In October 1948, I took a two-week bus trip through the South. Atlanta was to be my anchor stop. My friend John, who had attended the University of Iowa as a graduate student, was an instructor at Morehouse College and his wife was a music instructor at Spelman. After he received his degree, John was inducted into the Army. We corresponded during his stint at Fort MacDill. When I wrote I expected to be in Atlanta, John invited me to spend a weekend with them. He told me that when I arrived at the bus station to call him for instructions on how to get to Atlanta University. Having traveled during the week from New York City to stops in Richmond, Raleigh and Chapel Hill, it was good to get off the road. The day's ride was long as I watched workers going to and from work on a local run. It was well after dark when we pulled into Atlanta. John told me that when I arrived to call him and he would tell me how to get to their house. He explained that black cabbies couldn't risk picking up a young white woman for a black section. And no telling what would happen if I hailed a white cab and then asked for his address. The street car was the best bet. Be sure to sit in front and use only the front door. The tricky part was that at a certain stop the motorman would have to get out to manually switch to another rail. He had the power to hold but not to arrest. The power to hold a person for any reason would be active until he summoned the police. I felt very lucky because the car was not crowded and the passengers were Negro teenage couples, apparently returning from a downtown movie. I sat on the jump seat behind the motorman, shielded by a small curtain. Immediately my nose told me the fellow was well soused. When he got out to do the switching, he had considerable trouble executing the task, and he used some mean words on that confounded thing. I had told the young people the name of my stop and asked them to give me hand signals when we got there. The motorman continued to mutter ferociously. When the car stopped, I made a beeline for the back door and exited. Those wonderful kids were smiling, and one dared to say, "You know you shouldn't have done that." My friends came forward and we had a delightful weekend. Again, John explained how he wished it could be otherwise, but they had decided it would be best for us to stay at home and meet their friends. I understood, because we had discussed such matters in Iowa at the Interracial Fellowship meetings the Baptist Church sponsored. One of their guests was the sociology professor who was a mentor to Dr. King during his undergraduate days. I exposed my ignorance by opining that colored people would never leave their traditional Baptist and Methodist churches to join the Catholic faith. He countered by saying that I should see what was happening in New Orleans. His thesis was that people would put better working conditions and better education for their children ahead of dogma. And, if I really wanted to understand what he was saying, I should join the NAACP when I returned to New York. I took him at his word. I was used to riding the subways and found it a lot easier to go from Greenwich Village to Harlem (Sugar Hill, the members jokingly explained) than it was to worry about one inebriated white man in friendly black territory. The members were professionals in social work, education and such. They discussed the twin challenges of police brutality and job openings. A lot of water under the bridge in nearly 60 years. I lived in Chicago and worked down the street from Mayor Daley's home for a company where 95% of the employees were African-Americans. I rode the el to the Loop the day after Dr. King was assassinated. Despite fires in other parts of the city, things were quiet and the Guard stood bored on street corners downtown. In 1973, at just about the time Congress got active in impeachment discussion, we drove to Atlanta for a week. On April 4, we rode MARTA to Atlanta University as we watched people march to the celebration. Now that I have read Taylor Branch's excellent trilogy on the King Years, I see things in better perspective. Someone on C-Span advised reading the third volume to think what else there is to do. So I close this to send a note to John Conyers. Congressman Conyers has taken a lot of heat. Today, in a little memorial on C-Span, he said that if Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks hadn't put in a good word for him, he would probably have lost his first election.
Margaret Bassett is an 86-year old, currently living in senior housing, with a lifelong interest in political conumbrums. She hopes to hold out for one more presidential election. Bachelors from State University of Iowa (1944) and Masters from Roosevelt University (1975) help to unravel important requirements for modern communication. Early introduction to computer science (1966) trumps them. It's payback time. She's been "entitled" so long she hopes to find some good coming off the keyboard into the lives of those who come after her.
What a great story, Margaret. Your perspective from experience coupled with your storytelling skills painted a vivid picture - I only wish your article had been longer. Thanks, Jan
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Jan Baumgartner (47 articles, 135 quicklinks, 9 diaries, 221 comments)
on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 at 3:55:44 PM
I try to discipline myself. But I've got more. Living from 1962 through 1968 in Chicago gave me personal recollections each time I read of an event in Branch's books. At the end of the rhird volume are some afterthoughts. One was that Dr. King regretted he didn't allow Jessie Jackson to march all the way into Cicero. He stopped at the Chicago boundary. My stepson was a middle teen at the time and went with some of his buddies for a little action. He was disappointed because there were so few people and the cameramen asked the kids to keep moving around to look like there was a bigger crowd. I was aware there wouldn't be a major confrontation, or else I probably would have asked the boy to stay away. But he went and taught me very important fact about the interaction of protest and media coverage.
My really interesting experiences dealt in teaching a bunch of recent high school graduates, mostly black, and also taking a masters in the College of Education with a group of Chicago public schoolteachers. It seems education was considered more vital in those days. There's a more commercial aspect of college now, it seems.
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Margaret Bassett (19 articles, 1113 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 615 comments)
on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 at 9:48:29 PM
...I was sleeping on the hat shelf of a Model A Ford... with two kids up front (mom and dad)... back from a terrible war... off to a life of possibilities and dreams. In Chicago in '68 I was clubbed to the ground. We thought the "whole world was watching." Maybe it was. We keep the dream alive as best we can.
Thanks for your beautiful words... I would forward them to me own mum if I could... but alas... those kids up front are on a different road now. I know she would have loved your story... so would the Old Man. And their baby boy thanks you.
All of you.
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waldopaper (11 articles, 2 quicklinks, 18 diaries, 282 comments)
on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 at 9:54:57 PM
A most undemocratic time. The convention is something no one likes to talk about, similar to the way Republicans can't remember what happened during Nixon's reign.
Bobby Rush and Kathy Wilkerson were reminiscing about her book on the Weathermen. And he brought up the assassination of Fred Hampton, who was known by friends and students of mine. It was Bobby Rush who beat Obama in his first attempt to run for public office.
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Margaret Bassett (19 articles, 1113 quicklinks, 24 diaries, 615 comments)
on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 at 11:33:21 PM
