-: Everybody is some,
the whole time I was at St. Emma's,
I never had a visit from my parents or anybody like that.
A lot of the students that live,
say, if they were from Richmond or from DC or something,
a parent would come and visit on a weekend or something
and so they might have been able to share some information
but we really weren't and we would go home in the summer,
and they would let us go home during the Christmas holidays
and I remember we had a black principal, a priest,
and I remember him telling us this was like in 58 or 59,
and he said, there are gonna be things going on
in your communities
and, you know, we're not telling you not to be involved
but I'm telling you that you don't wanna mess it up.
(laughs)
So being too eager, you're there, you might you know,
they've got things planned and everything.
And so he just, he just, you know, admonished.
Most of us didn't know what was going on.
we were coming to areas that that wasn't happening
but some of them were coming from areas that,
there were protest going on
and I learned later that we were used in 1959 or 60,
when they did the freedom riots.
Well, we rode the trains and say we naturally had
to ride the trains.
Well, we didn't know at that time was the principal,
I was telling you about was in with the local, you know,
they were trying to use the school
in any way they could to help
and since we were an all black school,
it really made some interesting things
cause we ended up integrating the,
Virginia, had a lot of Catholics,
a lot of Catholic institutions.
And so they had their own leg.
So we ended up integrating the Catholic athletically,
you know that kind of thing but they could do it, you know,
and that way they, we couldn't do anything
with the public education system.
We rode the trains and
Todd: Was there a train station at Powerton
or where did you?
-: Well we get to, the station was in Richmond
and we we'd ride and they sent a bus
from the school to pick us up and transport us.
So it was only like 15 to 20 miles.
We, Richmond was a good size little city and we would ride,
normally I'd go get on a train in hern
and go to, Texicana, Texas, Texicana, Arkansas and
then go to the Little Rock and then we'd go to St. Louis
and then we'd changed trains in St. Louis.
And then we'd go from St. Louis to Cincinnati.
We changed trains and Cincinnati
and we'd go from Cincinnati to Richmond.
So that was a lot of, there's a lot of riding.
Todd: You get to see a lot of America.
-: Yeah, so you'd take a day and a half or so,
to do all of that.
And now, the year that we were gonna ride the trains
with the, for the civil rights thing,
they used us, we went from Richmond to Birmingham,
to, Little Rock, not Little Rock.
Memphis, and then Little Rock.
and came to Hern in that way.
So when we got to Little Rock,
it would have been the same train,
that would have gone to St. Louis.
And that one I didn't, we didn't eat from the time we got
on the train to, a time where you got into Little Rock.
I think they let us eat, we got it to go
cause they wouldn't let us into the cafeteria.
But, that was a fascinating thing.
Todd: But this had been coordinated by the school?
-: Yeah, yeah.
Todd: By administrators of the school,
-: Yeah, yeah.
Todd: who saw to it, that,
that what, you bought a certain class of ticket
and you would be served on, that part of the train?
-: Now, what they would looking at,
was what was the difference.
They were comparing routes, and Southern routes versus,
middle America routes and that that's what it was.
Todd: Okay.
-: So, it had to do with what was available
to us in the depot itself.
And in Birmingham, they wouldn't let us go
to the regular cafeteria, in the station.
There was, in the baggage compartment,
they had a little thing,
it was about like this where you can get a sandwich
and some chips or soda or something like that
and that was it.
And I'm pretty sure somewhere in Birmingham,
there was a soul food place, but we didn't know anything.
(Laughs)
Todd: Right.
-: So, you know, that was again, as so we just,
Todd: So you were, essentially
on a fact finding mission and reporting back
about what the conditions were like in each
of these train stations?
-: Yeah, yeah and that's all he wanted us
to do was didn't want us to encounter anything,
you know, no confrontations or anything.
Usually we traveling groups of two or three.
So, I realized later on
that they were probably more afraid of us
cause we all had uniforms and,
it was really,
it was just something you wouldn't see normally, you know,
and it was kinda interesting.
But, that was the only time,
that we had a pretty tough time, they put us in a hot car.
Now, I don't know if you, in a train,
a train has a you know, this was after the,
steam thing, but it, that car near the engine,
is pretty warm and they didn't have, any cooling
in that car and they would store all of the,
the pillows and all of the stuff, you know,
for the sleeping things in.
And that's where they had the bucks to sit, you know
that that was our seating area
and so that was uncomfortable.
We were used to traveling, you know,
we had four use of the club car
on the other Missouri Pacific.
We could go in and, you know, get a snack, play cards
or we weren't obeys to drink, but you know, that, that was
and being kids that was before the, you know, the, all
of the computers and all of that stuff.
So we we'd had a great time that day,
(laughs)
but now, it was kind of interesting thing
and when we got to Memphis, we couldn't do too much
because we changed stations in Memphis
and so, and by that time, we were pretty,
those of us that had gone that route,
Lot of them were getting off at different points,
but we made it and survived.
Todd: Well what, were the possibilities for you
if we go back to 1961, when you graduated from St Emma's.
What, were you thinking you would want to do?
What kind of choices did you have?
-: Well I was pretty angry by that time when I graduated
but, I was also confused because we had no idea
of what this whole pattern looked like in the country.
And, then it was time for me to go to college.
And so I just automatically thought, well
I'll be going to Prairie View
because everybody went to Prairie View
and it was no problem.
And I remember my dad asking me, if you could go anywhere
where would you wanna go?
And I said, well, you know if he wants to play that game,
I'll say, well I'll go to Harvard,
or I'll go to MIT, something like that.
(Laughs)
But I ended up going to university of Texas
and I didn't know anything about the university of Texas
and my mother had worked in Austin, for the Blind, Deaf
and Orphan school which was, you know, segregated
and, so she was, really high on UT and I go to school there.
I said, well, that's fine.
If that's what you heard.
I didn't know anything about the campus.
I got to UT and we lived in segregated dorms
and that was my first slap in the face.
(laughs)
Not that I knew otherwise, it was just that,
you know we had no option and that,
you know that was kind of strange.
So anyway, it was at the students,
the black students were wonderful students.
They were, very intelligent people
and, and I was proud to be among, you know, being
in that group of people
but I just didn't like that idea of that kind of treatment.
So anyway, but school was okay, most
of the courses I took, there was no problems in the classes.
There was no interaction between blacks and whites.
We'd be in the class,
you may not even know each other's names.
You know, it was just very small.
The only time I really had any real problem
at UT was in a PE class.
I signed up for PE and, you know,
I wanted to play basketball.
Oh, that's full, oh well, so what's left?
Well water polo is there.
I was the only black in the water polo, in this class
and I didn't know what I was in for.
(Laughs)
And the instructor, you know, he was kind of interesting.
He said, no, this is going to be a study in life.
(Laughs)
Yeah, I didn't know what he was talking about
but, what he did was he said, okay, now all
of you that can swim real well.
You know, you get on one side of the pool
and all of you that don't swim that well, you get over here
and those in the middle, you know,
kinda in the middle of the pool
and so I was in the middle of the pool,
but here I go playing a water polo.
(laughs)
Todd: That's a pretty rough sport, isn't it?
-: Yeah, yeah
and I'm not a real big super person,
anyway it was kind of interesting and he was right.
It said a lot about life.
Todd: In a Darwinian sense
that the strong take advantage of the weak.
-: Going out for the ball or they're going at you
(laughs)
So that was coming, you know, it was okay
and then sometimes it got kind of heated
and he just you know, tell us to sit down
or something like that.
Yeah.
Todd: Well, I mean, that involves a lot
of grabbing and a lot of close physical proximity
and there probably weren't too many places
in campus where black students
and white student got that close.
-: Well, that was happening, that's true.
Todd: And getting undressed in the locker room.
-: Yeah and, see, none of that was a problem.
It was just when we were in the pool,
and you know they would beat you
because you know, the whole idea was water polo,
is you wanna, you kind of duck the ball,
and keep it from being moved.
So, you know, obviously you got water there.
You're gonna splash and hit somebody.
(laughs)
Todd: And dunk 'em and,
-: Yeah, so anyway, it was okay.
We survived it and that was a, it was during
that time everything was segregated
in terms of student activities.
So, you know, that kinda, if you see my yearbook,
you'll see that I was a pretty active student
and that kind of stalemate my interests,
you know I wanted to be a longhorn
and so they were kind of shutting that off
and so it just never got back.
Todd: So you felt like,
so you would have you would have been into it, right.
You would've, into the school spirit stuff
and they, they denied that.
-: Yeah, Yeah. I, yeah.
I, well, I, you know, and you can see that with kids.
Kids wanna belong to something.
They wanna be a part of something
and you just you shut them down real easily, you know
and sometimes just admonishing them, we'll do it
but you know, when you just flat closed doors on 'em that's,
so I was one of those that was affected that way.
A lot of the students weren't in the ones that survived
and did well, what that would, you know,
one thing is we were all good students,
we were fairly good students and,
but some were, were better suited for that environment
and, you know, they did it well.
(laughs)
They, they have, like, I call that group,
they get together every now and then I call a precursor.
Todd: Hm.
-: And they made UT, they go to the Texas relay
to do all of that stuff.
And they're really longhorns
but most of them,
I was surprised quite a few of them didn't graduate from UT.
They all, UT integrated in 1950 and I went there in 61
so it was about 64 or five when everything open up totally
but up to that point.
Todd: Trickle.
-: We was the precursors.
Todd: Right, right.
Yeah was there much student activism
around civil rights issues while you there?
-: Yeah, when I say a lot, there wasn't a lot,
but it was a lot
of the, the students were, were, were conditioned
to you know, parents are saying, go to school.
We want you to get your degree
that's what you're going to school for.
So, you know, they don't care about whether you can be
in that organization or you can do
and then there were a few
of us like me who just resented it all to know end
and we'd be on a picket line.
(laughs)
Todd: So were these the pickets
at the theaters on the drag for instance?
-: Well yeah, there was, see what's his name?
Sweat, him and sweat live by the YMCA,
which was on it drag and that was,
I don't know how familiar, well, the drag then was different
than it is now, but it's the YMCA was here
and when Sweat was allowed to take courses
he couldn't go to a classroom the professors came to him.
and, and you know and that was horrible.
But anyway, yeah, we are though, it was a movie theater
on a drag right across from the university.
And we could go to that movie theater
but we couldn't go to the one downtown Austin
and so, you know, we, the first movie we got to see
in there was the To Kill A Mockingbird.
Todd: That's ironic.
-: It was and shortly after that, we,
they we were prepared for a sit in, but they let us in.