Great Grandmother and Matriarch
INTERVIEWED SEPTEMBER 29, 2012, EAST LANSING, MICHIGAN
Ms. Rhodes, I am thrilled to talk with you today. You were born on May 16, 1920, in Memphis, Tennessee. Tell me about your childhood, your family, and the values that were instilled in you at a very young age.
My brother and I were raised by our dear mother after my father passed. He was a World War I veteran. My grandparents also played a big part in raising us. We didn’t have a kindergarten or day care. I learned how to read and write before I entered first grade. My grandparents said to me, “Here are five apples. You take four away. How many do you have left?” And that is how I learned how to add, divide, multiply, and subtract. And after my father died, we moved to Chicago. This was in 1929. We were children of the Depression. We didn’t know that we were poor. We didn’t consider ourselves poor. We lived in a big apartment building. We were the only two children there. My mother would give me two dimes and tell me to go to the store and take this dime and change it and get two nickels and take the other dime and get five cents’ worth of potatoes and three cents’ worth of sugar and bring home the remaining two cents. There were gangs in Chicago then, but, no, they didn’t bother us. They would say as we passed by, “There goes skinny Evelyn and her brother.” Still, I went to high school in Chicago. I graduated from Wendell Phillips Academy High School in 1938 and from Theodore Herzl Junior College in 1940. That college was later renamed to Malcolm X College. During World War II my brother entered the armed forces, and he went to [Great Britain and] landed on the beach [at] Normandy. My brother is ninety years old now and lives near me in Holt, Michigan.
But as I got older, in high school we lived in a tenement building, where we had just one room and everyone used the community kitchen. My mother worked on the railroad. Across the street I could see a big mansion. I would ask my mother, “Can I go out and play?” She said yes. The young lady across the street said to me, “Why don’t you ask your mother if you can come over here?” This young lady’s parents were beautiful people. Her father was the first black attorney to have an office building in downtown Chicago. And in 1923 there was a race riot in Chicago so he helped some of those who had been persecuted. Her mother was head of the National Association of Negro Women. From this family I learned about all of the wonderful things I read in books. I would go to the prestigious Goodman Theatre and to concerts. My dear mother was working, and she knew that I was in good hands with this family. So as the years passed, my girlfriend, she went to Northwestern University, and I went to the junior college. My girlfriend [oversaw black music programs in Chicago public schools]. Later on she was nationally known for her accomplishments. Although she has passed, we had a great time together. When I think back on my childhood in Chicago, my mother did wonderful things for my brother and me and made sure that we were open to cultural activities. My mother was happy that her children had a good childhood.
What was it like growing up as a black young girl and then young woman in Memphis and Chicago? Did you know that you were a beautiful and smart person? Or did race issues in society or within your own family obscure that?
In my family I did know that I was beautiful and smart. Although my mother and her sisters, my aunts, and uncles, they were all light complected, and my grandmother was part Irish, we didn’t run into racial issues within my family.
Chicago had race riots again in 1968. What were your thoughts about it then, when you were older, especially given the fact that you did not experience racial tension within the boundaries of your own family? Or had you left Chicago by then?
As I got older we moved from Chicago to Detroit. Now in 1967 there was a racial riot in Detroit. I was a postal employee by then. I remember there were people complaining about the noise. The police came. People were killed. Houses were burned. But I never did have any racial upheaval with me as a person. And I am glad to say that!
I want to go back to the time of the Harlem Renaissance (1920–30). What was that period of time like for you?
When my friend was at Northwestern University, the late Langston Hughes was a guest speaker there [and] I attended. I was thrilled by being at his talk and meeting him. Langston Hughes autographed a book for me. And I gave the book to my niece. I am sorry that I gave it to her because it was signed by him. [Laugh] I have a lot of books on the Harlem Renaissance, and I love all of the writers during that time.
What is the importance to you of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 [which banned discriminatory voting practices designed to discourage black Americans from voting]?
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 means a lot to me. My grandfather, in the late 1930s and 1940s, who was living at that time in Tennessee, would regularly go to the city hall, and he even wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt about the poll taxes and how they were used to suppress black people from being able to register to vote or even voting if they didn’t pay [the taxes]. My grandfather even went to the city-county building and demanded a streetlight and a post office box in his neighborhood. He would say to me, “If you want to learn about the laws impacting people and learn about the rights of the people, then go to the city hall during court days, and you can sit in the back, and you can learn so much about how the government is run and how the attorneys make their legal arguments on each case.”
Then in the 1960s I did have friends that took part in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference [SCLC] which was first led by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the late 1950s. During the 1960s the SCLC worked very hard with other community groups in the South to fight for civil rights of all people, particularly for black people and for their voting rights. It has not been that many years since we as black people were able to vote. So, yes, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 means a lot to me.
In 1955 you were living in Detroit. That was the same year Rosa Parks boarded a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, and refused to give up her seat, for which she was later arrested. What did that mean to you?
[In the mid-1970s] my two grandchildren and I were waiting for the official opening of the People Mover in Detroit. The People Mover is an elevated transit system that operates in downtown Detroit. And Mrs. Rosa Parks was going to be one of the people that dedicated the building where the People Mover was stationed at. This lady walked over to us, and I said, “Mrs. Rosa Parks!” She replied, “Yes.” I said, “You are going to be on the program.” She explained to me that indeed she was going to be on the program, but the lady who was going to accompany her had not gotten there yet. So I met Mrs. Rosa Parks. And the lady came up to Mrs. Parks and said that she had been looking for her. . . . Then at a later date my grandson at school took part in a little program where they showed Mrs. Rosa Parks on a bus. And I think the actual bus she rode in is installed somewhere.
Yes. The Rosa Parks bus is at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan.
And Mrs. Rosa Parks lived in an apartment building near where I lived in downtown Detroit. So I did meet her, and I have books about Mrs. Parks. Mrs. Parks was a quiet lady but you don’t have to be loud. You can be quiet and still a fighter.
What does fighting mean to you?
Fighting means just to stick to it or sticking to your guns. You don’t have to be a rabble-rouser; you can just stick with it. That is the main thing.
Tell me about your work as a postal worker in Detroit.
I started in 1950 as a postal clerk and retired in 1982. I worked thirty-two years. The first day I worked, there was mail on the floor. I was not used to seeing mail on the floor. So I picked up the mail off the floor, and the foreman said to me in a firm voice, “Lady, what are you doing?” I said to him that the letters were getting dirty. He told me, “Get back to your case!” Back then we didn’t have plastic trays. We had wooden trays. And in this one wooden tray were business-class letters. One of those letters was open with hundreds of dollar bills in it. After seeing this, I immediately raised my hand for a supervisor because I knew that it was a plant to see if I would take it. But during those thirty-two years I issued both mail permits for nonprofit organizations and I was acting District Women’s Program coordinator. I worked for the postal newsletter called Eve’s Rib. I worked in the Equal Employment Opportunity department of the post office. We hired the nonhearing. Even back then we didn’t call them “deaf mutes” because they did excellent work on the computers. I had a wonderful career there. In fact I just returned from Detroit for the thirty-fifth annual women’s luncheon. I was the oldest one there.
Along with your professional work, you were also a mother.
Yes. My son and I had a great time together. He is now deceased. My son’s father and I did not stay together for long because of his lifestyle. He was a musician and played with all of the big bands, Jimmy Lunceford [a jazz saxophonist] and Cab Calloway.
. . . [My son’s father] had a lot of women followers and I was not used to that. But he took care of my son and me for a while. I did not ask for childcare money because I always worked. And I took care of my son. My son had a great high school education. He didn’t go to college. But he had many friends of all races and different backgrounds. It was after high school that he became a truck driver in Michigan. He drove those big highway trucks.
Did your son have a talent for music?
Since his father was quite talented musically, my son started piano lessons at the Detroit Conservatory of Music. I bought a spinning piano. He played well. Then, when rock ’n’ roll came, that was the end of that! But my son collected a lot of records. He went to a lot of concerts, including classical music concerts. After he got married, his children were raised on Mozart’s musical work.
As a parent, what were the values that you instilled in your son? How did you parent?
My mother was working. I was working. And then there was a point when my mother had to go to Tennessee to pick up her mother, my grandmother, because her father had passed and her mother was by herself. So I made the decision to send my son off to a Catholic boarding school in Wisconsin. Unfortunately while he was at the boarding school, he broke his arm. I told him to come home, but the nuns there said no, so I listened to them. I knew that he did not like being there at the boarding school. Later on I was sorry that I sent him there, but it gave him a good background on how to be a good young man, which he was. From that he learned how to treat other people from all nationalities and races with respect, which he did. And certainly he was a music lover.
Your son was married and started a family. Can you share a bit about his family?
My son’s wife, Peggy, is Caucasian. When he married my daughter-in-law she had a little girl named Cecilia. Now Cecilia is thirty-nine years old. My son had two children with Peggy: Eve, who is now thirty-seven, and Mark, who is thirty-six.
How did you feel about your son marrying a Caucasian woman?
I didn’t have any hard feelings about my son marrying a Caucasian woman because my grandmother was a mulatto, as they called it back then; her father was white, and her mother was black. My mother was fair skinned and my father had dark skin. Many years ago this was something we did not have control over; white men had black women who were enslaved. That has changed. People can choose who they want to interact with. It is a different world today, even compared to when my son married his wife, Peggy. There are more mixed-race or multiracial people now. The world is getting smaller. People are going to mix forever.
Were you concerned for them as an interracial couple and how the community would accept them?
No. They were married in the early 1970s. At that time my son and Peggy were living in Detroit. I was also living in Detroit. There were white people and black people living in my building, as well as people from other racial and ethnic backgrounds. There were mayors and city employees who also lived there, people from many different walks of life. I don’t think that Peggy or my son had problems with the community accepting them. I know that Peggy had white friends and black friends even before she met my son. Over the years both of our families have spent time together, so I don’t think that her family has had bad feelings about the different races either. Love is important to us.
What values did you instill in your grandchildren?
I expected that they be strong and honest. I expected that they do good, always work hard, and do not hold any bad feelings against anybody. Those are the same values that my mother taught my brother and me.
What is it that you hope that your great grandsons and grandkids especially take from you and your commitment to each of them?
The main thing that I hope they take from me is the message of love and understanding no matter what the person’s race or nationality. In the long run those traits don’t matter because, if you are raised with a basic Christian attitude, it helps you to understand and communicate with people better. I have friends who are Polish, Chinese, African, Caucasian, and American. We all are going to leave here one day, so you might as well enjoy each day and treat each other good.
How did you develop friendships across racial and socioeconomic lines?
I lived in different communities and worked in Detroit as a postal employee, a real estate sales person, and a sales lady at Dayton Hudson’s in Dearborn, Michigan, and Jacobson’s clothing store in Grosse Pointe. Therefore I met people of all races and nationalities—and all incomes. I know wealthy people. I had lunch years ago with G. Mennen Williams [a six-term governor of Michigan] and his wife. I’ve danced at the prestigious Ford Auditorium in Detroit. I knew Mr. J. L. Hudson Jr. [president of the J. L. Hudson Company, which owned Hudson’s department store] and other well-to-do people. You find out later that these people, no matter what their income or nationality, the basic thing they are interested in is, When do we eat? Where do we go now? It is that simple. Jesus said, “Love one another.” That is the main rule I choose to live by.
What inspired you to compose words and develop your writing interests?
I think that my interest in writing started already way back in high school at the Wendell Phillips Academy. I always loved to read and write, and I had wonderful teachers, including my English teacher, that encouraged me to pursue my reading and writing skills. I could write a story in about one day. Back then I would write stories mostly around the people that I would see. Then in my later years, living in Detroit, I became a part of the Black Writers’ Guild up to my recent years. It is a wonderful organization. I have some short stories and poems published. We would give readings and interviews at bookstores and other organizations.
You mentioned that you wrote a poem to the president of the United States. What does it mean to you to be alive to witness the first African American president?
First, President Obama is biracial, and there are a lot of biracial people in my own family. I think he is wonderful. I think the majority of the people in this country like him, but also there are those that don’t like him because they say he is black. I think that because he is biracial, part white and black, his racial background should allow more people to personally identify with him.
As you know, I was adopted into a Caucasian family. With that came a lot of blessings but also struggles, especially trying to figure out who I was as a person with an African American heritage. There are other transracial adoptees who also struggle with the identity piece, given their situations. What words can you share with Caucasian parents who are raising multiracial children in this society?
I think the same basic principles that are important in my family are the same principles that I would share to other parents if I was asked. It is about learning to love and understand those that are like you and those that are different than you. I shop down the street at Meijers [a supermarket]. And almost every day when I go in Meijers, I see a Caucasian person with children, including two or three brown-skinned children. It appears that some of them are the biological children of the parent, and some have been adopted by this parent. I don’t ask many questions but I always say hello. And the children say hello, and the parent says hello back to me. I think that it is wonderful when I see multiracial families. So, yes, I think that the main principles to teach children, especially in this society, are love and understanding.
Years ago when I was working at the Postal Service, this lady and her husband had a little girl in the store with them, and a woman approached the family and said to them, “Oh, what a pretty little girl. I wish I had a little girl like your daughter.” And the little girl said to her in a happy voice, “You can. I am adopted.” And I hope this beautiful girl is still living. I know she would be grown by now. Also, when I was living in Detroit I remember that our mail carrier and his wife adopted a little girl that had been fathered by a white gentleman and a black lady. I was told that the biological parents did not want this child, and so they decided to place her for adoption. That’s when the postman and his wife adopted this little girl. This family did not tell the little girl that she was adopted. Sadly this little girl heard that she was adopted from her classmates after hearing it from their mothers. And some of these classmates teased this little girl and were awfully mean to her, saying that her parents were not her real parents because she was adopted. This girl had a very difficult time because of this and cried a lot. This then compelled her parents to finally tell her that she was adopted. . . . I am sure you know, Rhonda, and your readers, that it is very important that parents who are adopting children speak truthfully and tell them that they are adopted in a loving way.
We have established that love is so important in all families, racially and ethnically blended or not, and for those who choose to adopt to speak truthfully about the adoption with their child and, I would, add family members in an empowering and inclusive way. So taking it a step further, for Caucasian parents who are adopting, for instance, a black child—how do they in your opinion reach out to the African American community, especially when these transracially adoptive families live in communities that are racially homogeneous Caucasian?
I think it is very important that these adoptive families reach out to the black community. Their black children and the rest of the family should know about black history, the black family, and ordinary black persons that they have access to, whether this person lives down the street or interacts within these families’ social circles. It’s important to know about the issues facing the black community and read the newspaper or stories on the Internet about black governors, politicians, community people, and et cetera. So, yes, I think that it is beneficial for black children adopted into white homes to know about their racial and ethnic background. They deserve to know where they came from and that story. Equally important is also for these families to know about white families and their diversity. It’s just wonderful to know about your background, and I don’t only study about the African American history and story; I study about many diverse groups and areas of interests. I study about Mozart, many of the politicians, the geniuses, et cetera. When you get to the basics you may discover that we are all humans and should be valued.