Oral History with Elaine Dowe Carter, November 9, 2012 (Ms2019-037)

Andrea Ledesma: It is Friday, November 9, 2012 and this is an interview with

Elaine Carter. We can start off with what it was really like growing up in Elliston.

Elaine Carter: Well, it had, let me put it to ya, I loved Elliston. When we

first moved there, I was three years old. There was--what do you call it--a

meadow across from me and they had cattle and [laughter] I was afraid of 'em. So

I sat on the front porch and looked at them all day long and cried and my mother

would say, well come in here. But I felt like somehow they wouldn't bother me if

I looked at them. I could tell what they were doing. But anyway, I don't know

why I told you that. I have no idea. My memory is very short so you will have to

be very patient with me and don't let me wander because I'll never 00:01:00remember what

I said. I'm in the last days, thank God, I don't think I'm going to live much

longer. Get the hell out of dodge while you still know your last name. So what

did you ask me?

Andrea: What it was like growing up in Elliston.

Elaine: Growing up in Elliston, I loved it. We lived on a four-acre land and we

lived in a brick house that my father's sister had built but lost when we moved

from Roanoke and there was a wonderful creek across and I could go down and see

the tadpoles and watch them grow into frogs. Oh, I loved it. I loved the woods.

I could walk in the woods right next door to my father. Well my uncle, his

brother, the Dowes lived in a row and my father's home place was there. So I

could wander the fields and go 00:02:00up in the hills on my family's property. We were

not allowed to go into the hills. We were African Americans, and if a white

person killed you, they just killed you. That was that. Nobody cared. So, but I

could wander. I was on Uncle Felix's place. Uncle Bentley owned--he kept buying

up land. He had about two hundred acres when he died. Uncle Felix owned a whole

hillside, so I could storm through the woods with these Dowe boys. My father was

one of fourteen children. Someone said, your grandmother's womb must have been

tissue paper because she carried all those kids. [laughter] Isn't that awful?

[laughter] But they all grew into good citizens. There were only five girls.

Uncle Felix was a scholar-like and he was reading a book and they had a

fireplace--that's the way they heated their houses, fireplaces--and 00:03:00his little

five-year-old sister got her dress caught on fire, and before he could get it

out, she died of smoke inhalation. But other than that, I must say the oldest

son turned out to be an alcoholic and got run over by the train. He was drunk,

he was coming home, he fell down, and the train didn't see him. So there were

two--this darling little girl that was only one of five girls--all the rest were

males, out of fourteen. I think two of them died in childbirth, so a family of 00:04:00twelve. There were four girls and eight boys, after the one died. But the Dowes

were very aggressive Christians. They had lots of pride. They believed in buying

up all the land. So Uncle Bentley worked on the railroad and he started buying.

And he and Sid Henson, who was the wealthiest man in Elliston, they fought for

who was going to buy the most land. [laughter] Uncle Bentley outsmarted him

because he lived among the people and Henson had to run his store and he lived

down on the highway with the upper-class whites. So Uncle Ben could always pull

a purchase away from something, whether they were white or black, because he

always had the money to pay them immediately. So anyway, what do you want to

really know from me? Because I can ramble on forever.

Andrea: Well, you talk a lot about the Dowes, but maybe more about the

African-American community growing up?

Elaine: 00:05:00Well, I can. It was pretty simple. Well-to-do white people lived on

Route 11 and if you go there today, if you're driving through Elliston, you have

to get off on the new way of coming in--81 or whatever it is--but, if you go

down there, you will see these lovely brick homes that the white people had. And

then you had Brake Road and black people were not allowed to live too far--you

couldn't see a black home from Route 11. But they lived on Brake Road. I don't

know how they got there. I think a family called Calloway 00:06:00was enslaved but the

slaveholder left his slave family with a beautiful brick house that never got

finished. I don't know if it's fallen down completely now. Then white people

began to threaten to lynch them if they moved into this brick house. Of course,

these were all out-of-wedlock children but it's kind of a nice story. Then he

built a frame house for them and that was the beginning of the black

community--a lovely, lovely house. So Elliston was, for me, being able to go

over and watch the tadpoles and watch the frogs come in. I was always afraid of

the cattle but I loved the branch and the little fish swimming around. You could

sit out there and play all day.

Andrea: Very rustic childhood.

Elaine: Yes, wonderful. Just wild. I had breakfast and I didn't start helping my

mother until I got about ten years old. No, 00:07:00eight. It was about eight that I

started helping by washing the dishes. But, generally speaking, I'd head out, I

would sit up and look at the place--we could walk on the Lundwall property and

if there were no bulls--we weren't afraid of the cattle but there were bulls--

Andrea: You and your mother?

Elaine: No, not mother. By myself, by myself. I walked all the way. I don't know

how many miles but a long time. My cousin Ernestine and I by the time we were

six, we were walking way up to Uncle Bentley's house without telling our

parents. One day we were petrified--we forgot about--children don't try to do

things because they're trying to upset their parents. We were just having a good

time walking up the Brake Road and my 00:08:00God, all of a sudden, we heard these

screaming mothers. Somebody told them they saw us going up to where Uncle

Bentley lived and that was probably, I would say three quarters of a mile and we

were not yet in the first grade.

Andrea: [laughter]

Elaine: One woman told my mother, don't worry about 'em because when a car comes

they get way over. And my mother said, have you ever heard of copperhead snakes?

I don't want them way over. [laughter] She was hysterical. But they were so

happy to know where we were and we were safe. We didn't get--we got whippins.

Where you got your parents talking to you and maybe taking away a little of your

liberties to punish, we got whippins. Some people use men's belts. Mama didn't.

They'd send you out and let you pick something from the limb. You know! You're a

country girl, in Virginia. And maybe you have to go out and get your own damn

whippin 00:09:00thing and if it was not long and limber, you had to go back out again.

So you tried to make it short. My mother didn't whip a lot. She didn't, and I

had the blessing of being able to be scarred. If you hit my legs, they would

swell up and then everybody would say look at that poor child. [laughter] Mama

was so humiliated. One time she whipped me on Sunday morning, because I decided,

as a little girl--my brother was almost two full years older than I. Nineteen

months, I think, twenty months. He would do anything I said do. Mama wanted us

to go to church. I didn't want to go to church. See, we only went to church when

Mama felt like going to church. So I got in the habit of not wanting to go and I

locked us--I told brother we could go in the room and lock the door and my poor

mother had to get out on the roof, which was a slanted roof, to come in and she

had to 00:10:00break the window because the window was stuck--nobody ever opened that

window--to get us out of there. Brother was so little, I must have been five

because he was so little that he would go to open the door and he'd be so

frantic. Every time he stopped, it was still locked. It had one of these

slippings [laughter] and I thought, oh, Lord. Oh, she did--oh, she spanked us.

She went out and got a switch. If you're rural, you know what a switch is. You

whip children with it. And she got a switch and of course we're fair skinned, so

we had these little red marks on our legs and this woman [laughter]--Mama was

late for church [inaudible 10:36] and the town crier, the woman, the biggest

gossip, Miss Carrie, she said, look at those children. That woman is the meanest

woman. I was so glad. My mother leaned at her, and I'll never forget it, she

said, shut your damn mouth. [laughter] These are my children and I'll do what I

please. But I felt so sorry for her. I was so 00:11:00ashamed because I thought, you

know, she thinks my mama's bad. I drove my mama crazy this morning. But anyway.

Andrea: Was she just as strict a teacher?

Elaine: She was not strict with us at all. In fact, I couldn't believe that my

mother was a good teacher. I thought, Lord, I will not go. My brother had to go.

She taught in a one-room schoolhouse in Elliston and poor little brother had to

go and be taught by her, third grade. But then they pulled mama out, brought her

to Blacksburg and then she was at Christiansburg. She only had first and second

grades and she was incredible with children. You know, the only thing mama had

was problems with principals. 00:12:00If a second grader could read at fourth grade

level, she said to the mother go buy the books and she started teaching at a

fourth grade level and the other teachers were furious. You know you can't do

that. Mama said, I am never going to let a child stay behind in their quest for

learning because of a grade. She said, grades don't matter. Grades don't matter

a damn. She cussed out somethin' terrible. Her principal told me, when she went

to Christiansburg, she taught first and second--

Andrea: Who was the principal?

Elaine: No, no but the principal was a young man. Mama was strictly elementary

school and of course when she first started teaching she had all seven grades.

We had one school teacher in Elliston and they taught all seven grades. Can you

imagine? And every day I was through with my work by ten and just began to talk

and go talk to the other children. So, during the world war, there was surplus 00:13:00foods and they began to give them to rural public schools.

Andrea: Public school lunches.

Elaine: Yeah, public school. [laughter] And at eleven o'clock every day, I was

in there with Ms. Polly Ford getting the lunch ready because I had finished all

my lessons. When I finished, I--a typical child--I was going around to other

children. I wanted someone to talk with and you know, it was very hard for the

teachers to--they had to do research and stuff in order to give me challenges.

My mother helped, my mother had taught school before she married and so she was

not teaching when we were little. 00:14:00Ms. Lester would come by and mama would give

her my lessons [laughter] but I still was free of that as a child. So she

finally, my mother told her to let me read to the first graders. Oh, I loved

that. I loved telling them stories. I made up stories to tell 'em in the first

grade. That was good. So at ten o'clock--I mean, when I was ten years old--I was

sent to Christiansburg Institute. I'd just worn all those people out. I'd done

the seventh grade work. So I was on the school bus, I was four feet ten--four

feet eight, I think, when I first--I got up to ten when I graduated I was four

feet 00:15:00ten. I took my mouthy self up there--

Andrea: Can you talk a little bit more about your time at CI?

Elaine: My time at CI was manna from heaven. My sister was also ten years old

but Talma looked like she was twelve. She was tall. By the time Talma got to

twelve, she was fully developed. Well, I wasn't. I mean, I was like four feet

maybe seven. I didn't start going into puberty until I was in high, almost

fourteen years old. So, even when I got to school, when I got there, the boys

especially teased 00:16:00me because I had these three braids and stuff like that.

[laughter] And they were pulling my hair while all the high school girls tried

to get their hair done and you know, going to the beauty parlors, I was still in

my three braids and I didn't wear--I stopped wearing the little--what do you

call them? They used to put--oh God, I can't think of anything--I am getting

senile. You are lucky to get everything you want today [laughter] because if you

come back again I might not know who you are: What are you talking about?

[laughter]. For me, school was a wonderful place. I read all the books that the

school had. But, they couldn't afford--I mean, they couldn't keep me out of

school and mama was pretty glad to have me going out. So, at ten years old I had

finished the seventh grade and I was 00:17:00off to Christiansburg Institute. I was four

feet eight and as mouthy as I could be. And high school, didn't intend to take

me at all. I loved it.

Andrea: Why is that?

Elaine: Most kids go on to high school, ya know. I loved it, I loved it and of

course I spoke. I loved the stage. A teacher had introduced me to Paul Laurence

Dunbar, a black poet and I was always performing so when I got to Christiansburg

Institute and the principal was going around to colleges to recruit, he'd bring

me and I'd be on the stage with Mr. Giles [laughter]. And people- one woman was

describing to my mother- my mother had not finished college and she started

going back so she could--you could teach in elementary school in the county

without a degree, but my grandmother 00:18:00said I'll pay for you to go to college. Get

back, get your degree so you can make as much money as possible because we don't

want these children to end up ignorant [laughter]. My grandmother did not like

my father: that low-down man you married is not going to have enough money to

educate these children. Because we were--for example, my sister, when I went to

Christiansburg Institute, my sister was in her junior year. So, we had this

overlap and that went into college and the day I finished college my brother

entered. So, my parents, even if daddy wasn't--he wasn't a ne'er do well. I

liked him very much because he took me into the woods and we walked and he told

me about all the animals and he was just wonderful and I went out and made

gardens with him. So, he was dear to me. As I got older, I began to see what

made my mother so unhappy is that he would not come to grips with the goals that

she had in mind. He was always proud when we were successful but if we hadn't

gone to college daddy wouldn't have cared. If we hadn't gone to college my

mother would have killed herself. You know that was the difference between 'em,

the passion was 00:19:00there. My grandmother, she had gone to college before she

married. And daddy, my grandmother came, and she said, I found places for the

children to go this summer, she had already talked to the people and they said

they would take us and she said, your brother--my Uncle Douglas had just come

from New York. He had a divorce and he came back to--they were living in

Bluefield at the time, so they had decided that they would pay for mama's

getting. She said, there are people who are teaching in Montgomery County that

don't even have any college education. 00:20:00So, you go up there and tell that man

that you are gonna go back to school and she had two years of college at Fisk

University before she married. [Inaudible 20:17] Luckily her first teaching job

was in Elliston. Now my mother was very high tempered. If you bothered one of us

she'd threaten to kill you. [laughter] I mean she'd go out and my mother had a

very foul tongue when she was angry. She would cuss people out, talk--I mean,

treat them like dirt and dogs and you know the ones that were really kind of

very poor and very rough would say, Ms. Talma you aren't to do that. I'll do as

I damn please [laughter] and, I thought, that's a nice thing: I'll do as I damn

please. It became sorta my motto in my life. But she would die for us and I knew

no matter what I did, if I could get to mother, if somebody was going to shoot

me, she'd stop the bullet. Then 00:21:00I said, oh God if she doesn't die, she'll kill

me. The rest of life: do you know what you did? My God, you almost got me

killed. [laughter] But she had a high temper, she loved her children, she was

bold and daddy was gentle. Walking through the woods with my father was a

pleasure for me. We got the Christmas trees and we picked them out and we

watched them spread out a little bit. Daddy said, you start getting the good

Christmas tree by looking at the shape. You know, what is it going to grow into?

So we would go out and go picking by the time Christmas came it had gotten a

little bit bigger. So I was very fond of my 00:22:00father as I went on and got to my

college. Mama had asked him--he was a bellhop at Patrick Henry, he wouldn't take

a job in the post office because it was manual labor. Mama said, what is

carrying suitcases? I mean [laughter] that's manual labor. But, that was a

problem. That was a problem. So, what are we doing about school?

Andrea: Who was your favorite teacher at CI?

Elaine: Mr. Cooley.

Andrea: Why's that?

Elaine: Because he was brilliant. He taught history, world history. I missed him

in American history because he moved. It was after the war was ending and he

could get jobs out of teaching for his young family. And his wife took over and

it wasn't so much. But, he was brilliant; he brought the subject matter to life.

You really felt like you knew the kings when you were dealing with world

history. And he 00:23:00would stammer like some of them. He was just a magnificent--but

he was also a fine actor. At Christiansburg Institute the faculty always, just

to keep themselves busy and all, they'd always give a play each year. And they

were spectacular.

Andrea: Did the students ever help out with those plays?

Elaine: No, we had our own. The students by grades all had an annual on the

stage for the community and I was always there. Between acts I recited poems

from Paul Laurence Dunbar. I was so young and my sister was ten when she went.

She was tall and she got none of it, but I was just, I was 00:24:00always--anything that

went on at Christiansburg Institute, I was on the stage more than likely. The

principal came down and told mama to try to help to get me under control, stop

screaming at people across the room. Somebody, one of the teachers there--you

know the boys would like to pull my braids. I was probably the only sophomore

that still had her mama braid her hair in the morning and they would pull it and

tease me. Throwing books around and carrying on something terrible. But I was a

straight A student and they really didn't bother me. When I got there I was ten

years old and I just went right into As like I had 00:25:00in grammar school. Learning,

most of my learning, was not in reading. The curiosity that I had was very

intense and I listened very carefully so that--and I had a sterling memory as a

child. So, I really just loved school. I loved all of these things that were

just going on in the world and sometimes I'd go read the books and sometimes I'd

pass my grades just by listening to what the teacher said in class. It didn't

make much difference to me.

Andrea: So, what was your least favorite subject?

Elaine: Huh?

Andrea: What was your least favorite subject?

Elaine: Physical education, physical education. Oh, I was terrible. I wouldn't

do any of the exercises. I wouldn't do anything and I had to take it because

that was a part of the--

Andrea: It's still that way. [laughter]

Elaine: Is it still that way? [laughter]

Andrea: Yes, in high school.

Elaine: You know, I thought, I'd rather be running in the woods or something, I

mean what do I need to be up here doing these silly old things? So, in fact, I

finished my physical education when I was a senior and the valedictorian of my

class. I'd been traveling all 00:26:00to the colleges and all with the principal. Every

time he was recruiting he would go and then get on a program and I would speak.

And so, my mother, when she started back to finish her degree--particularly,

Bluefield. Bluefield State was a black college at that time and the dean there

just couldn't get over me. And all the students thought, what is that little

girl sitting up there. She said I would swing my feet back and forth, these

little patent leather shoes, I'd just be swinging. I was bored. Finally, Mr.

Giles would turn it over to me and I recited poetry and I 00:27:00traveled all over

Virginia whenever he was recruiting and whenever there was--when the faculty

gave a play, anything went on the stage, they included me. Sometimes I think it

was just because they knew it would hurt my feelings. I tried to get in the glee

club. A great musician who had been in the army came back to the school and he

was getting a choir together and a band for the boys. He did that in like

months. So I was going to go and I was going to stand beside by my sister and

sing like--I could hear enough to sing. Well I didn't know that he could tell

that I was following Talma. I wasn't with Talma--I was following her. So he put

me out. He put me out. He had to. He had three voices and I couldn't hold a

tune, I couldn't read music, and he put me with two of my first cousins and they

had the worst voices you ever heard. 00:28:00You know he was doing that and he made

these little trios. I just started to cry when he put me with Camelia Dowe and

Goldie Scott, they were my first cousins. I thought, I am out of here, so I

started to cry and I go, what do you want me to sing for? Just put me out. I

didn't say that, I wasn't that outspoken at the time. But it was amazing. I

called him an old gray-eyed devil. He was right in the room, and this teacher

said to me, Elaine, he didn't mean any harm. I said he's a gray eyed devil,

that's what he is. [laughter] And he could have put me out, but instead he got

in his little car and drove down to my mother and he said, her heart is broken.

She's never been put out of anything at Christiansburg that went on the stage.

And, of course my sister went in and she had a lovely voice. And she was much

more musical. But 00:29:00Christiansburg was my life, my vitality. I was fourteen when I

graduated. I was sort of growing up at that time.

Andrea: Did you ever feel challenged by anything at CI?

Elaine: No, not at all. [laughter] That's terrible, not at all. I can say that

with total confidence. There was not one course--I went through algebra, went

through geometry, it didn't bother me at all. They had general science and then

we had biology and chemistry. The faculty changed. Mr. Cooley and Mr. Giles was

principal--they fired him because they said he was too progressive. He was an

incredible, an amazing principal and we were outstripping with these state

examinations we had. We were way, way ahead of the white schools.

[Mobile phone rings]

Elaine: What is that?

Andrea: Sorry, it's my phone. I apologize.

Elaine: [laughter] She's getting mad at that noise.

Andrea: I 00:30:00 know--ugh.

Andrea: Just bringing it back though, what about the other students at CI?

Elaine: What do you mean what about the--?

Andrea: Were they as happy as you were?

Elaine: Oh, I think so. I think so. I mean, you have to understand that most all

of us--not all of us because there was Pulaski and Christiansburg, Radford. They

would have four-room schools but we were all country kids coming into a place

where there was a decent desk to sit at. We had to ride the buses each day and

some of them didn't have family with cars. So, they'd never been coming into

school. The school was wonderful. There was glee club when Mr. Holmes got back

from the war and Mr. 00:31:00Giles always had--we had chapel every day. The school,

Christiansburg Institute was founded by Quakers so they would bring you together

for meditation. So Mr. Giles had that. We only had half an hour to eat because

we had to go to chapel. Chapel, for him, was not religious. It was student

performance. So students sang and they played the piano and they had all kinds

of things and of course, yours truly was there [laughter] a lot of times and if

I wasn't going to be there, Mr. Giles would call and tell me and generally

speaking the faculty tried to--I just took for granted that I should be on the

stage if the stage was open. But then I had my first theater and I was either a

little girl or an old woman. I loved being the old 00:32:00woman. I had gray hair and I

stormed around the stage for our senior class. But I couldn't have been in a

better environment. I couldn't have been in a place where--I was loved. The

students took, when we went traveling together with the band, Mr. Holmes took me

and he said, give them a break. Then I got to go to all the colleges and the

oldest students, sixteen and all, I graduated at fourteen. I started traveling

at thirteen with Mr. Holmes and they took just wonderful care of me. I can't say

they were the best days of my life but they let me--the further out in the world

I went, the more eager I 00:33:00was because I got things from Christiansburg Institute

and the students and I took that all, too. I went to Rosary College in River

Forest, Illinois. And I still thought I would be liked. I would be taken in. I

could be myself and not have to be worried about--I never worried about whether

I was liked. I was a mean little girl. [laughter] But I was. I was liked because

the students admired me, you know, my straight A's and my talents and I wasn't

as talkative. I could be, but by and large with my older classmates, I just

loved listening to them. They talked about their boyfriends and stuff like that.

I thought, Oh, boy. I'll be glad when I get fourteen. I was graduated when I was

fourteen, went to an all-women's 00:34:00college, so I didn't even start dating until I

was sixteen years old when I went to Howard Univesity.

Andrea: So how did you feel when CI closed? When you heard the news?

Elaine: Like I always feel about the South. I was cussing and carrying on. It

was inevitable. Christiansburg Institute had over a hundred acres of land and

the county took that 00:35:00over and they gave it to Virginia Tech [laughter] for some

kind of farming and stuff. So, you knew that this was an institution that the

Quakers had put together. And of course they had to finally turn it over to

Montgomery County. They couldn't wait. That was the best thing about integration

for the county, because all of that land mostly went into use for Virginia Tech

and its cattle farms and all that kind of stuff. There was no effort. All the

buildings were torn down. Only one lasted and that was because protest, protest, protest.

Andrea: Were you part of those protests?

Elaine: No, no. By that time, my darling, I had left the South. I was ready to

have another Civil War. I hated the South, and, and because I joined the

Catholic Church. [laughter] Oh, my God--when I think of this place--but anyways,

St. Gerard's was basically a black 00:36:00church. My uncle had become Catholic. My

mother sent him to a boarding school that was Catholic with a Benedictine

priest. So, when he came back there was a priest there and he let the black

people sit in the sanctuary. And then, all of a sudden of course, the Catholic

community grew and grew. It was here in Roanoke. The Catholic Church then was

able to interview and bring their own priest in. So, when they did that, all of

the black people that had been down in the sanctuary were told they had to go

sit in the choir loft. They couldn't sit in the 00:37:00sanctuary. So, my uncle and

about nine, eight, ten, maybe other black--other Catholic people went down to

the bishop. And, the good, old Catholic Church says, well, we'll give you your

own school--your own church. So the Redemptorist old priest came in and founded

St. Gerard's. St. Gerard's is still there, of course--pretty large, integrated.

It's down on--where is it? Orange Avenue. They bought a little grey cottage that

you all had to walk up this hill to. And, of course I followed--it was my

mother's brother and his wife was my dearest family member and I went up. And of

course I fell in love with the mass. I was so sick and tired of these Baptist

ministers talking about others going to hell, hollering, and hooping, and people

shouting. I though oh, goodness gracious. I got afraid of the people shouting.

And one day [laughter] there was a big rally. And of course they were all--the

Baptist church was filled and my cousin and I decided--the town crier, this

Carrie Calloway was the biggest gossip in town, she told everything--so we

decided we liked her. Mama said please, please don't stay with 00:38:00Carrie. Come over

here. No. My cousin Shirley and I, we wanted to be right with Ms. Carrie. One on

one side and one on the other [laughter] Right in the midst of--during one of

the religious parts, she began to shout. [laughter] Well, I was on one side of

her. Shirley was on the other. Mama said--mama was back there. I don't know how.

We must have been five years old, at the most. The Baptist church there had

three aisles and so we were in the center one. So, I went this way and Shirley

went the other. And mama heard this boom, boom, boom. She said, what is going

on? There was Shirley and I running back to where mama was, just absolutely

crying. We had never had anybody shout. [laughter] We didn't know what 00:39:00was going

on. So mama just looked at us and she said--and brother must have been about

three years old, but he had fallen asleep. You know you have these things,

revivals and stuff--and she just said, well I guess you got [Inaudible 39:09].

She said, shut up, sit down, and just shut up. Scared the living daylights out

of us. My family was not that kind of evangelistic. So, the Catholic Church was

the perfect place for me. I was so relieved. I was so happy. My father said mama

was letting us be in league with the devil. So she said, well if Jesus is up

there on that place where you go to church, I'd just as soon see my children in

hell. I loved my mother. She could just boom, boom, boom. She said, I'd just as

soon see the children in hell, Albert, she said, so don't start talking about

the Catholics. You know, because Masons--my uncle told me they put a sword

through the heart of the--who is the head of the Catholic Church?

Andrea: The 00:40:00 pope?

Elaine: The pope. The anti-Catholic feelings in these masonic and all kinds of

places, vicious stuff. And that's what daddy had grown up with. Now my mother,

her brother was sent to a school because he was becoming unmanageable. My

grandmother was always a domestic. She only went to fourth grade. She was very

intelligent woman, highly intelligent, so she was working in service and did the

housekeeping, cooking and cleaning for a white family. They turned out to be

catholic and she was sort of, you know, you get to know people you work with.

She was getting very concerned about her son, they had been living 00:41:00in Detroit

and they had brought him back and she was losing control of him. You know, he

was in high school. So, they suggested to her to send him to a Catholic academy.

He loved it. He had to wear these uniforms and capes and all of this kind of

stuff. When he went to St. Andrews after they got what they call a local priest,

meaning it was out of the Bishop's appointment and the people actually

interviewed priests and they sent all of the black people up to the choir loft,

wouldn't let them sit down in the sanctuary. And, of course, my Uncle who was

very Catholic went to the bishop and the bishop--that's what they all do

throughout the Catholic church. They say, here, we'll give you a black church.

They managed to spread the holy spirit around. So, my mother's youngest brother

was a devout catholic 00:42:00and he was the one that went to the bishop, when asked to

go up to the choir loft and not sit down in the Sanctuary. He didn't have

children, he and his wife. I don't know what that was but I think it was

physical. I think neither of them would have not had children consciously. But,

it was none of our business. My cousin and I would love to know. We still talk

about how we would like to know why they couldn't have children. It was one of

them that couldn't handle that. But, he was very proud of me and his wife adored

me and I loved her. She was 00:43:00very dear to me. I bounced right into the Catholic

Church. My father was very upset: you puttin' those children in the league with

the devil. She said, well I'll just so have them in the league with the devil

rather than have 'em up at that Baptist church. Let 'em go. [laughter] So I went

and then, of course, out of my grandmother's six grandchildren only one stayed

out of the Catholic Church. I trucked in and they trucked in behind me and

finally my sister at twenty-six decided to come in.

Andrea: So, were you just as excited about Catholicism when you went to Rosary?

Elaine: Yes, I was. You know, I loved it. The mass itself 00:44:00is essentially a

prayer and it's a prayer that engages you in the process of it. And it just took

me over. That's how I got to Rosary. I wanted to go to a Catholic women's school

and I wanted to leave the South. And I was accepted to a church in New York but

my parents would not have let me go there. Rosary was out in a suburban area and

my mother wrote around to all these catholic schools, do you accept Negros? And

Sister Aurelia [laughter] said, my dear, Mrs. Dowe, of course we accept Negros

and she had an exclamation point. That's what got me to Rosary, her enthusiasm.

She went on to talk about--there were only four of us in there but that was by

choice. The Catholic Church is not very prominent to the Black community. So,

that was the beginning of the turnaround for me. I fell in love with--I loved

urban life. I loved the theater and the 00:45:00Broadway plays would come and I loved

the museums. I got along very well. Then, I wanted to date. Then of course,

there were no black--I didn't know anybody black in all of Chicago and there was

only one black student who was a dayhop and the rest of them in the dormitory

didn't have any dates. There were only four of us, or five at Rosary College. So

I transferred--it was that when I started, kind of, looking at guys.

Andrea: Is that really why you transferred?

Elaine: Yes, it was.

Andrea: All the boys?

Elaine: It was, it really was the boys. I didn't like most of the boys that I

knew because they struck me as backward and ignorant. Living 00:46:00in Chicago from

fourteen to sixteen really left me very isolated. When I came back to Roanoke

and Elliston, I knew it. I loved the big city. I loved going to the restaurants.

The first Chinese restaurant I went to, I ordered moo goo gai--moo goo--I used

to remember, moo goo gai pan or something.

Andrea: Um-hm, that's it.

Elaine: That's it? Okay, yes, I will never forget it. I just, I fell in love

with it. I always love it. From that day I'm eating with chopsticks. I wouldn't

think of putting anything, putting anything. I mean I love it. That was a very

sweet Chinese woman. She was from China and she wore the dress and she was

Catholic. Of course, that was when the reds took over. She was closed from her

family. I don't know quite ever what happened to her. But I decided that I

needed dates. I'm 00:47:00stuck out there out there in River Forest, Illinois. No

African Americans or Jews could buy homes out there where I was. Where Rosary

College was. It was tough country. So I transferred to Howard University.

Andrea: What do you think the most difficult thing was about transferring from

Rosary to Howard?

Elaine: The intellectual life.

Andrea: Worse at Howard?

Elaine: No, it was worse at Howard. The students were very bright. They were the

brightest people. The faculty was superb but there wasn't a strongly felt

intellectual life. For me, the students were party, party, party. Boy, boy, boy,

everyone wanted--the medical school was there, the dental school was there, the

school of religions. Everybody wanted to go 00:48:00home with a husband--preferably

medicine. And the sororities and fraternities, they took over the campus and I

had just begun at Rosary to move more toward--my ideal was to be an

intellectual. I wanted to know as much as possible, talk as much about it. And I

hated Howard. Hated. I was ready to go back to Rosary and my father said no, if

you think every time you don't like a school, you're going to be shifting around

you've got another thought coming. You were at Rosary, you wanted to leave, you

gonna finish Howard. So, I finished Howard, a good solid two terms ahead of

time. And, of course, my family just kept me at home and I was just awful. I

still, today, hurt at how I ridiculed, denounced. I 00:49:00was like a thing. I was in a

trap and I hated my family. I hated their interest. I called them ignorant. I

did all of this stuff. Even though my mother was a school teacher, I thought I

was something. She said, well you're ignorant yourself and I said, no, you don't

read, you don't talk about anything. Oh, I was awful.

Andrea: So she never brought her school work to show you guys?

Elaine: She was teaching school, I had finished college when I was acting like

this. Yes, I finished Howard ahead of time and came home and wore my family out

again. It was this meanness that I had towards my family. I was lonely. When I

tried to talk to my mother about Chicago and the theater--my sister could talk

about The AKAs and the Alphas and Dr. 00:50:00So-and-so. Her whole education was in

black college and I was just out there. I had fallen in love with the theaters.

And they came from New York and to Chicago, music, I mean it was just--I was

very isolated. And Howard was not a place for me. It was a wonderful place with

beautiful faculty but the culture was not intellectual. There were intellectual

people on the campus but I came in as a junior and you know, I did start dating

there. That was nice. I did start dating. You know who I was dating? World War

II veterans. [laughter] Because these little freshman and sophomores, sweaty

types [noises of disgust]. So, a lot 00:51:00of the guys who were older, they thought I

was adorable. They were old enough to know that I wasn't--I mean they all had

girlfriends but they took me places and they got me used to talking to guys. One

of them was just adorable, I loved Frank Sullivan, and I think he did me. I

mean, but, he was in medical school. A veteran in medical school is going to be

hanging around with this little sixteen-year-old person? But, he was very

protective of me, he let me know the harmful places, the men who were not good

people. And I wish that I had stayed in touch with him. He finished medical 00:52:00school, he went into internship in Philadelphia and I was in Philadelphia

visiting a friend. And that was the last time I saw him and he called me and I

was too busy learning about the world. And I was still only eighteen years old,

had finished college. Always ahead, always and I got to the point that if I

wasn't probing something new, I was unhappy. So, I moved around, I went to

Boston and of course I went to Boston College to get my master's degree. I loved

Boston. I had always wanted to go because American History. That's where all the

anti-slave people were. Boston, Massachusetts. So I loved Boston and Boston

lived up to its reputation with me. The theaters were good, the symphony was

superb. I was a social worker so I spent my days in the 00:53:00slums and when it was

the weekend with my roommates--one of them, Loretta Dixon, who is still very

dear to me. We would go to all the theaters together and saved our money. We

were at the matinees on Saturday. My first Broadway play was Brigadoon. It was a

musical and I had to be pulled down by my friends. I just stood up. I was just

mesmerized by the power and singing. So, I loved the theater although I acted a

lot when I 00:54:00was--I gave it up. When I got to college, my age bore an impact on

me. I wasn't like the grown-up people. I wasn't like the girls that could flirt.

I was just sort of there, particularly at Howard, but when I went--a friend of

mine that I met--we became friends. We graduated from Howard at the same time

but since I was a transfer student into Howard, I didn't meet Corky until my

senior year. We were just in the same dormitory. So, she was upset that--I was

so sorry--going to a white school strangled out some of my energy for being on

the stage. I had a southern accent, in Chicago they all--they would come to my

room just to hear a southerner talk, stuff like that. So I pulled back from it

heavily and I got to Howard and I hated Howard just because the academic

voice--you couldn't discuss anything. I said my God, who do--I think we were in

the Korean war then or something?

Andrea: 00:55:00 Yeah.

Elaine: And I thought, that whole--they could take over the United States and be

walking down Fourth Street and the guys at Howard would be saying, look at their

crazy--what do they call clothes? Something. They wouldn't even know they were

at war. I mean, that's how far Howard was from everything that went on in the

world. It was right there on that campus. The people made A's from the teachers

that they had but they were not intellectually oriented. Now, I didn't meet all

of them, so I know there were certain departments that was not true. The English

department was superb. That was where--oh God, what was her name? What's her

name now? I'm getting 00:56:00senile. Do you know what--yes, I am worried. I'm going to

be sitting here one day, I won't be able to tell anybody my name. This is

terrible. She's an outstanding black writer. If I could remember her name, you

would know her. But, I graduated Howard with her. My first year at Howard, I was

just miserable. I cried all the time. In fact, I went home a term early. You

know, I doubled up on things. And then second year I did meet this bright young

woman and friends. I got friends that senior year and Corky told me, well why

don't you go back to--she was with the Howard players--so she said, why don't

you go back? I said, I'm not--I feel. She said, oh, come on. So she told Dr.

Cook, who was head of the drama department. Howard's students traveled all over

Europe. It was an excellent dramatic school. They put a lot of talent into

acting. So, Corky, took me to see her so she said--she gave me something to

read. So, Dr. Cook said Carolyn, okay, put her on the crew. So when you first

went to the Howard 00:57:00players you had to be on the crew. So Corky said, Dr. Cook,

[laughter] Elaine is graduating, she is already finished all of her degree. She

said, I just brought her over here to let her know she can still act. This woman

whirled around, she said, Corky why didn't you ask me? She said, well I was

afraid you would say no, so if I told you she was going--. She said, I admire

what she's done, and she said, pardon me, Elaine, it's not because I didn't want

you. I am a very busy person. She said, Corky if you ever do it, I will put you

out of the Howard players. She said, oh, you won't do it anymore. Corky was

wonderful, she was one of these--she was from the North and she'd always--. She

transferred into 00:58:00Howard from the University of Iowa just as I did, because she

wanted to go not be in a white school. You didn't have any dates. You were

isolated. So she had made a deal with her mother, who was a chemist. She was

from Rochester, New York and I had made a deal with mine to put Howard off. My

family was very happy when I went to Howard. It really was different. You did

have dates. It was the social life but the intellectual life was just--if you

didn't meet the right people, you could forget it. It was party time, party

time, sorority, fraternities--you know, it just really did remind me a lot of

Virginia Tech. [laughter] When I went to Virginia Tech, you rarely heard--I

don't think the whole time I was there working on my doctoral degree as I 00:59:00did, I

don't think I heard one intellectual conversation among the undergraduates. I

don't know what it's like now.

Andrea: Do you know how your college experience compared to the other ones from CI?

Elaine: Goodness, so few in my class went to college.

Andrea: Where did they usually go?

Elaine: They went into working. You know, getting jobs, women in domestics. The

men--in some things like the Radford Arsenal was there and places like that,

they could get jobs because of the war. But, they married as soon as they could.

So, out of my class Johnny McClenahan, he did. He came to Chicago, lived with

his family, and he went to school there. I'm pretty sure he graduated. I think 01:00:00Gloria Jean Mitchell did too. She wen, but most of the people that graduated

Christiansburg with me did not go to college.

Andrea: Did CI never stress--?

Elaine: Well, they stressed it the best they could, but where were they gonna

go? You know? Virginia Tech--segregation was rampant. The parents had to have--.

There was a state college and if you were a valedictorian in Virginia at that

time--I don't know if they're still doing it--if you went to a 01:01:00state school.

And, of course everybody got very upset with me. And, in fact my brother was

penalized because he was valedictorian in his class. And the principal said, no,

we're not going to give you that. We're going to make you a salutatorian and

we're going to call the young woman who's close to you, but not as good, we're

going to give her because--. As a valedictorian I could have gone to Virginia

State free. And, my mother said, no, you're not going to Virginia State at all.

[laughter] So, because I was Catholic and got the priest involved, and we

picked--I picked Chicago and Rosary College. And, my mother said I could go with

the nuns. Poor little Talma was accepted at Mount Holyoke. But my grand--. My

father's sister was, you know, she was a housekeeper. She was a part of the

staff to serve a very wealthy family. So, she said, well you don't want her to

go Mount Holyoke. Upper-class white people are immoral. So Talma was rather

bored. She was much--she was same 01:02:00age--in fact, she was younger than I was when

she finished but she matured quickly. She was a little boy crazy. She was

giggling and all. I never got into that. I just walked into a much older

expression of my interest with men. But Talma was giggling. And all of her

little friends, all they talked about was boys. They dressed the right way and

then they wanted to go to the drug store at the same time they came in. Oh,

that's what Talma did with her young life. Although, she was valedictorian,

extremely intelligent and very disciplined, but much more ladylike, much more

sorority-oriented, much more--you know, never cross your legs. You were a woman,

you keep it like that. I didn't care. I would put 01:03:00mine up on--

Andrea: Like you're doing right now?

Elaine: My mama would say, would you put your foot down? That's not the way to

sit. [laughter] I think a lot of it was because I went to a woman's college at a

young age and didn't take any of the social life out of Howard. Guys liked me.

You know, they used to sing. There was a song that came out, a popular song:

Good morning, judge. What makes you look so mean? [laughter] How did I know your

daughter was just sixteen? [laughter] And the Kappas would sing that

every--those bastards, I had to end up walking all around to get to class.

Because, when you went in the triangular way, like that.

Andrea: Yeah.

Elaine: I'd pass the Kappa tree and they'd start singing: Good morning, judge.

[laughter] Here she comes, she's sixteen. At Howard, the sororities and

fraternities dominated, and the 01:04:00Kappas actually chose me for their courts and

things like that. But I thought, that sounds so stupid. And they wouldn't stop.

They liked making me blush and mad. I was so young that they really--there were

other students at Howard that came in from southern schools where they had been

double promoted because of their intelligence. What was so difficult for going

to Christiansburg--and I think that this will be for most rural, southern, black

schools--is the teachers had some students who were very bright, others barely

making it. And, then you had very few, very little support for the students in

their homes. So, the teachers 01:05:00had to work overtime. If I got into a problem, my

father was educated. He went to Virginia State before it became a college, so he

doesn't have a degree. But I had my parents there, you know. Read this. What are

they trying to say? If I was writing a paper and got stumped about how to turn

it into the paper. Truncate it. You know, truncate the material? Both of my

parents were well-educated enough to help me with that. Well, when you were

going into high schools where parents were totally illiterate, very bright kids

who learned like mad, but they didn't have the support. And the Christiansburg,

everybody rode buses. You know, Christiansburg had a bus from Pulaski, a bus

from Radford, a bus from Elliston and Shawsville, and, I don't 01:06:00know how the

Blacksburg kids got to school. Was there a bus?

Andrea: There was a driver who would take them from New Town, which was one of

the Black neighborhoods

Elaine: Yeah.

Andrea: And they would, he would drive them.

Elaine: He would drive them. 'Cause I knew there wasn't a bus. There wasn't

enough of them going.

Andrea: It was a volunteer effort.

Elaine: I think it was a volunteer thing. And that would be the place where you

would get volunteers because people--all they did at Virginia Tech was clean the

floors and cook the food. But they had a sense of university life. I was awfully

glad I went to Virginia Tech. And, I'm not sorry that I got involved in

Christiansburg Institute and didn't finish my degree. I could care less about

the degree. I did all my coursework and I didn't--I began to get involved in

Christiansburg Institute. And I don't care. Meanwhile, the state of Virginia

will let me hang on the campus, there. [laughter] I felt like I was finally

getting my dues because my poor parents had to pay for Rosary College, which was

an expensive college. And they had to pay for 01:07:00Howard University. I was cum laude

and I didn't know it so, my senior year, they told me that. I went to pay my

bills and and all they paid me were little things like--I don't know what. The

kind of small things and I said, what's wrong? They said, that's okay. Don't you

worry about it. Here's your class schedule. I was cum laude and I didn't even

know. When I graduated, I didn't know it until I saw the bison. Mama said, why

didn't you tell me? I said, mama I didn't know it. I didn't care about Howard. I

hated Howard. So, I spent most of my time hating Howard, but I'm glad I went to Howard.

Andrea: In the long run?

Elaine: In the long run, yeah, in the long run. When you go out in the 01:08:00 world

with a college degree and you never run into people that you know. You know,

when I went to Boston and anyone that went to Howard wanted to meet me.

University life is a support system. You can walk into a town that you've never

been in for a job and then somebody will find out you're there and they will

come running to you and the next thing you know you're at the dinner table. You

both are going and when you get out into the real world you'll see how true that

is. People are always very happy to meet somebody who goes to their school at

the collegiate level and its one of the gifts that higher education brings to you.

Andrea: Before we interviewed people, we did a reading on Christiansburg

Institute history and one girl actually compared Christiansburg Institute to

college. She said, she loved--it felt like a little university.

Elaine: I can see why, because they had dormitories. You know, there was no

other--you know, Mount Holyoke and places like that. [laughter] And, I'm sure

Virginia has this one women's 01:09:00college. But, by in large, you know,

Christiansburg Institute had people that came from as far as New York. When

people had behavior problems with their kids, they sent them down South.

[laughter] Keep them out of the streets. And, so, Christiansburg Institute was

an amazing place, all I can say. The faculty gave you everything. The learning

curve--it was just tremendous that they set for you and they always managed.

They did a lot of things. There was an incredible glee club. There was a band

that Zedekiah Holmes came back from the military, and boy, he really 01:10:00 marched

that band. It was unbelievable. You've never seen anything like--little kids,

you know, little boys who were twelve and haven't grown up yet, and they would

be there, and they marched like nobody else. You'd never see a high school group

like that. And those kids--the ones that were really good--they would go out and

play for white dances, with Mr. Holmes directing it. And they got the money,

enough to buy them uniforms. So they were in these dark greens, with the gold on

the thing--they usually wear, like the military does. So, his coming back from

the war was just wonderful. He came back in the middle of my junior year. And he

traveled 01:11:00them. He could always get the Virginia State College and Lawrenceville.

And I always went because I recited poetry and gave them a break. So, I went. I

was always with the crowd. And, I've never known students--they were teenagers.

They were dealing with the girls and flirting with the guys, but to travel with

them--they were so, you know, I wasn't in that at the age. I was still really

backward in terms of social life and they never made me feel like I was taking

anything away from them. They were just--Christiansburg was a very wonderful

place for me. And I think most students who went there--if you talked with

them--would say that. It had a way of making you feel good. The courses were

pretty strong. And, then of course, when the Quakers left, turned it over to

Montgomery county.

Andrea: Can we pull the lens back? Like maybe your candid thoughts about 01:12:00 desegregation?

Elaine: Oh well, [laughter]. I think it's barbaric. I think it's made the United

States a country that will never be able to rise to its total height.

Andrea: Desegregation?

Elaine: Yeah. Segregation tosses the souls of people. So, there is always

animosity. There is always tension and stress. Not by everybody, but I don't

think that anybody who lives in the United States can avoid encountering that.

And, 01:13:00it's a destructive thing. Because, let's say Asian people come in, as

Mexican people come in, they never have quite the full blown loyalty to this

country because they're always treated. It gives away--it just makes it the hell

that it is. I don't give a damn about the United States. I don't give a hell if

you bombed it tomorrow. I had a friend who was just absolutely wild. This was in

Boston and this was when everybody was talking about the atomic attacks and that

scare--it was genuine, it was very frightening for--. The nuns were talking

about to one of the--I was a registrar at Catherine Library School. Nursing

there was one of my first jobs and so Sister Cecilia said to Mary, she said, oh,

they were practicing. People were building tunnels for themselves under their

houses. You were too young to remember 01:14:00that, I would think, but maybe not. And

it was terrible. I mean, we were gonna go to war, we were gonna go to war, the

japs were going to get us after all or something. I don't know who we were

supposed to be going to war--I think It was Korea wasn't it?

Andrea: Probably Korea at that time.

Elaine: Probably about that time, yup. Well, I wasn't paying much attention to

it. Sister Snug came by--the woman who was on our--she was our--the person you

first went into the office and she was--that was her desk and she was a lovely

woman. So she said, oh, she goes, how are those beautiful children? And she did

have beautiful children. She's a catholic mother so I think she had five

already. She said, it's gotta stop, I'm gonna just have to tell God I can't

follow those rules. Get out of here! She said, I'm gonna kill my husband 01:15:00if I

have to. I'm not gonna have any more children. So she said, well, are your

children? She said, oh yeah, my children are ready, she said, if there's a war.

Well what did you teach 'em? She said, I'm gonna tell them to listen to the

radio, find out where the bombs are gonna fall, go there, bless yourself, and

die. Oh, you didn't! She said, if you think I'm gonna send my children down in

these holes and all this dirty stuff and practice that kind--she said, no,

Sister, no, that's what they're gonna do. And she said, let's just hope that no

bombs fall here and they won't have to do that. But, she said, I am not going

through. I mean, oh, there was a period there that all people were practicing

and they had their homes all done. What is wrong with you? [laughter] That is

not going to happen. I mean, I know we had fools in the White House and all. If

Romney got to be president I was going to have to leave the country. I am too

old and tired to put up with an idiot at the round--George Bush was enough.

Eight years of George Bush, everybody in this country, and in fact, I think they

did. I think that's why Obama got in and that's why I think he stayed in. People

really began to see the limitations of having a president who cannot handle

himself like a 01:16:00president. Oh, God, and Romney looks like--what does he look like

to y'all? You think he looks like?

Andrea: That's a golden question.

Elaine: He just looks stupid, doesn't he? He looks like he's lost somewhere, and

then he has this insipid grin on his face. Oh, would you please? How in the

world? Only money would have allowed him to become a candidate. I wish the

Republican party would get itself together. And George Bush was certainly money

and politics. You know, his father. His father. I don't know what's going to

happen to America, but apparently most Americans don't take most of this stuff

too seriously.

Andrea: I think they've learned.

Elaine: Well I think 01:17:00they--well, I think to some extent that's a flaw. But

they'll go down and see what's going on at Macy's or something. Post-America: I

don't have time for that, I'm gonna go down, there's a sale. I like the country

for that but I wish that there were--many of the presidents are selling out the

nation in relationship to other nations. America is a very isolated nation now.

Nobody talks about that. But, nobody is going to risk themselves with the United

States anymore. It has been as ugly abroad as it is here.

Andrea: Do you think desegregation kinda started that?

Elaine: Huh?

Andrea: Do you think desegregation kinda started that?

Elaine: How would you say how desegregation started--

Andrea: Well you said that it jumbled the souls.

Elaine: Well I think for the world abroad, opportunities expanded into some

extent because other nations, 01:18:00particularly African Nations and Latin American

nations, these were people--when the Indian, when India sent its first, what do

you call it?

Andrea: Ambassador?

Elaine: Ambassadors and companies to the United States. Every day for a while

there was a big picture of an East Indian person who had been taken out of the

restaurants because they were told blacks couldn't get in. Oh, that desegregated

Washington in a hurry. And they would be laughing. You know when the reporters

were there talking to them, they were just roaring, like, you know, where in the

world are we? As far as they were concerned, 01:19:00America was nothing and it was

really the world that pushed the United States into civilization. And there's

always been people here fighting forward and the North was certainly better than

the South. With desegregation, the South has bloomed. They bloomed, you know? GE

would not come here until it was desegregation. People, they moved. A lot of

these large companies moved south in a big hurry because the cost of--it's

better to have new people, with taxation programs and stuff like that. But, I

don't know. America is a funny place and it still is operating pretty much on

individualism. I don't think that many people in America--they feel they have a 01:20:00right. And so, it's what I want, what I can do. You know? The only thing they

tend to gather around is church, but it's not a country where people really--.

Like the North, you know, it's usually your neighbors, your family, people like

that and people tend to be very cliquish. But, it's changed. It's changed. It's

changed enormously. And, I left it. I was not, I was not going to come back here

if my life depended on it. And I had a hard time getting a job, you know, and

then I got sick. My skin broke out and I had to come back home. And as soon as

my--that cleared up, I was back and going again. And then finally worked my way

into Boston College. Because while I was out I went to Church and there was a 01:21:00priest and he said, you're too young to be working anyway, so why don't you go

to Boston College? And that's how I got out of here. And I lived with a sister

and I didn't have to pay any room and board when I was at Boston College. My

graduate assistantship, it was all done politically so I was in the dean's house

and I was with another young woman and we were both working with the registrar

and stuff like that. And Father Fitzgerald had never talked to an African

American. [laughter] He was the dean of the graduate school and he had never

talked to an African American. So, he kept telling me, you're not African

American. I said, what do you think they all look like, Aunt Jemima? He said,

no, no, no of course I don't and he was just very pompous and he just kept

looking at me. Here was a man from Massachusetts, very prominent 01:22:00in the Catholic

Church, turned Boston College around and made it competitive at the graduate

school level--that's what he came there for--he had no idea of what was going on

this country and that is so typical of Americans. You know they are focused on

their way of life, their communities and they don't have much political life. It

is a 01:23:00strange kind of thing. Father Fitzgerald, he could just not--first of all,

he could not believe I was negro: well, you don't look like one. I said, what do

you think they look like? And I said, you should see my father. Even white

people don't know he's white--I mean, he's a negro. [laughter] Even down here,

daddy was famous. The bus one time--stopped the bus, the bus driver, looked

back. daddy got on the bus, went back and sat right in the middle of the seats.

So the bus driver looked up and he stopped the bus again. He said, come up here.

You in the 01:24:00middle, he said, you get up here and sit behind me, he said, because

they'll be getting on again. He had another stop up in Radford for picking up.

He said, they'll be getting on and complaining that we're taking their seats. So

daddy said, okay. So he let the bus pull out and so all the black people thought

daddy was passing. So he looked up. He said, I'm looking up here, they change

the state law? He said, what do you mean? He says, whites to the front, blacks

to the rear. I mean, that was up in the bus. Well he said, why do you think I

stopped the bus for and got you up here? He said, I'm black. My daddy was blonde

and blue-eyed. [laughter] He said, well, why didn't you say that? He said, you

didn't ask. You told me to get up and come up here. I said, daddy! When I first

came back here, you know, you can imagine getting in touch with people that I'd

gone to school with and around, especially since I was doing the Christiansburg

Institute work. And they just loved my father because when he stopped, and the

bus driver came up, they thought he was going to 01:25:00pass. Daddy got up there. The

bus had to stop again while daddy was--it was against the law to move when you

had a passenger. Daddy was laughing. I don't know, there must have been at

least, I think, a half dozen people who told the story of my father. You know,

he really messed over 'em. He was laughing: see you changed the state law.

[laughter] I said, daddy! And my mother hated my father for that. Ya know, she

really did. She felt like he should have been cussing somebody out. Very direct

and confrontational. But anyway, life in the United States has been interesting

for me. I've never had much faith in the country, I don't believe in it, I could

care less. I never did earn enough money to really move to another country.

That, when people move to another country you have to know the country, you have

to have money, chances of getting work and stuff. I just stayed here. Of course,

I loved New York and I loved Boston. You know I went to Boston College and I

knew I would fall in love with Boston and then I went to New York. When you

leave New York, you don't go nowhere. I don't care where you go across the

world. It is just a phenomenal city. I have friends from around the world and

they say it really is the most enticing. It's just enticing. You love it. You

may not want to live 01:26:00there but, you know, while you're there, you can't keep up

with it. You can never say you know New York. It is just too fluid and, of

course, I lived there for a very long time. You know I love it. I came back here

because of family and health to some extent. I don't regret it. I'll say this, I

wish that I wasn't afraid to live in a rural area. Because I would get a little

cabin and live in the woods. But I wouldn't down here. I would not. No, no, no. 01:27:00I'm scared. I'm scared of here. I told a friend of mine. They said, what is

going to be your first thing? I said, getting some white friends [laughter] I'm

not going anywhere in this dumbass place. I really wouldn't. I would not go onto

the Blue Ridge Parkway or anything with an all African American group. I would

not. I mean, some of it is paranoia. Luckily, when I first got here, working for

CI, I met this wonderful woman with Italian heritage from New Jersey. So

anywhere I wanted to go, Ana would go. We'd go together. She'd go down the hills

and around the hills. I 01:28:00said, good, you can tell them I'm your maid, just get me

out of here safe. But there is a fear that I have in the United States--I mean,

in the South--that was not a part of my experience in the Northeast. I went to

Boston, I stayed there, lived in New York for thirty-one years. Came back when

my marriage ended. My family was down here, I'd not spent much time with them.

New York is a place--it's very fluid and almost all the people that I was close

to had moved out of New York and gone back to California or gone to Boston. My

marriage was ending, that's what drove me out of New York. I felt like I wanted

to be quiet and not hustling for jobs. And I could not handle the lifestyle I

had. My husband was a businessman and a very good one. I lived on the high life

in New York and I could never support that, you know, as a divorced person. 01:29:00 He

was wonderful, he loved the symphonies, he was quite musical and we went to the

opera, we went to the symphonies. New York is just funny, you come out and

that's when you go have your dinner. So you didn't get home until two o'clock in

the morning. By that time, people from the cast would be coming in, and they

were having their dinner. It was just magical. And in New York, you do not

bother a celebrity. Unless you're a visitor to New York, and southerners are

particularly, you know, if they see somebody walking down the street like Yul

Brynner. I saw one day, this man running to catch up with 01:30:00him, and he got in

front of him and Yul Brynner just pushed around and never looked at him. I would

go to watch Yul Brynner. He was the handsomest person you'd ever want to see. He

walked, I mean--the walk was there and it was just wonderful. But, anyway, what

else? Do you have one more question? She doesn't care how many questions. She

keeps the notes.

Andrea: No, you've covered everything I've actually wanted without me having to

ask. But, is there anything that we didn't ask you that you'd like to say?

Elaine: I don't know. No. You know, you haven't told me exactly what--this is

just a paper for school? Or what is it?

Andrea: We're just trying to gather an oral history collection of the

experiences of students who went to CI.

Elaine: Oh, okay. That's right

Andrea: So, we'll be transcribing it and put it in special collections so other

people can learn what kids at CI, what they thought about the school, what they

thought about their experiences there

Elaine: Have I told you about the school enough?

Andrea: Um, what would you say Anna?

Elaine: Because, I mean I always take you down and around, underneath and up

again, up this hill and over the 01:31:00mountain. [laughter] In terms of CI, CI was a

place where the care they took of their students was phenomenal. And, when

children were headed for college, they poured everything they had into

preparation for that child, regardless of what their background was. I mean, we

had my mother and my dad was pretty good. But mama had gone to college. Most

important, it was a place that took advantage of all of the students'

capabilities, like the band, the glee club. We had 01:32:00acting. And, it was the

center. Everybody came. That was what all the community people did, to come to

CI. There were continuous--almost continuous programs of people to come in. The

teachers were not happy there. The younger they were, the the shorter they

stayed. There's nothing to do. As one woman from Philadelphia, she said, good

God almighty they didn't even have telephones. [laughter] You had to go down to

the office. She was Mrs. Cooley and of course her husband was teaching there.

She hated it. She hated it. And finally, he then realized that he could get more

money not teaching somewhere in northern Virginia. So she took his 01:33:00place. And, I

interviewed her. [laughter] She was just as wild as I thought she'd be. She

said, it was the dumbest place, with the dumbest people. She was from

Philadelphia. You know, she said, good Lord! She she said, we had to get our

children out of there. They'd grow up. No matter what you'd do, they were going

to be a moron at best. [laughter]. It wasn't that bad. Christiansburg Institute

had the only telephone, on the campus. She was in a whirl. And she said, you

know, I was in a whirl. When he left, she took his job, and she was awful. I

told her. And she said, I know I was. She said, I couldn't--. [laughter] She was

a wonderful woman, though. You knew that. She was a lot of fun. I interviewed

her somewhere, when I was trying to get--. Well no, I didn't interview her. I

interviewed Mr. Cooley and she sat in on it and she gave her--. To have both of

them there was good. But he had 01:34:00prepared. He wanted the world to really know

what Christiansburg Institute was like. I don't know where that material and all

is now that I'm no longer there. I have no idea what the Christiansburg

Institute is today.

Andrea: But we got your impressions down so it will definitely go into its history.

Elaine: So, anyway, ladies, I hope I haven't over-talked you and worn you out.

But you must realize I am old and I am lonely.

Andrea: We were happy to hear you speak. Thank you so much.

Elaine: Oh, thank you.