Horace Downing interview recording, 1995 July 21

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Mary Hebert	First, I just want you to tell me your full name and when and where you were born.	0:03
Horace C. Downing	My full name is Horace C. Downing, and I was born in Berkley.	0:07
Mary Hebert	What's your birthday?	0:17
Horace C. Downing	My birthday is February the 26th, 1917.	0:19
Mary Hebert	Who were your parents? What were their names?	0:23
Horace C. Downing	My mother was named Carrie, and my daddy was named Garfield.	0:23
Mary Hebert	What did they do for a living?	0:27
Horace C. Downing	Well, my mother was something like a housemaid, and that kind of category.	0:34
Mary Hebert	And your father?	0:42
Horace C. Downing	Labor. Only time that he moved up, probably I was in junior high school. He got a job working in a warehouse, shipping out information to freightline plants all over the country. That's as high as he could go.	0:42
Mary Hebert	Was it because of his race?	0:56
Horace C. Downing	That's right. Mm-hmm. Because, it was a funny thing, his last boss was from Boston, and I used to come down there from high school, help my daddy get the mail and stuff. He told me, he said, "Young Downing," he said, "when you finish high school, don't come back this way. Your daddy's age is against him to move anything else. He's locked in." I wasn't coming back anyway because I had other dreams. I started a six-year apprenticeship in the local newspaper, the Norfolk Journal and Guide. You probably heard of it. I worked in the mechanic end of the paper and also in the circulation department, assistant circulation manager.	0:57
Mary Hebert	So you never worked as a laborer or in any of the factories?	1:42
Horace C. Downing	No. Only times I worked as a laborer was when I was in high school. We don't have the kind of programs that kids have today like [indistinct 00:01:52] here. We would not look for a job, we made our jobs. So I went to the local box factory and they paid me nine and a half cent an hour, working 12 hours a day.	1:43
Mary Hebert	That was in the '20s, '30s?	2:02
Horace C. Downing	In the '30s, yeah, in the '30s, yeah. I only worked two weeks. I figured out on paper, my way, that I could sell newspapers, make more money in two or three days then going down there. Well, 90% of the employee of that box factory were Blacks and labor class. The supervisors and administration was White at that time. They used to have one or two, what we call straw boss, on the lumberyard.	2:10
Mary Hebert	Did your father ever belong to a labor union or did you belong to a labor union?	2:41
Horace C. Downing	Well, yeah, I did a labor union once before I went in the service, at the newspaper. But when I came back, some kind of way, the man got to the right people and the union—I've always been for union. I used to volunteer in the voter registration for the union, the local union.	2:46
Mary Hebert	Getting back to your parents and your grandparents, do you remember your grandparents?	3:12
Horace C. Downing	Yes, there was a couple summers, Dad used to send me down to my granddaddy in Roper, North Carolina. That's R-O-P-E-R. My granddaddy was a sharecropper too. On Saturday mornings, he'd go down to the flour mill, cattycorner there. If he had a 100 pounds, I guarantee you, he didn't get credit for but 90. [You know why, everything 'cause the man owned half of the town. And being a radical at the early age, I challenged the man. I said, "Look, something wrong with my eye." I said, "The scale read 100, you write down the paper 90." So he told Granddaddy, he say, "He better send that boy back up North." That's the time I really wanted to stay there because instinct, I feel it. That's why my daddy left Roper because he didn't see no way moving up. So he came to Norfolk here and met my mother.	3:16
Mary Hebert	So your mother was from Norfolk?	4:15
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, my mother was native born this area. She died December the 7th. She lacked six months being 100 years old.	4:16
Mary Hebert	Really?	4:27
Horace C. Downing	There's long livers on my side, on my mama's side of the family. Her older sister still living, she 100 too. Two of her sisters did go to college. And my mother went to high school, probably eighth or ninth grade. Ninth grade at that time, but she taking care of the family because her mother died.	4:27
Mary Hebert	Was she the eldest?	4:46
Horace C. Downing	No, she was next to the oldest one. Yeah, she was next to the oldest one.	4:47
Mary Hebert	What about your father? How much education did—	4:48
Horace C. Downing	Well, my daddy came down here, my mother two sisters who went to college, and they were teachers, they alright and—in this neighborhood, I could remember the people go to each other house and have their own little night school.	4:53
Mary Hebert	So there was like night school for adults?	5:10
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, yeah, yeah. To read and write and basic math. Then when my brother and I started school, my daddy started studying along with us. Tell you the truth, he would reckon more algebra problems than I could. Probably I didn't have my mind on it. That's where he picked up. But he was very gifted with his hands. I think that's why they held onto him on his job till he retired.	5:11
Mary Hebert	You said you grew up kind of radical, that you had this radical view. Where did that come from?	5:35
Horace C. Downing	Well, I think it comes from my daddy. He said each generation had a duty to carry out and by being a paperboy, I could see a whole lot of things going on in my neighborhood. Now when I was coming up, I was close to the Jewish neighborhood and we have a very good friend, we're still friends today, in my generation. We see each other, we shake hands, hug each other. The Gentiles in the area were the same way. With all the segregation going on, we didn't feel the sting of it in this area because everybody knew everybody. If my mama got sick, the Jewish family would come over and Gentile family too, the one who knew my mother. We had that kind of relationship and we still have it, those who living.	5:42
Horace C. Downing	But being in the South, there was certain line, invisible line. But my daddy taught us, my brother and I, how to survive. And he said the people said you cannot learn. Only thing you can be a minister, a worker, a longshoreman, things like that. And my generation said, "We going beyond that and our children are going beyond that." So my brother is a minister and alright, he went to college in the daytime, Norfolk State University. I went at nighttime because I had to take related subject for my trade. So he came out and worked for North Carolina Mutual. He worked for them 28 and a half year. He was top manager, field manager, in this area. So we made a pact, again, that he had seven boys and two girls. I adopted five girls. I got paper on it. That come from the family, my wife's side of the family.	6:25
Horace C. Downing	And my duty is to see that those girls get college education. And all of them have finished college and got good jobs. Even the grandchildren, the last one, Rhonda's in Baltimore. She work for Channel 13, I think, I think so. Then she do a little picture work. She out in California now. She graduated from North Carolina State, Chapel Hill. The rest of the girls graduate from—We had one graduate from Morgan State in Baltimore. She teach French and Spanish. The other two girls graduate from Norfolk State just out of habit because that was my school. So their children went to college and graduated. I think that was a trend in my generation, the family had that desire.	7:31
Mary Hebert	For the education?	8:27
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, getting an education was the most important thing. I didn't have to worry that when they were going to school, that they had to take zero subject. Because that was one thing, I said nobody in the family had to take that. So everyone passed.	8:27
Mary Hebert	So they didn't have to take any of the remedial exams?	8:41
Horace C. Downing	No, no, no.	8:48
Mary Hebert	That's what the zero subject is?	8:48
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. And didn't have to take that because my wife worked for City of Norfolk for 28 and a half year in recreation and she was something like a supervisor of the recreation center in this area. She had a whole lot, handle the kids and things like that. We used that same philosophy from home. I end up with more daughters, kind of associates of my girls and young mens and some will call me Uncle and all that. That's respect for elder people. Look, I did the same thing coming along. In this neighborhood during that period, most of your honor student came from a very low-income neighborhood.	8:48
Mary Hebert	What were the schools in this neighborhood? What school did you attend?	9:34
Horace C. Downing	Right across the street, came from this project was an elementary school called Lincoln Elementary School.	9:37
Mary Hebert	That's where you attended? Were those the only schools—	9:44
Horace C. Downing	No, well, they had two more school in this area. They were for the Whites. One named Robert Gatewood School and one named George Washington.	9:46
Mary Hebert	Those were elementary schools?	9:57
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, elementary school for the Whites. Yeah. But the funny thing, when they closed up, the White population tried to move up in the urban area, first they had to close George Washington, but they wanted to give it to us. And we went in there to inspect the school and we found that the main boiler of the school right over the stairway—We had a very, very strong PTA and the teacher were very vocal and they said they wasn't going in there. So we called the state fire marshal to come in to check and he condemned it.	9:59
Mary Hebert	What year was this around? Do you remember about the time period that this happened?	10:35
Horace C. Downing	I was in high school. See, I finished '37. It was about in the '30s.	10:51
Mary Hebert	Okay, so that was the '30s when it closed?	10:54
Horace C. Downing	Yeah.	10:54
Mary Hebert	When did the White flight start?	10:58
Horace C. Downing	Well, they started moving out in the area like Virginia Beach and Chesapeake, something like that. And a whole lot are sorry that they moved.	11:00
Mary Hebert	So this was before the civil rights movement?	11:09
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, it was hanging, at that time, the NAACP was the only organization we had at that time that we could cry on somebody's shoulder. Our philosophy was to fight the problem, go to court. That's why I know a whole lot about Thurgood Marshall because I had lived through that period. It was mandatory in some families that you belong to the NAACP. I remember I joined as a youth. They first sent a year membership. Now I'm paying $25. The cost, you know?	11:11
Mary Hebert	Did your father belong—	11:45
Horace C. Downing	Yes, my father was first because what happened when I came out of high school, I couldn't vote at the age of 18. I mean, at the age 21, that I had to pay a dollar and a half each year. If you miss a year, you couldn't vote.	11:55
Mary Hebert	That was the poll tax?	12:04
Horace C. Downing	That poll tax, yeah. That was one thing that I got tied into it. I couldn't vote at the time, but I did help the senior in the area, go around knocking on doors. I belonged to the Scout Troop at the time, I'll never forget it, Troop 74, and that was part of our citizenship training, to get our parents name on the book.	12:05
Mary Hebert	So the Scout Troop—Did the Scout Master organize this or was it—	12:25
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, it was the Scout Master. The first Scout Master, he was a friend to my daddy.	12:29
Mary Hebert	What's his name?	12:40
Horace C. Downing	Oh, Walter Fulford. F-U-L-F-O-R-D, something like that. He was a mail carrier. That was a big job. Being a teacher and a mail carrier, during that day, you were a big man in your neighborhood. So we did that. Then I got 21 years old, I decided to dabble in politics a little bit. So I been in the service, World War Two and Korea and I came back, I ran against the most important man in the town, the manager of the local bank, as the Democrat Committee man of the area. At that time, he had White and Jews and Blacks in the neighborhood. Then I was Scout Master then. My Scout boys, we went and knocked on the doors in everybody neighborhood and I beat the manager out, Ed Mueller. Still good friends, still good friends.	12:40
Mary Hebert	Now what office was that for?	13:44
Horace C. Downing	Committee man. I represented the Democrat in this area.	13:48
Mary Hebert	Oh, okay.	13:51
Horace C. Downing	At the present time, I'm chairman of the 89th District, Democratic District. My duty to keep my Democratic people aware of what is going on.	13:59
Mary Hebert	When y'all would go and knock on doors to get people to register to vote, did you get much of a positive response for it?	14:11
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. One thing is some people were shy, when someone couldn't read and write. Then on weekends, in the various churches, they would have little class. The funny thing about that situation, once people started reading and writing, they were able to fill out that form, then the system changed in that you had to memorize the form, then write it out. So they made a song of it.	14:19
Mary Hebert	That's how they memorized the form?	14:47
Horace C. Downing	That's it. See, and the big money boys downtown whose name was on the book, they didn't have time [indistinct 00:14:54]. They controlled that then. The Byrd Machine up in this area, it was on a rampage. They controlled everything, jobs and everything. See? That's when I became Democratic Committee man so I was inside working with the Machine and my neighbors called me Black Byrd. But I was in a circuit where everything flow through that area. You want a job, you got to see the head man downtown, see? I didn't say much the first year. I sat there and listened and see how it operate. I said, "Well, we can do the same thing in our neighborhood, see?"	14:50
Horace C. Downing	And at that—political science in our school was a soft subject. Nobody paid much attention to it. It passed, of course. But we found out that it would do our kids to learn a whole lot about political science when they went to college. One of my best friends, Dr. Robertson from Norfolk State, and he helped people living in this area. He would come to our league meeting and tell us they had it all. And we still had to do it today. People so lackadaisical.	15:26
Mary Hebert	Right.	16:01
Horace C. Downing	They think they got it made now.	16:01
Mary Hebert	So they don't register to vote?	16:01
Horace C. Downing	No, yeah. I'm contemplating now to try to think of some line of communication for the welfare people and the senior. But your senior in this area vote more than the young people.	16:04
Mary Hebert	Isn't that how it is in a lot of areas where the older people, the ones who fought for the right to—	16:17
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, that's right. Yeah, see, it was mandatory in my family, that my daddy did, that everybody name going to have be on that book.	16:22
Mary Hebert	So your father voted, your mother voted?	16:31
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, yeah. That's right.	16:33
Mary Hebert	With the voter registration schools and that kind of thing, teaching people how fill out the form, were there any reactions from the White registrars when—	16:35
Horace C. Downing	Oh, yeah. Ours wasn't as bad as down in the Deep South because people go to lunch at certain time. We sat down and strategized, how we going to trick these people? They go to lunch at 12:00, between 10:00 and 11:00, we going to have 50 people in line and nobody going to shut that door on us. Because we had a right to be there, to be served, something like that. That's where they came with the blank registration form. So they did away with that. A good friend of mine, you probably heard of, Evelyn Butts. She went to the Supreme Court to eliminate the poll tax, something like that. She was a very strong organizer in that field. I studied under her, so I'm still carrying on some of her wishes, something like that. Those of us left. You know?	16:45
Mary Hebert	Right. So was it hard for some of these people to go to pay their poll tax, for someone with very low income?	17:36
Horace C. Downing	Yes. What we used to do, through the Civil League, we would take 50 cent a week, we kept a record of it. By the time they got that dollar and a half, bring them down there. Then when you go down there, pay the dollar and a half, they tell you, "Well, you don't have to pay that now. You can pay your personal property tax." Me and [indistinct 00:18:03] "You going to tell me how to spend my money. That's a dollar and a half for the poll tax. I pay that personal property tax when I feel like it. See?" They knew me when I came down there. I did it in a way that the way that they tried to maneuver me, and let them know I was thinking for myself, something like that. I made friends with some of them people. I know where they're coming from, but the guy who controlled the money controlled politics. That was it. Only way that we could ease into it, become a part of the system.	17:43
Horace C. Downing	I think some of us became a part of the system and turned on their people. The power was in their hand, being exposed to—So they had to go through it just like anybody else. When my daughters' generation now is running for office, things like that, and what I've been telling them, as a senior member, that because your skin is black, they're going to say that you got to run at this time the ideal, "Do your homework. Become a part of the organization, your church, Boy Scouts, your Y and your name will appear, become a household, and then when you come out, they know you." But see, they thought that just by being Black, I can run, I can get all the vote. Then especially me, because the ward system, the district, you know, everybody has a good time. But it don't work that way.	18:36
Mary Hebert	So you have to be known by your—	19:30
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, yeah, by your peers, yeah. I was born and raised in this neighborhood and I was testing grounds at my age, at that time, I was about 70-some years old, decided to run for city council.	19:32
Mary Hebert	When you were seven?	19:46
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. They used me for testing the grounds. I come to find that a whole lot of kids who live in Berkley didn't know me, but their grandparents knew me. So I had to work among them. I would go the high school, the junior high school and they would go back home. "Yeah, I remember, he used to be my paperboy" or something like that. See?	19:51
Mary Hebert	So when did you run for city council?	20:10
Horace C. Downing	See, that was—I was about 71 years old. Yeah, I was 71 years old.	20:14
Mary Hebert	Oh.	20:24
Horace C. Downing	Because I worked for the City till I was 70. I met a whole lot of good White friends too. I have some White friends, I never dreamed that they were going to come out for me. And they would call me and my first $100, I received from a White friend. Because my theory of this, I don't believe in argument. Let's sit down this table and negotiate. See? [indistinct 00:20:53] started off first and then try to get all the crumbs and everybody can deal with the situation. That's the way I operate. But I get cussed out sometime from my peer group.	20:25
Mary Hebert	[indistinct 00:21:08]	21:04
Horace C. Downing	Be still right now, I had to teach that generation that. Some of them falling in line. Then I had found out among my people, once they put you in, they forget about you. That's the times you keep up with them. Go to Richmond, wherever you live, a church group, borrow the bus, put some gas in it and go out there, let the people know you're behind them, see? So last year, we carried two or three buses over from this [indistinct 00:21:38]. First time in the history they ever been to Richmond.	21:12
Mary Hebert	Really?	21:41
Horace C. Downing	That's right. Every year, part of my vacation, I go to Richmond and I have some kinfolks up there so I ain't even worried about a hotel. And I visit around and make friends. So I got an idea to help the senior citizens, I can send letters [indistinct 00:22:02] One day, a representative, he let me use part of his office. He said, "I know it's about time when you come up here." Said, "Have your office over here." And I really enjoy it. That's living history right there.	21:43
Mary Hebert	Do you think that your involvement, say, in organizations like the Boy Scouts helped you?	22:17
Horace C. Downing	Oh yes. I got a merit badge and a citizenship. I think I was one of the Black ones got one in citizenship over in this area. When I became a Scout Master, I still received all my merit badges, except swimming. We didn't have no swimming pool at all. If you can swim in that dang river.	22:22
Mary Hebert	You were teaching them how to swim in the river? Y'all would swim in the river, is that what you said?	22:48
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, we had some guys who knew how to swim in the river, not me. Apparently, a lot of people go to that river. Every year, at least one boy from the neighborhood would get drowned out there.	22:52
Mary Hebert	Was there any attempt to build a swimming pool in this neighborhood?	23:01
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, that came up and the citizens formed a committee. That's the time when they, all over the country, "Burn, baby, burn, baby." This was one of the recommendations that we asked the senator, help us build a pool.	23:08
Mary Hebert	That was the late '60s?	23:22
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, late '60s. Yeah. So what we did, we organized a boys' club and through the boys' club, the industrial people around this waterfront made a sizeable donation, not only Berkley area, but in Norfolk. And they the ones who put our swimming pool up.	23:25
Mary Hebert	Oh, okay.	23:46
Horace C. Downing	At first, it was located down at the—when you came off the bridge, not far from the [indistinct 00:23:51]. So the swimming pool there now, be on top of the City and make them put some money, put a top over it. See? And teach our kids water safety, see? That's just [indistinct 00:24:03]. In fact, everything in this area, we had to fight for it. But you had to do your homework, do your research and everything, know how to work with the city planners and all people—	23:46
Mary Hebert	You have to know how to approach—	24:20
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, how to approach them. I know they want to combine the fire station in Berkley with the fire station in Chesapeake. First of all, [indistinct 00:24:28] idea because we just across the railroad. But that railroad coming all south-north [indistinct 00:24:36] and the fire break out on this waterfront, and we got to wait till—We'd be messed up.	24:21
Mary Hebert	Right.	24:41
Horace C. Downing	So we told them, if it's about a merge, let them merge with us and they can get out quicker, get on the interstate and come down. Their fire chief had it all made, yeah. They told the man, get ready to move those trucks down there. And the TV people came up there and we had our people make a survey, what time no trains were coming through and that was during the period when heavy freight was coming through there. Look up every hour, 35 up to 100-some cars come through there.	24:42
Mary Hebert	Wait, what period was that?	25:10
Horace C. Downing	That was about eight years ago.	25:11
Mary Hebert	Okay, so 1980s.	25:11
Horace C. Downing	Mm-hmm.	25:14
Mary Hebert	Can you describe Berkley? What are the boundaries of Berkley?	25:20
Horace C. Downing	Berkley boundaries—Let's see, I think I got it right here.	25:23
Mary Hebert	[indistinct 00:25:31]	25:27
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. [indistinct 00:25:33] Yeah.	25:27
Mary Hebert	Okay.	25:27
Horace C. Downing	That's a history of Berkley there.	25:39
Mary Hebert	You were telling me about Norfolk State drawing up the plans and stuff for this area, for Berkley. When did that happen?	25:42
Horace C. Downing	What do you mean? Norfolk State?	25:49
Mary Hebert	Yeah, coming in and—	25:50
Horace C. Downing	Help—Oh, let's see, now I remember, as I reflect, I remember, I was very active in PTA and Mr. and Mrs. Brown was in the PTA at that time, PTA Council. And Ms. Brown told her husband, he was supposed to graduate from university in Richmond, and she said, "Brown, it's time for us to have a college in Norfolk, so our kids can go to college close to home." Then he made a deal with Union, have an extension from Union and then also, a couple years with Hampton combined. Now ODU started in Berkley at the old naval training station. And Norfolk State started at the YMCA on Brambleton Avenue. Yeah.	25:56
Horace C. Downing	On Sunday morning, each church would take a collection to pay the teacher, donation. Yeah, that's right. They were determined to get that school started. Then the past president, I'm trying to think—Many time been to his house. But anyway, this last president, Wilson. Oh no, I think that's what his name, but anyway, he played a whole lot of politics. That was the name of the game and he got a whole lot of things going. The other president brought it up to a certain level and he took over. I understand that the ROTC in this area is having its summer encampment at Norfolk State College.	26:49
Mary Hebert	Yeah.	27:30
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. See? And most of the officers in the Navy come out from Norfolk State.	27:31
Mary Hebert	A lot of them come out from Norfolk State?	27:38
Horace C. Downing	Norfolk State, yeah. Norfolk State. And we have a whole lot of Army boys. I was surprised, [indistinct 00:27:47] the colonel, lieutenant colonels now from Norfolk State. And some will come back on ROTC, teaching the rest of the students. So they have a good history and it's still growing. It's still growing. Just like every school close to any city neighborhood where people don't know how they behave theirself. Anything happen down in that area, then it's still reflected on the schools. They're trying to clean that neighborhood up. One of my friends who was president [indistinct 00:28:18] they were doing a good job to build new homes and things in that area.	27:40
Mary Hebert	What did Berkley look like when you were growing up?	28:23
Horace C. Downing	Well, I can remember very clearly. My mama [indistinct 00:28:32] Somebody must have told you this. But I remember my mother, on Friday, used to take me to a silk factory. Used to be right in here in the [indistinct 00:28:41] the block.	28:28
Mary Hebert	A silk factory?	28:40
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, silk factory.	28:40
Mary Hebert	Fabrics?	28:40
Horace C. Downing	Silk, fabrics, uh-huh. Stockings, something. Because I used to have to walk with her and they would leave me outside and they'd go get [indistinct 00:28:52] come back. On Halifax Street, yeah, Halifax Street was a cotton mill. They made those long johns with those flaps in the back. When I got big, I didn't wear them no more. The shipyard, Colonna Shipyard was the first shipyard [indistinct 00:29:19] this area. Then the World War Two came, Norfolk Navy Yard expanded. Norfolk Ship [indistinct 00:29:25] have it now. You see it when you came up.	28:44
Mary Hebert	[indistinct 00:29:27]	29:26
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. [indistinct 00:29:31] young mens in this area went to apprentice school, ship fitters, the machinists, outside machinists. And some worked their way through rank, start off as the labor and came [indistinct 00:29:48] Some were [indistinct 00:29:48] to the Newport News Shipyard. Norfolk had one of the best vocation school, but don't have much money, because somewhere down the line, I don't know why some of these counselor steer some of these kids the wrong way.	29:30
Horace C. Downing	We didn't have no counselor when we went to school. Our junior year teachers were our counselors and she would go over your record and she said, "We noticed your trade grade a whole lot better than your [indistinct 00:30:21] grade." As long as I got C's in all the rest of them. I was interested in auto mechanics or drafting. I really enjoyed that, see? And I put more time in there. So that's how I got in the print shop, see? But we didn't have no print shop in our school. The one was in the White school.	30:01
Mary Hebert	So what did you do? I mean—	30:39
Horace C. Downing	I worked in the print shop on job training.	30:41
Mary Hebert	Right. So you worked for the Norfolk Journal—	30:43
Horace C. Downing	The Journal Guide. Yeah. That course was six years and I did in four years.	30:45
Mary Hebert	So the high school was geared in two different directions—	30:54
Horace C. Downing	That's right.	30:57
Mary Hebert	[indistinct 00:30:58] the academic toward the vocational education?	30:58
Horace C. Downing	That's right. Now we have—Look like we're going to have to go back because somewhere down the line, some of our young Blacks may males, they think about [indistinct 00:31:19] This glorifies that. I worked behind that for 21 years and I tell you, my hair didn't get gray till I worked for Berkley City. But anything that in my year that I worked for the City in community relations, I had to lay out information like this to get to the citizens and with my training in print, I could do it. And I saved my unit a whole lot of money and I knew practically every printer in town.	31:04
Horace C. Downing	Every time I talk to young mens that we have another trade school in Norfolk. It's sponsored by the shipyard. They teach the kids pipe fittings and sheet metal, things like that. But guess who taking most of the courses? Female. See? The boys on the street, they claim that they couldn't work for $5 an hour, to work their way up the ladder. But the girls go in there, start at the third grade and work and first thing you knew it, she walking around with a white hat on, see, and they want to know why. I say, "Well, if y'all guy won't marry them, won't take care of them, so they got to move." And so forth and so on, something like that. But some boys now going into trade and we have to let them know, "You don't start at the top. You got to work. You work your way through and still stay in school to improve themselves." Because you got more time than money.	31:50
Mary Hebert	Did Berkley have a thriving business district?	32:49
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, it did. We had what you call it, about three blocks of, what you call it, neighborhood stores. Had a—We used to call it five and dime store, now it's a Dollar Store. The funny thing, Berkley has three movies.	32:50
Mary Hebert	Three theaters?	33:11
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. The reason why they have that, most of the people who attended it are from the city of Chesapeake, during that period. But when they put them interstates there, then people started moving out and when they leave Norfolk, they go home and they drive off. There's a supermarket right there. See? They don't come to Berkley anymore, so if Berkley had—if everybody invested money and depended on the people who live in area, and 61% of the people in Berkley on fixed income. So we got to come up with something that can draw the people off the interstate—	33:11
Mary Hebert	Back into—	33:46
Horace C. Downing	—and back into this area, see?	33:47
Mary Hebert	Who owned most of the stores here?	33:48
Horace C. Downing	The Jewish.	33:49
Mary Hebert	The Jewish?	33:49
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, the Jewish people. And the Gentile too. The Jewish people was up in our neighborhood and the Gentiles down the other end of Berkley, when you come off the bridge.	33:54
Mary Hebert	Were there any Black-owned businesses here?	34:01
Horace C. Downing	Let me see. The first finance institute in Norfolk was the Berkley Building Loan. I had put 50 cent a week in there when I was carrying paper. When I got to [indistinct 00:34:16] I bought a little stock in there. Then I got married then. I got married off of my paper money that I save up. See, what else? Undertaker, most likely. Then barbershop, beauty parlor. Some had the fish shop, something like that. But your big stores owned by White, Jewish and Gentile.	34:04
Mary Hebert	Would y'all ever go to the Church Street area?	34:42
Horace C. Downing	Oh, yeah, yeah. We went over there when we wanted to buy some other major thing. Church Street was the headquarter for the people coming up. Church Street, Virginia Beach. But now that been cut off. People got everything out that area. [indistinct 00:35:06] you were growing too fast. It may end up in a ghost town, I don't know. But then going downtown Norfolk, we went to the five and dime store. But eating downtown, taboo.	34:44
Mary Hebert	You couldn't eat downtown?	35:22
Horace C. Downing	If you did, you had to stand up. That was another thing my daddy would say, say, "Nobody force you to take your money out your pocket. You don't get served for it, go somewhere else." So people in business taking advantage of the situation. I'll never forget, there was a restaurant right behind [indistinct 00:35:43] Road, and when you walk in, you could see on the right hand side is White. That [indistinct 00:35:51] through the front door. But the guy who was eating at the back door was getting the best meal. Adverse situation, somebody always going to get the goods. So who in the kitchen cooking?	35:23
Mary Hebert	The Black people.	36:02
Horace C. Downing	The Black people in there cooking, see? So during that period, during the civil right period, we decided, we going to go through the front door, buy clothes, [indistinct 00:36:16] and then we teach our people how to be clean, decent haircut, and then when you go there, people ain't going to be able to turn you down because seeing your dollar is just as green as anybody else dollar. See? There was one store in Norfolk called The Hut, that was supposed to be the store for male. My daddy opened up an account there. And fortunately, I had a cousin worked there as a tailor, so when I bought a suit [indistinct 00:36:41] went to school there, they thought my family was rich.	36:05
Mary Hebert	[indistinct 00:36:46] gave you the nicest suit.	36:44
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was still conservative. My girl—the girls would tell me, said, "Pop, you're too conservative" because I check them out too. I know they're going through a new stage and all that. I said, "I raised you that way." I said, "Let's maintain some decorum." I had one that she gave me a fit. I had to send her back to her mama. But she went to school as a beautician and she doing fine. There's some things she lacked. She was good at books, but you had to stay on her back. She more mature for her age, see?	36:49
Horace C. Downing	I'll never forget one night, a young man came to my house about 1:30, looking for her. I figured what was going on. [indistinct 00:37:34] my wife's been through, I would feel sorry for the young man if I said, "I know what I have." So I said, "No, she home in the bed asleep." I said, "She got to go to school tomorrow." "She go to school?" he said. I said, "Did she tell you she was 30 years old?" He say, "Yes, sir." I say, "You know in the State of Virginia, that's statutory rape?" [indistinct 00:37:53]	37:24
Mary Hebert	So she was a teenager and—	37:53
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. Putting all that paint and stuff on her face like that.	37:54
Mary Hebert	Were there Black-owned restaurants that you could go to? I mean, you talk of having to go—	37:59
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, yeah. Up on Church Street, we had several restaurants.	38:05
Mary Hebert	What about in Berkley?	38:13
Horace C. Downing	Yes, you had about three. Yeah. Home-cooked meals and things like that. We even had a Greek restaurant.	38:14
Mary Hebert	Greek restaurant?	38:18
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, they had to close that one up. He was too greasy. Yeah.	38:19
Mary Hebert	What did y'all do for fun when you were growing up?	38:25
Horace C. Downing	Well, before the recreation program came in in this area, we did our own, we organized our own baseball league in the area and intramural. Volleyball, basketball was just coming up on the scene at that time. And football. We had a pro team in Berkley called—It was the Berkley Bulldogs.	38:27
Mary Hebert	But that was a pro baseball?	38:52
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, semi-pro. Yeah. They were ex-high school guys that didn't go to college and still wanted to have the glory to play football.	38:55
Mary Hebert	Oh, it was a football team?	39:04
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, football team. We had several young men from this area play in the Black baseball league, the national Black league. If it were today, they would probably be playing [indistinct 00:39:19] We had two or three fellows from Berkley—We couldn't run in the state track meet. And the closest to the state was [indistinct 00:39:33] University and that was national and Penn Relay. We had several fellows from Berkley came back in first place, 100 yard, 220 and the 440 for Penn Relay. So when they integrated, they used to play in the local [indistinct 00:39:56]	39:06
Horace C. Downing	But it was a little funny situation was going on, competition, once the Blacks got into the local football team, the White moved to the soccer. Now the Blacks is in soccer, doing very well. So I think they stopped moving because the Black coaches at that time were begging the White to join the team. See? Now I know sometimes I see the Navy ships, they come in, they utilize our recreation center and the young sailors, White and Black, they come there and play basketball and football, soccer ball. The British ship come in, they would teach our kids how to play soccer. But our kids didn't know the history behind—The world's greatest player in soccer was a Black guy from Brazil, Pele. Now he's on the national board of soccer team. Because see, they got to get all the history and everything—	39:56
Mary Hebert	Right.	40:54
Horace C. Downing	—before their face and then gung ho. See? That's the way you [indistinct 00:41:00] We have three boys from this neighborhood went to A1 school. Two of them lawyers in Chicago. And they graduated from Lake Taylor. See?	40:55
Mary Hebert	Lake Taylor?	41:14
Horace C. Downing	Yeah.	41:15
Mary Hebert	Was that—	41:15
Horace C. Downing	High school, our [indistinct 00:41:17] high school from this area. Used to be Booker T., but when this integration thing came up, they sent us over there.	41:19
Mary Hebert	You went to Booker T. Washington?	41:25
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, I went to Booker T., yeah. We used to call it Coca Cola Factory.	41:27
Mary Hebert	Coca Cola Factory?	41:31
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, because the Coca Cola factory wasn't so far from the school and looked just like it. Took us 20 years, about 22 years, to get a new Booker T. But [indistinct 00:41:44] anticipated that this integration was coming, and they wanted to be ready. Once they went to court and all that kind of thing, they had to build it. Then they wanted to change the name to Washington High. So we said, "Okay. We go along with that if you change Maury High School to something else and Granby High School to something else, then we'll go along with it." We couldn't do that because that a part of [indistinct 00:42:09] see? Said, "Okay, we'll compromise on Booker T. Washington." The idea, they didn't want to have their history from the White going to that school. Couldn't find a White that knew more about our history than our own Black.	41:32
Mary Hebert	Did you learn any African American history while you were in school?	42:24
Horace C. Downing	Every one of our history teachers, what source of information that we had were very limit, and most of the times, we had to use the Bible. During the course of the history of mankind, and that's the closest we got to African history. They had an organization in Norfolk, it was something like the NAACP because Mark Garvus—	42:28
Mary Hebert	The Marcus Garvey—	42:46
Horace C. Downing	Yes. And they started bringing books into the neighborhood and I said the last 30, 40 years, we got more Black books in the library we ever had. Once upon a time, Norfolk used to have a regular Black library. Guess who would use it? The White. So we had to beat the heads of the Black to use that library. So for 30 or 45 days, people would [indistinct 00:43:22] and volunteer our service to go into the school and talk with the kids.	42:55
Mary Hebert	Tell them about-	43:27
Horace C. Downing	About, yeah, history of what happened in Norfolk, among the Blacks and things. I gave a test with 10 question. And I guarantee you, our of the 10, only one kid could answer one. And that was about George Washington Carver. Then I had a Filipino boy answer five of them. So [indistinct 00:43:55] the class, "Well, where'd he learn all this stuff from?" He said, "My best friend when my daddy was stationed in Washington DC and I used to stay over at his house all the time, and I would read his books and things like that." So that gave me the idea. I thought of bringing books every day, [indistinct 00:44:09] I go down to the library, they give me some Black books and things like that [indistinct 00:44:19] Because even one the teacher couldn't pass.	43:28
Mary Hebert	The teacher couldn't even pass?	44:22
Horace C. Downing	That's right.	44:23
Mary Hebert	Well, when you were growing up, did you learn about Booker T. Washington?	44:24
Horace C. Downing	Oh, yeah.	44:27
Mary Hebert	And DuBois and those people?	44:28
Horace C. Downing	Oh, yes. Because those main topics, DuBois, I had to split idea. Because DuBois and Booker T. Washington today, like I said, I'm interested in trade, get greasy a little bit, and you make good money. When that plumber come to my house, I got to pay him $34 to come across that door to see him. And a guy walking around with ties and schooling, they ain't making nothing. You see what I'm talking about? This was something that we had to train our kids at home, the difference between the two in the situation. But the funny thing, I had noticed, most of my girls was doing most of their writing on DuBois. And the boys go for Booker T. Washington. The few boys I had in my family. And I've been trying to figure why. Did they have the same teachers? No, they didn't. But the girls always write—	44:29
Mary Hebert	More interested in DuBois and the boys were—	45:20
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, in that situation, yeah.	45:22
Mary Hebert	Did you learn about George Washington Carver?	45:26
Horace C. Downing	Oh, yes.	45:27
Mary Hebert	And Harriet Tubman?	45:27
Horace C. Downing	Yes.	45:28
Mary Hebert	While you were in high school?	45:28
Horace C. Downing	In high school, yeah. Those were some of the main one then. As the years went by, there was other things came up on scene. Those hidden facts at that time wasn't exposed to us, people invent why, especially in the South and a whole lot of research. Carter Woodson, the one who started this off. We used to take us a little nickel and dime and a quarter and buy books and take them to class and pass it one class to another class. But some of the teacher, they could give us a whole lot of background too, see? Then a whole lot of our great-grandmother—My great-grandmother lived till she was 105. I got most of my history from her.	45:32
Mary Hebert	Was she a slave?	46:22
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, she was a slave. Yeah. But one thing I was interested, the Black music, and certain Black music was coded music, like Steal Away.	46:24

Horace C. Downing	— but yeah—	0:02
Mary Hebert	They thought people were going to leave?	0:02
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, see what I mean? That means somebody's going to leave that farm that night, or something like that. And the slave masters think that the people are happy or something like that, until they—Around about the Civil War time, they found out what was going on. And they were people who did all of the work on the farm, that's why it's so many Blacks that have been recorded inventing certain things. Just a little simple ironing board was invented by the Black lady, because she did all of the ironing, so she had to make her work that much easier. The blacksmiths, they did a whole lot of things like that. See, our education, we didn't know anything about that. And—	0:03
Mary Hebert	But your grandmother told you about those things?	0:36
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, she's the one told us about it. Because I asked. I was the guy that always inquired, and she would tell me something. She died in Boston, at the age of 105.	0:42
Mary Hebert	Did a lot of your family go up North [indistinct 00:00:51]?	0:49
Horace C. Downing	Yeah.	0:51
Mary Hebert	Do you have to leave at a certain time?	0:52
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, 11:30.	0:54
Mary Hebert	Okay.	0:54
Horace C. Downing	I got plenty of time. Yes. My great-great-grandmother went up North. I have two cousins, females, they went up North. They went to Boston. One of them finished college up there. She owns a dress store up there. She's a little Jewish girl. And she serves on the board of the hospital up there in Boston. The other girl, she works at a department store. She was the head of her department, then she retired. But my mama sister had been up in New York over 60 something years, in Brooklyn, and she's 102. Will be 103 this coming Christmas, if the Lord spares her.	0:55
Horace C. Downing	She's the first one in my mama's side of the family that went to college, up to the Union. And the other went to Norfolk Mission College, here. See, that's history that the average kid doesn't know anything about.	1:39
Mary Hebert	Right.	1:49
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. And I—When I pass by a certain era, or a certain building, I'll relate it to my grandkids. I say, "That used to be so and so and so, now it's Norfolk Mission College." Norfolk State wasn't the first. It was Norfolk Mission College by the Episcopal church, and—	1:49
Mary Hebert	What did they train people? What did they—	2:08
Horace C. Downing	Teacher.	2:10
Mary Hebert	—Those were teacher jobs?	2:11
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, teach the others.	2:11
Mary Hebert	Did most of your teachers come out of there?	2:14
Horace C. Downing	Some of my teachers came out of there. Most of our teachers came from Virginia State College and Hampton. And once upon a time, Hampton had one of the country's best trade schools, but they changed over. And I'm sorry, I cried like a baby when I heard that they changed over, because I could go there some summers, to take on advanced work and apprentice, and things like that. Because they would send their students over to us, and then our mechanics would go to their school.	2:17
Mary Hebert	You mentioned earlier that you were in World War II.	2:47
Horace C. Downing	Yeah.	2:49
Mary Hebert	Were you drafted into the war?	2:50
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. I was drafted. When I was drafted, most of my friends were coming back home. I served what you call, police action group, and I was sent to Japan to do police duty. Security. Because I was with an outfit called the 24th Infantry Combat Team, all Black. And to be a part of that organization, it's just like joining the Omega fraternity. It was honorable, and they had a good record. All the way back from before Civil War time, they said.	2:56
Horace C. Downing	And they retired. We protested, those that used to be in that, but they're tied into another outfit. But they did a good job there in Korea. When I came home from Japan, I was home nine months. That same outfit I left, the 24th Infantry, was the first one who went over to Korea, as a vanguard.	3:29
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	3:53
Horace C. Downing	And I was the only one in this area had film of the 24th Infantry Combat Team, their tank outfit, it has four battalions, and some local boys, which is—and I sold them to my people.	3:54
Mary Hebert	You did?	4:09
Horace C. Downing	The local people got hot with me. We had a whole page across that, stuff like that. The funny thing about going to that paper, I had a—At that time, I just had the philosophy that some of the Blacks did, they couldn't work for Blacks.	4:11
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	4:33
Horace C. Downing	Like you said, I was radical. What you say can't do, I will do.	4:34
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	4:38
Horace C. Downing	And then my paperwork record, handling paperwork for those people, asked me would come there to do my apprenticeship. And I did it, for 31 years. And that's most of the money I used to put those girls through for school.	4:43
Mary Hebert	Was that from working for [indistinct 00:04:58]?	4:56
Horace C. Downing	[indistinct 00:04:58]. They didn't pay us like they're paying now to the local people, because they didn't have that kind of circulation, but my wife was working, and she was still [indistinct 00:05:09] hollering. She always said, "Let's try it," and some kind of way, it would pull through. Stuff like that. And my brother, he went to—Like I said, it was North Atlantic Mutual, for 28 1/2 years too. He was quite conservative, but I was noisy. Real noisy.	5:00
Mary Hebert	When you were in—You were in the Army?	5:27
Horace C. Downing	Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm.	5:27
Mary Hebert	Was it still segregated at that time?	5:30
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. Yeah, World War II.	5:36
Mary Hebert	It was.	5:37
Horace C. Downing	And way back into Korea, I was in the—A laundry outfit. Combat laundry outfit, all Black.	5:44
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	5:47
Horace C. Downing	That was during Korea. But at that time, it had just started to change over.	5:48
Mary Hebert	Truman had started to—	5:52
Horace C. Downing	Yeah.	5:53
Mary Hebert	—desegregate.	5:54
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. And I'll never forget, I was at a—A White outfit from Mississippi came there, and they were postal. Handling mail of the post. And here I am, the chief operation of the battalion, Black. And they walked in and looked at me, and just like I was somebody at a zoo. It tickled me. And I said, "Now, I've got to get these guys on my side." So I called a meeting one Saturday, and I said, "I didn't ask to come here. I didn't beg to come up here. I was sent here." And I said, "We've got brothers and cousins, sisters, overseas fighting," and I said, "I would do it to get these guys ready to go overseas, and I need your help. The reason why you're here is because you're well-trained in the field."	5:55
Horace C. Downing	I had the rank, but I didn't muster over it or nothing. I said, "All of us are master sergeants. You know what's your job. If you have special deliveries and money orders and so forth, and on Friday, we do our paperwork and I'll check it over." So then the IG came down that Saturday, he knows he not going to town and stuff without a bike. And they sent an IG down to a young lady. That guy was about seven feet. He looked like he was about seven feet tall. He was from Tuskegee, Alabama. Military. When he walked in there—He's going to walk in there with a white glove on his hand. He was Black too. I said, "Oh, Lord. I know these guys are going to scream."	6:42
Horace C. Downing	But he had been through it before. And I watched him very close. He found a few minor things, and real soft speaker. From then on, if my wife was going to come up and spend the weekend and I didn't have any transportation to go into town, they would tell me, "Sergeant Downs," he said, "Let me go down and get Mrs. Downs for you."	7:22
Mary Hebert	Oh, really? He was being—	7:40
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. Yeah. And we made friends.	7:41
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	7:45
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, we made friends after that. We kept correspondence with each other for about 10 years, as the years went by. But you have to, in a situation like this, you have to handle it very sensitive.	7:45
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	7:57
Horace C. Downing	I could have been nasty. I had the stripes on my arm, I could have called the IG and said, "Get rid of these jokers out here. We ain't got time," but no. This would give me an opportunity to let them know, "What you have been taught about me is a whole lot different."	7:57
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	8:12
Horace C. Downing	I'm human, most importantly. And it put me on today, to a certain extent, and certain level. Just like they were talking about paramilitary groups because they're worried about their constitution. And then I did get an opportunity to talk to some of the fellows who were leaving there. I said, "But look, your granddaddy wrote the constitution. Ain't nothing in it that's about me. A horse has a better go than I." I said, "But at the same time that—We love it, because it's just like you love it. I didn't ask to come here, I was sold." And I said, "Now you check your history. Why are you here?" This is the beginning, or something like that. The guy said, "You give me something to think about."	8:12
Horace C. Downing	So that's when we started checking those history books, and as the years went by, now [indistinct 00:09:12] picked it up. [indistinct 00:09:12] and now the kids in the school don't pay it much attention. What I mean about White and Black kids, they're telling kids, "I didn't know that was going on," or something like that. But when you start making a lot of noise, then everybody starts hollering. And when it ends up—Who suffers? The kids. The kids suffer.	9:03
Mary Hebert	Even when [indistinct 00:09:31]—	9:30
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. Now one of my girls loved the violin and music. Crazy violinist. And she was in the LY Training. Every Saturday, I had five or six girls come to my house; Philippine, Korea, anything. I call it my rec room, and you're in. And then the next Saturday, I had to take my daughter to one of their houses. And they did that there, for the entire school.	9:31
Horace C. Downing	What tickled me is, at my house for instance, all the parents came along with them to check me out. And my wife had everything all laid up for them. We knew we were going to be scrutinized. That shit was [indistinct 00:10:12]. I'd do that too, if it was in this neighborhood. If I think that the home is not conducive of my daughter at that time, I'll tell [indistinct 00:10:20] now. I say, "Look, you've got to check up on this house here." It's not the idea of being tight, it's the idea of, "I don't want be to exposed to a whole lot of stuff."	9:57
Mary Hebert	Right.	10:30
Horace C. Downing	That's right.	10:31
Mary Hebert	How did the Civil Rights Movement impact-	10:31
Horace C. Downing	In what? In Norfolk area?	10:31
Mary Hebert	Yeah.	10:31
Horace C. Downing	It didn't.	10:31
Mary Hebert	When did it start here? When did they start demanding change? Was it ever World War II? People started demanding change after World War II?	10:42
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. It started, as I would say it, about full speed, the NAACP had several cases in court. They were small cases, things like that. And they won every one of them.	10:46
Mary Hebert	What kind of cases [indistinct 00:11:04]?	11:03
Horace C. Downing	Most of the cases here were in voting rights. That was the most important one. And I think other areas noticed that this was going on, they didn't want to get caught in the situation.	11:08
Horace C. Downing	I had some friends who worked in the Navy yard, at Hampton Trade School, [indistinct 00:11:29], even some of them had went to Northwestern University, in their field of work, architecture and all that there. And when they went down to apply for a job, they were put in the labor shop. Now here's a man, where most of them had—What were doing peace work at home, for a [indistinct 00:11:47] house, but in the Navy yard, they want to make him an electrician helper.	11:19
Mary Hebert	And he had all these trainings?	11:54
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. He had a Master degree, in that field.	11:54
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	11:57
Horace C. Downing	And he married a girl from this area. Well the word got around, and what we did, we wrote a letter to his Navy department and they planted some of their people out here. And when word got out that those people were there, things started changing, just like that. Started changing.	11:58
Mary Hebert	So did the Navy influence here, and bring about change [indistinct 00:12:21]—	12:17
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. That's right. We had the Navy. And the other brother's area, the supply base. I think the supply base was a little ahead of us in the Navy yard, because ours was a little closer to the Navy yard. And they had Quarterman and all that. Those guys had those jobs for years, because one of my classmates went up as high as chief Quarterman or something like that.	12:21
Mary Hebert	I asked—Tell me about the schools here being shut down.	12:55
Horace C. Downing	Oh, yeah. When the schools shut down, the Whites went to school just across that railroad there. Arthur C. Smith School. They went to school at 2:30 in the afternoon until 7:00 that night. They were bused there. And they closed down every high school in Norfolk.	12:58
Mary Hebert	Did they close just the White schools or did they close every school?	13:20
Horace C. Downing	They closed the White schools.	13:24
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	13:25
Horace C. Downing	And they couldn't—I think some kind of way, the Black schools got mixed up in that deal too. But what happened, we prepared for it. Every church that had an education building in our neighborhood, and the Jewish neighborhood too, we prepared for it.	13:25
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	13:43
Horace C. Downing	And my job was, at that time, working with that group, was supply office. Buying papers and pencils, and things like that. And then each Sunday morning, the church, they would make donations.	13:44
Mary Hebert	Can I ask you something?	13:55
Horace C. Downing	Mm-hmm.	13:55
Mary Hebert	How did you get the position of supply office? Was it when you worked with the NAACP or—Who was working [indistinct 00:14:03]—	13:56
Horace C. Downing	I was working with a lady called Ms. Vivian Mason, who was very active in education in Norfolk. Everybody knows her. They call her "Ma Mason." She already had some private—in the summer months, private programs going on. And the way she would have it going on, she would receive donations for everybody to go, White and Black. And the kids would go to summer camp, music camp and things like that. So when this came about, she moved her program towards that, so everybody was ready to go.	14:03
Horace C. Downing	[indistinct 00:14:34] I actually had 17 kids from an area in Norfolk called—around Oakwood section, Titustown. They were some of the first kids that integrated in Norview and Granby High School. That's right there. There were some White kids too. But two of the guys used to work under me, and I could see the difference. Smart kids want to be in a smart environment, but the—You go to this school and you go to that school. And this is costly. It's very costly.	14:31
Horace C. Downing	It's still costly, because in this neighborhood here, we've got a Title I school, since we receive federal money. Computers, anything you name, they have it in that school. Good teachers, but you have some parents in this area—I mean parents who have a good educational background, they have the philosophy, "My kid can not learn in a Black situation, but I'm going to put him on a bus and transfer him about five or 10 miles from home." If you follow through, that kid is giving those teachers hell over there in that school. And some of those classes learn from 25. See, I've been to the school and seen for myself. One year, there was a thing about closing the school. I said, "No, no, no, no, no. They ain't closing this school. We've got too much invested. The city had too much-"	15:05
Mary Hebert	[indistinct 00:15:57]-	15:56
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. St. Helena, at that time. And we had some good principals, White and Black, in that school. Now some of those same parents now, in this neighborhood, they send their kids now—I always said, "A school is a school. The word cat is spelled the same thing here in Bakersfield, in Chesapeake." But the problem stems at home. Some of their parents don't work with their kids.	15:58
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	16:22
Horace C. Downing	And that's why their grades are low. Now here, I came through under the pressure of lack of money, but my desire to see that my girls go to college. And I carried them to the Navy base, to—We didn't have a beach to go to until they bought one or two sites down. Virginia Beach, we went to that ship.	16:23
Mary Hebert	That was a segregated section of Virginia Beach?	16:47
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. Mm-hmm. And anywhere that we could ride on the public transit, we utilized. We'd go to Hampton University, walk around. The people are very nice. You'd see the battleship on the water. It didn't cost but 15 cents to ride the Ferris—And we saved our little money up. But now, the average family in this area has a car and a half, and won't carry their kids anywhere.	16:49
Mary Hebert	And you would take your kids anywhere you could?	17:17
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, of course.	17:22
Mary Hebert	Now was all the transportation segregated at this point?	17:22
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. The Whites in front and Black in the back.	17:22
Mary Hebert	It didn't bother you, doing that?	17:22
Horace C. Downing	Yeah, it did. I think that's what's in that radical situation. We were always scheming, and they used to have trolley cars come through here. And when it came across that bridge, we would pull the arm down, that stopped it.	17:31
Mary Hebert	Mm-hmm.	17:43
Horace C. Downing	Ain't nobody know anything about it. Called the police and everything, let them—This car is just malfunctioning, and all that kind of stuff. We had one conductor on a car, he understood what was going on. He said, "Y'all people have not [indistinct 00:17:59], so y'all have to live over here," and so forth and like that. It wasn't a problem that the people living in this area, it was people from Chesapeake. I understand from the old times, they had a Ku Klux Klan headquarters up there.	17:44
Mary Hebert	In Chesapeake?	18:12
Horace C. Downing	Yeah. And on Saturday nights, they would ride down our main thoroughfare, through the—You had to come through the Black neighborhood. And we'd be hiding in the alley with a rotten egg—	18:12
Mary Hebert	Did y'all go do that?	18:22
Horace C. Downing	—and the policeman came down there and didn't see nobody. Didn't see nobody.	18:26
Mary Hebert	Did they have a citizen's council developed in the '60s and '50s? The White Citizen's Council, or was that [indistinct 00:18:43], it was more deeper South?	18:26
Horace C. Downing	The funny things around, and then especially in the city part, they were very, very—exposing their self to any kind. They had that network going on through that larger [indistinct 00:18:56], and you could see it and feel it. And they only project their self to a certain level, then back off. So that's what happened.	18:43
Mary Hebert	Can we stop now? I-	19:10
Horace C. Downing	Mm-hmm.	19:10
Mary Hebert	—Can I come back and talk?	19:10

Item Info

Title:

Horace Downing interview recording, 1995 July 21

Date:

July 21, 1995

Creator:

Downing, Horace C.

Contributor:

Hebert, Mary

Description:

Name: Horace Downing; Date of birth: 1917-02-26; Place of birth: Norfolk, VA; Occupation(s): public service; newspaper worker; Residence: Norfolk, VA
Informant ID: 963; Interviewed by: Mary Hebert.

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Language:

English

Digital Collection:

Behind the Veil

Source Collection:

Behind the Veil: Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South interviews, photographs, and project records, circa 1864-2011, bulk 1990-2004

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Provenance:

The David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library acquired the Records of the Behind the Veil Oral History Project from the Duke University Center for Documentary Studies in 1997, 1998, 2000, and 2002.

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CC BY-NC 4.0

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Copyright for content created by the Behind the Veil project is held by Duke University and made available to the public using a Creative Commons Attribution / Non-commercial (CC-BY-NC) license.

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RL00170-CS-1296
d7095ac2-dfc0-4e11-bbb6-74dbcc33293e
behindtheveil
8fc02525-adf5-4786-9c9b-8cd6a9406fba
ark:/87924/r4hx1j09c
8fc02525-adf5-4786-9c9b-8cd6a9406fba

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Horace Downing interview recording, 1995 July 21

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1. Horace Downing administrative file, 1995

2. Horace Downing administrative file, 1995

3. Horace Downing interview recording, 1995 July 13

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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John Hope Franklin Research Center

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