Irvin Joseph interview recording, 1994 August 05
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| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Hold on, hold on. Let me tell— | 0:01 |
| Kate Ellis | So will you say your name and date of birth one more time? | 0:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | My name is Irvine A. Joseph. I was born in St. James, Louisiana. 6 March 1937. | 0:09 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. So will you tell me about your coming up in Marrero? | 0:19 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I was born March 6, 1937 in St. James, Louisiana on a sugar cane plantation. And I can vividly recall my mother and father cutting sugar cane for a living. Well, my parents had an individual that was older than I who would babysit me while they were working out in the field. And his name was Little Joe. | 0:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Little Joe? | 0:56 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah, little Joe. So after four years of living on a plantation, my mother and father moved to Harvey, Louisiana and was residing with my father's brother. And my father got a job at Celotex Corporation, and he worked there for a number of years. In the meantime, I wanted to live with my grandmother and grandfather in St. James, Louisiana. | 0:56 |
| Kate Ellis | Those people in the picture? | 1:38 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. And I was too young to go to school, so my mother and father consented that I could live with my grandmother and grandfather. So I did until I was age six. But while I was living with my grandmother and grandfather. I used to go to school with my aunts who was still in school. So I vividly can remember the one room schoolhouse. And the kids that was in different grades sat on different benches in that one room. | 1:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I had an enjoyable childhood life because of my grandmother and grandfather, they had what was called a garden. And I used to carry a pocket of salt with me and go in the garden and pick a tomato, and eat a tomato out in the field, or pick up a cantaloupe, drop it on the ground, eat a cantaloupe or watermelon. I used to pull up turnip and eat the roots of the turnip. So I enjoyed my childhood. And I wasn't able to start school until I was seven. Now you had to attain the age of seven before you can start school. So my birthday was in March, so therefore, I couldn't attend school until that September. | 2:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So I stayed with my grandmother and grandfather until I was able to attend school. So when my mother and father came to get me, I didn't want to come, but my grandmother and grandfather told me that going back and start school and during a vacation, summer vacation, then you would be able to come back. So that's the thing that got me to come back to Harvey and live with my mother and father and start school. Soon thereafter, my mother and father moved to Marrero, 147 Robinson Avenue. So we lived at 147 Robinson Avenue for about eight years. Then my mother and father bought some property. It was still in Marrero, but at that time it was 605 Meyers Boulevard and they built a house there. So we moved from Robinson Avenue to Meyers Boulevard when I was about 12 years old. So from age 12, up until age 19, I lived at 6O5 Meyers Boulevard in Marrero, Louisiana. At age 19, I graduated from high school and I went into the military service, the US Air Force. And I stayed in the military service for 11 and a half years. | 3:25 |
| Kate Ellis | You want me to ask you a question? | 5:13 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. | 5:13 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. Okay. Going way back, just quick question, what was Celotex? What kind of— | 5:19 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Celotex Corporation? | 5:22 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 5:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Celotex board. | 5:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, it's like your ceiling? | 5:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 5:29 |
| Kate Ellis | Like a factory, help manufacture? | 5:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, manufacture the Celotex board. And that was prior to all of this asbestos. Celotex boards made out of mostly asbestos. | 5:32 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, it was prior to the knowledge of— | 5:43 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, prior to the knowledge of asbestos. | 5:44 |
| Kate Ellis | Wow. Is your father still with us? | 5:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, he's 83 years old. | 5:51 |
| Kate Ellis | Wow, that's great. I'm interested in your parents' background as far as cutting sugar cane. | 5:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Okay. | 6:00 |
| Kate Ellis | I'm assuming it was on sugar cane plantation. | 6:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 6:07 |
| Kate Ellis | They were sharecroppers? | 6:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. | 6:07 |
| Kate Ellis | They weren't sharecroppers. | 6:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. They were just workers. | 6:10 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, they were workers who were paid on a weekly or — | 6:13 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | On a, more or less, weekly basis. | 6:18 |
| Kate Ellis | How long had they been on the plantation? | 6:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I would say for about prior to — my birth, about a year, because they were living with their parents. | 6:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Now their parents being those parents in St. James? | 6:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In St. James. You see, my mother's parents lives in St. James, Louisiana, or was living in St. James, Louisiana. And my father's parents was living in Vacherie. And that's about 25 miles apart. | 6:48 |
| Kate Ellis | As far as the sugarcane plantation — Okay in St. James where your mother's parents were. | 7:04 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. Okay, now this is going to answer some questions. When they moved, you had said the first four years of your life in Harvey. | 7:13 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Correct. | 7:28 |
| Kate Ellis | When they moved, you wanted to go back to St. James. | 7:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Correct, yes. | 7:32 |
| Kate Ellis | You spent time with you grandparents. Then my next question was going to be, why did you want go back to St. James with your grandparents? | 7:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Because I had an aunt who had two boys, one my age and one a year younger than I. And we would play together. And my uncles had horses, so we was able to ride the horses also. So I had an enjoyable life I at that time. | 7:41 |
| Kate Ellis | I see, and they were your playmates. | 8:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | They were my playmates, yes. And we used to go in the field together and eat watermelon, eat cantaloupes. | 8:02 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, okay. So those were your friends who you— | 8:09 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. They're my relatives also. | 8:10 |
| Kate Ellis | — your friends, okay. So you wanted to go down and — That must have been fun for you. | 8:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was. | 8:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Plus my aunts. My grandmother and grandfather, my mother's side, 11 kids. So out of 11 kids, they had five living in walking distance. And because I had so many aunts and uncles living in walking distance, I was able to go to one house or another to find something that I wanted to eat, rather than, "Here it is, you eat it or nothing." So that's why I'm a finicky eater today. I wasn't forced to eat anything. I was able to go to my aunt house or my uncle house, and one of those houses had beans and rice. So I was able to eat beans and rice every day. And today, I still love beans and rice. | 8:25 |
| Kate Ellis | So did you have any brothers, sisters yourself? | 9:17 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, I have one brother and one sister. | 9:19 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, who are younger than you? | 9:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Younger. | 9:23 |
| Kate Ellis | Had your parents, when they moved to St. James Plantation, had they worked on other plantations before that? | 9:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. | 9:34 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, so it wasn't a situation of them needing to go from plantation to plantation as far as finding a better boss. | 9:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, right, it wasn't migratory workers. | 9:45 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, okay. | 9:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. | 9:52 |
| Kate Ellis | So I asked that simply because as I've said, I've been talking to people, a number of different people the past few weeks who worked on plantations. | 9:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 9:57 |
| Kate Ellis | My next question was going to be, how did they get off of the plantation as far as being able to save enough money to move someplace else? | 9:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, they didn't have any money. That's why my mother and father lived with my father's brother in Harvey until he was able to get a job at Celotex and save money to rent a house on Robinson Avenue. But when they moved from St. James to Harvey, they didn't have any money. | 10:07 |
| Kate Ellis | And that's where your father found a job. Did your mother find a job? Was she able— | 10:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, my mother, for the most part, she did not work. But the time that she did work, she worked out of a shrimp factory. | 10:38 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Robinson Canning Company. | 10:54 |
| Kate Ellis | That's what it was called? | 10:56 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 10:57 |
| Kate Ellis | Robinson. | 10:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Robinson. | 10:59 |
| Kate Ellis | Cane? | 11:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Canning Company. And when the shrimp— | 11:01 |
| Kate Ellis | Shrimp factory. | 11:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, shrimp factory. | 11:05 |
| Kate Ellis | Why was it called Canning Company? | 11:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, they used to pre-boil the shrimps and put them in cans. | 11:08 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you said — I thought you said cane, like in sugar cane. | 11:19 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, no, no. | 11:19 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. So then when you moved, when they took you back to — Well wait, let me just get one more thing. What did your grandparents do? They had a garden you said. | 11:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 11:32 |
| Kate Ellis | So they had their own land? | 11:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 11:35 |
| Kate Ellis | How much land did they have? | 11:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | They had property just as far as the eye can see. From the batcher of the river, Mississippi River, to the swamps was their property. And that property came about because in my family, there's White and Black, Indians also. Now, my grandmother's mother. | 11:40 |
| Kate Ellis | Her mother. | 12:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Her mother. And a White plantation owner, she had kids for him. So he provided the property for them. | 12:25 |
| Kate Ellis | So on that property, as far as how they sustained themselves, they grew food. Did they raise animals? | 12:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 12:53 |
| Kate Ellis | Were they able to sell that food? And were there other ways that they— | 12:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, they did sell the food. They sold pole beans, watermelons, cantaloupe, tomatoes, okras, okra — sweet potatoes and ash potatoes. | 12:58 |
| Kate Ellis | And is that how they pretty much, they supported themselves and the family? What they were able to sell they they— | 13:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. In addition to raisin' hogs. So the raisin' hogs provided the meat. The cows provided the milk. So all they purchased from the grocery store was flour, condensed milk, tobacco and sugar. | 13:28 |
| Kate Ellis | What about clothing? | 13:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, they made clothing. | 13:58 |
| Kate Ellis | But I guess I mean what about cloth. | 13:59 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, they purchased cloth. Yes. | 14:02 |
| Kate Ellis | Your grandmother's side. | 14:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Oh, and all my aunts. My mother did also. | 14:07 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah, do you remember the store? | 14:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Did I remember the store? | 14:15 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 14:16 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, because I'm the one had to go to the store on horseback with a crawfish sack to pick up the groceries. | 14:16 |
| Kate Ellis | That was your job? | 14:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I didn't have a job per se. So I enjoyed doing it. | 14:28 |
| Kate Ellis | I'm assuming it was a White store owner. | 14:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 14:43 |
| Kate Ellis | What was your family's relationship with the store owner? | 14:44 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was good. It was good. Because I can recall going to the grocery store without any money and purchasing items. So the relationship was good. | 14:51 |
| Kate Ellis | [indistinct 00:15:12] ask you a couple more questions. Who were the neighbors in that area? | 15:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I can recall Mr. Gus, G-U-S. He was an elderly gentleman, he and his wife, and they weren't working. They had kids, grown kids. And their grown kids was living in New Orleans. So they grew a family garden also. And I can remember Ms. Myrtle, she was a school teacher. And she taught my aunts and she also whipped my behind. | 15:17 |
| Kate Ellis | What far? | 15:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | For talking. | 15:55 |
| Kate Ellis | Talking. | 15:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | For talking. | 16:00 |
| Kate Ellis | In school you mean? | 16:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, in the classroom. | 16:01 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, okay. So then when you moved, okay, you moved from Harvey to Marrero. But you went to school in Harvey for a couple years? | 16:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, I didn't go to school in Harvey. I went to school in Marrero on Robinson Avenue. While I was living in Harvey, I was too young to go to school. | 16:17 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, so right around the time you — I see, were ready to go to school, you moved to Marrero. | 16:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 16:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. | 16:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And that's my first school I attended, Williams Memorial. | 16:30 |
| Kate Ellis | So what do you remember about Marrero back then and about your school? | 16:38 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I can recall my job in my class was to get the coal for the heater in the winter. And the coal was under the schoolhouse. The schoolhouse was about two and a half feet off the ground. And they had a coal bin under the schoolhouse. So my job was to secure the coal from the coal bin and bring it into the classroom for the heater. We had a coal burning heater. | 16:45 |
| Kate Ellis | About how many people were in this — It wasn't another one room school. | 17:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, it wasn't another one room schoolhouse. But there was only, it went on into the sixth grade. It was elementary school. After I graduated from the sixth grade, I had to leave that school and go to another school. And that school, the second school I went to was in Westwego. That school went from the eighth grade through the 12th grade. | 17:28 |
| Kate Ellis | How far was that from where you lived? | 18:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We was living in Meyers Boulevard at that particular time, and it was about 25 blocks away. | 18:09 |
| Kate Ellis | I'm assuming you had to walk. | 18:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We walked, yes. Yes. All through high school, all through schooling, I walked. | 18:19 |
| Kate Ellis | So what was Marrero like? What was your neighborhood like? Was it at all racially mixed the way that some of the neighborhoods are in New Orleans? | 18:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And my in Marrero on Meyers Boulevard, the neighborhood was mixed. And I have a real good friend, Charlie Creppel, he's White. And he and I, we didn't play together, but we worked together. We had a part-time job, and we worked together. | 18:40 |
| Kate Ellis | Where? | 19:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We worked for a poultry market, Sam Vicari. And at that time, he was able to get fresh poultry, and they would kill it and clean it for you. And also the restaurants in Westwego, Avondale, Bray City, Marrero, Harvey, McDonaldsville, Algiers, all those grocery stores. Not all, but the majority of the grocery stores and the majority of the restaurants, we would deliver fresh poultry to those places on a Friday and a Saturday morning. | 19:02 |
| Kate Ellis | So you and Charlie did that together? | 19:42 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. | 19:45 |
| Kate Ellis | And you worked alongside one another. | 19:46 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We did. | 19:46 |
| Kate Ellis | And there weren't any sort of prohibitions against you two. You were never given a hard time working. | 19:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, no. It's a funny thing. I didn't encounter any problems until I got in the military. | 19:56 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, really? | 20:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. | 20:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, that's interesting. | 20:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | All through high school, Charlie lived a half a block, well, right around the corner. It was about a half a block from me. And we were going to different schools because of segregation. And when we would come in, in the evening, well, then we would go to work together. And after work, we would stop at a place they called a Law Cabin and get a sandwich. And naturally, they had a little back room for the Blacks that the Whites could go into the restaurant. But Charlie, he would come in the back with me to get the sandwich. Until one night, the manager told Charlie he couldn't be served back there. So Charlie said, "Well, if I can't be served back here, well Joe can't be served back here." So then the manager called the police. But since we was working for Sam Vicari, nothing became of it. | 20:08 |
| Kate Ellis | So the police never came? | 21:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The police came, but after they found out we was working for Sam Vicari, nothing became of the incident. | 21:10 |
| Kate Ellis | So Sam Vicari carried some weight in the— | 21:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | He carried a whole lot of weight. He carried a whole lot of weight. And I can recall, I got a speeding ticket in Westwego, and I paid for the speeding ticket. So when I got back, there were very little checks during those days. Everything was cash. So when I got back, I told him, "Well, look, I got a $10 speeding ticket in Westwego." And I said, "Well, look, I paid it." He said, "Why did you pay it?" | 21:20 |
| Kate Ellis | That's what Sam Vicari said? | 21:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. He said, "You shouldn't have paid it." I said, "Well, I ain't going to go to jail." So he called Chief of Police in Westwego and told him, "Send him his $10." He had power. | 21:49 |
| Kate Ellis | He [indistinct 00:22:02] people who worked for him. | 22:02 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 22:02 |
| Kate Ellis | Why was he so loyal to the people who worked for him? Not all employers are that — | 22:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, during that time, yes, because employees were hard to — good employees were hard to get, just like good employees are hard to get now. There's no difference. And I must have quit with Sam Vicari about 50 times. And each time I quit, he would come by the house to get me. | 22:08 |
| Kate Ellis | Why would you quit? | 22:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I was tired. I was tired, dissatisfied. | 22:33 |
| Kate Ellis | But you worked well. | 22:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Apparently so. | 22:39 |
| Kate Ellis | Apparently so. | 22:39 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Apparently so. | 22:40 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. That's really interesting. So you're still friends with Charlie? | 22:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, Charlie Creppel. | 22:46 |
| Kate Ellis | How do you spell that? | 22:46 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | C-R-E-P-P-E-L. | 22:49 |
| Kate Ellis | You're still— | 22:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, we are. I went into the Air Force and he went into the Navy. So when he got out the Navy, he came back. He married a young lady from Lafayette, Louisiana, and he bought a shrimp boat. So he has a shrimp boat that can manufacture ice out of salt water. So he goes out shrimping and stays out two weeks, three weeks at a time. So he and I are really good friends, always have been. | 22:54 |
| Kate Ellis | As far as the fact that y'all went to different schools, did you ever talk about that? Did you ever look around and reflect in whatever way kids do? | 23:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. | 23:45 |
| Kate Ellis | The segregation, the Jim Crow. | 23:46 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. And it's because we didn't play together. And I think the main reason we didn't play together is because during high school, I was playing semi-pro baseball. And it was segregation. So the ball teams were playing ball teams from White Castle, Donaldsonville, New Road, [indistinct 00:24:12], Opelousas and it was all Blacks. So that's why we didn't play together. | 23:48 |
| Kate Ellis | I see. And you were in your Black league, in your Black baseball league. | 24:17 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. So that's why we didn't play together. | 24:21 |
| Kate Ellis | Because you mean you were so occupied with that activity, which — | 24:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Occupied, right. Occupied all of my free time because we had to practice also. And that's one of the reasons why I would tell Sam Vicari, "Look, I quit." I was going to school during the day and practicing ball whenever we could, mostly at night, and working also. So I had a busy schedule. And there was only one baseball diamond on the west side had lights. And that was at Landry High School. | 24:28 |
| Kate Ellis | At Landry High School? | 24:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. That we was able to practice at. | 25:00 |
| Kate Ellis | You didn't have your own— | 25:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Ball park? | 25:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 25:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, no. We did not have our ballpark. | 25:07 |
| Kate Ellis | Because that would've been on unheard of at that point? | 25:10 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 25:10 |
| Kate Ellis | I see. So again, what strikes me is, it sounds like you had obviously a really busy, productive life. And within the confines, or within the parameters of Jim Crow. | 25:15 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 25:33 |
| Kate Ellis | Did that pose problems for you? | 25:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. It didn't post problems for me because I kept myself busy. I'm Catholic, and when I made my confirmation, I had to attend catechism classes at Our Lady of Promp Succor church. | 25:41 |
| Kate Ellis | Our Lady of what? | 26:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Promp, P-R-O-M-P S-U-C-C-O-R Church that was in Westwego. Now, years later, when I was in the service, I found out that — Well, I read about that they were having racial problems there. Now the Whites didn't want the Blacks to attend that church, but I attended that church long before I went in the service. | 26:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Was it segregated? | 26:32 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The church? | 26:33 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 26:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, no, it wasn't segregated. It was segregated. It was segregated because the Blacks in all Catholic Church, not just that one, in all Catholic Church, had to set in the back. The Blacks couldn't go up to the front and set in the church, in the Catholic Church. And I can vividly recall that from attending church with my grandmother in St. James, Louisiana. | 26:34 |
| Kate Ellis | You always sat in the back. | 26:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. But they had a pew with that name on it in the back that they sat on. And I can recall that, because one morning, one Sunday morning, I sat on the wrong pew and my grandmother told me, "No, this is the pew you have to sit on." | 26:59 |
| Kate Ellis | And that's pretty much just how she sat? | 27:16 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. As I can remember it. | 27:18 |
| Kate Ellis | So you were in school, you did baseball, you worked. | 27:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Football too. | 27:34 |
| Kate Ellis | Football too. | 27:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. | 27:37 |
| Kate Ellis | And you were saying, you said a few minutes ago that it wasn't until you got to the military. | 27:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 27:43 |
| Kate Ellis | That sounds to me like that the segregation and the Jim Crow posed a problem. | 27:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It did, it did. I took basic training at Parks Air Force Base in Pleasanton, California. And there were three other guys along with me. The three guys were from Houston, Texas, and myself from New Orleans. And we all graduated at the same time. So we had a 10-day furlough before we had to report to our next assignment. So we decided to catch the bus to ride from San Francisco, or Pleasanton. Pleasanton is not too far from San Francisco — or Oakland. To Houston and to New Orleans. And my experience being in a military uniform was in a restaurant in Texas where they told me he couldn't serve me. That was my first experience. | 27:50 |
| Kate Ellis | How did you — | 29:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I just didn't eat. | 29:03 |
| Kate Ellis | When you were living in New Orleans, or near New Orleans, there were restaurants where you wouldn't have been served. You had other places to go. | 29:16 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 29:22 |
| Kate Ellis | So here in Texas, this was, in a sense, the only place — In other words, what was different about that Texas experience when the same kind of thing existed? | 29:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The difference was that when you see everyone going into this door, you're riding on a Greyhound bus and everyone's going into this door. So you wouldn't look for another door to go in. That was the difference. | 29:34 |
| Kate Ellis | And you were in uniform too. | 29:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 29:55 |
| Kate Ellis | So then after that, you just didn't eat and that was— | 30:02 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That was it. | 30:10 |
| Kate Ellis | So what happened? I guess following that, how was the rest of your military experience? | 30:14 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I spent 11 and a half years in the military, and primarily because I was playing sports, and I enjoyed sports. So the years went by pretty fast. But I've always worked in the administrative career field. | 30:23 |
| Kate Ellis | And in what administrative— | 30:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Career field. So I didn't have a hard job in the military, plus I was enjoying myself. I found by working in administrative career field, that there was segregation there, because after the first year in the military, I became Chief Clerk. And I've served as Chief Clerk and First Sergeant in the military. And there were times when I've seen Whites get promoted over Blacks, and the Blacks were more qualified than the Whites. I've seen that. Because all correspondence had to come through me, and it leaves out through me. | 30:48 |
| Kate Ellis | Did you ever call attention to that then? Did you ever— | 31:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, no, I did not. But the guys who were passed up, passed over for promotion did. And there was always a reason for doing it. | 31:59 |
| Kate Ellis | Always a reason for — needed an excuse given for why the White person was promoted over the Black? | 32:10 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, right. So you can't win. | 32:16 |
| Kate Ellis | That's what you saw. | 32:20 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 32:21 |
| Kate Ellis | And this sounds to me, just even the way you're talking about it, like it was routine. | 32:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was routine. | 32:23 |
| Kate Ellis | There's a sense of resignation and yes, they passed over them. Yes, they would register a complaint. Yes, there was always an excuse. | 32:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. And there was nothing else you can do. You could report it to the Inspector General, but he couldn't do anything about it. You're just making it harder on yourself. And you just had cross your finger and hope that the next promotion cycle, you'll be on a list. | 32:38 |
| Kate Ellis | What about in sports that you played? Now you played football, you played baseball. Did you ever play in integrated leagues? | 33:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In the military, yes. | 33:22 |
| Kate Ellis | They were integrated teams? | 33:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 33:23 |
| Kate Ellis | They were integrated. | 33:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. They were integrated. In Florida, Fort Walton Beach, Florida, there was an integrated league. And after, normally after the game, the guys would go out and drink beer. But in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, the Blacks couldn't go to the bar with the White to drink beer. | 33:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Only Whites were allowed. | 34:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 34:02 |
| Kate Ellis | So where did Blacks go? | 34:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, normally the Blacks didn't go any place. They would go to the barracks, take a shower, and just hang around the barracks. | 34:05 |
| Kate Ellis | And the Whites could go out drinking after? | 34:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. | 34:24 |
| Kate Ellis | That cause any kind of rift between— | 34:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no because — No, it didn't, because we had a good team. We would travel to other parts of the country playing ball. | 34:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Where that wasn't the case. Wait, what are you saying? It was a good team, you traveled together, traveled the country. | 34:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 34:47 |
| Kate Ellis | Are you also saying that in those other parts of the country, you didn't have to be separated as far as— | 34:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, right. | 34:53 |
| Kate Ellis | I see. So it's just in Fort Walton Beach? | 34:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. Right, just in Fort Walton Beach. | 34:55 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, okay. I was like, "Oh, okay. Here we are in Fort Walton. If y'all go get a beer, we're going to go back to the barracks." | 34:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 35:03 |
| Kate Ellis | Again, I get the sense of, "That's the way it is. And we're not going to rattle a lot of cages." | 35:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 35:11 |
| Kate Ellis | Is that right? | 35:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | You're right. | 35:16 |
| Kate Ellis | Then in the times when you could go hang out together in the same establishment, did you? | 35:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. That was in Takhli, Thailand. | 35:28 |
| Kate Ellis | What? I'm sorry. | 35:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Takhli, Thailand. I spent a year in Takhli, Thailand also. | 35:37 |
| Kate Ellis | You mean you were stationed over there or you played over there? | 35:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. And played over there. | 35:42 |
| Kate Ellis | And y'all could— | 35:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, in Takhli, the city of Takhli. We was able to go out and socialize together. | 35:47 |
| Kate Ellis | In that way, now let me see. You're born in '37, so now we're talking maybe the mid '60s or something? | 35:56 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | 36:01 | |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, mid '60s. What I was going to ask was, having traveled — You're fine. What I was going to ask was having traveled around so much and been in integrated settings and so on, did it ever make it tough to come back to the South that tended to have more entrenched — | 36:02 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, when I left the South, I only came back for a week, maybe two weeks. And when I came back permanently, there was a difference in the South because the Freedom Riders had rode the buses, and the lunch counters were integrated. And I can recall receiving a memo from the Pentagon stating that — I was stationed in Kansas. Stating that no military personnel can take part in any sit-in demonstration. And I was stationed in Wichita, Kansas at the time. And that was in mid '60s. It had to be '64, in 1964. | 36:27 |
| Kate Ellis | So what about that? What did that mean for you? | 37:36 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, it ruffled my feathers. And the reason it ruffled my feathers is because here they were fighting in Vietnam for civil rights. And here I got a uniform on and I can't fight here in the United States for civil rights. So it ruffled my feathers. | 37:40 |
| Kate Ellis | But again, it was like, well, it irks you. | 38:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 38:11 |
| Kate Ellis | The same way, it sounds like, the incident in Texas. | 38:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, right. | 38:15 |
| Kate Ellis | It's like you go without a meal, maybe it raises your blood pressure, but — | 38:15 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, you know when you get angry, you could do a lot of things that you don't think you could do, or you wouldn't do if you're not. And you're angry, so that in itself would fill you up. | 38:22 |
| Kate Ellis | You mean the anger. What do you mean, fill you up. | 38:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Okay, you got uniform on and you're going to a bus station. And they tell you they can't serve you. You got a uniform on. So that's the anger. | 38:40 |
| Kate Ellis | Great, okay. | 38:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 38:58 |
| Kate Ellis | So how did you get into this field? | 39:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, while I was in the service, there are several things that caused me to think about getting out of the military. Number one, I saw the difference between promotion. I saw the chances of Blacks being very slim of being able to serve 20 years in the military and retire. After 15th year, 16th year, the powers that be will start picking on the Blacks to force them out of the military to keep them from getting a retirement. | 39:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Really? | 40:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. My father, he was a longshoreman at that time, and there were benefits from the union that he wasn't getting — that I knew it would only take a phone call to get. So coupled along with other things, I decided, "Well, the military is not for me. Being in uniform, I can't set in and help the high school students demonstrate. I got refused service being in a uniform." So I said, "Well, I get out of the military and try and make life a little better for my life." | 40:03 |
| Kate Ellis | Did your father become a longshoreman when y'all moved to Marrero? | 41:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. | 41:07 |
| Kate Ellis | So that's where he— | 41:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. He only worked Celotex for about five years, and then he started working on the docks. | 41:16 |
| Kate Ellis | What was his job? | 41:19 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | He never was a union official. He was always a longshoreman. | 41:21 |
| Kate Ellis | And as far as him not getting benefits he was due, you said it would only take a phone call. | 41:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 41:33 |
| Kate Ellis | A phone call to who? Who would you call? | 41:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | An example is, my father got hurt twice on the docks. He have a pin in his ankle right now, and he got hit in the head with a hook, a cargo hook. And he didn't get one penny for his injuries. So I know a phone call would've taken care of that from this office. | 41:37 |
| Kate Ellis | The office you call now. | 42:02 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. You got to bear in mind also that, that time, the majority of the men that were working on the docks couldn't read or write. So it's incumbent upon the union officials to get what those individuals will do. | 42:08 |
| Kate Ellis | And you could see that wasn't happening. | 42:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 42:24 |
| Kate Ellis | And your father couldn't read or write. | 42:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, right. | 42:24 |
| Kate Ellis | And you knew that. | 42:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And I knew that, yes. | 42:24 |
| Kate Ellis | And was he aware that he wasn't getting what was due? | 42:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, he wasn't aware of it. When you are aware of something, then you could fight for it. But if you're not aware of it, then you can't fight for it. He didn't know anything about compensation for pain and suffering for injuries. | 42:38 |
| Kate Ellis | So this was in the '60s at this— | 42:59 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 43:01 |
| Kate Ellis | But he'd been a longshoreman since? | 43:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Mid '50s. | 43:06 |
| Kate Ellis | As far as the union officials were concerned, what was the racial makeup of the officials? The union was biracial. | 43:13 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 43:26 |
| Kate Ellis | It had remained so. | 43:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Until '73, 1973. | 43:29 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, until 1973. | 43:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right until 1973. It was segregated. And the mix came in 1973. This local here was ILA local 1419. And the Whites, well, ILL local 1418. Now, in this local, in the early '60s, we had 4,000 longshoremans. | 43:37 |
| Kate Ellis | In this particular — in 1419? | 44:14 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The 1419. This was the largest Black union in the South. | 44:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Now, at that time, 1418 had 1,000 Whites. | 44:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. In 1973, the unions was ordered to merge. | 44:47 |
| Kate Ellis | By the— | 44:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Federal court. | 44:53 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. | 44:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So in 1973 through attrition, the membership was down to little over 3000. | 44:59 |
| Kate Ellis | Who was dropping out? | 45:15 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Men due to retirement, disability. And when I took office in 1980, we had 2300 longshoremens in 1980. But that was a combination of Whites and Blacks. | 45:18 |
| Kate Ellis | Now, as far as the union officials, I guess each union would have the same hierarchy and the same representations. | 45:42 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 45:54 |
| Kate Ellis | So as far as who was not looking out for your father, it was the union officials within the Black union? | 45:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, union officials within the Black Union. | 46:01 |
| Kate Ellis | I see. And you saw that? | 46:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 46:05 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, because when you first — My honest thought had been, it was the Whites who were not looking out— | 46:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, no. At that time, the union was segregated Blacks, and then the Whites. And the Black union officials did not do what they were supposed to do when an individual get hurt on the docks. So I decided to make that my fight. | 46:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Out of the military. Well, another reason for me getting out of the military was to try to play professional football. It was 19, I got out of the service, 1980? No, at 1980. I took office here, 19, cut it off a minute. | 0:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In 1967, I got out of service, and I got a letter from the New York Jets and Miami Dolphins. Well, those two teams were expansion teams at that time. So the Saints was an expansion team in 1968. So I weighed the possibility of trying out for the Jets and the Miami Dolphins, and the scale tipped to trying out for the Saints, because since this was my home and if I get hurt, I'll be able to live with my parents until I recuperate, rather than being in New York or Miami. | 0:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So that was one of the reasons why I came back to New Orleans. So I went to the Saints headquarters and I talked to one of the secretaries, and the secretaries told me that they had their quotas of rookie for that year and for me to come back next year. In the meantime, I had an age problem, so my age was up there also, and I couldn't wait around until next year. So I said, "The hell with this, I'm going to have to do something else." And I worked for other companies here in New Orleans, and I found out that working for other companies, you'll do the same hard work, but you'll get less money. | 1:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Than Whites? | 2:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. So I started working on the docks, and working on a docks is fun and enjoyment. | 2:24 |
| Kate Ellis | And you began working on the docks because you knew you'd get the same pay as Whites? | 2:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, for the same work, because of the contract, union contract. And being in a union, you have an outlet. If the union officials doesn't represent you properly, you can file a grievance with the district, the international, or you can go to federal court. But on a regular job, a non-union job, that's not possible for you to do that. If your employer doesn't like the way you look, like the way you talk, then he or she can fire you on the spot, and you have no recourse. But in the union, that can't happen. See that the only way they can fire you is for cause. So in addition to the pay scale, the fringe benefits, the welfare, hospitalization, and pension. So there's no other job an individual should have unless it's a union job, White or Black. | 2:45 |
| Kate Ellis | So you're like the head of the union? | 3:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 4:02 |
| Kate Ellis | So you joined that around '68? | 4:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, yeah, '68. In '68. | 4:03 |
| Kate Ellis | As far as when they merged the hierarchies of the White union and the Black union, how did that go? | 4:15 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was dovetail. That means the president of local vote, the individual that would run for president of local 1419 would be Black. The vice president would be White. | 4:22 |
| Kate Ellis | Would it be Black? Because there was a majority of—? | 4:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. The vice president would be Black. I mean, be White. The financial secretary would be Black. The assistant financial secretary would be White, and the executive board member would be White. And there's another position that was White. Finance committeeman would be White. And that was the requirement. And that requirement lasted for two elections. | 4:40 |
| Kate Ellis | That was a federal requirement? | 5:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I don't know whether there was a federal requirement, but it did come down from our international headquarters. And over time, we had to consolidate the positions because all unions were a financial strap for money. So we had to consolidate the positions. So now we only have a president, a vice president, recording secretary and a financial secretary, plus three executive board members, three finance committeemans, and a chaplain. But that restriction is not on us now. No. We're have to dovetail those positions. That restriction is not presently on us. | 5:21 |
| Kate Ellis | Hmm. | 6:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | SCLC, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, was formed in this office. Martin Luther King slept on that sofa. The president at that time was Clarence J. Henry. | 6:36 |
| Kate Ellis | Of this union? | 6:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Of this union, 1419. And SCLC was formed here. | 7:01 |
| Kate Ellis | How did that happen? | 7:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, when Dr. Martin Luther King came to New Orleans, there was very few hotels that was accommodating. So they discussed forming SCLC until in the wee hours or the morning in here. So he slept on that sofa. And this was during segregation, but SCLC initial start was here in this office. | 7:05 |
| Kate Ellis | Now, that raises an interesting question as far as, and we almost talked about at the very beginning, as far as what has changed since segregation, legal segregation. Certainly one of the things that that's evident in the work that we do is that because of segregation, many very strong Black institutions and organizations have formed. Can you talk about that a little bit as far as—? | 7:42 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I never was an active member in any of the Black organizations. Never was. And the reason being is that my personal feeling is that the Black organizations are not doing anything for the little man. They'll go to— They're a hopper on helping an individual like O.J. Simpson or Mike Tyson. But for an everyday average man, unheard of. The NAACP, SCLC, or any other Black organization that you can name won't get involved. So that's my main reason for not being an active member of any of those organizations. | 8:25 |
| Kate Ellis | And you've always felt that, and you never have— You've always felt that way? | 9:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, yes. Going back through history, you've never heard of the NAACP or any other organization reaching down to that little man and helping him, or helping her. | 9:25 |
| Kate Ellis | So in a sense, and it sounds like you're saying that they may help middle class people. | 9:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 9:52 |
| Kate Ellis | But not working people. | 9:54 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | For the publicity. They help individuals that they can get publicity from. | 9:55 |
| Kate Ellis | So it sounds like you do see, in particular, Black unions as having been designed specifically to help Black workers. | 10:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, no, no, no. The unions will form to help the disadvantage. May he or she be Black or White. So that was the cause of the unions being formed. And that's the little man, the man that we can't even pronounce the name of. The man that's unheard of. But the man who has a family to support, and the employer's taken advantage of him. And that's my fight, to help that man that you've never heard of or that man you've never seen before. | 10:12 |
| Kate Ellis | Employers have often tried to divide the races, Blacks and Whites, to break unions, to prevent— | 10:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That's on an everyday basis. That's happening right now. That's nothing new. Divide and conquer. | 11:08 |
| Kate Ellis | How has that shaped the Longshoreman's Union in this century? | 11:20 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I think it made the Longshoreman's Union stronger, because I think the men now have realized that the theory of the employer is to divide and conquer, and to keep us separated. But we have integrated gangs working together, and we had union meetings. There was White and Blacks. So I think the employer have realized that that old theory of divide and conquer is not working on us anymore. And like I said before, I want to help those individuals who can't help themselves. | 11:30 |
| Kate Ellis | Like illiterate longshoremen? | 12:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. Yes. And I call them the disadvantage. | 12:23 |
| Kate Ellis | And again, you're saying that that cuts across race lines? | 12:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It does. | 12:34 |
| Kate Ellis | Sounds like at the beginning of the century, there was, at that time, a unified racial effort. There was that realization that they were going to accomplish more together than apart. And then I guess that fell apart again. I mean, the employers prevailed again, as far as— | 12:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, the employers fight on a daily basis to keep the workforce divided, because if he can keep the workforce divided and fighting among themselves, then we in the workforce can't mobilize and come together to fight him. So he keeps us divided. But we are beginning to see through that now. And every meeting that I have, I stress that. Yes, we have to come together. We are not each other's enemy. We have to come together to fight our enemy and let our enemy know that we are together, and let one voice speak. | 13:02 |
| Kate Ellis | I guess what I'm wondering is what is it that sometimes do you think makes workers forget that? It seems like there's a history of realizing that, coming together and the having it broken. | 13:54 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Complacement. We are accustomed to working for $21 an hour. So when you propose a change for $16.50 an hour, they get angry. But we have to look around and look at the big picture to see companies are shutting their doors, and those individuals are out of a job period. Now, I would much rather work on a job paying $16.50 than not have a job at all. So that's my fight molding the longshoremans together. | 14:10 |
| Kate Ellis | The White and Black. | 14:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | White and Black. Well, look, fellas, the $21 an hour jobs are scarce now, and we have to make some adjustments in our work agreement to attract work to this port, to keep work in this port. Now $16.50 an hour is nothing to laugh at. Now you might be fortunate enough, whereas you don't have to work for $16.50 an hour, but there are other younger longshoremans that we have in the union that need that $16.50 an hour job. I myself would work on a job paying $16.50, hospitalization, pension, and vacation. | 14:51 |
| Kate Ellis | As far as on the docks, how would those racial issues or the employer's attempts at dividing Whites and Blacks show itself on the docks? | 15:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I will fortunate, because we don't have that problem here in the port of New Orleans. I can't speak for other ports, but the Port of New Orleans, because it's rule of thumb that the best man qualified for the job get it. And that's the rule of thumb that we use. | 15:58 |
| Kate Ellis | And was that the case, do you know, during Jim Crow? | 16:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no, no, no. I can recall working at Galvez Street Wharf when Blacks wasn't allowed to operate the forklift on the wharfs, only Whites. | 16:23 |
| Kate Ellis | Even though— | 16:36 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Even though the Blacks were qualified, yes. | 16:37 |
| Kate Ellis | And unionized? | 16:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. And unionized. But the unions were segregated. | 16:42 |
| Kate Ellis | Well, that's what I'm wondering is how did the segregation in the unions translate into that? I guess under the allocation of jobs. I mean, there was an understanding that there was equal pay for the same job. | 16:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Except for the same job. But there was easier job than other jobs. See, a forklift operator job was much easier than a job working in the ship hole, picking up coffee sacks. | 17:00 |
| Kate Ellis | And the unions, they didn't regulate that as well? | 17:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, no, no, no. It was impossible at the time. And the reason it was impossible at the time is because the foremans had a right to place this man as he see fit. That's a clause in the contract. So that's why it was impossible. | 17:21 |
| Kate Ellis | Because the foreman were White? | 17:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | At that time, yes. The majority of them was White at that time. But now it's a flip-flop. | 17:41 |
| Kate Ellis | Now it's the other way around. | 17:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It's other way around. | 17:47 |
| Kate Ellis | As far as just focusing on the Jim Crow period for a few minutes, what you remember of that time? You had a separate Black union? | 17:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 17:57 |
| Kate Ellis | And there was an agreement that you would get equal pay. | 17:58 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 17:59 |
| Kate Ellis | And in that way, the White employers could not bring in the cheaper labor. | 18:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. You're right. | 18:06 |
| Kate Ellis | That was an important, but still, and even though my understanding is that Blacks out numbered Whites as far as number employees on the docks, I'm assuming that that was the case all through this— | 18:09 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Jim Crow period. | 18:23 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 18:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 18:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Foremen were always White? | 18:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 18:27 |
| Kate Ellis | And they decided the kind of jobs. Why couldn't the unions protect against that? Why wasn't that negotiated better? I mean, not better. | 18:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I can't answer that question. | 18:38 |
| Kate Ellis | But maybe some of the old timers? | 18:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, I would hope. | 18:43 |
| Kate Ellis | Might be able to tell me about that. | 18:46 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. I'm pretty sure David Giselle could tell you, because he was a union official at the time. | 18:48 |
| Kate Ellis | Is it a fair question? | 18:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It's a fair question, yes. | 18:54 |
| Kate Ellis | I just think it's interesting as far as what was able to be negotiated, and I guess in a sense— | 19:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, they camouflage everything. Now, the employer was saying, "Well, look, we need the foremans to hand-pick his men and to place his men as he see fit, to get the most production out of this game." So that was the main reason, I think, for that clause being in the book. But the foremans used that clause to their interests also, by hiring Whites to put them in the easiest jobs. | 19:09 |
| Kate Ellis | And in your lifetime, in your career as a longshoreman in the union, were you able to see that change as far as— Did that change? When did that change? | 19:54 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, it changed in the late seventies when the unions merged. It changed then. | 20:06 |
| Kate Ellis | So up until that time, it was White foremen? | 20:17 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. It changed— | 20:21 |
| Kate Ellis | Over majority Black workers? | 20:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. Now, you'll find the Black workers are working in the ship hole and the White foreman, plus the wage runners was White, the forklift operators were White. The hook on men were White. But you'll find the Blacks working in the ship hole. | 20:26 |
| Kate Ellis | And as far as— Do you know, and again, I know that a lot of is this before your time. Do you know how that affected relations between Black and White workers on the docks on a day-to-day basis? | 21:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, Black and White dock workers never just socialize together. After they complete their job, then they went separate ways, yes. | 21:17 |
| Kate Ellis | And as far as working together, you just did what you had to do? | 21:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. But normally, a Black would work with another Black as his partner in the ship hole. So very seldom you came in contact. | 21:38 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. That's what I was wondering. So it wasn't like fist fights would regularly break out on the dock because of that tension between the Whites' privilege? | 21:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. Uh-uh, no. I can't ever recall a White and Black fist fight on the docks. I can't recall. I'm not saying there wasn't any, but I can't recall one. And I've been out there for 28 years now. | 22:02 |
| Kate Ellis | I guess one of my interests, as might be obvious from my questions, is not only— Again, you see the structures of racism, you see the way they're enacted and they come in many so unique forms. And it's always interesting for me to hear about how people react to them, how you work around how you react to them, how it translates into daily relationships. | 22:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I don't think I can answer that question, but I did recall seeing what we call a marchion. That's a lady who cooked food at our house and bring it to the docks at noon and serve it well. She sells it to longshoremans. And I have seen White and Black eating together. | 22:53 |
| Kate Ellis | Back in those days? | 23:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Back in those days, yes. I have seen that. And naturally in the latter part of the years is Black and White go to same restaurant and eat. | 23:19 |
| Kate Ellis | I think what I'll do is move on to the family history part of this, but just ask you, and again, I'll keep the tape off for that as we talk, but are there aspects of the Jim Crow period that you recall that I haven't asked you about that in some ways stand out as—? | 23:43 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I can recall riding on the bus with a screen in the front with my mother. That stands out. | 24:14 |
| Kate Ellis | That stands out. | 24:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That stands out, yeah. | 24:24 |
| Kate Ellis | That was just something you had to deal with on a day-to-day basis? | 24:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, no, no, because I wasn't on a bus frequently. That's whenever we was living in Marrero, and my mother would come to New Orleans to pay bills or to shop. And nine time out of ten, it would be on the weekend, Saturday. And some Saturdays, I would come with her. | 24:40 |
| Kate Ellis | You'd go to the dock? | 25:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 25:07 |
| Kate Ellis | Did you ever ask her about that or anything? | 25:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. Never did ask her about it. | 25:12 |
| Kate Ellis | What you, and just and what you— | 25:14 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I don't like to embarrass people. And my mother and father, they couldn't read or write, so I wouldn't ask her about it because she wouldn't know. So I didn't ask her. | 25:20 |
| Kate Ellis | Let me ask you some fairly basic questions. | 25:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Go ahead. | 25:49 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, let me get the spelling of your name right. It's E-R-V-I-N? | 26:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. | 26:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Is it I-R? | 26:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I-R. | 26:26 |
| Kate Ellis | What does the A stand for? | 26:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Anthony. | 26:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Great. You were raised in a house like this? | 26:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. | 26:30 |
| Kate Ellis | Right, when when you were young? | 26:30 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. | 26:30 |
| Kate Ellis | So did you go into the home much, or were there houses on the lawn that you stayed? | 26:32 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. My mother and father, not my grandmother and grandfather, it was different. See, they stay in their own house on their property. But my mother and father, once they got married, they moved to this plantation house. | 26:38 |
| Kate Ellis | To a little house on the— | 26:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 26:57 |
| Kate Ellis | Not the first plantation? | 26:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Oh, no. No. | 26:57 |
| Kate Ellis | Do you remember much else about that plantation? | 26:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I might say something that you might think I'm crazy, but I can recall having a dog and, well, my mother fought at the dog, and they put a chair across the door to keep me from going in the backyard. And I climbed over that chair and went in the backyard. And every evening right after lunch, there was a snake would cross the pathway going to the outhouse. And I was sitting right there and wait on that snake to pass. And sometime that snake would stop and I didn't touch it. And then it would go on. But I wait on that snake to pass right now. | 27:05 |
| Kate Ellis | And that's what you remember about that? | 27:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Mm-hmm. And I remember little Joe also, he used to babysit me. And I remember my mother cooking spaghettis and meatballs. And I was a kid and I had a large glass of ice water. So I was eating the spaghettis and meatball, and it was hot. So I said, "I got ice water here, put some of this ice water here, cooled it off." So that's what I did. So I'd spaghettis and meatball, not because of it. | 28:00 |
| Kate Ellis | Really? And who was little Joe? He was a bit older than you? | 28:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, he was. | 28:40 |
| Kate Ellis | And he lived in the plantation as well? | 28:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 28:43 |
| Kate Ellis | Nearby? | 28:43 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Nearby. He lived two houses down. And when my mother and father would go out in the field to get sugar cane, then he would come over to babysit me. And there was no lock on any doors. The houses were wide open. So no windows screen, no glass. The windows, the wooden, those wooden windows. | 28:44 |
| Kate Ellis | There's no glass? | 29:09 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. Everything was wide open. So when you close the wooden windows— | 29:10 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, like they have wooden shutters? | 29:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah, but there wasn't shutters. Solid wood. So shutters didn't come in until later, much later. But when you opened the windows, it was straight through. | 29:20 |
| Kate Ellis | So when it rained, you just shut everything? | 29:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Shut everything. Right. | 29:38 |
| Kate Ellis | Was there any running water? | 29:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No running. Well water. You had two type of waters. You had well water, and you had the cistern. It was a large tank with when it ran the water off the roof would run into what'd you call this? | 29:43 |
| Kate Ellis | A basin? | 30:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, on a roof. Right under the roof. To catch the water. | 30:07 |
| Kate Ellis | I know what you're talking about. | 30:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That would channel the water into this large tank. | 30:18 |
| Kate Ellis | How many houses were there on the plantation? | 30:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | 20. 10 on each side. | 30:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Of the house? | 30:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | On the side the street or the road. | 30:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, those— | 30:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | 10 on east side, about 20. | 30:31 |
| Kate Ellis | Were there any differences in the houses on one side of the road versus the other? | 30:32 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. All the same. | 30:46 |
| Kate Ellis | And it was all Black families? | 30:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | All Black families, yes. | 30:49 |
| Kate Ellis | There wasn't a special house or anything for people who worked inside the big house? | 30:54 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Not that I can recall. If I'm not mistaken, I think they lived in there. | 30:59 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, the house location? | 31:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 31:11 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. I pass some of those houses— | 31:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I was in what I would call the country about a year ago. And this house still standing. | 31:17 |
| Kate Ellis | The one that you were born in? | 31:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. No, lived in. Lived in. So I'm planning on going back out there and taking a picture of it. | 31:28 |
| Kate Ellis | Of the house you lived in? | 31:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. Along with the picture of this grocery store, it's still there. It's on it. If I can recall, that's two houses and a grocery store that's still there. | 31:35 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. Are you talking with the house on the plantation? | 31:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 31:53 |
| Kate Ellis | And it's a different grocery store than the one you talked about that used to go to? Oh, it would be the same— Okay. The same grocery store you used to go to on the horseback? | 31:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, it's a different grocery store. Because you see, when I lived with my mother and father, it was a different area than when I lived with my grandmother and grandfather. So I used to go to grocery store on horseback. I was living my grandmother and grandfather. | 32:06 |
| Kate Ellis | But am I right that this was all in St. James? | 32:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, it was all in St. James. Different, right. | 32:21 |
| Kate Ellis | What do you remember about the grocery store by your house, on the plantation? | 32:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, not too much. Not too much. Because I was too young to go to the grocery store there. | 32:30 |
| Kate Ellis | I wonder if it was the plantation owner. | 32:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 32:35 |
| Kate Ellis | I wonder if your parents were ever paid with the plantation owner's money? | 32:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In script? | 32:42 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 32:43 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I think it was American money, but it wasn't that much. | 32:44 |
| Kate Ellis | Sure. Yeah, all right. It says was you born in St. James, and do you know what county that is, or parish, I mean? | 32:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | St. James Parish. St. James, Louisiana is in St. James Parish. | 33:03 |
| Kate Ellis | So your principal occupation is president of— | 33:10 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 33:14 |
| Kate Ellis | Let's see the name, the number is, does the number change when the unions merge? | 33:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | When the unions merged, 1418, 1419 became Local 3000. | 33:19 |
| Kate Ellis | How would you like your name to appear in written documents, as Urban A. Joseph? | 33:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That's fine. | 33:39 |
| Kate Ellis | And, you married? | 33:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes, I am. | 33:50 |
| Kate Ellis | What's your wife's name? | 33:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Dolores. D-O-L-O-R-E-S. | 33:52 |
| Kate Ellis | And her Maiden name? | 33:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Cady. C-A-D-Y. | 33:57 |
| Kate Ellis | And her last name, sorry. And when was she born? | 34:09 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | December 1st, 1930. | 34:11 |
| Kate Ellis | Where is she? | 34:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In Okaloosa County, Florida. | 34:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Okaloosa? | 34:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. | 34:33 |
| Kate Ellis | How do you spell that? | 34:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | O-K-A-L-O-O-S-A. | 34:34 |
| Kate Ellis | Okaloosa County? | 34:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah, Florida. | 34:40 |
| Kate Ellis | And what's her occupation? | 34:42 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | She's a retired school teacher. | 34:47 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. And your mother's maiden name? | 34:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Ferchaud. F-E-R-C-H-A-U-D. | 34:57 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. So what was her full name, what was her first name? | 35:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Matila. M-A-T-I-L-A. | 35:07 |
| Kate Ellis | M-A-T-I-L-A? | 35:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Mm-hmm. | 35:11 |
| Kate Ellis | How do you say it again? | 35:20 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Matila. | 35:20 |
| Kate Ellis | Matila. Middle name? | 35:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Is Gray. G-R-A-Y. | 35:27 |
| Kate Ellis | Matila Gray. | 35:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Ferchaud. | 35:28 |
| Kate Ellis | Ferchaud Joseph? | 35:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. You said my grandmother. | 35:33 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, I'm sorry. I said— I'm going to say your mother. | 35:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | My mother is Gerturde. | 35:40 |
| Kate Ellis | Gerturde? | 35:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | G-E-R-T-U-R-D-E. No middle name. Maiden name is Ferchaud. | 35:45 |
| Kate Ellis | Gertrude Ferchaud. I like your grandmother. And your mother's date of birth? | 36:02 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I can't recall offhand. | 36:12 |
| Kate Ellis | Do you know how old she is? | 36:14 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, she is dead now. | 36:14 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, when? | 36:14 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | She should be about, had she lived, she would've been about 80. My dad is 83, so she would've been about 80. | 36:20 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, so that's about 1950. | 36:23 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That's about right. | 36:33 |
| Kate Ellis | What year did she pass? | 36:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | November of '74. | 36:37 |
| Kate Ellis | And where was she born? | 36:44 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | St. James Parish. St. James, Louisiana. | 36:46 |
| Kate Ellis | And I know she was a farm laborer. | 36:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. Yeah, she was. Yes, she was. | 36:53 |
| Kate Ellis | And then after that, when you all moved, did you say that she didn't work after that, or that she—? | 37:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, we moved to Harvey. She worked, but it was seasonal. | 37:10 |
| Kate Ellis | That was the shrimp? | 37:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, the shrimp factory. | 37:25 |
| Kate Ellis | And then in that area? | 37:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | She still worked seasonal there also, in the shrimp factory. And they had a large truck that would come around early in the morning and pick up all the ladies to work in the shrimp factory, peeling shrimp. At that time, they had to peel shrimp by hand. | 37:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Must have been hard. | 37:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, it was. | 37:51 |
| Kate Ellis | Not that sugar caning— | 37:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Was any easier. Right, right. | 37:55 |
| Kate Ellis | Did she ever talk about the work conditions from the shrimp? | 38:01 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I worked there when I was a teenager also. | 38:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Really? | 38:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 38:08 |
| Kate Ellis | What do you remember about it? | 38:10 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was hard work. It was hard work, but my job was to, after the shrimps is placed in cans and the cans are sealed, they go into a vat, a hot water vat, and then the drain the hot water off the vat, and then we would take the cans out the vat and put them in boxes. It killed germs, I guess. | 38:13 |
| Kate Ellis | Real hot water? | 38:44 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah, it was real hot water. Yeah. | 38:44 |
| Kate Ellis | And your father's name? | 38:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | James Joseph, Senior. No middle name. | 38:51 |
| Kate Ellis | And his birthdate? | 38:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | August 1st, 1912. | 39:03 |
| Kate Ellis | And he was born where? | 39:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | He was born in Vachire, V-A-C-H-I-R-E, Louisiana. | 39:14 |
| Kate Ellis | And his occupation? Well, he was a longshoreman. Farm labor and then longshoreman? | 39:17 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. Farm labor. And then later on worked for Celotex, and he retired from the longshore industry. | 39:34 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. The names of your brother and sister? | 39:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | James Joseph, Jr. Altia. | 39:49 |
| Kate Ellis | Altia? | 39:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | A-L-T-I-A. Her middle initial is Mayor. Her last name is Lee, L-E-E, now. | 40:00 |
| Kate Ellis | How old is he? | 40:10 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I'm 57. My sister is 55, and my brother is 50. | 40:13 |
| Kate Ellis | And where were they born? | 40:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | My sister was born in September— | 40:29 |
| Kate Ellis | I'm sorry. Where were they born? | 40:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | St. James Parish, St. James, Louisiana, also. So my mother, she got pregnant and about to have the baby she went back to her mother. | 40:35 |
| Kate Ellis | Did your mother help deliver the baby? Did she have midwives? | 40:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Midwives, yeah. | 40:51 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. And do you have any children? | 40:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I have a daughter out of wedlock. | 40:55 |
| Kate Ellis | Do you want to list her, or not? | 40:59 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 40:59 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. | 40:59 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Shawnette. | 40:59 |
| Kate Ellis | How do you spell it? | 40:59 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | S-H-A-W-N-E-T-T-E. Marie. Her last name is Peyton, P-E-Y-T-O-N, now. | 41:06 |
| Kate Ellis | When was she born? | 41:16 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | '64. | 41:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Where was she born? | 41:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Wichita, Kansas. | 41:32 |
| Kate Ellis | And do you have any grandchildren? | 41:36 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 41:37 |
| Kate Ellis | How many? | 41:38 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Two. | 41:39 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, now I need your residential history, which I just basically need the city and state. Where you've lived, so I guess starting with St. James. I would just do start listing at St. James and then Harvey and then Marrero. | 41:44 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | All right. | 42:08 |
| Kate Ellis | Does that sound right? | 42:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That's right. Those are the three places I lived prior to going into the military. | 42:09 |
| Kate Ellis | St. James was from 1937 to about—? | 42:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Till about 1941. | 42:34 |
| Kate Ellis | Although, didn't you say you stayed there until you were six or seven? | 42:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, no. I moved to Harvey. | 42:47 |
| Kate Ellis | Then didn't you come? | 42:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I moved back. | 42:48 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. What I was going to do is just do St. James, until you went to school in Harvey. | 42:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Okay. | 43:05 |
| Kate Ellis | Which was like? | 43:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | '37, '43, '44 at the South school in 1944. | 43:05 |
| Kate Ellis | And then when did you move to Marrero? | 43:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Moved to Marrero in about '46. | 43:16 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. And then you left Marrero when you graduated from high school? | 43:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 43:26 |
| Kate Ellis | And when did you graduate? | 43:27 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In 1956. | 43:29 |
| Kate Ellis | So then you were in the Air Force? | 43:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, from '56 to '67. | 43:35 |
| Kate Ellis | Did you move to different places? | 43:41 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In the Air Force? Yes. | 43:47 |
| Kate Ellis | Then I think what I'm trying to do is type went in Air Force, stations various. | 43:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah, that's fine. | 43:51 |
| Kate Ellis | You moved around. | 43:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I didn't move around as much as some of the other guys, because I was in administrative curriculum. I was more or less stationed in one place. | 44:00 |
| Kate Ellis | Which one? | 44:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I stayed in Florida for four years, and I stayed in Kansas for four years. | 44:12 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay, from '56 to '67? | 44:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 44:22 |
| Kate Ellis | And then from 1967 to present, you've been in New Orleans? | 44:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. 1967 to present, New Orleans. | 44:39 |
| Kate Ellis | Now as far as your schooling, I need the names of the schools that you attended. | 44:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Okay. Elementary school is William Memorial. | 44:57 |
| Kate Ellis | And that was in? | 45:05 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Marrero. | 45:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Where you graduated from? | 45:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | From the eighth grade. I graduated from Lincoln High School in Marrero. | 45:13 |
| Kate Ellis | And you graduated in? | 45:20 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | '56. 18 in my graduating class. | 45:34 |
| Kate Ellis | So it was a small school? | 45:37 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No, it was a large school. | 45:38 |
| Kate Ellis | But a lot of people didn't graduate? | 45:39 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 45:41 |
| Kate Ellis | Why? | 45:42 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, pregnancy, drop out, got jobs. | 45:43 |
| Kate Ellis | And then did you go to college? | 45:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. I didn't go to college until I got out of military service, and that was in 1972 to 1974. Delgado Junior College. | 45:55 |
| Kate Ellis | Spell that out? | 46:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | D-E-L-G-A-D-O. Delgado Junior. | 46:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | — From 1980 to 1983, I was voted out of office in 1983. In 1986, I was voted back in in 1986 and from 1986 to the present, I remain in office. | 0:01 |
| Kate Ellis | How long have you been a longshoreman? | 0:20 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | On 28 years. | 0:23 |
| Kate Ellis | All right. Longshoreman. What's the name of the employer? | 0:32 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We are the employer. We work for a number of companies. | 0:39 |
| Kate Ellis | So you contract? | 0:47 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 0:48 |
| Kate Ellis | Contract labor. | 0:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Contract labor. | 0:49 |
| Kate Ellis | So as far as longshoreman [indistinct 00:00:52] from those different contractors, cut your check. | 0:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 0:57 |
| Kate Ellis | And that's, you said for 28 years? | 1:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | 28 years, yes. | 1:02 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. And prior to that you were in the Air Force? | 1:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Prior to that I was in the Air Force. | 1:20 |
| Kate Ellis | You said you worked for some companies, but that [indistinct 00:01:26] | 1:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It wasn't over a month. | 1:26 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, okay. Then that's— | 1:30 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 1:31 |
| Kate Ellis | From '56— '67. So maybe I miscalculated with it. You started as a longshoreman in '67, I guess. Okay. Have you received any awards or honors? | 1:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | A few. | 2:11 |
| Kate Ellis | Hold any offices? Okay. What should I put down? | 2:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The one that I'm most proud of? | 2:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 2:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That bottom one right there. | 2:27 |
| Kate Ellis | This one? | 2:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 2:29 |
| Kate Ellis | From Mrs. Turner's fifth grade class. | 2:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That's the one I'm most proud of. And the reason I'm most proud of that one is because I love talking to kids. That's one class I talked to, and they kept me there all day talking to them. I could say things that the teacher couldn't say, and they appreciate that. When I talk to the class, I don't try to tell them about books or anything. I tell them about my experience, and this is what they want to hear. I tell them that college is not for everyone. You have to find your spot and go after it and be the best in that field you can be. You don't need a college education to make a good living. There are carpenters, there are electrician, there are plumbers, automobile mechanics. They do not have a college education. They're making a good living. | 2:32 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So this is— When I say this, I mean the class that you are in now is what you actually need before you can branch out into anything. And while you are sitting in this class, there are three things that you will need the rest of your lives, and this is the time to get it. If you don't learn anything else, learn those three things. Reading, writing, and arithmetic. Regardless to where you go in the United States or in the world, you will need to know those three things. And they enjoy it. Yes. So. | 3:43 |
| Kate Ellis | That's great that they— Did they make— I mean that's— | 4:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was presented to me about six months later by them. | 4:29 |
| Kate Ellis | Did they come here or did they invite you go there? | 4:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | They invited me back. Yeah. So every year at career day or along career day, I get invitations from different schools to come and talk to the class. | 4:38 |
| Kate Ellis | Sounds fun. | 4:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I enjoy it. I enjoy it. Well, see most of the kids or in a one parent household and tell them that the parent are working to put food on their table, put clothes on their back. And I know you have two sets of clothes. One for school and one for play. When you get home in the evening, you don't need anyone to tell you to take off your school clothes, put on your play clothes. And then you go out and play. But don't stay out there until dark. You have homework to get. Come in, do your homework, then take your bath and go to bed. Well, they don't need a parent to tell them that, because the parent is not there. In order for a parent to survive, they need two jobs. They must work on two jobs to survive. So nine time out of ten, the parent are not there, but the kid, if you explain to this kid what he or she has to do, that's all that's necessary. That kid will do it. You just have to show some interest in that kid. | 4:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And let that kid know right from wrong, what he or she must do. That kid don't want to go to school not looking like the rest of the kids. So why should you go to school in these clothes and then when after school go out and play in these clothes, so the next day you have to go back to school in the same clothes? I used to tell them what I used to do in the military. I used to take off my uniform, hang it up, and let it air out, the next day, put it back on. But I only wore that one uniform two days. The third day, I put it on a fresh uniform. But whenever I would come in, I would used to take off that uniform, hang it up by the window, and let it air out so I can wear it the next day. | 6:02 |
| Kate Ellis | And that's the kind of thing— | 6:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right, right, right. And I tell them about smoking. Smoking is not good for you. But when I started smoking, it didn't agree with my system. My system was rejecting it. | 7:02 |
| Kate Ellis | So you're saying that it didn't— Your body rejected it? | 7:19 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. I forced it. | 7:23 |
| Kate Ellis | You forced it? | 7:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I forced it. Right, right. Because I can recall smoking Phillip Morris cigarettes and Phillip Morris cigarette at the time was supposed to be a mildest cigarette, and my body kept rejecting it. I was getting headaches, I was getting nauseated, but I saw my friends doing it. So I kept forcing it into my body until my body started accepting it. And when my body started accepting it, then I was hooked on it. So I let them know, if your body it is rejecting something, don't force it, because if you force it, then your body going to accept it. That's the way you begin to be a smoker or an alcoholic. If your body rejects it, fine. It's not for you. Leave it alone. | 7:27 |
| Kate Ellis | Other awards and honors that you want to include that stand out? | 8:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I don't think so. | 8:49 |
| Kate Ellis | Okay. What church do you go to now? | 8:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | St. Joseph the Worker Catholic Church. | 8:52 |
| Kate Ellis | St. Joseph the— | 8:54 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The Worker. | 8:55 |
| Kate Ellis | The Worker? | 8:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Mm-hmm. On the Ames Boulevard, Marrero, Louisiana. | 9:02 |
| Kate Ellis | What was the church that you attended when you were [indistinct 00:09:10]? | 9:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | St. James Catholic Church with my grandmother and grandfather. | 9:11 |
| Kate Ellis | That was in St. James? | 9:18 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That was in St. James. St. James Catholic Church. And then when I moved to Marrero with my mother and father, my mother would attend St. Joseph the Worker Catholic Church. | 9:18 |
| Kate Ellis | And I need to list organizations that you belong to or have belonged to. Specific community, educational, [indistinct 00:09:48]. | 9:34 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Let me see if I can find this resume for you. | 9:54 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah, see, this is [indistinct 00:09:58]. Did you have that kind of thing listed? | 9:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I have some listed, but it's not all of them. I think to list all of them would be would be bragging. | 9:59 |
| Kate Ellis | Would be bragging? Well this is the opportunity. This is for the historic record. | 10:14 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It's up to you. | 10:30 |
| Kate Ellis | Why don't you tell me a few more that, few lines that I can put in the section. Organizations that are important to you. | 10:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The committee that Mayor Moriello appointed to. I don't know which committee it is yet. | 10:54 |
| Kate Ellis | You don't know what the committee is? | 10:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Uh-uh. | 11:00 |
| Kate Ellis | It's a committee that you're appointed to? | 11:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Any, it's more or less a committee that he's getting together to give advice as to what we see the problem is and how he should go about addressing that problem. | 11:07 |
| Kate Ellis | So like an advisory committee? | 11:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. And advisory board. It haven't been formalized yet. | 11:29 |
| Kate Ellis | Any favorite saying or quote in the final comment? | 11:39 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. Lord, I tried. That's it. [INTERRUPTION] | 11:45 |
| Viola | — Done a good job with her kids. We are going to give her— | 12:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Want some of this? | 12:07 |
| Viola | No, thank you. [indistinct 00:12:11] Had paint from the city, from the federal government on Magazine Street. I went up there, the lady said, "Where do you live?" I said, I live 1009 South Telemachus. And she said, "Where do you work?" I said, "I work for TA." She said, "Well, you not qualified." She never looked to see how much money I made, what my responsibility is, or anything. Just because you drive the bus, you not eligible. My child never been able to go into no federal program because of the fact that her mother drives the bus. I started $5.54 cents an hour. And why couldn't my daughter go to the Kingsley House? | 12:07 |
| Viola | Her daddy wasn't there. But again, see how she was punished because her mother drives the bus and right now you go over there in the project, if they have anything going on, they could burn up our building or anything, the federal government going to slip money right in there for. But why can't they slip it out to a single parent? Why can't they do something to help us? It's some incentive for us to keep on working. If I hadn't bought a house, I believe I'd stop and get on the welfare too. Nothing. | 12:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | She used to live in the project. | 13:18 |
| Viola | And right now I could move back in the project. | 13:20 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Saint Thomas project. | 13:22 |
| Viola | That's right. | 13:22 |
| Kate Ellis | Saint which one? | 13:23 |
| Viola | Saint Thomas. | 13:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Saint Thomas. | 13:24 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, okay. Where's St. Thomas Project? | 13:25 |
| Viola | That's south front of town, off Jackson Avenue. At Tchoupitoulas, Annunciation, all around there. | 13:26 |
| Kate Ellis | All right. Okay. So down the— | 13:33 |
| Viola | Down Jackson. It's Jackson right up here. And you go out there now, from the time we used to live out there— | 13:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It's altogether different. | 13:42 |
| Viola | It's altogether different. We had elderly womens that was staying in the same department as I was because they was old. They used to watch my daughter while I worked and we used to keep the place up. My daughter had a swing in there. And I don't believe right now, I don't think you can even find where the fence was. And it's just all torn up. | 13:43 |
| Kate Ellis | I've heard from people who moved into some of the first projects that were built in the '40s, that they were beautiful. | 14:03 |
| Viola | They were. | 14:09 |
| Kate Ellis | That it was the place to live. And now you say the projects and it has whole— You get a totally different image in your mind. | 14:11 |
| Viola | Because I think the federal government is part of the blame for it, because all a young woman have to do is go out and get a baby, whether she's 12, 13, 14, and she go apply for a project and she could get it. That child mind isn't ready for a house. And so why would they do stuff like that? And they give them incentives to go and get a baby, and then because your mother have rules and regulations you don't want to follow, so therefore you just go get a baby and you can get a house. They pay their light bill, they give them food stamps. So what do they have to work for? | 14:22 |
| Kate Ellis | So do you think there should be welfare reform? | 14:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Definitely. | 14:55 |
| Viola | They should be have welfare cutout. | 14:55 |
| Kate Ellis | Really? | 15:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In the military, the federal government only paid for I think two kids or three kids, not over three kids. Regardless of how many kids you had, the other kids was on you. So that would stop a family from just having kids, having kids to get that additional subsistence from the government. So why can't they do that same thing in the welfare system, rather than give these girls $25 a month more for each additional baby they have, say, "Well look, now you've had two babies, we're not going to pay you for any more. That's all you get." Then that would give them incentive not to have any more and to try and get a job to help them to better themselves. Yeah. Now when I first met her, Viola, she was working at Mason. | 15:01 |
| Viola | Making $33 a week. | 15:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And she used to cook for me at Mason. | 15:51 |
| Kate Ellis | What's Mason? | 15:55 |
| Viola | Motel. | 15:56 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, okay. | 16:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In the restaurant. That's when I met her. She said she was making $33 a week. | 16:05 |
| Viola | $33 a week. That's right. | 16:06 |
| Kate Ellis | Did you have a baby then? | 16:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 16:12 |
| Viola | I had a daughter. And the court allowed that, told my husband that he had to give me $10 a week. $10 a week for a child. | 16:12 |
| Kate Ellis | So it sounds like you worked your way out of that, though. | 16:24 |
| Viola | I did. | 16:26 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | She did. | 16:27 |
| Viola | They brought me out because I started being— First I was hired as a maid with the $33. Nobody came in that night, so he asked me to stay over. I told him I had a baby. I brought my baby to work with me every night, and she would go upstairs in the motel while I stayed downstairs and work. And that's how I got out. And so now just think about if I had stayed there in the project, never tried to do anything, my daughter probably would've end up with the same cycle. And now my daughter is a nurse. But yet and still all that, I have stayed on that bus— Right now, I drive a bus. I stayed on the bus when she was in college. 97 hours a week, just to pay her tuition. | 16:28 |
| Kate Ellis | Did you say 97? | 17:17 |
| Viola | 97 hours a week. That's what I used to do. That's how I paid my bills and kept her in school, because she couldn't get a grant. | 17:18 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh my God. She couldn't? | 17:28 |
| Viola | No. | 17:29 |
| Kate Ellis | Because you were making too much money? | 17:30 |
| Viola | Because I was making $28,000 a year. | 17:35 |
| Kate Ellis | Amazing. | 17:35 |
| Viola | And when you have light, gas, and all this to pay for, how can you make it? | 17:36 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. Especially living in a city. | 17:41 |
| Viola | It's horrible. Yes. | 17:45 |
| Kate Ellis | But do you think that that, I mean as far as people who are in the situation that you were in, or maybe worse situations because they got six kids, do you think that— | 17:48 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | They work their way out of the projects? | 17:57 |
| Kate Ellis | Yeah. | 17:57 |
| Viola | No. | 17:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. | 18:01 |
| Kate Ellis | What's going to happen? | 18:02 |
| Viola | They're going to stay there in the cycle. The children going to do the same thing their parents do. | 18:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Do the same thing. Over and over again. | 18:08 |
| Kate Ellis | Do you think there's a way to fix that? | 18:09 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 18:11 |
| Kate Ellis | What? | 18:11 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | By only giving subsistence to X amount of kids. You have two kids, fine. That's all we going to pay you for. Or they could say, "Well look, now you had one. We'll take care of your first mistake. We not going to take care of your second." So if you have one kid, we'll make provisions for you. But if you have a second kid, we not going do anything for that second kid. Second kid is on you. | 18:12 |
| Kate Ellis | How do you think that folks living in the projects feel? I mean, who are dependent? | 18:41 |
| Viola | They are depressed. Some people that are in the project, they don't want to be there. You see, the thing is, you can change a neighborhood, but you can't change that individual by fixing something up. You have to change that individual from inside out. You have to give him something to make him have a desire to want to do better. But you see, right now, they have a medical plan. They can go to any dentist they want to, they can go get eyeglasses. They can go do everything. Why should they come out here and work and take a job for $800? You take for instance, Popeye's. Popeye's pays them the minimum wage and no medical benefits, no nothing. And childcare, they have to pay. Well, how can they survive? What are they working for? They're not accomplishing anything. What can they pay after they put the children in the nursery and they pay the light, the gas, and their rent? | 18:46 |
| Kate Ellis | And they'd be minus about— | 19:47 |
| Viola | $800. Can you imagine? They're not going to the dentist, what it costs. It's $55 just to get one tooth out. One. | 19:48 |
| Kate Ellis | Might as well just yank it out yourself. | 20:00 |
| Viola | And there are so many people that's getting rich off of welfare plan. | 20:03 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The welfare system. | 20:08 |
| Viola | You see, the welfare plan is money for some people. So they're not going to vote for you to get rid of it, because they're getting something out of it. | 20:09 |
| Kate Ellis | Like who? | 20:17 |
| Viola | The doctors, the lawyers, the program that they give the young women now in school, what is it that somebody can train you to take care of baby when you've had kids yourself? Why is it that you have to pay somebody $2,500 to go to a class for that? Search that person, see who's in office, see who's have that school, see where that money is going, and then you're going to find out something. | 20:21 |
| Viola | All that money is being kept right there in the same corrupted area. It's people they start up a school and about six months after these people get out of school, they go work until they pay the money back, and after they pay the money back, they fired so they can get the next bunch in off of public welfare. $2,500 for somebody to train you how to clean a house? You don't need that. That's something that comes automatically because you was brought up cleaning up a house. Why is it that because you're on welfare, you have to go to school for $2,500. Why is it that they're going to send you to school to be a nurse's aide when they're getting rid of LPNs out of the hospital? Do that make sense? But that's your federal government. That's the type of programs they put out here for that you can't even find a job in. | 20:45 |
| Kate Ellis | So you were saying earlier that you— I mean it sounds like you've had it with Bill Clinton. | 21:37 |
| Viola | No, Bill Clinton— It was there before he even got there. So you can't put that on Bill Clinton. It was there before he got there, and some of the same people that's in office now, they've been doing— The people that makes the laws. The state. They do things right now. Why is it that you think you can go to the credit union where you work, you can get $10,000 for a car, but they won't loan you $5,000 to get a house? | 21:40 |
| Kate Ellis | Good question. Why is it? | 22:08 |
| Viola | I would love to know, because you see that house, that house is going to keep my child from coming to rent from them, you see, but that car is something they know it may get torn up. And that's more money that they recycling. The system have to be changed, and you have to get people in the system that want to see a change. | 22:12 |
| Kate Ellis | Seems like there are a lot of people around who want a change, and yet it's so hard for people— | 22:38 |
| Viola | I don't think, I don't see one in my lifetime, and I'm only 48 years old. They got to do a lot of changing. | 22:46 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Same thing. I won't see one in my lifetime, because he can take the healthcare bill that Bill Clinton is trying to get through. He's not going to get the bill that he won't pass. He's not going to get that. But he have to accept what he can get. And that's because the lobbyists are paying the Congress people X amount of dollars to vote against him, because they're making money off him. The doctors, the pharmaceutical companies. They're making a killing. | 22:56 |
| Kate Ellis | [indistinct 00:23:36]. | 23:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | They're making a killing. It cost us $16 million a year just for our hospital and doctor bills. $16 million a year. | 23:37 |
| Kate Ellis | Let me ask you something, or both of you something. Sort of a crude way of putting it, but how does racism factor into all this? How did segregation factor? How did this come about? I mean, that's sort of a big question, but— | 23:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | How did it come about? | 24:05 |
| Kate Ellis | I mean, when we started— Yeah. | 24:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In my opinion, it came about is because if the establishment controls your economy, then the establishment controls you. Like Viola was saying earlier about purchasing a house, if you're not making enough money to save for a down payment of the house, then you can't go no place and borrow money for a down payment of the house. Then you can't move into areas that are restricted, because you don't have the income. And that's the establishment. Now, here in New Orleans, there are certain areas that Blacks cannot purchase a house in. Around Tulane, Tulane University or it's Loyola University? | 24:08 |
| Viola | It's Tulane is on one side and Loyola's on the other, so it's the same. | 24:56 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It's the same. On St. Charles's Avenue? | 24:59 |
| Kate Ellis | You can't purchase a house there? | 25:02 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | You can't purchase a house. | 25:03 |
| Viola | [indistinct 00:25:07] what I would say originally. | 25:03 |
| Kate Ellis | But I mean, if you were rich, could you? | 25:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. And [indistinct 00:25:16]. That's in Mandeville. Blacks cannot purchase a house. | 25:09 |
| Kate Ellis | So that's Jim Crow, 1994. | 25:21 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | 1994. Jim Crow is alive and well in 1994. | 25:25 |
| Viola | I think he's picking up more life now. | 25:30 |
| Kate Ellis | You do? | 25:32 |
| Viola | Yeah. You could see it more because of the things that's happening. It's just like we take and we send our kids to school to try to better— See, when our kids was going to the church school and the regular Sunday school teacher was over there, they had respect for the teacher. I know when I was in school, if I would see my principal coming, if I was even attempting to do something wrong, my whole attitude would change because of the respect. Kids don't respect them now because of the fact that our kids have been put in a situation that— My daughter, when she was in school, I put her in a parochial school here in the city and her teacher kept all the Black kids out of the classroom. Let all the White kids go in the classroom. And then when the Black kids was outside the door, she told them they were the ones that always started stuff in the classroom. | 25:33 |
| Viola | My daughter came home, I was getting ready to leave and I said, "Why are you so sad?" And she came to me and I always would put her on my lap. And I said, "What's wrong?" She says, "My teacher told— " She said, "Why is it that the White teachers always put us down?" And I said, "Well, what are you talking about?" She said, "My teacher kept us outside of the classroom, let all the White kids go back in the classroom, and told us that we started— Maybe one person in that group did start something, but why should we all be labored for what one person do?" And that wasn't so. And some of those same White kids have not achieved what my daughter have. But you see, as long as they can stigmatize kids and have them to feel this way, well they know they're not going to strive to be a doctor. They're not going to strive to be a lawyer, because these people— And it's going on today, because some teachers, if a parent don't go to school and look over their kids, they can find negativeness from that teacher that they are instilling in your kids. | 26:45 |
| Kate Ellis | It's interesting you should say that. I talked to a woman who grew up in Harlem. She's Black, and she said that her teachers would tell her— She would talk about wanting to be a lawyer or the president or a doctor when she was a— And her teacher was like, "Don't think like that." | 27:55 |
| Viola | No. That's off limit to you. | 28:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, I've never experienced that because my schooling was a segregated schooling. But I do have a friend named Harold from Alabama, Birmingham. He went to UCLA, and he wanted to major in engineering. And he told me that his instructors tried their best to discourage him from going into engineering, but he was determined to get a degree in engineering. And now he's working for Shell Oil Company and he's a multimillionaire because of his patents that he have. But I've never experienced that. Now, integration didn't help us. And I say us, the Blacks. Integration hurt us. It hurt us for several reasons. Number one, it took away our schools. | 28:15 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It took away all of our schools. Elementary schools, high schools, colleges and universities. It took away all of our sports programs, because the best Black athlete, male or female, the White schools recruited them. So they left the Black schools and went to the White schools, and that left mediocre players in the Black schools. And here in New Orleans, they were talking about closing Southern University here in New Orleans and just have University of New Orleans, which is White. Southern University is primarily Black. And you're talking about closing it to force all the [indistinct 00:30:08] into the White schools. Now, the Black schools, they didn't teach. They didn't have a Black history month. The Black schools, they taught Black history every day. But now in the schools, they teach Black history once a month. And the Blacks in the United States history is so great until they should be taught the year round rather than once a month. | 29:22 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So you find that the Black establishments that was prevalent in late '50s, early '60s are not there now because the Blacks who have means to go to other places have gone, have moved out of the community, relocated in other places and socialize in a mixed setting. So therefore, the Black lounges, bars, restaurants, motels, they out of business now. Even the taxi cab, Black taxi cab companies, they out of business. So integration didn't help us. It hurt us in that sense. And like I said earlier, they are a few Blacks that made it, but count them on one hand. So it didn't help. I firmly believe that. Had segregation still be here today, those same few Blacks who've made it, would've made it then. | 30:37 |
| Kate Ellis | Well, let me ask you while we're sort of on that topic, the question that I had when I first walked in here, if you don't mind answering it now. It was just funny when we left the interview and I was going over my notes from it, we were talking about his work and the union and stuff. Why was there a 1973 federal court order for the White union and the Black union to merge? | 31:57 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | To merge? Because of the hierarchy. You see, you had union officials and the Black local, and you have union officials in the White local. And if the two would merge, then you wouldn't have two sets of union officials, you'd only have one set. So the hierarchy here didn't want to lose their positions, and the hierarchy in the White local didn't want to lose their position. So they themselves kept the unions apart. | 32:20 |
| Kate Ellis | So neither one wanted to— | 32:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Merge. Right. And a guy by the name of George Williams, who filed a discrimination lawsuit in '73 caused the federal government, the federal judge to force the two unions to merge. But he's the one initiated the lawsuit. | 32:51 |
| Kate Ellis | What was the discrimination that happened? What was his— | 33:12 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, discrimination that happened was that the Blacks wasn't getting the jobs that I mentioned before. So he filed a discrimination lawsuit. | 33:14 |
| Kate Ellis | So he was one of the workers right under a White foreman who wasn't getting the jobs that the Whites were getting. | 33:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right. | 33:33 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, that's interesting. So did the Black union support his lawsuit? | 33:35 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | No. No. | 33:39 |
| Kate Ellis | So he did that himself. | 33:40 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, when you say the Black union, the officials or the membership? The Black union officials did not support him, but the members did, because I was a member at the time. | 33:41 |
| Kate Ellis | And you supported him. | 33:52 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. | 33:53 |
| Kate Ellis | Do you think now in retrospect that it was a good thing or a bad thing that the unions merged? | 33:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It was a good thing. Yeah, it was a good thing, because unionism is supposed to be brotherhood. So if you on that side of fence and I'm on this side of fence, there can't be any brotherhood. | 34:02 |
| Kate Ellis | But see, the thing is, that's interesting, just in light of the conversation we've been having, because it seems like integration is a real mixed blessing, in a sense. I mean, integration supposedly was about brotherhood, and yet that's not the case. | 34:10 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | That's not the case. No. Even today, we do not socialize together, although we work together. | 34:24 |
| Kate Ellis | In the union. | 34:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In the union. The Whites go to their watering hole or establishment or whatever, and the Blacks go to theirs. Even today. So integration did not bring us together in that sense. | 34:30 |
| Kate Ellis | But it did have you work together more for workers' rights? Okay. When you say it was about brotherhood and that that was why you should come together. | 34:49 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. But we had brotherhood on this side of the fence. They had brotherhood on that side of the fence. But to merge the two unions and get an overall brotherhood feeling among the workers, what integration did. Was supposed to do, rather. But it still didn't do it because even now, when those guys get off at 5:00, 5:30, 6:00, they go their way. The Whites go their way, the Blacks go their way. Even today. | 35:05 |
| Kate Ellis | Well what you're saying makes me think of what we were talking about earlier when you were talking about playing sports and playing on integrated teams. It made me think of a man that I spoke with years ago. He was White. I guess he used to play with the Raiders maybe in the '70s or something. And he said that as far as Whites and Blacks on the team getting along, of course in the game, as a team, they were worked great together. But as soon as the game was over, they went their separate ways. Was that the case when you played on integrated teams? | 35:42 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yes. Yes. Yes. And if you would follow the Saints players, the New Orleans Saints players, yeah, same thing applies today. There's no cohesiveness among the players. Once the football game is over, the Whites go their way and the Blacks go another way. The thing that hurt the Black football players on the Saints team is that the Whites get all of the endorsements, and the Black doesn't. Every commercial you'll see pertaining to a football player, it's a White football player. It's not a Black football. And those are the things that cause the Black football players to have the animosity in them, of which they have. But when they get on the field, they do what they're supposed to do on the field. | 36:16 |
| Kate Ellis | Wow. In all the conversations I have, I always wonder, as I saying earlier, how you live with that. I mean, how does one live with the animosity that it must— | 37:25 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | You can't erase it. You can't erase it, because it's there and it will always remain there. You can't erase it. Now, there was an article in the paper about Ricky Jackson. Now, Ricky Jackson was dissatisfied with the Saints, and he's been dissatisfied with the Saints for a number of years, and it was because of that. Now, Ricky Jackson made Pat Swilling. Now, Pat Swilling wind up getting $4 million a year for playing for Detroit, and the Saints refused to pay Ricky Jackson a half million. | 37:39 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | But the reason Ricky Jackson made Pat Swilling is because the runners didn't come round Ricky Jackson's end, they ran around Pat Swilling's end. They thought they could get around him, but if they thought they could get around Ricky Jackson, they would've gone around Ricky Jackson, and Ricky Jackson would've been famous. But it just so happened that the players knew that Ricky Jackson was a better player than Pat Swilling. But Pat Swilling made the tackles, because all the guys came around his end. I play golf with Ricky Jackson. Let see, he's being transferred. Well, he signed a contract with the 49ers. And when the Saints play the 49ers, Ricky Jackson going to tear up the Saints. That's that animosity in him. That's that payback. Pat Swilling going to do the same thing. If you notice it, the players that the Saints got rid of, or players who was playing on other teams— | 38:14 |
| Viola | [indistinct 00:39:27]. | 39:24 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | — On a regular basis and they're Black. | 39:27 |
| Viola | But it's something about Louisiana. They just don't want to see a Black man accomplish nothing. It's just something they just figure that they got to have they foot on their neck all the time. They don't think you should have over $500. They figure that you should work and go to Goodwill and buy your clothes, your kids' clothes. They don't think you should have a desire to see your kids with the best. Why is it? | 39:31 |
| Viola | And the average politician, they need $89,000 to live off a month, and the average working person, they want to give you $225 to work with. The bread is the same price in the store for me as it is for him. He needs money and so do I. And nine times out of ten, this man that's working need the bread the most, because he's the one that has the responsibility with the greater need. | 40:00 |
| Viola | It's just awful. And sometimes you really do. I really understand the man when he cracks up now. I really understand. Because they don't know how to deal with that pressure that in a man, that's in them that's fighting to break out. And the only relief I have is God. That's my relief. A lot of people don't understand that, but He is there and that's the only thing that keeps me from cracking up sometime. My kids and God. And it's just sometime you just want to get up and blow up too. | 40:30 |
| Viola | People here, city councilmans, they go in, they can get low rent loans and fix their houses up, but yet still, we can't go. And how do you feel you working every day in the hot heat, sun, getting up 4:00 in the morning and get up at 4:00 every morning, work. Go to work. And yet see, I don't have— | 41:08 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | The luxury. | 41:28 |
| Viola | The luxury things I would like. | 41:28 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Like taking a vacation. | 41:28 |
| Viola | If I take a vacation, I'm going to suffer when I come back. So what is it that you want to do? Suffer when you come back or just stay home. And you see, this is where the pressure come from. You see, we never have an exhaust. You never have no relief. It's just constantly built. Up time and time and time. And something going to have to change. And gambling is not the answer. | 41:35 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, you don't think that gambling's going to save the— | 42:00 |
| Viola | No, it's not going to save us. | 42:00 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I'm going to tell you the answer. Gambling is not the answer, but I'm in favor of it. It's not the answer. The answer is, everyone who own property in this city pay their fair share of taxes. That's the answer. Now, like this church here. Let this church pay its fair share of property tax on whatever it owns. And not just on this church, the other churches too. And on St. Charles Avenue, place I can't buy a house regardless of my income. They got this grandfather clause, so they don't pay any property tax. They got mansions on St. Charles Avenue. | 42:00 |
| Kate Ellis | Wait, those mansions don't pay— | 42:39 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Not one penny of tax. | 42:39 |
| Viola | You ask them for their light bill and get their light bill and compare their light bill with mine and you would see a great difference. And right now, those people that lives on St. Charles Street, they can go down and the federal government would give them money to repair their house and they don't have to pay it back. | 42:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Historical district. But they don't pay one penny of property. | 43:02 |
| Kate Ellis | They don't pay. I just can't believe— | 43:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | They don't pay one penny of property tax. | 43:08 |
| Viola | Who made that law? Look at the foundation. | 43:13 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | If everyone would pay their fair share of taxes. | 43:15 |
| Kate Ellis | Their ancestors. | 43:16 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | It wouldn't be a problem. No, you wouldn't need gambling. But you can't tax me anymore. At some point in time, I will revolt because of the taxes out there. | 43:19 |
| Kate Ellis | You ready to revolt. | 43:29 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | My only outlet is gambling. Yeah, right here gambling. Help me pay my taxes, because there are other people in this city are not paying any taxes. Not one penny in taxes. | 43:33 |
| Kate Ellis | Y'all have high sales tax, too. | 43:45 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | 9%. | 43:46 |
| Viola | 9%. | 43:46 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I think we're the second highest in the nation. | 43:47 |
| Viola | And then every time something come up, they want find something to tax you on. | 43:55 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Right now, we have more meter maids downtown than we have policeman. | 44:00 |
| Kate Ellis | I was going to ask you about that. I got a parking ticket today. | 44:06 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We have more meter maids in downtown than we have policemans. It's nothing but a ripoff. | 44:12 |
| Kate Ellis | Wow. | 44:16 |
| Viola | And can you imagine? Can you imagine they checking the meters from behind City Hall and now you have to have a car— A place that your tax money done paid of, your tax money go to, you can't park behind City Hall anymore. | 44:17 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I didn't know that. | 44:31 |
| Viola | No, you can't. They have the little thing where you slip your card at. That's what they got there. I was furious when I went back there. I had to go back there to get a birth certificate, and you cannot go up in there. | 44:32 |
| Kate Ellis | You were saying that, you said you thought it was something about Louisiana. Do you think things are worse in Louisiana? | 44:46 |
| Viola | I do. I really do. Because I was talking to one of the guys that was here for the conference over by the convention center. That's my route. And I was asking him about the process that they take to change the laws, the legislators. And he was telling me that their system was totally different from ours. He understand the problems that we go through because they don't have it. You can go there and apply for a loan for to fix your house up regardless of how much money you make. | 44:55 |
| Viola | This is there for everybody. It's not there just for a certain class of people. And so that's one plus now. And if you take, right now, if you would move in a neighborhood, don't have to be in a historical district, if they don't want you there and they do something to your kids or to your home— Because I had a coworker, one of the coworkers was getting ready to retire, and he told me he was going to sell his house. And I asked him how much he was going to sell it for, I may put a bid in. The other coworker, which both of them was White. He told me, "If you buy it, I'll bump it up." And so that's letting him— We work together— | 45:39 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | We had a foreman by name of Tom McKay. | 0:01 |
| Kate Ellis | Tom McKay. | 0:04 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Tom McKay, M-C-K-A-Y. He was a foreman. And there was some Blacks moving into his neighborhood, so he moved out into a more expensive neighborhood. So there's nothing new. | 0:05 |
| Kate Ellis | And that was kind of recent? | 0:30 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Oh, no, no. | 0:31 |
| Kate Ellis | Oh, that was a while ago? | 0:32 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Yeah. Yeah. About 20 years ago, there was some Hispanics tried to borrow money from the banks here in New Orleans. First National Bank of Commerce, Whitney, National Bank, and Hibernia. Those were the largest banks at the time here, and they wanted to go into import/export business. They couldn't get the money from the banks here, so they went to Miami and they borrowed the money from the banks in Miami to go into import/export business. | 0:33 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So after they did that, the majority of the freight that was coming through the port from Central America and South America, instead of coming through a Port of New Orleans, came through a Port of Miami. So that was one of the reasons why our workforce declined. Less work. The movement of the freight shifted from New Orleans to Miami because that's where they set up their operation at, Miami. | 1:13 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | So the coffee— We used to be the number two coffee port in the United States. We're not anymore. Coffee comes through the Port of Miami and it's either put in containers and trucked here or railroaded here to the Port of New Orleans. | 1:43 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And I went on a trade mission to Honduras about three years ago, and I spoke to an individual in Honduras who was in the petroleum business. And he have a house at the airport in Kenner, Louisiana. And he tried to borrow money from the banks here in New Orleans, and he couldn't. He's Hispanic, and he couldn't. So he went to Texas. Houston, Texas. And he got the money from the banks in Houston, Texas. So all of his petroleum product that's leaving the United States leave through a port at Houston, Texas, going to Honduras. | 2:08 |
| Kate Ellis | So you're saying folks here are shooting themselves— | 2:51 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | In the foot. | 2:54 |
| Kate Ellis | In the butt. (laughs) They're really— Huh. | 2:54 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | I can give you his name if you want it. | 3:04 |
| Kate Ellis | The guy in— | 3:07 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Honduras. | 3:08 |
| Kate Ellis | Sure. Honduras guy. | 3:11 |
| Viola | My mother was living in a old house. You could look through the ceiling and see the stars. You could look through the floor and see the worms crawling under the house. And these people, the preparers, in Innis, Louisiana, these people are rich and they refuse to put a bathroom on the house. | 3:17 |
| Kate Ellis | Still? | 3:36 |
| Viola | And still, people is going outside to a toilet. If they have a bathroom, they have to put it on their property themselves. And these people live in bricks mansion. And these old people that have picked pecans, picked cotton, and put their four parents up and they inherit everything they four parents have, and they will not do anything for those old people out there. They'd rather take these foreigners that come in and let them have the houses and stuff, and have the little business that they have. And these people never did anything for them. But everything they own today, it come through those old Black people out there that have worked and made them who they are. Excuse me. And they don't have enough heart to even say, "Well, you all could have these old houses, just fix them up." | 3:37 |
| Viola | A Black girl house caught a fire and her baby burned up because they had to pay for that baby. They would not put a bathroom on those houses, and they'd rather let everything grow up. And if you would see what those people are living in today, it's sad. | 4:31 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | Well, here's this guy now— | 4:48 |
| Kate Ellis | Thanks. | 4:50 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | — that I've highlighted. | 4:51 |
| Kate Ellis | Let me write it down. | 4:53 |
| Irvin Anthony Joseph | And he's the main supplier of petroleum product. | 4:55 |
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