[The interview was conducted at the residence of Malcoma and James Washington. In parts of the tape, James E. Washington, Malcoma's husband, also is brought into the conversation. The tape begins with a reading of the Statement of Purpose. This takes slightly over two minutes of tape tine. The transcript below takes up after the reading. Ed.]
Interviewer: [We will start with] the biographical data sheet. Your place of birth?
M. Washington: Richmond, VA.
Interviewer: Do you have a street address?
M. Washington: Oh no. I was born at home, at First and Baker Streets.
Interviewer: That's great.
M. Washington: I was a twin. My mother went to the hospital several hours before I was born and was sent home saying it was not time. We thought differently, and we arrived [laughs].
Interviewer: Oh my gosh! And your date of birth?
M. Washington: [1931].
Interviewer: Your full name?
M. Washington: Malcoma Lee Washington.
Interviewer: Your father's occupation?
M. Washington: Even though he's deceased?
Interviewer: Yes.
M. Washington: He was a pipe layer.
Interviewer: Your mother's occupation?
M. Washington: Housewife.
Interviewer: How many sisters and brothers?
M. Washington: There were three boys and seven girls.
Interviewer: Is that including you?
M. Washington: Yes.
Interviewer: Did you go to kindergarten?
M. Washington: Yes. It wasn't called kindergarten, it was called "junior primary grades," and that was a period of two years. ...... your second year, and at the third year, you entered the 2nd Grade.
Interviewer: That's different.
M. Washington: Yes, it is.
Interviewer: Okay. That's good.
M. Washington: That puts you an extra year back.
Interviewer: Did you start when you were five? Do you remember?
M. Washington: No, I did not start at five, I started when I was six.
Interviewer: So, it was a year because you would normally start 1st Grade?
M. Washington: I meant that according to the other states (there are other surrounding states which started with the 1st Grade), they did not have the junior primary grades. So, if a child was going to school for three years, that child would be in the 3rd Grade. And if we went for three years, we'd be in the 2nd Grade. So, it didn't matter what age you were when you started, you were following a year behind with the other states. I think that continued up until when I left here in 1960 and moved to North Carolina. We still had junior primary grades, and North Carolina was still .....
Interviever: Was that at the same elementary school where you went to elementary, like 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th?
M. Washington: Yes. To Baker [Elementary] School.
Interviewer: A junior high or a middle school? I'm sure there was junior high.
M. Washington: Yes. It was junior high, Booker T. Washington [Junior High School] in Richmond.
Interviewer: A high school?
M. Washington: Armstrong.
Interviewer: College or university?
M. Washington: Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, for three years. Later, MCV [Medical College of Virginia], in the School of Radiology. At Fisk University, I was in pre-med. There was a time lapse between that. I was married and divorced. We thought my life was back in school [laughs].
Interviewer: Was there a degree from MCV?
M. Washington: No, at that time they did not give degrees. It was a radiological program and you received a certificate.
Interviewer: Your occupation?
M. Washington: I'm a retired radiological supervisor.
Interviewer: I think they want your different jobs while you were working. You were a radiological supervisor?
M. Washington: I finished MCV and I moved to North Carolina because I could not obtain a job here in the city. I worked as a routine technologist there in a small black hospital that only had one technologist before I arrived. We were trained to do laboratory work routine, like typing and cross-matching[?] blood. So, I worked in the lab as well as in X-ray in the medical lab. I stayed there for three years and I came back here as a room tech[nologist] in urology at MCV. I remained at MCV and progressed from a room tech to a wing supervisor, from a wing supervisor to the Saturday morning division supervisor to a full division supervisor, to supervisor of the largest radiological division they had, and finally, coordinator of all five divisions of radiology when it came together in the new building.
Interviewer: Amazing. So what year did you start at mcv, do you think it was 1960?
M. Washington: No, I started training there in 1959, left in 1960, came back in 1963, and remained there until July 1 of this year [1992].
Interviewer: Your husband's occupation?
M. Washington: He's an accountant.
Interviewer: How long has he been an accountant?
M. Washington: [To her husband in the next room:] Jimmy, how long have you been an accountant?
J. Washington: 43 years.
Interviewer: Your religious affiliation?
M. Washington: Baptist--a foot washing, shouting Baptist [laughs].
Interviewer: Children?
M. Washington: Two sons.
Interviewer: Grand-children?
M. Washington: Five. Four grand-daughters, one grand-son.
Interviewer: They reside at?
M. Washington: Do your want their names or just their place of residence?
Interviewer: Just their place of residence.
M. Washington: Chesterfield, VA, and Highland Springs, VA.
Interviewer: They've been living there for a while?
M. Washington: [My] Highland Springs son moved back to this area five years ago, and [the one in] Chesterfield has been there approximately eight or nine years.
Interviewer: We're finished with the biographical sheet. Now we're ready for some questions.... First, I'm going to ask you about your early experiences in school, and then we'll move on to middle school and high school, and then we'll talk about your university experiences, and then we'll go on to sort of a different track, which will be community leadership [and] community relations during segregation and desegregation.
M. Washington: All right. My educational experiences [in] total? Is that what you want? Is that what we're saying?
Interviewer: First of all, how were your neighborhood institutions, such as church, important to you as a child?
M. Washington: Because that was a part of the family link. It simply carried over. Family life in black neighborhoods, you didn't have an active social life, and that's why you see most black people dress up to go to church now, because that was our place for socializing. I guess back from plantation time we put on our very finest and we strutted on Sunday mornings. Family life centered around church, around families. That was a part of the continuity of growing up. There was the neighborhood church, and you knew everybody in the church, and everybody in the church knew your family. The church that I used to go to, my mother joined Richmond when she moved here at 19 years old. in that neighborhood, about two blocks to the north, there was another church; two blocks to the south, there was another church. Black communities are full of churches, and you didn't just receive religious instructions. Religion is caring. So they taught you to care in the church and in the family as well. But come Sunday morning, no matter what you had done all the week or how tired you were, you got bathed and dressed and went to church. You were given your nickel or dime to put in that church and that's where it went, except on the rare occasion when it was saved to buy a sour pickle after church, 'till your mother found out about it [laughs]. I think I was 11 years old when I was converted, or received Christ as the elders [did], of which I am now one. As the elders used to say, I must be baptized. I remember that as one of the most traumatic experiences of my life. You want to hear about it? Because I was the first person in line to be baptized. Now, when I was' growing up, children didn't ask a lot of questions, and we were very intelligent in books, [but] whether we had other "gray matter" working for us, I don't know, because we didn't voice or question it. When I stepped out first in line to be baptized, I saw the minister standing below me in this pool of water. It never occurred to me that-I may have to go down steps, or how I was to get to him. He stretched out his hand and I stepped of f of that platform, and I went down into that pool like a big ... whale with that white robe bellowing over my head, you know. I yelled, "Save me, help me, save me", and the elder people in the church started clapping and singing, "Down By the River Jordan, We Shall Gather." About the time I thought, he brought me out of the water, "Thank God, I'm saved!" He clamped his hand over my mouth, and he threw me back down there again. I said, "oh, Lord, have mercy!" and I just carried on terrible! Well, when church was over and my mother got me dressed, she took me out of that church and she yanked me all the way home, because she said, "You have nothing, with all that yelling and screaming 'Save me, Help me!"' I tried to explain to her I wanted to be saved and I needed to be helped [laughs]. I thought I. was drowning, and I can't swim [laughs]. It took a long time for me to talk to her. In fact, I talked to her all that evening. My uncle, who was my dearest relative and the greatest friend I have ever had in my life, had come in from West Virginia to be with me for that baptismal ceremony. He was from the mountains from West Virginia. While I was down there floundering, you could hear him with that mountain laugh just going all over the church, which infuriated my mother more. I was allowed to go back and take Right Hand Fellowship and after that, I participated regularly in the church. I was even put in the choir because I had this heavy voice. It was said that I should sing alto, but I could not carry a tune in a bucket. When I got tired of working my mouth with no words coming out, I began to converse with my little girlfriend. Shortly thereafter, I was relieved of my choir duties. But still today, my mother... [laughs]. The only other interesting thing I remember about church is that I loved Sunday school lessons. I didn't care about the evening service. The first time we took communion, my bother was 18 months older than I was, we knew that you had some bread, and we knew we were going to get to taste that wine (we did not know that you didn't eat the whole roll). My brother proceeded to go through that entire roll. of course, all the people in the church would tell your parents, you know, and mother was really embarrassed about that. Of course, we had a lot of activities going on in the church. There were the Queen of Mays, with the little weddings. There was something always going on. Every mother in that neighborhood had a child in there that was a butterfly, an angel, or a goddess of peace. Your mother made your costumes, and these were beautiful costumes, and not crepe paper costumes. My mother made costumes out of sheets that she had to dye because she didn't have the money to go down town and buy colored material. I think school, church, family and home was one continuity. That's something I don't think we have here today.
Interviewer: I'd like to ask you about your playmates when you were young, and did you have any of a different race, or were you mostly... ?
M. Washington: No. The neighborhoods were all black or all white. The only Caucasians in our neighborhood belonged to a little soda store. We called it a soda store where they sold milk-shakes and sodas. Their children lived in the neighborhood and played with us until they reached the age of high school. Then, they were no longer permitted to be the little black children's friends. They didn't come down to that neighborhood to that store anymore. When they saw you, they did not see you. So, they [her friends] were all black children 90 percent poor, which we did not realize. At least, I did not realize it until I read about it in the paper. That's the truth. I tell my sons that I had no idea how poor I was, because I had as much as everybody else, if not, more. I knew I was one of the best dressed because my mother sewed for me.
Interviewer: What influence did your family, your parents or your brothers and sisters, have on your outlook of school?
M. Washington: What influenced them about what?
Interviewer: What influence did your family have on your outlook on school?
M. Washington: I knew that when I went to that school, I knew exactly what was expected of me behavior-wise and educational-wise. When the rules were laid down and the values stated to you, you did not deviate from these patterns. There was never any doubt in my mind as to what my grade was going to be when I came home. I knew I was going to have straight "A's". I used to listen to little children say, "I don't know what I'm going to get. I don't know whether I can take my card home." But I never had that doubt, because my mother sat at the kitchen table with us, and she read with us pointedly. We'd read a word here, skip over to another word, back to that word, until she was sure we knew every word on that page individually. Then, we could get to the composition of the page and read it. After that, we had to give her the understanding. My mother, as I said, had 10 children of which only five children survived; this meant that we were continuously in a pattern of adding to the family. My mother did not work outside of the family until I was in my late teens. That's what mothers did. They took care of the family in every direction. There was never any question about whether your mother was going to be home to help you or whether she was going to be there when you got out of school, because that's where she was going to be. She would be waiting.
Interviewer: So they had high expectations?
M. Washington: Yes. I think when someone expects a great deal from you, encourages and assists you in that direction, I don't think you have any other direction to go. But if they simply expect that of you, and offer you nothing else, then I think you have a lot of places in which you can flounder.
Interviewer: Do you remember your first day at school?
M. Washington: Yes, because during my first two weeks at school I came home ever day [laughs].
Interviewer: You came home very early?
M. Washington: I left school [laughs]. I came home everyday for two weeks because there was a little girl in my room named Joanie. The teacher knew Joanie and her parents. When recess time came, she said, "Alright Joanie, let's get ready for recess." But she never said anything to Malcoma. Well, there were probably 25 other children she didn't say anything to either, but I resented that and I stayed there. The teacher and class went outside thinking I would follow. Well, I got up and went home, my mother would turn me around and send me back. In the meantime, the teacher had contacted my brother's teacher because everybody knew everybody's child, you see. So mother would send me back to school while he was on his way looking for me going in another direction. Finally, after two weeks, I've never had a spanking in my life, but after two weeks, my mother sat me down and explained to me what it would be like if I came home again [laughs]. I stopped coming home every day. Yes, I remember--very well [laughs].
Interviewer: Regarding your teachers, how did you feel about them and what did you receive from them?
M. Washington: I have tremendous amount of respect for those teachers and the things that they taught us. Some of my teachers are still alive from those grades. It wasn't just what they taught me about school. It was what they incorporated in my every day learning in that school. They had time for every individual child. My mother would be on the front porch when school let out. The teachers stopped by as they came out of school, teachers that had taught this child or that child, and they conversed with your mother. The principal also stopped by, I only know of two teachers that had cars when I was in school, so they walked and they stopped by. There were two teachers I was fond of (and I guess the affection was returned), that I used to spend weekends with. They would say, "Malcoma, spend the weekend with me," and mother would let me go. They were both either divorced or widowed, I don't recall. In the summers, sometimes I could spend a week with them. So, I have a great deal of respect and affection for those teachers and for the time that they took. I don't know what exactly is going on now, whether the classroom is so much larger, whether they are so bogged down with paper work, but these teachers had that extra time and they gave it freely without it being asked. I'll tell you something, I had a little sister who died with leukemia when she was six years old. Almost that entire school and the principal turned out. The little boys in my class and my brother's class were honorary pall bearers. Little children sang solos. It was just truly amazing, and they walked from that school to the church because, as I said, they didn't have cars. That school was almost vacated that day. Nobody thought anything of it, you know. It was like, this is family, part of the school family. So, when there's death in the family, you go. That's the way it was. I don't think you can do that now.
Interviewer: Did you have both black and white teachers?
M. Washington: No.
Interviewer: How would you... ?
M. Washington: No. Or principals?
Interviewer: Yes.
M. Washington: I can't remember the name of the first principal that I encountered at Baker School. Shortly thereafter came the first black principal that I had ever known anything about in the City of Richmond. Her name was Catherine Johnson. I'll nevdr forget her because we were just overjoyed to have her there. She was a kind, spirited person. She voiced her opinion quite loudly and not only to you as an individual student, but to your parents as she passed by on the way home.
Interviewer: Was she involved in the community?
M. Washington: Yes.
Interviewer: Politically involved?
M. Washington: Well, I don't know about her politics, because I can't remember back that far. I don't even know if I knew what politics was. I would say that she was involved in the school, the PTA, the churches, and intermingled with the various families of the children she taught. I don't even know if.... Jimmy, wasn't Bushy at Booker T.?
J. Washington: The principal?
M. Washington: Yes. He was white.
J. Washington: Clyde Busby.
M. Washington: And who was at Armstrong?
J. Washington: W.W. Townsend.
M. Washington: Those two. Mr. Booker, a black principal, took Mr. Busby's place at Booker T. before I left, and Mr. Peterson, a black principal, took Townsend's place at Armstrong before I left.
Interviewer: Okay. How do you compare your circumstances at home and at school with other children when you attended school? I think you talked about it a little bit.
M. Washington: Well, I would say that in home-life we were all instructed, I think, in about the same manner. You see, you weren't permitted to be friends with people who did not receive the same instruction and who did not act the same way as you did. Oh, yes, your mother knew with whom you could be friends with and with whom you could not. Now, what did you say again?
Interviewer: That's pretty much how you would compare... ?
M. Washington: Oh, and as far as finance, we were all poor. I recall when my father made $13.00 a week and when that job gave out -- I think it was the W.P.A. [during the Depression] -- the men stood at the corner every morning, and people for whom my father was a construction worker, he was a pipe layer, these people came by in trucks from different companies to see if there was someone there who could do a specific job that they wanted them to do. But financially, we had little, but we [also] had a great deal. No matter how little money there was, if you came to our house, there was always this great big huge pot, maybe a five quart pot, of cocoa on the stove for children to have hot cocoa. My mother made all the hot doughnuts and things of that nature. If there was a pot of beans, there was enough beans there for any child or adult that came into that house to sit down at that table and have a piece of cornbread and a bowl of beans. That's just the way it was. We were all, more or less, on an equal level. There were several of our friends and schoolmates that had a bit more than we did, but you would never know it when you met them.
Interviewer: How do you feel about your education in comparison to youngsters in the other schools in Richmond?
M. Washington: At that particular time?
Interviewer: In early education.
M. Washington: I did not know anything about other youngsters and the type of education they received, except the black youngsters in the black community, we had no contact with them. There were no discussions at that time about any other type of education. The only thing discussed was what you would do with the education that was being handed to you here.
Interviewer: What about today, if you were to compare it?
M. Washington: Frankly speaking, as I said, I think there is a great deal lost in the continuity of teaching family, church and neighborhood. It's not just one missing link. There are a lot of links that are totally out of joint. I really feel sorry for the children, because I think that I had a wealth that they will never know. I don't even know if there is enough interest in the group of teachers and educators, in general, to give it to them. I don't know what it would take to get this back. You don't want to return to the level of education they had, but the level at which it was given to them, and the insight that was given to them, I think there is a great deal missing. one of my sons was a junior at Armstrong [High School]. He was so looking forward to graduating from Armstrong because his mother graduated from Armstrong and his father graduated from Armstrong. in his junior year, they transferred him to T.J. [Thomas Jefferson High school, formerly all-white]. He was so hurt, deeply hurt, because this was something he looked forward to. He supported his class with class dues financially, and things of that nature, but he did not march with his class and did not take a picture in the cap and gown from T.J. Instead, he bought himself a dashiki and grew a three-inch bush, went downtown, he didn't buy the dashiki, a friend of mine from Nigeria gave it to him, and had a picture made in that and he presented it to me. This was his way of totally rejecting what they had done to him because he really felt that they had taken something from him. Black families didn't have that much, but they had torn a part of his heritage, part of his tradition in the family, away from him. He was my first child to go to school, and I resented it, too.
Interviewer: Lot me ask you some more about your experiences. We can move on to your junior high, to Booker T. [Washington Junior High School]. How was this level different from elementary school? It"s pretty obvious, but can you differentiate it from high school and elementary school?
M. Washington: I suppose the only vast difference would be that when you reached the junior high school level, you had to begin thinking more independently. You did not have that teacher's shoulder to lean upon at all times. The closeness that you had in elementary school with your teachers was not as great in junior high school.
M. Washington: They did not have it either. You see, the lith grade was the highest level in high school. All of this did not start until the 12th Grade. I finished school in February, 1949. This [twelfth grade] started in September, 1949. We didn't have gymnastics either. We stood outside our seats, jumped up and down, clapped our little hands, touched our toes, and knocked over a few seats [laughs].
Interviewer: Would you like to contrast your experience of going to college at Fisk and MCV?
M. Washington: Oh, yes. There is nothing but contrast between Fisk and MCV [laughs]. I suppose I started off with a negative experience at MCV, and I probably ended with a negative experience at MCV as far as schooling is concerned. When I applied for school at MCV, I had been out of school for 10 years, married and divorced. I applied for radiology. I wanted to go into nursing, but it required you to stay in the dormitory overnight for one year. I did not want anyone to have my two children full time for a year, not even my mother. Nobody was to have those boys but me. So I decided to go into radiology. I went down there for my interview and everything, and the chairman of that department said to me, "Have you ever thought about being anything else?" I said, "Yes, I've thought about being many things other than this. In fact, this is the last thing I thought about. " He said, "Well, have you ever thought about being a cook or a waitress?" I said, "No, I don't enjoy cooking, so I wouldn't think about being a chef, if that's what you're saying to me. No, I'm not going to be a waitress unless it is to earn money to come here." He just kind of shook his head like that and got up and left me. His secretary said to me after he left, "You understand you have two small children." I had a child that had just started school, and a child eight months old. I said, "Yes." She said, "You'll never make it." I said, "Well, we're going to see." She said, "It's hard down here. You have to work 24 hours at a time." I said, "I know. I'd found out all of that before I applied, you know." I went on home and I got my letter of acceptance. I was the only black person in my class. in my anatomy class, there was a skeleton at the front of the room. We had to do clinical practicum, and class work at the same time, all in one day--half class, half clinical practicum. There was this skeleton there, and my instructor said, "The only way you will learn all the bones in the skeleton is to come up here when I call you and work with it. You must not be embarrassed if you make a mistake, but you must come to the front of the room and work with it." Well, he taught me anatomy and physiology. He never called on me, my whole time in there. I raised my little hand until I thought it would just drop off, and he never called on me. So I went down town and I searched all the stores and finally found a little skeleton about so high that I could disjoint. I took that home with a magnifying glass and learned that skeleton. The lowest grade I made the whole time I was there was 95. But he never called on me. When the first test came back, I think I made a 98. He said to me, "Have you been to college?" I said, "Yes." "Oh, that accounts for it. You left college and came here." I said, "After 10 years I did that," (because I had been out of college for 10 years). Maybe it wasn't that difficult for me to learn because I'd had some pre-med, but knowing where I was and what I was going through, I intended to be on top. You just have to make up your mind that "I am going to be on top of this thing." Finally, when the final grade came, he never called on me for any class, nothing he said, "I'll go over all your papers as you bring them up here. If you have something wrong, I will tell you which question to look over. You go back and re-evaluate your answer, and you will be given 10 points." He pointed this question. I looked at it and I said, "I don't see anything wrong with this question. I know.that answer is right." In the meantime, I had to go home to an eight-month-old baby, and a son that had to be at school at 9 o'clock in the morning. I came home at 12 when the baby took his 12 o'clock nap, and got up at 4 and fed them dinner. I'd go to bed around midnight and get up again at 2 and study some more. I said, "No, this answer is right and I know it's right." So, I left it like it was and passed the paper on back to him and made 100. You see, he was priming me to lose 10 points on it. When I finished radiology down there, you know when you're good and when you not good. I knew that I was good. The chairman of the department (the same one that came and asked me about trying some other field), he said to me--we didn't have graduation exercises; they gave you a little certificate in your room while you were taking care of the patients--he shook my hand and said, because I had done a lot of work with him during the last three months, "You know, you're excellent, excellent. It's just a damn shame, damn shame." I said, "Damn shame what, Doctor. He said, "Damn shame you're black! Damn shame you're black!" He hired everybody in that class, except me! You see, I never forget these things [laughs]. We had a girl in there, the simplest thing you could ever take was an elbow and a chest, and during her final exam on the chest, she had it aimed against the wall with the patient standing here, she couldn't understand why she kept getting blank films. He got a job for her, and when I left there, I said, "I'm going to come back here, and I'm going to run this division, okay?" I left and I went to North Carolina. They wrote me and asked me if I wanted a job hn the file room as a file room clerk in Radiology. I wrote them back and told them I wasn't trained as a file room clerk. I was trained as a radiographical technologist. Finally, after three years, they had five openings out there and I came back. They offered me one in urology with the Director of Urology who was extremely difficult, they said, to get along with. Nobody could work with him. I said, "I'll take urology." I went back there and the Chairman came in after a couple of days. He said, "I'm Dr. .., chairman of Urology." I said, "I'm Mrs. Johnson and Head of Radiological Urology." He looked at me, and I looked at him and he fell out laughing. He said, "I'll be damned. We have a spirited one here!" From that day on, he and I were like this. When my children were sick, he called his private pediatrician to take care of them. When his residents came over, he would tell me, "Take them in the dark room and teach them pathology on the films. " You know, if I had laid down and let him trot on me, he wouldn't have had any respect for me, but that was the type of person that he was. Anyway....
Interviewer: What year were you in college at MCV?
M. Washington: 1959-1960, and I came back in 1963 to work. There were some good people at MCV. There are still some good people there. There's going to be good and bad every place. That's just the way it was. Anyway, I did. I got what I wanted. I went from Room Tech to Wing Tech, to Saturday Morning Tech to Division Tech of the main division, and finally coordinated all five divisions as patient coordinator in my last few years. I'll tell you something, that was just the beginning of the experience. I felt that I fought every step of the way my entire employment at MCV until approximately, four to five years before I retired. I just made up my mind, I'm not going to fight anymore. I am so tired of fighting. if these people were standing right here, I would not bother them. I introduced my youngest son, he went with me to receive my 25 year pin, to the Head of Personnel and .... said, "Michael, you've met your mother on her first week on the job. She has been fighting ever since he has been here, but she has always had reason to fight." I finally just decided that I'd had enough. I went to a seminar and had to take a psych test and pass them in. They were graded. The instructor called my name and said, "Do you mind if I read your answers?" I said, "No." They were my answers and I didn't care who heard them, my Departmental Administrator was in this meeting at this particular time. The instructor said, "Every supervisor that has come through this seminar that was black has scored essentially the same thing in all the same areas." What it said to me was, you know, they had questions like, "Do you want to be a part of the group? Are you hurt when the group ignores you? Would you like for the group to invite you?", that if you had been ignored in certain aspects of your job for so long, you no longer wanted to be a part of them. Even if you were invited, you would never go with them, because you no longer had the feeling of being a part of the group. It also said that in your manner of supervising, you did not allow them to know, on a regular basis, what they expect from you. I said, "That's quite true. I no longer want to be a part of the various areas in this department or institute because of that reason." Now, I feel that the more people know about you, how you react and how you feel, the more capable they are of hurting you. Therefore, if there's a little fence put around you, it serves you better. So he said, "Well, I want you to tell me if segregation is dead here at MCV. I've been told that it is." I said, "Well, I'll tell you. If segregation is dead, his country cousin, Esquire Jim Crow, is threatening [and] preening for all he is worth." My administrator got up and walked out. He was embarrassed. He said to me later, "You embarrassed me in front of all those people." I said, "If you have not learned to appreciate a touch of honesty, then you should not go to those meetings." He said, "I am taking an Afro-American class at VCU." I said, "That won't help you. You'd need 20 years of black people-watching. Unfortunately, I don't have that time to give you. [Laughs]. So, we went on. I made some very good friends down there and I think when I left there I was very well thought of. They sent me off in high spirits. Yet, I will never go to a reunion, because I just don't think you can reunion' when you've never formed a "union." I miss a lot of people. I liked a lot of people, people in high places as well as people in low places. I had some excellent relationships there. It helped me when my son, he went to MCV-VCU, the oldest one who is an occupational Therapist, was in there. He just could not believe that in this day and age, you know.... It helped me to temper him and talk to him about things.
Interviewer: Was that your first experience? Was MCV your first experience in an integrated setting?
M. Washington: Yes. I also would tell you this, too. it wasn't just MCV. At MCV, you will find more of it because there are more people. When I finished MCV, I didn't want to leave town with these two little children because I didn't have an earning set aside. So I applied for Richmond Memorial, for they had two years. I thought I'd go there and get this second year, still stay with my parents and work part-time. They said they would let you, in your senior year, work part-time. I was accepted. I received a notice of the room to report to and the date to report. They called MCV during my last week down there and the secretary came and told me, "They did not know that you were black." Dr. Mandeville [?] asked them if they were aware that you were black. When they hung up, Richmond Memorial called me and told me that there had been an error, that the class was full. Several of my doctors wanted me to stay here and enter a suit against them, but I didn't have time for that. I had two sons that I needed to work for and raise.
Interviewer: What was Richmond Memorial? Was it a hospital?
M. Washington: It's a hospital here in Richmond.
Interviewer: In what year was that?
M. Washington: 1960. 1 didn't know whether to go out and get me a blond wig or just what I should do [laughs].
Interviewer: Let me move over to some questions about your ethnic, cultural or racial experiences in general. You said you had a class in your high school where you were taught black history. Was that the first or the only experience you had learning about black history?
M. Washington: Except for my mother. My great grand-mother was a freed slave. She had one of Paul Lawrence Dunbar's original books that the woman who owned her taught her to read out of. Consequently, my mother taught us about Paul Lawrence Dunbar and Sojourner Truth, and people of this nature. Those lessons were at home. We had in the neighborhood, of course, our black leaders. That was all we knew.
Interviewer: Local in Richmond?
M. Washington: Yes.
Interviewer: Do you remember formally learning about the black leaders in Richmond and in high school or was that all?
M. Washington: No. That was word-of-mouth throughout the community. That was not discussed in high school.
Interviewer: Who were some of the black leaders that you remember at that time?
M. Washington: There is Wiley Hall .... You mean in Richmond?
Interviewer: Yes, in Richmond.
M. Washington: Wiley Hall. He was a lawyer. There was Rev. Brown at Sixth Mount Zion Church. He was a minister. Let's see. Jimmy? [Mr. Washington comes in from the next room] Who were some of the black people we had in the neighborhood? We didn't have that many. Most of them were teachers and a few lawyers. I can't recall black doctors during that time.
J. Washington: You had Dr. Newman down on Second Street, Dr. Felix Brown on Leigh Street....
M. Washington: No, that was years later. I'm talking about when I was young.
J. Washington: Felix Brown used to live right next to Booker T. School.
M. Washington: I know where he lived, Jimmy. Okay, Felix right here, and I knew Dr. Newman. Most of them were ministers and school teachers.
Interviewer: Were they involved politically at all on the question of segregation? Maybe this would be when you were in high school or...
M. Washington: I don't recall any of it. I don't recall any activities of that nature. I really don't. As I said, at that time this was not something that was really wide open, you know. It may h`ve been discussed in closed settings or informally sometimes in your classroom or in your home.
Interviewer: Are you familiar with the term "white flight" or "black middle class flight"?
M. Washington: "White flight," yes.
Interviewer: In your opinion, what impact, if any, have these movements out of Richmond had on the city schools? What are your opinions now about how those [movements] affected city schools in Richmond?
M. Washington: Well, I don't know if we had not of had this.... In my mind, I wonder if the educational level of the city schools would have ever been raised to the educational level of the suburbs or the counties where the "white flight" occurred. Frankly speaking, I think we all need to learn about each other and know about each other. I also think that all schools should have been brought up to the same standard.
Interviewer: Do you remember when the Brown Decision was made in 1954? Do you remember talking about that or hearing about it, and have you thought about it?
M. Washington: What was the Brown Decision?
Interviewer: Ending school segregation. It was the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954.
M. Washington: No. I don't recall it. Jimmy, you want to tell them about it, what you remember? He has a computer mind [laughs].
J. Washington: That was the initial case brought before the Supreme Court by, I think at that time, Thurgood Marshall and some of the other people of the Legal Fund of the NAACP who argued the case. That's when the Supreme Court said that separate schools were not equal, and that segregation was illegal.
M. Washington: I remember the title but I couldn't remember exactly.... I don't even know if I was....
J. Washington: That was a test case, in other words, that went all the way to the Supreme Court.
M. Washington: I can't remember in 1955 where I was or what I was doing.
Interviewer: You had already graduated from high school?
M. Washington: Yes. I came out in 1949. Then I lived for some time in West Virginia, then I was in Nashville for some time, and then I lived for three years in Greensboro, North Carolina. I really don't think that if I hadn't had two children, I would have stayed any place too long.
Interviewer: There's another case, Bradley v. Richmond Public Schools, 1972. Robert Merhige, a judge in the Federal District Court here in Richmond, ordered Richmond, Henrico and Chesterfield to create one large school system. Do you remember that case and your community's reaction?
M. Washington: No, I just remember reading those. I can't really recall any details on that.
J. Washington: No, I don't remember that case either. It was argued, but it wasn't sanctioned by the court because we still had separate districts, Henrico, Chesterfield, and Richmond. I don't know what the outcome of that case was.
Interviewer: I think they had switched it over and they immediately switched it back. The Court of Appeals overturned Merhige's decision, and busing soon came to Richmond, schools and to the students. What do you think about busing, and how did affect you or your children, and what do you think about it now as opposed to then?
M. Washington: In the beginning it didn't affect me at all. As I said, it affected my first son when they pulled him out of the high school of his choice in his junior year. I didn't like it, I didn't think that the last year, certainly one year at this particular school, was going to increase his educational advantages or knowledge at all. I felt that he should have been left alone. I still feel that a child should have the right to go to whatever school he chooses in the neighborhood or out of the neighborhood as long as it is not crowded and there's room for him. All schools should be brought up to the same level. However, I do know that with the busing, black children were exposed to a great many things that they had never been exposed to before. Methods of teaching, better classrooms, just the atmosphere, in general, was better for them.
Interviewer: Can you describe that?
M. Washington: I didn't have any children in school at that time [laughs]. This is from what I have read.
Interviewer: From what you understand is fine.
M. Washington: Yes. Another thing, I just don't know about the little children who were being bused. Sometimes it took an hour and a half to get to school, and an hour and a half to come back. How tired they were when they arrived. At the end of the day, were they simply absorbing any more or were they were absorbing a great deal less than they would have if they had been allowed to remain in their neighborhood schools and the neighborhood schools upgraded to the level of the schools they were going to bus them to? I don't have any problem with busing on a black or white level. It's a matter of choice and education advantages, what's open to them.
Interviewer: In your opinion, who were the most important leaders during desegregation, the ones who most affected the way the matter was handled in Richmond? Looking back now, did those leaders have an impact on you and the Richmond schools?
M. Washington: Well, I was out of school. Who was it Jimmy?
J. Washington: I think the leaders at the time, for the most part, were lawyers....
M. Washington: And the teachers....
J. Washington: [Those] here in Richmond, who were working with the NAACP....
M. Washington: And ministers.
J. Washington: [Oliver] Hill, Tucker & Marsh's firm, Spotswood Robinson -- those were the people who were the leaders, and the teachers, and ministers who were working along with Martin Luther King and his movement. I think they were ... in Richmond ... integration movement here. who were influencing
M. Washington: ... Richmond in general.
Interviewer: We have one question left and I think you've pretty much answered it, but I'll ask you again just in case you feel you have more to say. Please feel free to say anything else. What do you think has been the most important effect of racial desegregation in Richmond schools?
M. Washington: I ... upgrading of the educational level, period. What I'm saying is at the upgrading of the various ... also at the same time ... to upgrade the ... teacher's education so that she can better present it to the class. I don't remember all of this going on prior to the desegregation. Also, the arts. We did not have a lot of arts presented to our children in the all-black schools. We had a limited amount. That was what the teachers formulated and what your mother could do. But there is more art participation now, taking the child out to the various Museums, to the various plays and things of that nature. So I guess all that plays a part.
Interviewer: Well, that sounds great. Is there anything else you'd like to say?
M. Washington: No, not really, except that, one more thing, I think that desegregation is still going on, although it is supposed to have ended. Desegregation brought out a lot of fighters. it brought forth more leaders and gave more role models for our children, people who had heretofore been quiet. I think that helped a great deal. I
[End of Transcript.]
Questions
Index of Oral History Transcripts - African-American Richmond:
Educational Segregation and Desegregation.
http://www.library.vcu.edu/jbc/speccoll/vbha/
school/washm.html
Last update 2/97 (rb)