00:00:00.170 - 00:00:23.729

I was interviewing Haitai Heritage Center, November 15th for the uh Durham Civil Rights Heritage Project. We're speaking with Professor Peter Klopfer and I believe you are a professor of Zoology at Duke University. Um It's the 15th of November. We're at the Haitai Heritage Center and uh

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Cathy uh said that you came specifically to the United States from England. Uh because your interest in uh integration, is that correct? That's not entirely the story I was doing postdoctoral work at Cambridge and I was very happy there. This was during the mccarthy era. So

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being in England at the time was like having escaped from prison, at least for me, because I, I had been uh much hounded by the Un American Activities Committee and its investigators. Uh but I did get a uh a courtship move from Duke and I did

00:01:06.089 - 00:01:25.099

have an interest in joining many of my friends and colleagues who were laboring in the South with the very civil rights group, particularly the Fellowship of Reconciliation that I was a member of what is the fellowship of. It's a Christian pacifist group which is sort of

00:01:25.110 - 00:01:45.730

disappeared from the rising, but back in the fifties and sixties. It was one of the dominant organizations that uh supported moves to integration throughout the country. And it was also, it was predominantly a pacifist organization of course, and was very active in the anti war movement

00:01:45.769 - 00:02:04.610

at the time too. So uh the, it was this just the one alone wouldn't suffice probably to make me leave England. But the combination of the academic opportunities that Duke offered and the colleagues I had here in the South, that was a pool that I couldn't

00:02:04.620 - 00:02:21.690

resist. So I was not planning to stay here. We were gonna come my wife and I for three years and then we head back to sanctuary in England. So this would have been 54 58 58. Yeah, a little later than that, we made the commitment in

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57 but didn't get here until the summer of 58. What could you describe, what was, what did you find when you got here? You've never been in the South before? So uh disembarking from the plane at what was then a rather provincial looking international airport at

00:02:42.259 - 00:02:59.800

the Raleigh Dorm where you had picked up your baggage on the edge of the tarmac and the little grassy verge. It was quite a shock then to go from there, pass through the building and suddenly see double sets of drinking fountains, colored only white, only uh

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double sets of bathrooms. We've never in our lives experienced anything like this uh, Cambridge is perhaps, uh, was then and still is one of the most, uh, polyglot and towns in the world and we had gotten very accustomed to, to Cambridge. So it, it was a

00:03:18.669 - 00:03:33.960

shock to us even though we read about this kind of thing. And, uh, indeed, it, it took a while to sink into our consciousness. About two weeks after we arrived, we still hadn't got the fully settled in our rental house. I had to take the laundry

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into town to the laundromat and washing machines on one side said colored and the other said white. So I separated my laundry and put the white stuff in one side and then the machine and the colored stuff and then the machine on the other side wondering

00:03:51.580 - 00:04:11.149

why they bothered. But uh, not until the supervisor there came and berated me. Did I finally dawned on me what this was all about. So, were you, um, are you English native? So you had to, I went to England for a post do and, uh, I

00:04:11.300 - 00:04:33.519

was, had been thinking of emigrating for some years because as the, as the, you know, I'm a Quaker on the past this and, uh I had, you know, refused to participate in the, in the Korean War draft and I was served a short bit of time

00:04:33.690 - 00:04:51.010

on a three year prison sentence for that. Uh I was because I was active in a variety of student groups that were uh objecting the compulsory ROTC on the campuses and the like and this was in California was the subject of investigation here at the House

00:04:51.019 - 00:05:15.940

on American Act Committee and was cited by them. So I was looking to emigrate then the opportunity for postdoctoral work at Cambridge presented itself. So I thought that would be a good temporary way to weigh my options and I hadn't really thought for sure that I

00:05:15.950 - 00:05:39.709

was going to come back. Um I had options in Australia and New Zealand. It's like that more appealing. But as I say, they do courted me and uh the research opportunities. Mhm, were very attractive because the kind of work I was doing in those days was

00:05:39.720 - 00:05:59.829

not easily accommodated with major research universities. What sort of work? Well, I needed a facility where I had a lab with all the technical support that labs have, but also within short, easy driving distance, a field station where I could keep wild animals and that combination

00:05:59.839 - 00:06:21.089

is hard to come by. So, so you, are you a native Californian? Where was that? Actually? Uh my, my earliest years were in Pennsylvania. Ok. So you arrived and uh made first acquaintance with the water fountains and then the, the laundromat. And this was at a

00:06:21.100 - 00:06:41.369

time, I suppose when just about when the school integration was beginning and uh and arriving in Durham. So how did you begin to involve yourself in? Well, it was clear that the our Children were gonna be ready for school before there were integrated classrooms available and

00:06:41.380 - 00:07:00.309

we were not gonna make them go to, we're not gonna allow them to go to a segregated school. So uh we had the option of returning to England or going elsewhere uh or founding our own school. And it just happened that several members of the Chapel

00:07:00.320 - 00:07:18.179

Hill meeting approached us and the friends meeting, quick meeting to see if we might. Uh our ours, I have to backstop among ours were the only Children in, in either of the two meetings. At that time, both meetings were quite small. Um And so these folks

00:07:18.190 - 00:07:40.250

from the Chapel Hill meeting approached us to ask if we wouldn't have an interest in helping them form an independent friends school that would demonstrate the success one could have in bringing together Children of, of different backgrounds. Uh The two meetings themselves were not willing to

00:07:40.260 - 00:08:01.399

sponsor a friend school. They were both committed to fostering integration in the public sector and felt that setting up a French school would distract from that effort. But my wife and I became very quickly convinced that that effort was not going anywhere nearly quickly enough. And

00:08:01.410 - 00:08:17.209

that given the attitude of many of our liberal friends, which was an integration is fine in principle. But the economic and social differences are so great. You can't bring these Children together into the same classroom and expect to educate them that we, we felt that because

00:08:17.220 - 00:08:36.270

of those attitudes, that the only way integration could be furthered was to set up a demonstration school. And of course, we had other motives as well. Since we do, we are committed friends and didn't want our Children to grow up in, in a school that fostered

00:08:36.280 - 00:08:56.130

friends beliefs. Uh So we uh joined that group. There are six of us all together in that committee which did finally win the support of the two meetings that we were still independent of the meetings. As the school is to this day, it's a friend school

00:08:56.140 - 00:09:16.710

which is run by an independent board of trustees, a third of which is appointed by each of the two meetings, but in the board operates independently in any event, uh we joined that small group and uh decided to, to start the school and things have moved

00:09:16.719 - 00:09:36.140

along so quickly. And we were so deeply involved that we kept postponing our departure because it was simply not a good time for us to leave. And then as I became involved in what became the Supreme court case, then it was clear that I couldn't leave.

00:09:36.150 - 00:09:55.789

And if I, I wanted to, for reasons having to do with my uh travails with the law. OK. What was the reaction of your, your colleagues at Duke or other people that you knew to your setting up the school that would, that would take in both

00:09:55.799 - 00:10:17.500

black and white Children there? Wasn't much reaction from our colleagues, uh you know, the school sort of outside the pur e of the university and uh the, the my younger colleagues with Children, the age of ours were very much interested and, and in some cases supportive,

00:10:17.900 - 00:10:34.299

the older ones either didn't know or didn't care. There were a couple who were quite hostile. I, I did have a couple of my older colleagues. Take me aside and tell me that as an outsider, I had no business of trying to challenge the traditions that

00:10:34.309 - 00:11:00.909

pers prevailed. How did you feel? Did that surprise you? You were, you were expecting, I've been hearing similar things all my life. It didn't uh didn't affect me noticeably, the my chair and the university administration were, were very supportive. And uh indeed, once, once he became

00:11:00.919 - 00:11:24.659

president, uh oh my goodness, Terry San uh actually uh came out and spoke at the dedication for one of our buildings in the school. And before that, uh Bill Friday was one of the original sponsors. He founded the school. He decided to find a few highly

00:11:24.669 - 00:11:43.710

placed citizens in North Carolina to service sponsors, so to speak, to lend their names to the enterprise. And Bill Friday was one of those. So we had good cover. She certainly did. You don't think you could do better than Bill Friday? Um So how did you

00:11:43.719 - 00:12:04.909

get in, get involved or involve yourself then in the uh the movement uh as regarded integrating Duke and um endures. Don't forget now, as a undergraduate student, this was first at UCL A and then as a graduate student in, I was very active um member of

00:12:04.919 - 00:12:23.580

these organizations such as the Fellowship of Reconciliation Corps. I was an early member of Corp when I was first formed. Um I had leadership roles and these and other student organizations. Uh I was very active with the American Civil Liberties Union and when I was in

00:12:23.590 - 00:12:49.630

New Haven uh and active with the Oak Street Christian Parish, which was force for integration in the ghettos of that city. Um So, you know, I grew up in a very activist Quaker household, so to speak. And uh this is and just a continuation of something

00:12:49.640 - 00:13:14.659

I've done from as early as I can remember. I mean, even as a preteen, I was exploited uh by the local labor unions, by the Democratic precinct, carry around leaflets and stuff them under doors. So this was this boy I grew up what was going on

00:13:14.669 - 00:13:37.510

or was anything going on at Duke in 1958 that would lead into the uh very little in 1958. Uh And indeed, it was really only after the uh sit ins began here in Durham that there was any involvement of students or faculty. And uh it, it

00:13:37.520 - 00:13:58.710

came, it came after the fact, were you one of those faculty getting involved? Although at the beginning, uh my role was simply to drive our kids home from the police station. They be, and, and try to protect them when the university uh imposed sanctions. We had

00:13:58.719 - 00:14:19.750

a number of resident advisors who were deprived of their positions after they had been arrested. And I made a number of calls on how A s was then president uh arguing and successfully the fact they hadn't yet been convicted. So, and of course, his, his argument

00:14:19.760 - 00:14:39.059

that he couldn't afford to have anyone convicted of a crime of normal, of moral turpitude on the staff, uh rang fairly hollow and I informed him that I was in those days a felon, uh having been convicted of a selective service violation. He evidently didn't know

00:14:39.070 - 00:14:58.580

this. And I was very shocked to learn that a faculty member was a fellow, didn't want this to get out. And I said, well, I have no reason to publicize it as long as you don't make, uh this the ground for sanctions on these ras. So

00:14:58.590 - 00:15:15.789

we agreed that as they hadn't even been convicted, there was no moral turpitude in involved in that job. But the other problem that, uh my colleagues and I were as tempting to assist with had to do with the fact that when our students were arrested for

00:15:15.799 - 00:15:35.330

trespass or sold or whatever the charges were, they would be held until fairly late at night. And then after being released singly, and they'd have to run a glatt angry uh segregationists who were waiting for them outside the police station. So several of us organized a

00:15:35.340 - 00:15:53.359

ferry service, be able to meet them and drive them back to campus. The uh the Gauntlet. Now, was this something that had organized? And the or just happened to be there? It sounds like I can't, I can't tell you that, but my own belief at the

00:15:53.369 - 00:16:14.049

time and I have nothing to challenge it since then. Was that the White Power Establishment was in close cahoots with the police and that it was organized. Certainly that was the case in Orange County where the sheriff's car on the beat had a wax sticker, a

00:16:14.059 - 00:16:34.169

trade with a Klansman. Uh There was a clear and, and the one incident that led to my Supreme court case, of course, uh involved the officers standing around, watching us being beaten until blood began to flow then and only then did they intervene and arrest us?

00:16:34.400 - 00:16:54.179

What was that? That was the, what the, what as I said, I, I was primarily involved in support and feeling that this was a student movement uh shouldn't be co opted. Uh But then uh one of the buddy tea or one of the student leaders approached

00:16:54.190 - 00:17:16.869

several of us who were faculty members uh to ask if we wouldn't form a faculty group that would call on the proprietor a particular uh establishment as a way of demonstrating that it wasn't just a student movement that the student demonstrations were being written off by

00:17:16.880 - 00:17:39.680

many as the equivalent of the panty raids of an earlier era and uh something that it was fun and exciting and would pass. So the thought was that it needed to be a signal given that there were serious support for these students as goals in the

00:17:39.689 - 00:18:00.959

adult community. So a buddy recruited a group of uh six faculty, originally two from Central who then were pressured to do withdraw. Uh And then four of us from Duke and then we're joined by two colleagues from Carolina. And the plan was to go to a

00:18:00.969 - 00:18:23.750

particular establishment that was popular uh place for seminars to adjourn to for after class, coffee and remonstrate with the proprietor and show him that the custom would not be lost if he served uh integrated group. We didn't do our homework though. It turned out that this

00:18:23.760 - 00:18:43.939

particular establishment was popular after classes because it rented rooms by the hour in the adjoining motel. Uh And that the other thing we hadn't known and should have known was that the proprietor was one of the active members of the KKK. Was this in Watts Grill

00:18:43.949 - 00:19:09.250

Watt in Chapel Chapel Hill, correct? Um In any case, uh that was the, the first time Duke faculty were actively involved in this. See, David Smith from mathematics, Harmon Smith from uh religion. Um My goodness can't remember it. I can't remember the other two, the two

00:19:09.260 - 00:19:29.209

other from the divinity school. And then, uh, a psychologist from Carolina who subsequently died of a brain hemorrhage. He was the one who was, who was, uh, had to be hospitalized from the beating. So you were, were demonstrating at, well, we, we went, we actually, we

00:19:29.219 - 00:19:48.810

hadn't committed ourselves to demonstrating. We were going to go to seek a service and, uh, remonstrate it refused with the proprietor. And our plan was to decide on the basis of the reception we got whether we would simply stay or withdraw. But uh we never got

00:19:48.819 - 00:20:10.780

inside because they apparently had been tipped off about our coming. We were jumped on in the parking lot and uh and, and beaten, as I said, the uh subsequent trials which included some incredible charges, assault on a female and all, all kinds of wild things uh

00:20:10.790 - 00:20:36.709

led to the conviction of all of my colleagues, but I kept getting a hung jury. And which is why the case has achieved some significance the between my having and the hung jury and being retried. The Supreme Court ruled that the Public Accommodations Act would apply

00:20:36.719 - 00:20:58.650

retroactively, which would require that my case be dismissed. The solicitor though, took advantage of a clause in North Carolina law which allowed him to plead a no pross with leave. What this detailed was having me on the docket. So I had to go to court daily

00:20:58.660 - 00:21:17.859

during the sessions but never would have the case called, which would allow my attorney to file for a dismissal. And so we appealed to the Supreme Court for a right to trial so we could have the charges dropped. And the State Supreme Court said you have

00:21:17.869 - 00:21:39.020

no right to trial. And, uh, we then, uh, with support of friends filed for rid of cer cer with the US Supreme Court, which was surprisingly enough. Granted, I say, surprisingly because no one thought, uh, this was a very significant issue, American civil liberties union. Though

00:21:39.030 - 00:21:58.400

their, their representative at, uh Carolina Dan, uh Pollard, I wrote an amicus brief that the AC U itself wouldn't take the case because I didn't think it's significant, but the Supreme Court did take it and, uh ruled then unanimously with, uh, the chief justice reading the

00:21:58.410 - 00:22:18.430

decision that, uh, it violated the right to speedy trial. And that turned out to have an enormous impact on it cases, thousands of cases in the country where defendants were being held for long periods of time when the prosecutors weren't sure enough of their evidence to

00:22:18.439 - 00:22:40.150

be able to convict them, but by holding them indefinitely could get them to plead on lesser charges. So, plus keeping them out of circulation for that. And, and, and so the significance of this, this whole whatll case derived solely from this accident of my having a,

00:22:40.160 - 00:23:02.819

a hung jury. Uh, we don't know for certain, of course why they, they hung. Uh, my suspicion is, and, and that if wa Penny was the lawyer at the time that I refused to swear on the Bible because I'm a Quaker. I, a firm. Uh, this

00:23:02.829 - 00:23:26.640

judge, uh, very narrow minded man, Raymond M Mallard was his name, uh, cited me for contempt for refusing to swear on the Bible. And, um, the, at that point, the American civil liberties Union did jump in and, uh, found, uh, the Mallard had refused to accept

00:23:26.650 - 00:23:45.369

Supreme Court ruling on the taking of oaths as binding of a state court. Um, because that ruling had been made only in a federal case, but it turns out there was 1/19 century statute in North Carolina passed in the days when there were still lots of

00:23:45.380 - 00:24:04.630

Quakers around that exempted members of the Society of Friends on stating their membership from the taking of oaths and the laying of hands on the Bible. And, uh, this was an old North Carolina statute. So we copied that out for the judge and he had to,

00:24:04.640 - 00:24:25.160

uh, had to, uh, dismiss the contempt charges and allow me to affirm. And, uh, while most of this was done with the jury, absent the fact that I've been cited for refusing to swear and the fact that I then was allowed to affirm, uh, suddenly, uh,

00:24:25.170 - 00:24:47.239

I think, clued them into the fact that I had, uh, uh, some religious reservations which must have had something to do with the Quakers because that was the only group there was commonly known to refuse. O and I suspect that lent my testimony of greater credibility

00:24:47.250 - 00:25:06.920

for better. Of course, uh in any case, the, the jury could not agree to convict. Well, it sounds like it turned out to be a very significant case. It did because of the Supreme Court ruling. So this Supreme Court ruling, the incident itself when you were

00:25:06.930 - 00:25:29.160

beaten, that was 1962. Oh, golly, two or three, I'd have to go. It was before the Public Accommodations Act. That's correct. It was before public accommodations. But then before I could be retried, probably they never would have retried because they were able to keep me hamstrung

00:25:29.170 - 00:25:49.219

by calling me to coin every session on one occasion. They even and I hadn't gotten there on time. They even sent a deputy to campus and I was led away in handcuffs to Orange County. That must have been spectacular. Um You mentioned that there were that

00:25:49.229 - 00:26:12.140

you were uh were working together with some uh professors from UN C and were professors from NC Central involved. You mentioned that they had originally been involved and then were told by their president uh that they would lose their jobs if they did this. So they,

00:26:12.479 - 00:26:35.550

we had two black students, Quentin uh gosh, what was his name? Well, uh there is a book has been published describing the uh student movement in Chapel Hill which names these, these people. It was by John Ely, the Freeman, the Freeman. And that details much of

00:26:35.560 - 00:26:53.170

this, although he has a few of his facts mixed up, but that's ok. He got the basic idea and he got the names. What was your impression? I know you were observing from the other side of town. But uh your impression of the, the activity or

00:26:53.180 - 00:27:15.890

the, the sentiment at NC Central or what was the NC College? Uh I wasn't really very close uh to anyone there at that time. Uh In subsequent years, I had more to do with activities on that campus and had some friends there. But in those years,

00:27:15.900 - 00:27:41.680

I really had no contact. Uh I had one of the members of our founding school committee. Founding school committee was on the faculty at uh at North Carolina Central European gentleman, Austrian Adolf Firth. Uh So he was an outsider there, of course. Uh And uh then

00:27:41.689 - 00:28:05.180

later on, uh Professor Brown from uh the arts department became a good friend. But in those years, I didn't have any contacts there. How about at Duke? Uh the image we have most people have now Duke in those days was very conservative, very, very, it was

00:28:05.189 - 00:28:24.930

still was segregated, of course. Uh medical school was the first to bring in in a black student, a resident. Indeed. Uh one of the elders of the friends meeting who was one of the founding fathers of the medical school. David T Smith uh told me this

00:28:24.939 - 00:28:43.219

tale which uh moved me greatly. He, he was a, a convinced friend that he hadn't grown up as a Quaker and joined late in life, joined society late in life. Uh He was growing up, I grew up in South Carolina in a Baptist community and had

00:28:43.229 - 00:29:06.790

very little contact with black people uh until he came to, to Duke and, and then it was at the lowest levels, of course, just the janitorial staff. But uh after his having committed to the society friends, he recognized that uh he had to fight for integration

00:29:06.810 - 00:29:24.260

that segregation is wrong. He was instrumental in seeing that the first resident was admitted. Uh He described seeing this resident in the refectory sitting all alone at a table with all the white residents as far away from him as possible and recognize that his duty as

00:29:24.270 - 00:29:40.339

the senior person president present to sit down next to this young man and share the lunch with him, which he did. And David told me then that he finished his lunch and it was all he could do to get to the bathroom before he had to

00:29:40.349 - 00:30:05.819

vomit because all his life, he'd been conditioned that this was just an unthinkable thing to do. And uh it was uh quite a moving moving testimony for me because I I've grown up in a very mixed community and roommates of all colors and sizes, so to

00:30:05.829 - 00:30:25.390

speak. So that uh yeah, this was my first day opportunity to really understand what some of the Southerners I was in contact with, some of the honest ones were going through. That must have seemed incredibly strange to you though. Oh, it seemed absolutely strange, but I

00:30:25.400 - 00:30:44.430

could not dismiss it because I knew and respected David Smith so much. Indeed. He was one of the, uh, the major financial supporters of the school at the time when we had no resources at all. Not part of the founding group. He, he thought it was

00:30:44.439 - 00:31:05.969

a mistake but he paid for the first classroom building entirely out of his own pocket. That's dedication. Yeah. Uh But the answer to your question was that there, I met very few like David, among my colleagues, there are either younger people who had just recently come

00:31:06.300 - 00:31:25.140

uh with backgrounds, not all that different from mine who, who I just couldn't believe that Duke was still segregated. Uh We were a minority of course, and there were the older majority who just couldn't see any reason for changing. And then uh the the middle who

00:31:25.150 - 00:31:44.319

sort of represented what the chair of the board of trustees said uh at the time that uh when we had, he made an appeal for Duke to admit students without regard to race. His response was Duke will integrate and we will not be the last but

00:31:44.329 - 00:32:04.260

we will not be the first fighter. And that was, that was the attitude of most of the uh my colleagues. Yeah. Sure we're gonna do it. But what's the hurry? Let somebody else, somebody else, right. And, and it was the young guys who, who uh who

00:32:04.280 - 00:32:27.219

are saying now and the older guys uh who are saying not ever. And it was interesting too that the support for integration was very much concentrated in particular departments and was largely in the biological sciences and social sciences. How interesting. II, I don't know why that

00:32:27.229 - 00:32:50.609

is. I don't think it was maybe it was across the board that way in other institutions too. But among the students, it was the graduate students in biology who were dominant in these um demonstrations are in psychology and uh very few from other disciplines. Hm. Was

00:32:50.619 - 00:33:08.890

integration uh a frequent topic of conversation among the faculty, the faculty and graduate students. Was it something that would come up over coffee or come up parties all the time? And it was a dominant theme at the time, much as Vietnam became the dominant theme in

00:33:08.900 - 00:33:30.969

a later era or the present mess today. Yeah. No, it was, it was very much in everybody's mind, especially during that period. Uh period of several months of very messy bloody demonstrations in Chapel Hill. Durham was sparely. Durham had marvelous leadership in the mayor's office in

00:33:30.979 - 00:33:51.339

the business community. And so the demonstrations here never got out, out of control as to the extent they did in Chapel Hill very quickly, the mayor had been able to agree with the student leaders on a moratorium during which uh so quietly agreed that the tests

00:33:51.349 - 00:34:12.770

would be done just very discreetly one place at a time. And uh so things in Durham after that initial group of demonstrations in front of Howard Johnson's in the year of the Holiday Inn, uh ran fairly quietly and Durham moved ahead in the public accommodations area,

00:34:12.780 - 00:34:30.954

not the school area, uh fairly smoothly without too much fuss. So we didn't have all that much to talk about uh with respect to Durham. But the Chapel Hill scene was very ugly as you may recall. And uh that was, you know, in everybody's mind every

00:34:30.964 - 00:34:58.108

day. What was it? It's, it's almost the flip of Chapel Hill has had this liberal uh reputation in Durham is the redneck factory town. Uh circumstance of leadership. I suspect I don't know what else to say, but there were some very sensible people in the uh

00:34:58.339 - 00:35:24.040

during power structure was perhaps Chapel Hill taken. Well, was most of the opposition in Chapel Hill coming from within Chapel Hill or was it coming into Chapel Hill? Which opposition, the opposition to integration? No, it was local merchants. Yeah, it was, I mean, Watts, the old

00:35:24.050 - 00:35:45.340

rock pile at the bottom of Franklin Street. You name it all up and down Franklin street. It was the proprietors of these places, all southerners now. Uh and much of their justification or uh was based on the fact that the demonstrations were uh the result of

00:35:45.350 - 00:36:10.330

outside interference, which was well true to the extent that after the movement started. And it was totally indigenous know this from firsthand experience initially. But after it had started, then core did send in some of its organizers from the North. So people I knew well and

00:36:10.340 - 00:36:32.800

I spent hours arguing with them to go back home that we didn't need their help and that they were gonna in effect uh justify the uh positions of the locals, the local merchants that this was simply outside uh uh outsiders fo many rebellion. Uh And we

00:36:32.810 - 00:36:58.080

were not successful in getting them to withdraw. But uh in fact, they, they were unneeded, unnecessary and came long after things had got started. Do you think the um the animosity of the, the Chapel Hill merchants, was this something that springing up spontaneously when they were

00:36:58.090 - 00:37:14.870

confronted by the uh the movement? Or is this some, was this something that had been through nestling there? I can't tell you that, I mean, there's no question but that people like Mr Watts and the proprietor of the, the Rock Pile. These are the two most

00:37:14.879 - 00:37:40.399

egregious example of violent reaction. Uh No question but that these guys were acting out their beliefs. Um And, and I, I suspect were encouraged to do so by the uh connivance of the authorities, the police and the failure of the uh the mayor and, and his

00:37:40.409 - 00:38:04.260

board to take a clear and decisive stand uh for change. That's largely surmise. I mean, I, the reason I ask the question is I know that, uh, when Frank Porter Graham was, he was president of the university for a long time, I had a very liberal,

00:38:04.270 - 00:38:25.870

uh, reputation. Uh, I deserved one, I think, uh, he was in the US Senate and there was a very ugly race tented campaign in 1950. There was a book called Blood On the Old, well, purported to unmask communist activity in Chapel. And it was just, I

00:38:25.879 - 00:38:47.649

was wondering if there was something, something brewing. It, it may, it may well have been, it may well have been, it was never made explicit in my hearing. But uh certainly, uh Graham was not a popular figure among the bulk of the people in Chapel Hill,

00:38:47.659 - 00:39:11.169

even, even at the time that I arrived. What about in, in Durham? Now you said that uh integration moved along, the demonstrations did not get out of hand. And uh Durham moved ahead at least as far as the public accommodations were concerned. Uh What happened after

00:39:11.179 - 00:39:34.100

that? I got to Durham in 1966 and I remember that things over the next two years got pretty tense at times around 6869. There was a little then. Yeah, what uh what developed, uh I think after say after 63 years, I think at that point, we

00:39:34.110 - 00:39:56.290

began to see some progress in school. Integration and then it sort of reached a threshold and toward the end of that decade where the inevitable problems did emerge. Some of them, of course, intentionally fomented by those who opposed furthering of uh integration. And you had the

00:39:56.300 - 00:40:18.510

beginnings of the White Flight movement and the the white citizens academies which were proliferating at the time. So that, OK, brought things to a head again. I think at least that that's always been my reading is that the integration when, when it began was in a,

00:40:18.620 - 00:40:41.729

at the earliest grades and in a very nominal fashion. And then when it began to accelerate, you had the the academies forming and the white flight phenomenon and then the black families were reacting. So the racial tensions then arose an new and you have these phenomenon

00:40:41.739 - 00:41:04.719

in the late sixties. What was your impression or were you uh paying much attention to the effects of uh urban renewal and the dislocation of? Fortunately, I was not paying attention to that. Uh Now, after the fact, I suddenly realized how much damage that had done

00:41:04.929 - 00:41:29.189

to the uh both to the black community and its internal organization as well as to the prospects for peaceful integration of the schools without bussing because Durham was geographically quite integrated. When we first arrived, it was the pattern that uh prevailed from the uh uh post

00:41:29.199 - 00:41:45.550

slavery days where you want, where you didn't have slaves anymore, but you had black servants and you wanted them to live close to you. So the black neighborhoods were sort of checker boarded uh as were the white neighborhoods rather than being cleanly separated. And that made

00:41:45.560 - 00:42:03.350

for a very easy task of integrating the schools because it reduced bussing. We saw that in Orange County too where we had a white bus going in one direction and 10 minutes later, the black bus going in the other room coming by our door. And now

00:42:03.360 - 00:42:22.379

you didn't need the buses at all because the schools would be truly for the local kids, black and white. And uh the Urban renewal of course, served to separate the board with all the white squares on one side and the black squares on the other. So

00:42:22.389 - 00:42:44.010

that for that very short time where integration reduced the strain by eliminating bussing was very quickly transformed into a situation where integration could only be had through both the contrivance of bussing, which nobody liked black or white. And I was not really tuned into this. I

00:42:44.020 - 00:43:08.129

wasn't aware of it. You know, I was preoccupied with my research, with my teaching, with friends, school issues, with my own family. OK. I know you you became very uh involved with the anti war movement, especially with the the draft resistor. And uh so did was

00:43:09.620 - 00:43:31.870

I imagine for you that was a pretty natural shift of focus from was a change in focus. OK. Did the anti-war movement uh specifically at Duke was that a, a further development or maturation of the, the activism that had developed for civil rights or was this

00:43:31.879 - 00:43:57.290

something that developed? Certainly the activism uh uh you know, sort of left its mark on the student body that it showed what students could do because there's no question that the uh the students were the ones that took the lead in transforming Duke. I remember the,

00:43:57.300 - 00:44:18.750

the vigil on the quad after Martin Luther King's assassination. I mean, that was the most powerful demonstration of the role students could play in a transforming university that I can imagine. Um Were you involved in the vigil? Well, I was there but I mean, I had

00:44:18.760 - 00:44:38.100

no organizational responsibility. My kids insisted on camping out there. So I had to go there, keep an eye on them because they were pretty young to be out there. A bunch of raucous college students. Al although the behavior there was impeccable students there, its very dignified

00:44:38.110 - 00:45:03.010

uh affair. Uh So there was a tradition of student activism that certainly uh played into the uh anti-war movement. But I think the uh facts of Vietnam probably would have stimulated a reaction in any case. Maybe not as quick.