WEBVTT 1 00:01.000 --> 00:45.000 —that was the first year that the State of North Carolina went full scale integration, so I don't have any recollections of—As a matter of fact, it was one of the reasons that my father was very insistent when I got ready to go off to college, that I get my undergraduate education at a historically Black college because he felt that I had missed something by not having that kind of schooling. He felt, for some reason, that his education was somewhat superior to mine in the sense that all of his high school and formative education had been done by all Black teachers and Black principals and things of that nature. He just was so insistent that I go to a Black college. After I got there, I found that it was the greatest thing that could have ever happened to me, was happening. 2 00:45.000 --> 00:58.000 It's interesting because Daphne has a friend who thought the same way. His daughter went to Metairie Country Day School, which is the most prestigious— 3 00:58.000 --> 01:00.000 Most expensive. 4 01:00.000 --> 01:20.000 Most prestigious and expensive school here in the New Orleans area. The former Kings of Carnival and Queens of Carnival went to that school and whatnot. They wanted her to go there, and then she went to Mount Carmel. Carmel, I think it is. 5 01:20.000 --> 01:21.000 Carmel. 6 01:21.000 --> 01:24.000 Yeah. Carmel. That's an expensive school too and whatnot. 7 01:24.000 --> 01:27.000 It was an all White girls school. 8 01:27.000 --> 01:46.000 When it came time to go to college, they took her out I think in about her second year and sent her to the prep because they felt that they wanted her to get in the school with Black children, with her own kids. They had to do that. 9 01:46.000 --> 02:30.000 I went to an integrated school system in high school, but my father was rather concerned that I seek out any one of the historically Black colleges in the country. He said, "There's enough of them out there that you ought to be able to select one and you ought to be able to select a good one." I stayed in my home state and I chose North Carolina Central University, which was a liberal arts college there. I got a fine education and a lifetime of friendships came out of there, but I'm grateful to have had that experience. It was a small college, five to 6,000, and I think that was what I needed at the time. I didn't need one of the big, major institutions in this country. 10 02:30.000 --> 03:03.000 My life has been very interesting because I have all of these children in different sets. It's surprising that each family unit has different ideas and whatnot. They're very diverse. Now, the daughter in Albuquerque, all of her children have gone to White schools, and they've gone to White colleges. Now the children here, they've all gone to Black schools and Black colleges. 11 03:03.000 --> 03:12.000 Yeah. Well, then again, does Albuquerque have any Black colleges to offer? New Mexico. Sometimes people have to make choices. 12 03:12.000 --> 03:13.000 Yes. They do make choices, 13 03:13.000 --> 03:14.000 Personal choices. 14 03:14.000 --> 03:19.000 But when it came to the colleges, they could have sent them to Black colleges. 15 03:19.000 --> 03:21.000 Yeah. I agree with you. 16 03:21.000 --> 04:08.000 Yeah, because my son's son, he went to Morehouse and one girl is at Howard. It's strange when they get together, [indistinct 00:03:34] tell the other one, "Why you going to that school?" One of my daughter's sons is in the same fraternity as Bush and Quill. When they came here, Rashida carrying on something awful [indistinct 00:03:50], "Mom, did you hear what he's saying? That he's at this fraternity that Bush and Quill belongs to. Can you feature that?" They carried on something terrible about that. You can imagine that. 17 04:08.000 --> 04:15.000 Yeah. 18 04:15.000 --> 04:17.000 It's very interesting, and it's varied, to see how each family thinks. 19 04:17.000 --> 04:18.000 Yeah. It varies across lines. 20 04:18.000 --> 04:20.000 Yeah, it does. It does. 21 04:20.000 --> 04:31.000 For one thing, I guess my parents didn't do the college thing. They came out of high school and went to work and that kind of thing. My parents were very concerned that I did receive a college education. 22 04:31.000 --> 04:35.000 Yeah. That was important to all families too. 23 04:35.000 --> 04:40.000 Not only that I received a college education, but that I received the kind of education that they thought I should have. 24 04:40.000 --> 04:43.000 That they thought that you should have. 25 04:43.000 --> 05:12.000 They came out of school in the early sixties, so Black colleges were a trend at that time. For the most part, if Black students were going off to college, that's the only place they had to go. They were insistent that I selected a Black college, and I'm glad I did. I have no regrets. None whatsoever. None. But I do want to, so we can wrap up talking about this, the educational system. You were talking about the different pay scales? 26 05:12.000 --> 05:18.000 When we started teaching, the Black teachers were paid much lower than the White teachers. 27 05:18.000 --> 05:21.000 When Did you start teaching? 28 05:21.000 --> 05:22.000 I started '50. 29 05:22.000 --> 05:23.000 Okay. You started in 1950. 30 05:23.000 --> 05:28.000 1961. 31 05:28.000 --> 05:30.000 1961. The pay scale still were not equal? 32 05:30.000 --> 06:21.000 No. Because with the same Mrs. Hill that we referred to. I went to Baton Rouge with the group, and they went with Sarah Reid. You remember? She was a fighter. She was about this big, a little White woman. She's the one who worked with that Veronica Hill, you would say worked with her. But she's the woman who helped Black teachers to get equal pay. I went to Baton Rouge with the group that year when they went to—McKeehan was our governor. She got on that floor and she did, you know what they say about filibuster, and she would not sit down. She told him, "If you want our help, as you said," because his slogan was, "Would you please help me?" 33 06:21.000 --> 06:52.000 She said, "All these teachers here will not vote for you again if you don't do something about this teacher." She would not sit down. They could not make her sit down until the session was over. She stood up there and fought all the way so that we could get equal pay. At that time, the White teachers were getting good salaries, fewer children. They had more schools to go to than we had in the beginning. 34 06:52.000 --> 06:54.000 The classrooms were small? 35 06:54.000 --> 06:56.000 The classrooms were small. 36 06:56.000 --> 07:03.000 Is that what you meant a little while ago, Ms. Pajeaud, when you talked about that you had to work harder than the White teachers? 37 07:03.000 --> 07:42.000 Yeah. I had to work harder because we didn't have the supplies and the materials, and the schools were not the same type of schools that we had. That's what they argued so much about, giving the Black children the same type of test that you would test a White child, who was in a fine school with all kind of materials, the beautiful rooms and whatnot, air conditioned and whatnot. And this poor Black child is in the hot classroom, dirty walls and whatnot. So how can you compare the two children on the same test? 38 07:42.000 --> 07:43.000 The environments are totally different. 39 07:43.000 --> 07:58.000 Right. Entirely different. They haven't been exposed. For instance, one of the questions on the first grade test was about the seashore. Black children don't know anything about any seashore! You know that. 40 07:58.000 --> 08:01.000 Yeah. 41 08:01.000 --> 08:14.000 Especially the Black children from the projects and whatnot and the little towns. They don't know anything about the seashore. They know about the river and the water maybe and the sand, but they don't know the word "seashore." That's not in their vocabulary. 42 08:14.000 --> 08:18.000 Exactly. 43 08:18.000 --> 08:26.000 So how can you test a child on a test with words like that that they've never been exposed to? 44 08:26.000 --> 09:17.000 Like the one that says about the toboggan. What does a child who's born and raised in the South know about a toboggan? I used to say all the time, and you would be training them for that test, you'd be trying to help them so they could do a good job on the test. I would say to them, I had a picture that I would get so that they would know that the only way you could have a toboggan, you would ask them first anybody knows what a toboggan is, and nobody knows what a toboggan is. Then I do show them a picture of it so they could know and know that you needed a lot of snow and ice to use that. I don't think we saw snow but twice in our lifetime here. 45 09:17.000 --> 09:20.000 No, not in New Orleans. We have to go up— 46 09:20.000 --> 10:37.000 No. I'm saying about here. Us. We saw snow and my little boy was because he made a snowman in the front yard. Schools had to close because we don't even have facilities to fight that kind of weather. And then one other time I remembered it snowed when I was at Village, it snowed, and some other time it snowed. But we are not accustomed to snow. The children who came after me are not accustomed if they've never been out of the city of New Orleans. What do they know about snow? This is the thing that they have those kind of questions on. A lot of the questions I never agreed with that because the questions were for children, California and Boston and those areas. And then, I don't think the questions were geared to the Black children. I think all those questions were to those White children who had everything. That's how I felt about it. It was not geared to what the children hear, not for their climate or anything else. I could say from their backgrounds and from where they came from. 47 10:37.000 --> 11:01.000 Our children were not even exposed to books. They didn't have books in the homes and whatnot. How could they read about those things either? The parents didn't know anything about that. No. And the parents didn't know anything about that. You couldn't even tell your children about them. They didn't know what seashore meant themselves. 48 11:01.000 --> 11:03.000 Yeah. Exactly. 49 11:03.000 --> 11:07.000 That wasn't in the Black family's vocabulary either. 50 11:07.000 --> 11:10.000 As you said, it has a lot to do with the lack of exposure. 51 11:10.000 --> 12:05.000 Right. Yeah. Right. They weren't exposed to that type of environment. To give you an example, one of the teachers taught kindergarten at Tall Timbers. That's a section across the river. Terrytown I think it is. Exclusive section. In fact, the assistant superintendent lived over there and his children went to that school. You know what she told me they did for Halloween Trick or Treat? She took the [indistinct 00:11:46] to the parents, one of the parents is home and the parents played the piano and whatnot and children milled around it and sang songs and whatnot and played games and they passed refreshments, cookies. 52 12:05.000 --> 12:05.000 That's what they did for Halloween? 53 12:05.000 --> 12:08.000 That's what they did for Halloween. 54 12:08.000 --> 13:05.000 If a public school didn't give a Halloween party so that the children could attend and have a little fun for Halloween, the children didn't have the exposure of knowing what it was all about if they didn't do it in school, and try to provide those children with some of the activities that they needed to know about here in the city, that they have been deprived so long. Unless you had parents who would insist upon doing some of the things like going to the library with a child like I did. Excuse me. You could tell. May I have some water? 55 13:05.000 --> 13:05.000 Sure. 56 13:05.000 --> 13:05.000 A half glass. 57 13:05.000 --> 13:08.000 [indistinct 00:13:06]. 58 13:08.000 --> 13:10.000 No. You have to have parents who provided and did things like that. 59 13:10.000 --> 13:10.000 I understand. 60 13:10.000 --> 13:27.000 I got pride. 61 13:27.000 --> 13:28.000 Now, this is your father? 62 13:28.000 --> 14:07.000 My father. And it's coming up as children. I've been working crossword puzzles in the paper since I was able to write and read because he used to get the daily paper. We had to study, come from school, you had to stay in and do homework. If you didn't have homework, you had to read because you could read on something else so that tomorrow when you go to school, you'd be better prepared to know what the teacher's talking about because you didn't go outside and stay in the street and drag all over the neighborhood in the first place. But we had to work the crossword puzzle. I've been working crosswords and I love to do it now. 63 14:07.000 --> 14:44.000 The word for a donkey was an ass, three letter word. As children in the family, every time we would get the crossword puzzle in the head donkey, we would say, "Papa, what's a three letter word for a donkey?" Now we knew, but we just wanted him to say ass because we weren't permitted to use that kind of language. Our mama would say to him in Creole that those children are making a fool of you because they know what it is. You see? We knew what it was, but now the children talk about it. 64 14:44.000 --> 14:46.000 Why do you suppose your mother would say it in Creole? 65 14:46.000 --> 14:49.000 So we wouldn't know what she's saying. That's how they used to do. 66 14:49.000 --> 14:50.000 Okay. 67 14:50.000 --> 15:16.000 My grandmother did too. All of them. All of my aunts and everybody, when they didn't want the child to know what they were talking about, they would start talking to each other in Creole so you don't know what they're saying. And then, we didn't understand it because my mother never encouraged us to talk Creole, but my father and his sisters and them when they would get together, that's all they talked. 68 15:16.000 --> 15:17.000 Was Creole. 69 15:17.000 --> 15:19.000 That's right. 70 15:19.000 --> 15:24.000 That's interesting. 71 15:24.000 --> 15:46.000 We had to read. We had to read what was in the paper. We had to read those books. He would buy books when he could afford it and bring it home and put it there so that we could—I have my mother's McGuffey reader that they used to use out in the country in the school. I still have it. 72 15:46.000 --> 15:47.000 Your mother's? 73 15:47.000 --> 15:51.000 My mother's McGuffey Reader. 74 15:51.000 --> 15:52.000 Really? 75 15:52.000 --> 15:54.000 That's right. 76 15:54.000 --> 15:56.000 Is it still in good condition? 77 15:56.000 --> 15:59.000 It's sort of yellow like anything else would get. 78 15:59.000 --> 16:02.000 What's interesting is you still have one of those things. 79 16:02.000 --> 16:05.000 I still have it. 80 16:05.000 --> 16:12.000 The archives may want to borrow that. 81 16:12.000 --> 16:29.000 No, they cannot. I will not part with that. When I was at Dillard, I brought it just to show when the education students. This instructor wanted me to, and I told them no because that's just how things get away from you. 82 16:29.000 --> 16:30.000 You just don't want to part. 83 16:30.000 --> 16:58.000 No, I will not. But that's what I have at my house, that mama. I have books. Like I said, he bought a book that said Negroes in World War I. I have that. Now, when World War II came about, he bought another book that said the Blacks in World War II. 84 16:58.000 --> 17:00.000 Well, your father was certainly making certain that you get some materials around you. 85 17:00.000 --> 17:07.000 He made sure that we went to school. That's what's the problem with a lot of children now. 86 17:07.000 --> 17:09.000 There's no one there to say. 87 17:09.000 --> 18:03.000 They give any excuse and the child won't go to school. I've had it to happen to me too many times when I was teaching a project and I used to didn't go along because I'd tell them all those excuses, I said I was taught that excuse was a sign of ignorance. That's what my papa would say. I never wanted to be ignorant. So now, when you come with all these excuses from one flimsy, that he didn't come to school because I didn't want—they been eating grits every morning, at least he ate. Now what's wrong with grits if you don't have anything else? I had to a lot of mornings right behind. Mama would get up and make biscuits, and we would have preserve and biscuits, milk if they had it, coffee if they didn't, water if they didn't, but you didn't go to school hungry. 88 18:03.000 --> 18:05.000 Yeah. 89 18:05.000 --> 18:26.000 Because I'd say all the time, and people say about the Depression, I don't ever remember being hungry because I had a mother who cooked every day and fed other people in the neighborhood. I don't ever remember being hungry. Maybe she cooked something I didn't like. 90 18:26.000 --> 18:27.000 That's a different story. 91 18:27.000 --> 18:30.000 That was a different story. But they had food. 92 18:30.000 --> 18:45.000 That's a different story. Is there anything else that either of you lovely ladies would like to say concerning your lives here in New Orleans in the Jim Crow South? 93 18:45.000 --> 19:00.000 The last thing I want to say is, even though we went to McDonogh 35 and we walked, and McDonogh 35 was upon Rampart Street, and Rampart Street was an area for Black businesses at that time. 94 19:00.000 --> 19:04.000 So it was quite a business district. 95 19:04.000 --> 19:12.000 Yes. We had to walk up there and the girls were not permitted off the ground on mornings. Now, we were not permitted off the grounds until three o'clock? 96 19:12.000 --> 19:16.000 What do you mean? You couldn't leave the school? 97 19:16.000 --> 19:25.000 No. Unless you were sick and they saw that you got home. Boys could leave at 12 o'clock at lunchtime and go down to the restaurant and get something or go to the bakery and get something. 98 19:25.000 --> 19:27.000 Oh, really? 99 19:27.000 --> 19:35.000 But the girls were not permitted to go off the school grounds. You had to stay once you got to school. You got to school until— 100 19:35.000 --> 19:37.000 And you had to take your lunch there at the school. 101 19:37.000 --> 19:55.000 Yeah. Yes. At that time, most of us brought lunches because 35 didn't even have a cafeteria. Now, lady used to sell us little sandwiches from that little booth, but they didn't have a cafeteria. Most times, we brought lunch. 102 19:55.000 --> 20:00.000 Now, were you and Ms. Marjorie, were the two of you best of friends in high school? 103 20:00.000 --> 20:09.000 No. We were friends. We just were friends. You see, not only did we go to school together, we went to the same church together. 104 20:09.000 --> 20:14.000 So you were neighborhood friends and everything. You went to all the same social. 105 20:14.000 --> 20:14.000 That's it. 106 20:14.000 --> 20:14.000 You went to the carnival together. 107 20:14.000 --> 20:14.000 Yeah. 108 20:14.000 --> 20:14.000 Did you double date and all that kind of good stuff? (laughs) 109 20:14.000 --> 20:14.000 No. 110 20:14.000 --> 20:14.000 No. 111 20:14.000 --> 20:24.000 That's why I just said oh, no. 112 20:24.000 --> 20:59.000 You know why? She lived on the other side of Claiborne where as a child growing up that was supposed to be out of bounds for me to be running all over the neighborhood, the street. People didn't let children come all, that came—they lived further from Craig's School. I lived right across the street from Craig. If I went on the other side of Claiborne, I used to go to go Yvonne's because she was just one block off on Claiborne Street. I had to be back home for six o'clock. If I went there and play a little while, I had to be home for six o'clock. 113 20:59.000 --> 20:59.000 Okay. 114 20:59.000 --> 21:00.000 You didn't come back. 115 21:00.000 --> 21:01.000 Just to play there. 116 21:01.000 --> 21:07.000 Yeah. But now Marjorie lives near Galvez Street, didn't you? 117 21:07.000 --> 21:08.000 I lived on Lafitte. 118 21:08.000 --> 21:10.000 Yeah, I know. But didn't you live near to Galvez? 119 21:10.000 --> 21:11.000 Yeah. 120 21:11.000 --> 21:11.000 Yeah. You see? 121 21:11.000 --> 21:11.000 I lived on Lafitte, on Lafitte between Miro and Conti. 122 21:11.000 --> 21:17.000 Yeah. 123 21:17.000 --> 21:17.000 Around the corner from Elaine's house. 124 21:17.000 --> 21:23.000 Conti? 125 21:23.000 --> 21:25.000 That was further from my house. You see? That was a good 10 block away. 126 21:25.000 --> 21:28.000 You were always friends and you started school in first grade there. 127 21:28.000 --> 21:32.000 We used to see each other and stop and talk with each other. 128 21:32.000 --> 21:36.000 Was Ms. Marjorie just as— 129 21:36.000 --> 21:38.000 She was a quieter person in school. 130 21:38.000 --> 21:40.000 Oh, she wasn't as witty then as she is now? 131 21:40.000 --> 21:40.000 She was quiet, oh, and scaredy cat. (all laugh) Scaredy cat, the teacher says "Stay in," and look, she started crying before three o'clock. (all laugh) Don't make me laugh. 132 21:40.000 --> 21:40.000 You were already laughing. [indistinct 00:21:56]. Yeah. 133 21:40.000 --> 22:03.000 I remember that. 134 22:03.000 --> 22:07.000 You weren't the social butterfly that Ms. Jessie was. 135 22:07.000 --> 22:24.000 She was something—she was always the way she is now. 136 22:24.000 --> 22:24.000 Okay. 137 22:24.000 --> 22:24.000 I would talk and laugh and answer back. 138 22:24.000 --> 22:24.000 You'd answer teachers back, and in those days nobody answered teachers back. 139 22:24.000 --> 22:24.000 But Ms. Jessie would. 140 22:24.000 --> 23:24.000 Yes, I was. I knew what was going to happen when I got home. I knew that. If you went home and said you were kept in the so and so and such, Mama, teacher said, "Yes. Well, tomorrow mama's going to come to school and get the other side of the story." Now that's the kind of parents we need here. Now, I knew that my parents were not ripping people, but my mother would deprive you of something you like to do. I used to love to play hopscotch in the evening with my friend Louise next door to me and I couldn't go and play hopscotch. I could sit there and watch them play hopscotch, but I couldn't play hopscotch. My brother couldn't shoot marble. Anything that you really like to do, my mother deprived you of that. The next time you would think about it and say, "I'm not going to do so." 141 23:24.000 --> 24:20.000 It was hard for me to get out of that because I'm like that right now. It's just hard. She say you're born with your personality. Every time I think about a teacher who taught all of it, and especially when you see Marjorie didn't have other sisters and brothers. Being the youngest, I had the four of them to go ahead of me. We all used to be most times in those same teacher's rooms. Ms. Thompson, I don't know what Ms. Thompson did me that particular day, but I know I answered Ms. Thompson back. Ms. Thompson told me don't come to school tomorrow until I bring my mama. You see, that morning, mama, when I went home, I had to tell mama she had to go to school tomorrow. You'd be telling your side of the story. 142 24:20.000 --> 25:05.000 Mama had to come to school that morning to talk with Ms. Thompson and Ms. Thompson told my mama—Now Ms. Thompson taught my mama's four other children, a [indistinct 00:24:31] and the twins. When she got out, they were in the hall talking and when she told my mama, she said, "Ms. Lawrence, Jessie is nothing like those other four." My mama said, "No. I know," she said, "Because I birthed them all and they all got different dispositions." And I'm laughing because we didn't say it, "I birthed them all." That was wrong, but that was my mother's way of expressing herself and you dare not to say that that's not what you're supposed to say. 143 25:05.000 --> 25:27.000 She said, "Because I could tell who's coming in by the way the dog react." We had a big shepherd. This is the truth. My mother would be in the kitchen preparing supper and she could tell who, and she would just say, and she didn't even see you, "Jessie?" or if that was sister she would say, "Sister?" because the way the dog reacted to us. 144 25:27.000 --> 25:31.000 Really? 145 25:31.000 --> 25:48.000 I'm telling you. You see, sister never did like animals. When it was her time to feed the dog, she'd get the food and instead of going and putting it in, you know, and saying "Eat," she'd pitch it in the plate. That's true. 146 25:48.000 --> 25:57.000 I just can't imagine Ms. Marjorie without this sense of humor back then. 147 25:57.000 --> 26:08.000 She would sit laughing about things, and maybe she thought something was—But she was a quiet girl, and so was Yvonne. They were quiet in school, scared of being punished, but not me. 148 26:08.000 --> 26:10.000 My mama never came to school for me. 149 26:10.000 --> 26:11.000 She just wasn't having that. 150 26:11.000 --> 26:35.000 I don't ever remember her, except the plays or something, and then they would come. And then, we were in all the plays. We were dolls. We were angels one time. We were bumblebees. Do you remember when you were a bumblebee, Marjorie? 151 26:35.000 --> 26:35.000 This is great. (laughing) 152 26:35.000 --> 26:35.000 You remember when we were bumblebees? 153 26:35.000 --> 26:35.000 Yes. 154 26:35.000 --> 26:40.000 Yes. My mother used to help make those great paper costumes because my mother sewed. 155 26:40.000 --> 26:49.000 I'll never forget. We were in something. I think we were elves. We had pink barrel dresses on that were cut from the bottom and we had to wear tennis shoes. 156 26:49.000 --> 26:52.000 No. We were angels then. 157 26:52.000 --> 26:53.000 No. Elves. 158 26:53.000 --> 26:54.000 Elves? 159 26:54.000 --> 27:10.000 Yeah. We had pink round dresses on and we had to wear tennis shoes. I was so happy because my mother never would let me wear tennis shoes. She would never buy me a pair of tennis shoes and I wanted to wear tennis shoes so badly. And I could never walk barefoot. 160 27:10.000 --> 27:18.000 Us either. 161 27:18.000 --> 27:25.000 When I was an adult, my mother would come to my house and I'd be barefoot. She would say, "Put your shoes on. Put your shoes on before you catch a cold." 162 27:25.000 --> 27:50.000 We see people go to the shopping malls looking like hell and some of them smelling like it. We were not committed to go to Canal Street, which we call uptown, without dressing up. You dressed up to go and you could walk to Canal Street and you weren't that far from Canal, but you didn't go to Canal unless you were dressed. 163 27:50.000 --> 27:53.000 Canal Street was the main [indistinct 00:27:52]. 164 27:53.000 --> 27:54.000 It was. It was. 165 27:54.000 --> 27:57.000 That's where all the stores were. 166 27:57.000 --> 28:06.000 That's where all the stores were. You just didn't go to Canal Street looking any kind of way or outside playing and pick up and think you're going to Canal Street. 167 28:06.000 --> 28:06.000 Oh, really? 168 28:06.000 --> 28:40.000 Now, when I was going to 35, like I say, we walked to school, we had to walk. There was what they call a red light district had not closed down then. We could not go through that area, through the red light district to go to school. We had to walk all the way to Rampart Street and then go straight up Rampart Street. If anybody saw you going through their district and said that back to my mama, "Why were you coming through that way?" Because you just weren't supposed to. That was off limit to you. You know what the red light district was. 169 28:40.000 --> 28:51.000 Yeah. Red light districts remain the same. They haven't changed. 170 28:51.000 --> 28:51.000 It doesn't change. 171 28:51.000 --> 28:51.000 Red light means red light. 172 28:51.000 --> 28:51.000 That's it. 173 28:51.000 --> 28:52.000 Right. 174 28:52.000 --> 29:47.000 We weren't permitted a lot of the things. My grandson will say to me, if my daughter says, "I'm coming to get you and we're going to the shopping mall," and I said all right, I'll get ready to go and, "Grandma, where are you going all dressed?" I said if we pass by somebody who doesn't look like I think presentable, I tell him, I say, "If I would come out with you looking like that, you'd be ready to say, grandma, you look a mess." He say, "I sure would." That's it. You have to instill those things in children. Now, I really don't feel that integration worked down here. I don't know about other areas. Because as soon as integration came about, even in neighborhoods, if you moved in Black, they moved out. 175 29:47.000 --> 29:49.000 White people? 176 29:49.000 --> 30:18.000 White. When the schools became integrated, the White children, I don't know who, they went in other places. They went to other schools. And then eventually, the schools that was predominantly White at one time, they are now predominantly Black. The ones that were Black from the beginning, they're still Black. That's how it is. 177 30:18.000 --> 30:19.000 I think that's all over the country. 178 30:19.000 --> 30:41.000 That's all over because when I was working at 42, that's what that used to be, an all White school, the McDonogh number 9, the name is still above it. That's right. Black children had to pass in front of that school to walk away to Jones School. 179 30:41.000 --> 30:48.000 But I enjoyed my life. Even though we had segregation, we didn't know any other life. It was good. 180 30:48.000 --> 30:50.000 I enjoyed my Black friends and I still do. 181 30:50.000 --> 31:12.000 It was good. You wanted to know what else we did for social life. We were in clubs and we went to club meeting. And then, we went to each other's homes during that time, played bridge and whatnot, and we did a whole lot of social things. We socialized. We went to the movies. 182 31:12.000 --> 31:13.000 Didn't concern yourself what White folks were doing. 183 31:13.000 --> 31:13.000 No. We didn't worry about it at all. 184 31:13.000 --> 31:13.000 As long as I didn't have to go and work for them. 185 31:13.000 --> 31:13.000 As long as you didn't have to what? 186 31:13.000 --> 31:36.000 Work. Domestic work for them. I was happy. I did not like doing it. 187 31:36.000 --> 32:51.000 Not only that. My parents had a very nice life. I can remember. It wasn't my father so much because he was never a social man too much, but my mother and her sisters had a lot of friends and they used to disguise on mass for Carnival Day. I can remember seeing the other ladies coming to the house and dressing the different costumes. And they'd go out on Carnival Day and they would go to some of the clubs, like the Center Center. What else? Chers Amis, I think another. You see, they used to go, my mother I'm talking about, they used to go to the dances. They used to dance a lot. They would have dances, play dances. My father would bring them, but he wouldn't stay because he didn't like to dance. But as I tell my friends all the time now, they went to dance, the men would dance with them because they like to dance and they would dance. Nowadays, if you don't have your own escort, you don't dance. 188 32:51.000 --> 32:51.000 That's [indistinct 00:32:52]. 189 32:51.000 --> 33:06.000 Because other guys don't ask you to dance. They're with their own wives or their girlfriends and whatnot, and that's it. But they would go to the affair, not to socialize so much, but to dance. 190 33:06.000 --> 33:07.000 Yeah. 191 33:07.000 --> 33:11.000 All the fellas would ask them to dance and they would dance. 192 33:11.000 --> 33:14.000 So you didn't even have to go to the dance with a date. 193 33:14.000 --> 33:39.000 No, we didn't. No. As I told you, my father would bring my mother and her sisters and the other girlfriends who wanted to go. And then, he would come back for them when it was all over. And then, they used to go skating. I can remember my mother in a big white sweater. They'd put on their skates and they'd go skating. They had activities. 194 33:39.000 --> 33:41.000 Now, this was when you were a youngster. 195 33:41.000 --> 34:12.000 When I was a youngster. I remember seeing them doing that. And then, the friends would come to the house. We had a piano. I never forget, it was Mr. Alfred White, his name was, and he'd come and he'd play the piano and they would sing and whatnot. And then after the piano, we had a Victrola where you'd put the needle on the— 196 34:12.000 --> 34:13.000 It's called a what? 197 34:13.000 --> 34:24.000 Victrola. V-I-C-T-R-O-L-A. Where you'd put the needle. It was like this, and you'd put the needle on the record and then it would play and you would [indistinct 00:34:25]. 198 34:24.000 --> 34:25.000 Okay. 199 34:25.000 --> 34:34.000 And then we had a pianola. 200 34:34.000 --> 34:37.000 And the pianola was that you need to know how to play the piano. You'd put the rollers on and pump. 201 34:37.000 --> 34:50.000 You'd put the roller on it. It was like a music sheet and you'd pump with your feet and then it would roll and then the music would come out. 202 34:50.000 --> 35:23.000 And it was called a pianola? 203 35:23.000 --> 35:24.000 Yeah. 204 35:24.000 --> 35:29.000 Pianola. We had one of those. Everything came out. 205 35:29.000 --> 35:30.000 But when you played with the rollers, the [indistinct 00:35:30] is moving. You didn't have to [indistinct 00:35:30]. 206 35:30.000 --> 35:30.000 But you put the notes in. 207 35:30.000 --> 35:30.000 No. It was like a roller. 208 35:30.000 --> 35:30.000 It was like a roller and it had the paper on the roller with the holes which were the notes. 209 35:30.000 --> 35:30.000 And it read from those notes. 210 35:30.000 --> 35:30.000 The music. Yeah. And you pumped it with your feet. 211 35:30.000 --> 35:30.000 I've never seen one of those. 212 35:30.000 --> 35:31.000 I guess you're right. 213 35:31.000 --> 35:31.000 My mother [indistinct 00:35:31], that's what she had. 214 35:31.000 --> 35:31.000 Everything came out. 215 35:31.000 --> 35:31.000 [indistinct 00:35:31] probably had one like that. 216 35:31.000 --> 35:31.000 Yeah. 217 35:31.000 --> 35:38.000 We didn't have a piano, but we had a—Papa would buy anything like radio when it first came out, washing machine. That's the kind of person he was. 218 35:38.000 --> 36:07.000 You see, the people at that time visited each other and they would come to the house and they would have refreshments and talk and whatnot. You see, they didn't have the TV when you come to visit, which they don't do too much anyhow these days. They turn the TV on for you. 219 36:07.000 --> 36:08.000 Yeah. 220 36:08.000 --> 36:19.000 No. They would come and my mother's friends, the ladies would come and they'd have coffee and whatnot and sit down and talk. They visited each other. 221 36:19.000 --> 36:21.000 Really? 222 36:21.000 --> 36:48.000 You can't visit like that after dark, unless we have somebody to bring us places. We don't hardly go out at night anymore. Now, one time you could go out at night and not even be bothered. Nobody would even [indistinct 00:36:37] you or tell you anything. As close as I am now, if I do come here and it gets dark, I'm ready to go back home. 223 36:48.000 --> 36:53.000 We had the Lyric Theatre, a Black theater, wasn't it? 224 36:53.000 --> 36:54.000 It was called what? 225 36:54.000 --> 36:55.000 The Lyric. 226 36:55.000 --> 37:00.000 L-Y-R-I-C, the Lyric Theatre. 227 37:00.000 --> 37:01.000 That was the Black theater. 228 37:01.000 --> 37:04.000 Wasn't it a Black theater? 229 37:04.000 --> 37:08.000 Yeah. Because papa used to take mama, but I didn't ever go there. 230 37:08.000 --> 37:42.000 My mother used to take me before I went to school. It was on the corner, [indistinct 00:37:15]. They had a restaurant, a Black restaurant. and they would have, like certain days they'd have cabbage, and other days they'd have red beans and different things. I can remember my aunt going with us and my mother, but of course I was the only child anyway, she made sure to take me. And then, we'd go to the restaurant place and eat our dinner and then we would go to the Lyric Theatre and they'd have live stage. 231 37:42.000 --> 37:42.000 Vaudeville shows. 232 37:42.000 --> 37:48.000 Okay. There were live performances. 233 37:48.000 --> 37:52.000 Yeah. The Palace had that too. The Palace gave that too. 234 37:52.000 --> 37:54.000 Performances. Yeah. 235 37:54.000 --> 37:57.000 Now, was The Palace of Black theater? 236 37:57.000 --> 38:12.000 Yes. That was Black. It was at the next corner from the Lyrics, but The Palace was later when we were coming up. Bigger, you may as well say. 237 38:12.000 --> 38:20.000 And then we went to the White shows, I guess you'd call it that, the like the Orpheum and the [indistinct 00:38:19]. You need to go up the steps. 238 38:20.000 --> 38:22.000 And you had to sit upstairs. 239 38:22.000 --> 38:40.000 [indistinct 00:38:22] sit upstairs. You couldn't sit downstairs. 240 38:40.000 --> 38:40.000 When you went to the White theater, that's what you had to do. 241 38:40.000 --> 38:40.000 Now, The Senger you couldn't go at all. 242 38:40.000 --> 38:40.000 I couldn't go at all there. 243 38:40.000 --> 38:40.000 You could not visit the Senger. 244 38:40.000 --> 38:40.000 No. You couldn't go to the Senger. 245 38:40.000 --> 38:40.000 They didn't even allow Blacks to sit in the balcony. 246 38:40.000 --> 38:44.000 No. You couldn't go to the Senger and you couldn't go to the Tudor, which was also on Canal Street. 247 38:44.000 --> 38:46.000 Tudor. Would you spell that? 248 38:46.000 --> 38:53.000 T-U-D-O-R, Tudor. There was another one. 249 38:53.000 --> 38:58.000 I guess the Tudor and the Senger were those places that you talked about your friends would sneak in? 250 38:58.000 --> 38:59.000 Yeah. 251 38:59.000 --> 39:00.000 And come back and tell that they got in. 252 39:00.000 --> 39:07.000 Tell they got in. Yeah. They wanted to see what the place was like. 253 39:07.000 --> 39:17.000 I see. Well, it looks like we better wrap this up because my battery is getting low on this thing. 254 39:17.000 --> 39:19.000 College. This is not high school. 255 39:19.000 --> 39:41.000 I'm talking back again now with Ms. Pajeaud, and we're having an interesting conversation here where she's talking about her educational experience. That is her advanced education. Now, what were you saying, Ms. Pajeaud, about the fact that from 1952 to 1960, you were pursuing your master's degree? Why such a long period of time? 256 39:41.000 --> 40:25.000 I had started that summer in the fall semester. I did enroll in the fall semester. After I started, I found out that I was pregnant, and I knew that I could not return for the January semester because at that time, women were not on the campus pregnant so I did not return. My baby was born July the fourth, and I decided that I was going to enroll in school that fall, which was a September. 257 40:25.000 --> 41:22.000 When I went to register, sister Anne Xavier told me definitely that she didn't think that I should return to school so soon because she learned that I had had a baby over the summer. She was very insistent that I did not come back to school so soon. She asked me how old was the baby. I had to tell a little white lie. I told her the baby was older than what it was. Then, she proceeded to ask me who was going to mind the baby. I told her that my mother was going to mind the baby, and I really wanted to return to school to pursue my master's degree. She reluctantly registered me and I was able to continue. 258 41:22.000 --> 41:22.000 But you told her a lie. 259 41:22.000 --> 41:28.000 I did. I had to tell a white lie to get back in school. Otherwise, she wasn't going to let me register. 260 41:28.000 --> 41:41.000 Well, the interesting thing is that what you were telling me just a moment ago is the fact that when you discovered that you were pregnant, what was the decision that you made in the middle of your educational process? 261 41:41.000 --> 41:49.000 That I was going to stop it because I knew that I could not return. You see? 262 41:49.000 --> 41:50.000 Why couldn't you just continue going? 263 41:50.000 --> 42:04.000 Because you see, if I had returned for the January, I would've been in school until May, until the end, and I would've been very much pregnant at that time. 264 42:04.000 --> 42:05.000 What would've been the problem with that? 265 42:05.000 --> 42:16.000 Well, they would've asked me to leave. I am positive about that because it was not permitted. Never had pregnant women on that campus. 266 42:16.000 --> 42:16.000 Even though— 267 42:16.000 --> 42:17.000 You were married. Sure. 268 42:17.000 --> 42:22.000 And had already had a family in place. 269 42:22.000 --> 42:22.000 Right. And I had a husband. 270 42:22.000 --> 42:28.000 Exactly. Well, you were married, so you had to have a husband. 271 42:28.000 --> 42:30.000 The husband was there. You could be married and not have the husband there. 272 42:30.000 --> 42:31.000 Yeah. 273 42:31.000 --> 42:36.000 No. My husband was there. He was in the home, definitely. 274 42:36.000 --> 42:39.000 You knew that you would've been dismissed from school. 275 42:39.000 --> 42:46.000 Yeah. I could not have continued there at that time so I did the wise thing. 276 42:46.000 --> 42:49.000 Pregnant women just were not permitted on college campuses. 277 42:49.000 --> 43:04.000 When I am on Xavier's campus now, I look around and first thing I say, "Boy, what is Xavier doing?" (laughs) Now looking at these girls with their shorts on and whatnot. That was not permitted. 278 43:04.000 --> 43:12.000 Yeah. Was there a strict kind of dress code? 279 43:12.000 --> 43:28.000 Yes. One day I came to school with a sheer blouse and I was called into the office about my blouse. Yeah. 280 43:28.000 --> 43:30.000 I don't think anybody's getting called into anyone's office today. 281 43:30.000 --> 43:32.000 Remember, that was a Catholic school. 282 43:32.000 --> 43:33.000 Yeah. Okay. 283 43:33.000 --> 43:38.000 You see? And they were very strict during that time. Very, very strict. 284 43:38.000 --> 43:48.000 Interesting stories. Interesting stories. Yeah. Very interesting. Okay. Anything else you'd like to say, Mr. Pajeaud? 285 43:48.000 --> 43:48.000 No. 286 43:48.000 --> 43:49.000 We've had a long evening. 287 43:49.000 --> 43:50.000 Yeah, we have. 288 43:50.000 --> 43:57.000 We've had a very long evening. Thank you.