Omeda Livingston interview recording, 1993 May 28 / Behind the Veil / Duke Digital Repository

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

—I said.

0:02

Rhonda Mawhood

Let me see. Would you mind if I put the microphone on you so that we would be sure of getting a good recording?

0:03

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I don't mind.

0:10

Rhonda Mawhood

It's very small.

0:12

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Am I speaking distinctly?

0:13

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes ma'am. Very distinctly.

0:14

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

At the high school in Durham High, they had so much equipment they weren't even using it. And the Black schools had none at all. Those were the things we found in those days. No wonder our students were behind. No library, no equipment, dilapidated high schools.

0:17

Rhonda Mawhood

What I would like to do is perhaps you have to do it yourself to pin this—

0:39

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What am I supposed to do?

0:43

Rhonda Mawhood

Well, I would like, if you wouldn't mind, I would pin this onto the collar of your dress. And then it'll will just—excuse me. It will just hang there. And with any luck, you won't even notice it after a couple of minutes. I'll just make sure this is actually recording. It should be. All right. Thank you, ma'am. Was that the time when Thurgood Marshall thought that case?

0:43

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

That's right.

1:13

Rhonda Mawhood

Was that when he stayed with your sister at her home?

1:14

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

He didn't stay with my sister, but he was a friend of my sister's brother. They were all fraternity brothers.

1:17

Rhonda Mawhood

I see.

1:24

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And Conrad Pearson, who was assisting him, was from Durham and lived here. And Conrad Pearson [indistinct 00:01:31] were both lawyers living in Durham and they were all friends of Thurgood Marshall and they were graduates of Howard Law School, of which Thurgood Marshall was also a graduate, so it was a connection. Leo Bruce, Dr. Bruce, my sister's husband was not a Howard, he was an Ohio State man. But this was his Durham and they were all Kappa men, fraternity men. So they all came down here and talked. And after they plotted and planned, we go up and help my sister, help them get meals. I was just a salon listener.

1:24

Rhonda Mawhood

You must have heard a lot of interesting things.

2:01

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Yes, it was, it was a marvelous experience to remember all of that. And that was a state of affairs. That Black students had nothing. In fact, until about '60s or '70s, Black students were still using outhouses in many parts of the country while White students had fresh [indistinct 00:02:23] for years. Out here in one of these schools, going out to the shopping center, I forgot which it is. There's a sidewalk that they built when White students started to go to that school beforehand, Black students walked in the mud. Those are the things that happened. It's been happening all over the country.

2:02

Rhonda Mawhood

Do you remember other teachers and yourself talking about the—

2:44

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

No, they didn't. That was the flapper 20s. Remember we were all girls in our tweens. I was 19, 20 after two or three—I was 19 when I came here. You don't expect people 19 years old to be thinking about political things. We weren't thinking about political things. Some of us thought about, but most people do not. Nowadays, I'd go around the world and come back and meet my members of the Bridge Club and they'd say, "Did you have a nice time?" And I'd say, "Oh," that was all. I never got a chance to say anything, they weren't interested. They were busy playing cards. They'd talk about John's Otherworld or some of these television programs. They're doing that right now, at bridge games, they're talking about television games. Do you think people are paying attention to what's happening in the world? No, they're not.

2:49

Rhonda Mawhood

Were you a member of teachers associations, professional associations and that kind of thing?

3:43

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, I never paid too much attention to it because I never saw the thing that they accomplished.

3:51

Rhonda Mawhood

I see.

3:58

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

No, I never paid too much attention to it.

4:02

Rhonda Mawhood

Did you ever talk to your students, maybe not in the earlier years, but as you had been here a little while, did you talk to your students about the conditions of the school?

4:07

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Meaning those days?

4:19

Rhonda Mawhood

In those days.

4:20

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I'm sure I did. Of course, later on when I was a college teacher, I spoke about it constantly.

4:25

Rhonda Mawhood

To the students in your classes.

4:34

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And when I'd go on a trip, I'd always tell my students about it. I'd make them be interested in history because I'd come back sometimes and plaster the wall. For instance, with the Great Wall of China, when I went to China, came back to North Carolina colleges and I spread pictures all over the wall of the classes I was teaching. And next time I made another trip—every time I made a trip, I told my students about it. Now whether they wanted to listen or not, I forced them to listen, because I believe that people need to know these things. But in those days, I don't know, as I preached about segregation.

4:35

Rhonda Mawhood

Do you remember your students ever talking about the poor conditions at their schools?

5:12

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

They were interested in basketball, things the youngsters are interested in. They had a basketball team, football team and things like that. They didn't seem to mind. A lot of people don't mind what they don't know anything about. And they weren't reading the newspapers, they didn't have an inquiring mind, many of them don't have an inquiring minds now. Why do you think we accepted all this all these years? Why do you think we put up with it? It's always been amazing to me. Nowadays, I was reading in the Christian Science Monitor, and I liked that book, yesterday, by the next 10 years, Asian population will exceed the Black population in this country. And they're more vocal than we are.

5:17

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, what are we doing, the Black population? We're playing basketball. That's what our men are doing. Playing basketball, fighting other basketball courts like gladiators, isn't that true? True, we got a lot of millionaires. But White people go in droves to see a lot of Black men out there, one or two Whites, fighting, knocking each other down the basketball court over a ball. Isn't that true? That's what we're doing. All right. We're dancing, now we're having some vocal music on television and making themselves look foolish. Every Black program that are on television is a disgrace, isn't that true? They use all kind of filthy language. Richard Pryor became a millionaire by using the word F-U-C-K, N-I-G-G-E-R, nigger, didn't he? He became famous for that. Flopsy Goldberg or Popsy Goldberg or whatever her name is, she became famous because of the word nigger. That's how she started.

6:10

Rhonda Mawhood

Do you remember Dr. Livingston?

7:10

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And she won an Academy Award. Making fun of our people. Now, The Color Purple and some story, she is good, but most of the time I can't stand her because I always think of her using that word nigger. And we put up with it. We make fun of ourselves. We had dignity, we would not do that.

7:11

Rhonda Mawhood

I was thinking about the changes that you've seen take place over your life and your own reactions to them. Do you remember anything about Black entertainers from this period? From the period of segregation?

7:37

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

In Springfield, Ohio, we had a little girls club. And we had a boys club and they started playing music for little parties that we had. And they ended up with a dance group. And many of them went on to work members of the famous group like Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, and one of my first boyfriends played one of those bands. So I knew most of those magicians, a lot of them came to Springfield, Ohio.

7:58

Rhonda Mawhood

What instrument did your boyfriend play?

8:28

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What'd you say?

8:30

Rhonda Mawhood

What instrument—

8:30

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Trombone.

8:31

Rhonda Mawhood

Trombone, I see.

8:32

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And you see, in Wilberforce, they had bands and they had fraternal life then, everybody was a member of sorority or fraternity. It was our way of life, I guess. Of course everybody's always had them. And we used to play for our own enjoyment and then it got to the place they were playing for our living. Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington. I can't think of some of the rest of them, but many of the boys that I knew played with those famous bands. And when they come to Durham afterwards, after I was grown, my sister and I come down, we knew them. You asked me another question about.

8:34

Rhonda Mawhood

I was just wondering about different kinds of—

9:17

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And I was familiar with Africa, because of the AME Church in Springfield, Ohio. We always had bishops and our bishops always went to Africa, that was their first assignment. And they brought students back from Africa and they used to come and talk with us. So I knew about Africa, knew about the history of Africa. A lot of people didn't know that, if you were an AME.

9:20

Rhonda Mawhood

So this was common in AME Churches. [indistinct 00:09:46]

9:42

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

It gave me a history of my continent. Lot of people, even now, don't tell I'm from Africa, that's nothing over there. Africa is a dark continent. It was called that. I don't know for why it was called dark continent, because people were dark-skinned over there. But not all Africans are Black. Some of them are other color.

9:47

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Some are Black, some of them are brown. The Hottentots were yellow, down in South Africa. The Boris hunted them on horseback, just like they hunted animals and tried to kill all them, the Hottentots, they were small people. Africa has 40 different tribes. It ranges from the [foreign language 00:10:34] to the [foreign language 00:10:38], which are seven feet tall. It has the greatest concentration of animals in the world and the greatest concentration of wealth in the world, so God didn't deny us anything.

10:14

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

He gave us everything in Africa. Gold, silver, all the magnesia, the zinc, the diamonds, everything. And the fact that Black people were stupid enough to let the White people go over there and take it away from them is an indication of how stupid we were. But not all Black people were stupid, some were not. Most people think we had no culture, we had no history. I was just reading about the great Zimbabwe. Did you ever hear the Zimbabwe ruins?

10:51

Rhonda Mawhood

I can't say that I have, no.

11:24

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

A mighty African state flourish from 11th to the 15th century. At the time of the pyramids. This is in Zimbabwe.

11:27

Rhonda Mawhood

People don't realize what a long and rich history Africa has. The African students whom your teacher—excuse me, your preacher, brought back from Africa, did they speak to Sunday schools and to church—

11:39

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, no. Some of them were—remember they were illiterate as far as we were concerned. They were learning English language. They speaks so many different dialects too. They have about 400 different dialects there. But they were no different from the English, we were fighting with picks—Hundred Year War, the English and French Hundred Year War.

11:54

Rhonda Mawhood

Sure. Did your parents tell you stories of family history when you were a girl when were growing up?

12:17

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, my mother knew about her own family history, but I don't think people sat down and talked about as much as they should, they should have told us more. Of course my grandmother died before I was born. And my father's sister, whose picture I have, was my favorite aunt. I wish she had told me more of the family history of the Reynolds as my family. I wish she had.

12:31

Rhonda Mawhood

When they did tell you things about your family, what sort of things would they talk about? Or did they not want to talk about it?

13:00

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

No, it wasn't a matter of that. I guess they had other things to do. I just—do you know your family history?

13:09

Rhonda Mawhood

I know some of it, yes, but some of it is missing. My grandmother was an orphan and so she never really wanted to talk about her family very—

13:21

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

No, it wasn't a taboo thing. It wasn't that at all.

13:30

Rhonda Mawhood

My family until my parents were very poor—

13:35

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I have deeds to the property that my sister, my father's home place, which I'll show you, that I finally had to sell because I couldn't keep it up in Springfield, Ohio. I wasn't going back there. But all my father's people are buried in Springfield. He's buried on the soldier's mound. My father's surrounded by his comrades in Ferncliff, which is a beautiful cemetery. The rest of the rentals is my father's mother, his brother, his two sisters are buried in the family plot. And there are places for me and my sister and my mother, but we will be buried down here in Durham. I had a cousin who kept up with the family history and I have some deeds to the family that went back to 1864 of the property that they bought.

13:37

Rhonda Mawhood

In Ohio.

14:35

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

In Ohio.

14:36

Rhonda Mawhood

I see. And they bought that property in 1864, your family members—

14:38

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

My grandfather, when he came back from the Civil War, he bought that property.

14:44

Rhonda Mawhood

I see. So did your grandfather, returned to Ohio from the Civil War, or had he grown up in Ohio?

14:48

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

He had not grown up in Ohio. He was half White. His father was White, and his mother was Black. He never knew anything about his father. But he looked like a White man. According to his enlisted papers, they say Black, but you'll see his picture 10 type, he looks like a White man. He came to Ohio after the Civil War when he's mustered out and met my grandmother and married her. Now our mother's father, Sandy Pettiford, his father brought them from North Carolina too, after the Civil War.

14:58

Rhonda Mawhood

Really?

15:32

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And he was born in Chillicothe, Ohio. And he married my mother—grandmother in Chillicothe. And they moved to Yellow Springs, Ohio. And that's where he lived and died.

15:32

Rhonda Mawhood

And your husband, Dr. Livingston?

15:49

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Texas.

15:52

Rhonda Mawhood

From Texas?

15:53

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

He was born in Texas. He died in Texas. He's buried there.

15:54

Rhonda Mawhood

And when did he come to Durham?

16:00

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I beg your pardon?

16:02

Rhonda Mawhood

And when did your husband move to Durham?

16:03

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

My husband's never in Durham.

16:06

Rhonda Mawhood

I see. So you lived—I'm sorry, I'm confused. [indistinct 00:16:12]

16:08

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

We lived in Texas. My husband—Dr. Bruce, lived in Durham. That's my sister's husband. That was his home.

16:11

Rhonda Mawhood

I see. I'm sorry, I hadn't asked you if you had lived in Texas. So how did you get to Texas, Dr. Livingston?

16:17

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I married my husband in New York City. I was working for the Department of Welfare. After I left Durham, I went back home to Springfield, Ohio and got a political job. I was the first Black girl to work in the County Treasurer's Office as a deputy, collected taxes. The state of Ohio changed its tax laws and we worked from eight in the morning till eight or night for six weeks putting the laws on the books. It was awful frustrating. Anyhow I stayed there two years and I didn't like it. And I left and went to New York and worked for the Urban League for two years as a secretary, National Urban League. Then the Depression came in the 30s and I worked for the city of New York as an investigator, a social worker. Went to social work school.

16:24

Rhonda Mawhood

I see. A relief investigator?

17:16

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Yes.

17:19

Rhonda Mawhood

I see.

17:19

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Of course that was not my cup of tea because I'm not a good social worker. I believe some people are lazy and they don't deserve help.

17:19

Rhonda Mawhood

So how long were you a social worker?

17:29

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Seven years. And I met my husband there and married him. And then, when he went back to Texas to go open his drug store, then I joined him there. After he died, I sold out the business and came back to Durham. Was invited to teach school at that same high school where I'd worked before, my mother was with me and I was adrift and sort of bewildered. I worked there two years. One day I came home and I said, "I'll scrub floors, I'll not go back there again." Is the end of my teaching experience at public high school. That's when I joined the Red Cross. When I came back from the Red Cross, Dr. Shepard asked me to come down to the college. And that was the beginning of my experience at the college. I stayed there from 1947, I believe, until 1971. And then I went to South Carolina State, then I told you what happened.

17:32

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes, ma'am. Decided not to do that anymore.

18:33

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What'd you say?

18:36

Rhonda Mawhood

I said, Yes ma'am. You decided not to do that anymore, not to teach anymore.

18:37

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

It can be enjoyable if you have people that want to learn, but if you had a lot of people that want to sit there and—they passed all these rules, unlimited cuts in class, all that sort of things. You don't have to go to class. Isn't that true?

18:43

Hasan Jeffries

Yes ma'am.

18:56

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Some people just took advantage of it. Some teachers would give one exam a semester and that was a grade. Well, they didn't need to be in class did they? If they did that. So that's why students don't learn. That's why they don't know anything. That's why they can stay in school and end up four years and can't read.

18:57

Rhonda Mawhood

There was one thing I wanted to ask you briefly about your husband if you don't mind which is, he had a drugstore, was he a pharmacist himself?

19:20

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What'd you say?

19:26

Rhonda Mawhood

Was your husband a pharmacist?

19:27

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Yes.

19:28

Rhonda Mawhood

I see. Where did he receive his pharmacist training?

19:29

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Meharry. Did you hear, Meharry?

19:34

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes, ma'am. I see.

19:34

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

See there were just two schools that educated Black professionals, Meharry and Howard. Nowadays, the barriers are down.

19:38

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes.

19:46

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

When those days when Black men wanted to go to bigger—to doctor, to dentist, pharmacist, he has to go to Howard or Meharry. And how those men educate themselves? They worked on boats, they worked on Pullman cars. They worked every summer, to say they might go back to school.

19:47

Rhonda Mawhood

What did your husband do during the summers to earn the money?

20:09

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Worked on a Pullman car, worked on a boat. Didn't expect their parents to send them because it's expensive. So they had a vast fraternity in the summer. All Meharry men knew each other. Are you from Durham?

20:12

Hasan Jeffries

No, ma'am.

20:28

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I was about to tell you one time you would go to the scene, there'd be all Meharry men, graduates from Meharry. Now of course they're different. You have men from every—they have a lot of Duke men now in Durham. That's what integration will do for us. It's a wonderful thing

20:29

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And you have to have it. How else can you learn if everybody wants to stick together like that? I do not approve of having a Black building out to Duke. I do not approve of that. If they get that, then the Irish can have one, the Germans can have one, the Muslims can have one. Pretty soon you just have a little culture center all over the campus. That is not the purpose of it, do you think so? You can maintain your dignity, your culture identity in different ways, by good grades, by the kind of scholarship that you achieve, what you do on the campus.

20:48

Rhonda Mawhood

When you were a professor at Central for many years, were these the kinds of values that you were trying to instill in students?

21:33

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Which I believe in.

21:42

Rhonda Mawhood

And did you try to communicate these values to your students?

21:43

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Yes.

21:46

Rhonda Mawhood

How receptive did you find your students there in the 1940s?

21:51

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, some of us were supposed to be stern teachers. Some people use the word M-E-A-N, which is not a good term to apply, means hatred, addictive. I'm a stern teacher, always was a stern teacher, but I thought that I gave my students something. I thought they learned.

21:55

Rhonda Mawhood

I'd like to ask you a little bit about the courses that the students took in the Business Administration department at Central at the time. What kinds of courses were offered through the Business Administration Department?

22:13

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Heavens.

22:26

Rhonda Mawhood

I'm sorry. It's my own ignorance. It's changed and I'm not sure—

22:28

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, I couldn't say, there were so many courses. Now you have different—marketing of course became the thing, everybody's getting a degree in marketing, finance.

22:32

Rhonda Mawhood

But you were teaching things—

22:46

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I taught mostly teachers.

22:48

Rhonda Mawhood

I see.

22:50

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Teachers. Methods courses, business management, office management, office machines, things like that, and typing. The accounting course would be handled by the County Department, they have so many different schools. Nowadays, everything is different for everything. Are you in school now?

22:51

Hasan Jeffries

Yes, ma'am. I go to Morehouse College.

23:13

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Did you go to school?

23:15

Hasan Jeffries

I'm still in school now.

23:17

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Which one?

23:18

Hasan Jeffries

Morehouse.

23:18

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Where?

23:18

Hasan Jeffries

Morehouse College.

23:21

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Morehouse College.

23:22

Hasan Jeffries

Yes ma'am.

23:23

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well then you can tell me what you have in your Business Administration course. What do you have down there?

23:25

Hasan Jeffries

They have the same thing, marketing—

23:29

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Departmentalized, don't you? Finance, management, marketing, right?

23:30

Hasan Jeffries

Yes, ma'am.

23:37

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Real estate. What else? Certainly accounting.

23:38

Hasan Jeffries

Accounting.

23:45

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

That's one of the biggest ones.

23:45

Hasan Jeffries

Right.

23:50

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What are you majoring in?

23:50

Hasan Jeffries

History, ma'am.

23:52

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

History?

23:53

Hasan Jeffries

Yes, ma'am.

23:54

Rhonda Mawhood

And when you were teaching at Central, Dr. Livingston, did you have both equal numbers of men and women in your class or more women than men or vice versa?

23:57

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, usually, in a methods course, you would have more women because men do not go in for teaching. Few. I understand. Of course, nowadays in the Department of Business, the teaching field has been moved to the Education department, is no longer there. Typewriting is a thing of the past. Shorthand is out. When you think all the years you spent going up and down writing those little scribbles and things, teaching people how to do it. Nobody uses shorthand anymore. I have an IBM typewriter there. My eyesight is poor and my coordination is poor and I can hardly use it anymore. Nobody teaches shorthand anymore and nobody teaches typing anymore. Yet you're supposed to know how to type. How you do? Pick it up. Do you type?

24:08

Hasan Jeffries

Yes, ma'am.

24:57

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

How'd you learn it?

24:58

Hasan Jeffries

Actually, my mother showed—

25:00

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

You what?

25:02

Hasan Jeffries

My mother showed me how.

25:03

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Times have changed.

25:07

Rhonda Mawhood

Certainly. Were there other chairwomen at North Carolina Central when you were there? You were the chair lady of the Business Administration Department. I'm wondering if you were the only woman in such a position or if there were others?

25:09

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

In fact, when I came back the last time as a visiting professor, the chairman of the division was a girl I taught, Marian Thorne. Dr. Thorne.

25:27

Rhonda Mawhood

What about when you were teaching at Central yourself? Were there other chair—chairwomen at the time?

25:35

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What do you mean chairwomen?

25:43

Rhonda Mawhood

Well, female chairmen of the department.

25:45

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I wasn't chairman of the Department of North Carolina Central.

25:47

Rhonda Mawhood

I thought that you were.

25:49

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

At South Carolina I was.

25:50

Rhonda Mawhood

South Carolina. I see.

25:51

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

South Carolina, the English department. Dr. Pars had the English department. And Dr.—I can't think when they had the Home Department. There were three of us in South Carolina who was chair.

25:53

Rhonda Mawhood

Do you remember, roughly, how many other professors in business administration there were at Central when you were there?

26:08

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

At Central?

26:16

Rhonda Mawhood

At Central.

26:16

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

North Carolina Central?

26:17

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes, ma'am.

26:17

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

How many what?

26:18

Rhonda Mawhood

Were there many other professors of business administration in the department? Was it a large department?

26:20

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Fourbrag was head of department for many years. I don't know.

26:27

Rhonda Mawhood

It's not such an important question. One of the things that I wanted to ask you about that was whether were there mostly women teaching in that department or men also, in business administration?

26:36

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Business administration, mostly men.

26:49

Rhonda Mawhood

Mostly men. I see.

26:52

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Member County was a big feature of it.

26:54

Rhonda Mawhood

And that was mostly men, who taught that. I see. Do you think that your experience as a teacher was different being a woman than the experiences of your male colleagues? Or do you not think that that mattered?

26:57

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

My experience different from anybody else? I don't think so. Why?

27:18

Rhonda Mawhood

I was just wondering if you thought that being a woman maybe was an advantage or a disadvantage at work, it may not have come up that much, but it might have. So I'm just wondering if it did come up.

27:24

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I can't think of it. I thought I had a picture here, of the teachers at that time, three or four of us.

27:38

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I don't know. I had a picture here of—well, the last time I was, four or five of us in the Department of Education at North Carolina Central, we were all women. One man died, Turner, the rest were women.

28:12

Rhonda Mawhood

There's a photograph of you here, but you're with all men in the picture.

28:26

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

That's at South Carolina State.

28:31

Rhonda Mawhood

South Carolina. I see.

28:35

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, South Carolina State, there I am. That was my Dean of the School of Educa—School of Business Administration. This was from Ernst & Ernst who was setting up a scholarship. These two were setting up scholarships. And these were two—an African professor of the Accounting, Indian professor of Accounting and American professor of Accounting. Those were two accounting—all three accounting. This was a Harvard accounting man. He's from Harvard. These three accounting men. There's my Dean, there I am. And these are from Ernst & Ernst setting up a scholarship for us.

28:36

Rhonda Mawhood

I see.

29:21

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Now, that was a South Carolina state where I was chairman. In North Carolina, I was assistant chairman of—Assistant Professor of Business. Don't get me wrong, I was never chairman of North Carolina Central. Never. I was only an assistant professor there, until I came back in 1975 as a visiting professor. At that time, I was a professor from South Carolina State and I came back as a visiting professor. Thank you.

29:26

Rhonda Mawhood

You were talking earlier, Dr. Livingston, about taking the train from Ohio to Durham.

30:03

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

When you get wet through West Virginia and Virginia, you had to move out your seat and take a seat in the engine.

30:13

Rhonda Mawhood

Had you been expecting that when you got the train?

30:23

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

No. And the porter took great pleasure. A Black porter took great pleasure telling you to move.

30:28

Rhonda Mawhood

A Black porter? Do you remember how you answered him when he told you to move?

30:33

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I didn't answer him. I just got up and moved. I asked why and he said that was the law.

30:44

Rhonda Mawhood

Thank you.

30:48

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

They had a system. It's funny afterwards. They wanted you to be the last, and yet they put you first because you're right behind the engine. That's because if the windows were open, the soot from the engine would fall on you. Their system, segregation, has been funny if you—it's been tragic, but it's been funny if you think about it. But segregated, they'd put you right behind the engine, so the soot would fall on you. And most of the time they were putting you in the back. You follow me? Funny, funny, funny.

30:54

Rhonda Mawhood

Do you remember anything about your first impressions of Durham when you got off the train and your first little while here?

31:25

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

No, I don't. I don't remember. It came a little dinky up there, which is no longer, it was a little dinky railroad track. And you walked across the railroad track before you got to Hayti, which was the beginning of the Black section of Durham. And we had a lot of Heritage Square. You know where that is?

31:37

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes, ma'am.

32:04

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

They had a play down there last week talking about all the businesses that were down in Hayti, shoe shops and hairdressing parlors and restaurants and all the things that Black people like and provide, White people do too, but they were privately owned. As I said, I was impressed by the North Carolina Mutual, which was uptown and at a sixth story building that the Mutual had just bought and owned

32:05

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Mr. Cici's father was the president of the Mutual. And I was very impressed with that. I was also impressed with the bank down there, The Mechanics and Farmer's Bank and the Mutual Savings Loan, which is now, as you know, a very large institution, getting ready to corporate. I have most of my money down there, in The Mechanics and Farmers Bank because I'm very proud of my people and I would bank with them. They had a building, they had office space, desk space in The Mechanics and Farmers Bank until they were able to get a building of their own, which they did in two years. Lincoln Hospital at that time was owned and operated partly by Black people, Negro physicians were trained at Lincoln Hospital, nurses were trained there. My sister worked there for 47 years as a registered librarian, medical record librarian, because she met Dr. Bruce when she was here, came to work and married him, came back.

32:36

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And those were things to be proud of in Durham, it's businesses. But the school system remained in shambles and somehow they never got ahold of that. It's because, I think, that Professor Pearson, who became a wealthy man, operate the school system for Colored people and he put up with it. And he used it as his project and he ran it any way he wanted to and they let him run it. And I think that that was the reason for it, if he'd been different type of man, I think the school system would've been stronger. But he was satisfied. He had a big house. He'd rather teach us home where all the teachers lived, two of them. He was a big AME and a Masonic man and he just liked the way things were.

33:40

Rhonda Mawhood

Did you think, Dr. Livingston, that things for Black people in North Carolina were better than other parts of the South or the same?

34:39

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Well, if I had to live in the South, I would only live in Atlanta or Durham. I wouldn't live anyplace else.

34:49

Rhonda Mawhood

Why Atlanta?

34:54

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

When I went to South Carolina I thought I was going to be the worst place in the world. But at South Carolina State College is a beautiful school, because they only had one school that they operated for Black people, and Strom Thurmond gave them everything they wanted and they kept him in office. That's how he's been in office for 40—that's how that old devil's been in office all this time, because of Black people keep him there. I don't understand why, but they keep him there.

34:56

Rhonda Mawhood

When you were living, the time that you spent in Durham, especially in the 1920s and '30s, did you have much contact with White people when you were living here?

35:25

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I say, I came '25 and left in '29. I didn't come back until '42.

35:41

Rhonda Mawhood

So in those years, in the 1920s and then again in the 1940s, did you have contact with White people in Durham?

35:46

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

When I came back in '42, after my husband died, I stayed here two years—Three years, then I left again. No, my contacts with White people, I guess, came after I retired because that's when I worked for recent recovery and out to the Veterans Hospital, if that's what you're talking about.

35:58

Rhonda Mawhood

I was thinking about any kind of contact whatsoever, just wondering.

36:25

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And I had enjoyed both of those experiences very much. When my sister worked at Lincoln Hospital all those years, and I used to go up and take dictation from Mr. Rich sometimes when he was pushed just as to help him out, right there for him, personal as he didn't want anybody else to take. If I had time. Did I have any White friends? I work for the Women's League for Peace and I've been a member of Women's League for Peace for a hundred years it looks like. And so I had plenty of contacts with them. I sit and appear reading one of the letters, Women's League for Peace the other day. And when I went to China, I was the first person in Women's League for Peace to report on China. Went over to Chapel Hill, the branch in Chapel Hill. So I had plenty of contact with lovely White people over there and in Durham too.

36:31

Rhonda Mawhood

I think that we've covered most of the things that we wanted to ask about. Do you have something, Hassan?

37:49

Hasan Jeffries

I know you—Dr. Livingston?

37:55

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What'd you say?

37:59

Rhonda Mawhood

Hassan would like to ask you a question.

38:01

Hasan Jeffries

I know you mentioned the—

38:04

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I didn't put my hearing aid. What'd you say?

38:05

Hasan Jeffries

I was wondering if you were in a sorority, at all?

38:08

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What sorority did I belong to?

38:10

Hasan Jeffries

Yes, ma'am.

38:12

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I'm a Delta. I've been a Delta for 28 years and I'm not old. I've been [indistinct 00:38:18] for 50 years out of my Lambda, a Delta.

38:13

Rhonda Mawhood

I know that sororities are pretty secret a lot of the time, but can you give us an idea of what kinds of things the sorority would do when you were at Wilberforce, for example?

38:20

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

When I was at Wilberforce?

38:40

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes, ma'am. Or later, even.

38:40

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

When I was at Wilberforce, and I believe [indistinct 00:38:45].

38:42

Hasan Jeffries

Really?

38:45

Rhonda Mawhood

I see.

38:45

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

The sororities and fraternities in those days were excellent opportunities for young men, young women to go around to different churches and tell the young people about their programs. Are you a fraternity man?

38:53

Hasan Jeffries

Yes ma'am.

39:06

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Which one?

39:06

Hasan Jeffries

Kappa.

39:07

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

Kappa. Kappa Alpha Psi?

39:08

Hasan Jeffries

Yes ma'am.

39:09

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

That's home in Wilberforce. Kappa Alpha Psi. My husband was a brother of Kappa Alpha Psi, and they had the guide right program. They used to come to our church, every month we'd have a fraternity at our church, a sorority, something like that. And they were educational and cultural experiences that I enjoyed, and still do. In those days, we had strict rules. Now when you see in the paper where somebody was accusing the Omegas of doing an initiation of raping somebody, you wonder what kind of people they take in.

39:10

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

We were very careful about people we took in. Now everybody can go. You didn't have girls that had babies in sororities in those days. So people have let the barriers down every place. I always thought there's potential for wonderful things in the sororities, fraternities and I still believe in them. I still believe in them. Scholarships, thousands of dollars of scholarships that help and aid. They're big businesses now. Both the two ladies Deltas and Alpha Kappa Alpha are very wealthy. We have enormous budgets.

39:48

Rhonda Mawhood

And have you stayed in contact over the years with sorority systems?

40:29

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

I'm still am still in contact with them. In fact, the Deltas just bought this big building down here. And I'm in contact with my pocketbook. I don't go to meetings. I can if I want to, but it's too much trouble. But I'm still a member, I'm still active. And I'm proud of what they're doing.

40:35

Rhonda Mawhood

Thank you. You had mentioned that you wanted to show us some—

40:58

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

And I belong to two honorary fraternities too. The business education. Oh my god. Five Delta Kappa. I can't even think. It's on that piece of paper, I believe. And one of them is in business administration and one is business teachers.

41:05

Rhonda Mawhood

I did get one of them, yes.

41:24

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

What is it? So they're teacher—

41:27

Rhonda Mawhood

Delta Pi Epsilon. Delta Pi Epsilon, isn't that it? Life member. And that's of teachers, it's a teachers organization.

41:28

Omeda Reynolds Livingston

It's from NYU. The oldest chapter in the country, NYU. Now you want to see some of those on the porch?

41:40

Rhonda Mawhood

Yes, ma'am. Thank you. I will turn off the tape recorder.

41:53

Omeda Livingston interview recording, 1993 May 28

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1. Omeda Livingston administrative file, 1993

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Omeda Livingston interview recording, 1993 May 28

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John Hope Franklin Research Center

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