to the SCLC. Montgomery (Ala.) ; Nonviolence King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference 1414 Meeting in Montgomery for the Freedom Rides Farmer. When, when, Jim said, I’d known Jim before. But then we were in prison together in, during, in Jackson, Mississippi. But but the, see when he said, ‘Well, we’ve proven the point,’ depending back on the legal stuff again, that that a black man, that even, even animals can be moved across country without having to be moved from one, one car to another, right, but , but not black people. Reverend CT Vivian discusses how he became involved with the Freedom Rides and how he handled it personally. Ardmore (Ala.) ; Farmer, James ; Montgomery (Ala.) Freedom Rides, 1961 ; Jackson (Miss.) 1660 The Relationship Between Spiritual and Intellectual in the Movement Yeah, you were kinda signing your life away, weren’t you? Reverend CT Vivian breaks down the intersection of Christianity and the Movement, as well as the role religion played in the community at the time. Old Testament Association of Southern Baptist Colleges and Schools ; Christianity ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 1947 The Impact of Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth ...any special recollections or insight you have into SCLC’s decisions about Birmingham. Reverend CT Vivian describes how Reverend Fred L. Shuttlesworth transformed the Birmingham Movement and shifted it toward success. March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (1963 : Washington, D.C.) National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference 2293 Nonviolent Practice and Changes Across the Country Well, I know would have been knowledgeable, but it often, in the mythologizing of all of this, it often gets painted, a picture gets painted, that puts you all on one side, like, ‘well, we don’t care that they’re trying to change the form of government, we’ve got to do what we have to do,’ Reverend CT Vivian explains that the Movement was working for national change of all people. Nonviolence Discrimination ; Slavery 2431 Winning on a National Level I’ve heard you use the phrase “we won” and you know, but what was the win it was a national … Reverend CT Vivian describes racism as anti-Christian and explains the Movement work in seminaries nationally. Christianity ; Racism ; South Africa King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Selma (Ala.) 2647 Using Love to Gain Solidarity Big difference is right! And so, we, we go and so I go, and I give the speech and I give the sermon, and one of the things I’m talking about, I talk about I – the only thing from the speech I really remember – , was the fact that , here , that , you can continue and ministers can stand up there and do it, but eventually, if they get rid of a minister that tells them the truth, they can never walk in that church, without the blood flowing, that they see flowing down the front of that pulpit. right? Reverend CT Vivian describes the role love should play in Christianity and therefore should influence the lives and relationships of Christians. Gay rights--Religious aspects--Baptists, [Catholic Church, etc.] ; Old Testament Christianity ; Racism 2861 SCLC's Relationship to Birmingham You said, ‘No. We never wanted to come back, SCLC, coming back to Birmingham,' but you said there were reasons … Reverend CT Vivian explains why SCLC did not have any desire to return to Birmingham in order to continue working. National guard ; SCLC ; Selma (Ala.) Southern Christian Leadership Conference 2976 Victory in Selma So, for you, was that place Dallas County? Reverend CT Vivian explains how the Movement in Selma included wins for racial justice, voter registration and women's suffrage. Bloody Sunday ; Voting rights ; Women's suffrage Selma (Ala.) ; Selma to Montgomery Rights March (1965 : Selma, Ala.) ; United States. Civil Rights Act of 1964 3244 Conclusion of Interview Thank you so much. Interview is concluded. Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Vivian, CT Oral History Reverend CT Vivian discusses his leadership in the Movement through SCLC. He worked closely with Dr. Martin Luther King in Selma and on the religious aspects of the Movement. ANDERSON: OK. Welcome to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. VIVIAN: Thank you, sister. ANDERSON: We' ; re so pleased to have you. Again, I' ; m Laura. Anderson. I' ; m an archivist here. VIVIAN: Mmm hmm. ANDERSON: And I want to begin by asking you to please give me your full name, and your date of birth and place of birth. VIVIAN: C. T. Vivian, but that means Cordy C-O-R-D-Y Tindell T-I-N-D-E-L-L Vivian V-I-V-I-A-N. Right. Mmm hmm. And that was July 30th, 1924, is when I was born. ANDERSON: And you were born in-- VIVIAN: In Missouri. In Howard County, Missouri, really. ANDERSON: OK VIVIAN: Mmm hmm. Across from, the river from Booneville, Illinois. ANDERSON: We won' ; t get into- VIVIAN: Oh, I mean, Booneville, Missouri. ANDERSON: Okay. VIVIAN: Pardon me. Yeah. ANDERSON: Well, we won' ; t get into whether Missouri is the South, we' ; ll just move on and we' ; ll talk about how you ended up in the South. VIVIAN: It was the South, however, the reason my family left was two: one was because the Depression had hit, right, and the other one is because we were in a segregated state, and, as a result, I couldn' ; t get the kind of education that the family knew I needed. So, since we lost everything, that, does things to a man. Right? It really does things to men. They had farms, they' ; d worked for three farms, and then worked and bought three farms, and then to have them disappear overnight was a little much for them to take. Both my father, who wasn' ; t that old, but it shook the whole country. I don' ; t care whether you were Black or white, you were shaken, right. But, if you were Black you had no reason to stay in a segregated state. As a result, the family moved to Illinois, as the best way to say it. But when they did, they stopped, for whatever reason, I don' ; t know, but they stopped -- I know the real reason -- they stopped at a university town. In McComb, Illinois, right. As a result of that, I grew up in a non-segregated environment. ANDERSON: Hmm. What university was there? VIVIAN: Western Illinois University. Which is the name now, but at the time it was Western Illinois Teachers' ; College. And that' ; s what happened during those times, that we were first a college, and then because the area we were in colleges were the norm, because we had to educate so many teachers, because there was a law about every square mile there had to be a school. And as a result of that, they needed lots of teachers, which means they needed lots of teachers' ; colleges, alright? And that' ; s it. But the bottom line on that for me, was that I went to a teachers' ; college, which is what I wanted to do anyway, but I went to a teachers' ; college, but had never seen a Black teacher. So, how was I even to know, that I was going to ever have a chance to teach? But I knew I could possibly teach because, if you were a Black woman, you could not stay in the dormitory. And there was only a woman' ; s dormitory at the time, and you couldn' ; t stay there, so there were Black women who came to stay in the city. And in our town. And then in the smallest part of it was Black community, right? So, my grandmother rented out, rooms in our houses to students. ANDERSON: Hmm. So, you went to teachers' ; college yourself? VIVIAN: Mmm hmm. Oh yeah, yeah. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. VIVIAN: And you will hear me later talk about being in journalism and editing at the Sunday School Publishing Board of the National Baptist Convention, which was the largest convention of Black people in the United States. We had the largest publishing house, by the way, as well, and in fact Nashville was filled with publishing houses. Ours was the largest African American one, but there were two others. ANDERSON: So you took a job in Nashville right out of school? VIVIAN: No, oh, there was a lot of things happening -- ANDERSON: I' ; m sure. VIVIAN: Then I had been, I had been in the YMCA. I' ; d been at the Urban, not the, I started to say, the Urban Training Center, but that was much, much later. But I had been at the recreation center in Peroria, Illinois, a Carver Community Center, is what it was called, and it was the largest place for activities for Black people, the largest between Chicago and St. Louis, which is a tremendous coverage. But that' ; s how little that we had in the North. As well as in the South, you see. You see, I mention that because we thought going north everything was going to be perfect, and both white people and Black people think, oh, it would be perfect for Black people, now that they' ; ve run out of the South into the North, but the point is it wasn' ; t perfect. But it was so, so, so much better than anything in the South. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: Much, much better than anything in the South. That it gave me a tremendous advantage. ANDERSON: Hmm. Well, so when you finally did venture down to Nashville, was your family worried for you? VIVIAN: Yes, I' ; ll tell you how it came, but they really got worried when the movement started. They began to talk about buying a house that I had liked in McComb, and a good place for us to be, and etcetera, and children, and all that. They were grandparents and that sort of thing, so they were very concerned. But they didn' ; t start that until it was very clear that the movement was serious and people were being killed in the South. And, so, they didn' ; t know whether that would happen to me or not. I remember telling them, and I' ; m doing this the long way, but I remember talking to my grandmother on the phone about it, and I told her, ' ; You see, grandma, what its like when you break an egg and it cracks but it doesn' ; t really open, and then you try to peel, the cover off of the egg, because you didn' ; t break through it, you see. And now we were in the situation where we had to break through not just the shell, but that inner thing that keeps things out, the energy, the food, the meaning, of the egg out of your reach.' ; ANDERSON: Hmm. I got too into what you were saying to remember my train of thought. Well, we were talking about your family' ; s concern for you coming South. VIVIAN: Mmm hmm. ANDERSON: And I understand that you just had to explain to them-- VIVIAN: Sure. ANDERSON: Maybe why you had no choice, this is- VIVIAN: Yeah, that' ; s- ANDERSON: -this is what you were convicted to be involved in. VIVIAN: Yeah, that' ; s precisely right. In fact, before I left McComb for instance, I had been the head of, or an important member of, every organization in high school. I was, in one situation in junior high where I lacked twenty votes of getting every vote in the school-- and it was a white school. There was very few of us Black, I mean, very few. I remember, in a class where there' ; d be two or three of us, and that was as early as fifth and sixth grade, second ward was the grade school, Lincoln, and then we went to Edison Junior High, and then McComb High School. ANDERSON: So you were always out in the forefront? VIVIAN: Yeah. ANDERSON: Well, let' ; s get back to the movement. VIVIAN: In fact, all during the movement, the McComb papers carried anything that was said about me. You know what I mean? But in fact, they' ; ve named a street after me. ANDERSON: Good. VIVIAN: Yeah, no, that' ; s very nice. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: And I' ; m very thankful. And they' ; ve already called me to come back, because I you know, the president is going to give me the medal of freedom. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: So they' ; ve already asked me to come back, it' ; s just a matter of figuring out how soon I can get there. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. That' ; ll be a great day in McComb. VIVIAN: Yeah. See, what I like about is it makes it easier for any Black people that come to McComb. ANDERSON: Mmm. You and I were talking on the way up, when we were walking through the Institute, about the media, and about things that were aired locally, or not aired locally, that were seen by the rest of the country, Was McComb' ; s coverage of what you were doing positive or negative? Were they- VIVIAN: Well nobody expected any national coverage of McComb. But Peoria, that was different. At the time, Peoria was the second largest city in the state. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. Well, I' ; m sorry, I don' ; t think I phrased it correctly. VIVIAN: Okay. ANDERSON: I wondered, at the time, were you a troublemaker, or were you a proud product of McComb? They wanted to you know- VIVIAN: Oh, oh, I was a proud product of McComb. ANDERSON: Even then? VIVIAN: Oh, yeah, oh yes -- ANDERSON: That' ; s wonderful, yeah. VIVIAN: See because we were never a segregated society in the first place, so they always felt and knew that they were far ahead of the South and did not want to be associated with anything like segregation or hate at all. And they had a right not to be. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: Now, socially I was different, I mean as I mentioned, got every vote in the school. But, anytime somebody wanted to invite me to a party that was happening on the other side of town, or to their home for dinner, it always reminded me of that famous film, Guess Who' ; s Coming to Dinner. Well I' ; ve had those, but the parents would say no. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: But, what that did for me, was to tell me everything was going to be alright eventually. Because there was the generation that didn' ; t want segregation, but didn' ; t want a social anti-segregation, right? So, socially they did not want a social bringing-together at that level. But any other level, they were for it. Well, I knew if wanted me to come to dinner, if my generation wanted me at parties, I knew that when they came of age it would be alright. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: And so, I had faith that the system would really work in the end. ANDERSON: Hmm. How do you feel about things now? VIVIAN: Oh right now? That it' ; s just a matter of time when the full change comes. We' ; re on the edge of it anyway. I' ; m more concerned about Black leadership right now than for the new changes, than I am anything else. But I see the cracked egg. We have a Black president, right? And although everything is wrong that he does--the same things I' ; ve seen from other presidents that nobody even thought about it. But when it' ; s a Black president, that' ; s a whole ' ; nother thing. And we call the Tea Party the confederate party, you know. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. VIVIAN: You know, because we see it only as that kind of impediment in the way. But that too will pass away. If I can use another one of my quotes. ANDERSON: Hmm. What role do you think Birmingham played in cracking the egg? VIVIAN: Oh, there were three -- Birmingham gave us, pardon me, Alabama gave us our freedom. See, Montgomery proved the method. By the way, I had used nonviolence in 1947, nine years before Montgomery. Alright? We had opened lunch counters in Peoria, Illinois. Nine years before Montgomery. My wife had been involved in Pontiac, Michigan, before we ever met. She had been involved in a group that were a very active group when she was a kid in grade school and high school. And they knocked on doors and all that sort of thing and asked people to come vote and that kind of thing, right. But when we look at what was coming, there was a drive-in in Pontiac, Michigan, that was broken the same way. They wanted to feed you out the window. And her minister took a group of young people, like the group I was telling you about, and went and when they gave them food in a bag, they went to the table, sat down, opened the bag, and ate, right? Well, after another one like that, they didn' ; t try it anymore. So, little things like that were happening everywhere. ANDERSON: Right, yeah it' ; s a long movement. That' ; s why I' ; m just gritting my teeth a lot this year when people use the phrase ' ; the 50th anniversary of the movement.' ; VIVIAN: Yeah, yeah. ANDERSON: I just have to-- VIVIAN: See, see and they, they' ; re -- ANDERSON: But I know that' ; s not direct-- VIVIAN: Starting the movement, but let' ; s say why. You see, we still didn' ; t know what to do-- all of that was north. Even when the NAACP won the school case in the West, that didn' ; t mean anything to the South. Didn' ; t change the South one iota, right? No schools opened in the South, right, you see what I mean? So it was so limited that we had to ask. Now what they were after was a new strategy. Remember Howard University Law School, they were the experts in constitutional law, cause that was the strategy they were going to use to open up everything. It didn' ; t open up the South at all. I mean not one iota. So, as a result of that, what we were looking for was another strategy. So the real strategy started when Martin and Montgomery came together, right. See, and this is why I said Alabama was so basic to the freedom of Black people, because Martin King, who had studied deeply --as deeply as you could under the circumstances -- studied nonviolence and at one of the best possible places for it, one of the three or four best seminaries in the United States. He came out of there as a minister going to Montgomery, and when something happened, they met as his church, asked him to be the leader, he became the leader and the method was nonviolent direct action. You see what I mean? What we needed was a new strategy. And when we won that case, that bus case, right, within days -- within weeks, really, but within a few, short weeks, ten different cities moved. Please don' ; t ask me what they were, cause I don' ; t know, I' ; m repeating a given line, but a number of cities really, really opened. And, as a result of that, that was the beginning of the movement, you see. You couldn' ; t say the experiment at Howard University was, because it didn' ; t do anything that meant the full freedom. When Martin called together the SCLC -- an organization that would be named Southern Christian Leadership Conference, right, -- leadership coming out of there was deciding to do the same thing that Martin did, with the same strategy that Martin had. See, it was the strategy that made the difference, you see. Then things changed totally. And kept changing, kept changing, still changing. ANDERSON: There were quite a few years in there to hone that strategy, between Montgomery and Birmingham. VIVIAN: Well, but it stayed the same. It was the same. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. VIVIAN: It was the same. It just proved itself to be workable. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: and to be work-ing, alright. There wasn' ; t any real change that went on. The only one change was the children going on, but we' ; d already been doing some of that in Nashville. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: The real difference was we trained people in Nashville, right. For nonviolent direct action, you see what I mean. But we were all of one mind, about the strategy and how to carry it out. And we added to the strategy that had been used before in nonviolence by us. So the only change we renewed when we won Montgomery, you see what I mean? But, remember there had been a bus boycott by CORE, before coming into the South, but only at the top of the South. And they were beaten and left, right? You see, well, that didn' ; t happen this time. And our group in Nashville said that violence cannot destroy nonviolence and we will refuse to let it do so. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: See, there wasn' ; t any thought of backing up. And as soon as he had said, cause remember on the bus boycott, it was by CORE, right. John Lewis was in the group cause he' ; d been asked to and because they knew we were training and etcetera, and they didn' ; t get very far. As you know, the busses were burned and so forth. As soon as he said, and then Jim Foreman said -- not Foreman, James -- ANDERSON: Farmer? VIVIAN: Farmer. known Jim before. But then we were in prison together in Jackson, Mississippi. See when he said, ' ; Well, we' ; ve proven the point,' ; depending back on the legal stuff again, that a Black man, that even animals can be moved across country without having to be moved from one car to another, right, but not Black people. And this is in the democratic country, you see. And they refuse to stand up for the rights of African American people -- they meaning the administration, they meaning more than the administration, it meant the citizenship of the United State and that they had no intention of being a democratic country. That was quite different, but it wasn' ; t enough for us. But we also were students -- well, I wasn' ; t a student, there were about six of us that weren' ; t students -- but the rest of them right. There were ten students that went to Montgomery, started to Montgomery that night. Police met them at the railroad tracks at the borderline, right, and told them they could not come across and go back home. The pretense was to turn around, but they never turned around, they came right back across those tracks that night, alright and asked people could they come into their houses and they said yes. ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: But in fact some of them took them on into whatever the city was, it' ; s not coming to me at the moment, when we crossed the border ANDERSON: Between Alabama and Tennessee? VIVIAN: Yeah, yeah. ANDERSON: Yeah, yeah. There' ; s a little, Ardmore, is a little community there. VIVIAN: Well, yeah, but we went on into--what was the major city? ANDERSON: Well, I don' ; t know what your group -- VIVIAN: Cause we had to leave it later. No, we had to within days, we left it. Not Birmingham, what was it, I' ; m trying to -- ANDERSON: Well, there -- VIVIAN: think of the name of the city. ANDERSON: I' ; ve never heard of y' ; all stopping in Huntsville, but -- VIVIAN: No, no -- ANDERSON: that' ; s -- VIVIAN: we went, we went into -- I don' ; t know why the name' ; s not coming to me, but -- ANDERSON: That' ; s OK. And I' ; m no help because I' ; m -- VIVIAN: but you' ; ll get it when it comes to you -- ANDERSON: Yeah, we' ; ll-- VIVIAN: And we met the we stayed in a dentist, a Black dentist' ; s home, and then -- ANDERSON: In Montgomery? VIVIAN: Yeah, in Montgomery. ANDERSON: Yeah. Yes, that was Dr -- VIVIAN: That' ; s it -- ANDERSON: Dr. Bryant. VIVIAN: OK, then the next morning we got up went to the bus station. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: See what I mean? Well, I joined them at that point. ANDERSON: Oh, OK. VIVIAN: That' ; s where I got off on this because I had to go home and tell my wife. You know, we had children, and not to ask, ' ; Could I?,' ; as much as to, you know, we had to announce it to each other. We weren' ; t going to leave without -- we were going to enter Jackson, Mississippi -- ANDERSON: Yeah, you were kinda signing your life away, weren' ; t you? VIVIAN: That' ; s the point. And the wife and I' ; d always felt as though it was the same, I mean we were doing it together. We were not doing it separately. In fact, a new library and archives will be founded, is being founded, as we speak. And it' ; s going to be named after both of us. And the symbol of it, is she' ; s standing over me, so that we don' ; t have to worry about ' ; it' ; s CT' ; s thing,' ; you know? ANDERSON: Hmm. VIVIAN: Because we both wrote books but I mean she, it was meaningful to her, I just knocked mine off because I had to -- ANDERSON: Hmm VIVIAN: But I have more books in my collection. I mean but together we have about 4,500 books. But almost a thousand books that are part of my seminary on thinking and experiencing, preaching, and etcetera, I' ; m giving it right off the bat. But I' ; m trying to do something different. The best materials to express what was happening intellectually in the Black community is done through a magazine there, and so I' ; m putting the two together. And giving it and putting it into our muse. ANDERSON: Okay. VIVIAN: Because I' ; m concerned that they see the intellectual and spiritual side of Black America and the argents back and forth, but never, a separation of the two. Because this is what Martin led, a moral and spiritual movement. He didn' ; t lead a political movement and what nonviolence was about was moral and spiritual. It wasn' ; t about politics, right. And that' ; s two, Martin understood that politics is just not deep enough to deal with the fact of the depth of racism in this society. And that you have to go beyond it, right. What we should have done -- well, pardon me -- one of the things we could have done -- is as soon as we won was to attack the Christian church for not being Christian. Because it' ; s not. My point being is what do you tell people who believe in every tit and jot and tittle of the scriptures? What do you tell them about the Old Testament? Obviously got mistakes all the way through it and two or three, up to five, books of the New Testament were not written by the people they say did it, right? You don' ; t tell Black people that, either, by the way. You don' ; t preach it, in fact you try to not preach it, or use it as an auxiliary to the real stuff. But my point being is that we have a moral and spiritual movement based around the Sermon on the Mount, right, and John 15 16 and 17, John 15, 16, and 17, right, --is that the understandings of love as central. And as Jesus said, ' ; You can' ; t be my disciple unless you love one another.' ; Now, you can' ; t tell that to Southern Baptists, either. It took them 30 years after the death of Martin to even admit that racism was seriously wrong. In fact, more than seriously wrong, that hate in any form could not be accepted as Christianity. I was going to tell you some other stuff, but it' ; s not necessary ; let' ; s keep going. ANDERSON: Ha. Well, I would like to know-- VIVIAN: It' ; s not important -- ANDERSON: Any special recollections or insight you have into SCLC' ; s decisions about Birmingham. VIVIAN: About Birmingham. There was only one point, actually, that Fred Shuttlesworth was one of the people that Martin invited to SCLC. Now, there' ; s -- well, there' ; s two or three points -- but one is that the governor of this state before Wallace-- ANDERSON: Patterson. VIVIAN: Yeah, said that you couldn' ; t have an NAACP in this state. Well, when he said that, Fred said, ' ; that' ; s alright,' ; and he went around the country with a new name. And they realized that anytime they tried to stop one, we' ; d come up with a new name. But they' ; d be the same people and working on the same issues and going forward, right? But Fred did that, right? And he did it all up and down the state. That' ; s the tremendous change point for this whole state, right? And Fred had the courage to do anything. You know, when you walk into, with your family, into a group of white people who are ready to kill you and try to prove it and you keep coming back. I don' ; t mean to keep coming back at that moment, but that it doesn' ; t defeat you. And when they try to bomb you twice, right, blow you out of your bed with bomb and it still doesn' ; t stop you, right. Blow your church away and the people rebuild it. Then we' ; re talking about what do you do, to them, so that they don' ; t come back anymore? Well we had the answer in song, ' ; you can' ; t kill us all.' ; And we will be here, but we' ; re not gonna die on your terms, right, we' ; re gonna die on ours. And we will prove to you, right, by our dying, quite like Jesus did, there, that you really can' ; t stop what we' ; re saying. And you can' ; t end truth with violence. And see that' ; s the main thing we did is that we proved to this country that violence can' ; t end truth. And that we refused to allow anyone to think it for any length of time. And we will be the example for it. This is the meaning of nonviolent direct action. Mmm. Yeah. But that' ; s one of the points, in terms of answering your question -- ANDERSON: About Birmingham? VIVIAN: Yeah, about Birmingham, is when we came to this town to finish the job that Fred had done, right? We may have had to wait three years longer, had it not been for the two or three years that Fred had already put in, or three to five years that he' ; d already put in, you see what I mean? ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: And when we think of that, how important that really was -- ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: And that we went from, and here' ; s another one of those changes -- in the middle of the movement here, the election that was gonna be held, right? We would have been used by the head of the police and fire department, trying to run for mayor. He would have used us as being so for the other guy. He being the best racist, and the most racist of racists, that he could have been elected. But we were at the March on Washington. See and, boom he loses, and we come back to Birmingham and to win. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: See, but that could have been that moment, that time, that period right there could have been very different. ANDERSON: So you all are very well aware of what all was going on with the municipal -- VIVIAN: Oh, oh, oh -- ANDERSON: change of government -- VIVIAN: Very, very. You couldn' ; t -- ANDERSON: Because, you know, you -- VIVIAN: You had to be, you had to be knowledgeable of everything. Pardon me -- ANDERSON: Well, I know would have been knowledgeable, but it often, in the mythologizing of all of this, a picture gets painted that puts you all on one side, like, ' ; well, we don' ; t care that they' ; re trying to change the form of government, we' ; ve got to do what we have to do,' ; and I' ; m sure that -- VIVIAN: Oh, no -- ANDERSON: was true on the one hand, but -- VIVIAN: In fact, we were concerned about the change -- ANDERSON: Yeah, tell me more about that. VIVIAN: The thing is that why let your enemy win, when you don' ; t have to? And when you can step out of that or whatever for a month or two. And while they' ; re having an election, you' ; re gaining the world on your side. See, it' ; s not a ' ; we' ; re doing what we have to,' ; in terms of Birmingham. It was because Birmingham was never our issue, America was our issue. ANDERSON: There you go. VIVIAN: And not just Black people, white people. Everybody has to be changed in this nation before a sin and an evil that deep in a culture, for so long, like 400 years, you don' ; t change that by simply saying ' ; we' ; re doing politics in the way that its always been done,' ; right? I mean, that' ; s kind of stupid. The point being is that you win by knowing your total situation. And you want to win nonviolently. You don' ; t want to win by trying, by even suggesting, that you' ; re trying to beat somebody out of the way, or you' ; re trying to shoot somebody out of the way, see what I mean. What we really taught is that you can change, make deep and important social changes, without violence. See, that was the important thing. ANDERSON: Alright. VIVIAN: The line I just used for you is a great line. And people like myself didn' ; t even say it until long after. ANDERSON: Mmm. VIVIAN: And not because we thought it but was afraid to say it, we didn' ; t even think about it. ANDERSON: Yeah, but it' ; s so helpful -- VIVIAN: Yeah-- ANDERSON: It' ; s helpful even now, because -- VIVIAN: Yeah, that' ; s the point. ANDERSON: I' ; ve heard you use the phrase " ; we won" ; and you know, but what was the win -- VIVIAN: Oh, sure-- ANDERSON: it was a national -- VIVIAN: Oh, of course, but you see, we couldn' ; t have won in any local place. One of the differences in strategy, SNCC thought about winning in a location. We thought about winning in the nation. See, ours was not to win a handful of Black people, only, right? But we realized that Black people could not win until they broke through white hatred. Now, how do you do that? -- you do it with love and truth and justice, alright. ANDERSON: Mmm. VIVIAN: But you must be willing to suffer for it. But you' ; ve had the cross on the wall all your life, so you knew that it wasn' ; t gonna come easy, and you knew there was life and death. And we didn' ; t understand why white Christians didn' ; t understand that, right? Everything about racism is anti-Christian. Right, there isn' ; t anything about racism that that is not anti-Christian. And yet the so-called Christian church of white America thinks it can represent Him. See, it' ; s just ridiculous. And this is why one of the first groups to come to our side was white Christian ministers, who came to walk with us in Selma, for instance, right. But the theologians at the seminaries were coming throughout the movement, right, showing support. But you see they didn' ; t have to face a white racist audience, because they were in seminaries where you argued those things out, talked them out, alright. And they were arguing for us at the places of teaching and concern, right. Well that was very very helpful because if the value-producing agencies, right, absorb truth, justice, and love as their high points then eventually the whole society has to say, either we' ; re for it or we' ; re against it. And when they say they' ; re against Christianity -- listen, in South Africa, the white Christian church came around years and years before we even got in the battle. Right? They knew they were wrong. Said it and you know preached it, and lost churches based on it, right. I remember going to the Southern Baptist seminary in Louisville, very early cause they asked me to come down to talk at the seminary, not at the church. ANDERSON: Big difference. VIVIAN: Big difference is right! And so I go, and I give the speech and I give the sermon, And one of the things I talk about, the only thing from the speech I really remember, was the fact that ministers can stand up there and do it, but eventually if they get rid of a minister that tells them the truth, they can never walk in that church without the blood flowing that they see flowing down the front of that pulpit. Because they have crucified a disciple of Jesus whether they like it or not. And if they want to come back and rub their nose in it every Sunday or try to run it away, their conscience won' ; t let them. They will know that they were totally wrong, and that they' ; re really not Christian. Because we' ; re not talking about some little thing about do you drink something on Sunday or Monday, or do you wear something [indistinguishable]. We' ; re talking about the very heart of the issue. That do you love somebody. That' ; s the way I teach sex education to our church, when they' ; re talking about gays for instance, right. I hate to say it that way, I wish there was another way to say it, right. Cause it' ; s already a negative, you know, the way you say it -- ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: Does did God create gays? And then did God love gays? And they know where they got to go. And I' ; ll say and where does God in the New Testament have anything to say about hating anybody, but much less killing? Putting down, destroying the personalities and drive of people. Now you tell me something about 4,000 years ago -- haven' ; t we learned anything in 4,000 years? -- but that' ; s Old Testament. Are you an Old Testament Christian or are you a New Testament Christian? And you can' ; t be both, because the concept of love won' ; t let you put up with that hate game. ANDERSON: We' ; ve got some recordings, I think there' ; s just one, and your voice is on one of them -- VIVIAN: Is that right? ANDERSON: It' ; s from a mass meeting, at one of the churches here in that spring, and you were pretty fired up then, too, like you are right now. VIVIAN: Ha ha. That proves, that' ; s proof it' ; s authentic. ANDERSON: Yep. That' ; s what I' ; m sittin' ; here thinking. It' ; s such a privilege to be sitting here with you. VIVIAN: Mmm thanks. ANDERSON: I don' ; t want them to get upset with me for wearing you out -- VIVIAN: By going over, right. ANDERSON: But I really, -- VIVIAN: One, one more question. ANDERSON: I really do want to ask you, yeah -- VIVIAN: And I' ; ll make it short. ANDERSON: you said, ' ; No. We never wanted to come back, SCLC, coming back to Birmingham, but you said there were reasons -- VIVIAN: Yeah -- ANDERSON: Can you speak to that for me? VIVIAN: Oh oh oh, the reasons is because we won. Is that the question you really asked me? ANDERSON: Well-- VIVIAN: See I was giving you two reasons why we were not having to, oh, see I was thinking. Was there a reason we had to come back to Birmingham? See, there wasn' ; t any reason we had to come back to Birmingham-- ANDERSON: No, that' ; s not my question. VIVIAN: Yeah. ANDERSON: Just whether -- I just want to know about the relationship of the organization to Birmingham, and -- VIVIAN: Oh, oh -- ANDERSON: and after this so-called victory -- VIVIAN: Oh yeah -- ANDERSON: I mean, I think it was a victory VIVIAN: Well, we saw it as a victory -- ANDERSON: Tell me more. VIVIAN: But you see we saw it as a victory, so we didn' ; t have to come back. ANDERSON: But life went on after ' ; 63 and -- VIVIAN: Yeah, but Fred was here. ANDERSON: Okay. VIVIAN: See and the troops were here, and we ended up with a white mayor. You see what I mean? Not immediately, but with a white mayor shortly afterwards. Right? We didn' ; t have to come back -- Fred was in charge. We just came back to get Fred over the hump. You see what I mean? It was never meant for us to stay in any place, alright? It' ; s that once the people had won, they could keep it, cause we had a strategy. You see what I mean? And that was the real thing, is that they knew what to do under a leader and a people that had been through the fire and had won. They weren' ; t going to give it up. See? ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. VIVIAN: What we had to do was be about another place, you see what I mean? That we could make as bold as this one. ANDERSON: So, for you, was that place Dallas County? VIVIAN: In Selma? Yeah, oh, in fact, that was just the next place. ANDERSON: That was the next step. VIVIAN: Oh oh oh, I' ; ll tell you what, I woke up after we' ; d known we' ; d won in Selma, right? I woke up one morning, and knew that this was going to be our last great battle. And I just woke up, and I was in my room, and I knew that was the last great battle we were going to fight around any of the city kinds of things. See, we' ; d fought in city after city after city to win legislation in one city or the other, get my point? We didn' ; t go to a city to win the city as much as just to win the legislation, that would free everybody, you see what I mean? Now, this was it, when we had the right to vote, that was the importance of Selma. When you put 20 million people where they can vote, that changes things. Alright? And that causes everybody else in the country like you to say ' ; whoo.' ; But that also changed everybody who had a gripe -- the women' ; s movement won, right, as a result of, I mean, we won it all at once. We got the law for the women' ; s movement, right? We got the law, remember there was a youth movement going on for a while? ANDERSON: Mmm hmm VIVIAN: Alright, is that we won, we won that. Right? And so that even the old folk, is the way I preach it, even the old folk, understood it well enough to call themselves the panthers. See that' ; s why the gays came, hmm? Had we lost, none of them would have been free. See what I mean? But having won, all of them are free. See? That' ; s the biggie, that' ; s what changed the nation. Very few people are left, and within, I' ; ll say 10, 15 years, nobody' ; ll be around that can even remember, what went on before. See that' ; s why your history is important. But let' ; s give it to you, is that Black youth can' ; t believe -- see, they can' ; t believe what was. It' ; ll be the same way with white people, short time. See? In fact, will not want you to remember that they, and that they reared their children, to hate folk. They' ; ll want to run you out of the house. You see what I mean? Because but you -- ANDERSON: Yeah, I know. VIVIAN: see, and that -- ha ha ha! You already know that, right? ANDERSON: Ha! VIVIAN: See but that that' ; s, the thing, that' ; s the importance. I know a guy, I know a family, where the woman of the family, really the grandmother of this guy, the mother of this fellow that I' ; m gonna talk about, told him if he--see because the name Vivian was in both cases, and he was saying we' ; re all relatives, he says and she says, ' ; if you tell folk that that my family were slavers,' ; he and says, ' ; I' ; ll cut you out of the money, I' ; m not gonna have anybody going around and saying that we owned slaves and stuff like that,' ; right. And I thought it was so good, because it makes the point so well, see. ANDERSON: Mmm hmm. VIVIAN: Is that ' ; whaaat?' ; She was gonna put him out of the out of her will, right? ANDERSON: Pretty classic. VIVIAN: To say that you' ; re gonna do that--Okay, sis, that' ; s it? ANDERSON: Thank you so much. VIVIAN: Alright. ANDERSON: Thank you, thank you. If we can' ; t have six hours-- VIVIAN: Yeah. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Rev. C.T. Vivian
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Reverend CT Vivian discusses his leadership in the Movement through SCLC. He worked closely with Dr. Martin Luther King in Selma and on the religious aspects of the Movement.
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
Freedom Rides, 1961
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Horace Huntley
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Calvin Woods
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Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department
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5.4 May 12, 1995 Rev. Calvin Woods 19950512W 0:51:57 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Madeline Jenkins Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights Bull Conner Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department Calvin Woods Horace Huntley Video 1:|1(2)|21(6)|34(11)|59(1)|78(6)|90(11)|113(11)|125(14)|136(12)|151(8)|165(11)|181(5)|207(10)|217(15)|232(1)|247(10)|255(9)|266(9)|277(5)|297(2)|313(1)|324(1)|340(8)|359(8)|366(5)|378(1)|395(4)|405(7)|423(8)|434(13)|449(15)|479(1)|497(3)|506(8)|523(2)|532(9)|549(8)|557(9)|583(4)|601(9)|615(7)|626(12)|634(7)|647(2)|654(8)|674(3)|683(11)|700(16)|717(11)|726(8)|734(15)|747(8) 0 https://youtu.be/RwuoF8SAORU YouTube video English 75 Introduction of Interview This is an interview with Rev. Calvin Woods for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. Interview subject is introduced. 33.516200, -86.813870 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 92 Background Thank you. I just want to start by asking a few general kinds of questions about your family. Woods discusses where his parents are from and how his dad is a preacher at a baptist church. Shiloh Baptist Church Birmingham (Ala.) 211 Educational Journey That's great. Tell me about your education. Where did you start elementary school? Woods recalls how he enjoyed going to Parker High School and rejects the claims that Black people are inferior. African Americans--Segregation ; Parker High School Birmingham (Ala.) 503 Attending NAACP Meetings as a High Schooler Were there any adults in your community that you patterned yourself after or would serve as a mentor for you, in your development? Woods discusses going to NAACP meetings and talking about the issue of police brutality towards Black people. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ; Police brutality--United States Birmingham (Ala.) 629 Transitioning into Different Neighborhoods How would you compare, say East Thomas with Loveman's Village? Woods recalls how he felt like he was moving up in the world when he moved out of East Thomas. East Thomas ; Loveman's Village Birmingham (Ala.) 728 His Community's Relationship with the Birmingham Police What was the Black community's relationship to the Birmingham police department? Woods recalls how a white police officer helped him crank his car and how this exchange changed his mind about all white police officers being bad. Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department Birmingham (Ala.) 887 Involvement in the Alabama Christian Movement In 1956, the State of Alabama outlawed the operation of the NAACP in the state. As a result of that the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights was organized. Woods recalls how a dream about Reverend Shuttlesworth pushed him to get involved with the Alabama Christian Movement. Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Birmingham (Ala.) 1028 Attending Miles College Prior to that you actually attended Miles College right after high school and that resulted, because you had won a contest of some sort. Woods discusses how he attended Miles College because he won a scholarship from the Birmingham News. Birmingham News ; Miles College Birmingham (Ala.) 1226 His Role in the Movement and Going to Jail What was your role in the Movement? How did you actually get started? Woods discusses how he encouraged people to break the law and was arrested for urging a boycott of a legal business. Arrest (Police methods) ; Boycott ; Civil rights movement Birmingham (Ala.) 1423 Attending the Mass Meetings Can you describe to me what the typical mass meeting was like? Woods describes what the mass meetings were like and how several ministers in Birmingham believed that they should not be involved in the movement. Civil rights movement ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Birmingham (Ala.) 1570 Bull Conner Monitoring His Church Services You had mentioned that you were monitored by Bull Conner in your sermons. How were you monitored? Woods discusses how Bull Connor monitored his sermons and how Connor got several of his parishioners to testify against him. Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; Bull Conner Birmingham (Ala.) 1804 Arrested at a Sit-in and Being Used as Prison Labor Were you or any of your family members ever harassed as a result of your involvement? Woods tells how he was arrested at a sit in at Woolworths and spent five days in prison working in ditches. Prison labor ; Woolworths Birmingham (Ala.) ; Sit ins 1973 Life in Jail Well, can you just give me a description of what being in jail for five days was like? Woods describes how you did not sleep in jail and how the food was disgusting. Birmingham jail Birmingham (Ala.) 2098 Participation in the Movement Between the time that you were arrested and fired from your job as you were preaching in your pulpit and the '63 demonstrations, a number of other things took place. Woods tells how he was involved in most aspects of the movement and that he pushed his parishioners to do the same. Civil rights movement ; East End Baptist Church Birmingham (Ala.) 2283 His Family's Participation in the Movement I know that your brother participated. He was a real active participant. Were there others in your family that participated in the Movement? Woods recalls that his elementary school age daughters went to jail during the demonstrations. Civil rights demonstrations--Alabama Birmingham (Ala.) 2518 Responsibilities as Chairman of the Guard What were your responsibilities during the '63 demonstrations? Woods describes his responsibilities in the movement and recalls an incident while he was on guard one night at his brother's church. Police brutality ; Stonewall Johnson Birmingham (Ala.) 2901 Participation on the Negotiating Team Right. Share with me just briefly about your participation on the negotiating team? Woods discusses what it was like on the negotiating team and how he had to deal with police brutality at the city hall meetings. Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham City Hall ; Police brutality--United States Birmingham (Ala.) 3078 Conclusion of Interview Right, Well, Rev. Woods I want to thank you for coming out and spending time with us today. Interview is concluded. Oral History Reverend Calvin Woods discusses his and his daughters' Movement involvement and subsequent arrests. Rev. Woods organized boycotts, served as a guard and worked on the negotiating team. His church was monitored by Bull Connor. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Rev. Calvin Woods for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College. Today is May 12, 1995. Welcome, Rev. Woods. It is a pleasure to be here with you today and thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule. WOODS: Happy to have the invitation. HUNTLEY: Thank you. I just want to start by asking a few general kinds of questions about your family. Tell me, where were your mother and father from. Were they from Birmingham or are they from other parts of the state? WOODS: My father was from Prattville, Alabama, that' ; s in Autauga County and my mother was born right out there in Eastlake, in Birmingham, right here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Okay. Where were you born? WOODS: In East Thomas in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters do you have and where did you fit into that number? WOODS: There are 11 of us and I am number four. Five boys and six girls. HUNTLEY: Okay. Tell me about your parents, their education and occupations. What did they do? WOODS: Well, my father was a hard working man who worked for some approximately 40 years at McWayne Pipe Shop, additionally, in later years, God called him into the ministry and he became a pastor of the Shiloh Baptist Church in Norwood, where he pastored for 40 years. I presently pastor that church. And my mother was always a housewife. HUNTLEY: Okay. So you are now pastor of the church that your father was pastor of? WOODS: Yes, I am. HUNTLEY: Second generation? WOODS: Yes, I am. HUNTLEY: Are you priming one of your sons to take it on later on? WOODS: No. I am not. I don' ; t think daddy primed me, but it just worked that way. However, I do have five sons who are already in the pastorate. HUNTLEY: Is that right? WOODS: So we don' ; t know what direction the Lord will carry them in. HUNTLEY: That' ; s great. Tell me about your education. Where did you start elementary school? WOODS: I started elementary school in East Thomas and that school only went to the 6th grade and after the 6th grade I think I got skipped about three times and along the way I went to Tuggle. I graduated from Tuggle and went on to high school. HUNTLEY: Okay. And you went on to Parker High School? WOODS: Parker High. HUNTLEY: What was Parker High School like? WOODS: Oh, it was exciting and it was thrilling. I had to begin at what we called the Parker Annex down near Lincoln school. And when you were in the 9th grade you had to go to the Annex. And after completing the 9th grade you would be able to go up to the main building and certainly we just looked forward to getting up to the main building. The Annex consisted of several small buildings like little houses. HUNTLEY: Little white buildings if I remember? WOODS: Yes, yes. It was very exciting. A lot of students and during that time Parker High School certainly was, if not, it was one of the largest Negro or Black high schools in the world. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. What stands out in your mind most about Parker? WOODS: Well, what stands out in my mind most about Parker was the zealousness of the teachers. The dedication of the teachers and the zealousness of students to excel and to achieve. We felt like we were really somebody. We had a great football team. We had the largest band that you had ever seen and there was just, it was just so great for us to be a part of that history that we had heard so many people talk about. HUNTLEY: So many scholars, sociologists, psychologists suggest that during the period, Black folk looked at themselves as inferior. How would you react to a statement like that with the background of Parker High School? WOODS: Well, we perhaps were inferior as it related to many opportunities that we should have had, but we were not inferior with ability nor inferior with our will to achieve and to excel. HUNTLEY: When you were at Parker, what community did you live in? WOODS: I lived in the East Thomas community. HUNTLEY: You were living in East Thomas? WOODS: Yes. HUNTLEY: And you eventually moved out of East Thomas and you moved into Loveman' ; s Village, is that right? WOODS: That is correct. HUNTLEY: Tell me about that transition. WOODS: Well, when I moved from East Thomas to Loveman' ; s Village I was married and of course, moving to Loveman' ; s Village to a brick apartment, and oh, I felt that I was moving up in the world somewhat, at that time. HUNTLEY: Let me back up just a bit. At Parker you were involved in a number of activities. Can you talk about some of those activities that you were involved in? WOODS: Well, as I recall, at Parker High School I believe I was the president of my class from my 9th grade year through the 12th grade. HUNTLEY: What year did you graduate? WOODS: I graduated from Parker in January of 1950. I also participated in groups such as the High Y and also we had an organization that I believe we called the civic club, we would meet once per week and discuss community problems and current events. We basically would use the Birmingham World newspaper. We would listen to the radio and be observant of activities going on in our community. We would discuss what we could do to improve things. HUNTLEY: Were there any adults in your community that you patterned yourself after or would serve as mentor for you, in your development? WOODS: Yes. I had great admiration for my father, my mother and certainly for my pastor during that time, Rev. J. E. Hayes who was pastor of the First Baptist Church of East Thomas. As a matter of fact, all of the ministers in East Thomas, it was a close knit community and we finished one service at this church and we' ; d run to the other church and try to catch theirs. Also, there was a man in East Thomas by the name of Mr. Patterson who was president of the NAACP and they used to meet and have their meetings and I didn' ; t completely understand it all when I started attending, but I grew to understand. I would go to the NAACP meetings. HUNTLEY: This is as a young man, high school student? WOODS: As a young man, yes. Yes, sir. HUNTLEY: And you were attending the NAACP meetings? What were some of the issues? Do you remember any of the issues of the times? WOODS: Yes, sir, there were issues of Blacks being beaten. Blacks being lynched. Deprivation of rights and things of that nature. And I was certainly very concerned about it. HUNTLEY: So this was impressing a very young man, and in fact, it appeared to be preparing you for what you would encounter a little bit later in your life? WOODS: I didn' ; t realize it. Also, they would discuss overt police brutality during that time. It was very rampant and it was just bad at that time. HUNTLEY: How would you compare, say East Thomas with Loveman' ; s Village? The move from East Thomas to Loveman' ; s Village? I know you are going really from sort of childhood to adulthood. WOODS: Well, in some respects East Thomas was just as high above Loveman' ; s Village to some extent as the East is from the West as it relates to knowing people. Coming up as a boy, I knew every person who lived in East Thomas. And if a new family moved in, we knew the new family. And anybody could chastise us. We were aware that they could do that. However, Loveman' ; s Village meant better living facilities, you know. Better, comfort, a nice brick apartment for my family. So there were advantages in both of them. HUNTLEY: You moved from Loveman' ; s Village then to Enon Ridge, I believe? WOODS: I moved from there to Enon Ridge. HUNTLEY: What was that transition like? WOODS: Well, that transition was, I had begun to buy a home and it wasn' ; t the best, but it was a start. HUNTLEY: It was yours though. WOODS: Yes, it was mine. And God blessed me to live in Loveman' ; s Village, I guess about eight or nine years and permitted me to make that move. HUNTLEY: What was the Black community' ; s relationship to the Birmingham police department? WOODS: At what time? HUNTLEY: During and after high school, prior to the development of the Movement. WOODS: During and after high school? HUNTLEY: Right. Between say ' ; 49 and ' ; 55 or so. WOODS: Well, during that time, the police department was all Black and there was still -- HUNTLEY: The police department was -- WOODS: Was all White I mean. HUNTLEY: Okay. WOODS: Thank you. Was all White and there was still many Black citizens who would run when they' ; d see a police car coming, particularly at night if they see bright lights, they would run. You were addressed as " ; nigger" ; or as boy and at that time we didn' ; t feel that the police was our friends. In spite of that, there were some good ones. And I remember one Friday evening I went to the grocery store, my wife and I. I came back out, got in my car and the car wouldn' ; t crank. So I continued to try to get it cranked, try to get some help, I couldn' ; t get any. So a policeman drove up and asked me what was the problem and he got my car cranked. And that changed my attitude to a great extent toward the police as a result of what that man did. He was White. HUNTLEY: This is the first time that a White policeman had actually assisted you? In remember in a number of cities they have a saying on their door, the police are here " ; to protect and serve" ; , so are you suggesting that? WOODS: I wasn' ; t aware of that at that time. The only thing, as a young man, I know this White policeman did get my car cranked for me and that made an impression on me and I said all of them are not bad. Of course, I' ; m certain that all of them never were bad but that was the perception because of the police commissioner that was in power at that time, by the name of Eugene " ; Bull" ; Conner. HUNTLEY: So that helped to soften what you had felt about the police department? WOODS: Yes, it did. HUNTLEY: In 1956 the State of Alabama outlawed the operation of the NAACP in the state. As a result of that the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights was organized. Were you a part of that organization at the time? WOODS: I was not present at the initial meeting. But I am quite certain I was there about the second meeting. HUNTLEY: So it didn' ; t take you long to get involved? WOODS: No. It didn' ; t take long. HUNTLEY: Why did you decide to get involved in the Movement? WOODS: Well, I had a dream one night. I saw a man, it was Rev. Shuttlesworth. I didn' ; t even know him and it was a crowd in a church and the name of the church was Gaines Chapel, it' ; s torn down. It used to be in East Birmingham. And I saw him standing in a pulpit. He had on a black suit, a white shirt and bow tie and he was standing up talking to the people about rights. And, of course, when the word got out that he had organized this group, I became very interested. And my mind ran back to when I had heard Rev. Shuttles worth preaching on a radio station. I believe it was WBCO or something like that. At that time he was working with the NAACP and all of that came to my mind. So I was interested. The word was out that the NAACP had been outlawed and the word was out that the organizational meeting had taken place down there, I believe, in one of Dr. Gaston' ; s building. Down at Smith and Gaston they had a white building during that time. This is how I really started attending the meetings. But my involvement had not become as deep as it did later on. HUNTLEY: Prior to that you actually attended Miles College right after high school and that resulted, because you had won a contest of some sort. Tell me a little about that. WOODS: Yes. I attended Miles College right after I graduated from high school as a result of having won the Birmingham News-Post Herald Oratorical Contest. This was a contest between the various Black high schools within the city. And you had to select a subject to speak on and I chose the subject " ; Toward World Peace." ; And as a result of that I won and it wasn' ; t much, but it was great during that time. It was a $100 scholarship and $25 and I used that to get into Miles at that time. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about your transition from high school to college? WOODS: I was very, very excited about going to college. And I just felt like I had already, almost reached the top of the world just being in a college setting. The teachers were very dedicated at that time. The campus was just loaded with students and the President at that time was Dr. Bell. And he too, as many others, was very dedicated and a courageous president. And he had, when he' ; d speak in chapel he would always have a concern about community. HUNTLEY: Then Miles held some real status in the community, I assume. Is that correct? WOODS: Oh, yes, Miles held great status in the community at that time. HUNTLEY: Most Black people who were being educated in Birmingham, of course, was going to Miles College? WOODS: Yes. Unless they went out of town. HUNTLEY: Right. Miles being the only school, well the biggest Black school I guess at the time?WOODS: The biggest Black school. We had Daniel Payne which was not as large as Miles, but Miles was the school. HUNTLEY: Then when the Movement, the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights is started, you, at that time were working, I assume? You were married? WOODS: Yes. HUNTLEY: Where were you working at that time? WOODS: I was working at that time at the Phoenix Building downtown which housed the telephone company for Molton, Allen & ; Williams Realtors. I was working as a janitor or custodian at that time. HUNTLEY: Were you pastoring? WOODS: At that particular time, yes, I was pastoring. HUNTLEY: What was your role in the Movement? How did you actually get started? What were the first things that you did? WOODS: Well, how I really got started in a big way in the Movement was as a result of my speaking to my congregation and anybody I could, telling them that it was unconstitutional to be segregated on buses. I told and instructed our people to sit down wherever there is a seat. If you pay your money, don' ; t get up for any White people, you know. If you get on, if there' ; s a seat, you sit down and little did I know " ; Bull" ; Conner was monitoring my service. HUNTLEY: You were actually encouraging people to break the law? WOODS: Well, I felt that the law was unconstitutional. And I didn' ; t, you know, didn' ; t try to hide that and it was unconstitutional. And I preached it everywhere I went and they had dates where I had said it, and of course, they came to my job at the Phoenix Building one morning and they sent for me to come to the office. These two detectives were there and they hand cuffed me and carried me out. I didn' ; t know why I was being arrested. HUNTLEY: And why were you being arrested? WOODS: For urging, allegedly a boycott of a legal business. HUNTLEY: That was the charge? WOODS: That was the charge. HUNTLEY: Because boycotts were illegal at the time? WOODS: Allegedly. However, as we went on through the courts, we found out that the law that they had arrested me under had been repealed in 1940. However, I was sentenced to six months at hard labor and fined $500 of which I appealed and had to go to the Alabama Circuit Court of Appeals. I was represented by attorney, our former chief justice, Oscar Adams, Jr. He represented me and of course, I had the backing and support of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. HUNTLEY: Approximately what year were you arrested? WOODS: This was approximately 1956 I believe. Just about the same year the Movement -- HUNTLEY: The beginning of the Movement? WOODS: It wasn' ; t long. I got involved very early. Yes. It was ' ; 56 or ' ; 57. HUNTLEY: So, I assume then that you attended the mass meetings on a regular basis? WOODS: I didn' ; t miss. HUNTLEY: Can you describe to me what the typical mass meeting was like? WOODS: Just like a revival. Singing, praying, shouting, proclamation, inspiration, aspiration that came from each meeting. We had a minister to preach, his choir would sing. Additionally, we had the Movement choir that was started by such people as Miss Palmer, Freddie Palmer and her mother. Bo Gay, Mr. Frazier. Later Rev. Nathaniel Lee came in and took it over and a few years later, Mr. Carlton Reese came in. But it was always very, very exciting and we always looked forward to words of inspiration and guidance coming from Dr. Fred Shuttles worth. He always had a message to inspire the people and we would always go forth from that place very inspired, wanting to hurry and get back or to do whatever he told us we ought to. HUNTLEY: Did this, the kind of fervor that was developing in the mass meetings on Monday night, did this have an impact on how Black ministers were preaching in their pulpits on Sunday? WOODS: Well, let me say, it did have an effect on how a segment of them preached. But we still had some who they called " ; Uncle Tom." ; Who said, " ; You ought to leave this alone." ; But many of us were inspired as a result of the Movement and it continued to spread. And as a result of that, our people were inspired and each week the churches were just running over. We got to the point where we had to start using more than one church on a given night. HUNTLEY: You had mentioned that you were monitored by Bull Conner in your sermons. How were you monitored? Did he come to your service? WOODS: No. He undoubtedly had people there reporting because he knew what I said on different dates, on this Sunday, on that night and all of that. At my church, in particular, and things moved on to the point where he started sending policemen to the service at my church. HUNTLEY: To your Sunday services? WOODS: Yes, sir. To my Sunday services. They would park out front. Sometime one car, two and three right out in front of the church, intimidating the parishioners. So that went on for a long time. HUNTLEY: Did you ever have any idea of who was reporting back to Bull Conner? WOODS: Yes. We found out. It was a group of disgruntled people in the church who were reporting to him. We were able to secure the names of those persons who were not too happy with my leadership and I assume that they found those people and were certainly able to use them. Some of them testified against me at my trial and some of them didn' ; t even know how to use the word boycott. They said, " ; He told us we were going to have a boy scout." ; So, but they knew exactly what they were talking about. HUNTLEY: Did they return to your church after testifying against you? WOODS: Oh, yes. Yes, they did. HUNTLEY: Were other churches impacted upon in the same way that your church was? Were there others that had the police to come out and sit and attempt to intimidate? WOODS: To my knowledge, I don' ; t know. I' ; m not saying that there weren' ; t, but to my knowledge, I don' ; t have a reporting of them doing that in any other church other than the police attending our mass meetings. HUNTLEY: Now, they didn' ; t actually attend your church service? WOODS: There were occasions when they did come in. HUNTLEY: Is that right, and actually stayed? WOODS: Actually came in and sat down and I preached until heaven' ; s bells would ring and they would basically act very nice. I recall we had a business meeting scheduled. They came to the business meeting. They thought the people were going to get rid of me that night and they were there to encourage it on. But God smiled on us and of course, the Movement stood by me and also contacted the Justice Department in Washington, D.C. and they investigated the situation, I do not know how they did. But they investigated. In a period of time I got a communication from them which stated that I may wish to take injunctive proceedings, which I did secure a lawyer to institute injunctive proceedings against the people who they had disturbing our church service, getting up, walking across in front of the pulpit when I' ; d get up to preach and doing things to disrupt. And that did bring us somewhat relief. HUNTLEY: Were you or any of your family members ever harassed as a result of your involvement? WOODS: Well, I did have a pistol drawn on me on one occasion by a disgruntled person who I felt was motivated by someone and God spared me. I also was fired from my job. HUNTLEY: Were you fired after you were arrested? WOODS: Yes, after I was arrested, I was fired. HUNTLEY: Did you ever go to jail any other time during the Movement? WOODS: Yes, I did go to jail in 1963. Many of us integrated lunch counters downtown. HUNTLEY: So you were arrested at one of the restaurants? WOODS: At Woolworth' ; s. HUNTLEY: At Woolworth' ; s? WOODS: At Woolworth' ; s. And how long did you spend in jail? WOODS: Five days. HUNTLEY: The previous time that you were arrested on your job, how long did you stay in jail? WOODS: Well, just one day. I was arrested that morning and was able to get in touch with my wife and she got my deacons came and got me out. It was dark. HUNTLEY: So you didn' ; t spend -- WOODS: No. I didn' ; t spend the night. HUNTLEY: But you spent five days the second time when you were arrested for the sit-in? WOODS: I also worked on, in ditches. HUNTLEY: What do you mean? WOODS: Well, we had to cut trees down and bushes down. They would load us on a truck in the mornings and carry us out to work. We' ; d work out until the afternoon and they would bring us back. HUNTLEY: Were there others that were affiliated with the Movement that were out there working with you? WOODS: Very fortunately, my brother, Dr. Abraham Woods, Jr. and I were in the same cell and he went out and worked, he said somewhere out there in Hooper City. But we weren' ; t working together. But there were others. Also Carlton Reese and I were in the same cell and during that time he wrote the song, We' ; ve Got a Job. All of God' ; s Children Got a Job, and he asked me about it when he was, you know, getting it together that night. " ; How this sound?" ; So I can attest to the fact that he really wrote that. HUNTLEY: Is that so? WOODS: All of God' ; s children really got a job. HUNTLEY: Well, can you just give me a description of what being in jail for five days was like? WOODS: Sure. It was rough. It certainly was tough and the sleeping was not good. And you had all kind of people in there. Some of those guys were hollering all night saying various types of things. The food was terrible. I had never eaten anything like that in all the days of my life. We went down and it look like it was some hard grits, no salt or anything in them and I don' ; t know whether they call that coffee or what. It was more like grease, no sugar, no cream. I just couldn' ; t eat and I tried. I came back for the next meal, whatever time it was. I said that I was not going to eat and I didn' ; t eat. But late that evening, I ate and it taste like ice cream and cake. I was nearly starved to death. I just ate it. I was so hungry, it was awful but I ate it. HUNTLEY: It taste like birthday cake? WOODS: Your birthday cake. But the food was just horrible, just horrible. HUNTLEY: What were the circumstances in your release after the five days? WOODS: The circumstances of the release in five days was that we were bonded out. We were bonded out. That' ; s the way we got out. HUNTLEY: And you didn' ; t have the occasion to go back to jail? WOODS: No. Not after that. HUNTLEY: Between the time that you were arrested and fired from your job as you were preaching in your pulpit and the ' ; 63 demonstrations, a number of other things took place. There was the Freedom Riders came through Birmingham, there were the efforts on the buses where the Movement was attempting to desegregate the buses. There was the Selective Buying Campaign developed by the students out here at Miles College. What were your participation? Was there any personal participation of yours in that period between say ' ; 59 and ' ; 63? WOODS: Sure. I participated from the inception of the Movement throughout its entirety and whatever transpired, if I knew about it, I endeavored to be a part of it. HUNTLEY: So you encouraged others to be a part as well? WOODS: Yes, I did. HUNTLEY: So your church was real active? Members of your church? WOODS: There were members, some members of my church that were very active and after I was arrested then it seemed like I gained more support from the members and had more of a free hand. I had to go on and participate in the activities, however, you have always had some who were anti. HUNTLEY: That were reluctant prior to your arrest? WOODS: Yes. And you know what I found out? That the former pastor of that church, East End, Dr. C. J. Evans was present at the very first meeting of the ACMHR' ; s organization. And some of the people there didn' ; t like that. He undoubtedly talked about it and it wasn' ; t too long thereafter. Now, I began pastoring that church I believe in about 1957 when I went to East End. I followed Dr. Evans who took ill. As a matter of fact, I read that somewhere in some documents that he was present at the first meeting in the organization there. So there were some who were disgruntled with him. And when I came in, you know, being on fire about it, so it kind of spilled over. HUNTLEY: I know that your brother participated. He was a real active participant. Were there others in your family that participated in the Movement? WOODS: Yes. I had sisters who sang in the Movement choir and of course, when the children demonstrated, three of my daughters were arrested and went to jail. HUNTLEY: How long were they in jail? WOODS: They stayed in jail overnight. Just one day. HUNTLEY: Okay. I am assuming you are speaking of the 1963 demonstration? WOODS: Yes. 1963 demonstrations. HUNTLEY: How old were they at they at the time? Were they high school age? WOODS: No. They were elementary students. HUNTLEY: And what schools did they attend? WOODS: Washington. HUNTLEY: Washington. WOODS: Washington Elementary School. At that time I was living, let me see. Yeah. I believe it was Washington Elementary School. I believe I was still living in Loveman' ; s Village. I moved out of Loveman' ; s Village, it was, I believe in, they were probably at Tuggle. They could have still been at Washington also. Because I moved on Enon Ridge in 1962. In ' ; 62. HUNTLEY: What were the circumstances of them being arrested? WOODS: I didn' ; t even know they were going. They just left school with the other children. And I was just appalled. They didn' ; t ask me. HUNTLEY: You were appalled at them being out there? WOODS: Yes. I thought me being out there was sufficient. HUNTLEY: What was your reaction? What did you do after you found out they were arrested? WOODS: Well, I didn' ; t know they were going. The three of them. I didn' ; t know they were going. There was nothing I could say, you know. We were sowing the seeds of, you know, of wanting everybody to be involved, but I didn' ; t expect those little girls were going to get involved in it. So they wanted their freedom too. HUNTLEY: Did that frighten you that, you know, the possibilities that something could have happened to them? WOODS: Well, during that time, Dr. Huntley, I really didn' ; t have too much fear. I don' ; t know. God moved it from me and I really didn' ; t. It' ; s hard to explain. But he just moved that fear. I was concerned for them and for all of the children, but I didn' ; t have a fear. HUNTLEY: How did other members of your family react to the participation of your family? Maybe your mother and your father or other sisters and brothers. Were their reactions positive? WOODS: Their reactions were positive. I didn' ; t experience any adversity from them. My mother was always telling us to be careful and prayerful. Be careful and prayerful. She always told us that and she prayed for us. And our father prayed for us. Daddy had been a courageous man in his way. He would always speak up. He didn' ; t have the education that we had but he was always a man who would stand up and speak out regardless of the cost. HUNTLEY: What were your responsibilities during the ' ; 63 demonstrations? The SCLC came into Birmingham I guess in April and the Alabama Christian Movement, of course, was already here and then started to prime the pump from April to May when the kids got involved. What were your responsibilities? WOODS: One of the responsibilities that I had was that at some point along with Colonel Stonewall Johnson and Picket, I at some point became Chairman of the guards for a while, that guarded such places as Arthur Shores house and other persons home and some churches. I also served as one of the coordinators for the picketers. I also served on the negotiating team. I had been placed on the Board of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. So I did a number of things, you know, leading demonstrations and so forth like that. HUNTLEY: I know that you led a number of demonstrations. You were never arrested? WOODS: No. Not again. We were on the verge of it. We were prepared for it. But it just didn' ; t come. We were manhandled and of course, on occasion, I was beaten, but I was not arrested again. HUNTLEY: When you marched and you encountered policeman, can you describe what that feeling was like? WOODS: Well, we expected viciousness and adversity from the police because of past history. And at sometime the atmosphere was more tense than at others. But we were determined to march on. At some occasions the police encountered the protestors and beat them but that did not deter the marches. It may have slowed it up at some points but we would regroup and go right back. So we were just prepared for any eventuality that would take place and we approached this in a non- violent fashion. We were instructed that we had to be non-violent and we were pledged and we were dedicated to that. Not to hit back. Not to strike back. HUNTLEY: You participated, you say you were Captain of the guards for a while? WOODS: For a while. HUNTLEY: Can you tell me how that was organized? WOODS: Well, I was organized. So much was going on until I was asked by somebody to work with them and we just asked certain men and women to work with us and we would give assignments where they would stay for a few hours as long as they could. HUNTLEY: So there were women associated with the guards as well? WOODS: Yes. There were some women also. Not to the extent that there were men, but there were some women also. HUNTLEY: When you guarded specific places, were you armed? WOODS: No. We were not armed. We would just -- some of the other men were armed. I could name a few. But most of us were not even armed. I don' ; t know how we were guarding, but we were there. HUNTLEY: You were there to see if anyone else came? WOODS: I remember I had one of my small sons with me and something just told me to get up. I wasn' ; t guarding that particular place. It was in the wee hours of the morning and I went down, I went to my brother' ; s church and a White man had WOODS: I took off behind him. Didn' ; t have a sling shot or anything. HUNTLEY: You saw him at your brother' ; s church and what did he do? WOODS: When he saw me turn the corner right there, he ran and got back in his car. And I took off behind him. I don' ; t know what I was going to do. But until it dawned on me that I was following this man. HUNTLEY: You did not have anything and you did not know what he had? WOODS: Not a thing in the world but Jesus -- but the Lord. HUNTLEY: You didn' ; t catch him? WOODS: No. I stopped. I don' ; t know what I was going to do if, you know, just like that and some of the other brethren can tell you things that were even more exciting of what they experienced being on guard duty and many of them dealt with it to a greater magnitude than I did, because in later years I did that. But some of those older men like Stonewall and Pickens and people like that, Ms. Holloway, they were in the thick of it when many of the bombings were taking place. They could tell you about the different cars they' ; d see come by and all of that. HUNTLEY: Right. Share with me just briefly about your participation on the negotiating team? WOODS: Yes. HUNTLEY: Can you give me just any information or description of what those negotiation sessions were like? WOODS: Well, we had negotiating sessions at City Hall, I believe it could have been during the tenure of Albert Boutwell who was the mayor and even during the time of George Seibels. It extends a period of time and some asked me to speak because I was very out spoken. I' ; d speak out and they said I' ; d talk too much sometime. Also, David Vann, former mayor and I served on a negotiation transition team trying to bring the different factions together. We were getting ready to scale down the demonstrations and I was noted for being a hard negotiator because I was, as a matter of fact, they said I was a little outlandish. I was tough during that particular time. I also served as convener for the Ministers Leadership Training Program that was a branch of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference which secured many jobs here in Birmingham and negotiated with many businesses. As a matter of fact, gave money to Miles College. Got businesses to give money to Miles College to the Birmingham Baptist Bible College and got businesses to put money in our Black bank to give advertisement to the Birmingham World and the other Black papers. All of them, as a result of our negotiations with companies such as these bakeries and so forth. We worked with that, we didn' ; t get a lot of publicity about it, but the record is there that these things took place and on some occasion we had to call for people to picket some of the grocery stores. HUNTLEY: So you have been obviously very actively involved throughout the Movement period. WOODS: Yes. And we also dealt with police brutality. Throughout negotiation committees and so forth, like that. HUNTLEY: Right. Well, Rev. Woods I want to thank you for coming out and spending time with us today. You have given us a lot of information and we will obviously be in touch with you because once we go through this we may want to sit down and talk with you again. WOODS: All right. Thank you for inviting me. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=CWoods1995.xml CWoods1995.xml
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Rev. Calvin Woods
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Reverend Calvin Woods discusses his and his daughters' Movement involvement and subsequent arrests. Rev. Woods organized boycotts, served as a guard and worked on the negotiating team. His church was monitored by Bull Connor.
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19950512W
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights
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1995-05-12
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Interviews collected as part of the general mission of the Oral History Project
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Clyde Jones
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http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=CJones1995.xml
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Mass meetings
Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights
NAACP
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5.4 June 1, 1995 Rev. Clyde Jones 19950601J 0:35:07 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Anna Wallace Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department Mass meetings Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights NAACP Clyde Jones Horace Huntley Video 1:|9(3)|35(12)|64(10)|80(5)|102(8)|117(13)|133(1)|150(12)|171(10)|193(4)|213(12)|226(4)|245(9)|265(12)|276(9)|287(13)|306(2)|319(11)|347(7)|368(1)|388(12)|402(4)|420(4)|433(11)|453(1)|467(5)|481(1)|498(2)|510(12)|527(15)|546(7)|556(4)|568(15)|581(16) 0 https://youtu.be/5a6DhTcgp8g YouTube video English 42 Introduction to Interview This is an interview with Reverend Clyde Jones for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. Rev. Clyde Jones is introduced. Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century 33.516200, -86.813870 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 58 Family Background I just want to start by asking you some general questions about your parents. Jones begins by stating he grew up in Birmingham with two younger sisters. His mother owned a restaurant located in North Birmingham on 26th Avenue around 24th St. Birmingham (Ala.) ; Business enterprises, Black ; Hokenville (Ga.) ; Lutherville (Ga.) African American families 145 Educational Background Tell me about your education. Jones compares the difference in his experience of Parker and Immaculata High Schools as the latter having more variety in education, but a harsher disciplinary policy. He states that his strongest memory of Parker High School was the quality of the football team during the time that Buck Buchannan played. African American athletes ; Buchannan, Junious ; Immaculata High School (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) African American children--Education 310 Serving in the Coast Guard Well, did you then, after you graduated from Immaculata, did you go right into the military? Jones recalls how after high school, he volunteered to serve in the Coast Guard for economic reasons to afford higher education. He served three years where he served aboard the SS John Gordon as well as a patrol boat in the Caribbean. GI Bill ; Military service, Voluntary ; United States. Coast Guard. Atlantic Area ; USS John Gordon United States. Coast Guard 453 Pursuit in Higher Education Like I said, I wanted to go to college, but I came about in a peculiar type way. Jones states that he went to Howard University to study political science and psychology before studying law at the New York School of Law. He then went into the Army to serve in the Korean War for four years, after which he returned to Birmingham. He also reveals that he went to Emory University later in his life. Emory University ; Howard University ; Howard University. Department of Political Science ; Korean War, 1950-1953 ; New York School of Law ; Political science ; Psychology ; United States--National Guard African American college students 632 Involvement in the NAACP and the Litigation Case Against the Birmingham Police Department So you are really returning to Birmingham at a time when the NAACP is probably the most active civil rights organization? Jones recounts how he became involved in litigation cases through the NAACP. One case he describes in detail is a litigation filed in 1956 against the Birmingham Police Department for not hiring African American police officers. Adams, Oscar W. ; Alford, W.F. ; Billingsley, Orzell ; Gardner, Edward, 1907-2006 ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Voter registration Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; NAACP ; Trials, litigation, etc. 1184 Roles of African Americans in the Birmingham Police Department & ; His Personal Ministry In the meantime, the different officers, I mean the high ranking officers in the police department, they want me to in something like an undercover agent. Jones talks about how Black police officers were often assigned cases that required them to infiltrate, obtain, and report information, which was frowned upon in the community. Jones states that he forewent a police position that was offered to him in lieu of becoming a police chaplain in various police departments in the Birmingham area. Bessemer Police Department ; Jackson County Police Department ; Police chaplain ; Randolph County Police Department African American police ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department 1499 Mass Meetings & ; Demonstrations So you did attend the mass meetings? Jones describes how the mass meetings had to be held at different churches due to the presence of police and informants. He also discusses the various demonstrations that happened, and that his family supported his involvement in the demonstrations, though they themselves refrained from protesting. Freedom Rides, 1961 ; Mass meetings ; St. Paul's Methodist Church Civil rights demonstrations--Alabama 1808 Reflections on the Movement What were the benefits do you think your family and the community realized as a result of the Movement? Jones remarks that the Movement motivated other African Americans to participate in the Movement to improve their lives from their everyday struggles with discrimination. Civil rights movement Birmingham (Ala.) ; NAACP ; SCLC 2060 Conclusion of the Interview Well, I certainly do appreciate you taking the time out of your schedule to come up and sit with us. Conclusion of interview Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Birmingham, Ala.) Oral History Rev. Clyde Jones discusses combatting discriminatory hiring practices by the Birmingham Police Department through litigation. He was involved with the NAACP before being outlawed. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Rev. Clyde Jones for the Birmingham Civil Rights lnstitute' ; s Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College. Today is June 1, 1995. Thanks Rev. Jones for coming and being with us today. JONES: You are very welcome. HUNTLEY: I just want to start by asking you some general questions about your parents. Where were your parents from? JONES: My parents were from Hokenville, Georgia, my father rather. And my mother was from a place called Lutherville, Georgia. HUNTLEY: Lutherville and what was the other? JONES: Hokenville. HUNTLEY: Hokenville, Georgia. Were you born in Birmingham? JONES: Yes. I was born here in Birmingham at the Old Hillman hospital which is now the University Hospital. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters do you have older and younger than yourself? JONES: I have one sister, two sisters rather, younger than I am. HUNTLEY: So you are the oldest child? JONES: I am the oldest child, yes. HUNTLEY: Tell me about your parent' ; s education. JONES: Well, at the time they had limited education. My mother was a high school graduate and my father attended one year at Morris Brown in Atlanta. HUNTLEY: What were their occupations? JONES: Well, my father was a shipping clerk and my mother was a restaurant owner. HUNTLEY: She owned a restaurant? JONES: She owned a restaurant. HUNTLEY: Where was your restaurant located? JONES: It was located in a predominately Black section of North Birmingham on 26th Avenue about 24th Street I believe it was. HUNTLEY: Tell me about your education. Where did you start elementary school? JONES: I attended Lincoln Elementary School and I attended Parker High School and also lmmaculata High School and I had a three years at Howard University and I also attended Emory School of Divinity which is in Atlanta. HUNTLEY: You attended both Parker and lmmaculata? JONES: That is correct. HUNTLEY: Where did you graduate from? JONES: Immaculata High School. HUNTLEY: Why did you leave Parker to go to lmmaculata? JONES: Well, at the time, the education system at lmmaculata was a little bit better than Parker because we had a chance, you know, more or less, learn things like Latin and several foreign languages as opposed to Parker which only had Spanish. HUNTLEY: So you went for the languages. What did you do after high school? JONES: Well, after high school, I went into the U. S. Coast Guard. HUNTLEY: Tell me, just let me back up just a bit. What do you remember most about Parker as a student? JONES: Well, I remember the football team. They had an excellent football team. As amatter of fact, at that particular time, it was the top team in the state·. And I also remember a lot of the teachers, you know, how concerned they was, you know about the students anyway. They had a good relationship with the students. HUNTLEY: Were you at Parker the same time Buck Buchanan was there or were you just a little bit ahead of Buck? JONES: I think I was a little bit ahead of him. And I had an opportunity to meet his parents, you know, at a later date they were a member of Enon United Methodist Church, where I pastored both his father and mother. But I never did get a chance to meet him per se. HUNTLEY: How would you compare your experience at Parker versus that at lmmaculata? JONES: Well, it' ; s more discipline at lmmaculata. Of course, at that time they had discipline at Parker, too because they had the paddling system. HUNTLEY: Who was the principal at lmmaculata? JONES: Howard Johnson. HUNTLEY: So you had the same kind of discipline at both places? JONES: Right. But the only difference is at lmmaculata they would expel you and they would more or less put the fear of the Word of God into you. Because it was more or less, you know, religiously indoctrinated since it was a religious school. HUNTLEY: Well, did you then, after you graduated from lmmaculata did you go right into the military? JONES: I went right into the Coast Guard. HUNTLEY: How did you happen to go into the Coast Guard? JONES: Well, at that particular time, it was real hard and I thought that would be a way out to get education in view of the fact that they had this GI Bill to write, where it is, you know, you enter the service, you could almost get a complete college education and beyond if you went into the service. So it was a way for me at that particular time. Because with the economical status of my parents, you know, I couldn' ; t have the opportunity probably to go to college. HUNTLEY: Well, why the Coast Guard rather than the Army or the Navy? JONES: Well, the Coast Guard is a part of the armed service during the war and as a matter of fact it stayed during the peace time, its under the Treasury Department. But I had an opportunity to serve aboard a U. S. John Gordon which I made about eight trips across the Atlantic and back. You know, bringing troops. To carry troops back and forth. And I also had an opportunity to serve on a patrol Coast Guard boat down in the Caribbean and other places. HUNTLEY: So did you get that opportunity based upon your experience in high school? Did somebody direct you to the Coast Guard? JONES: No. Myself and another friend, we were walking down 5th Avenue. At that time the Coast Guard station was in the federal post office building and we saw this sign, " ; We Want You." ; And I was teasing with my buddy, I said, " ; Well, this is us, let' ; s go in and see about it." ; So we went in and, of course , really you' ; re supposed to be eighteen but I persuaded my parents to sign for me in order to go in which they reluctantly did. But we went on in anyway. HUNTLEY: And so how long did you spend in the Coast Guard? JONES: We spent about three years. HUNTLEY: Three years. And what did you do after you were discharged? JONES: Well, we went on. Like I said I wanted to go to college but I came about in a peculiar type way I met this girl, she was attending Howard. And she enticed me to come to Howard, you know, in Washington. HUNTLEY: So is that the girl that you married eventually? JONES: No. Eventually, everything seemed to break down after I got there. You know, we stayed friends for about six or seven months and after that, the garden was so beautiful, I couldn' ; t see for looking. HUNTLEY: So you were there for three years? What were you pursuing? JONES: Well, I was majoring in political science and I had a minor in psychology. HUNTLEY: What was D. C. like? JONES: Well, D.C. was calm at that particular time. You didn' ; t have all these different drug warfare like you have now. And it was relatively calm. It was peaceful. You could walk down Georgia Avenue without any type of fear of being mugged or robbed. And it was a beautiful place at that time to live. HUNTLEY: Did you live on campus? JONES: I lived on campus, yes. HUNTLEY: And after you left Howard, where did you go? JONES: I went to New York. There I got involved, at the National Guard there and also went to, had one year of law school at New York School of Law, too. HUNTLEY: So then how long were you in New York? JONES: I was there about, just a little over a year. Just a little over a year until the Korean War broke out and I went to Korea. HUNTLEY: Did you go back into the Coast Guard? JONES: I didn' ; t go back into the Coast Guard, I went into the Army. HUNTLEY: How long were you in the Army this time? JONES: Well, I stayed in there approximately about four years. HUNTLEY: So when did you come out? JONES: I came out somewhere around the neighborhood of ' ; 56 or ' ; 57. HUNTLEY: Did you return to Birmingham? JONES: I did, yes. HUNTLEY: Now you went to Emory, right? JONES :Yes. That was at a much later date. That was in the 70s when I went to Emory. HUNTLEY: So what did you do when you came back to Birmingham? JONES: Well, I had various, jobs. I did substitute teaching and I worked as a shipping clerk, where my father worked and in the meantime I married and I had a family to support. HUNTLEY: So you are really returning to Birmingham at a time when the NAACP is probably the most active civil rights organization? JONES: That is correct. HUNTLEY: Were you involved with them at all? JONES: Yes. I have always been a member of the NAACP. And when the Southern Christian Movement came out I became involved with them through Rev. Shuttlesworth. HUNTLEY: Right. What did you actually do as a result of your membership with the NAACP? JONES: Well, really the NAACP was more or less involved in litigations. At the particular time it wasn' ; t like marches, per se until the Southern Christian. HUNTLEY: What about voter registrations? JONES: Voter registration that was a prime fact. That was one of the main problems we had at a particular time. Black folk were denied the right to vote and they had to take an oral examination and they had them poll taxes and different other things to discourage them from voting. So the main thrust of the NAACP was, voter registration. HUNTLEY: In 1956 the State of Alabama outlawed the NAACP from operating in the State of Alabama. Were you actively involved at that time? JONES: Yes, sir. HUNTLEY: And we know as a result of that, the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights was organized. Were you one of the charter members of the organization of the Alabama Christian Movement? JONES: Well, I wouldn' ; t say a charter member. But I was one of the first, in the particular group that really, signed up for it. HUNTLEY: That got the Movement going? JONES: Yes. I remember the day that I was over to Rev. Shuttlesworth office when he was pastoring over in North Birmingham and I don' ; t think he had met, Dr. Martin Luther King at that particular time. He said, " ; I got a letter here from Dr. King, about, the it was two separate groups. Actually there was a Montgomery faction and the Birmingham faction about them merging with each. HUNTLEY: The MIA from the Montgomery and the Alabama Christian Movement? JONES: Right. HUNTLEY: And eventually started the SCLC in ' ; 57? JONES: Right. HUNTLEY: You were one of the litigants in a case against the police department? JONES: That is correct. HUNTLEY: Can you sort of explain what that was about? JONES: It was planned that Rev. Shuttlesworth and Rev. Gardner and Rev. Alford and several more ministers at that particular time. We had set up a time to go to the Jefferson County Personnel Board to apply for the police department. We had agreed that we would go through with it. And we went and I never would forget. It was kind of hot. I forgot what month it was in, but anyway it was relatively hot at that particular time and we went there, so it was TV people there. Channel 13 and I believe Channel 6. So they gave us the application, to fill out and so, we took the application back home and filled it out and sent it back in and then I received a letter from the Jefferson County Personnel Board that we wasn' ; t qualified. Both Johnson and myself did. HUNTLEY: Who was the other person? JONES: George Johnson, Rev. Johnson now. That we wasn' ; t qualified. So I began and looked at my expertise within the police field. I had been in charge of the investigation section of the military, 212 military police in Inchon, Korea at the age of about 22. And I also served with the 519 military police group when they integrated, you know that particular unit. And I was in the first CID criminal investigation division down at Ft. Goins, Georgia. And I said, " ; Something has got to be wrong." ; And I saw lessor White persons were on duty with little or no education and so I knew then there was something wrong somewhere. HUNTLEY: Did you make the determination that you wanted to be a member of the police department or were you drafted by Shuttlesworth and the Movement? JONES: Well, we discussed it. They wanted me to be a test case to be frank about it. To see about getting them. Because all the other surrounding cities had it and while I am on that particular note I had already passed the test in Montgomery, police test in Montgomery and I had passed it with a high score. About 99 out of a 100 and also I had passed the test for the Washington police department, Washington D. C. police department and I also made 99. HUNTLEY: But you decided not to take it? JONES: Yes. I was doing it more or less, to make a test of the system. HUNTLEY: Why would you take it in Montgomery? Did you live in Montgomery? JONES: No. I did it out of self-satisfaction. You know to see what it was about. To test my knowledge. HUNTLEY: Was this prior to your taking it in Birmingham? JONES: That is correct, yes.I remember Captain Gant in Montgomery. He told me he said, " ; Well, we want you to stay on with us if you decide to come aboard." ; But I said, " ; I don' ; t know whether they are going to start hiring them in Birmingham pretty soon." ; And at that particular time it was so many loop holes in the Montgomery police department. They had the Blacks working at night like from 11 at night to 7 in the morning. And they could only arrest Blacks and they could only hold a White person until a White officer arrived, but you could see a White person committing a felony crime, you just couldn' ; t go over and apprehend him regardless of what he was doing under that type of system. HUNTLEY: You would simply have to wait until a White officer arrived? JONES: That is correct. And like one of my friends told me that, you know, that got on. He said that one night some White guys was robbing a service station and they parked on the other side and said the only thing that they could do was stand and look at that, and they got away. They radioed in and the lieutenant came in there and said, " ; What did y' ; all do, just stand there and look?" ; And they said, " ; That' ; s the only thing we could do, we couldn' ; t arrest them, they was White and that was our instructions." ; HUNTLEY: But there were Black policemen they just didn' ; t have the authority? JONES: That' ; s right. Then they had them going in at late hours, midnight hours to almost early morning. HUNTLEY: So as a result of you having made very high marks in both Washington, D. C., and Montgomery, you decided then to take the test in Birmingham? And you wanted the job in Birmingham? JONES: Right. HUNTLEY: But you received a letter saying that you were not qualified? JONES: Right. HUNTLEY: Then what happened? JONES: They we got our attorneys which was Orzell Billingsley and lawyer Adams who was a former member of the Alabama Supreme Court. HUNTLEY: Oscar Adams. JONES: Oscar Adams. They pursued the case through the federal system because we knew we couldn' ; t win in the state courts at that particular time because they were highly prejudice. HUNTLEY: What was the outcome? JONES: Well, they ruled later on in favor that, you know, the City of Birmingham must hire Black police officers. HUNTLEY: Now this, you initially filed the suit about 1956. The first policeman, Black policeman was not hired in Birmingham to about 1966. JONES: Right. About ten years. HUNTLEY: And was that as a result of the suit? Did the suit take that long? JONES: Right. Because they kept fighting it back and forth until finally we got a favorable decision after all that time. In the meantime, the different officers, I mean the high ranking officers in the police department, they want me Jo come in something like an undercover agent, you know, an investigator and everything. And so I told them I wasn' ; t for that. And I told them it ain' ; t nothing but a high class snitch. Either I be in uniform or they forget it. HUNTLEY: So they did offer you what was termed a snitch position. I know in the Black community you looked at those individuals as snitches. JONES: Right. HUNTLEY: But you refused that? JONES: Right. And they told me, " ; You would have a badge. You would have the power of arrest, you know on the case that you' ; re on." ; I said, " ; I am not that kind of person. I' ; m either on board, or I' ; m not." ; HUNTLEY: Do you have any idea how many Black men were in fact, those kind of investigators? JONES: It was quite a number. HUNTLEY: I know as I grew up here in Birmingham there was one that worked out in our area. JONES: Right. They did a lot of work, some of them had jobs like security officers and some of them had regular jobs. But still, in their off duty time they would infiltrate, you know, the bootleggers houses and things like that and pass on information. HUNTLEY: Were you ever hired as a police officer? Did you ever get the job? JONES: Well, really, I guess the Good Lord must have been in the plan, because I got something better later on because I served as the chaplain with the Jackson County Sheriff' ; s Department and I served as the police chaplain at the Bessemer Police Department and I served as associate police chaplain at the Birmingham Police Department for three years and now I am currently the chaplain for the Randolph County Sheriff Department. HUNTLEY: But in 1956 when the first policeman were hired, were you still available to take the position a t that point? JONES: No. I began to start pursuing a ministerial course. It seemed like within myself I had that particular calling deep down, but I was trying to fight it. HUNTLEY: So you were going into the ministry at that time? JONES: Right. And I thought about going back to law school. Going back to Washington and going to law school and so I was kind of debating, you know, in my mind, fighting within myself, what course I must take. So whereas I didn' ; t become a lawyer, I had a son and he became one. HUNTLEY: Right.Clyde Jones, Jr. JONES: Yes. HUNTLEY: Did you get involved in the Movement as a result of your attempt to become a police officer? JONES: No. I was really in it even before my attempt to become a police officer. Because I had seen the way that Blacks were being treated. I remember one time I had a job too, as a bondsman over here at the city jail at the Harlem Bonding company. And W. L. Williams, Jr. and I, who is an attorney there now, ran this particular company. It was White owned, but we Blacks were more or less fronting it at that particular time. And we would go to jail and see how Black people were just beaten, just for nothing. I remember one time a Black guy, I think up north, somewhere around in Detroit or Cleveland came in there and said he had some White girls pictures on him and they beat him unmerciful. HUNTLEY: So you and W. L. Williams ran this particular bonding company? JONES: Right. I sure did. HUNTLEY: How long did you do that? JONES: I did that, if my memory serve me correctly, it was about 2-3 years, something like that. HUNTLEY: So did you have the bonding company during the Movement period, during the demonstrations and all? JONES: Again, if my memory serve me correctly, I was participating in it, because I remember I was working shifts from 8-3, 3-11 and I believe I took that 11-7 shift so I could participate in it. HUNTLEY: What role did you play in the Alabama Christian Movement? JONES: Well really, only just as a supporter. You know, I would just attend the meetings and whatever, would be planned by the person in charge, I would participate in it, you know. HUNTLEY: So you did attend the mass meetings? JONES: Yes. I did. And we also was in the picket lines, also, too. HUNTLEY: Can you describe what the typical mass meeting was like? JONES: It was very emotional and it could only be held in a Black church because that was the only place that was open to them at that particular time. And a person had a chance to speak their mind without any kind of reprisal against them, you know, with their own kind. And also that they were plagued by the White police at a particular time. They would park maybe about 2-3 three blocks away from the church and in different directions and they would stop, the participants, on some minor charge. You know, they would say they were speeding or they didn' ; t stop at a stop sign, just a lot of things like that to harass them, to discourage them from attending. HUNTLEY: Were police officers present at the meetings? JONES: Yes. They would stand on the outside. They would have their informers in there. You know, that' ; s one of the things we talked about earlier. They would have the informers who had a first hand report within a minutes after the meeting was over. And plus, the fact that the police themselves, the White establishment they would be, you know just about have the church surrounded. So to help suppress some of that, the meeting was held at different churches. Sometimes it would be at 16th Street Church, St. Paul, Sardis Baptist and they would do a number of other churches. You know, Fairfield First, and in order, to help put the people q11 guard so to speak. HUNTLEY: Right. You said that you did picket different places? JONES: Oh yes. Well, we picketed the bus station, the Greyhound bus station. We picketed, I believe it was Newberry' ; s Department store and several other minor incidents and things. HUNTLEY: Were you ever arrested? JONES: No. I never did get arrested. HUNTLEY: In 1960 the sit-in demonstrations started. Well they were actually initiated in North Carolina and of course, they were sit-ins eventually here. In ' ; 61 the Freedom Riders came through. What do you remember about that period? JONES: Oh, I remember how they were beaten brutally at the bus station. What happened, only law enforcement Blacks really trusted in at a particular time was during the FBI and they would tell the FBI that we have some Freedom Riders, you know, from coming in from North Carolina and they would tell the city police and the city police would be at the bus station to beat them and there would be a ruckus, you know, whereas the civil rights riders would be beaten and molested in a very cruel type way. HUNTLEY: Did others in your family participate in the demonstrations? JONES: They didn' ; t particularly play active roles because most of them had the fear of losing their jobs in that particular time. But, you know, I had always been a type of person, I said, " ; If it' ; s going to happen, it' ; s going to happen. And we can' ; t live like this forever in this type of environment." ; And so I didn' ; t even fear for my life at that particular time, I would, sacrifice it. HUNTLEY: How did others in your family react to your participation? JONES: They were more or less fearful of me that I might get hurt. And they were glad I was doing what I was doing, but there was some kind of little remorse about, you know, the fear of getting hurt. HUNTLEY: What church were you a member of at the time? JONES: I was a member of St. Paul' ; s United Methodist Church on 15th Street and about 6th Avenue. HUNTLEY: And was your church actively involved? JONES: I think one or two meetings were held there and some where they got fearful that the church was going to be bombed. That was prior to 16th Street Church getting bombed and so I think they kind of voted within themselves, you know, not to have any more meetings there. HUNTLEY: What were the benefits do you think your family and the community realized as a result of the Movement? JONES: Let' ; s see. What benefits as a result of the Movement? HUNTLEY: Yes, sir. JONES: Well, the only thing I could see would be motivation. And it occurred to them that it was going to be a better day or if I' ; m focusing in on your question right. It would be a better day by them participating in those different boycotts and picketing and etc. HUNTLEY: Right. Is there anything else you would like to add that we have not dealt with in relationship to the development of the Movement and the history of Birmingham? JONES: Well, I would like to add, I wish as I look around today, and see how Blacks are killing up each other, if they could see the long struggle. I like to use this word, it was " ; Pure-0 -Hell" ; back in those days because a Black man was last to be hired and the first one to be fired. And when he went into a department store, he had a separate water fountain to drink out of. And sometimes he had no restroom. If they did, it was a bi-sex restroom, which was Pizitz. And also when he rode on a train, he had to sit in separate, segregated cars. He rode the bus, he had to sit in the back of the bus. And if you go to the counter to get something to eat, you had to stand there at the end of the counter and almost plead to get a sandwich or a coke. And after all the Whites had been waited on, then they would get around to waiting on you. And the police could arrest a person at random. In other words, a Black person would be sent to prison whereas a White person wouldn' ; t even be brought into question on. And the court system was rotten too. Asmatter of fact, I remember when one lawyer friend of mine, he attended Howard too because he was in law school when I was an undergrad. But they couldn' ; t even go to sit in the bar. They couldn' ; t even use the law library, for research work. They had a case like Whites did. And so, it was just " ; pure-d-hell" ; at a particular time anyway. Some people call it the good old days, but I don' ; t see nothing good about it. HUNTLEY: So the Movement then of course, was developed to clear up all of these things? JONES: Right. It would be the force behind Blacks, you know, having a better day because they were living in turmoil. And plus when you ride the street cars, and I would like to add, if we got time. I never will forget one time it was kind of comical. I guess I must have been around 11 or 12 and they had these old yellow street cars used to run from downtown to Ensley and so I didn' ; t believe in signs. So my friend we took one of those segregated signs off and threw it out the window. And so the conductor saw us and they put us off the street car in East Thomas. It was a hot day too. So we had to walk all the way from East Thomas to Smithfield. So I said, we are going to have to get him some kind of way. And so I remember my dad bought me one of these Red Rider BB guns and so we put some rocks on the street car tracks and so we knew about the time this conductor came around because the street car ran in front of my house. They got over the bend and we let loose with that B B gun. He cussed and everything. You know, Black folk always had a way, you know, doing something, to let the Whites know they resented the way they were being treated at that particular time. HUNTLEY: Reaction against the system of segregation? JONES: Right. Even during slavery time, they had some ways to get around it. HUNTLEY: Well, I certainly do appreciate you taking the time out of your schedule to come up and sit with us. And we will get you a copy of this and let you look through it. JONES: All right. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Rev. Clyde Jones
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Rev. Clyde Jones discusses combatting discriminatory hiring practices by the Birmingham Police Department through litigation. He was involved with the NAACP before being outlawed.
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19950601J
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department
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1995-06-01
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery
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5.4 April 11, 2000 Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery Interviewed on April 11, 2000 20000411L 01:31:10 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Jess Holdnak Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights United States. Supreme Court Southern Christian Leadership Conference King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990 Syndicate Affairs Association Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery Horace Huntley Video 1:|15(7)|24(6)|35(3)|53(6)|65(7)|77(7)|87(13)|99(12)|109(5)|118(15)|128(5)|143(9)|151(9)|161(9)|174(13)|185(4)|193(14)|203(12)|213(1)|232(11)|241(10)|252(1)|265(1)|282(3)|295(1)|310(3)|320(10)|330(14)|343(4)|353(7)|368(10)|379(15)|392(2)|401(1)|410(3)|426(4)|441(8)|457(5)|472(13)|486(6)|506(7)|519(6)|531(5)|544(7)|554(16)|559(3)|571(10)|588(10)|598(7)|611(1)|625(12)|635(7)|646(5)|657(1)|669(4)|677(11)|687(6)|695(16)|709(8)|717(15)|728(12)|738(7)|747(6)|755(14)|763(9)|771(9)|782(14)|790(12)|799(4)|806(7)|817(11)|826(4)|832(7)|843(1)|853(3)|863(12)|872(6)|881(13)|891(3)|907(7)|918(14)|928(16)|939(4)|949(2)|956(15)|966(3)|977(5)|986(15)|999(15)|1011(4)|1024(10) 0 https://youtu.be/NEbRe5TDhqc YouTube video English 0 Introduction and Family History H: Rev. Lowery I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule, and welcome to the institute. L: Well, thank you for inviting me to this marvelous institute, I’m glad to be here. H: Yes sir. Dr. Lowery, are you native Alabamian? L: Well, yes, but I’m an authentic Northerner. Although, you folks here in Birmingham consider yourselves North Alabama, I’m from the real North Alabama, Huntsville. I was born in Huntsville, Alabama, Madison County. Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery begins his interview by describing his family history. He discuses his mother and father's education and work. Alabama A & ; amp ; M University African American families ; African American religious leaders ; Huntsville (Ala.) ; Madison County (Ala.) 33.516200, -86.813870 18 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ The Homepage of the BCRI 452 Growing Up in Huntsville H: What was it like growing up in Huntsville? Young black men living in Birmingham as being the, you would say in the big city from the country, who was as less than a 100 miles from north of here. How was that different? Rev. Dr. Lowery talks about his early life in Huntsville including facing racism. He mentions two incidents in the family car where his father played off his mother's light skin to get out of racist situations. And another incident where as a child he was punched in the stomach by a white police officer, and later talked to the man as an adult. Lowery also talks about seeing the KKK march down his street. KKK African American life ; Huntsville (Ala.) ; Racism--United States 1162 Education and Becoming a Minister H: What about your high school, days? L: High school, it was very much segregated. When busing was an issue in the country, I always wondered why, because I used to see white kids on buses all the time. So, it wasn’t the bus, it was us they that they were concerned about. I used to walk all the way from down on Church Street down into the grove. We called the grove, to the black school, the colored school. Rev. Dr. Lowery outlines his education through seminary school. He mentions going to a segregated school, having confrontations with white children, and going to school in Chicago. Lowery also discusses the path that led him to the ministry including his mother's church involvement, speaking in church at a young age, and influential pastors. NAACP ; The Grove African American life ; African American Presbyterian churches ; African American religious leaders ; Alabama A & ; amp ; Chicago (Ill.) ; Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary ; M University ; Segregation in education ; Wayne University 1816 Early Involvement in the Civil Rights Movement and the Bus Boycotts And that was the ministry that led me into the movement, that was the theology, that was the concept of ministry that led me to civil rights. H: When did that happen? L: That happened right at East Thomas. My first year at East Thomas, I wasn’t there but a year, but I got involved in activities that were co-protestant. Rev. Dr. Lowery describes his first involvement with the Civil Rights Movement while he was living in Mobile. He also describes the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and the desegregation of buses in Mobile. Alabama Civic Affairs Association ; NAACP Alexander City (Ala.) ; Civil rights movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Langer, Jo ; Mobile (Ala.) ; Montgomery (Ala.) ; Montgomery Bus Boycott, Montgomery, Ala., 1955-1956 2266 The Outlawing of the NAACP and the New York Times v. Sullivan H: How did the outlawing of the NAACP affect Mobile? Rev. Dr. Lowery talks about the Alabama Christian Movement, MIA and Syndicate Affairs Association. He discusses the story behind the Supreme Court case: New York Times v. Sullivan. Syndicate Affairs Association Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Black, Hugo, Jr., 1922-2013 ; Civil rights movement ; Mobile (Ala.) ; United States. Supreme Court 2483 The Southern Christian Leadership Conference H: SCLC, how did you get organized? Rev. Dr. Lowery discusses the formation of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990 ; African American religious leaders ; Civil rights movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference 2786 The Nashville Movement and the Birmingham Movement H: Now back from 1960 to 1963 there were a number of things that took place. Of course the organization of SNCC, the freedom ride took place in 1961, in Birmingham in 1962 there was a selective buying campaign, and in Albany, Georgia, took place in 1962. Birmingham then would come along in ’63. Why did you leave Mobile? Rev. Dr. Lowery talks about his involvement in both the Nashville and Birmingham Movement s from 1961-1968, including some of the violence in Birmingham like the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, Birmingham, Ala., 1963 ; A.G. Gaston Motel (Birmingham, Ala.) ; African American religious leaders ; Civil rights movement ; Nashville (Tenn.) ; Sixteenth Street Baptist Church (Birmingham, Ala.) 3210 Move to Atlanta and Presidency of SCLC I was vice-president of SCLC then, and I was organizing up until ’67. At the convention in Atlanta Martin asked me if I would serve as chairman of the board. We didn’t have a chairman of the board. They asked me if I would be chairman of the board, and I agreed to do that. So I could preside at the meetings, and take some of the weight off of his shoulders and I did that, but he always wanted me to come to Atlanta, and I said, no my place is here. The Birmingham News had just had an editorial about blacks will be elected to public office and other blacks will qualify, and they named a bunch of names and mine was one of them. I said, well maybe its time for me to leave Birmingham. Rev. Dr. Lowery talks about moving to Atlanta in 1968 at the request of Martin Luther King Jr. and becoming the President of SCLC in 1977-1998. He also mentions the Labor Movement and Walter Reuther. Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990 ; Atlanta (Ga.) ; Civil rights movement ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Labor movement--United States--History--20th century ; Reuther, Walter, 1907-1970 ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference 3774 The Abernathy Book and the FBI Tapes H: The book that, the controversy, the book that Reverand Abernathy wrote, and that was during the time you were in the fore-front. How did that play? Rev. Dr. Lowery discusses the contriver around Ralph Abernathy's book and the FBI tapes of King and other Civil Rights leaders. Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990 ; Hoover, J. Edgar (John Edgar), 1895-1972 ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation 4209 Women of the Movement and Giving Demands to Gov. Wallace H: Let me ask you a question about the women in the movement, the wives of the leaders. I know that there probably were times when you had to go some place and your wife may say, well you know... How did you handle that relationship, keep that relationship together and be successful? Rev. Dr. Lowery talks about how his work ing the Movement affected his family and his relationship with his wife, He then goes on to describe in detail giving Gov. Wallace the Movement's list of demands in 1965. He also methods later encounters with Wallace. African American women ; Civil rights movement ; Selma to Montgomery Rights March (1965 : Selma, Ala.) ; Wallace, George C. (George Corley), 1919-1998 4840 " ; Retirement" ; and Conclusion H: Reverend Lowery, you have had a tremendous career in life, but you obviously have not finished. L: I’m retired. What do you mean? I have been retired two years now. Nobody believes me. Rev. Dr. Lowery discusses some of the causes he helped champion since his retirement including working with farmers, automobile dealers, and promoters. He also reflects on the President's visit to Selma in 2000 and many other changes since the Civil Rights Movement. People's Agenda Atlanta (Ga.) ; Civil rights movement ; Selma (Ala.) Oral History Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery discusses his extensive involvement in the Movement in Birmingham, Montgomery, Mobile, Nashville and Atlanta. He served in closely with Dr. King, lead the SCLC, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama in 2009. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Reverend Joseph E. Lowery for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s Oral History Project. I’m Dr. Horace Huntley. Today is April 11 in the year 2000. Rev. Lowery I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule, and welcome to the institute. LOWERY: Well, thank you for inviting me to this marvelous institute, I' ; m glad to be here. HUNTLEY: Yes sir. Dr. Lowery, are you native Alabamian? LOWERY: Well, yes, but I' ; m an authentic Northerner. Although, you folks here in Birmingham consider yourselves North Alabama, I' ; m from the real North Alabama, Huntsville. I was born in Huntsville, Alabama, Madison County. HUNTLEY: Right. Because of most of us now, we, actually migrated from the South, out of Black Belt counties. So, there is some real significance to you being from North Alabama I think. Let me just talk about your family for a minute. Tell me about your mother and father. What kind of education do they have? LOWERY: Well, my father went to a little training school in Huntsville with Professor McKinley, who is a noted figure in the 19th century in Huntsville, and he probably did not finish what we consider, now, high school. My mother went to a Normal, which is now Alabama A& ; M. And she taught school, but she probably had about the equivalent of a junior college, I think, education. But both of them were very intelligent, very very informed, and inspired me considerably. They were active church people. My mother sang in the choir for about 150 years, and my father was a reluctant church member. And that my mother spent so much time in church, my father decided he needed to go just to see what was going on. He became the Treasurer of the church, and it' ; s very interesting, the church where I grew up in Huntsville, Lakeside. My father' ; s grandfather, Rev. Green Echols, was the first African-American Pastor of my church. The church was founded by the old AME Church North and had a white pastor. And after plenty years my great-grandfather came here and became the first black pastor of that church. HUNTLEY: So that would have been late 19th century? LOWERY: That' ; s right. No that would have been, yes, yes, yes--that' ; s correct. HUNTLEY: Somewhere between the emancipation and the 20th century. LOWERY: That' ; s right, the 20th century. That' ; s correct. HUNTLEY: How many siblings did you have? LOWERY: Well, I had-- my parents lost two children before I was born. My father was named Leroy and this boy was named Roy, and then the girl was born Alba Lee, and she passed away as well. So, I was the first surviving child, and then I had a sister, born three years later. So, there was the two of us there in Huntsville. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did your father do? LOWERY: My father was a, it' ; s a very interesting story, he worked in an office of a physician, old Dr. Scruggs, in Huntsville. The earliest recollection I have of any physician was Dr. Scruggs. My father was still alive when I was old enough to remember. My father worked for him as a single man, and the deal was he used to go to Nashville, and somehow enroll in pharmacy school and come back and be the pharmacist, and Dr. Scruggs was to write the prescriptions, and they would have a partnership. So, my father didn' ; t have the money. And, so, he borrowed, he and a friend, borrowed some money and some equipment to open a little ice cream parlor ; with a couple of pool tables. And he decided to work for a year or two, and then go on to pharmacy school. It took him the two years to pay for the equipment, and so he had to stay another two to earn the money to go to school. He ended up staying 60 years, running a little business in Huntsville. Never did go to pharmacy school, but it was in the context of what Huntsville is about. A very successful entrepreneur. He bought some property and opened another business a sweet shop and then he opened another billiard parlor. And he became interested in insurance and was elected to the board of directors of Supreme Liberty Life Insurance Company, very prominent insurance company among any African- American who has ever been to Chicago. So, he was an enterprising man. HUNTLEY: Sounds like he was very respected individual. LOWERY: Very respected in the community, and probably had more influence on my outlook on life, my ideals, my principles in terms of my behavior, my integrity, probable influence in any other individual, in my life. My mother did too, and that was to be expected, I guess that was so expected that you couldn' ; t see the trees for the forest, or the forest for the trees, because my mother explained it. But you didn' ; t always have the father' ; s who set that kind of example. And I remember he use to write, on the board up on the front of the sweet shop little sayings every week, and he would sit down and discuss them with me. The first one I remember was " ; An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." ; I don' ; t know who said it, but my daddy is the reason I remember it. So, he had tremendous influence on my life. He was a man of great honor, great integrity, great industry, he was a hardworking man, and there' ; s no such thing as a self-made man, but I guess my daddy came as close to being independent in terms of his upward mobility, as you could be. Of course, he had help, but he was pretty much alone as far as family was concerned. His mother, I remember her very well. But his father he did not remember too well, was part Cherokee who sort of came through on the Dela la Rosa and didn' ; t remember him to well. But his mother, Ma Paulee also had a great influence on my life. She was a domestic, but a woman of great dignity, great beauty, great charm, and raised two boys practically by herself, and did a marvelous job. So, she and my father, that stream, had a great deal to do with the molding and shaping of my life. HUNTLEY: What was it like growing up in Huntsville? Young black men living in Birmingham as being the, you would say in the big city from the country, who was as less than 100 miles from north of here. How was that different? LOWERY: Let me tell you, Huntsville is a, not an industrial center like Birmingham. It mostly was a cotton city ; Madison County is agricultural. Huntsville was full of cotton gins, and cotton brokers who sold cotton across the country from offices in Huntsville. And the cotton was grown outside of town. Strange enough I lived in the city, such as it was, about two blocks from the railroad station. My grandmother, Ma Paulee, my daddy' ; s mother, lived about a block from the railroad station, and whenever I got angry with my parents, and was going to leave home, I' ; d go ahead and go by Ma Paulee' ; s and stay there awhile. If I was real angry, I' ; d go on to the railroad track and decide to catch a train, which I never caught. But it was a textile town. We did not have the terrible, awful kind of oppression in Huntsville. Maybe the fact that we were not such a large minority in the city, we didn' ; t pose a threat that black belt communities and even Birmingham did. But we knew we were black, we knew we were colored. I remember at very early age, my father bought a new Studebaker. We were in the car, he had my mother in the front seat, I was in the backseat, and I guess my sister was there, I don' ; t remember, but that sounds like a boy doesn' ; t it?, but the police stopped my daddy. I don' ; t know if he didn' ; t fully stop for the stop sign or what, and it was a brand-new car. I guess he didn' ; t expect colored people to have brand new cars, and he said, " ; whose car is this boy," ; and my daddy said, " ; this is Mr. Lowery' ; s car," ; " ; Mr. Lowery' ; s car, oh okay, you drive it carefully, here," ; and then drove on. I think he may have thought my mother was white, I' ; m not sure, and my daddy was the driver. But he let him go on and that puzzled me. I was very, very young and I remember asking dad about it and he gave me the best kind of explanation a very young boy could take, I guess. One other time I remember my daddy and my mother, I, and I guess my sister was present, he had a flat tire. He was changing the flat tire and looked around and saw about four big old hard nail boots, and he looked up and there four of the biggest rednecks he had ever seen. They used bad language, " ; what is [mumbled reference to cursing] (so and so) are you doing boy?" ; He said, " ; shhhh! My Miss in the car, oh Miss don' ; t like no cussing," ; he said, " ; Oh, excuse me," ; took his hat off and saw my mother, and said " ; get up little boy," ; and help changed the tire for him. I' ; m sitting in the car, mother and I trembling. And he' ; s out there trying to keep from laughing his crazy head off. And finally, when they finished, he got in the car, and they say, " ; good evening miss, we glad to change your tire for you." ; My mother just bowed her head, and we drove off and soon as we got down the road he had to pull the car over because we were laughing. HUNTLEY: What was his complexion? LOWERY: My father was a little darker than I, but my mother was very fair. She could, if she wanted to, she could pass. Because her side, her family were all fair. There was a lot of integration in those days and I think on my mother' ; s side, her mother participated in integrated sex, as many, black colored women had to do. Invasion, and rape. My daddy and I recall, from time to time, I didn' ; t exactly understand, use to tease her a little bit about it, from time to time. She didn' ; t take it too well. Later, when I was approaching teenage level, I was coming out of my dad' ; s sweet shop one day, and I was three -fourths out the door, and a big red cop was running forth in the door. He thought that gave him rights, and he punched me in the stomach with his night-stick, and said, " ; get back nigger, don' ; t you see a white man coming in the door." ; Of course, I got back, and he came in and he didn' ; t know who I was, I didn' ; t know who he was, and I cried and tried to wipe my eyes to keep from crying, I didn' ; t want him to see me cry. I went down the street, lived about a block from the sweet shop. I remember seeing a little pearl handle pistol that my father had in the drawer. I went to get it. I couldn' ; t look and find it. My mother kept asking what' ; s wrong, what' ; s wrong, but I wouldn' ; t say. Finally, I found it, and started out the front door, what I was going to do, I' ; m not sure to this day, but that was my recourse. But strangely enough as I started down the steps, my father was coming up the steps. Now what' ; s so strange about that is I guess most of my life in Huntsville I never saw my dad at home in the daytime, except on Sunday, it just didn' ; t happen, he was working. He left home before dark, he ran his business, help was hard to find, he had to be janitor, cashier and everything. But for some reason he came home this afternoon. Probably, between three and four, I was out of school. He saw something was wrong, and asked me what was wrong, and saw my hand in my pocket. He took the gun away from me, and gave me a good sound spanking. I ought to be truthful, a good sound beating. My father was not a part of the nonviolence school. HUNTLEY: Child abuse. LOWERY: No, no. If they had child abuse laws in those days, my mother would have been in jail most of the time, and my father occasionally. I told him what happened. He went to the police chief, and the mayor to complain. They told him that they were sorry it happened, but that was the only kind of white man they could hire to be police and there was nothing they could do about it. My daddy didn' ; t like it and came home and told me to forget it, choke it up, the experience will make you a better man, and this is the way the South is etc. My father, his insurance company, I mentioned, one year, he drove, let me go with him to Chicago, to the board meeting, a meeting of his life. It was a thrill to me because I had never been out of Huntsville, except to the country. When we got up there my father got his revenge. We were down in the loop, and we were in heavy traffic with another friend of ours whose mother lived next door to us, he was a physician. We were all in the car, and a cop yelled at Dr. Tate to come on, " ; Come on, why you hold traffic, come on." ; And he cursed G D and Dr. Tate said, " ; Don' ; t curse me, damn you," ; and my daddy was shocked to hear a colored man talk to white police officer, and so he said, " ; yeah, don' ; t yell at us like that," ; He got his little bit in, and I said, yeah too in the back seat, so we got our revenge for the incident at the sweet shop. But let me tell you this, many years later, I was pastoring my first church here in Birmingham, out in East Thomas, St. James. And I went home one day and was on the porch talking to my mother and my father and the postman came by. He gave the mail to my mother. I looked at him and he looked at me, and thoughts started running through my mind when he left. I said, mother. She said, " ; yes." ; I said, who was that man. She said, " ; well, I was hoping you wouldn' ; t recognize him, that' ; s Mr. Shields, that' ; s the police officer who punched you in the stomach many years ago." ; And I went down the steps, I wanted to go catch him. My mother wasn' ; t sure what my motives were, I intended just to talk with him, and he was coming back. And he said, " ; Mrs. Nora," ; he called her Ms. Nora, ' ; is this Joe.?' ; And she said, " ; yes." ; And my father by that time came to the end of the porch to see what happened. He said, " ; can I shake your hand?" ; We shook hands. He said, " ; I' ; m pastoring a little church out in the westside of Huntsville, and I understand you' ; re pastoring a church in Birmingham." ; I said, yes, I am. He said, " ; Well, I want to tell you, I' ; m sorry." ; " ; I thought about it many times, mother and I talked many times, I never dreamed I' ; d run up on you, and I said, I understand, how you grew up and how we all grew up, and thank God we' ; re growing out of it." ; He said, " ; yes, I' ; m out of it, I' ; d been born again, and I' ; m sorry, and I thank God," ; and he cried. Of course, he made me shed a tear, it was a moving story. But that was Huntsville. I only remember one-time hearing talk about the KKK. They had some kind of little march up Church Street, Church street road came from the depot, and right into the heart of town. I remember my mother, my father wasn' ; t there, he couldn' ; t get there, my mother closed all the curtains and made us come back in the bedroom and not go to the front, cut the lights out. I slipped out, crawled up the hallway and peeped out the dining room window. I saw them. It was only about 15 or 20 of them, seemed to not have hoods on, they all had on sheets, and it was a frightening experience for me, as a boy. HUNTLEY: I could imagine that experience, I experienced that myself. LOWERY: That was Huntsville, it was a good mixture. Alabama A& ; M was there. HUNTLEY: What about your high school, days? LOWERY: High school, it was very much segregated. When busing was an issue in the country, I always wondered why, because I used to see white kids on buses all the time. So, it wasn' ; t the bus, it was us they that they were concerned about. I used to walk all the way from down on Church Street down into the grove. We called the grove, to the black school, the colored school. HUNTLEY: Passing other schools. LOWERY: Pass one other school. But white kids passed us in buses, going to the white school. And we had to go through a white neighborhood to get to our school. There were some white kids, whose names I won' ; t mention because they may be some family to some people who still live there. But about once or twice a week, my friends and I would have a confrontation with these white kids. We had not been introduced to non-violence at that time. And I never saw them after we grew up, but they were infamous, those kids, and we use to throw rocks sometimes, throw fists at other times or go another way when we didn' ; t feel like having a confrontation. But Huntsville was a southern textile mill town. There were certain parts of town we never went in. And I never saw too many white kids down in the grove. They could come up my street, because my street was right on downtown, and pretty much non-identifiable in that term. But you didn' ; t see to many white kids in the grove and didn' ; t see too many black kids out near the mill. HUNTLEY: What did you do after high school? LOWERY: I went to college at Knoxville college. And in the summer took some classes at Alabama A& ; M. There I got involved with the NAACP, as a youth. And taught protest. It brought back memories, because I remember my dad carried me to a couple of church meetings. Old town hall meetings, where they would discuss race relations, and some incident. They had a fellow in town named Monk, and Monk was a bad fellow. But Monk every now and then would beat up a white fellow. And Monk would attend the meetings, and I remember my daddy saying in conversation with another doctor, that Monk was a bad nigger, and white folks thought he was crazy, and when they think you crazy you can get away. But when they think you intelligent, they don' ; t like uppity negroes. But one that' ; s crazy he gets away with a lot. I had tasted the race situation from all the perspectives I mentioned, and when I got exposed to the youth work with NAACP it tasted good to me. I had a familiar taste out of college, and I started teaching school for a while, but my daddy wanted me to go to law school. HUNTLEY: You came back home and then? LOWERY: I came back home over the summer, but in the meantime before I went to college, I was asking my daddy to send me to Chicago. He had some friends in Chicago, and I spent five years in Chicago going through elementary and two years of high school in Chicago at St.Vincent' ; s Roman Catholic School, and Dusable High School. I treasure those years because they were very good schools and taught me the discipline of studying. HUNTLEY: Who did you have in Chicago? LOWERY: A very good friend of my father. I didn' ; t learn until later that it was the brother of an old girlfriend of my father' ; s, who he almost married, but she passed, and he married my mother. But he and the brother maintained good relationship. And when dad felt that the schools in Huntsville weren' ; t doing what they ought to do, he sent me up there and I would come home in the summer, but I would go to Chicago during the school year. HUNTLEY: That must have been an experience, going from Huntsville to Chicago. LOWERY: Very interesting. And I guess it' ; s good I went to the St. Vincent school rather than a public school at first. Because St. Vincent' ; s was so strict in terms of discipline, until I didn' ; t have much choice to be flexible or irresponsible with the rules. They didn' ; t tolerate it. So, I made a transition without to much pain and difficulty. HUNTLEY: After you came back home did you ever have any desire to go back to Chicago, to live in Chicago? LOWERY: Yes, in a way I did, and in a way I didn' ; t. I went back to Chicago for a while, I studied for a couple of summers at Garrett, out in Evanston, and I lived in Detroit for a while. I studied a little bit there at Wayne. Just this past winter, Wayne University gave me an award named after the great labor leader with the autoworkers. HUNTLEY: Reuther? LOWERY: Walter Reuther and I was the first recipient of that award and it did me good because I had walked on the campus at Wayne and they gave me that award along with UAW. I always preferred the south, I don' ; t know why. I guess it' ; s because I grew up there, the neighborhoods, the neighborliness, the intimacy, the slower way of life I guess. And I came back after I went to-- in fact I came here to the theological seminary, in addition to Garrett for a while. Then I went to Garrett, but my first church was here in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: When did you first get involved with the church in the community? LOWERY: The church. You could leave my backyard and walk across the field and go to the church. So, I grew up at the church, as much as I did in the home. My mother was a substitute teacher, a choir singer, she ran, what they call, a harvest program every fall. They would have a harvest program, and my mother was always in charge. One of the things she did was have all the children bring in these sheaves. I ought to know what they are, but we called them sheaves, " ; bringing in the sheaves, and we' ; d wave them and wave them. I always did that so I could sing it in my sleep. Any occasion in the church I say the speech. Everybody told me, you are going to be a preacher. I always say, no I am not, when I get big enough When I get big enough where I don' ; t have to come to church, y' ; all not go see me. But I grew up in the church. I had a couple of ministers, one in particular who was in Huntsville, Rev. Fields, who use to tease me about being a preacher. But then he would to take the time to talk to me about the ministry. And planted a seed that later on when I was getting out of college it hit me again, and all of the seeds he planted began to bear fruit. I met another preacher when I went to A& ; M a couple of summers named Sam Williams, who was teaching economics, he was a preacher. That did it. He was the radical. Although the other preachers were not radical the chaplain at Knoxville, Ben Evans, was between radical and conservative. But I think I had enough. My dad, when I told him I' ; m not going to law school. He wanted to go in law and major in business law. And I said I' ; m not going to law school ; I' ; m going to seminary. And he said, " ; why?" ; I think the Lord wants me to preach. I said, you must have some understanding, your grandfather was a preacher, and all my in-laws on my mother' ; s side, there were uncles that were preachers on her side of the family. He said, " ; well, I was so counting on you to go to law school. We own a lot down this street on the corner of Church and Arnold Street. Let' ; s build a church there and you preach all you want to while you' ; re going to law school." ; I said, daddy I don' ; t think that' ; s what the Lord had in mind. And I was very hurt that he wasn' ; t enthusiastic. So, I preached my first sermon at my home church. And people in town heard, and when the word got out I was preaching my trial sermon, you couldn' ; t get in the church. HUNTLEY: How old were you? LOWERY: I had come through college, but they did not believe that the good Joe Lowery was going to preach. They had to come see it for themselves. Right on the front row was several young ladies I had known growing up, and I wished they would move in the back of the church. But I made it through and had a good time. My father came to me afterwards, and he said, " ; maybe the Lord did touch you." ; And then that Christmas I came back home. The Presbyterian Church was right next door to me and the pastor there asked me to preach the early Christmas morning service. I was thrilled, and that did it for my daddy, and he said, " ; I' ; m glad, I just wish my mother, Ma Paulee, had lived long enough to see you go into the ministry." ; But I guess all of that background when I went into the ministry, I didn' ; t have to develop a wholistic theology, it was sort of engraved that the gospel had to do with the whole person, and the whole of life. And I always felt that it was time to make heaven your home, but it was always trying to make it a home here heavenly. And that was the ministry that led me into the movement, that was the theology, that was the concept of ministry that led me to civil rights. HUNTLEY: When did that happen? LOWERY: That happened right at East Thomas. My first year at East Thomas, I wasn' ; t there but a year, but I got involved in activities that were co-protestant. HUNTLEY: This is in the mid 40s. LOWERY: This was 1948, and the next year I went to Alexander City, and I stayed there three years. Alexander City, I went there in 49 that was the movement was beginning to pick up then. HUNTLEY: Were you married at the time? LOWERY: Oh yes, I was married. And we had our first child at East Thomas. And then we went on from Alexander City to Mobile. It was in Mobile, I went to Mobile in fifty-two, and NAACP was meeting at my church and continued to meet, and NAACP was outlawed. And we organized other protest groups and I was selected President of what we called Alabama Civic Affairs Association, and headed the movement in Mobile. And when the boycott started in Montgomery, and Martin and Ralph issued their first demand, they had been sitting at the back of the bus and filing up to the front. And as white people got on, blacks had to get up and move back. We had been filling it back and when we filled up we' ; d have to get up. White folk would start at the front and if they filled up they didn' ; t have to get up. So white filled up they sat we rode, we filled up we sat they rode. And so when Martin made the first demand, I had met him, I knew him already, I met in Boston and I met him again in Montgomery. I called him up, and I said, hey man, y' ; all asking for what we already got, don' ; t ask for that, ask for the whole bag of peas, you know, no segregation. He said, " ; listen, don' ; t worry, they are not going to give us that, so we chose to ask for the least and so when they refuse that, it will give us the psychological and spiritual advantage." ; And of course, they did. They denied that, they wouldn' ; t do that, and the boycott followed. HUNTLEY: Why the difference in Mobile and Montgomery? LOWERY: I think two reasons. Montgomery was in the middle of Alabama, and Mobile was on the coast. So Mobile had the cosmopolitan flavor of shipping and the water and different cultures coming in, plus Mobile had a city commissioner, named Joe Langer very early on, and he was a very sensitive and fair-minded man. And he agreed to give the influence, and so Mobile just wasn' ; t as violent, at least at first. So, when we decided to desegregated the buses I was President of the Minister of Alliance. We had some workshops on nonviolence and we divided the preachers up. two by two we go ride different bus lines and sit in the front. I had called and talked with Martin, I had carried, as President, the first $1000 up to the MIA while they were protesting. I remember sitting in the church waiting on Martin and Ralph to get there from across town, I had to come all the way from Mobile. They came and I gave them the money. I told them what we were going to do. So the fellows decided since I was the " ; leader" ; that I had to ride the Pritchett line which was number five. It' ; s been a long time but I remember it. I as going out into the heart of crackerland and so Reverend S.N. McCree, pastor at Mount Zion Baptist Church. I met his son not long ago some place I was speaking, his son was there, but anyway he and I rode the bus, the Pritchett bus and sat on the front seat, and was facing from not on the side, but from when you first cross parallel seats. We got about halfway out there and a white fella got on with a bag. He obviously had a bundle in the bag. McCree said, " ; well here it comes." ; The bus driver hadn' ; t said anything. He had been instructed not to bother us. HUNTLEY: Is this during the Montgomery bus boycott? LOWERY: This was early stages of the Montgomery bus boycott. Though the bus boycott had ended, we started our desegregation process. HUNTLEY: Okay. LOWERY: And when the guy sat down he was a little inebriated, and then he didn' ; t realize that these two black guys were sitting on the front seat. And finally, it dawned on him that the two blacks were up there, so he left you sitting on the side seat right behind the driver. He went over and told the driver, said " ; hey make them get back." ; The bus driver said, " ; you just ride, and I' ; ll drive. I am in charge of the bus." ; So, the guy said, " ; by God if you don' ; t make them get back, I will." ; So, then McCree I felt his hand slip in his pocket. I said don' ; t do that Rev. McCree, you in my workshop now. The fella started back and I stood up. I said, sir! We are not bothering you, don' ; t bother us. Sit down please and reach your destination and we will reach our destination in peace. Thank you sir. And he sat down. That was what we had learned in our workshop. Take the initiative, you know. And that was our first time trying out. HUNTLEY: You disarmed you. LOWERY: I took the advantaged, took the initiative, and took charge. I said to McCree, it works man, it works. And I won' ; t tell you what he said. He said, " ; but I' ; ll be so and so, it did work." ; But I was worried Rev. McCree had a little bitty pocket knife in his pocket. I said, what was you going to do with that. That was what ended segregation on the buses in Mobile. About a month later we demanded that they hire black drivers. HUNTLEY: And they did? LOWERY: They did. It was six months. They hired them in ninety days. So, they beat us to the punch. McBeal never made the headlines because we were making too much progress. That was the news. It was the violence, the bombing, and so forth in Montgomery and Birmingham that made the news. But Mobile moved quietly along and we even desegregated the lunch counters as well without too much difficulty. HUNTLEY: How did the outlawing of the NAACP affect Mobile? LOWERY: That' ; s when I was elected president of the Syndicate Affairs Association. We organized independent organizations. Rev. McElroy and here it was called the Alabama Christian Movement, MIA in Montgomery, and Syndicate Affairs Association in Mobile, and that was how we ran the movement. Later, we were sued by the city commission in Montgomery and the Governor of Alabama for libel. Ralph Abernathy, Joseph Lowery, and Solomon Seay in Montgomery. We were sued for libel. The people in New York were raising money for the movement put a big ad in the paper, " ; Heed their rising voices," ; and they called and said that policemen were raiding the campus, and brutalizing, so forth, and the city commission to the exception, and the n Governor Patterson had sued. And of course, they won the case. HUNTLEY: Was that when they took your car? LOWERY: This whole thing, they could find I owned in Mobile. Thank God they didn' ; t look in Huntsville. I had a little property my father had left in Huntsville, but they didn' ; t think about it. HUNTLEY: They didn' ; t do their homework? LOWERY: No, they did not. For what they found after they got the judgement, the three-million-dollar judgement, was found my car in my name and they took that. They Ralph' ; s car, took Fred' ; s car, took Solomon Seay' ; s car. They also found Ralph' ; s home property in Marengo County. They found that and they took that as well, but they got new cars. The Baptist churches raised money and bought a new car. So, when the old car was sold in auction, they didn' ; t worry about it. My folks being Methodist that they were went down to the auction and bought my old car, out bid everybody, for $800 and bought it back and gave it to my wife for a dollar and put in her name, do they couldn' ; t get it. So, when they came to get my car, the YMCA campus was back of the Y, but in front of my house across the street, and a lot of kids were out there, and they threw rocks at the sheriff when he came to haul my car away. HUNTLEY: Is that right? LOWERY: That libel suit incidentally is the classic case on libel. It sets the standard. Later we were vindicated by the Supreme Court and we had to give the money back.. HUNTLEY: Is that the Sullivan? LOWERY: That' ; s the Sullivan versus New York Times, and Abernathy, Lowery, Shuttlesworth, and Seay. Anthony Lewis called us and said his book " ; Make No Law" ; was built around that case, the first amendment. HUNTLEY: Okay. LOWERY: What the ruling was---and the ruling was by Judge Hugo Black from Alabama. He wrote to the majority opinion. You can' ; t libel a public figure unless you are malicious. They have to prove malice. And of course they couldn' ; t prove malice in most cases, so a public official is fair game. So we got our face back and Hugo Black from Alabama got these four Alabama preachers their money back. HUNTLEY: SCLC, how did you get organized? LOWERY: Well, the movements were going on in Birmingham, Montgomery, Mobile, Tallahassee, Nashville, Baton Rouge, all these movements were going on. Most of them began with transportation, buses. Because transit--and I just completed 25 years on the board of the Transit Authority of Atlanta. In fact, I was chairman for three years during the Olympics. Because that was the closest, other than the police, that' ; s the closet institution to the people. You have to ride the bus and so everybody was attracted. The Montgomery bus boycott was effective, not only because of great leadership, but because everybody had a personal thing. HUNTLEY: Everybody. LOWERY: That' ; s right, if not you, your mama, your aunt, or your grandmother. So it was a personal thing. So that became the issue. We were fighting for voter registration and such. They had voter registration and so forth, but Martin and Ralph, Fred and I at the beginning, Susie Gevalia in Tuskegee, we would try to meet in Montgomery at least once a month. If nothing else to cry on each other' ; s shoulder about the terrible pain of oppression, and to plan strategies and so forth. It was at those meetings that we talked about a south-wide meeting. Five of us and others also agreed there ought to be a south-wide meeting. So a south-wide meeting was called at Ebenezer, toward the end of 1956. While we were there Ralph' ; s house was bombed and it broke up the meeting, but we met again in late January or early February in New Orleans, and organized SCLC. We called ourselves at first the Southern Leadership Conference for more transportation and voting, and we just kept changing until finally it evolved to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. HUNTLEY: After the SCLC was organized, SNCC was organized in 1960--. LOWERY: In 1957. HUNTLEY: In 1960, SNCC is organized, what was the relationship? LOWERY: SCLC people like Jim Lawson and others were involved in pulling SNCC together in North Carolina. They had a good relationship. The good relationship began to be disintegrated into a fair relationship because no matter what happened or where we went, Martin got the press, the media. So the young guys resented us, and they didn' ; t call us SCLC, they called us SLICK, and said these preachers can get all the media attention. And then some of them use to sing a little song. We talked about love and nonviolence, " ; too much love, too much love, nothing kill a nigga like too much love," ; and that was their way of ridiculing nonviolence. But we had a good relationship. As a matter of fact, we met here in Birmingham at the A.G. Gaston motel to plan a voting rights campaign. We had to get the vote...' ; 64 the bill had passed because of the Birmingham movement- the Public Accommodations Bill, but we still couldn' ; t vote. Martin met with President, Johnson, and said well we can' ; t have another bill so quick. Good God. Let this bill kinda sink in. But then we came here and decided to go to Selma. SNCC was already in Selma. Clay--and some other people were in Selma, but they weren' ; t doing well. They were beating him to the ground. So we decided to join SNCC in Selma, and--Martin went there, they were-- SCLC and moved the--and the rest is history. We just celebrated March 5th, the 35th anniversary of the Selma/Montgomery march, and Lewis, even though our staff was in charge of everything, John Wilkes went down there to join us, and he and Hosea decided to march that Sunday, even though Martin had told them not to march, but they did anyway, and the rest is history. HUNTLEY: Now back from 1960 to 1963 there were a number of things that took place. Of course, the organization of SNCC, the freedom ride took place in 1961, in Birmingham in 1962 there was a selective buying campaign, and in Albany, Georgia, took place in 1962. Birmingham then would come along in ' ; 63. Why did you leave Mobile? LOWERY: I left Mobile in ' ; 61 and went to Nashville. HUNTLEY: Alright. LOWERY: I will never forget the Mobile paper had a little headline, local agitator leaves town, and one of the members of my church came by that morning, she was upset about it. She said, " ; I knew you were going to be upset, but I want you to drive me home." ; I drove her home and she carried me down a long hall and in back of the house was a brand-new washing machine. She said, " ; you see that little red thing, that is an agitator, and without it ain' ; t nothing going to happen." ; HUNTLEY: She said that was an agitator. LOWERY: She said, " ; don' ; t be upset." ; She took me on back home. HUNTLEY: A compliment. LOWERY: She opened my eyes and taught me a good lesson in theology right there in her front door. But that was 11/61. I went to Nashville and got involved in the Nashville Movement. I was a part of the Nashville movement that desegregated public facilities in Nashville prior to the 1964 act. I remember we were sitting in and some of the Morrisons, Brittlings, and some of the other cafeterias, and two things happened. One fellow from the FOR, his name will come to me in a minute, joined us in the picket line, but we had been picking down there all day, and the thugs had been rolling eyes, but they hadn' ; t done anything. The minute the white guy got in the line, they knocked him down. They couldn' ; t stand for a white fella to be in there. But I remember sitting in the governor' ; s office, Governor of Tennessee, because Morrisons wouldn' ; t desegregate. They wouldn' ; t open to nobody, no matter what happen. They would not desegregate, and I went to the governor and said you can call the man who own it , he was in Mobile, and he did. He called him on the phone. He said you are causing disruption in our community. We want it over. We got everything else over except Morrison. And he told the governor, no, over his dead body, he wasn' ; t going to do it. Interestingly enough, the Act passed in the middle of the year in 1964. He died. Over his dead body? HUNTLEY: In 1963 where were you? LOWERY: Well, I was in Nashville. I was administrative assistant to the bishop, and I couldn' ; t spend as much time in Birmingham as I wanted to because I had these administrative responsibilities to North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Alabama. And I would come in to join them, I had to go back. I wanted to be more involved, I just couldn' ; t leave my responsibilities. I didn' ; t have the freedom of a pastor. I wasn' ; t pastoring. If I had been pastoring as I was in Mobile, I would have had much more freedom. As God would have it I came to Birmingham to pastor in 1964 across the street at St. Paul United Methodist Church. Now while I was in Nashville, that bombing took place in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Sixteenth Street? LOWERY: Yes. That was in ' ; 63. We were meeting in --before that, there was a bombing at A.G. Gaston [Motel]. HUNTLEY: Right. LOWERY: We were there that night planning. I was living in Nashville. Martin and all of us were in room 30. That was the biggest room they had. The next day on a Sunday I was to go to Athens, down from Nashville to do a commencement. I was late. I was going to catch the Pan America and go to Nashville and drive my family down. But that evening later on Martin said, " ; Joe I am going to Atlanta, why not stay here? You are as close to Athens here as you are in Nashville aren' ; t you?" ; I said, yes. Why don' ; t you stay here? The room is paid for, so don' ; t go. I said, okay I guess I will. So, they left and I stayed I got ready to go to bed, I said I told my wife I was going to drive her down there with me. I am going. I got up and went to Nashville, got up and drove there. And they bombed room 30, and the big hole was right by the bed where I would have been sleeping. So, God had something he was saving me for. But then I moved to Birmingham in 1964. Fred had gone to Cincinnati, and I became president of the Ministerial Alliance here. All the meetings about Selma took place in my church and in A.G. Gaston. I became a real part of it. But of course, the amazing thing had already been consummated, but there I became a part Birmingham movement. We had some demonstrations against the Liberty Supermarket. We had a big one. The boycott was 99.9% effective. Fred came down that night and we had a mass meeting out in Davis' ; Church, St. Paul A.M.E. Fred decided we were going to march that night, and I tried to get to him. I couldn' ; t before he announced, but when I got there he had already announced it, we were going on to the street. Well it was too late then. I said, Fred, this is totally unnecessary. We are taking too big a risk. I knew that we were halfway down there then, and that was the night when the fella shook the car and the fella got shot, and sued us, and cost us $90,000 bucks. But I left Birmingham in ' ; 68, and went to Atlanta. I was vice-president of SCLC then, and I was organizing up until ' ; 67. At the convention in Atlanta, Martin asked me if I would serve as chairman of the board. We didn' ; t have a chairman of the board. They asked me if I would be chairman of the board, and I agreed to do that. So, I could preside at the meetings, and take some of the weight off of his shoulders and I did that, but he always wanted me to come to Atlanta, and I said, no my place is here. The Birmingham News had just had an editorial about blacks will be elected to public office and other blacks will qualify, and they named a bunch of names and mine was one of them. I said, well maybe it' ; s time for me to leave Birmingham. They decided that I am qualified-- HUNTLEY: And the job is done, huh? LOWERY: Yeah, of course I must be doing something wrong because they were pleased with me. But I went on to Atlanta and I was chairman of the board then. Roger had tried to get me to come to Atlanta in the early sixties on up to run SCLC, and I didn' ; t go, and he died in April. I went in June. I hate that he didn' ; t live to see me come back to Atlanta. But even then I didn' ; t have any intention of running SCLC. Ralph was president. Even when they come to the office, I had an office and I would work with the fiscal responsibilities. He ran the program, and of course in 1977 Ralph decided to run for congress and resigned in February. The board elected me acting president. I was already chairman of the board, so I stayed there. I went with Carter after he got elected. Ralph ran for congress and lost, but by the time the convention came, the group had decided that I should stay as president and Ralph and I had several private discussions, and we persuaded Ralph that he would accept President Emeritus. I said you will have an office down there, and Walter Fauntroy would be chairman of the board. Ralph wanted to be chairman of the board if he couldn' ; t be the president. We had already talked to Walter and so Ralph took President Emeritus and that' ; s what happen. Hosea ran against me for president, but he was soundly defeated, and we are good friends, but that' ; s how I became president. I had no intention of becoming president. A Baptist pastor was more adaptive. He could be president with much more facility because he was rooted in the community, stayed longer, wasn' ; t accountable to a bureaucracy, and administrative structure, and sometimes white, as well as black. But I took it and held it longer than Martin and Ralph together, better than 21 years almost. February 1977 to January of 1998. I had some problem with the hierarchy of my church, but made it through, as a matter of fact, I met an interesting person, Bishop William Cannon, white. He was dean of Catholic School of Theology at Emory. He was my bishop. Before he was elected bishop he was the official apologist for segregation in the church. When I went somebody questioned the theology or doctrine, or the efficacy of segregation in the Christian community, they would call on Cannon to give a biblical, theological, doctrinal defense, and he became bishop. He was a bishop when I was about to be elected. I decided I would go to him and tell him what was about to happen, and he said, " ; no, no, you can' ; t leave central." ; I said, wait a minute I don' ; t leave central. I said remember Martin pastured at Ebenezer. I said I don' ; t have to be at central, I will just be the spokesman. I lied a little bit. I said I will just be spokesman. The staff will do most of the work, and so forth. He said, " ; oh, well that' ; s different. Yes, that will be great." ; He said as a Methodist preacher, you will be named as successor to Martin Luther King. That brings great honor to the church, and he gave the blessing and wrote an editorial in the church paper, the Christian Advocate, saying what I just related to you. It was a very, very startling and almost miraculous thing that happened then. He wished me well, and I stayed there 21 years. HUNTLEY: Did he change any after he saw how active you were? LOWERY: No, it was too late then. Every position that I took of the position, was in harmony with the position of the church, you know. And that was the power of our movement. Some called us communist, but that was a compliment to communism that they didn' ; t deserve. Our principals, our methodology, our protest, our philosophy was Christian, Democratic ; and then to give communism credit was blasphemy. So, a sincere churchman could not challenge our position. We stood on the grounds that God was made of one blood, and that God did not believe in oppression of his people, and that God was identified all through the Old Testament on the side of the oppressed. And that the Moses and Amos and Joshua and others throughout history were Christian statesmen and prophets. And we were in that endless line of splendor. And the church could not argue with that. HUNTLEY: They say the same thing about the labor movement as well, it was communist. But how did the labor movement and the civil rights movement interact? LOWERY: One of the reasons I was so honored to get the Walter Reuther award last December in Detroit from Wayne University and UAW, was that Walter Luther was probably the most prophetic labor leader, and the most activist in terms of civil rights, that we ever had in this country. And he marched with us. I have a picture at home, him marching with us in Charleston in 69 when we were fighting for the hospital workers. He and Martin were friends. The numeral progressive elements of the labor movement, particularly CIO joined with us in many instances because they recognized we were fighting for human rights, workers' ; rights, poor peoples' ; rights and that was in sync with what Reuther stood for. Now there were conservative labor folks like everything else who didn' ; t take that position, but we had a good coalescence with the labor movement and until this day. When I retired there were Bill Lucy, who heads the black coalition of Trade Union who' ; s on my board. Joe Davis headed UAW civil rights leader on my board, Clayola Brown with the Now Unite. Knight was on my board, we had a good relationship. When Walter Reuther passed we had a good relationship with everyone who succeeded him at UAW. So its been a good--. not that we didn' ; t have problems with Luther, and you have to understand that when I took positions against the labor movement, and I still do for that matter, but because I think there are pockets where they are still insensitive and discriminating. I think that John Swooney elected to secede, will get his name later, is much more sensitive than his predecessor. So it has gotten better. HUNTLEY: The book that, the controversy, the book that Reverend Abernathy wrote, and that was during the time you were in the fore front. How did that play? LOWERY: Sad, it was a very sad chapter in the history of the movement. Ralph was probably closer to Martin that any of us, they were in Montgomery together. Ralph played a very important role in Martin' ; s leadership capacity. Alabama State this past year just established the civil rights series in Ralph' ; s honor. I gave the first lecture and I commended them for taking that step. Ralph was not only an advocate for civil rights and justice, he also was an advocate for Martin' ; s leadership. He had more seniority in Montgomery than Martin did, he would stand up to some of the old timers when Martin couldn' ; t. It' ; s always good to have somebody else fight your battles, coming to your defense. Because who was that said, " ; that he who is his own lawyer has a fool for a client." ; But Ralph played a very important role. And Ralph worked hard as President. The book remains enigmatic and it remains a mystery. There are those that think Ralph had a very serious operation, you know. A doctor in Montgomery, whose father was President of Montgomery for a long time, who' ; s brother is an attorney here in Montgomery now, did the surgery, and it was a very delicate and very serious surgery. They are the ones who think that maybe Ralph had moments when he didn' ; t recall to clearly, and others think that the publisher who provided a writer to work with Ralph, influenced Ralph to include something sensational to be a catalyst for sales of the book. There are theories and other rumors of Ralph' ; s immediate family may have contributed something, we don' ; t know. Except, we do know that Bernard Lee was there, who has now passed himself, all the time. And Bernard vigorously denied Ralph' ; s recollection of the last evening. But it was sad because it put in peril the record that Ralph had made, all his achievements, all his contributions were imperiled by this dangerous voyage into scandalizing his friends name. HUNTLEY: Speaking on that, you were very much involved when the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, sent this material to King. LOWERY: I was pastor here then, at St. Paul. And living out on, I forgot the name of the street, the freeway was going right through where our house was, I believe it was on 10th street, I forgot. But anyway, Martin called me, and he said, " ; can you get over here in the morning." ; I said, " ; what you got?" ; He said, " ; you got to get over here in the morning." ; So, we went over there, the next day, and here to meet Andy, Ralph, myself, Martin, I don' ; t remember who else, but he told us about the tape, he played the tape, Coretta had already heard it, the tape was not clear. It was either two things, either the technology that they used record the conversation at the Wyndam Hotel, was not sufficient to get a clear picture, clear recording, a clear sound. Or we think they may have delivered it muffled, parts of it, because some of it we don' ; t believe were our voices. I was in the room, and some of it, it sounds like they may have had somebody impersonating some of us to say some nasty things, because nobody from there recalls anybody saying that. But at any rate, the note that came with it said that Martin said he should take his own life, or they were going to expose this tape. And we all decided, you know you not going to take your own life, number two its fabrication, that may have been part of the conversation was authentic. Whenever you get that many preachers in a room and they are going to tell lies about their sermons and all that stuff. But that was what that was, and we sent a message back to the FBI. A fellow named Sullivan was an important figure for the FBI, and we believed that it was taped by and distributed by the FBI. Coretta didn' ; t believe it, and none of us really believed it. I came back and told my wife what was said. It pretended to be an orgy, and later on a black writer, Collin, also used that book to say some nasty things about Martin and Ralph. But it was 90% fabrication. I am not saying that we were saints. I am not saying Martin was a saint. The only one I would have been called a saint was John Lewis. Time Magazine called him a saint, but I am not a saint. Martin is no saint. But Martin was not as promiscuous as Ralph' ; s book and other charges that were indicated. That simply is not true. HUNTLEY: Let me ask you a question about the women in the movement, the wives of the leaders. I know that there probably were times when you had to go someplace and your wife may say, well you know-- How did you handle that relationship, keep that relationship together and be successful? LOWERY: The most difficult time was in Mobile when the children were small and I had to go away. She had to stay through the telephone calls around the clock and the threats of bombing. Let me tell you something else. When I first moved to Mobile in 1952, and the house was next to the church and there was a restaurant right across the street called Big Mamas, and Big Mamas was Big Mamas. Big Mama had a jukebox that played all night long. We slept upstairs and the sound came right out of Big Mamas right across the street up into our bedrooms. We had a tough time, we came from Alexander City when we lived in a quiet community, and there was not a juke box within a mile or two miles of our house, and that contrast required a very difficult adjustment. I used to go and talk with Big Mama, and say, is there any way we could tone down the music a little bit, and she did. But it had no other competing sound, even to tone down the juke box, the sound traveled, oh, it traveled. But then when things broke and there was a green truck and a red truck that the Klan traveled around in. The word was out they were going to bomb my house, and they never did. And the reason they never did, was that they couldn' ; t find a time when somebody was not hanging around Big Mamas that could see them. At first it was an intrusive noise that became a comforting lullaby coming across from Big Mamas. That was very interesting. The Klan was active in Mobile, no question. HUNTLEY: I am sure that, this goes without saying that there was strength where your wife was concerned to keep the family together. LOWERY: They were strong women. Fortunately, all of us had strong wives. I hated for her to be alone, but then the church would take turns here in Birmingham, particularly following the ' ; 65 march when Martin named me to carry the demands of the march to Wallace. And he named me at the end of the speech to chair the group, A.G. Gaston, Billingsley, the president of Tuskegee and so forth. The troopers were guarding the steps of the capital. But the National Guard had been penalized. There was a general there in charge and we would take the demands up to the door of the capital. I went to the general and I said, what is going to happen here? He said, " ; I cleared it. I talked with him and they are going to let you come up and bring them to the governor." ; So, I carried my folks on up the steps. But when we got to the top of the steps the troopers closed in and would not let us pass. They formed a blue sea. We had already had the red sea and Joseph Myer had the blue sea. So I looked back at the general, as if to say, thought you said--and the general saw what was happening, and he stepped off the back of his truck where he was watching everything and yelled some commands, which I didn' ; t understand, but the National Guard did. They marched over and confronted the troopers and swarmed the bayonets around like that, and the blue sea, like the red sea opened up, and we marched through on dry steps and carried the petition to the capital. The governor' ; s secretary came. We wanted to see the governor. The secretary said give me the demands. Oh no, we don' ; t march 50 miles from Selma to Montgomery to give demands to a secretary, and if the governor won' ; t receive us, we will not submit the demands. So we didn' ; t get to meet that today. We came on back home. That' ; s when the threats were terrible over here in Birmingham with me because I had chaired the committee, and the governor had refused to see me. The Klan had killed Viola Liuzzo that night and so officers of the church would take turns watching the church and the parsonage. Because we didn' ; t want to have get away on Sunday and have to evacuate, so we watched the church around the clock so that they would know that we were clear. As you know, they didn' ; t bomb the house, they didn' ; t bomb us, and we did --but the women were wonderful. Later we did meet with the governor. The United Methodist Bishop here in Alabama persuaded Wallace who was a Methodist, to meet with us. So, then the governor' ; s secretary called me and said the governor has said he would meet with a part of the group. I said, oh! Out of curiosity I asked him what part? He said he would meet with A.G. Gaston, he will meet with the president of Tuskegee. He will meet with Tonya so and so, Fred Gray, who was from down at Wallace' ; s home. I said, well I' ; ll tell you what, as far as I am concerned the governor cannot tell us who represents us. I will poll the group and get back to you. So, I did, I polled the group, and to a man they said no, either we all go or none of us should go. So, I dutifully called the little governor' ; s office and said that word is that it is all or nothing or all. He said, " ; well I will call you back." ; So, he called me back, I guess, I don' ; t know whether it was next day or later that day, but anyway he said the governor will meet with you. We had a 90- minute meeting with the governor during which time I challenged him as a Methodist pastor to a Methodist layman, and said God was going to hold him accountable for what he was doing. I told him, you have a forum from which you can speak that the thugs don' ; t have, and they want to identify with you. So why you are raving and ranting, about your interposition and so forth, they are shooting Viola Liuzzo. They cracked the skull of Jonathan Daniels and so forth, James Reed, and that was a historic meeting with the governor. He called me to his bedside when I was in Montgomery not long before he died to pray for him. We had established a relationship that-- in fact he came to me in ' ; 95 where we conducted when we conducted the 30th anniversary of re-enactment of the Selma march. He came to meet me, and the marchers was out at St. Jude and apologized on the front page was of almost every paper in the country, apologized for his deeds in ' ; 65. HUNTLEY: In ' ; 95? LOWERY: In ' ; 95. He was sick in a wheelchair, couldn' ; t hardly talk above a whisper. As matter of fact in ' ; 85 the rascal was back in the governor' ; s house on the 20th anniversary, and we went by to see him, he was in his office, but he was in pain. We prayed with him there, and he gave us a kind of an apology, but not like the one he gave in ' ; 95. When we got word, we were coming into Montgomery the night before, we got word that Wallace wanted to meet us. Some of my people didn' ; t want it to happen. HUNTLEY: Oh? LOWERY: No. And I decided that as he stood in the schoolhouse door hindering education for young people, I was not going to stand in the door of his repentance. Because he had nothing to gain from coming out there, no way he could gain politically. He was in a wheelchair, could hardly talk above a whisper. And I guess that was his means of making sure he had to let God know and the public know that he had repented. So, I wasn' ; t about to --.as a matter of fact I used a little article from the New York Times. I said that was a message Wallace was sending to the demagogues of the day that you see where the roads of hate lead, and they have a chance to repent now as Wallace did much later. HUNTLEY: Reverend Lowery, you have had a tremendous career in life, but you obviously have not finished. LOWERY: I' ; m retired. What do you mean? I have been retired two years now. Nobody believes me. A group in Atlanta, Georgia, came to me and asked me if I would convene a coalition of representatives of various groups called the People' ; s Agenda, which I did. They seemed to think I could be successful in pulling more of a leadership together because I guess I had the black leadership forum nationally which includes all the groups. I am trying to retire from that. But, we are working to improve the quality of governance in Georgia. The farmers came to me, Chestnut and the black farmers around the country and said, will you help us with this suit we got. So, I pulled part of the civil rights community and the business community together to support the farmers, and the judge even let me speak to his court in a hearing they had, in which I appreciated very much. I had been in court, but they never let me address the court. We won the suit. The farmers won the suit. There is still a battle because I think they are rejecting too many applications, so we still got to fight. But the victory was marvelous. It was the closest thing--it' ; s the only thing for that matter that has happened to black folks that even smell like reparation. We think when the settlements are over and completed, that somewhere between one and two billion dollars would have gone from the Department of Agriculture into the hands of black farmers and their heirs in this country. So that got me out of retirement. Then the next I knew a group of automobile dealers, former automobile dealers, I won' ; t call the name of the automobile, but they were bankrupt. They had been abused and neglected by the manufacturer. They didn' ; t keep the promises they made to give them this and give them that and help them. And all of them went bankrupt. When a fella down in Tuskegee had lost his home, his wife' ; s home, another one in North Carolina, his wife' ; s mother' ; s property, and they and asked me if I would help them. I said only on one condition that you let me give the leadership, let me decide if and when we go public, if we can work it out and we negotiate across the table, let' ; s do it that way. They said whatever you want, we have nothing to lose, and everything to gain. We working, about seven or eight of them. I went to the head of General Motors, (gosh, can you take that out). But we went ahead to you know, and they were, not just General Motors, Ford done the same thing. I give General Motors credit that when I went to their leadership and explained what was going on, they worked with me, and for a year and a half we have been fighting that battle. Not a single press conference, but we have gotten settlements for six or seven former dealers, two in Alabama, North Carolina who otherwise may have been left penniless. I am very proud of that. It was a hard fight, but like Joe Lewis, I glad I win. So, they have kept me pretty busy. Then the black promoters came, and they say, will you help us? Did you know that no white artist has ever given a concert promoted by a black promoter? No major white artist. And when the black artist get major, the booking agent take them away from the black promoters. So, we are fighting that battle. We have a lawsuit filed now against Creative Artists and William Morris Agency and big booking talent in California that have control of everything. So, I have been--plus I am trying to write my book, and I would like a little more time if you could help me, I would appreciate it. But, I guess you' ; re right, I had a tremendously enriching career, and I had planned to title my book, but my opinion is I wouldn' ; t take nothing from the journey and I wouldn' ; t, so I don' ; t' ; know what I am going to call my book, but the Lord has blessed me so much. He let me live long enough to see some things come to pass, and that we would never have believed would come to pass. On March 5th last month we saw the President of the United States come to the Selma, Alabama. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. LOWERY: In 1965 the president had to send troops to protect us. In 2000 he came to direct us. He led the march. In 1965 the governor of Alabama sent troopers to beat us. In 2000 he came to greet us. And the troopers to salute us as we crossed that bridge. I am pretty sure that Martin saw that. If he didn' ; t I certainly will tell him about it when I see him. That was a marvelous thing, and should demonstrate to those who are tending to sink into pits of lethargy about voting, the power of the ballot, you know Clinton would never have come down there, he wouldn' ; t even be president. Nor would have Jimmy Carter without the ballot, that was made possible by that Selma to Montgomery voting rights campaign. I hope they would see that. I could name so many things that have come to pass. The president called my name a couple of times in his speech. I spoke to the group as I did earlier, but this little old small-town, textile mill, colored boy from the North of Alabama has come a long, long way from that punch in the belly until this day, and I am grateful. I don' ; t care what my call is, I am going to take that bit of a journey. I wouldn' ; t take nothing for it. God has blessed me and maybe it isn' ; t completely over, maybe you know, God got some use for me. I hope he lets me write this book. I am 78, and still breathing well enough to get a good night' ; s rest. HUNTLEY: That' ; s a blessing. LOWERY: I am very grateful, but the movement has been a tremendous spiritual experience. I almost didn' ; t make it. I almost died in ' ; 79 about 24 miles from where I was born in Decatur, Alabama, when the Klan shot me, four young people in the head when I was leading a march on behalf of Tommy Lee Hines, a young retarded man who was accused of raping, he couldn' ; t even ride a bicycle, and they said he drove a car in the process of the rape. We saved his life and God spared me. I don' ; t know who was shooting, but I heard the bullets, too close, but God spared me, and I thank God for the richness of my experience. I wouldn' ; t' ; take nothing for it. HUNTLEY: I just want to say, you know that I really, not just myself, but everyone just really appreciate you, not just as a civil rights leader because you are honestly that, you are a giant among giants, but your person is what is so important you don' ; t meet strangers and you are genuine in talking about it. LOWERY: Well, thank you. I love people. My daughter works over at University of Alabama I was over there today, and when I drove up and she told the people where she was going, the whole place came out with her, and much to my regret because I was hungry. I was trying to get to, what is it, Jabo' ; s? HUNTLEY: Yeah. LOWERY: But I enjoyed meeting them, I love people and my work has been--I never separated my ministry, never fragmented it, and was a holistic minister. I never separated my pastoral duties. They not only included ministering to my flock but trying to spread the balm and giving it to the whole world. I enjoyed doing that. I think it is the preacher in me. When I am marching, I am preaching. I thank God he has empowered me to do it for a long, long time. HUNTLEY: We certainly appreciate you Reverend Dr. Lowery. LOWERY: Joseph or Joe, as long as you call me, I don' ; t care what you call me. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. Thank you so much. LOWERY: You are quite welcome. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery (2000)
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Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery discusses his extensive involvement in the Movement in Birmingham, Montgomery, Mobile, Nashville and Atlanta. He served in closely with Dr. King, lead the SCLC, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama in 2009.
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20000411L
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights
United States. Supreme Court
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968
Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990
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2000-04-11
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Rev. Erskine Faush
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5.4 November 18, 1998 Rev. Erskine Faush Interviewed on November 18, 1998 19981118F 1:32:42 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Lessie Dingler Civil rights movements--Alabama--Birmingham Rev. Erskine Faush Horace Huntley Oral History 1:|14(4)|37(7)|56(3)|77(6)|90(12)|104(7)|116(7)|124(14)|138(17)|147(10)|159(7)|168(17)|182(1)|203(10)|216(7)|227(1)|239(7)|254(2)|271(4)|284(6)|301(13)|308(14)|320(6)|331(10)|346(9)|362(5)|382(4)|409(12)|423(4)|433(7)|449(14)|459(12)|475(14)|489(7)|504(4)|521(16)|530(8)|539(2)|549(3)|558(10)|569(11)|585(15)|599(11)|612(4)|628(2)|642(2)|658(1)|673(10)|680(7)|686(5)|700(5)|714(13)|724(4)|733(8)|746(7)|762(1)|769(9)|782(6)|791(9)|800(8)|811(8)|819(12)|838(1)|848(16)|857(13)|877(5)|892(9)|900(8)|910(9)|920(11)|934(1)|957(8)|975(8)|981(5)|992(14)|1004(9)|1018(11)|1030(1)|1042(5)|1049(3)|1060(4)|1071(14)|1084(17)|1094(7)|1102(4)|1112(6)|1130(6)|1144(5) 0 https://youtu.be/Iyf3aMixHRo YouTube video English 0 Introduction of Interview This is an interview with Rev. Erskine Faush 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 November 18, 1998. I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come and sit and talk with me today and welcome to the Institute. 33.5161, -86.8145 17 Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 53 Family Background I would like to start by just asking you some general questions about your background. Were you born in Birmingham? Rev. Erskine Faush talks about his family and where he grew up. African American Presbyterian churches ; Neighborhoods Birmingham (Ala.)--Maps ; Enon Ridge--Birmingham (Ala.) ; Fountain Heights--Birmingham (Ala.) ; Montgomery (Ala.)--Maps ; Selma (Ala.) ; Smithfield--Birmingham (Ala.) 196 Family Background-Mothers Side In that area. . .oh, let me ask you this about your parents education. How much education did they have? Rev. Erskine Faush talks about his mothers educations and her family of business people. black cleaners ; cattle farming ; entrepreneurs ; Family business ; Funeral homes ; Grocery trade--United States Alabama A & ; amp ; Beloit (Ala.) ; Edmund Pettus Bridge--Selma (Ala.) ; Huntsville (Ala.) ; M University ; Maxwell Air Force Base (Ala.) ; Snowhill Normal and Industrial Institute (Ala.) 521 Family Background-Fathers Side By contrast my father that side of the family was from Montgomery. Rev. Erskine Faush talks about his fathers jobs, falling ill, and his mother becoming the major bread winner of the family. African American single mothers ; Automobile dealers ; Blanche Department Store-Birmingham (Ala.) ; bread winner ; Drennen Motor Company-Birmingham (Ala.) ; family illness ; ironing ; Janitor ; painter African American families 814 Early Education That’s right. Now, you grew up in that Enon Ridge, Smithfield area. What school did you start first grade? Rev. Erksine Faush discusses his Tuggle elementary, and who he grew up around in his community while attending primary school. Cemeteries (Jewish law) ; Communities, contexts, and cultures ; doctors ; glass eye ; Middle class--United States ; Neighborhoods ; primary school Black Physicians ; Erskine Hawkins--Laura Washinton--Blues Singer ; Sardis Baptist Church--Birmingham (Ala.) ; Tuggle Elementary School--Birmimgham (Ala.) 1136 Community Background What did most people do? What kind of work did most people do that lived in that community? Do you remember? Rev. Erskine Faush briefly talks about the black business in his community being self sufficient. Businesses ; Jewish Cemetery ; Odd Job ; Self-Sufficient Black Community ; Business enterprises, Black 1230 Early Education-Tuggle Elementary What do you remember about Tuggle School? Rev. Erskine Faush talks of his time at Tuggle Elementary and his good relationship with the faculty there. community ; family ; neighbor ; student-teacher relationship Tuggle Elementary--Birmingham (Ala.) 1620 Early Education-Parker High School When you left Tuggle, where did you go? Rev. Erskine Faush discusses his time at Parker High School and being involved in the band. high school ; High school band ; jazz band ; music Parker High School (Birmingham, Ala.) 1837 Parker High School-The Elks Band So, that was an intricate part of your development. Rev. Erskine Faush talks about joining traveling with the Elks band during his time at Parker High School and barely losing an academic competition against another student. Academic achievement--Competitions ; Conventions ; High School Band ; High School Choir Asheville (N.C.) ; Clarks (Musical group) ; Elks (Fraternal order) ; Hampton, Lionel ; Parker High School (Bimingham, Ala.) ; Talladega College ; Whatley, Fess 2195 Alabama A& ; M University This was the principal? Rev. Erskine Faush talks about getting a scholarship to Talladega College, attending Alabama A & ; M University, being recognized as an honorary citizen of Huntsville, Alabama and being paid to sing for the Bradford Singers on the weekends. campus ; Experience of illness ; Honorary citizenship ; Musical performance ; singer ; swindel Agricultural and Mechanical College for Negroes (Normal, Ala.) ; Alabama A & ; amp ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Bradford Singers ; Elks (Fraternal order) ; Huntsville (Ala.)--Maps ; Lawson State Community College (Birmingham, Ala.) ; M University ; Talladega College ; Tuxedo Junction (Birmingham, Ala.) ; Von Braun Center (Huntsville, Ala.) ; Wenonah Trade School (Birmingham, Ala.) 2918 Starting at Radio Station WBCO What happened after that? Rev. Erskine Faush talks about starting at radio station WBCO. African American radio stations ; Black broadcasting ; broadcast Bessemer (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Jess Lainer (Mayor of Bessemer, Ala.) ; Louisville (Ky.) ; Stephens, Elton B. 3073 Starting at LOU Radio Yes. He was at LOK, I think it was or LOU. In the meantime they invested in promotional pieces and so on with the name Faush. Rec. Erkine Faush talks of his journey with his brother to LOU radio in Lousiville Kentucky, then getting training in Denver in order to be a promoter of music in Birmingham, Alabama. African American radio stations ; band ; broadcasting ; Gospel music ; Music--Performance ; orchestra ; promotion ; record companies Birmingham (Ala.) ; Louisville (Ky.) ; University of Alabama ; University of Denver ; University of Denver. Center for Mass Communications Research and Policy 3375 Entering Into Ministry At what point did you get into the ministry? Rev. Erskine Faush explains his journey into Ministry. A Higher Power ; Black amusement park ; grocery business ; Ministry ; Music Promotion Faith College 3678 Faith College Where was that? Rev. Erskine Faush goes back to school to study theology. Black community ; Theology Faith College ; Miles Community College 3800 Involvement In the Movement So, how do you fit all of this together in the particularly how you eventually relate to your activities during the early and mid-60's? Rev. Erskine Faush describes the historical moments and periods of time that have lead to the civil rights movement. Divine Force ; Human rights ; Politics African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka ; Emancipation Proclamation ; Ku Klux Klan ; Montgomery Bus Boycott, Montgomery, Ala., 1955-1956 4409 Meeting and Partnering with Shelley Stewart Tell me how did you and Shelley come together eventually as partners? I know you were together at WENN. Is that right? Rev. Erskine Faush mentions about meeting Shelley Stewart and getting together on the radio station WENN, but also in general the business of black broadcasting, the trials and tribulations of it. African American radio broadcasters ; African American radio stations ; Stewart, Shelley ; Television Birmingham (Ala.) ; McLendon Group--Mississippi ; United States. Federal Communications Commission ; Winfrey, Oprah 5523 Interview Conclusion I really appreciate you taking the time out, but I know I really need to sit down with you again. Video Rev. Erskine Faush discusses being involved in music and ministry throughout his early years before starting with broadcast radio. His voice, along with Shelley Stewart's, was a hallmark of Black broadcasting during the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Rev. Erskine Faush 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 November 18, 1998. I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come and sit and talk with me today and welcome to the Institute. FAUSH: Thank you, it' ; s a pleasure. HUNTLEY: I would like to start by just asking you some general questions about your background. Were you born in Birmingham? FAUSH: Oh, yes, born in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Were your parents originally from Birmingham? FAUSH: No, it' ; s my understanding that my mother was born in Selma, Alabama and my father in Montgomery. HUNTLEY: Ok, how many siblings? FAUSH: Three. HUNTLEY: Were you the oldest? FAUSH: No, the youngest of three. HUNTLEY: Oh, the baby. FAUSH: Yes, one sister and one brother. HUNTLEY: What part of town did you live in, did you grow up in? FAUSH: Grew up primarily, my earliest recollection is Enon Ridge. However, I was told that I was born in a double tenant house that was on a place called Kirkland Avenue. I don' ; t think it exists today. It' ; s in that border area that was taken by the freeway that came through 11th Avenue that sort of bordered between Smithfield and Enon Ridge. The border of Fountain Heights because if you had gone two blocks further you would have gone into that section then occupied by Whites in Birmingham and then down into the area that Black occupied. HUNTLEY: I had relatives that lived up in Enon Ridge up on 5th Place. FAUSH: Yes, yes, right. HUNTLEY: In fact, we can still see 5th Place from the freeway pass that' ; s where it was cut off. FAUSH: Right, those streets had names at the time. The one adjacent to the one that you mentioned was called as I remember Mortimer Street. HUNTLEY: That takes you way back then. FAUSH: And 11th Avenue and that was before the [inaudible] Presbyterian Church moved to its present location. All were displaced. I also remember there was a Mecca for business too. I remember it as a child, a candy kitchen, a Black owned candy factory that was on 11th Avenue North. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: Yes. HUNTLEY: That it was something that we lost. FAUSH: Absolutely. You could smell it of course halfway through town. HUNTLEY: It was a tracking point? FAUSH: Yes. HUNTLEY: In that area. . .oh, let me ask you this about your parents' ; education. How much education did they have? FAUSH: As near as I can recall from conversation my mother went to Snowhill Institute. She referred to it often. Just how far she went I don' ; t know. Her side of the family came out of the Selma area was very much a part of the history of that area. I remember my grandfather Peter, that' ; s the Thomas family. Her maiden name was Alberta Thomas. The Thomas family was quite well known in that area. In fact she was the only girl and three brothers. One was Willie Thomas, who owned at the time the only Black cleaners. That was on the main street. I think it was, I can' ; t recall, it will come to me later. It' ; s the main street when you come through Edmund Pettus Bridge downtown. HUNTLEY: That would be Highway 80. FAUSH: Yes, but there' ; s another name for it. It escapes me for the moment. Then there was her brother George who owned a small grocery store and was also a preacher. The most prominent of the Thomas family at the time was Mark Thomas. He owned most of the land around Range Street and 1st Avenue. In fact, if you visit the area now the building still stands because his widow still lives. She' ; s 106 or 107 years old or something like that. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: Yes, she' ; s still living. That is the name engraved in the stone at the top of that building now that says Thomas Grocery. They also leased a lot of land. He was a cattle trader and raised a lot of cattle out in a place outside of Selma called Beloit. The family, I' ; ve been there to the family cemetery and there are Thomas' ; that date back into the early 1800' ; s. At the time of Mark' ; s death, I think he would not let him tell and it was told at his funeral. I have the funeral program somewhere at home. Most of the civil rights leaders were there at his funeral because as you know during the height of the civil rights struggle in the area they tried to cut off the food supply. Mark had gone into retirement. He came out of retirement and started what is called the co-op grocery. They knew what they wanted to do but they didn' ; t have the expertise, so they got Mark. Mark was a person also who paid the fines for a lot of the demonstrators that were in jail at the time. However, he would not let it be told. At the funeral all of this came out. It was quite a story. His son is still in the area now, a lot of Thomas' ; . HUNTLEY: Are the businesses? FAUSH: No, most of the things on 1st Avenue. They' ; re still a part of their property but being leased. Service stations and other things are still leasing land off of the Thomas' ; even today. As I mentioned Aunt Laura still lives, until her demise the other generations there will come into play. However, the two well-known persons in the area that are still there, the Moss' ; , one of the Thomas daughters married one of the Moss, [inaudible] Moss, was an outstanding educator in the area, she just demised this last year. She was the daughter of the ruler of the Elks in the state of Alabama in addition to her educational involvement. The other two are twins, Malcolm and Maniard Thomas, my first cousins. Malcolm owns a high-tech industry in Huntsville, Alabama at the moment. His wife is Dr. Maddie Thomas who' ; s on the faculty at A & ; M. The other one Maniard who ran PX' ; s and so forth and Maniard serviced at Maxwell Air force Base in Selma. All of them were involved in business enterprises and things of this kind on that side of the family. HUNTLEY: So, you come from a long line of entrepreneurs? FAUSH: Yes, yes, in fact there is a funeral home in Selma today connected also with a hotel that [inaudible] and her husband Moss, operate in the city of Selma today. So, it' ; s been a long life. HUNTLEY: Yes. FAUSH: By contrast my father that side of the family was from Montgomery. My father would tell me the story of what he did, you know in work and so forth. I remember him telling me the story of the Drennen Motor Company, the Cadillac dealer and so forth for many years on the southside of Birmingham. They sold buggies, horses, and carriages before the oncoming of the automobile. He was a painter that did the special painting on carriages and things of that kind. I remember finding a case once as a child with all kind of small jars of speciality listing paints and things of this kind with a lot of thin brushes. I asked him about it and he told me the story. A man would come in, of course, and order a new carriage and that sort of thing and he would design what he wanted on it. Whether it was a family crest or whatever and he was the first one to do that. In later years, he became, when he worked as a janitor at school, in fact when I was going through school, he worked as a janitor. He also worked as they refer to them, I don' ; t know how they got the title calling them that because when you say porter you think of the railroad but they called them porters. They cleaned up the floors and he worked at Blanche Department Store. HUNTLEY: Did your mother work outside of the home? FAUSH: No, only when it became absolutely necessary. By being the youngest of the three children and so forth my father in my early years became ill. He was ill a long time before his death. So, that necessitated my mother doing whatever she could to supplement and keep the family going. I know she took in ironing. She ironed shirts and things of that kind. She worked, I heard her say once she worked at a laundry someplace. It used to be over on the southside of Birmingham. No, she was more or less a housewife and did these jobs when necessitated or demanded that somebody do something. She became the major bread winner of the family. It was always amazing that my mother, that again with such limited resources seem to be able. . . As I look back now I see a lot of human involvement as well too. She was always frugle, to say the lest. Quite thrifty and instilled in the children. If mother only made a dime she saved a penny of it. She was never broke but never had much. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: She was never broke. She knew where she could go to that jar inside the closet somewhere and get a few nickels when necessary. She was an amazing cook, an outstanding cook. I told some people in recent times, humorously of course that my mother could make the best gravy in the world. I was twelve years old before I knew that a chicken had anything but feet. I thought that was all that was to it. She would bring in these big bags of chicken feet. She would make the best gravy for rice. HUNTLEY: What do they do with chicken feet now? I haven' ; t seen a chicken foot in I don' ; t know when. FAUSH: I think that today perhaps, the younger generation today perhaps, I don' ; t think many of them today have even seen a live chicken. HUNTLEY: Not many of them, your right. FAUSH: Perhaps they have the same notion as I had about the feet that, that was all to them. That perhaps they come in the world that way. They' ; re all in the cellophane packed in the butcher' ; s case. HUNTLEY: (laughing) That' ; s right. Now, you grew up in that Enon Ridge, Smithfield area. What school did you start first grade? FAUSH: First grade, Tuggle but I went to Beulah Moore Day Nursery. She was quite a figure. Mrs. Beluh Moore. The building, I don' ; t know if it' ; s still there because it' ; s been a long time since I was in the area. As you know, Tuggle school, Ms. Tuggle of course, her grave site is in the yard of the school and it remains that today. Sardis Baptist Church is on the corner. Well, there is a building, it finally moved from wherever it was prior. The Beulah Moore Day Nursery sat on that western most end of Tuggle School. Right across the street from old Sardis Baptist Church. There was a grocery store that was across the street also called Bell Grocery. That' ; s where we used to go and by candy and stuff like that after school. I went to day nursery first. HUNTLEY: Oh, ok. FAUSH: Which propelled me to getting out of school more quickly then would be normal. Because having not waiting to age six to get in I was not quite five. Having gone to Ms. Beulah Moore' ; s Day Nursery there was almost a sort of automatic movement on into the first grade. So, I got in before being six years of age. HUNTLEY: So, you were ahead of yourself? FAUSH: Yes, I was ahead of the times more or less and so forth. We lived on a, I can remember after moving from, my earliest recollection of a house was, we lived next, at the end of the ball field at Tuggle School. Which was right down the. . .and so much is coming to my mind right now because across the fence was the family and relatives of Erskine Hawkins. The Hendersons, Sneads and those persons but they were sisters. I' ; m trying to remember the famous blues singer, Laura Washington? HUNTLEY: Laura Washington, yes. FAUSH: Laura' ; s family was in that area as well. We lived at the end at the house next to the grocery store which was at the end of the playing field or ball field that was on the campus at Tuggle School. In fact, my father got his eye knocked out from a ball game. The two of us were walking and he was holding my hand as a child, walking past the ball field. The catcher missed the ball, my daddy wore glasses and it hit his glasses and he lost one of his eyes. He had a glass eye after that. From there I can remember living on 4th Street which was called College Street. There' ; s a Jewish cemetery down near the bottom of the hill. Across the street lived Dr. E. W. Haggard. We were right up the hill in an old huge double tenant house. Sometimes we only occupied the lower floor and on the weekends a church would come in upstairs. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: Yes. There are a lot of people, well known people of that time that lived in that area. HUNTLEY: Who was the Dr? FAUSH: Dr. E. W. Haggard was a well-known Black dentist. Up the hill across the street from us lived Dr. Hutchinson. In fact, he was a Black physician and his family lived one or two doors down from Sardis Baptist Church. In fact, his son, Edward Hutchinson was in my class in elementary school at Tuggle. Around from us, right around the corner, living on the next street was the early Harris family. HUNTLEY: So, that community then was basically a middle-class community or was it mixed? FAUSH: Some were mixed. You had have these one or two houses, like Dr. Haggard' ; s was perhaps the most outstanding and the other one would have been Dr. Hutchinson' ; s. Directly across the street I forgot I had a cousin who lived directly across the street, the Howards. They lived next to Bell Store. Between that you would have double tenant houses. HUNTLEY: So, it was a mix? FAUSH: Yes. HUNTLEY: What did most people do? What kind of work did most people do that lived in that community? Do you remember? FAUSH: Various odd jobs, whatever was available during the time. HUNTLEY: Did you have any. . . FAUSH: You' ; ve got to remember also that as you start up 3rd Street North and this was all in that some general geographic configuration. There was that Mecca of Black business enterprise that also bordered the Black community. Part, right down the street from what they refer to later as Sugar Hill. As you know, Center Street was a dividing line of demarcation if you please. It became Dynamite Hill and Center Street. Over on 3rd Street on the other side which has been the southern most side of the Jewish Cemetery where the railroad would come through right beside that was the icehouse and the coal yard owned by the Commons family. HUNTLEY: Sounds as if the community basically is self-sufficient. FAUSH: Almost self-contained, yes. HUNTLEY: That' ; s interesting because I guess at that particular time it was almost necessary. FAUSH: Oh, absolutely necessary. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about Tuggle School? FAUSH: There are a lot of things of course that come to mind. HUNTLEY: Is there anything that stands out? FAUSH: Yeah, the again the community feeling. The extended family feeling and association. That was perhaps for the word of a better term an emotional and psychological connection. Everybody knew everybody. There was a what I like to refer to again as to what community really means. You can transfer that to mean a caring, sharing responsibility. You knew your neighbor ; your neighbor knew you. You knew all the children. Their history. There was a sharing of not only resource but information again of caring and concern to the extent in what has been described as a weeping with those who weep and of laughing with those who laugh and so forth. You shared each others' ; tragedies, each other' ; s joys, the hopes and fulfillment. If there was somebody in the neighborhood who made good, there was some rejoicing. Not only when your kid walked across to get his diploma, but they all made it. HUNTLEY: It was the epitome of the extended family. FAUSH: Absolutely. I was, I mentioned about 11th Avenue and the Candy Kitchen. I remember on the next corner the principal of Tuggle lived there. His name was Burt Hudson. Mr. Hudson always taught his seniors. He had some of us, it was a great thrill if you were selected as one of the persons who worked in the office. He would select different students to work in the office. I was fortunate enough to be selected as one of those who worked in Mr. Hudson' ; s office. We would have assignments, as carrying notes around the school and different things and so forth. But you had some exposure over and above the student-teacher relationship. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: Mr. Hudson always taught his seniors. This stands out to me perhaps more than any single thing in my elementary school career. He was a lover of literature. He always taught his seniors one hour a day and it was all about literature. HUNTLEY: So, not only did he select you to work in the office, he actually instructed you? FAUSH: Yes. HUNTLEY: He selected these individuals that he instructed? FAUSH: What I' ; m saying, these are two things. The persons who worked in the office were people that he selected, of course, either you were good students, your attitude and what other criteria he put in his selection process. It also meant that you were missing some of your recreational time because you still had to do your classes. Nothing replaced your classes, you had to do your work. The one perk that you got was that whenever they had a movie, instead of an assembly person time there was a movie that they had in the auditorium. If so, you at least got a chance to go to the movie free, you didn' ; t pay the nickel to go to the movie. That was really the only perk that you got for working. You got to remember though we didn' ; t have intercom systems and all that communication. The campus, it' ; s a hilly area up there and it was a long way when you had to go down to the shops area or the two-story building as we would call it or some other part of the campus. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: If you needed to and if there was a meeting or faculty, or if he wanted to see somebody or needed them in the office or whatever. If there was an emergency at a home for instance, that a call had been made to the school. You had to find a student or whatever the case may be. Somebody had to do that running and go find those people and get them to the office or transmit that information. So, you were a courier as well as other things that you did around the office. On that period, instead of a study period, when you got to be a senior Mr. Hudson taught that class. You had to go to Mr. Hudson' ; s class. He taught literature. I never shall forget that when I got to high school and started literature classes and so forth. Those of us who came out of Tuggle were so much further advanced because Mr. Hudson had already exposed us to American Literature and some English Literature. HUNTLEY: Wow. FAUSH: At the time we would watch other kids out playing ball, you know, we could see the ball field and we were sitting in there learning literature. I couldn' ; t appreciate it at the time. And those long nights of trying to memorize [inaudible] and many other things that come to my mind. When we got to high school. . . HUNTLEY: Then you understood? FAUSH: I understood and appreciated the fact that hey we were so much further ahead that it was a breeze to get through that. HUNTLEY: When you left Tuggle, where did you go? FAUSH: Parker. HUNTLEY: To Parker? FAUSH: Yes. They had the annex then. HUNTLEY: Ok, you went to Parker Annex first. FAUSH: Parker Annex first. HUNTLEY: Ninth grade? FAUSH: Yes. I had, I started my musical experience and training very, very early as well too. My first band teacher at Tuggle was Amos Gordon. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: Yes. Of course, he' ; s made such a mark himself, a hall of famer and all of that. To be under his tutorage was a great advantage at that time. Of course, I didn' ; t even appreciate that at the time but later on I appreciated it. He developed me and of course at the time I went to high school. Of course, you know Parker was the only high school, the largest high school in the world. HUNTLEY: In the world. FAUSH: You have the annex of course. Because of Mr. Gordon' ; s influence, and I had private classes with him and so forth which put me ahead [inaudible] in the music. HUNTLEY: What was your instrument? FAUSH: I started with percussions and then moved on to the winds and had a brief time with the strings. Primarily I was a percussionist and the winds, reeds and brass were my specialties at the time. Later I got into keyboards, as I got into choral music and so forth. But his teaching opened the way for me because when I got to the annex the band was so large at Parker at the time that they had a junior band and a senior band. No ninth graders, it was just too full, you just didn' ; t get in and so forth. But would you believe because that he had made contacts, Mr. Hudson, had went down and audition and I got in the Parker band as a ninth grader. So, I spent four years in the band. Along about the middle ways, again because of that foundational training that I had gotten earlier. Mr. Hudson took private students on Tuesdays and Fridays. I was one of his teachers. I taught his private students along with him on Tuesdays and Fridays. Which was very helpful because we had no money and I got 50 cents for staying after school to help teach the private students in band. That exposed me to a world of things because then I got to play with a jazz band and Fess Whatley was there at the time and so forth. Mr. Hudson would select about ten students that he would call the auditorium band. The school was so large that you would have to have alternate days for auditorium or assembly period. You had a junior and senior. You were either in ninth junior or ninth senior. You just weren' ; t in the ninth grade. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: So, all the junior classes would come on Monday and Tuesday it would be the senior section of those classes and it would alternate that way. I got a chance to play in the auditorium band. Also, they had the outstanding variety shows and I got a chance to play in the orchestra. In later years this was the only thing to help me to make money and to keep going. I played in jazz bands and other things and so forth. HUNTLEY: So, that was an intricate part of your development. FAUSH: Oh, no question about it, yes. I became, Mr. Henry, I was in the choir. I became the student director of the choir. I was one of the few students ever in high school that would travel each year with the Elks Band. The Elks were the organization, the fraternal organization for Blacks. They had the big conventions and parades. The trains would come through the whole state of Alabama and the bands would go and compete in Chicago, Cincinnati, and other places. I had a chance to be exposed to all that and play in those bands. I got to play with such people as Fess Whatley, the Clarks. I got a chance, I remember once, Lyle Hampton came to town and of course the only way you could, or the best mechanism to get information about. You know, where could you get a captive audience of thousands of students except at Parker High School. So, when a celebrity would come to town at your senior period they would bring them to Parker High School. I saw many play. Just all kinds of names come to mind that I was able to see. HUNTLEY: Right there at Parker High School? FAUSH: Right there at Parker High School, you see. Of course, the choir was just famous all over the world. I got a chance to meet [inaudible]. We went all kinds of places. They just had to hear that choir. As a senior each year that would have something known as the academic meet. You would meet and have this academic contest and of course you would win scholarships to various schools and so forth. Well, I took the academic meet, also one of my very strong subjects was chemistry. My chemistry teacher was Carlton Wells. He was also in addition to teaching chemistry he was one of the coaches in athletics. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. FAUSH: It got to the point that we had [inaudible]. So, he was pushing me and I appreciate so much those teachers who took an interest in me. When the academic week came Mr. Hudson and Mr. Henry wanted me to take it in music and Mr. Wells wanted me to take it in chemistry. So, I took both. While I did not win the top prize. And here forty years later I can remember the girl' ; s name that beat me. It was a girl named Mary Elizabeth Weaver from Asheville, North Carolina. She had a score of 99.8 and I had a score of 99.5. She beat me by three tenths. HUNTLEY: Where was this held? FAUSH: We were at, now that you asked me that, I think that we did it at the school, at Parker, I believe. Or did we go somewhere else? That escapes me. I can almost visualize being in the room with the test sheets. HUNTLEY: So, this was a national test? FAUSH: I don' ; t really know how far it extended beyond the boundaries of Alabama. That part eludes me at the moment. HUNTLEY: You said that she was from Asheville, North Carolina. FAUSH: This girl was from Asheville, North Carolina and I don' ; t know if it was administered. . . What I think happened is that they administered the academic meet in various sections of the country but not all come together. They probably held it in the state of Alabama and this is what I' ; m surmising because this girl was from Asheville, North Carolina. I remember getting a letter from then Dean Cater from Talladega College. Mr. R. C. Johnson was Principal of Parker High School at the time. Dean Cater' ; s letter came to me and said, we know that you' ; re disappointed in not being the winner. You' ; re score was so high so we want to offer you a 250-300 dollar scholarship to attend Talladega College next year. They sent a copy to Mr. Johnson. Mr. Johnson' ; s alma mater was Talladega. He came from--he came in the class. I never said anything to him about it. He came into the class and called me out. HUNTLEY: This was the principal? FAUSH: Yes, and he said that he had gotten this letter from Dean Cater and so forth and he was excited because it was the first time a Parker student had won something from his school, Talladega. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: He was excited. He went to marching me around the school, you know and all this kind of stuff. But a strange thing happened. They said to me. I was excited too. I was excited because he thought it was such a big deal, you know. So, I attentively said that I was going to go to Talladega in the fall. I sent off the application and all this sort of stuff. That was the year that I had gone off also that summer to another Elks Convention to play in the marching band which won first place. I know we got off the train in Tuxedo Junction. Anyway, it won first place in the national parade. When I got back home and incidentally I have to add because it' ; s connected to some other things. They would pay us like five dollars a day or something like that. It wasn' ; t much but it was something. It was important to me because I didn' ; t have anything. The guys being out of town would have fun and all this kind of stuff. I passed a shop on a corner and that was the first time the lapel-less jackets came out. It was a brown corduroy lapel-less jacket. I took my money except four dollars and bought this jacket. It was the only new jacket. I knew I was going off in the fall and my only chance to get a jacket was to get this one. I took it as a prize possession. Anyway, when I got back off the trip and so forth the letter was there approving my application for attendance at Talladega College. But, and I don' ; t remember the figure, but I needed to send $40.00 or $25.00 whatever the amount was for lab fees or something that it stated. That was it man, I didn' ; t have it, alright. But I was too proud to tell anybody. My daddy was sick. There wasn' ; t any way to get any money from him. So, time is getting close to school and so forth. I went back down to Parker by the school and so forth. I finally told Mr. Hudson. He asked where I was going and so forth. I just kind of [inaudible]. He kept pushing me and so I finally told him that I was going to go to Talladega, but I got this letter when I got back and I don' ; t have the money it takes so I' ; m going to have to sit out. He said, what? You can' ; t do that. He said, wait a minute. So, he called his friend, Jonathon Ford, who was the newly appointed band master there at A & ; M. He talked to Ford. He was in town. So, he said that this is one of my best students. Do something. They were looking for musicians and I was one of the best that he had ever produced. Do something. So, he said, you get your stuff together and he said, I' ; m going on back. You just get your stuff together and come on up. I said, look I can' ; t buy nothing. I don' ; t have nothing. He said, I' ; ll take care of it, you just show up. You get there. So, in the meantime I said ok. Everything I had in the world was in a footlocker. An old one that my daddy had. I got my stuff together and got on a Trail ways bus. Got off in Huntsville, Alabama. The school is four miles outside of Huntsville in Normal, Alabama. It wasn' ; t developed like it is today, brother. HUNTLEY: Yes. FAUSH: That four miles was woods. It was a country, ok. There were four guys on the bus with me. When I got off with my footlocker and so forth and got down there. They saw me coming. They asked me about if I was going to school and so forth. I said, yeah. Later I found out that they were upper class men. One guy a tall guy, I remember because I saw him months later there on the campus. He was a senior. Anyway, they said that they were supposed to meet a guy with a car and so forth and all that and I could go with them, but I would have to help to buy gas. Anyway, to make a long story short they swindled me out of my four dollars. I' ; m just 16, 17 years old. HUNTLEY: Four dollars would have bought a whole lot of gas at that time. FAUSH: It was the first time being away from home and so forth. They could tell I was young. Had the powder still on my cheek. (Laughing) Anyway, I stood around that bus station looking for them and I was left there. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: I had to get out on the road and do one of these numbers. After I had almost walked to the school with that footlocker someone had pity and picked me up and took me on up to the school. Ok, but when I got there I couldn' ; t find Mr. Ford. The folks down in the registrar' ; s office didn' ; t know nothing about me. HUNTLEY: They never heard of you? FAUSH: Never heard my name. So, here I was with that footlocker and didn' ; t even have my four dollars. HUNTLEY: All you had was a footlocker and some clothes and no money. FAUSH: Nothing and up there. Fortunately, at that time probably 60% or maybe even more of the students at A & ; M' ; s campus came out of Birmingham. All of them I played in the band with. Thomas Rossi was up there. It was just a bunch of folk. I mentioned him because he was a well-known musician. People that I had known, you know. Somebody, I don' ; t know if it was Tom but they let me stay in their room that night. The next day I did find Mr. Ford. You talking about hungry. Let me tell you this before I leave this. A few years ago there' ; s a big plaque sitting in the middle of my office wall down there and it says: The Mayor, City Council all signed by these people and so forth were making me an honorary citizen of Huntsville, Alabama. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: This was presented just a few years back at the Von Braun' ; s Center in Huntsville where I spoke to physicists and engineers and so forth that were there and brought the faculty from A & ; M. It was a special occasion there at the city of Huntsville. That night I said, if there was ever any doubt in anybody' ; s mind that there is an eternal force that has control of our destiny. I want to remove that speculation from your mind now. I told them this story that the first time I saw Huntsville, Alabama with that footlocker with everything I had in it. And to have you invite me here to this Von Braun Center and to speak to you on such an occasion as this. You could never understand the significance. So, anyway I wanted to share that with you because to me that was quite an impact on my life. HUNTLEY: How long were you at A & ; M? FAUSH: Stayed at A & ; M most of that first year. During that year what was happening is that I was coming home on weekends. I was singing. They payed $15.00 dollars to sing on the early Bradford program. It used to come from Bradford Funeral Home on Sunday morning. I came back when I got a spot with them. I was singing with a group called [inaudible] Mr. John Banks who was the director of music at Lawson State and in the group with them. It became an alternate thing on Sunday mornings on the Bradford Program. We were known as the Bradford Singers and so forth. John gave me $15.00 so I would come home on the weekends to get those $15.00. HUNTLEY: You said Lawson State. FAUSH: Well, it wasn' ; t Lawson State. HUNTLEY: Wenonah Trade School. FAUSH: That' ; s right, that is right. HUNTLEY: That was part of, I know in Birmingham the tradition of quartets. FAUSH: Yes, but this was hymns of the church as opposed to gospel music as such. HUNTLEY: I see. FAUSH: I was in everything but gospel as such. I became the pastor of the church that I was born in for 20 and a half years. I was the first person to [inaudible] to ever pastor that one little church. HUNTLEY: What church? FAUSH: Metropolitan. But I was a child at the church. HUNTLEY: Is that right? FAUSH: I stayed there and pastored longer then anybody else. Anyway, I said that information because when I talk about music now because I came out of the early Methodist tradition. Most of the things we did in church were musical. HUNTLEY: At A & ; M, you came here then you started to make the $15.00. That was big money. FAUSH: Oh, yes sir. HUNTLEY: That was big money. So, did that then change the direction you were going? FAUSH: Yes. HUNTLEY: What happened after that? FAUSH: Alright, one of the things that happened. My brother, William, had opened his radio station in Bessemer called WBCO. WBCO was owned and I mention some of this along the way because he has connection with the continuing story. William was there for about a year at the station. The three people that owned the radio station at the time was, one later became the mayor of the city of Bessemer, which was Jess Lanier. He served many years until his death. The second person was Elton B. Stevens, the Elton B. Stevens, [inaudible]. The third person was the late, fellow Judge Ewing. The three of them. My brother, who was different from what was common for Black broadcasters at the time to take an assumed name and a name that may be applied to him by somebody else. Like, Jeffery Jazz or Daddy O or Sugar Poppa or some other name. My brother used his own name, Faush. In the short period over time and being in early broadcasting and exposure for, it was something new for Blacks at the time. He became known by his name. So, with the promotional pieces, it [inaudible]. Well, my brother left, decided to leave Birmingham and go to greener pastures. HUNTLEY: Where did he go? FAUSH: He went to Louisville at the time, I think. HUNTLEY: In radio? FAUSH: Yes. He was at LOK, I think it was or LOU. In the meantime, they invested in promotional pieces and so on with the name Faush. Well, Faush was our name. It wasn' ; t something they dreamed up, you know as a handle or [inaudible] for entertainment purposes. So, somebody said, well, he' ; s got a brother. A guy by the name of Hal Faulkner was then the assistant manager, they sent him to ask me if I would come out and do it. HUNTLEY: And that' ; s the way you got in it. . . FAUSH: So, I very reluctantly agreed to go because I wanted to do something else. Any way I made a deal with them that I would try if they would permit me to continue to go to school or whatever it is that I wanted to do. Well, I early perceived that the advantage was with me at the moment, you know. Even though they were White I started bargaining early. To say that, hey, you' ; re asking me now. HUNTLEY: I' ; m in the driver' ; s seat, you need me. FAUSH: It didn' ; t take a Rhodes Scholar to figure out that they were seeking me at the moment and that I better seize this moment. While, salary wise, it was a big deal to make $25. I think I started with $25.00 a week, whatever the case may be. I also played at night with orchestras and things like that and so on. I had a little band and so forth and we played little gigs. Also, then I got involved in this gospel music and stuff and so forth. I got into the music and the music started getting into me. Also, I started looking at this thing and saying that I saw some potential even though it was nothing at the moment. It was in its embryonic stage at the moment. I also thought, I' ; ve got to learn something about this, you know. So, this summer I stopped in because they were having this first big seminar that was going on at the University of Denver. I made a deal with them to go. The thing was at the time because I couldn' ; t go in Birmingham, Alabama. They didn' ; t have a broadcasting/journalism school at the University of Alabama and other places and so forth. We couldn' ; t go. They do have these things that I need and if I' ; m going to be good for you and help you make money. You' ; ve got to fix me where I know what I' ; m doing. So, it became a good argument, you know. I never let it be perceived by them that it' ; s going to enrich me but it' ; s going to enrich them and they better make the investment and so forth. So, this is how I got off and got some broadcast training and so forth. So, I had to put my general studies on hold for a moment to do this because it meant work. So, then they got this investment and all this kind of thing. Then I also started then, with the music to promote it and that sort of thing. I also saw the fact that if it' ; s going to be a commodity that you' ; ve got to, it' ; s got to be a vehicle rather it' ; s sold as entertainment on a radio station, for whatever purposes this is the commodity. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: That you' ; ve got to be involved in and so forth. So, it' ; s in the interest that also you' ; ve got to promote it and stimulate it and otherwise. So, I started bringing the artist in and that sort of thing. So, for more than 18-20 years it became exploded and so forth. I did all the promotions here in Birmingham as well as the entire southeast, musically for about 18-20 years. Nothing moved without having some connection with it. Plus, I became A & ; R [inaudible] director for several record companies and so forth. I even got into recording myself and made about four or five. I' ; ll show you some of the books and things and so forth that reached the top ten in the country back then during that time. HUNTLEY: At what point did you get into the ministry? FAUSH: This was in the, the ministry came. I' ; m sure you' ; ve heard reference to the ordained ministry. HUNTLEY: Yes, yes. FAUSH: I had perceived ministry in an overall sense in all the things that I' ; ve done. Even prior to that I started to get into the promotions and so forth. I also felt the need to be able to somewhat have control of your own destiny to the extent that whether or not it made money there had to be some kind of self-gratification and to be able to step outside of someone else always determining the direction of your career or anything else. I wanted to be in charge. I guess that' ; s from, if I was in the percussion section I wanted to be first drummer. If I' ; m in the brass section I wanted to be first trumpet. At least make the attempt and make the effort to do it. So, and several things developed from a social standpoint and I guess I' ; ve always been a rebel riser to a certain extent. Perhaps not as vocal as some others but in my own way moving hopefully as growth does. It' ; s very silent, you don' ; t hear much from it. HUNTLEY: Sure. FAUSH: But that very force will crack concrete and a plant will come up through its roots if it gets the right nurturing and so forth. That force can come up even sometimes with more impact than it can if they void the significant or advanced notice that' ; s coming. I thought that the preparation and other things. My own corn field definition of luck is when preparation and opportunity meet each other. You can be prepared and never get the opportunity and it won' ; t work or you can have the opportunity and you' ; re not prepared and it' ; s going down the drain and so forth. So, trying to hopefully that one day one of these things is going to happen. So, I started off at a grocery business. I saw the need. I opened the first Black amusement park. I went through all kinds of trauma with these things. Each was an outgrowth of the other. It was almost like steps coming on top of each other. You mentioned the ministry. In promotion of the music and other things and so forth. There came times of public presentation and so forth. I think perhaps always that' ; s been that innate desire and awe. Sometimes preparing for a meeting and you know not what. I think perhaps that became the highest expression. To perhaps to put all of these formulating entities that come together and sort of jail to say in this. The impact of the music, the business, entertainment, all of this can come together and perhaps have its highest form of expression in this setting. I felt the energy in the movement. Then of course when I got into what is called the ministry and so forth. Then again like the broadcast and so forth I recognized that one has to also prepare himself. If you' ; re going to do something you owe it to that discipline. To at least make the preparation or it will never achieve its finest potential. I heard somewhere, sometime [inaudible] it' ; s not the people that know how to get the job but the people who know why become their boss. So, I wanted to know some of the whys of things. So, again I find myself back in school. Of course, when Faith opened up I went back to get my undergraduate courses and so forth. HUNTLEY: Where was that? FAUSH: Faith, Faith College. I finished up the undergraduate courses but at the same time I was at theological training with ITC [inaudible] who then had their extension at Miles and so forth. I was in all of this all at the same time. Aside from that I was involved in all kinds of community things because I always felt that you owed something to the community. If something is going to nurture you, you owe something in whatever it is you' ; re involved in, you know to move it along. Of course, we were then in the early stages of the thrust for human rights and all of this stuff was burning in all of us. I suppose all were waiting for some kind of direction or some kind of glue as such. A cohesive force to come together, you know. Like a magnet to pull it together to give it direction. We were always fighting our own wars and so forth. Even in broadcasting, that' ; s a whole story in itself and other things being White only. And the many fights and battles we fought with advertisers. Many incidences you feel they were taking advantage of the Black community. They were just taking from it and not giving anything back to it. As I said, that is a whole. . . we could write a whole other book about all that. HUNTLEY: Right, it needs to be written. FAUSH: So, here I' ; ve got all these hats going. HUNTLEY: So, how do you fit all of this together in the particularly how you eventually relate to your activities during the early and mid-60' ; s? FAUSH: In the thrust of human rights and all that? HUNTLEY: Yes. FAUSH: As I said, I think all of us. It was like a sleeping giant, or an animal if you please. Whose laying there and just waiting. It' ; s almost and you didn' ; t have to hear thunder. If you can imagine a sleeping bear laying in the woods and a hunter steps on a dry twig. That' ; s really all it took, you know. Or you got escaping gas and all it needs is the pilot light and such, you know. Once you light that pilot you can light the whole oven, or the whole stove, they say. All of these things, the pressures had been there. The restlessness, all of it, just waiting for direction. HUNTLEY: What gave it this direction? FAUSH: I think a lot of things. I don' ; t know if I could identify any single situation. It sort of like, if one is to identify your personality. To know me now or to know you or any individual at this point in life and development. There' ; s no way you can understand them because at any given point in time all of us become the cumulative total of life' ; s experiences that brings us to where we are. To understand the way, I think without knowing something of my cultural background and heritage and those things that had an impact to make me think the way I think today, you cannot really understand that thought process. Which is why history is so vital and so important. Those things that bring us to that point and time. One would have to had experienced some of the indignities. HUNTLEY: I assume that I understand some of those indignities. FAUSH: Alright. HUNTLEY: And try to explain to me why at this particular time is Birmingham ready for what would take place in the 60' ; s? FAUSH: Alright. One must understand though, like I said, you know, sometimes we focus in on a certain given point in time. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: To say, boom, it started, ok. That would not be correct in my way of thinking. HUNTLEY: Absolutely. FAUSH: Again, there were many things. It was like the leaven in bread. When we see the demonstrations with outward expressions. This is only that point perhaps where it all came together but the leaven had been working, you know. For instance, when the demonstrations started. We often forget about the Alabama Christian Movement and the other organizations and the meetings. When one says, if one would take the point to the Emancipation Proclamation for instance and decide hey, this is the time, boom, they' ; re free. One would have to go down long before that. You' ; ve got to go back to the ships. You' ; ve got to go back to those that slaved down there and those who had hopes in their heart and those that nurtured and carried that desire for freedom and so forth. When all of the environmental things got to the point where, it' ; s like a boil. If that boil gets to the point where that bacterial information comes and collects all in one place something has to give at that moment, you see. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: It just so happened and I think that there is divine handling and you can call it what you want to but I think that and many have postulated why do you think by the divine hand or whatever name you what to refer to the deity and the one that' ; s the creative force behind this universe. To say why is it always or why is that force seem to be identified on the side of the oppressed. I don' ; t give an answer to that. This is one of those things conceptually, like love. Love is not defined it' ; s evident. Whether we trace the course of history as far back as we are able to do so there have been times when one would have to contribute to a divine force if no more for the reason or the lack of being able to explain it otherwise. It all comes together and there is a point in time and if the universe operates by order and certainly it does. Whether you want to give a name to that force that created the order. The order is there the intelligence is there. Nothing just happens. Something or somebody makes it happen. That force by whatever name you want to give it. I call it God but if you want to call it something else and so forth by any other name still that creative force I think brings in the season just as the bud becomes a rose. I think all the other things that make up the universe and society come to a [inaudible] when something takes place. That creative energy has to have expression. I think all the things in our history that was coming together all of these times. I have no explanation why you take a Texas born Senator and a vowed segregationist and all the things that would constitute even the side issues that one of that discipline would think. His geographical background, his political background, and nurturing everything else coming up under [inaudible] and would also that at a certain given point in time that even, you know never would have been elected to the high office of President of the United States except for the quirk of history that removed a liberal person. Who would have ever thought that a Kennedy and a Johnson from these two opposite political polls would ever come together to form the leadership of this nation at that given point in time? Why would all that happen and then his subsequent assassination and then this Texas born person with all of this background would be the very person to be in the seat to push [inaudible]. Who can explain that? HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: Anybody who is a serious student I think would conclude that if Kennedy would have stayed there, that is a serious question as to whether or not he would have had the power and would it would take to get it through the legislature no matter what he thought. Who could explain a Hugo Black? A Ku Klux Klan was sitting on the Supreme Court and that would be the person, the instrument by which some things are done. Who can explain things like this? It defies logic. So, I' ; m saying this creative force brought all of these things to a point. It' ; s never been without suffering. I don' ; t understand why there' ; s no redemption without the shedding of the blood. I only know it' ; s a fact. HUNTLEY: Some place [inaudible] as we have said, God helps those who helps themselves. FAUSH: Of course. HUNTLEY: He' ; s always prepared to do whatever is necessary. FAUSH: Absolutely. HUNTLEY: As long as we are doing what is necessary. FAUSH: Absolutely. HUNTLEY: It appears that if you look at that period from, well many times we talk about the civil rights movement. We normally start at 1954. Of course, you' ; ve got to go further than that. FAUSH: Absolutely, right. HUNTLEY: If we talk about the marches in the civil rights movement. The 1954 Brown vs Board and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Then we start to see activities starting to take place although much has taken place prior to that. FAUSH: Absolutely. HUNTLEY: It' ; s just not publicized. FAUSH: It' ; s like a farmer preparing the soil. HUNTLEY: Right. It all then comes into play. And we' ; re not through yet. FAUSH: Oh, no, no sir, by no means. We' ; ve only seen a little crack. We have yet to push it fully open and to walk through it. HUNTLEY: Tell me how did you and Shelley come together eventually as partners? I know you were together at WENN. Is that right? FAUSH: Yes. Well, there was a time that we were on other stations. We go back to those early years and from each vantage point. Each head was engaged in various actions and involvements from different points. It' ; s like the guy I suppose who builds a fire over there and he doesn' ; t have a stove but owns some wood in the backyard. This other man may have a match and the other a lighter. In some way you know that a fire needs to be started. So, in the meantime, there have been few. This is the casualties in the broadcast industry. The causality rate is high. There are very few that last a long period of time. That in itself is somewhat an accomplishment, to simply last. That' ; s also even by design because it like gaining a foot hold and those who have the control of the strings in the first place don' ; t want anybody to get enough clout of any kind that they may even have notions of self-reliance. Forget about the resource but even the notion. So, all of these things. The same things you would find in any other discipline were certainly prominent. It was as simple as someone coming in and you' ; re gone and someone is in your seat tomorrow morning. It' ; s just that fast, you see. (snapping fingers) There' ; s a lot of movement even today, if you noticed. You might see a face on television tonight and so forth but there' ; s no explanation to what happened to them. They' ; re just gone. You see a new crew in there the next week and how do you want the ratings and what someone else says is popular. We just saw a thing in the newspaper the other day as being the impact that Oprah has today. The local outlets talking about it. HUNTLEY: Tell us, say something about that so that people will know what you are referring to. FAUSH: Well, the local outlet that airs the Oprah Winfrey show has reported that they have decided not to renew carrying that show, to pass the term to expire the present contract. I think it ends in ' ; 99. It has been supposedly picked up by someone else, but that' ; s almost unthinkable at this point and time. If that can happen to a top-rated show. HUNTLEY: The top-rated show. FAUSH:I don' ; t mean to elaborate just saying Oprah is enough. To elaborate on her status as an entertainer, entrepreneur and everything else that you could possibly name. The number one female performer in the history of television. If they could do that to Oprah what do you think they could do to the kid that' ; s fresh out of journalism school, you know, waving the diploma waiting to be an anchor. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. FAUSH: Anyway but getting to the matter of Shelley and myself. It did not come together in terms of partnership and ownership only that the both of us had the same notion and how to best get into ownership. You see it' ; s different with the broadcast industry perhaps. I think it' ; s probably the most regulated industry in the world. You can' ; t just decide that you' ; re going to open another grocery store or department store or mechanic shop or automobile dealership or anything else. It' ; s a long hard process. First of all, you' ; ve got to find an existing frequency or the possibility that once the ban is full no more frequencies are available. You' ; ve got to either buy an existing one or you know, you can' ; t just decide to open one. There are all the technical things involved. That' ; s much too broad a subject to even to explore in these brief moments. Aside from all the regular things that any other business enterprise must meet in terms of taxes and regulations. In terms of local, state, government taxes and all the usual things. An investment, you know. There' ; s also the FCC to deal with as well, along with the other agencies that get into the picture. Like the EEOC, the labor department, and the list goes on and on. The technical things. Once you got past all of that then of course there is the money. It has to be a viable and practical situation. It so happened that some years back that we wound up on the same station. I was on WENN, you know the story of that and that' ; s a whole other discussion too. HUNTLEY: It is. FAUSH: But just for the sake of subsequential explanation, I guess. The WBCO, I mentioned earlier after it was sold to the McLendon group which came out of Mississippi. One of the first group operators or attempted group operators. They wanted to increase the power and move to Birmingham into the larger market arena. In being restricted on 1450, which was the frequency it was on at the time. It also had a CP from the federal [inaudible]. It expanded in power. It could not be done on that particular frequency. There were limitations whether your pattern initial broadcast coverage area is know as directional or non-directional. If it' ; s directional it goes in not in a completely circular configuration of emissions from the tower but what it does it has sort of a shaped type. Which means it may go fifty miles this way or hundred or so forth. And that is done and regulated by the FCC so we would not have overlapping signals. In some instances, like for instance know as an example we' ; re broadcasting on what is known as the Mexican Clear which is 900 in the center of the dial. There is a treaty between the United States and Mexico that exists that keeps one from overlapping the other and so forth. So, that power of stations located on that frequency in Mexico has the control by the Mexican government and the United States government by treaty controls from that frequency on this way so that you would not have them collided or a jumble mess of emissions that would confuse the signal and so forth. HUNTLEY: Let me ask this, 900, this 900 frequency it is the middle of the dial, right? FAUSH: Yeah, in the center, yes. It is known because of that treaty that exists. That' ; s not true for some other frequencies. There is one other that is called Canadian Clear. There are two treaties that are now in existence that are on the AM band that the treaty controlled. 900 happens to be one of them. The advantage is and so forth that there is a non-directional single. It' ; s sort of like squeezing, if you had to have a conduit or a pipe that you were going to get water through and so forth. Depending on the diameter of that pipe, so matter what the lead in comes to it depends on a certain extent what is going to come out figuring pressure, resistance, and the other factors that go in to control it, as to how much you' ; re going to get on the other end as it comes out this end. Which means in some [inaudible] it is considered a very good dial position. If you' ; ll notice all around the country most of the lower frequencies were taken by those who were in broadcasting earlier. HUNTLEY: Right. FAUSH: Most of your Black stations or Black program stations are higher on the dial. Anywhere from 12 to 13 to 14 and on up to 16 some of them. None down at the lower end and that' ; s because those are considered the better frequencies. Our does not have to be as high. You can get more non-directional signals which means that you can take, if you were using an automobile engine for instance as a yard stick to measure by in later years they can get as much thrust and horse power out of a four to six cylinder engine which uses less gas to propel that car as you used to get out of a big straight eight that burned a whole lot more gas. So, efficiency and other things are related to what I' ; m saying. Anyway we wound up, as I said, to simplify it or somewhat complicated situation. We wound up on the same station. Without going into some of the other side stories and here we are. I' ; ve made an attempt to buy another station earlier and so forth and that' ; s a real story and I won' ; t get into that. At the time, I will say this about the earlier situation. I was in a position at the time that fortunately that northern Blacks in the stations were in. I was assistant general manager of the station. It gave me access to a lot of the financial information and so forth about the operation of the station. It was because of that information that I carried that information to some people to say that this is the time to strike. We need to do this and so forth. HUNTLEY: That was your position then? FAUSH: Yes. One of these days I would like to show you some of my personal files at home. It' ; s related to a lot of things you wouldn' ; t even think to ask me. Anyway, when I carried it to them, and they looked at it. They said, God, persons were in other enterprises. When I showed them on people it exceeded anything [inaudible] they just didn' ; t know there was that much in broadcasting. They don' ; t want you to know. The only way I could get my hands on that was because of the position, I had at the station at the time. Well, it went on from there. I wound up on the short end of the stick. So, but the desire for ownership is still there. HUNTLEY: You had learned that and of course I' ; m sure your appetite had been whet prior to then. FAUSH: Oh, yes. HUNTLEY: With that kind of information that of course would leave you to say this has to happen. FAUSH: Oh, yes. You' ; ve got to keep going because you know the old story. They say Colonel Sanders was turned down 300 times. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. FAUSH: That' ; s what the story says. On time 301 its history now. HUNTLEY: That' ; s the only one that counted. I know we have a long story to tell and we don' ; t have time to do that today. FAUSH: Yes. HUNTLEY: I really appreciate you taking the time out, but I know I really need to sit down with you again. FAUSH:Yes, there' ; s some other things that, you know, internal, social things that the involvement from the church and other struggles and so forth. You know, I' ; ve served on the advisory board of the governor' ; s economic advisory board. I learned some things from inside there, very, very few if any know anything about that I built a housing development, but I wound back up in graduate school back to A & ; M in 1977 in graduate school. In order to be able to compete and to provide homes for people who were not able to have them. There' ; s one out in Woodlawn that bears my name. There are a few people who know that I chair the central committee [inaudible]. HUNTLEY: I think they will do that based on what you are doing and have done because that will become. . . This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Rev. Erskine Faush
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Rev. Erskine Faush discusses being involved in music and ministry throughout his early years before starting with broadcast radio. His voice, along with Shelley Stewart's, was a hallmark of Black broadcasting during the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham.
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Civil rights movements--Alabama--Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Horace Huntley
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Frank Dukes
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5.4 May 11, 1995 Rev. Frank Dukes 19950511D 0:51:53 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Indexer: Emily Reynolds Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Connor, Theophilus Eugene (Bull Connor) Miles College Selective Buying Campaign Police brutality--United States Frank Dukes Horace Huntley Video 1:|1(2)|16(6)|39(10)|52(6)|62(8)|75(13)|88(9)|106(12)|133(10)|151(16)|173(12)|187(3)|198(12)|212(13)|223(11)|237(11)|252(3)|261(2)|275(8)|286(5)|303(12)|325(8)|342(7)|353(7)|362(2)|374(1)|386(2)|398(6)|413(9)|431(13)|440(6)|452(4)|464(11)|484(8)|500(15)|515(6)|544(11)|559(2)|570(2)|581(6)|593(15)|603(12)|618(1)|635(9)|656(5)|669(4)|678(2)|688(4)|697(6)|714(12)|727(14) 0 https://youtu.be/zULntubZIxY YouTube video English 0 Interview Introduction This is an interview with Rev. Frank Dukes for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College. It is May 11, 1995. Introduction to interview with Rev. Frank Dukes. 33.516200, -86.813870 17 The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute https://www.bcri.org/ BCRI Homepage 109 Family Background and Childhood I just want to start by asking some background questions. Where were your parents from? Rev. Dukes discusses where he was born, his immediate family, and the education/employment of his parents. African Americans--Employment ; Avon Cosmetics ; Fairfield (Ala.) African American families 202 Community in Fairfield, Ala. Tell me then, Fairfield is known, really around the country for any number of things, particularly the steel and for being the birthplace of Willie Mays. Can you describe the community of Fairfield as you grew up? Rev. Dukes discusses life in Fairfield, Alabama, including educational and recreational experiences from his youth. African Americans--Recreation ; African Americans--Southern States ; Education--Southern States Fairfield (Ala.) 411 Black Community's Relationship with Police What was your community's relationship to the police department? Rev. Dukes describes the relationship between local police and the Black community in Fairfield, Alabama. African Americans--Southern States ; Police brutality--United States African Americans--Civil rights ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department 435 Military Service and Early Career So after you finished high school, what did you do? Rev. Dukes describes his time serving in the Army and working in the auto industry in Detroit, Michigan. African American soldiers ; African Americans--Employment ; Chrysler Corporation ; Dodge automobile African Americans--Michigan--Detroit ; United States. Army 548 Return to Alabama and Enrollment at Miles College And when you came back to Birmingham did you then live in Birmingham or in Fairfield? Rev. Dukes discusses his experience as a student at Miles College. African American students ; Craps (Game) ; Fairfield (Ala.) ; Student government America's historically Black colleges and universities ; Miles College 689 Student Engagement in Civil Rights Movement You happened then to have been at Miles at a very, volatile time, because in 1960 of course, you had the beginning of the student sit-in movement, although it had began much earlier, but the college students started to get involved. Rev. Dukes discusses the formation of student-led protests during the Civil Rights Movement. African American student movements ; African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; America's historically Black colleges and universities ; Connor, Theophilus Eugene (Bull Connor) ; Greensboro Sit-ins, Greensboro, N.C., 1960 ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 African Americans--Civil rights ; Miles College 910 Childhood Experiences with Racism And I personally never accepted the role of being subservient to White folks, even as a boy, a young boy. Rev. Dukes describes childhood experiences with racism, as well as his family's views on standing up for oneself. African American children ; African Americans--Southern States Racism--United States 1000 Selective Buying Campaign in Birmingham Selective Buying Campaign... What actually precipitated the Selective Buying Campaign? Rev. Dukes discusses the Selective Buying Campaign and its impact on Birmingham and the Civil Rights Movement. African American student movements ; African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; African Americans--Employment--Law and legislation ; Alabama--Politics and government--1951- ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Connor, Theophilus Eugene (Bull Connor) ; History of the civil rights movement ; Miles College ; Segregation--United States African Americans--Economic conditions ; Civil rights movement 1697 Community Partners in Selective Buying Campaign Was the Alabama Christian Movement involved with you at that point? Rev. Dukes discusses the Miles College students' partners in the Selective Buying Campaign, and the results of these relationships. African American student movements ; Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Miles College ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 History of the civil rights movement ; Segregation--United States 1845 Results of Selective Buying Campaign Your demands, the demands that you made that resulted in the development of the Selective Buying Campaign, how successful were you in realizing them? Rev. Dukes discusses how the Selective Buying Campaign unified the Black community of Birmingham, and connected activists with the larger Civil Rights Movement. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.). Police Department ; King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968 ; Lee, Bernard Scott, -1991 ; Miles College ; Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 ; Southern Christian Leadership Conference ; Walker, Wyatt Tee ; Young, Andrew, 1932- African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Segregation--Law and legislation 2048 Arrest, Trial, and Jail Experiences Dr. Huntley: Did you go to jail? Rev: Dukes: Yeah, twice. Dr. Huntley: What were the circumstances? Rev. Dukes describes his experiences with being arrested and jailed, as well trial proceedings in Birmingham. African Americans--Civil rights--Southern States ; African Americans--Legal status, laws, etc ; African Americans--Religion ; Connor, Theophilus Eugene (Bull Connor) ; King, A. D. ; Racism--United States--History--20th century ; Smith, Nelson H. African Americans--Civil rights ; Birmingham (Ala.). City Commission ; History of the civil rights movement 2316 Post-1963 Movement Activism at Miles College Usually when we start talking about the Movement here in Birmingham we usually end up in 1963 and we know that the Movement continued. What were you doing after the demonstrations of '63? Rev. Dukes discusses his work as the Director of Public Relations and Alumni Affairs at Miles College, and continued participation in the Selective Buying Campaign and Civil Rights Movement. African American student movements ; America's historically Black colleges and universities ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Birmingham (Ala.). City Commission ; Congress of Racial Equality ; Racism--United States--History--20th century ; Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (U.S.) African Americans--Civil rights ; Miles College 2795 Reflections on Courage and Student Movement Momentum You now had been away from Birmingham, you had been in the military, you had lived in Detroit, others, I guess, Dr. McPherson had probably been away. [...] What do you think provided the courage for those of you who had been away, but more so those who had probably not been away from Birmingham? Rev. Dukes reflects on how activism and media representation inspired others to become involved in the Movement. African American student movements ; African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century ; Birmingham (Ala.) Miles College 2960 Reflection on Changes in Birmingham Are there any issues that we have not touched on that you would like to just mention before we end our session today? Rev. Dukes reflects on the changes that have taken place in Birmingham as a result of the Civil Rights Movement. African American judges ; African American leadership ; African American mayors ; African American police chiefs ; African Americans--Employment--Law and legislation ; Birmingham (Ala.) ; Clemon, U. W., 1943- ; Connor, Theophilus Eugene (Bull Connor) African Americans--Civil rights 3068 Interview Conclusion It's been a pleasure, Rev. Dukes to have you with us today. And I certainly do appreciate it. Interview conclusion with Rev. Frank Dukes. Oral History Rev. Frank Dukes discusses being a major organizer in the Movement, from facilitating the Selective Buying Campaign to being arrested in the Easter march of 1963. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Rev. Frank Dukes for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute' ; s Oral History Project. I am Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at Miles College. It is May 11, 1995. Thank you, Rev. Dukes, for coming and taking time out of your busy schedule to sit with us today. Obviously what we are attempting to do is to put ourselves in a position so that there is a possibility of writing the real history of Birmingham and the Movement and we know that you played a prominent role in that. So thank you for coming out to help us. DUKES: Well, thanks for inviting me. HUNTLEY: I just want to start by asking some background questions. Where were your parents from? DUKES: Well, my mother was from Selma, Alabama. My father from Fairfield, Alabama. HUNTLEY: And you were born where? DUKES: In Fairfield. HUNTLEY: In Fairfield? Is Fairfield a suburb of Birmingham or is Birmingham a suburb of Fairfield? DUKES: Larry Langford would say it' ; s a suburb of Fairfield. HUNTLEY: How many brothers and sisters did you have and what was your rank order? DUKES: Well, there were eight of us. Now there are seven. I am the third from the top. HUNTLEY: All right. So you are the third oldest? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: Tell me just a bit about your parents and their education. DUKES: Well, my father had an 11th grade education. And my mother had about an 8th or 9th grade education because she went to night school to get that far. She was a domestic worker for many years. And after that she became an Avon salesperson. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did your father do? DUKES: A steel worker. HUNTLEY: In Fairfield? Tell me then, Fairfield is known, really around the country for any number of things, particularly the steel and for being the birthplace of Willie Mays. Can you describe the community of Fairfield as you grew up? DUKES: Fairfield was quite a stable community during those days and I' ; m speaking comparatively now. Most of the persons worked in one of the steel mills or the brick yard or some place. Fairfield Industrial High School, in my opinion, was the greatest high in the world. Academics were stressed, first priority, second priority, third priority as well as discipline. And there are Fairfield graduates holding down very significant professional positions in all of the major cities in this country. HUNTLEY: There was a gentleman there at Fairfield that set the tone, Dr. Oliver. DUKES: Professor E. J. Oliver. In my opinion the greatest principal that ever lived. A strict disciplinarian who placed all emphasis on discipline and education. And when we used to go down to Montgomery to compete against high schools from all over Alabama, those were during the days of segregation, there were no Whites to compete against, though it wouldn' ; t have mattered. We would have done just as well or better, I' ; m sure. But we used to win the majority of the first-place ribbons in all of the academic subjects, math, science, biology, chemistry, you name it, we won it. HUNTLEY: So, you look then at Fairfield as setting a firm foundation for you and the community, the high school? DUKES: Very much so. For example, if you attended Fairfield Industrial High, if you were absent, you had to go back home the next day and bring your mother or your father or your aunt or uncle or somebody that Professor Oliver knew. Or the same thing applied if you were tardy. So, it was well run, well organized. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about recreation in Fairfield? DUKES: Well, there was just, aside from the high school football and basketball teams, those were the only two sports we had in those days. And, of course, the band. And then there was sandlot baseball. Most of the companies like USX at that time it was US Steel, they would sponsor teams. ACIPICO would have a team. Stockman would have a team. They would compete against each other. HUNTLEY: What was your community' ; s relationship to the police department? DUKES: Horrible. There was no relationship. Horrible. The police had one job that was to arrest Black folk. HUNTLEY: So are you suggesting that the police was not in the community to protect and serve? DUKES: I am not suggesting that, I am stating it emphatically. No! They were not. HUNTLEY: So after you finished high school, what did you do? DUKES: I had a couple of small nondescription jobs and then I left and went into the army in ' ; 49. HUNTLEY: How long were you in the army? DUKES: In ' ; 49 I went in and stayed a year. I got a discharge in September of ' ; 50. Went back in -- got discharged in July rather in ' ; 50 and went right back in September of ' ; 50 when the Korean War started. And I got out in October of ' ; 51 and I went back in the service in ' ; 54 and got out -- was discharged in ' ; 57. HUNTLEY: What did you do between ' ; 51 and ' ; 54? DUKES: I worked at the Dodge automobile plant which was a division of Chrysler. HUNTLEY: And where was that? DUKES: Detroit, Michigan. HUNTLEY: Detroit. How did you compare Detroit with Birmingham? DUKES: Oh, it beat Birmingham in a thousand different ways in terms of discrimination and segregation and all that kind of stuff. It was not a panacea, however, but it was a far cry from what we had to undergo here in the south. HUNTLEY: So you then went back into the military from Detroit? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: And you were in the military then until ' ; 57? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: And after your discharge in ' ; 57 what did you do? DUKES: I went back to Detroit and went back to work at the Dodge automobile plant. And I got laid off in ' ; 58 I believe it was. And I came back to Birmingham. HUNTLEY: And when you came back to Birmingham did you then live in Birmingham or in Fairfield? DUKES: I lived in Fairfield. HUNTLEY: Were you married at the time? DUKES: No. HUNTLEY: Still a young man, foot loose and fancy free? DUKES: That' ; s right. HUNTLEY: In 1958 Birmingham was embarking on, at least preparing for what would take place in the next few years. In ' ; 56, of course, the NAACP was outlawed from operating in the State of Alabama. And the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights is developed. In 1958 when you returned, did you go to work at US Steel? DUKES: No. No. When I came back in 1958, I was hustling in the pool room, shooting craps. HUNTLEY: Okay. DUKES: That kind of stuff. And I was waiting to go back to Detroit to work at the Dodge automobile plant when they sent me a telegram to come back. In the meantime I started to Miles in ' ; 59. And when they called me to come back to work at Dodge Main, I decided to stay in college. I didn' ; t go back. HUNTLEY: So you remained in college, at Miles, between ' ; 58 and -- DUKES: Well, I started in ' ; 59, the summer of ' ; 59. HUNTLEY: You were a student leader at the time? DUKES: Yes. I was student government president. HUNTLEY: How did that evolve? How did you get involved in the student government? DUKES: Well, you know, when it' ; s time to run for the offices, a lot of the students asked me to run, so I ran and I won. HUNTLEY: So you were perceived as a leader when you. . . DUKES: Yes, well you see, I was much older than the majority of the students. You see, I was about 29 or 30 when I went to college and most of these kids were like 18, 19 or 20. HUNTLEY: You happened then to have been at Miles at a very, volatile time, because in 1960 of course, you had the beginning of the student sit-in movement, although it had began much earlier, but the college students started to get involved. In ' ; 61 you had the Freedom Riders to come and Miles then is organizing. Tell me a little about that period between ' ; 60 and the demonstrations of ' ; 63. HUNTLEY: Well, I believe it was in ' ; 59, the fall of ' ; 59, some of the students went down in the park, Kelly Ingram Park to protest and they were arrested. And at that time Dr. Bell was the president of Miles College and his philosophy was 360 degrees away from ours in terms of what we were about. HUNTLEY: " ; We," ; meaning the students? DUKES: Students, yes. And so that little protest didn' ; t get off the ground really because the infamous Bull Conner was in office then as you may well know and we didn' ; t really get involved again until I would think, probably around late ' ; 61 when we started organizing. HUNTLEY: Right. Were you at all involved or knew what was taking place with the development of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights? DUKES: No, but I became a member before the demonstrations and the selective buying campaign. But in the very beginning when Rev. Shuttles worth organized it, I don' ; t think I had come back to Birmingham at that time. HUNTLEY: Right. They organized in ' ; 56 and you were away at that time. In ' ; 61 when the organizing of students started to take place, what precipitated that? DUKES: Well, some of the students like in North Carolina were protesting and demonstrating and a group of us felt that we should do the same thing because we were hamstrung by segregation, discrimination and all those other ills and wrongs. So we just got a committee together. U. W. Clemon who is now Federal Judge U. W. Clemon, Shelley Millender, a fellow by the name of Reuther Meredith and Dr. Jonathan McPherson, who at that time was a chemistry professor, who is now the owner of Scott-McPherson Funeral Home. He was our advisor and worked with us in the very beginning. HUNTLEY: And this is based upon what you saw happening in North Carolina with the four students who started the sit-ins? DUKES: Yes. We felt that we could not sit idly by and not protest here because the conditions in Alabama were worse than those in North Carolina. And I personally never accepted the role of being subservient to White folks, even as a boy, a young boy. HUNTLEY: What do you remember. Why do you say that " ; as a young boy, you didn' ; t accept it?" ; DUKES: Because occasionally I would get in fights with White boys about calling me " ; nigger" ; and I would fight at the drop of a hat. And then, you know, you would walk on the sidewalk sometime and you approach a White person and they would want you to move off and let them by and I refused to do it, and stuff like that. HUNTLEY: What did your parents say about that kind of behavior at the time? DUKES: Well, my mother and in particular my grandmother, always told us not to pick a fight, but don' ; t run from a fight. If anybody accosted us, to stand our ground. Be the person Black, White, Green or Brown. HUNTLEY: So when you arrived at Miles College with that kind of background, and with what had started to develop and students starting to get involved in the struggle, you basically were already primed already for that kind of activity? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: What actually precipitated the Selective Buying Campaign? DUKES: Well, Dr. Pitts got word that a group of students were getting ready for some direct action so he sent for us and he wanted to know what we were going to do, what we planned to do because he was not going to fight us. Rather he was going to advise us because he had had a lot of experience in that kind of thing down through the years. And he wanted us to protest like we wanted to protest but he wanted us to do it in an organized fashion and to do it in such a way that hopefully, we wouldn' ; t get killed off the bat. So we started to meet, and then Dr. Pitts, if you have heard anything about him at all, you know he was one of the world' ; s greatest diplomats and a brilliant man. He had a good relationship with the White leaders in Metropolitan Birmingham as well as the Black leaders. He talked with a bunch of the White power structure persons and we started to having meetings with these White businessmen in an effort to get these stores desegregated, hire Black salesman, Black firemen, Black policemen, everything we have now. We started to meeting with these gentlemen in an effort to try to get them to use their power to bring this about. HUNTLEY: Does this precede the ' ; 63 demonstrations? DUKES: Right. HUNTLEY: Because those were some of the demands that were being generated. DUKES: Right. Well, had it not been for the success of the Selective Buying Campaign, actually it was a boycott, but in those days, a boycott was illegal, so we had to call it selective buying. Had it not been for the success of the Selective Buying Campaign, there wouldn' ; t have been the demonstration of ' ; 63 because the Selective Buying Campaign got the Black populace of Birmingham ready for direct action. HUNTLEY: Tell me, why do you think that there was such a difference between President Bell and President Pitts? DUKES: Well, Dr. Pitts was a visionary. Also, he had never accepted the role that had been forced upon Black people by the White power structure across this country. And Dr. Bell philosophically I would think, or maybe from a more of a practical standpoint, if not philosophically, had acclimated himself to blend in and follow the rule of law as set forth by the White folk. HUNTLEY: Was Bell originally from Birmingham? DUKES: I think he came from Georgia. I know he lived in Georgia most of the time when he was president here. HUNTLEY: And Dr. Pitts, was not originally from here? DUKES: No. No. He was from Georgia. HUNTLEY: Right. Explain to me how the organization of the Selective Buying Campaign took place. DUKES: Well, we started to meeting first of all with some of the White power structure. The late Sydney Smyer, James A. Head, I think he' ; s still alive. Emil Hess of Parisian' ; s. The president of Loveman' ; s, the president of, a fellow named Roper Dial, who was president of Sears, Roebuck. It must have been some seven or eight. HUNTLEY: You say " ; we" ; , who are you referring to? DUKES: Well, that would have been U. W. Clemon, Shelley Millender, Wrother Meredith, Dr. McPherson and myself. HUNTLEY: All Mileians? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: And this is the initial contact with the " ; power structure?" ; DUKES: Right. Right. HUNTLEY: And how did those meetings go? DUKES: Well, in the very beginning they got off to a shaky start because the White power persons were trying to tell us to wait and things would work themselves out and we couldn' ; t buy that. And they were telling us that they didn' ; t have any power to change anything in Birmingham because they lived in Mountain Brook and Bull Conner was a beast and that they were afraid of him, and all that kind of stuff. HUNTLEY: So they were portraying that difference then between the business community and the government of Birmingham? DUKES: Right. HUNTLEY: And they wanted you to slow your pace? DUKES: Exactly. HUNTLEY: And allow them to do certain things? DUKES: Well, they hadn' ; t planned to do anything. They were really stalling. Like the stall had been on for hundreds of years, you know. But, while we were having these meetings, I guess after we had met about, five times, we saw that they weren' ; t going to do anything but stall and we were getting ready to start our Selective Buying Campaign and we told them this, but they didn' ; t believe that it would work, you see. So we started the Selective Buying Campaign. HUNTLEY: As a result of their inactivity? DUKES: Yes. Well, we had done our research and we knew that department stores operated on a 15% margin of profit and we knew all we had to do was cut into the margin of profit and that would make the owners of those department stores or managers or presidents, what have you, have another thought about trying to give us some redress of our grievances. And when we started the Selective Buying Campaign after about five or six weeks, Birmingham was lily white downtown. You didn' ; t see any Black people shopping at all. And when we first started, some of those businessmen had pushed Bull Conner to try to get him to change the laws here and Bull Conner said, " ; We aren' ; t going to change anything because those niggers are not going to stay out of downtown shopping, they' ; ll be back." ; And when they didn' ; t go back, Miles College in the meantime had started a March of Dimes drive to get books for the library and we had to get a permit to march for this fund-raising drive and Bull Conner denied us the permit. And from that we got national and international publicity and that helped to start the ball to really rolling. And during that period of time, some of the stores desegregated the water fountains and the restrooms but they didn' ; t hire any Black salespersons or anything like that. HUNTLEY: What was the mechanism that the students used to get Black people in the communities that were not part of Miles College involved in the Selective Buying Campaign? DUKES: Well, we ran thousands of, hundreds of thousands of leaflets listing what we were protesting about. We wanted Black firemen, Black policemen, Black folk at Social Security, Black folk at Internal Revenue, all the jobs Black folk now hold was what we were asking for plus desegregating restaurants. Because at that time, the only jobs that Black folk could get in Birmingham, you either had to be a preacher in a Black church, teacher in a Black school or an insurance salesman. There were two public health workers who doubled as social workers. A lady named Mildred Feldon and another gentleman whose name I can' ; t recall. But aside from those two individuals, nobody else worked out in the White community or had their office headquarters in the White community. Because they worked in the Black community, they didn' ; t deal with the White folk who needed their services. HUNTLEY: Although there were many Black domestics that worked in White homes? DUKES: Right. Well, most of the time, we could always tell Thursday in downtown Birmingham because that was the maid' ; s day off in Mountain Brook. And all of those ladies would come downtown to shop and go to the restaurants and bars and different places. HUNTLEY: Well, were there any difficulties with any of the people. Did you have to persuade anyone not to use the stores at the time of the SBC? DUKES: Well, we would have meetings out in the community sometime with groups and explain our situation. And we just kept these leaflets flowing. See, we would get up early every Sunday morning maybe like 4:00 o' ; clock. And we would have the back seat and trunk of cars loaded with leaflets and we would go around, and at that time, churches didn' ; t lock their doors. So we could go in the churches and we would put leaflets on all the benches so when the people got to church they could read them. And then we would put them in all of the public places. And then we would go into the White banks and leave them on the table where you wrote out checks and stuff. So we got the word around. HUNTLEY: Was the Alabama Christian Movement involved with you at that point? DUKES: No. HUNTLEY: When did they get involved with the Miles students? DUKES: Well, before we even started our meetings, we met with the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights and Rev. Shuttlesworth and told them what we were about because we needed his blessing in order to start our program. So, that' ; s how we got involved with them. But the actual mechanics of SBC was conducted and operated by Miles College students and some of the Black ladies from the Birmingham community. Folk like Deenie Drew and Ruth Barefield Pendleton, and Dr. Montgomery' ; s wife, Althea. HUNTLEY: What were their roles? DUKES: They helped us. They furnished transportation and Deenie Drew, as you know, looks like a White woman and she could go places and get stuff for us and go into the White Citizens Council meeting and stuff and get information and bring it back. HUNTLEY: So she actually went to the White Citizens' ; Council meetings? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: So they were very supportive of the efforts here? DUKES: Yes. They worked real hard. As a matter of fact, we had a big meeting once at Deenie Drew' ; s house of all the significant number of Black professional women, who at that time was mostly school teachers. Because most of them had charge accounts at Burger Phillips, Pizitz, etc. Black women traded at most of the department stores and we had a meeting with those women and told them to stop going into the stores shopping. Stop buying any kind of clothing from them because we wanted the SBC to be a success. And we would say things like, " ; If you go in Loveman' ; s or Pizitz' ; and you spend $500 you can' ; t go up on the mezzanine and spend a quarter for a glass of tea." ; And they could see the difference. HUNTLEY: The demands that you made that resulted in the development of the SBC, how successful were you in realizing them? DUKES: Well, as I said earlier, what we really got out of the SBC was unification of the Black community psychologically and philosophically and in terms of like the desegregation of stores and all this kind of stuff. All that we got was the desegregation of water fountains and the restrooms. HUNTLEY: So you laid foundation for SCLC and the Alabama Christian Movement? DUKES: Right. Well, in the middle of the SBC, Dr. King sent Wyatt T. Walker, Andrew Young and Bernard Lee out here to Miles College to confer with me. And what he wanted me to do was to let him know when I felt that Birmingham was ready for a non-violent demonstration. And on the strength of the success of our SBC we notified Dr. King that Birmingham was ready, Black Birmingham was ready. And that' ; s when he came to Birmingham and met with the Black leaders and so forth. HUNTLEY: You mentioned that you had the blessings of Rev. Shuttles worth and the Alabama Christian Movement. Were you getting any physical assistance from the Movement during those days? DUKES: Well, as I recall, you know, you are talking 30 something years ago. We just went at it on our own and we would go to the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights meetings every Monday night to let the people know what was going on and what we were doing. And we got their blessing. But the majority of all those leaflets being handed out and all that kind of stuff was done by Miles College students and some of those ladies that I had previously mentioned. HUNTLEY: So you attended the Movement meetings, the Alabama Christian Movement meetings on Monday night? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: Can you describe what those meetings were like? DUKES: Well, they were really church meetings, and there would always be a main speaker, somebody would preach and then there would be some other people who would talk about the segregation and discrimination and all this stuff that we were encountering. And this was the gist of the meeting from meeting to meeting. HUNTLEY: Were you aware that Birmingham policemen were present? DUKES: Yes. They sat down on the front bench with tape recorders and recorded everything that went on. And we said what we wanted to say and they recorded it. Oftentimes the police who would be recording what was being said, and when collection time came around they would put money in the collection plate. HUNTLEY: That' ; s interesting. Did you go to jail? DUKES: Yes. Twice. HUNTLEY: What were the circumstances? DUKES: Well, in ' ; 63, Easter Sunday, N. H. Smith, A. D. King, John Porter and me, we led the march in ' ; 63 from Thurgood CME Church. At that time it was on 7th Avenue and 11th Street and we led that particular march and we got arrested. After we had gotten about a couple of blocks, Chief Jamie Moore and his storm troopers came down on us and we all got arrested. HUNTLEY: How long did you remain in jail? DUKES: On that account, I was in for five days. And then the next time I went to jail was when we had a trial and Bull Conner had issued orders to the judge to fine all the " ; niggers" ; $100 and six months, 180 days. Judge Brown was adjudicating the trials and in the middle of this particular trial he died. Had a heart attack and died. HUNTLEY: On the bench? DUKES: On the bench. And we had prayer for the fallen brother. And as soon as they hauled Judge Brown out, Bull Conner sent up for Judge Conway and as soon as Judge Conway sat in the seat that Judge Brown had died in, Bull Conner said continue to giving all the " ; niggers" ; $100 fine and 180 days and we went off to jail. HUNTLEY: So he was really in control? DUKES: He ran Birmingham. There were two other commissioners, but he ran Birmingham. They were more or less figure heads. HUNTLEY: What were the circumstances of your arrest that time, the second time? DUKES: Well, the second time, was we went to jail because we weren' ; t going to pay the fine. HUNTLEY: Oh, I see. Were there other instances of your being arrested? DUKES: Going to jail? HUNTLEY: Yes. DUKES: That was the only time I got arrested. HUNTLEY: Did others in your family participate? DUKES: My younger brothers and sisters were in the marches but none of them ever got arrested. HUNTLEY: What was the reaction of your family to your involvement? DUKES: Oh, my family was 100% behind me. Because as I told you earlier, we didn' ; t pick fights but we didn' ; t run from fights. We would get in the middle of it. 100% support. HUNTLEY: You were still a single man at the time, during these demonstrations? DUKES: Yes. I was a bachelor as a matter of fact until I became 37. HUNTLEY: What church were you a member of at the time? DUKES: At that time it was called First Baptist Annizburg, but now it' ; s called Antioch and it' ; s down on 54th Street here up in Fairfield. HUNTLEY: What was the level of involvement of the church and your pastor at that time? DUKES: Well, I was a member of the church but I was zooming around, doing everything, going everywhere. I wasn' ; t really active in the church, at that time. HUNTLEY: Right. I know later on you would become a minister and we will talk about that in a minute. But how would you say the community of the Birmingham Metropolitan area benefitted from the Movement that was organized by yourself and others that you discussed? DUKES: Oh, as I said earlier, the two main things, as I see it was that we were able to get the folk philosophically and psychologically ready. We wanted them to have courage and not be afraid to protest, and that was achieved. HUNTLEY: Usually when we start talking about the Movement here in Birmingham we usually end up in 1963 and we know that the Movement continued. What were you doing after the demonstrations of ' ; 63? DUKES: Well, I finished Miles in May of ' ; 62 and Dr. Pitts hired me as Director of Public Relations and Alumni Affairs in June of that same year. So even during the time when we were in the SBC I was working here at Miles College. So I continued to work here to help Dr. Pitts build this institution. HUNTLEY: Was SNCC ever involved with organization here at Miles? DUKES: No. SNCC, CORE, all of those groups would come through here from time to time and talk with us and they wanted to get involved in it, but we believed that we would be more effective if the students who were involved in the fight were from Birmingham. HUNTLEY: So, did you discourage people from outside from participating? DUKES: We didn' ; t really discourage them, but what we told them was that this was a home-grown movement and if they wanted to give us their support, fine. But in terms of the mechanics, we would operate that. HUNTLEY: How many students were involved with Miles at the time? I know in terms of your negotiation you had just a few people involved, but at the height of the Movement, for instance, at high schools and the junior high school, kids left the schools and became involved in the demonstration, how did that transpire here at Miles? DUKES: Well, after we got the SBC going, on one weekend we got a petition and we got all of the Miles College students we could find to sign it. So I would imagine, some 600 or 700 signed it. And then we got citizens from the community to sign it. And we took that petition down to the courthouse, city hall and presented it to Bull Conner and Jabo Wagner and Art Haynes who were the other two commissioners. And the group who took the petition down there was U. W. Clemon, Frank Dukes, Jonathan McPherson and Shelley Millender and we had alerted the press that we were going to be there, so the press was there when we got there. So when they got through with the city' ; s business, Bull Conner wanted to know if anyone else had anything they wanted to say. So Clemon was our first spokesman. And Clemon got up to talk about we wanted Black policemen, firemen and internal revenue employees just everything that we got now. And Bull Conner cursed Clemmons out and called him a bunch of niggers and told him that before there would be Black policemen in Birmingham, niggers would be deacons in the First Baptist Church. That was the big White First Baptist Church up on 21st Street and I think 4th Avenue at that time. And McPherson got up and made his speech and then I got up and made my speech and some of the Black persons in Birmingham who were in cahoots with the police department had told Connor that Dukes was outsider from Detroit stirring up the Negroes in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: These are Black persons? DUKES: Yes. Snitches. Had told Bull Conner that I was not from Birmingham. That I was from Detroit down here stirring up trouble. So Bull Conner told me, he said, " ; Well, if you don' ; t like the way I run Birmingham, why don' ; t you leave and go back to Detroit." ; I said, " ; This is my hometown, just like it is yours and I' ; m going to stay here until we get it right." ; And he didn' ; t say another word. HUNTLEY: So he reacted to Clemon but he didn' ; t react to either of the others? DUKES: He reacted to McPherson, too. I just don' ; t remember the terminology that he used. But he didn' ; t say anything to me other than what I said. HUNTLEY: Do you remember what happened after that? DUKES: Well, we had a press conference down at Thurgood CME church and they wrote it up and it was on TV and all that. That was about the size of that. HUNTLEY: But then, that is part of that organization to get other people involved? DUKES: Right. And it gave a lot of Black people courage. Because people, both Black and White, were literally afraid of Bull Conner because when the news got out that we were going down there to challenge Bull Conner, people were calling our homes and begging us not to go. HUNTLEY: People like who? Friends of yours? DUKES: Black folk and White folk who knew our families would call and say, " ; Don' ; t go, or else you are going to get killed down there." ; But we were committed. HUNTLEY: So there was real concern about the safety of those who had nerve enough to challenge the status quo? DUKES: Yes. Because it was a dangerous thing to do. HUNTLEY: Well, were you or your family ever physically threatened with violence as a result of your activity? DUKES: Not to my knowledge, that I can recall. HUNTLEY: Then, what about faculty other than Dr. McPherson? DUKES: Other than Dr. McPherson, Abraham Woods. I can' ; t think of any other faculty member who actively participated and who went to jail and all of that kind of stuff other than Abraham Woods. HUNTLEY: What about activity on the campus? Were they supportive in terms of allowing students to do certain things. Well, as far as I knew, none of the faculty members fought the students. As a matter of fact, the faculty cooperated, because President Pitts was helping us spear head this thing, so they worked with us from that standpoint. HUNTLEY: What would be your most vivid memory during this struggle when you were making this effort to organize people, develop the SBC, what stands out in your mind more than anything else? DUKES: I would guess, when we first started meeting with those White power structure gentlemen at our first meetings, they addressed us all as niggers and about the third meeting we became boys and about the fourth or fifth meeting we were on first name basis. And you have to have been under bondage to understand why that would stand out. HUNTLEY: You now had been away from Birmingham, you had been in the military, you had lived in Detroit, others, I guess, Dr. McPherson had probably been away. I am not sure about Millender and Clemon. They were younger. What do you think provided the courage for those of you who had been away, but more so those who had probably not been away from Birmingham? DUKES: Well, I didn' ; t get my courage because I had been away. HUNTLEY: ... I had the same experience. I was older when I went into college. Younger people would sort of flock around you. You were sort of a catalyst for others around you because of really, your background. DUKES: Yes. Well, one of the things that engendered the Miles College students to get involved was, David Lowe, a producer with ABC. He came down to Birmingham with a camera crew. I' ; m sure you read about it. They did a documentary on the race question here in Birmingham and they showed it all over the country and it was called " ; Who Speaks For Birmingham?" ; And many of us spoke and of those of us who spoke, included citizens from the Birmingham community, ABC-TV highlighted what I said and what Shelley Millender said and a few others. And for the students at Miles College, to see us on the screen, defying the White power structure and the Klan and all these people, they got courage. HUNTLEY: So that courage was infectious? DUKES: Yes. HUNTLEY: And really, people became proud of being able to do what you all were doing and so therefore they sought to take part? DUKES: Right. And then everybody was hungry for some freedom because we had none, you know. HUNTLEY: Are there any issues that we have not touched on that you would like to just mention before we end our session today? DUKES: Nothing, other than if it were possible for Bull Conner to be alive, I would like to see him around here to see Federal Judge U. W. Clemon on that 7th floor up there looking out over Birmingham and who he said, " ; Better leave out of Birmingham and if he ever came back down there, he was going to have his head beat to a mush." ; And to see the mayor, who is Black, the police chief who is Black with four or five deputy police chiefs who are Black. The fire is Black. The head of the sanitation department is Black. The fight for Freedom, Justice, and Equality was not in vain. HUNTLEY: Change is your greatest revenge? DUKES: Exactly. And it does my heart a lot of good when I go into department stores or Internal Revenue or Social Security and see Black folk who are supervisors and all that kind of stuff. Managers. Before the demonstrations and selective buying campaign, when you saw a Black person in a building downtown he had a mop and a broom, or she had a mop and a broom. HUNTLEY: So all of that changes as a result of the people developing courage to stand on their own two feet? DUKES: Right. With prayer. HUNTLEY: With prayer. It' ; s been a pleasure, Rev. Dukes to have you with us today. And I certainly do appreciate it. We would like to, probably at some later date, after we have gone through all of this, we may want to sit down with you again, but I want to thank you for coming today and we certainly do appreciate it. DUKES: Thanks for inviting me. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=FDukes1995.xml FDukes1995.xml
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Rev. Frank Dukes
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Rev. Frank Dukes discusses being a major organizer in the Movement, from facilitating the Selective Buying Campaign to being arrested in the Easter march of 1963.
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19950511D
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
Connor, Theophilus Eugene (Bull Connor)
Miles College
Selective Buying Campaign
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1995-05-11
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video
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BCRI Oral History Project Collection
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Video
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Oral History
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
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English
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bcriohp
Oral History
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Horace Huntley
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth
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http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=FLShuttlesworth1996_1.xml
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Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011
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5.4 December 10, 1996 Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (1996) (1 of 5) 19961210S1 02:02:15 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth Horace Huntley Video 1:|12(2)|29(4)|58(2)|77(11)|97(5)|120(3)|130(7)|147(13)|161(1)|169(5)|182(3)|193(11)|212(3)|230(9)|240(9)|255(4)|264(7)|277(3)|287(16)|301(6)|315(4)|330(2)|350(14)|373(8)|385(13)|397(3)|413(1)|427(5)|444(10)|461(8)|475(15)|483(13)|499(6)|511(3)|524(9)|537(11)|552(4)|568(2)|583(8)|597(12)|611(1)|625(10)|638(12)|651(9)|667(7)|680(11)|689(2)|701(1)|713(9)|727(5)|740(13)|750(13)|761(3)|772(15)|787(1)|801(1)|819(3)|834(5)|849(3)|861(2)|871(13)|882(6)|900(11)|913(15)|923(1)|941(6)|956(13)|968(2)|977(5)|997(5)|1009(7)|1025(12)|1038(11)|1050(5)|1064(4)|1078(10)|1096(8)|1108(12)|1120(12)|1134(11)|1148(4)|1163(13)|1176(7)|1188(2)|1204(1)|1218(12)|1240(5)|1248(13)|1261(9)|1272(13)|1283(4)|1298(12)|1310(10)|1319(11)|1336(11)|1350(14)|1361(6)|1373(11)|1384(6)|1400(1)|1411(2)|1421(10)|1436(1)|1453(11)|1467(17)|1482(6)|1500(5)|1512(8)|1526(6)|1545(9)|1556(4)|1567(2)|1580(14)|1594(9)|1605(11)|1623(3)|1632(11)|1644(6)|1659(10)|1675(7)|1686(9)|1700(4) 0 https://youtu.be/Qd8aDOhjbqo YouTube video English Oral History Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth discusses leading the Birmingham Movement. Part 1 of 5. HUNTLEY: This is an interview with Rev. Fred Lee Shuttlesworth. I' ; m Dr. Horace Huntley. We are at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Today' ; s date is December 10, 1996. Welcome, Rev. Shuttlesworth. It' ; s really just amazing to have you sitting here back in Birmingham talking about the struggle. SHUTTLESWORTH: No place like Birmingham, my hometown, the place I love more than any other place on the face of the earth. HUNTLEY: It' ; s just a great opportunity for me to just be sitting here with you because now I have within arm' ; s length, really, the history of the Movement and that is what is so important about being here at the Institute. SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, at least a substantial part of it. It was God' ; s purpose that in the evolving of the Movement I would be on the cutting edge. And God prepares people for certain things. Some people do what others won' ; t and to dare, to have faith, to put faith in action, I say it, is what God needed at that particular time, and He knows who to choose. HUNTLEY: He chose the good person. Before we start into that, let me just get some of your background. I' ; ve known you for many years. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: But I would just like to talk about your early childhood for a minute. Tell me just a bit about your mother and father first. Where were they from? SHUTTLESWORTH: My mother was born in Montgomery, Alabama, out from Montgomery, Hope Hull, I believe, out from Montgomery. And I was born in Montgomery County too, until I was about three years old when I was brought up here and my mother married Shuttlesworth, so that my name actually is the name of the man who raised me. As my mother said, when you talk about your father, you have to talk about who really raised you, so I always took that, so Shuttlesworth is her married name. HUNTLEY: And he was from here, in Birmingham? SHUTTLESWORTH: He' ; s from Birmingham. She met him in Birmingham. Her parents moved from Montgomery to Jefferson County -- they saw they could make a better living way back in the year. I was around about three years old then. HUNTLEY: Were they farmers? SHUTTLESWORTH: Farmers? Yes, basically. HUNTLEY: Did they own their own land? SHUTTLESWORTH: No. HUNTLEY: So, were they sharecroppers? SHUTTLESWORTH: Sharecroppers, I would think. My mother attended the State Normal School down there and so forth. HUNTLEY: How much of education does she have? SHUTTLESWORTH: She went to some college. She did a little teaching at that time. She had above a high school, and she was in what they call State Normal. You remember that my mother and my real father never were married, his name was Vetta Green, an itinerant country preacher who fixed guns and was very apt to fix a watch, he could make a watch or anything. And I just met him after I was grown. HUNTLEY: Oh, is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, he had a little church out from Montgomery there, and I went out and did a revival for him. We knew each other before he died. HUNTLEY: Did you have a pretty good relationship with him? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, it was short you see. I was grown and pastoring and way up when I knew him. HUNTLEY: So that was the first time you met him? SHUTTLESWORTH: The first time I met him I was a grown man. And it is to be said, since we are talking about that, in those days parents exercised a much larger influence over whom their children married than now. My mother and father really wanted to marry, they were crazy about each other, but the parents didn' ; t like him. So, they kept her from, kept her from-- HUNTLEY: Is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. HUNTLEY: Do you know anything about his education? SHUTTLESWORTH: I would think that he had probably less than a high school education. He was just real great at his doing things. I have that gift. I can just do things. I built a house without ever practicing carpentry and I learned mechanics and so forth. But he was real apt at it, although he wasn' ; t a man publicly known except for little church and his circle of people. And in fact, and I think it' ; s sort of good that we' ; re talking about this, because he never did -- he might have married somebody -- but he just never did become the man that I think he could have been had he been allowed to get married and build a relationship, so he just wandered around, messed around, and never did make too much of his life. HUNTLEY: I see, yeah. SHUTTLESWORTH: So sometimes that' ; s to be thought of as people really try to consider their children' ; s future. HUNTLEY: Were you the only child? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, no, no. My mother--another sister, my second sister, my sister under me, was also by him. We are the two whole children in my mother' ; s. The rest of them are by Mr. Shuttlesworth. Seven children by him. Nine of us. HUNTLEY: Nine of you? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, I was the oldest and I caught the most trouble. My mother would beat the devil out of me, and the top ones and the little ones would get in line. So, I caught it both ways. HUNTLEY: Well, your mother, for that time, was very well educated. SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, not with a degree, but she was competent, my mother was competent. She stood for a lot of things, and I can thank God that my mother' ; s parents and she were really religious people. And I thank God for that, at least, in my own life. My mother never did allow me the luxury of being asked whether I wanted to go to church. In fact, she would assist me if I wasn' ; t out of the bed on time by a strap or whip or whatever, and I had to go. And it' ; s amazing. I have always been allured or enamored of the idea of God. When I was a youngster, I didn' ; t rebel against God like... I always wanted to know something about the supernatural. I should also say here, since we' ; re talking, I think I made up early in my life I was either going to be a preacher or doctor. HUNTLEY: So, you determined that very early? SHUTTLESWORTH: I always knew that I wanted to be a preacher or a doctor. And of course, this has so happened. HUNTLEY: So, the preparations then that you were doing as a youngster was actually in preparation for either one or the other. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: And at what age did you determine that it would be preaching? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, when I was a boy I was always impressed with people who ran revivals in that area. I always looked up to the ministry. And I learn now, myself and all, that nobody' ; s a perfect person, but revival time was a special time. It still ought to be a special time when people come together to think deeply that week or that two weeks or whatever it is, you hear the preaching, you have a knack, for think, of a preacher explaining, expounding as best possible, people from all around, and it was a moving thing to see people, farmers -- mostly we were rural, we worked in the mines and so forth -- come to revival and be talking about God. So that idea was centered in me very early. And I always thought of God even when I didn' ; t know, understand as I do now -- nobody perfectly understands God -- that He was it and He was all. In fact, the Bible says, " ; He' ; s all in all." ; We really don' ; t understand that. I always wanted to know more about Him, and I always had that feeling to want to conform to some relationship with His being. HUNTLEY: Yes, so it was, really, you basically had no choice. SHUTTLESWORTH: I had no choice. And then my mother comes from a poor family. My stepfather, Shuttlesworth, had worked in the coal mines. He had had one family. In fact, his, I believe his third child or second child by his first wife was older than my mother. So that he was a much older man than my mother. He was not a religious person basically. Used a lot of foul language, and we were on the welfare. And he, I guess I saw in his authoritarian type abuse of my mother -- she didn' ; t have much. I remember my mother had, I don' ; t think ever had over two dresses at one time. And I learned that she said that you take what you have and make the best out of it. That' ; s a principle I will never forget. I would to God that people now would understand that a person' ; s life isn' ; t consist of what he has. Bible says that. I remember one time -- I don' ; t want to ramble but-- HUNTLEY: Go ahead. SHUTTLESWORTH: My mother had ; I believe it was twenty dollars. We had to walk from Oxmoor over to Wenonah, which was several miles at that time, to the commissary. And on the way there, my mother suddenly discovered that she had lost the money, didn' ; t have it with her. And I was a little boy. You know, it' ; s amazing, children are supposed to pay attention and I did, I was very, always apt, looking forward to that. And she in the middle of the road, just almost undressing, just look, because ten dollars, five dollars, at that time, was...two dollars was life almost. And so, she just suddenly resigned that she didn' ; t have it. And so I looked for her, knowing her being poor and knowing her not having much, I looked for her to start crying and just going berserk. And she didn' ; t, and I asked her, I said, " ; Well, you ain' ; t gonna even cry over this?" ; And she said to me some words like this, " ; Son, you cannot lose what you never had. You take what you have left and make the best out of it." ; Now some things are just deep in my culture or my life and I can' ; t forget it. But she was tough, and my mother never -- she went to night school. My stepfather was jealous of her for that. He wouldn' ; t go, but he would, you know, this is... And yet, so far as doing things of a bad nature, I' ; ve never seen one thing to my mother. And that' ; s one thing I can respect to this day and be thankful for her life as I knew it. She didn' ; t have much, but she set a standard for us, and she insisted that we obey. If I got a whipping at school, I got another one at home. People in the community, all of us, could discipline, so Mrs. Clinton has something when she said it takes really a community to raise a child. We need to go back to that. HUNTLEY: You said there were nine children. How many boys and girls? SHUTTLESWORTH: Six girls and three boys. HUNTLEY: And all are still living? SHUTTLESWORTH: All are still living. And my mother, just as you know, was buried here, right across the street, Sixteenth Street there, in ' ; 95. She was 95 years old - would have been in August of 1995. HUNTLEY: Now, what community did you move into when you initially came to Birmingham? SHUTTLESWORTH: They moved into a little place, I don' ; t even know where it is now... called Rat Row over here close to Goodwin' ; s Store in that area. If you go out towards Oxmoor Road, Goodwin' ; s Store ' ; cause it' ; s a little area somewhere in there. HUNTLEY: Called Rat Row? SHUTTLESWORTH: That' ; s the little area they were in, and that' ; s where I understand my mother married. I remember my aunt didn' ; t use the word Rat Row. I don' ; t even know where it is. But then my stepfather, Shuttlesworth, had this house, it' ; s a home house now in Oxmoor. He and his friend Haygood (?) had built the only two houses just alike. And so he had this house so when he married her on Rat Row, they moved into that house, and that' ; s where I was raised up, went to school out there. HUNTLEY: In Oxmoor? SHUTTLESWORTH: In Oxmoor. HUNTLEY: What do you remember about your first school? SHUTTLESWORTH: Seriously, I think my elementary school days and junior high school days, and to some degree, the high school, were some of the formative things. I don' ; t want to be misunderstood, but I was always very apt. I really didn' ; t have to study hard. I always was challenged to see what made things tick and so forth. And I could read, I remember, and I' ; m getting ahead of myself, when I was in seventh grade, or eighth grade I believe it was, I read a 15-page oration over three times and committed it to memory for Mrs. Owens. I was in the seventh grade this time, but my early education was the old school there going up on Sand Ridge right off the Oxmoor Road, through the curve, around the curve, and you turn left and go up. HUNTLEY: Was that that old white building, the old wood building, was that the same building? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, no, no. The one that' ; s there now, the junior high school, that was put there. I was the first class to graduate from there in 1937 in the seventh grade, I believe it was, ninth, whatever. But the old school was just as you turn up that hill, it was just as you turned up between two houses and started on Sand Ridge, it was there. A ditch ran right down beside the school, but there was some days that I will never forget. And I remember my teachers, they had... especially Professor Ramsey, a Christian gentleman, and we went to school with several classes in the same room. And I well remember a lot of things about Mr. Ramsey. He never feared to discipline those boys. Those boys were older than I was, and some of them louder than he was, but he would use his switch on them. And he-- I believe I was in the sixth grade under him at that time. And some of the boys in the ninth grade would go up to the board and couldn' ; t get a lesson, and I could just see it, you know, and I wanted to do it so bad, and I wondered why he never let me, he never would me get up and show them. I guess--I understand it now. It would have been terrible for somebody down here to show somebody up here. And I understood his wisdom in not allowing me to do this. It helped me a lot into my life, you understand that there are levels and degrees of people' ; s understanding, and maybe some people don' ; t know because they didn' ; t take time to learn, but they are here, they got a point, and nobody particularly needs to be shown up. And I respect him for this to this day. Then at least, and in my early schooling, one of the things that I guess was, is vital and key to my life, we always had song and prayer in the morning. We never did have a school without acknowledging God. Or even into Selma University, when I got up into college after I had married, years later, and gone to work and gone back to school. So people ought to always take time to recognize God. I know sometimes these days people don' ; t want you to use that name, but I never speak without saying what my roots are. HUNTLEY: What kind of work did Mr. Shuttlesworth do? SHUTTLESWORTH: It' ; s interesting but the truth is, though, my stepfather had worked in the mine, had worked in the coal mine, but he wasn' ; t working in the mine then. At the time I was with them, he was on the welfare, WPA, and he did work some on the WPA, you know, that' ; s Roosevelt. People had a thing, " ; Let Jesus lead you, and Roosevelt feed you." ; And that meant a lot for us. And my stepfather made liquor. He sold liquor, and as I recall now, many people could do much more with what little bit they have if they would conserve. I remember sometimes people would come to the house -- and this is a boy, now, I' ; m a boy -- and he would count out money, hundreds of dollars after people had left, you know, buying liquor. But as I recall, he had one bill after he died that he had being paying interest on $5 a month. He had been paying on it for years cause I used to ride my bicycle to Bessemer and pay it. So after he died in 1936 -- no, I' ; m sorry, 1940, I graduated in ' ; 40, I was eighteen -- I said to mama let' ; s pay this fifty -- didn' ; t owe but fifty dollars. HUNTLEY: Fifty dollars. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, fifty dollars. And I went over and talked with the man for mama, and he said, " ; Well my goodness, Bill Shuttlesworth has paid this debt over and over," ; and just wiped it out. Just talking with him about settling a debt and we had been paying on that thing five dollars a month for... So it goes into what we have now, I guess, it' ; s called credit cards. People abuse credit. They don' ; t realize that you don' ; t have to owe a lot. Conserving your own is better than owing somebody else, and that psyche needs to be understood in our generation today. HUNTLEY: Did your mother work outside of the home? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, no, no. My mother never worked. We were on welfare as I told you, and of course, I remember riding my bicycle to -- the Welfare Department was on Twenty-Fourth Street, I believe, viaduct, I remember the viaduct area -- and getting the welfare goods. My stepfather, he would get day old bread and a lot of other stuff, it was... We lived, I remember back there when you could buy half a side of a hog for a dollar or two, sack of flour and all this kind of stuff. We learned how to conserve. My mother was very conservative. We never wanted for food. HUNTLEY: Did you have any animals? SHUTTLESWORTH: Dogs, cats. I plowed, hoed, went to the field. HUNTLEY: You had gardens... SHUTTLESWORTH: We had gardens, we had gardens around the house. And incidentally, you wouldn' ; t believe it but I carried papers, and up where Edgewood is, where those big buildings there now, old factories or something, I threw papers at that far up to the end of the Edgewood Lake, walking, and finally got a bicycle. I carried papers, and different people do-- but I' ; ve hoed in the field, and we had, incidentally, a field right there as you go down from that great big church on Oxmoor Road, round in the valley like going to Birmingham. We went down that hill and cut back into the left, and we had rented several acres there, and I plowed the mule, gray, brown, red. My grandfather had a mule, and I did everything. HUNTLEY: What did you grow? SHUTTLESWORTH: Corn, ' ; tatoes, peas, different-- everything. HUNTLEY: So, during the Depression, what was lifelike? SHUTTLESWORTH: We never did have a whole lot, but we had enough to live. And people could always find food at our house. Even other people and children and so forth. God blessed us in that, I have never suffered for food. HUNTLEY: So that era, although it was a depressing time-- SHUTTLESWORTH: It was a Depression Era. HUNTLEY: you actually had food because you grew your own food? SHUTTLESWORTH: We grew some of it at least, yes. Hogs, we grew hogs, we killed hogs, chickens, and a certain time we had for hog killing, chitlins, and meat, Mama and them would smoke the meat, and salt it down and so forth. We had, we raised potatoes, I remember putting potatoes in a bank, you know, bank. It was really a regular farming life. HUNTLEY: Pretty much self-sufficient though? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, self-sufficient. And this area now is within the city limits under Mayor Arrington. This city has done a... but that was in the country then. HUNTLEY: Oh, yes, yes. But, see I lived in that area too. SHUTTLESWORTH: Did you? HUNTLEY: In Wenonah, Riley, and Over-the-mountain. ' ; Cause we use to hike and we would camp over there. SHUTTLESWORTH: I remember, we were talking about schooling, and then when I got in the, what was that, tenth grade I believe, we started going to Ro... we had a bus that carried us. HUNTLEY: You mean busing was back in that time? Was it a big issue at that time? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, it wasn' ; t a big issue at all. But, we were Black, who rode the buses, as I recall. I' ; m trying to-- I don' ; t remember if there were whites. There weren' ; t too many whites in that area, just one or two, in Oxmoor. We went for just a few minutes over in Wenonah, but then they took us out of Wenonah. We weren' ; t over there that long. I remember Mrs. Robert Crawford was the principal, she was tough too, they say. Then we went to Rosedale High School, under Professor Montgomery, so I graduated at age 18, in 1940, from Rosedale, same year my father died, died just a day or two after I got my robe and everything. HUNTLEY: Is that right? What do you remember about your high school days? Were you active in extracurricular activities? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, yes, yes. We rode the bus, typical boy, I get into boyhood fights and things like that, but never no mean-- no knives, no guns. And at that time, if you killed one person, you were marked for life. I remember our bus driver had killed a man. There was always a stigma on you although you liked the man. It' ; s unfortunate now. Murder and violence has become a sort of a normal thing. But we would ride to school, and Hugh Jackson and I, we carried on a lot of foolishness, we would laugh at anything. We were, for instance, on the bus, like going to school, he would be sitting up front and I' ; m in the back. We would be talking about kidding some of other kid whose... one of their, Joe Nathan, I believe it was, his father had gone to jail for stealing a cow. And so Hugh Jackson said to me, we were in the front. He said, Fred! Yeah! So and so' ; s daddy went to jail. I said, what did he go for? He said, He picked up a cow with a tail on it. HUNTLEY: Just always keeping something up? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, but in school, and I respected Dr. Ben Montgomery a lot. I was very apt in school, always through school. Not to take any credit, it just was my gift. Then God had me prepared for the Movement because you see, at one time in the Movement, I could go to the telephone and dial a hundred numbers if I wanted to without looking in the book. If I called your number twice, I could commit it to memory. It was a part of-- what I' ; m saying is God has somebody for every job, and He especially equips you for that, and I had the apt phrase. I could-- I didn' ; t have to study for words. Dr. King would wonder and say, how can you say things, I have to think when I' ; m up there. I said, Well, God prepared it. But at Rosedale, I wanted to always play football. I couldn' ; t catch a baseball, so I never tried too much. At Oxmoor, we had boxing and all this kind of stuff. And I remember, I guess this pulls to my desire to foolheartedness, I always wanted to play football, and they didn' ; t have the uniforms, the gear. And I would get up in my regular pants and shirt and be tackling folks on the field ' ; cause I wanted to do it. And how I got togged was, the young man ... this was Rosedale High, named Sawyer, called him Pap Sawyer, was playing one day and got his arm broke in three places tackling, and pulled off his togs on the--, and I picked them up and put them on. HUNTLEY: That' ; s where you got your togs? SHUTTLESWORTH: That' ; s how I got my togs and went right on. It didn' ; t affect me that his arm was laying there in a twisted grotesque way. But I had wanted the thing. So, this is it. In high school I made very good marks, actually I never made under a B in school, even in college, but I was the valedictorian in my class. Another young boy named Henry Williams was the salutatorian. In Selma University I was the valedictorian and Autherine Lucy, who went to the University of Alabama, was right behind me. So, I was always up front. HUNTLEY: Oh, yes, so you' ; ve always been a leader then? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, I never sit in the back of a room unless I' ; m forced to. I always sit up front. I notice there' ; s some kids usually like to go in the back, think the teacher won' ; t call on them, but I always sit up front ' ; cause I would challenge. HUNTLEY: Was that because you wanted to be called on? SHUTTLESWORTH: I wanted to be called on. I wanted to participate. Well, mine is such a long story and I don' ; t know how you want to do this. HUNTLEY: Well, you just want to talk about it, ' ; cause I think that' ; s important. That' ; s part of that development, see. SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, yeah, okay, so at age 18 or 19, we had this youth thing. I forget what you call it, Y - something, it' ; s on the Y. And I began a new job working at Southern Club, before Southern Club.... HUNTLEY: Was this while you were in high school? SHUTTLESWORTH: After high school. I was sterilizing needles and things, where the doctors would examine people on welfare to see if they' ; re able to work and so forth. This is where I met Ruby, my girl who I married - the mother of my four children. HUNTLEY: The two of you were working there? SHUTTLESWORTH: She began working there, not in the doctor' ; s office. She was doing something else there. I just met her, and I liked her. She could have been a graduate nurse, had another quarter or something, but she didn' ; t want to do that. And I remember walking from the Southern Club on Fifth Avenue I believe it was then, to West End where she lived. Then I rode a bicycle across the mountain to Oxmoor. It was-- then we finally got married in ' ; 41. HUNTLEY: You were then what, 19? SHUTTLESWORTH: I was 19 when I married, and she was too. HUNTLEY: Let me ask you, before we talk about that, how did the death of Mr. Shuttlesworth affect the family? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, he had, we call it consumption, basically, but he coughed and spat a lot. But he was a vigorous person up until a few months before he died, before he got real down. We weren' ; t very close ' ; cause he was very hard, and my cousin who was born with me in Montgomery -- my mother had a sister and she had a son -- we both were born in the same room in Mt. Meigs. So, my cousin stayed with us awhile. He was very abusive to him and to me too, sometimes. And we weren' ; t very close, though I respect him -- I had to respect him, he was older. But when he got down sick, when he got down...well, let me, this is an incident, I guess you' ; re talking about formative years, in 1937, my mother and my stepfather would periodically get into fights. And, he didn' ; t have much wind. He was short-winded, very short-winded. And she was a fiery type person. I guess I get some of that too. And if he would start at her, she would get on about something, I don' ; t even know whether women or what, but she would just nag him, get on him, so he didn' ; t have much wind, but once in a while, he' ; d tell her, Buddy, I' ; m gonna do so and so, I' ; m gonna slap so and so out of you. And so, he would once in a while whap her, and then she' ; d get on him like white on rice, he was trying to move out but he didn' ; t have much wind to resist. And I don' ; t need to talk about all of these times, but I remember one time, my mother had one eye as you know from 1937 on. HUNTLEY: What happened to her? SHUTTLESWORTH: They were moving in a struggle and I remember my mother had a broom handle and was hitting at him, and he had a chair and he held that chair up and the broom handle split. Now I' ; m looking at this as a boy, and that slit went right into her eye. And you could see the (inaudible) or whatever you call it. She accused him of knocking her eye out, and we thought that too, we just took it that, you knocked my eye out, but she never did have an eye after that. I guess these little incidents that you want to know, it' ; s, so I' ; m, at this time I was around about maybe fifteen, this was back before I (inaudible). And we were going to discipline him for knocking mama' ; s eye out. Which as I recall now, actually, I' ; m looking at stick the (inaudible) up in her eye. He was holding the chair up and she hit it and it slid in her eye. So, my oldest sister, the one that' ; s older, and my brother, his first child, we were going to discipline him. We knew he didn' ; t have much wind, so we had figured out that we were going to take him on. Mama had been sick, and she was in the hospital. Mama had another child, two or three children, after she-- And so, we were going to go in the kitchen and he was going to come in and I was going to be ready, and sister was going to say something and Gene was going to bring up the rear, and I was going to grab him. See, I knew if we grabbed him we had him you know. It' ; s an amazing thing. Young people never think that old people have been where they' ; re going. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right, absolutely. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, Sister was coming from this room with the broom, she was gone hit him with the broom, Eugene was gone come from this door and confront him, and I was gone grab him. And Papa sensed something that morning, so I started on him and I said, Yeah, you knocked mama' ; s eye out, haven' ; t you? You ain' ; t gonna get away with it either. And so, he was aware, but he was watching. So, Sister began coming through this door with the broom and Gene started through the door, and Papa standing there, What the hell y' ; all gone do? Everybody went everywhere. (Laughter) And I' ; m glad to this day I never touched him you know. I don' ; t think young folks should attack their parents for any reason, I just... But I' ; m talking about boyhood situations. I had a typical boyhood childish life just like everybody else. But I was religiously motivated, and we were disciplined. My mother did not allow us to talk back. HUNTLEY: You had that foundation, that grounding. SHUTTLESWORTH: If my mother called my name, I didn' ; t only answer, I had to go to her. I raised my children the same way. She and Papa was this way. If he called me, I had to get up and go, all of us. I even, in my children, I think I might have been pretty strong, but I didn' ; t allow them to whine and pamper after if you get through, if you had to discipline? And my second girl, I kid her sometimes now, she has grandchildren. She' ; s a toughy, you know, she' ; s gone, I say, Alright, whenever you get ready to end up, I' ; m through. I' ; m putting the belt on, you know, or switch. I' ; d say, when you smile, I' ; m through. And that' ; s a hard thing, but I did not allow them to go off and pout, and I think now, a part of young people' ; s inability to cope is that they can sulk with life. You can' ; t sulk. Mine had to be a done situation. HUNTLEY: I remember that too. SHUTTLESWORTH: My mother didn' ; t allow me to pout. She' ; d come after we' ; d get through and if you were in a corner somewhere pouting and (sniffs), she' ; d put a little more on you, you know, to help you get over it. HUNTLEY: I remember my mama whipping me, and my brother, " ; Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!" ; (laughter, inaudible) SHUTTLESWORTH: But then you got to thank the older people for discipline and pray that at least somewhere we can get back to understanding that without discipline nobody makes a success. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. At 19, you met the woman that you were going to spend the rest of your life with? SHUTTLESWORTH: I think I was nineteen and a half, somewhere around there. Nineteen I met her. We stayed married 27 and a half years. And we married and lived in a two bedroom on Eighth Avenue and Twenty-fourth Street here in Birmingham. She had an aunt. Her aunt right over her had been a twin and she was the only one that directly over her and married to her uncle, so Adele and Josh, we called them, were the closest relatives. Adele had another aunt that lived down here by the juvenile thing on Green Street in there somewhere. They was her closest relatives, she didn' ; t have many. HUNTLEY: Was she from Birmingham? SHUTTLESWORTH: She was from Birmingham originally out on Lomb Avenue, 824 Washington Avenue. And we got married, and we... I had my mother' ; s sister, which is my cousins, she was my favorite aunt. So, between these two aunts we would do. And we didn' ; t have much money, and it' ; s an amazing thing. People need to perhaps know this. We had, I got working at the Alpha-Portland Cement Plant out there. HUNTLEY: Oh, okay. Right off of Jefferson. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, right. Four dollars let me see -- fifty-four cents an hour. HUNTLEY: How long did you work out there? SHUTTLESWORTH: I made 54 cents and the man who had been working there for 16 years was making 52 cents. But I was the car hooker in the quarry, hooked the thing to pull it up on the rock up to be crushed. And our budget was so narrow ' ; til we didn' ; t have but about two-and-a-half dollars to live on for two weeks, got paid every two weeks, didn' ; t we? My wife would buy a lot of corn and English peas. I used to say in church sometimes, she English pea-ed me to death. I don' ; t like them today. But this is it, and then we didn' ; t stay there very long. I always wanted to buy a house. That' ; s another thing, from a child. So, we went out here to, I don' ; t know where you call this little place, it' ; s right below the Number Ten mine, little area there in Wenonah. It' ; s not Wenonah, but you call it something -- Toppler City. HUNTLEY: Toppler City, okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: A man named William Croon sold us a house, had four rooms, for $750. I thought we were doing great things. So, he gave me whatever it was on that house. Folks think lawsuits -- and I' ; ve been in about forty lawsuits -- that' ; s the first lawsuit I got in. The house was about five feet on somebody else' ; s property. And we learned that, and he wouldn' ; t move it, so that was the first lawsuit that I... But he did move it. Incidentally, this is the same house that the state tried to get when, you know, they took my car in this Montgomery Times suit. And they checked into that property, but as the Lord would have it... and I' ; m ahead of myself, I had got the Rev. L. J. Rogers to make me a deed, back, and they did move the house, and he finally put two block houses there. They would have taken that property also, but it was a deed from me to Rogers, although I had the real deed and just hadn' ; t filed it yet, they would have taken it. They did take my fifty-seven Plymouth car and they took some properties from Ralph Abernathy and others. HUNTLEY: Well, when you, after marriage, you went to work, you worked for a while at the cement plant? SHUTTLESWORTH: I worked at the cement plant until... and these dates may be a little hazy in my mind. Worked there for at least three years, but I remember I could walk to work, it wasn' ; t that far from Toppler City over there. And then, the first child was born in that house, Patricia Ann, in 1943. We married in 1941, she was born in 1943, January, or February, January. And then I had met another young man named Dewitt, and Dave, this is how, you know, my life is almost like Abraham' ; s, vagabond, going around. And we decided that we would go, where we started, to work at this Bechtel-McCone airplane factory here in Birmingham. We wanted to work there so we could get in defense work. Instead of that, we took mech-- automobile mechanics, and under the government work. That' ; s how I learned how to, you know, I used to overhaul my own motors and things. HUNTLEY: Oh, you did? SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, yeah. Although I had a natural inclination for things like that, but, took 700 and some hours of training. And we decided that we would go to Mobile, start work in the shipyards to make some money. You know, everybody was trying to make money then, shipyards. HUNTLEY: Defense work, more or less. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right. So Dewitt had a family here, his friend Dave, he didn' ; t have a family, but he had a cousin in Mobile who was named Iola, and she lived in an old barber' ; s house with a porch go all the way around the house, and a round barber shop about the size of this room, on the corner. So, we decided that we would stay with her until we got places to go. So, I left my wife and child at our house, and we went on down to Mobile. As the Lord would have it, it' ; s amazing how God fixes you for what you have to do. We went to the federal government' ; s Brookley Air Force Base the very next day, didn' ; t get to the shipyards. We got hired, all three of us, as truck drivers. HUNTLEY: On the base? SHUTTLESWORTH: On the base. Brookley Air Force Base. And we got jobs where I didn' ; t have anything to do. I could drive my truck and take people to a place and park it all day. Sometimes, like these joints between the runway, just scrape the old out and put fresh tar, and that would be one thing, and sometimes other stuff. And that' ; s all I had to do. Sometimes, I just, if I went that morning I didn' ; t have anything to do but to park my car and read my Bible all day. So, I was lured to the Bible. I concentrated, I didn' ; t have anything to do but that. HUNTLEY: How long were you there? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, we went in, let' ; s see, was it forty-three, I believe it was. HUNTLEY: Okay. Did you bring your family down? SHUTTLESWORTH: Not yet. This is how the Lord does. You skirt on the edge of disaster and yet you are guided. You know that scripture in the Bible that says, " ; The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord" ; ? That' ; s as true as you can believe. So, at this time, I have never believed in people just living prolific, rough lives. I' ; ve always, I was trained up basically religious and to have some respect for yourself. So, I was the youngest of the trio of us. Now in this barber shop, which wasn' ; t, it was a round as I recall it, it was round, not square like this room, but not too much more room than in here. And there were three young women lived there, one of them was real light skinned, another one' ; s about your color, another one slightly darker, but all were nice-looking girls. But the light-skinned girl just took a-- oh, she just-- And all we had to do, see, once we went to work, went to work from 3:30 to 11:00 I believe it was, we would sit out and play checkers. See, that' ; s all we did. The cousin, Dave' ; s -- what was Dave' ; s last name? -- Dewitt was Dewitt Murphy. Dave' ; s cousin named Iola, nice looking, dark, dark-skinned, but she was taking care of this old man. He was real old. And she just cooked and he... I don' ; t know what their arrangements were. And she, she (inaudible), but what-- SHUTTLESWORTH: I didn' ; t hate them, many light-skinned people around. But I just never, I never wanted to be called black by them, I just thought that you know, you hear kids calling each other that. The other thing that made it bad, she would come out and wear just a bra and shorts. Which I thought was practically ungodly for a woman at that time in the 40s. My puritanical, I guess, my, I wasn' ; t so puritanical but I just-- HUNTLEY: That was your upbringing. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. And maybe I could have liked her a little better if she hadn' ; t been so pushy. I couldn' ; t move, she wanted move for me [inaudible], and so Dewitt' ; s cousin' ; s, Iola, she always empathized with her. Now the other two girls, very seldom even, I didn' ; t see them hardly, they would come by once in a while and keep moving. One of them there I thought was nice, fairly nice, I could have kind of liked her. Also, at this time, the government was paying $50 a month as you recall. And all three of those girls liked me, I didn' ; t know it, and this girl, the light-skin, she wanted to give me her check, and I never believed in men living off women, that' ; s another principle. And I thought it was ungodly for her to do something like this. So, I liked her that much less. But the one I could have liked, she was quiet, and you know, in a situation where one person is gonna take over to do, other people just sort of hang back. And that' ; s why I guess the Lord-- And then we were sitting down discussing it one day, Dewitt, Dave and me, and we were playing checkers. She had been there, and Iola had suggested that I ought to take her to the movies, since she liked me so well. I say, Well, I just don' ; t like her, and I don' ; t play with people, I don' ; t carry people on. She said, well, you can be nice to people. She said, there' ; s nothing wrong with you, and there ain' ; t nothing wrong with her liking you. Well, she' ; d never said anything like this. So she went back in the house, I think she' ; s tricking and fooling, and you know, these things, now, say something to me. Dewitt and Dave said, you know what, he said, Fred is the damnedest fool I ever seen, and-- HUNTLEY: Were they married as well? SHUTTLESWORTH: Dewitt was married. He had family here. Dave was not married. I said, " ; What do you mean?" ; He said, " ; You got three women crazy about you and you don' ; t like none of them." ; And Dave said, " ; No, he' ; s got four, say, ' ; cause my cousin Iola likes him." ; I said to myself, my God, look at what I' ; m into, to myself. So it was that situation that made me, we had been there about a week and few days, and government paid twice a month, and we got a partial payment. And it was then that I decided with this partial payment to come back home, get my wife and baby at that time, and move down to Mobile, we moved into a project. Now it wasn' ; t that I was so good, and I don' ; t want to say that I would not have gotten involved slightly, at least, with the one I would have liked. But the other one just pushed. So, this was God' ; s way of keeping me, because you can get into this immorality stuff and just really... And I thank God for that now. HUNTLEY: Your surroundings will make you see things. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, yeah. So, I came back home and got my wife and the child, we were churching. Another thing you might be interested in -- I don' ; t know how long I' ; m supposed to talk -- I was reared up in a Methodist church out here in Oxmoor. St. Matthew AME, I go out there now and do the services. I never forget your raising ; I don' ; t think you ever get too large to go back to where your roots were. And I consider it an honor to see the old people and go back to those places. And my mother was a Methodist. I had sucked a moving toward the ministry by the time I was 18, seventeen-and-a-half, and I had spoken to my pastor about it, and he said, and in ' ; 43 he was to take me to the presiding bishop in October, I think that' ; s when the Methodists meet. But we left Birmingham in June, you see, or July going to Mobile. And he was going to take me and ask for the licentiate to get my license if the mission (inaudible) approved. But we went to Mobile, so naturally I wanted to follow my upbringing and stay with the Methodist church. As God would have it, we had some good friends in the Baptist church. And the Lord had always been good to me. People just take to me for some reason. I don' ; t know why. And some people in the Baptist church were just real nice, and said, come up and visit us, and so I always was apt, and like I' ; d get up and do a Sunday School lesson and so forth, just took to me. And there were people, the whole church was friendly, well, this was Corinthian Baptist Church. And the St. Paul Methodist Church was down the street, oh, maybe two blocks away. And I tried to go there, but it looks as if there was something about the services that was just cold, methodic and cold. And it was a difference in their worship at this Baptist church, and of course, I was raised up, you know, in Oxmoor and got a good Baptist church there, and we would go down there, we respect them, but I never thought of being a Baptist. And I said to my wife on a couple of occasions, I said, you know it' ; s a strange thing, I don' ; t feel like I feel. I said, I' ; m sort of leaning to this. She said, Well, you know we' ; re Methodist, and her family was Methodist and so forth. And we had to drive up from Mobile to Birmingham several times, and I told her aunt and my mother, I said, You know it' ; s a strange thing, but I have a feeling I never felt before about this, I' ; m really sort of leaning, she said, well, you know you' ; re (inaudible). So we just didn' ; t make too much out of it. I went back to Mobile and I had acknowledged to the pastor there that I felt the call to ministry, and they invite, welcome to the church. But I had to go back and settle the issue of the Methodist church, and I said, well Ruby, let' ; s go -- my wife Ruby -- let' ; s go to church, and so she said -- and it look like the service was so cold, and the minister was preaching, looked like he was doing a strange-- and I said, Well, you know, I' ; m really considering joining this other church, and then I went (inaudible). I was almost tempted to join the next Sunday, but I went back Methodist church again, but it just didn' ; t take. HUNTLEY: So, you went back to the Methodist church twice? SHUTTLESWORTH: I went back three times, three or four times. So the next Sunday, I went back to this Baptist church. Now I remember the sermon that pastor preached, over in Samuel where the Philistines had taken the arc and Samuel had recaptured it and brought it back. And he said, the text was, Samuel said, here I set my Ebenezer, for here truly the Lord has blessed me or helped me or something like that. And that sort of made me realize you have to make a decision and prove what the Lord has done. And I remember that particular sermon out of many which I-- so I joined that church that day, here I set my Ebenezer. Now the historical backdrop is this -- had I been in the Methodist church, I could not be where I am today in the civil rights because the Bishop would have the say, and he was here in Birmingham. A young Methodist minister out in Ensley got in trouble with the Bishop because he would bring people to the Movement and so forth. HUNTLEY: So, they' ; ll move you? SHUTTLESWORTH: They can move you around. They can dilute. And so, I remember in ' ; 74, he was in Durham, North Carolina, a young man, and I went there and spoke for him at Durham, North Carolina, at the University and other things, he had a big Methodist church there. And he told about how his Bishop had done him. So, my point is that I would not have freedom of speech and expression. In the Baptist church as long as I can get along with my folks-- and so, I was free, I could say what I wanted to say. No Bishop, no President, nobody came, nobody else could tell me what to say-- HUNTLEY: In your congregation. SHUTTLESWORTH: --and I was absolutely free. And when I got to Bethel, now it' ; s a long history of -- and I' ; m just in Mobile, I told you my life was like a vagabond. Then the second child was born, Ruby. HUNTLEY: Born in Mobile? SHUTTLESWORTH: In Mobile. Ruby, my wife, we wanted a boy, my wife named her Ruby and I knew a boy was coming after awhile, I sent the certificate back and named her Ruby Fredericka. That' ; s the second girl. And then the third child was a boy, he was born in September, forty-six. Now in Mobile... HUNTLEY: What' ; s his name? SHUTTLESWORTH: Fred, Jr. Now, I have started taking training, must understand. I was working during the day, going to school out in the country. My wife was with me now, out in a place like would be Bessemer from here, taking night school for four nights a week. HUNTLEY: What did you-- SHUTTLESWORTH: My theological training, ministers would come and take a little theology, a little this, a little that and the other. But I had a gift, and when the minister licensed me, Rev. E. A. Palmer, at Corinthian, when I joined the church, he let me preach my trial sermon, baptized me -- I was the first man he had baptized. And, of course, and licensed. HUNTLEY: This was in Mobile? SHUTTLESWORTH: Mobile, in ' ; 44, licensed in ' ; 45, as I recall. So then I preached around (?), and that gift, and everybody allowed me to do, you know, preach at the churches and in the district. I had this gift, and so as the Lord would have it, it' ; s just so many-- and you have to just direct how you want this to go-- HUNTLEY: We' ; re going good. This is important, you' ; re talking about foundations. SHUTTLESWORTH: The white Baptists had what is known in Mobile as Goodwill Missionary to the Negroes. (Laughing) That' ; s interesting in these times. HUNTLEY: Goodwill Missionaries. SHUTTLESWORTH: Old Dr. Maynard and his wife, retired white minister and his wife, they took an unusual interest in me and my family, but they had I guess had seen some-- knew I was taking this theological training, and they sought to help, little help they could give us -- although I was working, I didn' ; t need a whole lot. But they took it to be sure that I would continue my religious training. And here' ; s what really made me... I had a permanent job with the government. I had... not being a truck driver, but tow motor operator now, where you stack things. My job was permanent with the government, I could have been working as long as, you know. But we went to Mobile to save money, at the end of one year we had exactly $93 saved and I said to her, Ruby, I said I could pick up $93 worth of sticks in one year, in a year. I said, Something' ; s wrong, we' ; re not saving money. I said, What I' ; m going to do, I said, I have a feeling that my life, for some reason, is designed to touch many people. I don' ; t know why I feel like this. I said, So I' ; m going to school to prepare myself. Whatever God wants me to do I don' ; t know. I had no idea, of civil rights. I had no idea of going by two rural churches, and the historic First Baptist Church -- First Baptist Church is usually " ; Fust" ; Baptist Church -- and that' ; s where I really got ready in Selma for the Civil Rights Movement, I went through... So, I said I' ; m going to school. Well, she never did contradict me cause she knew I was going to do what I thought I should do anyway. She said, Well, if that' ; s what you feel. So, I began -- I would have gone to school in 1946, but she was pregnant. I have great reservations about men running off and leaving their wives, husbands leaving their wives in distress. Dr. Maynard and others wanted me to go that year, but I said, no, I' ; m not going to leave my wife. I said I' ; ll try to go next year. So, I went on and worked until the next year, and I remember being in the theological contest, oratorical contest, I was-- come up to Selma University, see, from the Mobile thing, and there was people from other areas. HUNTLEY: You represented the Mobile district? SHUTTLESWORTH: Represented the Mobile. I had learned an oration and D. L. Motley, who was pastoring, he was in Selma, they had churches, little rural churches, and so I went up and Motley orated, and when I orated, man, the whole-- and the president said, Well, you know, I would be glad to have you, we' ; ve got property back here, we' ; ve got a little property we' ; re going to build for married students. Which was just right, and I said, Well, I' ; d like to go to school, I told my wife-- HUNTLEY: This is at Selma University? SHUTTLESWORTH: Selma University, President Dinkins. He said, We' ; d be glad to help you if you could come. Dr. Maynard and his wife, they were always encouraging. But the boy was born now in ' ; 46. So in September of ' ; 47, now you must remember -- I told you I had these gifts -- the government always stows away, at that time, a lot of, still does, aviators' ; coats, salvage yard, tear down buildings, so what -- I was driving a truck now, and instead of carrying some of that lumber to the salvage yard, I just, I had gotten with a young man, we bought a lot on -- mine faced Jett Street, and his faced Atwood Street. I said, now, if you help me build me a house, I' ; ll help you build you a house. I had never taken training, but we built these (audible), 12 by 24, two rooms. Then I try and help him build him one. And then I hauled a lot of that lumber that the government was going to send to the salvage yard, I just piled up on mine, and eventually made that 12 room into a 24 foot room. I figured out how to extend, and it was an old man that loaned to Corinthian church who helped me, you know. There is always help when you want to do something. So, I, on my own I had a house, five rooms, my own house, which, when I left Mobile-- and I put in, my purpose in saying this, I put in my own gas, put in my own pipes, I can do that now, and I bought a butane tank, had my gas, and of course, so when I got ready to go to school, I dug my tank up and put it on the truck, bought a cow from a market, dressed out the 450 pounds of beef -- I had too much beef! -- and piled up the stuff, truck, oh, high, way up high, big truck. And it was a hurricane going on in Mobile at that time when we left, but people came and wished us well and had prayer. It was a beautiful day. I went on to Selma. We got there, and we lived in this house back down there. The president of the university, well-educated man but if his wife hadn' ; t had some money, he would have starved to death, President Dinkins. Yet he could speak some five or seven languages, he told me about it. But he just couldn' ; t get things going. So, I moved in this house, I put my own tank, hooked it up and everything. He said, Well, Mr. Shuttlesworth, and of course I glazed some windows and I fired the boiler in the girls' ; dormitory, get up early in the morning. There wasn' ; t too much he could do because they didn' ; t have that much money. Selma University has always been poor. HUNTLEY: So, you were a Godsend to the university then? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: In more ways than one. SHUTTLESWORTH: More ways than one. So he said, But I' ; ll tell you what I' ; ll do, he said, Now I could buy you a cow and you could pay for it by giving the school two quarts of milk a day, 14 ¼ cents, and then all over that that you have, you' ; ll buy it for 14¼ cents. And that' ; s how I helped myself a little bit. And I remember the cow had twin calves and that was the first thing I got in the paper way back then. A cow having twin calves was unusual. Of course, the cow died a little later. But I worked and started Selma University, glad to be in school, and we made it. We didn' ; t have much, but we didn' ; t have to starve, and then my wife, being about a year being close to having nurse' ; s training, began working at Burwell Infirmary. HUNTLEY: She had nurse training in Birmingham? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, before, she was going to Tuskegee before, when she lived in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: So, she did go to Tuskegee? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, she didn' ; t lack but about three months from being a full graduated nurse. And so, she started working at Burwell Infirmary, they liked her over there. President Dinkins was a dyed-in-the-wool Baptist, he just didn' ; t think Baptists and Catholics should have anything to do-- And even as a young man, I never did let people just dictate to me and run over me. So, he would see her, he' ; d be coming early in the morning, I' ; d be getting up, you know, and he' ; d be coming down from his home to the school, be reading the paper, walking, reading the paper. Remember once a dog jumped at him, he fell over the thing, not paying attention. Just that he was that kind of eccentric person, but a nice person. And so, one day he told me, he said, Oh, Mr. Shuttlesworth -- never did call me reverend -- oh, your wife work with Catholics? Because, you know, Baptists don' ; t have anything to do with Catholics, no, no, no. And so, when he got through I said, Mr. Dinkins, nobody tells my wife what to do but me. I said, Now, you' ; ve helped me put in a few windowpanes, and I appreciated you buying the cow, but that' ; s, I can' ; t live out of that. And he was so taken aback, he didn' ; t expect my response, he never mentioned it again. She just kept right on working and of course the Lord blessed us. Well, in Selma, the same as in Mobile, I got friends, Danny Pritchards, a deacon at First Baptist, and I started going to school there, naturally, Sunday school and church, my gift, I guess, made a way for me. And this is forty-seven. In July ' ; 48, a church called me and eleven miles beyond, Everdale Baptist. And in October another one on this side, four miles west of Selma, called, so I had two rural churches. HUNTLEY: Two churches? SHUTTLESWORTH: Two rural churches, same year. HUNTLEY: First and third and second and fourth? SHUTTLESWORTH: Right. Well, the first was a one-Sunday, third Sunday, church, and they, the church had been built for $1500 the year I was born, 1922, and yet they owed $6000 on it. You can imagine. HUNTLEY: Wow. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, they call me, a college student, you know, and I go out there, and I remember in our very first meeting. I think my preparation has been thorough, the Lord just brought me through things, and not having training from older people in knowing how to do it, my sense of what' ; s right and what' ; s morally right always guided me, so I remember the very first meeting. They had every year at that church they called in preachers, some preachers been called there five times or more. So, they called me and just didn' ; t have but three deacons, one of them, he read the (?). You want to hear this? I said, What is there to hear? He said, Well you want to hear me just read this? I said, Well, go ahead and read it. He said, Everdale Baptist Church called Rev. F. L. Shuttlesworth for the year 1948 and 49. I said, Read that again. So, he read it, Everdale Baptist Church called Rev. F. L. Shuttlesworth for the year 1948 and 49. I said, Then you still don' ; t have a pastor. Well, no, we called, we want you. I said, No, that' ; s been your problem, I think, calling pastors every year instead of going on and doing. I said, now, I don' ; t have a church, I' ; m in school, and I don' ; t really need one, I said, y' ; all called me. Well, we want you. I said, well, no, but don' ; t call me every year. I said, I believe that the Holy Spirit has something to do with the churches and if you follow him you don' ; t need to have a pastor every year. A young man, 26 years old. And he said, Well, we want you. I said, Well, no, I won' ; t even come. I said, And I' ; m ready to dismiss the meeting. Go and y' ; all can call someone. No, we want you. I said, Well, the only way you can have me is to make it indefinite. I said, And I' ; m not asking you, because I don' ; t need no church. Well, we want you. I said, Okay. I want to move we make it indefinite. I said, You don' ; t have to, I said, but this is your last vote on me today. HUNTLEY: You were twenty-five years old at this time? SHUTTLESWORTH: Twenty-six. HUNTLEY: Twenty-six years old. SHUTTLESWORTH: This is ' ; 48 ; I was born in ' ; 22. July of ' ; 48. So they made it unanimous. And in that very meeting I think I set the tone of how the church should be run. I said, Okay, now you say you think you owe six thousand dollars debt, I said, but we have to find out from the man what it is. I said, Okay, let' ; s check, how many deacons you got? They said, We got three. I said, I don' ; t know them, they' ; re alright with me. Are they alright with you? I said, Because these people are the people you' ; re going to have to work with. Anybody who knows anything about why they shouldn' ; t be deacons you have the right now to say it because these are the people I' ; m going to work with. We' ; ve got to get this debt paid. And all of a sudden the fellow, he said, Well, I don' ; t have nothing against Jones and Sears, but that Parker, the only reason he don' ; t take a drink of liquor, he can' ; t get it -- he drink liquor like a snake, like a fish. And people (imitates clamor of people talking), and I said, Just a minute. I asked anybody to say honestly what you know. I said, He has courtesy and you don' ; t. You talk about people. I don' ; t believe in talking about-- I said, Now is the time for him to say, in the church -- we' ; re here in the name of the Lord -- what' ; s wrong. I said, He has the courage. So, let him say that. I said, Anybody else? No (whispered). And then here comes my judgmental quality, I said, and I began wondering how I was going to solve this thing. I said, No, he' ; s right. I asked him to say this, and you have the right too. I said, Now there ain' ; t but one way of dealing with this, I said, ' ; cause righteousness determines that we try to follow Biblical standards. I said, Now, I think his name was Brother Jones, Now, Brother Jones if you have followed the Bible in this then we can deal with this. If you' ; ve thought about it, if you can tell us now that you have, see the Bible says if you have, know a brother with a fault, you go to the him and talk to him, between you and him, if not then you tell us. I said, now, have you done this to Brother Parker? Because if you did then Brother Parker can' ; t be a deacon. He said, Well, no, I ain' ; t said nothing to him. I said, Well we can' ; t deal with it that. Now Brother Parker, I don' ; t know you, it is said that, but you have an opportunity to straighten up. And that' ; s the way I did it, and folks saw that wisdom and they were just carried away, you know. It went on and moved on into it. I said, They have a knack -- it was out in the country you know, they have a knack of, timeliness is another thing. I think this was a good thing that I used in the Movement, I believe in time. I said, Alright, what time are we going to have service? I said, You set the time, now, but when you set it, be sure and be here ' ; cause I' ; m going to be here and we' ; re going to, and they had a knack, people have a knack of voting one thing and doing another. So, they said, What time are we starting at, what time is Sunday School hour? So okay. So ' ; bout the time for church, they wanted me to start Sunday school, so I had been in that Sunday morning, waiting, and so half of them come down the street, just about the time they were coming in the door I said, Let us stand: [singing] " ; Blest be the tie that binds--" ; (Laughter) They always came on time after that. HUNTLEY: Because they knew you were going to start. SHUTTLESWORTH: It' ; s an amazing thing if people would just... but you see I' ; m hard on myself, not just on other people, and I think you should sort of try to find the line. But went on, and I don' ; t guess I have time to tell you how we found out how much of a debt and why. But anyway, we went to the man with a hundred dollars and I was hoping to get him to give us a receipt off of the six thousand or whatever it was -- sixty-five hundred they owed, and this is in Selma now. And this old man owned the store, people come from miles around, he was about 80, and he was cussing me out and said I didn' ; t look like no damn preacher. HUNTLEY: Was this a Black man or white man? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, white man, an old white man owned the store, you know. Everybody come, this was the biggest thing in Selma - on Water Street as I recall near the L & ; N Station, and he said, No-- I had my little deacon with me, you know, and we had this hundred dollars, I was real proud, you know. HUNTLEY: Hundred dollars is big money. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. He said, No, preacher, I' ; m going to put hay in the damn building. He said, You ain' ; t the first preacher to come up here. He said these Negroes ain' ; t gonna do nothing but just keep telling lies, they supposed to done paid for that building. Then that' ; s when I learned how much -- it just didn' ; t cost but fifteen hundred dollars in ' ; 22, the year I was born. He said all that' ; s interest. So he was, he was really insulting. So, he called his son who was much older than I was. He said, Son, go bring me my so-and-so book. And he looked at it and he said, Now, he said, Reverend, now course these niggers ain' ; t gonna do nothing, said, But I' ; m gone give you a break. Said, you look like you' ; re a smart young man, but I' ; m telling you now, you ain' ; t the first preacher, they been coming here telling me all the time what they were gone do but I' ; m about ready to close the building up and put hay in it. I said, Well you can put hay in it, I said, but if you gave others a chance, I would hope you' ; d give me a chance. We' ; ll get it paid. And he said, Well -- looked at the book -- he said, Now tell the truth about it, all this mostly is interest. He said, I' ; ll tell you what I' ; m going to do, preacher, for you. I' ; m gone knock it off, it' ; s sixty-five hundred, I' ; m gone knock it back to forty-five hundred. I could have hugged that old man. I said, Would you give me a receipt on it for that? And so, I took a receipt back to the church for forty-four hundred dollars instead of sixty-five hundred. It was sort of a glorious thing, to them, you know. And we went on, and when I left there in ' ; 50 we had got it down to, what, thirty-nine hundred, something like that. No, it wasn' ; t that, I wasn' ; t out there but another year. But this shows you how a problem, now, I said okay, it' ; s a third Sunday church. I said, Well, let' ; s set the first Sunday since we owe this money, and I' ; m gonna give fifty cents and ask everybody to give fifty cents a month. Now some of those people weighed bales of cotton. One fellow weighed 15 bale one year, another one weighed, one fellow named Jack Pettaway, who, you had to drive right by his house to get to the church. House sat as close to the street as that wall, and one of his fields was right across in front of me, and at that time I' ; d go out and go to the field. Jack demonstrated to me one day he could shoot a rabbit' ; s eye out. He wouldn' ; t shoot him in the bed kicking, he said, he' ; d say he' ; s gone come around there, watch him, say, they always go around and come back where they come from. He said, I' ; m gone wait till he gets around there and I' ; m gone shoot him. And sure enough he shot that rabbit through the eye, didn' ; t even hit him in the body. He was a crack shot, and I had to drive right by his house everyday. He said, But I ain' ; t with the first Sunday, said, that' ; s St Luke' ; s day. I said, You don' ; t have nothing to do with St. Luke, that' ; s-- St. Luke was a Methodist church anyway. I said, You' ; re belong to Everdale, and you ought to, I said, Now, fifty cents ain' ; t gone hurt you. He said, Well I just ain' ; t with it. I said, Now, I don' ; t think you supposed to be in the church and say what you ain' ; t gone do when you can. And we were walking along the field, he was plowing, as I recall, that day, and I walked up two, three rows with him. I said, Well, now, Jack, why don' ; t you just try to understand that the church belongs to the Lord, and we' ; re all working together. I said, I don' ; t have anything. Said, last year, you made five bales of cotton, so at fifty cents-- He said, Yes, I can give it, but I just ain' ; t. I said, You realize you' ; re talking to the pastor of the church and you realize that you can' ; t stand up in a church and say what you ain' ; t gonna do. He said, Well I' ; m telling you, and you can do what you want to about it. He didn' ; t make no (?). I said, Well, Jack, you know, I said, Brother Pettaway, you know if you don' ; t give the fifty cents and you' ; re able, I' ; m gonna have to turn you out. He said, You do what you have to do. I' ; ve always been tested for courage. It' ; s an unusual thing. So, I said to him, Alright I hope you' ; ll think about it. Said, Pray over it, I said, I' ; ve always believe in prayer. He said, I do to, but I just ain' ; t with that. HUNTLEY: He still wasn' ; t with that, huh? SHUTTLESWORTH: We had another little fellow out there, white hat, called Bat Smith. And they had gotten together that they weren' ; t gone pay, it' ; s a little group of them. Always it' ; s amazing how Satan-- HUNTLEY: (Laughing) It' ; s always a group there. SHUTTLESWORTH: So it so happened, I' ; m going to school and had start taking classes at Montgomery, driving fifty miles, and at one time I needed some gas and I had asked the deacons for I think it was sixteen dollars, that was over a period of time, not just one time. And they had gotten word of that, that I had spent sixteen dollars, and so I guess that sort of helps them in their wrong and not doing. So, we had a September meeting, this was in September of 1949. We were doing well, now, from the year we had already gotten that debt down, we really moved. So, I called the annual meeting. I called the meeting and I said, Now we' ; re going have to get it straight, we' ; re gonna have to get it straight, we' ; re gonna check the roll and everything. I never will forget this little fellow. I said, Why don' ; t ya' ; ll come on in and let' ; s start. They were under the tree talking and smoking. They said, Y' ; all go ahead we' ; ll be in, in, in a minute. We' ; ll get it straight. I said, Okay. We started, but they didn' ; t know, and I didn' ; t think, and I was wasn' ; t thinking I had so much special about me. So when they came in, I said, We want to read the roll. Now this same Parker that had accused been drinking at first, he put out a rumor that he had heard that I had a baby at another church at the same the other church was giving me an anniversary, had to be around September or October, they were getting ready, yeah, September, and this was getting ready for October, making plans. In fact, we had the invitation from this church to go to that one. And so they came in the meeting, and I said, Now we have to insist that we do the best we can, if anybody here can' ; t pay the fifty cents, that' ; s not a problem, but if you can pay it and, I said, Now I have some brothers that said they weren' ; t going to pay it. I said, And we at Everdale are not responsible for St. Luke' ; s business. And I said, Now I have to say this to the church and this is the first thing we' ; ll do today, I said, I talked to Brother Pettaway, I came out just later on this week, we talked twice, I said, but this week I came back. We walked in the field, plowing, and I asked him to give the fifty cents and he told me he wouldn' ; t. And I said, Brother Pettaway is that a fact, did I go up and talk with you? Yeah, he said. I said, Did you tell me that you were not going to do it, you could but you wouldn' ; t? Yeah. I said, And I also told you that if you didn' ; t and can, and won' ; t, and tell the church you won' ; t, then I' ; d have to ask to turn you out, right? Yeah. I said, Well have you considered, have you prayed over it like I asked you? He said, I prayed but I still ain' ; t with it. (Laugh) This -- I hope this doesn' ; t sound trite. HUNTLEY: No, no. SHUTTLESWORTH: I said, Well you know I told you that if you say you won' ; t, and can, I have to ask the church to turn you out. He said, Yeah, and I told you to do what you have to do. I said, Well alright. So, you won' ; t do it. No. I said, I want a motion. So, they made the motion and I turned him out. Now he had sons old as I was. Remember this is the same fellow I got to drive right by his house. Shot a rabbit' ; s eye out in front of me, but I wasn' ; t worried about that. So, he was turned out. And I said, Now, you may be excused. Said, Don' ; t, don' ; t have him go. I said, No, he doesn' ; t have anything to do with the business now if he ain' ; t gone participate. So he went on out, and so Bat Smith who led the little group on the other, I said, Alright brother Smith, I understand you, oh yeah, we were going to do, we understand that you got sixteen dollars. I said, Are you saying I stole the sixteen dollars? No, but you spent the sixteen. I said, Well let' ; s get that straight, that may be nice, I said, ' ; cause that ain' ; t got nothing to do with your job, though, see, doing your duty. Well, if you pay it back we' ; ll be out. I said, Brother Smith, that had nothing to do with this. In fact, I don' ; t think I' ; m gonna pay it back, ' ; cause I didn' ; t steal anything, I asked the officers for it to get gas to go to school. I said, you ought to appreciate that. I said, But just to help you out, I don' ; t think I have to and I don' ; t think the folks want me to do that, folks kinda grumbling. I said, but let' ; s let the folks vote on it. If they say I' ; ll pay it back, I still have to decide whether I' ; ll pay it. I said, All those who want me to pay it back stand up. Nobody stood up. I said, All those who want to forget it, stand up. Everybody stood up, including him. HUNTLEY: Including him! SHUTTLESWORTH: I said, Alright, now, but, Bat, that means forget it. Now, secretary read the roll of what Brother Smith owes. He had to come up and pay up. HUNTLEY: He did come up and pay up? SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Well this was (?), but that isn' ; t the worst thing I had-- churches are, but this was, I guess, part of my discipline. HUNTLEY: This is part of the preparation. SHUTTLESWORTH: Preparation. The worst situation I ever had was at First Baptist Selma before I got to Birmingham. And I must move on and tell you that. They had a minister at First Baptist, Grimmett, John Frank Grimmett, who -- I don' ; t know if he' ; s still alive, he teaches in Nashville -- but he was there. And you will remember that I told you J. D. Pritchard, he was superintendent of the Sunday School, a deacon and a trustee -- and sang in the choir. And he was real friendly, called me F. L., I called him J. D., you know. And so, this pastor had become involved with some woman or something, and he would stand up in the pulpit and fussed, just, it was terrible. So finally, he left in, what was it, October ' ; 49. I' ; m still at my two churches. You must remember I' ; m going to school in Montgomery, I' ; m working and different, oh, and I was getting so tense, but I still stayed in church. So the deacons at First Baptist -- and I worked for one of the deacons, the only Black plumber, named Ben Harrison, under the plumbing, doing all of that stuff. Wrench would slip, he' ; d cuss, he didn' ; t think nothing about it ' ; cause he never thought I' ; d be his pastor. And he, Pritchard and Dr. Brown, who was a pharmacist, the only Black pharmacist in Selma, they were the three people who had to do everything, and they did some ungodly things, the church didn' ; t have nothing to do with it, so I guess God had me going through that as a training. So, but they liked me at the church so that one morning -- Grimmett suddenly left the church -- I went to Sunday school, getting ready to go to my other church about one o' ; clock. They said, We want to see you after church -- the deacons. I said, Okay, but I' ; ve got to go. So when they, Pritchard said, Well, Reverend, you' ; ve got a good message and people here kind of like you and we think you can be a help to us and we can give help to you. I said, In what way? And Ben Harris, I never will forget him, Ben' ; s veins, just normally, would stretch along his temple like rope, just stand out very-- an old man but he was nice old person, he was kind of mean, and he took over and he said, Well, what we' ; d like for you to do is set your service back an hour and preach for us and we' ; ll give you ten dollars -- didn' ; t ask him -- and we' ; ll give you ten dollars. Well, ten dollars to me then was like a hundred, hundred-fifty, now. So I didn' ; t say anything, I said, Well okay I can do that. And I knew that other churches would agree. And I had straightened that first church out, and that second church, Mt. Zion, [inaudible] was a family church, out of the seventy-something folks, fifty-eight of them were family members, the great-grandfather, the grandfather, the grandson -- generations. I can deal with this real quick. When I went there I said, This is a family church. Yeah. Okay. Second and fourth Sunday. I said, Now church is supposed to be God' ; s family. I' ; ve always been able to frame it in a way that it' ; s scriptural. And there was an old man, hair white as snow, I said, Brother English -- four generations were in that church -- I said, Now this family' ; s your blood, right? Yeah. I said, Well, here' ; s the way we deal in the church. Your blood is corrupt. The blood of Christ is the blood we' ; re goin' ; in. (Laughing.) HUNTLEY: It' ; s Christ' ; s church? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yea, I said, It' ; s Christ' ; s church so that means I won' ; t deal with you as a family. I deal with you as members of God' ; s kingdom. Understand that. So, it went on, it was pretty nice. This is Mt. Zion, Potters Station. That' ; s only thing I ever had to straighten out there, so maybe if I got eight dollars, I thought that was good. So, I called myself-- and they were-- whatever they gave the preacher they were cutting out of it for to pay the lights and things. So, I said to them, well now let' ; s do this. What you want to give for lights and the expenses of the church, do that, what it' ; s wrong for them to cut out of what you give to me. So I said, Well, give a quarter one Sunday for the church and then what you give me they won' ; t have to cut out of it. I said then the next thing, and the deacon, see he had his family on one ward, and you know, I said, we' ; re gone read the ward off so I can hear it ' ; cause they wasn' ; t reporting too much. So next Sunday everybody' ; s gone read the list, the ward lead. My good friend Stuart which figures promptly in at First Baptist, as I' ; ll tell you a little later, he had a church named St. Paul. He had a deacon over there would stand up and just head-to-head with him in the church, you know, and I told him I thought, I said Stuart, he has no reason of doing that to you in the church. Stuart was a nice little person. So that same Sunday that I had told them to read the names, he happened to be in our church. And we didn' ; t have on the board but -- John Praytor was a nice person, the English' ; s, and we had a tall kind of light-skinned fellow named Jones. And I had preached -- we had a good service -- and had sat down. SHUTTLESWORTH: I said, Brother Jones, do you understand last Sunday, two weeks ago, now, that we were gone read today? Yeah. I said, Well, you didn' ; t say a word to me about it, you just gone announce that? You can' ; t do that. I said, Sit down and I' ; ll call the roll. (Laughing.) So, he sat down. And the old man was friendly, the granddad. And this was beautiful. I never had no more problems. I said, Alright, well, call the roll. Class number one! Brother English! And English got up and he-- it was so beautiful, as he may would have, and so and so, and so and so [sing-song voice], said, And so and so, but he didn' ; t have it written out. And I said, Oh, you wasn' ; t gonna-- you didn' ; t have it written out, did you? I act like I' ; m mad. I was so tickled I didn' ; t know what to do. He said, Well, no I don' ; t have it today, Brother Pastor. You decided you wasn' ; t gonna do what I asked you to do. I' ; m acting like I' ; m mad, I wasn' ; t. He said, Well, no, we' ; ll have it next time, I' ; ll have it next time, I promise, I' ; m sorry. I said okay, just make your report. Now his son was the next one. I said, Alright, number two. (Laughing) He said, I' ; m sorry, Brother Pastor, I don' ; t have... I said, Oh, y' ; all got together on this thing. I said, I don' ; t know, I don' ; t want to have to be the whole deacon board, but now we' ; re gone have to follow some directions around here. Just as tickled as I could be inside. I said you don' ; t have yours written out? I said, Have it written out next Sunday. Then his grandson, next, his son, Well I don' ; t have mine either. I said Alright, just tell me what you got tell me, said but don' ; t come up next Sunday without them. And so that was all. They did real well and I had no more trouble at that church. Beautiful. Beautiful. Had no trouble with none of that church. So, I' ; m at First Baptist now. HUNTLEY: This the big church. SHUTTLESWORTH: This preacher left it, so I' ; m preaching there from October til May. And First Baptist Church, they didn' ; t shout, you know, but I was a young man and I was doing what I-- doing the best I could. And they started shoutin' ; now and then. And most time I' ; d leave them shouting, I' ; d have my back, going down the aisle, and be at my church next thirty minutes, either one of them was that close. And so, we, they had sent out and got oh, at least eight or ten preachers during that time to come and speak. But somehow or another, at May, when they decided to call, it was set that they would call me. And I had no concern about it, never asked anybody. So then, so we decided, they decided to call me. Well now here is where you get into these problems within these churches. These three men, and four was a man, tall fellow named Lawrence Danzy who had a real light-skinned girl, he was dark, tall. He put his hand on his knee and his fingers would come down a third of his leg, real long, real (inaudible). But he was the people who the others would put him up to say what he-- he was the man, you know. And now, remember, as we got there this church, old historic steeple seventy-five feet in the air, history, but dying on the vine. So, I had gotten the mission organizers, four or five circles were working, and women and young people, BTU and so forth, going to school, and really working myself to death not knowing, becoming almost nervous because I had worked both the other churches and now this one. And still in school, so these deacons had somehow or another had got up that the pastor would preside over the church meeting and the chairman of the deacon board, who was Dr. Brown, would preside over the deacons' ; meeting, which means those three people do what they want them to do. And I' ; m sitting in the chair, it' ; s as if I' ; m rubber-stamping it and I told them I didn' ; t think that was right. Pritchard said, Well, you know, you have to (inaudible) here' ; s Stewart, Rev. Stewart (inaudible). Brian, tell F. L. -- the hardwood floors began to be popular in that area in ' ; 50, ' ; 52 -- go down there and tell F. L. that he ain' ; t got nothing to do but stay on them hardwood floors, we' ; re gone take care of it. So, Stewart brought that message to me. I said, Go back and tell J. D. that I can' ; t eat hardwood floors. This is just how the Lord does it. And so, and later on, and he said to me, incidentally, shortly after I got there, F. L., now you' ; re First Baptist' ; s pastor, you don' ; t have to fool around with these little Negroes like Stewart and others, you' ; re a big Negro now, you don' ; t need these little Negroes. I said, Now, J. D. -- don' ; t have to fool with these little Negroes he said -- I said, J. D., God must love little niggers, he made many more of them than he did us, as big niggers. And I said, I don' ; t change, a person doesn' ; t have to be a big person to be a friend of mine. So, he didn' ; t say no more. I said, Now I don' ; t let anybody tell me what to say and how to do. Well, you better get with us, ' ; cause we-- I said, No, you get with me, now. They had, in the short, let me see if I can sum this up, they had either aggregated to themselves, or -- they said the church had done it but it wasn' ; t as you' ; ll see a little bit later -- that the deacons and pastor, or rather the deacons because, see, the pastor didn' ; t do anything but rubber-stamp. The deacons could do anything they wanted to do and didn' ; t have to make a report to the church. Baptist church. (inaudible, could be " ; in which the power in the pulpit" ; ) And worse than that, it' ; s just only those three, or four, that was making all the decisions. HUNTLEY: They had control didn' ; t they? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. He superintendent of Sunday School, blah, blah, blah. So okay. I remember going to St. Louis, to, yeah, to a convention. When I got back, Pritchard said to me -- this is how things go -- F. L. -- and did you notice now you go to Selma, they built parking right up almost against the church, so the church had a lot in there. And, F. L. -- he just reported to me like one Sunday morning -- F. L., State had to take that property out there so me and Ben and Brown told them to go ahead and take it. I said, Who did that? Me and Ben and Brown, said nothing else we could do but take it. I said, If you can' ; t help but take it, I said the church ought to take it. He thought that was the worst thing in the world. He said No. And so, Ben said to me, Ben Harris -- tough one -- you ain' ; t got no business bringing no business before them. I said but they put you up in the honor here, you supposed to teach them here, they don' ; t know till you teach them. And they just got (inaudible, could be: " ; heartless mad at me" ; ) for bringing things to the church and letting the church do it. So, it so happened that the Lord would deal with things. I don' ; t think that we do so much, we just have to stand where we' ; re supposed to stand, the Lord will work things out. I had gotten another woman to be the missions president, and she had five circles, more than ever had in a long time. And we were coming up now to -- see this is ' ; 51, I left at the end of ' ; 52 -- but, it, and Ben Harris being the only plumber, they had built this parsonage, had put the water in, put the gas in, all he did without any bids at all and didn' ; t say nothing to the church, so you' ; d hear folks say, yeah, folks say preacher and deacons stealing the money. Well you know I' ; m not going to get into that. So, at First Baptist they had a couple of outhouses for toilets, you go down the steps and on that side, the women on the other side. And that old fixture was so bad till if you used it, pulled the chain, you had to run outside to put your clothes up, men and women. So, I said to them, Brethren, this is wrong. We ought to put those toilets inside where they need to be. Basically, the church is higher than the ceiling so you could just put it inside. So, they agreed. I said, Well alright, now let' ; s get estimates on the toilets. Pritchard said, No we don' ; t need none, let Ben do it. I said, I favor Brother Harris doing it, even if his bid is higher ' ; cause he' ; s a Black, Negro, plumber, I said but we should get bids. And they thought I was the worst thing in the world for insisting. HUNTLEY: A change. SHUTTLESWORTH: It was terrible. So, they never forgave me for that. I said, Alright (handclap) but we gone get bids. Said we won' ; t do it. And the church had already voted for it, so I' ; ll have to say to the church we' ; ll get bids. Well, you don' ; t have-- just let us-- I said, No, sir. So, guess what they did. They said, Well, alright we' ; ll get bids. But Ben had to get on the bidding committee, so he' ; d see everybody else' ; s bids. HUNTLEY: (Laughing) And then he' ; d make his bid, huh? SHUTTLESWORTH: Alright so when the bids came in, Ben' ; s bid was seven dollars less than the other two bids. Seven dollars. I said, Well, Brethren, this isn' ; t the problem. The problem is that you all just insisted that the church had nothing to do with the bid, to get them in the first place. HUNTLEY: Was he on the committee? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. Yeah. So, I said, Naturally Brother Harris is going to do it. I said, I told you that at first, but the idea of getting the bids is so the church would know that it costs what you say it costs. And they thought I was just the-- Alright, so the crisis is coming. The crisis is coming. But God' ; s getting me ready for the Civil Rights Movement. J. D. when he was -- we were good friends you know -- when he was fine he' ; d call me F. L., and in church he' ; d shout like a woman sometimes. He' ; d get mad he' ; d set up just like this here, and I said-- And so, I announced in church one Sunday that we were not gone have board meeting. He sat right behind me, great big old (inaudible, could be: " ; auburn" ; ), you know, and he was right behind. Wasn' ; t time for it to be? I said I just announced that we won' ; t have it. I said because I don' ; t think I should be sitting in the chair and you all doing the business of the church and I ain' ; t got nothing to say, I' ; m not that kind. Well-- I said, well, you can' ; t call the meeting, can you? I say I just announced that we won' ; t have it so that finishes that. That' ; s the first time he' ; d ever had that happen. So, I didn' ; t have the meeting for a while. It so happened in August of that year -- it' ; s amazing how you remember things -- the women had raised some money to go to Birmingham. They didn' ; t mind, they gone provide and bring the money to them so they could count it, just, as deacons, as authority. She said to me, said, Well, Reverend, they won' ; t even turn in reports when they go out and collect for the money. She said, I ain' ; t gone turn in nothing. And so, I said, Well, I don' ; t want no trouble. She said, Well, you got it. She said, These people are doing their best now to destroy you and you better let us work with you. Well, I have never thought of dividing people, pitting them together. To me that' ; s offensive in a church. Her name was Nora (inaudible). I said, Well, Nora, let me-- let me-- I said, I' ; ll tell you what you do. I said, Why don' ; t you just go ahead and turn it in? She said, No, she said if you order me to turn it in, I' ; ll turn it in. But if you don' ; t order me to turn it in, I ain' ; t turning it in, I ain' ; t studying those niggers, that was her words. I said, I don' ; t want no trouble, she say, You got it. She said, They' ; re doing their best now to destroy you. They don' ; t want-- they' ; re talking about the work-- Now see they knew more about it than I did. And so, said, Pritchard already done talking about voting you out of the church. I said, Well, I' ; ll tell you what you do, let me go home and pray over it. I say this now when I have to think about something. I said let me pray over it. She said, Well you pray over it but I' ; ve told you what I' ; m gone do. She said, You tell me Sunday to turn it in and I' ; ll do it, but if you don' ; t I ain' ; t gone do it. As the Lord would have it, Pritchard sent Stewart back around to my house. Stewart, go around there and tell F. L make them women turn that money in -- just like that! HUNTLEY: (laughing) That was it, huh? SHUTTLESWORTH: So, when he sent Stewart around there, Stewart said, I didn' ; t want to do it but Pritchard told me to come out there and I told him I' ; d do it. I said, go back and tell J. D. I said go to hell. He said, Well, tell you the truth, Fred, now, he knows, blah, blah-- I said, Stewart, this is not St. Paul where you let this brother go up and-- I said, this isn' ; t St. Paul. He said, Well, to tell you the truth about it, now you know you do live on them hardwood floors, and they pay you a hundred and eighty dollars a month. As the Lord would have it, the assistant superintendent was a Black woman, she belonged to that church and she gave me a job making two hundred and fifty dollars a month, so I' ; m making two fifty plus that one eighty they were paying, believe it was a hundred and eighty or a hundred and eighty or two -- whatever it was. And they just thought, man, that that was just too much money for me, they couldn' ; t control me, you know. So, they were really getting it together and I had stopped the meetings. Then before I had stopped the board meetings , the parsonage was on almost an acre of ground, beautiful little house, and they wouldn' ; t cut the grass, wanted me to cut it, so I told them I said, Well, no, in the board meeting, the last one I attended before-- I said, well, give me ten dollars for this. They said, well, we don' ; t cut the grass. I said, Who' ; s supposed to cut it? Well, you live-- I said, Yeah, but I ain' ; t gone cut the grass. So, I just quit cutting the grass, let it grow up around it, had a little path to go up to a beautiful house. And so, I did say one Sunday morning, I think I' ; m going to have to ask the church to cut the grass around there. Well, they didn' ; t want that you know. So, Brian said, Well, we, we, we' ; ll give you ten dollars this time. I said, No, don' ; t give me ten. Well, we' ; ll cut it this time. I said, No, not this time, just cut it. And cut it the next time. HUNTLEY: Regularly. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. Well, all of this, they were just backing up, you know. So then finally, to make it to a head, now, I realize I' ; m talking too long on this, but this is... HUNTLEY: No, no, no. SHUTTLESWORTH: When this woman didn' ; t turn the money in and he sent round there, the fat was in the fire. As the Lord would have it, I had to go down to Camden to do a revival in the Presbyterian church, a fellow, we were friends, and that week I got a chance to think, during the day you know, preach at night, and it was good for me. And so, when I came back home that Saturday morning I went on to Selma University, and I was coming back walking by Pritchard' ; s shop and he' ; s in there just doing his work you know. And it looked like to me something said, Go in there and let him know that he' ; s not God. And I walked in there and I said to him -- he was shocked to see me ' ; cause he' ; d been talking about me, know he was mad. F. L., I didn' ; t expect to see you here. I said, I know you didn' ; t. Said, but I came by to tell you this morning that I have observed you as being a person who as much devil as is much angel. I said, Now you can shout like a woman and curse like a sailor. I said, You want to speak for me and through me but I' ; m not to do your work. I said, Now, I really came by to tell you that I don' ; t need you to speak for me and when I make a determination, I' ; m supposed to do what I think God wants me to do. And I finally came by to tell you to go to hell. And walked out. He was shocked. I knew the fat was in the fire. So, Nora called me and asked me did I want her to turn-- and I said, No, to hold it for a while, see what happens. And so, when I did call a meeting, after all this, that, the plumbing, all this other stuff. I had one little fellow who really thought the world and all of me. And they had gotten to this fellow and he was so fired up till, so when we had the meeting it was almost a cheerleading squad. " ; We don' ; t have no preacher runnin' ; this church (inaudible)! NO! Ain' ; t gone have no women runnin' ; this church! NO!" ; I was shocked you know. And so, this little fellow, he said it two or three time and this fellow said, Shout NO, goddammit! I said, uh, oh, that' ; s enough now. I say that means the church has to take charge of this now. Pritchard, what you mean, you gone bring that-- I said, Yes, sir, church has to decide on, I said this is the church business, you know. I said, And I told you to start off with, and they want to tell me I couldn' ; t bring something to the church. Well, when you gone bring-- I said, Whenever I get ready. Well, we don' ; t have no-- I said, We have when I get ready, that' ; s all. So, Pritchard and them really go to running around now. Remember I lived in a little house back of Selma University, and I had to come up a little alley. Joe Cribb, bald-headed guy, no teeth, had a (inaudible), but he loved me and my wife. And he knew what time I come out going to Sunday School. And you could look straight down the road and see dust fly half a mile, streets weren' ; t paved then. So, Joe was standing out there when I came out, he had his handkerchief waving me down, had tears in his eyes. He said, Reverend -- and Pritchard had put it out -- he said, I know how you' ; re feeling and, God, I admire you, said but if you can see your way not to bring that up today I' ; d appreciate it. I said, No, Joe, it ain' ; t your business. He said, Well it' ; s my business because I love you and your wife, I think you' ; re a God-sent man, said, but those people have killed so many preachers at First Baptist. He said, See that (inaudible), say, that' ; s Pritchard' ; s, I just left him, said Pritchard said to me that if you bring that up today, you done preached your last sermon today. I said, Well I' ; m on my way now to preach my last sermon. Incidentally, that same meeting where they had all this squad, Lawrence Danzy, the one I told you about his fingers so long, he sat there, and before he got into this other thing, Pritchard said, Yeah, people say you' ; re part-time preacher, full-time pay, talking about my teaching. I said, Are you talking about my teaching school? Yeah, but that what the folks say, I said, I don' ; t remember appointing any committee to find out what the folks say, I say, ain' ; t nobody said nothing to me but you about this. I said, what you want me to do, babysit you? Y' ; all grown folks. I said, I don' ; t know whether I sat all the time with you, you' ; d be that much more holy. Well, that' ; s what folks saying. He sat there with his hands on his knees, I never will forget, and I looked at him and I remembered that Scripture. He said, You gone quit teaching or else. I said, How did you say that, Danzy? He said, I said, You gone quit teaching or else. I said, You just gave me my answer. Dr. Brown, well, well, what' ; s, what' ; s, what' ; s your answer, Brother Pastor, what? Pritchard too, Yeah, what is your answer? I said, I' ; ll take the else, whatever the else is. Dr. Brown said, well, what does that mean? That means that I' ; m gone get in the boat with the Lord and we both gone sail right down the middle of the river. If God has gotten so weak as to let little people like you get strong enough to sink the boat, then God' ; s going out of business and I' ; ll go out with Him. I said, But I don' ; t think you can. I said, that means that I' ; m going to take the else. I' ; m not going to stop teaching. That' ; s what it means. I said, Besides, I' ; m ready to go home this week. They were just, ooh, they were-- So that Sunday morning -- history. HUNTLEY: Now is the church splitting on this issue? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, it ain' ; t split, it' ; s not split. HUNTLEY: It' ; s just those individuals. SHUTTLESWORTH: Those deacons. And three or four preachers before me, some of them had never preached any more since they left that church so disgusted. So that Sunday morning, I got up and preached. Hindsight now, I' ; d do that before I preached, but anyway I preached and had a good service. And so, I said, they were all sitting together on this long bench, church is kind of curved, they were on this bench on this side. And I said, after I got through preaching, nearly ' ; bout time to go, I said, There comes a time when a man must decide whether he' ; s a man or mouse. And boy you should have seen their faces, crestfallen. I said, The church has to decide the relationship in this church between deacons and pastor, and what is the authority, whether the church has the authority, whether I have the authority to at least give directions and expect cooperation. Well, yeah! That' ; s what you' ; re here for! (inaudible) So I had an old preacher named Alexander whose wife like this, she played the organ, and when she played the organ it could make you almost get up off your seat. But he said to me, he said, Son, call you a conference. That' ; s what he said, Son, call you a conference. I said, Alright, alright, we don' ; t need to settle it now. I said, Meet out here Wednesday night. Meet Wednesday night at seven o' ; clock. I' ; m expecting everybody. Now this is a point of history. The same day that Carl Erskine struck out fifteen Yankees in the World Series, I sat on the side of my car, ' ; 35 V8, in Montgomery (inaudible), writing down my recommendations to the church. The first thing was that all authority in the church be in the body and no boards. Second thing was that the pastor of the church preside over all of the business meetings, the board and everything else. Third thing was money. But any rate, so we met that night, it was tremendous. HUNTLEY: Church packed? SHUTTLESWORTH: The church didn' ; t have enough members to fill it, but I think there were some folks who weren' ; t members. So, they were all sitting on this thing, just like that Sunday morning. I said, Now, it' ; s unfortunate that this happened, I said, but I cannot and will not play with a church. I will not be in charge of something that' ; s going wrong and not being done right. And as I had said in the pulpit that morning, I said, from the top of my head to the sole of my feet I' ; m all man, there' ; s nothing mousy about me. And I said, I told you that Sunday. I said, now the church has to decide tonight the relationship, who is to be the pastor, what is the pastor' ; s duty if you want to define it. I said, But it can' ; t go any further like this. I don' ; t know why God sent me to First Baptist. I have no idea. I was satisfied with my two rural churches, I was doing well. And I was. My level of understanding at that time was -- and you know teachers were getting a C certificate at that time, they could teach. Teachers would come to Selma University to work on that C certificate. If I had two little churches and could get a C certificate and teach, I was alright anyway, I was teaching. HUNTLEY: Where were you teaching? SHUTTLESWORTH: Uh-- Emanuel School, right below Selma about thirty miles. HUNTLEY: High school? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. High school. And so, everybody was there. And I said, I' ; m not for argument, but it has come to a point where I just won' ; t go any farther. I said, I don' ; t have to have a church. So, folks said, Well you tell us what you want. I said, Alright, I said, Now, number one, Pri-- the deacons say -- I didn' ; t call no name -- that you all have voted somewhere down the line that all authority goes to the deacons and trustees and they can do what they want to do and don' ; t have to make a report. Oh, no! Whoever said that --- Pritchard said, Oh no-- (mimics shouting) Y' ; all said so-and-so-- Nooo, we ain' ; t done nothin' ; ! I said, No argument, don' ; t have to argue. My recommendation is that all authority, final authority, over me and everybody else, be in the body. I say, I want a motion. Unanimous. I said, The next thing is that the pastor of the church preside over all business of this church. I said I sit in the chair like a kid, the board doing what they want to do. They said, We thought-- Pritchard said, (mimics shouting) -- preside over church meeting, deacons-- I said, Nope, nope, I said, no, hold it, they voted that. Next thing, I said, I split the deacons from the trustees. I said, whenever things get to where one man has to do everything it' ; s the wrong. So, I said, The deacons be deacons and the trustees be trustees. That was number three. Number four was, The pastor of the church be authorized to either sign or countersign all checks, cause that' ; s where the power is. We thought you signed! I said, No, Dr. Brown signed. Who told you to sign checks, Dr. Brown? I said, No, uh-uh, let' ; s vote this. I said, because this was either I' ; ll sign, or I will tell who signs what to sign. That way I will at least administer it. That was, what four things? Fifth one was, as I recall, that ward leaders be required, or be replaced, to turn in their records and so forth. ' ; Cause see I had just printed a partial list of people hanging with them and me too. And it was seven or eight, it was eight things I think, but that' ; s about five or six, I don' ; t remember all of them-- This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (1996) (1 of 5)
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth discusses leading the Birmingham Movement. Part 1 of 5.
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Horace Huntley
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth
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5.4 December 10, 1996 Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (1996) (2 of 5) 19961210S2 02:02:04 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth Horace Huntley Video 1:|10(4)|29(2)|42(5)|59(7)|75(3)|85(13)|96(7)|109(17)|133(3)|149(6)|167(10)|184(7)|205(8)|214(15)|226(9)|239(7)|249(7)|256(9)|266(10)|275(4)|284(7)|295(6)|306(13)|320(6)|333(13)|345(4)|357(11)|376(12)|385(14)|397(13)|412(12)|425(14)|435(11)|446(7)|458(3)|470(8)|480(1)|500(7)|512(10)|531(16)|542(6)|562(2)|576(3)|590(3)|616(3)|632(7)|661(3)|671(5)|686(6)|695(4)|709(12)|723(4)|732(8)|741(3)|752(14)|771(7)|787(15)|800(5)|808(9)|817(12)|831(2)|853(4)|861(3)|873(11)|893(5)|912(7)|921(13)|940(2)|948(5)|962(7)|976(13)|991(15)|1001(12)|1020(2)|1033(6)|1044(10)|1064(3)|1081(12)|1101(8)|1112(4)|1128(4)|1148(6)|1158(1)|1166(10)|1177(10)|1189(10)|1204(6)|1219(5)|1231(8)|1240(2)|1249(2)|1258(10)|1271(4)|1282(3)|1300(6)|1314(11)|1326(9)|1341(15)|1351(5)|1361(1)|1370(12)|1387(9)|1401(5)|1416(5)|1429(12)|1441(11)|1458(3)|1468(7)|1483(2)|1500(11)|1520(5)|1544(2)|1561(3)|1573(14)|1586(3)|1596(11)|1611(10)|1623(9)|1635(9)|1649(4)|1665(10)|1674(5) 0 https://youtu.be/aiXGJDknxx0 YouTube video English Oral History Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth discusses leading the Birmingham Movement. Part 2 of 5. SHUTTLESWORTH: So okay. So, that, that' ; s a Wednesday night. That Sunday morning, boy, my church was packed. Folks had done heard. Pritchard had been running the church for years ' ; fore we' ; re talking about. So, it was terrific. So, I got there that Sunday morning. (inaudible) have no deacons. And the one deacon that was friendly with me, he died that same week. It was too much for him. And I had to ask the Lord in my stress, Lord, where are you? What' ; s happening? But I never lost-- Because, see, I believe if you do what' ; s right and what' ; s just and fair in any situation, then that' ; s when you' ; ll be taken care of. And people have to understand the biggest and the best things in life are not done really by us, they' ; re done for us. And so, they were there, so that Sunday morning, (laughing, inaudible) them same folks sitting on that same seat. But I wanted to tell you this little-- during the conference, Pritchard got up and say, Yeah, many, many a-- (I' ; m back in the conference) -- HUNTLEY: Mm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: Many notes that I signed for him. See, he signed, I got about a hundred dollars from the bank and he countersigned. I said, What has that got to do with this? I said but since you brought it up, tell the people how many you' ; ve had to pay a little. ' ; Cause I always paid my notes ahead of time. (inaudible) Well, I didn' ; t have to pay nothing! I said, Well, you just countersigned then. I said, Have you ever read where the Bible says, Don' ; t do your alms to be seen of men? I said, Brother Pritchard, you have a pray a little bit more, because if you didn' ; t do it out the spirit of right and helpfulness, you still didn' ; t do it right. I said, God has no place in this here. And you can' ; t do that to buy somebody, I' ; m not to be bought. HUNTLEY: See now, that is significant. SHUTTLESWORTH: I said, You can' ; t buy me, you can' ; t buy my voice. I' ; m like John the Baptist, the voice of him that cries in the wilderness. I' ; m gone speak the truth of God. So, that night, Pritchard got up and said, y' ; all (inaudible)! I said, Brethren, if I had wanted you to resign that would have been the first thing I would do, fire the deacons. I say, I (inaudible) that. I say, I can work with you if you can work with me. I say, So I didn' ; t ask that, so you don' ; t have to resign. We just have to establish a relationship. No, no, no, I' ; ll resign, I can' ; t, I can' ; t, no, no-- Then Ben Harris got up. Then Danzy, then all eight of them. And I had to say, Lord, where are you, you know, when this man died during that week. So, then that Sunday morning, as the Lord would have it, I had spoken to, think I got six men to agree to serve as temporary deacons. If I had known like I know now, I' ; d put them in as permanent deacons. So that Sunday morning, boy, I done preached and got everything ready to go home. I said, Because of the action of the former deacons, the church does not have any deacons at this time. I say, I' ; m calling the following men down to the front of the church, would you come down, brethren, as I call your name? So-and-so, called six. So, they came, I said, come into the front. I said I recommend to the church that these men serve as temporary deacons. Now in that church, they sat around the pulpit, which was kind of around, facing the audience. So, when they voted then they started to go back up, I said, No, gentlemen, y' ; all sit down here now, face the audience. Y' ; all are the deacons. HUNTLEY: Mm-hmm (chuckling). SHUTTLESWORTH: Say I' ; m asking the following persons to stand as I call your name. I' ; m recommending these be ward leaders, and sure enough, then I stood and dismissed them. The church went on. That was, what was that, I' ; m trying to see, what month-- October. Had to be October. Same day that Carl Erskine struck out those fifteen Yankees in the World Series. HUNTLEY: Hm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, I knew I was gonna leave the church anyway. I was just about tired of it. So, in November, I went to Mobile, and T. J. Hale, pastor of (inaudible), said he was going to somewhere in-- But I should tell you this. This is where really the Lord let me-- this is, this is the closest thing to my conversion, and that might have been the ____?____. During this situation at First Baptist -- remember I told you I went to do that revival? HUNTLEY: Hm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: It was, was that, let' ; s see, it was during time of the convention and we had to be on a train. So, it had to be in either September, yeah, September, same time I came back and told Pritchard out, to go to hell. I was on the train going to the convention. And you know how people joke and tell lies on the train, little Negroes from Gadsden, Alabama, had joked and lied all the way to California, (laughter) almost, on the train at night. And I had not been able to sleep in really weeks, I guess. And look like when I go to sleep, something would be just doing this to me. And it was problems. Going to school, studying, trying to do. But I trusted in God. So, I was on this train, and I sat and talked, after while, about one, two, three o' ; clock in the morning, everybody would go to sleep anyway. I sat in my seat and tried to go to sleep and couldn' ; t. Everybody was on the train. So, I went the length of that train to see if anybody was woke, awake, that I could talk to, and nobody was awake, six or eight cars. And so, then I decided I would go and get in the end of the car, you know, those half doors, so I was gone look out and see what we were passing, since I, you know, couldn' ; t talk to anybody. And it was black dark, I didn' ; t think about that. And I tried to look out and the train was going so fast water would cut out your eye so I couldn' ; t look out. So, I stood up in the end of that train and said these words, Lord, I don' ; t know why you sent me to First Baptist. I say, I had little rural churches, and I was teaching school and I was doing well, and I was satisfied I was doing your will. And somehow or another you decided to send me to First Baptist for your own purposes I guess. I said, But now you know the situation, I don' ; t have to tell you. I said, And I realize that, all through the Bible I read of people who really follow you have had to suffer, some killed. I said, Now I' ; m willing to do that. I said I don' ; t even mind my family suffering. I said, But one thing I want you to do. I said, Fix me so I won' ; t worry. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And honestly I must say to you it looked like somebody just, while I' ; m talking, lifted that whole train off of me. I went right back to my seat and sat down and went to sleep, that same... I knew then it was the Lord. HUNTLEY: That' ; s powerful. That' ; s powerful. SHUTTLESWORTH: That was one of the most powerful, except for that bomb blast and two or three other things. But God was getting me ready. And when that, looked like that whole train just lifted off of me. And I knew it was the Lord, and I went back and sat down and went to sleep and didn' ; t worry about nothing from that day to this one. So, then I' ; m in Mobile now and Rev. Hale had to go to Florida to preach, and I wanted to go to Florida, somehow or another I wanted to go to Pensacola. HUNTLEY: Wait, you say you' ; re in Mobile now. SHUTTLESWORTH: I went to Mobile for a visit. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: I wasn' ; t living in Mobile, see. I lived in Selma. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And Motley -- I had gone down to either, see, ' ; bout the end of November, I just walked away from the church, you know, during December, and I went to Mobile. And Motley said to me, said, T. J. Hale' ; s going to Pensacola to preach that afternoon service, and he said I' ; m going to let you preach so you can be heard. So that was good for me, that' ; s why I went. I just didn' ; t tell them I wasn' ; t coming back to church that day. So, T. J. said to me, he told me, you don' ; t have to go now. He said you do what you need to do, and I can get you an appointment down there, which satisfied me. So, I came on back to Birmingham and for a month, see it was only a month that I wasn' ; t pastoring, in all my forty or near fifty years. HUNTLEY: So, you actually left First Baptist-- SHUTTLESWORTH: At the end of the year, yeah. HUNTLEY: and went to Mobile. SHUTTLESWORTH: Didn' ; t go to Mobile to preach this time, just went to visit. I was going to Florida that day, see, and that was either the end of November or the first of January, it wasn' ; t long. It wasn' ; t too long after that conference, but I had the authority now, the church was with me, and I think they were disappointed I left, but I just didn' ; t want to-- because, see, they wanted those old deacons put back. And that' ; s really what made me decide, you know, not to stay and keep fighting. HUNTLEY: The church wanted those old deacons back in there. That' ; s why you said it would have been more advantageous if you had put those men in permanently. SHUTTLESWORTH: Permanently, right. HUNTLEY: Rather than temporarily. SHUTTLESWORTH: See, you had two preachers in there. (inaudible) who was a great Bible teacher, and this old man who told me to call the conference, said, well, folks there really ain' ; t with you, they just want their deacons back. You know how people signify. And I didn' ; t say anything at first. And I did say to one of them, Well, they haven' ; t asked to come back, you know. And I' ; m trying to figure out exactly what-- did I finally make a decision. But I let it be known, I didn' ; t care about them coming back ' ; cause I didn' ; t put them off in the first place. And yeah, I think I did, at the end of, what was it, at the end of December, I said, yeah, okay, at the end of December if they want to come back and work with me, fine. But I had made up my mind that if they' ; d come back wasn' ; t any use in me staying there and fighting that battle all over again, although I could have, I' ; m sure, as I look at it now, if I did it then, I could have done it over. But I did and they were doing everything they could to cut out, you know, people. Besides, the Lord had had me do my work there. All he wanted to do was to show them that he could get the victory. The Lord doesn' ; t have to keep, he doesn' ; t wham on us, he just overcomes us and then the real work is done, my work was done. And I was conscious. So, I think it was in either December or early January I came to Birmingham to live. And Motley, who had a church in Mobile, had been called to Bethel Baptist Church. Now look at how God does things. You must not ever leave him out of the equation, because he is the equation. I was waiting on Rev. Hale to call me to come back, so when Motley called I knew he wanted me to come to Mobile and go to-- He said, Fred, say, I' ; ve been called to Bethel in Birmingham now, he said, and I can' ; t come, I' ; ve got some kind of cold in my chest and I want you to go to Bethel and preach. This was the either the first Sunday in February or the second Sunday in February. HUNTLEY: What is this, fifty-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Fifty-three. HUNTLEY: Fifty-three. SHUTTLESWORTH: See, fifty-two, my ending at the-- HUNTLEY: Right, that' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: I said, Okay, I' ; ll go, I said, but I thought I wanted to go, I thought we' ; d go over-- he said, Well, Hale said he' ; ll get you an appointment, but I need to go up there and I can' ; t go there, so you go, so it was a matter of urgency. And I remember so well. I went there that day and they didn' ; t know me, and I didn' ; t know them. And I preached, what was it, I had it on the end of my tongue, I' ; ll think about it. At any rate, they carried on so to my soul and I was embarrassed, you know. I never considered myself a great preacher, even to this day. It' ; s, Oh! If we' ; d heard him we never would have called--. And they wanted to talk to me, so I said, No, I can' ; t discuss anything with you, you have a pastor called. Well, give us your address. I said, No, you don' ; t need my address, just ask him, I said, ' ; cause I don' ; t play with churches and he said he couldn' ; t come and he would be here next week or whatever. And so that' ; s the way I turned it off. And the very next Sunday morning or that week, Motley called me again. He said, Fred, they want you back at Bethel. I said, Motley, now wait a minute, I said, now what are you going to do, I am not going back. He said, Fool, you don' ; t know, this may be the Lord! I say I don' ; t believe the Lord wants me to play with no church, Motley. I said, I' ; d better not go. He said, Well, at least go, you' ; d at least get you something to get you some food with, or groceries were his word. He said and I promise you I won' ; t ask you to go again. I said Okay. I said, I' ; ll go this time, but I' ; m telling you now I will not go back again. He said, Okay, go on, so can I tell them you' ; re coming? I said, yeah, okay. Man, they were there that Sunday. Church was packed, people were standing up. HUNTLEY: Word was out. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. And so, I preached on, over there in Jude, God teaches in an amazing way, where the spirit of God teaches us to deny ungodly, worldly lust, we should present our bodies-- or something like that. And that Sunday was worse than the other one. And I guess I wasn' ; t preaching over twenty minutes. And so, I just had to literally walk out from them, not talk with them. And he said that he would, he told them that he would see them next week, so I said he' ; ll see you next week, so I just left, I was almost rude, really. ' ; Cause I had no idea that I was with the church, I wasn' ; t thinking about it, my mind was in Florida, see? And hadn' ; t been to Florida. So he was to meet them that Thursday night following that second Sunday, third Sunday, whatever it was, and that night it came up a rain, it was a torrent, it was, it rained so ' ; til you just couldn' ; t hardly drive, people in the street, I understand, could have to stop. But the church met out there, and Motley sent them a telegram that he could not come, and they called me unanimously in the rain. HUNTLEY: Is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: It was God' ; s appointment. So when I got there, I didn' ; t have to, I didn' ; t have to, I' ; ve had some-- SHUTTLESWORTH: -- First Baptist. He said, You don' ; t need to fight, just say what you want to do. But I' ; m ready to fight, you get in a mood, you, so I went out there and really Bethel is one of the greatest churches except for the one I got now which came out of another fight. Look like it' ; s been mine to fight inside and outside all my life. When I get to Heaven, I' ; m gone have the crown (laughter). At any rate, when I got there, ain' ; t just unanimous, they were exuberant and so forth. Well, God has problems with preachers sometimes, they get involved in things you don' ; t need to, so you have to fight this person and that person. At any rate, without telling it all, there was a man there who was involved with some woman in the church that the pastor was involved with, and the pastor liked to go off and fish a lot, as I understand, I don' ; t know, that' ; s what they say. And so, he would get up when the pastor would take his chance, and contest him in the church. Where' ; d you take that text? That text is set on the fires of hell, this and that, that' ; s what I understand. So, Walter Blockley (?) and two or three others said, he gone sure, he gone sure do that. I said, well, let' ; s pray for him and let' ; s hope he doesn' ; t, don' ; t, don' ; t, maybe he won' ; t. But you see, you must remember now, I' ; m burned in the fire and solid, and I' ; m still determined not to run over people. So the first Sunday I preached, that' ; s __(?)__, he got up and he said, want to say this, we have a great pastor, blah, blah, blah, we been had preaching like that all the time we' ; d be somewhere, blah, blah, blah. See, I didn' ; t prompt him. So, the next Sunday, he made comment about the good pastor, we got a good pastor, on fire. So, the third Sunday when I got up, I said, Now, let me say something to the church. The Gospel is to be lived more than commented on. Your comment on the Gospel is your living it. I said, Now, after today, when I preach, it' ; s period. Nobody says anything about it. Said I need no comment to make it good or bad, if it' ; s good, live it, if it' ; s not good, pray for me. Well, that cut him off, see. But the devil is still in a person until it comes up to a crisis, very seldom a person will just take the low and go on, it' ; s amazing, and it' ; s amazing to me how God allows the devil to always challenge him, but he knows himself I guess. So, ____?____, Superintendent of the Sunday School and deacon. And honestly, from March until December that church just went like a fire. And that' ; s ' ; 53, well, you know, in ' ; 54, the decision. So, but I was still concerned about, even before ' ; 54, church being involved in community affairs. So, I was alert that this guy may do something, but I had cut him off, and I thought that would be enough to let him know that I wasn' ; t the kind. So, and this should have let them know the kind of person I was. The same woman who was the mission president, one of the most popular women in the church and the deaconess chairman, in October they were supposed to be getting Women' ; s Day chairman, went to hit, clash about one of them had an umbrella, and the other one had a brick, gone fight. So, I called them both in the church and I said, Well, now you know, y' ; all fighting in the church, I said, I don' ; t think that' ; s the kind of church the Lord wants. I said, Now, I tell you what I' ; m gone do, I' ; m gone get the speaker, neither one of you need to get one. And I said, Now, you, since they know you were gone fight in the church, you also will have to know that you can apologize to the church. And I said, I' ; m gone ask you, I' ; m not gone demand, I' ; m not gone tell you what to do, but I am telling you if you don' ; t do what you' ; re supposed to do, then I' ; ll do what I must. And that means that if you don' ; t get up and apologize toward the church Sunday morning, as pastor I will suspend each one of you before the church before I even take my text. I say, So I' ; m making it plain, it ain' ; t training you, I hope, but if you Christian, Bible said humble yourself. And you know, amazingly they said, Well, alright. I said, You realize, they said, Yes, we realize. I said, I' ; ll give you a chance to apologize, at least the world will say, if you do wrong, she say, confess your sins-- That Sunday morning, I said, Two sisters, we got two sisters who loved each other so much till they began to express it the wrong way, so these sisters are coming before the church now, express their sorrow for their mis-actions. So, they got up, grown people ain' ; t nothing but grown up children, you know that. HUNTLEY: (laughing) That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: Vivian Duran and Blanche Robinson. And one of them had had involvement you know on both sides. So, then I said, They have something to say. So, they apologized, sort of mealy mouth. I said, No, go ahead and apologize if you' ; re going to. Alright, y' ; all, why don' ; t you shake hands, so they, I said, No, when you shake hands, you grab hands and grip them, I said, I don' ; t want anybody just put their hand in mine. So, they gripped their hands. I said, Well, then, why don' ; t you just go ahead and hug each other to show folks that we love, that' ; s what, and they did! Now, that ought to show people that you don' ; t take, come up to end of December, as the Lord would have it, and it' ; s amazing how you remember this. There was another young lady, well she was older than I am, older than I was, ' ; way older than I was, and she was kind of prissy, she walked kind of, and she was, I had said I wanted the choir to march in from the front door, you know how Bethel is built, you been out there. HUNTLEY: Sure. SHUTTLESWORTH: Coming from the back. And I said, Now, everybody be in the march, don' ; t just switch, and she wants to be switching in like she does every Sunday. And so the second Sunday morning she missed the march, and she come prissing down the row, I walked to the edge of the pulpit and I said, Sit right ___?___. So, she didn' ; t (laughter). I like to burned him up but he didn' ; t say nothing. So last Sunday in December, 1952, the church raised three hundred and some dollars, more than it ever had raised in any one Sunday except the rallies, and we were back in the back, we were getting ready to, and I had appointed a tall lady, I had her name on my mind, she was dark and one of her teeth was kind of awkward, she had a big gap there, and Verta Funderburk, the one that was prissy, they wouldn' ; t work with her, so the program wasn' ; t what it ought to be but it wasn' ; t too bad. And so, after the program I was saying, Now, let' ; s come to the conclusion that I believe that anybody in the church that' ; s too big to work with other folks is too little to lead something. See, that' ; s the position I take in the church, and I hope that we don' ; t have anybody here like that, I hope that we do our best in all, because you don' ; t have but one time to do any one thing, and I' ; m talking just like, and I' ; m about finished. And I said, Let' ; s pray hard, so I' ; m just about ready to close out and go home. All of a sudden he' ; s in the back, he' ; s in the choir, in his robe, and we had worked real good, we had drove into conventions, we had worked real good, it shocked me that he would do that. Well, Pastor, may I say a word? I' ; m talking. I said, No, sir, you may not. I didn' ; t even look at him. I expected, he said, How come I can' ; t talk? I said, Because I' ; m talking and you and I can' ; t talk in this church at the same time, never looked back yet. He said, Now, I' ; m a member here and I' ; m gone talk. I said, I' ; m pastor here and you' ; re not gone talk ' ; cause I' ; m not gone give you the floor to talk. I said, and I looked back, and I said, Well, now would you kindly, Brother Davis, be seated so I can go on the worship? I said, ' ; Cause you are interfering. Now, I want to talk, now, I wear my pants, I say, It isn' ; t a question of who wears pants or what pants, the question is that you are out of order and disturbing the service, and the deacons were calling, they were saying, Sit down, Davis! You' ; re out of order, son, now! He said, You little weak fellows, he' ; d been the bull of the woods, you know. So, I didn' ; t say any more. He stood up there and so, so he just stood up and didn' ; t say anything, for about, oh, I guess about thirty seconds, look like, felt like a minute, but I was gone let him talk. I looked at him and after while he sat down. I said, Now, the church will have to speak on this, we can' ; t have this. I said, I understand this is the routine of the past but the past won' ; t govern the future. So, I felt sorry for him ' ; cause see he had been one of the most avid workers with me, go to the Sunday School convention. HUNTLEY: What caused him to do this at this point? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, things building up, number one, he couldn' ; t get up enough to make comment, whenever-- HUNTLEY: That' ; s what he was used to doing. SHUTTLESWORTH: Don' ; t care what the church was doing, if he' ; d know the pastor was taking a text and he' ; d get up. And then he was involved with two of the women that was involved, the little prissy one and plus this Vivian Duran, and the pastor was involved also with Vivian Duran, as I understand, I don' ; t-- So, after dismission, we' ; d always go back in the back and sort of say what you do with the money, and I remember saying to him, Brother Davis, you interfered with the ministry tonight and I' ; ll have to, come see me and we' ; ll talk about that. He said, You said too much. I said, Not up to you to tell me what to say nor how much. Well, anything hurt me I' ; ll speak out. I said, That sound like a woman, we don' ; t have no women on the deacon board, see. I said, But anyway, you come see me this week. Now it was my idea to let him come into understanding, try to explain what he' ; d been doing and how much out or order, and I was just gone let him get up and say a few words to the church next Sunday morning and forget it. But he' ; s a big man, see, he just is swelled up, so he didn' ; t come. I said, Now be sure to see me after we finish this, I said, Brother Davis, be sure, I' ; ll be expecting to see you this week. So, he didn' ; t come, he told her, No, I ain' ; t going. So next Sunday morning I got up and read a brief writing I had written over, and I took him out of all of his offices, and boy, this girl, this Funderburk, the old I told you, prissy, she was in the choir. She was just, Oh, Jesus! Oh, Lord! I said to myself, The Lord is squeezing the hell out of that lemon. (Laughter) Well, it had to be. But, so he didn' ; t, so, and I had appointed the assistant superintendent to take over that next Sunday morning. And I got word, he was gone be, I didn' ; t go to Sunday School every Sunday, but I just went over there that Sunday morning, and he came with all his books and things, sat down right by me, I really felt sorry for him, you know, felt sorry that he hadn' ; t done it. He didn' ; t try, so Robert Turner got up and carried through with the Sunday School just like everybody else ' ; cause if he had ___?___ I was gone tell him to sit down, but he didn' ; t try anything. HUNTLEY: And he was superintendent of Sunday School? SHUTTLESWORTH: He was superintendent of Sunday School and a deacon in the church. But I took him out of it. So, this was a week later, see. So, this week he comes to me, after (inaudible). And he said, I said, Well, why didn' ; t you come last week? Well, I, I, I said, No, you don' ; t really have no excuse, so don' ; t try to make up one. I said, You were too big to come, weren' ; t you? I said, so you forced me to do what I had to do. I said, My job, and then I read Jeremiah where it says, Pull down, destroy, tear down, build. I said, that' ; s what, I said, You' ; re full of hot air balloon and I puncture balloons, that' ; s my job. I said, Now, I haven' ; t done nothing personally to you, I just had to let you know that you ain' ; t God, and people, you been a big bull of the woods in church, there ain' ; t no bulls and bears in church. He said, Yeah, I recognize, and I realize you the pastor and all of us are servants. I said, No, all of us are equals, we have different jobs. And I said, I wish you had come last Sunday ' ; cause I hate I had to do what I did, ' ; cause we been working together, you been acting like a Christian, but you were a devil under, with sheep' ; s clothes, I said, So I had to unfrock that. Yeah, well, you were right, I was wrong. I said, So now you admit you were wrong. Yeah. I said, Well, I don' ; t want to pressure you, I said, I can' ; t make any promises to you. I said, I wish you had done it last week and I wouldn' ; t have had to do, I said, But I' ; ll go ahead and pray over whatever is to be done, and I said, I won' ; t make you any promises. I already knew I was gone put him back later on, but maybe not the next Sunday. (inaudible sentence). So then during the week, Brother Charlie Watson, my fondest memories is of him, his skin as smooth as any woman, you see, didn' ; t have but one tooth, smoke cigars, laugh all the time. And he would almost do anything for me, he said, Reverend, he say, He' ; s hurting so bad. He said, You know, I wouldn' ; t ever tell you what to do, he said, But if you can find possibly to let him know you might restore him, he said, And I' ; ll make the motion if he does, I said, No, if I put him back, I' ; m gone fix it so nobody has to make a motion, I said, No, no, no, we don' ; t go through this same thing over, I said, If I ever put him back, and I won' ; t even promise you that I' ; m going do that, he said, Well, I understand it. I said, But if I do it will so that if he does anything he' ; s automatically not only out of the deacon, but he' ; s voted out the church, without the, take a vote on that, don' ; t have to vote on him no more. He said, Okay, whatever you do, he said, I, I say I tell you what you do, you pray over it, pray for him, and pray for me. So, I had already known I was gone put him back, so that Sunday morning I never will forget. He' ; s in his black robe and back in the choir behind me, same place he was when he got up. And before I preached, I said, Brother Davis, I' ; m going to give Brother Davis one minute to come to the floor and make a statement to the church and to the pastor, and upon the basis of what he does I will have a recommendation to the church. So, and I almost shed tears, when he came down he took out his watch so he could be sure he didn' ; t go over. And I really felt sorry for him. And he took out his watch in his hand, was looking at his watch, he said, Well, I want to apologize to the church and the pastor, I realize I was wrong and I realized I didn' ; t have to say all what I said and did but I was wrong. And I want the church to forgive me and I want the pastor to forgive me, I promise, and I said, Now, Brother Davis, do you understand what you do, I said, ' ; Cause there' ; s always a temptation to go back and do over again. I said, You just did for me what you' ; d been doing, but the other pastor didn' ; t have to put up with that, see. I said, You' ; ll do it again if you follow the devil. I said, But I want you to say that, I say, And you must understand that now before you do anything else, if you do it again you won' ; t have the opportunity to do it again, see, ' ; cause my recommendation is that the church accept your apology and vote you back into your position with the understanding that if you do the same thing again, you are not only out of office but you are voted out of the church, I said, Do you understand that? I said, That means we won' ; t vote on you no more. You accept that? Yeah. I said, Alright, need a motion. Just like that, see. Went back up in the stands. I never had no more trouble out of him until I got ready to leave the church. Then that' ; s a story in itself. Well, that' ; s the biggest thing, but that church went on and I got in civil rights, we got-- HUNTLEY: Let me ask you before we get into that because, think we may do that a little bit later. But when you got to Collegeville, what kind of community was it? SHUTTLESWORTH: Complacent community, accepting segregation as it is, there were a lot of dives and dens, liquor dens and things around, and police operated a lot of them. Trains blocked traffic, still do some now, but any time you' ; d go anywhere it' ; d be blocked a half hour. I remember once we were at Trinity Church, right across the railroad, and the police was trying to get through and the train stood there a half hour, building burned down. There was no communication between Negroes and City Hall except pimps of Bull Connor, I think, and we had a lot of ditches, uncovered, and it was, but you know God has people, God gets people ready, and we don' ; t know it, see, we be ready. That Scripture in Hebrew where it says, God moves at sundry times, periodically. He does, and He has to find a person. I always say God has to give his contracts for work to people who got faith, that is, people who will exercise their belief by acting on it. It gets into trust, three steps, belief, faith and trust. That' ; s where Paul got when he said, I am persuaded, nothing, you know. HUNTLEY: Uh-uhh. SHUTTLESWORTH: And so, I went there with zeal, I had no inkling that the Civil Rights Movement was coming, I had no, I didn' ; t ask for that. HUNTLEY: But now although you had gone through some fiery storms-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. HUNTLEY: in your churches. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, and went through a lot more in Revelation, now you talk about some tough stuff, that was, but go ahead. HUNTLEY: What about your relationship throughout all this period with white people? The only one that you mentioned, really, was the old man that owned the church and you needed to pay, you made that agreement with him. Did you have any problems with whites or with police prior to coming to Birmingham? SHUTTLESWORTH: I didn' ; t have a lot of relationship with white people. I worked in a man' ; s field up Edwards Lake where I was talking about, hoeing, HUNTLEY: When you lived-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Two or three days I worked up there. And I remembered Newt Hubbard, had a one _____ leg, was the constable who put my brother and me in jail after my father died, and they listed for distillery but we wasn' ; t distilling, the worm, coil and condense was on the property. HUNTLEY: But that had never happened to your father, to Mr. Shuttlesworth. SHUTTLESWORTH: No, no. HUNTLEY: Did he pay the police off? SHUTTLESWORTH: He was dead. HUNTLEY: Yeah, I mean before that, why didn' ; t they not-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, they never catch him. You know I got some interesting anecdotes, if I tell you one, you' ; d laugh. My father would get up and run the liquor off before day in the morning. And this is one time, and it look like it be so cold, the side of our house that I slept on was as high as these lights, higher, nearly ' ; bout high as the ceiling. And that floor would be so cold. My papa, he' ; d get up and get ready to get the mash and take it and put it in the vat and burn fire you know and so forth, hoping the police wouldn' ; t catch us. And we had a, we had a, and he was rushing me you know, probably cursing, come on, dammit! -- that' ; s like him. He had a skull cap on, I never will forget it. I' ; m gone run tonight! That means he' ; ll run his liquor. And I never could be fast enough for him, so it happened that this night that it had sort of drizzled rain, and it was cold enough for the rain to make ice on the boards and things, and we had a board across a (laughs), and went out past the hog pens, we had two boards across a stream. And when you walk into a path long enough, it becomes wide, water there, so we had these boards across it. (Laughs). He didn' ; t know it was ice, Papa was very, come on now, dammit, I' ; m ' ; bout to run! And so, he went on and hit that, stepped on that ice, broke through the ice into water, and he got up and said some words that I don' ; t want to repeat. (Laughing) But he did say, Damned if I' ; ll run tonight! And Mama was laughing, and I was too! Made a big fire, to stand before the fire. But this is what he did, you know. He was consistent, I guess, at what he was and what he did. HUNTLEY: Right, yeah. So, but he was never, he was never caught by the police. SHUTTLESWORTH: He went to jail twice. The only time I remember my stepfather going to church was at right after or before he would have been in jail. And I don' ; t know whether they actually caught him or not, ' ; cause I was never caught with him. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: For some reason he went to jail, I remember him going to jail twice in those years, from the time I was three or four up to eighteen. HUNTLEY: Right. So, you had to help him with that, with making the liquor. SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, yeah, we' ; d get a tub and he' ; d, see you put the barrel in the ground and you put your rye and other stuff and it' ; d ferment, yeast and stuff, and we' ; d dip it out and carry it and put it in a drum and heat the drum, and the steam comes off the hot water and comes through, and the worm is the thing where, and as it goes through it cold water it distills into liquid. Yeah. And you know, I could have made liquor, I could have been a great liquor maker. And, I thank God another side of my life, I never tried to like it. Now I taste it two or three times, it would always do me like medicine, so I never have had a taste for it. HUNTLEY: Hm, hmm. So, when you and your brother then were arrested, what were the circumstances of that? SHUTTLESWORTH: Papa had died. Oh, I guess we had buried him about, within the space of three months, maybe it was a month, as I recall now. And the people who lived right above us, they had also made liquor, beside us fields (?). And we kept the one on the edge of our line right under some bushes, like. And Mama thinks that they turned us up, that they called, but anyway, Newt Hubbard, Newton Hubbard, the deputy sheriff, came, he lived over in Oxmoor, right in front of Gooden' ; s store up on that hill up there. And he was standing up there, and I didn' ; t know, I was a youngster, me and my brother, Come here Fred and Gene. Mama was there. If I had known like I did now, but I was a kid. (unintelligible) I should have been on other things if I had known. I wasn' ; t savvy. HUNTLEY: Right, right. SHUTTLESWORTH: I would never have known, but he went and picked it up, so he took us to jail for, for that. My brother was younger than I am, he' ; s five years younger, so he went to juvenile and I went into court ' ; cause I was eighteen. I was over eighteen. My father died when I was eighteen, he was dead. So, he took the worm and got us for distillery, we weren' ; t distilling. But at that time the system could make a case and do now, the system does now, make cases out of anything. We were no more distilling than you are. HUNTLEY: It just happened to have been on your property. SHUTTLESWORTH: The coil was on the edge of our property. HUNTLEY: So, you think that there is a possibility that somebody-- SHUTTLESWORTH: It' ; s a strange, ask Mama, I don' ; t know why. Look like she should have been the one. But that' ; s the way it was. You know, in the record of the, they had this Klan paper, you remember, Wizard, or Fire-something, years ago, and they put in, ' ; way back when I first started the Civil Rights thing, that I was a distiller. (Laughter.) HUNTLEY: Is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, yeah, that was in there, the Klan knows about you, you know. HUNTLEY: So, they had checked your background. SHUTTLESWORTH: Checked my background, yeah. HUNTLEY: Well, Fred, at what point did you register to vote? SHUTTLESWORTH: I was in Mobile, Alabama. John L. LeFlor was the Negro who agitated for voting and this and that. Think he belonged to Stoner Street Baptist Church, and as I told you, people who met me could see something in me that I guess I didn' ; t know myself, for he told me, You ought to vote. I don' ; t know how I met him, I think I met him through Harold, one of my friends who was driving a truck too, and I went to a meeting and I met him, and I always admired people who stood for something, it' ; s just been a-- HUNTLEY: Was this during the time when you left here going there to work SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, I was in Mobile HUNTLEY: And you were working at the air base? SHUTTLESWORTH: At the airbase. And it would be some type community meeting, it could have been a Sunday or something, but I met him, and I told him I was interested so he got me or caused me to register in Mobile. So, I registered in, it would have been in forty-four or five. HUNTLEY: So, when you came back to Birmingham, you were already registered to vote. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. HUNTLEY: So, you didn' ; t have to re-register. SHUTTLESWORTH: I had to re-register here in Birmingham as I recall. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: See, you vote by districts. HUNTLEY: Districts, right. SHUTTLESWORTH: See, so I wouldn' ; t have had to register here, I would have had to transfer, only way I could have registered in Jefferson County, it' ; s unclear to me at the moment, I can do some thinking, I' ; ve been through so many things and so many detailed things till sometimes you forget how you do, but I would have had to register in Jefferson County. HUNTLEY: But you don' ; t remember right off hand what those circumstances were? SHUTTLESWORTH: I really don' ; t. I remember getting a lot of others registered though. HUNTLEY: Right. Yeah. So, you actually now worked with the NAACP. SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, yes. A little bit in Mobile, as when I met LeFlor. I was always moved by the character of people who try to __?__. And somehow or another I had the basic understanding that the system wasn' ; t right. It may be strange, you know, most people who talk to me would have expected that given my history now, I would have done something terrible way back there, killed somebody or blown up a house or something, but you see, God has everything in his own time. I accepted segregation as a way of life, I never thought it was right. I never thought anybody was superior to me, I have been inferior in my mind. But I knew that the law said that. Just like when Newt Hubbard was, see I recognized him as the law, so had I talked to Mama first and she said don' ; t tell him, I wouldn' ; t have, but I was immature. But I always believed in my core that segregation was wrong. Even the people in Mobile that were so nice and influenced me to come to the Corinthian Church, they had white folks they worked for, and I could see the difference, you know, white people were-- And somewhere in my -- _?__ about my conscience for white people -- believe it was Joe that drove the bus, killed a Black man, Negroes we called ourselves then, and Joe' ; s only character witness in the court, ' ; cause we went there ' ; cause we (unintelligible) bus drivers, you know, was a white woman who got up and said Joe was a good nigger. And he got off. HUNTLEY: Where was this? SHUTTLESWORTH: Here in Jefferson County. HUNTLEY: Mm, okay. He got off based upon her testimony. He was a good nigger. SHUTTLESWORTH: He was a good nigger. And then, see now, I did work, I didn' ; t work a lot around white folks. I think I worked ___?___ when I was a boy. My aunt, my mother' ; s sister, had a son the same age I was, and said to my, man named Marshburn, it' ; s amazing how you keep all those, Marshburn, so I worked over around his place two or three times, I very much liked, but I didn' ; t went there that much. And I remember that other boys, like John Lewis, and Prentiss (?) and all the others, but we were basically accepted the subservience to the white power structure, and we knew that the system, we knew that with the system, white man was up there and we were down here. And people ask me, say, well, why didn' ; t you make up your mind to disobey back then? The only answer I can give out even now is, in God' ; s own time He does things. And He does it at a time when all circumstances, you know, according to what I -- I should have been dead four or five times here in Birmingham but lived to serve (?). HUNTLEY: You were saying that you knew the hierarchy of race. SHUTTLESWORTH: Hierarchy, yeah. HUNTLEY: White folks were here and the Black folks were here. But it appeared that you' ; re also saying that you never internalized that. SHUTTLESWORTH: I never internalized that the white people were superior to or better than Negroes. Of course, I was brought up in the Negro tradition, we did some things that were different from whites and so forth. And then, one of the things I think way back in there, you realize that Black folk couldn' ; t look at white women too much, and even in Mobile, as it comes to mind, I remember, I always have been sorry, it' ; s amazing that I hadn' ; t done something and jumped over and got killed before God got me into this, but He-- I remember a guy, I was driving a truck, and they had a man in a led (?) squad of Negroes doing this common work, and he would just take his foot and kick them in the behind. HUNTLEY: White man. SHUTTLESWORTH: Mr. Pepper, yeah. So I' ; m driving a truck and I see him do that two or three times, and it just something moved me to say to him, Now Mr. Pepper, I don' ; t really understand why white people have to feel better to kick Negroes, and I' ; ve seen you do that, I say, but I hope you will never kick me. I say, I just hope it never comes to that, cause I don' ; t know what I would do. I' ; m sure I wouldn' ; t take it and smile like they do. Brother Preacher, you know I wouldn' ; t kick you (inaudible). On the government job. Another tall fellow, nice, and people would talk, Preacher So-and-So! They liked to talk to me. You know in Mississippi where I come from, he said, I think he said Nigras, that was a good word, Nigras pass through (inaudible) hat when they get to the edge of town and won' ; t put it back on til they get to the other. I said, Well, I' ; m glad I didn' ; t live there because I would not have taken off my hat. You won' ; t believe it! And the closest thing I came to getting fired in the government job, and I' ; ve always crusaded for people, as I recall. The captain under the military, had civilians, and the man who was over this part of the work, he was, his salary was making about twenty-five dollars a day. And these Negroes on the job, some with six or eight kids, were making about five or something like that, less. And I didn' ; t know at that time you can' ; t lead folks to strike on a government job. And I didn' ; t lead them to striking but I just took them, __?__ and Buck to the captain and talked to him. Well the captain, he just treated me like he appreciated me bringing them up. And he called my foreman. And so, my foreman told me, said, say Rev, he called me, said, Come in here Rev. He said, You know you can' ; t teach folks to strike on a government job. I said, I didn' ; t tell them to strike, I said but you know yourself it ain' ; t right ' ; cause you make more money than the average person here, I said but it ain' ; t right when we have all them children. He said, Well, I understand, Preacher, I' ; ll tell you what you do. See how God, here' ; s another thing about God. He said, he don' ; t want you back in there assessing (?), but what you do, you come in here every Sunday morning, every morning and check in so I' ; ll know you' ; re here then go on back home. I was off, getting my pay, for at least three weeks before I started driving back, just go in at __(?)__, and go back home. And then it was during that time when I started driving back that they was tearing off all this stuff, tearing these houses, got a truck and hauled to my house to enlarge my house. Everything. And I guess that comes from that Scripture that says, All things work together for good for them that love the Lord. You don' ; t know you love Him and you don' ; t know how much or how less you do, ' ; cause none of us loves Him enough, when you think about it. But things just come to happen. HUNTLEY: It appeared, then, that you had a certain respect-- SHUTTLESWORTH: I had respect. HUNTLEY: -- that white people wouldn' ; t cross a certain line with you. SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, yes. HUNTLEY: Was it because you were a preacher or because of something else? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, I was respectful, but I recognized I was the same as other people. They respected me because I was a preacher, yes, I must accept, I think I did get a little bit more respect, that' ; s why I could advocate. See, I always believed in advocating for people who were left down or had less, and I do it now. I think one thing (inaudible), we got to give poor people work, provide help so they can work and take care of their bills, you not supposed to pay more for daycare than you make for work, it' ; s something else, but I realize, you have go to advocate. HUNTLEY: So, you' ; ve always been an advocate. SHUTTLESWORTH: I' ; ve always been an advocate. HUNTLEY: Especially for the underdog. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, and I' ; ve always respected the law. And I' ; ve always been in disagreement with segregation. But I recognized that I' ; m in this system. And I always felt like this that sometimes, they said God' ; s gone __(?)__ Zion' ; s __(?)__. In Numbers, they have, they have-- And you know another thing, come to think of it, I' ; ve heard Negroes, we have a way of kind of easing our consciences, we realize the white man was so bad, and I hear Black men talking, be talking about what white people do and white men, and one man said one time, said, a white man got to go to hell if he don' ; t stay but a minute. (Laughter) He felt good just saying that, that God is going to equalize someday, all that we' ; ve said has a kind of an epic forward thrust, that you' ; ll reap what you sow, and maybe I can' ; t make you do it now, but I' ; ve always felt that God' ; s tomorrow has to be better than today, or yesterday. HUNTLEY: You have really enlightened me on that whole part of your life that I was just convinced that sort of set the tone for what you were going to be doing when you came to Bethel. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, yes. In other words, when I got to Bethel, I had gone through enough that I could be, I could know somebody didn' ; t like me, but I didn' ; t have to dislike him. And I could speak straight, always respecting that person' ; s humanity or manhood or womanhood or what. But I' ; ve never said what I didn' ; t mean, I wouldn' ; t do that now, see, I tell people, you hear me speak, my yea is yea and my nay is nay, and I' ; ve got a hell nay. And I think people ought to be positive, you don' ; t have to be brutal, I say, Okay, I' ; m brutal and frank. Some people are turned off, I must admit this, but I' ; m also conscious from my own experience that God will have enough people with you to do what you need to do, and will give you enough resources with which to succeed if you want to succeed. I guess our main thing is the center of our, where are we going. In this ________ that the system has so disillusioned so many people, especially Black people, and some white people, that they wouldn' ; t care if this country burned down. And yet we have got to realize that life itself is sacred, that we are put here for something, we aren' ; t to (inaudible) and destroy our own selves. The Lord came that we might have life and have it more abundantly. (One handclap on " ; life" ; and one on " ; more" ; .) So that' ; s the way I feel, and I' ; ll be seventy-five years old if I live to see March, March eighteen, and I didn' ; t expect to get forty years, but I' ; m as committed now to trying to do things without violence (inaudible) as I was then. And you haven' ; t asked me, but people do ask, have asked me, would you do it all over again. Given the same ways, having the same drive, and having the same belief that you can' ; t lose if you' ; re working for Christ, I' ; d do it all the same way, I' ; d go through the same thing. HUNTLEY: The same thing, hm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: And you haven' ; t heard, you don' ; t know what I felt and heard understanding the bombing, I guess that will come later. Or in the fire hosing or the march. HUNTLEY: This is just very revealing, and I want to give you a rest right now. SHUTTLESWORTH: Okay. HUNTLEY: Then we' ; ll get back into it. SHUTTLESWORTH: Alright. HUNTLEY: Yeah. HUNTLEY: You came to Bethel in 1953. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: 1954 was a monumental year because of Brown vs. Board. SHUTTLESWORTH: Supreme Court decision (inaudible). HUNTLEY: What do you remember about that particular time? SHUTTLESWORTH: I can' ; t tell you what it did to and for me personally, except it was almost like a new baptism of faith or a new conversion or something, that the Court had declared segregation in schools unconstitutional, that was the biggest thing that had happened to Negroes almost since emancipation. We thought that that decision itself would do a lot for attitude, but it resulted in hardening the attitude of the Southern states. I remember walking on nineteenth street in front of the old post office building. When I saw that, I can' ; t tell you exactly what it did for me, and I' ; m sure it had the same effect on most Negroes. It give us hope that if we-- and those who had felt that it was no need to strive, I think that it did something to them too. It didn' ; t waken in me any new thing. I already felt basically segregation -- I knew it was wrong. This was a confirmation by the highest court in the land and I thought that the Supreme Court decision actually would have meant more than it did directly. HUNTLEY: Did you think it would at that particular time, you were really enamored about the possibilities as the result of the highest court in the land making this decision. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right, right. I was enamored over the idea that the highest court had done it, we are a law-abiding people, and so, segregation has got to begin moving. Instead, as you know, there would be, all the officials of the Southern states were allowed to get away with ideas of interposition and nullification. And with the latent Klan activity and the Klan mentality and the abhorrence in most white people' ; s mind of Black folks being equally the same as they were, even though they might not have personally done things against Blacks. But I think that most white people felt as if they were better than Black people. HUNTLEY: We understood what the Klan meant at that time. By the same token, there were some who were more sophisticated who developed an organization called the White Citizens Council. SHUTTLESWORTH: White Citizens Councils, the John Birch Society and all this kind of stuff. HUNTLEY: Yes. SHUTTLESWORTH: And even like now we talk about racism, it' ; s just a sophisticated word for segregation in my mind. And there was time given by the Court, came in ' ; 55 talking about gradualism, didn' ; t it? HUNTLEY: Right, right, with all deliberate speed. SHUTTLESWORTH: All deliberate speed, but it didn' ; t order anything done. And those few years caused much more suffering than would have been had the Court mandated that the lower courts see to its order being carried out, even if they had just made a beginning. HUNTLEY: It was really similar to the Emancipation Proclamation when it was signed in 1863. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. HUNTLEY: Because it really didn' ; t free any Black people until, you know, the -- SHUTTLESWORTH: Far later. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right, two years later. SHUTTLESWORTH: And each time, just as the carpetbaggers and other things took advantage then, these segregationists were allowed, because, you see, the Southern senators, they had seniority in Congress and everything, so that I don' ; t really think the Supreme Court anticipated the resistance that it did nor the fact that there would take troops. But you know there is a justice that underlies, there' ; s a justice, a line that underlies all we do. Abraham Lincoln said it when, something on that order when he says he hated the war had to come, but if God wills it that the war continues (?), with every drop of blood drawn by the sword -- by the lash! -- somebody whipping Black folks -- shall be repaid in kind by one drawn by the sword -- whites killing whites, even so it must be said that the judgments of the Lord -- that' ; s in Psalms -- are true and righteous altogether. So, you' ; re going to reap what you sow. And the hardening, the resistance, and it' ; s still in one sense being moved now. We talk as if we' ; re going forward and yet there' ; s always resistance, even in the very best of our politicians and so forth, to do no more than you have to do. And I think that has been a disservice to the country. But just the fact that it spoke that, it couldn' ; t go back on it. HUNTLEY: We know that as a result of the Brown vs. the Board of Education decision, there was a lot of defiance. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, that' ; s what I' ; m saying. HUNTLEY: What, though, was the mood of Black folk? What did that do for Black folk at that particular time? SHUTTLESWORTH: You mean the decision or the defiance? HUNTLEY: The decision. There was an action and reactions from both sides. SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, for those who were leading in the Movement, like myself and others, the old NAACP people all over, that was really plodding along the legal lines, hopefully persuasion and legal persuasion -- it meant a whole lot. It meant everything. To the average Black, Negro person at that time we called ourselves, I think it had a liftening effect, but it didn' ; t always mean that because you feel better, you shout. But I don' ; t think it had any dereliction effect among Blacks. I think all Blacks basically wanted to be better off or equal to, and I think many Blacks, like they do now, look for other folks to lead, whether they follow or not, they still look for people up front to lead, whether they criticize them or not. For me, it was forward march, full speed, and now we' ; ve got the legal background, go ahead. And I think that' ; s one of the emphases I had, that some people even see me reading that Book, they didn' ; t understand. Yes, I did consider my moving forward as a mandate from God, I still do. I never changed that. HUNTLEY: In ' ; 53, ' ; 54, were you active then with the NAACP? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: And what were you doing them, what was your position? SHUTTLESWORTH: I wasn' ; t in an official position. I would meet with-- I was always moved to talk with Shores-- I was on the Board of the local NAACP, see? Gwen, Lucinda Roby, crippled man -- Ryals, J. J. Ryals, and, oh, I don' ; t know, some others. Shores was a member, but he was a lawyer basically, and timid, and there were several others I don' ; t remember. HUNTLEY: The emphasis at that time was voting? SHUTTLESWORTH: Voting and appealing to people to be concerned about whatever elections were had, maybe your little bit could sway it one way or another. And generally, just to talk to people about integrity and other things as they always have. But I was on the Board, yes, I was active member with the NAACP when it was outlawed, in fact I was Membership Chairman. HUNTLEY: Okay. Now prior to that, though, the Montgomery bus boycott took place, in 1955. Were you active in that? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, we were there the first night. It met at Holt Street. We went down. We established liaison with Martin Luther King and Ralph, and others. And we went down continuously to sort of give our support to their leadership. We were in it from the start. HUNTLEY: When did you first meet Martin Luther King? SHUTTLESWORTH: I' ; ve been trying to figure out was it here or somewhere else, but I remember my first-- one of the first meetings I had with him was here in Birmingham. He had come to attend some affair here, and I believe it was, I' ; m not sure it was Jim Dombrowski, but it was somebody who had been working with Southern Conference who had arranged with somebody else for me to be in contact, because at this time, Southern Conference Education Fund was red-baited, you know. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And I' ; m not sure that Martin would have at that time wanted to be identified. But anybody could meet him as a visitor. And in our interview you will probably want to talk about how we got civil rights and civil liberties combined because it was largely through me that it happened. But I met him, and I was impressed with him. I' ; m never awed with anybody' ; s personality ; I realize all people are people. At this time -- maybe Emory Jackson had something to do with it because he was enthralled with the fact that he had a Ph. D. At that time, if a Negro had a Masters, he was good, was considered quite a bit. Now it might have been through Emory Jackson' ; s effort that I first met Martin. HUNTLEY: Right. The Montgomery bus boycott is termed as sort of igniting the Movement in the South, particularly the career of King. SHUTTLESWORTH: It was. HUNTLEY: And you were saying that people from Birmingham -- SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh yes. HUNTLEY: -- going down to assist in that encounter. Now, were there any efforts to keep people from Birmingham and from other places from participating in that by the police? Did they know that you were coming down, back and forth? ' ; Cause you didn' ; t have the interstates at the time, you had some-- SHUTTLESWORTH: We did not have the interstates, and at that time the lines were not tapped as much as they were later on -- every time I picked up the line I could hear what was going on in the police department or the fire department. One time I got a four-way hook-up which we' ; ll talk about. There were some terrible things going on. But there was one (inaudible) after we had begun getting together, calling for a coordination of our effort, which turned into SCLC, culminated in the SCLC, then the police started to listening in on my line, King' ; s, so that, at the time when I was in jail here -- of course this is later -- King sent some men and he called, and Bull Connor came out there and threatened to arrest him -- he knew they were coming, see. But we cooperated, to answer your question. HUNTLEY: What was your role at Montgomery? Was there a specific role that you played? I knew you did a lot of speaking. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, that was, at first, more, and then they appreciated any advice and ideas we would have. And you must remember that there was a national kind of a thing, a national spotlight, so there were people from the (inaudible) talking with King, that' ; s how King got to be the national spokesman in a sense. And there' ; s nothing wrong with that. I think he took in a lot of people' ; s advice. They were real appreciative of what happened from Birmingham as such. HUNTLEY: In terms of the -- I know one of the issues that was paramount at Montgomery was that of the use of the automobiles and getting insurance for the automobiles. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: How did that play to either enhance the Movement or to work against the Movement? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, I' ; m always honest about what I know about, see, I didn' ; t know as much about the inner workings, but I do know they had people who were outside -- New York and other places -- who were interested in the Movement succeeding. I think they got Lloyd' ; s of London -- HUNTLEY: Right, that' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: --as I recall, and some others. I only heard about that. I never did know, see the papers and so forth, or-- I wasn' ; t involved in the personal inner workings at first in Montgomery, no. HUNTLEY: Did you have any dealings with E. D. Nixon? Did you know him well? SHUTTLESWORTH: I spoke with him several times, and I thought that he was the, in a sense the father and the general of the Movement, because he was head of NAACP. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And he indicated to me that he had groomed Rosa Parks for this job, for this situation, so maybe unbeknowing to Martin and before Martin got there, there was-- the seeds are always planted for goodness and righteousness and justice, you know. Somebody just picks it up here and there. HUNTLEY: ' ; Cause it was suggested that Rosa Parks was really not the first one of course to be arrested on the bus. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right, and I think somebody else had, as I remember Nixon' ; s talk to me, though we were riding the train one night and he explained a lot of things to me, and you know, Nixon was almost unknown, and I used to get on Martin and Ralph about not keeping him before the people, because I believe in people who have contributed ought to be kept before, what they have done. HUNTLEY: Right, right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And yet I realize that there are so many people clamoring for Martin and Ralph' ; s attention, even government people. See in the Movement it was a terrific amount of liaison with Washington and trying to get in. And sometimes I would have problems with Martin because he wouldn' ; t listen, even here. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And I had to say, well, now, wait a minute now, you know, Washington, D.C. doesn' ; t run Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Yeah, I know that' ; s one of the classic controversies that you had with him, but we' ; ll get to that a little bit later. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, yeah. But I think what I' ; m saying, it' ; s amazing the, at that time, the tremendous amount, of outside presence -- HUNTLEY: Even that early. SHUTTLESWORTH: That early. And interest. And everybody was hoping and thinking that they had the answer. More than that, everybody thought -- you must remember this -- that segregation could be easily defeated. And this is what most people now, who write about it -- lot of writers, they have their ideas, God bless them -- and even King thought, and I thought, to a lesser degree, that if we just simply point out to the South how you, why have you mistreated the Negroes. For example, when we organized SCLC, we took over the idea of bus desegregation as a thing everybody could do. And we thought that it wouldn' ; t be difficult. And you must remember the slogan that we first used -- to redeem the soul of America. To regain the consciousness or something like that. We think that people would just, in their own souls and hearts, think, now we ought not treat our Blacks so bad, and this and that. But it just doesn' ; t happen that way. And everybody thought segregation, a lot of people of the North, our people who hoped and everything, they had hoped that we could just get together and do a thing and just segregation would die. Uh-uh. No, no, no. It recoiled. HUNTLEY: When the NAACP was outlawed in the state. SHUTTLESWORTH: Talking ' ; bout a great big thing now, go ahead. HUNTLEY: What did, I mean, what did that say to the world about Alabama? SHUTTLESWORTH: The segregationists said to the world that Alabama-- You must remember this wasn' ; t just Alabama, it was Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Georgia and others. They were in cahoots, but Alabama is the first on the roll call of states. Alabama had a governor who I think wanted to be first, Patterson at the time I believe it was. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And, so that they wanted to do it first, and did it first, as I understand now from history. And Judge Walter B. Jones would have issued an injunction against the sun if Patterson had asked him. HUNTLEY: The day that it happened-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: --that the NAACP was outlawed, what kind of experience was that for you, because as you say you were the membership chairman-- SHUTTLESWORTH: --chairman, and I was going to meet with two or three people, papers were served on me. HUNTLEY: And that was one of the issues, that you wouldn' ; t give up the membership rolls, right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, I didn' ; t have to deal with that because I-- membership rolls would have been kept in New York anyway, right? Not in Birmingham. HUNTLEY: Hm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: But the injunction was served on us locally, because I think the (inaudible) and others were, they had their headquarters basically here in Birmingham, and the injunction was served. I never will forget that day that little fellow brought all that sheaf of papers, like when it was unloaded it went down to the ground. And he said that we were enjoined. And I said, What do you mean? It means you can' ; t do nothing. I said nothing? He said, Nothing! I said, That' ; s not the destiny of Blacks -- of Negroes. Of course, Mr. Shores, Lucinda Robey and others, we were enjoined from meeting, remember, and from collecting memberships, and, but we secretly met, anyway, got together, a few things, not openly but we met together. I remember Lucinda Robey and J. J. Ryals, man that had the long, (inaudible), and several, few others. But Shores didn' ; t, and Lucinda Robey and I were considered I guess hotheads, because, to me, it was a tragedy to tell us that we couldn' ; t fight for freedom, and also I felt as if the government, the Supreme Court was allowing these people to disobey the law openly, you know, ' ; cause they had called on folks to defy the law and everything. More than that, at the time NAACP was outlawed, you remember Huddleston, I believe it was, got up on the floor and said something about we got the old goose that laid the golden egg or something, so I said, in my speech I said, well, we' ; re fighting this kind of a plight, you got the goose after she laid the egg, but before you got the goose the goose had laid some eggs and they began to hatch. Mr. Shores in this meeting, I think we met two times, to my recall, and I was a little disturbed that they couldn' ; t come up with a way to do something. Well Mr. Shores, in his legal understanding, say, well now, an injunction is an injunction. He said, and you' ; ll go to jail for violating an injunction. And I said, well, then somebody has to go to jail. Lucinda Robey said, well that' ; s right and I' ; m one willing and ready to go! I said, well, let' ; s think about what we need to do, so Mr. Shores just counseled like he didn' ; t, he just counseled us that we could go to jail. The injunction meant that you couldn' ; t meet, you couldn' ; t collect memberships, and you couldn' ; t do anything in the name of the NAACP, which to me meant nothing. Mrs. Robey and Riles, several of us met again without Mr. Shores, to figure on exactly if there anything could be done. And the idea was coming into my mind then that somehow or another we gone have to defy. Now Mrs. Robey was just like I was, that' ; s one thing I thank God. She said, that' ; s right, they can' ; t tell us we can' ; t do, that was right down my alley. HUNTLEY: Right, you got some support in your idea. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, I said, let' ; s pray over and think it over. God' ; s got to do something. In fact, I knew that God was not going to let those segregationists triumph at this time. And at the very same time, something else began to happen. Things move together, you know, they are disjointed but we, people were calling me up, since I' ; m membership chairman, and I had gone and made liaison with all of the civic leagues, all over this area, Graysville, all around, even down mid-Alabama. HUNTLEY: You had developed a network of folk then, around the state. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right. Around the area. HUNTLEY: In this area. SHUTTLESWORTH: Not in Mobile or something like that, or not ' ; way up in Anniston, but around the county area and part of other counties, Graysville, Dolomite, and people were calling me and all the questions were saying, What can we do? What do we do now? I believe the injunction was issued, or I believe it was served, as I recall, on a Tuesday morning -- Tuesday? Think it was Tuesday, if it wasn' ; t Tuesday it was Thursday, whatever day, May twenty-sixth, and -- think it was a Tuesday -- and every day, from the time it hit the news, I guess I must have gotten, to start off with, fifty calls, then a hundred. What can we do? Take we take up, can we send you a card and you send to New York? I said, well, no, let' ; s hold everything for a while, and don' ; t do anything ' ; til we clear, and call me back next week and we' ; ll come up with some solution. And this is what I would say to the people who called. Say, we' ; ll have some sort of a solution within two weeks. HUNTLEY: Now, the NAACP in Bessemer was, did you know Asbury Howard? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: Did he work closely with you in the development of this? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, we had worked with, he and Miss Helen whatever-her-name-was down there, and this lawyer Hood and the others, but they didn' ; t work with us in developing the Movement. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: We had worked with them on some things in Bessemer and others. He was for the injunction. We respected each other. And I believe it was that Saturday morning, that I recall, I knew the answer. I woke up about three o' ; clock in the morning, sat up straight in the bed, wide awake, and look like something was saying to me, You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. And in my religious background I understand that was God saying to me, But you' ; ve got to do something, you' ; ve got to get the truth over. I tried to lay back down, but I couldn' ; t sleep, so that mid-morning I had a few preachers I knew would go with me on anything I tried that was right. Rev. Lane, who was at Hargrove (?) Church on the Southside (inaudible), Rev. Pruitt in North Birmingham, and Rev. L. J. Rogers at Shady Grove. I knew those three would go, regardless. I didn' ; t know about Alford, and I knew Herman Stone would go with me. And Phifer. And Nelson Smith. So I said to, I started calling around and I said somebody' ; s got to do something. I said, And I' ; m thinking about calling a mass meeting. Smith was for it, Lane and Pruitt. I said now, Somebody' ; s got to do it, and if nobody goes with me, I' ; m going to do it alone, but it looks better if more than one. I say, I' ; d hate for people to think only one preacher in Birmingham can call a mass meeting or has the courage to do it. Any rate, I must have had five or six interested, it' ; s in that book (inaudible). And I announced the meeting for Tuesday, June fifth. And I remember calling Rev. Alford. Now I could have had the meeting at Bethel. But I have always believed that everything shouldn' ; t have to be in just my church or even just the way I see it. And so, I called Rev. Alford and said to him, told him what I had thought, he said, Yeah, yeah, let' ; s meet at my church, meet at my church. I said, That' ; s good, now it' ; s gone be at Bethel if it can' ; t be anywhere else, knew it could be at Bethel. Meanwhile, Alford, I had asked Alford, myself, Lucinda Roby and a few others, Georgia and Lola Hendricks and some others, we had gotten together and talked about getting a statement of principles. ' ; Cause I know it' ; s an educational thing and you have to say something that' ; s gone hopefully catch people, so that statement of principles, I had written it out and I asked them for what they think about it, did they have anything they could add to it. You know, it' ; s an amazing thing that God gives you words for that moment that will stand. That' ; s on your thing out there, they can outlaw a movement, but they can' ; t outlaw the will of a people to be free. And I made sure I put in it that the Supreme Court ' ; way back there had ordered things, but now court-ordered segregation and here we are, something like this. So we called a mass meeting, of course you know the resultant chaos in the press, from Saturday when it hit the press until that Tuesday, every fifteen minutes, every hour, and of course I knew and I said to all of them there, you have to guard yourself, you have to watch yourself, because there' ; ll be the Ku Klux Klan thing. And I wasn' ; t, I wasn' ; t actually hoping somebody would throw a bomb against my bed, I' ; m not that stupid. And I knew that you didn' ; t have an adequate defense against the Klan, neither with police help or what we could do ourselves, I knew it. But I depended on God to do it. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And of course, I guess one evidence of the fear would be given where the press would take a picture, a blow-up of me, and look like I' ; m larger than I am, and much more black than I am. And they' ; d always, " ; Rev. F. L. Shuttlesworth, 3191 North Twenty-Ninth Avenue" ; , that was telling the Klan, you know. HUNTLEY: Where your house was. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. " ; -- is calling a meeting of Negroes, blah, blah, blah, blah, for Tuesday night--" ; And this went on all day Saturday, all night Saturday night, all day Sunday. And Sunday evening about 9:30, Lou Beard, pastor of Fifteenth Street, called me up and told me the Lord told him to tell me to call the meeting off. And you know, as I look back over it now, you almost hate to say these, but this is history. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And I have never intended to demean any man' ; s name, King nor anything, we had differences, but God was using everybody. And I said, Well, doctor, when did the Lord start sending my messages through you? He said, Well, I' ; m not afraid of anything, but I just think, I said, You think, or the Lord told you? Yeah, the Lord wanted me to tell you to call it off. I said, Well, I tell you what, doctor, you pray over it, I said, because I think the Lord told me. He said, Alright you pray over it, you pray over it too. I said, Okay, I' ; ll give it some thought. I didn' ; t intend to re-think it. I' ; m already announced it, how I' ; m gone re-think? HUNTLEY: Someone told that story, and said that he told you that the Lord told him to call-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, I haven' ; t finished it! HUNTLEY: Oh, okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, at eleven-thirty, the prime news hour when everything (inaudible), he called me back during that time, really, I been praying, ' ; cause I had told him I was gone pray, you know. And, the Lord really wants you to call that meeting off, but I was in no mood to talk, and I said, Well, doctor, you go back and tell the Lord, if he really wants me to call it off, he' ; s got to come down here himself in person and tell me, and he has to be sure to bring the identifying marks in his hands and his feet and his side, and I just hung up. Because I knew the meeting, and I knew he was nervous, and I knew the Lord didn' ; t use nervous preachers. So, the meeting went on. Rev. Ware didn' ; t like it, and N. W. Whitt, as you know, two of our most outspoken critics. Ware tried to get the Conference to almost go on record against it. And several of the ministers did speak up and say, We ought to do something, my God! Ware said, Well, brethren, just don' ; t say nothing good about it or bad about it, just let it alone and it will die itself these next two or three weeks just like everything else these little Negroes trying to start around here. That was Ware' ; s words! So, I knew then that I wouldn' ; t have an ally in him. But I made it up my mind that I wasn' ; t going to be an enemy to anybody, I wasn' ; t going to contest or challenge preachers, even when they organized the Betterment Association. Went on that night, and you couldn' ; t get to Alford' ; s church. History has that. But Rev. Whitt and Rev. Ware did come, and as the Lord would have it, that night Whitt and Ware wanted to start talking. Whitt was saying, all you little Negroes don' ; t know you gone get yourself killed. And folk wanted to put him out. And I said, No, doctor, now we' ; ve come to meet, and you can say what you want to say. You can' ; t, I said, you have to go on and talk now, though, people want you to say what you' ; re going to say. I was in charge. And he went on down to say something about, you know, you gone get killed, and I said, well, maybe the Lord wants some of us to get killed so the others of us can quit being afraid. Not a whole lot, I didn' ; t need to have a lot, I didn' ; t want to embarrass him and I realized the people would have tossed him out anyway. And incidentally we got him and Ware to take up the collection that night, after the, so I gave one of those rip-roaring speeches. HUNTLEY: The people were ecstatic at that time. SHUTTLESWORTH: They were ecstatic. They were, just the idea of us meeting, the idea of the state telling them they can' ; t meet. And my thought was, how in the name of God can folk can tell you you can' ; t be free when God made you to be free. And I kept on with that thing, Jesus say you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. And it was, every word I said it was just applause. And so, I said now, we' ; re going to have to organize. And we had already gotten the initial thing, the draft to be readied see, to be read. And I asked them three times, because I didn' ; t want them to just jump into something. I said, now what we' ; re getting into, it may cost some lives, it may, it may, none of us may survive, I said, but we have to do something, for our sake and our children. Do you want to organize? They voted to organize. Then we read this thing that we had in our book of our movement ' ; way back there, the preamble, and what we believed, and our pledge to nonviolence, and they voted on that and I had them vote on it twice, and they elected me president. And I told them in electing me president, that means we gone move, we won' ; t be standing still. And Lucinda B. Robey, bless her heart, I think of her all the time, she developed the word that, The Movement Is Moving, it' ; s supposed to move. And that was our drive. So, we were to challenge segregation in every form we could. And that' ; s why, I' ; m sure, that I have suffered as much as I have because I believe in challenging on all fronts. And also, I' ; m not a person who asks other people to do what I won' ; t. I' ; m a battlefield general, I believe in leading troops to battle. I never asked anybody to go and do what I wouldn' ; t do myself. And I guess when you get to where you really trust and believe in God and depend on him, you go. And I was aware, I must say to you, I was aware that I could get my brains knocked out. I was aware that any day could be my last, but I wanted my last day to be a day on the battlefield for the Lord. And I literally believe that thing -- people are shocked when I tell them I tried to get killed in Birmingham -- but I literally believe that writing in which Jesus said he that loses his life for my sake shall find it. And I recognized I had a family, and it wasn' ; t that I didn' ; t care anymore for them than you care for your family or others, but there was a counterbalancing understanding that even if I cared for them I couldn' ; t protect them if somebody wanted to kill them, so go ahead and commit. Since it is He that keeps thee, He doesn' ; t sleep, see? So that was, I had that understanding. Go ahead, I' ; m sorry. HUNTLEY: What did your wife and family feel about your fearlessness? SHUTTLESWORTH: You' ; d be surprised. We never sat down and discussed that. They knew me. They knew I never said anything, at church or anywhere else, that I didn' ; t mean, and I think they felt as if God must have been saying something. ' ; Cause I never backed down, I never sat down and said, Well, wonder if you do this what you ' ; gone do, I never, that was never-- HUNTLEY: So, your wife never said, You know, you need to slow down a little bit because-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Never, never. You must remember that the day we went down to that terminal station in ' ; 57, long time away, she went with me and I didn' ; t have any weapon, nothing. HUNTLEY: One of the first issues that the Movement dealt with, I think it was the issue of having no Black policemen. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, no Black policemen, and voting, yes, Personnel Department. HUNTLEY: How did you approach that, what did you decide to do to elevate that issue? SHUTTLESWORTH: You have to remember that the Police Department under Bull Connor, knew everybody' ; s record or created a record for them. So, you had to get somebody you hoped that was at least aboveboard. And it is God' ; s way of, how shall I say it? Rounding the thing out. Just like when the kids went to those stores, they didn' ; t have to buy anything, but we made them buy a handkerchief just to be sure, ' ; cause the lawyers would get up in court, What you buy? HUNTLEY: Right. Covering the bases. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right. HUNTLEY: So basically, you did the same thing with the issue of the police matter. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. The young men, I can' ; t recall their names right now, were talked with and we understood, and another thing we had to go again, nobody can really sit down in a moment and figure out all of the things you had to think about and go through back there. You see, we had the problem of Negroes would want to come up and act like they want to do something and then back out, which would have been worse. We were dealing with all of that, and then we had to work with whoever would come up, whether it was schools, integration papers, or (inaudible) as to whether or not they would need protection and so forth and so on, so when you see me walking with Colonel Johnson and others and people like an Armstrong, God gives you people enough. God will see to it that you have enough resources to do. I never had to worry, and I didn' ; t, there were many times I did think about, when I was going off, what was happening back to my family and so forth, but it didn' ; t bother me because I knew they were in the hand of God and I knew I was on a mission for God. So here too we made sure in our own mind that the young men had nothing in their record that could embarrass others, ' ; cause that' ; s the first thing the press and Bull would do. And I think Dr. McPherson was one of them, wasn' ; t he, in that period? HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And I think when Dr. McPherson took that examination, a man with a third-grade education gave it to him I believe, just about what was a quarter of a point or something like that. This just shows you how silly they can be, and Dr. McPherson had at Ph. D. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And it all confirmed my understanding that no matter what you' ; ve got, if you' ; re Black, you have to be less than. But the policemen, the voting, we were quite diligent, and we stayed at the voter registering. Here' ; s one thing that I think God blessed me. I had a church and I have a personality that is sort of pushy, I realize that, and so when the press writes about me, I am a dictator, and I was pushy. I' ; d say, Well, okay, you call me a dictator, say I' ; m a benevolent dictator, trying to do what' ; s good for us. But I would, on my Sunday morning services, I would call my members' ; names out, so-and-so, are you registered? I would always call them by their first names. No, I' ; d say, Well, I' ; ll be by to get you in the morning at such-and-such a time. One of the things I remember so well was I had a real light-skinned woman, she' ; s still living out there, Maude Elms, she' ; s light-skinned, tall, taller than I was, and her husband was real dark, much darker than I am, named Lonnie. So, they were sitting in church one day. And remember, I would put their names up on the board, I was the first church in North Birmingham to register all of his members. HUNTLEY: Oh, is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah! And I said to my deacons, I said, I don' ; t want y' ; all wearing these robes out, and the carpet, and can' ; t get up and go vote. You' ; ve been watching. One that loved me so well, I got him registered and all. And so, I would just be up in church Sunday morning. I said, Maude, are you registered to vote? She sitting right beside of her husband Lonnie. She said, No, sir. I said Well, alright, I' ; ll be down to get you in the morning, I' ; ll be there by about seven o' ; clock. She said, Well, don' ; t come that early, Reverend, I (skip in tape) HUNTLEY: So that was sort of the badge of honor, then. SHUTTLESWORTH: The badge of honor. And one of the things that I succeeded in doing was getting other churches, especially those close to me, to do a lot of registration, see. Because as you (end of Side 1) Side 2: SHUTTLESWORTH: -- old white people, decrepit, old, on a stick, and one man' ; s body was-- first time I ever saw a body look like in a z shape, was a man at the courthouse who ought to been home, retired long ago, but he had a job, and the only Black people I saw in the courthouse were people who mostly swept the floors, not too many of them, and if any Black person wasn' ; t sweeping the floors, or had a piece of paper, he had one that some white man had written something to another one on, he carried that way, and that just didn' ; t set well with me at all, and I had turned the table. So, it' ; s good to go to the courthouse now and see these faces, just even if we went up to lunch while ago, see all those young, Black Negroes, many of them perhaps who never would recognize me, businessmen, how did they get there? HUNTLEY: They don' ; t know, many of them don' ; t know. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, and what did it take for them to get there? So that' ; s the thing. But it was a thing. And I never was divided in my mind about whether or not to attack segregation. HUNTLEY: That was never a question in your mind. SHUTTLESWORTH: It was never a question, all aspects. I think I sent Lola and some of them to the library, and this, and to Midfield, that Kiddieland Park, and all, everything that we could do. And then when the intrastate thing was going on, that' ; s when me and my wife and I went to the Terminal Station, as you know. HUNTLEY: Yes. SHUTTLESWORTH: (________?________ ) was the first legal suit that the movement filed. HUNTLEY: Okay. As a result of your tenacity that first year between June and December, by the Christmas season-- SHUTTLESWORTH: This was later than ' ; 56. You' ; re talking about ' ; 56 now. HUNTLEY: Fifty-fix, yeah. As a result of that organization, there was an answer to you that Christmas season. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. HUNTLEY: Talk about that for a bit. SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, you remember from June, the Montgomery lawsuit was filed in ' ; 55, see. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: It took it that long to get up to the Supreme Court. In June we started meeting, the first one was a Tuesday night. But I had the understanding that if we were going to really be more effective we had to meet the next night from Sunday so we could get around to all the churches. And so we got a thing going where, in all the churches the Movement would be announced, see, on Monday night, see. And it stayed there for years, we met every Monday night, rain, shine, storms, this and that, It would take a long time to talk about the different types of harassments that the police did, and from different churches, I never did let it meet at no one church, all around, we had a committee to get the churches and so forth. HUNTLEY: That was done in the first year. SHUTTLESWORTH: First year, we met regularly. HUNTLEY: Every Monday. SHUTTLESWORTH: The police would follow cars, arrest folks, give them tickets. I remember once we met at, as I recall at that time, Rev. Phifer' ; s church was in the middle of the block, but the police would get you by running on a red light, in the middle of the block, anything. But people came on. Unmitigated harassment and so forth. And in ' ; 58 it had gotten so that Dr. King came. He was shocked at how I had dealt with the police, we talked about that too, you want to ask, I' ; m trying not to get it all mixed up-- HUNTLEY: Yeah. SHUTTLESWORTH: --because mine is a myriad, long story. We' ; re talking about that first year now. HUNTLEY: Right. The first bombing. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right, well, I' ; m leading up to that. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, by June, July, August and September, we were so crystallized till the people themselves would move. Emory Jackson did a great job, you know, always pronounced where it would be. That was a help. So, we somehow or another felt, the Supreme Court had heard the case in June, about the time we organized, before that, but their decision didn' ; t come down in June. So, we were expecting it any time after June at the time we first organized. And somehow or another, Nelson Smith and I got wind that the Supreme Court decision on that was coming down. We felt, we knew it was going to be against segregation. HUNTLEY: This is the bus--? SHUTTLESWORTH: Bus desegregation, yeah. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: We were at the TV station when it came through on the teletype. And so I said to Nelson, you must remember that God activates you, gets you ready to do this moment what will last a generation, I said, now we don' ; t want all the Klansmen to be in Montgomery, see, all over Alabama and the South. I said, let' ; s ask the commissioners to rescind the segregation laws in the light of the Montgomery decision. And we knew that if didn' ; t threaten them they weren' ; t going to do anything anyway. In fact, we knew they weren' ; t going to do it, but we had to threaten them to let them know that something was going to happen if they didn' ; t. So Nelson was for it, and we got the decision, Lola and Georgia and them, Lola would type it up and we got it to the press, all of the press, and so that took some of the heat off Montgomery that here in Birmingham we threaten we gone rise if they don' ; t, you know, that was a big thing. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: Incidentally, I' ; m going to go back and look at some of those headlines. So, we got that done and we knew they weren' ; t going to do it. And we' ; re coming up to Christmas, and I remember that Christmas Eve, churches in that area met, and they met at somebody else' ; s church but this time it was mine to preach. And I remember preaching from the text over in Isaiah, sixth chapter, unto us a child is born, mighty counselor, and I was preaching, I was calling myself swinging out, and I remember saying these words, and I don' ; t know why, I said I expect at some time now any day, some Klansman will throw a stick of dynamite at my house. One stick? Sixteen. That Christmas night, sixteen sticks of dynamite was placed between the church and the house, church was brick and the house was wood, and there was a metal, a cement thing at the bottom so that the implosive effect couldn' ; t go into the brick, but couldn' ; t go down this way into the house, had to go corner of the house -- you got that picture here somewhere haven' ; t you? I think they need to put it up in the library level under my picture so people can see it just wasn' ; t me looking good, it was what you come out of that caused the Movement to go. And the corner of that house was blown off. And I felt the, it was around about nine-something. And my deacon, Charlie Roberson and his wife from down the street, always came to visit us on that Christmas night. HUNTLEY: Charlie Robinson? SHUTTLESWORTH: Charlie Roberson, r-o-b-e-r-s-o-n, not i-n. And his wife and my wife and the kids were in the other rooms. So he was sitting beside me in the bed in the corner of the house, just like this thing but up against the wall. And he was sitting right in front of a mirror, that mirror, you know a dresser with a mirror? That mirror was as wide as from here to that corner, well, twice wide as this, and little longer than this, about half again, and so it was a great big mirror on that vanity. And he was sitting right before that, but sitting right by the bed, so we were just in there talking. We been talking like this less than an hour, must been about an hour, hour-and-a-half, about nine-something, ' ; cause he was just about getting ready to go. And all of a sudden, Whoom! I felt something I never felt, and the lights went out, and I felt such a pressure I never felt before, and I felt the force of something be like driving me back, and yet I understood something that I never, nobody ever told me, I understood, I felt a presence that I can' ; t really identify. And this wall between my head and the dining room, and the corner, was blown off, front part of the front wall was blown past the porch. This wall was blown, was just demolished, and the roof came down I guess, from up there to down here and I' ; m down, the floor was blown out from under the bed you see, as far as from here to that-- HUNTLEY: You' ; re in the bed. SHUTTLESWORTH: Laying in the bed, my shorts and undershirt. HUNTLEY: And your friend was there. SHUTTLESWORTH: Sitting right by the bed, in front of the vanity. And so, all of this floor in this corner was blown away, so I' ; m down in where the floor was, lying on the mattress. It would take a long time to describe it, but the, as we found later, the foot of the bed, the bed feet, legs, they had been blown off too, and right in the, as we were gathering up the debris, we found that a sliver of wood from this wall was driven in that bed thing which would have come into my head were it not for that -- where I was lying in the bed, a sliver of wood had been driven through that, sticking through that bed. But more than that, most, many slivers of wood from this wall were stuck in the center wall, now which was holding up the roof. I had a gabardine coat hanging up, somebody had given me a wide fedora gray hat. I couldn' ; t wear either of them anymore. I put them on that night because I didn' ; t have, I had to go out later on, the crowds keep them from getting, but I put the coat on over my, didn' ; t even put a shirt on, but put my coat on and went out. HUNTLEY: Was your family in the house? SHUTTLESWORTH: In the other room, right across, like that room that' ; s over there. But that room was holding up, that wall was holding up the what was left of the roof. This floor, part of it had been blown away, had arced up, and some of the planks had gone up into a little heater that we had on there and it was beginning to catch fire and I put that out. And Charlie Robinson was sitting right by the bed, which would have come to about the bed about half way the room, and that mirror that was behind him had been shattered I guess into a million pieces, and he didn' ; t get none of the glass cut, just two or three little knicks of blood. And know what his remark was? Reverend, I guess the Lord saved me ' ; cause I was with you. It' ; s amazing that the shards of glass would have just, but the glass was shattered, we never did find no large pieces of glass. HUNTLEY: Just totally shattered. SHUTTLESWORTH: And you wouldn' ; t believe this, the springs that I was lying on, we never did get no large pieces of springs. It was shattered. HUNTLEY: Powerful piece. SHUTTLESWORTH: But I was there laying on the mattress. And in a second I knew what Moses meant when he said underneath thee are the everlasting arms. I never, to smell all that smoke dust from years the house, dynamite mixed with that acrid smoke, so Charlie had gotten out and gone back through, we had to go through that door, couldn' ; t, let me see, the house was leaning kind of this way, so we couldn' ; t go in that door, that door was, so he went out that way. But I took time getting my clothes out and so a crowd began to gather on the outside, I could hear them. Everybody thought I was dead. My wife and children had gone out, so Charlie had gone out this door, this wall that still stood, and, but I took time and put this fire out, because if I hadn' ; t it would have burned down, and I could hear voices out there, the police naturally come. So, I put this coat on and came out, and I could hear James Revis-- This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (1996) (2 of 5)
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth discusses leading the Birmingham Movement. Part 2 of 5.
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Civil rights movements--Alabama—Birmingham
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Horace Huntley
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth
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5.4 December 10, 1996 Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (1996) (3 of 5) 19961210S3 02:02:16 BCRIOHP Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Oral History Project Collection bcriohp BCRI Oral History Project BCRI Oral History Collection Civil rights movements--Alabama--Birmingham Shuttlesworth, Fred L., 1922-2011 Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth Horace Huntley Video 1:|9(14)|20(15)|31(1)|46(11)|65(1)|78(17)|94(2)|109(5)|119(18)|132(14)|143(7)|156(7)|170(4)|180(4)|190(12)|201(13)|233(2)|248(10)|275(13)|286(3)|304(8)|324(13)|334(13)|354(9)|363(9)|380(10)|391(1)|404(13)|415(8)|429(3)|447(7)|456(15)|470(13)|485(2)|496(12)|505(12)|515(1)|526(5)|542(15)|556(8)|565(6)|575(3)|587(12)|603(3)|614(2)|626(7)|638(10)|648(6)|659(2)|676(3)|691(1)|708(1)|721(14)|732(8)|744(1)|766(12)|776(12)|795(3)|811(4)|823(14)|835(7)|849(1)|859(11)|874(5)|890(10)|909(7)|923(4)|935(11)|945(5)|967(5)|987(5)|1002(6)|1015(7)|1029(11)|1044(5)|1055(7)|1071(13)|1091(7)|1103(7)|1104(10)|1108(8)|1126(15)|1135(11)|1148(6)|1168(9)|1184(9)|1196(15)|1213(10)|1230(4)|1239(5)|1247(2)|1270(3)|1289(8)|1300(1)|1313(7)|1323(4)|1334(8)|1347(10)|1356(5)|1369(3)|1382(13)|1393(13)|1406(4)|1420(5)|1431(6)|1440(11)|1454(3)|1465(7)|1473(14)|1486(13)|1498(4)|1513(9)|1526(3)|1535(13)|1547(11)|1565(7)|1576(1)|1590(7)|1605(1)|1621(6)|1631(4)|1643(4) 0 https://youtu.be/03yhOw8F9ts YouTube video English Oral History Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth discusses leading the Birmingham Movement. Part 3 of 5. SHUTTLESWORTH: --And so he was gonna come in ' ; cause I would hear him in the back door saying and all. You scared and you gotta not (inaudible). So, when I heard him, I hollered back to him saying, " ; James I' ; m coming out I' ; m alright." ; " ; That you Reverend, you alright?" ; I said, " ; Yeah I' ; m alright I' ; ll get out in a minute go out and tell everybody be quiet." ; So, he was happy he turned around and went on back out and passed a policeman standing there so I put on a coat and went out there and him and his brother the policeman. I hit him right round in here somewhere. Big big guy weighs easy 300 pounds, 280 or so. And he had his cap on and he looked- we were at the back room. It was a six-room house and we were right where the back- you get off the back porch and get on the ground and he looked, and he saw me in took his cap off and took his handkerchief out and rubbed his eyes. I wondered- I never saw a policeman cry before. At least I thought he was. I didn' ; t say anything. So, then he turned around, put his cap on walked maybe from here to that door. He would have been not quite to the middle of the house. He turned and looked at me again shook his head. So, I' ; m walking along so he' ; s ahead of me as far to me and that door, so he walked on up maybe against another time between where I am and that door. Maybe 25 feet, which would be a little bit beyond the middle of the house. We hadn' ; t got to the crowd yet and on this side of the house, and he said- he hadn' ; t spoken all this time- and he said, Reverend, I' ; m so sorry. He said I know these people ; said I didn' ; t think they' ; d go this far. Said I really didn' ; t think they would go this far. He said I' ; m sure enough sorry. He said, Reverend, I' ; ll tell you what I' ; d do if I were you, I' ; d get out of town as quick as I could. But I hadn' ; t spoken to him either. So, I said, Officer -- I always just called them Officer -- I said, Officer, you are not me. And you go back and tell your Klan brethren that if the Lord could keep me through this, and bring me out of this, tell them the war is on and I' ; m here for the duration, it' ; s just beginning. He didn' ; t say no more, he turned around and walked off. And I walked out right behind him, and as I, as the Lord would have it, all policemen want to show their authority, you know, but people were really upset, it could have been a big thing, had I not sent Mr. Revis back out to tell folks I was alright and to be quiet and calm. But a policeman had challenged some young Negro, and just as I got past the porch through the hedgerow to the street, and this Negro was looking at this policeman and this policeman was saying something, he went to put his hand on his gun and this Negro had a knife, he say, I' ; ll cut your so-and-so throat, and this policeman, he could have pulled his gun out, and so I patted him on the shoulder, I said, Now we don' ; t need that. I said, Now, Officer, you need to control yourself. What you do if you can' ; t control yourself, I have to call down to there. I say, They' ; re excited. Said I' ; ll have to call down and get you to move from out there, say, ' ; cause you aren' ; t gone cause anybody any harm out here tonight. HUNTLEY: Was this was the same officer that? SHUTTLESWORTH: No, not the same, the big one had gone on. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, I went on to my car, see I was going to the car as they were there. I think some of them had wanted to come in, you know, or something. The police trying, Git back! You know how policemen do. So, I went on and sat in the back of the car that was waiting for me, I don' ; t really know now whether it was mine somebody had, take me to be checked out, but as I sat in the back of my car, just had this coat on, and the pants, and my little daughter was six years old then, the baby that' ; s in Washington, and she always sucked her finger, and so she came and curled up in my lap and put her finger in her mouth and looked up in my face. They can' ; t kill us, can they, Daddy? I said, No, darling, they can' ; t kill folks. That' ; s historic. HUNTLEY: That' ; s what the baby said? SHUTTLESWORTH: She said, They can' ; t kill us, can they, Daddy? Just like that. That was a night of nights. But I remember something, and I had a sense of a presence. Nobody can teach you that. It' ; s not, you can' ; t write it in a book fully. HUNTLEY: Now of course that was designed to kill the Movement, to frighten people away. SHUTTLESWORTH: To kill the Movement, and I got up the next day, and this is the other thing. You know it' ; s amazing what God does. The average person would have been scared and been gone. So, I said to the, to people in the Movement who came, I said, We gone meet first thing in the morning, ' ; cause we had said we gone ride the buses. The Klan didn' ; t intend for me to be around to ride. And the, so when daylight came, the police went and they wanted to know if I needed to tear -- I said, No, let it stay there, people are coming from everywhere to just pass by to see it, so I thought they should see it, I said, No, we' ; ve got time to get it down. I said it didn' ; t fall last night, it' ; ll stand up a while. And so, , I' ; m trying to think where it was, if it was in Mims' ; s house or right out there, that I -- Alford was one of the key ones, Rev. Alford, who said, I think we ought to think this thing-- (?) Stone, who was my Vice President at that time, said, President, I think you need to really go somewhere and think. I said, Alright, everybody meet down to Gaston' ; s, so that the people heard me tell them, meet down to Gaston' ; s place down here on Sixteenth Street or wherever it was. HUNTLEY: The motel? SHUTTLESWORTH: Not the motel, funeral home. HUNTLEY: Funeral home, okay, sixteenth street. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. And you' ; d be surprised at how God makes things come out. So, the press --naturally they' ; re going where I' ; m going -- so I knew I had to take total charge of the situation or it could be a mess that day. First of all, I was a challenge to ride. There was a need to be sure the people were disciplined to ride, remembering nonviolence. And there was a need to do what we say, else we have been dead. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: The Movement I mean. I could have been alive and yet the Movement would have gone unless we had at least announced a time to ride that day. So, when we got in, I said, Now, to the Movement, and you know the Lord does thing. I was preaching Sunday morning about how he made those Israelites, Egyptians, give them most of their jewels and stuff ' ; fore they left, so they had most of the riches of Egypt. I said to the newsman, we were friends, I said, Now gentlemen, I want to say something to you all. I said now I have to talk inside. I said I' ; m gone give you a scoop today, it' ; s worth your waiting, but I cannot have you at the meeting, would y' ; all respect that for us? Yeah! I said, But don' ; t go away now because when I come out, I' ; ll have a scoop for you, and I' ; ll let you know exactly when we gone ride. Well, they thought I' ; m going to be deciding whether to ride. Now inside, fear, fear is something. Most of my board members, I had ordered them to ride. I said all of the board members gone ride to show the other folks. And I was moved at how fearful they were. Rev. Stone, and Alford was almost (?). Now Brother President, I think that we ought to take time and think this thing out. I said, Well what is there to think out? I said, We said we were gone ride. And more than that, when I knew I was alive after the bombing, that' ; s the first thing on my mind. We gone do what we said we were gone do. I said it' ; s time for Negroes to learn to do what you say you gone do. And so, , Alford went on to say something else, but one little slender fellow -- I wish I knew his name -- he said, Now, Brother President, we come here to hear what YOU got to say, we didn' ; t come here to hear these scared folks, we gone do what you -- and he was actually crying, and a lot of other people were crying, ' ; cause first of all, here I am alive. I said, Well, alright, let me just say to everybody, said, Now, so far as members of the board, if you all are nervous or scared to ride, I said, when I leave here, we going to the buses. I said, now I won' ; t look back. Find you any crack that you want and hide if you can' ; t ride. Say, I' ; m not commanding, you' ; re free from that, you don' ; t have to ride ' ; cause I say so. I said, But I think enough people here will ride. I said, How many y' ; all want to ride with me? All the whole house went up. I think it even made some of the board members feel-- I said, Now, let' ; s get together. Now you would think this is something after a night of a bombing and terrifying, but I was as calm as a cucumber, even in that bombing when they were, I said, Then now we got to get ourselves ready. First place, I said, All y' ; all want to ride? Yeah. I said, Be sure you want to ride, you don' ; t have to, said, But somebody' ; s gone ride if it' ; s nobody but me. We' ; re with you, Brother President. Well, I said, I want you to ride, and I don' ; t want all you to ride with me. I said we' ; re going down to 18th and 19th Street, 21st, up in there where the buses crisscross. I said, We want to ride all over town. Said I don' ; t want you to get on, just go on one place. Go all over. Be sure somebody goes everywhere the buses go. I said, that' ; s one thing. The other thing, when you get on the bus, don' ; t gang up like blackbirds. I say, I don' ; t want no two Black folks sitting together up front. I said, All Black folks gone sit up front, but leave space for your white brothers to sit with you. HUNTLEY: One to a seat. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. I said, don' ; t no two Black folks sit, I say, you sit down and you sit over here so the white folks have to sit or let them stand. I said, y' ; all understand it took time. I think one of the things that really made the (inaudible) go well was my calmness. I wasn' ; t excited. I said and didn' ; t nobody ask me was I nervous. I said now one reason the press, I didn' ; t put the press out ' ; cause, if the press heard me say we gone ride today, the police would be up here and we can' ; t get to the buses. I say, so the next thing is I don' ; t want anybody here to gang up around me when we go out from here. Go, somebody start walking this way. But, the goal is, in so many minutes be down in those four-block areas where you crisscross the buses. I say, and let the press talk, you be saying and talking ' ; about nothing. I say, But we get to the buses today if we going to make history. I said, Klan made their history last night, we make ours for God today. And they were so glad. First of all, glad I was alive, was crying for me. I said, We don' ; t have to get emotional about it. And my oldest daughter had been burned, not from the bombing, and here again God does some things for you. I better tell you this ' ; cause, see, people have to understand that God is saving us every day and we don' ; t know it. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: She would get up early with an outing gown on and help her mama cook in the morning. And so, happened I was traveling everywhere then. I would just come home and change clothes and get right back on the road for days at a time. And so, happened that night that I stayed home, I didn' ; t come and go right out, I stayed until the next morning, which I was going out the next day, ' ; cause I had invitations everywhere. And she got up early, and she had this outing gown on and was standing in front of this open-face heater and that outing caught fire. And I' ; m lying in the bed, and I hear my wife was saying, Oh Pat, oh Pat, oh oh Pat, what! And she was -- and I got up and the girl' ; s gown was burning up the back of her thighs. My oldest daughter is burned on, and even her in stomach. And I could see it was reaching her hair and I just threw her down and beat the flames out, burnt my fingers and so forth. So, she had to go to the Jefferson Hospital here, thing rolled over, just like you, just like a burnt pig, you know. But she was real touchy, one thing, and I thank God for it today, she ain' ; t gone miss nothing coming here to church, all she was saying was that she hate she missed church. But I rode to see her, that was the only place I was going, then I was going back home, you see, to see whatever else happened with anybody else that rode. So, then I called the press in after I had everybody calm. I said, Now you all decide. Two or three people want to ride in every area, at least three or four. I called the press in. I said, gentlemen, you all want the scoop I was gone give you? Yeah. I said, Well, I' ; m sure you wanted me to announce to you the date when we gone ride, right? Yeah. I said, And I appreciate your, said I got one more thing to ask. I said, In the first place, I said suppose I, I said you want to know the date? Yeah. I said before I tell you the date, let me ask you a favor. I said whenever we ride and the police see me talking to you, they gone know that I' ; m gone do something ' ; cause they know I' ; m in action. I said, So, whenever I tell you, I don' ; t want you to go ahead of us, whenever that is, alright? I said, ' ; Cause if you go ahead of us at the buses, the cops gone know we coming, we won' ; t even get there. I said, y' ; all know that, don' ; t you? Yeah, yeah. I said, would you promise that whenever we arrive, you won' ; t just go ' ; way up ahead of us, I said, stay with us, talk to folks, and you know where the buses going, if these things. One of them said, Well, you ain' ; t said when. I said, I' ; ll tell you when when you tell me what. I said, you can agree to that, then I' ; ll tell you when we gone ride. He said, we gone follow you. You always have worked with us and we have respect for what you' ; re doing. I said, Okay, we gone ride today. Gone ride TODAY? I said, Yeah, we gone ride today, right now in fact, and said, so don' ; t go ahead of us. Talk to people, stay behind, all of it. Some of you can talk to me, talk. And we went up, and over two hundred and fifty people rode that day, all over. HUNTLEY: Is that right? And this is right after the bombing. SHUTTLESWORTH: Next day. HUNTLEY: Fifty-six. SHUTTLESWORTH: Next day. HUNTLEY: Were you arrested? SHUTTLESWORTH: No. HUNTLEY: Nobody was arrested. SHUTTLESWORTH: I, I rode, see, the police thought we were gone go down and decide to ride next two, three days, they were getting ready for then. HUNTLEY: So, they were not prepared. SHUTTLESWORTH: When they heard the thing, we had already ridden, so they did arrest twenty-two, I believe it was, wasn' ; t it? Believe the first ride was twenty-two. HUNTLEY: Yeah, that' ; s right it was twenty-two, that' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: Twenty-two. And that give us the thing to make the case so we didn' ; t have to continue to ride. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, I rode on to the hospital, saw my daughter, came on back home. And by the way, the press was with me, you know, so I got up and gave a, so we were sitting down, a young white girl got up so I, ' ; bout halfway there, I said, Would you like to have my seat? (laughs) It was nice. But that' ; s how we did it. And people were right, and I said, and they said, God saved him to lead the fight. And that' ; s how I got to be the leader, it wasn' ; t because, you couldn' ; t have gotten Black folk in Birmingham to vote to face nothing like that. And I don' ; t think most of the people who write about it understand. Even Dr. King was candid enough to say, I could not have done and survived and led the people in Birmingham, see. But the bombing, see, God does things in a way that you know nobody but He, just like the Red Sea. And that' ; s the only reason I' ; m alive. See, that' ; s why I think you should put those pictures up so folks will see what you come through. That' ; s why I led Birmingham and why I didn' ; t have to fight for leadership. HUNTLEY: So, the people actually saw what had happened. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: And that was like your baptism. SHUTTLESWORTH: That was my baptism, but it was-- HUNTLEY: into leadership. SHUTTLESWORTH: It was induction into leadership. They knew that I wasn' ; t afraid because if I could come out of that and get up and ride the buses the next day, challenging the system, segregation (inaudible) HUNTLEY: So, in effect, you along with the people, then, set the example for the rest of your leaders, in effect. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: Because they were basically afraid. SHUTTLESWORTH: They were afraid, they were afraid. But that did a lot, see, that bombing, and my coming out of it, and then, see, I could afford to preach God will provide, God will take care of you. And then I was never afraid, see, I was always saying that, moving on to something else, see, I never just stopped on the ground conquered, you, what that thing in the old Christian vernacular said, Each victory that you win over sin helps you some other to win, fight manfully onward, and that' ; s been my drive. And I guess I' ; m a little bothered today because Black people, they think they' ; ve got it together, but they don' ; t have it together. And we' ; ve allowed the drug subculture, we' ; ve allowed rock-and-roll, we' ; ve allowed rapping and other things to sort of take the idealism from the forward march. And then there' ; s a tendency now, one of the things that disturbed Martin Luther King before he died was, you can' ; t guarantee that you' ; re gone have a nonviolent march at any time. You remember the violence in Memphis? But he was committed to nonviolence and so am I. HUNTLEY: And that was very significant because that basically was the stance of the Movement. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: And that, again, was part of that belief that you had. In order to really believe in nonviolence, you had to have that belief in God. SHUTTLESWORTH: You see, one of the -- I don' ; t know whether you want to just starting about incidents -- we can get a thousand, St. Augustine, Florida, here. But that was just the bombing thing. But one of the other most significant incidents, and there were many, and I guess we' ; ll get to them. HUNTLEY: Let' ; s get to them, we' ; ve got time for one of them now. SHUTTLESWORTH: In nineteen-fifty-seven, that was a tremendous year, we had, started out with the Carl and ________ Baldwin in March, and the court denied our petition for the schools. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And so, then it said something about the placement laws, Boutwell come up with the placement laws. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, I decided to make Boutwell place our children (laughs). I knew it was segregation, I wasn' ; t moved. The Supreme Court could have declared it unconstitutional but said they would allow it on its face, in application. And here again, I blame the Supreme Court, because you see, white flight is largely a result of the negligence of the Court in moving to do things. HUNTLEY: That' ; s significant. SHUTTLESWORTH: That' ; s significant. And another thing I would say if I had any one biggest problem I had with Martin, after we came here and won the victory -- because people in Birmingham after that would have done anything, we had the victory -- I said to him the next thing ought to be, let' ; s integrate these schools so that the white folks won' ; t run. Course we went to Selma, as you know, and then to St. Augustine, Florida. But I said, if we integrate Birmingham schools before the white folks move out, that' ; ll start others across, you must realize that, you throw a rock in the water and it has a ripple effect. And I was, I was real disappointed, many writers have questioned Martin' ; s, and there are questions to be raised about it. But I was concerned to integrate the city and Martin was concerned with his name during this, and I think we both had kindred ideas and naturally he would have had his image to deal with, and I don' ; t mind supporting his image so long as it does help (help?). You see, the violation of the court order, that had to be. Wasn' ; t no way that Martin Luther King was gone come to Birmingham and get that many people in jail and not violate the court order. That' ; s a whole other thing, and that' ; s where we had this confrontation which even involved the President of the United States. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: Where I was bombed, went to the hospital that night, struck with a fire hose? That' ; s a chapter in itself. HUNTLEY: Yeah. SHUTTLESWORTH: But, all in all, and I' ; ll just say this and maybe we won' ; t get into detail. HUNTLEY: Let me ask you to just talk briefly about the incident at Phillips High School. SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, at Phillips, fifty-seven, September. Okay. The Court said that the board had a right to " ; place" ; students, by all that " ; pupil placement law" ; . Well, I knew they weren' ; t going to place a lot of Negro students with white. And I didn' ; t think mine was going to really get in Phillips, to be honest with you. But history would have to record that we attempted to do, that was why, and that' ; s the second time I came ninety percent of dying, right there. So, I always announced and sent the police everything what I was gonna do, and I must candidly say to you that the policemen that were there were enough to have prevented what did happen, had they wanted to. But the Klansmen intended that, they had missed me in the bombing, fifty-six, Christmas night (inaudible) Christmas again, September fifty-seven, and I' ; m harassing and everything. So, they said, they met there and they said, Let' ; s get this s. o. b. I don' ; t mean ___?___. Said, If we kill him -- (inaudible) -- it' ; s all over. HUNTLEY: Where is this? SHUTTLESWORTH: In front of Phillips High School. HUNTLEY: This is what they are discussing as you. SHUTTLESWORTH: They are saying, when I' ; m driving up, getting out of the care, Here he is, let' ; s kill this S.O.B. today and it' ; s all over. See, I had never seen brass knuckles before that day, and other things. And so, it was, it was two, maybe it was, I' ; m trying to see was it three or five policemen there. And so, when I, my two daughters in the back, and the young man, with my wife, were in the back. They were in the back, my wife' ; s in this side, so she got out. So, when I got out, they came, they went after the car. Here again, you must look at the faithfulness of God. When I drove up, I act just normal like I' ; m gone get out and go in, and guy was over her, and they took my coat an pulled it over my head, I couldn' ; t have fought had I wanted to, and carried me, kicking, stomping, knocked me down, must have fallen at least three or four times within the space of thirty feet, twenty-five, twenty feet from the car, and they were kicking and stomping and howling, and one policeman, instead of him using his blackjack or something, said to them, aw, you don' ; t have to do that. I think they intended to let them get to me. Whether they intended to let them kill me or not I can' ; t judge, but I know the Klansmen intended to. So, one guy had a bicycle chain, another one had brass knuckles. I was struck with the brass knuckles at least twice. And kicked, and as God would have it, and my wife got out to get the girls and the young man out of the back, and she had on a real thick girdle and one Klansman stabbed her in the hip with a switchblade knife. She didn' ; t know that she was stabbed until the doctors over there examined me in the hospital and her hip started stinging, and they had to take care of her. So, we never got beyond the sidewalk, so they put her, after they stabbed her she had to get back in the car. And they didn' ; t even bother the car. Look at what God does. Phifer had the sense of mind to wait. He didn' ; t drive off. They were not attacking the car, they intended to kill me on the streets that day. HUNTLEY: You were the target. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. And the door was left open of the car. So, they had taken me down, oh I guess far as that corner at least twice, kicking and stomping and hitting and, I' ; d been struck, and it was morning about nine-thirty, ten o' ; clock, between ten and eleven, somewhere, and I began to understand that if I keep getting hit, every time I' ; d hit, the light would become gray, and I realized I had to get back to the car, see, and I began to just discern where the car was, and I was about half, I was about to lose consciousness but God would have, unless I would have died on the sidewalk, so I began to struggle to get back to the car, so they were pummeling me and hitting me but we were going back toward the door. And one guy had a chain and he got right in front of the car door, he didn' ; t shut the door, and he was swinging this chain, I could discern, and the guy had struck me with the brass knuckles again, and it was just gray and dull, and I knew if this guy had hit, he was setting to hit me again across the head with that chain, and I knew if he hit me again I would fall right there, and so he was swinging, and I said on the hot CBS film, Who Speaks for Birmingham?, a mob is so out of control that they' ; re not really in control of what happens all the time. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And so, while he was getting ready to swing, I just, I knew I had to get in the car, so I just sort of stumbled into him and he bowled over, he didn' ; t even get a chance to hit me. And I fell into the car and Phifer reached across and pulled my arms in the car and as I was getting in the car one guy kicked me into my side and I had just a slight few drops of blood in my urine, only time, that day. And I saw the camera, I wish I could find it, but we turned away, as Phifer was driving away, to that next street from the, that way, my feet was still hanging out the door. HUNTLEY: Your wife and children were in the back seat. SHUTTLESWORTH: Them in the back, they were shut up. HUNTLEY: And your feet are just dragging. SHUTTLESWORTH: My feet were out the door as we were going off. So, then, we go over the hospital, they had these two little nurses cleaning me up, white, both white. One of them segregated with me, and she was saying, Damn if I would let somebody do something like this, why, what, so I said, well you, and the other girl was trying to hush her up. I said, Well, you wouldn' ; t understand if I told you. And they were cleaning me up, see, I was, skin was all off, and I had been struck here and here, and I really thought my arm was broken. So, they kept on, and I just didn' ; t say anything else. And so, that other girl said, well, ain' ; t no use to keep asking him, he told you you wouldn' ; t understand. After look like an eternity, wasn' ; t that long, a doctor came in, nice little old fellow, came in so apologetic, and he was so sorry. And he said, Well, Reverend, I' ; m so sorry, I just, and you know, lying on that thing out, everybody who could walk, it was all on TV, would come by and look at me, and I' ; m nearly like a skinned pig. And the doctor said, so he took me in the examining room actually, and I don' ; t know how many x-rays he took of me. It looked like he come back and do it over or something. And after a while he said, I guess you wonder why I' ; m taking so many. He said, It looks like to me you had a terrible beating. He said, I' ; m trying to find a crack in your head, at least a contusion -- I think that' ; s a small crack -- he said, but I can' ; t find anything, x-rays don' ; t show it. It didn' ; t bother me. I said, Well, doctor, the Lord knew I lived in a hard town so he gave me a hard skull. And he took my pressure after a while, and it was normal, I wasn' ; t upset. HUNTLEY: Pressure was normal. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, I was just as calm as a cucumber in September. But I knew I had to get to the Movement that night ' ; cause Negroes had gone through a whole lot and I knew that after the bombing and with all of this, if they weren' ; t contained this night, violence could easily happen. So, I went home, so the doctor said, well, I' ; d like for you to stay at least overnight so I can observe you, he said, I can' ; t order you but I' ; d like for you to. I said, well, doctor, I' ; m glad you can' ; t order me ' ; cause I' ; d have to resist the order. I said, in the first place, the only I would willingly stay, you' ; d have to have to two policemen inside and two outside the door to watch them. I said, now if I die at home I would die among my friends, but I think I' ; m all right. He said, well, I understand, Reverend, and I will release you but I really wish I could observe you ' ; cause you gone have some problems. I said, no more problems than the Lord wants me to have. He admired my courage and all that. I went on home. And I knew I had to get back to there, so we were at Rev. Stone' ; s church over at New Hope just over that bridge, First Avenue. And you couldn' ; t get around again people were half a block around because it' ; s all over the news. HUNTLEY: We can start again tomorrow but see that--what you' ; ve done there is you' ; ve put another piece into the bombing piece. See, all of that of course in designed to kill the movement, while in effect doing just the opposite. SHUTTLESWORTH: Doing just the opposite. HUNTLEY: With those ministers who were afraid, the people with your help, with you leadership were the ones that went on to carry it on. I mean that' ; s marvelous--you earned your keep today. [Interview resumes the next day- December 11, 1996] HUNTLEY: Just give me a little more on the mob violence at Phillips High School that you were discussing yesterday. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, it was one of the three or four incidents where I was right in death' ; s jaws, God wouldn' ; t let me die. As I said yesterday, they really intended to kill me. They felt, they were shouting it out, let' ; s kill this S. O. B. and other words, and it' ; s all over. And I was aware that they were trying to kill me. And it' ; s an amazing thing how you can submit yourself, even under pressure, and even understand, people must understand that faith goes much farther than we believe, or we understand. It takes hold, I guess, when you can' ; t do anything else anyway. As I said, they had taken me sort of twenty or thirty feet from the car. And I had to kind of stumble and cajole, not cajole, not fight with them, I couldn' ; t have fought anyway, but stumbling back toward the car because I realized that every lick caused the brilliance to turn into a sort of a grayness. And on my way back to the car, amid the kicks, curses and the slanders, people running into each other trying to do me harm, I was struck again with that chain and I realized -- I was struck again, I' ; m sorry, with the brass knuckles, and I realized that if I had gotten another lick I probably couldn' ; t have even made it to the car, but I was very determined to make it, so I just, they were holding me, pulling me and so forth, and I was just stumbling to the car, and as I say yesterday, one guy was sitting near the door of the car and he was swinging that chain, he had struck me with it already once or twice, and I knew if he hit me I wouldn' ; t make it into the car, and so, and I don' ; t know what, you have to give God credit for how you come through. There was nothing that I had to prevent him from swinging and hitting me, I couldn' ; t have anyway. But he was trying to get set to hit me, and I just sort of stumbled into him, and he bowled over and then I reached up and began pulling myself up into the car. And as I said yesterday, the camera, Phifer kept the door open, see, had he closed the door or had driven off, I would have died right there, see. We talk about how good God is and how he provides for any eventuality. See, we' ; ve got to remember that God does move in human affairs. He does do some critical things. So, and the camera caught it as I viewed it then, my feet were sticking out as the car pulled off and turned left from Phillips High School, went on over to the hospital. HUNTLEY: Were there any efforts on the part of the Movement to have others there, other Black people there when you were going in or nearby or anything of that nature? SHUTTLESWORTH: Rev. Woods always tells now, whenever he introduces me a lot, about how he was -- this is always a joking thing -- and I had decided, we had gotten together and I said, Woods, I want you to drive me. Woods was kind of nervous, said, I, I, I, I, Rev. Phifer, who was real bold, Phifer said, I' ; ll drive you. He said, yeah, yeah, yeah, Phifer, you drive! And Woods tells that he viewed the scene and kept close eyes on us around the corner from where the action took place, he was there. HUNTLEY: He was there. SHUTTLESWORTH: Other side of Philips High, but he didn' ; t come and get into the melee but he observed what was going on. But I, people are always thrilled to hear him tell how he wasn' ; t quite as brave, and he always said, well, I always thought Fred was trying to get us killed. (Laughter) But we went on the hospital and I think I was telling you about how those nurses were, one -- it' ; s amazing how even white people have different conceptions of things -- one was quite __?__, thinking I was a damn fool, this and that, or anybody who would let this happen -- why would you do it? They were cleaning me up, you see, getting me ready for the doctor to come. And I had said once, you wouldn' ; t understand if I told you, and I didn' ; t say any more, that other girl just kept, both of them white, said, he already told you you wouldn' ; t understand. But I just can' ; t, so I didn' ; t say anything. And it' ; s amazing, you might wonder sometimes how I was feeling or what I was thinking about. HUNTLEY: Yeah, that' ; s obviously what I' ; ve been thinking about, after going through all that, you still have your wits about you. SHUTTLESWORTH: I had my wits, I was calm, as I said, when the doctor finally came in and took my pressure first, and I think it was amazing that my pressure was normal. God controls things, I wasn' ; t nervous. And as I told you, most of the ambulatory people come down the hall, looking, and there I was lying on this, like a skinned pig I guess. My little girl, if there are some pictures you have already for sitting by me, the oldest child. And the doctor came and of course he was so very apologetic, said I' ; m sorry to hear, but my mind was on the fact that I had to get to the Movement that night. Because I knew with the tensions mounting, the police had been harassing us, and with my being mobbed, it was all over the paper, I had to at least put in a presence at the Movement, I felt I should, and let them know what nonviolence meant to us at that moment, and what violence would mean and would to do the Movement if they engaged in violence. So, the doctor examined me, as I said yesterday, quite extensively, I thought he took too many x-rays, he said I guess you notice I' ; m taking all these x-rays, but I have to know, it' ; s impossible for me to believe that you could come through all of this without any fracture, and I can' ; t even find a contusion -- I think that' ; s a small one. And I always had a ready answer -- Doctor, the Lord knew I lived in a hard town so he gave me a hard skull. That seemed to, look like, relieve him. He said, yeah, I understand. We both discussed the fact that God was in it, you know, God' ; s will. And he asked me, he' ; d like to observe, he said, that you really need to be in the hospital, and I' ; d like to observe you overnight at least. And that just wouldn' ; t set with me because I said to him, now doctor, if I go home and die I' ; ll die among my friends. And if you order me to stay here, you' ; d have to have at least two policemen inside the room and two on the outside. And automatically I began thinking that if I had to stay, I would have written out some directions for the Movement. They expected me. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: See, the Movement expected me to give them direction. And I knew that they were depending on me. So, he said, I was real pleased when he said, Reverend, although I can' ; t force you to stay, said, I really wish you would. And I told him I said, if I go home, I' ; ll die among my friends, over here I can' ; t have anything to do with my death if I die. He said, I understand, so he released me, reluctantly, and I went home, and I was struck on this -- I thought this wrist was broken, and my knee, scarred, I was scarred all over, you know, really, we are as white under our skins as anybody else. HUNTLEY: Hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: I was struck here, back of my head, I had some scars as was pointed out in that CBS film, I forget where they are now. HUNTLEY: So, there were cameras on the scene? SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh yes, yes, it was cameras just -- and they knew it. They didn' ; t care, they intended to get it over, they intended to kill this s. o. b. and other names they were calling me. But I wasn' ; t fearful, it' ; s an amazing thing. HUNTLEY: What was going through your mind at the time that all of this was going on? SHUTTLESWORTH: (Laughing) I knew you would -- I knew, people ask me that, and I knew you would. You' ; d be amazed how your sensibilities focus on not only what is happening, but you understand the meaning of the moment and even the needs of the moment and you feel a sense of sorrow that it has to happen this way, and yet you also understand that it has to be undergone, it has to be, it' ; s sort of akin to what that Gethsemane word he said, nevertheless if it' ; s your will, I' ; ll do it. And you' ; re resigned to death, see. You must understand, I had no hesitation, if death had come that day, I believe the Lord would have been ready for me. But I was more sorry for these men, you can' ; t understand, and I said in that film, how otherwise sensible, ordinary citizens, could allow themselves to be whipped up into a mob and they knew that they were being photographed but they didn' ; t care. HUNTLEY: Explain that how can you be taking all this punishment, this brutality, and you are feeling sorry for your attackers? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, let' ; s don' ; t think that anybody can' ; t do it if God' ; s spirit, you must understand that we are human beings, we are flesh, but there' ; s something about us that' ; s above and beyond our flesh -- our spirits. And that' ; s what' ; s connected to God. And if people can realize that we are to become a little bit more spiritual and receive divine unctions and impulses and directions from the Great Spirit of the universe, all of us could do better, and we would fear less, you see. Now Charles Billups, when he was taken out later on -- he was fifty-eight -- by the Ku Klux Klan, and I think they tied him to a tree and branded KKK on his stomach and beat him up and he was in the hospital, and that Sunday morning Nelson Smith and I went over to visit him. And I could hear him before we got in there, and he was saying, the first words he said to us was, You know what? I felt sorry for these men, I said, Lord, forgive them for they don' ; t know what they' ; re doing. You see what I mean? This is what God puts, makes available to us if we would use it. And it would really do away with a lot of our anger. And it' ; s sort of what King was talking about, if you can understand the spirit of nonviolence, even though you are hurt you don' ; t want to hurt anybody else. You don' ; t want to see anybody hurt but, but in a crisis, in a moment of, really, death, when you can' ; t do anything but die or live according to God' ; s will, you can be committed, you can be resigned, and yet you can be prayerful, and I was not only resigned to whatever God wanted, I was prayerful, but I was also determined to use whatever little strength I had, and commitment, to get to the meeting that night because I had to speak to them, so that they could control their emotions and control their anger and their rage. And so, I went home and, they took me home, and naturally people came in all through the day but I was trying to relax and everything, and I would speak but my mind was on that night ' ; cause I knew there was going to be a multitude around New Hope, close to First Avenue viaduct. And I didn' ; t know how extensively I was hurt. So, my arm was sort of aching, and we had to put that in a sling so I wouldn' ; t be holding it down and it would be worse, so I put it in a sling, not for dramatic effect because I never believe in putting on airs. I detest people who put on shows, I think the biggest show that was ever put on was Calvary, for us, and I don' ; t think we ought to be putting on a show. That wasn' ; t a show, that was real, that was God' ; s love. And so, we ought to be involved in realness insofar as humanly possible. But anyhow, this isn' ; t a sermon, but it' ; s just what I feel. HUNTLEY: Sure. SHUTTLESWORTH: I asked the Lord, I remember that day, to not let me sink into a -- because I realized that when you' ; re hit on the brain and beat all over a lot -- and I told you I had taken at least eight or ten blows directly on my head -- not to sink into a state where I couldn' ; t command my facilities or, and at least couldn' ; t be, wouldn' ; t be, communicable, to the people that I went to see, and I really didn' ; t want to develop a feeling of anger, and I didn' ; t, thank God, because angry people don' ; t express things best, even their good intentions, they don' ; t express it best when you' ; re angry. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And so, as the Lord would have it, I just laid down and relaxed. ' ; Cause see, I knew God was in control, my friend, if you know he' ; s in control and if you know at least you' ; re doing what you' ; re supposed to do, there' ; s a strength in that, there' ; s a sort of a resignation that you' ; ve done a job or you were trying to do, and where it says that if you love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, mind, soul and strength, says if you give it all you have nothing to fear. And I think that' ; s the meaning of if you lose for His sake, you' ; ll find. You' ; ll find better life. And so, I got up that evening and put on my clothes and I had to put my hand in a sling because it was actually aching, and my knee was struck. I' ; m trying to see, I believe, if I recall, I had a cane because I didn' ; t want to give way in my knee. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: I said yesterday that, I said in our other interview that I had blood in my urine that afternoon when I got home. But that' ; s the only time I ever saw the blood. I expected it more than that, I told the doctor and he thought that I was going to have, and asked me to keep in touch with him, but I never had to call him back. HUNTLEY: Is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, and so, my mind now is going to this meeting. And actually, there were so many people around the church. HUNTLEY: People couldn' ; t even get in the church. SHUTTLESWORTH: You couldn' ; t get in, the church was full, and I said to them, you know, they were so glad to see me, and they were -- and to see me in a sling and with a stick, you know, and then I was scarred, you could visually see my scars -- it really set them off, and I was listening as I go in, you know, I told them, I' ; ll speak to you when I get back, so they made way for me to get in the church, and I got into the church and went up the aisle, and everybody was glad to see me and they were really incensed at how I looked. HUNTLEY: How you appeared. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, how I looked. So, and my idea was that here nonviolence lives or dies, and how do you express it, how do you do it? And I wasn' ; t thinking so much about that because as I told you before, God had always given me the ready word. I didn' ; t have to sit down and think what I was going to say, and I don' ; t think really people need to put on. You ought to be yourself. Be your best self-connected with the best about you, your inside and outward. It' ; s what makes the best communication anyhow. So, I didn' ; t have a written speech or nothing, and I didn' ; t intend to stay because I was beaten up and ill. And when I got there and I sat on the platform, I didn' ; t go behind the thing, and I sat on the edge of the platform, and I said, I hope you' ; ll forgive me if I sit down, as you can see I' ; m a little wounded. And I, another thing that people realize, you have to face issues head on, you can' ; t back off, you don' ; t need to cut around and subterfuge, I said, Well, alright, how many y' ; all mad in here tonight? Everybody raised their hands. In fact, you' ; re mad as hell, aren' ; t you? Yeah, yeah, yeah! Said, in fact, you could tear up the town, couldn' ; t you? Yeah, yeah! We gone, we gone. Someone said, Ain' ; t gone get away with this, and all this kind of stuff. And I said, Well, I can understand this. I can understand how you would feel. I said, But you know what I' ; ve been telling you all the time? This is the price of victory. I said now, since you' ; re mad, say everybody in here mad. I said, well, you know it' ; s amazing thing, I' ; m not mad. I said, how many y' ; all were beaten up? Raise your hands. Said, Nobody was beaten up but me, and I said, well, it' ; s strange I was beaten up and I' ; m not mad and I' ; m not angry, ' ; cause I know this is what it takes for us. And then I said, this is sort of akin to what the Lord had to go through in the Garden of Gethsemane. And you know, it' ; s an amazing thing how that just settled down. I said, So, you will tell everybody, inside and outside, that we tonight are going to have our meeting, and I' ; m sorry I can' ; t stay with you. Got to go back home and go to bed, but you will have our meeting and when you get through we are going home, going through the streets nonviolently. And not mad, I don' ; t want a windowpane burst nowhere, and if anybody does do it, I want you to report to me so I can tell the police that that person did it trying to hurt the Movement. And I think that saved, it was God' ; s way of preserving what we had done and build on it. And by my being, I guess, the leader who was willing to suffer like this, it sort of had a discipline. You know the Movement has a lot of value in Birmingham, they had far less crime during those terrific days than they had since or before. HUNTLEY: Right, ' ; cause you had people who were-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Who were committed to something, and I don' ; t want to mix a whole lot of things, I want you to-- HUNTLEY: That' ; s alright. SHUTTLESWORTH: But I remember the second time, the second bus ride, remember when the, the dubious ruling about sit up front and reasonably request? HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And this time I, we had thirteen people arrested instead of-- HUNTLEY: That' ; s right, you didn' ; t ride that time but you were arrested. SHUTTLESWORTH: I didn' ; t ride, I was always the Kingfish that got Andy in trouble so they' ; d get me for conspiracy and causing a breach of peace and all this kind of stuff. But the point I' ; m getting at is while I was in jail, one guy was seventy-four years old at that time, same age I am now. And old people back then used to wear handkerchiefs on their heads so we in jail, and oh, I don' ; t remember how many of us were in that cell, eight or nine, cell was about like this, and I was lying up on the top bunk, there' ; s another bunk down there and people were talking, and this man, I was kidding him about this head rag, you know, and he came over to me to the bunk and said in front of them, he said, you know, he said today is my birthday, say I' ; m seventy-four years old today. He said I' ; ve been living all of my life, and I just found today something to live for. Segregation you see. Took incentive, there was no, there was nothing. As I used to say sometime and do now in speeches, we knew back then what we could not be. Young people now have to realize, perhaps, what they can be. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: and move on. But if we did all this, if we had that kind of courage, if young people, who helped even to win the Movement, had the courage, knowing what they couldn' ; t be, to struggle nonviolently in a directed way and take direction, then what ought we be doing now, when we can be anything? See, they were talking about a Black man running for president or vice president. Just think of this. HUNTLEY: Unthought of at that time. SHUTTLESWORTH: Unthought of. Here in this city, couldn' ; t be a policeman, couldn' ; t be a fireman, couldn' ; t drive a bus. And we have to say these things, and the young people will have to talk to young people. It may be true that sometimes young people don' ; t listen to their elders or something, and maybe it is a period of disillusionment with the system, but young college people, young people who aren' ; t in college, will have to say to others, look, we' ; re depending on you, you' ; re a part of us, and we' ; re all a part of the future. HUNTLEY: How many times did you go to jail? SHUTTLESWORTH: (Laughs.) I quit counting at about thirty, I think it was, twenty-five or thirty or something like that. HUNTLEY: Was there any time that stands out in your mind of events that took place once you were in jail? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, you must remember that I had the consciousness of what people could do to me in jail, that the system would kill me. And remember this, about that time I think a third of our police force were Klansmen or Klan-affiliated. Bull Connor had the sensibilities of a friendship with the Klan. And I always at that time -- it' ; s amazing how God prepares you -- if I' ; m going to be arrested, there were people who made sure I got to the jail, just followed, you know, far off. HUNTLEY: You mean, your people. SHUTTLESWORTH: My people. And you know, it' ; s amazing. People would do anything I say, and when I would be arrested or knew they wanted to arrest me, I would be arrested at my own time. They' ; d be looking for me, and I' ; d call the chief up and say, you looking for me? Yeah, where are you? I' ; m so and so and so. We' ; ll be over to get you. Okay, you want me to come down? No, we' ; ll be there to get you. But I would have gotten everything ready, my letters dictated to Lola and Julia, and people would be knowing I' ; m going into jail. James Armstrong went to jail with me almost, quite a few times I was arrested. I asked him sometime, I said, Well, James, what you go to jail for? Well, just to be with you. Well, I said, if there' ; d been any pushing you' ; d would have probably made it democratic, but nonviolently. But I' ; d always have somebody to know that I got to jail. And herein again we must give God the credit. He looks out for us. And although policemen at this time could beat Negroes and run them off, they had determination to follow. The policemen knew, you know. And there was only one time that I was arrested, I will say this to you, that I felt as if they were trying to do me in or something. They went way somewhere, and I' ; m back in the van, couldn' ; t see, and it' ; s night too. HUNTLEY: Is this in a paddy wagon? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. And they might have been picking up some people in those areas I guess or something. And it was rough, and not like on the street, you know. HUNTLEY: Are you the only one in the thing? SHUTTLESWORTH: I believe, I' ; m trying to think, I believe I was. But those people who guarded my house and who guarded around the Movement when we were, were always, they had sense enough to do it in a way that police couldn' ; t, if the police stopped and said, where you going, go back, others would -- it was a thing. And speaking of the loyalty and the discipline those men had. You must remember when the buses, and I realize I' ; m bringing in something here later, when the buses were burned in Anniston, I was getting ready to go up there because nobody was getting those people out from the Klan. And my men said to me, I said, men, we' ; re going to take three cars. And I always say you can' ; t carry a toothpick, scratch yourself and think somebody else did it, don' ; t get angry. You have to go and, we have to go up and get them. So, I' ; m getting in my, they said, you don' ; t need to go. I said, No, no, no, I wouldn' ; t ask you to do what I don' ; t do. They said, No, you have to stay here and lead us, we' ; ll go. This is loyalty. They went into the Klan, near Anniston, and got those people. So, we can' ; t think of events and situations in this world unknown to the eye of God or even under only his direction. I think just like he controls Nature, he really has things and do with our affairs, he doesn' ; t make us robots, he does not take our thoughts and direct, he allows us a freedom within, but I think there is a certain direction that life is going to go in, regardless of us. HUNTLEY: In either ' ; 57 or ' ; 58 there was a young man that was taken out into the woods and castrated. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes, Judge Aaron. HUNTLEY: Did you know him? SHUTTLESWORTH: I didn' ; t know him personally, but the Klansmen were concerned that the police had not put me out of business. They had missed me in the bombing, they had missed me in the mob, and I kept going, I was pursuing the city and all this kind of stuff. And the man testified in that trial that they were just mad and they wanted to find some Negro, said they were, they would have liked to got me I understand. Course I' ; m thankful that God didn' ; t let me go that route. He wanted me to go another route. But they just caught this Negro and castrated him. And really, he would have bled to death had they not put the turpentine there for pain, they called it giving him pain and it cauterized the wound. Here again the grace of God is. HUNTLEY: Tell me about the Terminal Station incident. SHUTTLESWORTH: Now this was in nineteen, what was it? HUNTLEY: This was in nineteen-fifty-seven also. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. Now, there were one or two incidents, see, I have a picture of President Harry Truman coming to Terminal Station, and it had to be before that incident or it might be afterwards, I' ; m not sure, ' ; cause Lamar Weaver knew Mr. Truman was coming into the city -- it might have been after that incident -- and he arranged, he wanted me to meet Mr. Truman and I met him there at the station. HUNTLEY: At the station? SHUTTLESWORTH: I thought it was courageous for the president of the United States to come here knowing, and stand up, and I have the pictures, you have it. HUNTLEY: Okay, okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: The Terminal Station incident came as a result of this dubious ruling, instrastate versus interstate. Other words, you don' ; t have to move if you' ; re going across state lines, but you have to segregate if you' ; re going within a state, intra, which to me was sick, silly. In fact I thought segregation was wrong anyhow, see, so that it' ; s all one thing to me, and I, I don' ; t know why I asked my wife to do it, because anybody at this time, I could almost ask anybody to volunteer for things. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: But I always had the feeling, Dr. Huntley, that the person who leads, really, should affect, not only try to shape opinion and shape direction, but that he has a way of , he should give himself to what he asks others to do. And it' ; s no different, I' ; m not making any aspersion on anybody else, that' ; s just the way I felt. HUNTLEY: You' ; re saying that you would not ask anyone else to do anything that you wouldn' ; t do yourself. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right, right. So, I asked my wife, I said, we are going down to challenge this. And really, she never questioned, I said, in the morning. So, I always sent police notice and telegram that they should send a release to the state. I had to request protection because I always felt that the police ought to be sued, that you' ; d be in position at least to have them in court if they didn' ; t give you protection once you have done it. So, then I had to give it time, so the Klan would know also. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And that was another morning that death could have taken place except that it wasn' ; t God' ; s will. So, we went, I got in, I had a suitcase, and you have that picture also in your file, and I had my wife with me. And I believe Commissioner Leadgood was in at this time. If Bull had been in there I probably would have gotten killed, being honest with you, because the police probably would have taken a different tack, I don' ; t know. And I don' ; t want to say bad things about Mr. Connor -- his record is bad enough without my making it worse. But we went straight up to the door, the white station, where you can go back to the right, oh, twenty or thirty or forty feet, and go in, between the terminals, between the white and the Negro entrance. And so, we walked up to the front door, and these people had filled that -- it was a whole lot of people as far as I could see of them, maybe I couldn' ; t see although I was surprised that that many were in there, but they were at those doors, I couldn' ; t have pushed in there had I wanted to. So, I walk up to the doors, and you have that picture, and this little fellow with a crew cut, like a German crew cut, he stood there and he said, Shuttlesworth, we don' ; t want you in here. I said, I don' ; t think it' ; s up to you to tell me that I can' ; t come in. And I was saying, we were saying, didn' ; t say that much, and they were getting ready, and I could hear them in the background getting ready to push and make a push through the door, see, and while I was talking to him I was listening at him. Then I had my eye on the right as the policemen came, they saw they couldn' ; t get in anyway, unless they had come in and started to battering folks. So, they knew that they could go in this door and come up behind and put them out. So, we were hesitant, my wife and I. So, when I saw the policemen go in, I just took her hand and left this young man, and go right on, went right on behind the police and that' ; s how we got in in the first place, we never would have gotten into the station. HUNTLEY: Oh, is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Oh, no, no way. HUNTLEY: The mob was already there. SHUTTLESWORTH: The mob was inside. HUNTLEY: Oh, they were inside. SHUTTLESWORTH: They were inside the Terminal Station, we walked up to the white entrance. HUNTLEY: So, they were like barricading the white entrance to keep you out. SHUTTLESWORTH: Absolutely, absolutely. You know I wasn' ; t gone go to the Negro, Colored entrance to test it. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And so, , the policemen, when they came up, they came up to where we were but they didn' ; t say anything to the man nor to me. And I guess their strategy was to get in behind them, and I noticed in the back of the crowd they had started pushing toward the front. And I took my wife' ; s arm and run right behind the policemen and run inside, because my purpose was to sit in the station. (Laughing.) That' ; s the victory. To actually sit in the white room in the station. HUNTLEY: Did you drive there that morning or did someone bring you? SHUTTLESWORTH: I either drove or was carried, I can' ; t be sure. HUNTLEY: ' ; Cause I was thinking if you had driven and the mob had seen you, they probably would have attacked you at your car. SHUTTLESWORTH: I might have driven and parked my car somewhere else. It wasn' ; t that I was afraid to drive. And then I' ; m not too sure that I was organized, because I hadn' ; t organized anybody too much, strange thing, normally I had always been, but I didn' ; t have anybody qued up to support me in this, just me and my wife. As I think of it, that' ; s about one of the most indefensible situations I sort of-- HUNTLEY: How did Lamar Weaver get-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, I' ; m fixing to tell you. So, I bought an instrastate ticket and interstate, intra- for her and inter- for me, I think it was. And we had already pre-purchased the tickets. Willie Williams was at this university over here the other evening, talking with Constance Motley, we talked about that, she was involved, and he was saying one of us had this type ticket and one had the other. Willie Williams was a young lawyer then. And so, , as we went in, the policemen busied themselves on getting them out, pushing them out, see, ' ; cause didn' ; t any of them have any tickets anyway (laughing), so I sat, I wouldn' ; t be right at the door but there were seats, most of the seats were empty, they were just ganged up at the door. So, I went in the middle of the station, I wasn' ; t gone sit right at the door, either. It' ; s amazing how you can get yourself so, in a position so indefensible. And so, I was there, and then, the policemen, as they were getting them out, one man, one policeman came to me and said, Do you have a ticket? See, he was gone arrest me if I didn' ; t have a ticket. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: Which I had too much sense to go in there without a ticket. I said, Officer, you know I have sense enough to have a ticket, so I pulled my ticket out, he didn' ; t say any more. I said, You know I have sense enough not to come in this station without a ticket. So, he didn' ; t say anything else. And it wasn' ; t, oh-- so I sat there, and he went on. And it was I guess less than five minutes at the most that Lamar Weaver came in through that same door and came to sit down with us. You' ; ve got to admire the man' ; s courage, whether he was a fool or not, people have to judge. And the policeman came in, and here' ; s a white man, you know, sitting with a Negro anyhow, so that sort of nettled him I guess, but he went ' ; bout the legal way: Where your ticket? He didn' ; t have one. HUNTLEY: Mmm, okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: He didn' ; t have one so they had to put him out, so they him out, right out the same door. Into the mob. And that mob set on him, and they were pummeling him, and he had a canvas-top Cadillac, as I recall. I didn' ; t see this, see, I don' ; t want to give myself credit for things I didn' ; t see. But tell me they rocked his car and almost tore the canvas off, and he barely got away with his life. HUNTLEY: And then the police arrested him. SHUTTLESWORTH: Police arrested him for running over a red light and the judge gave him a ten-dollar ticket. This was Birmingham in those days. HUNTLEY: Right, right. You know, in 1959, after you had gone through all of this, what you' ; re doing is developing the nonviolent protest movement. In 1959, CBS, I believe, did a documentary on Malcolm X that was shown nationwide. I guess this was really the first time that the Nation of Islam is introduced nationally. How did that impact upon the Civil Rights, the traditional Civil Rights Movement? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, we didn' ; t have too much liaison with the Malcolm X people. I think people admire anybody who protests segregation. And of course, Malcolm X and others did protest a lot. They didn' ; t do a lot of suffering like we did against it. And I never, I never got in a contest with them. I never did want to get into a situation where the System would have Blacks fighting each other. And you know, Dr. King said, and I believe, that really a man ought to be free. And if he goes after his freedom different from others, even in a violent way, Dr. King thought it was better for a man to be violent trying to get free than to be totally passive and enslaved. The only thing he said was that you ought to be willing to take the consequences for your actions. That is what' ; s bothering people today, we want to act without being responsible. HUNTLEY: Nineteen-sixty is the year of the sit-ins, and Bull Connor made the statement that there are sit-ins going on all around the world. SHUTTLESWORTH: He assured the people of Birmingham that there would not be sit-ins. But you know it' ; s not been accurately written. I had to be in High Point, North Carolina, the same day of the sit-ins. It was in that area, High Point, Greensboro. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: B. Elton Cox was a small fellow then, he' ; s heavy now, he' ; s up in some place Illinois, above Chicago, I saw him here about nine months ago. But he had invited me to come up to speak, just like people do now, and the sit-ins started there. And so, when he picked me up at the airport, he said, Come on, I want you to go in with me (?). Before I would speak that night, this was in the afternoon, I got there, we went by the lunch counters in Greensboro and another place there close. And we went by and sat in with the students. That' ; s not really basically written, history. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: But I was there when it started, and I was the one who called back to SCLC' ; s office, see, Ella Baker was our executive secretary then. And I said to her, Tell Dr. King this is a new departure and that we have to support these students. HUNTLEY: So, that' ; s the beginning of SNCC. SHUTTLESWORTH: That' ; s the beginning of, yeah, SNCC came out of that. HUNTLEY: Mm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: But I was in it then and I called back, so SCLC was knowledgeable that the sit-ins were going on. But I spoke that night in High Point and commended them and said that we' ; d be on. So, Bull Connor then comes up. Poor Bull. It' ; s amazing how you can put a little man in a big place, and he makes the place either small or terrible. HUNTLEY: Mm-hmm. SHUTTLESWORTH: And leadership is what this country needs, in all time and in every place. At any rate, he assured the citizens of Birmingham that there would not be sit-ins in Birmingham, Alabama. And of course, I never thought, that' ; s another thing, we never intended to have massive sit-ins in Birmingham. First of all, we didn' ; t have the money. We didn' ; t have the national backing to do it, but I know Mr. Connor could not prevent Negroes from sitting in, so I just made a statement that it is an insult to the Negro people for Mr. Connor to say that he can prevent us from sitting in if we want to sit in. There will be sit-ins. Well, that' ; s a challenge you see. And I had to mount the challenge, the idea' ; s challenge, anyway. ' ; Cause you cannot submit to segregation. Now how it was gone be done I did not say. Most people expected that you' ; ve got to have massive sit-ins and if you want me to go on and explain how it was done-- HUNTLEY: Yes, I would. SHUTTLESWORTH: Okay. I knew that in Birmingham, Alabama, if we were going to have sit-ins it had to be--We chose the five stores -- Pizitz, Loveman' ; s, Newberry' ; s, I forget -- HUNTLEY: Britt' ; s. SHUTTLESWORTH: Britt' ; s, for five of them. And I said to them, now, we' ; ll have cars that take you not to the door, but within forty-fifty feet and to the sidewalk. And you must be aware of the policemen, and it was gone be two, they' ; d have books, you know. And we gave them money to buy, they had to buy something and if they went into court and didn' ; t buy anything, Earl McBee, the city solicitor (?), they had begun attacking ' ; bout, yeah, you went in there to do this, didn' ; t you, and they' ; d say, yeah, you went in there to sit in, so, and we' ; d say, no, we bought something. So, we gave them money, and then I set the time. I said, we identified where each lunch counter was in each store, and they had to, at a certain time, they would go in only one store, away from the counter, so they wouldn' ; t take the eye of the police, and within three minutes they would be on the floor where the counters were but not near the counters. Before this time though they would buy a handkerchief or something, anything. And 11:30 was the deadline hour, and they were to be within twenty feet of the counter by 11:29, doing something not even looking at the counter. But at 11:30 sharp they would make it to the counter and sit in, not together but among the whites. Now this shows you how prepared Bull was. At 11:35 they were already in jail. HUNTLEY: Is that right! SHUTTLESWORTH: They would sit at 11:30 sharp. At 11:35 they were already in the jail. And of course, I never sat in, as you know. Charles Billups and I were indicted each, we got, what, five convictions out of the city and so we never sat in. HUNTLEY: Was it Charles Billups that, Hendricks, I believe it was a couple of Hendricks brothers that actually went out to the airport to sit in at the Dobbs House, I believe it was called at that time. And they paid for, I think he told me he had kept the sandwich (laughs). SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, and you know, now that was something that wasn' ; t necessary ___?___ but it' ; s showing that the people had the spirit, see. I wasn' ; t concerned about any more sit-ins, but they knew that my spirit was, we attack segregation everywhere. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: See, so this was on their own and really, I thought it was a beautiful thing. HUNTLEY: Sixty-one was the year of the Freedom Rides. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: And this is the situation in Anniston. It appeared that, and I believe you said that it appeared that any time anything is happening in Civil Rights in that era, look like Birmingham, Alabama, was sort of focal point. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. Well, yeah, you know, first one on the roll call of states, first, at that time, in instances of tragic consequences and foolishness and stupidity. And the legislators and the governor had no hesitation calling anything during Civil Rights, and stirring up the people, so that naturally this was where, where it was going to be (?). There is a Scripture in the Bible that says, Light shines in the darkness and the darkness can' ; t stop it. I believe in that and that' ; s why, in my being here, and that' ; s another thing, now the sit-ins were started, begun in New York. I didn' ; t have anything to do with it. When I knew anything, it was being announced. And they charted the route through Alabama, Mississippi. HUNTLEY: You mean the Freedom Rides. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, I mean the Freedom Rides, that' ; s it. HUNTLEY: From D.C., wasn' ; t it? Didn' ; t they come down from D.C.? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, see, it was planned in New York and D.C. but it started in D.C. And I wasn' ; t in on the planning. HUNTLEY: Right. So, when did you find out that they were headed to Alabama? Did you not find out about that until the incident in Anniston, or were you forewarned? SHUTTLESWORTH: I knew that they were going to come into Georgia, and then to Birmingham. And I' ; m trying to see how did I have the communication, a lot of things escape me. I might have had some communication from someone in Atlanta. And I believe someone in New York, I don' ; t even know who it was. You must remember, however, that in these times, whenever my long-distance calls, my phone rings, it' ; s automatically heard in the police station, so when I picked up my phone many times, I could hear police giving signals out, and this and that. And one time there was a four-way hook-up, the police, the hospital, the ambulance service and my, and you wouldn' ; t believe it, but there were times when my phone would just keep ringing at night, I' ; d take it up off the hook and it would ring off the hook, that had to be from downtown. So, that' ; s a long-- this Freedom Ride, because it got hung up here. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: And the federal government got in, this is, you' ; re in a terrific point now, because we had always wanted to involve the federal government in seeing to it that the local people, local police, protected us. HUNTLEY: Right. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, the Freedom Rides were really, basically, the beginning of the actual involvement of it. And if you had, we had longed for Kennedy' ; s telephone call to me and others after we got started, let' ; s get started talking about it. So, they came in and got hung up in Anniston. James Peck and others were beaten up, that was a Sunday. As I recall it was happening near one o' ; clock or twelve-something, because I was dismissing service when somebody came up and said there' ; s a young Black man out there bloody. So, I went outside, out in front, and he was bloody. By the time I talked to him here come some more. And then here comes this white man with his skull burst open. The first time I saw a human skull it was James Peck. They had hit him with an iron pipe and just burst his flesh. HUNTLEY: Had someone brought them out to your church? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, well, where else could they go? They were already told that they could get in touch with me, see. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: That was why they came to my place, couldn' ; t go any place else. And you know there' ; s some instances here that people don' ; t know about. They intended to turn Peck over to the Klan. I' ; ll tell you about that I hope, hope to tell you about that. So, Peck came. So, we knew we had to get him to the hospital. And I would imagine that, let' ; s say, the latest would have been one or one-thirty. We went into my house and did the best we could then we had to send him to the hospital, and he had, I think they took over fifty-two stitches in his forehead, his head, all, he was really beaten up. Howard K. Smith described it in that CBS film. So, we sent Peck to the emergency of Hillman, Jefferson, whatever it was called then. And we said to him, Now you can' ; t try to get no cab or nothing to come back, you wait till they get finished with you then you call us. I was going to send one or men back at him, ' ; cause I had cars, people guarded my house anyway and at a time like this I had any number of people that was available for anything. And then I had all these people, the doctor and his wife from Detroit, all of them integrated at my house. Bull called out there and said, You got whites and niggers out there. I said it' ; s my business, what you gone do about it? Hotels wouldn' ; t take ' ; em. At any rate, so, from that early afternoon until that night, at least past nine o' ; clock, James Peck was over at University Hospital. And I have no doubt they intended to turn him over to the Klan. HUNTLEY: You think the hospital intended to turn him--? SHUTTLESWORTH: The policemen, the policemen. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: And I' ; ll tell you how that developed. And there were a lot of things went on that day, there was communication, I was called from Detroit and New York, and of course, when they called me, Bull Connor and everybody heard it. But I had to be, you know, on the scene, but they were in my house, and we made sure there wasn' ; t nobody going to, no Klansman or anybody else, involve these people. I don' ; t know whether it was, what, twelve, thirteen, or fourteen of them. Young people, white and Black. So-- HUNTLEY: Did they stay at your house? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. HUNTLEY: Were all of them there or did they stay at other people' ; s homes as well? SHUTTLESWORTH: At mine. HUNTLEY: Just at your house. SHUTTLESWORTH: I don' ; t remember anybody taking them ' ; cause we' ; d have had danger, you know. HUNTLEY: You wanted it to be centrally located so everybody would be-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now if it was, but I had people if I had needed to put them somewhere. But I don' ; t recall now anybody taking them. If it would have been, it would have been some trusted person, like Colonel Johnson or somebody to come there and take them. HUNTLEY: But you were talking about Peck. SHUTTLESWORTH: Peck is the main focus right at the moment. So, we gave him a dime. So, he called. And almost as if it was something speaking to me, say, why don' ; t you go? Normally I would have sent two men in the car with him. And then we had always two or three other cars following that one, far off, to be sure they, you know, and I stayed home to find out what happened, I would have stayed home to find out what happened. But tonight, something said to me, You go. And if I hadn' ; t I' ; m sure Peck would' ; ve been turned over to the Klan. So, I said to him, now, when he called I said, Now, we gone come up and drive under the shed and you out and get in the back, we gone open the door and just right on out and get in and then we gone pull off. So, there were several cars, and like, you had driven your car and parked, but you may get in another, somebody else' ; s car and drive. So, I was in the car with someone who was in another person' ; s car. And we drove, so when we pulled in we noticed a three-wheeled policeman sitting right at the door, one down the street, two or three police cars space, so we pulled in and he came out and got in, in the back seat. So, I' ; m sitting in the passenger' ; s side and this other man in the back. Now the other cars were following inconspicuously to see what happened, if anything had happened at the hospital or anywhere else, we would have known it. And so, we came out Avenue F, 6th Avenue, and come up to the one way coming across, which was 21st, isn' ; t it? HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: When we pulled off, the three-wheeler pulled off, right behind us, and when we got into the street good the police car that was sitting down the street pulled off and was another three-wheeler in front of us and when we passed them, they got behind us. And so, we up from, what is that, twentieth street to twenty-second. And by the time we got to twenty-second street, there were at least two police cars behind, but the three-wheelers were up with us. And they made sure that we got up on the viaduct where we couldn' ; t turn off, couldn' ; t run or nothing. And by time we got not to the mid-point but up far enough so that we couldn' ; t get off any place, to maybe a third of the way, this three-wheeler comes up to this fellow, to the driver' ; s side, Pull over! Incidentally when we pulled off from the hospital I said, Now don' ; t go over ten miles an hour, we' ; re not gone have a speeding ticket or anything else. So, the policeman said, What' ; s your name?, no, he said, Where you going, boy?, or something like that. He said, I' ; m going back over the North Birmingham. He said, What' ; s your name? Told him his name. Said, Let me see your driver' ; s license. Where your car registration? So, he told him he was in another fellow' ; s car. Oh, a stolen car! I didn' ; t say anything until he said that ' ; cause I knew where he was going. And so, he said, Oh, we got a stolen car here. I said, Officer, I' ; m sure you know that this man would not come over here in a stolen car. I said, And I' ; m sure you know that everybody' ; s aware of what' ; s going on in this city and I' ; m sure that you' ; re not going to arrest anybody here for a stolen car tonight. Said, What the hell you got to do with it? I said I' ; ve got everything to do with it. Well, who the hell are you? I said, I' ; m Reverend F. L Shuttlesworth and I' ; m sure you know the name. Won' ; t be no stuff tonight. Said, What did you say your name is? I said, F. L. Shuttlesworth and you know it well. He said, So-and-so, Shuttlesworth, and you could hear them talking. He said, So-and-so, Shuttlesworth, he said, Aw, hell, let ' ; em go. I' ; m hearing this, they would have detained them. So, we went on and got safely to the house. And I thank God always that I was there that night ' ; cause it would have been a calamity, another black mark on Birmingham. But went there and then we were in the house all the next day. Well now the government, you see, at this time we had begun pressing from New York and all around, the government to see to it that the people were protected. That people traveling the interstate, intra-state and all this, would be actually protected by the police department. So, then the White House gets involved in it. Robert Kennedy was President Kennedy' ; s point man, you know, I, we were in Robert Kennedy' ; s office when Meredith was put in in Mississippi. HUNTLEY: Oh, you were? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, and I' ; ve been there any number of times, but at this time, he called to ask, what could we do? I said, Well, these people are here, and they' ; ve got to get off, and you can assist us in seeing to it that we are protected and so forth and so on, very polite. And they had already called the police, Bull Connor, __?___, and the governor also. So, I think we sat in the station and they were trying to go out, and the white, the bus drivers refused to do, so we stayed in the station all night, and I wish the public could hear the conversation between Robert Kennedy and me, so Kennedy calls me at home, and I went down to the bus station, and said, Well, what can I do? I said, Well, you can get, you can see if you can get the buses rolling. He said, Well, white driver won' ; t drive them? Well, tell them to get a Negro. (Laughs) I said, Well, you know they ain' ; t gone hire no Negro here. And he was telling me first of all, could I negotiate with the bus? I said, I don' ; t hire buses, I' ; m not into that, y' ; all see to these people. Then he said, Well, tell them that if the white drivers won' ; t drive, I' ; ll put a Negro driver on and the Air Force jet will be there within the hour. Then the whites decided they were gone drive, see? And of course there were thousands of people around that bus station. It' ; s amazing something didn' ; t happen. HUNTLEY: Was this day or night? SHUTTLESWORTH: We went (?) in the day, but you know we stayed all night, had to stay all night, we ate everything out of the, and you know it' ; s an amazing thing, you know I walked out and among those Klansmen just like walking in this place, and didn' ; t fear, and they knew who I was. But I went, and if I go out to do something, I went home, couple of times, came back. HUNTLEY: But every time a bus driver came and he found out what was happening, he would not drive. SHUTTLESWORTH: Right. So, I told Mr. Kennedy, I wasn' ; t negotiating with no bus drivers, I don' ; t hire drivers, very courteous, very pointed, though. And every time he called, Bull and me get cursed out, but he would tell us, now, you have to do your job and we do ours. You know we don' ; t want to put marshalls in there, but we can federalize the troops if we have to, you know, all that, it' ; s amazing the use of power. But knowing how to use it is what' ; s important. And naturally the local officials didn' ; t want to be superseded, so they had to give appearance as if they would reluctantly go along just so far, but here is the point I want you to get to. Robert Kennedy was so happy when finally, the bus drivers agreed to drive, so he calls me back, he said, Rev. Shuttlesworth, he said I understand the driver' ; s gonna drive, yes, say now, he said, do you have to go through Mississippi? I said, yeah, he said, Oh God, Reverend, said, the Lord ain' ; t been to Mississippi in a long time. I said, Well, that' ; s why we want to go, Mr. Kennedy, so that we can get the Lord in Mississippi. (Laughter) He said, My God, well, can' ; t you go to New Orleans? I said, Mr. Kennedy, I didn' ; t set the route. I said, the route was set in Washington and New York, you know about this. He said, I' ; ll tell you what, I' ; m gonna make arrangements for, I' ; m gonna call the governor of New Orleans, of Louisiana, he was suggesting that we go to Louisiana. I said, Mr. Kennedy, didn' ; t you say that the government can' ; t tell people in a free country where to go? Said, these people are going to Mississippi. And that' ; s when he asked me, he said, Are you going with them? I said, Mr. Kennedy, I don' ; t ask people to do what I don' ; t do. He said, Oh my God, I hadn' ; t thought about that. And then, you know, I was arrested. I' ; m sure that he made up his mind that if I got killed it would have been tragic. HUNTLEY: So, you think that they had you arrested? SHUTTLESWORTH: I think Bobby Kennedy made a deal with Chief Jamie Moore to arrest me, ' ; cause you know when the buses did run, I' ; m a little ahead of myself, you see, the whites, you must remember now, don' ; t get it confused. The original group didn' ; t ride the buses, they had to go back to my house, and they tried to get off on a plane, remember, they flew on a plane. HUNTLEY: That' ; s right, some students came in. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, and here again is a whole, I told you, this is a long thing. So, I get a call when they flew off, the plane flying off, and the Klan clapping (claps) ' ; cause they couldn' ; t get out on a bus. I get a call, and I' ; m supposed to go out of town to speak somewhere, Rev. Shuttlesworth, this is Diane Nash Bevel, students at Nashville. I said, How are you? She said, Well, the students have decided to take up the bus ride. I said, Young lady, you realize that somebody could get killed here? Do you know what has happened? She said, Yes, we know it, and we don' ; t think that violence is supposed to stop this. I was so glad and yet I was shaking in my boots that some more people were going to come in and really get messed up. I said, Well, do y' ; all have to, she said, oh, yes, we have voted to come, and they are on their way. I said, Well, we have to, I said, I' ; m supposed to go out of the city, but I have to be here, I can' ; t let y' ; all come in here and nobody knows. She said, that' ; s why we contact you, to let you know we' ; re coming. She said, the group will be coming tonight. Well, Bull took the first people back, you know, and put them out two o' ; clock in the morning at the Nashville line. So, she calls me back, I said, Well, we have to, and I knew that I was being heard, but sometimes when they' ; re busy doing other things, I said, Well, let' ; s develop this thing, you send your governor and your police commissioner exactly when they are coming, and then you call me and say, The chickens are on their way, some will be roosters, that means men, pullets, that' ; ll be young women, hens, old women, dominic, mixed race, mixed. See, you tell me, then I' ; ll call my police commissioner and tell them what time y' ; all are supposed to get here. So, by the time Bull thought he had freed himself, the group was in here, she said, The chickens are on their way, some are rednecks, and dominics (laughs), it was beautiful, the Lord was with us. And so, they got in, and we were hung up there at the bus station. Now, I was in and out because I was going to be sure, and this is where Robert Kennedy called me in, What can we do? Whites won' ; t drive. Well, can you talk with them? I said, I' ; m not a negotiator. When I told them that Kennedy say he' ; d have a Black driver in the Air Force jet within the hour, then it was decided that they were going to drive. Meanwhile President Kennedy had decided to send his special, what do you call it, assistant, John Seigenthaler, who was beaten up in Montgomery, remember. HUNTLEY: Okay. SHUTTLESWORTH: And so, , ' ; cause if I had been in it, I' ; m sure now I would have been killed because, and I thanked John Seigenthaler, we were speaking at University of Northern Kentucky, and I said, You got beaten up for me, so I appreciate that. I said, a white man, I said the thing' ; s gone get better when white men are beaten up in Negroes' ; places, just put it like that, but back to the thing here. So, they finally got everything ready to go. Well now, I always had sense enough to get my ticket. So, I' ; m getting, buses finally getting ready to go, and I' ; m making sure everybody is ready, you know. And it' ; s amazing, so many Klansmen around the bus station but didn' ; t nobody bother me. And so, I decided when the buses getting to roll, I went to get up on the, I went to step up on the bus and Chief Jamie Moore called me by name, Freddie Lee? Are you going to ride the bus? (laughing) I said, Of course I' ; m going to ride. I said, and I flagged my ticket into him, I said, I' ; ve got my ticket and I' ; m going to ride and you can' ; t stop me. He said, I' ; m going to give you a lawful order to, what did he say, to not ride the bus or something like that, and if you don' ; t I' ; m going to arrest you for refusing to obey a lawful order of a police. I said you can' ; t give me no lawful order not to ride and I' ; ve got a ticket to ride and the right to ride. So, I' ; m gone ignore him, I' ; m gone step up and I got to I think the middle step and he grabbed me right in my collar, just gently pulled me, didn' ; t snatch, gently pulled me down, and took me to jail, said, I' ; m arresting you for refusal to obey an order. And I' ; m sure that, as I look at it now, that Kennedy had decided I shouldn' ; t get killed, because he knew I was going to ride. I said I don' ; t ask other people to do what I don' ; t do. He said, You must go? I said, I must go. Well, you know, they rode into Montgomery and it was a fiasco, beaten up, boy' ; s teeth knocked out and it was just terrible. Well, I' ; m in jail, see. HUNTLEY: You' ; re safe in jail. SHUTTLESWORTH: No, but I wasn' ; t safe. I' ; m trying to get out. And immediately I was bonded out but the buses had already gotten to Montgomery. So, I got in my car and the first time that I had been photographed without my mustache -- I' ; d had a mustache since I was fourteen -- was I was rushing, you know, to get ready to go to Montgomery that night. And I had whacked too much off and I just whacked it all off, made my lips look like it swoll. But I got in the car and I flew. They could have arrested me for flying, but I got down there at night and it was a night of nights. The federal marshals were there, the Klan, they were really upset. And we were in Ralph Abernathy' ; s church, the First Baptist Church, and I don' ; t recall any incidents in my getting in, but I got -- and it might have been that some men drove me down, they would drive me anywhere, or I might have driven myself, I don' ; t remember right at the moment -- but I got out and went into the church and tear gas smells, first time I ever smelled tear gas. HUNTLEY: Tear gas smell in the church? SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah, the marshals had to use tear gas on them Klansmen on the outside. And so, we were there that night. And we were talking, Martin and Ralph were glad that I got there because they were a little bit unsure about what had happened, and then the governor had declared limited marshal law. See, Kennedy had forced him to do something, else he would have federalized the guard. So, they allowed Patterson -- was Patterson in then or Wallace? -- whoever was in. HUNTLEY: Wallace was in. SHUTTLESWORTH: Wallace was in then. Limited marshal rule, I believe it was. So, Martin made that announcement, it was good, you know, limited marshal rule, we thought it meant troops, and we were disappointed when we found out it wouldn' ; t mean federal troops. It was a national (?), limited. So, then, it' ; s written somewhere, and I guess I' ; ll say this, I never did have fear. It came that James Farmer was at the airport and he had to come in. HUNTLEY: CORE. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yeah. And so, I volunteered to go out and get him, forget all those Klansmen out there and how I got in. (Laughs) So, I went and got him, went to the airport, and when I came back they had really gotten ferocious, and it was tear gas all on the outside and marshals were being hit and all this kind of stuff, and James Farmer said something about he thought I was the bravest, most courageous man, and you know, when we got to where we had to go in, I said, Get back, folk, coming through! And they just fell back like, I was shocked myself. HUNTLEY: Is that right? SHUTTLESWORTH: Went right on through and went up into the church. Then the adjutant general took over and told us all that we had to stay there, and talked very nice, but he said, I insist on it. And it was in that time that we stayed in Montgomery so that wherever we went, let' ; s see, were we at Martin' ; s house or Ralph' ; s house, whichever, and wherever we would go the Guard would take us, we had deliberately made places to go and ride with the National Guard, and I told Martin and Ralph I said, Now we' ; re getting some of our own tax money. They took us everywhere we wanted to go. So, we, I think it was for a day or two we were in that situation. And then it came time for the buses to go to Mississippi. And I had already promised, and Kennedy knows now that I am back in Montgomery, also Martin and Ralph and all of us were supposed to ride. I guess, I don' ; t know whether Martin was going to ride or not, I really don' ; t know. But I was, course I' ; m in Montgomery, and I went there to ride, to prevent it being Birmingham. And so, we' ; re down, we' ; re in the white waiting room at the bus station, sat down at the lunch counter, and of course I led the integration because I was going to make sure, I said, well, we' ; re here and we must integrate! (Laughs) So, we were in the white, Ralph didn' ; t want to go, Martin said, well, you know we got to go ' ; cause if he gets arrested, I said, that' ; s right, let' ; s go. So, we' ; re in the white waiting room and white restroom and everything, integrated it totally. And I didn' ; t, I felt something happening, I didn' ; t know what, but, so when the buses came and people began to load up, the folk, then we were arrested, again, in Montgomery, see. Wyatt T. Walker, I' ; m trying to see whether Martin and Ralph were there, I' ; m pretty sure they were, I was, and several others of us who were going to go on the bus, so they arrested us. HUNTLEY: They arrested you before you could get on the bus. SHUTTLESWORTH: Before I could get on the bus. And then the others rode the bus into Mississippi, you know they let the people down there arrest them. (Laughs) HUNTLEY: That' ; s right. SHUTTLESWORTH: It' ; s an amazing thing. And so, we were in the Montgomery jail. And naturally I' ; m the actionist, and Wyatt T. Walker, also. See, one of the -- you must remember, and I should say this -- one of the reasons for the success of the movement in Birmingham and elsewhere was I' ; m an actionist and so was Wyatt T. Walker. Wyatt is a dramatist, you know, we were right together. And what we felt, basically, Martin had to go, ' ; cause Birmingham was under my-- HUNTLEY: You all usually agreed on-- SHUTTLESWORTH: Wyatt and I were right together on strategy and movement. In fact, we made most of it. And so, we were in jail. So, we decided in jail we were going to fast and not eat. Wyatt said, Well, we ought to take a little coffee for liquid' ; s sake. I said, No, no liquid. (Laughter) And then that night -- we didn' ; t stay there long -- that night that we refused it, they wouldn' ; t give us blankets or something and we had the sheriff to come down and talk with us, ' ; cause we wadn' ; t gone eat and wadn' ; t gone shave or something, we were just, it was, we had to embarrass the system. It was not that we were trying to make anybody look bad. And, I' ; m trying to think, that' ; s about the highlights, except for Ralph' ; s snoring, Ralph was the world' ; s greatest snorer. Ralph was in, we were in jail here in Birmingham, but in Montgomery was, as I recall, Ralph was in the cell right above me, and he snored and hit those metal walls and reverberate through that, and I always say that Ralph was the world' ; s greatest snorer. But we had camaraderie, we had fellowship, we knew we were going, we knew we were winning. But the point here is that the government directly involved itself in the protection of citizens in the performance of carrying out of their own privileges. And that was the high mark for us. Of course, in Mississippi, I thought that it was bad that they were turned over to the officials there and it didn' ; t move, but you know, God had his own reasons. People came into Mississippi, and schools, and all this stuff, and Mississippi has more Black people now in office than Alabama, doesn' ; t it? HUNTLEY: That' ; s right, it does. SHUTTLESWORTH: So, you see, it' ; s God moving in history. HUNTLEY: Sixty-two was the year of the selective buying campaign and there was a relationship that seemingly developed between the Movement and Miles College students. SHUTTLESWORTH: Yes. HUNTLEY: Can you talk about that? SHUTTLESWORTH: Well, the Movement, my position was, we had to be supportive of any movement, whether they were " ; us" ; or not, because, really, in the segregation struggle, all of " ; us" ; is " ; us" ; , all of " ; us" ; are " ; us" ; , you know. And I thought it was nice for the students, they wanted some interdependency, and so we were supportive, and they knew also that if they didn' ; t have the backing of the Movement, if they got in trouble, they wouldn' ; t-- We had cooperation and I was really glad to see. HUNTLEY: Was there, also at a point in ' ; 62, the students had started doing some door-to-door solicitations. SHUTTLESWORTH: There were interspersions, it' ; s difficult sometimes for me as I haven' ; t just taken time and jotted these things down, but we were always generally supportive of anything any group did, including, when we first started, we' ; re ahead of this now but remember, the preachers wouldn' ; t go, and they organized the Betterment Association? HUNTLEY: Right, right. SHUTTLESWORTH: It' ; s interesting -- I should say this because people should know -- at one time Ware had said, in the conference -- they wouldn' ; t endorse a petition for Negro policemen -- and that' ; s the time when he said, Well, brethren -- and people are talking up for this -- so he said, well, don' ; t say nothing good about it, don' ; t say nothing bad about it and it' ; ll be gone in two weeks like everything else these little Negroes running around here trying to do. Well, I didn' ; t take no offense. So, they organized the Betterment Association with E. W. Williams of Fairfield. Well, I took the position, as I said to our Board, that we should be supportive, and we are glad that the preachers are organized. Although we were preaching we are not gone crusade. They were trying to show that they were adequate to speak words for the moment, but that era called for actions and they were not actionists. So, I didn' ; t try to dominate their meeting, but Rev. Gardner and I went down to, I believe it was St. Paul church, one of the churches that the Betterment Association was meeting in, it was two or three weeks after they organized. And I just wanted to state my position to them. And they, Dr. E. W. Williams was on the floor down in front talking -- we sat in the back -- and one or two of the people had noticed that I had come in but he was down there talking, and they had quite a few preachers there, naturally they are good at organizing you know. And he was round there saying that, I' ; m not gonna bow! Loud and funny. These little Negroes running around here, and so-and-so-and-so (mimics in a high voice), and I' ; m now gonna bowww! He hadn' ; t seen me. So, finally, he had said that two or three times and was saying other things, and one of the fellows said, Well, you ought not to talk so much, action is what speaks. Yeah, but I' ; m not gonna bow! I don' ; t know what he was talking about but he was dialoguing against me. So, the man said, Why don' ; t you talk to the man, he' ; s here himself, and he went almost go through the floor when he looked up and saw I was there, and so, and he said some kind of mealy-mouth word, Rev. Shuttlesworth, why don' ; t you come on down, we' ; re glad that you are here. But he' ; d been sitting there talking, saying some pretty rough-- HUNTLEY: ' ; Cause he didn' ; t know you were there. SHUTTLESWORTH: He didn' ; t know I was there. And so--when I got up, and you know, I realize that you don' ; t need to fight with people in public. This material is property of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. video This material is available for educational and research purposes only. Permission for commercial use will not be granted. For publication information, please contact archives
bcri.org. 0 http://bcriohp.org/ohms-viewer/viewer.php?cachefile=FLShuttlesworth1996_3.xml FLShuttlesworth1996_3.xml
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth (1996) (3 of 5)
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Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth discusses leading the Birmingham Movement. Part 3 of 5.
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19961210S3
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Civil rights movements--Alabama--Birmingham
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1996-12-10
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video