High School

When I was allowed to attend Reitz Memorial High School in Evansville, IN, it certainly wasn’t a special occasion for me even though I was the first Black boy to go there. Two girls from St John’s elementary school had been enrolled the previous year. Memorial was a coed school but girls were separated from the boys, they were on the top two floors and the boys on the bottom two. And we did look up their skirts as they ascended the staircase each morning in spite of the nun’s effort to chase us away.
Brothers of Holy Cross taught the boys and Sisters of Providence taught the girls. We had no contact with them until assemblies when we all sat in the auditorium each sex on a designated side. Those going steady sometimes managed to grab seats in the middle so they could sit next to their respective mate or pass notes in the stairwell.
There are hardly any fond memories of high school that I have because there were no social activities that included me or the Black girls. Interracial dating was unheard of and my girl friend who also attended was never accessible at school. The only thing we did was ride the bus together or walk home when the weather was nice. Things like the prom were at venues like the Country Club which was out of bounds to us. The only social event that I remember attending was the senior class picnic at a state park where I served as one of the lifeguards. We ended up going to the prom at Lincoln High School where all our friends attended.
The purpose of my going to Memorial was to get a good education and I did indeed do that, finishing in the upper 10th of my class, and having no trouble getting accepted into schools of my choice. I selected Howard University in Washington, DC. over my father’s objection, he having had to transfer because of financial reasons years before, because it was academically recognized Black school also known for the pretty coeds that attended there. I had some class mates that I was friendly with but never did we ever socialize out of school.
A while back one of my classmates, a prominent attorney in Indianapolis, who I have maintained a friendship over the years asked me to go to the 50th anniversary of our high school graduation. He said that they were having a golf outing and dinner and dancing at the Country Club and all my classmates wanted to see me. I told him I couldn’t go to an event there in 1949 and I damn sure wasn’t going in 1999 Thanks but no thanks.
Some people remember high school as some of the best times of their lives but I was deprived of that experience by the tension that racism played in my young life. And in some respects still plays in my life. I am forever thankful to Father Mootz and Archbishop Ritter for their color blind stand on providing me and others after me witha quality education at Memorial. Archbishop Ritter later integrated the Catholic schools in St. Louis, Mo

Jobs

I was always looking for a job after school or on weekends to make a little money. But my opportunities were limited. No chance to caddie, they wouldn’t even let you near a golf course, Soda jerk, nah! But sweep and mop the drug store floors, Yeah! All of the waiters jobs went to grown men, but you could bus tables. One time I was bussing at a private club working for my girl friends father Big Jim. He let me put out the tomato juice appetizer and I had this big oval tray of glasses filled with juice and was struggling to pass between the tables. Some guests were in the aisle talking and taking seats. One lady was leaning over talking to her friend with her butt in my way. So I said “excuse me, excuse me mam, can I get by”. Now, I have a tray with about 30 little glasses of tomato juice. She had on a sequined white gown and abruptly stood up bumping my arm and the entire tray of juice splashes all over her. I walked right out of the room thru the kitchen got my coat and headed home. No pay that night and never to work there again!
Big Jim didn’t give up on me or my friend Ernest who went with his other daughter. He use to cater big parties and picnics and once we did an affair of about 500 people for Sun Oil Co.in a park. We barbequed almost 300 chickens, they came 28 to a case and we had at least 10 cases. When we were done serving he said you boys go over and put the chickens that are left in some empty cases and load the car, since the people that hired him were all drunk He started coping cases of beer for himself. We had four cases of chickens and when we got home he gave us each a case. When I walked in with 28 chickens my mother almost fainted. Luckily we had a freezer and we ate chicken for months, thanks to Big Jim. He was the Asst Fire Chief and the firemen at his station ate good chicken for awhile too. Big Jim taught me some lessons on how to cook, serve and swipe food that helped me get over and survive later at Howard.
One of my jobs the summer before I went to college was working at the ice house. One of my first jobs there was what is known as ”pumping cores” Ice is made in big casket like metal containers that sit in a bath of brine and are filled with water. When almost frozen there is slush in the center of the block called a core. This is pumped out and filled with fresh water making a solid block, The process is repetitive and boring and cold and from the old hands I learned to keep warm by sipping on pints of mint gin we hid in the rafters. Every one in the icehouse carried a holstered ice pick. And there were some bad dudes working there who would stab you in a heart beat. On one shift someone took my gin and I said to the group “somebody stole my gin”. And an old timer said “ young blood, it’s unbeknownst to you who stole your gin.” I knew than I need to get a job out of the core room. So I switched to loading and hauling. This entailed filling a semi with 200lbs blocks stacked 4 high that we took to Sterling Brewery to fill the reefers cars (refrigerated rail cars ) that hauled kegs of draft beer. The best thing about this job was we timed our delivery to get to the brewery around lunch. They had a rathskeller where visitors and employees could drink all the free beer they wanted and we did too.
The month before I left for college I was working the to 3 to 11 shift one Saturday and a buddy who worked at a different place said lets hang out when we get off. He had a car and that night I told him to pick me up after I went home and changed clothes. That delay saved our lives. We were going to an after hour joint called “Teddy Coles” that was on river road down in the bottom land. A bunch of soldiers from Camp Breckenridge, Ky. usually hung out there on weekends. The place had a long tunnel like entrance and inside a huge dirt floor room. On week ends it would be so packed you could hear music a mile away. The door man was named Rooster, he was a big bad black dude who didn’t take no shit. When we turned down river road we saw cars racing by and people running and screaming towards us. We stopped and picked up a couple of hysterical women who told us a soldier threw a hand grenade in the door and Rooster kicked it into the parking lot. We got out of there fast and later learned they had been fighting and Rooster had put them out and one returned and threw a grenade in the entrance. It killed Rooster and blew out windows of about 20 cars and scared 100 people shitless. If Rooster hadn’t kicked the grenade out the door who knows how many would have been killed including us if we had not been running late After that I couldn’t get out of Evansville fast enough. Howard University, I thought would be a safe refuge, Not to be so!