Margaret Goodwin interview recording, 1997 October 12
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| Kristen Lee | Pretty light. If you could, just to test to make sure the machine's working, could I get you to state your full name and your date of birth? | 0:02 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Margaret Kennedy Goodwin. I was born the 17th of October, 1918. | 0:11 |
| Kristen Lee | And where were you born? | 0:17 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | In Clarkton, North Carolina. That's in Columbus County. | 0:18 |
| Kristen Lee | Oh, where is Columbus county? | 0:24 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Near Wilmington. That'll give you an idea of where it is. It's about 25, 30 miles from Wilmington, out in the country. | 0:28 |
| Kristen Lee | Oh, right. | 0:38 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | My grandparents had a farm. My father was in the army and my mother went home to stay with them until he came back from the army. | 0:38 |
| Kristen Lee | Was it a large farm? | 0:50 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes, quite large. And some members of the family still live in Clarkton and that farm is still in the family. | 0:52 |
| Kristen Lee | Did you have lots of other family members living on the farm with you? | 1:08 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | My mother was one of 12 children, so it was quite a large household. Of course, she was the baby and they moved out and went to their own homes. But at one time there were 12 children in that house with grandma and grandpa. | 1:13 |
| Kristen Lee | Did they move far or did they all stay in? | 1:37 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Some of them came here to Durham, some moved as far away as New York, Cape May, New Jersey. Oh, they're all over. The Spaulding family is all over the United States. We have a reunion every two years and I guess between 300 and 400 family members attend that reunion. | 1:41 |
| Kristen Lee | And what about your father? Was he from—? | 2:09 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | My father was from Georgia, from Andersonville, Georgia. Famous Andersonville. It wasn't famous in his time, but it has since become. He was one of 13 children and at a fairly early age, he moved to Savannah to work in the life insurance business. And one of my mother's brothers had moved to Savannah. He had a picture of my mother on the piano. My father saw her and said, "Who is that beautiful woman?" They started corresponding and corresponded for two years before he met her. A real Cinderella story, isn't it? And then they got married and he was called to the home office of the Mutual here in Durham, North Carolina Mutual, and they moved here. But in the interim, Uncle Sam's army called him and he served for, I believe it was four years in the army. And I was born while he was in the army. Armistice was signed the year after I was born. I was born in October. It was signed a year later in November and he came home. | 2:12 |
| Kristen Lee | Oh, that's interesting. Can you tell me about your childhood growing up, your father and your mother? | 3:50 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | It was wonderful. We were poor, but we didn't know it. We always had enough to eat, clothes to wear, a roof over our heads. As children, we had no idea the struggle they went through to provide these things. So that as I say, we were in the lower income, but we didn't know it. We lived royal as far as we were concerned. I have one brother and I had one sister. She died in 1995. And my brother and his wife lived in New York. My sister and her husband lived in Philadelphia. But we all managed to come back to Durham to live. My husband and I lived in New York, but we all came back home to live. Durham is a wonderful place to live. So we managed to come back and raised our families here. | 3:57 |
| Kristen Lee | So you all grew up here in Durham? | 5:17 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. | 5:19 |
| Kristen Lee | Where in Durham did you grow up? Where did you live? | 5:21 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Fayetteville Street. The house that we grew up in is no longer. Urban renewal took that part of the city. And we grew up in a house at 1008 Fayetteville Street, beautiful, brick home. We lived there from 1919 to— Gee, I can't even remember when. Urban renewal wiped us out, just mowed down the houses in that area, and there's nothing there now. They were going to rebuild and put affordable houses for Blacks. If I sound a little unhappy, it's because the houses they removed were beautiful and they left the little ones behind them that didn't resemble anything. And if we had known I guess then what was going to happen, it might not have happened. But they said we had to move. Progress. They were going to build a freeway and the freeway is there, but it goes from nowhere to nowhere in a hurry. Fortunately, this house was available when we had to move. Dr. King lived here and he had built his own home across town, and it was available. And my mother and father moved here. I was away in school, Talladega. And this is a nice house, but it wasn't like ours. It has grown to be home, but 1008 Fayetteville Street will always be home to me. | 5:25 |
| Kristen Lee | Were your neighbors and the people in your community, were their reactions similar to urban renewal? | 7:30 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. And one dear lady, Mrs. Ethel Hill, refused to move. Her house stood, oh, I guess for 20 years after urban renewal. She even went to court to stay there. And she was just one stalwart example of, "I'm not going and nobody can make me," and the court ruled in her favor. She was allowed to stay right there. And they built around her, what little building they did. | 7:37 |
| Kristen Lee | So there were mechanisms in place to kind of oppose urban renewal? | 8:18 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes, but as I say, we didn't know. The government said, "You must move," and they allowed us 90 days to find a place to move. And we moved, but she was one who says, "I'm not going anywhere." | 8:24 |
| Kristen Lee | Did they offer any kind of compensation for your moving? | 8:41 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes, not nearly the value of the home, but they did give us what they considered a fair market value for the home. I was only about 19, 20 when all this was going on, so I didn't understand the logistics behind it. And we were sort of sheltered children. Our parents just took care of it and they did what the government said, and they moved. Fortunately, by that time, my father was president of the North Carolina Mutual and they were able to assume the loss and move and keep going. A lot of people who moved from that area were not able to cope. And I've actually known two or three people who died, who were just unable to adjust to the move. We were the fortunate ones. We not only survived, we did all right. | 8:52 |
| Kristen Lee | Well, tell me about your schooling as a child. | 10:22 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | When I was a child, Hillside High School was the only school. It ran from first grade through the 11th grade. There were only 11th grades. But Black students from all over the city came to Hillside, because there wasn't any other school for Blacks. After the 11th grade, I went to Palmer Memorial Institute in Sedalia. That's just outside of Greensboro. Dr. Charlotte Hawkins Brown had founded a school for Black youngsters and finished the 12th grade. But at Hillside, we had excellent teachers who instilled in us the value of education, a wanting to learn, a seeking for better things. I went to Talladega, because two of my teachers had graduated from Talladega, and they were wonderful. They not only taught us our subject matter, whatever classes we were in, but they gave us that little extra boost of using your brains, using what you have to get where you want to go. And that has stayed with me all my life. I've always been a little bit curious about what's inside of those books and what makes people tick and—you know. But I got my basic background in Hillside. | 10:28 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | And when we were coming along, we made our own fun. There were no TVs, very few radios. We played tennis and basketball and— Oh, we had dances. The building that is now the W.D. Hill Recreation Center on Fayetteville Street was, at that time, the Algonquin Tennis Club. And we congregated from all over the city there, played games, learned which part to use at the table. We made our own fun. | 12:27 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | The theaters at that time were segregated. If you were Black, you had to go up three flights of stairs to watch a movie, so we didn't go. It runs over into my life now. The Carolina Theatre is open to everybody now, but I still remember those days when Blacks had to go up those three flights of stairs. And it may be that I will never set foot inside the Carolina Theatre again. And that's my loss, they have wonderful programs there now. But I can't get over that hurdle. It's not resentment still. I don't resent, because that was the law then. Blacks and Whites simply didn't mingle. But it still lingers in my mind. If they didn't want me then, I don't want them now, which may not be Christian. But it's what I feel. | 13:22 |
| Kristen Lee | You mentioned your teachers at Hillside. Were your teachers Black? Were they women, men? | 14:42 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Black. Women and men, but all Black. All Black schools had all Black teachers and we never knew what went on inside the White schools. Black was Black and White was White and never the twain shall meet. We had Black teachers, but they were excellent teachers. We got something that I'm not sure the students are getting now in schools, in high schools and elementary schools even. But one thing, discipline was no problem back there. If you misbehaved in school, your mother knew it before you got home. You got a spanking at school and you got a spanking when you got home. So you minded your manners. They didn't have any great discipline problems then. You never heard of children taking knives and guns to school. You never really heard of bad fights. And that's just something you didn't do. You went to school to get educated. Your parents expected you to behave, your teachers expected you to behave and your neighbors all along the way between home and school expected you to behave. They say it takes a village to raise a child. That's what was happening then. | 14:50 |
| Kristen Lee | So it was a very close knit community? | 16:17 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. Everybody knew everybody that lived in the community. We'd have block parties. In different neighbor's yards, everybody would bring a dish and we'd have neighborhood gatherings, oh, once a month or so. Everybody knew everybody and knew everybody's children, and where they were supposed to be and where they were not supposed to be. And I've realized now that I was most fortunate growing up. Everybody was concerned about me and I loved all my neighbors. | 16:18 |
| Kristen Lee | Who were your neighbors? Were they people that were affiliated with the North Carolina Mutual, like your father was? Were they— | 17:08 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Oh, two or three of the families were, but others taught, worked in the factory. Lincoln and American Tobacco Company were great employers. They hired many, many Blacks and Whites in Durham. But everybody lived with everybody. There was no, "You live here because you earn this much" or "You live here, because you don't earn this much." You could live wherever you wanted to, wherever you could afford to live, and— your friends were whoever you got along with, whoever thought the same things you thought and were interested in the same things you were interested in. There was no such thing as, "I couldn't play with certain children." We played with everybody. In fact, we'd play tennis all day long in the summer, just come home to get a bite to eat and get clean clothes on and go back again till the sun went down. And we traveled all over to tennis tournaments. That was the main recreation during that time. As I say, we had to make our own recreation. And tennis and baseball and basketball were favorite pursuits. | 17:16 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | We went to church on Sunday. We did not play tennis on Sunday. If you were too sick to go to church, you were too sick to go anywhere. You couldn't even go walking down the street if you were too sick to go to church. Most families around us were raised in church. There were White Rock, St. Joseph, Mount Vernon— This is a 79 year old memory lapse. I can't remember the name of the church I'm down the street from. It'll come to me in a little while. But there were, oh, I guess eight or 10 Black churches. And you were inside of church on Sunday. You went to Sunday school, to church, to Baptist Training Union and back to church at night. | 19:19 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | You had devotions in school before you began your days work. And I do believe the children are missing something now that they do not allow any religion whatsoever in the schools. I truly believe they're missing something to hold onto. You never heard of young people committing suicide in those days. You never heard of young people going into other people's houses and killing them or stealing from them, and I firmly believe it's because they've taken God out of this schools. That's just my opinion. I may be wrong, but that's the way I feel about it. | 20:34 |
| Kristen Lee | You mentioned that you used to travel to tennis tournaments— | 21:33 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Oh yes, we'd been as far as Tuskegee, Alabama. We'd go to Virginia, to Kentucky, to Alabama. And that was some traveling in those days, because the motels and hotels were not open to Black people. So you traveled moving to live with family along the way. And it was not at all unusual to say, "Right, we'll be coming this way, going so and so," or to have families, either call or write us to say, "We'll be coming to Durham for the tournament. Is it all right if we stay with you?" We stayed in each other's homes. And at one time I had walls of cabinets of trophies. I was pretty good at tennis. I was very tall and very thin. And my sister and brother and I played together a lot, as did all of our neighbors. That was the pastime in the summer and part of the winter. I learned to play bridge, because my parents were avid bridge players. Still lots of bridge clubs in Durham. And that was another pastime. It required using your mind. I liked doing crossword puzzles and word games and— where you fit the pieces of the puzzle together. | 21:37 |
| Kristen Lee | A jigsaw puzzle? | 23:45 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Jigsaw puzzles. Simply finding things to do with yourself when your schoolwork was done, when you finished. You got your lessons first. Nothing came before getting your schoolwork by the next day. But after that, you could find anything you wanted to do. See, there was no TV to look at, no radio, so you found things to occupy yourself. | 23:49 |
| Kristen Lee | So when you went to the tennis tournaments, how did you travel? Did you travel in cars? | 24:17 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | In cars. Didn't do much traveling on the train until I went to school at Talladega, and then everybody from the area would board the same train and end up in whatever school you went to, Howard, Talladega, Fisk. And the very first year I went to school, we traveled on a train that had a little pot belly stove to keep us warm. And I'm sure the conductors look forward to our coming every year, because we raised Cain. We sang and we played games, because Talladega— Alabama's a long way from here. | 24:23 |
| Kristen Lee | Yes, it is. | 25:11 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | But we made it. You didn't get to come home often when you went to school for the year. Toward the end, toward my fourth year there, we managed to come home for Christmas sometime. But most of the time, the families around Talladega made Christmas for us, for the students. They just took us in as though we were their children. As late as the sixties, when my child went to Spelman, the families in Spelman just took them in as their own kids. It's something that, if you haven't experienced it, you just don't know what it's like. As I say, there are plenty of things to amuse, entertain and make children feel loved these days, but I really don't believe there's anything that can replace that warm embracing of, not only your own children, but other people's children. My child would bring for and five people home with her for Christmas vacation when she came, and they would have a grand time. | 25:14 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I'm sure there's something that takes the place of that now, but my childhood growing up was wonderful to me. I didn't know any better. I didn't know that everybody didn't wear their Sunday clothes until they wore down a little, and then they became your go to school clothes. And when they were outrageous, you took off your go to school clothes and put on the not so pretty clothes to play in. You wore shoes until they didn't look so good and then you played in those, and got a new pair for Sunday. | 26:42 |
| Kristen Lee | You kept all your best. | 27:30 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Right, for Sunday. Yes. I learned to sing. Oh, I guess that must have been about in the sixth grade. And a teacher discovered that I could sing and she would not let me sit down and not use my talent. So I've been singing at weddings and funerals and stage productions ever since. | 27:32 |
| Kristen Lee | Really? What kind of stage productions do you— | 28:04 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Well over at Central, there is a drama department there, and they used to use people from the city to bolster the cast. And I played in Gian Carlo Menotti's The Medium, The Consul. Oh, any number of drama projections over there, since we were so near the campus, and on and off the campus, when it was— Back then it was safe, you know, you wondered and got acquainted with everybody. And that was something else to keep you occupied, to keep your mind keen and sharp. And every year, a gentleman named John Henry Gattis, who was really an English teacher at Hillside— but he was also gifted musically. He would put on a production and use not only school children, but citizens from the city. I've had a very interesting, very, very gated life. | 28:11 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | When I finished college, I was going to be a research chemist. My major was chemistry and my minor was math. My trunk was up at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, ready to go and be a chemist, but the young lady who was running the x-ray department and the school of laboratory at Lincoln Hospital decided that she was going to get married. And she left, and there was nobody to take her place, so I moved into that spot. The director came and asked me, wouldn't I just hold it together until they found somebody, and that lasted 45 years. | 29:48 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | And that's delightful. I do believe God places you where he needs you to be, because I can't think of any profession I would rather have devoted my 45 years to. I took some extra trainings, postgraduate training in Pennsylvania and training at Duke and at Watts before integration was cool. I'd go to classes early in the mornings with the interns and residents, and learned what I needed to know, and come back to work. And as I say, I am as satisfied with my life, my professional life, as I ever would've been as a chemist. So I just think I was in the right place at the right time where the good Lord could use me. | 30:41 |
| Kristen Lee | When you were training over at Watts and at Duke, how were you received being a Black person and being a woman? | 31:49 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Well, the medical profession is sort of different from the world at large. If you have brains and you want to use them, they don't really care what color you are. I was not forward. I was not bodacious. I was not proclaiming that it was my right to learn. I just was a member of the class and I sat with the classes and learned what they learned and then came on home. I was not interested in social interconnection. I was really interested only in gaining the knowledge I needed to carry on my work. And I've always been a little bit shy, still am. But I got what I needed, the best way I knew how. I knew I could not exist with the courses I'd had in chemistry, because it's entirely different when you're dealing with people's lives. You need to know exactly what you're doing and exactly how to apply the chemistry and the math that you have gotten to help the doctor along with finding out what's wrong with the patient and how to go about curing them, hopefully. | 31:57 |
| Kristen Lee | Tell me a little bit about Lincoln Hospital. Was it large? | 33:37 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Oh, Lincoln was wonderful. Lincoln was a gift from the Dukes, from the tobacco industry. They were about to erect a statue of a slave, because they were grateful that the slaves had not turned on White people. Dr. Moore, the same Dr. Moore that founded the North Carolina Mutual, and Mr. John Merrick, who was a barber to the Dukes, said, "Rather than build a statue that's not going to help anybody, why not give us a hospital?" Because there was nowhere for Black patients to go. You could not go to the White hospital, even for emergencies. So Dr. Mall was, at that time, the only Black doctor in Durham. And if he couldn't get around to seeing you, that was just tough. Eventually, they opened up the basements of those hospitals and Black people could go there for treatment, but not to lie down. So that a hospital was just a wonderful gift. The first one was a wooden building on what was then Cozart Street. Urban renewal removed that too. And then they built a beautiful brick building on what was Stokes Grove. You know where the hospital is? | 33:41 |
| Kristen Lee | Mm-hmm. | 35:41 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | That was just woods. A farmer owned it, and when he died, the Dukes bought up the land and built the hospital there. It was almost the end of the city at that time. It's since just grown and grown and grown all the way down to almost Chapel Hill, but it was just marvelous. We had our own hospital and we supported it. It got no county support, no city support, no state support. It was fortunate that it was built, because here was a place that Black doctors who were training could go to get their internships and residences. They were not allowed in the White hospitals either. There were only three hospitals when Lincoln Hospital was built, Homer Phillips in St. Louis, Kate Reynolds in Winston-Salem and Lincoln Hospital in Durham where young Black doctors could get their practical experience in learning what they had learned in medical school. So Lincoln was a Mecca for students in med tech, nurses and residents and interns. | 35:42 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | We had what was called Lincoln Day in all of the churches. Someone from the hospital would go and speak to the congregation about the need for linens, for money to run the place, gifts of food, any kind of supplies that would help the hospital move on. Then later, the large corporations would give us money to carry on the business. We took what we had and made what we needed. That's a function of a lot of Black institutions. North Carolina Central was like that, when it first started. Like Booker T. Washington said, "You let down your bucket where you were, did the best you could with what you had and added to it as you went along." The different classes, as they graduated and moved on out to gainful employment, would send back donations to the hospital, supplies. And until the county realized that the hospital was as much their responsibility as Duke and Watts, we managed that way. And I happened to come along in those early days when— This was our hospital and we considered it a source of pride to keep it open, to keep it going, to keep it moving. | 37:33 |
| Kristen Lee | Wow, that was interesting. Let's see. You were talking about your childhood and how— It sounds just so splendid to me. Did you have any contact with any White children, White families, growing up? | 39:41 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I didn't know I was Black almost until I went away to college. I never came in contact with White children and I didn't know there was any difference in the way they lived and the way I lived. There was nothing to compare it to and it never occurred to me to question the fact that I was a different color from them. And almost, really, I went away to Talladega when I was 15 years old. They skipped me through two or three grades in high school. And until I got there and saw Black and White people intermingling, I got a taste of what segregation was like and the harsher realities of discrimination. I knew that in the stores up town, there were Black—(phone ringing). | 40:05 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | We'll just let that ring— Black water fountains and White water fountains. You could not try on clothing. You had to bring it home. And if it fit, you kept it. If it did not fit, you went back and got your money back, shoes, hats, clothing. As I say, the harsh reality of segregation and discrimination did not impress itself onto me. And I'm sure my parents and our relatives and friends, not intentionally, but shielded us from that. | 41:19 |
| Kristen Lee | Well now I think it'll be a good time to take a little break, because I think this tape is ready to stop and I'll need to flip it over. | 42:12 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | All right, m— | 42:19 |
| Kristen Lee | Okay, Mrs. Goodwin, you were showing me this book here on Black society, and various of your family members and relations in here. Could you run that by me one more time, please? | 0:02 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | This is the original North Carolina Mutual building, which was on Parrish Street. He was the first president. He was the second. He was the third. My father was the fourth. | 0:15 |
| Kristen Lee | Oh, okay. | 0:25 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Mr. C.C. Spaulding, the third president, was my mother's brother. | 0:25 |
| Kristen Lee | [indistinct] My microphone here— | 0:27 |
| New Speaker | [INTERRUPTION] | 0:27 |
| Kristen Lee | Okay, there we go. | 0:27 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Dr. Moore was my grandmother's brother. My mother's mother's brother. Mr. Merrick was a pioneer in barbering, and he had a store, and he was a barber to the Dukes. That's how the Lincoln Hospital came to be. | 0:40 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | These three men pioneered in selling insurance to Black people so that they would have enough money to bury themselves. That was the primary reason for founding the insurance company. | 1:25 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Blacks worked, but they were never able to save enough to get ahead until these three men taught them if you save five cents a week, that's more than you had, and if you save as much as you can each week in an insurance policy, we'll keep it for you and we'll invest it so that when it comes time to bury yourself, nobody will have to take up collection to bury you. That was the basis on which the insurance company was built. | 1:43 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | This man in his youth and his wife, Doctor—Mr. Merrick. And these are their two children. This was my daddy. This was the man that followed my daddy as president, Joe Goodloe of the Mutual. This is Asa T. Spaulding, who was his cousin. And he followed him as president. This is Mr. Edward V. Williams, who was on the board of trustees, and he owned a funeral home in Chicago. He's since—All of these are long since gone. | 2:28 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | This is the Mutual Building as it exists today upon the hill, on Chapel Hill Street. These are various agents and friends of the Mutual past president's party. That's another whole set of people. But, the Mutual was a life saver to many, many people. | 3:15 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Most opportunities for employment at that time were in the tobacco factories. And, as I say, if you're not accustomed to saving, you spent most of what you had just for living. For rent, for food, for clothing, and for your church. That was an important part of life for most Blacks in that era. Church is not so prominent in the life of Black people now as it was then. But it should be. Everything we have belongs to God, He gives it to use and to multiply and to help each other. And to give back a little bit to Him. | 3:52 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | But, when the Mutual came along, it taught people to save. Whether they saved on a policy with the Mutual or just saved for themselves, it got them in the habit of saving. And that's how the Mutual has grown into a billion dollar institution. Just from the saving habits of people. You save more and more, and you find out you can have more of the nicer things of life. And then you save a little bit more. That was their philosophy. | 4:50 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | And then they had agents—I guess they still do, I don't even know. Who went from door to door collecting you up, premium on your policy each week. It has since grown much more sophisticated with the advent of computers, and saving through the mail, and progress. But it started out with footwork. | 5:38 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | My brother, following Mr. Spaulding, my brother is W.J. Kennedy III, as president of the Mutual he retired in—must've been around '72. There's my brother right there. | 6:16 |
| Kristen Lee | Oh, okay. | 6:33 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | But, that institution has been a part of my life. When we'd go on vacations, the first thing my father would do when we drove back in town was drive by the Mutual Building to be sure it was still there. We used to tease him. But it was his life. | 6:33 |
| Kristen Lee | Seemed to have a big influence on the community. | 7:04 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. Yes, it did. It empowered. It was a source of employment for Blacks. You worked at the Mutual and the factory, as a nurse, as a teacher. Those were the four main opportunities for employment. Of course then we had Black farmers who farmed their own land. That's almost a non-entity now. And particularly around here. The farms have either been bought up or just gone out of existence. Young people found out that there are better things to do than get up at five o'clock in the morning and go plow the field. So, the family farm is not nearly as prevalent as it was then. | 7:07 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I feel fortunate to have grown up when I did. Life was so—and it still is interesting to me, even though I'm not a part of the mainstream anymore. It's interesting to me to see how people treat each other, live with each other, love each other or don't love each other. That's the sad part. I don't think people love each other as much as they used to. | 8:19 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I don't think the human race loves each other. The whole Blacks, Whites, Hispanics—I look at the Hispanics that have come to town now, and how people are preying on them, robbing them, and in some instances killing them. I just don't see how any human being could do that to another, especially people who have had it hard coming up and know what it is to be trying to better yourself. That's just incomprehensible to me. But, as I say, I'm the old generation now. | 8:54 |
| Kristen Lee | You mentioned that your family was very involved with the North Carolina Mutual. | 9:43 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. | 9:49 |
| Kristen Lee | Where you all involved in other kinds of civic organizations or political organizations? | 9:50 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. As an outgrowth of the Mutual there was Union Fidelity, a fire insurance company. The Mechanics and Farmer's Bank. What is now the—it was a realty company, but it's gone to a bank now. The Royal Knights of King David, which was a fraternal organization that did much the same thing that the Mutual started out doing, insurance for low income families. The Urban League, particularly the affairs of Black people, that organization which started out teaching Black people how to assess the candidates for political offices. | 9:57 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | They brought them in and let the candidates explain their positions, and gave you some idea of who you were voting for when you went to the ballot box. And, to a large extent, Black people still vote on the recommendation on the Committee on the Affairs of Black People. They talk about the political action committees. And that's one that—well, everybody is invited to come and give their views. Blacks and Whites. And sometimes the Whites do come, but it gives you a forum to listen to what they're all about, what they intend to do for the city of Durham. What their views are on this particular faction of government. And, whether you vote that way or not, it gives you an idea of what the candidates are about. | 11:24 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | The Mutual was a great proponent of giving, particularly Black people, but anybody who wanted to listen, a means of learning what the candidates thought, so that you just didn't go and pull a libra, and not know who you were voting for, or how you connect an error. | 12:32 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Coming along, the fever just sort of—I used to drive people to the polls from 7:00 in the morning to 7:30 at night. Just stopping people on the street, asking, "Would you like to go to vote?" Because some people, unless they're encouraged, just don't particularly think about voting. And I think voting is one of the most important privileges we have. | 13:06 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | If you don't go to the polls and vote, then you cannot complain about what's happening to you. You cannot complain about how people are governing you. If you don't vote and say whom you want to govern you, then you have to be quiet. Though, were not apt to be quiet, we're going to complain anyway. But, I feel that if you don't vote, you're giving up a right. | 13:40 |
| Kristen Lee | So, would you say that when you were coming up, that the Black people had a strong political voice in Durham? | 14:14 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. The Committee on the Affairs of Black People has influenced—it isn't "Influenced," that's not the word I want to use. Has elected candidates, Black and White, for the betterment of Durham. They are criticized for promoting Black voting, but if enough people get together and vote for the right candidate, Black voting is good. And, if you don't get out and find out who's doing what, how can you put in anybody who is going to better the city of Durham? | 14:23 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Politicians get caught up in rhetoric and "What I'm going to do if I get in," and "What I'm not going to do if I get in." And then, after November the fourth, they forget all about the promises they made. And, unless you keep up with what they said beforehand, and what they do afterwards, you lost. | 15:29 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I'm not very politically minded, but I know what I want to happen in government, and I know where to go to find out who's going to do what I want. I've never run for an office, but I always wanted to put in somebody whom I thought was going to better the City of Durham, the County of Durham. Who was, as my grandma used to say, was going to do right by everybody. | 16:02 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Because when you do right by one factor of the city, you are doing right by everybody. What's good for one race is good for the other. Good is good, no matter who you're doing it for. Some people get into politics, and we've seen it happen right here in Durham, just to be in office. Just for a name. Just "I am the mayor. I am the councilman, I am this, and that." And I've known people who have gotten into office, and who have done just the opposite of what they said they were going to do when they were trying to get your vote. | 16:40 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | If you're not interested enough to follow through and vote different the next time, you deserve whatever you get by way of a candidate or an officer. I'm going to get off my soapbox now, that you get on with your interview. | 17:38 |
| Kristen Lee | What about organizations like the NAACP? | 18:05 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Oh, yes. | 18:08 |
| Kristen Lee | They're very active. | 18:11 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Very active. And in fact, my goal, I'm working now on a life membership in the NAACP because no matter what, every now and then a bad apple will get into any organization. But, the NAACP has done so much good, has helped the unfortunate as well as the fortunate. Has helped people to see that treating your fellow man right pays off more than just honor to God. It pays off in getting people off of welfare, getting people to making a living for themselves, helping them to better themselves. And lots of situations. And, of course, in the legal matter, in representing people who have been unjustly accused of crimes. I think it's one of the most wonderful organizations that was ever invented. | 18:13 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | And the Black people of Durham— of almost any city of any size, needs some focus for their— some togetherness to reach their goals and aims. And the NAACP is one organization that can help you reach your aims and goals. | 19:35 |
| Kristen Lee | What kind of things can they do in Durham? Do they do a lot with charity work? Helping people? | 20:11 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | They do not only charity work, but when we were trying to integrate the schools, not only the high schools and secondary schools, but the institutions of higher education who use our tax money to educate people, and wouldn't admit Black people. And the NAACP people is very active in supplying legal funds to help with the suits. And being sure that people who have nothing, through no fault of their own, had access to funds, food, legal, health. | 20:21 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | The NAACP has been a very active group. In some cities it's not as active as it is here. But we've always had a strong branch of the NAACP here. | 21:27 |
| Kristen Lee | Well, earlier you mentioned the Algonquin Club. What kind of things went on there? | 21:47 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | The Algonquin Club was really organized to house. It was sort of a bed and breakfast, to house insurance agents from the North Carolina Mutual. So, they'd have a place to stay when they came to town. But, it evolved into a social organization, too. During the day, dear Mrs. Bessie Alberta Johnson Whitted, who was an officer in the North Carolina Mutual, saw to it that young people had a social life in there. | 21:52 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | She was sort of a mother to us all, just teaching us social graces, how to dance, how to eat correctly at the table. All of us did not get that at home. Parents were too busy trying to make a living, and provide the necessities of life. But, with Ms. Bessie—everybody called her Ms. Bessie, saw to it that there was a place where you could go and get the social graces, and learn how to think for yourself. Learn how not to do something just because everybody else was doing it, but think for yourself and do what was best for you and best for the community. | 22:35 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | There was a dear lady, Mrs. Mary Newby, who stayed in the Algonquin Club, and provided meals not only for the agents who came through, but for anybody who wanted to stop up and have a lunch or a dinner, for a very small fee. There were tennis courts behind the club house, and a swimming pool, which was a boon and a blessing, because we weren't allowed to go to the city pools. It just was something that didn't happen until the '50s. We didn't realize that our tax money was going to provide the city pools, but we weren't allowed to go too. And that group of youngsters that came along in the '50s, and did the non-violent protests, even went to jail. Non-resistant, but just said, "This is not right, and it must change." | 23:30 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | My daughter was one of them. She was in Atlanta at the time, in Spelman. She stayed in jail in Atlanta 18 days to open up the government cafeteria in the government building there. And it opened up. She made the best grade she ever made because the citizens of Atlanta rallied around those kids, took their books to them, saw that they got their lessons, that their lessons where passed back to the school, and that their assignments for the next day were there. | 24:49 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I must've lost 18 pounds while my child was in jail because she says, "Momma, you stay in Durham, please. We're handling this down here, don't come down here." | 25:28 |
| Kristen Lee | I know that was hard. | 25:38 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | It was, it was. But I realized, even then, I realized that they were doing a wonderful thing. And, most of the youngsters these days don't realize that there were days when you could not darken a White bank, a White store or White residence. And, for heaven's sake, no White hotel or motel. | 25:40 |
| Kristen Lee | You mentioned that going downtown, the stores, you couldn't try out the clothes— | 26:12 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | You could not try on hats, clothes, shoes. You could go and look, and you could bring it home if it was something you thought you might look nice in. Try it on, but don't get it dirty. Carry it back, if it didn't fit, get your money back, but you pay for it before you left that store. | 26:17 |
| Kristen Lee | So, did you frequent shops downtown? Or did you— | 26:42 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | We had to, there were no Black business. That was our only source of clothing until the Black businesses started to open the street, the one that was demolished for the speedway, had drug stores, cleaning establishments, dress shops, restaurants. Can't think of what others, but a whole line of businesses that we lost. Urban renewal. But, that was where we managed to get quite few things. We could get and not cross the river and go downtown to get what you needed. | 26:45 |
| Kristen Lee | So, how did you do your shopping? Would it all be done on the weekend? Or did you just kind of go— | 27:51 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | The weekends you went downtown. Downtown was a viable, growing, living city. Our downtown was where you went on Saturday, whether you bought anything or not, just to meet your friends, and walk up and down, and look at the windows of the shops, and buy ice cream at the ice cream store. It was sort of like a fair the whole weekend. | 27:58 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Not on Sundays. Nothing was open on Sundays. No store was open on Sunday. No restaurant was open on Sundays. You cooked at home. Even for White people. The stores were not open on Sunday. Sunday was a day that belonged to God, and you used it for Him. But, Friday evening and Saturday, you congregated downtown, just to look and to associate with people. | 28:36 |
| Kristen Lee | So everybody— | 29:15 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Yes. That was your excursion on Saturday. Up until the '50s, really. When things started opening up for everybody. And Black people and White people where downtown, but they went in separate groups. Not together, but of separate groups of Black people, separate groups of White people. It's hard to realize that now. It's hard to understand how it happened. And, you really can't understand how one group of people could not associate with another group, but it happened. | 29:18 |
| Kristen Lee | Did it just kind of happen? Or was there tension between Black people and White people? | 30:18 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | No tension. Black people understood they were Black people and White people understood they were White people. No tension. Just, as they used to say, you stayed in your place. | 30:22 |
| Kristen Lee | Kind of let each other be? | 30:36 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Uh-huh. And it was accepted that—as I say, Black is Black and White is White, and never the twain shall meet. It was just accepted just until the youngsters got to thinking, "This isn't right. This is not—they should not have it all, and we should have nothing. We've got to break this business up." And they did, peacefully. Many a time my child got hit on the head with an umbrella, or spit on or— you know, just acted ugly to when they started this business. But they stuck it out. And good things came of it. | 30:36 |
| Kristen Lee | They certainly did. | 31:30 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | And the younger generations now are reaping the benefits from that. Black and White. Some of them don't realize how it came about, but the fact that it did come about is a blessing to both races. To all races, really, because Hispanics and Asians were included in that non-White group, so everybody is benefiting from it now. | 31:32 |
| Kristen Lee | Let's switch gears a little bit. Tell me about when you left home, and when you got married. | 32:05 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Oh, yes. Well, I met my husband at college, at Talladega. The first year I was there. And I knew immediately that that's the man I was going to marry. He didn't know it for a couple of years or so. But, we went together the whole four years we were in college. And then he went home to New York to work, and I worked in Norfolk, Virginia for a while in the paramedical profession. | 32:10 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Then he moved to Washington D.C. to work in the government. He worked in the commerce department. And he came down one summer, and asked my father for my hand. And we got married, and I moved to Washington to live with him. And, one year after we moved there, the draft came along to the army. | 32:47 |
| Kristen Lee | What year was that? | 33:24 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | 1942. World War II. And he never came home from World War II. So, I moved back home, and went to work out in Lincoln. And I don't even remember those first three years after he died. I was unhappy with our government, because he was such a peace-loving soul. And he only went to the army because he had to go, they drafted them then. | 33:24 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | And I was unhappy with our government for a good little while. But, then I came to my senses and realized that that's just what happened. That's just the way it happened. And while the government was responsible, they had to do what they had to do. And I had to live with what was left, and go on with my life. Marsha was two years old the day we buried her father. And I had to support her, and send her to school, and get on with my life. But, I was an unhappy camper. | 34:07 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I have, maybe a couple of times, thought of remarrying. But, when you're on call seven days a week, 24 hours a day, there's very little time for romantic interests. And I was heart and soul into what I was doing. It's a fascinating life to have people's lives in your hands, and the results of what you're doing decides whether they live or die. | 34:53 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I went to school summer every year. I took courses summer every year to keep up with what was going on in the profession, so that I was comfortable in knowing that I knew what I was doing. I knew that I was competent and able. And, for 45 years, I lived that way. And I would not have had it any other way. I loved what I was doing until the minute I came home to take care of my mother and father. | 35:31 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I retired at age 67 because my father had a stroke, and he was completely incapacitated physically. But, his mind was keen as a whip. When he retired from the Mutual, he brought his files home with him. And he knew where everything was, and every file. He could say, "Margaret, go down and look in the third file from the window on the right, in the middle of the file, and bring me the file on so and so." And it'd be right there. | 36:11 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I gave his papers, his files, to the Hayti Heritage when he died. And they are cataloged, and available there now. But, he was very meticulous. His mind was like a steel trap. He had papers on the Urban League, the NAACP, the Committee for Affairs of Black People, and of course, many, many files on the North Carolina Mutual. White Rock Baptist Church, the [indistinct 00:37:25] Community Literary Club, the Algonquin Club, we're talking about. Neatly organized. | 36:45 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Floyd McKissick Sr was alive then, and he asked that they'd be concentrated in one spot, and the Hayti Heritage was just coming into its own then, so we gave these papers to them. | 37:31 |
| Kristen Lee | So, they're there— | 37:50 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | They're there, yes. And Andre, you know Andre, very recently was working on a history of Lincoln Hospital. My father was a trustee of Lincoln. And he found some valuable information among the papers that my father left. | 37:50 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | I've had a fun life. I've had a whole lot of tragedies, unfortunate happenings, but I've had a lot of fortunate happenings. I've had a wonderful life. And if I had to do it all over again, I think maybe I'd do it the same way. | 38:13 |
| Kristen Lee | We're all right? Well, really good. I'm not going to keep you all morning. I've taken up too much of your time, but I'm so appreciative. Thank you. | 38:37 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | This has been delightful, my dear. | 38:48 |
| Kristen Lee | Is there anything else you'd like to mention this morning? | 38:49 |
| Margaret Kennedy Goodwin | Keep on keeping on with what you're doing, my dear. This is marvelous. I am so happy to see young people have brains and want to use them. A whole lot of young people, all races, have brains, but do not care to use them, do not care to explore what's out there in this wonderful world around us. Keep it up. | 38:54 |
| Kristen Lee | Thank you. | 39:25 |
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