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this is an interview with Maureen slaughter for the Sanford University oral history program by James Lamar Sledge at the Woodlawn Masonic building on november 5th 1985. All right. Do you care if we just start getting, go through background material and all and then go on to

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Howard? Just some background on you, your family and all in high school. Just what you want. Just things like you know um like what your parents did for a living. Um How large your family was? Well my father was a building contractor. My mother kept house.

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I had a brother Who also went to high school and later we went, we moved to Albertville where I talked in the high school there at the same time he was in school. But anyway I finished high school that went on and then went to Howard

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went there in the fall of 27 and I finished in three years in one summer school which meant taking a lot of extra hours and I didn't start this to my third year. No second year, I took one extra course and then they had to double

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up really double up to third year and then I had some of the cool, I doubled up and I taught school for about 6.5 7 years. Albert. Rolling cross over shades Cahaba high school before shades Valley High School was built, the school building is still there.

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I think it's an elementary school and then when war came along I went in the Marine Corps a certain record during World War two and now I'm a retired Marine Corps major. And I've been in the real estate business now for about well since World War

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two. And that brings me up today. Was there when you joined the marines? Were there a lot of women in the marines at the time? No, no, there were, there were none. We went, we went in as uh waves. And the first, the charter members of

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the Marine Corps were 19 of us who were in the ways that transferred to the Marine Corps. So we were the 19 charter members of the women marines. Was there a lot of opposition from the marines? Yes, they were. There was a lot of opposition. They

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sent us back to do recruiting to as near our home bases. That could get us. So I was sent to Atlanta and the morning the morning I reported we had a male captain there and he didn't say good morning, come in or anything. He said, well

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says first we had ***, then we had dogs. And now to top it all, we've got women. Well within three months he was asking for more women to work in his office. But that was my greeting when I first reported for duty. Made me feel about

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so. But anyway, uh, no, there wasn't, there was some opposition throughout the south. That's why they wanted Southern women to do the recruiting because they figured we understood people in the south, but there was not too much opposition in the other parts of the nation, but

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the parliaments were in the car, Well, I wasn't aware there were women in the mornings today. Oh yes, yes, We have some station here. I'm sure I have. I don't know how many, but I'm sure that in the recruiting office and investment in the uh, Battalion,

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that there's some out there to have been for years. One of the ones that started all that and it was a lot of fun, a lot of hard work, but it was a lot of fun the whole time. Yes. Well, I came here for 11 months

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and the rest of the time I was in Atlanta. Now then let's talk about how it got. Well, by the way, I went back out to Howard, they invited me out one time when I was in Birmingham to speak to the students about it. And uh,

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Dean Percy P Percy Pratt Burns was our Dean and he was also an english teacher. And when he was, when I was in school, main thing, he stressed we're good grades, good grades were the most important thing in this world. Well, the day I went out

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to speak to students about him, he invited me in his office and we were talking about various people that had finished about the time I did. And I said, you know, Dean Burns, those grades weren't all that important. He said, what do you mean? I said,

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well, some of these people who did things other than just study, I don't mean they failed, but they made B's and c's and I said they did other things in the student body. They were quite active in all the extra curricular activities. And I said they

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made better successes in life than these bookworms did. And he said, now name a few. So I did, he said, okay, I agree with you. But don't you ever tell it? Oh, but now that's just something that that showed that that he was, he was not

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the type person we thought he was, we thought all in the world he was interested in was good grades. But he admitted that some of them that didn't make the best grade had made the best success in life. And when I taught school I found the

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same thing. I wanted people to participate in debating teams and things of this nature and I coach the debating. No, we won state championship, but Howard College was, I don't remember what the student body was. I'm sure that somewhere in the files you could find out,

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but it was a small student body. We all knew each other and uh, we were just all good friends and close, close knit group. We worked together and it was a lot of fun. It was not like a big university, more like a family. It was,

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it really was, especially the ones in the very sororities and fraternities and and then of course we had the ministerial association, They still have student ministers. Yes. And they go out on HD and preach and things like that. They keep real active. Well, turn it off.

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I'll tell you something. I don't know. Um We had as you do now, we had winter and summer classes. Do you go six days a week? Now we went six days a week. Yes. Uh we had classes monday Wednesday and friday Tuesday thursday and saturday. Like

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we didn't know that we weren't supposed to. So we just did. It wasn't an option at the time. No, surely wasn't. And um we, because it was a college, it wasn't a university and they had teacher training as well. That's what the course that I took,

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my major was history and my minor was french and my said I could teach french but I really couldn't understand, I've been suffering through two years of myself. I had two years in high school and three years in college but even then I could, I could

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not have talked french, did you end up teaching history in high school? I still love history. Still have some of my history books that I go back and read just for the fun of it. History major, that's what interests me the most. Nothing else is really

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interesting. How did you happen to choose ours? Well, we lived in holland and About six or 8 blocks to the streetcar. They don't after Howard, I never thought about going anywhere else. I did want to at one time at that time. Of course the tuition and

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all the fees were this minimal in comparison with today, but at that time you could go to University of Alabama or auburn, either one and pay your tuition and your room and board just about for the these and uh, from Howard, what work and I'm trying

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to get, I told them my mother and dad that I'd like to go to the University of Alabama and my dad said I was too young. I couldn't go. That was, that was about the second or third year, second year I guess it was, but it

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was, it was more or less a continuation of Woodlawn high school at that time went on. High school was rated and ranked uh, the foremost high school in the south according to the grades made by their students who went on to college students go to college.

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Well not as high as you do, Not as high as we did 15, 20 years ago, let's put it that way. But there were quite a number of us that went from woodlawn onto Howard and then quite a number of them went to bring him something

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and uh, that uh, catching each other and shaving their heads got especially frank with young men who had known each other in high school and been good friends. They catch them out somewhere. They caught uh two boys from Birmingham Southern one time out east lake and

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took them up on the campus and shaved their heads and uh took your chrome and painted something on their bald heads. And at that time there was a vice funeral home right down here and they used the hearses and his ambulances and two of the vice

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young men were at Howard. So they just went down and got one of those hearses or ambulances piled them in that ambulance and took them back to southern, dropped them off on the campus. Surely did. So you don't have things that anymore. I think there's not

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been too much rivalry between Howard and Southern since a young man was killed. They stopped it and that's too bad because it was a lot of fun. Oh by the way, my freshman class, what was members of our freshman class were in the group? That dedicated

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legion field. The first college football game that was played there. The one that that was your freshman year. Remember he played? No, I don't, I have tried to remember who we play but I have forgotten uh Loyola keeps that Loyola out of Louisiana keeps popping in

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my mind but I'm not sure. But anyway we did. Did you play all of your games out there? Well yeah, no before legion field was built. The college games were played either at Howard or Birmingham Southern. We even played the university of Alabama on Howard campus

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in our own field one time title 77, but then after legion field was, it was not my freshman year, I took it all back, it was sophomore year that uh it was dedicated because the freshman year we played out southern or we played at Howard and

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the scholastic uh activities at Howard were quite good. They had a very high standard on scholarship and quite a number of students made real good grades and, and we're in a lot of the honor societies and things of this nature. Was that a bigger part of

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campus life? I mean we're your honor societies active. Oh yes, very active, They really were. And at that time, I wondered it's the same way now uh since it was a baptist institution, the students, especially, the women were very closely chaperoned. The rules in the bull

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pup says that they can't go out in the car without a chaperone except the seniors could. And uh every Class sorority or fraternity activity had to be okay by the college. Well the summer class decided to have a dance at Cascade one and they were calling

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it the sophomore claire stance and everybody in school. This was invited. Well when the administration found out about it, they caught um that the dean of women who was in charge of the dormitory and said that she, the girls there would not be permitted to go

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and they had to change from the sophomore club dance to sunrise club dance to get around these rules. But anyway uh there was a young couple that were dating and they later married and they live out in Roebuck now. Uh she decided she was going anyway

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so she put the pillow and blankets in her bed and fix it where it looked like she was there if the dean walked in french Dean french Haynes was the beans name. And so her date came to her window and she crawled out the window and

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she went to the dance. She was on one that had enough nerve to go. So when she came back he pushed her back in the window. Now I'm gonna tell you what happened to me inside because I ran into the same women up in a college

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and somewhere in north Carolina during the war when I was on a recruiting trip and was speaking to the student body in that college and she took me over to her room, She had a little apartment there in the dormitory and uh save me some just

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that some of them would slip out so she made a room check and then she went in this young woman's room, said bed looked a little bit odd. So she went over and felt she found out that it was blankets and pull us under the cover.

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So she said she just removed all that and climbed and crawled in the bed to wait for him. So when the woman got back and her date pushed her in the window, she didn't turn the light on and the team said that she just lay there

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watching him. So she put her pajamas on and she comes over to move all this stuff so she could get into bed. And she did, she said she sat up in the bed and the young woman scream. So she campus for about two weeks or something

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like that meant she couldn't go to class but she couldn't go anywhere else. Go to class and come back to the dormitory and that's all she could do for two weeks. You couldn't have a date, you couldn't go anywhere. She could go to church. But that's

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all in school, not disapproved dances at that time. Not school sponsored. Either sororities or fraternities or classes. They did not know when. Well that's not exactly right because of sororities had dances and so did the fraternities. I don't know why this one that that sophomore class

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was going to give was so different. Perhaps because it was a class rather than a sorority or fraternity. But anyway, if you can see those two now, I still tease them about it. They said, please don't tell our Children about that. They still do crazy things

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like that. The were not guarded that close anymore. They don't, you know, keep a close rain on. You just have to be on campus at a certain time. And other than that you're pretty much free to do whatever you wanted to. Well, I think the boys

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were at that time it was just the girls that worked so closely guarded. You said that the seniors did were their privileges for the seniors. The seniors had more privileges than the underclassmen did. The women. I'm talking about the women now according to those bull pups,

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I'd forgotten about it until I went back and read some of those things. And it's fascinating you get almost the history of the school from those. I guess the standards were a bit different. I'm sure they were, they had to be in by 10:00 except Saturday

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night. And I think Saturday night could be out to uh 11 and and they could have dates in the living room. Oh, just a very brief period of time. Look at close range on y'all. Well, not me because I wasn't there. In fact, I didn't even

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know those rules existed until I read them. Did you have any problem being a commuter student? Did you feel like you missed out on anything? No, not really. Surely didn't if there was something special being done or some kind of festivity at the dharma. So we

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were all invited and no, he didn't buy this at all. They didn't have too many people. Do you know where Easton hospital used to be at. He's like that originated as the girls dormitory. And when they moved Howard College, where it is now. They sold that

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to this corporation. That was in 19 45 I guess 44 45. They sold it to the corporation that was organizing the Eastern Hospital. So for a year or two they used it just as it was and had little bitty rooms because in the dormitory, women had

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little bitty rooms and that was the hospital. And then it grew and grew and grew. But you could still, up until the time they moved, you could still see some evidences of the time when it was uh girls dormitory. That was yes. Mamie nell smith hall

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became Eastern Hospital the same building. Then they built onto it several times. I guess they would have to be. Oh yes, surely. Did. Did you take the trolleys back and forth streetcars? Was there any problem with that? I mean, what kind of hours did they? Oh

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no, no, no. They ran much more often than we do now they ran just every few minutes. About every 15 20 minutes. But now of course some of our organs, some of our lines do. I was looking at our annual report last year and some of

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them during off peak hours we have one hour. Uh Headway. Oh no. So some of them are still maybe 20 minutes or 30 minutes. No, there was no problem. So were there a lot of students that owned cars at the time? I know very few. That's

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another funny thing. We had one member of Maserati, her name was Wallace and her parents, her father owned a big franchise store downtown and she had this huge enormous Buick touring car it was called. Oh but it would run and she was just about this towel

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and she just barely concealed staying here. Then we had another young woman whose father was a doctor and he bought her a new Packard nearly everybody every other year and if we wanted to go someplace to make arrangements for a party and wanted to get it

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as cheaply as possible we'd all pile in this old touring car and go and we didn't have the money which we didn't really because it was during the depression. Depression have a big impact on the campus. Oh yes yes. Now for instance I'm a cruise right

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now. Uh she, she'll tell you that because of the depression when she finished school she had to go to work and that's why she's back in school now she went back, she went back when she, after she retired she was Irma Russell and she married a

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man named Clyde Cruise and they were all in my graduating high school class in high school, she was telling me something about that he was jewish or something. Yes he was jewish and at that time the Que Klux Klan was very active in Birmingham you've heard

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of Hugo black Supreme Court test, he was a member of it everybody. Is it ever expected to win any contest in the election politically or anything else? Everybody would belong to the queue Klux Klan. So did my dad and most of them belong to the Masonic

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lives. Well uh we did not know it but we knew he disappeared all of a sudden he was there one day he was kind of the next. The name was banned man and they got a man named Noble Hendrix then in principle and so nobody ever

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told us why he left. So my senior class I was vice president in the class. A man named George Tarrant was president. So we voted at a class meeting that we wouldn't invite Mr Bannerman to come back for I graduated exercise to speak to us. Well

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the word got out, my dad had been upstairs to lodge meeting. He came home that night he said I hate to tell you but you gotta you gotta withdraw that invitation to Mr Bannerman. I said why? He said well that that they found out you were

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saying your father came out he said that uh they had reports and had proved found proof that this man was not ever permitting the new testament to be read in chapel period. We had not ever Even noticed such a thing and according to him the Que

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Klux Klan and the Masons gave him 24 hours to get out of town and that's why he had left so fast. So we had to un invite him as I speak. I had to write it was it was terrible. But I didn't know that Irma had

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told you that. That's exactly what I said. Something to ask you to find out what happened. They were getting the jewish students at Howard. Yes, yes. That's another thing. At that time, every person who got a degree had to have at least one year of bible.

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Do they still do that? Okay. And I had two years because I I enjoyed it so much. Dr Dawson was our teachers I told you, but he taught it purely as a history. He would not, we have several ministerial students in the class and once in

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a while they would try to get into interpretation of a certain passage. He said his answer to them was always was we'll discuss that in your in the ministerial class, but not in here. We're teaching it purely as a history and he wouldn't do anything but

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that therefore, since it was being taught as a history then it was not offensive to the jewish students. Well, we had I had one year of the old bible and one year of the news so they could take the old and be all right. But they

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were not required to take but nobody was required to take but one year. But I had both because I really enjoyed it. But he allowed no discussion of interpretation. It was purely as a history. How do they do it now, basically the same way. At least

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for old testament. I haven't had a new testament yet, but old testaments done about the same one. They don't get into interpretation or discussion of what this means. Well, he allowed none. That was dr Dawson. Absolutely nice. But anyway, did you have a problem with anti

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Semitism on campus? No, no, no, no, no, no. We surely did not uh know if there was any problem at all. I never heard of it. Were there jewish girls in the sororities and fraternities? Uh, surprise. I know. And then um hm. Never came up. It

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just never came up. How about now do they? They've had a big fuss this semester about black. The black girl went through sorority rush and didn't get a bed. Well, they should not have invited her if they didn't expect to. Somebody give her a bed. Did

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you invite for the party? Yes, yes, yes. They were. Nobody ever went to a rush party without an invitation that I knew of. They do it different now. You sign up for it and then you go, you go to the race parties, that's my understanding. But

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no, our race parties were held purely by invitation hmm. That would be interesting. And so there was never a problem. Now there was a greek girl whose father owned a big restaurant in town and they decided that they would not Russia even though we are all

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crazy about it. That's it. Only basket I ever saw. Oh the funniest thing must be something. Then one of our sorority Sisters was, oh, very well liked and her younger sister came in as a president and uh, she was blackballed and we asked choir, they said,

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well she smokes and they had heard that she had had a drink. So I was furious and I said within five years, all of you voted against, it will be smoking yourselves because I didn't smoke until years later and I went to a bridge party and

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they're the ones that were smoking cigarettes that had blackballed this young woman smoking and I went around and point them out and told them reminded them of it. But uh, it was a different society women not smoke on campus with no, uh, no way. Because when

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you look at the newspapers and all the, all the cigarette advertising, but no, they, no, they didn't know. And of course drinking out of the question, it was completely out of the question. I remember one time one of the young men that was, that I had

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finished school with and he was just a really close friend. I don't mean dating kind of friend, but just close friends and I had heard that he had a drink at a party and I got him out and lectured him. But good things have changed a

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lot now, you know, it's still not allowed on campus, but it's not that big a deal anymore. Junior, let me show you what I told you. It's not a lot of history basically. We just want ideas like you were finding you weren't what you said that

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y'all had had a win. Yes, we had a room in the main building and just outside the hall, this was where all the administrative offices were. And this dr Dawson, that was the president was real hall and his wife had died. He had a great big

00:31:26.950 - 00:31:45.660

dealing on monday and uh, he was nice to everybody and he booked the girls dormitory and just fill that car full of those young girls, take them to move in out to dinner and things like that, including his daughter and here they go. So everybody loved

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him. It was a lot of fun. And just outside our sorority room in the hallway with the water family. Well sometimes you would turn it on and just about this high and sometimes you shoot all the way to the ceiling just above it was the picture

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of the first president I was in college and I've forgotten whether it was howard carter was the first president anyway when it was first started down and marrying. But anyway, I went out there one day to get a drink water and I turned it on and

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get shot all the way up. Oh that picture and somebody behind me said well you sure made a methodist out of him. I turned around and it was dr Preston the college. You scared me to death. But he thought it was hilarious. He was real popular

00:32:32.050 - 00:32:55.210

with students. Oh yes, very a very human person. And uh they all were and Professor Eagles was the vice president was the little guy and he also was very popular in Burns Wise but he was strict with us. All he wanted to do was study and

00:32:55.210 - 00:33:18.120

then Professor Bohannon was had uh psychology department or philosophy of psychiatry. I've forgotten what they called it. But he loved to hypnotize people and he chased me all that main building one time up and down steps trying to hypnotize me. No, no but one of the

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funniest things he ever did, we had a ministerial student that was one of these good pretty good tight you know everything was so simple. He went around you know and he told that he couldn't hypnotize him so can send him up in front of the room

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And he said two or 3 things he told the man he said now said uh you're getting sleepy and it's time to go to bed so it's time to undress. So he unbuttons his shirt and at that time they didn't have zippers on their pants, they

00:33:54.050 - 00:34:18.790

had buttons but he started to unbutton his pants and this is, he got about halfway. The ball snapped him out of it. I guess that was the into his question. If that happened, he would say things were different than anybody. You said something earlier about when

00:34:18.790 - 00:34:42.780

your chest was stolen by moving. The chest wasn't some things out of the chest was stolen. There was a pen stolen was in a pen. Okay. I was wondering, I thought it was another sorority. You'll have a lot of competition between the authorities. Um, yes, we

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did in a certain way at that time, the 80 pies always won the trophies for athletics by muse always won trophies for a scholarship. That was just natural. So by the time I told you I went back out there during the war to speak to the

00:35:02.890 - 00:35:24.880

student body. I went to the family house and to have these trophies on my mouth and I said, where's the scholarship cup? They said, oh, a deep. I always Wednesday. I said no, who would have thought that they had switched completely. The families were very studious

00:35:25.440 - 00:35:56.960

and the 85s were having fun and, and they had to switch sides converted. So I guess year after year they do, huh? Is now still are considered the intellectual or the, they still get the top grades always do real well at step sing and what steps

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saying it's a big musical production competition that we do in the winter and I think they want women's intramural football this year. Well now it was when I was in school, it was right. The other way the £80 are the ones that did things like that.

00:36:13.030 - 00:36:34.230

And we studied And all the boys hung out around 85 rooms when they needed help in school. They came to, y'all. Well, I don't know whether it was help or not, but anyway, Uh, so the type people characteristics just completely changed. But now during World War

00:36:34.230 - 00:37:00.420

II, 80 lb, we're getting a scholarship cup every year. Things change a lot. They surely do. Um, did you have a lot of physical education courses when you were, the, uh, the gymnasium was built was being completed when I finished school. We didn't have a gymnasium

00:37:00.430 - 00:37:22.360

and behind the main building, which would be south of New South. Now, whether it's now a nursing home was where the football field was. And about two or three of the fraternity houses were around the football field. But any kind of, even, even the young men

00:37:22.360 - 00:37:46.350

did not have any classes and physical education. None whatsoever. Well, we had no facilities for it. But after they built the gymnasium, I'm sure from then on they did, but they didn't while I was there. Yeah, they ended up making it mandatory later. I believe there's

00:37:47.300 - 00:38:09.480

Miss Kate, I believe who came in. Women's gym teacher. Well, it was not even mandatory for the men then. So you just had your plastic classes? Mm hmm. How many classes did you usually take time? Usually four. Uh, maybe one that had just very few points

00:38:09.480 - 00:38:27.610

to it. But the last year I think I had seven. How did you manage to juggle all that? I just did. But the depression was on and I knew if I didn't finish that summer, I'd never get enough money to go back. So I had to

00:38:27.620 - 00:38:49.330

do it to get your education to get my degree. Did a lot of people graduate with, you know, I believe 63 was that summer in May? I don't know how many, there's one here for the May, 1930 class, hard colors, 1929 stunt night. What was done

00:38:49.330 - 00:39:11.070

at night? I don't think I've ever heard anything about it. Well, uh, different groups would performed different stunts and 1930. Now here are the graduates in 1930. See now these are the ones that when I finished in August and they're the ones, I don't know how

00:39:11.070 - 00:39:30.630

many on that in this in May of 1930. So you had a good many graduate at the end of the summer? Yeah, I believe that article said 63. Did you just have three times a year? You know, we had to, well, the course in the summer

00:39:30.630 - 00:39:53.020

was very abbreviated. I think it was six weeks. Could have been nine weeks because, yeah, I guess it was nine weeks, but we had 4.5 months in each summer. It was called semesters we had two semesters during the regular turn and I guess the summer was

00:39:53.030 - 00:40:09.290

nine weeks. I've forgotten. You have a large percentage of the students going in the summer. Well we had to those who are trying to graduate early and those who flocked, we go back in the summer and take classes over. And then we had a lot of

00:40:09.300 - 00:40:29.270

teachers at that time. A lot of certificates were given to people who did, did not for teaching, who did not have a college degree. So every summer they come back and go to summer school working towards a degree. So we have three groups, those, those were

00:40:29.270 - 00:40:47.190

making up trying to graduate early and teachers, I guess it's about the same now. Yeah, I have a lot of teachers that come in, they have to continue their education remain certified or something to that effect. What type of parties and things your parties seem to

00:40:47.200 - 00:41:13.320

be a lot different than? Uh, Do you? Yes, you would remember. Remember Hollywood country Club. Okay. Uh that's what it was brand new then. Beautiful at that time. Most of the sorority and fraternity parties were held at Hollywood country Club and it was a beautiful place.

00:41:13.330 - 00:41:32.730

Some fraternity had a party there one time and the management said that everything that could be moved was gone when everybody laughed that night and that is ashtrays and small lamps and this and that and the other how they got out with them, I'll never know.

00:41:32.740 - 00:41:53.180

But anyway the next time we had a party there, the everything, the lamps were bolted down somewhere to the tables and nothing little was around when anybody can pick it up. But it was a beautiful place, it really was and it hurt me to know that

00:41:53.180 - 00:42:14.510

it was torn down because it had been a special place for us. And then the old thomas Jefferson Hotel uh their ballroom is the most gorgeous thing you've ever seen in your life then on second and 17 or 18 and we had parties there in the

00:42:14.520 - 00:42:36.080

ballroom and uh Acosta and Head have bought it and they say they're going to redo it And but I asked them about the ballroom and the way it was made because it is a gorgeous place and they said they're gonna redo it just like it was

00:42:36.090 - 00:42:59.930

so if they ever do you need to see it because you won't believe such a pretty place. Yeah that that is and uh one up on 5th Avenue. Mhm. Not the bank, the bank head now is the old people's home and this one up on 5th

00:42:59.930 - 00:43:21.760

Avenue, I can't remember what the name of it is. Uh those were all here then, but oh another thing we did. We of course nobody had money but if you have very much money and there were a lot of shows in town plays Some of the

00:43:21.770 - 00:43:37.490

off broadway people came in place. They don't do that anymore. But they did then. And for a dime you could get in what they call the peanut gallery. So after school we all go downtown and pay our dime, ride a streetcar and go downtown. Pay a

00:43:37.490 - 00:43:59.350

dime and sit up in this high gallery and buy a package of package of peanuts for a nickel. Get in for a dime, eat our peanuts and throw them down on the people down below. So I guess that's why we call the peanut gallery. So we

00:43:59.350 - 00:44:14.880

had a lot of fun. I'm sure it's quite different from college life. Did you go to the theater a lot? Well yes, when you had a date that were, there weren't any other places to go. We go to the theater. Sometimes we go out to dinner,

00:44:14.880 - 00:44:44.640

then we go to the theater and then over on, oh and behind Avondale Park on Gi forgotten maybe that street, there was an ice cream uh, establishment. And they had these old fashioned wire chairs and round tables and that's where everybody went after the movie delicious

00:44:44.640 - 00:45:03.580

ice cream. So there wasn't anything else to do. That's what we did was a spiritual life on the campus. Real strong. I mean, was it really emphasized that you were at a christian school? Yes, it was now the Y. M. C. A and W C. A.

00:45:03.590 - 00:45:31.740

Put out these every year. Was that the campus campus organization? It was the campus. Did you have mandatory church? No, no we had no for those, those in the may have, I don't know. But those who live off campus didn't, but we did have fresh laid.

00:45:33.520 - 00:45:54.810

We had mandatory auditorium attendance and uh, but we'd make the freshmen sit in our seats if we didn't want to go and then they could be counted absence. And I did that one time. Much to my, sorry. If I had known he was gonna be there,

00:45:54.810 - 00:46:10.600

I would not have done it. It's George carver, this black man, you know, that did so many things with the peanut. He was the speaker and I missed it. Was that just for the freshman? No, it was for the whole whole group. Everybody was supposed to

00:46:10.610 - 00:46:32.040

go to, everybody was assigned a seat and they went around and checked the empty seats to find out who was not there. And that way they knew was there a big emphasis put on, you know, church and religion and that or was it kind of left

00:46:32.040 - 00:46:47.950

to the students? It was left to the students. I don't remember anybody putting emphasis on it. I'm sure they did perhaps in ministerial classes. But in the other places they didn't. You said you were a history major. What were your history courses like? I mean, did

00:46:47.950 - 00:47:08.510

you have, was there a wide spectrum of, there must have been because when I got through I had six years of history instead of four. I just loaded up on history because I loved it so much. Uh well we had ancient history. We had american history.

00:47:08.510 - 00:47:27.870

We had english history, we had world history. We had all kinds of histories show based on english history. That was a lot. Especially when we have, we've had several on Queen Elizabeth and I always get that book out and go to the period that the novel

00:47:27.880 - 00:47:49.210

or the television show is depicted and go back and get the background to find out. You know, just what, who was who and what was happening about that time. Um, years at Sanford or and howard rather prepared you for the outside. Were you kind of insulated

00:47:49.210 - 00:48:11.910

there? No, we were not insulated. Uh, it was supposed to prepare me to teach school courses are, but when I started teaching school, what they had learned in those books other than how to give a test didn't help too much. You know, you have to use

00:48:11.910 - 00:48:40.720

common sense when you teach school. Yes. Well it is now, especially at that time. It was not all that much. Yes. Most of them did. Very few discipline problems now. I imagine you didn't have too many. Mm It wasn't that bad. No and Albert will doesn't

00:48:40.720 - 00:49:05.010

do, but they do here. What do you, have you been back to campus recently? No, I haven't, let's see. I guess that kind of like dinner Four or five years ago was the last time I was there then? They were honoring the class of 1930, oh,

00:49:05.020 - 00:49:28.050

so four years ago and I went to that. But I haven't been back to often. I'm still mad at them because they moved it. Yes. And uh, I resented, I still resented they, they said, oh, they didn't have room out there to expand. Well, that's not

00:49:28.060 - 00:49:48.130

true. There were a lot of old houses around there and they could have expanded all they wanted to right there. But, and I get letters all the time begging for money. And some of these wealthy people from over the mountain wanted it over in their section

00:49:48.430 - 00:50:06.540

and they got it over there. Still got it over there. As far as I'm concerned, they can keep it up. And I think I told you that one of my former students is on the board of trustees, John Pittman and I talked to John about this.

00:50:06.540 - 00:50:23.710

I said, John if somebody left me $100 million, don't come to me asking for a penny because you ain't gonna get it. They moved it. And I still resent the new campus. Seems a lot of people say it's missing a lot because you don't have the

00:50:23.710 - 00:50:41.730

spirit of community. We're kind of isolated and the town ignores you. Yeah. Well I hear they didn't know the whole community just belong to howard college and everybody cooperated and the spirit was great. Did the people in the town or in east like get caught up

00:50:41.730 - 00:51:03.770

in the southern and Howard route. I don't know of anybody but the students who get in the head shaving, but I have a hunch that have been willing to gotten in there and helped. Did were they still having the big parade downtown? Uh, the after the

00:51:03.770 - 00:51:27.110

game, whoever won would go downtown and just really march around. Well, what was it called? It? It's from 1920s on second and down 20 and then back on third and back up 19. It was called something and I've forgotten what they called it. But that's where

00:51:27.110 - 00:51:49.820

we paraded and there was no time limit on parking. You go down there and park and everybody would celebrate that what you were talking about when you were telling about the floats and yeah, we have the parades in town authorities and no, we didn't. I don't

00:51:49.820 - 00:52:05.860

know. I know they do it album Alabama and auburn, but we didn't, if we did. I don't remember it, but we did a lot of different floats just for Howard and everybody worked on these floats. So it was just all still working. It was everybody did

00:52:05.860 - 00:52:23.500

the southern people. Did you parade with the southern people. You know, I don't remember whether they did or not, but I'll tell you something funny that did happen. That robbery was not the year that the young man got killed. It was the year before somebody went

00:52:23.500 - 00:52:48.560

out to Birmingham Southern and splashed orange or red paint or something all over the columns and all over their buildings out there. And so bunch of this work, one of the shows downtown and they had this uh, I guess it was a magician mind reader and

00:52:48.560 - 00:53:07.370

we asked him the question who paid Birmingham Southern's welding. Well he didn't give us a name, but he described a young man and so we didn't know who in the world it was, nobody even had any suspicion of who it was. And I was at one

00:53:07.370 - 00:53:24.910

of the attorney houses grouped around the store one day. And this young man that belonged to that fraternity can turn for the living and up the steps policeman right after they got him and took him out. Well, I don't know how they found out that he

00:53:24.910 - 00:53:41.660

was the one that painted the building, but the description fit that the mind reader had given us and he was the son of the past of the pastor. Goes back to Avondale baptist church. This other man was not the pastor, but this boy's father was named

00:53:43.510 - 00:54:01.660

and he's the one that painting, did the police, do you get in trouble for it? He got expelled from school and later he became a minister himself. That was a surprising thing. He was expelled but he went back to school I think the next year and

00:54:01.660 - 00:54:18.720

then went on to ministerial school, the seminary and became a minister. Did you never have any problems like you were telling me earlier about how y'all stole the mascot know that these young men stole a mascot? I didn't I would have been afraid to. Was there

00:54:18.730 - 00:54:37.460

any did they turn it back over to? Yes. Yes. But they didn't do it till after the game, you see they paraded the team, would parade the mascot as they do now so they couldn't parade their panther because Howard college had it. So after the game

00:54:37.460 - 00:54:45.750

they gave it back to them. Did they ever steal the bulldog? Know that bulldog was guarded day and night? It really was?