Well, that was not the usual. But we were beginning to get an element
that had a lot to say that they shouldn't say. So this probably
shouldn't be on your tape but we had a lot of interesting situations
with the IBM'ers who came in, they'd take the ball over. One day I had a
couple of sisters sent to the office and I had them repeat what they had
said that the teacher was offended. Oh, we can say anything we want to,
and you can't do much about it. So I dictated a letter to their parents
indicating they were suspended and would be until the parents came by
for a conference. Believe you-me, they were there that night. And I
said, would you like, as we get started, let's get some background on
this thing. Right off the bat the mother, which surprised me, they were
from Providence, Rhode Island, said we're used to going to policemen in
Providence and tell them to go to "H" and say anything we wanted to and
they couldn't take any action on us or with us. I said, you know, we're
not quite that sophisticated down South, but we have a certain lifestyle
and if you'd like to take them back to Providence, I'll get the
transcripts
Page 26 ready and you can be on your way. And
right away, the father said, "no sir, no sir, we like it here. We will
guarantee you their language will be cleaned up." So we had a number of
interesting situations like that.