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Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview A-0356, in
the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical
Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill”
Civil rights activist and NAACP leader Modjeska Simkins recalls the civil rights struggle in South Carolina in this spirited interview. Simkins was active in social welfare and civil rights organizations in her state, emerging as a leader in the Columbia, South Carolina, branch of the NAACP. Simkins reflects on race and history in the United States and on the nation's violent past, and provides anecdotes of activism and life in the pre-World War II segregated South.
Civil rights leader Modjeska Simkins discusses race and civil rights before World War II.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
Everett Otis Andrews.
Otis Whitfield, he was named for Whitfield, a Whitfield I guess of South Carolina history. He fought a duel, one of the Tillmans.
Yes, Pitchfork Ben. He was a bad member wasn't he? You all planted these trees? That's a live oak.
They came up.
Oh, really? What is this one here?
It's what you call a White Oak.
A White Oak?
Yes.
It's got a wisteria vine in it and it's huge.
My husband's people lived in Summerville, so when they sold that property, we decided we wanted to bring something to remind us, so we brought the wisteria from Summerville, South Carolina.
How old is this house?
We don't know. Our deed goes back and I'll be glad to show that our deed goes back to when Sherman burnt the courthouse, and it says in there . . . I will show it to you. I can put my hands on it very quickly. Sherman burnt Columbia in '65. It was February 18, I believe, 1865. The came through here and then they went north, right by the property where I was [later] reared.
So you grew up not far from here?
I grew up out on [highway] 21 which is the road to Charlotte. The old road to Charlotte. Old 21 goes to Charlotte.
How far out from town?
About five miles. That's where all the family lived except for my sister.
We have a sister in Birmingham. I mean Michigan—Ann Arbor Michigan. Her
husband [unclear]
You were a social worker?
I was everything from a busy body to a hell-raiser. Yes, I would say I was a social worker when I started out. My parents were people that were always concerned about others, or the disadvantaged or under the pressure of being mistreated. They reared us that they and they also reared us to believe that no one was better than ourselves unless they behaved better than we did. So I never suffered from an inferiority complex. And in these days I would curse out anybody—trashy white folks and the press.
You just don't take any lip off anybody?
No, I never have. I don't try to get anybody to get into anything, but if put in a corner I'll fight my way out.
Well, when somebody is courteous to you you are always courteous back to them.
Yes.
I never knew you to ever be just mean to somebody . . .
No, I wasn't reared that way.
No, you've got good manners.
I had a policemand said he was a Klansman, call me one day. I said, come
on up here as long as you stay on the sidewalk it's alright. I said if
you get on my property somebody might [laughs]
I want to show you something that you probably have seen before. That's a list of the people that attended the Southern Race Relations Conference in Durham in 1942. It starts on that page and it goes over, there's quite a few names on there. Your name is one of them.
Yes, I was there.
You're the only person that I've been able to identify, so far, who was at that meeting whose still living. If you see anybody else on there that you know is still living I wish you'd point them out to me.
I know that Jordan Hancock is gone,
Charles Johnson, he was a great man, wasn't he?
Yes, he was. I knew most of the others.
Gordon Foster gone?
Oh, yes.
Luther Foster, I mean.
H. B. Butler is gone, he was really sweet. And Adams. I don't know about old J. A. Bacote. Is he still living?
I don't know. Okay, let me turn this over because that's repeated over there and you can see the whole name. You think he might be?
I never thought he was gone.
Yes, ma'am.
Benedict College, call out there—they will know.
Yes, ma'am, you said he is.
No, he's gone. Bacote is gone.
You changed your mind about him, then?
I'm almost sure he's gone. You can call Benedict.
Or even look in the phone book, maybe.
Oh, I see.
She came from Virginia.
No, this was in Durham.
I didn't know
James Jackson? where is he?
He's up in Hampton, Virginia. He and his wife are living.
Where did they identify him there as being . . .
Southern Negro Youth Congress. He and Esther are still living.
In Hampton?
No, they are not in Hampton. He was head of the youth congress in Birmingham. We had that trouble down there. Who was that old governor that went down there?
I forget his name.
We had so much with the old police chief.
Yes, with Bull Connor.
He was a bull, too.
He was. But you say James Jackson . . .
He and his wife were both outstanding civil rights workers.
And you say where I might find them.
It will come to me in a little bit. I'm ninety years old but my brain ain't what it used to be.
When's your birthday?
December 5, 1899. Rufus Clement, is he still living?
Rufus Clement, no ma'am, he's gone.
You called him Jack?
We called him that in the work field.
And his wife's name is Esther?
Did you finish that page?
Yeah, I finished it.
Look on the next page. There's a few more names over there.
Lee's gone,
So you probably are the only one? Unless the Jacksons'.
Yes, I know the Jacksons' are still living. very fine young people, young
to me.
Where do you think they are?
I know where they are. It will come to me.
What state?
They are in Virginia. Almost sure it's Virginia. My brain's about worn out, child.
No, I don't see any sign of that. Let me see if I can get you to focus on something for me. You went to Durham. Do you remember where that meeting took place in Durham?
As I remember it was at the college there.
At the North Carolina Central.
Yes, [James] Sheppard . . .
Sheppard? Is he on this list?
Let's see, it's alphabetical order. I saw it a while ago. I have a house
in the back that has a lot of my old stuff.
I'm writing about that period of time in the 30's and 40's when these meetings were taking place. It was at the college?
Who was I talking about?
Sheppard.
Yeah, I remember him well.
It wasn't at the insurance company or the bank was it?
I don't know why I thought it was at the college . . . It could have been. I believe you are right, I believe it was at the North Carolina Mutual Insurance Co. But now, I'll tell you who knows where, a fellow named Clemmons. Did you ever run into Clemmons? He's retired now but he's still in Durham.
Clemmon?
His name will come to me, but he's originally from Charleston. I talked
to him the other day. I was somewhere where they asked me to speak up in
North Carolina the other day.
Sheppard.
Why isn't any of this in alphabetical order? When I pick up something like this I put it in alphabetical order.
Do you remember that Gordon Hancock and P.B. Young were kind of the leaders of that?
Yes, I knew them both.
Is that the way you remember it that they were pretty much in charge?
Yes, but Gordon Hancock was the initiator.
He was the one?
Yes. I'm going in a minute and get that envelope. When you write my name put the "p" out on it. It's Simkins.
Okay, good. I meant to ask you that.
My husband's daddy was an old slaveowner over there, and his daddy was
the slaveowner's son. He took me
Do I have the rest of it spelled right, Modjeska?
Yes. I had to carry that a long time. When I was born there was a Polish woman who was well known at that time, actress, and her name was Helena, her first name was Helena. My mother's baby sister thought it was a beautiful name and she loaded me up with that and I've been toting it all these years.
Her name was Helena Modjeska?
Helena Modjeska, she was a Polish actress. You can look that up in the biographical sketch somewhere, but that was her surname. Here's James Sheppard, President of North Carolina College, Durham.
And he's gone though?
Yes, I'm almost sure he is.
Do you remember anything much about that meeting? About what went on there?
No, I really don't know.
It was in October of '42.
Well, at that time, I know it would have concerned getting the ballot.
Yes, that was one of the issues. Another issue that was real hot was whether or not this group of people ought to come four square against segregation. All the Jim Crow laws. One side was arguing to do that and the other side was arguing no, if we do that we're going to kill off all the hope we ever would have of having any kind of white support and we've got to have white support in order to ever pull this thing off. So what we better say is that we're against segregation but we recognize that for the time being we've got to live within the boundaries of it.
I don't remember that and I wouldn't have been a part of it if I had.
You would have been on the side saying you got to come down against it.
Yes. I guess that's the reason I wasn't part of the decision making.
The decision was made not to. Charles Johnson wrote the statement and it's very carefully worded to say that this group is unalterably opposed to segregation but they at this time are not choosing to demand that all the segregation laws be taken off the books. Save that until later.
That was somewhat the spirit of the time. I guess maybe I've always been
bull-headed—I just ran right straight into the power structure all the
time.
Po-tacky, is that what you call them?
Well, they call them that. You see, there's various names, like there was for Negroes—like poor white trash. But a lot of them call them po-tacky. Po-tacky is widely used. You see that was the place of cracker.
Right.
Buckra, but they would say po buckra and then they call the white folks big buckra. They didn't say rich buckra they say big buckra and po buckra..
Buckra was a term for white people?
Yes. Do you know the derivation of the word buckra?
I see. I never knew what the origin of that term was.
Buckra. I studied and was keenly interested in Gulla for years. Then in
history, back of the Christian Era. See, a lot of people don't know,
especially poor whites and the average Negro doesn't. They think and
name the word that the time Christ was born. And the ones that talk
about
Teach it as it was.
There is no need to get mad with those people who did something back
then. They were working in the atmosphere of their times and all they
knew what to do was what they did. The overseers, and the masters and
all. Sleeping around, got in the [Laughter]
What were you doing in all those places?
My daddy was a builder.
A builder?
Yes. There was a construction company. You see, being born when I was the South was evolving from an agricultural empire to an industrial empire. A lot of mills, Cotton mills were being built. My daddy had charge of the brick work for a company called the T.C. Thompson Brothers out of Nashville.
Yes, I remember that in Nashville history.
Yes, well he had charge of the people, he was a very fine bricklayer.
When we had the trouble in
Ya'll traveled around with him when he'd go to a job ya'll would go?
Most of the time, until I got old enough to go to school.
Were you the only child?
The oldest child.
How many children?
Eight.
Eight children.
They're all gone now but me.
And you were the oldest?
Yes.
So, when you got old enough to go to school, ya'll came back to Columbia?
Yes. The family came back but he continued to go out. Depended on what job he worked. We had our home already. When my daddy had another idea and he brought his boys up the same way. A man shouldn't be married until he had a home fit to take his wife in. When he married my mother— the house was standing.
Out there on the highway?
No, we went out . . . I'll tell you the story about that.
That was earlier.
That was on Pine Steet here in Columbia. In my girlhood all a girl had to do was go to work anywhere and make a little extra change. Work in white folks homes, nurse the babies, roll them around in carriages and my daddy's mother who was black as three midnights. She was born in 1840, somewhere in the 40's. When Freedom was declared she was working in the home of this white family, kind of well-to-do. Anyway, as the old folks used to say, the head of that family bedded my grandmother, black as homemade sin, and here come my pretty brown-skinned daddy.
So it was the white master of that home. . . .
Master of the home but not the slaver. He [my father] was born in 1870.
Where did you go?
I went to Benedict College. I went there the first day I went to school .
. . see the Yankees came down and founded that school and they had—clear
up through college. I started there in first grade and finished college
there. They gave you a lesson they had for the day, you got it that day,
you didn't bring it back tomorrow. One nice thing about
When did you finally finish out there?
Benedict? I finished there in 1917 in what they called the LI. My
licenciate of instruction. It was not like high school when you say 12th
grade, it was whatever the kind of school . . . anybody finishing that
could teach in any of the public schools in the state, any other school
for that matter. And then you went to college, you went four years and
you got
Did you stay on and do that?
I did that. I finished Benedict in 1921.
Then what did you do after that? Did you start teaching school?
I taught at Benedict one year. Then I went into the city schools. I
wanted to teach mathematics. They didn't have an opening in the city
school that year so I went and taught at Benedict for one year and the
next year I went into the city school. They did not have mathematics so
I taught in the elementary department one year and then after that I
taught algebra until I married. At that time married teachers couldn't
teach in the city schools systems. So when I married I got a husband but
lost a job. So then after maybe a year or so . . . at that time not only
in South Carolina but in the history of medicine or the history of
health, you see at that time the incidence of tuberculosis was very high
among blacks. The South Carolina Tuberculosis Association, that board
decided that the problem was so real that they wanted to set up a
special program for blacks so they organized a bunch of Negroes called
the South Carolina Tuberculosis Committee. The main thing was called the
South Carolina Tuberculosis Association, which was a state wide
organization. Now, the South Carolina Tuberculosis Committee made some
kind of survey and they found and at that some time. . . . South
Carolina at that time made all the southern states I guess for that
matter there were some counties that were more
You mean you stayed in that job all that time?
Yes, I stayed in there until, I think it was 1953 or 1954. The record
will show it if you want to tighten down on that. I can get it. The year
that I came out, the last seal sale I ran was $32,000. Now, in the
meantime, the South Carolina NAACP had already organized in South
Carolina at that time, about eleven counties I guess it was. They had
some kind of NAACP organization. They decided they would organize a
state body. So I worked with them without a salary. I just worked as
a
Yes, I know. They were so shocked by that that they don't know how to react to it.
And then she was a member of the southern Presbyterian church. You know
they put out all kinds of
You stayed on?
I stayed for awhile.
But that was effectively the end of your work for them?
Yes.
Yes, they hide behind that stuff. Let me back you up to something else. You know the Southern Conference for Human Welfare meeting you went to in Birmingham last December?
Yes.
That was to celebrate. . . . It was the Southern Conference for Human Welfare.
Last year?
Yes. I guess
Fiftieth anniversary.
Yes, in 1938.
Yes.
When I talked to you down there then you said you were not there in 1938.
I was not at that very first meeting. I was working then. I was on a job where I couldn't get off. I sent, I may have told you then, someone and told them to report to me what happened. A fellow named Seymour Carroll went there. If you ever run across the name of Richard Carroll, in old South Carolina black history stuff, that was his daddy. Seymour Carroll went down and he called to tell me what was happening.
And you subsequently became a member of that organization?
Oh, yes. I was an initial member. I was one of the what you call founding
members but I
Right. Then there was about two years later a meeting in Chattanooga. Did you go to that one?
I don't whether it was that one but I did go Chattanooga up there where a fellow just died not long ago.
Myles Horton?
Horton, yes. I knew him when he was a young man. Yes, I was up there, I'm almost sure I was. I just can't remember all those things.
Ms. Roosevelt came to both of those meetings. She was in Birmingham in 1938 and then she came up to Chattanooga in 1940.
I'll tell you about something that happened
Right, separated, had to sit separately.
Yes, they had to have a barrier between them. That's the way Anne Braden got the title for her book.
The Wall Between, yes.
It was suppose to be a natural barrier.
Yes.
We went to that courthouse, have you even been to the courthouse in
Birmingham? It's not like our courthouse here, our courthouse. . . .
This is the courthouse floor in Birmingham, now here's the center and on
each side of this great big
A ruler.
They brought her the yardstick. She said, "Now measure from that chair to this chair." And they did that not knowing where she was coming from. She said, "Now find the mark half way between us, and put an x." which they did. "Now bring me a chair." And she told them to set it so the middle of the chair was over that x. I was telling the crowd about it so and I said Mrs. Roosevelt sat in that chair over that x with one of her hands on one side of that x and one of hands on the other. That's the way she sat the whole meeting. Yes, she did. Now I was down there when Glen Taylor, you know who Glen Taylor is?
No, now what about that?
We brought him down there to the Southern Negro Youth Conference. Southern Negro Youth Conference was one of those organizations blackballed by the Dies Committee. Glen Taylor was out of South Dakota, I think. He came down there. You heard about Bull Connor, I guess.
Right.
Well, Bull Connor—have you ever been to Birmingham?
Yes.
Now here's your courthouse, here's a street, yard goes right on the
street. Right across on that corner over there from the courthouse, at
that time was a little three room house. White folks been living here
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
He was already in town, I knew he was in, I don't know whether he had
already picked up a hotel room or not. He may have come in on a plane
that morning. [Laughter]
Carried them all to jail?
Put them in the Birmingham jail. Yes, sir. I've been in there, been in
Bull Connor's office in the Birmingham jail. We go in the Birmingham
jail and get our
Tell me something about Gordon Hancock and P.B. Young. Did you know them real well?
I met P.B. Young
He did?
Yes, he finished Benedict College.
Did you know him then?
I knew him as a young girl, you know a child. He was up in college.
He was older?
Yes, he was older. He was the moving spirit in the Southern Regional Council.
Yes, that's what this meeting was the start of.
Yes, that's right. On the strength of that that's when he invited me to
come up to this meeting because the old folks that he knew at Benedict
and around the state
You knew him pretty well then?
Knew him well. I knew him the better part of forty years. See I'm ninety years old.
He really was the ring leader of that, wasn't he?
Yes, he was.
Do you think of him as being. . . .
He was the moving spirit.
What about Charles S. Johnson? Did you get to know him?
Knew him well. He had something in Washington when I was up there he was connected with—I can't remember—with DuBois and—the great singer.
Paul Robeson.
Paul Robeson. We walked together on a picket line at the White House.
But you were in several meetings with Charles S. Johnson?
Yes.
What did you think of him?
I was very much impressed with him. I didn't know him like I knew Hancock.
Did you think of him as being as rather formal man? He wasn't somebody that you just sort of could be real informal with, joke and carry on.
I wasn't around him that much. But Hancock, knowing known him coming from
this state and having known him in later years, I got to know him, you
know once you be a child and then when you get grown you just grow and
it's like all of you were grown at the same time. Hancock was a kind of
fellow who was a great scholar and kind of like Thurgood Marshall.
Thurgood had all the air and everything of a great lawyer and then when
he gets home and shakes his shoes off and gets him a little drink or
Stay in people's houses.
He certainly doesn't stay here all the time.
Let's talk about John McCray. I told you on the phone the other day that I was real interested in him. I noticed his name was not on this list, why do you suppose he wouldn't be involved in a meeting like this.
What year was that?
1942.
1942, he was a youngster then.
When did he take over this newspaper?
In the fifties.
No, he was here in the forties because I've got some clippings . . .
Wait a minute now—no, he left here in the fifties. He must have come up here around 1941-42.
Where do you think he came here from?
Charleston.
From Charleston?
So that is how the paper got started, or was it already here?
His paper was called The Lighthouse, that's what his
paper was. There was another paper running here all through the years,
run by somebody named Howard, a preacher out of Darlington. You may run
on some old copies of that somewhere. The Informer.
Seymour Carroll's daddy was a great Baptist potentate. So we maneuvered
in some way to get Howard to let us make a banner. So he let us take
over The Informer and combine them and make the
masthead. That's where The Lighthouse and The Informer came from.
That was in the early forties? How long did it last?
Over into the fifties. We had it when we beat the white primary [in 1947].
Did John McCray stay with it until it folded?
No, it folded not long after he left. He was. . . you know, the power structure here put him in prison.
No, I want to hear that story, you told me you'd tell it to me.
He printed some articles, they weren't libelous, but it was libelous to
them. What ever happened at that time, I forget now—a fellow named
Booth, Dale Booth, he was on the staff of the State,
the paper here. Now Dale Booth and McCray wrote articles about the same
thing, and they carried them both to court, but Dale Booth didn't serve
any time. McCray served time on it. On the chain gang. I don't think he
ever went on the road, but. . .
When was this?
This was in the fifties. He served time and when he was convicted, when they were getting ready to take him to the road gang, he called me. I knew his lawyer well. The lawyer gave him time to call me asking me for help. "Whatever you do try to keep the press open."
Keep the paper running?
Yes, which I did.
You did? How did you do that?
Well, I had a lot of newspaper experience, no newspaper writing.
You mean, you ran the paper after they took him to jail?
I ran it, you see, his staff was there. I didn't have to run the press or anything.
Yes, I know, but you were in effect the editor of the paper.
Yes, that's right and I wrote some such editorials—one of the first
persons to come out after you get the paper off the press for somebody
to
How long do you think? A year?
All that will have to come back to me. But anyway, when McCray came back,
he got out, came by the office. I'd run the paper, in fact, he called me
Was that the last time you saw him?
Why do you think he did that?
I don't know. I reckon he was like, my old folks used to say, wasn't raised he was brought up.
How did you interpret that?
I didn't interpret it. I ran the paper a little bit longer like that and then he just closed it down. He didn't come back to see, the presses were there.
What about his family, did he take his family with him?
His family had already gone. His wife
Went back to Talledega?
Yes, moved down there that year. He finally was in Talledega, that's where he finally staked himself. All of those papers, I mean he was a good writer, those papers were priceless, and all the copies were destroyed, thrown out. They are not in the library like a lot of them. Not found in the archives.
They're not on microfilm?
No.
Too bad, too bad. What a waste! He was a good writer, he was an excellent writer.
There certainly was no doubt about that.
He was a troubled man though, wasn't he?
I don't know what was wrong with him.
For him to have done that after you had taken care of the paper and family and for him to walk out and not even thank you. . . .
Well, some people. . . . my old folks used to say that somebody acted like that, he wasn't raised he was just drug up.
Didn't have the manners or whatever. It sounds to me like there was something really bothering him.
Maybe he felt that without him there it would have crashed. When he found I could keep it going, maybe it was a shock. I don't know, I never discussed it with him or anybody.
Do you think his widow is living here now?
She is here somewhere.
She came back to Columbia?
She was not a Columbia woman, she came from somewhere else. She has a
sister connected with something here. And I think she came here to be
near her sister. Her name is
Okay, I'll look her up. That would all be in the newspaper about that
trial and everything, won't it? In The State, they
must have covered that libel trial.
Yes, they should have.
Do you think that was in the 1950's? Or could it have been in the late 40's?
I just can't remember. McCray helped to organize the Progressive Democratic party here and I think that was organized in the forties, because we worked together to organize that.
Right. Let me ask you about a couple of other people. Did you ever Know Rayford Logan?
I know the name. What is he connected with?
I'm not sure where he was, I think he was an English professor. But, I
don't know if he was in South Carolina or not. He got a book out in 1944
called, what the Negro wants, and it was a real
important book because it had essays by about twelve or fifteen black
leaders from around the country.
Do you have a copy anywhere?
No, I haven't.
I can't remember now which one he was. Isn't there a black encyclopedia somewhere?
Yes, I'm going to hunt it up, I'll find it. Who did you think of as the black leaders at that time in the 30's and 40's? Who did you look to for some kind of moral support or what not?
The leadership in this state at that time was largely in the hands of the state conference NAACP. We had a very big conference at that time. We were black-mailed by Governor [James] Byrnes, I think it was. The NAACP Conference. They expected us to. . . . What were they doing with the organization at that time?
One of the issues, I know, was the white primary.
I don't mean that. I meant that during that time they were doing
something in organization, like black-balling. The state was doing
something. It can't come to me now, but I know it concerned the
administration. They were threatening . . .
Tried to silence it somehow?
Yes, they tried to and it was during the Byrnes administration as I remember.
What did you think of Jimmy Byrnes?
Nothing. Ain't as good as dog meat.
Ain't as good as dog meat?
Yes. [Laughter]
Yes.
There was a lot of mess going on at that time about Byrnes' daddy. He never knew his daddy.
Oh, he never knew his daddy?
That's what they said, he never knew his daddy. You might look up that point on him. He was supposed to have been brought up by some woman down in Charleston. There was a lot of mess about that one time.
Can you think of anybody white during that period of time, 30's, 40's, 50's, anybody white you met in or out of South Carolina that you felt like was trying to do right by black people in this country?
The ones I would have met would have been in organizations like the Southern Conference for Human Welfare.
Like Dombrowsky and so forth.
I was with the old civil rights conference, that was organized by black workers.
Like Frank Porter Graham or Jim Dombrowsky;
Yes, Graham was with the group that helped organized the Southern Conference for Human Welfare.
Right. Mrs. Durr?
Yes, I still hear from her quite a bit.
Back then, were you able to think of those people as being allies with your cause?
Yes, we did. They were pressured by their own people for just saying that a Negro was a human being. We weren't considered human beings until the Emancipation and that was only in the north. It wasn't in the minds of some people. They bred us just like they did cattle. They put Negroes on the plantation in time for the woman to be in heat so to speak. They bred them just like they do cows and hogs and sheep. I tell them history books don't include those things. I had to laugh one of the last times I was down in Carolina. A lady asked me down to her place. "I hope you're not on tight schedule because some people in the other classes heard you were coming down and they want to come hear you." Most of them young white fellows, young boys. You see they're not teaching history as it was. When I go I tell them like it was, like I'm telling you today. They treated Negro women just like cows. Men just bred them like they did the pigs. And I tell my folks, "You don't have to hate white people for what they did back then, they were doing what was the matter of course at the time." They say, "I don't like Jews because they crucified Jesus." I say, "You don't even know whether Jesus was crucified or not."
They don't know so they've got no right to say it.
He gave them prescription, love God with all your heart, love your
neighbor as yourself.
After that meeting in Durham, the white people had a meeting in Atlanta to respond to that and then they sent delegates from that meeting and the Durham meeting up to Richmond and that's where they drew up the document that became the Southern Regional Council charter. Did you go to that Richmond meeting?
I went to Richmond.
You did?
Yes, the only one I missed was the one I told you a good while back that I missed because I was working. I was fortunate to have the kind of husband . . . . You know sometimes a woman is kind of curbed by her husband's thinking. I was just as free to follow my interests as if I had not been married. Then I never was pinched for income. He was in business and he gave me part of the business. If I was going he would ask if I had enough money. If not, go to the cash register and get what you want. That's the way I lived. I was able lots of times to help with these causes and I actually gave money to help the causes. Not a whole lot but a lot in the course of what some could give.
What kind of work did he do?
He ran a service station and then when Prohibition was out we had three
markets and a liquor store. He gave me one of those stores. The income
from that store
And so, you went up to Richmond. Now that meeting was held in a big Episcopal church up there. Do you remember that?
Yes, I remember.
One of the curious things about it that I can't figure out there was nothing in the paper about it. It wasn't in the white papers and it wasn't in the black papers. They didn't say a word about that Richmond meeting. I just wonder if you can remember any conversation? That was just strange, it was like they decided ahead of time that they weren't going to tell anybody.
Well, that happens. That happens a lot of time with people.
Did you ever go to Nashville to a Southern Conference for Human Welfare meeting? Can you remember that?
I've been to Nashville but I don't remember what it was called. I've been to Highlander. I might have been to Nashville. I used to go there everyday, I just can't remember.
Another big debate that took place at that meeting in Durham was whether or not the blacks who came ought to include blacks from outside the South.
I don't remember that.
You don't remember that? And it was decided not to invite any northern blacks. Everybody who was there was from the South and the reason for it was that Hancock said if bring the northern blacks in here it's just going to give all our white enemies a good excuse to say this is outside influence here and we need to show them that we're doing this on our own.
Negroes down here don't have sense enough to [Laughter]
Was that a wise idea?
I should think so. I think the people who were working for change in the
South at that time, whether it was expressed in those words, I think it
was generally believed that the problem was here. And we knew more about
it than anybody else. The Southern Conference Human Welfare, the
Southern Conference Educational Fund and even now, the Southern
Organizing Committee, we have people from outside the area saying it's
north of the Mason-Dixon Line. But they are not really thought of in the
category as bonafide members, I mean as full membership. The picture
that we always had, whether you're thinking of it or not, it would be
the southeast. After we got a piece of the southeast we always had in
mind that the hard core was South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama,
Mississippi and Louisiana, the hard core. You
It was more liberal, more progressive.
Yes, you see they just about killed off that man they had head of the college up there at one time.
Frank Porter Graham?
Yes, they just tried to lynch him. I knew him well too.
He was a good man, wasn't he?
A good man, good man. There was a general feeling, whether it was expressed or not and there was no reason not to be expressed, but there was a tendency at that time to keep the southeastern division solid behind the problems that were uppermost, in high relief down in this area. It's just as bad some other places. During the first world war a lot of these people at the time we're talking about went up there to work and they carried this stuff right along with them. That's the reason they had those race riots up in those areas. Race riots while their country was at war.
Right, in 1943. It was a real bad year. It sure was. And see that was just about the time this meeting was taking place in Richmond, summer of 1943. I think the riot in Detroit happened within two weeks of that meeting.
Miss Simkins, as you can tell from all the questions I'm asking you, my interest is primarily in that early time, 30's and 40's. I would be curious to know from the perspective of 1990 what you think has been accomplished.
I think we're in the valley now. We went way up there and then we got Reagan in there. The Reagan administration just about rubbed out what we had done. Teddy Kennedy, he's still around here, the remnants of that family. All they have is about half a dozen up there in that Congress that's worth half a damn. We're in a bad fix.
I think we are in a bad fix. I think race relations have gotten worse.
They've gotten worse. They are worse in a way than they were before the fights started. They expected them to be that way then. A false sense of security came and like the people along with me that helped make that fight are gone.
It's past the time for you to be able to. . . .
I go all the time. I got calls already this morning. I'm going out tomorrow. I guess I'll stay up in Greenville and then tomorrow, some organization here connected with the schools has organized something forming seminars for teachers to learn more about Negro history and the contributions of Negroes. The white students and the black students don't know anything about this.
They don't know any of this. All this stuff we've been talking about here today nobody knows anything about this anymore.
No, and a lot of the whites never knew. You see before we got these TV's
and radios, you have salespeople going all through the countries selling
books about blacks and black history. They would sit and read it as best
they could.
Like Gordon Hancock, for example.
Tell me about your mother. . . Where was your mother from? Where did she grow up?
Right here in Columbia.
She did?
She was born here in Columbia. Her father was a slave in Athens, Georgia.
Now why he came this far I don't know. I don't know anything about his
slavery, except that he was born and reared in Athens, Georgia. Now my
mother's mother was a Turk. Sometime during that period of time they
brought some Turks here and tried to enslave them. They took them over .
. . you know where Columbia is now is the capitol wasn't the original
site. The original site they called it statesburg, between here and
Sumter. They dropped those Turks in the woods around Statesburg. My
mother's mother came from that crowd. She somehow became enslaved. I
don't know whether they went out there and caught some of them and then
enslaved them but anyway that's the way they dropped them over there in
the woods after they couldn't enslave them. You never know in the ways
of time how people get married from one end of the world to the other,
you know. But he came from Athens, Georgia, and she came from Turkey.
Somehow or other her father was a slave owner and
So how did she meet your father?
Met him here in Columbia.
He was the bricklayer? And they got married here?
Yes, in Columbia. You're talking about my grandmother. My grandmother met George Hull as he came out of Athens, Georgia. Then George and Sarah Hull's daughter, Rachael, married Henry Monteith, my daddy, who was the son of old lawyer Monteith, a white and a lawyer here. That's where I got the Monteith name. He never disowned us and the last time I remember seeing him he had my brother on his back, infant brother. Back then so many people were malnourished. It would take a long time for them to move their heads. I was five years older than my brother. I remember that I was down by him on the chair and he had the baby on his lap and he told my mother, you know they are doing a lot babies heads being well-shaped in those days because so many of them were malnourished. He told my mother, this boy will make you cry some day, he's got a good shaped head. But that didn't do him any favor. He had a good shaped head because my daddy said he did. Anyway, now many of them disowned their black children but he never did. He gave money to educate my daddy and my grandmammy gave it to the church. He gave money to educate my aunt, by another black woman. She eventually went to school.
Did you and your husband have children?
No. Well, he had five children, and I helped raise them and all. His son lives here.
So you do have a stepson that lives here.
Yes, he's in business here.
You've got somebody to look in on you.
Oh, yes. He's very careful with me. My own blood couldn't be better. He
was raised that way. I don't know
END OF INTERVIEW