INTERVIEW NO. 7 PHYLLIS TAYLOR

My dad’s mother’s name was Julia Allen and his dad’s name was Charlie Allen. My grandmother’s name on my mother’s side was Phyllis Coles Lecars. And my grandfather was John Henry Lecars. My mother was Corinne Lecars Allen. And my dad’s name was Booker T. Allen. I grew up in a section in Richmond called New Town. We were approximately in the area where the Maggie L. Walker High School is now. There was two parts to New Town. One part was called New Town, and that was the section on Moore Street and Lee Street, and it ended at Hermitage Road. And the other part, which we did not call New Town, was called The Hill. And that’s where the Black neighborhood on the other side of the railroad was. And it was on a hill. And that’s where our church was. And it was started by my grandfather and grandmother, along with 14 other people. And it’s called St. Paul’s Baptist Church.

But in the area that really was New Town, there was a church called First Union Baptist Church. And my grandmother and grandfather were formally members there, and they, along with the group I told you about, asked to start a church of our own, and that’s what became St. Paul’s Baptist Church. And it was started on Thanksgiving night. In 1909. And most of our family still have family members that are part of St. Paul’s, including me. I was baptized when I was five years old, became a legitimate member of the church. And I’m still an active member at my tender age!

I’ve held a number of positions in the church. As a member of St. Paul’s for years, our pastor at the time, Reverend J. A. Mosbit, had a lot of confidence in the members and in the young people who were growing up in the church. Before he became pastor, whenever we would have an activity or something, they would go out into the community and get people to be in charge of it and sponsor or train the people who were going to be a part of it. But once he became pastor, he said, we will no longer be going into the community of neighbors to secure people to do our work. We will be doing it ourselves. So, the members started using their talents, which were many, and were very effective to start having programs in the church.

One of the main things that we did have growing up was what was called the Baptist Training Union—the BYPU—which met every Sunday evening at six o’clock. He was a very forward-looking minister who would make the young people feel comfortable. So, he allowed us to have activities in the church that other churches would not allow, for instance, debates, quiz contests, oratorical speeches.… So, we got a lot of training. We also had youth choir. But he was saying to the congregation that, once a person is baptized and they fellowship into the church, they are full-fledged members, regardless of their age. So, at 10 years of age, I became the church secretary. And I served for 25 years in that position. We had a youth choir. And I have pictures of that choir when we were growing up. Some of us were in early teens and some are younger. And we were all in our robes and caps, and we were looking mighty good, if I do say so myself!

What skills and opportunities did you receive from growing up in church in the segregated South?

Oh, it was like talent being developed. But we didn’t realize it at the time. We joined when we were five, my first cousin and I. And during that time, it was a tradition for churches to visit each other. And when you went to the other church, they would have someone to give the welcome and somebody to introduce the pastor. So, once we became official members at five, whenever our pastor would go out, he would be so proud of us he would have one of us to introduce the speaker, and the other one to give the welcome. And we knew that you better be prepared because you are going to be called on.

We also had some citywide organizations, and we were chosen to go to them and represent the church in the youth department—not only in Richmond, but throughout the state of Virginia. That gave us a talent. And then we had a General Baptist Missionary Society, who had a radio program on Sunday morning. And I was chosen to be the youth participant on that program on Sunday. We had talent shows, also. At the time, you didn’t charge money in the church to see those things, but we always took up an offering to help finance the church and help finance the activities that were sponsored for the young people. We also got quite a bit of encouragement from the senior members of the church, because even if you got up and tried to do something, and you may not have been real good at it, they would say, “Yeah, chile, go on chile, do it!’ They would encourage you.

My mother was a seamstress. So she made all of my costumes. And she made a lot of them for our kids in the neighborhood. When we would have events, she had to turn people away because she could make all those costumes they wanted!

And another event that our church sponsored, which was city wide, and the tickets always sold out, was.… You know, we could go to the beach every summer, but this was during the years of segregation. And so the Black beach was called Bay Shore. And the white beach was called Buckroe Beach, but you could not go on Buckroe Beach. But my uncle worked for the railroad, and he persuaded them to let him have a train for that whole day, so that we could take people to the beach. And so what happened, we would take the train, we would have seven or eight coaches, and sell tickets to go to the beach for the day. You’d go in the morning, and you come back in the evening. Ours was so popular, and so well received, that one of the social clubs, called the Devils, decided they were going to do it. So, the railroad would only let two groups do it. Our group would go in the morning, and when the train came back to Richmond to put us off, then the Devils would get the train. And they would stay until midnight. And we went the first Saturday in August of every year. If you didn’t get your ticket by maybe … I’ll say July 15, you weren’t going to get no tickets to go with us. And lot of people didn’t want to go to with the Devils because they were having drinking and you know, alcohol, and they were just carousing. So they didn’t want to be bothered with them. But our tickets, you know, they knew they were going to do very well. Everybody would be well behaved. And so they were very anxious to get our tickets and those are the ones who took the children as well. So the adult tickets were one price and the children for half price.

The Sunday School really were the sponsors of “the excursion,” we used to call it. And those kids, if you came to Sunday School every Sunday regularly, you could go free. And your parents would have to pay a small fee, but their fee would be smaller than the regular people’s fee. It was maybe a dollar or two. Five dollars at the most.

What was the beach day like?

It was interesting because they had a refreshment car. And so they were stocked with all kinds of sodas and potato chips, all kinds of snack stuff, sandwiches and everything. They made sure that it was well stocked. Nobody could have alcohol on the train with our knowledge, but you know, some people did sneak the alcohol! But they would hide it if we came along. So it was a fun time. And when you’d get down to the beach, the Black side of the beach, we had a member’s daughter who had a restaurant. We called her Ms. Sitter. Everybody was gonna go to Ms. Sitter’s restaurant sometime during the day and get some fish, because that was her specialty. You got to get some of Ms. Sitter’s fish before you leave the beach, although it was traditional for everybody to pack a basket. Very rarely did they pack sodas because there were plenty of them in the refreshment car. And we talk about it now, and we don’t understand why none of that stuff spoiled! Because now they say you can’t leave stuff out. But that stuff stayed out all day! We had deviled eggs. We had potato salad. We had slaw. We had everything that you have now, but nobody ever got sick of food poisoning. So we don’t know what’s the difference? We didn’t worry about any of those things back then.

Some of the activities that we had in the church was, we had the Camp Cary for the young people. And it was for girls only. And every year, for a month, the General Baptist Association would rent what was called Pocahontas Park. And they would have a camp where your church could send as many girls from 10 to 16 to the camp to stay a week. Okay? That was an activity, which was very beneficial, because you got to meet kids from all over the state. And also, you got to use your talent. And you got to study the Bible. I got to go when I was a young child, and my kids got to go when they were young as well. And they remember some of our leaders from that time, that had such a great influence on their lives.

And we also had a citywide group of junior missionaries, we called them, and they met once a month. So that gave you a chance to meet kids from all over the city. And even till they passed away, you know, we would get together for different activities just like a reunion, because we remembered growing up together. And those were some things that we did, because all of our activities were sort of limited during that time because of segregation.

Did you ever interact with white churches?

I had a mentor named Emma Hicks. And I don’t know how she made the connection. But she became connected with the National Conference of Christians and Jews. And they had a youth department, which was all white. But she insisted that they could not be a National Conference of Christians and Jews if they didn’t have any Black representation in it. So she got me to be the representative for the Black churches in Richmond. And once a year, they would have a conference in what is called Rosslyn, which is an Episcopal community center. And it was all segregated, as far as I know; I never knew any Blacks to go there. But the National Conference of Christians and Jews would use it for their youth meeting once a year, and I got to go. And the interesting thing was that I was a participant there, and I knew no discrimination. I felt no different from any other kid. But the minute we left there, and came back to the city, I knew I was Black.

How old were you?

I was between eight and 12.

Did you go that one time, or you went several times?

Several times. But we only had one meeting per year. It was something that you did on a yearly basis. I was the only Black person there, and they even elected me the vice president of that youth group eventually.

So how did your parents feel about you being in this role?

My mother was a person who believed that you had to be exposed to experiences in order to be a well rounded person. And so she made sure that when Ms. Hicks had anything that would be beneficial to youth, she let me go, and she made sure I was dressed appropriately, because, as I told you, she was a seamstress. So they were very happy to have me to go. And when I was in elementary school, I went to school, and because of my gift of speaking so well, they would let me go represent our school at different activities like the Red Cross meeting for the city’s schoolchildren. All of those activities were segregated—we did not have an integrated Red Cross for youth—but Black youth from all-Black schools would come to this particular meeting once a month. And your teacher would be your person who escorted you to the meeting. And they would plan the activities for us to do, but they were all segregated.

When you were representing the church, did you have any Black adults come in with you or it was just you?

This lady, Emma Hicks, she would escort me to everything that I went to as a youth. My mama wouldn’t let me go by myself. First time I ever went by myself to a conference—and that was in connection with the National Conference of Christians and Jews—I was chosen as one of the delegates to a national meeting, which was held in New York City. My mother let me go by myself because I had an aunt that lived in New York, who was like my godmother. So she was going to meet me at the train and make sure I got to where I needed to go. And that was an excellent experience, because you had people there from all over the world, all nationalities and everything.

You said that when you would go to the yearly meeting, it was a great experience. But as soon as you got back to Richmond, you knew you were Black. Can you talk more about that?

Well, you know, like I said, she would take me to the meetings, and I would feel so good. You know how you feel so special and everything. But once you got back into the real world, and crossed the city line, I knew right then that segregation would rear its ugly head because you had different signs, and, you know, different community borders that you weren’t supposed to go across.

Back some years ago, First Baptist Church on Monument Avenue in Richmond … white church. Well, they used to send missionaries to Africa. And when some of the African people came over here, to live, and they tried to join the church, they refused them because they were Black. And the pastor at that time, Dr. Adams, said what a testimony that would be if we go out to convert people and bring them into the Christian fold. And we are all supposed to be sisters and brothers. And yet, still you don’t want them to be a part of this church—I refuse to be a part of this church. And so they allowed them to become members. But before then, they did not have any Black members. And if you went to that church, you could not sit with the white members. You had to be in the balcony or something.

So for you growing up as a young girl in the church, what was your favorite thing to do?

Well, I guess we used it as a dating source because all the boys and girls could get together on Sunday without anybody restricting you from having a conversation with your favorite person. So it was like a social event: everybody who lived in the neighborhood would go to our Vacation Bible School, even if they did not belong to First Union. Because I told you our pastor was so lenient. So he let us do things that were interesting to kids at that time. And then of course, if your boyfriend knew that you would be at BYPU, they gon’ get there too, because see, that gives them a chance to talk to you on the sly. You couldn’t go nowhere or do anything, but you could at least talk to each other and wave at each other across the aisle. And that was ’bout the limit of what you could do at the time. Because you were never allowed to date until you were at least 16 years old. And you know, between 12 and 16, there’s a lot of interesting things going on.

So you said your mother was a seamstress; what did your father do?

He was a porter for the railroad. The RF&P. And so that was another enjoyable experience during my years growing up. Because if you worked for the railroad, the railroad would give you a pass according to what routes they used. And the direct route from Richmond was from Richmond to Washington, DC. So my dad had a family pass, which all of us had copies of. And we could ride the train, no matter how many times we wanted to, any day of the week, as long as it was between Richmond and Washington. So one experience that we learned doing that … they had the Black coaches, and the white coaches. What I’m saying is one was for Black people, and one for white people. And from Richmond, to Washington, DC, if you rode the train, you had to ride in a coach for Blacks. Once it got to DC, they would have an exchange of coaches. And all the coaches would become desegregated then—you ride anywhere you wanted on the train.

One of my most memorable experiences was the time when I went past Washington, DC. And then they go through this tunnel and then they say they got to switch engines. That’s what they used to say. But actually, they were fixing the coaches so they would be for anybody who wants to ride there. And so you get off the train, and then when you got back on, you can sit anywhere you wanted to. Now, if you were going South, they did the same thing: they stopped in DC. But when you got back on, you were going to be in a segregated car.

And one good experience that came to mind, because you asked me to think back over segregation, so one time—this only happened one time—my mother decided she was going to take me on a long train trip so I could experience that, because she always wanted me to be experiencing new things. So she got … you could get a pass to anywhere in this country, on the railroad, but you had to get special permission. So my dad applied for us to go from Richmond to Miami. And it took two days and nights to do it. But we got on the train. We didn’t have to worry about it because we were already segregated since we were going South. Now if we’d been going North, it would been different. And it was one of the most interesting experiences.

Phyllis’s parents, Booker T. and Corinne Leecost Allen.

But you weren’t allowed to eat in the dining car after … I don’t remember whether it was North Carolina or South Carolina … must have been after you got out of North Carolina, you couldn’t eat in the dining car. Because that’s what the segregation rules were. You couldn’t eat in it. You could buy food in it, but you couldn’t eat in it, there in the dining car. But because Dad worked for the railroad, and his friends knew the porters and everything, they would bring us good food from the dining room. And I remember that because we would not have had it if they hadn’t brought it to us. So that was a wonderful experience.

So your dad was a porter? What kind?

Yes. He was a baggage porter. He was in charge of baggage.

Do you know if it was difficult for him to get that job?

I really don’t know. Because you know, I was a child. And things like that weren’t important to me back then. Although I know, porters were the biggest jobs you could have. Those that worked on the railroad fixing tires, and, you know, changing the rails and all that stuff, wasn’t quite as sophisticated as the baggage porters.

Do you have siblings?

One, I have a sister, and she’s still living. And she is 94 years old now.

Did you know your grandparents growing up?

I knew my grandmother and grandfather very well. That’s on my mother’s side. On my dad’s side, I only knew my grandmother. And I knew her very well. We visited them every summer. And that was the interesting thing. They were sharecroppers. And I remember when we went down to visit, a lot of kids in my neighborhood would go spend the summer in North Carolina or wherever their parents came from, because they didn’t have any babysitters. But I grew up in a different environment. But anyway, we went to North Carolina to visit, and all of my cousins were out in the field picking cotton and tobacco. But they knew better than to send me out there because I was a sickly child. They’d say, “Phyllis will never make it if we send her out there!” So one week a year was enough for me. You know how people love to go visit? Not me, not down in North Carolina, no. But when my grandmother used to come visit us, we’d be happy because we didn’t have to go down in those parts. But we had to go at least once a year.

One time, we went during the wintertime. I can’t remember whether somebody had died or what, but we did go during the wintertime. And that was another experience I’ll never forget, because they heated the house with fireplaces. Well, of course we had stoves in our house. And so a fireplace was just a showplace as far as we were concerned. And so when I went there, and everybody’s sitting around the fireplace, and I thought it was so interesting, you know, to see the fire and everybody sitting around it, trying to keep warm. But I discovered that sitting around the fireplace might be fun. But the front of you was burning up, while the back of you was freezing!

Did you have any special memories with any of your grandparents?

The only thing I can think of is that with my grandfather—my grandfather on my mother’s side—I was his favorite. I didn’t realize it at the time. He favored me over all the other grandkids. And so it was tradition in the family for my grandfather to take my grandmother shopping every Saturday night down to the 17th Street Market. And so we would get in the truck and go down to the market. And he would say, “Phyllis, you go ahead and do what you need to do.” I was named after her. I would sit there in the truck. And as soon as she would leave, he would say, “Come on, Phyllis,” and he would take me out to one of the seafood places that sold seafood, and buy me a bag of shrimp. And we would come back to the truck and sit and eat all that bag of shrimp. By the time my grandmother got through shopping, we were lucky if we had any left. It was so much fun! And I never forgot that.

There were a lot of first cousins, and my grandma kept a lot of us, and if we had spats—if somebody did something to me—he would punish them. But then if I did something to one of them, I never got punished. And I say, I’m surprised my cousins still love me because of that! This is in my memory all this time. I forgot to hold on to other stuff. But I didn’t forget that.

What about your schooling?

The schools that I went to, I lived up near where Maggie Walker is now, and at that time when my mother was in high school, there was only one Black high school in Richmond. And all of her family went to Armstrong High School because that was the only high school. And all of the kids from all over the city came to that high school. And how they handled it was they had two periods of study: the morning study and afternoon study. The kids who were freshmen and sophomores, they went to school in the afternoon. And the children who were juniors and seniors, they went in the morning so that they could go to jobs in the afternoon. And then, in the 1930s, they decided to build another high school. But they built it for the purpose of teaching trades to Blacks. And that’s what school was all about.

I lived right on the block next to the school. But my mother and her sisters insisted that their children go to Armstrong because they wanted us to get what they called a better education. But we’d walk past the other school, walking past this good school, down to Armstrong. But it was a social event for us too. Because walking down, you picked up people along the way. And so all of us were friends. And then we would pass kids going to Walker, because we were all friendly. But we were on different sides of the street. I don’t know why we never were on the same side of the street! And so we would wave at the kids going to Walker, and they would wave at the ones of us going to Armstrong. And it was a friendly thing.

Well, the highlight of those years was the Armstrong–Walker game. It was a football game between the two high schools, and that was the social event of the Black community. I don’t care where you were in the world. On Thanksgiving, you came home to Richmond, because you had to go to the Armstrong–Walker game! It was such an event that if the white people told the Blacks they hired that they couldn’t be off on Thanksgiving Day, they would say, “Well, we quit!” They would quit their jobs because they were determined they were going to be at that game.

And that was the fashion show of the year. Everybody was trying to outdress the other one. Everybody wore either green and white, or orange and blue. And you couldn’t be on no sidelines, you had to be one or the other during that weekend. Those were the schools’ colors. Walker was green and white, and Armstrong was orange and blue. And remember I told you my mother was a seamstress. She made me this skirt that was blue with pleats all around. And in each pleat was an orange panel. And I wish to this day that I knew what happened to that skirt, because that would be really something worth saving! But I don’t know what happened to it. And when I’d walk—you know how the pleats will do, they just move and peek out. Oh, I still think of that skirt even now! Now that was so much fun.

But that was the social event, we call it, of the century, because everybody was going to get off to go to that game. We had more people at that game than any other activity that was held at the stadium. And that’s where the game was held. And then when one of the superintendents came in, because they started integration, they decided that there weren’t enough people to sustain each high school individually. So they grouped them. And they did away with the Armstrong–Walker game. And it has not been the same. People still mad about that, people who are still living and remember it, even if they weren’t even students at the school—they still mad because they cut out Armstrong–Walker.

This reminds me of the whole debate between Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. Du Bois, the talented tenth and all of that. Do you know why your parents would have wanted you to go to Armstrong … can you talk a little more about that?

All of us within that social circle went to Armstrong, and it was because they knew we would get more education after high school. They had schools back then called “normal school” that you could go to, but they were planning for us to go to college. And Armstrong was the college preparatory school. And we did get a good education at Armstrong to prepare us for college. But then, when the neighborhoods changed, because they brought the expressway through Richmond—we call it the Downtown Expressway—and 95 cut through the heart of Richmond, and it affected mostly Black residents. And as a result of that, people had to move to different parts of the city. The majority of the people moved to Northside. That was when professional people wanted our kids to go to college too, so they changed the curriculum so that both schools could have college preparatory. Armstrong never became the trade school, but Walker still had the trade plus the college preparatory. You could do either one at Walker, but you couldn’t do that at Armstrong.

What did you and your sister end up doing after high school?

My sister didn’t go any further. I went to Virginia Union for a couple of years. And then I got married and my education stopped for a while. And then I decided to take up schooling to be a secretary. And then after that, I got to be a professionally certified office person, by going and getting an associate degree.

Let’s see. One thing that really helped us as Black people, I think, was World War II. Because when World War II came, everybody that was able had to do something to help with the war. And before then, most Black people had menial jobs. But those like my mother, who had talent for sewing, she used her talent to help make parachutes. So she got a good paying job, and was able to save that money so that we could buy a home and all that good stuff. And a lot of women, too, went into the manufacturers and factories, to do whatever they needed to make the war materials that were needed at that time. So after they came out of the war, they had accumulated funds, because you didn’t have many places to spend the money and everything. And then when the soldiers came back, they were given an opportunity on the GI Bill to get some education beyond what they would have normally gotten if they had not gone to war.

And so Walker had all the different trades, like automobile repairs, and even got to the point where some of these things were put into the colleges like Virginia State, so that they could get degrees in those particular things. And that helped a lot. They were able to come back to go back to school; some of them became teachers or lawyers, even doctors, because their education was free. And they could pursue it. And it helped them to be trained to do something that they really had wanted to do but just couldn’t afford to do.

Phyllis on her wedding day, 1948.

And that was another thing that changed the social events. Because when the soldiers came back from the service, the young ladies who were in school with them before they went, they had moved on to something else. So the younger ladies were in Walker or Armstrong. And so they met each other. By that time, I was in college, and they were all coming back. So they married a lot of those guys. Although they were older. Before that time, you rarely ever married anybody more than a year or two older than you. After that time, they were three and four years older.

We had a lot of different activities that were a result of them coming back and facing life and thinking differently because they had a broader view of what the world was like. Some of them went overseas and they saw how the people lived and everything. So they wanted to make vast improvements in how they lived.

Even after we integrated, we still had segregation very open in Richmond. For instance, I worked for Richmond Public Schools, and a job came open for me at what they call the plan services. When I went to work there, which was the headquarters for all of the maintenance of the schools—like the grounds, the flowers, the buildings, plumbing—everything pertaining to schools were in this particular building. And the person who was in charge was a white person. All of the purchasing for Richmond Public Schools was done by whites, no Blacks. You know, when you were ordering something, you didn’t worry about who was doing it, or how they were doing it—you just ordered it. And the same thing when you needed a repair in the school—you just called, never thinking about the fact that these people are white.

So when I was offered the job to go there to work, it was my first experience with total racism. And that’s all it was. All of the employees were white, except about 3 percent in that particular unit of the school systems. Only about 3 percent were Black. One of the things that was under that was the custodians, and that was the one thing that was headed by Blacks. Well, I went to work for the man who was the head of the whole department. I went to work for him as the secretary. And when I got there, one of my responsibilities was to keep the payroll. But I could only keep the payroll for Blacks. Not whites.

And before I got the job, they had three people doing it. When I got there, those people had left, and they were never replaced. So I had to do the job that three people were doing. And we had ladies in what we called the radio room. And their job was to answer the phone and take the calls.… Like when I was in the schools, I would call and tell them what I needed done, or call in to order supplies. So they would answer these calls. Across from my office was the radio room. And every time a call would come in for the Black supervisor, one of the white ladies would be complaining about it, you know? And then she kept saying, “Why can’t Phyllis take his call?” But she never asked me to take any white person’s call. My boss was trying to keep peace with everybody and keep everybody pleased. So he would just say, “Just ignore it, ignore it.” But one day, she caught me wrong. And the Black came out in me! I got up from my desk, went over to her in the radio room—and there were two other white ladies working with her, but the two of them were just as nice to me as they could be. But for some reason she decided that I needed more work to do when I already had the work of three people. And I said, “Look, Audrey”—I pointed my finger, and I said—“If my name come out of your mouth one more time, I’m gonna give you a knuckle sandwich.” And that was during the time when they had the program on TV where the man said, “I’m having a heart attack,” and he used to tell his son all the time that he would give them a knuckle sandwich [author’s note: This was Sanford and Son!].

And so I told her that’s what I was going to do to her if my name came out her mouth one more time. And of course, I was through with it after that, and went and sat back at my desk. And I thought about it and said to myself, well, if you don’t speak up for yourself, you’ll never get anywhere. So that was that.

There was a white guy who was in charge of growing the flowers for the schools, and, you know, that type of thing. And every day when he would come back from inspecting whatever school he went to, he would bring flowers to the ladies in the department. And he would give everybody some flowers, except me. He never gave me any. And so the different secretaries, who were white, would say, “Well, you didn’t bring Mrs. Taylor any.” He’d say “Oh, I forgot!” and every day it was a different excuse. So you know, I’m not dumb … he thought I was dumb, but I knew what was happening. So anyway, he caught me wrong one day.

So here he come, and Ms. Emily asked him, “Where are Mrs. Taylor’s flowers?” “Oh, I forgot. I will go out there now and get some for her.” So, he did. He went out and came back and brought the flowers to me and offered them to me. “Here, Mrs. Taylor, here are your flowers.” I told him, “I do not want any flowers that you put your hands on, and don’t leave them in my office, either.” I didn’t want flowers from him when he clearly didn’t want to give them to me. And I was through with that. So, there were things like that. Those were the kind of things that would happen regularly.

Then, I got a Black boss who was head of the whole department, because the white person resigned. But the white counterpart upstairs in the building had a secretary. She wasn’t required to do any of the things they would ask me to do. He wanted me to keep doing all the other things, like being in the cafeteria, being the cashier, being helpful, doing all kinds of extra things. They wanted me to do them to keep the peace, but I don’t care nothing about peace when I’m being mistreated. So the white boss kept telling my boss, “Tell Phyllis to do so and so, tell Phyllis to do so and so.” Of course, I ain’t paying attention to him, because I wasn’t planning to do it! But why am I expected to do these things when the one person who has the same position I have is not required to do it? So I told him, “I will tell you right now. Don’t ask me to do that anymore. I don’t plan to do it. And I don’t care. Until Alice (which was the white lady) is doing it, I will not be doing it either. I don’t care what you do. You can take me downtown, you can do anything you want.” The superintendent at that time was white, and he would come up to visit the department. He came in about two days later after I had told the white boss that I wasn’t going to do any of that. He walked in the door and said “Ms. Taylor! Are they treating you right up here?” I said, “I’d rather not answer.” And he had a very loud, boisterous voice. And he said loudly, “I’m letting y’all know that Ms. Taylor is my friend. And if any one of y’all mistreat her, you will have to answer to me!”

One thing that was a startling thing to me when I went to this particular building was that every office in the building had a Confederate flag in it. Can you imagine? Then, we got a Black superintendent, and he had no knowledge of it at first. When he came to visit for the first time, they were taking him on a tour of our building. And every one of the offices had a Confederate flag in it. He said to my boss, who was Black, “Archie, what is going ’round here? Why are there all these Confederate flags?” That was his department that had all these flags, see. And my boss said, “That’s something they’ve been doing ever since I’ve been here, and before I came.” The superintendent said, “Well, they all better be gone by the close of the workday today. If not they’re fired.” And for fear that my boss would not tell them, the superintendent went right to his office, wrote a memo, and sent it directly back to both departments, one downstairs and one upstairs in the building. It said, “Anybody who is a supervisor and has a Confederate flag in his office after five o’clock today will be fired.” They never liked him anymore after that!

But that was an experience. And that was my first experience with the school system where I suffered such outrageous treatment as a Black woman. I’d never been treated like that, in the way I was then. And I never forgot it.

When you were a kid growing up, did you have any negative experiences like this?

I really didn’t. My mom, at one time, worked for two white families. And one of them were deaf and mute. And my mother—I told you she was always a forward-thinking person—she taught herself sign language so she could communicate with him. And this family did not have any little children. The other family didn’t either. So, my experience as a child with white people had been wonderful, because each one of those families looked out for me, in a sense. For every special occasion, Christmas, Easter, whatever the children celebrated, they made sure that I had all those things that they would have given to a grandchild. So I had gifts from three different sets of people, and I just thought the world was a wonderful place. I just didn’t have no idea; my first rude awakening was when I went to work at plan services. I didn’t know white people treated Black people so badly! I’d heard of incidents, and a lot of rules that were given to us, in our youth during segregation, were just the way of life.

One perfect example was: you had to be in the house by 10 o’clock. And if you didn’t, of course, you were going to be punished. But the way they made sure that rule was kept, they would tell us how white people would go out at night with the trucks and kidnap people and kill them. Just to show you some of the things that went on. And whatever an adult would tell you back then, it was gospel. And we didn’t question it. And growing up, they made sure that we were never in their presence when they were discussing things like violence and things like that. When company came to your house, if there were no children with them, you were sent somewhere else so they could have their conversations. And so a lot of things that we might should have heard or should have known, well, I always say we lived in a bubble. And I didn’t realize it until I became an adult.

So when you were going to the beaches and stuff and you knew that there was a Black beach and there was a white beach, did you wonder why you couldn’t go? Or you just didn’t think about that?

We didn’t think about it, because it was something we had always done, and we had never done any differently. And not until they integrated these places did we show any interest. Because we felt like, well, what’s so unique about them? We really didn’t want to associate with them because we had everything we wanted right where we were. So, we didn’t need to go over there or want to be with them.

Did you ever feel that your safety may be in danger because you were Black?

I can’t remember any incident like that. Because although Richmond had segregation, I did not see a lot of open violence towards Black people. The only thing that we always used to say—and maybe that’s what kept us cautious—was that white people made the rules, but they didn’t make them for themselves. They made them for us. Because if they broke a rule, there was always some reason why it was alright for them to have done that. But if you broke that rule, you were arrested and put in jail. So we were aware of it. But we felt that, you know, because they were in charge, they were doing it to suit themselves, and to just stay out of their way. That was your best bet. It was that kind of attitude with most of us. But I’m glad the present generation doesn’t feel that way.

Did you ever know of anybody being lynched?

I have heard of people being lynched. But I’ve never heard of them being lynched in the larger cities. We didn’t hear about people being lynched in Virginia. But in North Carolina, and South Carolina, yes, we have heard terrible stories about people being lynched.

I just knew of them from hearing about it. Like they may have had an article in the paper, or by way of the grapevine—someone would pass that on to that one, and tell it, because people were even afraid to talk about it, even if they knew it. Because the Ku Klux Klan … everybody Black was afraid of the Ku Klux Klan. And they didn’t know who or where they were. Because see, they were dressed in hoods when they paraded and stuff, and you didn’t see the faces. And then when they were right in the public, you never saw any evidence of who they were. So you didn’t know who you were dealing with.

But I did have an experience once. Telephones at one time, they had two different systems. You could have a party line or you could have a non-party line. And when I moved from Richmond proper to the county, I picked up my telephone one day. I wasn’t supposed to have a party line. But I heard these people talking. So I decided to listen to see who they were. And the Ku Klux Klan had tapped into my line and were using it for free. And they were talking back and forth with each other, what they were doing, what they planned to do. But I reported the fact that somebody was on my line. And of course, it was taken off.

Cross burnings, yeah, we even have them now. Sometimes in the area, especially in Chesterfield. We have it. But when the crosses were burning, I never heard anybody say they feared them. It was: “If you come to my house, you will die.” You know, that type of attitude [from us]. So you stay away from my house, we’re not going to accept this. And then even if they had white neighbors—sometimes they had them because the neighborhood hadn’t completely changed over from Black to white. That has been my knowledge of it. But Black people growing up, I had never heard of white people killing Black people violently, people that I knew or knew of. I’ve heard more of it in these last years than I have heard of it in all my lifetime. When I was growing up, we had boundaries, and most of the people stayed within those boundaries.

Going back to how you were talking about how the KKK had tapped your phone line, what were they talking about when you were listening in on the conversation?

Well, one thing—a word that they liked to use was “niggers.” And we don’t use that anymore in public. But they were saying, “If those niggers don’t do such and such.…” Whatever it was. I can’t remember now, because I wanted to forget. It was such a shock to know that this was going on … this had to be 1985. I thought by then it would have stopped, you know. But it’s still going on now. They still got a lot of racism going on.

The Black community lost a lot when it came to integration. And I want to know what your thoughts about integration are today, now that we can look back and see what has happened since then.

Well, when it first happened, I was skeptical about it. And then some of the things that happened to our kids during integration I do not feel helped us as much as they should have benefited. Because it’s the negative things, to me, that we glorify. And the things that we could have benefited from, we were not able to develop them as much as we should have. My first experience with integration was with shopping, and the big, main stores in Richmond at the time—the department store was Thalhimers, and Miller & Rhoads, and then another secondary one was Kaufmann’s. Now, when you would go to those stores, you could buy things, but you could not try them on. And when they found out that their profits were falling, then they changed the rules. For instance, they would let you try a hat on, but you had to put something on your head before you could put it on. You know, things like that … which to me was an insult. And we never thought about it when it was just segregation because we weren’t able to ever experience that in the first place. Thalhimers had a basement store, we called it, where they had the things that they did not necessarily want to have upstairs—above. They put it in the basement; you could go there and buy it. And you could try it on down there, but you couldn’t try on anything up above.

When we integrated, I don’t think the teachers had enough support. And I was working at Whitcomb Court School at the time, which is in a Black community; it was a housing project called Whitcomb Court, and then we had another section where people owned their houses. Before integration, everybody was like one big family, and anybody could discipline a child. Once we integrated, they did not want the Black teachers to discipline the white kids. So, they changed the rule of discipline.

To me, the key to why we succeeded before integration was because our Black teachers loved us and we knew it. They corrected us. We expected it. And we respected them for the way that they treated us. But all of that was taken from out of their hands doing integration because basically white people did not want them to discipline their kids. Some of those things, our kids will never recuperate from. We lost a generation of people because of it.

When my hometown integrated, my mom was in the race riots and one of the first Black classes at the public school and all of that. Do you have any experiences or memories from when the city integrated?

They integrated the schools during the time that my kids were in school. And my kids were extremely smart, not bragging or anything. And so, the teachers wanted them to try the integrated schools, because they felt they would do a great job there. I was one of those parents that didn’t want to integrate, because I felt my kids would not be treated fairly. And I did not want them to experience that at that age. So, I did not allow them to go to integrated schools.

One perfect example of that: we have a neighborhood called Oregon Hill. And it was out where the penitentiary was. And it was the poorest class of white people. And they were always causing problems, and they went to the school that my kids would have normally been assigned to. So I did not want my kids to go, because I didn’t want them to mingle with those children. And as a result, they stayed in the Black school, and they excelled. They excelled. And the teachers really looked out for them, because we were very supportive of our teachers.

But in this particular case, their school eventually had to take a whole grade—like all sixth grade students, four or five classes—and send them to the school where I didn’t want my kids to go to, which was formerly all white, because the Black school was overcrowded. Okay. And so the incident that happened involved my daughter, who is the middle child, and her class, who went to that school. And they had this little girl from Oregon Hill, and she would intimidate all the Black kids. If they didn’t do what she said, she pushed them up against the wall. They were afraid of her. But when they would tell the teachers, they would ignore it. They were trying to keep the peace. I didn’t care anything about the peace when it came to my kids, okay?

So one day, she decided she was going to hit my daughter. Well, that was the last straw. I called the principal who was in charge at the time, and told him, “I’ve always taught my kids not to fight. I think there’s a better way to settle an argument. So they were taught to talk things out. But she is never to hit my child again.” And we never had any more problems after that. Because sometimes, you have to speak up. I taught my kids to respect all adults. You may not like what they are telling you to do, but you’re not supposed to have adult discussions as a child. Tell me what’s going on. And you know, I’m going to see to it that you are treated fair.

Ms. Sandra, Ms. Phyllis’s daughter steps in here:

I had to say, hearing my mom when she was talking about it is so true, with regard to our education. And you know, having gone through Richmond Public Schools, and for my entire time it was in what was then the segregated schools.… And when I look back and see the difference with my sister and her experience, I really wish, if we could turn back the hands of time, that when they talked about having separate but equal, that we had just had separate but equal. If they had kept everybody segregated, as far as I’m concerned, unless you wanted to go—but given the Black schools, the same money, the same equipment, the same books.… We didn’t need better teachers. Our teachers were much better than the white teachers, because for many of them, their opportunity was teaching. We had teachers with PhDs, but they couldn’t teach at the college level. So, we were blessed. I look at my graduating class. And there were 400 and some odd of us. We had people who went to Harvard, Yale, all the prestigious schools, and did well. I don’t know if the kids who went to the white schools had the same experience, because facing the racism that some of my friends faced, those that did go, traumatized them at an early age. I faced it in college, but by then, my self-esteem was established. So yeah, I wish we could turn back the hands of time.

I look at the way that schools are, and then you have the school-to-prison pipeline these days. And to me, that is a direct product of integration. And even now, students that graduate from HBCUs do better than Black students that graduate from white colleges. So we need ways that we can bring some of that back to our community. So I agree with you. And on that same note, do you think Dr. King’s dream is possible in this country?

Back to Ms. Phyllis:

Oh, yes, I do. I really think it’s possible. I would like to say before I get to that point that I think what we need to do is to write our own stories. The white man has been writing it for so long and telling it the way he wanted to. And for important things that we should get credit for, we are not getting credit for, because they are telling the story instead of you. And so I always encourage my kids to keep copies and records of rewards, honors, anything that they think will be part of that future legacy. Give future generations something on which to build their future. And these things that you have kept, you can share with them. And you need to keep a daily diary, because you forget. Write your stories so they will be accurate in history. And also, you should collect any items that you think that your family was a part of, in making history what it is today.

I always say keep the faith. And give true meaning to “Black lives matter.” We have to value our own lives. Take pictures. I think that we should not forget that King said that he had a dream. But I believe we have a reality. Because we have seen things happen that we’ve never seen before. Richmond had its first Black mayor. Then you had the first Black governor elected in the country [author’s note: Henry Leander Marsh III and L. Douglas Wilder, respectively]. And then to top it all, Obama was elected the president! How many of us thought it could happen? I know, in my lifetime, I thought it would never happen. And I refused to believe it when they told me, because it just seemed impossible in our society. But I believe the dream is possible. I believe, even if I don’t see it, we will see it in due time.

Is there anything else you want to share?

The only thing that I can think of is to let you know how … what happened to change Richmond into electing these different people I was talking about, like the mayor and the governor. There was a resident by the name of Curtis Holt, and he felt that Richmond Blacks were not getting a fair shake. So, he sued for a chance to have our voices heard, and he won the case. When he won the case, they had to go by the federal guidelines for all elections. And as a result, Blacks in Richmond became part of certain districts. Redistricting. And we got nine districts, and when Blacks were counted in the voting, five or more of those districts were won by Black people. And that’s how we began the journey to become an integrated government here.

Look for the Crusade for Voters organization, which was started by Mr. Brooks, Dr. Reid, and Dr. Thornton—that has a lot of wonderful history that will help you to understand how far we have come.