Oral History with Michael Herndon, September 20, 2000 (Ms2002-001)

[Tape 1, Side 1]

Cook: I'm interviewing Michael Herndon today and first I'd like to talk about

where you are from originally.

Herndon: I'm originally from Farmville, Virginia, which is about two and a half

hours from Blacksburg, about an hour from Lynchburg.

Cook: Did you grow up there?

Herndon: Grew up there, born and raised there and stayed there until I was 17

and went off to college.

Cook: Did you have brothers and sisters?

Herndon: Yes, one brother and one sister and they're all older. I'm the youngest

of three.

Cook: You're the baby. [Laughter]

Herndon: I'm the baby.

Cook: Did your sister and brother go to college?

Herndon: Yes, both my brother and sister went to college. My brother and sister

went to Virginia State University in Petersburg.

Cook: Both of them?

Herndon: Both of them went to the same school. I almost went there but at the

last minute went to another school.

Cook: Tell me about your parents.

Herndon: My parents are 00:01:00both retired. My mother is a retired fourth grade

teacher. She taught for 37 years in the public schools in Prince Edward County

and also in Fredericksburg. My father is a retired LPN. He worked at a

psychiatric hospital for a little over 30 years. He's retired--both of them are

living the wonderful retired life.

Cook: That's wonderful, a LPN, he must have some good stories.

Herndon: When I always hear people talk about non-traditional roles I always

talk about my parents particularly my father being a nurse. Even being teased by

some of the kids at school about your father being a nurse.

Cook: My two little boy's father is a LPN. They really want male LPN's now.

Herndon: They do.

Cook: What school did your mother go to?

Herndon: My mother went to 00:02:00Bluefield State College in Bluefield, WVA.

Cook: Did she do that before her children were born?

Herndon: Yes. After graduating from high school she worked for about 3 or 4

years to raise money to go to college. So she worked and went to college and in

between summers worked in Vermont at a hotel resort there. She worked in the

kitchen doing domestic kind of things. She did that in the middle of her college

semesters because the money was better up north than staying in Virginia.

Cook: Did her siblings go to college as well?

Herndon: Yes she's the fourth of four children. She's the baby too in the

family. My oldest aunt went to college. She 00:03:00went to Hampton, which is now

Hampton University but at the time it was The Hampton Institute. She graduated

from there and later went on--a few years later--to NYU. This was back in the

early sixties. She graduated with a degree in Special Education in 1962. Then my

aunt next to her got married, had three children, all of her boys grew up and

graduated from high school. Not one of them wanted to go to college so she said,

"I'm going to go to college." She had gone to a technical school and had her LPN

license. She later wanted to get a bachelors degree in nursing and she later

went on to the University of the District of Columbia and got her Bachelor of

Science in nursing. She became a RN. She worked, I guess, at least about twenty

years beyond that until she retired as a RN. Then my uncle didn't go to college.

He went into the military. He spent considerable years in 00:04:00the Army. He was

discharged from the Army, honorably discharged, I might add. When he left the

service he went back to working for them as a civilian. He worked in the food

preparation services at Fort Belvoir, which is outside Washington. He did that

until he retired. Then my mother, of course, went on to school.

Cook: This is a little out of context, but I want to know. Who was your

childhood hero?

Herndon: My childhood hero? I have so many heroes I don't know 00:05:00if I could single

it down to one.

Cook: You can say more than one. A role model?

Herndon: Some of the people that come to mind of course Martin Luther King. I

always think about him and what he did for all Americans not just black people

in this country but for everyone who has a cause they want to fight for. I think

about him. I think about other people in the civil rights movement. Rosa Parks

for what she did for people. But then close to home I think about my

grandparents on both sides of my family. When you really talk about heroes I

always think about the real heroes, are those people who touch your lives

everyday in a substantive kind of way. So I think about my 00:06:00grandparents and the

kind of life they led so that their children and their grandchildren could have

a better way of life. I think about the personal sacrifices even within my own

family. So when I think about Martin Luther King and Rosa Park's and people like

Nelson Mandela and John Kennedy. Even though John Kennedy died the year before I

was born but his legacy still lives on. I think about John Kennedy, Bobby

Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, Mandela. These are the national and

international kinds of luminaries and heroes but then I bring it back to a very

personal local level. I think about my grandparents, my parents, my aunts and

uncles, people from my local church, my community, my neighborhood. Those are

the people who are the true heroes because they've been able to accomplish so

much with so little and how they've been able to pull something within me to

make me want to do the things that I do today. Those are the people who have had

the long lasting impressions on me.

Cook: Now I'm curious about your grandparents, so you have to say something

about your grandparents.

Herndon: Well my grandparents on my mother's side, my grandfather went to

seventh grade. Of course at that time schools only went up to the seventh grade.

There were some areas where they had elementary 00:07:00schools and high schools and

then when high schools were introduced, for the most part only the well to do

white families sent their kids to high schools--but for the most part up to

seventh grade. My grandfather finished the seventh grade. Finishing the seventh

grade education was somewhat of a big deal.

Cook: What year would that be around?

Herndon: He would have graduated from seventh grade in the early 1900s. If my

grandfather were alive today he would be about maybe 105,110 I guess. My

grandmother would be somewhere around that. This would be back in the early

1900s. I would say somewhere around the 1900s, 00:08:001910-1912. my grandmother went to

third grade. Of course, even though seventh grade was also available, a lot of

people came from agrarian families and worked on farms. There were things to be

done in the fields. They were just taken out of school because they had to work

for the family because that was their livelihood. So I think what my

grandparents did for me in terms of raising four kids on a meager income--My

grandmother did domestic work, worked doing laundry for different families in

the community. Plus she had a regular family she worked for all the time, even

spending holidays with them. And of course she had 00:09:00her other laundry business on

the side, cleaning and doing laundry for other families. My grandfather worked

for a contractor, building homes in the area. Even though my grandfather wasn't

a contractor but he worked with that company. He went around doing construction

work and things like that.

Cook: Was this all in the Farmville area?

Herndon: All in the Farmville area.

Cook: So your history goes back.

Herndon: Goes back right--even goes back to my grandparents and

great-grandparents. I'm glad I can piece that together as far as my personal history.

Cook: It's unusual nowadays.

Herndon: Right--for people to talk about grandparents and great grandparents. My

mother, aunts and uncles, they tell me about their grandparents who are my great

grandparents. So that's how I'm connected to them, through the oral tradition

and stories about what happened when they were kids, what my great grandfather

did for them and different things like that.

Cook: Have you written this done yet?

Herndon: Haven't written it down. That's one of the things I would like to do 00:10:00 as

far as an oral history putting it down on paper. One of the things I really want

to focus on are some of the oral traditions and some of the stories that are

told of the lessons one can learn that can apply to any family or any group of

people. Some of those life lessons that are told through life stories. I'd like

to put that down in writing one day.

Cook: So it's not lost for your children.

Herndon: Right, right. Now my grandparents on my father's side, my father is the

ninth of twelve kids. My paternal grandparents were sharecroppers. What is

really interesting on that side of the family -- the Herndon's in that area --

the black Herndon's, of course, are descendants of slaves. When my father was

born he was born on the land of the original Herndon slave master because the

big house, if you want to call it that, was just a few yards away. So you had

the 00:11:00white Herndon's over here who were descendants of the slave owners and then

you had the black Herndon's. Of course, my father was born a free man, because

slavery was done away with but that's an interesting piece of history in

connection to there and these Herndon's are in the Lynchburg/Campbell County

area--Amherst, some of those areas. If you were to go look in the Herndon phone

book section of that area, you would be calling both white and black Herndon's.

All of those Herndon's are associated in some kind of way.

Cook: Can you actually go to that area? Can you see where your dad was born?

Herndon: Yes, he took me there, about five or six years ago. Both houses were

torn down. The house that was the original house of the slave owners, I guess if

you want to call it that. At that time, these were the sharecroppers and the

people who owned the land, their home. Of course, they had the 00:12:00 sharecropper

houses or shanties spread out. He told me there was just an open field. He said,

"I was born right here. Across here on the other side of the field was the man

who owned the land and his family lived over there." My father was born in the 1920s.

Cook: With your family -- you could just do a study of black/white relations in

one area. That is really interesting. I just got this book out of the library

that is talking about a black sharecropper family.

Herndon: Yes!

Cook: 00:13:00What did you want to be when you grew up?

Herndon: Originally, I thought about doing something in the medical profession

but chemistry helped me to decide I didn't want to do that [laughter]. Then I

thought about other areas. Ultimately, even as a fourth or fifth grader I had a

desire to go to college. I really didn't know what I would major in but I knew

that whatever I majored in I wanted to do something that would help people. I

always saw different things that people were going through and I thought that I

wanted to use my efforts and education to help other people. I think it has come

through the 00:14:00tradition of my family. Everyone who has had the opportunity to go

to college always saw it as not only an opportunity for self advancement but

what can you do to contribute to your community.

Cook: What a good legacy!

Herndon: That was ingrained in me at an earlier age.

Cook: Where did you go to high school?

Herndon: I went to Prince Edward County High School in Farmville.

Cook: Was it a predominantly black or white school?

Herndon: When I went there, it was a predominantly black about sixty-five

percent blacks, well about 60-40. Now it's more fifty-fifty. Well, it's really

not even fifty-fifty; it's much more diverse now then what it was. Pretty much

it was a black/white configuration. Now we have more Hispanic students there,

more Asian students. So we have a good cross-section of different kinds of

students who go there, so it's good.

Cook: Are you seeing Mexican migrant workers?

Herndon: There are some. We have a Mexican migrant population; small population

there and they have some of their students in the 00:15:00 school.

Cook: What was your school life like?

Herndon: High school?

Cook: Yes.

Herndon: I think I had a typical traditional high school experience. It was

good. I was in the band. I was in the Forensics program there. We would go to

different places to--

Cook: Debate?

Herndon: Yes. I enjoyed that. I was involved with--I was one of the guinea pigs

of--when our school introduced the Latin language. I was one of the first

students to sign up and go through the Latin curriculum there and I thought that

was good. Also, I was in the honors program, which was pretty much like college

prep throughout. So I had a good high school experience 00:16:00overall--looking back.

In fact, this weekend I'm going to my high school reunion.

Cook: Oh that should be interesting! Which one?

Herndon: Now this is really interesting. It's really the eighteenth reunion but

they weren't able to pull off the tenth reunion or the fifteenth and they didn't

want to wait until the twentieth. So right in the middle of the fifteenth and

twentieth, they're going to have the eighteenth.

Cook: How long has it been since you've seen your classmates?

Herndon: Several of them I haven't seen since graduation night. Others I've seen

here and there, going home on the weekends or if we were all there on certain

holidays, I would see people in the grocery store or see their parents and ask

about certain individuals.

Cook: That's always interesting! Did you have both black and white teachers at

your high school?

Herndon: I did. I had, I think, a good balance, of black and white teachers.

Cook: I think you already answered 00:17:00this, has Prince Edwards County changed much

since you were in school?

Herndon: Yes it has changed. Test scores are higher. We have students now

leaving from that high school and more of them are going to college. More of

them are being accepted into more elite, prestigious universities then in the

past. So things have changed and race relations have improved. So it's changed considerably.

Cook: Now, was Prince Edward County the one that closed down for a year?

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: Do you have any memory of that?

Herndon: Well, it closed down for five years and I was born the year the schools

reopened. So I don't really have any memory or recollection. I only know what

I've read and the stories people have told me.

Cook: Your mother was a teacher during that time?

Herndon: Right. So she lost her job because when the schools were closed, all

the teachers, all the school personnel, from bus drivers to teachers, 00:18:00principals, whomever was on the payroll of the public schools, they no longer

had a job.

Cook: That must have really affected your family. I seem to remember that at

some point, she commuted to another county.

Herndon: That's right, she left and went to Fredericksburg and stayed there five

years and drove back and forth on the weekends with another teacher who left the

area and went to Fredericksburg. The two of them car pooled together. At the

time, my brother and sister weren't of school age initially but then my sister

became a first grader and my mother took her. Then she came back for my brother.

So they were with my grandparents.

Cook: Your mother is an amazing woman If I can remember correctly from your

class, they closed down because they didn't want to integrate. Is that correct?

Herndon: Right, 00:19:00right! They essentially defied a Supreme Court ruling that gave

certain counties and school districts, a timeline to integrate or to have a plan

of integrating for blacks and whites to go to schools together. Rather than

integrate, they just said, we won't have public education anymore. So, they were

really the only county in the whole country, pretty much that defied the Supreme

Court ruling. So of course, they had to have federal representatives, people

from the State Department and so forth to come to Prince Edward County to have

the schools reopen.

Cook: And that took five years?

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: I remember your mother, she's amazing and your aunt as well. Which aunt

was that?

Herndon: Now that's the aunt who put me through NYU.

Cook: She's a maiden aunt or did she marry?

Herndon: She married and she's 00:20:00widowed and she's a character!

Cook: My impression is that you have strong women role models in your life.

Herndon: Strong women role models!

Cook: I haven't met your father but--

Herndon: Strong women role models. Women who aren't afraid to speak their mind.

Who have this depth of soul where they can just take on any kind of situation

and they aren't afraid of anyone. They respect people and they're courteous. For

example my mother mentioned a couple weeks ago that she had gotten to the age,

you know, she had earned her right to say what she wanted to say. That she

wasn't going to hold back anymore. That she had held back for so many years but

she's now at a point where she has come to the place where she can say what she 00:21:00feels. She doesn't have to mince words.

Cook: How's that? [laughter]

Herndon: It's still courteous, you know, and respectful of others. But speak

what's on your mind and tell it like it is. So she has encouraged me to start

doing this at an early age and not wait until fifty/sixty years to get to that

place. But to speak what's on your mind and to let other people know, whether

they agree or disagree, that's okay but at least you've said what you have to

say. Plus you're a healthier person for it because whatever was troubling you in 00:22:00your spirit; mind or body is released. It's no longer bottled up and that helps

you in many respects. From a physical standpoint, it doesn't run your blood

pressure up. From emotional to mental, there's not something on your mind that

bother's you, keeps you restless at night. You go to that person if you have a

grievance. You tell that person what the issues are and identify the issue and

point out the issue, and not necessarily attack the person verbally or physically.

Cook: How are you doing with that?

Herndon: Doing really well with that. I'm really pleased with the way I can

confront people about certain things and still walk away with my dignity and

integrity intact and also with their dignity and integrity intact. Hopefully,

there's some mutual respect there between the two people.

Cook: You need to teach a seminar because there's people on both sides that need

to learn that.

Herndon: Yes, it's like poison in your system that's bottled up. So what I've

come to the conclusion that 00:23:00I'm not going to allow that person to run my blood

pressure up. I'm not going to allow that person to have that kind of control

over me. I'm not going to allow anyone to have that kind of control over me. So

in order to diffuse the bomb, get rid of the pressure, then go to that person

and lay the cards on the table. If they aren't willing to listen, then I'm

responsible for then taking someone else with me as a witness or at least some

other person who is a neutral party who has nothing to deal with the issue, who

can sit down as a mediator for the two of us to work out whatever problems we

need to resolve. Then if that person refuses to come to the table and want to

resolve any kind of issue, then at least I've done everything in my power to

approach that person and resolve that issue. My conscience is clear. The guilt

is gone. Maybe the issue isn't 00:24:00resolved but at least I've done everything

humanly possible to bring a resolution to that situation.

Cook: Is this how your mom has positively influenced you?

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: It has probably really changed your life.

Herndon: It's made me a healthier person. I feel so much better and you can do

it in such a way that people don't have to use profanity. They don't have to get

all up in arms. They don't have to use violence. They can speak at the tone of

voice that I'm speaking now. You say what you mean and mean what you say. You

give that person an opportunity to give his or her perspective because people

can look at the same image and perceive it differently. So at least that person

is given the voice or the opportunity to share how 00:25:00they perceive the situation.

It may be totally different from the way you perceived it.

Cook: You would be a good mediator and you're very relaxed.

Herndon: Thanks!

Cook: Was your neighborhood integrated?

Herndon: My neighborhood was, but it predominantly black. I would say my

neighborhood was more predominantly black than my high school population. I

would say that my neighborhood was ninety percent black.

Cook: When you were growing up did you have white friends as well as black friends?

Herndon: I did. I had white friends in the neighborhood who were neighbors and I

also had white friends in high school.

Cook: Did you have 00:26:00any negative racial experiences while living at home, in high

school or other grades?

Herndon: I had some racial experiences where at the time I didn't know that's

what it was called. But now looking back, I know that they were acts of racism

and racial incidents that took place. So, yes, I've been able to endure some

racial tensions and try to work through those and going back to the point of

resolution, some of those people are dead and gone. There is no way I can go

back and resolve anything with them. But, at least within myself I have peace

with certain situations.

Cook: Would this be more with peers or elders?

Herndon: Elders. Some people in grocery stores, department stores, and those

kinds of situations. I was a paperboy 00:27:00in my early high school years and the

route I had was a predominantly white neighborhood. I had some situations there

going to collect the money for the paper because at that time people didn't

necessarily send their money to the newspaper.

Cook: I had a paper route too. You had to collect it at the door.

Herndon: Right, at the door.

Cook: And hope you got a tip.

Herndon: Right, exactly. There was this one person, this man and he was like

Satan's brother. I mean, he was just wicked! Every time without fail when I

would go to collect the money, he would be so belligerent and nasty and his wife

was equally nasty. She worked in one of the local grocery stores and even when

customers came through the line she was nasty with people. There was a

noticeable difference in the way she dealt with black customers versus white

customers. It was the same kind of thing although I never heard the 'N' word

spoken but it was the same kind of hostility that she had in that store when I'd

go to their home to collect the money. It was a nasty ordeal. Those were the

reasons why I quit the paper route. I felt that I'm not getting paid enough

money to 00:28:00deal with this. There are other jobs, cutting grass and things like that.

Cook: They are probably dead and gone.

Herndon: Yes so I can't go resolve anything with them but at the same time I

don't hold any anger, any animosity, any unforgiveness against those people

because I'm not going to allow what they did to me cause me to go to hell. So,

that's something they have to deal with between them and their Creator.

Cook: Good attitude! Where did you go to college?

Herndon: I went to Howard University, Washington, D.C. and I stayed there for

seven years. I got my undergrad degree and my master's degree there. And after I

graduated from graduate school there I worked at the University for a year. So

wonderful seven years experience in Washington, D.C. and 00:29:00Howard University! Excellent!

Cook: Did you have any problems moving from a small town to D.C.?

Herndon: I did. I did! I was a small town boy from Farmville of all places and

you can imagine how I was ragged on about the name of my town. [Laughter] Going

to a big city like Washington and it was a great experience but it was also a

cultural shock to me. It was culture shock in the sense that people always say

how could it be a culture shock for you. I mean you're black and Washington,

D.C. is predominantly black. It was still a culture shock because I saw more

black Ph.D.'s under one location than I'd ever seen in my entire life. I saw

black physicians, black attorneys, and just different kinds of black

professional people that I'd only read about. I didn't see any of that in

Farmville. Black 00:30:00college professors by the dime a dozen. These were people who

had Ph.D's from Columbia, from Harvard, from Stanford, from pretty much all over

the world. Also saw people who looked like me who had different accents--my

first black Englishman speaking a true, authentic British accent, people from

Caribbean, parts of Africa. It was really an eye opening experience for me.

Cook: Going to a predominantly black school and experiencing it would you like

your children to experience that?

Herndon: I would. I really would. I'm not saying one is better than the other.

But for me going to Howard University was one of the best decisions that I have

ever 00:31:00made. Just as coming to Virginia Tech has been one of the best decisions I

have ever made. I think that one of the advantages for me of going to a

predominantly black university was that whenever a professor got on me about not

writing or anything about my work I knew that race wasn't a factor. Race wasn't

an issue because math was math and history was history, chemistry was chemistry,

whatever the situation was. It wasn't racially motivated. I knew without a doubt

that it wasn't racially motivated. Mind you, I had white and black professors at

Howard University. In fact, my freshman year, I had three white professors and

three black professors. Whenever they said, "Herndon you can do better than what

you're doing", I knew that it wasn't racially motivated. I could clearly

separate that this was an act or way for them to motivate me to do better than

what I was doing. Whereas some freshman who come here--some students of color or

minorities, whatever--which I don't really like that word but I'll tell you

about that later--when some of them come here and if a professor were to say,

Johnny or Susie, your writing is not up to par, they may not see it the way I

saw 00:32:00it because they may think that this person is being racist. Why are they

signaling me out? Where in fact, that person is doing the same thing that my

Howard professor was doing but here because there are so many things in the

environment, that people don't know what is racial, what is an act of racism,

what is an act of sexism, what is an act of homophobia because there are all

these different signals. All these things going on at the same time.

Cook: You're right!

Herndon: So at an HBCU, in a sense they controlled for race. Race wasn't really

an issue because here it was a predominantly black institution so whenever they

wanted to instruct me or correct me I knew that it purely was an act of

instruction to make me a better student. Whereas here I think sometimes people

may be confused. But since I have had the Howard University experience and now

I'm here at Virginia Tech and I'm older it's now easier for 00:33:00me to distinguish

between what is an act of racism or sexism and what is a situation where my

advisor's telling me, you can do better than what you're doing. The same thing

that my Howard professors told me. So I think by me being older I have an

advantage of being out in the world and worked. I can read between the lines a

little better than say, incoming freshmen or even the incoming graduate students

who 00:34:00had the all white school experience.

Cook: Which makes you probably a better advisor to help people in similar situations.

Herndon: I just try to work with that to help students. When students come in

and they say well I think that this person did this, that and the other, I say

well a verb is still a verb and a noun is still a noun, an adjective is still an

adjective. These are the rules of grammar. It has nothing to do with you being

female. This has nothing to do with you being black. Has nothing to do with you

being from Southwest Virginia, from Farmville, from Northern Virginia. These are

the standard guidelines for evaluating a comprehensive paper in freshmen English

1105. It has nothing to do with--if you want to bring race in--to pull the race

card, then you have to be prepared to really substantiate that kind of claim.

You have to pull out the evidence. If you don't have that evidence you are 00:35:00 going

to perhaps falsely accuse someone who is simply trying to make you a better

student. Now if it is clearly an act of racism, sexism or any other 'ism' there

are channels and mechanisms within the University system and even outside the

University to deal with those acts of discrimination. But if you do believe that

you've narrowed that particular situation down to an act of racism and it meets

certain kinds of standards, than you can proceed with whatever process you want

to take.

Cook: Have you seen that happen here?

Herndon: Well, I've seen some people who have falsely accused, charged a

professor or several professors. But on the other end, I've seen there've been

true acts of racism and discrimination. They were so blatant 00:36:00and so obvious that

anyone can see. It wasn't even the covert kind of racism. It was so blatant! It

was laden with racist kinds of remarks, attitudes, and actions. In those cases,

when I dealt with students--I told them, these are the options you can take or

you can consider. It's up to you. If you sit down on it--I can't wage this war

for you because I wasn't in the class. I can support you in it but I can't go

and say Professor 'Do-dad' is a 'racist pig' and then a student isn't willing to

step up to the plate and make the claim and provide the evidence. But if a

student does take that action, of course, I'm one of the cheerleaders. I'm one

of the people in the stands cheering that person on--trying to be that person's

advocate, trying to make certain that 00:37:00resolution is brought to that situation.

Cook: Have you, yourself, experienced any racism here?

Herndon: I have. As a graduate student, I've experienced some racism. Not a

whole lot of racism but any racism is too much. But I remember I was in a

situation where I was one of a few males in the class. I was one of the few

black people in the class. This was a graduate course and we met every week. You

had to do readings and I always read my materials and came prepared for class.

There was a student--a very good friend--a white female friend--she hardly read

her readings for that week. Whenever there was time for class discussion of

course I would contribute because class participation was part of the oral

grade. 00:38:00So, the professor pulled me aside one day after class and told me I was

outshining- I'll call her Mary (that's not here real name). I was outshining

Mary and that in other words, I was making her look bad. But I couldn't tell her

that Mary needs to do the readings just like everyone else. If Mary were to read

the articles and the chapters before coming to class then she could contribute

to the class as well. She even asked that I tone down my comments and responses

to give Mary an opportunity to contribute and then she even said, I'm not saying

this to you because you are black. But then I thought would she have made that

same kind of statement to me if I had been a white female--

Cook: That's exactly what I was thinking.

Herndon: Or if I were any other kind of female or any other person of another

ethnic group. But, to me, it was implicit within those comments 00:39:00that you as a

black man, you're not supposed to know as much as Mary. You're not supposed to

be in a situation where you sound halfway intelligent. You're not supposed to

engage this class to the extent and degree that you are because you are black

and you are male. You're making Mary look bad because Mary is supposed to be the

model, the icon of virtue and so you're just kicking mud in her face. Well, I

wasn't and that wasn't the purpose and she never said that to other people in

the class, to other females in the class. She never said that to even

other--there was no black female in the class but in fact there were only two

blacks in the class and both were males. The other black male was vocal but he

wasn't as talkative as I am.

Cook: In graduate school, I found that they love when people talk and 00:40:00contribute. That is the optimum.

Herndon: So I toned down my comments I didn't say anything for three weeks in a

row. Then she comes and said to me, you're not contributing anything to the

class. So I felt damned if I do and damned if I don't. If I talk, I get in

trouble. If I don't say anything, I get in trouble. So what do I do? I came

back; I don't want to make Mary look bad. Then she just kind of--well, we need

your participation and you contribute so much to this class. Trying to clean it

up, you know. I'm like no let Mary. It's her opportunity to shine. I'm going to

be in the background. Let her do her thing. She's on center stage. Not that I

ever wanted to be on center stage. But, I thought, well I'm going to be part of

this class. I owe it to myself and I owe it to a lot of other people who could

be here, who want to be here but can't be. So I'm obligated to do my work.

That's 00:41:00how I look at every project, everything that I do. So, she would probably

say it wasn't an act of racism or racist act. But I clearly thought--and I'm

always one of the last people to call anything racist but that's one that I

would put in the category of racism whether she was ignorant to it or not. It

still happened.

Cook: Did you see her as favoring Mary at all?

Herndon: Yes, I always felt that Mary--

Cook: Who didn't do the reading--

Herndon: She didn't! She didn't. Mary came to class late. Mary came to class

unprepared. Mary did all the "stereotypical" things that she thought I would

have done. But it was just the opposite. So Mary--even with the research

paper--Mary was scrambling trying to get some things together for her research

paper. I 00:42:00even gave her some citations of some articles I have read that I didn't

need and things like that. Of course, I never held any animosity toward Mary or

felt that Mary was making me look bad and putting in this situation. It was

really the professor of the class--because Mary and I, to this day, are really

good friends. We've done a lot of things together but I don't like the way that

the professor set that up--you can't be as smart as Mary kind of attitude.

Cook: Was the professor an older woman?

Herndon: I would say middle age which really surprised me because I expected

this from an older professor closer to retirement and not someone--

Cook: That probably grew up in the sixties.

Herndon: Right. This person came through the sixties and at the time she started

this class I think she was in her late forties, maybe about forty-eight.

Cook: Is that a singular incident or have you had other problems?

Herndon: I haven't had any other problems here at Virginia Tech. 00:43:00But certain

situations maybe in Blacksburg or outside the Virginia Tech community.

Cook: Could you talk about some of those because that's one of my questions? How

comfortable do you feel in the community?

Herndon: Overall, I feel comfortable being here. I think it is a safe place. A

good place for family but for example, going into a store--the same kind of

things. I remember one time I was in a Sears store. Maybe I shouldn't say the

name. But that's okay. I was in Sears down in New River Valley Mall and I was

going to buy a Father's Day gift. I had already gone to a couple of other stores

and I had maybe two bags. I was looking at these shirts for my father and these

shirts were over up against the wall. All of the sudden this salesperson comes

up out of nowhere and she says, "May I help you!" in a tone of voice like 'what

are you doing' kind of voice. I said, "You 00:44:00startled me, you can help me after I

calm down!" Letting her know that just don't--

Cook: Her behavior wasn't appropriate.

Herndon: Yes! That's right. I ended up buying--I told her what I was doing and

she automatically was so helpful showed me these specials for Father's Day and

so forth and so I purchased the shirts and everything and I just told her don't

come up on a customer like that and anything in this store I want, I can pay for?

Cook: Did she think you were stealing?

Herndon: That's what I think she thought because I had a bag from another store

and I was looking up against a wall and there was no other employees over on

that end and a lot of times they will either come and adjust a shirt and pretend

they are straightening up a display. Usually then I start talking loud and

saying stuff. Sometimes they've even gone over and said would you like me 00:45:00 to

situate this or clean this up since you seem to be have some problems in this

particular area--especially when they start following me. That happened in

Wal-Mart as well. There was this guy who followed my wife and me all over the

place. He looked at us--it was almost like he was a stalker. So I just blatantly

walked over and said you don't have anything in this Wal-Mart store that I want

that I can't buy either with cash or plastic and basically stop following me.

And he stopped.

Cook: Was he undercover?

Herndon: He was undercover and I just told him I don't have to deal with this

when I come into this store. Another time I went to a local store. I won't call

the name of that because later this lady and I have become real good friends.

Went to this one store and get up in there and it's a furniture store and I

start talking to her about what I want 00:46:00and what I need for our apartment and she

said, "Oh you speak so well. Do you go to Tech?" And I said, yes, I do go to

Tech. I said, "why do you say that I speak so well?" What's so different about

my speech from other people who go to Tech or whatever? She never said it--

Cook: You knew perfectly well?

Herndon: I knew--that's right, she never said it and I was trying to push the

envelope to get her to tell me but of course, she wasn't going to tell me. But

from her perspective, in her mind, she hadn't seen black people who spoke the

way I spoke. Not that I speak so well. I guess, she was expecting a certain hip

hop, slang language--

Cook: She stereotyped--

Herndon: Right. That I could put a sentence together 00:47:00that made sense to her and

to me and it was that stereotypical kind of--oh wow, you're not like the rest of

them kind of attitude. Well, if I'm not like the rest of them, who am I like.

Who are the 'them' that you're talking about? How do we classify this invisible

'them'? You have the black people, the Virginia Tech people--

Cook: Like that explains it--you're from Virginia Tech.

Herndon: Exactly. Situations like that but nothing really so overt where you know--

Cook: No problems with finding housing?

Herndon: No problem, which was a concern. I thought that I would be rejected

because of race.

Cook: When you first decided to come to Virginia Tech--how did you decide to

come to Virginia Tech?

Herndon: My mother is a very spiritual 00:48:00person and she told me, she said if you

apply to Virginia Tech, I believe that you will get in. You will get in to

Virginia Tech. Virginia Tech was the last place I applied. It's not that I

didn't want to come here. I love the school but I didn't want to be in Southwest Virginia.

Cook: That was my next question!

Herndon: I applied to all these other schools. I applied to that school in

Charlottesville. [Laughter] They turned me down!

Cook: They didn't! Good for you!

Herndon: Hindsight really I am so glad I'm here at Virginia Tech because other

things have unfolded with the kind of opportunities I have at Blacksburg and at

Virginia Tech I know that I was destined for me to be here. Despite the things

that I tried to do not to come here everything was still pointing toward

eighty-one and here I am! So in looking back over my situation, I 00:49:00realize, it's

divine providence for me to be here in Blacksburg at Virginia Tech at this time

at this stage in my life. I applied to that school, Mr. Jefferson's school, in

Charlottesville and they told me no. I applied even to other schools that

weren't as competitive as Virginia Tech. For example, VCU told me no. I applied

at William and Mary and they told me don't even think about it.

Cook: They tell everybody that.

Herndon: Yeah! Those are the schools I applied to. I even applied to my alma

mater at Howard. I really didn't want to go back to Howard because I already had

that experience there; I wanted a different experience. I didn't apply for a

Ph.D. program there. I applied for another Master's program in a whole other

area. I got accepted there but it still wasn't what I wanted.

Cook: What was the program?

Herndon: That program was a master's degree in Organizational Communication.

Cook: Your undergraduate [degree] was in communication?

Herndon: Right! I got 00:50:00accepted and that was really my back up plan and I can

always go back. But why go back for another master's when I could be using that

time to go toward a Ph.D. So I applied there, got accepted and then I finally

applied and got my paperwork in to Virginia Tech because my mother was on my

case about, well have you applied--?

Cook: She had a vision!

Herndon: Yes so I applied here and I got in and everything else down to my

furniture matching in my apartment--just those signs here and there showing me,

yeah, you're in the right place at the right time. Don't you move, don't you

mess up.

Cook: Were you married at the time?

Herndon: I was single when I came here. I was single for my first two years in

Blacksburg. Got married two years after that. My wife came to Blacksburg and she

didn't like it at first for a lot of 00:51:00 reasons.

Cook: Where is she from?

Herndon: She's from my hometown, from my area, she's about fifteen minutes from

where I live. So like a Blacksburg/Christiansburg kind of thing. She's from a

town called Brookville and Brookville is about fifteen minutes from Farmville.

She didn't like it initially because she didn't find the hair care products that

she needed. She couldn't find stockings in the shades that she normally bought.

For example, if she were to go to a store that she went to in Richmond, same

chain of stores, they wouldn't have her color here in Southwest Virginia.

Cook: That's important to a woman!

Herndon: and the same with makeup and things like that. But things have gotten

better. I remember there was something on the black graduate student list serve

that came out last year. It was kind of humorous but then again it just spoke to

the whole situation 00:52:00of black people in Blacksburg. This woman sent a note out

that now Wal-Mart was carrying a certain brand of panty hose in a certain shade.

Apparently this brand and shade were popular among a lot of black women on

campus. So that was news to a lot of people because in the past when they went

to Roanoke or whenever they'd go back home, they'd stock up on certain supplies.

Cook: So get that out to the community!

Herndon: Right. It was something as simple as that. I told Jean about that

whatever that model and style, brand of stockings or pantyhose and she said,

"Wow, I'm going to go down now."

Cook: So she is from Farmville area but she was in Richmond?

Herndon: Well, she worked closer to Richmond but she commuted back and forth. So

whenever she went to 00:53:00shop, because her job was only about twenty minutes from

Richmond, before coming home she would go to the mall.

Cook: How did you meet her?

Herndon: I met her through my now brother-in-law. When I worked at Longwood

College my brother-in-law was one of my residents. I was a hall director there

and he was a resident in the building and my wife she was a commuter student. He

was a residential student and he said you should take my sister out.

Cook: Oh!

Herndon: So it kind of started from there. She would bring goodie packages from home

To leave there for him and many times he would be in class so she would bring it

downstairs to my office and I would leave a note on his door that she had come

by or either she would call and leave a message on his phone to pick up a

package from me. So that's how we met.

Cook: Did you ever--were they goodies--like food?

Herndon: Yes, food goodies and there was always enough 00:54:00where my now

mother-in-law put in enough for both of us--homemade pies things like that.

Especially on Mondays, they'd have a lot of the Sunday dinner leftovers, which

were really good!

Cook: That's wonderful! Is your wife a good cook?

Herndon: She is a very good cook.

Cook: I found that's really important.

Herndon: Yes! That's right! [Laughter]

Cook: You've answered a lot of my questions. Oh here's one. You mentioned [you

worked at] Longwood College and I saw that when I was doing background research.

What was that like, working at Longwood?

Herndon: It was good. A good situation and I enjoyed it. I gave Longwood College

six years of my youth and it was great professionally.

Cook: After Howard? Oh okay!

Herndon: 00:55:00Yes I stayed there and worked in residence life and it was a good

situation both personally and professionally. I was back home and professionally

it gave me the opportunity to build upon what I had learned at Howard and now

the experiences at Longwood helped me to build upon what I now have here at

Virginia Tech. So I liked it. It was really interesting when I came back to

Farmville; I had some of the same kinds of reactions from some of the local

Farmville people particularly from some of the white residents. They knew my

family name but according to them I didn't sound like any one from around here

kind of thing. Again how does someone from around here sound? Because I think I

have a very southern accent and it wasn't like I was sounding like someone from

New York.

Cook: I think you do have a southern accent. 00:56:00Not as bad as Sam but you do-- [Laughter]

Herndon: But it wasn't anything like you know coming from New York or the

Midwest but again I was saying things in such a way that whatever--

Cook: You didn't fit their definition.

Herndon: Right, right. A lot of times I like to do that just for shock value

just to see peoples reactions. [Laughter]

Cook: That happens to me. My parents are from a rural community and people

there--you're fine city ways or something like that. You were on the Prince

Edward County School Board?

Herndon: Right. You've done your homework. [Laughter] I was on the Prince Edward

County School Board and I was the first alumnus from my high school to be on the

school board. All the other people who had been on the school board were retired

people or people who had moved from other areas and had settled 00:57:00in Prince Edward

County. So I was the first person who was actually a graduate of Prince Edward

County to be on the school board because before Prince Edward County High School

became Prince Edward County High School, it was named after a person called R.

R. Moton. Then they changed the name from that to Prince Edward County High

School. See Moton was pretty much the black high school and then after

integration and all these other kinds of things started coming about the county

then took over the school and then it became the Prince Edward County High

School. I was the first and the youngest one on the board. I was appointed for

two terms. I didn't finish the second term because I had the opportunity to come

to Virginia Tech so I took that opportunity and I'm here.

Cook: Is it something you 00:58:00would do again--be on the School Board?

Herndon: It's something I would do again but not right now. It's a worthy

position because you can affect positive change not only for students but also

for teachers. You can be the advocate for every employee and student in the

school system. You can be the vigilant person or the watchdog for curriculum if

there's some funny things in the curriculum you can point that out. So I was

glad about my Howard education and how my Howard education prepared me for that.

So it is something that I would do again and it's something that I enjoyed. It

was very time consuming.

Cook: Did you do it while you worked at Longwood College?

Herndon: Right. You had the regular monthly meetings but you also had committee

meetings and I was also on the Student Academic and Personal Affairs Committee.

That committee was pretty much responsible for 00:59:00hearing student judicial cases

when students had gone through all of the different chains of command from the

teacher to the principal up through the superintendent and these people were

coming to the school board because they had done some things that were

dismissible offenses. In many cases we had to expel students for a whole

academic year.

Cook: Would they come with lawyers?

Herndon: Some would but mostly they would come with parents and maybe a

grandmother. These were people who did some really bad things so we had to kick

them out of school but also think of alternative programs for them to pursue

their education. We had an after school program that allowed them to still

continue but they weren't in the regular program where they came during the

regular school hours.

Cook: It's funny I don't think the media talks about 01:00:00that--how the school does

help the students who've been expelled.

Herndon: That's right. Most of them say the school expelled the student--

Cook: And just abandoned them. They're gone. I bet your mom being a teacher in

Prince Edward County was very proud that you were on the school board.

Herndon: She was very proud and it's very interesting, the superintendent who

was the superintendent when I was in elementary school was still the

superintendent when I graduated from college, came back home and this same

person in fact at one time he was my substitute Latin teacher. He's name is Dr.

James Anderson and he really came in and rebuilt the school system and I've seen

him as a student. I've seen him as one of my employers/bosses because I was also

a substitute teacher between college semesters and now then I saw him, as I was

his boss.

Cook: You were his 01:01:00 boss?

Herndon: Yes it was really interesting! But I'm also his peer in the sense he's

an educator and I'm an educator and he's really one of my supporters back home

who supported me to come to Virginia Tech and do well and finish my degree and

so forth.

Cook: Do you ever want to go back home when you have children and live there again?

Herndon: There are some days when I want to go back home. Like certain weekends

I just want to be there and then other times I don't want to.

Cook: Well, I mean for good.

Herndon: Oh yes, when I see myself retiring or maybe closer to retiring to go

back home and settle down.

Cook: And because your wife is from there, she would agree?

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: So you left Longwood College and your position there to come to Virginia Tech?

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: Your Ph.D. program is in the Department of 01:02:00Educational Leadership and

Policy Studies?

Herndon: Right.

Cook: How have you enjoyed that?

Herndon: I've enjoyed that. Had a great time there, great time. And I'm ready to graduate!

Cook: What is that under? Is that Human Resources?

Herndon: Under Human Resources and Education, yes.

Cook: Is there anyone on campus--I don't know if mentor is the word--just anyone

that has been important to you academically or otherwise?

Herndon: I can think of a lot of people. Some of the professors from different

classes. Some of the names that just pop up--Dr. Joan Hurt. She is my

dissertation advisor. I've taken courses with her. Dr. Don Creamer. I've taken

courses with him. He's also on my committee. Dr. Elizabeth Creamer. She's

another person.

Cook: Husband and wife?

Herndon: Husband and wife. I'm also supervised by her 01:03:00in my job here on campus.

Dr. Delores Scott who is no longer here. But she was the Associate Provost for

Retention and Support Programs. She's now at Virginia Union University as Vice

President of Student Affairs. Another person on my committee that's been

instrumental is Dr. Gloria Byrd. She's in Family and Child Development. I think

of some other people, Dr. Katherine Allen has been a big sister type to me away

from home.

Cook: You're lucky!

Herndon: Yes. I've had some really positive people who've encouraged me. Hayward

Farrar in his special personality. He's done a lot for me and contributed to my

academic and personal well being and I can think of other people like Dr.

Barbara Carlisle in the Center for 01:04:00Interdisciplinary Studies.

Cook: Do you know Barbara Pendergrass?

Herndon: Dr. Barbara Pendergrass, she is another one. She and I go to the same

church. Very positive, very upbeat and always the same, consistent and the way

she deals with people and there's some others here on campus that I could think of.

Cook: Dr. Farrar was at University of Maryland when my sister was there. I found

out recently that he was head of the Black Student Union.

Herndon: That's right.

Cook: Very militant.

Herndon: That's right, very militant.

Cook: Before he went into the Navy. I told my sister. She said, I know that name!"

Herndon: He was a rabble rouser then and a rebel rouser now. [Laughter]

Cook: Doesn't he always wear black to protest?

Herndon: Always. Right.

Cook: I just started to 01:05:00notice that and I thought Johnny Cash does that for a

reason I wonder if Dr. Farrar does that too?

Herndon: Well he carries Johnny Cash's, the lyrics to that song, "Why I Wear

Black" in his pocket and he also has those lyrics on his web site.

Cook: Oh, I didn't know that. I'll look it up.

Herndon: Yes and the same lyrics for the reason why Johnny Cash wears black are

the same reasons why he does.

Cook: So he was influenced by old Johnny. Very interesting man, Dr. Farrar.

Herndon: Yes he is. I also think about people like Dr. Myra Gordon in the

College of Arts and Sciences.

Cook: I met her once.

Herndon: Yes, she's another big sister type. Dr. Terry Kershaw, he's Director of

Black Studies. He's like a big brother type.

Cook: Is he doing Women Studies right now?

Herndon: Right, the Interim Director of Women's Studies.

Cook: I've heard the best things about him!

Herndon: He's very positive, very upbeat and he's the kind of scholar,

researcher 01:06:00that I want to be. I don't necessarily want to be him or take on his

persona but he is doing the kinds of things that I'd like to see myself doing

ten or fifteen years down the road--that I aspire to be in terms of a scholar,

an intellectual. So he is a good role model. This is what you can be like if you

just finish that dissertation type of thing.

Cook: Does he say that?

Herndon: Well he doesn't say that but he has encouraged me to go ahead and

finish and say about the different opportunities that can come about by

finishing what you've started. It's really interesting that all these people

that I've named from Joan Hurt, the Creamers, Dr. Byrd and all these other

people. They have really; really reinforced in a way, the things I've learned at

home. Although my parents didn't have the opportunity to go to graduate school

at Virginia Tech but the same kinds of themes, the same kinds of 01:07:00life lessons

are learned in both places. So it hasn't been a conflict in what I've learned at

home, the values of home and the values of the University, for the most part.

Cook: You have a very positive attitude, which comes through.

Herndon: Thanks.

Cook: As a professor too. So, you haven't had any negative problems, except with

that one lady, with professors or advisors?

Herndon: For the most part I've had a very rewarding experience. And part of

that experience was the way I embraced Virginia Tech. When I came here I told

everybody that I'm a Hokie too. I am a Hokie too. Whatever is out there,

whatever the benefits of a being a Hokie, I'm going to take part of that. I'm

not going to sit on the sideline and say I'm not going to be a part of this

because or I'm not going to allow my race or gender 01:08:00get in the way of letting me

experience all of the great things that come along with being a Virginia Tech

student and member of this community. So, yeah, a lot of negative things that

are out there and I know a lot of horrible things that have happened that some

of my friends have told me about some situations that I know to be true, that

have happened to them. I'm saying that in my experience, it may not necessarily

be the typical Hokie experience, but it's been a good experience. I know some

people who have really been through hell and high water to graduate because of

racism, sexism--

Cook: At Tech?

Herndon: Yes, it's very--on one hand it's very covert, very subtle and some of

those things that are kind 01:09:00of --it's like a fine line you know, talking about

the example, is this really a true act of racism. Then it could be a situation

where this person is an equal opportunity harasser. Maybe they harass all kinds

of people.

Cook: That's hard to prove.

Herndon: Yes. I know a situation where there is this one person who just doesn't

do well with people PERIOD. But if a woman were to come up--and maybe that woman

would perceive it as a sexist act or if a black person or a Hispanic

person--they may perceive it as a racial situation but in this particular

person's situation, he really--he's a bah humbug kind of person.

Cook: That's too bad he's up there, though.

Herndon: Right. He doesn't need to be here. Those kinds of people need to be out

of here. They don't need to be at Virginia 01:10:00Tech. Yes, you can still hold the

standard and maintain academic integrity and have a rigorous program but you can

still do that in a way you don't crush people's spirits. You're not going to be

mean and nasty, belligerent, hostile. You can do it in such a way you can

encourage and motivate people to want to become better people and to not only

improve their lives but also take those things that they've learned back to

their communities. You don't have to beat a person down; you know and crush them

emotionally to have them perform at a certain standard. I think that's what some

people have done. They've confused academic rigor and hazing. For some people

it's one and the same but I see it as two different things.

Cook: Well it's a shame. People like 01:11:00that need to retire or worse. Do you want

to tell me--you talked to me a little bit about it already--but just a little

bit about what your dissertation is on?

Herndon: Alright, my research is looking at the role of African American

families in the life of college students. How do families influence the behavior

of college students while they're in college? Particularly black families. What

is it about those black family's interactions that impede or enhance a person's

experiences while they are at the university? So I'm looking at the kind of

support that students receive from their families and how that support relate to

what goes on here at Virginia Tech. What kinds of values, lessons, influences

have they learned at home 01:12:00and brought to the University and how if at all have

those values and experiences clashed with experiences and values here at the

University. How do people embrace a certain kind of academic culture here? How

some of the values may be different from the kind of culture of being at home

and how they draw the line for example how do they make decisions about when am

I a family member when do I perform as a student. Sometimes those two roles

conflict and overlap for all students, but particularly black students who are

at predominantly white campuses where many of them seek and receive the support

they need and the kind of support that sustains them. That support is not on

campus. It's back at home with the family. What about those family interactions 01:13:00how do they shape students experiences while here at the university? So I'm

comparing and contrasting the experiences of students at an urban university and

students at a rural university and seeing if there's any differences between

their family experiences based on institutional type.

Cook: So you have your own perspective as a student and you get to talk to other

students about their perspective.

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: What about some of your results as far as Tech. What backgrounds are more

successful or what?

Herndon: Well essentially what I've found, whether the family member or the

parent went to college or not, pretty much if a student is receiving support for

the most part 01:14:00they are excelling or achieving the kinds of goals they need to

achieve academically. On the other hand if the student isn't receiving support,

they may not be excelling but then again that may be a motivating factor for

them to excel because they aren't receiving support. They may be on their own.

Cook: I was thinking--parents that maybe didn't go to college and maybe want

their children to go to college and therefore, that's their support. Mom and Dad

are saying you can do it, you can do it.

Herndon: Yes that's one of the things I've seen in my research both at the rural

and the urban institution. If the parent didn't go to college and they are very

supportive of their son or daughter in a way they are going to college through

the life experiences of their son or daughter. What I've termed that theme is

'vicarious 01:15:00matriculation.' What I mean by that, in a way that son or daughter is

representing that mother or father who didn't get a change to go to college. And

the mother or father in a sense is still participating in higher education

through the life of the son or daughter. So when that son or daughter graduates

the mother is graduating even though the mother didn't go to college. But the

mother did go to college through the blood that's running in the veins of that

son or daughter on that campus.

Cook: I can absolutely see that and that's your own word -- vicarious matriculation?

Herndon: Right, vicarious matriculation and it's nowhere documented anywhere in

the literature so I'm going to be the first one to put that down on paper.

Cook: That's wonderful!

Herndon: And you hear responses from students who say I'm doing this for mom.

I'm doing this for grandma. In a lot of cases, grandmothers are instrumental in

the college student experiences. So maybe grandmother didn't get to go to

college but grandmother is doing everything she 01:16:00can to make sure that that

grandchild has what he or she needs from a physical standpoint, spiritual,

emotional, social standpoint in order to exceed and excel in this kind of

environment. So that's one of the things that's really been exciting for me to

come up and coin that term and put it down on paper and get it out in the literature.

Cook: Was it like a light bulb thing?

Herndon: Something just went off and I started thinking about what can I call

it--what can I label this phenomenon that I kept hearing all these people over

and over--you know this is really not about me. This degree is a family degree.

It's not about me, it's about me and family. It's about my neighborhood, my

community, the little kids who play on the playground and know I'm in college.

They see me and they come back and they say if John or Jane can 01:17:00graduate and go

to college, if they can do well, then I can do it to. So, even in this instance,

others who are not even related to the student, but in some kind of way interact

with the student (either as a church member or a neighborhood person), they in a

way vicariously matriculate through the walls of higher education through the

life of the student. Especially if that student is a first generation student

they themselves are actually here in spirit. They're here emotionally. There

also here because of the blood that's running in their veins but also because of

the values that's been placed in that person to go to college and the kind of

support, the lifeline that student has while they're in college. Even though

their family may be hours away from the University and 01:18:00how it has baffled the

higher education community because for the most part people say if you come to a

university setting you must take on or adapt to the University. You must take on

different values, severe the ties that you have back home. But for a lot of

women and minority students those ties are essential for their success. So that

is what I'm looking at and some of the things that are being revealed. For those

students who don't have a close family network where they can drive home on the

weekends, they developed their own fictive kin, extended family or make believe

family. Not an imaginary family but for example as I mentioned earlier, Dr.

Barbara Pendergrass and Dr. Laura Scott, those were two names that came out in

our research where people said 01:19:00that these two women have been like big sisters

to me. They've been like an aunt to me, a mother to me. They've taken me in

under their wings; they've shown me these are the things you need to do in order

to be successful. But beyond that they've cared for me just as a human being. So

the kinds of things that they would have received say at home with their mother,

with a godmother or with an aunt, they were receiving from these women here on

campus. So again that's even groundwork for maybe another study for people to

look at kinds of family relationships that students form on campus while they're

in college and how those relationships influence their college career.

Cook: Seems like those strong family ties should be nurtured. Did you know that

Kimberly 01:20:00Ware and Barbara Pendergrass are Sam's adopted sisters? Mrs. Cook is

their adopted mom. She cooks for them because they're always cooking for other

people at least Barbara.

Herndon: Right! She's always cooking every fish fry.

Cook: Have you ever had her trout?

Herndon: Yes, and her catfish.

Cook: That's what I mean, her catfish.

Herndon: Very good!

Cook: I did, but I didn't get enough.

Herndon: And her cabbage.

Cook: I've never had that. Is it fried?

Herndon: She has it in a stir-fry.

Cook: Well, I'm hungry now, I think we better move on. [Laughter] Now I'm

thinking about fried catfish, really gone through my list here. Are you

politically active?

Herndon: Not as much as when I was on the School Board--I was more politically

active. But I'm politically active in my right to vote and I encourage others to

vote and encourage voter registration. I've even gone to the point of handing

out voter 01:21:00registration forms to the people to register or give out absentee

forms so that people--to make sure that they vote back in their precinct at

home. So I've been more politically subdued, you might say.

Cook: While you're getting your Ph.D.?

Herndon: Right but I do see when I graduate getting back in--for example, I'm a

member of the NAACP but I haven't been really as involved in it as I want to be

and going to committee meetings and doing other kinds of things because I've

been bogged down with this graduate work but that's one of the things I want to be--

Cook: That's what you'll pick up--?

Herndon: Right. Because I was involved with that when I was at home, when I was

working at Longwood College and on the School Board. In fact, it was an

interesting situation where the local NAACP brought these charges against the

School Board and I was also a member of the School Board and a member of NAACP.

I was walking that fine line 01:22:00there. So I want to pick that back up and I

encourage everyone to vote in the 2000 election.

Cook: I feel like you'd be a good writer independent of you Ph.D. because you

have a lot of stories like just that one.

Herndon: Well thank you. I'm glad you mentioned that because right before you

came over earlier today I was talking to a student about two books I feel I have

within me that I feel that need to be developed. One book is a book I'm going to

co-author with Dr. Farrar and James Moore. I don't know if you know James Moore?

He just recently graduated.

Cook: Wait, did he teach the class with you?

Herndon: That's right, you know James.

Cook: Yes, yes. He's wonderful!

Herndon: Yes, I forgot about that you know James. He is now at the University of

South Carolina as an assistant professor.

Cook: He's from South Carolina?

Herndon: That's right. He's about 80 miles away from home where he was raised,

University of South Carolina. Columbia is 01:23:00about an hour.

Cook: I know exactly where that is. My first husband was from Columbia, South Carolina.

Herndon: Okay, well, he and I--we have this title that I came up with. I don't

know if I should tell all of this because--

Cook: You can cross it out if you want.

Herndon: Okay, well the working title of the book is Hope Unborn: Reclaiming Our Destiny.

Cook: Wow, you have the title, okay!

Herndon: James' is going to write three chapters, Dr. Farrar is going to write

three chapters and I'm going to write three chapters. We may have some other

person write the intro, preface or forward. The whole premise of the book, in a

nutshell, we're looking at say for example the kind of stories I told you about

my parents, grandparents and so forth. They had less and they did more. This

generation of people--we have more but we are 01:24:00doing less.

Cook: I'm seeing that in my reading.

Herndon: We have more opportunities. We have more-- just think about people who

wrote a thesis even ten years ago on a word processor. The technological

advances that a person can enjoy today because of what's out there on computers.

Just think about different rewrites. If we had a whole lot of rewrites on a

manual typewriter compared to cutting and pasting--

Cook: A nightmare!

Herndon: On a PC today--we have more technologically. We have more in a sense of

tangible things that we can put our hands on and say look what we have

accomplished. But on the other hand as a group, as a society, not just black

people, including whomever, we are more morally bankrupt now in 2000 than we

were in say 1900. You talk about 01:25:00families who would sit around the dinner table.

Cook: Visit on Sundays.

Herndon: Visit on Sundays and everybody is so busy, busy, busy, busy. Yeah,

being busy is okay. But then I would ask, are you fruitful and productive in

your busyness. People are just scurrying and running, to and fro, doing this,

that and the other and the next thing you know the kids are grown up. What kinds

of values have you been able to speak into their life, the lasting kinds of

values, lessons for them to carry on to their children and their children's

children. But we're just so busy, so busy doing nothing. That's why I ask, what

have we accomplished. Have we been fruitful in our busyness? So the premise of

this book is really going back 01:26:00to our fore-parents and looking at what they

accomplished with so little and how we can develop a plan or model to tell

people to get back on track. To put first things first, to have a plan for life

if you want to call it that. This whole idea of hope unborn, the thing about the

person as a baby. The person has the potential to become either positive or

negative, whatever. When you think about hope unborn, that's 'unborn,' the hope

that's in the womb. The possibilities, opportunities to become great, the

opportunities for success. Those things that are already built into a child

aren't nurtured or developed. What happens like Lorraine Hansberry says, dries

up like a raisin in the sun. 01:27:00So we're trying to go back and remind people of the

greatness not only in this country, but the greatness of individual family

stories and how people were able to do a lot of things and not have the kinds of

financial resources. But they had other kinds of resources. They had spiritual

resources. If you want to look at it from that perspective. There were the kinds

of resources--for example in my generation we haven't had to endure any of the

things that my grandparents or even my parents had to endure.

Cook: Children dying, illnesses just even the flu, pneumonia, measles, whatever.

Herndon: That's right. We have all the technology and medical advances we have

now. And just think about even with racism and sexism, they were legal and on

the books. Somehow people were able to endure those harsh times and 01:28:00now today it

just seems that people don't have backbone and stick to-itiveness. I don't know

if that's even a word. But just to see something through to completion, the

hanging in there, to not give up. There's an expression of hoping against hope.

You can still hope even when all the odds against you suggest you shouldn't

hope. That group of people, that generation of people still hoped.

Cook: Why are we so hopeless?

Herndon: Right. Yet we look around--all these things we have and how we can find

things on the Internet to help people, provide information to people. We have

more advances in technology; we have more advances in science. We have all these

other things. Why do we just walk around hopeless and empty?

Cook: Yes and I've seen in my reading about black 'granny' midwives. 01:29:00It's social

history. For instance a black woman, who had ten kids--how her husband would die

she would carry on, how her children would help, how the farm would keep going.

It was just incredible. Now what happens--? You're right. It's a wonderful

subject! You are a writer! You'll have to go on circuit!

Herndon: Yeah and I have another book title that I want to develop. It's called

the Evolution of Success.

Cook: Would that just be your book?

Herndon: Yes that's the book I want to write. I was looking at how people are

successful. They get to one plateau but then they grow and they reinvent and

retool themselves for another level, plateau of success. They reach that and

they go on and on. I don't believe in the whole idea of evolution from 01:30:00 Darwinism

but I do pull from what he's talked about, the survival of the fittest and those

that do survive and have been able to survive because they were willing or had

the possibility to adapt to change. If people don't adapt you know regardless of

your field, if there's a language to pick up, pick up that language, if there's

new computer technology to learn, pick that up because people are going to be

left behind if you don't pick up different things to do to reinvent ourselves

and retool ourselves--. That's what I'm talking about with the 'evolution of

success,' reaching plateaus and moving on to the next rung. In that I want to

look at peoples personal histories and how they did that. For instance, for the

housewife whose been at home 15-20 years and she says I'm going to college or

I'm going to go back and get a master's degree or I'm going to open up my own 01:31:00business or I'm going to write a book, I'm going to do this that and the other.

How they then move from one and it's not that you stop doing whatever it is that

you're doing before. It's not an either/or. It's a both 'and.' It's adding on

something else that to the foundation that you already have. So that's what I'm

talking about that's unfolding.

Cook: My father retired and then two years later got his real estate license and

now he's selling real estate. A good person would be Leni Sorenson. She just

started college, she told me, when she was forty-six.

Herndon: Wow!

Cook: After she raised--four--how many children--I can't quite remember--but she

started her undergraduate degree at forty-six.

Herndon: Forty-six. Wow! Now look at her.

Cook: Now look at her, she's wonderful. I love talking to her. So there you go.

There's one person.

Herndon: Put her down! .

Cook: Just to talk to her, she has all these ideas and so much enthusiasm for

living. I think that would be a great book because it would inspire other people 01:32:00 too

Herndon: Get certain case histories and studies of people and say, "this is how

they did it, so you can do it!"

Cook: Yes, I need to read things like that -- inspiration! Are you still the

graduate student representative on the Board of Visitors?

Herndon: No longer. That was a one-year appointment. So people serve one year

and then they appoint two more people, an undergrad and a graduate.

Cook: Can you talk about that?

Herndon: I had a great time doing that! I pretty much was the spokesperson for

the graduate student population at the Board of Visitor meetings to let them

know certain issues, certain concerns that were going on with the graduate

student population. How they could shape policy related to certain things within

the graduate student population. Even though I was for the graduate student

population, I was also at times given the opportunity to speak 01:33:00for students, in

general. So, that was a great situation for me. I enjoyed it, learned a lot,

learned about policy, learned about the operation of the University from the

top, a birds-eye view and seeing how when someone says we should have this that

or the other kind of thing here at the University just the different chains of

command and the different levels of bureaucracy that it has to go through before

it reaches the Board of Visitors before they have an opportunity to vote the yea

or nay -- So groundwork has to be done, research has to be done on that

particular matter.

Cook: It's like a full time job.

Herndon: Right. Then it goes from committees. We have different committees here

at the university. Like for example, the Commission of Student Affairs. They

deal with student related issues so if the Commission of Student Affairs studies

an issue and 01:34:00they recommend a policy. For example and that goes from the

Commission of Student Affairs to the Provost, then to the President and the

President will recommend to the Board of Visitors for that particular policy.

Then that particular policy becomes 'a policy' in the graduate or undergrad catalog.

Cook: Very complicated! This isn't on my list but it just popped into my mind.

You're a very good professor and I was wondering where you got your technique.

Was it at Howard or did you just come to it naturally?

Herndon: I think from a combination of things. From my mother, from my mother

being a schoolteacher and seeing her teach and also she's a Sunday school

teacher and I'd see her teach on Sunday's and from other people that I pull

from. From my aunt, 01:35:00from some of my Howard professors and even some people that

I worked with at Longwood. So from a combination of people have influenced the

way that I've approached people and approach students and approach a topic and

how I teach.

Cook: I think that you are very student oriented but you're approachable and

also demand respect and I think that's hard to balance.

Herndon: Yes, it's hard. It's a tightrope act. Because I always say that respect

begets respect and that if a person wants to receive respect then they have to

show respect just like if a person wants to have friends they have to show

themselves as friendly. So if a person wants to receive respect and respect is

earned you know it's not just because they are the XYZ of the ABC, that you

automatically--you know but because of the relationship they have with others

and how they engage and respect other 01:36:00people. So if I want people to respect me

whether they are students or whatever, I have to first open up myself to give

respect in order to receive respect. I always do that especially with students

to say that my time is their time and if I want them to respect me then I have

to approach them in a very respectable manner. First, they are human beings.

They are important, they have value, they have worth. They have potential. They

have this 'hope that's unborn.' Maybe that hasn't been tapped into and so I can

learn from them and they can learn from me. It's a reciprocal kind of thing. I

don't see it as I'm standing on this platform and I'm looking down upon the

underlings but we're all in the same level. We're all in the same life's journey

and we can learn from each other and I think that the system of 01:37:00hierarchy is

okay in certain situations and circumstances because we can only have one

president of the university, we can only have one President of the United States

but just in the regular day-to-day interactions of human experiences I think we

should cut through all of that and see each other on a human level. We can learn

from each other. We can give and receive something and everybody has something

to contribute. So we look at a person from their perspective and not look at

them as some people--I've heard the term the 'lowly freshman.' Well you got to

start somewhere.

Cook: I've never understood that.

Herndon: You can't start off from high school and become a senior in college so

whomever, the president of the university, the president of the country, they

all had to be a freshman. Everybody had to be a freshman some time so it's not a

state of lowliness but it's a--

Cook: 01:38:00 Step--

Herndon: That's right. It's a beginning. I always hare--I don't like to use that

kind of terminology--the lowly freshman or even--because even though that person

is a freshman, they could teach me a whole lot about computers. They could teach

me something--I mean I know some freshmen that come here--they know how to build

computers from the ground up. So who am I to say because this person doesn't

have any credit hours they don't have anything to contribute. I've had some life

lessons I've learned and some things I can share with them and also they can

share some things with me that I don't know anything about. People just have to

rethink the way they interact with people and how we treat people. I was always

taught to treat people the way you want to be treated. If you want to be treated

with respect, you give respect.

Cook: I also like the 01:39:00way--I guess it is my perspective as an older student but

some students still want to slide by and do as little as they can--like in your

class and how you handled that when students in Maymester, weren't showing up

when there weren't many classes. I liked how you demanded respect.

Herndon: I also want to show them they're not only hurting themselves, you're

cheating yourself. I don't know what it is now. I'll have to recalculate it. But

based on last years tuition for every class a person missed it's like taking

$62.00 and basically throwing it out the window or flushing it.

Cook: Do you know I told my daughter that and she said that was one of the most

important things and that when she would get up in the morning she would think

that's $62.00.

Herndon: Just think about in the whole scheme of things with tuition and fees

for every class, Monday, Wednesday, Fridays or Tuesday/Thursdays classes and of

course Tuesday/Thursday classes cost more because it's only two times a week but

the Monday, Wednesday, Friday 01:40:00class, that's $62.00 for every class missed and

you think about for example getting back to family and parents and the

sacrifices that certain families are making. Some people are working two or

three jobs, taking out loans--

Cook: That's a lot of money to me!

Herndon: Right! That's a telephone bill or a light bill that could be paid or

something or food--!

Cook: Or money you won't have to owe. I told my daughter $60. That's a good

thing to tell students. I wanted to ask about your church community in Blacksburg.

Herndon: Okay. My church community here in Blacksburg. I'm a member. Well, I'm

actually not a member of--but I attend. They treat me like a member--St. Paul's

African Methodist Episcopal. That's where Dr. Pendergrass attends. I like that.

It's a good church, small, community oriented, family oriented.

Cook: I'd like to go sometimes. Mrs. Cook has been at least once that I know and

she just really liked it.

Herndon: Very good 01:41:00people, warm. They greet you and it's the kind of place that

they want you to come back. I like it. I've gone there since I've been here.

Cook: So that's Methodist and Episcopal?

Herndon: Yes.

Cook: What's the community that you belong to in Farmville?

Herndon: At home I belong to a Baptist Church. Actually I'm a bonafide,

official, if you want to call it that, member. This is your regular traditional

Baptist church. It's an independent Baptist Church. It's not associated with any

particular denomination. Its called Race--like running a race--Race Street

Baptist Church.

Cook: That sounds familiar--Race Street--I don't know why.

Herndon: I have to go in a few minutes because I have to meet a student at 3:00.

Cook: 01:42:00Okay. How about are there any other things you'd like to bring up that I

haven't asked you? Have we covered everything? We've done pretty well.

Herndon: We've covered it.

Cook: Alright. How about this one? If you could briefly address this. What

problems pertaining to African Americans do you thing the University should address?

Herndon: In a nutshell. I guess, in short, the University needs to really focus

on recruiting and retaining. They both go hand-in-hand. Don't bring more black

people here until those people who are already here feel comfortable enough and

satisfied to the point where they can tell their brothers and sisters and other

black people back at home or their high schools, their cousins, you need to be

at Virginia Tech.

Cook: It's a good place!

Herndon: It's a good place to be. It really is a good place. I'm not saying that 01:43:00recruitment efforts shouldn't go on. Yes, it's a both/and situation while we are

recruiting more people to come here we need to bump up the retention efforts.

What can we do to keep those who are already here? As we are doing it we are

recruiting people but as people become more satisfied with the University

experience then the recruitment effort will be easier. Word of mouth is the best

kind of advertisement. So they need to do that. One of the things I'm concerned

about that has troubled me and this is a whole other session but I'll tell you

about it in a nutshell. Some of the people here on campus, the white people,

some of the white people who are on campus, who are opposed to whatever kind of

recruitment or retention efforts of black students. Some of those people, some

of those same ones are hollering and yelling in Cassell Coliseum at the football

team. Why is it that the football players can find Exit 118 off of 581 but other

students who would fit in well with Virginia Tech, they don't find Virginia Tech

but they find 01:44:00JMU, they find William and Mary, they find VCU, they find some of

the other schools. What are those schools doing that Virginia Tech isn't doing?

So on the one hand, it's really a contradictory kind of situation where some

people have said we don't need to be doing this and we don't need to be doing

anything in terms of affirmative action because it's not right. They think it's

reverse discrimination but none of them are fussing or complaining about the

disproportionate amount of blacks being on the football team. I have nothing

against the football team. I love the football team. I know a lot of football

players but it's a contradiction. So in a sense, they're saying if the black

people do come here they should only perform for the University on the athletic 01:45:00perspective but they don't highlight or look at the greater possibilities of

people who want to come here purely for academics. I think that the University

could do a better job of recruiting and retaining. I know that the President

currently has that as one of his top goals and initiatives. I'm glad that he's

here to do that and I also thing that other black people need to embrace that

initiative and help with the recruitment and retaining. It's not what the

University can do for you. I'm not trying to pull off a 'John Kennedy' kind of

statement but it falls along the lines of a John Kennedy statement. What is it

we are doing for ourselves and doing for the University to make it a better

place? It's not going to become a better place overnight without any hard work.

That's why I want to stay here to be in the trenches to see the evolution of

success at Virginia Tech.

Cook: Good comment! Thank you, Professor Herndon