Bricks Club interview recording, 1993 June 24
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
- | See, all those other things was done to him. | 0:01 |
Well, they couldn't put that on him. | 0:04 | |
They had somebody else. | 0:06 | |
And of course they had the dogs out. | 0:08 | |
And I don't know | 0:11 | |
maybe they found out who, but I don't know. | 0:12 | |
as I say, I was small. | 0:15 | |
I mostly know of this from them talking about it, | 0:17 | |
but he was done a lot of things like that. | 0:21 | |
See, my daddy run the store. | 0:24 | |
They done it. | 0:27 | |
He, well, as I said, did a little bit of farming. | 0:30 | |
And then, he later went in there undertaking business | 0:32 | |
and he started that | 0:36 | |
and they would make the caskets | 0:37 | |
and do all that kind of stuff. | 0:39 | |
And so, I think he was doing a little too much | 0:41 | |
later on in the years for them. | 0:45 | |
And I think that's why, | 0:47 | |
I know that's why they were doing things | 0:49 | |
like that against him. | 0:51 | |
And all that was during this segregation time | 0:54 | |
'cause he was Black. | 0:56 | |
- | I'd like to say here too, | 0:59 |
during that time, | 1:01 | |
you were all right, as long as you stayed over here | 1:04 | |
in your place. | 1:07 | |
- | Oh yes. Oh yes. | 1:07 |
- | We had a place. | 1:08 |
You stay over here in your place. | 1:10 | |
As long as you stay in your place, | 1:12 | |
everything's going to be okay. | 1:13 | |
But don't you go over there | 1:15 | |
and interfere with my cup, cup of tea, get in trouble. | 1:16 | |
- | Did anyone ever deliberately cross that line | 1:20 |
and try to defy the rules? | 1:24 | |
Do you remember that ever happening? | 1:28 | |
- | I'm sure they did. | 1:29 |
I wish I had brought a paper with me | 1:30 | |
that my dad wrote when we were small children | 1:33 | |
to this very school, | 1:36 | |
to Professor Inborden, | 1:38 | |
asking him to allow him | 1:40 | |
to either buy or lease a piece of land | 1:43 | |
that would be near. | 1:47 | |
Now, we live approximately 13, 14 miles from here | 1:48 | |
and there's no way we could walk here. | 1:52 | |
He thought that if we got closer to school, | 1:54 | |
it'd make everything easier for everybody. | 1:56 | |
He was pleading | 1:58 | |
for a parcel of land, | 2:01 | |
either for sale or lease, | 2:04 | |
that he could put a house on | 2:07 | |
so he could bring his family closer | 2:09 | |
to this institution of learning. | 2:11 | |
I looked at the paper this morning. | 2:13 | |
Had I known we were going to talk about this, | 2:15 | |
I would have gladly brought it and shown it to you. | 2:17 | |
But he mentioned | 2:21 | |
in this article | 2:25 | |
that segregation was such | 2:26 | |
that his children | 2:31 | |
were not getting the proper education that they deserved. | 2:33 | |
Not that they needed, but that they deserved. | 2:38 | |
And this is way back, | 2:41 | |
many years ago | 2:44 | |
We never had any problems with segregation, per se. | 2:49 | |
We lived out in our house | 2:53 | |
in the country and we went to school, | 2:56 | |
we came home, we did our work, | 2:59 | |
we went into town and did what we had to do, | 3:00 | |
and back home again. | 3:03 | |
We had no association- | 3:04 | |
We did know the Cofields. | 3:05 | |
We used to visit them. | 3:07 | |
But for some strange reason, | 3:11 | |
we never had any problems with segregation, per se. | 3:16 | |
- | What about when you went to town, Miss Wells? | 3:21 |
- | We never had any problems there either. | 3:22 |
Never. | 3:27 | |
As I say, we weren't allowed to go into town, | 3:28 | |
like some of the people were allowed to go into town. | 3:30 | |
Town then was a place to go | 3:34 | |
to congregate and enjoy your friends from elsewhere. | 3:38 | |
It was a day of- | 3:44 | |
- | A meeting place | 3:47 |
- | A meeting place and fun | 3:48 |
for everybody to be together. | 3:50 | |
And we weren't allowed this. | 3:52 | |
And my parents did not allow us to come into town. | 3:53 | |
Only if we had to go buy shoes, underwear, whatever. | 3:57 | |
We went straight to the store. | 4:00 | |
We bought what we had to buy. | 4:02 | |
We didn't even buy groceries | 4:05 | |
'cause my dad and mom did all the grocery shopping. | 4:06 | |
We bought what we needed, | 4:09 | |
back into the car, and back out in the country again. | 4:11 | |
We never had any problem with that. | 4:14 | |
Never ever. | 4:18 | |
- | Did other people? | 4:19 |
- | But it wasn't | |
that they had it. | 4:20 | |
It was there. | 4:21 | |
- | But can you remember anybody getting into trouble, | 4:23 |
Coming to town on Saturday and they're being- | 4:26 | |
- | Many of the times my dad would come to Enfield | 4:29 |
to get John or Henry out of jail. | 4:33 | |
They had too much to drink or caused a disturbance. | 4:35 | |
- | Yeah. | 4:39 |
- | I've got to go over town. | |
That's what he called Enfield | 4:41 | |
and get John or Henry out of trouble. | 4:43 | |
These were the fellows who worked for him. | 4:46 | |
He had at one time as many as 14 hired hands. | 4:48 | |
And on Saturdays, they just had a ball. | 4:53 | |
They would go into town | 4:55 | |
and my father would go in | 4:57 | |
and he'd have to go in and get them out, | 4:59 | |
bring them back out the country. | 5:01 | |
- | One of my cousins told me this story. | 5:03 |
I didn't know it. | 5:06 | |
But he told me | 5:08 | |
that, when he was growing up, | 5:10 | |
he was about our age, | 5:12 | |
but he was a little rougher | 5:14 | |
and one of the white boys | 5:17 | |
mistreated him and he did him in real good. | 5:22 | |
Real good. | 5:27 | |
And then, he hid. | 5:29 | |
And the undertaker, | 5:32 | |
I'm not calling it a name, | 5:36 | |
use his hearse or ambulance, | 5:38 | |
whatever you want to call it. | 5:43 | |
- | Hearse. | 5:45 |
- | He hid in that. | |
They didn't bother that when it was passing through. | 5:48 | |
And so he got out of town as a result. | 5:51 | |
- | What do you think would've happened to him | 5:53 |
if he hadn't hid? | 5:55 | |
- | Well, the trees are a convenient place to dive | 5:56 |
in case you do something like that. | 6:00 | |
So far they're concerned. | 6:04 | |
They may take you off and you never know | 6:06 | |
because they had all of the weapons | 6:08 | |
and the Negros were kept separate, | 6:12 | |
so to speak, from each other. | 6:19 | |
And you couldn't think of getting together | 6:21 | |
and defending yourself. | 6:25 | |
If you were willing to defend yourself, | 6:26 | |
like my cousin there, | 6:29 | |
well, you had to pay the price. | 6:31 | |
But if you could get some help, you were lucky. | 6:33 | |
And he was lucky. | 6:36 | |
But sometimes, that was not the case. | 6:37 | |
They'd just pick him up. | 6:41 | |
And when you see him again, | 6:43 | |
somebody was taking them down from a tree. | 6:46 | |
That's always... | 6:48 | |
Really, this area was probably | 6:49 | |
well, as rebbish as any area in this state. | 6:58 | |
You see you had slave plantations | 7:03 | |
and the anger and hatred | 7:07 | |
that developed as a result of losing free labor just lasted. | 7:12 | |
And that's still around. | 7:18 | |
Not as much so | 7:21 | |
because you see a lot of our boys | 7:22 | |
have gone to the army | 7:25 | |
and they know how to use guns | 7:27 | |
and they have them. | 7:30 | |
And those are the things that have made a difference | 7:32 | |
'cause being in the army has made a difference | 7:35 | |
because they were trained to fight | 7:38 | |
and how to use weapons. | 7:41 | |
And some of them brought those same weapons back home. | 7:46 | |
So they are now able to defend themselves much better. | 7:50 | |
And they do. | 7:56 | |
'Cause a lot of things happen sometimes | 7:57 | |
because tension has been built up. | 8:00 | |
You think about what somebody did to my uncle, | 8:04 | |
my brother, or my sister, or my mother, | 8:09 | |
and now I had a chance to get even. | 8:13 | |
So one way or another, | 8:16 | |
I will retaliate. | 8:19 | |
And of course, it's not easy to live with | 8:21 | |
and creates other problems, | 8:24 | |
but we've been living with problems all our lives. | 8:27 | |
And we just don't run away from it quite as fast. | 8:30 | |
And then, if you get a guy about half drunk | 8:36 | |
or full of dope, | 8:39 | |
he doesn't think of dying as such. | 8:40 | |
And that's why you have so much, | 8:44 | |
so many people in prison | 8:47 | |
in this area | 8:50 | |
because the situation has changed completely. | 8:52 | |
And they're learning to respect the fact | 8:58 | |
that, if you try to come in my front door, | 9:01 | |
you might not get in. | 9:05 | |
There was a time when | 9:07 | |
you could get in. | 9:10 | |
But if you try knocking our front door | 9:11 | |
and if I tell you not to come in, don't come in | 9:15 | |
(woman chuckles) | 9:18 | |
because it's just like committing suicide. | 9:19 | |
- | I don't want to interrupt you, | 9:22 |
but we have to go somewhere else. | 9:24 | |
So we have to wrap up here. | 9:26 | |
- | Well, wrap it up. | 9:28 |
(people chatter) | 9:30 | |
- | Yeah, I just wanted to ask you how much time | 9:31 |
do we have in here? | 9:33 | |
- | Well- | 9:34 |
- | 'Cause we could sit here. |
- | Very nice to read those things in class. | 0:01 |
And I always remembered that, | 0:06 | |
and that was the thing | 0:08 | |
that I thought that I would like to do, was sew. | 0:08 | |
- | To be a seamstress for a living? | 0:14 |
- | Right, yeah. | 0:15 |
But, I didn't continue that. | 0:17 | |
I did do some of that work, not too much. | 0:19 | |
My father, he was into business. | 0:25 | |
He had all kind of businesses that he went into. (laughing) | 0:28 | |
And I guess he kind of finessed that way, you know, | 0:34 | |
to be kind of independent. | 0:42 | |
In other words, he wanted you to do things | 0:43 | |
and have your business | 0:47 | |
that you didn't have to work for somebody else. | 0:48 | |
And in that, he did a lot of things | 0:53 | |
to take care of nine children. | 0:56 | |
And my mother just stayed home and took care of the family, | 1:00 | |
you know, she never worked out anything. | 1:03 | |
But, that was a job to take care of that many people. | 1:07 | |
Maybe somebody else now might like to. | 1:11 | |
- | Mr. Bell, what did your parents do? | 1:14 |
- | My parents lived on their own farm. | 1:19 |
Travel and ride my bike | 1:26 | |
three and a half miles out from Enfield. | 1:29 | |
In Enfield, I would catch a bus. | 1:31 | |
You sit in the back of the bus. | 1:33 | |
Get back in time to do a few chores on the farm. (laughing) | 1:43 | |
- | But, you were here during the time in school | 1:48 |
when the counties were running, weren't you? | 1:52 | |
- | Yes. | 1:54 |
- | Yes. | 1:55 |
- | Uh-huh, that's what I was saying. | 1:56 |
- | He came later, he came later on. | 1:57 |
- | I can't remember the year because, | 1:58 |
you know, being young and- | 2:00 | |
- | We don't bother to remember the years. | 2:01 |
(everyone laughing) | 2:03 | |
(coughing) Excuse me. | 2:06 | |
But it would be in about in 1946. | 2:06 | |
It's the first time I've been back here since then. | 2:16 | |
(indistinct) | 2:19 | |
(crosstalk) | 2:24 | |
(crosstalk) | 2:29 | |
- | So, your family owned their own farm? | 2:33 |
- | Mm-hmm. | 2:35 |
- | What did they farm? | 2:36 |
- | Everything. | 2:38 |
They did everything, (indistinct). | 2:41 | |
And the cows. | 2:44 | |
We got some milk, and butter, and we made ice cream. | 2:46 | |
(everyone laughing) | 2:50 | |
- | Chickens? | 2:51 |
- | Yeah, I don't think I missed anything. | 2:52 |
(everyone laughing) | 2:53 | |
- | How about the rest of you, | 3:00 |
what did your families do for a living? | 3:01 | |
Did you- | 3:05 | |
- | It's my time? | 3:07 |
- | Yes, please. | 3:08 |
- | First, I'd like to apologize for being late. | 3:10 |
- | That's alright. | 3:13 |
- | I'm still at work, otherwise. | 3:14 |
And my son was doing a renovation job on our house, | 3:16 | |
and he calls me in for advice, (laughing) | 3:23 | |
and it just took more time than I expected. | 3:26 | |
So, I apologize. | 3:30 | |
Ordinarily, I'm not late. | 3:31 | |
I think he'll tell you that my reputation means | 3:34 | |
that first of all, the first thing I learned | 3:38 | |
when I was coming to Bricks | 3:41 | |
is one of the most important things was be on time. | 3:42 | |
- | Right. | 3:45 |
(everyone laughing) | 3:46 | |
So right. | 3:47 | |
- | I don't know where to begin, but I'll begin. | 3:49 |
I met these three young ladies yesterday, | 3:54 | |
and they insisted that come by 'cause I was about to stay | 3:57 | |
because my schedule's really full. | 4:01 | |
But, now that I'm here, I can begin the age old story. | 4:04 | |
Mrs. Exum happens to be by birth, a first cousin, | 4:11 | |
and we lived more or less on the same yard. | 4:19 | |
Their yard rather than mine because her father was my uncle | 4:24 | |
and she had nine brothers and sisters | 4:29 | |
between her and- | 4:36 | |
Of course, she made the ninth one. | 4:41 | |
But anyway, that's where I did most of my plan, | 4:41 | |
that's where I grew up, | 4:44 | |
and that's where I learned some of the tricks of the trade. | 4:45 | |
(everyone laughing) | 4:48 | |
Her father was actually basically, I would say, | 4:50 | |
served as a second father to me. | 4:55 | |
My mother was divorced | 4:58 | |
before I remember what my father looked like, | 5:01 | |
so I didn't have that experience. | 5:04 | |
Personally, I think I had a better experience | 5:08 | |
because my uncle was right close by. | 5:10 | |
He passed my house every time, every morning, | 5:14 | |
going to work. | 5:16 | |
And he had a message for anybody who would listen. | 5:18 | |
- | Oh, awesome. | 5:21 |
- | And I could hear a little bit. | 5:22 |
And as I said, that he taught me a lot of things. | 5:24 | |
I could go back to the time when we would go fishing. | 5:31 | |
And I don't know | 5:35 | |
whether the interviewer been fishing like we went or not, | 5:36 | |
(everyone laughing) | 5:39 | |
but it was really interesting what we would do. | 5:40 | |
Well I guess, first of all, he was the kind | 5:44 | |
that believed in getting ahold of everything possible, | 5:47 | |
and that which was free, and that which was available, | 5:52 | |
whether it was free or what have you. | 5:55 | |
And so, we lived close to the swamp and he liked to fish. | 5:57 | |
And I followed him and his sons to the swamps, | 6:04 | |
and we had a trick that we'd play on the fish. | 6:14 | |
We'd carry hoes there and make the water so muddy, | 6:19 | |
they would come to the top, | 6:23 | |
and all we'd have to do is pick them up | 6:26 | |
and put them in the bag. | 6:28 | |
(everyone laughing) | 6:29 | |
- | They didn't fish with hoes, you know. | 6:30 |
My daddy didn't- | 6:33 | |
- | That was too slow for my uncle. | 6:34 |
He believed in getting them all and getting them quick. | 6:37 | |
(everyone laughing) | 6:39 | |
And so when the weather would get like this, | 6:40 | |
we would strip down to nature's calling | 6:45 | |
(everyone laughing) | 6:48 | |
and go fishing. | 6:52 | |
Well, that's the truth, | 6:53 | |
that's what you want to hear, isn't it? (laughing) | 6:53 | |
She wasn't there because she was girl. | 6:56 | |
- | Oh no, I was- | 6:58 |
- | And so, we would usually come out | 6:59 |
with as many fish as we could carry. | 7:02 | |
And of course, I'd get enough to supply my folk, | 7:06 | |
and he'd use all the rest for his family. | 7:10 | |
And it was a very fine experience, | 7:13 | |
the companionship and the skills. | 7:17 | |
I learned to swim just a little bit | 7:20 | |
as a result of that experience. | 7:22 | |
Then coming to something that's a little bit more important | 7:28 | |
was fact that I went to grade school, like most folk. | 7:31 | |
I think I started school a little late | 7:36 | |
because we lived on the far end of town | 7:39 | |
and school was on the south end, as we say sometimes. | 7:42 | |
And when I figured my age in relation to the school program, | 7:48 | |
I know beside the fact that I was an unusual student- | 7:54 | |
But you see, there are two kinds, there are normal students, | 8:01 | |
and there are subnormal, and there are above normal. | 8:05 | |
Now you can put me in each class, mostly, | 8:09 | |
but not in the super class 'cause I just wouldn't fit. | 8:12 | |
So, that may have accounted | 8:16 | |
for the fact that I got to Brick | 8:17 | |
and finished junior college, comparably speaking, late. | 8:21 | |
But, I finished in 1932. | 8:31 | |
Now, if you want to talk about the subject at hand, | 8:36 | |
which is Bricks' contribution, | 8:38 | |
I personally think it was an opportunity | 8:43 | |
to learn a lot of things, go to school first of all, | 8:48 | |
as you're fully aware of the fact | 8:53 | |
that public high schools in small towns | 8:55 | |
were not available to some of us, and I was one of those. | 9:00 | |
- | I think you were last to get in. | 9:07 |
- | But, Mr. Inborden's personality and type, | 9:10 |
everybody in the Enfield area | 9:16 | |
felt that he was the next best thing for us all. | 9:18 | |
And my mother came here to school, | 9:23 | |
and I don't know how long she stayed, | 9:28 | |
but I do know at her age | 9:29 | |
she was considered quite well equipped to read and write. | 9:32 | |
So every club that she was in, I think, | 9:37 | |
made her a secretary. | 9:39 | |
I don't know that she was that smart, | 9:41 | |
but she could at least write, | 9:42 | |
and you could read it after she wrote it. | 9:44 | |
So, she insisted that I go to school, | 9:49 | |
and the opportunity came, | 9:52 | |
so I left, finished actually a private school. | 9:56 | |
And of course, that's another story. (laughing) | 10:02 | |
And I think my cousin did the same thing (laughing) | 10:07 | |
'cause we were all in school basically together. | 10:09 | |
In that period of time, transportation was not available | 10:17 | |
unless you were very fortunate, | 10:22 | |
and I'm not going to talk about the fortunate folks, | 10:25 | |
but I was not one of the fortunate ones. | 10:28 | |
But even at that, on our way to school, invariably, | 10:31 | |
somebody would stop and pick us up and bring us to school. | 10:35 | |
And so, we didn't always walk that four miles | 10:41 | |
from Enfield to Brick, | 10:46 | |
sometimes we were fortunate enough, | 10:48 | |
in many cases, we were fortunate enough | 10:50 | |
to have a chance to catch a ride | 10:53 | |
if we were two men in a group. | 10:57 | |
And of cause, we were smart enough to kind of spread out, | 11:00 | |
and the person who was going to give the ride (laughing) | 11:03 | |
could pick up whatever group that he chose. | 11:07 | |
And occasionally, I was in that group. | 11:11 | |
So, we would be able to get here basically on time. | 11:14 | |
And as I said before, | 11:21 | |
if I learned any one thing | 11:23 | |
from the Brick School experiences was be on time. (laughing) | 11:23 | |
That's all there was to it. | 11:28 | |
(everyone laughing) | ||
And we used the creek bridge, | 11:29 | |
those of us who walked, as a marker. | 11:32 | |
If you got to the bridge before the bell rang, | 11:37 | |
then you knew you were in time. | 11:43 | |
But, if the bell was ringing when you crossed the bridge, | 11:48 | |
you would move a little bit faster | 11:50 | |
because the chances are you will not be here on time. | 11:53 | |
And so, that was one of the landmarks that we used. | 11:57 | |
But, although the experiences that I had here were manyfold, | 12:01 | |
I came here as I said, from an independent school. | 12:11 | |
And I can remember Mr. Gordon at registry, | 12:16 | |
asking me for my credentials. | 12:19 | |
I said, "Well, I don't have anything but this certificate," | 12:23 | |
a diploma, I guess you would call it, | 12:29 | |
from the independent school in Enfield. | 12:31 | |
And he took it and looked at it and said, "Okay." | 12:38 | |
And he registered me as a ninth grade student, | 12:41 | |
I believe it was. | 12:48 | |
And I stayed here for the four years. | 12:50 | |
And finally, I graduated from high school. | 12:54 | |
And during that period of time, I took shop, art, music, | 13:00 | |
farming, and carpenter work, along with the academics. | 13:10 | |
The carpenter work was probably in the shop | 13:17 | |
and the farming were my pet subjects. | 13:22 | |
And well, | 13:25 | |
I guess one reason was I could pretty well do a fair job. | 13:26 | |
And ever since that time, | 13:32 | |
I have been doing some type of carpenter work. | 13:34 | |
I always had a garden, I farmed, and- | 13:40 | |
- | Flowers. | 13:46 |
- | I beg your pardon? | 13:47 |
- | Flowers. | 13:48 |
- | Oh, yes. (laughing) | 13:49 |
Well, it's true | 13:50 | |
that I have had a very unusual group of flowers, | 13:51 | |
and I spend most of my time now doing the yard. | 13:57 | |
I've gotten a little decrepit | 14:03 | |
and I don't need quite as much exercise. (laughing) | 14:07 | |
- | Aw. | 14:10 |
- | But, flowers, I think that I inherited that, | 14:12 |
going back into the family again from my grandfather. | 14:19 | |
He always had a bunch of flowers. | 14:24 | |
'Cause my cousins accused him of loving the girls | 14:27 | |
and he would give him them flowers, | 14:32 | |
but he wouldn't let the boys get any. | 14:34 | |
But I did have a cousin, her brother, who liked flowers, | 14:38 | |
and so I guess it was in the blood. | 14:44 | |
And I at one time, had a very beautiful rose garden, | 14:46 | |
that consisted of 50 flowers. | 14:52 | |
And I could name all of them one by one, (laughing) | 14:56 | |
and most of the time, | 14:59 | |
I could do it without reading the labels. | 15:00 | |
But now, if I plant a flower and don't read the label, | 15:03 | |
I can't tell you what it is. | 15:07 | |
But, I do have some love of flowers. | 15:09 | |
That experience though paid off in many ways | 15:15 | |
because this place is for culture, including music and art. | 15:20 | |
And the first prize, | 15:26 | |
I believe the only prize I ever got as a student, | 15:28 | |
I received it | 15:33 | |
from a drawing that I did in the art department. | 15:34 | |
And of course, I was very proud of it, naturally. | 15:38 | |
It was worth a whole dollar. (laughing) | 15:41 | |
Well, the instructor was encouraging us to do art. | 15:44 | |
And at the end of the course, | 15:50 | |
that particular drawing was the winner. | 15:53 | |
It was a bungalow house, | 15:58 | |
and I've been interested in houses ever since. | 16:02 | |
I took shop with Mr. Saunders. | 16:07 | |
Most of you who were here, remember him of course. | 16:12 | |
- | Yes. | 16:15 |
- | And he taught me how to use saws, hammers, and nails, | 16:16 |
and what have you, | 16:22 | |
and that has been my hobby for the last 30 years. | 16:23 | |
And I have developed an interest | 16:34 | |
in the renovation of houses, building houses. | 16:37 | |
And I buy houses, renovate them, and then rent them. | 16:44 | |
And so as a result, I have not only some that I built, | 16:51 | |
but I have some that I renovated, | 16:56 | |
and all of them are now are paying business. | 16:58 | |
And my second son is here, working full-time | 17:04 | |
as manager, a repair person, and the director, | 17:10 | |
and what have you, in that business. | 17:17 | |
He works both night and day. | 17:23 | |
And he chose to call me this morning | 17:26 | |
to come and tell him how to put a house back in balance. | 17:29 | |
I don't know why. | 17:34 | |
Well, the front door has fallen, basically one-sided. | 17:38 | |
I'm telling you these things | 17:43 | |
because these are the things that I got at Brick. | 17:44 | |
- | You were talking a little bit | 17:49 |
about influential teachers of yours. | 17:51 | |
I was wondering, Mrs. Wills, | 17:53 | |
if there's some influential teachers | 17:54 | |
that you remember at the school, when you were going- | 17:56 | |
- | Or everyone else. | 17:59 |
- | Or everyone else, as well, | 18:00 |
are there teachers that you remember particularly | 18:02 | |
from your time at the Brick School? | 18:05 | |
- | I do. | 18:07 |
- | Mm-hmm. | 18:08 |
Who were some of those people? | 18:09 | |
- | I remember Miss Brown. | 18:10 |
And she was here, in fact, I think when Brick closed. | 18:14 | |
She went to Rocky Mount's Booker T. High. | 18:18 | |
And in fact she's buried in Rocky, | 18:21 | |
in the city of Rocky Mount. | 18:24 | |
She was one of them. | 18:26 | |
And then, there was a Mrs. Redding, | 18:27 | |
she was the English teacher. | 18:30 | |
I remember her, very outstanding. | 18:32 | |
And Mrs. Miller, Mr. Inborden's daughter. | 18:35 | |
I remember those three. | 18:40 | |
I would say they were outstanding. | 18:42 | |
- | What was so outstanding about them? | 18:44 |
- | Well, I guess maybe the way they taught the class. | 18:45 |
I liked them, I thought they were very good. | 18:52 | |
I think I was influenced under them as a student, | 18:55 | |
I learned a lot under them. | 19:01 | |
And of course, I still stay in contact with Mrs. Miller | 19:02 | |
through my daughters, exactly. | 19:06 | |
I stay in contact with her. | 19:10 | |
And I don't know what Mrs. Redding- | 19:12 | |
I don't think, I don't know if she's still in Enfield- | 19:13 | |
- | She's dead. | 19:17 |
- | I've said those three, maybe others have. (laughing) | 19:18 |
- | Mr. Bell, you were saying someone. | 19:23 |
- | I remember Ms. Hamlin, the English teacher. | 19:26 |
And she was the type of person | 19:31 | |
that she never had any trouble in her classroom | 19:35 | |
because (laughing) the way she spoke | 19:38 | |
and the way she carried herself, | 19:41 | |
nobody would dare do anything, you know? | 19:43 | |
She had a stern look, | 19:48 | |
yet she had a Sunday look at the same time, you know? | 19:49 | |
You just, maybe just within yourself, | 19:54 | |
you would not do anything just to embarrass her. | 19:57 | |
And I remember Ms. Pearly, my biology teacher. | 20:00 | |
She was a very nice teacher, very friendly, and a pleasure. | 20:04 | |
I was always looking forward to coming to school, | 20:07 | |
my teacher was so pleasant. | 20:11 | |
And you always go home, you always learn something each day, | 20:13 | |
you know, so I enjoyed it. | 20:19 | |
- | I have, | 20:24 |
I guess you would call it an odd remembrance of sorts. | 20:28 | |
I remember my mother and father | 20:34 | |
so vividly talking about their teachers, | 20:36 | |
and it came right down to us. | 20:40 | |
When I was in school at Brick, I was six years old. | 20:43 | |
And I remember so many of the older teachers, | 20:48 | |
but my special teacher was Mrs. Saunders. | 20:51 | |
Do you remember Mrs. Saunders? | 20:54 | |
- | Yes. | 20:55 |
- | She was a doll. | 20:56 |
She was. | 20:58 | |
- | She was, wasn't she? | 20:59 |
- | (laughing) She never scolded you, | 21:02 |
she'd never put you down. | 21:04 | |
You know, I had a trouble with spelling, | 21:07 | |
and I was one of those kids | 21:11 | |
that they shoved along, you know. | 21:13 | |
But I had a trouble with spelling, | 21:15 | |
especially the days of the week. | 21:16 | |
And I could not spell Tuesday. | 21:19 | |
(everyone laughing) | 21:22 | |
I remember it as if it were yesterday. | 21:23 | |
And I was standing in front of the class | 21:26 | |
with my hands at my back. | 21:27 | |
And my sister who's sitting on the side over there, | 21:29 | |
she's looking at me, and I'm trying to spell Tuesday, | 21:33 | |
and I'd say, "Tuesday, T-U," | 21:36 | |
and that's as far as I could get. | 21:39 | |
(everyone laughing) | 21:41 | |
And my sister, she would say, "E-T-U-E," | 21:42 | |
and I could not get it. | 21:46 | |
And finally, I just broke down in tears and I began to cry. | 21:48 | |
And Mrs. Saunders said to me, | 21:53 | |
she said, "Oh, that's all right, Virginia." | 21:54 | |
She said, "Come and have a seat. Sit beside me." | 21:57 | |
She always sat in the seats with the children, you know, | 22:00 | |
half off, I guess, but she would sit there. | 22:03 | |
And you would go to her and she would console you. | 22:07 | |
If you could not read, | 22:10 | |
or you did not have your assignment for the day, | 22:11 | |
she would talk to you in such a manner | 22:14 | |
that it made you feel all but relieved that, | 22:16 | |
"I didn't know this, but I know that I'm going to get it." | 22:19 | |
Another thing she did, well she used to make soup | 22:24 | |
or would see to it that we'd have | 22:27 | |
this delicious homemade soup and hot chocolate. | 22:29 | |
Now, whether she got it from the dining room over here | 22:33 | |
or whether she brought it from home, I don't know, | 22:36 | |
but we just thought it was the greatest thing | 22:38 | |
'cause Mrs. Saunders, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, | 22:40 | |
she'd always bring us it. | 22:42 | |
A great teacher she was, a beautiful lady, | 22:45 | |
a beautiful person. | 22:46 | |
And if you couldn't learn under her, | 22:48 | |
you might as well go home. | 22:52 | |
(everyone laughing) | 22:53 | |
Because she was so willing and able to help. | 22:54 | |
- | She mentioned Mrs. Saunders. | 22:57 |
She was an influence on me through Mr. Saunders, | 23:00 | |
he was an instructor in the physical arts, | 23:04 | |
manual arts, I believe they called it then. | 23:10 | |
And he taught me how to use a hammer. | 23:13 | |
And I think I gotten more out of his instruction | 23:16 | |
than I did all the rest put together. | 23:21 | |
Mr. Gordon, or Gordon, Mr. Inborden's son, | 23:24 | |
was not to be overlooked because he taught science, | 23:28 | |
and he found a way to get his gardens planted, | 23:33 | |
and worked, and developed, and housed, | 23:39 | |
and he used his sciences classes in that area. | 23:42 | |
And so, I got the experience | 23:46 | |
of doing farm work on a scientific basis through him | 23:48 | |
'cause he was very good at it. | 23:53 | |
And those are two of the people that I will never forget, | 23:55 | |
I don't believe. | 24:00 | |
Of course, there were others, | 24:02 | |
like Mrs. Brown who taught history. | 24:04 | |
And those of us who came here through high school, | 24:06 | |
I'm sure you recall her instruction as a history teacher. | 24:10 | |
There was Mr. Killingworth, who had a lot of patience. | 24:15 | |
He was almost like a big brother to me. | 24:19 | |
And of course, you know, growing up, | 24:23 | |
you wear out clothes pretty quick. | 24:25 | |
And he always found something to make my day more than once. | 24:27 | |
And there many others, | 24:34 | |
most of them were helpful in their own way, | 24:35 | |
and I could appreciate that so much. | 24:38 | |
Like many of us, | 24:41 | |
I was not the best speller in the world either. (laughing) | 24:45 | |
And I learned that sometimes, | 24:49 | |
good conduct, a friendly smile, | 24:56 | |
would get you a whole lot more | 25:02 | |
than knowing all the alphabets in the world. | 25:04 | |
And I learned to use that technique to some extent, | 25:07 | |
not overdo it because I didn't feel that I had a right | 25:11 | |
to really rob myself of an education, | 25:17 | |
even though it was kind of hard because of the background. | 25:21 | |
You see you can't walk to school four miles each way | 25:26 | |
and do a good job of studying | 25:32 | |
when you had to go home and pick cotton for an hour. | 25:35 | |
If you got there early enough and the field was close by, | 25:39 | |
you were tired. | 25:44 | |
When the night came, you would go sleep, | 25:45 | |
and that's all there was to it. | 25:47 | |
But at any rate, | 25:48 | |
those were some of the experiences that I had here | 25:50 | |
that I think were really worth | 25:53 | |
the time and trouble to come here. | 25:58 | |
And I always thought I had basically an inferior education, | 26:02 | |
but the training that I got at Brick | 26:10 | |
helped me when I went to Elizabeth City, | 26:15 | |
it helped me when I went to Durham Central High, | 26:20 | |
a central college route. | 26:29 | |
And of course, I had a short stint at A&T, | 26:31 | |
I was there two summers, | 26:38 | |
and that was a very fine experience as well. | 26:40 | |
But, what I'm trying to say | 26:44 | |
is that I was able | 26:45 | |
to get rid of what many called an inferiority complex. | 26:48 | |
You will get that when you go to some places, | 26:54 | |
or you're young and you just don't do as well. | 26:58 | |
But I guess I learned a few tricks, (laughing) | 27:03 | |
which most abnormal people learn. | 27:08 | |
I'm talking about the subnormal now. (laughing) | 27:12 | |
Yes? | 27:16 | |
- | I'd like to inject here. | 27:17 |
You're talking about superiority, feeling superior too. | 27:19 | |
- | Yeah. | 27:23 |
- | No. | 27:24 |
- | And equal to. | 27:25 |
- | Equal to or superior to. | 27:26 |
When Brick closed, my dad took us out of school. | 27:30 | |
We stayed home for two years. | 27:34 | |
He wouldn't allow us to go to the public school | 27:37 | |
because he felt the school was inferior. | 27:39 | |
He just did not feel that it was up to standards, | 27:44 | |
to our standards anyway. | 27:48 | |
And believe it or not, now that we talk about it, | 27:50 | |
I remember back that far, and it was not up to standard. | 27:54 | |
I remember in Eden school, | 28:00 | |
we had books that were handed down, | 28:02 | |
and I'm sure you know about this, | 28:04 | |
were handed down from the White schools. | 28:06 | |
Nine times out of 10, the teacher's reading to you, | 28:10 | |
"Baby Ray Went Home," and you are looking for, | 28:13 | |
"Baby Ray Went Home," where is "Baby Ray"? | 28:16 | |
It's not in your book, it's torn out. | 28:19 | |
Many pages were torn out. | 28:21 | |
Now, that's what I mean by superiority and superior. | 28:23 | |
We had material, and books, and things to work with at Brick | 28:27 | |
that we did not have in the public schools. | 28:32 | |
- | We wanted to ask you about segregation in the community. | 28:37 |
How were the lines of segregation drawn in your community? | 28:41 | |
- | I'd like to say about Mrs. Powell here. | 28:48 |
Mrs. Powell is from Trinidad. | 28:50 | |
She married a homeboy. (laughing) | 28:53 | |
She married a fellow from home, | 28:56 | |
and that's her reason for being here. | 28:58 | |
She joined our club to help him and to help us, | 29:00 | |
so she won't be of too much help to us. | 29:02 | |
- | How about Mr. Powell? | 29:06 |
- | We'll discuss, I'll discuss, | 29:07 |
or we can discuss, segregation. | 29:08 | |
- | Oh, we full of that, but anyway. | 29:11 |
- | If that's what you were concerned about. | 29:14 |
Well, as you know, the schools were segregated. | 29:18 | |
You didn't have, if you went to Willow, | 29:24 | |
there were no cafes available | 29:27 | |
only in the Negro neighborhoods. | 29:30 | |
You couldn't go into a White cafe like you can now, | 29:33 | |
and sit down, and eat, and enjoy a meal. | 29:37 | |
That was out of the question. | 29:42 | |
See, you living on a new day. | 29:45 | |
I don't feel slighted so to speak, you know, | 29:52 | |
when I go into some of these places, | 29:57 | |
but I don't relish going in to start with. | 29:59 | |
'Cause if my money wasn't good enough for you 50 years ago, | 30:02 | |
to me, it still isn't good enough for you. | 30:07 | |
We own places that are just as well kept, | 30:11 | |
just as well available. | 30:14 | |
Well, the whole thing's entirely different. | 30:20 | |
And there's no real reason why you should feel | 30:22 | |
that you ought to go where you're not wanted. | 30:26 | |
That's my philosophy. | 30:30 | |
And today, I hesitate to go to some of the places | 30:32 | |
because I feel that they'd rather not have me there, | 30:36 | |
and there are other places | 30:42 | |
that I think appreciate my coming, so I go. | 30:43 | |
Those are just the way I take it. | 30:47 | |
Now, that is a countywide situation. | 30:49 | |
And if you look around and go to any other county | 30:56 | |
in the east of North Carolina, | 31:00 | |
I think you'd find basically the same thing. | 31:02 | |
Sometimes, you can understand their attitude | 31:09 | |
and sometime you can't. | 31:13 | |
Why is it alright for the Black man or the Black woman | 31:16 | |
to nourish the babies, to cook the food, | 31:21 | |
and do all these other things, | 31:25 | |
and yet being denied the simple necessities of life. | 31:27 | |
I'm not talking about socializing. | 31:31 | |
And why is that still practiced? | 31:35 | |
And it is to limited degree, and only has stopped | 31:40 | |
because the United States government says, | 31:45 | |
"You have to serve that person." | 31:47 | |
And they know that somehow, | 31:50 | |
they've got one problem or another if they don't do it. | 31:52 | |
And that's the only reason why they do it, | 31:56 | |
it's not because they want to do it. | 31:58 | |
- | And our schools, we had rundown schools, | 31:59 |
you know, in our community, for our children, | 32:08 | |
and they had the nice schools. | 32:10 | |
And the children, | 32:13 | |
the rural children who came to school in town, | 32:16 | |
well I didn't live out there, but I know about it, | 32:19 | |
they had to walk and get to school maybe, | 32:22 | |
and walk a lot of miles. | 32:25 | |
And meanwhile, | 32:29 | |
the White children on the buses that were carrying them, | 32:31 | |
they'd pass these children on the street | 32:35 | |
and go on to their schools. | 32:38 | |
- | And your mom and dad are paying the same taxes- | 32:40 |
- | They're probably paying more taxes than some of them | 32:44 |
'cause I know some of them didn't have as much as we had, | 32:46 | |
and my dad was paying taxes and we could not go there. | 32:50 | |
- | That didn't matter about taxes, if you paid the taxes. | 32:53 |
I mean, that's the way they felt. | 32:57 | |
- | Very unfair, very unfair. | 33:00 |
- | You were Black. | 33:03 |
- | Well I can say, to describe segregation here, | 33:04 |
to me it was so thick, you could cut up with a knife. | 33:10 | |
(everyone laughing) | 33:14 | |
That's how bad it was. | 33:15 | |
- | Oh yeah. | 33:16 |
- | I didn't care, I was small, | 33:17 |
and I wouldn't necessarily go to restaurants anyway, | 33:19 | |
you know? | 33:21 | |
And if I could have, I mean if I had the money to go with, | 33:22 | |
I would not have gone 'cause my mother's food | 33:29 | |
was far superior I think than any restaurant. | 33:32 | |
- | Oh yeah. | 33:34 |
- | She was a really good cook. (laughing) | 33:35 |
I don't think anybody could, you know, | 33:37 | |
cook any better food than she cooked. | 33:40 | |
- | And it was almost unheard of anyway | 33:43 |
to go to a restaurant in that day and time. | 33:45 | |
We just didn't do that. | 33:47 | |
We stayed at home and had our meals at home, | 33:49 | |
and that was it. | 33:51 | |
- | Well in a way, being segregated here, it did me a favor. | 33:53 |
'Cause I left, I got another job, I retired. | 33:58 | |
I said, "I'm going to beat the system." | 34:02 | |
And I'm retired now, I'm walking around here, | 34:03 | |
and I think I've beat it. | 34:06 | |
I think I've done my job. | 34:07 | |
- | How did you mean to beat the system? | 34:08 |
- | Because I mean, not necessarily- | 34:10 |
Within myself of doing what I wanted to do. | 34:13 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 34:15 |
- | I mean, segregation's still out here, see, | 34:16 |
and it will always be. | 34:19 | |
But, I did what I wanted to do within myself. | 34:21 | |
I'm just talking about what I did. | 34:22 | |
I mean, I don't have to go out and look for a job. | 34:24 | |
I get up in the morning, I get ready. (laughing) | 34:27 | |
And by the system being that way, | 34:30 | |
it made me twice as aggressive, you know, | 34:32 | |
when I probably would not have, | 34:35 | |
if I could have done things like I wanted to here, | 34:36 | |
I would not have been so aggressive in doing, overcoming, | 34:39 | |
as Martin Luther King said. | 34:42 | |
I think I've overcome within myself to do. | 34:44 | |
Now, I'm giving back some of the things that I had gotten, | 34:47 | |
you see? | 34:51 | |
I have have delivered the Meals on Wheels in Enfield. | 34:53 | |
And in that way, | 35:00 | |
I've given of course back to the church in Enfield. | 35:02 | |
And whatever program they're doing, | 35:03 | |
they can call me anytime, and they do, | 35:08 | |
and I think they overdo it sometimes. | 35:10 | |
(everyone laughing) | 35:12 | |
What'd they tell me you said, "Push it to the limit"? | 35:15 | |
I think they pushed it to the limit of calling me, | 35:18 | |
"Do this, do that, take me here, pick up this," | 35:21 | |
I'm always getting a call. | 35:25 | |
But, I don't mind. | 35:26 | |
Sometime I say, "Well, I'm tired, | 35:27 | |
but I can get up and go do it and come home again." | 35:29 | |
It's a day's work, you know? | 35:35 | |
I can leave with a satisfaction with myself | 35:36 | |
having done some activity during the day. | 35:38 | |
- | Well, I can remember. | 35:42 |
I didn't mean to- | 35:45 | |
- | Oh, it's okay. | 35:46 |
- | I remember, you know, my father- | 35:47 |
I was small, but I can remember how my father was treated. | 35:49 | |
I think it was more or less | 35:53 | |
because he just went out to do things | 35:55 | |
and to take care of his family, | 35:58 | |
and he did a whole lot of things. | 36:00 | |
Like, he did a little bit of farming, | 36:03 | |
he did all kind of businesses he went into. | 36:05 | |
And I think he was doing a little too much for him. | 36:10 | |
And I can remember once, they had a place, | 36:15 | |
I guess something like a market. | 36:21 | |
How is that said? | 36:24 | |
- | It's a market. | 36:25 |
- | Uh-huh, downtown, you know? | 36:26 |
- | Yes, it's what they call a beef market. | 36:28 |
- | And I think they had stalls like- | 36:32 |
- | Yeah. | 36:34 |
- | Each one had- | 36:35 |
And so, my father had one in there, | 36:36 | |
you know, with the Whites, of course. | 36:39 | |
And he was always mistreated. | 36:42 | |
His stuff would be, you know. | 36:44 | |
And I think they didn't want him there for one thing. | 36:47 | |
- | What happened to his stuff? | 36:51 |
- | Well, I don't really know, | 36:52 |
but they would do little things, | 36:54 | |
you know, to discourage him, I'm sure that's what that was. | 36:57 | |
And I only know about this from hearing it, you know. | 37:02 | |
And I can remember once, my mother- | 37:07 | |
As I said, he had a garden, he sold stuff out the garden, | 37:12 | |
he just did a whole lot of different things. | 37:15 | |
And I guess it was just | 37:18 | |
getting a little too far for him or something. | 37:22 | |
And one morning, early, | 37:25 | |
I think my brothers probably was coming over here to school, | 37:29 | |
my older brothers, | 37:32 | |
and she would've to get up early, you know, | 37:33 | |
and fix breakfast for them. | 37:35 | |
And she went out to, | 37:36 | |
what they called a smokehouse or something, to get some- | 37:40 | |
- | Smokehouse. | 37:42 |
- | Yeah, some meat or whatever. | 37:43 |
And when she went out there, | 37:46 | |
she found this pile of things out there, | 37:47 | |
and it was covered over, | 37:54 | |
And she kind of looked to see what it was, | 37:56 | |
and it was a pile of clothes, freshly pressed clothes. | 37:59 | |
So, she went back in the house and told my father. | 38:06 | |
So, he came out and he saw them. | 38:08 | |
And somebody, what they had done from the cleaners, | 38:15 | |
they had been and got these clothes and brought them there, | 38:19 | |
so he would be accused next morning, see. | 38:27 | |
The law, as he would've gone to the police, | 38:32 | |
and they found out somebody had broke in, | 38:34 | |
and they would take these things out. | 38:38 | |
And they even had the dogs and everything | 38:40 | |
and had been out looking for them. | 38:46 | |
But my mother had found them, | 38:47 | |
and so she told my father, he gets up there- | 38:49 |
Item Info
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