Interview with Adele Abstain, February 14, 2000

Tracy K'Meyer: Well, like I said what I'd like to do is start with just basic biographical information like when and where were you born? Adlene Abstain: I was born in Montgomery, Alabama, July 1, 1943. TK: 1943. Could you tell me a little bit about your parents? What were their names? AA: OK. My mother is Ruthie May Smiley and my father, my stepfather is Roosevelt Smiley and I got involved through my mother. My mother was registering people to vote and back then you had to know the preamble of the constitution and the first five amendments and you had to pay a poll tax in Alabama. So at the age of nine, I started helping her register people to vote and it was during that period that I 1:00guess I was in maybe the ninth grade that we had the Montgomery bus boycott. So we had two major high schools there in Montgomery so I had to choose the one on the side where my mother lived because at that time I was ward of my mother and my natural father so you stay six months with each and at the time of the boycott I was with my mother. So I transferred to Booth Washington High School where I graduated in, oh God, that was '52, oh Jesus, probably '52, yeah. I entered Alabama State, during that period all that time I was working with the Montgomery bus boycott and the movement of the boycott and everything that was 2:00surround. I worked with Reverend Dixon, Reverend Wilson, Reverend Nix, Bernard Lee, Fred Taylor, Ralph Abernathy, and at that time, oh, I can't think of her name, it was a woman that was president of the MIA [Montgomery Improvement Association], she was the original one that was doing this and at the time of the Montgomery bus boycott we were downtown transferring buses and Montgomery Fair was a store like equivalent to something like Dillard's here and she worked at Montgomery Fair as a seamstress for a week. TK: She being your mother? AA: No, she being Rosa Parks. We were all on the bus and when she got on like she sat almost to the back and then as the other race got on the bus, the white 3:00people got on the bus, they would sit one seat behind the black people and then you would have to get up and move to the back even further. I guess she was just tired but she was the third person to have been arrested but she was the only one that had a clear record and a good background that people knew she wasn't lying. So it was like four of us girls on there with her. TK: Now did you know that she was going to do that, that day? AA: No, nobody knew. TK: You just happened to be on the bus. AA: It was just something that happened. It wasn't planned, it wasn't anything that everybody knew we was on the bus, like going to the other side of town. It was nothing planned, it was just she got on and she was a very beautiful lady and she just sit down and sit down in the seat next to the back door so like she was basically in the back of the bus and when the bus 4:00stopped and the explosion started, it was right at the square which they have undid all that in Montgomery now, so they could erase those memories. If you go there now, you wouldn't know that there was a square. TK: I've never been there. AA: Dexter Avenue was right up the street, so we got off the bus and we literally had to walk. So over that weekend period, that happened on a Friday, over that weekend period, the city was blanketed with leaflets saying that we would not ride the bus and it took us five years but we won. TK: That's amazing, so you would have been in high school that whole time? AA: Yeah, and I never actually went to college and that's what people need to know that I enrolled in college. TK: At Alabama State? AA: Right and when I enrolled in college and I 5:00got ready to go to my first class they was having a meeting for the freedom riders and that's what I did, I joined. We went through the training and went through Gandhi's theories and all of that teaching us how to be non-violent. That's what I did. TK: Real quick, I should clarify, was Smiley then your maiden name? AA: No. TK: What was your maiden name? AA: Howard. TK: Howard. AA: Actually it was Moses Howard, you know, because I was carrying my mother's and my father's name. TK: Just curious. So joined the freedom ride, that would be 1961? AA: I joined them 1960, later part of '60 which was like November. We went out in '61. TK: So were you on the one that saw the first one that got bombed in Anniston and all that kind? AA: I was on the one that, when we got back 6:00Birmingham got beat. I was on the one that went to Grenada, Mississippi, when we got there locked up, taken straight through and got locked up. I was ( ) to Montgomery, march on Washington, basically all the marches. TK: Now when did you, after the freedom ride how did you, when did you actually get involved with the SCLC? AA: SCLC in Louisville. TK: It's a hard one to say. AA: Southern Christian Leadership Conference. On a trip to Louisville, we came here I think it was like '65, '66 it was either '66 or '67 and we were on a bus down on Dumesnil and at that time everybody was coming to Louisville for this big mass march because they were marching for housing, we were registering people to 7:00vote. We ended up a part of the march but in the end, we marched the first night. The second night the police decided that we wasn't going to march and that was with ( ) and ( ) was here and they got the burning and all we could do was retreat to our bus but we were still arrested. They shaved half of our hair here and I said that if I ever wanted to live any place, it would be here because I thought the people were very satisfied. I thought the people were not pushing hard enough, and this being a gateway to the North I figured I could make a little difference. TK: Could I back up, I have a question to ask you. I just want to clarify something, so you were already in SCLC obviously, doing work other places in the South since you'd been in the marches and stuff. What led to your decision to come here for that? AA: To Louisville? TK: For that 8:00march? AA: Well, it wasn't a march, we were here for A. D. King doing voter registration. TK: So did he ask you to come or invite you? AA: Yes, we would always be asked. We never went anyplace, people say we would just intrude but we never went any place without being asked. TK: So A.D. invited you to come for voter registration. AA: Right because that's what we were doing. The freedom riders were doing that. SNCC [Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee] was handling another section of it, CORE [Congress of Racial Equality] was handling another section and each part came together but all of it came from under the roof of Dr. King at that time he had organized SCLC, it came out of the Montgomery Improvement Association. The reason I really wanted to live in Louisville because when we got here to be honest, most people did not want to receive us although they sent for us. We didn't have a place to go, not a place 9:00to stay and Anne Braden opened up her house that we might stay there and we would never [stay] any place over a week unless we were arrested. I always said that when I got old enough, I skipped the college and going back to Louisville, Louisville is a place that I always felt they needed help and I still do. Although in the last five years, I've not really been active, now Herman's still active. TK: I saw his name in the paper just like a week ago. AA: Yeah, he's still active, but I ceased being active about two years ago because when I became a pastor I needed to get my church together. But that's the only reason 10:00that I'm not active right now. When I came to Louisville to the LEO (???). TK: When was that? AA: It was in September of '66 was when I came to LEO (???). That was in -- I was still apart of the movement and very much involved, in fact I was heavily involved at that time but I had claimed Louisville as my home. It was four of us left here, it was Herman Dozier, myself, and two other guys I can't even think of their name now but Herman -- Robert Sims was one of them -- Herman would know the other one. He sees, he keeps in touch with them. TK: Robert Sims is that? AA: He changed his name to Kuyu. TK: OK. Is he still here, do you know? AA: No, he's not here anymore. TK: So when you came here, you did the voter registration, that's when you had that experience, could you tell me 11:00about that a little bit more? Because it sounds it was pretty wild. AA: Well we were like parked on Dumesnil and there was record store named Vine Record Shop at that time, right on the corner and our bus was there and we were supposed to retreat back to the bus so we could go to South End to march for open housing but instantly it was like, wow, everything just started happening. Buildings were being burnt, people were being stepped on and we would like, we told girls, guys stay on the bus because the last thing you need to do is get hurt. With the way we were living we could not afford to get hurt because some of our parents 12:00didn't even know where we were. Little did that help because instead of them arresting the people that actually did it, they came and arrested all of on the bus. Louisville has been an experience for me as far as like in Alabama, you know they don't like you so you can deal with that, in Louisville they pretend they like you but yet you know there's a motive for a lot of racism behind some of the things that they do. You got a lot of the ministers, the ministers that I remember the most standing out for us was Father Tachau. TK: Father Tachau, white minister? AA: Yeah, Mattie Jones, Ruth Bryant, Ella Weathers. TK: She's 13:00the one person I don't have on my list, that I need to add to my list. AA: Ella Weathers and there was Ruth Bryant. TK: Yeah, I've already interviewed her. AA: Some of the kids that we met were Raoul Cunningham, Shobe -- what's his name, he's -- TK: Deana Shobe? AA: Shobe, those were some of the teenagers that we met and they were doing their own things. I give them a lot of credit but it seemed like the people in Louisville was just wasn't cooperating. Like they was out there by themselves but I thought they did a marvelous job. I've seen a lot happen in the movement a lot. We were laying in a field resting, we went on a march from Selma to Montgomery when I saw Viola (???) car coming toward up and 14:00then all of a sudden explode in front of our face. TK: Do you remember very much about there was a couple different organization in Louisville and when you mentioned a couple of those people I wondered, do you know anything about BULK [Black Unity League of Kentucky] or WECC? AA: I didn't know them, I knew some of the people but I basically didn't know the concept of the organization, I was strictly SCLC. TK: You weren't involved, so you're basically just with SCLC. Can you tell me anything else about the open housing movement? AA: OK, the open housing movement was that it was -- I don't even know how we got involved in that to be honest because we were here doing one thing and when we got ready to leave A.D. met with us and he said would you'll go with us on this open house march because and that was a lot of people from Louisville. So we said yeah, so 15:00the bus went so far and we had to walk the rest of the way. I remember being blocked up, we was blocked off from the bus like we were over here some place, now that I know to be South End. At that time I didn't know where I was and the bus is back over here and being lost, you got it was like ten of us together because we was in tens and to be lost and not be able to find the bus and then they was threatening to bust tires. It was something you had learned not to have the spirit of fear, because the spirit of fear would have taken you down. I don't think we did anything heroic I just thought we were doing the thing that we thought was right for our people. We felt that they had a right to live where 16:00they want to live so therefore and the reason for the open housing because someone had moved out there and they had burned their house and burned a cross or something in front of the house. So when I moved back to Louisville and that was before Dr. King died and I stayed here like six months and then we had another call, we went to South Carolina and from South Carolina back to Memphis. So that was back in '68. So February we was in South Carolina with Ben Chavez and all of them and we got down there and found out that Ben Chavez had his ( ). So it's like he pulled us away from the and we were going to go to the garbage collection march and before we could get there he was -- we would have been there that night for his speech but he [King] was already gotten shot that day. 17:00TK: So you got there the day after that? AA: We got there that night. TK: When you say that you came Louisville did you move into a place of your own or did you live with other people? AA: We lived -- I lived with my cousin for a while, then my aunt said that she could not, she was afraid. She said you can't live here. So within two months time they had gotten me a place to live and it wasn't just like a place for me, it was like we bunked together because we was on the road together. A girl named Odessa, she's now dead, she and I shared a room and we lived at 38th, do you know where Braden Center is? TK: Yeah. AA: It's the 18:00house right next door to Braden Center. TK: On Broadway the, 38th and Broadway. AA: And that's when we met Anne Braden and she was, boy, she was super nice. They bought us food, they took care of us, she was super nice. And living there then from there, you branch out, you get to met people and I didn't know that I was coming into the city on -- with Lois Morris and all of them. I didn't know that that was an elite pedestal, I didn't realize that at that time. You see, I'm from Alabama, strictly from the projects when I got here the people that was handling the march were not grass root people and I didn't know that. Ruth Bryant and them are considered the elites. TK:: Yeah, I can see that. AA: Because the husbands are doctors and etc. I really didn't get to meet the grass root people until I started meeting Mattie Jones and people like that. And Mattie was very, she and Anne Braden, they were very nice but I had to work my way back down there. TK: So you came in and you met the people sort of at the 19:00elite level first and then -- that's interesting. Was there any conflict between the elite and the grass roots people? AA: No, it's just that's why they started naming them grass root because they felt like everybody was that was participating wasn't grass root and they felt the grass root were the people from the project and etc., but working with all of them I felt like anybody that did not have a spirit of fear and was ready to do the work of the movement was grass root. If that's what you want to call it. I don't believe in separation of people, I think, some might have a couple dollars more than the other but basically everybody's the same and that's been my philosophy all along. I met Dr. Gertrude Coleman and she's here now but I met her -- she was associate dean 20:00of nursing at JCC at that time. TK: Is she related to Louis Coleman? AA: Her husband is cousin. Well, you know later I met Louis Coleman but the role with -- the roles that I play when I joined SCLC here, Reverend Elliot and Reverend Kirby, but no, Leo Lesser was president. TK: Ah, that's a name I haven't heard very much about. AA: Leo Lesser was president then and Leo Lesser, we went on some marches and some open housing marches and some voter registration. After Leo Lesser died, Reverend Elliot took the torch and after Reverend Elliot took the torch, it went to many marches. Reverend Elliot would march from breakfast, 21:00dinner and supper and some of us took part 'cause some of us had to get jobs. I seen the time I volunteered forty hours for the movement and worked forty hours. TK: Where'd you work? AA: Kroger. I started out teaching and I was -- you start teaching and if you say you didn't go to college not to come into ( ). OK, I got a certificate, I enrolled in the University of Kansas and did correspondent courses. From that, they gave me an associate degree. So I started out as parent aide, then to a teacher's assistant and I started doing that for a while and then I started back to go to U of L and then I thought about Kroger and Kroger 22:00was paying good money at that time. For the next eighteen years I worked for Kroger. TK: Wow, when did you go to U of L ? AA: I enrolled in U of L one -- let me see I enrolled up ( ) because I didn't even go to class at U of L that was in '74 because at the same time I left the board and went to Kroger. TK: So that's long after U of L had some sit-ins and things like that. AA: Yeah, but we were there for sit-ins at U of L . TK: Oh, you supported them. AA: You had a, like a leader for welfare rights, we had like an Anita Lawless for welfare rights. You had like Mattie Mathis for parent rights with students. You had Mattie Jones with Kentucky Alliance against Racism and Political Repression. Then you had Louis Coleman with his and then you had SCLC and then you, NAACP. There come a 23:00conflict with being from an organization so it was left to the two people that were still here from Dr. King and that was me and brother Dozier. So we came out with an open statement that whatever you belong to push, pull, sit, stand, as long as you get involved. And for a while I felt like we were making a lot of headway and sometime I think we -- I still think we still are making a lot of headway. But now racism is mostly in the courts, I see that being a pastor. I know personally with doing drugs, selling drugs walking the street, then I -- guy who might be pushing for a middle man that ain't got no money and end up in 24:00prison. So to me that's racism because if you can pay for this one to get out then you can pay for that one to get out. Personally, I'm against drugs, I think it's genocide through the Afro-American community because it spreaded in to the Afro-American community. Just like moonshine when it first came out it spreaded to the Afro community. I'm against malt liquor because I feel like it deals with the brain and you don't find malt liquor being sold anywhere but in the black community. Reverend Kirby now we've set in against the Klan, the president, chairman of the anti-Klan coalition. TK: The one that had that march that was about five years ago. That was right when I moved here. That was right after I moved here. AA: One downtown ( ). TK: So how long, does KCLC, well, I mean the Kentucky version of the Christian Leadership Conference, does it still exist, is 25:00it still active or had it sort of -- ? AA: It's sort of fold but it's still active, it's active within those of us like Pete Cosby, he's the president now. TK: He was on my list at one point, he's the president now? AA: But we were thinking about getting in touch with Osmond (???) and reorganizing it because it's on the rise again and we fell like he's just sitting. TK: Would he have been active in it in the past, too? Would he be worth me talking to do you think? AA: Cosby? TK: Yeah. AA: He was active but he was not active as much as his brother who was on the human relations committee. TK: What's his brother's name? AA: What was his brother's name? Laken Cosby. TK: You know, OK, I do have his name and for some reason I thought that was father and son but it's 26:00brothers. AA: No, two brothers. OK, the son is Kevin Cosby. TK: And there is a Connie Cosby, who I think was the mother? AA: Yeah. TK: She was one of the sit-in kids. You know it's funny because there are certain families like Ruth Bryant and her daughter and the Cosbys and the Neals. AA: Cheri and Peggy and then, yeah, the Neals, Sterling and Gerald. TK: And Gerald and Beverly. So Laken Cosby is the brother and he would have been more active back then, so if I'm interested in the more pre-1980 period so I'll call him. AA: But now Pete was there too, so the two of them together they can fill you in on like the times I was in and out. I stayed here from '66 until now. Just leaving for marches and come back. TK: Just going to marches and stuff like that. AA: And the last out of town march I went to was in South Carolina. TK: Just recently? AA: No, this was two years ago. TK: OK, because they just had a big one down there just about 27:00a couple of weeks ago. AA: That's the one that Herman wanted to go to but he's physically not able and I am, but I don't feel like driving all the way to North Carolina to march right now. I'm fifty-six now and I need to realize that, like I'm serious, from the water hose, I've got scars. You know my back was split open, my pores largely and you can see the scars from my legs from the water hose, so I'm saying I carried the scars of what I have done and the places I have been and sometime I might be able to write and jot some things down for you because I'm overlooking because I'm just talking in general. But being a part of 28:00that it was an experience I will never forget and sometime when I walk in a restaurant now and someone slide my food, it will click and I'm like, no, this is not and you try to ignore but it's still very strong. Then you got the younger generation that don't know what we went through that they might even walk in a mall free. They felt like it's a privilege, you know, like it's just something they're supposed to do but it's a privilege because we paid for it with our blood and my foreparents' blood. The past -- before Dr. King was lynched in Montgomery, Dr. Lambert (???)was lynched. TK: I didn't know that. AA: The Dexter Avenue has always been know. TK: Well, I knew that because I've heard of Vernon Johns, well, actually a friend of mine is writing a book about Vernon Johns. AA: Well, he was actually lynched there, then you had Reverend Lambert, 29:00he was the black radio announcer, Christian radio announcer. He got lynched there in Montgomery because he was outspoken. TK: Who were some of the other important ministers here in Louisville? AA: Reverend Elliot, Reverend Elmore, TK: I interviewed him. AA: Reverend Kirby, one across the bridge, D.L. Moley. TK: I don't know that name, Motley. AA: He's over at Guilt Edge (???). He was like the person that could always talk to the police to keep you from getting arrested. TK: What was his first name? AA: D.L. TK: How do you spell that? AA: It's Douglass. TK: Oh, D.L., oh, I thought you said like Dale, Douglas L. Motley. AA: He's at Guilt Edge Baptist Church over in Jeff. TK: Baptist. I've 30:00heard of most the other ones you mentioned. One thing that happened while you were here and I'm trying to get different people's perspective on is the riot of 1968. Do you have any memories of that? END TAPE 1, SIDE A START TAPE 1, SIDE B AA: The riot of 1968, oh God, if I could wipe that out of my memory I would. TK: You would. AA: I would. Is not because I didn't feel it should happen. I felt like it happened at the wrong place. I didn't feel like it should have happened on 28th Street. When we got there and all, we called them field workers came in and then you had field workers from the Black Panther they came in and when they 31:00found out that the Black Panthers was here, the police came around and surrounded us down there and you get locked into that little thing. TK: That corner. AA: They sort of went crazy and again we retreat to the bus which did us no good again because again we got arrested and that was the time that they cut half of our hair off. SCLC office was there, Urban League office was there, NAACP office was there and you had -- the people that was actually involved in the actual march were not the people that were doing the burning but when you got people that's trained for non-violence and then you got the followers, they have not been trained and they don't know when their cut off point comes. When 32:00they get tight, when they get to that anger, it's like either they shut down or they go into violence. That's what I feel like happened. I felt like it could have been avoided if the police just had not been there doing what they were doing, I felt like had they let them just go ahead and march, it would have been a peaceful march. Just like two years, what a year later we were in Greensboro with the four kids getting killed, they let them march so it ended up being a peaceful march, had they did the same thing in Louisville, I think -- and they should have known from the examples of what had happened in Birmingham and what had happened to us in -- on the way from Selma to Montgomery and what had happened to us in Decatur, where the lady ran into the middle of the march. It's like the police was not interested in looking back at history, I give the 33:00Kennedys a great deal of respect for what they did for us because I remember sitting in Dexter Avenue and I'm going back when I was a child, when they declared martial law there and they was shooting tear gas into the church and this was policeman's and national guards. TK: I've seen that video footage of it or news footage of it. And King is inside and he gives this sermon about not being afraid. AA: It was actually shooting ( ) he always taught us the spirit of fear was the worst fear to have because once the spirit of fear sets in then all the rest of the fears come in like you don't want to be bothered, then you go into depression and then you go into all of these things. He taught us that -- and that was one of the things that has always lived with me that he taught, fear no man because they're the same as you and once you start fearing then 34:00you're already defeated. So if you're gonna die for what you believe, then die in belief of this is what you really believe. The training sessions that we went through prepared us for the rest of our life, those of us that's part of the marches. Now there were some people like -- there was a lot of them like when they came out of it, they went back to school, they went ahead and did what they were doing. Then we became the others, although -- and that was the one thing that came out of the march that I didn't like. I didn't like being the others. It was like -- it took more than John Lewis to run our bus, John Lewis didn't 35:00run twelve buses, he ran one. You know what I'm trying to say, Mildred ran one bus, but it's like and this one is a housewife, but they never said anything about the people that continued in the movement. TK: That's true. One of the things that I'd like to do in this book is talk about, so after the big thing here in Louisville was always open housing was the really big thing and obviously it's one of the things that was happening just as you were getting here, but what happens after that, what kinds of thing did SCLC do, say after 1970? AA: After 1970 we did with job discrimination. TK: Job stuff. AA: We marched on Ford, we marched on GE, we marched and it's after gathering facts and investigation, you actually have people in those jobs being discriminated against. South Central Bell was one of the ones, Kroger, where I went to work, was one of the ones. We worked with situations like that, then up rose the Klan 36:00in about '70. Jim Kennedy and Jim Hardy and ( ). TK: Who are they? AA: The guys at Shepherdsville, they're Klansmen and they rose up against us and they threatened to bomb my house, Dr. Kirby, church and etc. So you were constantly fighting a battle of one kind or another. So we confronted the Klans, we went to their meeting out at Southwestern Community Center on Dixie Highway. That's one I'd like to forget because that was one time I really thought I was going to get killed, I want to be honest. That's the only time that I really thought that I would get killed then something inside of me said, no, speak the truth. And that 37:00was when Mr. Lavender's son had got shot or something out there. TK: Oh, I didn't hear anything about this stuff. AA: OK, we went out there and we confronted them and the consultation guy, he did, but in the end when Dr. Kirby said, well, what are we gonna do, we have no weapons, they do, so you start saying to them I do not have a spirit of fear, I do not fear you nor your weapons. You can kill me but there will be another one after me. And you have to say it convincingly even though they might but at the time we were doing it there was another one after you because am I my brother's keepers, yes, if I fall, then there is another soldier. And that's the same way we went back to the 38:00roots of what we had been doing in the beginning. If this row falls, the next row just comes and we just kept doing that and they thought we were crazy for doing it but I thought it's the principle that you are living by and if you don't live by a principle you will die for anything. So I might as well die for a principle than to die for anything and those are things that I really believe. I believe within my heart that right now today we are still, we're making a lot of progress but we are still buying leftover buildings, we're still going in the direction of trying to go into a club that they don't want me in. I'm not interested in going where you don't want me, because if you don't want me there, then lets me know you still don't like me, so why would -- am I going to sit and 39:00laugh and talk with you. So like I told -- when Dick Gregory was here like about four years ago and we were talking about that and he said OK. I said I won't go to the Pendennis Club because I don't want to eat and sit with them. TK: That place is still pretty segregated, isn't it? AA: Yeah. TK: Well, though, I guess I don't run in the right circles but no one I know goes there at all, white or black but then again, mostly I know schoolteachers.(laughs) AA: ( ) TK: And they're not actually hanging out at the Pendennis Club, I don't even know where it is, I must admit. AA: Yeah, Dick [Gregory] and Buster [Coleman] just went jail a couple of years ago, last year, not two years ago. TK: I think that's right when I moved here. AA: They went to jail for -- and that was one, when I said I think I need to back off and get my church together. The church that I'm pastor ( ) TK: Do you have your own church now? AA: Yeah. TK: What church is it? AA: The Fountain of Life Word and Worship Center. TK: Where is that ? AA: We are now holding worship service at 3400 Vermont, we're there on Sunday mornings but 40:00my church is predominantly white. TK: Oh really, that's interesting. AA: It is interesting but I -- you've got to learn. When you think of the Gandhi theory and you think of -- I will not do these thing until certain things happen, people will listen. Like I will not eat until you come together and sit at this bargaining table with me, people will listen. Because after you get a certain size they think that you really gonna die, so they are willing to negotiate. It's not a threat, it's just something you've got to live by and like marching 41:00and walking, it's not in vain to me, it's the principle of it. I would rather march and make people aware of what's going on, like when we were having the rally for the Klans when they decided they were going to have a meeting on the steps and I'm like, we're electing Klansmen all over the United States to serve in the House of Representatives in Washington and Senators. So before the year 2005, you're not going to have any minorities there because minorities does not fit in blacks now, it fits in whoever is non-Caucasian as they want to call it is a minority. So -- and then you're going to turn around and count us like 42:00black man equal one, black woman equal two, three. I stand for one because I'm only one and who gave you judge over how many I should be. Then you turn around and you say I'm going to take away their Affirmative Action. So that lets me know that you're fighting me now on a new area and this area I need to study to put somebody there in that position that can handle the law that can deal with what's going on with us like the merger for the city. I knew this was going to happen when we went to Cleveland because that's the way [Jerry] Abramson laid it out before this panel. I knew it would happen and I came back wondering if it would happen. It would take away representation for the blacks and you don't have very much as it is. So why just give them something on a silver platter? 43:00When this is over next year, Abramson will be back and you'll be going through the same thing. It's not I'm against Abramson or [Dave] Armstrong, I'm not against him for I'm for the person for the right thing and I'm for representation of all Afro-Americans and basically low class whites, to be honest, because they are very much mistreated. When you stand up and quote to me that we have forty-five thousand people on ADC [Aid to Dependent Children, welfare] and we're going to cut it back, you basically did not hurt the black folk, you hurt yours. Then when they saw they were hurting, they're -- they figure out a way of how I'm going to give you some food stamp. OK they don't know that we know that food stamps were not invented for us in the beginning, it was invented for the farmers so they could buy stuff that they could not make on 44:00the farm when they was going under. TK: Was SCLC involved in the War on Poverty here at all? AA: Yeah. TK: How, in what way? AA: We did -- OK, what we did was, we did a hunger thing, a hunger campaign and we went all -- we blanketed the city with paper plates and had them just sign them. We flooded and we did that all over, we flooded Washington with the paper plates, just empty paper plates saying we are hungry. But then since I was at Legal Aid, I already knew that by the time we get the news that it is already mostly become a bill, by the time they read it to us and we hear it on TV, it's pretty much. TK: It's pretty far along. AA: See, people -- and when you go and try and tell people that, they go "how do you know" because I've been to Washington , I've seen the old Senate 45:00meet and I've met with President [Ronald] Reagan. I know how that when we hear it and start reacting to it and not too much you can do. TK: Did SCLC get involved in the Poor People's March and all? AA: Yes. TK: Coming through in Louisville, I mean, what did they do there? AA: What we did was, we prepared, we prepared the poor people march, we prepared for, uh, we didn't know that we were going to get involved in that because Buster Coleman was heading that up. And Mattie Jones, but we ended up getting involved in that because you know, they had this quilt, remember that? TK: The only quilt I know was the AIDS quilt. AA: Not the AIDS quilt, no. TK: That's a different thing, yeah. AA: That's a different quilt. The poor people -- TK: That's a -- years later. AA: That's real about now, but this is back then. Then you see a different patch on for a 46:00different state to let them know that you're involved in that hunger march and the quilt was made like the United States. You know that? TK: I never heard about that, that's interesting. AA: We did that in Clarksdale . TK: OK, Clarksdale's one of the housing projects? AA: That is to say the place we basically do everything because they got the facilities that you can do it. TK: The meeting facilities, or something?, OK, I didn't know that either. AA: And Candy Olmsted was involved, she's with the housing authority now. Did anyone tell you about her? TK: What's her first name? AA: Candy. TK: Candy. AA: I'm not sure she'd talk to you because of her husband, but I'm pretty sure she -- TK: Candy, what's her last name? AA: Olmsted, you know Chuck's wife. She's been involved since she's been here. TK: Oh, yeah? AA: Yeah, see, we, what happened was after we saw how the law was doing, how it was being handled through the law. Lois Morris organized Black Women for Political Action. OK, Black and ( ) 47:00was first president and I'm first vice president, Candy, vice president. What we did was start teaching young people. And that's our dream, is to teach as many young people as we can and educate them towards the law and how its made and how things go so they will be able to run for office. One of the people that first ran out of our campaign, I ran myself one on the independent ticket just to see where I stood, and I think that if I had come back the year and ran I would've won. Bobby Powell, (??) she ran, Cheri Bryant, she ran for magistrate back then. Those were three of the people that I know were well versed. We used to have schools of instruction on Saturday and we're getting back to that this year. 48:00Schools of instruction to teach them how laws are made. To try to inform that when the law get to you it's already made. Black Women for Political Action also is politically involved in teaching people not to vote necessarily for the party anymore, but to vote for the person. Because neither Democrat nor Republican stands for Afro-Americans. And I say Afro-Americans, 'cause that's the new name they gave us. But they don't stand for me. OK, I say black folk, Afro-American, you know. Since I've been in this world I've been Negro, black, African American. No, I was Negro first and then I was black and proud and then I was Afro-American and now I'm African American. I just say well, now I don't know 49:00what I'll be next week. TK: I guess you're too young to have ever been colored. AA: Yes, I was colored first. TK: Colored first, then Negro. I've got black, Afro-American, African American. AA: I know you can get it from the library, but two sets of material of mine is missing. The set where I organized the young people out of Newburg, I had the youth of Newburg and they were in gangs and stuff and I know one person I hear that work with the gangs and first time offenders, and that set of papers is missing. I worked with George Unseld, now Unseld was very involved. TK: Yeah, yeah. AA: OK, that's how know George. OK, I've been knowing George but that's how I do George. At that time Wes was still here. Had you got here when Wes was still here? TK: Yeah, that's the name I know because I teach at U of L, but so when I know Wes Unseld. I'm assuming this road 50:00out here is named for that family. AA: That one. This one, for Martin. I know that sounds real crazy but this set of papers I have for Montgomery, now book of papers that I have when I was traveling in the march and I've still got that. Now could I ( ). But the set that I have for Montgomery, I can't find those 'cause I had those with my most recent papers. But you can go to any TV station, they'll give you any kind of footage you need on me. TK: On the gang stuff, too? AA: Uh huh. TK: That's interesting. This Black Women for Political Action, that's still an active group? But it was started by Lois Morris and she's passed away now. There actually may be some information about that. She left her personal papers to the library. And then Candy Olmsted, is that O-L-M-S-T-E-D ? AA: Uh huh. TK: OK, so I can maybe call her and what did you say was her husband's name? AA: He's WHAS reporter. TK: Oh really? 'Cause usually the wife's 51:00name listed under the husband's name in the phone book, so I often have to know the husband's name. 'Cause I may call some time, 'cause that sounds like an interesting group to try to find out. AA: I'm first vice president of that group. TK: You are currently or you were when it started? AA: I'm currently the president. Candy's carrying it for two years. We going to meet again, we're going to start meeting in April. TK: When was it started? AA: Lois Morris organized this back, you, it was in the '80s. In the '80s. Now that should be in the papers in the library. It should be easy to see because how that was that I got moved up to chair to president. I was the first vice president of three Black Women when it was first organized. Boy, Lois was a character. She was a part of everything and she ran for mayor . TK: She was an elected official, 52:00wasn't she? AA: She was an alderman, she was the first black alderman. Alderwoman. TK: In the '60s? AA: Uh, huh. And she ran for mayor. Then she came out -- Mae Street Kidd for -- she got sick, she was support. Georgia Powers was support. TK: I just met her this weekend. AA: You did? TK: Georgia Powers. AA: You did? TK: I haven't interviewed her yet, but I met her. Actually I met Mattie Jones this weekend to. AA: You did? TK: So I'm going call her AA: Well, tell Mattie that you talked to Adlene and Mattie will talk to you. TK: OK, I actually -- AA: Now I'm going to be honest, you got to mention that, maybe you got to curry name. That means I will talk to you. I know that you're not a scam. OK, if I talk to you, Mattie will talk to you. Candy will talk to you. Is like, not a secret code or anything like that, but its just memories and a lot of memories, a lot of memories. I can't even, I could sit on days and start on the day of my 53:00walking next door to teach this man how to write his name on the voter registration form. And teach him the first ( ). Then they paid a poll tax. Which was basically that weekly salary, just to vote. And then you get in and when I got to Louisville, and found all you had to do was sign your name, I was pissed, oh. I was like ( ) you mean all these people is sign their name, 'cause I was standing in there registering, 'cause I declared myself a resident. And they said, You want to register to vote? I said, sure, that's what I'm here for. I got my piece of paper, they said sign your name, you know, fill it out and sign you name. I said what else do I have to do. They said, nothing. Oh, wow, I was a 54:00( ), we were having a rally right down at 38th and Broadway at night. I went berserk, I was like, how dare you come here and not be registered. And now I ( ) my challenge to the people now, I dare you not be registered when all you have to do is sign your name. TK: It is so easy, you mean. AA: It is so, you tell me you don't care about what's happening, but you make the difference. TK: How did that, the fact that it was so easy to register to vote, in Louisville in the 60's, how did that effect, or shape the movement here? AA: That was the reason why I wanted to come back. Because you did not have, you still don't have enough registered voters here. TK: Even though it's easy. ,AA: Even though it's easy. And that's my little song and dance now. Is how can you just not care about who represents you in Frankfort, who represents you in Washington, when I have gone 55:00through people who could not read and write that wanted to have that privilege to vote and maybe because my great grandmother lived to be 107 and I know my history and I know from whence I came. And I know the Native American side of me and I know both sides, both great grandfathers lived to be 125. Neither one had Alzheimer's or amnesia, or anything. So I know where I came from. And you're going to tell me that you don't want to vote because you don't care. That bothers me. It sort of makes me feel like every thing I've done from eighteen to thirty. I could have been on the college and did, you know, maybe doing all of this stuff. But instead, I'm out here walking the street doing this thing in order that you might have a better life. And you're going to tell me you don't 56:00care. That bothers me. You want to see me get ticked, and I'm serious. You say, and people do say that, where it just don't affect me. It does affect you. Aubrey Williams lost an election by two votes. Just think about it, had you had two more people to vote he would have won. Mae Street Kidd lost because a man was giving out chicken. Know what's going on around you. Here's a man giving out chicken, then five years later you're going to tell Reggie, we going to bring you down because you gave out chicken. But Handley gave out chicken and give it out every year. So how can you overlook this and see this. It's like you see what you want to see. You can see that I get upset about voting, that's my baby. 57:00TK: Right, right. AA: I get out and I still walk the streets You'd be surprised if you cross that side of Newburg Road, how many people are not registered to vote. TK: Really? Wow. AA: I'm serious. TK: Is that the city still? Is that still city of Louisville? AA: No, none of us is city, it's all county. Now this was city. But when they came in -- TK: That's right, with the schools it was city system. AA: You know they came involved because we were a city. But when you take 500 names down to the county judge and say, I want to be mayor, and nobody is on that paper is a registered voter, you know what is going to happen. But see, they couldn't understand how I could go there and I could act ( ) a flag, I got it, I act ( ) the street and I got it. Because if you put on a dogfight, I'm voting. Put on a catfight, I'm voting. Because it's my privilege, 58:00that's the only given privilege I really have. That's the only freedom anybody has. The only freedom you got, I've got is to vote. That's what SCLC taught me, and that's what is about. You got to have some principles and voting is one of them. TK: I already taken an hour of your time and I was going to put another tape in, but I'm sort of out of questions anyway. I said I've already taken and hour of your time. AA: I'm free, I'm all right. You got me to talking -- TK: But I was going to ask, what I usually like to do is ask people, do you know anybody else I obviously -- Herman Dozier I'm going to call, I think I'm probably going to call this woman -- AA: Make sure you tell him you have already talked to me because maybe he can remember some things that I don't, we traveled a lot together. TK: I didn't know that he had come here with SCLC, too, 'cause that's 59:00interesting. AA: Yeah, yeah. And he has field director. TK: Oh, really? OK, and I'm going to call this Candy Olmsted, you mentioned her. Is there anybody else that you can think of that you haven't mentioned yet that I should try to interview. Ella Weathers, you mentioned. AA: Ella Weathers, Denise is Ella Weathers' daughter. TK: Denise? AA: Denise Bentley. TK: I've heard of her name, why do I know -- AA: She's an alderman. TK: OK, isn't that terrible, I know mine, Tina Ward Pugh is my alderman. AA: That's all you need to know. That's what you have to deal with. She can tell you how to get in touch with her mother. TK: Actually, there was an article about Ella Weathers in the paper. AA: Then you could talk to Myra Friend Ellis. TK: Ellis -- AA: Myra Friend Ellis TK: How do you spell the first name? AA: M-Y-R-A TK: Myra? AA: Friend. TK: As in friend? AA: Uh, huh. TK: Ellis? AA: dash Ellis. TK: E-L-L-I-S? AA: She's in what was Paul Bather's office, 'cause she's now Cheri's aide. TK: Cheri? AA: Bryant 60:00Hamilton. TK: Cheri's aide and what was her connection to all of this? AA: OK, all those people were with Raoul Cunningham, Deana Tinsley. They were all raised down there together. And I was down in that area. TK: Works for.. I interviewed Diana Tinsley, Raoul Cunningham.. AA: Did Raoul give you any more names? TK: He gave some names, but only the names he had were people who did sit-ins and the -- END TAPE 1, SIDE B START TAPE 2, SIDE A AA: The reason you needed their involvement it's like when you go into a city and you asked SCLC, you contact the main person at SCLC, they contact organization in that city and have a representative in order that you can bring their people to make the march. 61:00That's how you always had so many people on the street and they were not necessarily all apart of SCLC but they were a part of Jack and Jill, Girl Scout, Boy Scout, SNCC, the Muslims, whoever was represented. You had back then and I don't think that we got -- the anti-Communists, the Communists part, BWC, everybody. But Dr. King said exclude ourself from no one because Jesus excluded himself from no one. He ate with everybody. So when you sit down and you come together on one common thing even though you're not a part labor, you're not a part of the main struggle what's your working for but labor understands what you're doing, so labor bring their people. Everybody carried their own banner to show their representation. That's how that worked, that's how you built a march 62:00and when you want to build a march for out of state you wrote to SCLC, SCLC bring all these people together, then you might take ten buses but it's ten different buses of ten different organizations going for the same cause and that's how it worked. TK: Were there many white organizations that supported all this stuff? AA: Yeah, the CWP was sound in the fight. TK: That's the Communist Workers Party, right? AA: They were predominantly white, they were white. There was another one, Socialist Party, they don't exist anymore but they were heavy in Louisville back then, very heavy, they were all white but they were good people, good people. You want some work done because I remember going on that, those kids getting killed in Atlanta and they called us and said well, their SCLC would like to bring one of the parents to Louisville to explain what is 63:00happening and I say sure, they got it there, raised that money just like that. You know what I'm saying, so what I'm saying, you need everybody, everybody needs everybody. Like you need input from everybody but when you sit down and start putting it together, you see how it come together, it will come together for you because everybody played a major role. When I moved to SCLC, when I moved to Louisville that made me like a link to the national. Herman and I were links to the national and we get a memo from the national and just think about it we had computers then like we do now ( ). We would really, really be doing a whole lot but you get a letter from a bulletin saying gather people, we need a hundred or we need five hundred people in this state at this date. OK you know you ain't got five hundred strong in your organization but you stand up and you make and appeal and you start calling and everybody start coming together. 64:00You've got five hundred going and that's how they worked. TK: Well, I definitely get the sense of these organizations weren't as -- were not very separate that there's a lot of overlap of people involved in more than one group and stuff. Did you hear of the Black Workers Coalition? Did you work with them at all? AA: Yeah, black workers because I was black worker at Kroger at one time. TK: Which Kroger were you at? AA: I worked right there at 278 at Bardstown Rd. and Hikes Lane for eighteen years. TK: OK, that one. AA: ( ). TK: So you don't work there now? No, you're a minister now. AA: No, just a pastor now. TK: Well, I'm going to go ahead and stop this. AA: The door was closed and we couldn't find nobody with lights out, you couldn't find nobody within near sight, we come in one o'clock in the morning. We knew nobody in this city. TK: When you say we came, how many -- were you with, just two people, with a bunch of people? AA: We came with a bus. TK: Oh a whole bus load. AA: Like the bus came in from University of Alabama, not the University of Alabama but Alabama State and Alabama A&M, we 65:00used to travel together Alabama A&M and Alabama State and Spelman and Morehouse now, they would travel together. You travel basically to two states, two colleges, black colleges within the inner state and those guys from Grambling, boy, they were some big guys and by the time you got five buses pulling up one behind another and you have no place to go and we have slept on bus , I've ate much bologna. That's why I like it too much. I'm just now getting back the taste for bologna. I've eaten a lot of bologna and cheese and souse meat. TK: Hey, that's what I ate when I was growing up. AA: But I ate it because I had no other choice. I don't mind eating it and then .. I've been a lot of places my mother 66:00didn't even know where I was. TK: What did your mother think of all thus? AA: My mother? When she really found out what I actually did, I was grown. She knew bits and pieces from my involvement in Montgomery , but when I moved away, to actually know just how deep I was involved and how close I came to being killed, she was like, I should have known. Because I took God from her. TK: Yeah, it seems like , yeah. AA: I got it from her. She, you know.. TK: Had her parents been active? AA: Well, her parents, my grandparents and my great-grandmother was not a slave. My great grandmother was an Indian come out of Prickett, Alabama. So therefore she was property owner, OK, didn't know that we were supposed to be well off, I just thought that we lived up in the city in the projects and my grandmomma lived down on this farm and they raised cotton, never dawned on me 67:00that they owned this. Things like that, material things were not -- like we got this or we got, like kids do now. Boy, if we did something like that, Mom would knock us out. It was like you don't own anything, God's given, had loaned you this. So when my grandmother, my great-grandmother died at 107 and I was the executive of her estate, although I have ten other brothers and sisters. I being the oldest child, we see, my mother was an only child, so she never wanted not to just have one child. I was the only child for ten years. TK: Then she got busy. AA: Real busy, but she always said she didn't want them without marriage and after she and my dad divorced, well, she didn't have any more until she got married, which was nine years later, and then she and Dad had nine more 68:00children. She said she didn't want them to grow up along like she was and I grew up along because ( ) 'till I was ten but Mom was swift, she was smart, well educated because my great-grandmother saw to that. She traveled a lot, they saw that she traveled that she knew things and that she was of so when she came back to Montgomery to head up a campaign for Kennedy was nothing to her. She just -- was like, it was natural thing for her she was a natural leader. TK: Was your family very involved in the church when you were growing up? AA: Yeah. TK: Was it Dexter Avenue or was it --? AA: No, my mother -- we were not members of 69:00Dexter Avenue but we were members of Hote (???) Street and our pastor was ( ) Wilson. He was one of the original ministers. See after Nixon, Dixon, Wilson and ( ) when all them came together, well, Mrs. Cora, she was president of Montgomery Improvement Association and they came together with her. King was a better spokesperson, OK, but that don't mean he didn't have no ideas of his own because, see, this man ( ), he would go on learning. OK, shortly after he came into it, he went to India and studied under Gandhi so he would know what to teach us. By the time I got out of high school I had no intentions of being a freedom rider, I hadn't really even thought about it. But the day I walked into Alabama State and they was signing them up, I knew then that was going to be my 70:00life. A lot of people often ask why didn't you go back. I said by then I decided to come to Louisville and being involved and ( ) Smith got me a correspondence course form University of Kansas and that, the school ( ), that's what I was worth paying for. So therefore it was like, I never gave a thought to my future until I was maybe twenty-five and like, eh, wait a minute, I've got to do something. Yeah, I should have went to college, I should have, I should have -- I was sitting in the office one day with her and I was a parent aide and we taught reading in the parent aide and I was like, you know, I gotta do something with my life after this. I said, all I do is the movement, I live, sleep, eat, drink the movement. She said, well, I can look around and see what I can get you 71:00as a correspondence course. And at that time that was the only place you could get one. When I finished that I wanted to go to U of L, I didn't want to go to U of L, I did want to go to U of L, I didn't so I went over there and I thing, I signed up but I went for a loan -- I don't know what happened but I didn't go, instead I ended up back into the movement and I said, now I need make some more money. By then I had another man and got married and I said I need to make some money, I'm married now. I don't need nothing now, I got a husband. Thank glory to God I still got the same husband. March 14 will be our 30th wedding anniversary. I went and worked for Kroger for the money. At that time and I could still do the movement and work at Kroger. TK: Your husband is from here? AA: Yeah, and my husband -- now his brother, Marshall Abstain was active, his 72:00aunt, Sadie Abstain, she's deceased now, they were active from the educational standpoint. Now Marshall was the first black student to go to Shawnee. TK: Marshall, with an l at the end. Male or female, you said brother? AA: My brother-in-law. TK: Brother Abstain was the first black at Shawnee, did you say. AA: Yeah, played basketball and you know, Shawnee was a predominantly white school. He was one of the first blacks there. TK: And he's still in the area? AA: Yeah, he just retired from Seneca, he taught at Seneca for years. Now when you call me back, I can get his number for you, because his number is private 73:00because everybody call him. TK: Yeah, because I thought that there was only one Abstain in the book. The one I saw was on Abstain Court. AA: You should have known we'd be a little something, something and there family was very instrumental from the educational standpoint of making sure that black children had a way to get to school. Marshall integrated Shawnee and the sister integrated Lincoln Institutional, which is now Job Corp. She was the first to go there and she graduated with honors and she taught for -- she went on to, I think, I don't where she went to school after that. I know she's a licensed teacher, too. TK: So they're all involved in education. AA: Their education.. 74:00TK: Is your husband involved in education, too? AA: My husband was, but then my husband and them stopped playing, basketball. So, you know, he and Unseld and all them grew up together so they were basketball people and Joe Hampton, his son played, is a coach here. The dad, he works a couple days a week at the school system. He was a professional. TK: What was his first name? AA: My husband is Marvin. TK: Just trying to keep track of all these people. AA: It's Marvin, I guess why I've always been so free to go and march because of what we believe. He gave in his senior year from Marshall to go, so he played for 75:00College of the Scripture, his brothers that played semi-pro, he's dead now and he probably ain't going to talk too much about him, I talk more about him. But by the, somebody puts the -- that's back when they were spiking the drinks with drugs back, long time ago. He died of a seizure from that, so they don't talk about that, I told them they need to talk about it but -- TK: It sounds like he's from a big family, too? AA: No, it's just Marshall, Marvin, Bobby and Kitty but the Williams side of it, you know like Keith Williams, Carla Williams, ( ) played basketball for U of L. TK: Sounds like it .The Unseld family, too. In fact that's one of the first things that.. AA: Have you talked to big George? TK: No, not yet. He has been suggested. AA: He's at the neighborhood park place. Also he's an alderman. TK: When I first moved here I interviewed a couple, I got 76:00hired actually, ( ) so that interview with a couple who have been all involved in various ( ) issues in town mostly so anti-death penalty and peace related stuff, Jean Edwards. AA: Jean Edwards. TK: Yeah. And they were other ones who told me first about George Unseld and the family. I guess they had some relations when he was young. They had helped to start a Presbyterian Church out here in Newburg (). AA: They did. TK: That church -- AA: George was still belonging it. George was belonging it. TK: That's how come I knew of them. AA: But Jean and George, they (). TK: Oh, really. AA: You're not going to believe some of the things we done. We brought a guy from, where is the place they make cocaine over there? Where they grow it. TK: Colombia. AA: Brought a guy from 77:00Colombia. TK: Oh, really, are you involved in the FOR [Fellowship of Reconciliation]? AA: Only through George and (). I on everybody's mail list. Jean, they called me because I work with young people and they said, Allene said, can we get these families to school because - And he actually brought proof that all they do is grow it. For our people just did not want to actually believe that. He said, all we do is grow it, we do not, you know, is not for sale. We grow it. And the majority of what we grow is for the government in Colombia. And we had a private interview with him here and he was () because the United States did not receive him the way he thought they should because of their being innocent, and he showed us pictures of where he lived. I said, no, 78:00you definitely don't sell it. TK: ( ) checks basically. That's what I know -- That's my first introduction to all the Unseld family and Newburg and all that stuff came AA: Now you know Newburg was (), that's a whole 'nother story. This is a historic black community. Moving out here, I did a research on, like you, you know, I need to know where I'm living and why everybody is so protective of this little area. Found out they got a rich like history and that Miss Tillie had ten children. Out of the ten children came Newburg. She was Carl Hite's, sort of like Thomas Jefferson's daughter, she was Carl Hite's lady. He gave her, from the railroad track over to Shepherdsville Road over to Poplar Level Road. 79:00All that was hers. And that's how there got to be Newburg. Now actually how it back to the county. Originally it belonged to all blacks. And right up there, you can see the graveyard from the slaves on back of, you know -- TK: Do you know when that was? AA: I got material -- You know what I gave it to the Farmington. TK: The house, the historic home? Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. That was before the Civil War. AA: Yeah. TK: OK. That's interesting, I think that there's another place that I bicycle past, I read the sign, is Berrytown. It was also -- AA: Yeah, Berrytown, Griffytown. TK: It is kind of interesting. One of my students did a paper on Cane Run or Church Run. But it was a very small -- It used to be a free black community but it's only two or three families left that remember it as such, and I can't remember, Church something? It's out in the 80:00county somewhere. It out in a real rural area of the county, like Cooper Church or Cooper Chapel? AA: Caperal. () got a grant ( ) for that. () Where it is you go straight out Dixie Highway or either 65, and you turn and it's a very rich little area there and it's, they say it was all given the same way this was. But they kept it in the family. They got their own little church. TK: Yep. AA: Caporal. TK: But it's very small. AA: It's very small. But the only people go there is them. TK: She said she discovered it because she discovered the graveyard. AA: OK. TK: You know and she was -- AA: You know a graveyard give you away every time. They slave grave and such -- TK: She said she did a history, she basically worked, the county was paying people to -- AA: Oh, you know ( ) just sit here and I'm running off -- TK: That's OK, I'm --. END TAPE 2, SIDE A