Teachers

Mrs. Parker retired in May 1991 after twenty-seven years in public education. She was hired to teach in Bowling Green, Kentucky in 1964, following college. She taught high school English and psychology for one year. She then moved to Jefferson County, where she taught junior high math for two years. Over the next twenty-four years she became a school counselor, and served at Stuart, Moore, Frost, Knight, and Highland schools. She talks about the changes she saw over her career. She speaks at length about the problems the schools had during the years following court-ordered busing and the merger of the city and county schools. She didn't feel prepared for the chaos and hostility and she spent much of her time resolving conflicts with students, teachers and parents. She also describes the change from junior high schools to middle schools, which gave the 6-8 grades an identity separate from the high schools, and promoted unity in the staff. She speaks of greater teacher involvement with all students, healthier holistic approaches, and identification of home problems in the new middle schools. In the last ten years of her career, Parker notes social phenomena and issues including "latchkey" children, single parent homes, dysfunctional families, and sex and drug abuse, which the schools were identifying. She saw her job change from administrator to facilitator between student, parent, teacher, and communtiy resource, a change she welcomed. Her greatest sense of accomplishment was working with "at risk" students.

Dr. Parrish discusses his father, Charles H. Parrish, Sr., who was a Baptist minister and president of Simmons University, a black Baptist college in Louisville. Parrish also discusses his own life and work, including his time teaching at Simmons, at Louisville Municipal College (University of Louisville's college for African Americans under segregation), and finally at the University of Louisville after the Municipal College closed and UofL integrated. Dr. Parrish was the only member of Municipal's faculty who was offered an appointment at UofL following LMC's closure, becoming UofL's first African American faculty member. He describes this experience as well as his ongoing research interests.

Dr. Parrish was the only Black professor employed by the University of Louisville after integration. A professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of Louisville, he discusses his academic journey and the history of Black education in Louisville, Kentucky. Born and raised in Louisville, Parrish attended Howard University and Columbia University before earning his doctorate from the University of Chicago. He spent most of his academic career in Louisville, with brief stints at Lincoln University in Missouri and the University of New Orleans. Parrish also discusses the merger of the Louisville Municipal College (LMC) and the University of Louisville, which he argues was not a token gesture but a significant step towards desegregation. He also touches on the Garvey movement and its limited impact on the Louisville community, and the importance of studying race and ethnic relations in the current global context.

Patricia Seale was a teacher at Norton Elementary School at the time of this interview. She answered questions regarding her younger influences, teaching experience, and thoughts about KERA (Kentucky Education Reform Act) and the teaching profession in general.

Interview regarding the history of Louisville's LGBTQ movement with Ed Segal, a UofL anthropology professor and faculty adviser to early gay-rights non-credit class at UofL who testified on behalf of lesbian marriage plaintiffs in 1970 courtroom.

Raised in West Louisville, Richard Spalding discusses his life as a musician and musical educator. Spalding discusses childhood in family grocery stores in Louisville’s Russell and Portland neighborhoods; family’s interest in music; music education at St. Anthony School and St. Xavier High; industrial life and community among former residents of Marion county, KY; mother’s religious superstitions; excitement and discovery at UofL School of Music, 1941-1943; electronics technician in Army Air Corp during WWII led to assignments in Europe including France; meeting Cecile who became his wife. In the second interview, Spalding recounts meeting and courting his wife, Cecile, in Paris; his discharge from the Army Air Corp after assignment in Germany; return to UofL (piano) under GI Bill; UofL faculty in immediate post-WWII; difficult mail courtship with Cecile; return to France to study at American Conservatory of Music in Fontainebleu and personal piano instruction in Paris; knew Bill Mootz, famous Courier-Journal music critic; marriage to Cecile in Paris; Cecile arrives in Louisville with little English; music teacher in Bardstown public schools (getting there by bus). In the third interview, Spalding talks about Cecile’s introduction to Louisville: Edmund Schlesinger takes her to UofL football game and she speaks to Alliance Francaise; success as choral director at Highland Junior High; part-time music grad student at UofL; job offer at UofL; learning to teach elementary music teachers; training abroad in Orff and similar methodologies; language coach for French operas; leader of Louisville Chorus; leader of summer teaching workshops in Canada; feelings about faculty role at UofL; French in-laws move to Louisville; leader in Sister Cities of Louisville; and his bi-lingual home.

Barbara Sutherland started teaching in the Louisville city/county school system in 1964. Her teaching certificate enabled her to teach elementary school and middle school. Her subject area was language arts. Mrs. Sutherland taught first through fourth grades in Abraham Lincoln, Wellington, and Norton Elementary schools. The latter fifteen years of her career she taught grades 6 and 7 at Kammerer Middle School. During the 1970s Sutherland felt that the changes in the schools brought on by court ordered desegregation and the city/county merger were handled poorly. She is critical of the systems implemented by the school system to solve school climate and discipline problems. Sutherland did not like the new programs of the 1970s and willingly transferred to a school nearer her home. She felt that she was forced to teach the "regular" students, primarily black students, and complains that they are not being prepared with life skills. In her classroom, Sutherland tried to have talk sessions with her students about their problems and concerns. She holds that no one is listening to those students and that they are falling through the cracks. She expresses a sense that integration let black students fall behind.

Carol Tonini was a teacher at Norton Elementary School at the time of this interview. She answered questions regarding her younger influences, teaching experience, and thoughts babout KERA (Kentucky Education Reform Act) and the teaching profession in general.

Rachel White was a teacher at Norton Elementary School at the time of this interview. She answered questions regarding her younger influences, teaching experience, and thoughts about KERA (Kentucky Education Reform Act) and teaching profession in general.

Wilson discusses growing up in Louisville around the turn of the century; his student days at Central High School and Indiana University; his return to Louisville in 1926 to teach at Central High School; his career at the Louisville Municipal College.