Collene Riggsbee Rogers - What people should know (clip)

Collene Riggsbee Rogers: That they were dependable. That when you call them, they did show up. And they learned, but they learned from others you know and that’s the only thing that I didn’t understand when I did move back. Music was something that we always did. We were always competing, all of it, and when I came back here and I went to the first Christmas Parade I was seeing the Black folks in the band which was strange, but later I guess when I was working on that minority achievement group at Chapel Hill High, there were no Blacks in the band and they said it was like honors band or something like that. And then they were not teaching shop, and the reason that a lot of those people at the time had jobs, was because my brothers learned carpentry in the shop. We were required to take it. So, they learned how to do woodworking and stuff, making tables and all that stuff from shop. Mr. Smith made sure that they all learned how to drive, he had drivers ed and auto mechanics and everything, but when I came and I went they did have a thing at Chapel Hill High, but they didn’t have any Blacks in the classes so if they are not going to be college material, maybe you would think that that would be something they would offer them so then maybe they could be interested in something, but that doesn’t happen here. I said even if they had a career school like that where they taught that stuff and they went, and I thought they were going to do that with Phoenix down here, but they didn’t do that either because I went and we were supposed to be doing cooking and stuff with them, you know, we were pairing with them to teach the girls and stuff how to do cooking and sewing and stuff, but that’s just the way the system is now. And maybe it was designed to be that way once integration came, because you found a whole lot of guys out here on the street that ain’t doing nothing and, you know, don’t know how to do anything, but I don’t know, we had to learn how to--and I loved it. That’s how I made my money in college is sewing for the sororities and stuff, and I loved sewing for myself--I like wearing something that ain’t nobody else got or that type of thing. But we had to learn that and we had a choice to do interior design to improve your home or your wardrobe, so that was what we did. And then the boys, they did the auto mechanics and that type of stuff. So, I guess with doing that, that’s why they all had jobs even if they didn’t go to college and they still could earn a living.