Ernest Grant interview recording, 1994 July 19

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Ernest A. Grant	I'm Ernest A. Grant, Jr. I was born and raised in Tuskegee, and other than school and the military service, I've lived here all my life.	0:01
Stacey Scales	Do you remember your grandparents?	0:12
Ernest A. Grant	Of course I remember my grandparents. My grandparents?	0:17
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	0:19
Ernest A. Grant	Of course I do.	0:20
Stacey Scales	What did they do	0:22
Ernest A. Grant	Well, on which side?	0:26
Stacey Scales	Both of them.	0:28
Ernest A. Grant	Okay, well, of course my grandparents are deceased. But I had one set of grandparents from Cleveland, Tennessee, and I had another set of grandparents from Beaufort, South Carolina. Now I remember my grandmother on my father's side, but I don't remember my grandfather. And on my mother's side, I remember both my grandfather and my grandmother. And I guess they were what you might say self employed which was the lot of Black people in Cleveland, Tennessee. Cleveland, Tennessee, of course, is about 35 miles from Chattanooga.	0:29
Stacey Scales	Did they ever talk about segregation?	1:12
Ernest A. Grant	They didn't have to because I was right there and I saw it with my own eyes. And Beaufort, South Carolina, it's very fresh, and in my mind it's very fresh, and of course, in Cleveland, Tennessee. And of course, the same thing applies for Tuskegee. But my mother and father were on the faculty at Tuskegee.	1:15
Stacey Scales	Oh, really?	1:43
Ernest A. Grant	So my mother was in the school system, and then of course my father was on the faculty here at Tuskegee until he died. So I knew the political problems and racial problems that we had here in Tuskegee.	1:45
Stacey Scales	Do you remember any stories that you can share or any early memories?	2:06
Ernest A. Grant	Well, I know that my—Well, there's so many as I said before.	2:16
Stacey Scales	Share it again.	2:33
Ernest A. Grant	It was nothing for—We had an Avon lady who was White, and we had insurance men, and most of them were White. Excuse me. They would walk right in the door without even knocking or anything. And as a result, they would address my mother and the other Black women by their first name. So even as kids it wasn't unusual in some households for the insurance man to try to give us some money and tell us to go to the store and buy a cookie in an attempt to leave the Black women with the White guy.	2:33
Ernest A. Grant	So almost everybody became aware of that in all areas. Mobile, Alabama, most areas that I know about. But anyway, this particular gentleman walked in the front door, and my mother was ironing with a smoothing iron, and he walked up behind her and grabbed her bust, and she turned around with that smoothing iron and hugged him with it. And she burnt him very badly. And the big problem was there was some other ladies there, and in the commotion, he wasn't able to really identify my mother as the one that hugged him with the iron. I've forgotten, I must have been about seven or eight years old then. And I never forgot that. So that extended right on through high school.	3:26
Stacey Scales	And you said your mother left?	4:27
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, my father had to take my mother out away from Tuskegee to Tennessee in the trunk of the car. And she stayed up there over a year.	4:30
Stacey Scales	Did your whole family move?	4:41
Ernest A. Grant	Well, we had to. Yeah, we had to. Well my father, of course, came back to Tuskegee because he was working here, but he left my mother and my sister and myself in Tennessee. And that lasted over a year. And I never ever forgot that. So I grew up, obviously I'm 63 years old, I was born in 1931, so I grew up in a turbulent area. The Klan used to march right up our street.	4:43
Stacey Scales	What street?	5:17
Ernest A. Grant	On Washington Avenue. It's the same Washington Avenue.	5:19
Stacey Scales	How would the people in your neighborhood respond when they would walk up the street?	5:23
Ernest A. Grant	With great difficulty. We had clashes from here and there, but what happened was that you couldn't buy—If you went to the hardware store or went to a store in Montgomery, the only thing you could buy was .22 short rounds. There was no other ammunition available. And since there was no ammunition available—How you doing? I'll be a few minutes. I'm sorry, I'm doing an interview. That extended right on up through the integration of the armed forces, which Truman, I think, did in '49, '50s, right in that somewhere. And that was supposed to be the law of the land, but it didn't get down to the other areas. So as a result we were segregated and not segregated. It depended on the circumstances.	5:29
Stacey Scales	Did you remember the first time you voted here in Tuskeegee?	6:33
Ernest A. Grant	Sure, I remember them, because I didn't get registered. My father was a registered voter. He was a registered voter, I guess, because he had a PhD. And if you were the right kind of Black person, they would—	6:35
Stacey Scales	You said you had to be of a certain faculty. What do you mean by that?	7:00
Ernest A. Grant	Well, you had—Not only was there a poll tax, but you had to—The board of registers would ask you questions about the constitution, and you had to interpret the constitution to their satisfaction. And there were a few Blacks that they would permit to vote. They put you on the list, but there were very few.	7:05
Stacey Scales	So your father did vote.	7:32
Ernest A. Grant	Yes he did.	7:34
Stacey Scales	So was it because he had a PhD and [indistinct 00:07:41]?	7:34
Ernest A. Grant	That's the only possible reason I can think of. But it was very limited. Sometimes the women could get things that—They could go in the store and buy stuff and get credit that the Black man with a PhD and everything else couldn't get.	7:41
Stacey Scales	Do you remember gerrymandering?	8:01
Ernest A. Grant	Of course, I remember it. I remember every piece of it.	8:04
Stacey Scales	Try to explain it.	8:06
Ernest A. Grant	Well, what happened was was that they redefined the city limits of Tuskegee. Now, in the process of doing this, it put most of the registered voters out of the city limits, which means that you could not vote on any local officials. So you couldn't vote on any of the officials at Tuskegee. You couldn't vote on the mayor. In any of the municipal elections you were not permitted to vote because you were not a registered voter anymore. So they put every registered voter, Black registered voter out of the city limits except 10.	8:08
Stacey Scales	Except 10. Who were those chosen?	8:49
Ernest A. Grant	I don't remember who they were, but I'm trying to think of the gentleman who sponsored that election, that sponsored that gerrymandering. But if I remember correctly, he was somewhere near Short, Alabama.	9:00
Stacey Scales	Could you describe some of the changes that have taken place then and now, if there are anything?	9:15
Ernest A. Grant	Well, there are quite a few changes because what happened was the composition of the municipal officials changed. For the first time we had a Black sheriff, and he's the first Black sheriff since reconstruction. And of course I knew him personally.	9:23
Stacey Scales	Who's he?	9:45
Ernest A. Grant	Sheriff Amerson, Lucius Amerson. And he was really tough because it wasn't long after he became sheriff a lot of individuals thought that he wasn't going to be an effective sheriff. So there was an individual who took picked up a Black guy, carried him out to the practice range and decided, "Well, we're going to make this guy tap dance," so they kept shooting at his feet and what have you. But anyway, when he went down—	9:46
Stacey Scales	The sheriff took the person?	10:22
Ernest A. Grant	No, he didn't do the sheriff that way. But the individual went to the sheriff and complained. And the sheriff went to Notasulga and arrested the policeman, the highway patrolman. I don't know whether it was highway patrolman or not, but the two officials, both of them were law officers, and arrested both of them. And that's convinced the other White officials that Lucius Amerson was for real. So then they had a number of tapes that they used to play, that it was real popular among the White people, and it had to do with jokes, what have you, the racial jokes and all—	10:23
Stacey Scales	They'd play them over or something—	11:07
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, there was one called the High Chair. for example, that was the name of the tape. And most of the White people had it.	11:08
Stacey Scales	So what type of things would be on the tape?	11:16
Ernest A. Grant	It had to do with—It would just be this conversation between these two White guys, and they were talking about, "Have you heard about our new nigger sheriff we have," and so on, and everything and all. And then they had somebody who would mimic the sheriff. And the point was the—I've forgotten, it was kind of a parody. And he was supposed to go out and arrest a White man, and Amerson was saying—	11:21
Ernest A. Grant	The sheriff was supposed to say, "You want me to go and rest—" Amos and Andy type thing. Just got this truck with the Confederate flag and the pearl handle pistols and the shotgun and everything, he said, "You want me to go and arrest him?" I don't know where those recordings are, but I'd give anything to find—But it made us so angry though, until—And your rage can consume you and also get you killed. So a lot of times you have to put it aside and the common sense was there.	11:54
Stacey Scales	What was people's reaction to those tapes?	12:32
Ernest A. Grant	For us, it was disgusting, but in a way it set our tasks before us and we knew what we were going to have to do.	12:39
Stacey Scales	You have any cases of lynchings down here?	12:46
Ernest A. Grant	No, no, no. I don't know anything about—The only lynching I can remember exactly the one that took place in Georgia, and that was a long time ago. That was back when I was much younger. Well, lynching usually designates—Has something to do with a lynch mob and a noose and all that, but I think in this case right here, these people were just assassinated. There were four Blacks that were assassinated. Two of the women recognized some of the White individuals, and as a result, they were killed too. And a lot of this had to do with just—A White man would say something to a Black person and he would reply, and then they would show up.	12:52
Ernest A. Grant	Now I do recall, though, that there was a lady who was an extremely good seamstress, and she got a lot of White business. And the White people in Tuskegee complained because they were losing business on the account of her, but she was also extremely good with firearms. So some of the local White officials decided they'd go over and teach her a lesson, and they showed up, which was right across the street, mind you, from where I lived.	13:48
Stacey Scales	On Washington Avenue.	14:27
Ernest A. Grant	On Washington Avenue, right there at the corner. So they decided they'd go there and intimidate her, but she intimidated them because everybody that she shot at, she hit.	14:28
Stacey Scales	How many of them were there?	14:43
Ernest A. Grant	Two or three. And it was beyond belief. And they were local officials and everything and all that, so they never tried that again. So with the sheets and everything and all, the sheet comes unimportant if you're shot, if you're hit. And these individuals turned out to be a local merchant and a couple of other guests invited in from West Point, Georgia, if I remember correctly. They didn't make any secret of where they were from.	14:44
Stacey Scales	Oh no?	15:18
Ernest A. Grant	No, they used to stand on the corner, the whole works right there on the corner. And see on Washington Avenue and Scott Street where I live, it used to be a very convenient place for the Caucasians to pass through. Now Washington Avenue doesn't extend all the way to the place that it does now, but it's a convenient place to attempt to intimidate people.	15:19
Stacey Scales	Do you remember the syphilis thing over at—	15:50
Ernest A. Grant	Of course I do. But at the time all this was going on, I was about eighth grade, and I remember seeing a posted sign on the telephone post that said that all Black males, 18 years or older, had to report for a blood test.	15:58
Ernest A. Grant	Well, I wasn't 18 years old, I was 15 or 16, if I remember correctly. Anyway, so I went with some of my friends who were 18, and they went over to John Andrew Hospital and got a blood test and all. We were puzzled because we couldn't figure out why just us. So it was sometime later, but we had some physicians here who were either interning at John Andrew Hospital. Anyway, they were involved in it, and it was years later before we were able to put it together, but when you kind of live through it, you still don't attach anything to it. But I do remember the older guys in my group happened to go for a blood test.	16:25
Stacey Scales	So did they come down with the symptoms later?	17:22
Ernest A. Grant	Oh, I have no idea. I have no idea because I didn't know the individuals who might've had syphilis or the ones that didn't. But I do remember the sign that was on the pole.	17:25
Stacey Scales	What was the relationship between the university and the community?	17:40
Ernest A. Grant	Extremely good. Now, if there ever was a Tuskegee family, that was it.	17:48
Stacey Scales	This was then?	17:50
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, when I was coming up. Very close relationship between the Tuskegee community. In fact, we were one.	17:53
Stacey Scales	How about the dog track relationship?	18:02
Ernest A. Grant	Well, there wasn't a dog track then. Nobody even thought about a dog track.	18:05
Stacey Scales	[indistinct 00:18:09] much later.	18:09
Ernest A. Grant	Oh yeah, much, much later. See the dog track, it hasn't been here long. Now what happened was the institute and the Tuskegee community kind of went this—Well, it was bound to happen because we used to depend on Tuskegee Institute for everything. We used to get our electricity. Tuskegee Institute used to have its own system. It was completely independent. There used to be a track, a railroad track that brought coal into the—So it had its own generating plant and everything. So it had its own generators. And what happened was, as the loads got greater, naturally, the amount of electricity available became less and less. And when we got fluorescent lights, you had to turn the fluorescent lights on early in the morning before the load got too high, because if you ever turned them off in the middle of the day, you could never turn them back on again because the voltage wasn't high enough to start them.	18:11
Stacey Scales	Did you have a car?	19:17
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, my father had a car. A '39 Chevrolet.	19:22
Stacey Scales	Did you all go on family trips?	19:29
Ernest A. Grant	We went on family trips, but it was an ordeal. I hate to even think about it. It was terrible. We used to go to Montgomery, and when you went to Montgomery, there were a few places you could go in Montgomery. There were a couple of places you could go and eat. So fixing your lunch got to be an expected thing. The same way with the train. The train used to come to Chehaw.	19:29
Stacey Scales	Could you share some of your experiences?	19:54
Ernest A. Grant	They're all bad, but anyway—When the train came through, there was a Crescent Limited, there was a South Wind, there were a bunch of them. The big problem was that the Blacks all used to be up in the front behind the tender. You know what the tender is on a steam? When you don't have a fireman. And this fireman, you're thinking about an automatic stoker. I'm talking about the kind where you have a shovel.	20:00
Stacey Scales	Right, that's what I was saying.	20:34
Ernest A. Grant	But anyway, make a long story short. The car's right next to the engine and the tender. I'll have to talk to you in just a little bit. All right. When the train stopped, you got on, but you boarded up in the front and that's where all the smoke and everything else. Because remember this is old fashioned steam engine. So all the cinders and everything else.	20:35
Stacey Scales	Because you'd be right there with that.	21:07
Ernest A. Grant	Right behind, right. The smoke, the whole shebang. And then when you got on you were next to all the dirt and everything else that was there.	21:09
Stacey Scales	[indistinct 00:21:29].	21:27
Ernest A. Grant	Just the reverse.	21:30
Stacey Scales	Do you remember the Freedom Train?	21:35
Ernest A. Grant	Of course I remember the Freedom Train. How can I forget? We had several instances, we had incidents right down at our bus station now. This is a small town. We knew the people that ran the bus line here, and all of us did.	21:35
Stacey Scales	How was the freedom—Can you describe the Freedom Train?	21:53
Ernest A. Grant	Well, the Freedom Train was not quite as bad as the Freedom Bus. When everything got supposedly integrated and everything, the Freedom Riders, let's put it that way. And naturally we made a lot of White enemies along the way, and they tried to make it as difficult for us as possible. But what you had to do in 1963, 1963 was a pretty impressive year for most of us. That was the year, if I remember correctly, or it may have been before—I've forgotten exactly when. We decided we were going to test the desegregation laws and everything and all. But apparently they hadn't got to a number of areas.	22:00
Ernest A. Grant	And at that time, George Wallace was something to deal with, you better believe it. The George Wallace that we have right there, and the one that's still up in the schoolhouse door. And then even the newspaper, the Montgomery Advertiser, they used to have one little page that went in there, or at least two, and that would be delivered to people who got the Montgomery Advertiser if you were Black. If you weren't Black, that page wasn't in there. It was kind of a page that's kind of stuck in the Montgomery Advertiser. News for Colored people.	23:00
Stacey Scales	What other ways did you receive news?	23:51
Ernest A. Grant	There wasn't any news other than—There was a radio, but the radio primarily was all White. They had a little—What did they call that program? But anyway, they had a program on the radio on Sunday. They had a program that was targeted to Black communities. I don't remember. Anyway, it was transmitted by WAPI, if I remember correctly, which was out of Birmingham. And that would be Black news. That'd be Black news, and there'd be some spiritual, some what have you, and so on and on. That was about it.	23:56
Stacey Scales	What about on campus? Did any of your classes deal with the whole voting and the process? [indistinct 00:25:01] of education?	24:51
Ernest A. Grant	Sure. Sure. If there ever was a time now—During that time, history got to be an extremely important item for everybody. And you couldn't afford to miss the boat. And by that, if you're going to take a course that involves what used to be and the way it is now, you would find yourself in great difficulty because you're more interested in Black history and what's going on, you with me, than ancient history. In this particular case, it wasn't a case of being interested in the legend of Ferio and King Tut. This was basically what has happened during your lifetime and—	25:01
Stacey Scales	Which classes [indistinct 00:26:10]?	26:06
Ernest A. Grant	I've forgotten which classes they were. But I was going to say that he was—What he did was, if I remember correctly, he went to the Library of Congress and put his notes—You with me? Put his notes together by his own efforts, which is a little different than taking the notes from somebody else and translating those. He did those since then. And it was apparently he knew—I mean, he knew every single detail. And what it did was it fired us up because we got real interested too.	26:10
Stacey Scales	Was Dr. Tolin a motivator on the campus?	26:44
Ernest A. Grant	You better well believe it. In fact, he made me the way I am. I hated the course because I had to work so hard. Will you ever talk about him?	26:51
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	27:03
Ernest A. Grant	Well, you know what I mean, he did not play. He did not play any kind of way. He would ask you to discuss something, and I mean, you had to have all the dates and everything. But on the other hand, you couldn't afford—Ignorance now was something you couldn't afford. So that's the way it went.	27:04
Stacey Scales	So he taught voter education?	27:23
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. in fact, if you didn't know why the right to vote was so important, if you didn't know before, you sure knew afterwards. And of course my daughter never took a course from Dr. Tolin, but she was very impressed by him. She's an attorney. She's in Montgomery now. And of course she handles a lot of cases that involve interracial—It was kind of tough because she went to Auburn, and then she went from Auburn to the University of Alabama. So you can imagine the problem. She's one of these activists anyway. She's one of these Black activists anyway. She's a deputy attorney general of State of Alabama, and she had all kinds of problems there, but almost everybody did that was Black. So you had to kind of watch yourself, so to speak.	27:29
Stacey Scales	Do you remember the name Otis Pinker?	28:46
Ernest A. Grant	Of course, I know Otis Pinker. Of course I know Otis Pinker. I've known Otis Pinker all my life. And he's been real active too. And he's always been like that. One thing about him, he's consistent. And that means a lot, because anytime you have a person that has a philosophy that varies with the seasons, then you don't know who you can count on and who you can't, because it depends on what the political expediency happens to be. But he's never been like that. And I've known him all my life, as I said before. And we aren't the greatest of friends because that's not what it's all about. So you might say we're professional friends. I expect him to tell me the truth of whatever philosophy he believes in, and I tell him the same thing.	28:48
Stacey Scales	Was there a Black business district in this area?	30:00
Ernest A. Grant	Was there a Black business?	30:03
Stacey Scales	District?	30:03
Ernest A. Grant	District? Yeah, so to speak.	30:04
Stacey Scales	Where was it?	30:10
Ernest A. Grant	It was just scattered—It was just scattered through the community. You have a store here, and if they didn't have it, then you had to go downtown.	30:10
Stacey Scales	That was all right.	30:26
Ernest A. Grant	Oh, you better well believe it. I think there was one little section there uptown by the jailhouse, where the jailhouse used to be. Well, you know where the jailhouse is now, right?	30:26
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	30:39
Ernest A. Grant	It was in that same site. But that was the only way you could make it. You either had to be an undertaker—I don't even—I was trying to think of a Black attorney. There had to be one, but I don't know who it was.	30:39
Stacey Scales	Was it [indistinct 00:31:03]?	30:59
Ernest A. Grant	No, and of course I knew Dr. [indistinct 00:31:06], I've known Dr. [indistinct 00:31:07] all my life. But anyway, I guess what I'm saying is that most of the Black business we had—Of course we had Black doctors, but I don't recall—I don't know any Black attorneys right off hand.	31:03
Stacey Scales	Did you have any interaction with the VA hospital?	31:30
Ernest A. Grant	No, other than the kind ordinarily have with the community in the hospital and the school. But it was nice.	31:36
Stacey Scales	Do you remember the incident where they tried to have an all Black administration and plan marched against it?	31:45
Ernest A. Grant	No, I probably wasn't here then. See, I didn't go to college here, and I couldn't. I couldn't because I couldn't go to Auburn. Auburn was segregated. The school of engineering wasn't accredited. So we have what we call out of state aid. If you were a Black person and you want to attend a segregated school, the state of Alabama would give you the difference between what it costs to go there and here.	31:59
Stacey Scales	So you went to the service?	32:32
Ernest A. Grant	Well, yeah, but I'm just saying, I went to Drake University. When I went to Drake University, state of Alabama paid the difference between what it cost me to go to Auburn University and to go to Drake University.	32:33
Stacey Scales	Did you run into racism at Drake?	32:47
Ernest A. Grant	Of course. And how. It's everywhere you go. That's a Black engineer, it's tough now. But you deal with it.	32:49
Stacey Scales	How were classes? Did they treat you as though you're lesser?	33:02
Ernest A. Grant	Well, if you want to have an incident where the person calls me number 25, and after about four or five class meetings, I ask this gentleman, I asked the teacher, I said, "Why do you keep calling me number 25?" He said, "Well, there's no point in me learning your name, because nigger, you ain't going to be here long enough." Now he is my teacher. So when he got to that, he would just say—When he was checking the role—	33:08
Stacey Scales	Would call everyone else by their name?	33:42
Ernest A. Grant	By their name. Call me number 25.	33:44
Stacey Scales	So what was your response?	33:48
Ernest A. Grant	Between a rock and a hard place? I told him, I said, "Well, you might as well learn my name. I'm not dropping this course. I'm going to be here." And he would ask me—No, the guy turned out to be the best friend I ever had. Because I happened to be going to a school where most of the individuals in my class had wealthy parents and all the other stuff that goes with it and lots of influence. I noticed they didn't do much work.	33:50
Stacey Scales	No?	34:16
Ernest A. Grant	No. And I kept trying to figure out how in the world are they going to pass this course if they don't really buckle down?	34:18
Stacey Scales	But it was because their parents paid?	34:29
Ernest A. Grant	Right, so what would happen was he said, "I didn't want you to get caught in that trap." He says, "You'll notice that the other individuals in your class don't seem to do much of anything." He said, "But all their parents have to do is buy a new wing for so-and-so and so donate a 100 or $200,000 to so-and-so, and their kids get out and graduate. But you, on the other hand, are going to have to study because I know you don't have any money. Because if you had the money, you wouldn't be here." And he was right.	34:29
Stacey Scales	You do that same thing in the military?	35:01
Ernest A. Grant	Oh yeah. Don't even mention the military. That was beyond belief. And it got worse and worse and worse. In fact, there was one other guy—We got paranoid because we figured it was going to be a race war.	35:05
Stacey Scales	Yeah?	35:17
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, almost everybody did because everybody was stealing ammo, stealing weapons.	35:18
Stacey Scales	Did you?	35:23
Ernest A. Grant	No. No. I didn't need to steal any weapons.	35:24
Stacey Scales	How would they steal?	35:28
Ernest A. Grant	What do you mean? You have a supply sergeant. Oh, there were all kinds of ways to doing that, but don't misunderstand now, the mafia type individuals did not—They were interested in the dollar. They didn't care anything about, just profit motive. We had some individuals that were dedicated to improving the lot of the Black men.	35:29
Stacey Scales	So how would they steal the weapons?	35:57
Ernest A. Grant	It's simple. You're on a truck and it's loaded with weapons. You just throw one off the truck every once in a while and some other people come along the car and pick it up. It's as simple as that. But things got real nice after that because pretty soon our local merchants realized that there were a lot of veterans from the Korean conflict here, and they were extremely well armed. They had panzerfausts. Do you know what a panzerfaust is?	35:59
Stacey Scales	No.	36:37
Ernest A. Grant	A panzerfaust is a gigantic rocket launcher, and one round from that takes the side of the whole building away. So there's no point in hiding in the building because one round from that would've been in the whole side of the building disappeared.	36:39
Stacey Scales	Panzerfaust?	36:55
Ernest A. Grant	Panzerfaust. That's a German name. It's for a super bazooka, the 3.2 rocket launcher. It was a 2.8, if I remember correctly. Then they went to the 3.2 and it's a—Uh oh.	36:56
Speaker 1	I think you have the 4.93 now.	37:10
Ernest A. Grant	When we went to NASA, they were talking about the man landing on the moon and everything and all. Our dean at the time carried us to a segregated eating facility. They went inside and ate in Albertville, Alabama, and we sat out there in the car with a sandwich. And that was our dean, dean of the school of engineering.	37:12
Speaker 1	That's right. That's right.	37:36
Ernest A. Grant	No, right here, Tuskegee.	37:37
Stacey Scales	What year is that?	37:39
Ernest A. Grant	That was in 1963. We went to an IEEE meeting, the dean put Dr. Clayton and myself and another gentleman, Black, in a car and gave us $160 a piece. And we drove all the way to New York to the convention. They rest of them flew. That's a fact. They flew.	37:43
Stacey Scales	So what did you all do?	38:15
Ernest A. Grant	What did we do? Well, we wanted to go. We wanted to go, so that's what we did. You're really talking to the wrong person because, see, I get angry every time I think about that. But that's what happened. The department head flew. So we met them in New York, they were getting off the plane.	38:17
Stacey Scales	Was there any discussion over why—	38:37
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, but it didn't help. They hired some faculty from Auburn who came over and talked, but they taught at night. They were members of the faculty of the Tuskegee Institute, but they wanted to pursue their graduate degree, so they went and pursued their graduate degree. I'm not the kind of person you want to talk to, because you can imagine what kind of attitude I have about all of this. So they made our Black kids come to class at night while they pursued a daytime curriculum.	38:43
Stacey Scales	This was in the 60s still?	39:24
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, well, that's right. Extended right up to the '70s. But when we used to go on these trips—And the thing about this, and I remember now, Tuskegee Institute is supposed to be paying for all of this, but what this individual—Now he's dean. We get in the car with him, they stopped at the nice restaurants, go in and eat and enjoy themselves. We can't go in there because they're segregated. So they go in there and bring us a sandwich.	39:25
Stacey Scales	How long have you been here?	40:04
Ernest A. Grant	I was born and raised—I've been here over 30 years.	40:06
Stacey Scales	You've been teaching here 30 years, you're born and raised.	40:11
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, born and raised, so I have an attitude. I said before they were going to school at Auburn. See, we had to quit our job, pack up, and leave and move north, you with me, to pursue a graduate degree, because we couldn't get in any of the other White schools.	40:13
Stacey Scales	[indistinct 00:40:39]?	40:37
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, of course. I mean, you didn't have to like me. But see, we were vets by that time, so you'd have to be crazy mess with a vet. You're asking to get killed.	40:40
Stacey Scales	Now with those weapons, did anybody ever use them?	40:51
Ernest A. Grant	I don't know, but I know nobody bothered anybody. And I learned every weapon there was. Every one. Every one.	40:56
Stacey Scales	They were weapons—	41:08
Ernest A. Grant	Everybody really had a chip on their shoulder. We had made up our mind when we went the service that when we came back to the south, that wasn't going to ever happen again. Ever. And if we had to go down, we were just going to go down. That's a fact. We were committed to that. Because we had had enough. And somehow they figured out that we weren't playing.	41:09
Stacey Scales	So how were you treated?	41:35
Ernest A. Grant	Treated like—	41:40
Stacey Scales	In the states?	41:40
Ernest A. Grant	Oh, as Black veterans? Oh, come on. Doing an interview, I'll be doing a few minutes. Terrible. There were no jobs in Philadelphia. No jobs in Philly for Blacks. In Montgomery, you probably didn't know it, but to drive a yellow cab, you had to have a college degree. Did you know that?	41:43
Stacey Scales	In the '40s and '40s?	42:05
Ernest A. Grant	No, up to the '60s. Why don't you check it out and see. Check it out and see. Your eligibility for being a cab driver with Yellow Cab, you had to have a degree, a college degree. You had to be a college graduate.	42:08
Stacey Scales	[indistinct 00:42:29].	42:27
Ernest A. Grant	Well, it was targeted at Black folks, I guess. And you can check that out and you'll find it—If you had a college degree, you could get a job with—And you were Black, you could get a job as a cab driver with Yellow Cab Company. That's a lot you don't know. You check it out and you'll find out that I'm telling you the truth. So you can see what kind of personality conflict I have.	42:30
Stacey Scales	Were you treated very differently because your parents were institute people?	43:04
Ernest A. Grant	Not really. No, no. No, because we were all between a rock and a hard place. No, I don't ever recall getting any special attention because of the fact that my parents were professional.	43:08
Stacey Scales	You had any brothers or sisters?	43:32
Ernest A. Grant	I have one sister.	43:34
Stacey Scales	Were there any hard times with the family? How did the family survive?	43:37
Ernest A. Grant	Well, a hard time, of course—Well, when my mother came down with breast carcinoma, my father spent every dime he had. She died just the same. And it took about five years to die, but die she did. But when she died, the only thing my father couldn't cash then was his life insurance policy with Tuskegee Institute. He couldn't get that, which I think was worth about $2,000. He had a $2,000 life insurance. And the bills were beyond belief. So we didn't get those—My father was dead and in his grave and we still hadn't paid off all of it.	43:42
Stacey Scales	Did he ever share with you how he survived the depression? Was that a hard time for—	44:22
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, it was a hard time for everybody. Have you been to Montgomery, haven't you?	44:29
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	44:37
Ernest A. Grant	You ever see the sign that says Mitylene?	44:37
Stacey Scales	Mighty lean?	44:41
Ernest A. Grant	Mitylene, M-I-T-Y-L-E-N-E? You've never seen that sign. When you get off—	44:42
Stacey Scales	Probably have.	44:49
Ernest A. Grant	When you go into Montgomery and decide to get off that Mitylene exit, when you get off there, you go right on into the outer outskirts of Montgomery Valley. You know what I'm talking about there?	44:50
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	45:06
Ernest A. Grant	You know where they have some nice houses and everything out there and everything and all where the White folks and everything, where the dean used to live there. Know what I'm talking about now?	45:07
Stacey Scales	The dean of—	45:15
Ernest A. Grant	Of engineering. That's Mitylene. But that Mitylene means what it says. Mighty lean. How are things going? It's mighty lean. Mighty lean means—Mighty means big and lean means nothing, doesn't it? Mighty lean times. That's the way it used to be expressed. These are mighty lean times. Cause there's no jobs, no nothing for Blacks. You with me? No cotton. It's a mighty lean year. Mighty lean year because the cotton. We already have gotten the cotton. You with me? Mighty lean because the cotton gin is laid off most of the kin. It's nothing to do.	45:17
Stacey Scales	So that's how that name—	46:06
Ernest A. Grant	That's how the name got to be, mighty lean. See, my father was an ag man, so I used to travel with him. I used to travel with him all over the state and everything and all. And he used to go out and visit farmers. He had a lot of students here.	46:08
Stacey Scales	Did he live with Dr. Carver?	46:26
Ernest A. Grant	I used to go on field trips with Dr. Carver, what are you talking about? I used to go on field trips with Dr. Carver.	46:28
Stacey Scales	Could you share some of your experiences with him?	46:33
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah.	46:39

Ernest A. Grant	It was the kids in the neighborhood.	0:01
Stacey Scales	How did people feel about him then?	0:02
Ernest A. Grant	I don't think anybody paid any attention.	0:05
Stacey Scales	No?	0:07
Ernest A. Grant	No. He was just a person that liked horticulture and all the other things. And you named it, he could do it. He used to make all kinds of paints and candy. The only thing he used to make sweet potato candy, which I hated.	0:07
Stacey Scales	Sweet potato candy?	0:18
Ernest A. Grant	Sweet potato candy with coconut on top of it. I wouldn't eat it, it tasted terrible, myself. Then, he made some kind of potato chips, except that they were sweet potato chips.	0:20
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	0:33
Ernest A. Grant	I didn't like that either.	0:34
Stacey Scales	Sweet potatoes?	0:35
Ernest A. Grant	But I came to hate sweet potatoes.	0:36
Stacey Scales	Really?	0:37
Ernest A. Grant	That's right. I did not like. And peanuts, I never have been crazy about peanuts either. And they used to make various types of extracts from peanut oil for Polio. At that time, Polio used to be the scourge of the region.	0:37
Stacey Scales	Let's talk about people trying to [indistinct 00:00:57], did he ever say why he didn't accept the offer?	0:53
Ernest A. Grant	No, dumb loyalty.	0:55
Stacey Scales	Dumb loyalty?	1:02
Ernest A. Grant	That's right. I mean, he stayed with Tuskegee, and what happened? I saw everything and all. And it's unfortunate that everybody else saw that. Let's take the peanut butter, for example. We ate peanut butter for a long time. At that time of course the homogenized peanut butter was something that came along later. But other individuals at other areas developed all kinds of products that turned into a nice financial windfall, and Tuskegee, I don't see what Tuskegee benefited from that. I don't see what Tuskegee Institute benefited from it. So here, he's come up with peanut butter, which of course, from a nutritional standpoint, was a godsend for us. Besides, I like peanut butter. I'm a diabetic, I'm a late model diabetic, but up until then, I loved peanut butter.	1:04
Stacey Scales	Yeah?	2:10
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. Peanut butter and jelly, I mean, that was the mainstay for everybody. Because it's—	2:11
Stacey Scales	Yeah, that's what [indistinct 00:02:21]. It is mine.	2:13
Ernest A. Grant	It is?	2:13
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	2:13
Ernest A. Grant	Okay. Because we came around the same time.	2:22
Stacey Scales	Oh, really?	2:24
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, I'm older than he is but between the two of us, that would bring you up to the modern age.	2:24
Stacey Scales	Okay, yeah. So Dr. Carver, he started it then?	2:35
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah.	2:42
Stacey Scales	Dr. Carver?	2:42
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, but we had a lot of people at Tuskegee that were loyal like that. My father was like that, and everything, and all. And only problem that you have is that it wasn't—I don't think he personally could have done anything about it, the financial part of it. But when you share your developments and everything, and all with individuals, they figure, "Well, if you're just a dumb nigga, they just exploit you. And Planter's peanuts, and all the other peanut companies, and everything, and all, they may have given Tuskegee Institute some kind of token award, but Tuskegee Institute did not reap the financial benefit like other individuals with him.	2:42
Stacey Scales	So—	3:45
Ernest A. Grant	For example, those individuals who came up with products fall over and for example, benefited very handsomely from whatever products they turned out, but that didn't happen to Tuskegee. They simply come down. We had, in one of the buildings, Milbank Hall, I remember Milbank Hall very well because my father's office used to be over there. Dr. Carver's office used to be over there. And when I was a kid, we used to play over there. But the point I'm getting at is that they stored a lot of material from the oaks in Booker T. Washington Day.	3:47
Stacey Scales	Yeah? They'd sell it?	4:39
Ernest A. Grant	The letters—No, they stored.	4:39
Stacey Scales	Stored.	4:40
Ernest A. Grant	Okay. They stored a lot of stuff there. And it just so happened that it was all out there in the weather and everything, and somebody happened to take a look at it, and I don't know whether they called the person that was with the Smithsonian or who, but anyway, they came by and took a look at it, and I think they checked and they said, "Well, you can have it. We don't want it. We're throwing it away." You with me? And it was worth a small fortune. And what happened was Tuskegee gave away their legacy because by the time Daniel T. Williams discovered that there were letters that—You with me?	4:42
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	5:32
Ernest A. Grant	Written by—There was family communication, and so there was a whole legacy there, because you've got the whole history of the Booker T. Washington family, given away. So—	5:32
Stacey Scales	That was when? When did they take it in? Which year?	5:51
Ernest A. Grant	That was in the late 60s. So a lot of local citizens went over and just went through, rummaged through. Found all kinds—	5:53
Stacey Scales	They did?	6:10
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. Found all kinds of paintings and photos, all kinds of stuff. The letters and Booker T. Washington wrote the other members of his family, and everything, and all.	6:11
Stacey Scales	How did you feel about that large house they kept hidden up in there, down by [indistinct 00:06:18]?	6:18
Ernest A. Grant	Oh, the Oaks?	6:18
Stacey Scales	No, the mansion down the street.	6:18
Ernest A. Grant	Oh, yeah. But see that mansion, I hung a chandelier in that mansion back—You're talking about Gray Collins?	6:36
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	6:44
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. Well, now Gray Collins is nothing like you'd think it is. The Gray Collins was occupied by a White family. And every Christmas, of course, they had the Christmas deck. They had some lights there that used to light up and everything, and all, but Gray Collins, that was just recently occupied by the president. You see what I mean? Up until then, it got too expensive. If I remember correctly, for the White family, that the taxes and everything got to be beyond the lease.	6:46
Stacey Scales	So they hung chandeliers in it?	7:19
Ernest A. Grant	Oh, back during my younger days, and we were taking electrical construction—	7:21
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	7:27
Ernest A. Grant	They had bought—If I remember correctly, the chandelier was given to us by—Was given to them by a studio that was responsible for the film production of Gone With the Wind. So with all of the—	7:28
Stacey Scales	Gone With the Wind, was that filmed there?	7:47
Ernest A. Grant	No, it wasn't film there. No, no, no. That's what a lot of people seem to—It wasn't film then, Gone With The Wind had nothing to do with Gray Collins.	7:49
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	7:56
Ernest A. Grant	Okay. Nothing to do with it. But what happened was there were a lot of relics that were used in the film that were donated to various areas. Carrollton, Georgia and some of the other places, some of the other Antebellum homes and everything, and all got a piece of whatever was used there.	7:58
Stacey Scales	Right, in Gone With the Wind?	8:19
Ernest A. Grant	In Gone With the Wind.	8:20
Stacey Scales	So the chandelier inside comes from that movie?	8:21
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. Well, that wasn't the only chandelier, if I remember correctly. Anyway, when the chandelier came, it had to be put together because it had all these pieces, and it had to be hung. So, because of the weight and everything, and all, and the wood construction, it required a beam. Now, the only way I became involved was because I was taking electrical construction then, and I was in high school.	8:24
Ernest A. Grant	Now, up until I took electrical construction, before that, there was only one thing you could take. You took agriculture and home economics. So for the first time, I took sheep metal and I made chicken troughs. So at least I was away from the farm. You with me? Then I took electrical construction and we learned what electricity was all about. And so at that time, we used to do a lot of stuff for the community. If you were White and you're a White businessmen, and you wanted to get some work done, you just came over here because we had the shop area.	8:54
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	9:37
Ernest A. Grant	We had sheet metal, you with me?	9:37
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	9:38
Ernest A. Grant	We had a welding shop. We had all the mechanics. So we had all kinds of trades. We had electronics, or radio electronics. So we had a trades area. And the idea was when you finished that, at least you could get a job that meant something. So they would come out, they'd say, "We come out and see whether the Negroes can do this or not." And this man had this, I can't remember his name, but he wanted the chandelier hung and everything, and all. So we went. I was in high school then. And so we went out and put it together and everything, and all, they cleaned it and everything, and all, and we hung it. And that was my first introduction to Gray Collins.	9:39
Stacey Scales	Were many Blacks helping the Whites with the outside jobs they didn't know how to do, like that?	10:20
Ernest A. Grant	No, of course not. Unless you were over here in the trades area, you were just out there. The biggest business we had was cotton, if you remember correctly. Cotton was king. So there was Bridges Cotton Company, and that was as big as they get.	10:31
Stacey Scales	Did anybody ever try to shoot you out of your money, or you didn't know whether it's a nice job?	10:47
Ernest A. Grant	No. No, I never had any problem with that. No. They would try to trade. They wanted to give you some clothes. You don't want the clothes, you want the money, but the money wasn't that good.	10:51
Stacey Scales	No?	11:02
Ernest A. Grant	No, but 25 cents would buy an awful lot for you. If you bought 25 cents worth of candy, you'd have enough candy for the year, see? So yeah, a dollar was extremely good pay for cutting some grass, for cutting a regular lawn.	11:02
Stacey Scales	Yes, then.	11:24
Ernest A. Grant	But from an economic standpoint, it was tough for everybody. But there's some people that wish for the good old days. I don't wish for the good old days. I'm glad the good old days have gone, wherever they were going, because I hated it.	11:25
Stacey Scales	Do you have anything else to share?	11:42
Ernest A. Grant	Nothing in particular except the attitude that I have, and I think you kind of got the message there.	11:47
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	11:54
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. I'm sorry, I have such an attitude, but I have never been able to get rid of it. Never, never. And it was highly unequal because if you were a Black female, you could get anything you wanted from the White man downtown. But if you were a Black male, you couldn't get anything. If you wanted to buy a car, how are you going to buy a car? And the agreement would be, "Well, I'm going to let you get this car and, everything and all, but I don't want to see a Black man riding in it in no kind of way." So it'd be nothing.	11:55
Stacey Scales	They didn't take it?	12:38
Ernest A. Grant	It'd be nothing for the Black woman to tell you, "Look, I'd give you a ride, but Mr. So-And-So and So-And-So, he's the one that got this car for me, and everything, and all. And he'll take it away from me if he ever sees you, or sees a man in here." Now, that's a fact.	12:38
Stacey Scales	So did that create some tension in the family?	12:56
Ernest A. Grant	Well, of course it creates a problem. Here you have a woman that can go out and come in with the groceries and everything, and all, and the car, and here you are a day laborer, you with me? And you're getting 55 cents an hour, and the woman now furnished this economic base rather than the man. Of course. So I saw that happen. I saw a lot of families fall apart on account of that, and the White man just made the most of it. You're there and the kids need some shoes, now you don't have no money for the shoes. So you go down there and talk to the man who's selling the shoes, and he says, "Well, I tell you what, send Thelma down here, your wife, and tell her to stop buy and out, and I'll talk to her."	12:59
Ernest A. Grant	So you can't get any credit. So who goes down there? Your wife. And she comes back with all the shoes and everything, and all. Now, he can come by anytime he wants to, so he drives in the driveway, and honks his horn and everything, and all. She comes out, he says, "Here, give each one a penny. They can send them to the store."	13:53
Stacey Scales	A penny to go to the store.	14:16
Ernest A. Grant	Right. For nothing. And they'll tell you in a minute, she said, "I didn't have any choice in the matter." Said, "My kids' got to eat." Yeah, and this is not allowed, I didn't see this on TV, because I won't even look at a movie like that. I will not. I'm not looking at a movie like that. Movies where there's sound, and all those, I don't look at those. You know what I'm talking about?	14:21
Stacey Scales	Mm-hmm.	14:52
Ernest A. Grant	I don't look at any movie like that. None whatsoever. I never even looked at the color purple.	14:53
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	15:02
Ernest A. Grant	I forgot about this show, was it the Kunta Kinte and all that, everything, and all? I couldn't look at it because I got too upset.	15:04
Stacey Scales	Did you ever protest in any way?	15:10
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, but it doesn't do any good though. All you do is just get beat on the head. Oh, we used to be terrible. We just were able to run fast. We knew our neighborhood. I mean, we knew our neighborhood. So the police had no hope. It wasn't the point even thinking about catching us. We knew every nook, cranny, and corner, and the whole shebang, see?	15:13
Stacey Scales	That's crazy.	15:43
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. Yeah, so perished the idea because wasn't anything but a cloud of dust when we were gone. So naturally we all have an attitude.	15:44
Stacey Scales	Right.	16:00
Ernest A. Grant	Dr. Clayton would say the same thing. I mean, even in the 60s, even in the 60s, I can't call his last name, but anyway, he owned a business and asked me would I go out and look at this lady's television, because I had a part-time job. At that time, you had to let Tuskegee Institute know that you planned to do outside work for compensation.	16:01
Stacey Scales	Right.	16:28
Ernest A. Grant	So I was fixing TV stuff on the side. So I went way out in the country toward Union Springs, drove through this land, got to this house, and there was a man out in the field with a tractor. So I waved him down and told him who I was. He said, "Well, just park over there and I'll be there in a few minutes." So I sat there, and I sat there, and I sat there. And after about 45 minutes, and this guy was way down at the other end of the field, by that time, the sun was high and the sun was shining right in on the TV set, and I could see the TV set. It was like there.	16:28
Ernest A. Grant	So I said, "Well, rather than just sit here on this porch, I'll just turn the TV on and see what the problem is." So I went and turned the TV set on. Naturally when the sound came up, I heard this voice. I heard these two voices. And this White man came through the door and stuck his head out, didn't have no clothes on, and went there and says, "Alma, whoever it is, there's some nigger in there messing with your television set." Then this Black lady comes to the door, she's got this sheet around her, and I said, "Mr. So-And-So sent me out to look at the TV set, and I can't stay here any longer."	17:18
Ernest A. Grant	So she went back in and said whatever it is, said Mr. So-And-So sold her the television set, and who sold her the television set sent me out to look at the TV set. So I'm still checking the set out. In the meantime, he comes out, hitching his clothes on, his overalls on, and saunters on out the door, "Well, I'll see you later." Slam.	18:05
Stacey Scales	But he called you that while he—	18:47
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah, so he's in there with this Black woman, and he's White.	18:47
Stacey Scales	Was the farmer outside?	18:53
Ernest A. Grant	Yeah. Now the lady's husband. Now the lady's husband.	18:55
Stacey Scales	Oh, the lady's husband was outside?	18:57
Ernest A. Grant	That was a lady's husband on the tractor, right? Now you know why I am like I am. How's that for the pits?	18:58
Stacey Scales	Yup, the pits.	19:09
Ernest A. Grant	So—	19:09
Stacey Scales	So, you think he knew that he was with her?	19:12
Ernest A. Grant	Of course he knew.	19:15
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	19:18
Ernest A. Grant	Of course he knew. Yeah, he comes down and gets in his truck and everything, and all. There was a truck. He's what, eating more possum? Confederate flag? Of course he knew. And when he walks out there on the porch and everything, he's hitching up his overall. And you wonder why I'm like I am? You really talk to the wrong person, because—And I never forgot that, and then when I got back to this man's place of business, I thought, I said, "I'm not ever going out there again because I'm going to end up getting killed."	19:18
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	20:02
Ernest A. Grant	He said, "Well, I should have warned you about that." I said, "Yeah." I said, "Wasn't that the lady's husband that was on the tractor?" He said, "Yeah, but they worked out some kind of special arrangement." He said, "She really has to depend on him for financial support." Is that enough?	20:05
Stacey Scales	Yeah. Thank you.	20:29
Ernest A. Grant	Okay.	20:30

Item Info

Title:

Ernest Grant interview recording, 1994 July 19

Date:

July 19, 1994

Creator:

Grant, Ernest A.

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Scales, Mausiki Stacey

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Name: Ernest A. Grant; Date of Birth: 1935-06-09; Place of Birth: Tuskegee, AL; Occupation(s): electrician; electrical engineer; Residence: Tuskegee, AL
Informant ID: 700; Interviewed by: Stacey Scales.

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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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Interview number: 1136
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Ernest Grant interview recording, 1994 July 19

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1. Ernest Grant administrative file, 1994

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Ernest Grant interview recording, 1994 July 19

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