Oral History with Frank Bannister, February 26, 1991 (Ms1991-019)

Michael Cooke: Today is February 26, 1991. I'm conducting an interview with Mr. 00:01:00Frank Bannister of Blacksburg, Virginia. Mr. Bannister, could you give us a

brief biographical sketch of your life? Your birthdate, birthplace, education,

and occupation?

Frank Bannister: Well, I was born in Wake Forest, Virginia. I went to school

there, grade school, in a one-room school sitting beside the road. We had a ball

game in the highway. [Laughs]. The highway, or the road, came right by the

school, and we played ball in the highway.

C: How many teachers taught at that school?

B: Oh, just one at a time.

C: Just one? Do you remember any of the teachers?

B: Yeah, I remember one. She was Rebecca Forks.

C: Rebecca Forks?

B: Rebecca Forrest, and she was from Roanoke, Virginia. Awful good teacher.

C: Did she commute back and forth from Roanoke?

B: No.

C: Oh, she lived in the area?

B: Back in that day, school teachers didn't leave the community.

C: Was she married or single?

B: No, she was single. She had to get a [inaudible 1:30]. Stay there all year.

Confined to the school house.

C: And how many people generally went to that--you said, it was a one room school?

B: Yeah.

C: How many people were, as best you can recall, were in that one school room?

B: Twenty-five or thirty?

C: Twenty-five or thirty. And it simply served the community of Wake Forest?

B: Yeah.

C: 00:02:00Let me ask you another question, did they have a school in McCoy? Because I

know some Blacks lived in McCoy.

B: [inaudible 02:29]. All the Blacks from Wake Forest went to the school that

they went to. And now you take high school and [inaudible 02:40] and a Black

family lived there and they were too far from Blacksburg to go to school.

[inaudible 02:50]. They wouldn't let them go to white school. They grew up to be

men and women that never knew their ABCs. 00:03:00It sounds pitiful.

C: It does.

B: It forced integration. Their daddy cut them off going to the mountain

[03:15]. The mine he worked for was in Wake Forest [03:25]. Now, he had eight or

ten children, and none of them had gone to school a day in their life. They

didn't know A from B. [03:37].

C: That's really bad.

B: We had some in Wake Forest. They had the opportunity to go to Blacksburg to

go to school [03:45].

C: At least they had the opportunity. Although could you compare educational 00:04:00opportunities as equal with whites? I mean, when you looked at the white public

school and looked at your own one room school, was that on the same level or?

B: Same level. In McCoy, they had two rooms, but it was on the same level. They

had two teachers.

C: So, more Blacks lived in McCoy than in Wake Forest?

B: No.

C: They just, for whatever reason, they built--Were these schools operated by

the state or the local government?

B: I don't know. I couldn't tell you this.

C: But there was some educational opportunities?

B: Yeah.

C: Okay. Now you mentioned that you had sons and a daughter, didn't you?

B: Yeah.

C: Were they born and raised in the Wake Forest area or were they born and

raised in the Blacksburg area?

B: No, they were born and raised in Wake Forest.

C: Oh, they were?

B: And an old school bus happened years later. When integration come around,

they rode their own school bus, and they 00:05:00would be gone from about seven o'clock

to five in the afternoon at Christiansburg High School. They had a high school

in Christiansburg.

C: The Christiansburg Institute? The Black school there?

B: Yeah.

C: Where did they go before they went to high school there?

B: Well, they went to that little country school-

C: So the same school you went to?

B: Yeah. Few years and then they were put on a bus [5:32]. Some of them folks

used to go to Christiansburg and board over there. They wouldn't ride the bus. [5:42]

C: How expensive was the board? I mean, I heard people talk about, you could

board, but I mean, how much did they generally charge for the board?

B: I never did know. I was never there.

C: You never had inquired. You just 00:06:00simply had to commute by bus. And I

understand that this is the only high school in the area.

B: Yeah, it was.

C: To the best of your knowledge, where was the nearest one, like Christiansburg

Institute or similar to it?

B: [inaudible 6:16]

C: You couldn't recall-

B: Pulaski, Christiansburg, Radford, all the Blacks right here in this area.

C: What about Floyd?

B: No, they had [inaudible 6:37].

C: But all the other areas attended the--why did they come? Because there was no

public high school for Blacks?

B: No public high school for Blacks.

C: How did people justify that lack of opportunities? 00:07:00Did you find people think

like a public school education is enough? How did whites justify that kind?

B: Whites in the area [inaudible 7:09-7:20] Folks will take you out of school to

work. [inaudible 7:24] Why would a high school in Christiansburg--The Quakers

come here for religious, for education--it hadn't been long since we was

freed--and the Quakers from Pennsylvania come here, started a school, a high

school they built there. And then old white fellow, Captain Schaeffer had an old

horse and buggy, he used to go around the vicinities and-

C: Do you remember him?

B: 00:08:00 Yeah.

C: Oh, you do remember?

B: Yeah, I'm eighty-nine years old. [inaudible 8:16] mighty good to me and kept

me here a long time. Can't say nothing about him except [inaudible 8:26]. If

there was any chance in getting justice for [inaudible 8:40-8:45]

C: So the Christiansburg Institute was founded by John Schaeffer?

B: Captain John 00:09:00Schaeffer. And when he died, they sent a Black man to carry on

his work. He preached around. He was C. H. Smith. I remember him just the way--

was sitting right there now, and that was one of the best men I think I'd ever seen.

C: Do you know where he came from?

B: He came from Pennsylvania [inaudible 9:39] 00:10:00educated in the same school. He

had four little churches

C: Oh, so he was a minister?

B: Yeah. One of them.

C: What churches did he have?

B: [inaudible 10:10] Baptist church.

C: What about St. Paul AME? Wasn't that around? Yeah, that was around.

B: They were around but they weren't wide open like the Baptist church.

C: It was a number of the people huh? Yeah, the Baptist church which was on-what

street is it?

B: Clay Street-

C: Clay Street, right.

B: Well then on down home, when I was a child [inaudible 10:45-10:51] you would

come in every Saturday and preach with us on Sunday. We'd meet him at the train

station where [inaudible 11:04-11:13].

C: Did he commute from somewhere? Or was he here all the time or was he commuting?

B: No, he's from Christiansburg. That's where he came 00:11:00 from.

C: Oh, I see. So, he lived--he wasn't commuting, but you said, sometimes he came

and y'all-

B: No, I didn't say that now.

C: Okay.

B: I said that he would come over on Saturday, spend the night, and then Sunday

morning, he would in the summertime, have a box of peppermint stick candy. I

remember this well as if it was yesterday. And then in winter time, he would

bring that same kind of box of hard candy. And he would start out on the back

side of that community.

C: Which community?

B: Wake Forest.

C: Okay.

B: And every child that he'd seen on the road 00:12:00or stop at his home, pick 'em up

and make 'em come to Sunday school. And he would burn, one of the best I'd ever

seen. He was [inaudible 12:22-12:36]. In Sunday school, the first song that I

ever learned was in that Sunday school. And we had a little choir. 00:13:00You could

sing in that choir every Sunday. Well let's recite a hymn, "Leaning on Jesus."

He wouldn't let you sing if you didn't know that hymn by heart. Recite it like

you were in recitation. Then you could sing [inaudible 13:15]. Put that down

Frank and I'll let you be in the choir. I often think today how much paycheck

[inaudible 13:34] and they would learn and you learned, too. I had a first

cousin. Her name was Annie. We lived together and I didn't know that she wasn't

my sister for years and years. I 00:14:00imagine I'd hear him say, hello there Frankie

boy, how you this morning? [bell ringing in background] Here's my darling little

Annie. And take her in his arms. He loved Annie. He loved children.

C: Was he married himself?

B: Yeah, he was married.

C: Had several kids?

B: Um-hm. Yeah he did. I never seen but two of them.

C: You said that he had several churches. What other places did he minister?

B: Here one Sunday. Blacksburg one Sunday. Down near Eggleston-

C: Near Eggleston?

B: Yeah.

C: So he'd go all the way over to Giles County?

B: Yeah.

C: Oh wow, okay.

B: He had four churches. And he went to a church every Sunday to preach.

C: You remember the last one? You said Eggleston, Blacksburg, and Wake Forest.

Was there one other community?

B: 00:15:00Yeah, Christiansburg.

C: And Christiansburg.

B: Of course [inaudible 15:13-15:16]

C: You remember which churches he was a minister at? In Blacksburg and

Christiansburg and-

B: Saint [inaudible 15:21].

C: Baptist Church? So did he minster at Schaeffer?

B: Yeah, he was sent to Schaeffer.

C: Okay, so Schaeffer and then the First Baptist on Clay Street in Blacksburg.

I'm not familiar with the Eggleston Black church.

B: Me either. There's a Black church up on the side of the hill there. He didn't

have many members 00:16:00there. And then he would preach in all those churches, for

weeks preaching. He had his hands full. You know?

C: Uh-huh.

B: Going so many places with all them churches, but he was supposed to get all

the Blacks to come out of slavery, to religiously educate them. And that's why

they get the Schaeffer Church in Christiansburg. That's where [inaudible 16:35]

and that building out there. That building was a personal schoolhouse [16:43].

C: The one that they now use as the NAACP building?

B: Yeah. And I think of that church so much [inaudible 16:56].

C: Was that called the Hill School? I mean, that building that the NAACP is

using. Was that the Hill School?

B: Yeah.

C: In fact, that's where people went before they went 00:17:00to Christiansburg Institute.

B: Yeah.

C: So up until I guess up until grades one through six, they would go to Hill

School in the Christiansburg area I guess.

B: And I would go to another [17:20] church around here. See, I would go with my

folks to [inaudible 17:33-17:41].

C: Especially in Wake Forest, I guess, there were no churches. Blacksburg there

was a church, I believe, that was already functioning. 00:18:00Not in Wake Forest. Could

you tell us about growing up in Wake Forest? What were some of the things that

went on in Wake Forest? I mean, how big a community was it? How many people

lived there?

B: Forty-five families.

C: Good size.

B: Yeah. My grandfather--There's a whole lot of history behind, in Floyd. Sherman--

C: You said Shermans. Are you talking about the family or are you talking about

Oscar and Homer?

B: [inaudible 18:39]

C: 00:19:00You're talking about the Sherman family.

B: Sherman family. One of the old slave people give two of them land down on the

river, and that was Long Shop. And it ended up a place to [inaudible 19:14-19:29].

C: What did the rest of the people do if they didn't have their own property?

B: [inaudible 19:23-19:25].

C: Okay.

B: [inaudible 19:28-19:40] I never went to school, and I tell you why I didn't

go. [inaudible 19:49-20:05]. We had money. We were tenant farmers [20:09]. We

sharecropped. 00:20:00We had money.That was as much work on the farm as you would get

[20:25]. Old man had these slaves up here [inaudible 20:35] property. He

auctioned off [inaudible 20:46].

C: I guess compared to a sharecropper.

B: Yeah, compared to anything he'd done.

C: [Laughs].

B: From him being there, and my 00:21:00grandmother was a cook there as a slave .

C: Was that the Kent family?

B: Yeah.

C: Did the Kents give that property to the two people you mentioned?

B: No, let's see, the Kents' decedent [21:19]. Let's see--[Rustling].

C: Okay. Oh, so you got some photographs.

B: That's the only picture I could find of my mother. [inaudible 21:48]

C: 00:22:00Who was that chap? Was that you?

B: No. Wasn't me. She worked there.

C: Oh, this is a white kid?

B: Yeah.

C: Oh, okay. I needed to look a bit better. [Laughs]. Now I see it. Now I understand.

B: That's what they called old smoke-

C: And this a--Oh? A smokehouse. This is a little bit blown up right here. This

is a smokehouse? They-

B: Yeah, that's Kent's old smokehouse.

C: Oh, I see.

B: There used to be a concrete walkway to the smokehouse up there to the main

house. [22:33]. It was sitting out from the main house.

C: Is the structure still standing?

B: Yeah. 00:23:00My mother, her mother, was a cook and had a fireplace in that old

kitchen. Take a rail from a rail fence, and it was nine feet long. [inaudible

23:22] old rails. It didn't have [inaudible 23:27]. Old kindling starter that

would enter the fireplace and it would be [inaudible 23:35] on each end and

little pots [23:46-23:52] that the Kents would 00:24:00 eat.

C: So your father was a tenant farmer?

B: No, I didn't say that. I said, my grandfather.

C: Oh, your grandfather. I'll get it right eventually. [Laughs]. Your grandfather.

B: I don't know nothing about the father.

C: Okay.

B: I always regretted that. My grandaddy raised me.

C: I see.

B: My mother gave me to him [inaudible 24:06]. My grandparents raised me, and

they raised me good. [inaudible 24:20]. They spoiled me and raised me. I don't

know nothing about how to raise the two boys of 00:25:00mine. I always thought if I had

a daddy of my own...worried me my whole life. [24:48]

C: That you weren't doing the right thing or doing enough?

B: I didn't know what to do.

C: Well...

B: Let me ask you, you had a daddy at home. You knew why he raised you.

C: That's true.

B: Let me give you some advice. The most important thing I think of. And thank

God for the day that he was [inaudible 25:23] church. A very highly respected

man to everybody. [inaudible 25:32]. Taught Sunday school-

C: Which son is this? You didn't name him.

B: 00:26:00 Huh?

C: You didn't name him.

B: Who?

C: The person you're talking about.

B: Yes, I did. I told you.

C: Your grandfather?

B: Howard Sherman.

C: Howard? Oh, yeah. Okay. So you're related to the Shermans?

B: No. Howard Sherman married a Bannister. I'm a Bannister. Now he comes from

down in [inaudible 26:16] County and married my grandmother.

C: Oh, I see.

B: And then he got drowned down by the river.

C: Yeah was he a waterman?

B: Yeah.

C: Yeah, did he lose his arm?

B: No, he lost his whole life. He got drowned.

C: I remember reading about a waterman who had one arm. Maybe I'm thinking about

somebody else.

B: Thinking about [inaudible 26:37]

C: Yeah, I'm thinking about another person. 00:27:00Okay, so he was a waterman? What did

he do? In terms of his occupation? Did he fish?

B: Not at that time, no. At that time, you hauled goods by water.

C: Oh, yeah. Okay.

B: When you couldn't do it by train or buses, trucks. At one time they had horse

and wagons. But at that time, they were putting it on boats. Except for North

Line, the New River makes up everything [27:28].

C: Oh so he'd be on New River?

B: Yeah.

C: I see.

B: And he would come down on to [inaudible 27:35] off the line to Bluefield and

they would have a boat load. 00:28:00And the boat turned over down there. He got

drowned. And then Howard Sherman, his wife, had died and he married my

grandmother when her husband died. And that's [inaudible 28:05].

C: Let me ask one question, what occupation did Howard Sherman have?

B: I told you he worked at Kent.

C: Kent? He was a sharecropper?

B: Yeah, [inaudible 28:24].

C: What did he plant? What did he cultivate?

B: [inaudible 28:29]

C: Some, maybe, corn? Things of that nature?

B: [inaudible 28:35]. He worked dawn [inaudible 28:42]. Kent's 00:29:00had five

daughters [inaudible 28:46]. Kents around everyday. He either [inaudible 28:50-28:56].

C: And there's Elizabeth Kent who didn't marry, right?

B: Huh?

C: Wasn't there an Elizabeth Kent who never married?

B: She called me the other night. Talked about two hours. She's in a nursing

home. [inaudible 29:19-29:28]. Kent's daughter. She's thirty, lives in

[inaudible 29:37].

C: So she's still 00:30:00 alive?

B: [inaudible 29:44]

C: Let me ask you this, did any whites live in Wake Forest or was it primarily a

Black community? Or did a few whites live here, either in the community or maybe

right next door?

B: Probably right next door. Never did get to tell you about my grandfather.

C: Oh, go ahead.

B: Now he bought forty-five acres of land from [inaudible 30:05-30:15].

C: Forty-five acres is a lot in Wake Forest.

B: And he kept his folks [inaudible 30:25] because you had no other land to 00:31:00build [30:35]. [inaudible 30:43] Forty-five families. He built that.

C: When did he buy all that land?

B: [inaudible 31:07] in the Spring.

C: So shortly after slavery? I guess he must have been saving up his money.

B: No. He didn't have that kind of money, but he, in the minds of everybody

whites and Blacks, respected him. And he could get money. He could get that

money and [inaudible 31:37-31:48]. Some of them never did have a home. They just 00:32:00leased and stay there [inaudible 31:55], and you could go back there now to

those places. [inaudible 32:08-32:40]. Some of those people never did have any

money. [inaudible 31:47].

C: Do you remember some of the family names of people that lived in the area?

B: 00:33:00There was Jones and Sherman and Eaves.

C: Yeah, there are plenty of Eaves down there.

B: And Smiths. Palmer. My grandmother was a Palmer. [inaudible 33:30].

C: That was the major families, I guess. Some of the bigger families, I mean.

What kind of work did those people do? I mean, you said some of them didn't own

the land, but they must have been employed somewhere. What did they do to make a living?

B: Well, some of them work down on the 00:34:00farm. [inaudible 34:17-34:29].

C: Was that near McCoy or was it-

B: No. No. Whitethorne.

C: Oh, Whitethorne. So, they worked in Whitethorne.

B: And then it was up on the mountains that used to be there. Then they had the

coal mines.

C: What mines did they work in?

B: [inaudible 34:55]

C: Was it Big Vein and-

B: Big Vein or Great Valley.

C: Great Valley.

B: [inaudible 35:08] Ain't too many mines left.

C: 00:35:00Was there any one area that the majority of people worked or did they just

kind of work a lot of places, a lot of areas and types of work going on?

B: [inaudible 35:25]

C: Do you think the mines employed a lot of people, or a good number, but not

the majority.

B: They had two mines. And then they worked on the railroads.

C: Oh, they also worked on the railroads. What railroad did they work with?

B: Virginia. [long pause]. Roanoke to Bristol. They'd go all the way down to

[inaudible 35:58] Valley.

C: Do you remember where some of the people worked? I mean, who were some of the

people that worked for the railroad? Do you remember some of the people?

B: I don't remember a 00:36:00bunch from the railroad. [inaudible 36:20] And then they

had farmer at that time.

C: So your uncle, what was his name?

B: Martin.

C: Martin. Martin Bannister?

B: Willy Martin married my aunt.

C: Oh, Willy Martin. Was he a member of the labor union or was he non-

B: No, they didn't have no union in those days.

C: There was a non union railroad?

B: All of them was non union.

C: In this area? What about people that worked in the mines, do you remember

some of the people that worked there?

B: [inaudible 36:58]

C: Oh which mine did you work at?

B: Big Vein.

C: Big Vien. What was the pay like?

B: 00:37:00It was pretty good.

C: Do you remember some of the pay that you were getting paid today?

B: Well, you got paid for what you'd done.

C: Oh, so it was paid by how much you produce? I mean, how much was the average

pay for you when you worked at that mine?

B: Well the company men, it was called a company mine, they gave us--we got

three dollars and twenty cents a day. That's what we 00:38:00got. [inaudible

38:00-38:06]. Inside, you haul coal, and you got a quarter a car. That's one

thing I liked about [inaudible 38:14] come back and get-

C: And get paid.

B: No, you didn't get paid but once a month.

C: Oh, once a month. How many cars could someone reasonably do in a day?

B: When I was loading, we would load four a day.

C: Oh, so that sounds like good pay for that. Was it hard work?

B: Yeah.

C: 00:39:00Could you do it for a long period of time? I mean, could you do it til you're

sixty years old, or was that something that was just too much?

B: It was something that was just too much.

C: Yeah, you couldn't do that forever. So, you couldn't retire at sixty-five

doing that.

B: Yeah you could retire at sixty.

C: But not many people would work past sixty doing that kind of work?

B: Unh-uh.

C: Were there whites in the mines working with the Blacks?

B: Yeah, about half and half.

C: About half and half. And you got paid on an equal basis for work? Or did they

get paid more?

B: No, it was an equal set of checks. When you load that car, you put that check

on it. [inaudible 39:23]. And then they would come out and dump, and the dump

would take you to check off. Hang it up, and 00:40:00you would mark it on a sheet.

[inaudible 39:39]. Twenty-one, that's the number of the check, and I'd run that

check for years and years, number twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three,

twenty-four, twenty-five. Whatever amount they had.

C: But Black and white workers doing the same work were generally paid the same?

B: Yeah, paid the same.

C: Could Blacks get promotions and be supervisors? Did you know any Black supervisors?

B: No, we didn't have supervisors.

C: So-

B: I told you everybody mine was the same [40:25]

C: Every man-

B: [inaudible 40:32] according to how hard you worked.

C: Did any Blacks work on the outside? Or were they all on the inside?

B: [inaudible 40:37] inside.

C: There were some Blacks on the outside?

B: 00:41:00 Yeah.

C: But there were no Black supervisors?

B: Unh-uh.

C: Okay, that's interesting. Do you remember some of the people, besides

yourself, that were working at Big Vein?

B: All of us.

C: [Laughs] All of y'all. Do you remember some of the people?

B: Yeah. See that mine was on a slope, started off a forty-five degree angle

going down. They would have a cable that pulled you when you go in don't fall

and then you'd turn out [inaudible 41:39-41:50].

C: So it was fifty-four. About fifty people in the mines. Was it dangerous work?

Did it ever collapse any time?

B: Yeah, blew up.

C: It blew up? Anybody get hurt?

B: I 00:42:00think [inaudible 42:03]

C: Oh. Do you remember when?

B: No.

C: Didn't happen while you were there working there, did it?

B: Yeah.

C: It did happen? Was it your shift or somebody else's shift that happened to?

B: That was somebody else's shift.

C: Any people who you knew who got killed there?

B: Whole lot of [inaudible 42:26]

C: Anybody from Wake Forest?

B: No.

C: But it was dangerous work?

B: Dangerous work.

C: Did gas go up, or was it water problems, or maybe all of them?

B: No, gas.

C: Gas. Gas was dangerous. What about the other one? You mentioned Great Falls,

did you ever work there?

B: Great Valley.

C: I'm sorry. Great Valley.

B: Yeah, I worked there.

C: For many years or 00:43:00just not as long as Big Vein or about the same?

B: No, I only worked at Big Vein.

C: Were they operated by the same company or was it two different companies?

B: No, it was two different companies.

C: Oh, I see. Did they have the same pay scale or did they pay differently?

B: They had the same pay scale.

C: Was the work harder at Great Valley?

B: [inaudible 43:26]

C: About the same [Laughs].

B: About the same.

C: Did they have more problems with safety, you know, explosions or collapsing?

B: Well that depends on the fire boss.

C: So the fire boss is really important for their safety, right?

B: Yeah.

C: You feel better with the fire boss at Big Vein or the one in Great Valley?

B: I was one of the fire bosses at Big Vein.

C: So, what was your job as the fire boss?

B: 00:44:00Well, you test the place out to see if there was any gas [inaudible 44:08].

C: Why would you do that?

B: I had a safety light. About [inaudible 44:22] round thing. And you had to be

able to put that light together in the dark, and it had a hundred and

thirty-nine pieces to it.

C: A hundred and thirty-nine pieces in the dark?

B: Yeah. And I went to school [Virginia] Tech. They'd put us in a dark room

[inaudible 44:49- 44:56] And they'd test the 00:45:00light. [inaudible 45:00-45:03]

number one.

C: Was that a state requirement?

B: Yeah.

C: So it was state law that you had to pass this test?

B: Yeah.

C: So in other words, you had to have a certificate that you were a qualified

fire boss.

B: Yeah.

C: Was that something you had to do periodically that you know, they didn't say

that, well you passed it once. You never have to be tested again. Or did you

have to be tested every once in a while?

B: You could train folks how to do it yourself and they go to the school at VPI

[inaudible 45:43] They had to probably train them [inaudible 45:50].

C: Well, was being a fire boss really important? 00:46:00I mean, was that a promotion to

be that? When you were just simply a miner, then you went to a fire boss. Did

you regard that as a promotion?

B: No, I regarded that as a [inaudible 46:08]

C: Oh, you made less money?

B: I made less money.

C: Oh.

B: I was asked to be in there at four o'clock in the morning and go to maybe

fifty some places, test that out, and walk up if they had any gas. I had a bad

place, gasy place, [inaudible 46:46]. I had to be back outside at six, and not a

lot of folks worked in those places.

C: What would you do if you found a bad place? If you found a place, 00:47:00how would

you get rid of the gas?

B: [inaudible 46:55-47:01]

C: Okay, so you'd pump air into that area?

B: No.

C: You wouldn't?

B: Unh-uh. You had to [inaudible 47:25] a ten by six there. Then you'd have to

set another ten by six right there. Put a plank up there and put burlap on the

plank. You put it like that on the isle closer to the [inaudible 47:46] And you

kept the burlap, the bag [inaudible 47:54-48:00]. As soon as you get that out of

there, you can come out.

C: Was something in the burlap-?

B: And I was 00:48:00responsible for--if I let your work in a gassy place and something

happened to you [static in recording]

[Break in interview]

C: Okay we're resuming the interview. You were just telling me how you would

deal with gassy areas in the mine at Big Vein.

B: Yeah, I would have to go in there and find it. Mark it off with a board.

[48:00]. Write gas on it, go in or don't go in. And I had two or three bags, and

I would run in and find out how much gas I had. And I'd come out the outside and

mark it on the board on the outside. Found gas in such and such room or such and

such entrance [inaudible 48:35]. 00:49:00If I could get it out [inaudible 49:13]. If I

couldn't, [inaudible 48:47]. Then I'd come outside at six. And they went to work

at seven. Then I could get them in at seven o'clock. [inaudible 48:57]. I

thought I couldn't do it in an hour's time. [inaudible 49:14]. And then I was

responsible. Otherwise when the mine [inaudible 49:24] wide open, I come out of

there at six o'clock and go on home. If I had some gassy places, I wouldn't get

out of there until 00:50:00 two.

C: In the morning?

B: No, two in the evening.

C: Two in the evening. Let me ask you, do you remember when you first became a

fire boss? How old were you when you became fire boss?

B: I don't know. I'd have to check.

C: You think in your thirties or forties?

B: Forty.

C: While you were forty. When did you first go to the mines? I mean, how old

were you when you first did some mine work?

B: Well, I go into the mine when I was eighteen. [50:50]

C: Oh, you had to be eighteen. They wouldn't let you go in until you were eighteen?

B: Unless you [inaudible 51:00]

C: A release form. Did people-

B: They encouraged you to train your boys. 00:51:00Wasn't nothing but native people that

load that coal. [inaudible 51:07]. They never could work on that and make more

money. You couldn't raise them for a while. And they didn't want them [inaudible

51:48]. And then they didn't want them. They couldn't afford to pay them.

[inaudible 52:02] didn't know what they were doing. And one day we were loading

a 00:52:00car [inaudible 52:15]. And I loaded eight-ten by myself.

C: In a day?

B: In a day.

C: You just had a pick and shovel, I guess? Or just a shovel?

B: Well, we had a pick and [inaudible 52:2152:25]

C: So there's a lot of equipment you had to know.

B: And that's pretty much it [52:32]

C: Did they teach you this? Before you went in the mine, did they have kind of a

school? Like you had to learn how to be a fire boss. Did they teach you how to

be a coal miner?

B: No.

C: They just thought that they should know how to do that.

B: No, you just, some of the [inaudible 52:49] Now for instance, they encouraged

us to raise our boys 00:53:00to take to the mine [inaudible 52:56].

C: Okay, on occasion where you went with some people before you really started

going to the mine you got familiar with what was expected.

B: [inaudible 53:09]

C: Do you remember who helped you?

B: [inaudible 53:28]. I forgot to tell you about that. I never went to school

around here, and so I had to learn myself. Be taught by folks who know more than

I did. And then when my time come, obviously, a good friend of mine, he died

last year. I had 00:54:00two boys, and he had four. When we were ready to take the boys

out in the mines, I take his boy and he take mine.

C: What was his name?

B: Whitaker.

C: Oh yeah, I remember that name. Whitakers! That's right. There were Whitakers

in Wake Forest, too, right?

B: Well, they were all white.

C: Oh, they were white.

B: Yes.

C: Oh so you're talking about a white friend?

B: Yeah.

C: What was his first name?

B: Sidney.

C: Sidney Whitaker.

B: Only friend I had. [inaudible 54:38]. I would be satisfied for ten years.

[inaudible 54:51].

C: [Laughs].

B: So we learning in the rough. 00:55:00And then they learn, and they can teach somebody else.

C: So both your sons' worked in the mines?

B: Um-hm. When they were not in school. This young preacher boy, he hated the

mines [55:19]

C: He hated the mines. What was his name by the way?

B: Langston.

C: Langston. So he hated the mines? Why did he hate the mines?

B: Hard work.

C: Hard work. So he went to Christiansburg Institute right?

B: [inaudible 55:40]

C: Where did he go from there?

B: Tuskegee, Alabama.

C: Oh, so he went to Tuskegee.

B: He got a scholarship.

C: Was it an academic scholarship or athletic scholarship or maybe 00:56:00 both?

B: Tuskegee would give scholarships out to one Black boy and one Black girl.

[inaudible 56:10-56:15].

C: A graduate from this area?

B: From one state.

C: Oh, from one state?

B: Yeah, from each state.

C: Oh, I see from the state of Virginia.

B: Uh-huh.

C: Oh so he was a real good student?

B: He was one of the best. He finished high school and stayed on honor roll for

four straight years when he was thirteen.

C: So when did he go to college?

B: He went to Tuskegee when he was thirteen years old.

C: Oh, so he went that old?

B: Yeah, he got a scholarship.

C: Did he go to college preparatory school first and then go to college?

B: No, he-

C: 00:57:00Just went straight to college?

B: Um-hm.

C: So, when he graduated he must have been really young.

B: [inaudible 57:02] finished his education when he was nineteen.

C: Good grief. What program did he undertake?

B: He was an English teacher.

C: An English teacher. So did he come back here after he finished or did he go

somewhere else?

B: No, he went into service.

C: Oh, was this during the war or one of the wars?

B: [inaudible 57:36]

C: So he went into service.

B: He went into service and went to Alaska and stayed there for a year [57:45].

And then he come--Travis had a base in California. [57:52]. 00:58:00He trained with a

pilot [inaudible 58:00-58:14].

C: Oh, so he had vision problems.

B: Um-hm. And then he married when he was lieutenant and then--or maybe second

lieutenant. And then he said he couldn't [inaudible 58:42] and any personale

[inaudible 58:52] and went on 00:59:00welfare. [inaudible 59:00-59:13].

C: [Laughs]. So he stayed in the military for a while?

B: He stayed there. And then transferred to Fresno base in California, and then

he went back to Californiato--no he went to school down there [inaudible 59:48]

in California. And then he got his master's degree 01:00:00there, and he left California

and went to Boston College and became a teacher [1:00:09]. That's where both my

boys got their PhDs.

C: Oh, so both of them went and got PhD's?

B: Yeah.

C: In what fields did they get their doctorates in?

B: I told you [inaudible 1:00:10] they were in industrial law [1:00:18]

C: Oh, industrial laws. And the other-

B: [inaudible 1:00:25-1:00:32]. I had him down here in Virginia at a trade

school. And L. C. [Langston C. Bannister] got a scholarship at Tuskegee in the

honors program [1:00:56]. He 01:01:00wasn't thirteen years old. I didn't want him to

send him down there by himself. So, I pulled this boy where he was going and

sent him down to Tuskegee, said, you go out there and get [inaudible 1:01:02].

And he went to school at night, but I had to pay for him.

C: I see. Well, wasn't that expensive?

B: Yeah. Yeah.

C: So, I guess that's why you were working so long and hard in the mines.

B: Yeah.

C: Do you think it was worth it?

B: I had folks that laughed at me and make fun of me, 01:02:00having all three of my

children in college at the same time.

C: Where did your daughter go to?

B: She went to Richmond.

C: Was it Virginia Union or Virginia State? I can't remember.

B: [inaudible 1:02:19]

C: Oh, you're talking about nursing school.

B: And then she got her education and she went to New York [1:02:24].

C: Seems like all your family, your children, did well.

B: Like I said, I didn't get no education, but I seen that they get one.

C: That's the most important thing, that your offspring do a little bit 01:03:00 better

than you did, have it a little easier, at least. Was that something that was

typical for other families? Are you unusual-

B: Yeah.

C: Or was it something that people in Wake Forest, that a lot of people, have

their children get education and do well? Or was it something-

B: Mine was the first. Now you can take it from that.

C: First to get a college education?

B: Yeah.

C: Did others follow?

B: First to go to college.

C: First to go to college in the community.

B: Um-hm.

C: Did other people follow them, their footsteps?

B: Sure [inaudible 1:03:36]

C: Why did so many children leave the area? You know, you said both yours son-

B: There were no jobs around here!

C: They couldn't find jobs in the mines?

B: They go to school four or five years to get to work in the 01:04:00mines. I said, I

might as well go work there myself.

C: [Laughs]. Yeah, you didn't have to go to school for that.

B: No.

C: So, children who went to Christiansburg Institute, they didn't want to work

in the mines. Is that the case?

B: No, some of them ended up [in the mines] and never did get no further than

that. But I was determined I would [inaudible 1:04:04] sending them boys to

school, the girl too. I went to Christiansburg one time, I had something going

on, and that [inaudible 1:04:20] boy-

C: Oh, yeah. Was it Zacker? I forgot the name. The one who died.

B: [inaudible 1:04:45]

C: Yeah.

B: I heard him public speak over there, and he'd just come out of college. 01:05:00 And

that gave me the thought that I could get my boys in there. And I told him

several times after that, I said, well L. C. gonna speak at such and such place.

But I'm going to help him. I said, when you starting off. He said, yeah but it

ain't so hard for me now [inaudible 1:05:18]. [Laughs].

C: [Laughs]. Mr. Holmes. He taught at Christiansburg Institute?

B: Yeah.

C: He was one of the better teachers there from what I've heard.

B: They had some good teachers there. Now, Ms. Shautner used to teach there. She

taught him French. [inaudible 01:06:001:05:58] I told her, I said, my boy thinks a whole

lot of you. And she said, well I think a whole lot of him. She said, he helped

me as much as I helped him. [She] said, I'd give him lessons in study hall, and

he looked at me right in the eye and he said, you sure you got this right?

[Laughs]. She said he kept her on her toes all the time. He said, you certain

you got this right?

C: Sounds like he was a very good student.

B: He was a good student.

C: Let me ask you another question, you said like both of your sons left the

area, your daughter left the 01:07:00area, what about other people in Wake Forest? Did

they go elsewhere, too? Did they find a lack of job opportunities in the area?

Where did they choose to go to?

B: Well, I tell ya, at that time, [inaudible 1:07:16] then the powder plant come along.

C: Oh, yeah. The Radford Arsenal.

B: Yeah. And they could make pretty good money [inaudible 1:07:30].

C: So some people went and worked at that plant?

B: Yeah.

C: I guess they built that plant around World War II or during World War II? So

that gave people some new opportunities.

B: Yeah.

C: When people started working at the arsenal, did they leave Wake Forest?

B: No.

C: They continued to live there?

B: Some of them still work over there.

C: 01:08:00But not everybody stayed because some of the people left the area, Wake

Forest, I mean, left the New River Valley, period. Where did people go as a rule?

B: Well, our biggest majority went to [1:08:13] Washington.

C: Washington. And any other areas that people go to?

B: Not many.

C: Not many. What do you think they were looking for in Baltimore and Washington?

B: [inaudible 1:08:33-1:08:41]

C: Yeah, Rice Dobbins. In fact the Dobbins, they did pretty well.

B: Yeah, [inaudible 1:08:46]

C: They did pretty well. In fact, one of the Dobbins is a colonel in the air

force. So they did okay, too. There 01:09:00were a number of other families that did all right.

B: Yeah, I had a first cousin. She died last month. She worked her way through

school, and she went to the air force [inaudible 1:09:17-1:09:23]. She married

young, and she [inaudible 1:09:28].

C: Let me ask something else, what was social life? What did you have to do? I

mean you didn't just simply work all the time? What was church life like? Did

y'all have organizations? Did you belong to the Odd Fellows or the Household of

Ruth or the Independent Order of St. 01:10:00Luke? What did y'all do besides work in

Wake Forest?

B: [Inaudible 1:09:56]. I joined when I was seeking out to be a miner. I joined

the Ruths.

C: The Household of Ruth?

B: The Household of Ruth. And I joined the Odd Fellows.

C: Which ones? The one in Christiansburg or Blacksburg?

B: [inaudible 1:10:27]

C: Yeah.

B: And then [inaudible 1:10:35-1:10:50]. And then I found him. 01:11:00I wanted to

belong to an organization. I was financially set and became an Odd Fellow

[1:11:17]. [inaudible 1:11:26] made sure [inaudible 1:11:31].

C: [Laughs] Didn't find it?

B: [inaudible 1:11:52-1:12:00] And make you treat your neighbor right.

[inaudible 01:12:001:12:02-1:12:20] mothers and daughters. [inaudible 1:12:34]

C: So what church did you join?

B: I joined the baptist church.

C: First Baptist at Clay?

B: No, in Wake Forest.

C: Oh, in Wake Forest Baptist Church. Okay.

B: I wasn't living down there yet [1:12:50]

C: Oh, so when did you move to Blacksburg 01:13:00 anyway?

B: I've been there twenty-five years [1:13:07]

C: Oh, so it's been awhile--But you did, you joined a church. Are you still a

member in Wake Forest Baptist Church?

B: Yeah, I've been digging [1:13:10] in that church for--let's see. I was

married there in sixty year or a little more. [1:13:28]. There was a husband and

one wife [inaudible 1:13:26]. Now, one thing I'm thankful for is marrying

Revella, and I stayed with her for sixty-two years.

C: That's a 01:14:00lifetime of love.

B: I had a [inaudible 1:13:54-1:14:02] [bell ringing in background]. I'm eighty.

I'm still with her from [inaudible 1:14:10]. She's been sweet to me and

[inaudible 1:14:22].

C: Did she live in Wake Forest?

B: No, her grandmother lived in Wake Forest.

C: What was her name?

B: Page.

C: Oh, one of the Pages? Was she related to Clarence Page?

B: Yeah [inaudible 1:14:47].

C: Oh.

B: Do you know Clarence?

C: Well, I read of him. There was an interview that was conducted, an earlier 01:15:00interview. I read that interview. So, I know of Clarence Page but--

B: And then, you know I was in a [1:15:20] nursing home [inaudible 1:15:21]. I

stayed in there for over nine months. And she stayed in there [inaudible

1:15:34-1:15:40]. First born child [inaudible 1:15:45].

C: That's real old. Well, you mentioned that you were a member of the Odd

Fellows and the Household of Ruth and the Masons. What did y'all do? Besides say

that you were brothers forever. What did y'all 01:16:00do? Because I know it must have

been kind of restricted social life because whites didn't socialize with Blacks

that much, probably. You couldn't probably go to the theater that much. So was that-

B: Yes we did.

C: You did? Did y'all go to The Lyric [Theater]?

B: Yeah.

C: Could you sit anywhere you wanted?

B: No, you had to sit upstairs.

C: So Black people had to sit upstairs? But when you went to the-

B: We went to everything.

C: Y'all went to everything?

B: Yeah.

C: What about restaurants? Could you go to any restaurants?

B: Yeah.

C: Where they'd let you sit down?

B: They didn't let us sit [inaudible 1:16:48]

C: Were there any Black businesses that stood out? I mean, were there any Black

businesses in the past which 01:17:00Blacks operated?

B: I don't know.

C: Was there somebody like S. B. Morgan in this town? Burrell Morgan of

Christiansburg. I mean, he was a prominent businessman. Did you find people like

that in Wake Forest or Blacksburg?

B: Well, we didn't have nothing like that in--I had an ice cream parlor.

C: Oh so you had a business? What about the Mills? I understand they had a dance hall.

B: Who?

C: The Mills. Aubrey Mills? Did they have a little dance place?

B: [inaudible 1:17:40]

C: Did people go quite often there?

B: [inaudible 1:17:45]

C: Well, you said you had an ice cream parlor. Was it a good business?

B: Um-hm.

C: Who went? Did whites and Blacks buy from you?

B: Yeah.

C: 01:18:00You just operated during the summer I guess.

B: No, all through [inaudible 1:18:01]

C: All the time?

B: [inaudible 1:18:11] snow on the ground, and you can't let the sun shine hot [1:18:12]

C: [Laughs]. So you had quite a few jobs. You worked in the mines, you worked

with--now when you got out the mines, was this store in Wake Forest?

B: Yeah.

C: So you had a place in Wake Forest?

B: Um-hm.

C: Did other Blacks have business in Wake Forest?

B: [inaudible 1:18:34]

C: Who else started something like that?

B: Clarence Page. [inaudible 01:19:00 1:18:49-1:19:00]

C: So, your wife was running the store?

B: Yeah. She started at seven [inaudible 1:19:06]

C: So did you just sell ice cream or did you just sell other things besides?

B: Sold everything.

C: Sold everything? It was a convenience store?

B: Um-hm.

C: Was that the nearest store in the area? For instance, if you wanted if you

wanted to do some shopping, where'd you go? If you wanted to go to the grocery

store, how far did you have to go?

B: I had a grocery store.

C: Oh you had it? So you didn't have to go any farther? So you didn't have to go

to let's say, I don't know if Wade's had been in business that long, but you

didn't have to come all the way to Blacksburg to get something? Did you sell

meats and stuff of that nature?

B: Yeah.

C: You sold meats?

B: Sold everything.

C: Sold everything. What about drugs? If you had a headache or something and you

had to get an 01:20:00aspirin to something, you sell that?

B: [inaudible 1:20:05]

C: You had it huh?

B: I'd order to get whatever I didn't have.

C: That sounds like a pretty good operation. So that kept your wife real busy?

B: Um-hm.

C: What were the hours of the store? Did it open everyday or almost everyday? I

guess not Sunday, probably.

B: [inaudible 1:20:34]

C: Oh, she would sell ice cream Sunday evening. But it was open generally from

what? Monday through Saturday for the most part? What kind of hours did they

have? When did y'all open it up and when did y'all close it up?

B: When we opened up our house, it was right on the side of it.

C: So, it was right next to your 01:21:00 house?

B: Yeah, [inaudible 1:20:59]

C: So, somebody could knock on the door and ask why y'all not open? [Laughs]. It

sounds like my grandfather. My grandfather had a convenience store. Had this

place similar to what you had. It was out in the country in North Carolina, and

he had soda pop and all kinds of stuff. Candy and all kinds of things. Pickled-

B: [inaudible 1:21:30]

C: So you were at the first Black ones. Was this in Wake Forest?

B: Yeah.

C: So your uncle, which one?

B: George.

C: George?

B: Bannister.

C: George Bannister had the first store. Was it like your store?

B: [inaudible 1:21:54]

C: 01:22:00Oh, so he had a--kind of like my grandfather--his was about a hundred yards

from his home.

B: Oh, we didn't live that far [1:22:05]

C: But it was the same. It was a convenience store like we would call 7-11 or something.

B: Yeah. [inaudible 1:22:16]

C: Did he do okay?

B: [inaudible 1:22:22]

C: And what happened? Did he get rid of the store or? What happened to his store?

B: Well, same thing [inaudible 1:22:48]

C: So, after a while it wasn't very profitable. So he had to stop them. How long

did you 01:23:00operate your store though?

B: For [inaudible 1:23:01]

C: Ten, twenty years?

B: I don't know [inaudible 1:23:15]. It was probably ten [1:23:17]

C: Ten. Well, that was a good venture. Let's see, well I think we have covered

most of the--let me ask you one last question. When you wanted to get some

credit, did you find it was easy to get credit from the banks and savings and

loans? Or did you go to the Odd Fellows to get loans?

B: [inaudible 1:23:45]

C: Well, if you wanted to get insurance or get a loan did you go to the banks?

B: Always had [inaudible 1:23:53]. Never no trouble for me to 01:24:00get any amount of

money I wanted.

C: So did you go to the banks?

B: Yeah.

C: So what banks did you have to deal with?

B: I had the bank of Christiansburg.

C: Okay. I remember that one.

B: A bank in Blacksburg. I'll tell you how I got money from the bank.

C: How'd you do that?

B: It was the best way to do it for anybody else. I loved their children, and

this little old boy when I started there, [inaudible 1:24:47] go to his home.

[inaudible 1:24:56] and he often 01:25:00had president of the bank. I forget. And I

could tell [inaudible 1:25:08] since I was a little boy. [inaudible 1:25:17].

You got to get some money for boots.

C: That was your nickname?

B: Yeah. He wants some money. The money will come.

C: [Laughs].

B: I paid him back. I'm a good tipper. Anyway, in Christiansburg, another way I

had a [inaudible 01:26:001:26:05-1:26:07]. I didn't need money. I worked. For five

hundred and some dollars, he bought [inaudible 1:26:20], fifteen maybe twenty

dollars the most. [inaudible 1:26:30] I stayed with her for about ten or fifteen

years and worked on a farm for her. [1:26:39]

C: What was her name?

B: Mary Collins.

C: Mary Collins?

B: Mary Cowlens.

C: Oh Cowlens. I'm sorry.

B: When I got ready to 01:27:00build this house, I went to Christiansburg bank.

[inaudible 1:27:17] was out on vacation. And the mine was in this place

[inaudible 1:27:21]. I had to hunt them down there in Wake Forest. [inaudible 1:27:30-1:27:43].

C: They didn't want you to have a loan?

B: No, they [inaudible 1:27:51]

C: Why did they say you couldn't have a loan?

B: [inaudible 01:28:00 1:28:01]

C: You think that was a fair deal?

B: No, I don't and I didn't do it.

C: Do you think he was going to cheat you out of your properties?

B: No, he just wanted [inaudible 1:28:14]. And he wanted me to know [inaudible

1:28:20-1:28:35]. I didn't never [inaudible 1:28:35] And then I went to this

bank over here. [inaudible 1:28:58] and then I found out [inaudible 1:28:42]. 01:29:00 I

had a good place down there. [inaudible 1:29:04] Satisfy him because he wanted

it done that way.

C: Do you think he was just being racist or being bigotted? Why do you think he

was trying-

B: He thought I wanted a loan so much he cheated his place while she was on

vacation [1:29:25]. And when she didn't come back, I turned him in, turned

Cheatham in for reference and got a lawyer [1:29:45]

C: Cheatham is like what's going on here? [1:29:55]

B: [inaudible 1:30:00].

C: [Laughs].

B: I looked at Frank Bannisters accounts, and he hadn't missed a payment in

fifteen 01:30:00years. Never have failed to pay anything. He bought his car, bought his

land, everything he got from the bank.

C: [Laughs].

B: I looked at his records and if I looked at yours [1:30:14] and he never

missed a payment for fifteen years. You can't come in here and run my good

customers all away like that. He told me, said Frank, you can borrow any amount

of money you want. I'll take care of you like I always did. I had some money

saved up that was to 01:31:00build this house. This house was built, and I was moved in,

stayed in it for thirty days had it fixed up in no time.

C: So did you go back? Did Mr. Cheatham give you a loan?

B: Yeah.

C: So you didn't file a-

B: No, I didn't go back.

C: You went back to Cheatham?

B: Cheatham come over here to see me.

C: [Laughs].

B: He told me, don't fool with the bank down here. He said, when we were in

Roanoke, they don't know you like I know you. Miss a payment with them, maybe I

take you [inaudible 1:31:41].

C: Were they likely to do that? Did that happen to people?

B: Yeah, [inaudible 1:31:50] a lot of people in those days.

C: Was this area primarily a Black community?

B: 01:32:00 Um-hm.

C: But Jackson street was a Black community?

B: Yeah, there were a few Blacks. Yeah. Few of them from down here. [inaudible 1:32:16].

C: How many other Black communities were in Blacksburg? When you first moved here?

B: Newtown.

C: Yeah, I've heard of Newtown.

B: Bitter Hill.

C: Bitter Hill. Where is that at? I've never heard of Bitter Hill.

B: Over there on Roanoke Street.

C: Oh, okay. Is it near the cemetery? Is it past the cemetery?

B: Past the cemetery.

C: Like going up that hill?

B: Yeah.

C: Okay.

B: [inaudible 1:32:54] was Bitter Hill.

C: 01:33:00What about the Clay Street area?

B: [inaudible 1:33:04]

C: Were there a lot of Black land owners at one time in this area?

B: Unh-uh.

C: Or were people, they had properties, but they didn't have a lot of land?

B: Many homeowners up here went down to Wake Forest. Probably had no enterprise

up here. With the power plant and few other things come in here. They didn't

have no work here, I guess, other than the school.

C: Why were so many people leaving this area? Why did so many Black people leave

this area?

B: I told you they couldn't find no work.

C: No jobs. Was that something that was true when they had integration or was it

something before integration?

B: It's true all the 01:34:00 time.

C: All the time. So it's been a steady decline.

B: Um-hm.

C: Well, I guess-

B: And then [T. Marshall] Hahn, he opened the college up.

C: Uh-huh. And that meant that there were people, Black people, going to school.

Were Blacks working at the college? Did Blacks work in the college very much?

B: Yeah. [inaudible 1:34:30]

C: Which was what?

B: [inaudible 1:34:38]

C: Custodian?

B: Custodian.

C: Dining hall work maybe?

B: Yeah. Blacks couldn't do nothing. They could clean and cook.

C: So that was the only job for Blacks at the college? Were there a lot of

Blacks working at the college at that time before Hahn got there?

B: No.

C: There were no Blacks working 01:35:00before Hahn got there?

B: Just a few.

C: Just a few. But more of them got work when Hahn came.

B: Hahn spilled the thing right open [1:34:59]

C: Let me ask you another thing, what was the reaction when they started talking

about desegregation of the schools? What was the reaction of whites when they

had to deal with that with the Brown [v. Board of Education] decision of [19]54,

[19]55? You remember their reaction when they heard that the law said, now you

had to have not separate, that you had to have integrated?

B: Well, I was working for [President] Hahn at the college at that time, and I

tell you what he come to the house and told me.

C: Okay, what did he tell you?

B: He 01:36:00said, [inaudible 1:35:45], I understand that every man is black in this

house for [inaudible 1:35:48]. [Static in recording]. And I'm tell you-

[Break in interview]

C: Okay, you mentioned that you had worked with Mr. Hahn, and he came to your

place to talk about integration.

B: No, I didn't say that.

C: Oh, well he came to your place?

B: I said, you asked me about integration [inaudible 1:36:06].

C: Okay.

B: And I told you I was working for Dr. Hahn's at the time. I was his house

[inaudible 1:36:19]

C: At the president's house?

B: Yeah. I worked thirty-some years.

C: Oh, you worked twenty some years in the mines and thirty some years at

[Virginia] Tech?

B: Yeah.

C: Wow.

B: I was eighty-four years old before I 01:37:00retired at [Virginia] Tech. I was

working with Dr. Hahn when he came to the house that [inaudible 1:37:02]. He

said, [inaudible 1:37:03], I understand that they never had nothing but colored

coming over for dinner to parties [1:37:20]. I said, Newman didn't want them in

the house [inaudible 1:37:31].

C: Is Dr. Newman a former president of [Virginia] Tech?

B: Yeah [inaudible 1:37:37], and Dr. Hahn said, well they paid their price for

school just like everybody else, Blacks. And I've been wanting to tell you first

you will receive 01:38:00a [inaudible 1:37:59-1:37:09].

C: One of the Black students?

B: [inaudible 1:38:13]. And I want you to treat them all just alike. Doesn't

make no difference between [inaudible 1:38:14] bent over backwards for none of

you. Don't-

C: Don't mistreat them either. [Laughs].

B: Don't mistreat them. Treat them all alike. Don't bend over backwards for none

of you. Don't mistreat them. Treat them all alike. I know the first that we ever

had. Boy, I tell you that was something else. [1:38:47]

C: Was there a lot of controversy about that, or was there any fall out, so to

speak, as a 01:39:00consequence? How did it go?

B: It went all right but [inaudible 1:38:56].

C: A lot of worry but it worked out?

B: Men were so overwhelmed. I had one come in the house to fix up the front door

[1:39:19] front door. The President was standing there [inaudible 1:39:34] And

students come in that house, 01:40:00two come in this way. [inaudible 1:39:41-1:40:09]

C: How big was your staff?

B: Oh, I had a big staff. I had [inaudible 1:40:24-1:40:35]. Six to eight waiters.

C: That's a fairly big operation. You had about ten or more people.

B: I had more than that.

C: More than that?

B: Um-hm.

C: Twenty?

B: No.

C: Maybe somewhere in between. 01:41:00Did they often have these parties? Did they have

other parties besides the freshmen get together with the students?

B: Yeah.

C: So they were always having some social affair or another?

B: Often with five hundred people for about three hours.

C: You know, I'm listening to this, and you sound like--have you ever worked at

the university club because Mr. Bell, I talked with him and he said, he pretty

much had the same type of--he was a supervisor for the university club.

B: [inaudible 1:41:40]

C: Yeah they had little get-togethers too.

B: Had get-togethers. It wasn't nothing like the [inaudible 1:41:52].

C: You had more people though, you said five 01:42:00hundred people could come.

B: Yes. Well, there was a lot of freshmen.

C: Was this a catered affair or did y'all do the cooking or how-

B: No.

C: The university cooked the food, and then y'all served it?

B: The university did the cooking [1:42:13]. They brought the cakes. Mr. King,

do you know him?

C: Mr. King?

B: Arnold King.

C: Arnold King. No, I don't believe I know him.

B: I knew him. [inaudible 1:42:38]

C: Was he Black or was he white?

B: He was white. He was older. He brought the food for the college. He did the

whole thing. [1:42:54]

C: He operated all the 01:43:00dining halls?

B: Yeah.

C: That was a big operation. Was this before the college got as big as it is

now? Or is it about the time it started to get big?

B: Time it was starting to get big. [Bell rings in background].

C: I guess you've seen the college has grown really significantly since you were

first there. You said you worked there a number of years. It's changed from

being a small college to a big university.

B: You couldn't realize it if you could see it [1:43:27].

C: Growth for the college. I guess I've monopolized your time, so I guess we

have to come to an end. We covered a lot of ground. I'd really like to thank you

for your cooperation and your help in this project.

B: Well, you're welcome. I 01:44:00hope [inaudible 1:43:44]-

C: Oh, quite a bit. Quite a bit of history, but we'll stop on that note.

[End of Interview]