School integration--Kentucky--Louisville

Elmer Lucille Allen grew up in the Russell neighborhood in the 1930s and 40s. Allen described the neighborhood in the days before urban renewal in the late 1950s. She attended Madison Street Junior High School and Central High School during segregation. She attended Louisville Municipal College, the African American arm of the University of Louisville. After the Supreme Court desegregated schools in 1954, UofL closed Louisville Municipal College and Allen went on the Nazareth College (now Spalding University). She became the first African American chemist at Brown-Foreman.

Jann Westerfield Ballard talks about her life experiences growing up in the Okolona community and the experiences of African-American property owners on Cooper Chapel and Maple Roads, their community during the early 1950s, and how it changed or remained the same in the following forty year. The interview also covers Ballard's experience of public school integration and busing protests in the Cooper Chapel Road neighborhood and the community of Okolona.

Robert Benson (b. 1942 in Lousville), Louisville lawyer and former Kentucky legislator, speaks about his experiences with the Civil Rights Movement and some of its leaders in Louisville. Topics include how he became aware of prejudice in the community and got involved with the Open Housing movement; the demonstrations for Open Housing; his experiences representing the Hikes Point/Highlands district from 1974-1980; his friendship with ACLU lawyer Thomas Hogan, who filed the lawsuit that lead to desegregation efforts in Louisville; the passing of laws merging Jefferson County school districts; the passing of laws to desegregate the resulting combined school district; and the backlash and demonstrations against desegregation and busing.

As publisher of the Courier-Journal in the 1970s, Barry Bingham Jr. recounts the coverage of busing through the news media in Louisville. Discusses the weekly editorial conferences and research involved in taking a position of the paper on busing.

Civil rights activist and journalist Anne Braden talks about the civil rights movement in Louisville in the 1950s and 1960s. Topics explored include efforts for school integration, the public reaction to it, her family's experiences with school integration, and redistricting of the city; the West End Community Council and its efforts to keep the West End neighborhood integrated, white flight, and the open housing movement; the activities of SCEF (Southern Conference Educational Fund); the emergence of youth movements; the beginnings of groups like CORE (Congress of Racial Equality), the Committee for Democratic Schools, and the Gandhi Corps; Black Power organizations in Louisville like JOMO (Junta of Militant Organizations) and the Black Panthers; the trial of the Black 6 and the protests surrounding it; and many individuals who were involved in the civil rights movement.

Sheila Brown grew up in the Parkland neighborhood and then lived all over the city. She was a child when the 1968 Parkland Riot occurred. She talked about how it changed her neighborhood. Brown was also among the first group of African American kids bussed in Louisville. She remembered the protest and taunts aimed at her and the other students.

Mr. Burch was principal of Southern High School when Jefferson County Public Schools initiated busing for integration in 1975. He was a long-time resident of Okolona, and a graduate of Southern High School. While stating that within the school, he was isolated from the community, he indicates that the pulse of the community had been quickened by media reports. He indicates that they never had any direct problems with protestors prior to the riots of September 6, 1975, and that rioters never tried to inerefere with the running of the school. He characterizes the internal workings of the school as remaining normal during this period, and indicates that the teachers kept their opinions to themselves. Similarly, he describes the students as having coped well under duress, with few discipline problems. He states that though the student body was obviously uncomfortable in the position it was in, the students did not fight amongst themslves. Burch recalls the night of a football game with Moore High School, another south end school which before the segregation order had been primarily black. He describes the issue as slowly dying down over the course of the school year - protestors eventually stopped coming around the schools, attendance gradually improved, and life returned to normal by the end of the school year.

The Louisville Times editor on the process of school desegregation in Louisville.

Personal history of Doris Chapman. Relates to Louisville, Kentucky childhood; the Great Depression; the 1937 flood; living in Camp Taylor; World War II; German POWs in Louisville; Okolona; bussing; working at GE; and the 1974 tornado. (Interview index available)

Seventy-nine year old Ursula Parrish Daniels, who had returned to Louisville for the dedication of a historical marker at the Seelbach-Parrish Home at 926 South Sixth Street in the Limerick neighborhood, speaks of spending her entire life there until she left for college. With her parents, Charles Henry Parrish Jr. and Frances Murrell Parrish working out of the home, Louisville Municipal College student boarders from her father’s place of employment helped with child care and household chores. Dr. Daniels recalls frequent civic, educational and social leaders in the African American community (both local and out-of-town) visiting her home for meals and social events. In addition, her maternal grandmother, Mary Virginia Cook Parrish, came for Sunday dinner and the house was the center for many visits and overnight sleep-overs by Ursula’s friends. The white family next door consistently expressed animosity to the Parrishes, the only Black family on the block. As an aside, she mentions her father’s “adopted” brother Frank Parrish. She remembers walking to Duvalle Junior High at Eighth and Chestnut Streets and happy days at Central High—including Saturday night sports—through her Junior year. Then, to manifest her parent’s pro-integration views, she spent an unhappy year with one other Black senior at Male High School. Similarly, she describes attending Ohio Wesleyan University where, again as one of the very few Black students, she lived in a group house of “revolutionary” outsiders. (She believes her race denied her the opportunity to be the yearbook queen.) After a time in Chicago, she moved to New York City where ultimately--aided by a generous fellowship--she earned a doctorate in educational psychology at City University of New York, which launched her career as a professor of early childhood education and administrator at Bergen (New Jersey) Community College from 1979 to 2018. Dr. Daniels discusses her summer visits to her maternal grandparents’ (the Murrells) comfortable home in Glasgow, Ky., recalling how her grandmother’s male siblings (the Martins), who had good jobs as railroad porters in Chicago, returned annually sporting fine cars and pocket watches. Ursula notes that despite the weight of racism, her Glasgow family achieved success as contractors, farmers, entrepreneurs, and professionals. She further notes that this family wing included Native American ancestors, which explains why her Mother, Frances, was so light-skinned. (Ironically, her father’s doctoral research focused on color as a mark of privilege in the Black community.) Ursula explains how her mother came to Louisville to complete high school, boarding with the Clark family, and ultimately attending Louisville Municipal College to study sociology and statistics, where she married her professor Charles Henry Parrish Jr. She discusses her mother’s role as a public parks administrator and, after securing advanced degrees, as a long-time professor of sociology and research methods at Spalding University. She calls both parents as “board room” racial activists for equality and inclusion, indicating that her mother temperamentally was more outspoken and her father more stubbornly reflective. Dr. Daniels notes her father’s affection for the University of Louisville—especially President Philip Davidson—and the difficulty within the African-American community when her father was selected as the only LMC professor to be invited to join the racially-integrated faculty at UofL’s Belknap Campus. Ms. Daniels, on reflection, points to several values that shaped her life and profession. First, as a child of educational, economic and cultural advantage, she believes much was demanded of her, including a career commitment to create opportunity for marginalized people. In addition, despite her family’s struggle for integration, she talks of the need for Historically Black Colleges and Universities for certain African-Americans. Noting the Louisville-area achievements of both her parents and paternal grandparents, she insists that it was important for her to make her mark out-of-town, free of that family connection. Finally, when asked about the role of religion in her life, she credits being brought up in the Black Protestant Church for fundamental values but observes that her current spiritually is both broader and more ecumenical. At the closing of the interview, Ursula Parrish Daniels thanks the interviewer for his part in the successful 1978 effort to secure the donation of the Parrish Family Papers to UofL’s Archives and Special Collection