Bowman and his brother defied segregation on a bus as children
Bowman and his brother once refused to move from the white section of a segregated bus. That decision was significant because they defied the system before there was a major movement for integration and while they were still in grade school.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Richard Bowman, July 8, 1998. Interview K-0513. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- KELLY ELAINE NAVIES:
-
So, that experience at the Picadilly Club-was that the first
time that something like that had happened to you?
- RICHARD BOWMAN:
-
Yeah, that was the first time. In Asheville, my brother-we were
riding the bus-the bus ran from the black section of town to
the white section of town and of course it would always fill
up-and say for example-this night we were coming
from the movie and when we got on the bus near the black section of
town, all of the seats were filled up in the back so we just filled on
up to the front and we got up at Pritchard Park-one of the
white sections and also close to where we lived, the seats emptied and
some whites came and sat behind my brother and the driver wanted my
brother to get up and move back but there were no
seats back there. And I told him no, not to get up-this was
before they had all the things about integration. And uh,
[KN: interjects to ask: This is your younger brother? RB: No, my
younger brother.]
So, the driver told him again-I said, "no,
he's not getting up out of this seat." So anyway, when we got
to the end of the route-they usually open the back door so we
can get out, but the bus driver wouldn't open the back door he opened
the front door-so, I had to go by him and when I went by him
he told me-he said, uh he wasn't gon do anything this time,
but if it ever happened again, it would be the last time I would do
something like that.
- KELLY ELAINE NAVIES:
-
Really?
- RICHARD BOWMAN:
-
Yeah.
- KELLY ELAINE NAVIES:
-
Last time-period you would do something like that!
- RICHARD BOWMAN:
-
Yeah, the last time.
- KELLY ELAINE NAVIES:
-
That's quite a threat.
- RICHARD BOWMAN:
-
It is, and so I just got off the bus and that's it.
- KELLY ELAINE NAVIES:
-
That was pretty brave of you-how old were you then?
- RICHARD BOWMAN:
-
Oh, let's see-I couldn'ta-I had t have been probably
about fifteen years old or something like that. I was young. I was in
high school.
- KELLY ELAINE NAVIES:
-
So, you were challenging the system.
- RICHARD BOWMAN:
-
Yeah, there and like I said with the library. Cause, I just never had any
fear, you know.
