Hilliard Caldwell - How teachers talked about segregation (clip)

Interviewer: How would your teachers teach you to deal with the society?

Hilliard Caldwell: They said it’s wrong. We know it’s wrong, but this is the way the South is. This is the way society is here. That there would be two separate schools. That we have two separate churches and there will be separate barber shops and separate cemeteries and separate all of those entities. And that was it. They were part of it too. It was not a given, despite the fact that they taught in it, they dare not attempt to rectify the situation because back in those days that was a good cause for dismissal. The white superintendent would tell the Black principal, “You got a teacher over there that’s stirring up trouble. McDougle get rid of Mr. Johnson.” There was no tenure back in those days.

Interviewer: Were there cases of that, [that] you actually know of where things like that happened?

Hilliard Caldwell: I can’t bring anything to focus, Yonni.

Interviewer: Were there teachers who stand out in your memory as ones who maybe talked about things in a way to teach you that maybe something could be done to change the situation?

Hilliard Caldwell: There were teachers who felt that one day the system would no longer exist. There were teachers who felt that all of this is going to be… the separate situation years would no longer be the case years down the road. They would say that in their comments. They would say that in their teaching, but they didn’t go beyond the classroom with it, Yonni. Let me put it that way. It was not conducive for a history teacher to go beyond the classroom and openly say these kinds of things back during that time.