James Woodson interview recording, 1994 July 11
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| James Willard Woodson | Historically some families have tried to use other families to serve them in terms of working, whether it's on the farm, or some field work or whatever, those who had strengthened possessive property, you see? And what is the industry about anyway? The industry is about some people who have achieved a certain amount of assets producing employment for those who have not done it. | 0:04 |
| James Willard Woodson | And it gives them greater profit also, and it helps these people. And they can be the same race, but they're going such as planting, and have job people come in and get them to work. Man has since his creation has been trying to improve his condition, and in doing it, having others to serve them in their industry, whatever they had to offer employment. And this has created problems and it has just developed in various ways, you see what I'm talking about? | 0:37 |
| James Willard Woodson | If you go back far enough, you won't hate anybody. You just try to improve yourself, and be worthy of yourself, and accomplish something for yourself. I remember a meeting we had here at the University, the Tuskegee Institute then some years ago with one of our trustees, members of the trustee board who was a Black person named Ag Gaston. You may have heard of him, from Birmingham. He became a wealthy man and he had great investments and employment opportunities for people and so on, and provided jobs and things. | 1:20 |
| James Willard Woodson | He became one of our wealthiest pictures of Black Americans anyway. And he came here on the board of trustee at Tuskegee Institute, and he came here for a meeting and he was willing to come and another thing, he married a young lady who graduated from here in 1938. Minnie Gardener, she became Minnie Gardener Gaston, and they became a good team together. | 2:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | He came down here and I think he was invited. Anyway, a student asked him a question in the discussion session we had and he asked him, Mr. Gaston said, "I understand that you are a millionaire. Is that true?" He said, "Well, I guess you could say that is what he said." He wasn't bragging. "And you have a lot of employees working for you?" He said, "Yes." So Mr. Gaston, what bother with me is I understand that you didn't go to college, and didn't graduate from college. | 2:31 |
| James Willard Woodson | And I think he said he only went to about the eighth grade. "Mr. Gaston, well can you explain to us how you happen to become a millionaire, how you happened to achieve money and get some plants and employment for people?" He said, "Well, I'll tell you." He says, "I adopted a philosophy when I was quite a young lad, and I called it, I pay myself first." He said, "You know how that works?" | 3:04 |
| James Willard Woodson | He said, "I don't count how much money I make if I work for anybody, everybody make $10. I'm going to take $2 off of that and save it." And I've done it all my life. And after a period of time, I made more money, I saved more. And so a lot of young people said they thought they would try that. But I'm saying this man is rather than hating somebody else, he looked at himself in self-improvement. | 3:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | And in doing that, you could always make progress in life. I was trying to think of someone now who said that they believe in the gospel of continuing self-improvement. That I heard make a presentation too. And in other words, if you keep improving yourself, then you'll be a better person tomorrow than you were today. But anyway, it's been a long struggle to accomplish things. But there was a time we didn't have churches, we met in the fields or in houses and so on. And this is just one of the many churches we have in this community. And I'm sure there'll be more yet to come. | 4:10 |
| Paul Ortiz | Now, last night you told me a story about when you were going to Booker T Washington. Was it grammar school? | 5:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh, no. This story is told right here in Carter Woodson has a dream. I included it in this story here, and my native home is Fremont, West Virginia. I was born in a little mining camp. I was from a town called Laurel Lee in the next county, very close to Clarksburg. But I grew up in a town, that was a mining center and there was employment stuff there. | 5:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | And we lived, my family, I have a brother and my mother live over there. She and my father are separated, and we lived in this house on what we call the east side. And it was a slum area of the city. And I tell that in here. But anyway, whenever I saw a person out on the street, a man, Black man, and you didn't see many White person on this side of the city. They were on the other side across the river, the Monongahela River, I forget the name of it. | 5:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | They had a river separated the city in two separate sides. But anyway, you see a man walking across the street there on the street, then he might be cursing, he might get in a fight with somebody. It was just a lot of bad things happening. And that's all we saw. And this was the poverty area, the city too. And a lot of people were on welfare and different things like that. It had created me an attitude that wasn't good for myself. And I went to school, I was so bothered with the life I was living. I wouldn't get my lessons. I couldn't study. It was a problem. Before I just read this to you here briefly, do you mind that? You can read yourself, but I want you to see what I'm saying here. | 6:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | I'm just going over here the way I'm dealing with this here now. A personal experience of this writer, me, James Woods, supports the logic of Carter G. Woodson's dream and Carter G. Woodson had a dream which he wanted to do research, and produce historical information that Black people could learn about themselves and be proud of themselves. And this I have here book here, I don't know if you ever read it or not, called The Miseducation of a Negro by Carter G. Woodson. | 7:36 |
| James Willard Woodson | And he tells how by the lack of information, the lack of explanation, understanding, and the lack of exposure to the worth and value of the Black race had caused the young people as they came along to cease to try to keep improving themselves and be somebody. This picture he has has a blind [indistinct 00:08:43] over the head you see because they don't have the information. | 8:13 |
| Paul Ortiz | It symbolizes the miseducation of Black people. | 8:47 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, of Black people. And then let me just, and that influenced me to write this. I wrote that so many years ago. A personal experience of this writer supports the logic of Carter G. Woodson's dream. I was processing with poor results through the second grade at the Paul Laurence Dunbar School in the town of Fairmont, West Virginia. And Paul Laurence Dunbar was one of our best poets, and well recognized American poet. I was having poor results for sitting to school in the second grade when annual Black history observances were in the early developmental stages. And Carter Woodson had got this started. | 8:51 |
| James Willard Woodson | After repeating this grade, the second grade. And I had to go back and do the second grade a second time, and barely make it through the third grade. I got moved barely through the fourth. I no longer had to trudge two miles to Dunbar school on the west side because the town fathers opened the Booker T. Washington school for its Black youngsters on the poverty-stricken east side, the school system segregated West Virginia. | 9:43 |
| James Willard Woodson | Although located in a large vacated dwelling. And what they did on the East Side, they found an abandoned church, I believe it was. It was a big dwelling. And they constructed, opened a church, a school and then at the recommendation of some Black people, they named it the Paul Laurence Dunbar School. All right. It was a welcome change for most of the students. And one of the reasons for this was that our principal teacher, he was both, the late Miss Fannie Lee Hudson was kind and considerate at all times. | 10:20 |
| James Willard Woodson | However, as a nine-year old experiencing difficulty with the learning process up until that time, I was not overly impressed with this opportunity, with this wonderful teacher. My self-image was low partly because of school failures, and partly because my environment was a Black segregated community that portrayed my race in subordinate roles. While White persons held the positions of importance in every walk of life except Black schools and churches, Black churches. My race seemed locked out of significant participation in society. | 11:02 |
| James Willard Woodson | Meanwhile, there was this new personal problem and I decided to present it to the kind Ms. Hudson. One day in October, I told my teacher that something was bothering me, and she asked me to tell her about it. Raising my hand, I'm standing in front of her desk, she closed out school and students get up going home, I went to her desk and told her this is bothering me. For raising my hand standing in front of her, I said, "The name of this school is the Booker T Washington School. But don't they mean George Washington School?" Now I thought that because in that period did not history there was a famous song Asleep in the nation about George Washington. You sing First in war, first in peace, first in the heart of his countrymen that is, you heard that song? | 11:48 |
| Paul Ortiz | I've heard about it. I've never heard the song. | 12:43 |
| James Willard Woodson | First in war, first in Peace, first in the heart of his countrymen. That is the story of washington. That is the story of Washington. And his spirit is here, his spirit is here. He's standing, commanding above. That is the story of Washington. That became a very popular song in this year through across the nation. Now, and that's why I asked her, didn't they mean the George Washington? The George Washington I heard of was a great joy, who was the father of the country and all this was coming out about him, and there were articles and papers about him and all this. She then emphatically responded to me, "Why no James, Booker T Washington School is the right name. Booker T. Washington was a great man and he was a Negro." | 12:45 |
| James Willard Woodson | I look at Ms. Hudson as though stunned, and then while shaking my head, I departed with the words, "A Negro was a great man." I would have to go shaking my head. I was ill prepared to accept the reality of that revelation. However, Ms. Hudson did not give up on her mission to instruct me, and she was a great teacher, dead now. And the next day she called me to her desk at the close of school, handing me a copy of Booker T. Washington Up From Slavery. | 13:44 |
| James Willard Woodson | She said, "Now James, today is Friday and you don't come back until Monday. Go home and read this book carefully, and be prepared to discuss it with me when you return." Keeping my promise to read this assignment was undoubtedly a turning point in my life. I spent the entire weekend thoroughly engrossed in the reading of Dr. Washington's progress from slavery to leader of his race and world renowned. | 14:24 |
| James Willard Woodson | Now I didn't say here because I didn't want to take up the time, but my mother saw me sitting there trying to read this book and she says, "Why you keep trying to read that book honey?" I said, "Mama, I got to have it read when I go back to class Monday so the teacher will discuss with me." She went and took the closet in the room and cleaned it out. They had a light in there. She put a light in there, put me a chair and everything there. And she said, "Now come on over here and get here and read so you can't be disturbing me or anybody else." I said, "Yes ma'am." I got in there and I could read better than I did. Now and I finished it before it was time go back to school. | 15:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | When I reported Monday, Ms. Hudson accepted the returned book without asking me any questions, because she could detect the change in my countenance, my face. I wasn't frowned up again like I used to. I was convinced that the school had an appropriate name, and that there was a chance for me to become a worthwhile member of society. My class performances improved continually until Ms. Hudson crowned me as the spelling champion of the entire school, regardless of grades. | 15:41 |
| James Willard Woodson | A $2.50 gold coin for this achievement is still retained by my mother. Course that was 1981, my mother's deceased now died in 1992, I think a week before her birthday, 92nd birthday. Dr. Woodson realized that countless thousands of Black youth were deprived of proper self images of their present and potential work. And that this condition would continue as long as there were racial biases in textbooks of school system. | 16:19 |
| James Willard Woodson | Many of the publications respond more favorably to information about the Black experience, but the ballot is far from being won. Let us all therefore conscientiously observe February as Black History Month in appreciation of a great historians dream that he helped him make into a reality as long as he had the opportunity. Now that still needs to be done, just the challenge takes more than Carter G. Woodson. Booker Washington, there's a letter I have at home where he wrote Carter G. Woodson after the turn of the century, and told him he had heard some information about things he had been reporting and things. | 16:56 |
| James Willard Woodson | And he read a letter he wrote to somebody in public, and he told me he liked the way he was projecting about the Black achievements and all. And he told him that he would want if he ever had an opportunity to come this way, he wanted to invite him to come to Tuskegee and lecture in front of the faculty and students. And he did. And he's talking about the same thing. Now, Booker T. Washington had letters, had books that he participated and wrote about the Black experience. | 17:49 |
| James Willard Woodson | He's the author of a biography of Frederick Douglas. He is not considered one of the main ones but is a good one. And one reason why he could do it is that he concedes that Frederick Douglas became his role model. He was a young lad in slavery in Virginia, and then his parents moved to West Virginia, and he heard him talking about this Black man who had been to Washington, and had conferences, and had lunches with the president. And this inspired him that President Lincoln had invited him to the White House. He'd been had sessions with him. And this man was Frederick Douglas. Then from that day on, he began to try to learn everything he could about Frederick Douglas. | 18:27 |
| Paul Ortiz | Washington was inspired by Frederick Douglas? | 19:33 |
| James Willard Woodson | Booker T. Washington, he was his hero. His role model was Frederick Douglas. And as I say, he had putting a book out on him and everything else. See his biography. This is Fred Douglass biography here. And he tells somewhere, I think it's in here. I know it's somewhere about how he had interviewed with Lincoln, and how he campaigned for Lincoln 359, 362. After he had grown up, he had joined the abolition movement and things were going slower in terms of liberation. And he decided at the time of the next election of the president by 1861, that we're going to have to get somebody in the White House who will help us abolish slavery, president. | 19:37 |
| James Willard Woodson | So he went around and talked to all the candidates who had been nominated by different parties and different groups to run for president. And he asked each one of them, what would they do about slavery if they got elected President. Abraham Lincoln was the only one who told him that he would do everything in his power, ability as the president have abolished. It's been on too long, now we need to get rid of it. And so then he went out and organized a political block rule called the National Abolition Association. | 20:43 |
| James Willard Woodson | And after he talked to Mr. Lincoln, he sent word around to all these supporters in this organization that Lincoln is our man, please support him. And when the election ended and they counted the votes, this block vote he had organized was equal or little more to than the votes Lincoln won by. Lincoln was not favored to win, but it was an upset victory. One thing, I think it's all in here. He's not where he is, Lincoln. As I have said, the southern threat lost many votes. But it gained more than would cover the loss. | 21:21 |
| James Willard Woodson | It frightened the timid, but stimulated the brave. And the result was the triumphant election of Abraham Lincoln. And then he's going to tell how he influenced Lincoln to write the Emancipation Proclamation. He didn't tell them how to do it, but he kept coming to the White House to see what Lincoln was going to do something about slavery. On one occasion he came to Lincoln and took his pen out and wrote the Emancipation Proclamation while Douglas was looking at him. | 22:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well these are the things that have been not been taught to people in textbooks and so on. And it's hurt America. Okay, now let give you one example of something. I don't want to say I'm a disciple of Carter Woodson, my name is Woodson, and in my family, we had reunions for years. Got one coming about this week or next week. I don't think I'll make it. But anyway, I have seen on my family tree they put up, we had Carter G. Woodson is listed there too. As my grandfather, or great-grandfather's brother. Now whether it's true, I don't know. I had planned to go to Washington when I was in school here when I got out of school, and had tried to see him and have a meeting and ask him him to show me this tree. And he resembles, we all resemble. But that isn't why I agree, it's the logic of what he is saying here. | 23:07 |
| James Willard Woodson | Okay, who was the person, the first person to perform a successful operation of the human heart? His name was Dr. Daniel Hill Williams. He was a Black doctor. And he was in Chicago, I believe it was Chicago. He was somewhere where he had an office in the city. And one night while he was there, the men got in a fight and one of them got cut in the heart, he rushed to the hospital, and they brought Dr. Daniel Hill Williams in, he was on duty at that hospital, and he performed surge on his man and saved his life. | 24:26 |
| James Willard Woodson | And it had never been done before in the history of the world. Anybody ever knew about him. Now what I'm saying is, you mean to tell me that a White person would say, ""Well I don't want that operation because Dr. Daniel Hill Williams was the first person to do it? We need the best way he can get from everybody. If I can give you better information about what you want, then this is the person to come to or wherever it is. | 25:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | And some years ago there was a young lady in school at Auburn University, and I was already at Auburn too, I was one of the first Blacks to go to school there after the [indistinct 00:25:53], when they abolished segregation and then made all Auburn agreed to accept students, Black students. And I went over there because I was trying to get a master's degree. I was working at Tuskegee in the alumni office. | 25:39 |
| James Willard Woodson | And there was a White lady over there, a young White lady, who came to me and told me that one of our professors told her to talk to me about a question problem she had. Anyway, she was writing, doing a research project for her degree. I think it was a Master's, I'm not sure about that. And the information she needed was so the professor called I was better informed than anybody he knew around, he had me in his class, and he suggested she talked to me about it. | 26:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | I told her, that was back in 1972 or three or four or something like that. I think it'd be nice if we meet at the library, [indistinct 00:27:00] library and we study over there, and we go over this information. And so we did and we met over there for oh, I guess several weeks anyway at a certain time of day. And I look at her material and I give her suggestions. But she went on and graduated and she earned Doctor's degree on it and published stuff, books. But what I'm saying was, the professor sent her to me, it's a White professor, because I had the information that she needed. I should be man enough to provide it. Because as I say, when I help somebody else I help myself, and do it above board to be a gentleman. | 26:47 |
| James Willard Woodson | We needed her success and her talents too, and she's done well since them. Very well. And I'm glad that it happened. And I went back and commended the professor. I said, "I'm surprised you did that." We carried on very well. Okay, now let's take the Black experience. Carter G. Woodson, and Dr. W. E. B. Dubois scholar, the first Black, Harvard PhD, and so on have done a lot of good work on that. I have done some work, but we are looking at it from this side of the world, we're Black. | 27:48 |
| James Willard Woodson | You get your information you look at from your side, and man always get the truth. That's an asset to everybody. We should help each other. We want the truth. Some people have argued that Jesus Christ was a Black man. I've never seen that written anywhere. It may be. You know what I always said? So what? He was a man. And that's benefit by his good work. See that's the important thing. | 28:36 |
| James Willard Woodson | Who is the best person for this job? And who will do the job best? Who would teach me best? Who teach you best? And this is what he said, in the miseducation of Negro, that hurts us to be miseducated. No education or the wrong education. Now, Booker T. Washington said something I've always admired, but a lot of the people of his time who were leaders, came out against him, because they said he was not a pure Black leader. | 29:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | That he also liked White people. They call him an Uncle Tom. And I have never believed that for a minute. Think I know about Booker Washington, especially having gone to school here, and been in class with two of his granddaughters in my class. And I learned a lot about him talking to students who graduated under him when he was principal. He was an unusual man. And so I know some things about it that make me know what kind of man he was. | 29:51 |
| James Willard Woodson | For example, he would meet his students every so often and tell them, I don't want to learn or hear that some of you students have withdrawn from school because you're having a hard time getting your lessons, or you can't get enough money to stay in school, or you can't get along with people. Now when you're having problems, I want you to come to my office, and sit down and let's talk about it and see if we can't find a solution. And many students would do that, and he would do all he could to save them. There's some unproven stories that Mr. Washington, my mother told me when she was living in Birmingham one time, when she and my father got married in Birmingham, and he was from Alabama, she was from Arkansas. | 30:23 |
| James Willard Woodson | I'm from South Carolina, Aiken, South Carolina, that she lived in this neighborhood And this man bought this girl home in his little surry. He had a little surry, he called it Dexter. And he bought a home and took her into the house to the people, and stayed there a little while. And then they said it neighborhood said this man sat down and talked with her parents, mother and father, some whoever. And that he brought the girl home because she was pregnant, got pregnant in school, and she couldn't stay in school like that, it was against school rules and policies anyway. | 31:29 |
| James Willard Woodson | He brought her home and talked to her parents and said word got out that he told her mother that after she had his baby and gets up and get around with everything, if she wants to come back to Tuskegee, please let me know. And said, "We'll be glad to consider her." Now I would suggest that he was going to set up some rules for her, but let her come back and get an education. Now how many principals do that? He was an unusual man. | 32:16 |
| James Willard Woodson | And there's a lady named [indistinct 00:32:53] Yancy who finished here in 1915, a year before Booker Washington passed in November. But she finished in the spring. And she'd been going for four years, four school years. And she told me once at her home down in Louisiana and she lived down there. And Mr. Washington and a lot of others back there, we were in school too when the students called him Paw. And whenever they'd see him coming on the campus, he'd walk around the campus quite a bit, looking at his campus, this is a new place. And they call him Paw, and say, "Hey Paw, Paw, can we walk with you?" He said "Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm." | 32:50 |
| James Willard Woodson | They'd get around and walk with him around the campus, and he'd see something that had happened, now some structure or something, some [indistinct 00:33:48] here. He'd stop and tell them about it, how they got it and everything, what they plan to do with it. He would give an orientation to the school. But they asked for this trip. And after he walked around a little while and show them different things, he'd stop them and said, "Come on, go with me." He'd take them in the cafeteria and tell the people in the cafeteria to give them some snacks. And he would do it. And so the students just really loved him, and hey called him Paw. | 33:40 |
| James Willard Woodson | Now I just looked at a letter yesterday he wrote to one of his sons, and he signed it Papa. Papa, Paw and Papa, you see to him. He was a person who was loved and he has a quotation where it can be identified. And he said, "I will let no man drag me down so low it will cause me to hate him. Now most scholars will concede that his arch enemy in the civil rights program, and in the struggle for liberation of Black people, was Dr. William E. Burghardt Dubois. He used initials right name W. E. B. Dubois, the first Harvard PhD and was a great scholar, produced a lot of works on the Black experience, some very good ones. | 34:20 |
| James Willard Woodson | He was perhaps the front ranking opponent of Booker Washington's ideas. And he presented opposition publicly and different things like that and wrote things too. But historically, there was a time in the history of migration in America when he lost his job where he was working for some reason or other. And he was out of employment, and he contacted Booker T. Washington to see if he had any work for, and Booker T. Washington had brought him here and put him on the factory, in spite of what he had said again. Which says what kind of man Booker T. Washington was. That proves there he meant what he said, I let no man man drag me down so low as to cause me to hate him. And he was a church man, bible reader. And he perhaps was influenced by the apostle Paul who said that "Love never fails." That's the one instrument for success in life. | 35:18 |
| Paul Ortiz | Mr. Woodson, you were talking earlier about your childhood in West Virginia. | 36:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well it's in that article, yeah. | 36:38 |
| Paul Ortiz | It's in the article. Did your father work as a coal miner? | 36:40 |
| James Willard Woodson | My father was a coal miner. But now I don't say much about my father because I didn't know him. I have some memory of him. But none in the house with my father. You see, my mother is, she was pretty young. She was only 18 years old when I was born. And she was 16 when my brother was born. My brother was born in January 1917. My mother was born in 1900, that November of 1900, in 1916 she was 16 years old. Which let you know that to me know that when she conceived my brother, she was 15. My father was about I'm not sure, he was in his early twenties, when I came to the world. And it's a young 15-year-old girl. And my mother was such a natural woman and she was back in West Virginia in our hometown she was cited for her dress wear and stuff. | 36:48 |
| James Willard Woodson | She and a White lady who owned a taxicab company were voted the two best dress women in the city. And she was a very lovely person. But what I'm saying is that she told me, and I asked my mother one time, I said, "Mama, I said, where is my father?" People come to school, their father bring them to school. And I asked my brother if he could remember, my brother was two years and seven months my senior. And she told us, had a meeting with us and explained what happened. That my father was a young coal mining leader of the men in there struggling to unionize, and they would use him to go and make speeches and different things like that. He was a very intelligent man and make good speeches and so on. And she said he stayed away from home so much that it created a problem. | 38:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | And she told him that if he didn't stop staying away from home and come home with his family, she's going to have to leave him and say he just patted under the chins on her. "You're not going nowhere. She's so young she can't." But then he came home one night and she was gone. Took me and my brother and left. I was five months old when he was still three years old. And I remember him, I forget how old I was now, but he came to back there to hometown where we were living as a family on a couple of times. And I saw him the first time I saw him, my brother and I walking together, he said, "Jim, you see that man walking there coming talk coming toward us?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "His name is Sam, he's our father." But I was just damaged. When he walked up to us, he stopped and he took my brother. | 39:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | He said, "Where you boys going?" And he said, "We're going up the street to play." he pulled the comb out of his pocket and pulled me up to him. Now I guess I might have been five or six years over there. And he stroked my hair. Combed my hair. Then he put the comb back in his pocket. And my brother's hair is straight as any Caucasian person. But he just stroked my hair and he put the comb back in his pocket. Then he reached in the pocket and he pulled out a dollar he gave him, "Give Jim half of this." He walked up the street. That's the last time I ever saw him in my life. | 40:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | I don't tell that story because it was too sad. But I just didn't know my father. Now and I have had people that come to me after I grew up and I started working at places and different things, and tell me they knew that I was just like my father in many ways. And that, so yeah, and they talk about some of his traits and things. He was a good public speaker. One man asked me, because I speak like my father. But no, I just didn't know him. | 40:54 |
| Paul Ortiz | People would come up to you though in later years and say, "We knew your father." | 41:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, that's right. | 41:33 |
| Paul Ortiz | And they would say that he was a great public speaker? | 41:36 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, he was used by the labor unions. | 41:39 |
| Paul Ortiz | By the United Miners? | 41:47 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. | 41:47 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, and so he was an organizer? | 41:47 |
| James Willard Woodson | I can't say what he did, I don't want to say he was organizer. I don't know what that was. But there is a need when you have organizations that have somebody who can come in and calm them down, keep peace, all this stuff. I don't know what he was doing. | 41:52 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you remember your grandparents on the other side? | 42:15 |
| James Willard Woodson | On my father's side, I never didn't know, their name was Spencer. And my mother's parents, on the Woodson side, I heard of them, but I didn't know any of them. I knew my grandmother on my mother's side. In fact, my brother lived in her house a few years and my mother. | 42:21 |
| Paul Ortiz | I see. You mentioned at the beginning of the interview that the town you grew up in West Virginia, it was a mining camp, and it was a tough situation, tough environment. Can you talk a little more about living conditions? | 42:50 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well, it was basically a mining camp. They had some other work there too, but basically it was a mining camp business. Well the miners worked not in Fairmont. Fairmont was the city, but it was just on the outskirts. And they had a little name for different places out there. One called this, one called that, and so on. And so the people worked on the mining camp, and after they got off work they'd come in and live in the city, quite a few, some stayed up there with a camp too. And when I was in high school, they had a population of 23,000 people there. And there were several schools there. | 43:04 |
| James Willard Woodson | Only one Black high school there, was only one Black elementary school. And it was a condition of, I came along during the depression years too. It was a condition of Hoover and Roosevelt, and then Roosevelt improved things. And I can't remember Hoover was, and he had a tough time with the economy, depression. The people there just had a hard time getting work. Some would go out and find job working on construction jobs and different things. And some had regular jobs in their coal mining camp. That's the men, it was rough. And every so often some family would pack up and leave. | 43:49 |
| Paul Ortiz | Where did the people come from? There were a lot of migrants? | 44:51 |
| James Willard Woodson | There was a lot of migration from the south, what we call the south, the lower south up into West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, like that because there were jobs, they were opening up industry, different things. They'd come and try to get those jobs. And so quite a bit. It was not unusual when school opened up there to meet two or three people who come left from Alabama, George, Virginia. | 44:57 |
| Paul Ortiz | What was your earliest childhood memories? | 45:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well, my earliest childhood memories, I can remember when sometime word come that somebody in the family had passed or someone, a young lady in the family has had a baby and things like that. Some of my cousins and so on. As I said, I barely remember when Calvin Coolidge was president a little bit, but I remember very close about Hoover. And then Franklin Roosevelt came in and he became a hero. He was providing jobs and opportunities, things like that. And then, as I said, that experience I put, when I started the school, it was difficult to get my lesson. But when I found out about the. | 45:37 |
| James Willard Woodson | Booker T. Washington was also going to turn me into the type of Frederick Douglas, [indistinct 00:00:09] legacy. And I got curious about why he was such a hero, Booker T. Washington, and I started reading about him. | 0:02 |
| Paul Ortiz | And you were doing this in high school? | 0:18 |
| James Willard Woodson | I was, yeah. I read about him in high school. And he sort of inspired me. You see, if a person is poor, economically, if he has a very limited choice of the schools he can go to, and if there is segregation, discrimination, and problems like that— And I lived as a little boy to encounter some race riots in West Virginia. | 0:21 |
| Paul Ortiz | What were those like? | 1:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh, my gosh. This one was horrible experience in the world. People would come and try and knock the door of your house down. They stopped you in the street and fight you, and different things like that. | 1:02 |
| Paul Ortiz | And this happen as a child? | 1:18 |
| James Willard Woodson | I witnessed it as a child, race riots. I was quite young, I know that. Yeah, but I think when I was a child, the old people— parents would take the children and put them in a quiet room somewhere, so they wouldn't be part of that, because it was frightening, you see. You're in a minority population, you see. But I witnessed race riots in West Virginia, my hometown Fairmont, when I was a young lad, pretty young. And— | 1:20 |
| Paul Ortiz | How old were you? | 1:45 |
| James Willard Woodson | Pretty hard to say now. I guess I was about 12 years old when I first saw. | 1:47 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you know what started the riot or—? | 2:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | I don't know. You'd hear rumors about some— The number one thing I think in race riots in the South and in America was racial contacts and infringements, including alleged rape of girls. Including that, you see? Whether it's true or not, you don't know. Because if a White person had something against a Black person, if he went out and accused that person of rape, he'd get a lot of support. I mean, it's seen as [indistinct 00:02:44], you see? | 2:06 |
| James Willard Woodson | But I never knew anybody, personally I didn't, that ever even talked about raping anybody or that did it either. It's just something we wouldn't do. It's just no reason for it, as far as we were concerned. And we had some White friends. I can't remember just who they were now. We definitely had some White— There's some neighborhoods, even in the South, where there were White people living there and Blacks. I know in Sumner there were, and we got along with them all right. | 2:44 |
| Paul Ortiz | Can you describe perhaps, one of the race riots that you witnessed as a child? | 3:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | I can think of it, but I was just a child. It seemed a lot in Sumner, West Virginia. It became an unfailable factor that on Halloween night, the celebration of Halloween, and people would wear masks and things, that there'd be some fighting among White and Black people downtown, in the city. They'd meet and fight. That was one of the things there. There was a lot of bad, corrupt, of course, I don't know, but they got so you had to kind of be careful about going out on Halloween because you don't know when somebody's going to start a fight with you or what. | 3:36 |
| James Willard Woodson | Because on Halloween night most everybody would have on some kind of mask. I know I lived through some of those riots. Nobody seemed to bother me, but I lived through it. But then I was kind of young and I tried to stay away from it. But I've seen it and then it happened on the street too. Sometimes you'd be in the house and they'd be going down the street looking for somebody they wanted, and you'd just stay in and get quiet. | 4:34 |
| Paul Ortiz | Would they have masks on? | 5:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | Sometimes. But most of the time they didn't have it on. When you look at it, racism is silly. When you look at it. And then according to some reports and things you see, on Sumner street, you have many Black people or White ancestors. You see? In other words, there were many Black families who had some White person who had been in there and helped to get some children by one of the— Just like it's a known fact that back in the days of slavery, sometimes the master would get in contact with one of the slave girls, and then she'd be pregnant then as a result of it. And that wasn't true of all of them, and [indistinct 00:06:15]. But there was some of them who did do these things. You see? We can't control it. | 5:16 |
| Paul Ortiz | Where did you go after high school? | 6:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | Where did I go? | 6:25 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah. What year did you graduate in? | 6:26 |
| James Willard Woodson | Let's see, in high school— I finished high school in 1937 at Dunbar High School in 1937, in West Virginia, Fairmont. And then in 19— Well, that's September, and I finished in May. That September, I enrolled at Tuskegee, in Alabama. And they had a program called the five-year plan, where you could work your way through the school. I came there on that plan, and they put me on it. In other words, you work four years and you finish in five years because you don't have the money to go to school, so you earn it as you go on. You see? | 6:28 |
| James Willard Woodson | And then after a period of time, you'd have enough savings to switch over and go to school full-time and work part-time, when you make it. I never had any problem making it financially at Tuskegee, once they got me on the five year plan. In fact, I've told many times the story that after I got registered in school, I had $60 left. That's all I had. And on occasion, my mother would send me a few dollars, just like [indistinct 00:07:44]. | 7:14 |
| Paul Ortiz | And so you started at Tuskegee in 1937? | 8:04 |
| James Willard Woodson | Uh-huh. (Affirmative) January 6th. | 8:05 |
| Paul Ortiz | January 6, 1937. | 8:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | Uh-huh. (Affirmative) | 8:11 |
| Paul Ortiz | And then you went there up until 1942? | 8:11 |
| James Willard Woodson | 1941. | 8:19 |
| Paul Ortiz | 1941. What was the school like? And how did you make contact with Tuskegee? You were in West Virginia. | 8:20 |
| James Willard Woodson | That's a miracle story, and I don't know if people believe me now but it's true. In Sumner West Virginia, it was not unusual for someone to come up into the town and a new person to get a job in a coal mine. There was this young man who'd come up about a year before I graduated my high school. His name, I believe it was Gene Barnes. And he started out trying to make him some money. We'd heard rumors that he'd been in college and he had just left college, he didn't graduate. A lot of people thought he got in trouble, but he didn't. And he started to live at his sister's house. She was married to a coal miner. So he started out, not having no job at the coal mining company. He started out cutting people's hair. Because he'd cut your hair then for a quarter. I think maybe about a dollar at the barbershop. | 8:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | Anyway, he proved to be a good barber. And I went to him this once and talking to him. He came here my junior year, about a year before I graduated. He'd tell me I got to cut my hair for a quarter, so whenever I need a haircut I go to him. And he was good. You see? Well, he had learned how to cut hair at school in Tuskegee. He's in town somewhere. But anyway, I ended up getting Gene to cut my hair. He wasn't too far, I could walk up there. | 9:41 |
| James Willard Woodson | When I got to his house— He lived with his sister and her husband. You see? I rang the doorbell outside and she came to the door and she said, "Yea". I said, "Is Gene home?" She said, "Yeah." I said, "Tell him I want to get a haircut." "Just a minute." Turned her back and he came out. She told him. And he said, "Come on." And he took me on the porch somewhere outside the ground he set up to hair. And he'd put you in a chair and he started cutting your hair. | 10:14 |
| James Willard Woodson | What he would do is cut your hair and then you gave him a quarter and you leave. And I heard about why he came and so on, and as he started my hair— Well, then I was long toward the end of the school year that year. I had gone to get my hair cut, he started cutting my hair and he said, "Are you going to be in pass graduating or finishing next— about two weeks later." I said, "Well, I'm scheduled, I hope I do." | 10:50 |
| Paul Ortiz | To graduate high school? | 11:27 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, high school. Said, "I hope you do too." [indistinct 00:11:28] as I get my hair cut, [indistinct 00:11:37] graduated. He cut my hair and he said, "[indistinct 00:11:40]," he took me on the back porch to cut my hair. And he said, "Did you finish college Friday night? "Yes, I did, Gene." [indistinct 00:11:58], "Are you going to college?" I said, "Yeah, I want to go." I said, "But the school I write to tell me I need so much money to come that way." | 11:27 |
| James Willard Woodson | To cut it long and short, he said, "You don't have that money to college?" I said, "What did you say?" [indistinct 00:12:15] go to college, it can happened. Tuskegee has a five-year plan. So we had to work so you go and he spend the first two years working full-time on a job and saving him money. And then you switch over and you have the money [indistinct 00:12:32] and then you can get a part-time job, you go to school the next two years and you finish in five years four-year college degree. | 12:04 |
| James Willard Woodson | I said, "Is that so? Is that so?" He calmed me down and said, "I'll tell you what you do. The next time you go out of town, stop by the post office and get your postcards. Get the card and write to the registrar Tuskegee Institute, Tuskegee Alabama, and ask him to please [indistinct 00:13:00] back to the five-year plan." I didn't say anything. When he finished with my hair, I went home, and the very next morning my mother told, she said, "[indistinct 00:13:17]. It's not your [indistinct 00:13:17]." | 12:38 |
| James Willard Woodson | Said, "Why don't you go to Jackson Avenue by the post office and say it's [indistinct 00:13:26] low that's [indistinct 00:13:27] and get some [indistinct 00:13:29]. I got the mail and I [indistinct 00:13:31]. [indistinct 00:13:32], she wouldn't get a lot of chains a quarter. I got a [indistinct 00:13:37] and I walked the post office. The post office is [indistinct 00:13:42] from me. I looked up there, post office [indistinct 00:13:49] try that. I went to the post office and went looking and got inside a [indistinct 00:13:55] five or six count [indistinct 00:13:57], didn't buy any of them. | 13:16 |
| James Willard Woodson | I went one of them, I said, "Give me a postcard." They gave me postcard, I went to the writing desk, I wrote Registrar, Registrar, Accounting Institute, Accounting Institute, Tuskegee, Alabama, [indistinct 00:14:13] Virginia, two cards. Wrote it and drop [indistinct 00:14:18] and put them, and I laughed to myself, "Well, this isn't the end of that. Too better be true. You see?" I was [indistinct 00:14:25], I never heard from Hampton, but I learned later that Hampton dropped the program that year. | 13:59 |
| James Willard Woodson | Tuskegee had a large farm, and they made some money. One of the reasons. So anyway, I walked to the post office to get my letter. I asked some money to give me two [indistinct 00:14:53] and I went to put it in a dropper. "I guess this is the end of that," is what I said. "Sounds too good to be choosy." And in about five days, I was home by myself, I wasn't really going to work. [indistinct 00:15:11] if I'm at work or not. | 14:33 |
| James Willard Woodson | Postman [indistinct 00:15:15] and I heard him and my mon said, "Look, [indistinct 00:15:20]." So [indistinct 00:15:20] I got mail [indistinct 00:15:20]. That my mother. [indistinct 00:15:24] from school. Mother started to read, and said, "It's from Tuskegee." I had [indistinct 00:15:41]. The letter said, "Dear Mr. Woodson, we are pleased to acknowledged we have received your application for admission, and also to inform you that the admissions committee had granted you acceptance as a freshman. You report [indistinct 00:15:56]." | 15:14 |
| James Willard Woodson | However, we must inform you that your acceptance is based on the condition [indistinct 00:16:03] see your your high school transcript. Please have your [indistinct 00:16:08] your transcript right away." I said, "I didn't understand how it worked then, I was fairly young. So I took the thing up. I had a chance go to college. So the next morning I got [indistinct 00:16:23] school about miles and a half away. | 15:59 |
| James Willard Woodson | And the principal sitting in his office at his desk and I hot on the door. He said, "Come in." He said, "Woodson you've been accepted?" I said, "Yes sir." "Woodson, you've been accepted?" "Yes sir." "Woodson, you've been accepted." "Yes sir." Now he didn't tell me he was so excited. I hadn't even replied. I said, "The postcard, that's all." So he told me, "You need to [indistinct 00:16:55]. I am going to help you to find [indistinct 00:16:56]." I said, "Thank you sir." And he did. I got a [indistinct 00:17:00]. You see? I didn't realize I hadn't fully been accepted. Didn't know how to do it. So I went home and got the material out and I sat [indistinct 00:17:14]. And then he told me some [indistinct 00:17:16] for the second time. That's how I got into Tuskegee. You see? I had nothing to do with this, God did a miracle [indistinct 00:17:27]. | 16:26 |
| Paul Ortiz | And when you were at Tuskegee, what kind of work were you going to earn money to—? What kind of work were you doing to work your way through school? Mr. Woodson, you mentioned that you worked your way through Tuskegee basically. | 17:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | Basically, yeah. | 18:27 |
| Paul Ortiz | What kind of work were you doing? | 18:29 |
| James Willard Woodson | That's interesting too. The first year on the five-year plan, I started out working on the landscape out here. I was cutting the grass, cutting the hedges and shrubbery, as I was. A lot of us did — we were. We were about six of us, same time working together. And all over the camp, we had to do. You see? We would haul fertilizer, and placed it on campus, where we would pack grass, grass were growing. | 18:31 |
| James Willard Woodson | And we we dig up the ground and put that in it to improve the grass. We did landscape work. You see? And then we also went on to the ice house, they call it. The laundry and ice house down the backside of campus, and get the ice and haul around the different building and put it in a [indistinct 00:19:39] for cool water, warm [indistinct 00:19:41]. No, one time. And we also go out there and bring back tools, whatever they needed. They [indistinct 00:19:50] back to work. | 19:11 |
| James Willard Woodson | There's be a gang [indistinct 00:19:54] time, come fight together and fix the other [indistinct 00:20:02]. We [indistinct 00:20:02] to the cafeteria or one of our jobs also. And then I think it was a second semester I got a job as a night guard. No, no, second year, I got a job as a night guard. We got six hours at night [indistinct 00:20:27]. We would guard the campus. We were the security, and then we come on a different shift. We come to work from like from 6:00 PM to 12:00 AM or 6:00 AM to 2:00 AM, and we had to come and night work through the daytime. You see? | 19:53 |
| James Willard Woodson | And we walk around the campus and observe certain things. Each we was assigned a certain part of the campus, to work with me. [indistinct 00:20:54] tools and all this kind of thing. That was the security day and night — student security. And with that kind of work, and as I got to make pretty good grades, they gave me a job working in the history department. In college I was a good history student. | 20:45 |
| James Willard Woodson | And so because of my academic record, Mr. Alonzo Davis, who was professor of psychology, he was also director of the workforce, he [indistinct 00:21:35] one time. And because the student make good grade he considered a job on campus. [indistinct 00:21:46]. So I got a job working at history department, you see? And my last two years job was in the history department, so I graded the papers. And when the school was going through depression and they couldn't hire enough teaching, they had me teaching the class. | 21:17 |
| Paul Ortiz | Did you have any particular favorite teachers? | 22:08 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yes, I did. I have some very favorite teachers. I like them all but my most favorite was Dr. Robert Daniel Reed. He taught me my freshman year. Robert Daniel Reed, he's deceased now. His wife still lives here in Tuskegee. We talk all the time. He [indistinct 00:22:42] in Alabama. I think he was born in Selma, Alabama. I think his father a politician and a [indistinct 00:22:54] construction. You see. He was a state congressman of some kind. A senator or [indistinct 00:23:02]. | 22:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | But anyway, he was a very brilliant lecturer of history. And he said he liked it. You see? He taught me my first year history. And I made such high grades that he needed [indistinct 00:23:22] the class [indistinct 00:23:24]. Said he was very surprised that he graded that he wanted to give me a 100. I got all questions, I knew [indistinct 00:23:31] answers we had. And from that one, he liked me and he used to come get me explain things in class, and I all I get [indistinct 00:23:40]. | 23:02 |
| James Willard Woodson | So get me to read. You see? So then as I was working on landscape in my second year, and he came out here, and he saw me and we talk, he took me outside and said that he was sure I was working for [indistinct 00:23:54]. And he wondered if I wanted to kind of work with him. I said, "I wish I could get [indistinct 00:24:00]. I want to talk with my [indistinct 00:24:03]." And so he [indistinct 00:24:09] and told him, "Dr. Reed want me to come over. He said that I had a good reputation for my work on the job, keep it up [indistinct 00:24:16]". | 23:39 |
| James Willard Woodson | So my last two years, I was in the history department. I graded the students papers mostly— I could tell you the truth, I have never cheated in my life. My God hears me talking now. But I never graded a paper, gave a student a grade. He answered that question. I did my work. And they could depend on me. I was trustworthy. I have never cheated a student, for a student. | 24:19 |
| Paul Ortiz | Now, you were at Tuskegee between 1937 and 1941. | 24:50 |
| James Willard Woodson | Right. | 24:54 |
| Paul Ortiz | In 1941, I've read that there was a strike at the school. I don't know much about that. Can you tell me about that? | 24:56 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yes, I can. I guess I can. I became the leader of the strike. I don't tell if it hurts. There's negativity in terms of the school image and stuff. What had happened was the school was going through difficult time because of unemployment, depression and stuff. And the school was having a difficult time getting to switching [indistinct 00:25:37] operators, Tuskegee was a private school. And they started to reduce the cost of the food. | 25:07 |
| James Willard Woodson | The food service in the cafeteria where we all ate, until the food we've got less palatable to the students and they started complaining about it. Someone wrote an article and the school [indistinct 00:26:04] digest, student paper about it and so on, you see. That's one thing, and then there was some other things [indistinct 00:26:11] difficulties, the administration tighten down on us and made sure we did our jobs and all those kinds of things, you see. | 25:49 |
| James Willard Woodson | The student didn't all that and so they got together and started complaining. So the student council set up a meeting to discuss our problem. And they had some other problems too that that someone got expelled this, something like— Different things. They were not too pleased the way things were going. But I was on the student council, I was a member of the student council. So they call a special meeting one evening late down in the council office, under cafeteria. They sent someone else to my office— my room [indistinct 00:27:03]. | 26:21 |
| Paul Ortiz | You were the president of the student council? | 27:05 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, no, I ran for it but I didn't get elected. | 27:06 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay. | 27:06 |
| James Willard Woodson | I was one of the three candidates but I didn't get elected. | 27:07 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay. | 27:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | What I'm saying is that I was on the student council and I had been an influential student. I was a candidate, you see? And I'd been making history speeches. I was a captain in ROTC at that time. I'd in what you call Negro History Week in February, they had me to speak speak in chapel, the students. We had president speech and so on, so they liked me. So anyway, when I went down under the cafeteria to hold the meeting about the condition, what can we do about it? Then they [indistinct 00:27:59] that a strike could be called. | 27:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | When he came to my room and told me to come on to the meeting, they want me to be down there. They told him to come get me. So I went down to the meeting, and that happened. They got some of other [indistinct 00:28:11] come too, you see. I was home. In all fairness to myself, I didn't play around the school. I got my lessons, I studied. And I had an ambition to graduate and take care of my mother, because she had gotten sick, you see. Before I came to college. | 28:02 |
| James Willard Woodson | My brother, he worked up in construction, but they laid him off and so on. So I promised her that I'm going to finish school and come back and get a job and take care of her for the rest of her life. That was on my mind too. So after a lot of time in school setting, I was [indistinct 00:28:45] somewhere then and they came and got me [indistinct 00:28:48]. And so I went to the meeting. The council [indistinct 00:28:54] sent for me, but the follow who was presiding he was one of my buddies. He was the vice president of the council. The president of the council was off on a study leave, on leave. | 28:31 |
| James Willard Woodson | He was away from campus. So the vice president took over. He and I were almost like brothers. And so I kind of wanted to help him get pressure off of him. We were seniors, we're going to graduate this year too, you see. So, anyway, we had that meeting in the council, and he told why they called the meeting with the conditions and so on, and— | 29:07 |
| James Willard Woodson | I don't think [indistinct 00:29:36] really [indistinct 00:29:36] a vote to [indistinct 00:29:37]. So he said, "Now anybody got any question before we take the vote?" I said, "Yes, I have a question." And I got up, ask him, [indistinct 00:29:46] having said, I got something to say. I got up, and God is my judge. I tried to persuade the student council, that this wouldn't be the wisest thing to do. And I said, "You know the leadership of the school, the president and on is going to feel insulted. And the result is going to be the leaders are I was going to be the leaders going to get expelled. | 29:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | Some of those leaders are going to be expelled first. And I said "Now—" they have— I think there's six of us in this meeting. I think we had about 14, 15 there present. I think four of us [indistinct 00:30:34] who were seniors and graduating this May. And I said, "Would rather for us to let this situation go on, and stay in school and get our lessons and graduate. And then we go out and get jobs and send or bring money back to help our students. [indistinct 00:30:59], we call this, Jack, we're going to get expelled." | 30:14 |
| James Willard Woodson | We were the more mature student, the upper class and definitely [indistinct 00:31:09] for them. We're leaders too. And I said, "Let's go ahead and graduate and come back and solve the problem this way." We went [indistinct 00:31:16]. "Well, some [indistinct 00:31:19], nobody is scared. We're not scared and [indistinct 00:31:32]." And so finally I talked to him, they said things on. They want to voted to strike. | 31:05 |
| James Willard Woodson | When they get ready to take a vote to strike, a fellow told them, he said, "Wait then, before you take the vote, we got something to say. We got something to say to us, and you're better if we got to say [indistinct 00:31:54]." "Okay, what you got to say?" He got on the stage right here, [indistinct 00:32:02], "I want everybody to here," he said, "We heard about this potential strike, and some of us at the meeting and we have made a decision that there's only one condition which we'll strike." He said, "What is that one thing? Why? What one condition?" "We mean it and that is how we're going to strike. What is it?" | 31:40 |
| James Willard Woodson | "Our condition is that if we're to strike, we will agree that the leader of this strike will be James Woodson." They were shocked, because I hadn't said one thing in favor of the strike or anything. And so they all turned and looked at me, and said, "What you got to say about that?" Anyway I hadn't said anything about that. I have been trying to sway them not to do it. I said, "I got something to say, so I want you all listen to me good. I want to talk y'all." We've been speaking, I told them that we don't have the kind of administration who's going to give in to our protest and so on, you see. | 32:20 |
| James Willard Woodson | And they're not going to tolerate that. And if we got out on strike, some of us are going to get expelled. And I said, "I recommend that if we go ahead and we had the strike—" You see? I recommend that we postpone the strike and don't have it. This time I gave them a chance to improve this in the cafeteria. You see? "And we'll go ahead and graduate and then we'll come back and ease off and see how y'all are doing and we'll bring money if you all promise you won't strike." | 33:07 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:33:55], we're going to get expelled. Oh, "[indistinct 00:33:55]. You scared." So finally, I said, "What are you going to say? Well, the students [indistinct 00:33:59] I'll be leaving." And I understand why because just like I wrote that article there when it got around in my junior year I was good in Black history. So whenever they had a thing to go do they get me to make the presentation on Black history. So in a way— Definitely in school organizations too, [indistinct 00:34:24] club and everything, bring me in to speak about famous Black women or whatever. | 33:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | So nevertheless, they said, "Well, [indistinct 00:34:34] what do you say?" I said, "Well, I don't know. I'm trying to think." I said, "I have one condition I'll make if your students don't agree with that," I said, "I leave." "Well, what's your condition?" I said, "If I am going to lead this strike, will you students promise me that you will take your strategy, instruction, from me as a leader and not do anything else you wanted to do? [indistinct 00:35:01]" "[indistinct 00:35:01] about that?" "Yeah, yeah, we'll follow." "We'll follow." "Why are you going to follow?" "We believe. We believe you." "We believe in you." | 34:32 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well, later we'll be talking about Frederick Douglass. The role of the Black life [indistinct 00:35:19], and all that. And believe he was, [indistinct 00:35:24] slavery. "Oh, he's [indistinct 00:35:29] Frederick Douglas." So okay, they agreed. They voted that I could lead the strike [indistinct 00:35:38] I believe. Well, the second day or the third day, let's say, one of the campus security persons came to me and said, "Mr. Woodson, will you go see Dr. Patterson?" "Are you talking about Paterson?" "Yeah." I said, "He wants to see me? "Yeah." | 35:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | So he took me and see him, and Dr. Patterson had me [indistinct 00:36:09]. I [indistinct 00:36:10] "You're leading a strike?" I said, "Yeah." "Well, you know my parents got no money, so I'm grateful I guess." He said, "Well, what do the students want?" "They had picked me, [indistinct 00:36:23]." I told him what they were talking about the food and cafeteria and better treatment from the administration, in fact, your local press we call it. | 36:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | He said that, "Well, I'm going to ask you a question now, so you think about this and give me an answer. Do you think you, as the leader of the strike, would have the authority to call this strike off?" I said, "Well, we'll see now." I said, "I can think of one thing which I could." "What's that?" I said, "If you would give me a written statement that we had this meeting now. That we had this meeting, and you have promised me that if the students would agree to come off strike to behave and to return to class, that you'll examine all of our grievances and try to give us a satisfactory solution, I said I'll [indistinct 00:37:27] on this condition and try to call this strike off." | 36:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | I [indistinct 00:37:34]. You see? | 37:29 |
| James Willard Woodson | So he looked at me, he got out of his seat and looked down on me, and we both sitting in his office. "So you mean to tell me that you're just a student here, and I'm the president in the school, and you're going to tell me to give you a written statement?" The man had a temper, and I don't want to attack him now. See? I knew that. I said, "Dr. Pat, I'm not trying to insult you. I don't disrespect you. And I respect very much. You're asking me to judge a difficult question that I call off the strike, and the students [indistinct 00:38:32] and that's just the only way I can do it." I said to him. "And I will do it." | 37:49 |
| James Willard Woodson | Looked at me, [indistinct 00:38:44], "Well, I want to tell you here. You're just a student here, and I'm the president, and I'm not going to give you a written statement." And I said, "Well, Mr. president if we can't solve the problem", I stopped the conversation and got up and I left. And the next day as I was working out, I was expelled. I finally had to go [indistinct 00:39:11] but I wouldn't leave. I kept coming around. And so [indistinct 00:39:16], "Mr. Woodson, why aren't you going home? You've been expelled, why aren't you going home?" I said, "Kevin, [indistinct 00:39:23]" "Yeah. Yeah." I said, "I don't have enough money to go from here [indistinct 00:39:26]." | 38:43 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:39:26]. I told him, "[indistinct 00:39:26]. I truly don't have money to go down south. I'll be here." [indistinct 00:39:39]. [indistinct 00:39:45] train station ticket, [indistinct 00:39:47] Youngstown, Ohio. "Will you go home now?" I said, "If I got to." So I packed [indistinct 00:39:54] and I left. You see? Well, I don't know now— See, the president of the student government was Arthur Dickens, he was a football player, a good one too. But he was off on agriculture interning in the second [indistinct 00:40:10]. | 39:26 |
| Paul Ortiz | Who was the vice president you mentioned you were good friends with? | 40:11 |
| James Willard Woodson | Wilbur Hines. | 40:14 |
| Paul Ortiz | Wilbur Hines? | 40:16 |
| James Willard Woodson | Wilbur Hines. W-I-L-B-U-R H-I-N-E-S. Wilbur Hines. | 40:17 |
| Paul Ortiz | And what was the outcome of the strike? | 40:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | The outcome of the strike was— Let's see, the outcome of the strike. | 40:26 |
| Paul Ortiz | Did it last the entire rest of the school year? | 40:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh no. No, it didn't last more than two weeks— | 40:37 |
| Paul Ortiz | Two weeks. | 40:41 |
| James Willard Woodson | It's that long. Nearly two weeks. That's they expelled us. They expelled how many now? 200? | 40:43 |
| Paul Ortiz | They expelled 200 students? | 40:52 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, at least 200. And most of them were sent home, and then [indistinct 00:41:04] 14 of the students stood by their [indistinct 00:41:05]. So that was broken up [indistinct 00:41:09]. | 40:52 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you think that the conditions improved after that or as a result of the strike? Did the condition seem to improve after this strike you think? | 41:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | I wouldn't be able to tell you. | 41:41 |
| Paul Ortiz | And now, just a couple of— | 41:42 |
| James Willard Woodson | I heard it then. I heard it then. | 41:45 |
| Paul Ortiz | So it makes you— | 41:48 |
| James Willard Woodson | See, now I want this published, but see remember one thing now. Here's a man in whose presence [indistinct 00:41:56] trying [indistinct 00:41:57] America, and the students would strike. That could have caused him his job, and the [indistinct 00:42:06] now. You were talking about—? | 41:50 |
| Paul Ortiz | So did you come back after 1941? | 42:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yes. | 42:12 |
| Paul Ortiz | And graduate? So they accepted you back? | 42:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, I came back in about two years later. They accepted me to come back, but I didn't come back until I think it was two years later and I got my degree. The sad thing about me was I didn't need anything academically to graduate. I had more than enough hours to graduate, and they included everything that was required, plus I had teachings [indistinct 00:42:52]. I had the teachings I was paid. You see? | 42:16 |
| Paul Ortiz | Was that one of the conditions that the students that you were trying to address with—? | 42:59 |
| James Willard Woodson | What? | 43:04 |
| Paul Ortiz | With the strike was getting paid for teaching. | 43:04 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, no, no. That was coming for my student for work credits. | 43:08 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay. | 43:15 |
| James Willard Woodson | They were paying my bill. And it was a good experiencle too. Plus they [indistinct 00:43:20] me also at the end of the year, I was going to get an all-expense fellowship to Holly Hill or something. [indistinct 00:43:30] going on Holly Hill with [indistinct 00:43:32]. But anyway, they won't give me the desirable fellowship [indistinct 00:43:36] as a reward for my teaching. So it was no feeling about that, you see? It was the same value that I had finished all my required work. If you look at my transcript now, you'll see I took two major courses twice. I made an A in them both times. And that was [indistinct 00:43:59] so I had to finish that I already had before. But you've got to accept the fact you'd had led a strike, and been expelled, and so on. I can be in Booker T. Washington too, you see? "Do what you have to do." | 43:15 |
| Paul Ortiz | Right. | 44:16 |
| James Willard Woodson | Like [indistinct 00:44:18] said, he was pretty but [indistinct 00:44:21] rich White people like Carnegie, and Rockefeller, and [indistinct 00:44:27], he was doing pretty [indistinct 00:44:28] wasn't anybody else. But Booker T. Washington knew because if he's going to keep this school open he had to get some money. Now when he had to get some money, how was he going to get— who got the money? | 44:19 |
| James Willard Woodson | The Black man didn't have it. You see? And they go no reason they would not give it. Okay, so now if I'm trying to raise one off of you, and you got a big family somewhere, and I want to go back to school or keep the school operating and running, I got to come to you from [indistinct 00:45:02] and convince you this invaluable to the point that you give it to me. [indistinct 00:45:08] cause, see? Okay, but Booker Washington knew that. And so he wanted to see if he would learn things about them. He had people researching formulas, and he [indistinct 00:45:20] what would impress them, what are they like? You see. | 44:40 |
| James Willard Woodson | Someone has something very special, he take [indistinct 00:45:27], different things like that. And he tell you what you want to hear, and he gets what he can get from you and he go back to what he want to with it. Now, history doesn't record it, anyone [indistinct 00:45:43] down somewhere but it can be proven. I can prove it that with Booker T. Washington, with the money he raised for the school, or otherwise. I've been dealing with my own civil rights cases. [indistinct 00:45:55] segregation and so on. I think he would say that was a part of the whole mission. And he did do that, and maybe some of the people who doesn't have him in mind. And that's research we haven't found. But he did— He probably felt more on civil rights issues than any of those people who complain against him. | 45:25 |
| Paul Ortiz | So where did you go after Tuskegee? Where was your next—? | 46:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | Where did I go? | 46:22 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah. | 46:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | After I went home from the strike, a young fellow hired me and I moved to Youngstown. I got— well, I tried to get in the school up in Youngstown but they wouldn't take me in because of the strike, they read about me. | 46:22 |
| Paul Ortiz | Youngstown State? | 46:37 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. They recommended that I come back here. | 46:38 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, really? | 46:40 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. | 46:42 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:00:03] went to University of Michigan, and in between that — Do I have all my stuff here? I did, I forgot that I didn't bring that, I don't think. I got a fellowship when I was an alumni of Tuskegee from the National Endowment of Humanities to spend twelve months of study at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. And I spent it under a professor there who was a known scholar, George Tindall, you ever heard of George Brown Tindall? He was White, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he [indistinct 00:00:47] and he'd written another book on history. | 0:03 |
| Paul Ortiz | What year was this? | 0:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | He was obsessed with that. What was that year? About '75, it was, it may be be a little different in the year, but I could identify that year by checking on it. I went there one summer, I spent twelve weeks with him. | 0:58 |
| Paul Ortiz | At Central North Carolina? | 1:16 |
| James Willard Woodson | Not at Central. | 1:16 |
| Paul Ortiz | I'm sorry. | 1:16 |
| James Willard Woodson | Was it North Carolina Central? It's at Chapel Hill, that's where it's located. | 1:17 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay, so you went to the University of North Carolina? | 1:26 |
| James Willard Woodson | At Chapel Hill, yeah. | 1:28 |
| Paul Ortiz | At Chapel Hill. | 1:29 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, and I spent three months there, twelve weeks, taking courses under him. They got a grant somewhere and got some money to initiate this program to improve chances to produce creative scholars, you see, and they wanted to do that to get more money for the school program endowment and so on, it was a very smart move. They picked students from different places who had outstanding records, and I was one they picked, you see, and I took this opportunity. | 1:30 |
| Paul Ortiz | What were you doing throughout the 1950s as far as work? | 2:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | The 1950s? I came back here, when? I got that somewhere too, I don't know, let me see now, I can tell you that. I came back here to work in 1959, but up in that time I worked in the steel mill back in Youngstown, Ohio. | 2:16 |
| Paul Ortiz | You came back here— | 2:45 |
| James Willard Woodson | I was buying a home there for my mother too, you see, I went back there and worked at the Republic Steel Corporation, you know what I'm talking about? | 2:46 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh yeah, I've talked to people that worked at the Republic Steel in Birmingham. | 2:58 |
| James Willard Woodson | I worked at Republic Steel Youngstown, where I was also a labor union shop steward there. | 2:58 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, really? | 3:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, one of the first Black ones there. | 3:09 |
| Paul Ortiz | What was that experience like? That must've been— | 3:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | One of the best I've ever had in my life. What happened was that the fellas working the mill learned that I had been to college, and most of them didn't have it, it was always [indistinct 00:03:29]. They told him, "They got this guy who went to college, and he's a good man," so the union asked me to be the shop representative at the department where we worked, you see, Black and White. I did it and I helped them a lot, I mean workers who had problems and all, they would go to the company and get some solutions. In fact, some people were about to get fired, and I got them another chance [indistinct 00:04:06], they kept me [indistinct 00:04:08]. | 3:14 |
| Paul Ortiz | That must've been challenging, you were representing both Black and White workers. | 4:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well, to me they were workers, you see. Just like now, if I'm teaching a class here and there's some White students here and Black students, there's no way I can just show favoritism or give that to a Black student or a White student, I want to treat them as they are, they deserve to be taught, you see what I'm talking about? That's the way I've always been all my life, when I was in the steel mill, I represented both and I have had cases where sometimes a Black person had not quite done what he should do involving a White boy or something like that. I would go to that person and get offsite and go on out and tell them what to do, sit down out there and go apologize, and they would keep their job. | 4:15 |
| James Willard Woodson | You're not good or bad because of your complexion of your skin or your race, you see, a person who sees like that is very blind, you see, and I would not do that now. We got some White little children right now and they seem to like me very well, you see, and we have to be deserving too. I've got to be fair to you, you've got to be fair to me, so I have never wanted to mistreat anybody, know what I mean? Regardless of color or race or whatever. | 5:11 |
| Paul Ortiz | What was your occupation at Republic Steel? | 5:52 |
| James Willard Woodson | I was what they called, the terminology was a steelworker, but I was working on what they call a loading situation where they had these cranes, would come over [indistinct 00:06:15] and they'd make this product back there in the hot place, they'd bring it out, bring it on down to the assembly line and so it'd go down to where you are and piece out the pieces, and you'd load it up, put it on a crane to carry it back, put it in a container, you see. I'd be one of those guys doing the loading, I was a loader helper, they called that. | 5:56 |
| Paul Ortiz | Loader? | 6:38 |
| James Willard Woodson | Mm-hmm. | 6:41 |
| Paul Ortiz | Were there ever any strikes while you were at Republic Steel? | 6:41 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. I've had the company [indistinct 00:06:53] Youngstown. | 6:47 |
| Paul Ortiz | [indistinct 00:07:02]— | 6:52 |
| James Willard Woodson | Greenland Country Power Company, and I've had [indistinct 00:07:08] a foreman called me in to help get problems solved by telling the people what I thought was right and what was wrong, the employees and everything. This gets to be an obligation, "What is the truth here?" If someone's working for a White man and not doing their job or stealing on the job, I can't defend that person, I can get that person off to the side and try to dissuade them to stop doing this kind of thing and be worthy of what you are, know what I'm talking about? That's the way I am about that, I didn't tell this church to give me this office, you see, but I do work that's important for the church, you see. Plus, I'm never going to take anything away from here, I'm going to bring something if I can. | 7:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | According to the way I feel, if I do something wrong, there's one certain umpire, it's God. I might can steal something out of your pocket somewhere, but God sees me and I can't live with it, and I shouldn't want to, you see. I don't have problems like that, I really don't, I can't hate people because of the color or nothing like that. Who is the person that decide what race you'd be? You woke up and here you are, and it's true. To me it's all been silly over the years, I have always thought that these different hate groups and animosity was just silly and needless, you see, that's what I thought. | 8:10 |
| Paul Ortiz | Mr. Woodson, I have some biographical information to ask you that becomes part of the record of the interview. Woodson you spell W-O-O-D-S-O-N, right? | 9:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | Right. | 9:25 |
| Paul Ortiz | And your middle name? | 9:29 |
| James Willard Woodson | Willard, W-I-L-L-A-R-D, and I'm a Senior, my son has the same name. | 9:32 |
| Paul Ortiz | Your current address? | 9:42 |
| James Willard Woodson | I live at 2803— | 9:45 |
| Paul Ortiz | 2803. | 9:47 |
| James Willard Woodson | — Azalea, the flower, A-Z-A-L-E-A, Street, and that's considered the postcode of Tuskegee Institute, Alabama. | 9:48 |
| Paul Ortiz | Tuskegee Institute? | 10:02 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, not Tuskegee, Tuskegee Institute, Alabama, 36088-2807. | 10:03 |
| Paul Ortiz | Your home telephone number? | 10:17 |
| James Willard Woodson | See, my home phone, 727-3425. | 10:21 |
| Paul Ortiz | James Willard, okay. Your date of birth? | 10:31 |
| James Willard Woodson | June 24th, 1919. | 10:46 |
| Paul Ortiz | 1919, and you were born in Fairmont? | 10:50 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh no, Laura Lee, that's not too far from Fairmont. | 10:54 |
| Paul Ortiz | Laura Lee? | 11:01 |
| James Willard Woodson | Capital L-A-U-R-A, capital L-E-E. | 11:02 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay, so I got L-A-U-R— | 11:08 |
| James Willard Woodson | A, Laura, capital L-E-E, that's the name of the town, West Virginia. | 11:12 |
| Paul Ortiz | You're currently married? | 11:23 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yes. | 11:26 |
| Paul Ortiz | Your wife's name? | 11:27 |
| James Willard Woodson | Dorothy, her middle name is Altamese, capital A-L-T-A-M-E-S-E. | 11:29 |
| Paul Ortiz | A-L-T-A-M-E-S-E? | 11:44 |
| James Willard Woodson | Uh-huh, that's her middle, now her family name was McCurry, but [indistinct 00:11:53] McCurry, which is M-C capital C-U-R-R-Y, McCurry. | 11:46 |
| Paul Ortiz | Her date of birth? | 12:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | Her date of birth is June the 29th, 1921. | 12:03 |
| Paul Ortiz | '21, and where was she born? | 12:11 |
| James Willard Woodson | Asheville, North Carolina. | 12:15 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay, Asheville. Did she do any outside work? | 12:23 |
| James Willard Woodson | Let's see, I'll check on that Asheville, but she grew up there. Outside work? Yeah, she was a schoolteacher, she's retired now. Not only that, she taught in the public school system here in Macon County for a number of years, and then after I came in, she finally became the director of residence life for women. What'd you ask me about now, my wife? | 12:25 |
| Paul Ortiz | Her place of birth. | 12:58 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, I think I got that right. | 13:01 |
| Paul Ortiz | Asheville. | 13:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | I guess it is, but I know that's where she grew up at. | 13:05 |
| Paul Ortiz | Your mother's name? | 13:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | Her name is Willa, capital W-I-L-L-A Brown. | 13:12 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you know her maiden name? | 13:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | Her maiden name was — Who, my wife? | 13:25 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah. | 13:29 |
| James Willard Woodson | My wife? | 13:29 |
| Paul Ortiz | No, I'm sorry, your mother. | 13:31 |
| James Willard Woodson | My mother is Brown, my mother's name was Willa Agnes Brown, B-R-O-W-N. | 13:32 |
| Paul Ortiz | Her date of birth and when she passed? | 13:44 |
| James Willard Woodson | Her date of birth is November 11th, 1900. | 13:50 |
| Paul Ortiz | You said she passed in 1992? | 14:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | '92 or '93, let me see now. Yeah, I'm sure it was 1992. | 14:01 |
| Paul Ortiz | Was she born in West Virginia? | 14:19 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, Asheville, North Carolina, Asheville. | 14:21 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, your mom was born in Asheville also? | 14:27 |
| James Willard Woodson | Nashville— | 14:32 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, I'm sorry— | 14:33 |
| James Willard Woodson | I mean I'm sorry, no, I'm wrong, that's my wife, but my mother was born in Aiken, South Carolina, I apologize. | 14:33 |
| Paul Ortiz | Did she do outside work? | 14:48 |
| James Willard Woodson | She did, what you call it, housework. | 14:50 |
| Paul Ortiz | Domestic work, okay. Your father's name? | 14:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | Samuel Warmack, W-A-R-M-A-C-K Woodson. | 15:00 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you know his date of birth? | 15:08 |
| James Willard Woodson | I used to, but I can't think of it now, I probably got it somewhere, 18-something, about 1892 or something like that, I'm not sure. I'd have to look that up. | 15:17 |
| Paul Ortiz | Which he was a coal miner? | 15:34 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, he was a coal miner. | 15:37 |
| Paul Ortiz | The names of your sisters and brothers? | 15:51 |
| James Willard Woodson | I just had one brother, no sisters. | 15:54 |
| Paul Ortiz | One brother. | 15:56 |
| James Willard Woodson | Name is Edwin, E-D-W-I-N. | 15:57 |
| Paul Ortiz | Edwin. | 16:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | Leon, capital L-E-O-N Woodson, and he's a Senior, he got a son with the same name. | 16:02 |
| Paul Ortiz | He's still alive? | 16:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. | 16:13 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you know, now you said he's younger than you, two years younger? | 16:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | Huh-uh, he's two years older than I am. | 16:18 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, so he was born in 1917. | 16:20 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, and difficulty turning senile. | 16:20 |
| Paul Ortiz | You were the firstborn. | 16:33 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, he is. | 16:34 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, I'm sorry, he was the firstborn, you were second. Do you have children? | 16:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | One son. | 16:42 |
| Paul Ortiz | One son, and his name is? | 16:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | Same as mine, James Woodson Junior. | 16:55 |
| Paul Ortiz | He was born in— | 16:57 |
| James Willard Woodson | He was born in March — What is that day now, is it 12th? March the 10th, I believe it is. | 16:57 |
| Paul Ortiz | March 10th, 19— | 17:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | Let me ask [indistinct 00:17:10], I guess she's home now [indistinct 00:17:14] phone, it won't get on. I've got an adopted granddaughter, I think. Let's see if he's come home. | 17:12 |
| Paul Ortiz | Do you have an extra copy of this article? | 17:43 |
| James Willard Woodson | Sure, I've got lots of them. Is it important to you that in your family and your race, there have been some achievers? | 18:03 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah, it is very important. | 18:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | It's important. | 18:13 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah, it is, and I think Carter G. Woodson, part of his struggle and part of the struggle that we have now in school is to basically say that Black people and Hispanic people have made contributions and have— in many different walks of life, and [indistinct 00:18:37]. | 18:17 |
| James Willard Woodson | It really speaks good for the United States to have a country where people are achieving and doing things, one of the best things that can happen. I want everybody to do well, White, Black, whatever color, and so somebody here we know has the potential to do something very worthwhile for society, and we both benefit by it if they can do it. There have been a lot of us who have gotten fellowships from White schools, you see, and from White people. Now I got something here now [indistinct 00:19:26] now, and this is after I was out there so long, [indistinct 00:19:34] man, now see these people want to tell you these things, but now I kept wondering why this man doesn't want me to go to Michigan, the president of the school at the time, Luther Foster. | 18:37 |
| James Willard Woodson | I kept saying, "Why?" Find out I went to his office, he sends for me to come back [indistinct 00:19:55] talk to him about my progress and how I was doing, and one thing I had built to run that program so well that I hold the school's alumni merit award for that. You've heard of this first Black four-star general? | 19:45 |
| Paul Ortiz | Benjamin Davis. | 20:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, he was at West Point and he was one of the first generals, but the first one to get four stars was Daniel "Chappie" James, the pilot. Anyway, he was my classmate at Tuskegee, and he got expelled, you see. | 20:13 |
| Paul Ortiz | For being involved in the strike? | 20:33 |
| James Willard Woodson | No, after the strike. | 20:36 |
| Paul Ortiz | After the strike. | 20:38 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, he didn't get involved in the strike, he was an athlete and [indistinct 00:20:47] he made all them stay out of it, and they obeyed him, you see, where they had scholarships and everything. Later on he got put out because he had a girlfriend here, and he saw a fella trying to talk to her and hold her hand, and he went up to him and shook him away and hit him and knocked him down. They saw his father was a Tuskegee graduate and alumni trustee [indistinct 00:21:11] in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, so they expelled Chappie at that time, and Chappie was not a top ranked student anyway, [indistinct 00:21:23] if he wanted to, he was a good athlete and he liked to have fun. | 20:39 |
| James Willard Woodson | Anyway, Chappie, after I came back and got into alumni office, he became a good pilot with the 99th [indistinct 00:21:39], he met me somewhere on the road and told me he wanted to talk to me and he had to take me to his room. He told me that before the United States Congressmen, two in the House and two in the Senate, had been talking and told him they wanted to nominated him for brigadier general in the next session of Congress, but they noticed in his record that he never did graduate from Tuskegee 'cause he was in trouble, and that'd needed to be changed. He said that if he could find a way to get his degree, to go ahead and do it and 'cause they wanted to nominate him, 'cause he was quite a pilot, you see. | 21:27 |
| James Willard Woodson | Chappie had met me, he came around and met me and I wasn't at his place, he came to me and told me that. I think we were at a national convention and so on and so forth, he told me he wanted to talk to me so he had me go to his room, and he told me that this Congressman told him, and he said, "You know I got put out of school by hitting Dan James [indistinct 00:22:41]," who's his wife, they had married. Well I didn't [indistinct 00:22:46], I said, "Chappie," I said to him, "I'm going to do all I can to help you," I said, "Now you give me the information," he gave me all the information. I came back to school after the convention, went and see President Foster and he got excited about it, he said, "You mean to tell me —" I worked a little psychology, I said, "Dr. Foster," I went to his office and he said, "Hey, how was the meeting out in California or something —" Not California, somewhere. | 22:19 |
| James Willard Woodson | He and I had been to a lot of national conventions, "How was the meeting?" I said, "Fine," and I had brought some money back to school, and I told him I'm trying to [indistinct 00:23:30], and I said, "I came to talk about something," and he said, "What's that?" I told him what Chappie had told me about getting his degree and how he got expelled and everything, so he could become — Not the first one, he was a Black brigadier general, but there weren't many. He got excited about that, [indistinct 00:23:52] next Black brigadier general in the paper now to be an alumnus of Tuskegee, "Well yeah, [indistinct 00:24:01]," talking about Chappie. He said, "Well, how can we do that?" I said, "If you would talk with the committee, they'll approve him for it," I knew that as I already talked to the chairman, Dr. Foster, and [indistinct 00:24:18]. | 23:22 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:24:20] and he was approved to get his degree at the next commencement, you see, and so when he came back for the next commencement to get his degree, they also put him up and me too for the alumni merit award, that's how I got it, you see. It was based on the work I'd done, I had built this alumni program up quite a bit, it was way down, you see. Based on that, you see, Chappie got his degree. That was one of the things that included also me getting the alumni merit award, you see. | 24:16 |
| Paul Ortiz | What year did you win that award? | 24:56 |
| James Willard Woodson | 1969, I won't forget that, we both got it in '69 together, just the two of us, you see. Here's Michigan's requirement, you see, prospectus on what my dissertation would be about, you see. [indistinct 00:25:20] could I'd get my time extended, I hadn't produced this thing now since I left there, and they made me come out because of Foster [indistinct 00:25:35] me back home, you see, and so— | 24:57 |
| Paul Ortiz | You said he wouldn't hold your—? | 25:37 |
| James Willard Woodson | He said he would hold my job if I didn't come back. What I did, I came back and then I had so much work to do, we had a national convention coming and everything, I couldn't find time to do any work, you see. Then they wanted me here about two years ago as somebody to help the students stay in school, and I sent them $100 'cause [indistinct 00:26:12] from Michigan, so they thanked me for it and I told them in a letter I sent, I told Dean Rosenberry I can't help but wonder how much better I might be doing with this if I had ever finished my dissertation. Where do I sign, here? | 25:41 |
| Paul Ortiz | If you could just put down your educational history. | 26:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | Here? | 26:34 |
| Paul Ortiz | Your degrees and the year you got them. | 26:36 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh boy now, Tuskegee, [indistinct 00:26:48] university now, High Point University now, okay? | 26:42 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay. | 26:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:26:55] if that's all right. The dates I've got it as, actually what they have done now, they redated it to keep that strike out of there. | 26:56 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, really? | 27:09 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. | 27:09 |
| Paul Ortiz | What year is your— | 27:10 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well, on the records they put 1941, that's when I should've graduated, and I had finished the work too [indistinct 00:27:21], and so I actually got the degree in 1950. | 27:13 |
| Paul Ortiz | 1950. | 27:25 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah. Is that what you want? Which one you want? | 27:27 |
| Paul Ortiz | Sure, 1950 would be— | 27:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | They won't talk about that. | 27:30 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, so the date on your graduation says '41? | 27:34 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, for that same thing. | 27:37 |
| Paul Ortiz | Whichever one you'd want to put, whichever one you think is the most— | 27:40 |
| James Willard Woodson | Actually, I had completed the work. | 27:44 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah, '41. | 27:47 |
| James Willard Woodson | See, but I was punished so it got delayed, 'cause that's what it says now, 1941, and that's my class, you see. Now, I didn't get anything at Auburn. | 27:48 |
| Paul Ortiz | Could you put that? Let's see, you had a BS? Or no, I'm sorry, a bachelor's at Tuskegee? | 28:05 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, a degree, BS, that's what it was. I didn't finish at Auburn, I got the [indistinct 00:28:19]. Oh yeah, that's right, they wanted me to do it on Black experience, Auburn won't do that now, they stopped that. Now let's see, now the next thing is University of Michigan, I guess. You see, the thing with University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, there was no degrees, there was just special studies, see, so we're just going to put that down. | 28:11 |
| Paul Ortiz | You got your MA though at University of Michigan? | 28:46 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, I got an MAE, they call it AM, yeah. | 28:49 |
| Paul Ortiz | I want to hear your prospectus. | 29:08 |
| James Willard Woodson | When it says place now, you want to put the place there, Ann Arbor? | 29:11 |
| Paul Ortiz | Sure, that's in Ann Arbor. | 29:14 |
| James Willard Woodson | That's 1975 [indistinct 00:29:26] or '74, '75. | 29:24 |
| James Willard Woodson | AM. Now I had done first [indistinct 00:29:53] completed you see, now don't put it in? | 29:47 |
| Paul Ortiz | You could put working on PhD through University of Michigan. | 29:59 |
| James Willard Woodson | Why don't I put "further study"? | 30:26 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay. | 30:30 |
| James Willard Woodson | I'll put toward PhD. Now my work history, let's see now, oh boy. | 30:30 |
| Paul Ortiz | Starting with your most previous job. | 30:57 |
| James Willard Woodson | My most previous job? | 30:59 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah. | 31:01 |
| James Willard Woodson | Assistant professor of history. | 31:07 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:31:26] Tuskegee University, Tuskegee [indistinct 00:31:28], and those dates were 17, 18 years, let's see. [indistinct 00:31:56] I left in '89, 1972, that'd be '89, okay. That's not really true because I spent — Ooh, '59, oh wait, I see, that's okay, from '59, 13 years [indistinct 00:32:29] let's see now, director of alumni affairs. Let's see now, I became that in 1959, and that went on for 17 years, that was in 1976, so this would go from 1976, now I got it. I guess that's it, is that all? | 31:08 |
| Paul Ortiz | Sure, then you said you had been a steelworker? | 34:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yeah, where you want that? | 34:03 |
| Paul Ortiz | Right underneath this one. | 34:07 |
| James Willard Woodson | Just say steelworker? It was in Youngstown, Ohio at the — See now, I worked all over Republic Steel's operation, most of it. | 34:12 |
| James Willard Woodson | [indistinct 00:34:56] about 1942 — Anything else? My name isn't on there, but you take that. | 34:28 |
| Paul Ortiz | Now I have your name on this other paper. I was going to ask you, do you have— | 36:08 |
| James Willard Woodson | I think I have a copy that somebody gave me. | 36:12 |
| Paul Ortiz | Oh, of this? | 36:14 |
| James Willard Woodson | Uh-huh, a copy. | 36:14 |
| Paul Ortiz | Sure, I can make a copy for you when we get access to a photocopier. Now let's see, your residential history, you lived in Laura Lee. | 36:18 |
| James Willard Woodson | I was born there, I don't know how long I was there, not very long I'm sure. That's where I was born, [indistinct 00:36:53]. | 36:38 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah, you lived there from 1919 to the time you graduated high school? | 36:52 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh no, I went to grade school in Fairmont, and there were little town mining camps all around, and it's pretty hard to put that down and pinpoint that. My awareness period of places, things like that, it goes way back, but I think I was in a little place called — What was that place? It was a little mining camp place, but they'd do their shopping in Fairmont. | 37:01 |
| Paul Ortiz | Then you were at Tuskegee from '37 to '41, and Youngstown, Ohio from '41. | 37:56 |
| James Willard Woodson | Until I came back in '59. | 38:00 |
| Paul Ortiz | '59, and then you've been in Tuskegee since. | 38:00 |
| James Willard Woodson | Mm-hmm. | 38:11 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay, just a couple more. Do you have any grandchildren? | 38:23 |
| James Willard Woodson | Not really, there's a little girl that call me granddad, but she's not kin to me. She just got married, she's pregnant now, she's not kin to me at all, and she'll start crying if you said she's not. | 38:25 |
| Paul Ortiz | Organizations that you belong to? | 38:44 |
| James Willard Woodson | Let's see now, I'm a member of what they call the Optimist Club, it's the Tuskegee Optimist Club, I think that's the name of them. | 38:48 |
| Paul Ortiz | Right, Mr. Huth, okay. | 38:57 |
| James Willard Woodson | Let me see, [indistinct 00:39:12], I'm a life member of the Phi Alpha Theta Honors Society and Alpha Kappa Mu, [indistinct 00:39:36] and the church here, Westminster Presbyterian Church, I was the [indistinct 00:39:51] for about 15 years, not now, but I was. | 39:04 |
| Paul Ortiz | Please list any activities, hobbies, interests. Activities, obviously you give lectures on history. | 40:03 |
| James Willard Woodson | Reading is one, I can't tell you anything else that I do. | 40:16 |
| Paul Ortiz | What was your MA, you did an MA thesis? | 40:46 |
| James Willard Woodson | I did, I've been trying to think of what it was now. [indistinct 00:40:53]— | 40:50 |
| Paul Ortiz | What was the title of it? | 40:55 |
| James Willard Woodson | I can't think of it as this minute, I'd have to go look at it. (phone rings)What was it called? Hello? It sure is, yes? [indistinct 00:41:12], hey. Unless she came downstairs, hold on, [indistinct 00:41:21]. | 40:57 |
| James Willard Woodson | Okay. I'm ready whenever you are. | 0:03 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah. So you were telling me that, one day you met Dr. George Washington Carver, and he was walking, and he just came up and talked to you, just out of the blue, about what you were studying. | 0:05 |
| James Willard Woodson | Yes. I was telling you that and one thing that made me more aware was I had learned about Dr. Carver in my high school days in West Virginia when a young man named Hobert White, one of my classmates, came to class and gave his report on a personality. He reported on George Washington Carver who had been born in slavery and so on. When I came to Tuskegee, I had forgotten where he was working then, and I found out he was here. | 0:19 |
| James Willard Woodson | The first time I ever saw him here at Tuskegee, I was a freshman. I was working out there on the landscape for my school expenses and he saw me coming down to campus from work, and he stopped me. He said, "Young man, how are you today?" I said, "I'm fine, Dr. Carver." "Well, young man, where are you from?" I said, "Dr. Carver," I said, "I'm from West Virginia." "West Virginia? Did you say West Virginia?" "Yes, I did, Dr. Carver. West Virginia." "Well, you know my assistant, Mr. Curtis, he's from West Virginia, and he's the nicest man." I said, "Thank you, Dr. Carver." | 0:54 |
| James Willard Woodson | Then, the next time I saw him, he asked me, he says, "Young man, how are you today?" I said, "I'm doing fine, Dr. Carver." "Young man, what are you studying?" I told him that I was studying history. He said to me, he says, "History? Did you say you're studying history?" "That's right. I major in history." He turned and looked at me and turned and started walking away from me as fast as he could. He threw his hand up in the air. He said, "Well, who knows? You might do something for your people too, someday." I recalled that for a long time, the day Dr. Carver put me down. | 1:38 |
| James Willard Woodson | I've been invited to different parts of the country to speak, up north and west and everywhere, but [indistinct 00:02:30]. And then, but the most outstanding story I witnessed from Dr. Carver was when as a student here, word came down, when I was a student here, word came down to Tuskegee that Thomas Edison, who had his place in Michigan, had sent out a message down to Dr. Carver inviting him to come up to his plant, in Detroit, I believe it was, and work for him. Take a job, he offered him a job. | 2:23 |
| Paul Ortiz | Was that Edison or Henry Ford? | 3:05 |
| James Willard Woodson | I'm sorry, Henry Ford. Henry Ford. Edison also offered him one too. But Henry Ford made the big offer. So they summoned him to a meeting, and I went to the meeting and he said, "Why you all want to talk to me now? [indistinct 00:03:29] me?" And said, "We heard about this offer you had from Henry Ford. And he said you could name your salary. And let him know, and come as soon as you can. He wants you to do research for him for the plant, improve his automobile." | 3:06 |
| James Willard Woodson | S,o said, "We don't know now, when are you leaving? And what kind of salary are you going to get?" "Oh no, I can't leave. I can't take that off. I can't leave Tuskegee." "Well, why can't you leave, Dr. Carver? Take it, that's a big offer." "I can't leave Tuskegee because if I leave Tuskegee, Mr. Washington wouldn't like it." And Mr. Washington been dead over 30 years. Said, "Mr. Washington wouldn't know if you left." "I cannot leave Tuskegee, because Mr. Washington wouldn't like it." And so he stayed on here, and he left the world here, in 1943. | 3:45 |
| James Willard Woodson | But anyway, those are some experiences I had, you see. And whenever he — A lot of students would stop and talk to him. He's famous and he could do a lot of good things. Plus Dr. Carver had developed some rubbing oils, ointments that if a student had problems playing football or whatever and with their limb and walking or hurting, they could go to his lab and he would rub 'em with it. And they'd get well. | 4:24 |
| James Willard Woodson | Miracle, way he could do that. And so he was very well liked by students. But they wanted to talk to him, he wouldn't talk to 'em. He'd say he didn't have time. He's busy. "Leave me alone." But whenever he'd pass them and see me, he stopped me for a conversation. And I've always thought that I must have reminded him something about his past. But then the day he had enough of me, when I told him I was majoring in history. And he said, "Oh, well who know, maybe one day you might do something for your people too." And he went on up the road. | 4:53 |
| Paul Ortiz | He didn't think much of history at that time. | 5:35 |
| James Willard Woodson | No. And he was very devoted to his assistant, Mr. Austin Curtis. So when I told him I was from West Virginia. He said, "My assistant, Mr. Curtis. You know, my assistant, Mr. Curtis, he's from West Virginia and he's the nicest man." Now, there were times when he would be scheduled to the chapel by the president at the time of Dr. Patterson, would have him come to the chapel and give lectures to the students on special occasions, in the mornings, early and things like that. | 5:38 |
| James Willard Woodson | And he would give some lectures about improving yourself and making yourself a good American and a good person and providing help for society. And he'd quote certain people and he was very effective in that. Those [indistinct 00:06:28] we also liked very much. And some students, when they have certain problems with playing football or something, get hurt, they'd go to him and tell him. And he'd take 'em into his lab and rub 'em. And they didn't improve. | 6:13 |
| James Willard Woodson | Because I know one fellow who lived near me was a good friend of mine, worked with me and everything. He got hurt playing football and he was real bad strain in the groin section. And Dr. Carver took him in his office and rubbed him and he got well. And could barely walk before that happened. So he was a very well liked by him. But we were not prepared for his thin pippy voice. It was [indistinct 00:07:10] but beyond it, he was a fine man. And he never got over his love for Dr. Booker T. Washington. Historically, Booker T. Washington brought him to Tuskegee because when he learned about his great work as a scientist, he arranged to get him to come to Tuskegee and work on the faculty. He'd called him to come here in the first place. | 6:42 |
| Paul Ortiz | Okay. | 7:32 |
| James Willard Woodson | And I remember they used to call him the sage of Tuskegee back in those days. | 7:39 |
| Paul Ortiz | But he was well liked on campus? | 7:45 |
| James Willard Woodson | Oh yes, he was well liked. And they gave him an office and everything. He was a fine, humble man. He'd help people and things like that. He was a nice person. But he was always busy doing things too. He didn't have much time. | 7:47 |
| Paul Ortiz | Right. Especially if you were majoring in history. | 8:02 |
| James Willard Woodson | Well, he was a scientist. In other words, he wasn't trying to just tell what somebody else had done. He's trying to do something himself. I understood where he was coming from. | 8:07 |
| Paul Ortiz | Yeah. Okay. Well I— | 8:19 |
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