835 24 26018 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b521989f702277891a9f2ee506921107.jpg 714a1d5a46532d9a0c1191598758022c Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Grand Valley State University Photographs Subject The topic of the resource Aerial photographs Universities and colleges Michigan Grand Rapids (Mich.) Allendale (Mich.) Building Facilities Dormitories Students Events 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s Description An account of the resource People, places, and events of Grand Valley State University from its founding in 1960 as a 4-year college in western Michigan. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource News & Information Services. University Communications Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/41">News &amp; Information Services. University Photographs. (GV012-01)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-03-03 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-NC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright - Non-Commercial Use Permitted</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpg Language A language of the resource eng Type The nature or genre of the resource image Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV012-01 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1960s-2000s Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Local Subject Subject headings specific to a particular image collection 1990s Source <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/41">University photographs, GV012-01</a> Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV012-01_UAPhotos_001174 Title A name given to the resource Robert Annis speaking at special convocation Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University Description An account of the resource Robert Annis speaking at special convocation. Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Allendale (Mich.) Universities and colleges Events Language A language of the resource eng Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-NC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright - Non-Commercial Use Permitted</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpeg Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives black and white photo https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5712bdd95ac3044b29dd64ac87f5ee52.mp4 28fd7b65fab06820473952e87512fd54 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/cd0e1ed6fa0ec1fa0450ef60c42aa9c1.pdf fe01e9a3bc007b0813b0e67cffc66d60 PDF Text Text William James College Interviews GV016-16 Interviewer: Barbara Roos Interviewee: Robert Burns Date: 1984 Part: 1 of 3 [Barbara] [Working with the video camera] It doesn't look as well, skin tone is… it would just be a mess. I really wanted this. Oh, my is he dark. Let me see what I can do here. I'd hate to go to one six. That is just so… well, I think that this is going to be allowed. Let me just check focus. Let me make sure I'm steady. And I'm steady. And anytime you would like to resume I would be grateful. [Robert] Okay. I think it would be hard for an outsider to imagine how many committees we felt were indispensable to the running of our little college of two dozen odd staff. Their peasant villages that feel obliged to do some things in the bureaucratic way. They wind up doing it was extraordinary classic simplicity. There are individual tasks that are parceled out to a handful of individuals each year, each one he's in charge of a particular kind of activity. They carry out the duties of the office, and then they pass the notebook, which contains records to their successor the next year, and that successor intern then becomes responsible for the handling of that particular detail for the village. We always found it necessary to work with committees, which meant that every time a committee met there was an inside privy group to a particular kind of information. And we tended to not have very good ways of uniformly getting information from committee to the community at large. There would be the decisions, there would be the reports, but very little of the nature of the ongoing dialogue in committee so that occasionally committee results were unfathomable in terms of how they arrived at that conclusion. Typically, what happened whenever a committee met with that the corridors were full of all the little side conversations that we're necessary to be engaged in as different people came out of the woodwork to try to find out what it happened in that particular committee. It seemed to me that the single individuals could have been tasked… could’ve been entrusted to certain kinds of tasks, or that some of these things could literally have been handled in some kind of committee as a whole where literally everybody was going to hear the same information same time and not have to go through the business of asking for a duplicate committee reports one by one by one from any and all members of the given committee. [Barbara] But we were very well intentioned, and we liked each other a lot, and we had all selected each other, and we're not stupid at least not all of us at the same time so why did we persist in this? What structural advantage was there in this kind of super bureaucratization that made it last. �[Robert] I'm not sure that there's any other explanation for why it persisted, except that nobody felt that resort to individual responsibility for individual kind of task was anything other than a kind of an elitism that couldn't be tolerated. Things ought to be done in groups… in small groups for at least good democratic purposes. [Robert] But the small groups were in effect too small, and they always had an external environment of those who (one) needed to know the results but (two) weren't in on the meeting and then this enormous amount of time that was always spent after committees trying to find out how the results had turned out, what decision has been taken. What kinds of points of view had been presented, and the like. There was something I was going to say earlier about this. And it's not fresh in my mind at the moment. [Barbara] Shift yourself slightly towards the window and tell me the part about polishing. I don't mean toward the window, I guess I meant turn [inaudible]. [Robert] Oh, okay. Let's see what did… [Barbara] If you can recall it, not too artificially, we were talking the other day about one of our little problems being… a fine sense of sandpaper. [Robert] We always undertook to do things better than we had done them before, we always looked at our processes as if virtually anything we did. Anything we had done, could be done better if we: examined it carefully, profited from experience, and made the right judicious changes. This is a kind of thing that I've always thought of as polishing, and honing, and smoothing, and whatnot. We spent an enormous amount of time doing that. In one sense we've logically fall to the larger campus structure for having undergone major reorganizational upheavals every few years. But in another sense, we never ever settle down with our own processes inside, in a much gentler fashion, long enough to see how they worked before we were already predicting that they were not working, or finding evidence that they were not working, and then proceeding to tinker with them. So, although it was all carried out on a much more modest, much more gentle scale, and there were no big upheavals… still I think it remains that nothing that we ever tried stayed in place for very long before we found a better way to do it. And we didn't see this as reorganization -- frivolous or whatever. We saw it always “perfectionistically” as doing something a little bit better than we'd ever done before. So, we invented new ways and better ways of the new ways ad infinitum. And this gets to be time consuming, too. So, some of these processes – as I wind up thinking -- where processes had a life of their own. Once you're embarked on them, you follow through with them implicitly. Even if you have thoughts that maybe there may not always be for the best, there's a certain inertia that carries you forward. And you don't really feel it's fair to blow the whistle or to yank things to a complete halt for fear of being seen as a �disbeliever. Somebody who really doesn't belong in the system. Now realize, in this respect, I may sound like a peculiarly ambivalent character. Because on the one hand, I came to William James because I wanted to, because I found it to be an exciting place to be. And I always did, and I believed in what we attempted. [Robert] And I'm very sorry to find… to realize that it no longer exists. That's the part of it, that seems to me, like a death. But I wouldn't be honest if I didn't also say that I found our ways a little peculiar at times. What makes allowances for one family. When you're talking about a set of colleagues who are growing more and more like siblings with respect to one another every day. You put up with foibles because you know all these people too well to simply launch a political diatribe against them because they have failed to do this properly, or they haven't foreseen with the effects of that might be. You put it down to a longer-range type of problem which could be tackled over a considerable period of time. You understand we are all in learning positions, in learning situations, and that there are possible ways of all of us gradually coming to espouse a single point of view that we all share in some future. So, you overlook certain of the little points of potential… � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource William James College Interviews Description An account of the resource Videotaped interviews of William James College faculty, students and administrators by Barbara Roos. William James College opened in 1971 as the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. Curriculum was organized around three concentrations that were meant to be interdisciplinary career preparation offerings: Social Relations, Administration and Information Management, and Environmental Studies. The college was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Language A language of the resource eng Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16_GVSU_11_Burns Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Burns, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Title A name given to the resource Robert Burns interview (1 of 3, video and transcript) Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert Burns by Barbara Roos, documenting the history of Grand Valley State's William James College. William James College was the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. The college opened in 1971 and was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley State. Robert Burns was a faculty member of William James College and longtime professor at GVSU who taught anthropology and photography from 1973 until his retirement in 1993. He was also notably the father of documentary filmmaker, Ken Burns, who found inspiration from his father's photographs and travels from a young age. In this interview, Robert discusses the bureaucratization of William James College and its numerous committees, in addition to his belief in the college and his thoughts on its final closing. This interview is part 1 of 3 for Robert Burns. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Bureaucracy Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/07cbe5eceb73b64e701b5be0f32161b0.mp4 b0455d82db8e7bfaabff15b946f1f700 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6dc69307eed3882095c19542e1b10bcd.pdf 0194f74eb90f261babb01cd42f625c65 PDF Text Text William James College Interviews GV016-16 Interviewer: Barbara Roos Interviewee: Robert Burns Date: 1984 Part: 2 of 3 [Robert] You don't know when the curtain is going to come down. You don't have any idea about just how much time you've got left. You don't have any sense that you're necessarily that endangered. But when you look at it in retrospect the things we did, the things we didn't do, the things we might have done, and the things we insisted on doing. Then I think it's apparent that there are a couple things that we did wrong. Vis a vis the outside world. Like the campus across campus. We never spent enough time building pathways and bridges to the rest of CAS, the rest of the campus the way I think, in retrospect, it didn't make sense that we should've done. We spent so much time immersed in our own problems, in our own preoccupations, within William James that nobody ever really gave much thought to establishing the broader connections overland to the rest of the campus. Because what was clear is that when the crunch came, the rest of the campus didn't understand us. They didn't understand us at all. They didn't understand who we were, what they knew of us, they didn't sympathize with, and it seems to me that all those kinds of problems could've been… would've been alleviated if we had more of a sense of bridge building. More of a sense that part of our security lay in relating to them, not just ignoring them or even worse than that is estranging ourselves from them. Estranging them from us, and that's where I thought of it many times. We weren't as smart as an Australian tribe would've been about the kinds of overland connections you need to develop if you're going to ever have available an escape route to save you when the times come down to the crunch in your own territory. We didn't have anybody under those circumstances that was willing to understand us, and then that comes back to reflect home on what we did internally, which I think was incorrect. With all due allowance to the Monday morning quarterbacking kinds of things go on the time like this. Why didn't we make the overland connection? We spent much too much time polishing, and honing, and fine tuning our internal processes. We labored through all of our committees to perfect every single thing that we wanted to do, every single concept that we wanted to lay claim to, as if somehow this burnishing process was going to represent our salvation. It was almost as if there was some kind of cosmic onlooker who was watching us and grading us on the sincerity, the depth of profundity of all of our efforts, and so it made great sense to us to spend all of this time somehow coming to grips with the meanings of the propositions, the substitutions of prepositions, or conjunctions and the like. As if somewhere, somebody was going to look at this is of the Rosetta stone and fault us for having used the wrong grammar in the wrong place and it was the fault of gilding the lily. We were spending much too much time on the internal processes �than we should have. We acted all this time as if fine tuning the individual word of our own processes was the important thing to do. Without realizing that single word in the outside world simply cancelled us out once and for all when the time came. [Barbara] Why did we choose to do this? We are not all fools. [Robert] No, we certainly weren't all fools. One we all I think… however many routes there were to get to William James, we all came with one main idea and that was that they we were going to do good; we were going to do well doing educational things in a different mode. And we wanted to be very sure we were thinking of every possible eventuality. We didn't want it laid at our doorsteps that somehow we had overlooked the obvious. So, we kept reexamining the obvious, as if we were searching for possible flaws, failures, loopholes, and so on. Well that's either elitism of some strange sort, or this could easily also be the case it's a narcissism of an extreme variety. That we get so preoccupied with the being of ourselves and the doing of ourselves and the eternal expressing of ourselves that we forget that there's a larger context. There's an ecology in education, and if you're not mindful of the ecology, there are things out there, misunderstood and maybe rubbed the wrong way can return to do you in, or to do you no good. [Barbara] Do you want to try lifting the GV level, Gerd. [Gerb] Is it too dark? [Barbara] I think it's dark. [Barbara] You want to put it up one? Yes. [Gerb] Wait! Come sit closer next to me. [Barbara] Yeah? [Robert] Okay, I guess. [Gerb] Then turn this way. [Robert] Okay. [Barbara] Um. [Robert] Go on and say what you were talking about. [Barbara] If we paid attention to the outside, where would we get the energy to build this �nirvana that we were all heading for? [Robert] The energy would've been the energy that we brought to the enterprise simply by being ourselves. I mean, I think we always misunderstood… [Laughter]. Let me say that over again. I think we always misunderstood completely the amount of special energy that we needed to put forth. The fact of the matter was, that all of us, and all of our various ways, and all of the times at which we were interviewed and came into the college. In all our various ways, we represented people that somehow were seen to have some sort of useful talent in the new educational scheme of things, and I think our problem was that we never relaxed, and believed in the existence of that talent. We always felt that what we were called on to do is to put forth some kind of special brand-new effort, without ever realizing that the efforts that we already put forth (that attracted ourselves to the college in the first place) and them to us, was exactly what we should've kept on doing. We should've kept on being the people who were interviewed, rather than somehow trying to transmute ourselves into this new kind of educational being that, less and less people across campus, were prepared to understand. [Barbara] It sounds like a very negative feelings about your eleven years spent there. Is this the case? [Robert] No, on the contrary! I think it was something that you said earlier that made me think that. Now, what I'm getting into at this stage in the game, I suppose, has something to do with grief work. With the death of something that you were really attached to, you begin to look around for all the kinds of things that contributed to that death and you wind up occasionally faulting the system for a premature death. I don't think that's misplaced hostility. I don't think it is hostility for one thing. I think it's simply one of those turns that somebody takes you know uncomfortable circumstances when you're trying to cope with in an absence of something that you've grown to love. And you're wondering where it went? Why it forsook you, and then eventually come around to examining the warts, the frailties, and the flaws that you didn't see at the time because you were simply so busy doing it and being it. We have some vulnerabilities from the very beginning, and I can remember talking with Robert about this many times, and he got quite excited about one of my little characterizations. I started talking about the different years of entry of staff members into William James. As if they had been, in effect, generations. There was that founding generation of Robert and others who in response to whatever the call to glory was at that time came to be the first faculty at William James, and they had always seen it as their mission to think through the purpose of the college, and to try to state that purpose. So, they were constitutionalists in a way. They were writing us an organization platform on which the future college could expand. And the second generation, the secondyear staff, always seem to me to me the wheeler dealers, the actors, and the doers. �[Robert] The ones were going to put the dream of the constitution writers into practice. You had an enormous amount of energy, often times very aggressive energy, that was expended in the cause of carrying out, as they sought, the wishes of the founding fathers. And then that left certain problems for those of us who arrived in the third year. The third generation, so to speak, because we found ourselves not in on the writing of the constitution, and we found ourselves late by year in coming to grips with enacting the constitution, and it was as if the third year came in a little confused as to its role, and it also came in just a little bit suspect because neither the framers nor the doers were quite prepared to believe immediately at the start that this third group of newcomers – “upstarts” – could possibly really understand what they had produced and enacted. So, there was lots of skidding wheels. There were lots of burning brake linings. While those of us who arrived too late to be in on the founding, and too late to even set the stage for the enacting of it all to try to figure out what the new vocabulary was that had been created and how the things we did were supposed to fit in with that new vocabulary. [Barbara] For example? [Robert] All I can point to here, I suppose, in all honesty, would be my own confusion in my first year. It extended into my second year, as well. I thought I'd arrived to do a certain kind of thing. I thought the reason that I had been accepted after the interviews had something to do with my being the anthropologist that I knew I was. And I'd discovered that on arrival that it was as if nobody on the staff had any idea of what anthropology was all about. If they did, it was a purely intellectual understanding and it had nothing to do with the kinds of things anthropologist really say when they're being anthropological. And so, I just discovered over and over again, to my confusion, that anytime I attempted to be myself, an anthropologist, was a time that I could expect to be misunderstood. Either as to content, or as to motive. Either one of those. This is a little off putting when you think that your reason for being here has something to do with what you are, who you are and then discover that you're not recognizable. [Barbara] What did they want you to be? I don't understand. [Robert] Oh, here one strides into dangerous territory. You know, it's kind of stuff with hidden agendas are made and… maybe we need to switch to something else. Well, I can come back… I could come back to it, but I need to think about that one little bit more. [Barbara] Okay. So why did you come to James? [Robert] I had come to James for a lot of reasons. I had gotten thoroughly fed up with the �anonymity of the classroom relationships in the large university. I tried it at the University of Michigan. I tried it at Eastern. And I found that the only improvement that Eastern had represented over the U of M was that I was in charge of the class of two hundred in a section, instead of a class of four hundred. And neither one of them offered me any possibility of developing a personal relationship, a personal rapport with the students that I was talking to. I'd really felt that. Well, I had quit teaching for a year, and I had gone to Europe to think things through, and I'd availed myself of the fact that a number of my anthropological graduate students were in field work in Europe that year, to search and number of them out, and to face them with a simple question: What is Bob Burns good for? And the upshot of it was that I found… they reinforced the notion that a much smaller college setting and one with a much more experimental focus was the kind of place that I would be looking for. And I have to confess that there they were one leg up on me in that regard because I hadn't yet picked up on the fact that there were this many new experimental footings that academia had set out upon or had devised for itself. And so, I came back prepared to begin to look for kind of college that I didn't know existed at the time that I first began my search. I really thought I was looking for a nonexistent animal and instead I discovered that there were these precious few little institutions that had developed under cover under certain kinds of protective wraps in special environments and that probably one of these was exactly the little harbor, the little niche, that I was looking for. [Barbara] Could you summarize in a couple of sentences. Short answer. What you think the essences of James was? [Robert] The essence of James was really the idea of an unstructured highly personalized, highly particularized education to suit the needs of individual students. Instead of the sheep dip approach to education which is about what most places were involved in. Big distribution dipping, a little bit of history, a little bit of economics, a little bit of arts (to make sure we weren't absolutely illiterate) and all of this. Pretty much the same bath going on for all students whether or not it related to what they needed, or whether not related to their ability to pick it up at the moment that they took it. You know you can be dipped on these things and not absorb anything because you're not ready for it. Well, in William James I had the sense that when we function best what we did was to loosen up the structure these requirements. We tried not to let students get away without requirements in the broader sense. But we left the requirements assert themselves, express themselves, in their own way and in their own time at a time when the student was most ready to pick them up. And eventually students would wind up getting that broader education of which we all dreamt. [Robert] In which we all had ourselves, but they didn't get it by virtue of having had their noses rubbed in it. So, it was a gentler tact, which always made a suspect in the eyes of others who believe in scruff of the neck types of introductions to learning. �And in the end, it meant that their breath was self-paced. They got broader as they needed to, and our good students always eventually needed to. No system is perfect so we had our share of the determined educational ne'er-do-wells who will not get an education in spite of anybody's efforts to offer it to them the "right" kind of way. On a silver platter or not. We have those exceptions to the rule, and we all blushed privately and publicly when we think of them. On the other hand, all institutions have those kinds of characters, too. So, I don't think our batting average was terrible in that regard. I am just amazed when I think about the William James accomplishment. Of how many good students, great students, went forth from here equipped to do all kinds of things a little better, I think, than other students who might have to wait five/ten years maybe even beyond that to realize finally what their education is actually done to them and for them. Whereas I think our students left already knowing what their education meant. Precisely because they had had a hand in the organizing of it. [Barbara] Do you regret having spent eleven years at James rather than somewhere else? Now that they've closed it on us? [Robert] Oh no, [laughter] I don't regret a moment of William James. But as I said earlier, I was talking about the Monday morning quarterbacking, or the moments that…the real moments of anguish when you turn on something that you love and fault it for not having been better than it could've been, and that's just a simple part of grief. But no, I would not have traded those eleven years at James for eleven years anywhere else. They were exciting, they were exhilarating at times. All of us did feel as if we were trying to produce something great. I was just talking earlier about the extent to which we got too carried away sometimes by our enthusiasm, and didn't raise our heads enough above ground level to see just how threatening that external environment could be. I think we suffered from the sin of pride or vanity and maybe understandably so on the circumstances. Because we did seem to be treated as very special beings for a time. And that probably lulled us into a sense of security that we shouldn't have bought into. [Barbara] One more question. When I interviewed you before, you talked about comparing peasant society to James. Where we had twenty faculty who spent their entire time on committees. Would you reprise that quickly? [Robert] One of the most appalling realizations I ever had was the day that I looked at our little college. Our little structure, a score of staff, and maybe two or three more at one time than another time. [Robert] But twenty, twenty-two, twenty-three people. And what we had devised internally as a structure for ourselves was a system of committees -- of overlapping committees, of parallel committees, of separately meeting committees -committees which when they had met were immediately confronted in the �corridors by all the people who hadn't been in on the committee. Either because they thought they weren't invited because they were teaching class at that hour. But who had to find out what had gone in and what had gone on in that committee that day? And I kept thinking: this is an appalling structure, what a bureaucracy. Byzantine couldn't have been more crazily subdivided and categorize than this. And all we were twenty/twenty-two lonely little people. I mean, if we had been an Australian band or if we'd been an Alpine peasant village… � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource William James College Interviews Description An account of the resource Videotaped interviews of William James College faculty, students and administrators by Barbara Roos. William James College opened in 1971 as the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. Curriculum was organized around three concentrations that were meant to be interdisciplinary career preparation offerings: Social Relations, Administration and Information Management, and Environmental Studies. The college was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Language A language of the resource eng Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16_GVSU_12_Burns Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Burns, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Title A name given to the resource Robert Burns interview (2 of 3, video and transcript) Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert Burns by Barbara Roos, documenting the history of Grand Valley State's William James College. William James College was the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. The college opened in 1971 and was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley State. Robert Burns was a faculty member of William James College and longtime professor at GVSU who taught anthropology and photography from 1973 until his retirement in 1993. He was also notably the father of documentary filmmaker, Ken Burns, who found inspiration from his father's photographs and travels from a young age. In this interview, Robert looks at William James College in retrospect and discusses his thoughts on the endangered nature of the college, the various stages of grief he has worked through with its closing, and what the essence of "William James" really was in hindsight. This interview is part 2 of 3 for Robert Burns. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/c443869eceb4bed54e91009309fe299b.mp4 3a610d14cc1c7700293092fa4979116d https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7249ef2c51d4d95fbcb17d5425c0c653.pdf 8734a38be9f7aa2d3155a9d6e972b3bb PDF Text Text William James College Interviews GV016-16 Interviewer: Barbara Roos Interviewee: Robert Burns Date: 1984 Part: 3 of 3 [Robert] My nose out in the bright sunlight. Have I got to…? I can suddenly see it. [Gerb] Lean forward. [Robert] Yeah, so maybe I'll… [Gerb] Go back a little bit. [Barbara] … powder my nose. [Robert] That'll keep me going for another… [Barbara] White balance [speaking to camera operator] [Gerb] I don't think you need it. [Unknown] … need makeup? [Gerb] Makeup? [Barbara] Alright. [Robert] Perspiration! [jokingly] [Barbara] Alright, where we were is where we need to start. I guess you need to start that answer again. I asked you to talk about the Byzantine Bureaucratization. [Robert] One of the things that I found most appalling about William James, and I say this with all the love of parents for an abhorrent child of some kind. I couldn't believe what bureaucratic structure we conceived for ourselves. I mean it had to surpass anything that ever occurred in the times of Byzantium. We had committees for every conceivable purpose under the sun, and yet all we were was a faculty of twenty to twenty-two people at most. We had devised so many parallel crosscutting categorize kinds of committees that met for special purposes. Because they met for special purposes they always excluded, by reasons of timing, other kinds of people who might've easily sat in on the conversation. Every time a committee finished it was met in the corridors with hordes of people who needed �to find out what happened that committee. So enormous amounts of time wasted not only in committees, but in filling other people in after the committees had met with the kinds of things that transpired in committee. We watched such an unwieldy group of twenty that we couldn't work these things out in the larger community. [Robert] I mean we had our community meetings, our council meetings, meetings of the whole, and a lot of these kinds of things could've been solved there. [Barbara] But then we had students. There wasn't just twenty of us. We gave students an equal vote. So, it’s a much larger group. [Robert] There is possibly another of one our mistakes. Because I think we lean so far in the direction of according students a role in governance, that we forgot for a moment that we were actually faculty and there was nothing discriminatory about meeting occasionally as faculty without students to come to certain kinds of conclusions that we might easily have come to in that fashion. [Barbara] But that wouldn't be pure. [Robert] No, that wouldn't have been pure, and we were for purity, you know? There was – at that level of simplicity – there was a kind of a search for mom and apple pie at an academic level that we never really quite got over. Or we didn't quite grow beyond it enough. [Barbara] As I was… [Robert] We were committee structured to a point that was quite ridiculous, I think. We were twenty-two people, at most, and yet we had, at certain times, as many as seven-eight-nine-ten different committees going. As if it were possibly that many kinds of purposes that we would've had available to talk about. Each one of which called for a separate slate of individuals to meet separately and to work out some kind of a policy for the college is a whole. Granted, there are cultural differences between James, and Australian bands, and peasant Alpine communities. But I can think of no Australian band, and no Alpine community that can't figure out ways to organize the lives of five hundred, six hundred, seven hundred, eight hundred people in vastly simpler ways then we put together. [Barbara] But they've been around for a thousand years, and we were around for eleven. [Robert] Of course, that's exactly-- that's exactly the explanation. We hadn't been around that long. we were worried about being understood by those who spend enough time reading us or reading about us to know what we were about and we hadn't even been around each other long enough to make sure that we all spoke the �same vocabulary. I mean this was really, from our own internal point of view, the logic back-up, all of this constant probing and testing and fussing with the language. Because what we were really trying to prove was that we understood each other. [Robert] That there was no point on which we couldn't stand up and finally, in a very relaxed and matter of fact way agreed that we occupied a common footing. But there were suspicions, there were doubts, and all of this kind of stuff I think led to this over commitment of time. This over zealousness in pursuit of minutia, and I think anybody, from the outside world, than we ourselves later on in the wisdom that comes with the passage of time, look back on some of these things and think: "Oh my God! Three months taking up discussing that particular issue from the time of this inception to the time where it finally got established in council as college policy." And how insignificant that all is in the long run, when it's related to the fact of the nonexistence of the college at all at the present time. [Barbara] Katie are you thinking something that we can ask him? [Katie] No, not at the moment. [Barbara] Gerb, are you? [Gerb] Mn-mn. [Barbara] Robert, how about you? [Robert] I'm not at the moment. [Laughter] [Barbara] I don't think it's necessary to go back to that thing that you blocked on. I don't think it is at all central, we just let it go. I just won't use it. [Katie] Yeah. [Barbara] Just got off on personal… because I know you're listening; I see you reacting. [Katie] I wish he'd been able to continue with when the tape ran out. I liked… [Robert] There was a way I then… that I couldn't quite get back into that… [Katie] [speaking over Robert] …it made more sense... it flowed… [Barbara] But it made sense this time? [Katie] Yeah, it did. �[Gerb] Okay, now rolling. [Robert] We came from a lot of diverse directions. Points of the compass to get to William James, and we came - probably more of us that would care to admit – at moments of crisis or even mild desperation in our lives. [Robert] Where we really despaired of things in the larger society taking the turn that we would have liked to see them take. I mean -there were so many issues that the sixties had spawned. Everything from civil rights, to women's liberation, to the whole problem with the Vietnam War, and what there was or wasn't of an academics participation in that agreement to it (resistance to it) or what have you. A lot of people that found their way to William James, I think for public and private reasons, had wound up despairing of various academic situations in which they'd found themselves previously. Despairing of what they took to be some of the larger outlines of American education (educational structure) and came to William James to find an alternative, to build an alternative. On the other hand, you don't assemble that motley a crew of people. Motley in the sense that-And this doesn't refute what I was saying earlier about the level of intelligence that I think we brought to the enterprise. I think that we were all very bright, very concerned, very committed people. But I think we came from such disparate backgrounds. We came from such a variant set of our own special bleeding wounds. That one of the very special things we had to touch base on, and reassure ourselves about in William James, was that there was some commonality to our wounds. That our wounds could be shared. I don't think— That may sound like a very anomalous and strange way of putting it; because never once did we sit around talking about ourselves and so many walking wounded. Though, in fact, we were for variety of real intellectual reasons. We were a set of walking wounded. Because it's only if you have encountered things of that kind that you have come to your senses, and packed up, and moved out, and sought to find something different. But we had been wounded in different ways, and one of the things that we worried about was that the special wounds would either get in the way of our being able to carry out our mission; or the special wounds would prevent us from seeing the legitimacy of somebody else's special wounds. I don't know whether this makes sense, and maybe I can figure out a way of saying it more clearly, sometime. But it made for a certain amount of enthusiastic embracing of one another, and then simultaneously in a 'schitzy' kind of fashion, a certain mutual suspicion of one another. Which is one of the reasons, it seems to me, that we spent so much time fine tuning the rhetoric. It would've been no need to fine tune the rhetoric as an instrument to demonstrate our purposes to the outside world, beyond a certain point. Beyond a certain point, we were proving certain things to ourselves. We were justifying our own approaches, rationalizing our positions, trying to define ourselves in relationship-not to the outside world but to one another. �[Barbara] Where did the students fit into this? [Robert] They didn't fit into that part of it. In fact, if I'm correct in what I'm talking about, this was an activity that we did not acknowledge even to ourselves. I'm just simply, after the fact, being analytical about something. [Robert] And I've never really talked about in these terms to anyone else. So, I would be prepared to discover that colleagues disagreed with me on my choice of words, or even on my choice of schisms, or problems, or definitions. But I think that there was an amazing amount of disturbing suspicion within William James. It's part of what lay behind the concoction of a code – a kind of rhetorical code that we employed in talking about the college, and about its purposes, and about our positions with relationship to that purpose, and about the relationship of students to the purposes of the college. And we spelt this out in terms of the number of buzzwords. [Barbara] Like? [Robert] I can't even think of one. I can come up with them if… I can supply that at another time. Just my memory bank on buzzwords is sort of closed down momentarily. But… [Barbara] Oh, surely you can think of some? [Robert] Well, I can't at the spur of the moment. We had lots of them. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource William James College Interviews Description An account of the resource Videotaped interviews of William James College faculty, students and administrators by Barbara Roos. William James College opened in 1971 as the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. Curriculum was organized around three concentrations that were meant to be interdisciplinary career preparation offerings: Social Relations, Administration and Information Management, and Environmental Studies. The college was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Language A language of the resource eng Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16_GVSU_13_Burns Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Burns, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Title A name given to the resource Robert Burns interview (3 of 3, video and transcript) Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert Burns by Barbara Roos, documenting the history of Grand Valley State's William James College. William James College was the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. The college opened in 1971 and was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley State. Robert Burns was a faculty member of William James College and longtime professor at GVSU who taught anthropology and photography from 1973 until his retirement in 1993. He was also notably the father of documentary filmmaker, Ken Burns, who found inspiration from his father's photographs and travels from a young age. In this interview, Robert discusses the diverse directions that brought individuals to William James College and the common ground shared within its community. This interview is part 3 of 3 for Robert Burns. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/516290f44ebb80dfc21b6a29c5948cc1.mp4 baf485936f0c641671916bc95b304ebc https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/90ad3f6ba6322588ccf7e474ef16ac32.pdf 92e5b6335948f8e007e8192f2702e78d PDF Text Text Living with PFAS Interviewee: Robert Delaney Interviewer: Dani DeVasto Date: August 1, 2025 Dani DeVasto (DD): All right, so I'm Dani DeVasto, and today, August 1st, 2025, I have the pleasure of chatting with Robert Delaney. Bob, can you, just to get us started, tell me a little bit about where you're from and where you currently live. Robert Delaney (RD) (00:00:39): Okay. I'm essentially from Michigan. My family moved quite a few times, but we were always within the state of Michigan. Most of my relatives were in the upper part of the lower Peninsula. Right now, we're living outside of outside of Lansing in a small village, small town called Potterville. DD (00:00:59): Alright. Thank you. How long have you been in the Lansing area? RD (00:01:06): Since 1979, I think. On and off we, we were a few years in France and a few years in, or one year in Colorado. Otherwise Michigan. DD (00:01:18): Okay. Bob, can you tell me a story about your experience with PFAS or PFAS in your community? RD (00:01:26): Sure. the PFAS my discovery of PFAS and what was happening in the state of Michigan and worldwide dramatically changed my career direction and my personal life really in many ways. And what happened was I was a project manager of the state's oversight of the US Air Force cleanup at the former Wurtsmith Air Force base that's up in Oscoda, Michigan. And it was a SAC base. In other words, it had the bombers that carried the nuclear weapons that were, well, the strategic bombers to protect us from nuclear war. They were a deterrent. Anyway, that that base closed in, I think it was 93, well, 95 might have been official year. And it was therefore part of the cleanup program for these major sites, it happened to be a Superfund site, EPA biggest site's most difficult ones that states weren't able to deal with on their own. And so I worked through a program where the Air Force paid for my services to help them follow our state laws as they cleaned up the project. And so during that time I oversaw the different technical consultants and all the, the grant work and all that. And, and handled the negotiations with the Air Force on this cleanup, well we were at the point where we had conquered, the Air Force had cleaned up, or we had a remedy in place for all what we consider the traditional contaminants, the chlorinated from the metals and oils and gasoline, that kind of stuff. We had, we've gone through virtually every site got have remedy in place. And I was starting to think about I need another, something else to work on. And I was praying in church one day and I said, God, I'd like to do something where I, I've never really used my intellect. This has been too easy. And and so I just, before I retired, I'd like to do something that really challenged me. Well, little did I know that within a month I would be down and at a conference and I would learn about PFAS chemicals, the firefighting foams the Air Force had well, the DOD had a, a session where they came in and told us about chemicals that were on the horizon of as potential problems. And it just so happened that while I was at that conference, my consultant calls me from Wurtsmith Air Force Base, and he says to me, we have this soil at at fire training area where we had been arguing with the Air �Force for years about the cleanup there. And they finally agreed to do what we told 'em they needed to do. And he calls and he says, Hey, they dug down in here 'cause they were installing the remedy. And he says There's a black soil horizon two foot down here. And that nobody told us, nobody knew anything about it. So that would change the potential for the effectiveness of the re remedy as is. And I said, okay, well grab three samples of this soil and send them to a lab and see if you can and analyze 'em for absolutely everything. 'cause We didn't know what they poured out there. And I said, and while you're at it, see if you can find a lab that can analyze for PFOA and PFOS. And so he said, so he found one in California and we sent it out to them. And it comes back with loaded with PFOS and PFOA, especially PFOS. 'cause It's a, it was a firefighting foam. And and I was surprised because they're essentially soaps, that's what they're used a lot as a soap. So I'm thinking they're, they should be all swept away outta that soil. And I won't get into the technical reason why they weren't, but they weren't all, there was a lot of 'em in that, those soil. So, so I said, well sample the groundwater. And then and then from this training I had gotten, I realized that there were all kinds of potential sources across the base. And so we started sampling across the base, all the surface waters soils. And every, absolutely every single sample came back with PFAS in it. Every one. I had never seen anything like it. And this is like four or five square miles of, of area that we're sampling and we're finding it everywhere. And we finally found one well, that didn't have any PFAS in it. DD (00:06:36): And did you decide to sample or test for it because of the conference? Or had you already started hearing about it before that conference? RD (00:06:43): I, I went back through my records and I had one message in 2008, two years earlier from a toxicologist that said you guys might think about PFOS or PFOA, you know this is something on the horizon. That was one of our lead toxicologists, but it wasn't on any of the stuff we worked on or knew and had no idea what it was. And at that point in time, there wasn't much literature even on it. And so I was shocked to find that we had, and I think we even mentioned it to the Air Force at the time, but I, it was just such a random thing. I totally slipped my mind. So it was because of that conference and just the uniqueness of the, the situation that we sampled for it. DD (00:07:26): And was it hard to find a lab at that time to test for it? Or was that not, RD (00:07:30): Well, I don't know. 'cause My tech, my my consultant does all the hard work. I just do the, you do this, you do that, and then he goes, do the hard, the hard work. DD (00:07:40): I see. Okay. RD (00:07:41): But yeah, it was, it was actually difficult because like, we went out the next year and sampled fish, and the only place that would analyze fish flesh was in Canada. So we had the whole cross border thing, and we had to figure out how to send a sample up there and stuff like that. So yeah. People weren't doing it. It was unusual. 'cause You know, there was no regulatory reason to sample for it. DD (00:08:06): Sure. So you started sampling and looking for it and finding it everywhere, except where you said one well, �RD (00:08:14): One, well, eventually we would find some other wells, you know? Yeah. That's just forest upgradient of the, of the Wurtsmith. So there, forest doesn't produce any PFAS. So it was yeah, it all came from, so it started at the base boundary, basically. DD (00:08:32): And what then? RD (00:08:34): Well this, the thing that really changed the direction was that my I went, I didn't know. I knew that these chemicals by this point were indestructible, essentially indestructible. And they also were ubiquitous. And so I went to our, went to the toxicologist in our department, the one that usually worked with me and asked him, can you come up with some criteria? Because that's how we operate. Something needs to have a criteria or some reason for you to try and regulate it. So he did a back of the envelope calculation, and he came up with a hundred parts per trillion as the cleanup, potential cleanup standard for PFOA and 60 parts per trillion for PFOS. Now, those words, those numbers, those words don't mean anything to anybody. But to me, in my line of work, if a contaminant was around a part per billion, which is a, an order of magni-, I don't wanna get into that too technical. But anyway, that's a lot, maybe a hundred times or a thousand times what we were eventually looking at for PFOS and PFOA as far as the criteria. So like, it's a thousand times maybe, or a hundred times higher. If I saw a chemical that was that bad, I thought, this is a really bad chemical. It's really dangerous. Then you back down into the parts per trillion. Well, there's only a few things that we worry about, you know, dioxins and mercury that we look at at that level. So here's a chemical that is on the level of a dioxin or mercury in people's systems. So that was pretty shocking. And then the kind of the weirdest other coincidence, there's a lot of weird coincidences. My son, we'd been told that they thought he was on the spectrum having Asperger's, and because of some of his and now he's, if he is, he's super high functioning. So, and I'm waiting until he becomes a billionaire, but he hasn't yet <laugh> Anyway. He so we my wife, you know, she's concerned and she knows that I want technical information. I do not want what some talking head says or whatever. I wanna understand something at a more base level. And so I started researching autism and what, how the brain worked and, and a lot of the things that go on, and it came to the realization that it was rising. And it's been rising since. Well, we know since 2000. So it's the last 25 years, it's gone up every year, the rate, and as I read about where autism was showing up, that, you know, I started realizing, okay, it's showing up in various areas in various subpopulations of the country at the same time, because my consultant had come to me and said, or my toxicologist had said, this contaminant is like super, super dangerous. And I said, okay, I've gotta go back to the military. We all think that we're almost done cleaning up Wurtsmith. Tens of millions of dollars have been spent, you know, 20 years or more have been spent on cleaning this place up. And I'm gonna have to go back and tell them that this is, we're just starting all over from scratch. So I didn't want to go to them. And <laugh>, I, I always joke, I always saw toxicologists as witch doctors. You know, when you want a criteria, they take some bones in the back room, throw 'em out on the floor, come up with a number and come out and tell you what that number is. And I'm a geologist, so I just follow whatever the toxicologist says. I had faith that they knew what they were doing. I'm just joking about the <laugh>, about them being witch doctors. But anyway, I decided, I want to know for sure if I, this is a dangerous chemical. Is this dangerous enough to go try and fight the Air Force? 'cause You, you know, you fight the Air Force, it's not a fair fight. So you had take it on with some, some intelligence. So I started doing a research on the toxicology of of PFOS and PFOA and the epidemiology. Where, where did it show up? What populations had higher concentrations? So as I'm reading these two sets of things, they're mirroring up. Like, autism was higher �in Minnesota. Well, who had the first widespread known PFOS contamination? It was Minnesota. And it's more common among rich people. Well, who gets new cars and new stuff, and it comes off electronics and stuff. Well, your carpets where they're covered in PFOS, your cookware, your fancy clothing, your floss, it's, and so the things that wealthy people did expose them more to PFOS than what the regular people did, you know? You go to Goodwill, that stuff's been washed outta that clothing by that time. You get it. And we don't change your carpeting probably as much. So anyway, then like, autism was higher among the military. Well, I already knew the military was drinking this stuff all over the place. Autism is higher in, along expressways within 300 feet of an expressway, or I think, no, 300 yards. I don't remember exactly. But if you look at where, where contamination non-point source contamination is, it's a lot of times along major freeways and stuff like that, because it's in diesel. There’s five systems in a, in a, in a diesel truck that de-gas. And, a lot of those fluids have PFOS in 'em. PFAS. So anyway, I'm getting, down rabbit holes. But, so anyway, I started thinking, well, maybe this is why autism's going up, because the use of this stuff has been going up dramatically through all this time. So I, I, there's, there's research being done on that now, but you know how it, is cause and effect, very hard to prove. So anyway, I just, for me, when I thought, oh my gosh. And I had, I was bouncing this off another one of our geniuses at the state, and I'm not kidding, he's a genius. And we were thinking, well, yeah, it's seemingly like this is the case. So anyway, I felt like literally I felt like I was standing at the edge of the abyss looking in that we were poisoning ourselves. And the more you read about diseases on the rise, the more you realize we're poisoning ourselves. And so to make a very long story short, <laugh>, I haven't made it short. But anyway that changed the, my motivation level to where I became super motivated that I had to do something about it. And it was not just deal with Air Force, but this was a, a reality that was way bigger than just the Air Force. And the Air Force and DOD actually proved to be a catalyst for people becoming aware of PFAS and, and the dangers. So it was really strategic. I was strategically placed because I was negotiating with the upper management of DOD on their environmental issues. And they were in a position to actually make a difference with our understanding of it and, and doing something about it. DD (00:16:59): Can you say more about how you, through DOD, were able to be a catalyst? RD (00:17:07): Sure. DD (00:17:07): From what you could see? RD (00:17:08): Okay. Well so, so many backstories. So anyway, I advised my management of, of this, at the end of 2010. I did a big slideshow, brought the toxicologists in and, and leaders of our division. And we went through all this. And then when this, and, and those were old time environmental leaders that were in that meeting, and they knew exactly what to do. 'cause They had already done the dioxins and the mercury and the variety of lead. And, and so they'd already gone through all this. And they recognized instantly the challenge that was there before us and what needed to be done. And so they set up immediate work group to work on on the toxicity and what we should be doing about these things. And we had some ideas. They were gonna test all the waters each year. The state tests a certain number of, of streams. So we were gonna do all this. And, and so there was, we, we started up gung-ho and then the Snyder administration came in and they stopped what the division and the department was doing. And and, and what they told what, I came back through the, through the grapevine. 'cause We asked our, our chairman chairperson of the group, why aren't we doing anything? Why aren't all these things we were supposed to do, we're not doing? And they said, well, the Snyder �administration had told our management is that if our management, DEQ's management, had made one more problem for business that we would be put outta business. And so obviously PFAS is a huge, huge problem for business. And not necessarily always because of their own fault. I mean, they didn't know, most of 'em didn't know. A few knew. So, so that kind of killed what was going on with the state, you know? Not until Rockford broke. Did, did anything happen with regard to PFOS, PFAS. But I was on these national committees working with the Department of Defense with EPA and with all the other states. And there I had carte blanche. My, I think my intermediate management said, yeah, you can go to any conference you want. You can speak to anything. They didn't say this to me personally, but every time I asked for, can I go do this, can I do that? They said, yeah. And so I went out and I would just tell the story of Wurtsmith, you know, and what was happening there. I didn't get into the toxicology or what I thought, you know, how bad it was or anything that, but and I, I talked to, well, in 2012, it was in Salt Lake City. RD (00:20:03): I told, told the defense department, they asked me to talk about contracting. And I said, well, you got a problem with your contracting. Because they were going to a method where you pay somebody to clean up a whole site and whatever was on that site, they were gonna clean it up. And they had to give you a price up front. The contractors had to say, alright, this is how much we're gonna do to clean this up. I said, you, you, yeah, you, there's a couple of problems with that. But anyway, they're gonna clean this up, but they don't know about PFAS or PFOS. And when the regulators come and say, Hey, you've got a problem, then there's no way they're going to have accounted for that in their costs. There's no way. 'cause It's about impossible to get rid of. It's terribly costly. So I said, so this is the demon in the closet, PFOS, PFAS, it's going to screw up your relationships, your, your contracting. RD (00:20:59): And it was from that point forward that I, I just started building, you know, building coalitions or you know, network of people that we were all concerned about it. And we, I, I you know, did issue papers for ASTSWMO, Association of State Waste and Manage Waste Management Operators. So it's a state organization that works with all the different states. That's where I was on the committees. Well, one of the places I was on the National committees was them. And so I would just go and I would just tell the story and you know, and find labs that I could work with and just people all over. And I got relationships with the media so I could feed the, you know, like InsideEPA from Washington would call me all the time to ask me what was going on with PFAS, PFOA. And so I was able to influence the nation and then within EGLE, or now called EGLE. But it was the Department of Environmental Quality at the time within that group, you know, all those peons, we all really cared about the people and the environment. And so, you know, word got out amongst us. And so when the Rockford thing broke, there were people that were already, were already knowledgeable about what was going on. DD (00:22:23): So you had initially been worried that bringing that information to the DOD about, Hey, we just finished cleaning up, but I just found this new thing that you need to think about. You were concerned. But it sounds like they, they kind of went with it, or No? How did they receive that information? RD (00:22:48): Well, it's the federal government. So <laugh>, what up here starts out as a shout, do this. And what actually gets at the bottom is two different things. Like they, the people at the bottom have no idea what's going on. You know, what the management really wants. And the people at the bottom can be shouting, and it gets muffled by the time it gets to the top. So, so there was this weird, I, because I was in acting at both levels, I could see the dynamic. So the person that was in charge of, at Wurtsmith, �he was anti-environmental. Anything environmental was bad in his worldview. And so they would do, they were doing nothing. And I knew they would do nothing. But what happened was we we went out and sampled the fish, like I mentioned, well, we sampled them in the AuSable River. And when we sampled in the AuSable River, the day that the data came back from the labs, this Canadian, this Canadian lab, the health department made an or, an order do not eat the fish in the AuSable River. Okay. So that had political resonance. Yeah. Is that right? All the way up to Washington. Suddenly Washington had a big PR crisis on their hands. And so they brought in outside people to deal with the situation and stuff. And so there was actually immediate action to control the contamination off that fire training area. And they built really the first DOD treatment system for PFOS or PFAS, anywhere that they had. and so, it was, so it just then, you know, just more and more information coming out, more of the waters are impacted people's drinking water's impacted, the on base water system was impacted. Uh, they, it became a political thing for both our state, you know, the governor's office and for DOD. And so that's why there was movement down at the bottom. There would never have been movement based, you know, from the, the local, local group. And so that's what I meant when it came to negotiating with those people. They, they, they are a law unto themselves at times when it comes to, what the president say. Well, I didn't hear it. You know? And, and so there's a kind of a weird dynamic, politically with the DOD. DD (00:25:43): Sure. And then you said too, that at that time, under Governor Snyder's administration, the state was also not pursuing... RD (00:25:55): Well, let's see...Well Snyder didn't come along until, well, he came along around. Yeah, that's true. He we were working on it. And, and Snyder administration, you know, they weren't stopping us from like we couldn't create criteria, or we couldn't, you know, start enforcing against anybody else. But they didn't care what we did to DOD essentially. So we were out pushing DOD, and and they were under Superfund. So Superfund doesn't necessarily need our criteria. Fortunately we didn't get surface water criteria long before we got a drinking water criteria. So we were, we were pushing that at 'em. 'cause They had a surface water, Because the treatment plants, they could regulate them under a different set of laws than what we were operating. Anyway, it was all lots of maneuvering. It was like I had a, when I wanted an intellectual challenge, that was it. I mean, they had to understand law toxicology, epidemiology to be able to talk to all these people. So, DD (00:27:04): Yeah. Can you tell me about the Delaney paper? I heard you wrote a paper. RD (00:27:12): Yeah. Myself and Richard DeGrandchamp professor out at Colorado University of Colorado. And that has another crazy backstory. But I, my, so I knew that PFOS what PFAS was a problem. 'cause My toxicologist had given me those criteria, and I'd started doing my own research. Okay. But my, my toxicologist was swamped. They were re-writing criteria and doing all kinds of things, and he just said, I, I can't support you. And the weirdest thing happened, another weird coincidence, but one day, one of the unit chiefs from the Superfund section comes over to me with a thing that had come across the fax machine. Somebody had done one of those, grab a fax numbers from all governmental offices and fax out an advertisement. And what it was, was a this toxicologist Richard DeGrandchamp was advertising, and they did, he did epidemiological and toxicological not studies, but research and what he did a lot was going, going to court as expert witnesses. So anyway, this, he was doing it on PCBs, and I think dioxins those two things. And she, so she brings it over to me, this unit chief, and says, well, you know, you might, you might be interested in this. And and so I say, oh, yeah, it sounds like it might be something interesting. Maybe this person can do some work �on PFAS. So I told my contractor, contact this contractor and subcontract him so we can, we can get to his expertise. And so we got him, and I remember meeting him at the airport, and he was just a, he was a classic professor type, corduroy coat, hat. And it was just all, it was just classic Indiana Jones. I kind of, all I thought of at the time. So he shows up and brilliant, brilliant man. And I have funny stories about him, if you ever want to hear any <laugh>. But he's a, he's a brilliant man and conscientious. And so I told him we, I got this problem. I got this PFAS stuff in the groundwater and the soils up at Wurtsmith. And I don't know if it's really dangerous or not. I didn't tell him that. I suspected it was super dangerous, that I had been doing the research. And and very much convinced that this was a, a very, very dangerous chemical. So I just say, will you go out, do the research, come back and advise me on what we should be doing about this? So he comes back to me and he tells me that this is really, really bad stuff. And he said, the studies in, West Virginia, Ohio area are, the gold standard for studies. You can't do a better study than this. And they say that this stuff is really dangerous, and, you know, it's almost better stuff than what the cigarette industry or the cigarettes were, you know, is that it was really good, good data and good information. So I say, okay, well, well, anyway, so that gave me direction on how to go with pursuing the, the military. But we had a new director come in. And the new director, it was funny, he, this is under Snyder, so this new director comes in, and he really wasn't, and he wasn't, didn't know much about environment. He was quite honest. He didn't know about, the environment. Uh, this is Dan Wyant. And he said he wanted to meet all of his 3000 employees, I think that was, so he had these meetings where you got to stand up and you had five minutes or something like that to tell him what you thought he should be working on or any, you could tell him anything. And he said, you could even tell him he didn't know what he was doing. So when it came my turn, I think I was the only state employee to do this, but I stood up and said, you don't know what you're doing. And then I launched into PFAS and PFOA See, in 2009 the European Union had already begun to regulate this stuff. And my director had never even heard of it. So this is 2011. My director hasn't heard of this, these chemicals, and yet they're that critical. Maybe it was 2012, I can't remember exactly what the date was. So I say to him, I'm gonna write you a report. And so I got myself and Richard DeGrandchamp wrote the, I think it was 95 pages. There's 96 page report on PFAS and PFOA, talking about the dangers, its distribution, its history. And one chapter, which turned out to be particularly inspired was what, what can the department do to address this? So it was, it was pretty, it was actually pretty funny. 'cause I always thought, well, I heard that. Don't bring a problem to your boss unless you got a solution. So this was a throw in, throw, throw in a chapter. I was just off the top of my head stuff, well, this is what we could do. We do this, we could do this, you know, or we should do. I never said we could. I said, we should do this. You know? And later that would be the kind of outline of what the state did. So it was kind of funny 'cause it was just off the top of my head to try and not, not do a faux pas and bring a problem without a solution. DD (00:33:21): I was impressed by that chapter or that part of the paper when I was reading through it. I was like, oh, they actually offered, like, some steps forward and some like very reasonable things. Like next steps. So I was very impressed when I read that part of it. RD (00:33:38): Yeah. That was the, that was the easiest part to read, write. 'cause I didn't have to really think hard. It just <laugh>. It just flowed. So it was funny. DD (00:33:45): And how, so once you had that paper written, how was it received? RD (00:33:50): Well I mean, it was received well, I, I had I had a good friend that was advising the, the director. And he was on, he was one of the, he and myself and the director had all met together. He, he �myself and another fellow that I have a lot of respect for was there as well. I can't remember his name. But anyway, they they received it well. The director was fairly interested in the autism thing. I hadn't mentioned autism, but he had ridden with my student assistant somewhere. And my student assistant was talking to him about autism and the link. I really didn't wanna talk about that 'cause I was a geologist. And this autism thing is just my, my my thing. I put it out on the web because I wanted to provoke conversation. So so anyway I didn't find out until later, but they distributed about 20 copies to other leaders in the, in the department. So, but that was in 2012. And it got lost after that. DD (00:34:58): Mm. Why do you think? RD (00:35:02): Well, it was, it was huge. And I mean, to me, it was like, to me, it radically changed my whole view of what we'd been doing. I thought that America had been making advances on contaminants that we had stopped putting out, you know, TSCA, RCRA ,all designed to stop us from doing this. And then I realized at that time that those, those were mirages, those were not doing, protecting us, that we were creating new problems. 'cause I thought, oh, we've stopped making new problems, and so suddenly here's a problem that is so huge that it's mind boggling trying to address it. And mostly, like a lot of reasons the DOD went and did some pretty positive things is they didn't realize how big it was and how expensive it was going to be. When it started dawning on them, how incredibly expensive and difficult this was. That's when you finally got push back at the top levels. Before that they were, they're most of the people, what, contrary to everybody's opinion nowadays, are really decent human beings. I mean, they're Americans. They're not like, they're not crazy people. They're Americans. They are honestly decent human beings. And yes, there are some bad ones up there, but wherever there's power or money, there will be bad people. You can't help that. But there were a lot of great people out there, and they wanted, like, one of the things I said in that 2012 meeting was I said, look, you guys have the young people in your ranks, the people that are gonna be having babies. It is critical for you to go out and find out and, and I didn't do it quite this dramatically, but it is critical for you to go out and find out if your people are drinking this water. So they literally went all around the globe and sampled every water supply that they had at their bases. And that becomes key at what happens in Rockford. And, and so if we get to Rockford, I'll tell you how, that became a key thing that made Rockford happen. DD (00:37:17): Can you just clarify one point, you said you put it out on the web, was that the autism information. Like did you have your own like, website or what? RD (00:37:27): The other person that I was working with is I'll just say Mark for right now 'cause I know if he wants his name out there. But Mark had a, a website for his business. And so we quick put it onto his business website, and for awhile it was the number one you put in PFAS and autism, it would be the number one paper that popped up. But, now, I don't know if you'd ever find it again, but still out there I think. DD (00:37:56): Wow. Thanks for that clarification. Okay. So how, so you're, you know, you're, sounds like you're working nationally. You're kind of, you've got kind of that perhaps unofficial carte blanche to do these conferences. Meanwhile, the state at some points is not really embracing this... RD (00:38:18): I gotta say like the health department was, and the surface water people, they were still going out and sampling fish. And they're still sampling the surface waters. So there was work being done at all the Defense department sites. So we're gathering information and there's this little pool of �information that's growing. But yeah, the department itself is, it's you know, we'd rather sweep this one under the rug. DD (00:38:43): So then how did you get connected in, or how did this get connected in with Rockford? RD (00:38:52): Oh, well, that is a, that I, I, like I mentioned in 2012, I had spoken, there was both, it was an Air force and Army conference, environmental conference with a small, um or they called it a summit. And I gave my little spiel and I told them, you guys, you know, you got these young people, you gotta go out and sample your water to make sure they're not drinking this stuff. So they literally, they didn't, they didn't check with me, but they went ahead and did that. And so they're sampling all around the globe. And that's where you, you find that suddenly the military has all these sites. And they were always mad and rightfully so. 'cause Everybody was saying, oh, the military's so horrible. They've contaminated everything. Well, the only difference was they sampled for it, nobody else did. So that, you know, they were really doing a great thing. Opening up the reality that this is super widespread problem. But, you know, they got whacked for, for doing it. But one of the last rounds they did were all these low risk sites. And it so happened that in Rockford there was a a facility that they had purchased, and its only function was to provide a place for the band to practice. Okay. And they never operated anything there. It was and they hadn't bought it that long ago. Well, when they sampled that water, it came back highly contaminated with PFOS, PFAS. And so they started investigating, you know, how is this possible? We know we didn't do this. You know, they reported it to the EGLE, the DEQ, whatever they were called then. And, and it, so that pointed back to, well, they were, they did weird things. The department, the, the people, first of all, the people that were responsible for doing the sampling, they, we don't know why, but they sampled down gradient instead of upgrade, or No, they sample, what did they do? They sampled either cross gradient or something to the groundwater flow. And then they didn't detect anything. And so they were trying to write it off as something, I don't know what, you know, nobody knows the full story of what was going going on with them. But anyway, they got called out eventually. 'cause They sampled, the, I don't know how it got tied back to the, the tannery, but it just, the investigation, I guess eventually got it back to the tannery. And, so it was because of that, because they found this high levels of contamination from a DOD site. And they know they hadn't done it that eventually was found out it was the tannery. And, and the other side note is that there's a friend, Janice, that had called me from, in 2000, I think it was 2011, that's when the emails are from, she called me and was talking to me about, contamination at the tannery. And I told her at the time, the thing that I said, she was worried about heavy metals because in tanning they used heavy metals. But, I said, wait, at the time, I said, well, you should have, you should be checking into PFAS. Because I had lived in Rockford, I knew about the tannery, and I knew they used Scotchgard on, on those shoes. And so, and the water tasted horrible. So <laugh>. Anyway, I told Janice, you guys need to be looking into the PFAS and see if they used Scotchgard and stuff. And so as Janice went through all the, all the files, from the tannery, she found evidence that they were using Scotchgard. And so, they were working from that end of things, from the public, trying to bring EPA in and, and various other things. You probably know Janice's story better than I do now. But, so those, those were the two things that were brought it together, DOD's discovery and, and that that group, fighting to have the place, that cleaned up properly. DD (00:43:32): And you knew that Scotchgard at that point had PFAS in it. RD (00:43:36): Yeah. In fact, in all my slideshows, when I talk about what, what's it in, Scotchgard is mentioned. �DD (00:43:42): Wow. That seems like two really lucky breaks in terms of putting that together. Right? Like these low risk band practice site, and, you know, Janice happens to contact you. Those are really tenuous threads RD (00:44:03): There are and as I've mentioned to you I have had a couple of supernatural experiences in my life. And this in total felt like one string of miracles. I mean, and I know I'm a scientist. Okay. I'm, I'm a I'm a skeptical personality type, and I don't expect anybody to believe it. But to me, the things that happened literally at, when I was sitting with upper management in our work groups at EGLE, and we were discussing, you know, we're gonna go out and sample all the water and all the systems in Michigan, I'm sitting here pinching myself. Like, this is unbelievable. This is like, I can't believe this is like a miracle. I never, I never thought in the world I could get, I would get them to do anything. You know, because the of the business angle, and if it hadn't been for Flint, Flint was also critical to what happened in PFAS because the, the, the governor could no longer look like he was ignoring environmental problems. He just didn't, he didn't, couldn't risk that. And so there was no political way of stopping what was going on. And so yeah, it was just crazy stuff just went on that, you know, when I was looking at that abyss, I was looking at it from the standpoint of there's a horrendous problem out here, and there is no way in the world it's ever gonna get addressed because we're going so far away. Even back then towards in the environment, it was, it was already an obvious thing that we were tired of caring about environmental things that was causing us problems with jobs or whatever. So I was thinking, there is no way we're gonna take on this. Like we took on the dioxins and, and the, and the lead and the mercury. And so to see what happened was, has been just amazing. DD (00:46:07): It sounds like your whole world became, at least work world became RD (00:46:10): Yeah. DD (00:46:11): PFAS RD (00:46:12): Yeah, I was just thinking this morning, my mom was the second one of the second leading experts on PFAS in Michigan. 'cause She would sit and listen to me when I ranted on and on about it. <Laugh> <laugh>. So yeah, it was, it, it became very very dominating in my life. DD (00:46:29): What what if any concerns do you have about PFAS now moving forward? RD (00:46:35): Well that, that anti-environmental spirit that has now gripped our nation, a lot of our nation is PFAS isn't the only environmental problem. We have so many diseases that are arising, not just autism and a lot of the autoimmune diseases, thyroid disease childhood cancers and diabetes. There are so many things hitting us all at once. And so it's not because we're all eating at McDonald's or some fast food place, that's not what's doing it because this is happening in other places around the globe that they don't have the same cultural behaviors that we do, and the same foods. And yet you'll find autism raising in you know, China and, and other places that don't, don't do what we do. And so there has to be an explanation for what's causing these real rates. Not just population trend changes. Like, you know, a lot of us are getting dementia while we're all getting older. The population get older. You expect dementia to increase, but you don't expect childhood cancers leukemia or something like that to increase. They're the same age, you know? So there are environmental things that are impacting us. And I've already, I've already seen rumblings of the Trump administration lowering the standards on, on �PFAS. And I don't, I haven't been able to verify this 'cause they just saw it yesterday. But there's even a move to to allow PFAS contaminated sludges from municipalities to be spread in farmland when they were trying, the Biden administration just apparently passed something that said, you can't put PFAS contaminated sludges on land, on farmland. And, you know, there's a, there's a business reason why, you know, tax and business reason to put that stuff on the land. RD (00:48:55): And that, again, I don't want to use this as a, a pun or whatever, but that's, that trumps protecting people's health right now at, at almost every turn. If it's perceived as bad for business, bad for American economy, real or not real. It is, is under attack. And so I see you know, I <laugh> it's almost suicidal. If people understood they were killing their children and their grandchildren, then I don't think this would be happening. Because like I say, I don't know if we can afford to clean up PFAS and stop it from getting into us, but I do know we cannot afford to poison our children. If you're doing your economic analysis, then what is the price of our children? What's their worth? So to me, it's mind boggling where we're at. So Yeah. I'm concerned. DD (00:50:04): Yeah. Sobering. RD (00:50:06): Yeah. Yep. DD (00:50:09): To say the least. Is there anything that you would want to add that we haven't touched on today or that you would want to go back to and say more about? Anything that's kind of bubbled up since we've been talking? RD (00:50:32): You know, the only thing I thought about is like what you're doing and what one of the things that was remarkable to me about the American system was the power of the media. You know, for all the garbage that the media puts out, they're also totally instrumental in counteracting the lies and the nonsense. If you want to know the truth, it's out there. And a lot of why I didn't get touch into what the media did with regard to helping the story here in Michigan and how they were so instrumental in, in in getting the, getting public awareness out there and making it impossible for the politicians to ignore. They were just so critical. And so it was, it was, it was great to see, you know, we had, we do have some important political and social things that have helped us. And that's what I'm more, almost more afraid of losing in this country now, is that with all the pressures that are going on towards I don't even blame people for being so thoroughly confused about what's true, but, but it is a scary thing. DD (00:51:53): Do you want to say anything more about media and PFAS and if you have any part of that story or...? RD (00:52:02): Well I'll tell you, there was a couple of people and that were critical. Garret Ellison and oh, drawing a blank on his name. This is a sign of old age. Steve Gruber Steve Gruber, he got me onto his show. When I broke the story, I think that's probably something I'd like to tell about is the, how, how Michigan actually became a leader nationally on PFAS and PFOA. And this is another one of those really crazy stories, but in the, in the Flint situation where they had the drinking water problem with the lead, and it was, it was caused by a bad decision to change water sources. There was a state employee that came to management and said, look at if we switch this water source from from Detroit to, or no, from whatever they were using in Flint to the Detroit water system, what's gonna happen is lead is gonna leach into the water. He told him, flat out, it's gonna be in everybody's water. That person was actually indicted by the Attorney General of Michigan, Bill Schuette. 'cause He, he needs to, he needs to hang or �not hang that this needs to be hung on him, that this, you did this. But he went after this this employee that was trying to warn people. And it, it was because his theory, from what I understand, was go after the little people and they will give you the big, big, big fish, which was John or not was Governor Snyder. 'cause He wanted Governor Snyder's job, basically. I guess. So he goes after all these small fry at the state and wrecks careers, hurts their lives, their families, all this because he wants to be governor, not because he wants the truth. So I was driving down the road one day when Rockford had broke. It was out in the news they'd find, they find the contamination all over the place. And I thought to myself, out of the blue, well, who knew about this first? Me. They're gonna go after me. And so I so I called my friend who's an attorney, and I say, Hey, can I meet with you? And we get together and I explain the situation. I explain why I'm concerned that I will be the next victim of this, this political war. And he takes my report home. 'cause I said, look it, I gave this report in 2012 to, to management. And he reads the thing and he comes back and, you know, after he's read it, the guy could read awfully fast, apparently. Anyway. And, you know, he's just really, he's blown away by it. And he, and so, so this is the amazing thing, Steve. This was on Wednesday. It turns out that Steve Gruber on his radio program here in Lansing, a talk radio in the morning. And he was talking on Thursday about what was happening in Rockford. And he's familiar with the Flint situation. And he says, somebody at DEQ had to know that this was out there. That this was a problem. And that's where I found out about the 20 copies that had been spread around. That somebody had read my report that was driving in to work at the state and they heard Gruber say this. And they call in and say, yeah, I saw this report report from this DeGrandchamp guy or whatever. And on Friday morning, Gruber is reading my report on the radio. This is a, I mean, that's how crazy this is. So Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. DD (00:56:17): Are you hearing this on the radio? RD (00:56:19): No, I didn't know anything about this. This is, this is this is just, this is what's so funny. So I, and I don't know how, I don't know how my attorney found out. My attorney found, my attorney turned out to be friends with Gruber. Okay. So another weird connection. But, so my attorney has this contact in the attorney general's office. And so he contacts this Attorney general and says, Hey, I got this guy that knows all about this PFAS stuff, and he's willing to come in and talk to you and give you everything he's got for immunity. So, well, Sunday or Monday, Sunday I think it is, I, we get back an offer from the Attorney General's office. And what they offered me was the deal they offer to mobsters, if you, we will, we will not con not prosecute you if you tell us every bad thing you did and everything, all your information, and if you hold anything back, we can come after you for that. Okay. So there's assumption that I did something wrong or bad in this and that. And so I said, I'm not signing that. So my attorney gets together with some some judges and some other attorneys. We all meet together on Monday evening and the decision is made that I need to get my story out before the attorney general comes after me 'cause then there's a, like gag order on you and whatever. And so that's where it comes out to me that Gruber has been talking about me and <laugh>. And so they set up an interview for Wednesday morning. So this is within a week. Wednesday morning I go on, I take time off from work, get it cleared so I can't get me for moonlighting or whatever. I don't know. Anyway, so I go on radio and we talk for two hours about the report and, and stuff. And you know, other co coworkers or people in the governor's office driving in listening to Gruber, hear my, what I'm saying on, on the radio about Yeah, they knew about it in 2012. And you know, this is the report. And, and so many of the questions you asked that kind of stuff too, was being asked. RD (00:58:37): And so it was really a tremendous relief to me because I felt like I've got all the, I'm so concerned about this stuff and I can't get the communication out. And so from there as one person said, �well, your attorneys made you prosecution proof that nobody can come after you. And but anyways, really, I knew I didn't really want to do it because, you know, it would be perceived as betrayal to the department. And, and so my career got, got whacked. But the nice thing about civil services, they can't fire you for telling the truth. Or they might be able to, but they're not supposed to <laugh>. So I, I knew they could make my my life miserable, but firing me would've been a, was a huge problem. Yeah. So they did make it kind of uncomfortable, but other than that, it wasn't bad. DD (00:59:29): That sounds like a really stressful week-ish. RD (00:59:33): I was under well on the stress belt too. Because you know, I no longer, well, I know I no long, I always felt like I was part of a team. And and that of course had been breaking down because of our division was headed in all the wrong direction. But then it got really bad. So they had one other person supposed to be spying on me, and all this other junk was going on. So it was stressful. But every morning I'd get up and I have my quiet time and I, I survived it all. My doctor gave me some pills to keep my blood pressure down. DD (01:00:15): And then from that point on was, I know you're saying the department was changing and like your role changed and things like that. So then was PFAS less a part of your life and your work? RD (01:00:32): You know what, well, what happened was the Air Force went after me trying to get me fired. And my division chief, she at one point was trying to get me fired. And and what they were doing was micromanaging me and they were making it so I couldn't give my, I give instructions to my my consultants. My consultants wouldn't do anything. And then they put another person that was supposed to be helping me, but rather was the one that was truly being made the project manager. 'cause They couldn't really take me off the site. They couldn't make it look like they were punishing me or anything. So they left me in position, but then took, stripped my abilities to do anything. And wasted my time basically. But I kept working on the outside on, on the issues, so DD (01:01:28): Yeah. Are you still working outside? I know you're retired now, but, RD (01:01:34): Well, I did a lot of volunteer work, but because of family issues I had been pulling away and just too much stress. So I have pulling away from doing much of anything anymore right now. So, but I was doing a lot of consulting on the side for, for free. You know, I was just helping out with the communities and still those kind of things, but I'm pretty tired. DD (01:02:05): You wanted to use your intellect... RD (01:02:08): Yeah. <Laugh> I did. Yeah. DD (01:02:10): Oh my goodness. Okay. I'll ask it again. Is there anything else that you wanna add or go back to before we wrap up? RD (01:02:19): There's a lot of wonderful people out there in the world. A lot of great people. I wish Americans could realize that even the people on the other side are not such bad people. But that's, that's relates to everything, not just PFAS. DD (01:02:35): Well, thank you so much, Bob, for taking the time to share your story with me today. �RD (01:02:40): Oh, it was a pleasure. I haven't thought about it much lately, but it was fun. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Living with PFAS Interviews Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Devasto, Danielle Description An account of the resource Beginning in 2021, the Living with PFAS interviews were recorded to gather the personal stories of individuals impacted by PFAS contamination. PFAS, or per- and polyflourinated substances, are a large group of human-made chemicals used widely since the 1940s to make coatings and products resistant to heat, oil, stains, grease, and water. They can be found in countless household items, including food packaging, non-stick cookware, stain-resistant furniture, and water-resistant clothing. These chemicals are often called “forever chemicals” because they do not break down easily, can move through soils and contaminate drinking water sources, and build up in animals, plants, and people. PFAS have been linked to increased incidences of various cancers, increased cholesterol, decreased fertility, birth defects, kidney and liver disease, and immune system suppression, and thyroid dysfunction. It is estimated that PFAS are in the drinking water of more than 200 million Americans (Andrews & Naidenko, 2020). In Michigan alone, over 280 sites have PFAS contamination exceeding maximum contamination levels for groundwater (MPART, 2024). Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Living with PFAS (project) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In copyright Subject The topic of the resource Oral history Personal narrative PFAs (Perfluorinated chemicals) Groundwater--Pollution Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context DC-11 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf audio/mp3 Type The nature or genre of the resource Motion Picture Text Sound Language A language of the resource eng Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context PFAS0040 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Delaney, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2025-08-01 Title A name given to the resource Robert Delaney, 2025 (Interview video and transcript) Description An account of the resource Robert Delaney, a former Michigan Department of Environmental Quality project manager, became one of the first in the state to identify and investigate widespread PFAS contamination. His work at Wurtsmith Air Force Base in Oscoda and later statewide helped bring public, governmental, and national attention to PFAS risks, despite facing political pushback. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource DeVasto, Danielle (interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Oral history Personal narrative PFAs (Perfluorinated chemicals) Groundwater--Pollution Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Living with PFAS (project) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/efc8fba0e6d7b736fd5a888e294b1d46.pdf 1cc0325667af03435784a4a99e16efbd PDF Text Text Young   L ords   In  Lincoln  Park   Interviewee:  Bob  Lee  (Robert  E.  Lee)   Interviewers:  Jose  Jimenez   Location:  Grand  Valley  State  University  Special  Collections   Date:  2/16/2017   Runtime:  01:49:38       Biography  and  Description               Bob  Lee  or  Robert  E.  Lee  like  the  confederate  general  is  from  Houston,  Texas  where  he  did  his  oral   history  interview.  He  grew  up  in  the  “forest”  near  Jasper,  TX.  His  family  worked  on  a  cotton   plantation.  One  of  his  brothers  Franco  became  a  county  commissioner  of  the  5th  Ward  of  Houston   for  over  30  years.  In  1969  Bob  Lee  became  a  Deputy  Field  Marshall  for  the  Illinois  Chapter  of  the   Black  Panther  Party.  His  worked  included  Uptown  where  he  started  working  with  the  Young   Patriots  Organization.  This  was  a  Southern  White  group  who  sported  the  confederate  flag  but   worked  against  racism.  Bob  Lee  was  trying  to  bring  them  closer  to  the  Panthers.   The  Young  Lords  had  begun  working  with  the  Illinois  Black  Panthers  in  mid  -­‐February,  the  day  after   they  had  entered  the  second  floor  and  briefly  “occupied”  the  18th  Police  District  Workshop  Meeting   to  protest  repression.  It  received  media  coverage  and  Chairman  Fred  Hampton  came  to  the  next  day   to  the  street  corner  of  Dayton  and  Armitage  to  meet  with  the  Young  Lords  leader,  Jose  (Cha-­‐Cha)   Jimenez.  Fred  and  Cha-­‐Cha  were  arrested  twice  that  same  month  and  charged  with  mob  action   along  with  Obed  Lopez  and  his  Latin  American  Defense  Organization  which  was  picketing  the   Wicker  Park  Welfare  Office.  They  were  attempting  to  form  a  welfare  union  with  both  caseworkers   and  recipients.   �On  April  5,  1969  Fred  Hampton  asked  Cha  -­‐  Cha  to  join  with  William  (Preacherman)  Fesperman  and   the  Young  Patriots  in  a  Rainbow  Coalition  of  the  three  groups.  Though  the  original  founding  was   informal,  between  the  Black  Panthers,  Young  Patriots  and  Young  Lords,  there  were  several  press   conferences  held  in  Chicago  and  in  other  cities  later.  The  coalition  was  more  mass  and  symbolic   with  the  goal  of  being  more  inclusive  and  bringing  more  groups  into  the  coalition  such  as:  I  Wor   Keum,  the  Red  Guard,  the  Brown  Berets,  AIM  and  SDS.   �Transcript JOSE JIMENEZ: There it is. Okay. ROBERT LEE: You know who I would like to meet before? Miss Katz, Marilyn Katz, yeah, I would like just to say hello to her. JJ: Yeah. RL: Yeah, Marilyn Katz. HY THURMAN: JJ: Yeah? I got her number. Are we recording? RAY: Yeah. That already (inaudible). JJ: Yeah, at least to me. FAIZA: Only from the back? HT: Hey, man. How you doing? R: Yeah, there you go. That’s good. JJ: (inaudible) RL: Okay. Well, y’all want me to do, to tell? JJ: No, I’m just going to ask a few questions, whatever. R: I’m not asking nothing. JJ: You’re not asking no questions? I’m going to ask some questions because this is an oral history about your life. So, tell me where you were born. Start with your name and where you were born. RL: Okay. My birth name? JJ: Yeah. 1 �RL: My dad named me Robert E. Lee, Jr., III, okay? And that’s like naming [00:01:00] a Jewish kid Adolf Hitler in Germany. And I didn’t know. You know, I’m six, seven years old. I didn’t know about Hitler or the Holocaust, things like that. So, you know how when you go to school, you’re in the first grade, it’s your first day, and everybody stand up and introduce themselves? So, we go on down the line. Little girl says, “My name is Judy Johnson.” And they go, “What’s your name, little boy?” “My name is Harold Jones.” Get to my name, this lady’s name was Mrs. Walker, the teacher. When they got to me, you know, I’m Robert E. Lee III after my grandfather and my daddy, so I assumed [00:02:00] that that was a great name, you know? I assumed it. So, Cha Cha, when I stood up and said, “My name is Robert E. Lee., Jr., III,” the teacher looked at me. I knew then that I had done something wrong. She had no smile, so she said, “Robert E. Lee, Jr., III, after class, I just want to speak to you for a minute.” I said, “Yes, ma’am.” So, she went around the circle, and by the end of first day, she sent all the kids out kinda early. So, at that time, our internet was an encyclopedia. It wasn’t what we do now. So, I’m a little boy, little ol’ bitty thing, and we sat beside the bookshelf. She pulled that L bookshelf up, Cha Cha, [00:03:00] pulled the L up in the encyclopedia, pulled that page out, and she thumbed through till she found Lee. Now, at first, I didn’t see Lee. I saw that horse, you know, a traveler. You know, my background is ponies clubs and ranches and rodeos. JJ: What do you mean, ranches? RL: Yeah, that’s my thing. JJ: Oh, you do that? 2 �RL: Yeah. Yeah, I’ve organized rodeos in East Texas, (inaudible) rodeos, racer rodeos. So, when she started telling me all the history, but they never really, in that encyclopedia, mentioned the Holocaust. Yeah, we found that out later when Adolf Eichmann was arrested. So, I went home pissed, okay? [00:04:00] They did talk about Hitler, what he did, the war, millions of people being killed. So, dad came home, and I’m waiting on him, man. Because I finally got him. (inaudible) got it, because when you’re that young, you was a hassle for your daddy (inaudible) go about. So, I told dad. Dad said, “Okay, Junior. Okay,” he said, “but wait until I die.” I said, “That’s a deal.” So, he chose my name for me, which is Robert Alwalee. That means to be a friend, the organizer of people’s affairs. And the positive side of this, being named [00:05:00] Robert E. Lee, one night I’ll ride -- I’m thinking I’m in my community now. One night, me and a girlfriend and I and are riding down Cavalcade, and this is the positive side of that name, and I saw it clearly. In Houston, being a Southern city, you didn’t have to have a high school diploma, a college degree to be a cop in the South. So, I got a pocketful of weed, and back then, you could go to prison for one joint, you know, forever. So, I’m speeding, and a light come on, and I knew this was it. And the law, I told the girl that was driving, I said, “Take the car home.” [00:06:00] So, when the cop got out the car, walked towards me, he said, “Boy, gimme your driver’s license.” So, I handed him my driver’s license. He looked at my name. He said, “God damn, boy. This is a damn good Southern name, boy. Boy, slow this car down now,” and he gave me my driver’s license back. That’s when I saw the positive side, you know, because I aiming to get jobs. I might apply for a dishwasher job, 3 �and I’ll get a call the next day that I was hired. And that’s how I pretty much got it, man. When I came to Chicago, I came there as a VISTA volunteer. When I came to Chicago, I came as a VISTA. JJ: From where did you come? [00:07:00] RL: When? JJ: Yeah, from where did you come and when? RL: Oh, here? JJ: To Chicago. RL: Oh, okay. I had a scholarship, a track scholarship. I ran track at Southern University after high school, and I got tired of running because the movement was really drawing me then. Rap Brown used to come on the campus in Baton Rouge to talk us as athletes, the role that we could play in the movement, because Ali and them were stepping out there. Jim Brown was stepping out there. So, I walked on the track field, and part of mine was doing recruiting for VISTA, so I figured everything out, but I went out to Oakland to visit my relatives out there. Then [00:08:00] I got a job working at the recreation center for the handicapped. See, that’s my strength, wheelchair basketball, archery for the blind, baseball for the blind. I could coach those things. Then, all of a sudden, about six months after being there, I got this notice that I was accepted into VISTA by Jane Addams Training Center. And I had to think about that, but when I was – flew out, and I was living in Training Jane Addams, and I lived in [ICMY?]. JJ: Oh, at the [ICMY?], Actually, that’s where we were at when we were a gang, the Young Lords. 4 �RL: Let me get to that. JJ: Okay, let’s get to that. RL: Let me get to that. That’s when I was first (inaudible), [00:09:00] not physically or personally, but where I worked for Methodist Youth Services as a VISTA. I lived there as a VISTA. That’s where I would first hear the word, “Young Lord.” Matter of fact, that was the first time I would meet any so-called gang in Chicago is first the Lords. And see, me, I’m thinking when you say Latino in South, the Lords was a Rainbow Coalition just by itself. And so, what happened, my mother was talking to Bobby Seale’s -- oh, yeah, come on, babe. Sit down. JJ: Yeah, we’re just having a conversation. RL: Yeah, my mother was talking with Bobby Seale’s [00:10:00] mother. See, Bobby Seale is my second cousin. JJ: Oh, Bobby Seale is your second cousin? RL: Uh-huh. See, Bobby was born in Jasper. That’s his home, Jasper, Texas. So, when my mother got talking with Mrs. Seale, she asked me to go see about Bobby, you know, because apparently there’s some information, which I did. And that’s where I would meet Fred and Rush, and see, you guys was already evolving. And then later, what happened, as you know, Mike Gray and them was -- I’ll put it this way. When I joined the party, my name Robert E. Lee [00:11:00] changed to Bobby Lee, you know? JJ: Yeah, at that time, I knew you by that. I knew that story. RL: Our press got Luis Cuza. We had our first conference, Captains, Patriots, Lords, as the [picture that?] (inaudible). Luis Cuza was there that day. 5 �JJ: Luis Cuza was there, yeah. But that was more like in April at that time, around April, because I think we met Fred in February. And then I remember we went to jail a couple times at the Lincoln Park welfare office. And then later on, that’s when everybody got together with the Rainbow Coalition, in April. RL: That’s right. The next morning, my name went from Robert E. Lee, Jr. to Bobby Lee. JJ: Yeah, I remember that, because we were hanging out only in Old Town and all them places. RL: Huh? JJ: We were hanging out in Old Town and on Lincoln Avenue. RL: Yeah, that’s right. That’s as clear -- [00:12:00] JJ: What was that place on Lincoln Avenue? Wasn’t there a -- RL: The [Vieux Carré?]. A place called Vieux Carré. JJ: What’s the name of that? Is it Shiflett? RL: Then they had O’Rourke’s. JJ: O’Rourke’s, but that was in Old Town. But there was one on Lincoln Avenue by Shiflett. RL: I see it. JJ: You see it? RL: I see it. JJ: That’s Shiflett. That’s where we were hanging out. R: Oh, yeah, you mentioned there was a thing underneath it, right? JJ: Right. 6 �R: Or a (inaudible). JJ: No, no, that was on Lincoln Avenue. A lot of the leftists used to go there, and me and you went there a few times. We just met his son the other day. That’s why I mention it. RL: I figure I had to really learn fast about the Young Lord history. That’s when you gave me the history of that great revolutionary. Who’s -- JJ: Albizu Campos. RL: Yes. I remember clearly you was talking to me about it. Later on, [00:13:00] Piri Thomas, Down These Mean Streets, it had just come out, and you had suggested that I read that book. But Campos really impressed me. You either brought the book to me, or I brought the book to you. I don’t remember. JJ: You probably were. You were handing out books to everybody. RL: Yeah. That was the key. JJ: You might’ve gave it to me. RL: Yeah, see, we found our resources. We found every one of our resources by getting out there. The resources ain’t gonna on the door. You gotta go out there. And that’s pretty much the history of it, man, for that name. But I tell people a lot that, well, How to Organize Your Own. There’s a quote in there from [00:14:00] one of the young artists and writers stating that Robert E. Lee came back as a ghost. I’ll never forget that quote that this young man (inaudible). And I think that How to Organize Your Own, it could stand by a Saul Alinsky book, Rules for Radicals. JJ: So, you were using a lot of Saul Alinsky. I remember talking at that time. 7 �RL: Yeah. See, Saul, where he saw our Rainbow Coalition, I mean, our, (laughs) that’s what he failed to do. He wished he could’ve done it. He tried to organize a coalition with the Irish poor from the back of the yard, and he failed. He was able to do Woodlawn, but he couldn’t bring in Woodlawn in connection with the Irish [00:15:00] community because at that time, they’re racist. At that time, many was racist. Yeah, 90 percent, 95 percent of the Chicago police were, and so he always felt bad that he organized [back of y’all?]. JJ: So, what did you feel was the mission of the Rainbow Coalition? RL: The first mission is identify the working-class poor. That’s the first mission. The second mission that Fred and all of us, we discussed with folks in the coalition, what we have in common as a people. [00:16:00] For example, I tell Hy Thurman, I mention to Hy a lot, that the only difference between Black Appalachians and the white Appalachians is just that; one digging coal and the other digging coal together. But see, to this day, I tell my wife a lot when we talk about it, I’d never seen that kind of poverty, man, that we saw at Uptown. I (inaudible) fast to see that the West Side would be considered a middle-class community compared to what was happening in Uptown. [00:17:00] And what I couldn’t understand, the brutality of -- at that time, I couldn’t understand the brutality of whites on whites. I had never seen it in the South. You never see white people screaming at white people, not here in the South. I’ve never seen that. Well, we knew that the Rainbow Coalition had touched a vein in America. That’s why people now are really trying to find us. That’s why people is really trying to find us, Cha Cha. And talking today and yesterday, and brother Hy 8 �agreeing, I think we should have a conference, [00:18:00] a Rainbow Coalition conference, but not to have it in Chicago; have it on the campus of Ole Miss. I just gave Professor [McCann?] some contacts, well, contacts he had given me, but we should have a conference that’s on campuses that attracts that young student today. So, that’s what we were chatting about. He called Tracy and gave Tracy the idea because that whole racist thing here in the last -- what’s the guy’s name? HT: (inaudible) RL: All the politicians, [00:19:00] right-wing politicians who wanted to announce their campaign started to (inaudible) they’ll always kick it off (inaudible). So, we should have a conference, you know, this year, next year, very well organized. We know how to do that. But to attract students from, not just students, but you want that core of young students, white, Black, Hispanic, Latino, to attend it, have the books, films, and start a third party because that’s what we want, man. I didn’t realize that till later, but that was David and them’s fear, a third party. We had it, because after the Rainbow Coalition [00:20:00] in Chicago, Cha Cha Jiménez run for Alderman, and that was a seed when you ran. And that seed now has grown. In a sense, we owe -- I’ll do it this way, the regular Rainbow Coalition, then we talk about the first time the coalition was tested, Cha Cha Jiménez, Bobby Rush (inaudible) he ran for that. Then, Harold Washington, that’s where it was successful. Then, Rush, US Congressman. Then, a man named Barack Obama. You can’t be in Chicago, man, for 15 years and not [00:21:00] have seen (inaudible) Fred Hampton, period. Can’t do it. So, it’s 9 �already, what we are doing now is already evolving to a third party. My man was Sanders, Bernie Sanders, in the beginning. He talked more like me. And you remember when Bernie, when they took the camp, that they had that strike on campus? Was it University of Chicago, they had that strike? Bernie led that strike against the administration. JJ: University of Chicago? RL: Yeah. Bernie and they locked the doors and everything. Nobody could get in, and so that was Bernie Sanders. Fred and I went down there, but we couldn’t get in. [00:22:00] They wouldn’t let us in. Come on. Oh, yeah, come on, man. So, we, in a sense, we’re already a third. I cited the third party. After the Rainbow Coalition, the next seed became you, for growth for a movement. Then, Harold Washington, and I’m just being redundant, Harold Washington. JJ: But I think when I ran, it was more a mass group. I mean, it was the Rainbow Coalition, but we were not like an organization. We were like a mass movement. RL: Right. JJ: So, did you see the Rainbow Coalition like that? RL: That’s exactly right, because see, now what we’re talking about is disorganizing and reorganizing. [00:23:00] Hy Thurman, [the chip?], that one like [move of?] a body, and others of course. Our power base here in Houston is based on the Rainbow Coalition. See, Precinct One, we’re a minority Precinct One, and it’s 900,000 people in Precinct One. Most folks think Precinct One is all Black. It’s not. We’re a minority. 10 �JJ: Same with my campaign, we had to do that. That’s why we had to (overlapping dialogue; inaudible). RL: Yeah, man. That’s right. But see, what I was able to do, in the South, it really was hard for a lot of Black Southerners to work with many of the, well, Southerner period, because media had made the Southern accent a negative sound, [00:24:00] you know, like media has done to -- the show, The Beverly Hillbillies. That’s a stereotype. We’re at that point now that our children have a different attitude about life and people. But Precinct One, what I did, I went into the precinct where the white working class was, and my brother Franco said, “Yeah, you go.” But I took that hell, and they were right. The Black politicians ignored our Southern white brothers, but my thing, that it’s all about the working class in this country. I’m a Socialist. [00:25:00] I’m not a Democrat. I vote like a Panther. I’ll always be a Panther, like you’ll always be a Lord. Hy definitely going to be the white Panther. All Lords stay the same. JJ: So, what was your role in the Black Panther Party, your title and your function? RL: Huh? JJ: In the Black Panther Party in Chicago, what was your title and your function? What did you do? RL: Deputy field marshal. The night that I would meet Hy and all those guys, I was a section leader, but, you know, I never told Fred what I was doing for about two weeks, [00:26:00] because see, the party was just started, and a lot of the brothers had those strong racist tendencies at that time. You know, Dr. King got killed, the bombings, church bombings. Then the media would just blow it up 11 �with those accents, you know, Southern white accent. A lot of Panthers left the party because of that, but many came back also. It’s all the education process. So, you include people. You don’t slam the door on people. Let ’em talk about why they don’t wanna work with a white Southerner. Let ’em talk about why they don’t wanna work with a Puerto Rican. Let ’em blow it out. That’s what you do; allow them to express themselves. And it could take a week [00:27:00] (inaudible), but I think a mass conference would work well because we have all this new technology. We have all the books there. But the Ole Miss could be assembled today because this is where all people get lynched, burned, and bombed over wanting to go to college. JJ: I think that’s a good idea. We need to connect what’s going on Puerto Rico with it. RL: Yeah, well, see, I’m finna ride with that one. I’m with the people that shot at -what was the president’s name then? Who was that group of Puerto Ricans? JJ: Oh, Rafael Cancel Miranda and Lolita [00:28:00] Lebrón. RL: Yeah. I was very impressed with that. JJ: Oh, at that Blair? They shot up the Blair House. RL: Yeah. I don’t support the theory of any colony, not at all, but that’s got to be an issue. It’s got to be an issue. That’s why I was saying the college campuses. It’s time for -- we know why they killed Campos. We know why it’s a form of slavery, the colonies are. And that’s real key. We can’t ignore Puerto Rico because if we’re all warriors, then we all go fight in Puerto Rico also. 12 �JJ: And it’s an issue that’s going on today, I mean, with the Fiscal [00:29:00] Control Board. For us, it’s a big issue. It’s a major issue today. RL: I’ve been keeping up with it for years. JJ: Same thing we -- yeah. So, it’s a good idea. I think we need to work on that. I think it’s a good idea, and I think Ole Miss is good. It has to do with racism. We were fighting racism, so it has to do with that. RL: Mm-hmm. See, it’s perfect historically for world shame, but in particular here, we’re such a young nation, we can(’t) disorganize and reorganize. We’re such a young nation compared to England, France, Sweden. Historically, the Young Patriots already have a root also, and now you have the growth that’s going on in Ireland. We’d be amazed of the support [00:30:00] that the Young Patriots would be given by fine people that lived in Ireland. And also, they realized also because the Irish was just -- well, they’re around here, as you know. They joined, many of them -- and I’ve told people this. Many of the brothers joined it for that meal. They had been around (inaudible) months come across that water, weeks, weeks, weeks. And when they arrived, anyone who had a plate of food, if it was Washington, D.C. had a plate of food, clean clothes, or if it was the Confederacy who had a place, they didn’t have no slaves, right? [00:31:00] Then you got the Asian brother. He’s definitely a part of that coalition because when we looked at what he was oppressed, today you got a young youth that are in the movements, young. You got young Asians, young Chinese, Japanese, that once they’re educated, they will [form?] folks just from the point of view that they were 13 �about their rights also. But the real deal is us who’s sitting in here. We’re alive, man. We ain’t dead. JJ: This is the oral history, so I want to ask you, what was your father’s name, mother’s name, and any brothers or sister? RL: Yes, that’s a good one. All right, that’s my mom’s picture. Get that frame, that [00:32:00] big frame over there, Cha Cha. You’ll see my mom. You see, that’s what I look at at night before I go to bed. That’s my family. HT: This one? RL: All right, of my mom. Yeah. That’s my mother. JJ: Yeah. Hold on one second. Thanks, Hy. I appreciate it. RL: Now, she was born in Jasper, Texas, and the plantation that owned my people was the Adams Plantation in Jasper. My people were brought here as slaves in about 1832, before it was a state, and then her name is Selma Adams Lee. [00:33:00] And I’m reading -- JJ: You said Jasper? RL: Jasper, yeah, Jasper, Texas. This is the little town that my cousin -- JJ: Oh, so you’re coming home to Texas when you came here. RL: Huh? JJ: You’re coming home to Texas. RL: Oh, yeah. Yeah, man. Yeah, this is home. JJ: And your father was from here too? RL: Hm? JJ: Your father? 14 �RL: Yes. He was from the town way in the Timber Belt called Henderson, Texas, and my father’s -- my ancestors came from a plantation called the Flanagans. No, this is home. JJ: And the Flanagans, that was here too in Texas? RL: Huh? JJ: The Flanagans was here in Texas? RL: Yeah. JJ: What kind of plantation? What kind of vegetables, or was it sugar cane or sugar beets? RL: Huh? JJ: What did they grow on the plantation? RL: Oh, that’s cotton industry. JJ: Cotton industry? Okay. [00:34:00] RL: Yeah. Cotton, sugar cane, that was another, but cotton was definitely the major industry. JJ: Here in Texas? RL: Yes. JJ: Let me know if you get tired, but I think we’re doing good. RL: No, no. I’m not gonna get tired. The Adams family -- I’m sorry, I’m forgetting the names of them. The Flanagan family, very, very wealthy family, even today. JJ: But you grew up here, and what schools did you go to? RL: Yeah. Well, see, I went to school here, but summers, I would spend my time with my relatives. [00:35:00] See, I was the only member of the family that loved 15 �horses, you know, ponies clubs. Now, don’t tell nobody that, okay? (laughter) Ponies clubs, fishing and hunting, you know, I did things like I could fish without a hook, called mud fishing. That’s how deep I go, things like that, hunt. You know, I would go as far as northern Wisconsin to hunt. When I wanted to get a break, when I was in Chicago, when I wanted to get a break from what was happening in Chicago, I would just hit the highway, go straight up north, and I would camp out in the forest, and things like to camp, fish. And I always wore a cowboy hat, even to this day. Ray, pull [00:36:00] them (inaudible) down so Cha Cha can see my grandchildren. R: Okay. Yep. They’re over here? RL: Yeah. Everything is on that -- R: Oh, I see them. Yeah. RL: That’s a (inaudible) get a look at my kids and my wife and everyone, my son. R: These ones here, right? RL: Yeah. All right, yeah, and pull the other one now of her. They’re all there, Ray. R: Okay, hang on. RL: They’re all there. JJ: Point ’em this way. R: Oh, okay. I see them. JJ: Point ’em this way, Ray. R: Oh. Let me just put it on my (inaudible) so you can -- JJ: I can’t -- R: Oh, you can’t see that? 16 �JJ: Yeah. R: Yeah, how about I put ’em here? JJ: Well, yeah. Okay, probably. Okay, I see them better now. R: Okay, hang on. RL: When we would sit and talk about our programs [00:37:00] in Chicago, and two of the major programs that we discussed all the time, as you were doing the same, as Young Patriots was doing the same, how to feed people and free health clinics. My mom, when we -- I’m trying to think. Then we got down to guns. Now, initially, having guns wasn’t a big issue, Cha Cha. That was at the bottom of the list. But Cha Cha, the first raid that we had, the Chicago Police destroyed all our food, all our eggs, bacon. We had everything stored. [00:38:00] JJ: What do you mean, the first raid? You mean there were several? RL: Yeah, we had three raids on our office. The first one, they didn’t think we’d be able to put it back together, so the first one, the image of that raid is in the murder of Fred Hampton, that shootout, that raid. Mike filmed that first one, but the second one and the third, he didn’t have an opportunity to do that one. So, the first one was, it’s kinda embarrassing because when I arrived that morning, when they notified me and everything, I got over there. A little boy about eight years old (inaudible) go, he said, “You niggas ain’t shit.” He said, “Y’all done (inaudible) the white boys to come over here and eat all the cookies, [00:39:00] eat all the ice cream,” because we had storage abilities, “all the orange juice.” He said, “You niggas ain’t shit.” JJ: He was worried about the food, huh? He was worried about the food. 17 �RL: I knew then we had to really get it together now because we were losing our support because Black lives matter; Hispanic lives matter, you know; Patriot lives matter, mattered really then, as it does now, but not like when we came up. So, that’s when discussions of weapons would come in, to defend ourselves. JJ: So, you’re saying that the weapons, the guns were not the priority. RL: No. No, that was not. JJ: The priority was the programs. Is that what you’re saying? RL: Yeah, the programs first. Right. Yeah, man. JJ: I don’t want to put words -- what are you saying? RL: Oh, we couldn’t do that. JJ: Because this is your interview. RL: My quote was -- JJ: I agree with everything you’re saying. RL: I’ll tell the quote. Once they had outvoted me, [00:40:00] then I looked at Fred. I said, “Man, I gotta go home and talk to my momma. I know this shit is finna get serious.” And I drove home, literally, got the car fueled and everything, and drove to Texas. And my brother (inaudible) school, and my mother, of course, was shocked to see me standing there. JJ: So, let me get this straight. So, the focus was in organizing the community through the programs? RL: Yeah, service, service programs. JJ: Service programs? 18 �RL: Yeah. Free health clinic, breakfast program, also legal service. Dennis Connor had that. We wanted that, you know. Those were the things we wanted, groceries for people, because we had made contact with the grocery supply. [00:41:00] I organized what is called a mile square, because you gotta have turf. You’re not overwhelmed. Most organizers will go into a community, but they’ll go in and get overwhelmed by the sight of the environment of the city they’re living in. So, I preferred a mile square. But some people organized four blocks north, four blocks south, four blocks east, or four blocks west, and then they’ll look at the institutions that’s in that community, in those blocks, those little blocks. You really want to find a church because in the weekdays, churches are not using their kitchens, Baptist churches, [00:42:00] that is. They’re not. Or it’s like the Bruce Johnsons here. They’re a good example. They turn their resources seven days a week. So, the Black community, if you have four blocks north, south, east, and west, you want to first look for the churches. That’s first, the ministers, and talk with them. JJ: Bruce Johnson, when he died, when he was killed -- RL: When he was killed. JJ: How did you see that at that time? RL: It’s still paining me today, man. They killed him and his wife, man. All of this that we’re talking about is like yesterday to me, and to you. It’s still painful today, man. He was such a [00:43:00] kind man. No matter what it was, we do know that there is an unsolved murder of a minister and his wife for serving people. That much, I know. And I think about Bruce every day. Only an ex-Panther 19 �would forget about Bruce Johnson and Manny Ramos, Rodolfo. I can’t do it, you know. JJ: Because you know, they were also trying to blame the Young Lords. RL: Yeah. Right. But I knew better than that. JJ: And here we were, the victims. RL: Yeah, I knew better than that. And then the more I started learning of the role of the Red Squad, [00:44:00] they’ll do anything to people who -- the Red Squad was like a little informal CIA, snipers, assassins, because Fred Hampton’s (inaudible), that happens, you know? And so, that’s with me. That’ll always be with me, man. JJ: Now, what about Fred Hampton, Chairman Fred Hampton? After his death and that, what happened to the party in Chicago? RL: Psychologically, it died. That would’ve been like losing you. I’m using the word “psychologically,” but the spirit of the movement died with Fred. [00:45:00] It changed. Huey, in a sense, took over control of that excitement. See what I’m saying? And Huey called all the leadership out to Oakland. [Shay?] was living out there, Yvonne. Bobby went out there. And then the test also of our coalition was when Bobby Seale ran for mayor. And that’s when it hit me about here in Houston. But the leadership, well, our coalition, we all were leaders in that circle. All of us, you, that coalition [00:46:00] was a coalition of warriors. We didn’t kiss nobody’s ass. See, we all respected each other. We never argued over nothing, man. We never argued over a thing, man. That’s changed with Bobby and Fred, because our coalition was a corps. When you see the corps, the photographs of 20 �our press conferences, you know, Fred was there. Rush was there. You were there. Luis Cuza was there. Hy Thurman was there. And so, to get to my mom, after eating the best meal I’d had of my life, when I left, I wasn’t gonna have no greens and cornbread no more. JJ: That was your favorite, greens and cornbread? [00:47:00] RL: Oh, man, yeah. My wife will tell you, I will wear them (inaudible) out, man. JJ: (laughs) RL: And my mother listened to me, because see, my parents was proud that I was in the Panther Party, no resistance, no resistance. And I’m sure all of us had to talk with our parents. All of us, we had an explanation. We had to have an explanation of what we were doing because it was going to change all their lives and ours also. And when I got ready, (inaudible) getting ready to come back because I left the same day, turned around, came back, but my mother said something that still stayed with me, “If you live by the sword, you’ll die by that.” And then [00:48:00] you look at how Huey Newton died. We tend to forget that he wasn’t shot by no policeman. Well, I’ll tell you what. The boys in Oakland have kinda forgotten that he was shot by a dope dealer. Fred was killed. Rodolfo was killed. JJ: By the police. RL: Right, and Ramos was killed. Danny and John Howard, they were killed by policemen. 21 �JJ: But you know, Rudy Lozano in Chicago was a community leader, and he was killed by a drug dealer as well. So, what do you think? Do you think maybe that could’ve been set up through Red Squad or something? [00:49:00] RL: No doubt in my mind, now. None of us ever thought that we were being (inaudible). We thought that shit happened in Russia, (inaudible) because we had a lot of faith, man. We knew what we were doing, but we didn’t think there was actually some men that -- man, you went through hell. You’re a prime example of that, what they did to you, man, you. JJ: I appreciate it. Now, you were talking about your wife. How long have you been married? What’s her name? RL: Let me start on this one. (laughter) With the background I had politically and historically, if a Black woman wanted to go up the ladder, I’m the last nigga that she gonna want to marry ’cause you ain’t gonna go up the ladder marrying [00:50:00] a guy like me. Now, for the relationship, quiet relationship, they liked it, but they knew I wasn’t going up the ladder. I’m not gonna do it. And so, if I had 100 dollars for every time someone would say to me, “Bobby Lee, Bobby Lee, Bobby Lee, I’m just gonna love you till the day I die, but I just can’t live like this,” now that’s pretty much the quote. I would have 100 dollars for that, man. My wife is a Godsend. Here’s a woman -- JJ: What’s her name? RL: I call her Godsend, my wife. God sent my wife to me, and I’ve always stated -- JJ: Is she Puerto Rican? [00:51:00] 22 �RL: You know, (laughter) that’s a good one. Yeah, I think she got a lot of that Puerto Rican in her. JJ: A little Puerto Rican in her? RL: Yeah. JJ: (laughs) RL: But I tell when my wife and I started dating, people would see us out, but my theory then, with all of that shit, you always go to the left when the crowd’s going to the right, and keep it quiet and everything. But I always emphasized that the reason why she’s Godsent, my wife did not come to Houston, Texas to marry a nigga from Fifth Ward. I always said. Now, that’s a word that’s out of [00:52:00] her vocabulary, by the way. Cha Cha, she made some mistakes for her time. Not one mistake, and she never made it again, because you know, her language is Arabic. Her second language is Swahili. Her third language is English, and her education, degree, is in geography. F: No, just English. RL: Huh? F: English. RL: Yeah, but all them other studies, algebra, and I tell my partners, and they said, “Man, well, how you get along with her?” Blah, blah, blah. I said, “You know how I do it all these years? I know when to close my mouth and breathe through my nose.” JJ: (laughs) 23 �RL: (inaudible) because it’s culture, you know, and she’s been [00:53:00] a lifesaver right up to now. And see, you guys, to her, she’s been hearing about you for years. JJ: You been married how long? RL: How long, babe? F: Fifteen years. JJ: Fifteen? RL: Mm-hmm. JJ: Okay, 15 years? RL: Now, for a revolutionary who don’t have no money, and he married someone going up the ladder, that’s a lifetime. Pretty soon, they’ll start saying, “Can we get a loaf a bread?” (laughter) But that’s important that we leave all of our work, like today. It’s going to affect people in a real positive way, man, of what we doing now. It’s going to have that effect. That’s very important because again, we got to remember, it’s a young nation, so we continue. I was [00:54:00] citing the third parties, as I think it is. Abraham Lincoln, that was a third party that eventually became the Civil War and freed us. The next third party would be -what’s my man’s name? What was the name of an organizer, (inaudible)? R: Which one? RL: Yeah, no, no. You know, I was giving the names of the -- R: Oh, yeah, you talked about -- JJ: That’s not Eugene? RL: (inaudible) 24 �R: Debs. JJ: Oh, Eugene Debs, no? R: Eugene Debs. RL: Yeah. All right. Lincoln; Eugene Debs, working-class poor. [00:55:00] R: (inaudible) RL: And then we move up to definitely like Cesar Chavez. It was a possible thirdparty movement, the Chicano movement. And then we move up to the Rainbow Coalition because we really became solid because see, when you ran for -- JJ: Alderman. RL: -- alderman, that was a sign, now, you know. That was a sign. And Barack Obama definitely picked that sign up. That was a sign for us, and it’s a sign for us now, but we got to have the history to lead. [00:56:00] We got to lead the history, man. And so, what we are doing now is very important. For example, I’m organizing in mile square, and I only tell very few people that because organizers are always, you gotta to know who share that with, who to not. And the fact of it is right in your face. Draw your turf, and knock over every door in that turf. And we do that. That’s what we do, and that’s what helped build the Panther Party, really, that mile square. JJ: One of the things that you did, because I remember those letters that we put in the archives, that’s when I saw your wife that first time because you had photos. So, one of the things that you tend to do, and you did that in ’69, [00:57:00] was to give information to everybody you talk to. RL: Yes. 25 �JJ: Why do you do that? RL: So they can make their copies. See, that’s why I call ’em up. The original copies, the originals of my art is at the Phogg Foundation, the South Austin Museum of Popular Art. That’s where all my originals are, the South Austin Museum of Popular Art. They have the originals. Then what I’ll do, I’ll color up. See, I’ll run -- my wife might run, in a week, almost a week, maybe 50 copies, and that’s when I color ’em, make ’em real pretty. Then I send ’em out to activists, politicians, even to Klansmen. See, some people put ’em on the walls, so what happens [00:58:00] is they’ll make their copies. See, they’ll end up running off -- some people, 30, 40, 50 copies. They’ll mail it to their people because everybody at least know 10 human beings, at least, and it’s real brief, and it speaks to them in a real brief way, because people spend thousands of dollars mailing these beautiful brochures and all that that a lot of folks won’t read. So, you gotta have it in folks’ experience. You gotta set the art where they know Cha Cha Jiménez. See what I’m saying? So, that’s why I spend a lot of time sitting and color them. (inaudible) I got my coloring book here. I’ll get up at one. I’ll get up around three o’clock, and then I’ll [00:59:00] go to work, you know, doing coloring. Let Cha Cha see that basket with the -- right there beside you. F: The box? RL: The box, yeah. Show you where I keep my working materials. JJ: And you send them? It’s like a message that you’re sending them? RL: Yeah, see, I’ll personally (inaudible). Yeah, that’s it there. See, I’ll personally -- F: (inaudible) 26 �JJ: I can get that from there? Okay, thank you. RL: So, see, what I do, as you know, is the -- JJ: Is that like a propaganda tool? RL: Yeah, we could use that. [01:00:00] JJ: I mean, what do you call it? RL: It’s a positive propaganda. JJ: It’s positive propaganda? RL: Yeah. It’s a positive. It’s a negative and positive about it. JJ: Do you feel that that reaches people? RL: Man, yeah, I know. Especially in this neighborhood over here, there are people calling, “Hey, man. You mad at me?” (laughs) No, man. We know we know it works in the Fifth Ward. I don’t know outside the Fifth Ward, but it works here, especially maybe a week before an election, when we announce who we run for. And see, our free health clinic is right up the street, so I have all the equipment that I want, copy machines and everything, you know, everything. But no, mostly the people who really profit by it is the working-class poor in Precinct One. And then [01:01:00] I’ll send what I call select pieces, you know, to you or Carol Gray, but 90 percent of them will go out in the Fifth Ward, Jasper, you know. Come on in. Come on in. JJ: And we can still finish it up. Give me some remarks that you want to leave, and then the -- RL: Oh, come on in here. Come in. Give me the poster. This is one of the original organizers. Pull up Cha Cha Jiménez. 27 �F1: I didn’t bring my -- RL: Cha Cha, you got your -- JJ: What? I don’t have a [brochure?]. RL: Huh? JJ: It’s C-H-A like the (inaudible), C-H-A, and then Jiménez is J-I-M-E-N-E-Z. J is like an H. RL: Yeah, he flew in. [01:02:00] JJ: Or you can just look up the Young Lords. That’s the group that we worked with, with the Panthers. F1: The Young Lords? JJ: Yeah, the Young Lords. RL: Did I give you a button? Did I give you any buttons? You got buttons, the Rainbow Coalition button? F1: No. You gave me some papers. RL: Oh. No, give you some buttons. Yeah, the Rainbow Coalition buttons might be over here or might be over there. F1: She has ’em. RL: Now, anybody in the family need some? F1: (inaudible) RL: Nephews? Okay. F1: Thank you. RL: Yeah, Google that right away because for the political arena, before he joined politics, he was the leader of close to 2,000 boys in Chicago, Young Lords. 28 �[01:03:00] Well, he’s like a Puerto Rican Malcolm X. I’ll put it that way. I’ve been knowing him from day one. She had three people in his organization that was killed by the police, you know. F1: Do you live in Chicago now? JJ: I’m actually in Michigan now. I’m in contact with Chicago yeah. RL: You got some pins for her? F: Yes. RL: Yeah, give her the Rainbow Coalition button. She got ’em? F: Uh-huh. RL: Okay. If you want some more, but pull up Cha Cha Jiménez. F1: I remember. RL: Okay. All right. All power to the people. F1: All right. RL: And come up any time you want and chat with me. F1: All right. (inaudible). RL: I’ll never stop organizing. [01:04:00] JJ: (inaudible) We can -- RL: No, no. We have the time (inaudible). Yes, sir, Cha Cha. We (inaudible). Now, since you have to ask me things that you want to know, but like I was saying, if you want to start a novice out in organizing, as you well know, start him out on his own block, but he’s got to identify some resources that he’ll have. He gotta be able to call the community centers, know what they have to offer, food banks, [blawie, blawie?]. So, he contact people, introduce himself, he’ll have a resource 29 �to help him. That’s all we’d do in the communities. Like my wife, she work at Harris County Social Service, [01:05:00] thanks to her brother-in-law being a boss. And she was able to get this job and a degree in it. She taught at Arabic private schools. But no, man, we on a real good roll, man. The only reason this thing won’t roll, we don’t get the information out. We gotta get it out now ’cause Trump is already everywhere, has defined America, and Trump defined it as being white nationalist. And Young Lords, from day one till now, we don’t define that. Our issue is Puerto Rico. Those people that’ll go against [01:06:00] that would be the Hispanic, Spanish, rich ruling class have controlling interests in Puerto Rico, as opposed to the masses, people which is over there. And folks don’t know that. They don’t understand. Many people, that is, don’t understand, man, the pressure of the Puerto Rican people. It’s not them sitting around getting drunk. That’s the energy the media is giving. When they show our brothers there, they kind of sometimes show lavish living. “Why do they want to have a -- they doing good.” You know? But they don’t know about the assassination attempt that was the reason. [01:07:00] That was the reason, but they blow that up. Oh, man. They start out with that assassination attempt. JJ: So, you mean the assassination attempt in -- RL: Huh? JJ: It was in 1950? RL: Right, and Truman, that’s the one they was trying to get. JJ: They focused on that in Puerto Rico? RL: That’s right. 30 �JJ: So, in the Rainbow Coalition, you were organizing that. Were you planning on that, or it just came about? How was that? JJ: No. I was invited to speak at the Church of Three Crosses, me, I forget, me and another Panther. And I accepted to go there. What had happened, the people [01:08:00] that rolled the program out mixed us up for the same program, which that wasn’t no -- God wanted that to happen, okay? And so, when I arrived that night, I was the only Black there, me and that Panther. I was the only Black there, and they didn’t know that I was there because I always felt that you wear the beret and the leather for certain effects. But then you just later put on your everyday clothing. Guys were getting busted in the party for being in the car going to get one of those, which I love them, Polish sandwich, and get [01:09:00] arrested over supper. So, I just tell people, we got Chicago and Oakland Panthers. There’s a big difference in Oakland. You can do that. Berkeley, Cal was that. Cal State was not, you know? But when -- you gonna ask a question? JJ: I gotta turn this off for a second. (break in audio) Okay. So, we were asking what? JJ: How did I meet the Young Patriots? Like I said, it was a lawyer, activist lawyer that invited me to the Church of Three Crosses, and it was still all white. I was the only Black there, me and a guy named Lionel. I think he was from Mississippi. [01:10:00] And so, when I arrived, we sat in the front row, and the Lords had spoken a week earlier, and they invited the Lords to talk. I mean the Young Patriots was invited a week earlier. And then, the committee agreed to it, 31 �and this lawyer then invited me to come. So, we got there the next week. I had never, ever, man, had witnessed white people attacking white people. [01:11:00] I had never seen that. I’m from the South, you know. And there was a lot of confrontation in there. Michael just edited. (inaudible) just edited. See, Michael got almost four decades of filming us here in Jasper, and you know, the projects he had. But I was stunned to see that. It was a change, an evolution, for me to see that. And so, the second time we came, I’m sitting, waiting on Hy and them to finish and Junebug to finish. They (inaudible). They had everything. The only thing they didn’t cover, let’s see, [01:12:00] anything that they were -- shit, they covered everything, police brutality, tenement housing, tuberculosis, welfare. They covered it. They were speaking for me also. So, when things quieted down, the meeting, when it was over, the minister allowed us to go into their chamber to talk, and wonderful meeting, man. Wasn’t no tension, nothing like that, and then that’s when we had an informal structure that was placed together. The biggest issue in Uptown was our issue, or police brutality. And I knew that much [01:13:00] that I should take a role to prove ourselves. That’s first that the warrior must do if you come from another camp. You put yourself out there to show the people that you’re willing to put yourself on the line for them. What’s more bigger than putting your ass on the line with the Chicago Police, you know? But then that’s when we went up to Uptown and came back. This time, I had (inaudible) with me and Ruby with me. And we spent a lot of time up there, but after about two weeks, I knew it was time to tell Fred that they had molded our 32 �relationship. And Fred just naturally just fit into it, and [01:14:00] it’s all history now, you know, all history. JJ: So, you told him, and what was the reaction? RL: Well, Fred already was a Socialist. Fred already had strong ties with the politics of working-class struggle. I had, you know. Now, you had many Panthers that left. They just couldn’t handle it, which I understood that because we’re talking about the ’60s, man, when churches were being bombed, and Dr. King was killed, Malcolm. We spent a lot of time on that, and I understood that. But many came back, as I stated. And it was all a reeducation process. With a Southern white, you start with John Brown, man, then move on up to Lincoln, [Dell Rowe?], [01:15:00] these white boys, and they (inaudible) white boys. But you saw with John Brown. You saw with John Brown. A lot of cats don’t even know him because in the South, they don’t talk about John Brown, no class revolution, Cha Cha. If they write anything about John Brown, they always make it sound like he was a maniac or mentally crazy, all of that. Even the movies were projecting him as being mentally unstable, but there’s no parks in the South for John Brown. There is no schools, no streets, none of that, man. [01:16:00] So, this is it. JJ: What are your strongest memories there of Chicago, the organizing work there? RL: Memories? JJ: I mean, that you think, you know -- RL: I’ma simply answer. Just coming to Chicago, that’s the best I can put in words, because it changed me. It made me the person I am right now, and so for me, it’s a lifestyle change for me that has lasted to this day, [01:17:00] because it’s 33 �not only affected me and not only affected what we try to do in Chicago and everything, man. We got a political base in Houston, you know? So, that, Chicago, I’ll put it this way. If you want to be a musician, you go to New York City. If you want to be an actor, you go to California. You want to be a labor organizer, community organizer, you go to Chicago. JJ: Why is that? RL: I think it’s just the nature of the population. It’s the nature of the nation that we [01:18:00] live in. Chicago had the basic massive industry. Back of the yards, there’s always been a struggle of the ethnic group communities that you could really identify. You knew where the Polish communities were. You knew where the Irish communities were, German communities. You knew where they were, then where the Young Lords was. You knew that community. You knew where the Black communities were. And since that’s been a working-class environment always, then what you’re doing always, organizing and making lives better for people. And a lot has changed in Chicago but not like we would like to. So, that’s how I’ve split it up. JJ: What do you want the Chicago boys to know [01:19:00] about Bobby Lee? RL: I was a good boy, good man. I spent my life there for them, and for me. That’s what I want people to know. And really making that possible, you and Hy and (inaudible). It’s simple [01:20:00] as that, man. JJ: I appreciate it. I appreciate that. Any final thoughts (inaudible)? RL: Oh, wow. JJ: (laughs) 34 �RL: I found a peace, and I added to it. The Rainbow Coalition is like the people on one hand. That’s what we were. When one was in pain, Cha Cha, Hy, Junebug, Bobby McGuiness, [01:21:00] I’m giving him a car, man. I ain’t seen Bobby in 40 years. So, when any member of the coalition is in pain, we’re all in pain. We all gotta watch out for each other, man. And when the spirit is in pain, then your whole body is in pain. We won’t survive. If we all work hard and help each other and never stop organizing, never stop serving the people, man, and we know this, I’ve said what I would teach my organizing classes, and I used to tell Fred, the people on the West Side, [01:22:00] they don’t read The Red Book. They read The Black Book (Bible?), and that every person in that Bible, and I’ve said it thousands of times, man, every person in that Bible are organizers or servers of the poor. That’s what I want people to remember, that when they read their Bible, every person in that Bible, they lived and died serving the poor. JJ: Take a break? RL: No. What you want? JJ: We’ll take a break. I don’t want to exhaust you. RL: Okay. [01:23:00] I didn’t want my wife seeing me crying. HT: She’s talking to someone up in hospice. (break in audio) JJ: It is really (inaudible). That’s what we got in common. Everybody got the stuff like that in common. 35 �RL: Yeah, I’ll tell you, (inaudible) years ago, just a real good joke because you’re going to jail. (laughs) Yeah, I said, “You’re going to jail. (inaudible) three or four good jokes, because you’re going to jail.” JJ: Right. “And you better make sure.” RL: (inaudible) “Eventually, you will go to the Chicago jail.” JJ: That’s going to keep you alive. RL: (laughs) Oh, that’s funny, man. While you’re here, I’d like [01:24:00] to meet Miss Katz. JJ: Who’s Katz? She works here? RL: She’s in Chicago, Marilyn Katz. JJ: Oh, Marilyn Katz, I know Marilyn Katz. HT: Yeah, she’s got a (inaudible). She’ll be talking to you today. RL: Okay. Yeah, I never met here, but she’s always on my letter list. JJ: Okay, she’s on your letter list. RL: Yeah, (inaudible). She got some colorful characters involved, because I knew of her activities, and so I wanted to meet her (inaudible). JJ: She was proactive in the community. RL: Very. JJ: Very proactive. HT: She was the first person I met when I came to Chicago. [01:25:00] JJ: Oh, she is? She’s still active? Is she still active? HT: Oh, yeah, she’s on our board. Yeah, she’s very cool. 36 �RL: I like her (inaudible) work, and I thanked her for the things she’s done for the people. But yeah, man, any new thoughts on what we been talking about? JJ: I know when we were talking yesterday, we were talking about your oral history, so we were starting to talk about your brothers and sisters, how many that we have and where you grew up. How was it like growing up here? RL: See, my oldest sister’s name, Dolly, and she was the one that was born in Jasper, [01:26:00] but again, in the forest. And she was about seven years old, she got real sick. JJ: You call it the forest? RL: Yeah, we lived in the forest. We say Jasper, but we have a Post Office box that say Jasper. We live in the forest, in the woods, in like a village, and she got real sick one night, and my dad and them tried to rush to her to the hospital to get her to Jasper, but during segregation, they wouldn’t take her. So, then they tried to drive to Galveston, and she didn’t make it. She died. [01:27:00] JJ: Because of the segregation, she had to go a long route. RL: Yeah. See, my oldest brother, Jesse Lee, he was a pretty strong dude, man. He should’ve never been down in the South with the temper that he had, you know? And he wouldn’t take too much insults from the white supremacy brothers. And all they said to him was (inaudible). And Jesse was sentenced. And he spent [01:28:00] a lot of time on the farm, and my brother would stay there quite a while in the prison. We knew he was getting beat and everything, and he died in prison. Then it came down to me and my brother named Thurman, which is a question that I have a brother named Thurman, and then the guy that don’t have 37 �the same look, that don’t have the same blood but have the same spirit. Where Hy Thurman? JJ: He’s right here. RL: Hy Thurman. My brother, and that’s Irish, real Irish, and then we go on down the list, (inaudible). [01:29:00] JJ: What schools did you go to? RL: Atherton Elementary School. Then I went to Phillis Wheatley. The Atherton Elementary School, E.O. Smith, he was a labor organizer in the Fifth Ward (inaudible), and my parents (inaudible) also, and you know, I was raised around union talk. So, from there, from E.O. Smith, I went to Phillis Wheatley High School. Have you ever heard of her, Cha Cha? JJ: Who? What was her name? RL: Phillis [01:30:00] Wheatley. JJ: No. Was that the name of the high school? RL: Yeah. JJ: Okay, I can look it up. RL: Pull her name up. JJ: We can do that later. RL: She was the first Black published poet. She did a poem on George Washington. JJ: So, you love a lot of poetry, right? Was that poem you were saying? RL: You know who inspired that was Al “Bunchy” Carter. I added to it, added another word in, (inaudible) it a little bit, you know. But no, I’d added that to that. Bunchy Carter, he was the Panther that was shot and killed [01:31:00] in LA. 38 �JJ: In Los Angeles? RL: Yeah. With Ericka Huggins. JJ: That’s right. So, what’s your organizing here in -- because you moved here right after Fred Hampton? RL: No. No, I didn’t move. I really (inaudible) later, May 1960, when I would pretty much officially go home. May 1960, no, that’s not right. Oh, man. JJ: ’Cause it happened in ’69. RL: Yeah. He died in ’69. [01:32:00] JJ: Right, so it was after that, sometime. RL: I came May 1960. No. I came -- JJ: Was it a lot of years afterwards? RL: No. I came home May of 1970. JJ: You know, we got a chance to look at some of the masks that you have in here. RL: Huh? JJ: Some of the masks, African masks. RL: Yes. JJ: That you have in your living room. We didn’t get any photos, but we were looking. They mentioned something about they symbolize different things? RL: They symbolize the 29 Panthers that got killed. [01:33:00] It’s symbolizing Manuel Ramos. It symbolizes [Ronaldo?]. JJ: Julio Roldan. RL: It’s hard to pronounce his name. JJ: Yeah, no, that’s name. 39 �RL: He’s a Puerto Rican brother out of -- JJ: New York. RL: -- out of New York. JJ: Yeah, Julio Roldan, they got killed, yeah. RL: He was shot. New York. JJ: Yeah, Julio Roldan, they got killed, yeah. RL: He was shot. JJ: I appreciate that. I appreciate that. RL: Yeah, he was shot by a cop. JJ: Right. RL: That represents, when you look at all those names, I know what it is, but keeping that, it represents the warrior instinct. Other people have forgotten Manuel, and [01:34:00] a lot of folks have never even heard of Jake Winters. JJ: Jake Winters? RL: Yeah, Jake was November 1969. That’s when Jake had a shootout on the South Side, and then later, the next month, that’s when COINTELPRO came after us. Where Hy? F: He’s here. JJ: Yeah, it’s your medicine. You’re getting low. Is that what that is? NURSE: Your light is on. Can we help you? F: It is beeping. RL: Say what? JJ: I think probably it needs to get changed. 40 �RL: Oh, yeah, that. [01:35:00] F: His machine is beeping. N: Thank you. JJ: Thank you, Faiza. I appreciate that. RL: (inaudible) F: No. RL: (inaudible) F: Yeah. RL: All those masks on the wall, that whole wall were all warriors. I know it. My wife know it. People who come in, then they see. Well, they see the house is different when they walk in there. They know that (inaudible). You know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna wait (inaudible). Did I introduce y’all? JJ: Did you -- what was that? [01:36:00] F: Yeah, (inaudible) know all of them know. Yeah, when she sees them on the street, she knows them. Yeah. RL: Yeah, we’ll wait until Cha Cha, he gonna catch a flight, and he gotta get on up. That’s a long drive. JJ: Are you kicking me out already? RL: No. Well, I’ll keep you here. Imagine all of us here in Houston, you know? Imagine all of us in Houston, man. So, when are you going back to Puerto Rico? JJ: You know, because of the project, we were able to get some funding. RL: Thank you. I’m sorry that I -- N: You’re welcome. No problem. 41 �JJ: We were able to get a little funding. I went four times. I hadn’t been there like in 20 years, and I went four times. I went in one year. But I was working. That’s during the recent oral histories and stuff. RL: I’d like to go there. [01:37:00] JJ: I was telling Ray that your house is like Puerto Rico because you got the parrots, and you got the palm trees on the other side. But for me, everything, it looks like Puerto Rico. RL: And the birds. R: (inaudible) JJ: And everyone -- (laughs) F: There were a few blackbirds. The others, because it’s all cloudy and overcast, so they haven’t been there yet, but there were a few blackbirds. RL: Oh, the red-wing blackbirds or the ravens? F: No, the ravens. RL: Okay. Yeah, man, we got some beautiful birds, man. JJ: No, it’s nice. It looks like they replanted the trees after they took it away from Mexico. They put the northern trees in Texas. (laughs) They used to be palm trees, but after they took it from Mexico, they put northern trees. F: They put (inaudible). (laughs) HT: Yeah, Northerners taking over everything. [01:38:00] JJ: Yeah. (laughs) I saw pine trees. That’s for snow. You know what I’m saying? But they’ll make up anything. They’ll come up with anything. (laughs) 42 �RL: Then, Cha Cha, after that, man, I was real fortunate to have a friend named [Laddie Earl Altham?]. We met each other in nursery school, and I didn’t wanna run no track. I was mostly into jazz, into music, because I was raised around nightclubs. I had that (inaudible). But when Laddie was 15, he drowned, and he already taught me how to come off the block. Where Hy? JJ: He’s right over here. F: He’s right here. [01:39:00] HT: I’m here, buddy. RL: Okay. And when Laddie drowned, we had a school athlete award banquet when I was in the band. You know, the band boys, they get the girls, you know. (laughter) You was going to be a band boy or gang leader, one or the other. JJ: You had a plan, huh? (laughs) RL: And I went out, man. My first track meet, I won. And I trained a lot with the coaches I had, and my first track meet, I won, and I won again. JJ: That’s pretty good. RL: My wife can tell you about all the silver and gold medals and things like that, and I kept winning and winning, [01:40:00] and it took me to college on a scholarship. JJ: Oh, you got into college on a scholarship? RL: Yeah, I got a college scholarship, Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. But I had signed up for VISTA. That’s what got me directed to VISTA. I was in college though already, and the movement, man, and if you have any tendency, like I showed you the bottom of my heel, I’m born with the mark of Achilles. JJ: See who? 43 �RL: Achilles. JJ: Achilles, they call it Achilles’ heel. RL: Heel, yeah. They’ll call it Achilles. It’s a medical term. JJ: So, you’re part Indian too. RL: You see, most athletes, they get it. [01:41:00] It’s a sprain on their heels. F: Yeah, they recognize it. JJ: Cherokee? F: Yeah, Cherokee and Choctaw or something. JJ: Cherokee and what? F: Choctaw. RL: Yeah, that’s word I was (overlapping dialogue; inaudible). I was trying to separate it from the mythology to the medical, you know, and from that point, Cha Cha, right on till today. But that’s a good question there, about family. I love talking about family. That’s a good question, man. JJ: Because you’re a family person, or why do you like to talk about the family? RL: Huh? F: He said, “Why do you like to talk about family?” RL: That’s the ultimate talk. Then [01:42:00] when you go outside, then you talk about kicking ass, (laughs) organizing, organizing. JJ: So, you go from family to kicking ass. (laughs) RL: Yeah. When you go home, you’re talking to your brothers and sisters and uncles. You know, you’re listening. Then you have an all kinda home-cooking meal, cakes and, you know. That’s a genuine conversation because family, we 44 �wouldn’t be who we are now, man, if it wasn’t for how our family raised us. And yes, everybody have a crazy uncle. (laughter) But I got Thurman like that Archie Bunker of the family. (inaudible) get a job, man. JJ: (laughs) RL: That’s Thurman, [01:43:00] a good man. He’s a good man. JJ: How did the family -- did you see that with the Rainbow Coalition? How did that play? RL: It was at play. JJ: Was that related to that? RL: Yeah. The Rainbow Coalition represented family because like I was saying, if one of the fingers on one hand is paining, everybody paining, you know? And then, all of a sudden, the whole body pain, like with me with this cancer. My whole family, they cool and everything, but my whole family is affected by it because they feel like you guys do, ’cause we family. So, family, [01:44:00] ain’t nothing like it. Once mom’s gone and grandma’s gone and, you know, grandparents, you know, the people that come to you, right or wrong, my daddy used to say -- excuse this language -- but my daddy used to say, “Junior, if you get in a fight, blah, blah, blah, blah, fight hard, son, because I’d rather for another motherfucker be dead than you.” (laughter) JJ: That’s great. RL: Yeah, man. My family, that’s what we doing, Ray, you, Faiza, you know. F: Hy. RL: Hy. 45 �JJ: Hy. RL: It’s family. And it’s serious family when you wake up one morning, like Hy did, and [01:45:00] in the Washington Post. JJ: Okay, Washington Post. RL: Yeah, Washington Post. JJ: I saw that article. It’s a good article. RL: Yeah, right? That’s a hell of a shot there, man. And we all family. You put family as your root, as your root because all struggle (inaudible) community (inaudible) and be a family. Then it’s spreaded out. We wanted our nephews and folks in the house to be safe from the police, to have jobs, [01:46:00] you know, decent housing, healthcare. We wanted our mothers to have pretty dresses. We wanted that. So, I’m waiting, Cha Cha. JJ: You’re waiting for me to say something? RL: I thought you wanted to ask another question. JJ: No, just, you know, we were talking about family, and I was just kind of letting you -- the importance of that, and I think you described it well. So, we’re leaving pretty soon. I just wanted to know, what do you want me and the other people to remember? I know I asked you that before, but I didn’t ask you what you want me to make sure that we should remember. And you know, when I’m going back, since I’m going back. [01:47:00] RL: What we been doing, years ago, right on till now, is keep serving people. If it’s just three or four hours a day you do something, you know, like my mom would say, “Save your own soul.” Do something. That’s pretty much how simple it is, 46 �man. I’m excited, just the thought of a third party. I’m excited about the idea of having a big conference at Ole Miss. We can do that now. We can do that. We got a man in this room that personally knows (inaudible). Those are realities. Now y’all better get to rolling ’cause (inaudible). JJ: Okay, we’re going to get you rolling. RL: I’m serious. [01:48:00] If they have a record, man, don’t [leave it to the?] law. JJ: I appreciate hanging out with yesterday all day, and we had a good conversation. It’s the longest time I’ve been in the hospital, (laughs) but I appreciate it. RL: Yeah, I appreciate it too. JJ: Talking with Faiza and Hy, that man from the Young Patriots, and of course my friend Ray here. So, I really appreciate the time, the opportunity. RL: Yeah, man. JJ: I love you, my brother. I appreciate that. RL: We’ll get together. If I’m not here, then Faiza’ll be here. She know the history. She know what to do. You know, that’s why I wanted her to step up front, so you can hear her and her skill for sitting and talking with you. Yeah, Faiza breaks the stereotype. JJ: (inaudible) [01:49:00] Okay, so we’re going to get ready to take off. RL: Yeah, you don’t want to miss that (inaudible), man. JJ: No, but thank you. Thank you very much. RL: They got all that security you got to go through, all that shit now, man. HT: Don’t forget your peanuts on the plane. 47 �JJ: Oh, yeah, then they got peanuts. They give you peanuts, and you give you security and shake you down. I asked the other guy, “Why are you shaking?” (laughter) I’m just kidding. Okay. RL: Okay. END OF VIDEO FILE 48 � https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/dfa2fb63402b2ad10cd9067e844fd1de.mp4 4ea7799a93377bb599fe92fbd2a5e07f Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Young Lords in Lincoln Park Collection Subject The topic of the resource Young Lords (Organization) Puerto Ricans--United States Civil Rights--United States--History Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.) Personal narratives Social justice Community activists--Illinois--Chicago Description An account of the resource Collection of oral history interviews and digitized materials documenting the history of the Young Lords Organization in Lincoln Park, Chicago. Interviews were conducted by Young Lords' founder, José “Cha-Cha” Jiménez, and documents were digitized from Mr. Jiménez' archives. The Young Lords in Lincoln Park collection grows out of the ongoing struggle for fair housing, self-determination, and human rights that was launched by Mr. José “Cha-Cha” Jiménez, founder of the Young Lords Movement. This project is dedicated to documenting the history of the displacement of Puerto Ricans, Mejicanos, other Latinos, and the poor from Lincoln Park, as well as the history of the Young Lords nationwide. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Jiménez, José, 1948- Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/491">Young Lords in Lincoln Park collection (RHC-65)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-04-25 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng spa Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-65 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 2012-2017 Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Título Spanish language Title entry Robert E. Lee vídeo entrevista y biografía Descripción Spanish language Description entry Bob Lee o Robert E. Lee creció en el "bosque" cerca de Jasper, TX. Su familia trabajaba en una plantación de algodón. Uno de sus hermanos Franco se convirtió en un comisionado del condado de la 5 ª Sala de Houston por más de 30 años. En 1969, Bob Lee se convirtió en Subdirector de Campo del Capítulo de Illinois del Partido de las Panteras Negras. Su trabajo incluyó Uptown donde comenzó a trabajar con la Organización de Jóvenes Patriotas. Sujetos Spanish language Subject terms Young Lords (Organización) Puertorriqueños--Estados Unidos Derechos civiles--Estados Unidos--Historia Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.) Mexicano-Americanos--Relatos personales Justicia social Activistas comunitarios--Illinois--Chicago Mexico-Americanos--Illinois--Chicago--Condiciones sociales Relaciones raciales Conflicto social Identitad cultural Partido Pantera Negra. Illinois Capí­tulo Source <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/491">Young Lords in Lincoln Park (RHC-65)</a> Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-65_Lee_Robert Title A name given to the resource Robert E. Lee video interview and transcript Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Lee, Robert Description An account of the resource Bob Lee or Robert E. Lee grew up in the “forest” near Jasper, TX. His family worked on a cotton plantation. One of his brothers Franco became a county commissioner of the 5th Ward of Houston for over 30 years. In 1969 Bob Lee became a Deputy Field Marshall for the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party. His worked included Uptown where he started working with the Young Patriots Organization and the Young Lords. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Jiménez, José, 1948- Subject The topic of the resource Young Lords (Organization) Puerto Ricans--United States Civil Rights--United States--History Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.) Mexican Americans--Personal narratives Social justice Community activists--Illinois--Chicago Mexican Americans--Illinois--Chicago--Social conditions Race relations Social conflict Cultural identity Black Panther Party. Illinois Chapter Language A language of the resource eng Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-02-16 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b1f2ed9bfc07e89c7e8e2f67395a39c6.jpg 83a358f03b6cfb17910cc3652ab75d67 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Douglas R. Gilbert Photographs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gilbert, Douglas R., 1942-2023 Description An account of the resource Photographs scanned from negatives and transparencies from the Douglas R. Gilbert papers (RHC-183). Douglas R. Gilbert (b. 1942) is an American photographer from Michigan. He was born in Holland, Michigan and is the son of Russell W. and Carmen (Andree) Gilbert. Gilbert earned a B.A. in social sciences and art at Michigan State University in 1964, an M.S. in photography from the Institute of Design at Illinois Institute of Technology in 1972, and a M.S.W. from Salem State College in 1993. He is married to Barbara (McDonald) Gilbert, and has three daughters, Robyn, Rachel, and Anne. Gilbert took a serious interest in photography at the age of fourteen. In 1963 he joined the staff of Look magazine in New York as the second youngest photojournalist in the magazine's history. As a Look photographer from 1964 to 1966, he photographed folk musician Bob Dylan, the Newport Folk Festival, Simon and Garfunkel, the New York City Financial District, the children and facilities at the Manhattan School for Seriously Disturbed Children. From 1967 to 1969, Gilbert did several shoots, including that of folk singer Janis Ian for Life magazine. After moving to Chicago, Illinois in 1969 to attend the Illinois Institute of Technology, Gilbert conducted notable photo shoots of business and political figure Lenore Romney, and pursued more personal and artistic photography, focusing on urban and rural landscapes in Illinois and Michigan. He then joined the faculty of Wheaton College, where he taught from 1972 to 1982. In 1993, Gilbert graduated from Salem State College, Massachusetts, with a Masters in Social Work, and later pursued a second career as a psychotherapist. Douglas Gilbert died in June 2023. Throughout his photography career, he pursued both freelance commercial work as well as artistic work. His art photography is characterized by its classic black-and-white format, and features people, places and objects shot great attention and sensitivity. Gilbert's works are held in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, The Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, and the Grand Valley State University Art Galleries, as well as in numerous private and institutional collections. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-2011 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="%E2%80%9Dhttps%3A//gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/783%E2%80%9D">Douglas R. Gilbert Papers (RHC-183)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Subject The topic of the resource Photographs Photography -- United States Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-183 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Image Type The nature or genre of the resource image/jpeg Language A language of the resource eng Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-183_I067-0018 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gilbert, Douglas R. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1968-06-07 Title A name given to the resource Robert F. Kennedy Funeral, St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York Description An account of the resource Black and white photograph of a group of mourners and police officers gathered outside St. Patrick's Cathedral on the day of Robert F. Kennedy's funeral in New York, New York. In the photograph, police officers are baracading the sidewalk while crowds of people are seen exiting the church. Scanned from the negative. Subject The topic of the resource Kennedy, Robert F., 1925-1968 New York (N.Y.) Funeral rites and ceremonies--New York (State)--New York St. Patrick's Cathedral (New York, N.Y.) Black-and-white photography Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/783">Douglas R. Gilbert papers (RHC-183)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpeg Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1960s Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e7bda5c37720c088b390e154d019c3c8.jpg d08c643b7323dd9a116b8741c7cb36b7 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Douglas R. Gilbert Photographs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gilbert, Douglas R., 1942-2023 Description An account of the resource Photographs scanned from negatives and transparencies from the Douglas R. Gilbert papers (RHC-183). Douglas R. Gilbert (b. 1942) is an American photographer from Michigan. He was born in Holland, Michigan and is the son of Russell W. and Carmen (Andree) Gilbert. Gilbert earned a B.A. in social sciences and art at Michigan State University in 1964, an M.S. in photography from the Institute of Design at Illinois Institute of Technology in 1972, and a M.S.W. from Salem State College in 1993. He is married to Barbara (McDonald) Gilbert, and has three daughters, Robyn, Rachel, and Anne. Gilbert took a serious interest in photography at the age of fourteen. In 1963 he joined the staff of Look magazine in New York as the second youngest photojournalist in the magazine's history. As a Look photographer from 1964 to 1966, he photographed folk musician Bob Dylan, the Newport Folk Festival, Simon and Garfunkel, the New York City Financial District, the children and facilities at the Manhattan School for Seriously Disturbed Children. From 1967 to 1969, Gilbert did several shoots, including that of folk singer Janis Ian for Life magazine. After moving to Chicago, Illinois in 1969 to attend the Illinois Institute of Technology, Gilbert conducted notable photo shoots of business and political figure Lenore Romney, and pursued more personal and artistic photography, focusing on urban and rural landscapes in Illinois and Michigan. He then joined the faculty of Wheaton College, where he taught from 1972 to 1982. In 1993, Gilbert graduated from Salem State College, Massachusetts, with a Masters in Social Work, and later pursued a second career as a psychotherapist. Douglas Gilbert died in June 2023. Throughout his photography career, he pursued both freelance commercial work as well as artistic work. His art photography is characterized by its classic black-and-white format, and features people, places and objects shot great attention and sensitivity. Gilbert's works are held in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, The Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, and the Grand Valley State University Art Galleries, as well as in numerous private and institutional collections. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-2011 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="%E2%80%9Dhttps%3A//gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/783%E2%80%9D">Douglas R. Gilbert Papers (RHC-183)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Subject The topic of the resource Photographs Photography -- United States Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-183 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Image Type The nature or genre of the resource image/jpeg Language A language of the resource eng Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-183_I067-0025 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gilbert, Douglas R. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1968-06-07 Title A name given to the resource Robert F. Kennedy Funeral, St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York Description An account of the resource Black and white photograph of a group of mourners and police officers gathered outside St. Patrick's Cathedral on the day of Robert F. Kennedy's funeral in New York, New York. In the photograph, police officers are helping to guide the foot traffic while crowds of people are lining up outside the church. Scanned from the negative. Subject The topic of the resource Kennedy, Robert F., 1925-1968 New York (N.Y.) Funeral rites and ceremonies--New York (State)--New York St. Patrick's Cathedral (New York, N.Y.) Black-and-white photography Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/783">Douglas R. Gilbert papers (RHC-183)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpeg Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1960s Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/15d45c9b6c4183519f3a64f28ad72c79.jpg a89b7e1cf755615f1812b539c60fca92 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Douglas R. Gilbert Photographs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gilbert, Douglas R., 1942-2023 Description An account of the resource Photographs scanned from negatives and transparencies from the Douglas R. Gilbert papers (RHC-183). Douglas R. Gilbert (b. 1942) is an American photographer from Michigan. He was born in Holland, Michigan and is the son of Russell W. and Carmen (Andree) Gilbert. Gilbert earned a B.A. in social sciences and art at Michigan State University in 1964, an M.S. in photography from the Institute of Design at Illinois Institute of Technology in 1972, and a M.S.W. from Salem State College in 1993. He is married to Barbara (McDonald) Gilbert, and has three daughters, Robyn, Rachel, and Anne. Gilbert took a serious interest in photography at the age of fourteen. In 1963 he joined the staff of Look magazine in New York as the second youngest photojournalist in the magazine's history. As a Look photographer from 1964 to 1966, he photographed folk musician Bob Dylan, the Newport Folk Festival, Simon and Garfunkel, the New York City Financial District, the children and facilities at the Manhattan School for Seriously Disturbed Children. From 1967 to 1969, Gilbert did several shoots, including that of folk singer Janis Ian for Life magazine. After moving to Chicago, Illinois in 1969 to attend the Illinois Institute of Technology, Gilbert conducted notable photo shoots of business and political figure Lenore Romney, and pursued more personal and artistic photography, focusing on urban and rural landscapes in Illinois and Michigan. He then joined the faculty of Wheaton College, where he taught from 1972 to 1982. In 1993, Gilbert graduated from Salem State College, Massachusetts, with a Masters in Social Work, and later pursued a second career as a psychotherapist. Douglas Gilbert died in June 2023. Throughout his photography career, he pursued both freelance commercial work as well as artistic work. His art photography is characterized by its classic black-and-white format, and features people, places and objects shot great attention and sensitivity. Gilbert's works are held in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, The Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, and the Grand Valley State University Art Galleries, as well as in numerous private and institutional collections. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1960-2011 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="%E2%80%9Dhttps%3A//gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/783%E2%80%9D">Douglas R. Gilbert Papers (RHC-183)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Subject The topic of the resource Photographs Photography -- United States Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-183 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Image Type The nature or genre of the resource image/jpeg Language A language of the resource eng Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-183_I067-0033 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gilbert, Douglas R. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1968-06-07 Title A name given to the resource Robert F. Kennedy Funeral, St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York Description An account of the resource Black and white photograph of a display of flower arrangements in honor of Robert F. Kennedy on the day of his funeral at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York, New York. Scanned from the negative. Subject The topic of the resource Kennedy, Robert F., 1925-1968 New York (N.Y.) Funeral rites and ceremonies--New York (State)--New York St. Patrick's Cathedral (New York, N.Y.) Flowers--New York (State)--New York Black-and-white photography Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/783">Douglas R. Gilbert papers (RHC-183)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpeg Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1960s Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/49c685b754bb7dd70a0cfc6416550b82.jpg 3d4c1e9b6ca5497197a95cf3e90b4488 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Robert H. Merrill photographs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1909/1950 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Robert H. Merrill papers (RHC-222) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-222 Description An account of the resource Photographs, negatives, and lantern slides digitized from the papers of engineer and archaeologist Robert H. Merrill. A Grand Rapids native, Merrill held an accomplished career as a civil engineer. He founded the company Spooner & Merrill, which held offices in Grand Rapids and Chicago. From 1919-1921, Merrill lived in China, working as Assistant Principal Engineer on a reconstruction of the Grand Canal - the oldest and longest canal system in the world. Merrill became fascinated by archaeology, and among other projects, he traveled to the Uxmal Pyramids in Yucatan, Mexico, with a research expedition from Tulane University. Merrill's photo collection includes images of his travels and projects, friends and family. Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Merrill_NE_56_1924_006 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1924-05-17 Title A name given to the resource Robert H. Merrill Description An account of the resource Black and white photograph of a Robert H. Merrill holding a trout in front of the steps of a house. Subject The topic of the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Robert H. Merrill papers (RHC-222) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpg Language A language of the resource eng Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/594a5bf1c1d55a5b20cb66b64d4d5dcc.jpg 8f3141d31718c8cca9c183a0c32fb82c Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Robert H. Merrill photographs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1909/1950 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Robert H. Merrill papers (RHC-222) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-222 Description An account of the resource Photographs, negatives, and lantern slides digitized from the papers of engineer and archaeologist Robert H. Merrill. A Grand Rapids native, Merrill held an accomplished career as a civil engineer. He founded the company Spooner & Merrill, which held offices in Grand Rapids and Chicago. From 1919-1921, Merrill lived in China, working as Assistant Principal Engineer on a reconstruction of the Grand Canal - the oldest and longest canal system in the world. Merrill became fascinated by archaeology, and among other projects, he traveled to the Uxmal Pyramids in Yucatan, Mexico, with a research expedition from Tulane University. Merrill's photo collection includes images of his travels and projects, friends and family. Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Merrill_NE_60_1924_016 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1924 Title A name given to the resource Robert H. Merrill Description An account of the resource Black and white photograph Robert herrill sitting on a rock jutting out of a mountain side. Two other people pose on the rock nearby. Subject The topic of the resource Yosemite National Park (Calif.) Yosemite Valley (Calif.) Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Robert H. Merrill papers (RHC-222) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpg Language A language of the resource eng Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/18b412d13f95fb205db1b69215fc03c0.jpg 0254c759ae2a5a6dce0a381ba2a738eb Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Grand Valley State University Photographs Subject The topic of the resource Aerial photographs Universities and colleges Michigan Grand Rapids (Mich.) Allendale (Mich.) Building Facilities Dormitories Students Events 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s Description An account of the resource People, places, and events of Grand Valley State University from its founding in 1960 as a 4-year college in western Michigan. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource News & Information Services. University Communications Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/41">News &amp; Information Services. University Photographs. (GV012-01)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-03-03 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-NC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright - Non-Commercial Use Permitted</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpg Language A language of the resource eng Type The nature or genre of the resource image Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV012-01 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1960s-2000s Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Local Subject Subject headings specific to a particular image collection 1960s Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1969 Title A name given to the resource Robert Hendricks, GVSC student teacher Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV012-01_UAPhotos_001626 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/41">News &amp; Information Services. University Photographs. (GV012-01)</a> Description An account of the resource Robert Hendricks, GVSC student teacher, having a discussion in the lunchroom at Creston High School. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpeg Language A language of the resource eng Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Grand Rapids (Mich.) Universities and colleges Education Students Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-NC/1.0/?language=en">In copyright - Non-commercial use permitted.</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives black and white photo https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/9f060fea6bd5068c6fa31d7765f43c0a.mp3 8f4367ac48a9054e2ea64d57250e6436 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7d0686f32d7e22da4c5aba91b6b0d336.pdf 53ca9bf9ae2595c9d6dcbda509ff82ef PDF Text Text Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 1 Ken Kutzel: This is Ken Kutzel and Katelyn... Katelyn Bosch: Bosch. KK: Katelyn Bosch, and were here today to, uh, with, uh, Bob Lord, uh at the old school house in Saugatuck, I’m sorry in Douglas Michigan, and let’s see today is June 4th, uh 2018. This oral history is being collected as part of the Stories of Summer project, which is supported in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Program. Thank, uh, Bob, thanks for talking with us today and were interested to learn more about your family history and your experiences of summer in the Saugatuck Douglass area. Can you please tell me your full name and spell it? Bob Lord: [Laughs] Well, nobody calls me Robert but that’s what it is. Robert William Lord. L O R D. Then just call me Bob. KK: Okay, and um, do you – oh you don’t use any accents or anything so, tell us about where you grew up. BL: Well I grew up in Charlotte, which is hometown, center part of the state, uh, I was, I was born there 1945, and uh, and that was hometown until 1976. I graduated high school there and I was tool and die maker there for a number of years, and then I went into Field Sales Engineering and from there in ’76 I migrated to the Holland area and went to work for Bone Aluminum as a Field Sales Engineer and uh, consequently that drew me to this side of the state. Um, my wife and I ended up in 1978 purchased a property in Saugatuck on the corner of Holland and Lucy Street, and the property had no gas, meters had been pulled, the electric meters on both houses had been pulled and the water meter had been, the water had been shut off. And I say both houses because there is a Singapore house on that property. The main house uh, was about 2400 square feet and the Singapore house was probably 820, 840 something like that. KK: Singapore house would mean it was moved from Singapore. BL: It was moved from Singapore and we had the original abstract which stayed with the house and um, which I just recently sold. Um, but the Singapore house, the abstract reflected that the taxes changed in the winter of 1874, 1875 and so we suspected that when the prop, the house had been moved. We had been told by, and I don’t remember who had told us that, but it had been separated in two and skidded up the channel on ice and then reassembled on the property and then the main house, uh was started construction sometime thereafter. Um, the main house actually had been called, when we bought it, had a sign out front, called ‘The 1894 House’, and the reason for that was because there was an addition made to that, that property, that house uh, that the cornerstone laid at the very front and that was the parlor and the master bedroom above it, um that had that date on it. Leslie Junkerman who was as Justice of the Peace, ended up, held court in the front parlor, and consequently we had had from time to time people that would knock on the door and want to come in and say ‘oh, yeah we were married in your front parlor, could we look at it’ and so on and so forth, so uh, but that gives kind of a brief �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 2 thumbnail of, of that property. I don’t know if I could tell you anything more about it than the people we bought it from [pause] Jim and Pam Davis were the previous owners to us and she was a Potter and the what is now kind of an office, secondary apartment uh, was where her studio was, and um, anyway Jim was a Pharmaceutical Representative of some sort and um, it had really fallen onto bad times. It was, the main house had had a fire in it, and like I said all the, everything had been shut off so when we bought it we were digging in and going for, going for the walls as far as putting everything back to right. [00:05:29] KK: Uh, I spoke with you once before Bob about the fact that uh you have some knowledge about the houses around you? BL: Oh! KK: …and that some of them were from Singapore, can you elaborate on that? BL: Well, you know, from the standpoint, yes. Um, headed toward the channel which would be west, next door neighbor was Marlene Ansorge, she lived there when we bought the property but the next, the next house over Betty Watson at that time, she later married uh, Warren Mulder, uh, ah, we were told that was, had been a Singapore house now I, I can’t substantiate that because some of the people that we had talked to, either have passed or don’t remember anymore, and so on. But, I know that the house on the other side of that one, which would be 1, 2, 3 down from us, that had been, um, purchased and a second story elevated to that house and that was a Singapore house and then I think, um, the property called Filamare, I believe that was a Singapore house as well. The interesting thing about that block was that our back property line was constant from Holland Street all the way to Butler Street. We shared that common back, uh, back lot line and that, in fact you could, if, from, from the air you could look down and see the, that track right on through. Interesting piece of property. Betty Watson, Betty Mulder told us that her Uncle had owned everything on that street from Holland Street to Butler Street at one time, which would’ve gone back, probably 1870. KK: And you’re talking about what street is that? BL: That’s Lucy Street. KK: Lucy Street. BL: Lucy Street. KK: Okay. BL: Holland Street, it would kind of, I’ll call it parallel to Lucy Street, but and, if you look at, the, the actual survey of that corner property the um, 748 746 Holland Street the one corner marker for that property is out in the middle of, I should shouldn’t say middle, but it is out in the right hand traffic lane of Lucy Street. If you measure from one corner to this corner to that corner, it’s an oddball shape its �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 3 right out in the middle of that one lane. So, the city actually owe, owns, owes, owes me some back tax money I think I should probably get. KK: Yeah, good luck. BL: Yes. Anyway. KK: Um, why did you locate in Saugatuck Douglas? BL: Well, um we were renting a place up in Macatawa Park and this goes back to ‘77 ‘78. My wife had taken a job over in what is considered the Haworth Building, she worked for a company called Flame Tech as a Office Manager everything taken care of payroll, this and that and whatever, and um, I was working for Bone Aluminum and consequently I’d pick her up from after work and I’m, we just took a jaunt down Water Street crossed the bridge, and I took the first right hand turn once I could, could take a right hand turn up past the congregational church and down the hill, and on Holland Street, and this is the month of February and I see this mustard colored house with cream trim and I’m thinking ‘Wow! Look at that!’ and she said the same thing, and in the snow, sticking up about this far above the snow and I’m showing you about 4 inches of height, there’s a for-sale sign and I’m thinking ‘Oh my goodness’. Well through the course of events we were able to purchase it and did a lot of back-tracking because the people that had owned it, had left the area and so on. But, we thought it was [chuckles] a quaint area, like a fishing village from Massachusetts Connecticut someplace out there. Well that’s not quite the case. [00:10:24] KK: That would be about what year? BL: Ah, it would be 1978, and we closed on the property on May the 4th and started working it on May the 5th because we had to be out of the property that we were renting up in Macatawa Park by the end of May. So do you know, when we moved would’ve been? Memorial Day weekend! Now, if you’ve been around Memorial Day weekend you know that it is like ‘Holy Smokes! What did we get ourselves into?’ Nothing but traffic and confusion and it was um, to put it very bluntly, it was like a madhouse. But, we got through it, um, we raised uh, her two kids, we adopted another one and my three kids from time to time were here and the main house was just that, it now became a residence and uh, there’s four bedrooms upstairs and one bedroom down, a parlor, and so on and so forth. But, very nice community, good school system, great school system in fact. KK: Uh, what was your first impression of the area? BL: Yeah [laughs] moving on Memorial Day? Yeah, the first impression was when we saw that house, and that was like ‘Oh my goodness look at this’, it, it was an amazing thing. I, I truly did, the house was everything I thought it was, it had enough gingerbread on it, just to be more than attractive and ah, it looked like it needed saving so we did. �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 4 KK: And so you really did not have earlier contact with uh, Saugatuck or anything? BL: No, I had been here once in high school, back, went to Oval Beach when I was in um, our, our, I was in DeMolay and our whole, our whole lodge came over to the, um, to Oval Beach once, one Saturday, and uh, that was the only contact I’d had with it, never knew what it was like. KK: Any special memories of Oval Beach at the time? BL: Hm, not at the time because that would’ve been, I was probably 16 or 17, and that’s um, [whispers] that’s over 50 years ago. KK: Can you share any particular memories about living here, besides what you have, anything good or bad that just kind of stands out? BL: Um, the academics that are here. The school system is amazing. The um, the class sizes at the time that, that, um my stepson and my stepdaughter were in, were you know 30 35 kids so it was a 1 on 1 and the competition between students was amazing. The National Honors society always struck home um, Jack was actually for the college entrances on was, should’ve been Valedictorian but was um, Salutatorian. Anyway! It’s, it’s the school system that was a draw. KK: Ah, what were the um, the key places in Saugatuck and Douglas that you liked to hang, hang out in or go to? BL: Hm, oh I’d go down to the Butler, to the restaurant, um, over in well, now, now I don’t think it was at the time but Ida Red’s for breakfast once in a while. Um, Jack was working for, Jack my stepson, he uh, worked for Henry Gleason, right there beside the boat launch, and uh, in fact we ended up helping Henry and Claire Deen at the time that they were running the store, and of course um, Bruce and Marilyn Staring they ran the, um, Star of Saugatuck the paddle wheeler that was right next store so we knew that, and took advantage of that every now and again. Would ride that every once and a while. KK: Okay, um, doesn’t affect you there, uh, how aware were you of the LGBT community here? [00:15:02] BL: How aware? KK: Huh, yeah. BL: Oh, I just, I never really paid too much attention, to it really, I mean I, I knew it was here, didn’t matter one way or the other. KK: Yeah. BL: I was a, I’m a, a ‘Live and let live’. �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 5 KK: Okay, uh, let’s see…and I guess the other question I would want to ask you, did you have any contact with the art school or any… how aware were you as somebody living here of the art school and what went on there? BL: I, I knew that it, you mean Oxbow? KK: Oxbow, yes. BL: I knew that it was there, I never really visited it as far as going out and taking a tour of it, but I knew, uh, my, my one, my one daughter ended up having a, um, a stepson that was doing um, artwork over there. Back, this goes back probably 30, yeah maybe 25 years ago and so on, but I knew it was there and knew that it was rather prestigious from the standpoint that, you know, ‘Oh you’re in Saugatuck, ah! You know where Ox…” Yes, I do, I know where Oxbow is but I never, I, I, was always out on the road working so, I never really took advantage of it. Wish I had though. KK: Yeah. Uh, how would you describe Saugatuck Douglas to somebody who’s never been here? BL: That’s a really good question because, during, during the off season, you could fire a shot gun off down Lucy Street and probably not hit anything. Ah, but during the season, I think a good description would be you go from 2,000 people during the offseason, wintertime, and during the season, it elevated to probably 20,000 people because of the outlying area and so on so forth. It’s a tourist community, there’s no doubt about that, it has a good draw, the restaurants and the stores everybody comes to town for that um, but candidly I would tell people that if you’re looking for a good restaurant, a nice place to stay, you can’t get to the beach from the Saugatuck side of things you have to go across, the, the bridge and then take a hitch and a giddy up. You know what a hitch and a giddy up is? Going that-away, um you know, long story short, yeah its its it’s good place to visit. KK: Okay, and how would you compare the area to other places you’ve lived and worked? BL: Oh. Hm, well, my growing up I was in a rural area. I actually lived in the Charlotte area, there’s no real comparison because it was, Charlotte was farm industrial community, were, Lansing, Lansing’s bedroom. Oldsmobile was there, Fisher Body was there and uh, and in my hometown there was the Aluminum extrusion company and uh, a glass factory that would, uh, would manufacture Gerber baby food jars and uh, S-Strohs stubby beer bottles. So here’s this one community that I came from in 1976 all the way over here to the west side of the state, and [inaudible] there’s, it’s like apples and plums. It’s not the same. KK: Okay, um, do you have any specifically, or, favorite memories of the summer time here? BL: [Laughs] Venetian Night. KK: Well, talk about it. �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 6 BL: One, the traffic and so on getting out of town. We were sitting on the front porch, in the dark, watching the traffic try to get out of town. Try to get out of town was the key, cause this was before somebody really got a hold of it and organized it, this was probably would’ve been the early 80’s, somewhere in there and, [pause] is this going to be re-listened to and edited possibly because, one of the people that was in one of the cars, she got out the car ran up to our porch, did not see us and proceeded to relieve herself in our bushes! [00:20:05] [All laugh] BL: ...and my wife ended up taking her sprinkling can, stood up, and just poured the sprinkling can right on top of her head! [Imitates person complaining] Oh! Talk about wet hen! Ah, yeah. That was probably the highlight of it. After a while, you know Jack ended up getting a scholarship to Alma College, and we bought a cottage up north by uh, Lakeview and consequently weekends were spent up there so that the traffic and so on, we didn’t really partake in that and so on, but it, it was, it’s still a nice community. KK: Uh, let’s see, what type of shenanigans did you get into? Were you a participant, an instigator, or bystander of mayhem? BL: Uh, I was a bystander. I would never, never end up getting in. I just watched her take the sprinkling can and dump it on top of this woman’s head. No, no, I think probably the wildest thing was every now and then I’d fire up my motorcycle and run down the street and Jimmy VanOss and his crew down the street would “Hey!” Cheer and, oh well. KK: Well you um, you actually moved here after the, the um, the rock festivals and all that... BL: …Yes... KK: ...So you wouldn’t remember that. BL: No, it was ’78 when we moved here. KK: Yeah, uh, and um, [pause] how would you describe Saugatuck Douglass as you best remember it from, from this era? That would be the era like, when you moved here. BL: Boy. KK: I know. You gave us several examples already. BL: I just, you know, the one thing that changed, uh, that my wife prompted, she got after the state police for having people walking into town down our street from Holland Street from either the boat launch or from other places and so on with open container. And that would’ve been probably, the early 80’s, ’84, ’85 and yeah that’d be about right because Jack and Bryan Earlywine would stand on the �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 7 corner and the state police would have everybody dump their coolers, their beer cans, everything, and the kids would pick up their cans and cash them in down at Gleason’s! And I remember the guys doing, you know, great big grocery sacks full of that, and, and that pretty much ended the rowdiness, uh, it became controlled chaos rather than wild chaos. KK: Yeah. BL: It, it did, it got out of hand if anybody has ever rafted off in front of Coral Gables, or down to the Singapore Yacht Club, I don’t think they do it down there, I think it’s more down in front of Coral Gables. When you raft off you have to go 1, 2, 3, 4. People that have not done boating don’t get that! Yeah. Have you done boating? KB: Not very much. BL: Do you know what I’m talking about? KB: Oh, yeah I do. BL: Oh, okay, yeah. KK: Ah, what are some of your hopes for the future? I know you just sold the house. Um, and what would you like to see happen in this community? BL: [pause] I can’t think of any reason why someone would want to have the road divided, from the bridge on into Douglas. That is a travesty, that’s a mess. Somebody is going to get hurt, killed, whatever, that, that’s, that was not well thought of. KK: Okay, and you’re referring to something that their working on right now. BL: Yeah! Yeah! That’s terrible. I’m you know a, if, if it were my vote I’d vote that right out right now and it’d be gone. That’s crazy. Somebody just wasn’t thinking right. KK: Um, remembering that this interview will be saved for a long time, when someone listens to this tape 50 years from now, what would you most like them to know about your life and community right now? BL: My life and community, hm, [pause] Well you know that I’m not a very friendly guy. [00:25:03] KK: [Laughs] BL: I’ve enjoyed and Ken, where I met you was at the Saugatuck Antique Pavilion, and you know how much I enjoyed, still would enjoy doing the communication and the elbow rubbing of customers and people that work there. You know I, just the very fact that, that [pause] try not to hurt anybody’s �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 8 feeling, you know somebody needs a hand, help them! Someone needs a door opened, open it for them! Somebody needs something loaded for them, load it for them! Just to be, do unto others I guess is probably a good thing. Yeah. KK: Do you have any advice for a young person who may listen to this tape, although I think you just gave some good advice. BL: [pause] Stay in school. Stay in school. That’s your paycheck for the future and you don’t realize it right now, ‘Oh my goodness this is terrible, I hate going to school. The classes are this and that’ Stay in school. That is, that is, that is the draw the education is that jewel that you can end up losing by passing it along to other people. Dig in, go for it. I just graduated 2 grandsons, one over out of Lansing Catholic and another one out of Olivet and I look at these kids and I think, we might make it. As a society, we might make it, finally. Anyway. KK: Ah, is there anything that you’d like to share that I might not have asked about? This is your chance to just go for it. BL: [Laughs] You mean I didn’t before? Uh... KK: I know you too well. BL: No, I, you know, I from time to time will be coming back here. Um, right now I’m still sorting through boxes, and I still have things in the cargo trailer that, from the move a month ago. In fact, just for one little high note, and that was, or low note that, that the property we owned it. I just cleared May the 4th this year, so from May the 4th of 1978 to May the 4th of 2018 I was here exactly 40 years. Exactly 40 years, and it was a, it was like [snaps] a snap. I had hair color when started here. KK: Yeah and for the record, if you didn’t see a picture of Bob, Bob has perfectly white hair. BL: Perfectly white hair. KK: And lots of it! BL: Yep, I’m going to hang on to it! It was a good gene pool. KK: Now, Katelyn is there anything that you wanted to ask? BL: She’s been so talkative over there, hasn’t she? Giggle, giggle, giggle. KB: No, I don’t think so. Think we’ve got some good stories. BL: There are some that I can’t repeat, but yeah. KK: Okay, well thank you so much for your time and sharing with us, uh, this concludes the interview. �Robert Lord - Interviewed by Ken Kutzel and Katelyn Bosch June 4 2018 BL: Thanks, Ken. [00:28:43] 9 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Summers in Saugatuck-Douglas Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. Kutsche Office of Local History Description An account of the resource Collection contains images and documents digitized and collected through the project "Stories of Summer," supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant. The collection aims to document the twin lakeshore communities of Saugatuck and Douglas, Michigan, as they transformed through the state's bustling tourism industry and acceptance of minorities. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1910s-2010s Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Various Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">Copyright Undetermined</a> Subject The topic of the resource Michigan Saugatuck (Mich.) Douglas (Mich.) Michigan, Lake Allegan County (Mich.) Beaches Sand dunes Outdoor recreation Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries. Allendale, Michigan Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Saugatuck-Douglas History Center Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Stories of Summer (Common Heritage project) Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpeg application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Text Language A language of the resource English Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018 Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context DC-07_SD-LordR-20180604 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Lord, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-06-04 Title A name given to the resource Robert Lord (Audio interview and transcript), 2018 Description An account of the resource Bob Lord moved to a historic home in Saugatuck in 1978. In this interview he covers the history of his home, known as "The 1894 House." He details some of his favorite summer activities, and offers some hopes for the future of Saugatuck. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Kutzel, Ken (Interviewer) Bosch, Katelyn (Interviewer) Van Orsdol, Mollie (Transcriber) Subject The topic of the resource Michigan Saugatuck (Mich.) Douglas (Mich.) Singapore (Mich.) Allegan County (Mich.) Oral history Audio recordings Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Stories of Summer project, Kutsche Office of Local History. Grand Valley State University Relation A related resource Stories of Summer (Common Heritage project) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Sound Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio/mp3 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4ef5c603f2a3bec79c5c9d13a575c4f9.mp4 7054adf20b2a18ea489e79a9f7abae38 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b93d7501e76d4408f9f476e72b2d35a0.pdf f4248f9967b5831b0c41e01dd221e307 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Special Collections & University Archives RHC-88 Fei Hu Films Flying Tigers Interview Interviewer: Frank Boring Interviewee: Robert M. Smith Date of Interview: 04-25-1991 Transcriber: Frank Boring [TAPE 1] FRANK BORING: To being with if you could tell us in as much detail as you want, what were you doing before you even heard about the opportunity in China with the AVG? R.M. SMITH: Well, I'd gone to school in Kansas, I went to Kansas State and while I was there I got interested in radio, radio writing and the local station, KSAC and real interested and did quite a bit of work, mostly dramatic, mostly historical stuff. Then my folks were in Colorado and I went out there one summer and with the help of Doc Summers, a Professor of public speaking, I got a job at the local radio station and I hadn't graduated, I still needed a semester. So here I was a radio announcer for a couple of years. I used to go out with my girl and the chief engineer and his girl and we'd practice code and drink some kind of Catawba wine I remember and so I got interested and picked up a little code speed. Then towards the end of 1939 I came out to California and tried to crack Hollywood, but I got three interviews for radio announcer, but I flubbed them, I was nervous so I decided I wasn't gonna do that, knew a war was coming. So in January 1940 I decided I was gonna enlist in the Army. My ROTC was Army. So I went down to Fort MacArthur and the Sergeant down there looked at me and he said "I'm gonna put you in the Air Force." So January of 1940 I was sent up to Moffett Field for basic. But they didn't have any uniforms for us and they didn't have any shoes, so we spent the six weeks basic mostly in the barracks. Then they sent us up to �Hamilton Field for the 20th Pursuit Group and I remember when I was interviewed by an old Major - he was at least must have been 40 - he looked at my record and said "Well son, you can go to Randolph Field, you've got two years of college. You don't have to pass the mental, just the physical." I said "Well I don't think I can pass the physical because one eye is 20-30." And he leaned back and he said "Well, maybe it's just as well. I'm the only one left out of my class at Randolph." Anyway they split the 20th Pursuit Group into the 35th, so there were 3 more squadrons, 2 more group headquarters, this happened about a year later. In the meantime, I'd practiced total out on the squadron school and studied and I was able to pass the various exams, so I passed the exam for Air Mechanic First Class, which paid Tech Sergeant's pay. When they split, of course there were all kinds of openings. So I got here a year later, I was Buck Sergeant drawing Tech Sergeant's pay and that's when they came around in April of '41 recruiting for the AVG and boy that sounded fine - $300.00 a month for a radioman. FRANK BORING: What was your first encounter with it? Did you find it by a newspaper? By word of mouth, how did you find about AVG? R.M. SMITH: Oh it was word of mouth. The word was going from here to here to there. So they told me - I've even forgotten who I talked to. So I went in and presented myself and he said "Fine, you want to go fine. You're a Radioman." But I was a radio operator really, not a mechanic. FRANK BORING: What did they tell you your responsibilities were gonna be and where you were gonna go and the purpose of why you were going? R.M. SMITH: Well they told us we were going to protect the Burma Road. They may have told pilots more than they told us, but I had no - I realized it was going to be a war situation, I had no illusions about an easy peace time job. I knew what we'd probably be getting into so that didn't particularly worry me. I was just glad to go. �FRANK BORING: What did you know about the Chinese at that time and later the Japanese at that time? R.M. SMITH: Nothing really. Nothing except what one reads or picks up, but nothing about China, nothing about Japan. It was just romance. (break) FRANK BORING: Once again, what did you know about China at that time and what did you know about the Japanese at that time? R.M.SMITH: Well I really didn't know anything about the Chinese or Japan except what one reads in the newspapers. I knew of course that there'd been a war since 1937 and they'd been fighting the Japanese, but I didn't have any real detailed - I was of course pro Chinese. I think most Americans were at the time, but I really didn't know any detail at all. FRANK BORING: Why did you want to go? R.M. SMITH: It was adventure. I would have gone for $100 dollars a month. It was $300 a month and it was a chance to see the world. I was just happy to go. FRANK BORING: Once you'd made the decision to go, could you explain to us the procedure of getting out of the military and joining up with the AVG and any difficulties you may have had. R.M. SMITH: Well I didn't have any difficulty at all in getting out of the service. Apparently when I put in for my discharge, there was no argument at all because I think our C.O. was, by the way, Colonel Aker, later General Aker. But Arvol Miller, who was another Radioman, heard that I was going so he went in and said "Hey, I want to go too." And Aker heard about and says "No way, they're taking enough of our Radiomen." So the interviewer for the AVG, he got on the horn to Washington and radiogram came back or telegram came back saying "Release Arvol Miller, so he was released. �FRANK BORING: What was the next step in terms of your leaving the military, where did you go next to join up with the AVG? R.M. SMITH: I was discharged from the Army Air Corps on June 26, 191. My mother was living down in Los Angeles, so I went down to Los Angeles for a few days and then a week or two later I caught a train in Union Station up to San Francisco. I remember my uncle, William Dutton, came down, my mother's brother came down to see me off and I heard later he turned to my mother and he said "We'll never see that boy again." Well, he was partially right because he died before I got back to the States. But then we went up to - Jim Music, I met him on the train, he and I went up together to San Francisco and they had reservations for us in a hotel there I've forgotten the name now, but we stayed there for several days until the 10th of July and on the 10th we sailed from San Francisco. I remember because it was my brother Philip's birthday. FRANK BORING: What did you tell your mom about your going? R.M. SMITH: Well I told my mother the truth and my mother was always one of these women who would say "Well if you want to do it, go ahead." I didn't have any problems at all and also I made an allotment out so that my mother had an income while I was in the service - while I was over in China. I had no objection and later my mother and father were both very proud of the fact that I'd been there. Mother made many little talks at Ladies Aid or something showing various things that I brought back from China. FRANK BORING: You're staying in this hotel in San Francisco. This is when you're meeting a lot of the AVG at this time, a lot of the Tigers were showing up at this time. Could you describe your arrival there and your meeting these guys and hearing what they were saying about any of that? �R.M. SMITH: There were quite a bunch of us that got together at the hotel in San Francisco. There were 123, I think, of pilots and ground people and there was quite a bit of drinking and talking, but I don't remember anything in particular that we talked about. FRANK BORING: How did you react to being in the presence of a bunch of guys all going off to China? Did you hear different reasons why they were going or - what was the main subject of conversation that you guys were talking about? R.M. SMITH: I really can't recall anything particular. It's been so long, I just don't remember FRANK BORING: Was there a sense of excitement? Was there a sense of danger? R.M. SMITH: Well there was quite a feeling of excitement - all of us were real happy to go. We were looking forward to it, it was a great adventure. We were a little dubious about some of the things that had been promised or the rumors that got around, but I don't think anyone would have turned around and gone back to the service. FRANK BORING: What kind of doubts did you have? What were some of these rumors that you're referring to? R.M. SMITH: There was a rumor that the pilots would be paid $500.00 a month for every plane shot down, this went around. And there was some doubt about that, some of them really didn't think that they would do it. (break) R.M. SMITH: One of the doubts was that the - particularly from the pilots - that they really didn't believe that they were going to be paid $500.00 for every plane they shot down. They were a little dubious on that. Generally, there was some speculation. �FRANK BORING: I know later on these things were brought up, but did you at that time think that you were a mercenary or going to a foreign country to fight under a foreign flag or did you think in terms of you were just an American getting into the war before America got in the war? What were your feelings at that time? R.M. SMITH: I realized at the time that I was a mercenary and that didn't bother me a bit. When we got to China - or not to China - when we got to Toungoo in Rangoon, we were required or asked to sign a piece of paper that put us in the Chinese Air Force and I had no objection to that at all. Although some of the fellows kind of cried a little bit or objected, but I didn't - it didn't bother me. FRANK BORING: From San Francisco you boarded a ship? R.M. SMITH: We boarded the Jaegersfontein in San Francisco. It was a Dutch ship out of Java. All of the servants aboard were Javanese, wearing their skirts and the turbans and were very colorful. The food was good, it had a bar, you could charge, sign your name. In 35 days at sea I don't think we ran out of booze at all. FRANK BORING: Can you describe for us perhaps some of the incidents that may have happened on the ship? R.M. SMITH: Well the happiest place of course was the bar and we played bridge, we played a lot of bridge and there were poker games going on all the way across. We were rather packed. The rooms were designed for two people, but they put extra cots in so generally most rooms had three, so they were a little crowded. But the service was good and we were treated well. FRANK BORING: As I understand it, you all had different occupations on your passports. I wonder if you could comment on that particular bit? R.M. SMITH: I of course was listed as a radio announcer, but I had been a radio announcer. But some of the other fellows who hadn't had any �civilian jobs at all, they had to make something up. So they did with some imagination. FRANK BORING: What about your fellow passengers? Was there any interaction between the AVG group and the other people that were on the ship? R.M. SMITH: All the first class passengers were AVG. There was some steerage there and there were some Chinese there - some Chinese very educated - one of which gave lessons in Chinese for us for $1.00 a lesson and I took those lessons and quite a few of us did while we were on the ship. FRANK BORING: You said that people made up occupations could you give us…? R.M. SMITH: Gosh I don't remember. There's other books that tell this but we didn't see each other's passport or look at it. FRANK BORING: Did you have to maintain any kind of secrecy while you were in San Francisco? Were you aware of anything like that? R.M. SMITH: We weren't aware of any secrecy at all. I think we were told to keep quiet about what we were doing, but I don't remember anything particular. We didn't associate with any other civilians, mostly within ourselves. But I know there were a lot of rumors going around. FRANK BORING: Once you were on the ship, you were starting to get to know some of these guys that you were eventually going to become very good friends with. Could you let us know what that was like to get to know some of these people that were from all over the country and any ones in particular that you became close to, starting on the trip on the ship? Were there any of the AVG guys that stuck out that you personally, in terms of developing a friendship that eventually lasted into China and beyond? �R.M. SMITH: Most of the close friends I made in the AVG, came on other ships and the only one that I knew fairly well on the ship, a guy named Hauser, because I played bridge with him, he quit early. But the ones that I really got to associate and made good friends, lasting friends, came on other ships. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Flying Tigers Interviews and Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Chinese World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Description An account of the resource Collection contains original 1940s films and interviews conducted in the 1990s, documenting the history of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) "Flying Tigers." The Flying Tigers were organized by the United States to aid China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Original filmstrips were recorded by AVG crewmen Joe Gasdick and Chuck Misenheimer, as well as Chinese Air Force Interpreter P.Y. Shu, who was assigned to assist Col. Claire Chennault as he trained Chinese pilots and established the AVG. Interviews with members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) “Flying Tigers” were conducted by Frank Boring for the documentary film Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers, which he co-produced with Frank Christopher under the production company Fei Hu Films. The AVG Flying Tigers were a group of American aviators, mechanics, medical and administrative military personnel, led by Col. Claire Chennault to assist the Chinese Air Force in their defense against Japanese air strikes from 1941-1942. The AVG Flying Tigers also flew in defense of the Burma Road, a major Chinese military supply route. The group disbanded and returned to regular U.S. military service after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Boring, Frank Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films Research and Production Files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938/1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Fei Hu Films Christopher, Frank Gasdick, Joseph Misenheimer, Charles V. P.Y. Shu Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4; application/pdf Language A language of the resource English; Chinese Type The nature or genre of the resource video; text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-1945 World War II Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88_Smith_Robert_M_1991-04-25_v01 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Robert M. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1991-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Robert M. Smith interview (video and transcript, 1 of 6), 1991 Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert M. Smith by filmmaker Frank Boring for the documentary, Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers. Smith served in the American Volunteer Group (AVG) as a Communications Specialist. In this tape, Smith discusses his background in the Army Air Corps prior to joining the American Volunteer Group and his journey overseas aboard the Jaegersfontein. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Boring, Frank (interviewer) Christopher, Frank (director) Fei Hu Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films research and production files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/dd2bc36b792cfa2992837958980b5649.mp4 f302b83ea5081aa88cf66b82060720b8 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/ee04d71680bb96922925b184183b524c.pdf 72896b8007842e20a018a644767165aa PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Special Collections & University Archives RHC-88 Fei Hu Films Flying Tigers Interview Interviewer: Frank Boring Interviewee: Robert M. Smith Date of Interview: 04-25-1991 Transcriber: Frank Boring [TAPE 2] FRANK BORING: Once you were on the ship there were some frequent stops on your way before you arrived in Rangoon, are there any particular places that you stopped off that you thought were of particular interest? R.M. SMITH: On the trip from San Francisco, our first stop was Honolulu. We went in there in the afternoon and we were given leave and then sailed the next morning. Honolulu was a Navy town, lots of sailors around and I did a little shopping. I bought a diary, a bound ledger which I used for a diary, I bought half a dozen Hawaiian shirts which I wore later in China and then had a drink or two and then back to the ship. Our next stop - well, after we left Honolulu after the first day or so, we picked up two Navy cruisers, the Salt Lake City and the North Hampton, who convoyed us then down straight south, southwest into eventually the straits between New Guinea and Java and then the Salt Lake City and the North Hampton dropped us and we were picked up by a Dutch gunboat that took us into Singapore. FRANK BORING: I think there was some reference "Maverick War" maybe came from your diary about the night life in Honolulu. R.M. SMITH: The night life in Honolulu - it was the 15th of the month and that was Navy pay day and the Navy was out in force and they were at the local houses of ill repute, lining up in lines. Of course my group were mostly Army and we were looking down on these �Navy men for their crude approach. But I guess when you're in a sailor's town - that's about all I remember of that. FRANK BORING: When you arrived in Singapore, I noticed in your diary you had a great deal about Singapore. What was your impression upon arriving there and how long did you stay and what were some of the things you did? R.M. SMITH: When we got to Singapore, we only stayed there about 24 hours. It had been planned that we'd stay there a week or two and then go up north to Burma by railroad. But the first 30 of the AVG had been there a couple of weeks before and they had really torn up the town. They advertised in the local paper a beauty contest to attract good looking young Asian girls, they were obstreperous to say the least, so when they heard that we had hit town, 123 of us, the local authorities said no way and so they ordered the Dutch Captain of the Jaegersfontein to take us up to Rangoon, which took another five days. But we did get shore leave. We got 24 hours, that night we went ashore. We didn't stay at a hotel, we just came back around midnight. But, as I remember, Singapore, it was a dirty town. Open sewers - I understand it's cleaned up now - but it smelled. The canals that went through it, the odor was so bad that we held our noses and ran to get away from the canal. It was - little kids crapping in the street - it was a cultural shock. When the Navy - I mean the British came aboard our ship, they were dressed in typical tropical with light shorts and high stockings and our guys whistled at them, they'd never seen them, we didn't wear shorts in the States in 1941 - men didn't wear shorts. But later, when we were in Burma, not only did our guys all start wearing shorts, but they didn't wear the real neat shorts like the British did, they wore shorts that were cut up fairly high. But it was a cultural shock for us - it was a real cultural shock to see the different peoples, the various races, Indians, Malays, British, Australian, Chinese incredible - it was incredible. �FRANK BORING: You also mentioned that another thing about Singapore that upset you was the selling of the daughters for sexual purposes. R.M. SMITH: When one of our men reported, we got back to the ship - that the apparently a native husband had sold his wife - because when he got up in the morning, the husband was sleeping outside the door of the bedroom. Their customs were somewhat different. FRANK BORING: What was your first impression on arriving in Rangoon? What can you describe for us about the arrival there? Because this was your first train - you went to Rangoon and then to Toungoo? First was Rangoon though, right? R.M. SMITH: Yes, we arrived in Rangoon, I think it was the 23rd of August and the ship did not go up and dock at docks, it anchored out in the harbor and we went ashore on Lighters and our baggage was taken ashore. This was in the morning, so they took us to a hotel and fed us a breakfast around 10 o'clock in the morning, then they put us on the local railroad, local train, which was a narrow gauge train that ran north from Rangoon through Toungoo and then eventually up to Lashio. So we got into Toungoo sometime late in the afternoon and I'll never forget old Walter Dolan, my old buddy, the first time I saw him he was part of the first 30 group and he was out there in a pair of white duck trousers, a sun helmet, carrying a stick and he watched us come in and he said "Welcome suckers" and I remember that pair of white ducks because I bought them from him later for $5.00 because he couldn't wear them anymore and they had a 30 inch waist, which I couldn't use today. FRANK BORING: From Rangoon, what was the next stop? Where did you go from there? R.M. SMITH: From Rangoon we went up to Toungoo which was a small town in the central Burma plains and the airport was about 7 miles out of town, Keydaw Airport. Toungoo had one place to eat, the railroad �station, and some Baptist Missionaries. I remember I bought from them a Burmese grammar to study Burmese. FRANK BORING: Give us your impressions of your arrival there. What were the living conditions like? What was the weather like? What was the atmosphere like? R.M. SMITH: We were in Toungoo in central Burma in the middle of August, it is hot, the first thing that we noticed was the horrible, oppressive heat. Our barracks were built for the British. Teak wood with a veranda, porch, on one side. The beds all had a nice little sticker on them saying "On his Majesty's Service," but this airfield was built for the British but they were not using it, so they turned it over to us as a gesture because Chennault did not want to start training up in China because Burma, at that time was neutral and it was a safer and better place to train than China itself, where we could have been subjected immediately to air raids and many of our pilots had never blown a P-40. FRANK BORING: What were the barracks like? Could you describe a little bit more in detail what the barracks were like? R.M. SMITH: The barracks were made of teak, the roof was a thatched roof, they had lots of bugs in them, we had mosquito bars over the barracks and when we'd go to bed at night, I'd always take my clothes inside to keep various odd creatures from getting in them. Then the first thing I'd do when I dressed in the morning was to knock out my shoes to be sure that I didn't have anything in there before I put my feet in them. FRANK BORING: Were there any incidents you could recall - one of the things that was mentioned in one of the books was snakes would sometimes run through the barracks. Were there any incidents that you can recall that happened in the barracks along that line? �R.M. SMITH: I don't remember any snakes in the barracks, but I do remember almost stepping on a crate one night as I was going over to the mess hall and we heard some real nice stories about the crate. They said if you're bitten by it, you had 90 seconds to live and they tell a story of a Gurkha who was bit in the hand and with one motion he took his knife and cut his hand off in order to save his life. A crate is a very poisonous snake, not too long. FRANK BORING: That story is powerful. This time explain what the crate is though. R.M. SMITH: There was a story about the Gurkha who was bitten by a crate. Now a crate is one of the most poisonous snakes in Southeast Asia. It's not very long, it has colors of red and yellow on it. They tell the story of a Gurkha who was bitten by the crate - when you're bitten you have 90 seconds before you die - so with one motion the Gurkha grabbed his knife and cut off his hand in order to save his life. FRANK BORING: What were your immediate duties, if you will, once you arrived there? What was your job, what were you supposed to be doing? R.M. SMITH: The first job that I had when I got there was - since I was a radioman - was to tear out all the wiring in the P-40 planes that we had, because they were wired for British radios because these had been designed to go to Britain. But we didn't have the British radios, so we had to tear out the wiring and re-wire them for an RCA 7H. I think it was a radio that was designed for Piper Cubs. The radios had - I think 24 volt batteries in the planes - but the radios were 12 volt, so we had to tap half the side of the battery in order to run the radio. Now this runs down the battery on one side and out the other, which doesn't do any good for the batteries and makes the crew chief very, very unhappy. Crew chiefs were always chewing out the radiomen because of their damn radios. So we set up a little shed near the field and we had a battery charger there and we had many batteries and we were always charging batteries. �FRANK BORING: When was your first meetings with the official AVG people, for example Chennault or Greenlaw or any of these people? When did you first meet these people? R.M. SMITH: When I got to Toungoo, I never really met Chennault while I was there. I saw him at a distance. I saw various people, but most of my contact was with Parker Dupouy who was appointed Communications Officer and so he was the one that I talked to and that I reported to. FRANK BORING: During your stay in Toungoo, besides putting the radios in - or is that all you did during that period of time? Were there other things that you had to do besides the radios? R.M. SMITH: Besides that I was put in charge of communication supply while I was in Toungoo and one of my jobs was to try to scrounge tools and any spare parts that I could get locally in the local town of Toungoo. I remember the day before - the day Pearl Harbor when we heard about it, I had been planning to go to Toungoo to go around the various shops and markets and scrounge tools and I though well I might as well go, I think we're gonna need them worse than ever now, so I did. FRANK BORING: What's involved with scrounging? What do you mean by scrounging? R.M. SMITH: Scrounging is an old Army term meaning going out and get by any means - fair or foul - whatever you need for tools, food, whatever. FRANK BORING: So for example if you went into Toungoo to get radio parts or something like that, where would you look for that? R.M. SMITH: There were thieves' markets in Toungoo. There used to be jokes that if something was stolen from you, go down there the next day and you can buy it back. You would see - they would sell - I bought pliers there, screwdrivers, various odds and ends. Whatever �was around. We'd buy things there that here in the States that we'd probably throw away, we wouldn't bother with. FRANK BORING: What was the supply situation like in Toungoo in terms of you have a problem with fixing something because of a tool - could you just ask Parker Dupouy and he'd be able to provide you with the equipment? How did you go about - I guess what I'm trying to get is this idea of - you didn't have a Sears and Roebuck that you could just order out of - what was the supply situation like? R.M. SMITH: One of the big problems in our supply situation was that we did not have any spare parts at all and very little proviso for them. We had 100 P-40's, one of which dropped in the bay at Rangoon, so absolutely no spare parts. There were no tires, no extra tires or anything. So when a plane crashed and we had quite a few accidents, we'd use the plane to the part various parts for repair. Later on they did find from the Philippines and from Singapore, they did find some spare tires and some various other things. In fact, Joe Alsop, that was his main job there to scrounge around the various parts of the Far East looking for spare parts. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Flying Tigers Interviews and Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Chinese World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Description An account of the resource Collection contains original 1940s films and interviews conducted in the 1990s, documenting the history of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) "Flying Tigers." The Flying Tigers were organized by the United States to aid China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Original filmstrips were recorded by AVG crewmen Joe Gasdick and Chuck Misenheimer, as well as Chinese Air Force Interpreter P.Y. Shu, who was assigned to assist Col. Claire Chennault as he trained Chinese pilots and established the AVG. Interviews with members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) “Flying Tigers” were conducted by Frank Boring for the documentary film Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers, which he co-produced with Frank Christopher under the production company Fei Hu Films. The AVG Flying Tigers were a group of American aviators, mechanics, medical and administrative military personnel, led by Col. Claire Chennault to assist the Chinese Air Force in their defense against Japanese air strikes from 1941-1942. The AVG Flying Tigers also flew in defense of the Burma Road, a major Chinese military supply route. The group disbanded and returned to regular U.S. military service after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Boring, Frank Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films Research and Production Files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938/1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Fei Hu Films Christopher, Frank Gasdick, Joseph Misenheimer, Charles V. P.Y. Shu Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4; application/pdf Language A language of the resource English; Chinese Type The nature or genre of the resource video; text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-1945 World War II Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88_Smith_Robert_M_1991-04-25_v02 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Robert M. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1991-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Robert M. Smith interview (video and transcript, 2 of 6), 1991 Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert M. Smith by filmmaker Frank Boring for the documentary, Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers. Smith served in the American Volunteer Group (AVG) as a Communications Specialist. In this tape, Smith describes the journey overseas with the AVG, his first impressions upon arrival in Rangoon and Toungoo, and his first duties as a radioman for the group. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Boring, Frank (interviewer) Christopher, Frank (director) Fei Hu Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films research and production files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/3afbbd23587127a26879e83c46804dc5.mp4 599b9b42dbee4b6be7c9b173badfd4f6 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6cbbc23aba0fca39696198722559357c.pdf c976e2221c732220d94059a22b13ace0 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Special Collections & University Archives RHC-88 Fei Hu Films Flying Tigers Interview Interviewer: Frank Boring Interviewee: Robert M. Smith Date of Interview: 04-25-1991 Transcriber: Frank Boring [TAPE 3] FRANK BORING: You had worked with radios in various capacities before you even got out there. I wonder if you could give us a real clear evaluation of the radios that were provided to you to put into these airplanes and as a professional radioman, what was your opinion - how did you react when they gave you these radios to put into these airplanes and how did they work? What kind of problems did you have? R.M. SMITH: We did not have the radios of the caliber that we had in the P-40's in the States. The 20th Pursuit Group was a P-40 group and with three squadrons all using P-40's. So that generally the radiomen, the mechanics that found them were very chagrined when they found that they had to operate with a radio that probably was designed for a Piper Cub - they used to use that phrase. The quality wasn't nearly as good, they weren't as well built, they weren't as solid, they were smaller. They caused problems in the air. We had lots of complaints that the radio didn't work and it was not uncommon at all to find radio failure. FRANK BORING: Before you even installed them, the radios, did you anticipate there was going to be problems? Did you think - oh no, these things are not gonna work right. Did you actually get a chance to tell anybody that - either Parker Dupouy or anybody else? �R.M. SMITH: I don't know. I don't think I can really go in and know that much about the thing. I just don't remember. FRANK BORING: When you got there and it was so hot and the insects were there and there were snakes out there and everything, did you have any second thoughts about - what am I doing here? R.M. SMITH: After I had been there for a week or two, many of us began to wonder what are we doing here and there were a number of them that quit and left because there was absolutely no way to keep anybody there. Technically we were civilians and if we wanted to quit and go home we could. Personally, I had no desire to quit. This was part of the adventure. So it was hot and so it was miserable and the food - the food was terrible - but do you know we were paying I think two or three rupees a day for the food - the chow - but the same contractor that was feeding us, was also in charge of the mess for the British, local British troops. And the British were paying six Anna's a day, which is about a 4th or a 5th of what we were. The British used to like to sneak into our mess because it was so much better than theirs. Well the food was so bad that I got to wondering what are they doing with it in the kitchen? So I decided, foolishly, to go and inspect the kitchen. This was a cultural shock because modern American stoves - no way. A big mud, brick platform with little charcoal pots on it. Dirty, filthy. I couldn't eat for a couple of days. But I made a rule - as long as I'm in the Far East, never again will I go and inspect a kitchen. If it's hot and it tastes good, I'll eat it. FRANK BORING: The time that you spent there at Keydaw, once you had the radios installed, and you're scrounging for equipment and what not, what was your daily routine like? What was it you were doing? I know that the planes were training at that time and planes were cracking up and coming in and being repaired, but what were you doing during that period of time? �R.M. SMITH: In the months before Pearl Harbor while the pilots were mostly training, I frankly don't remember too much what I was doing at that time. It was a routine and not particularly memorable. The things I do remember is we did used to go into Toungoo, they'd run a truck in and I can remember going and visiting the local Buddhist Temple. They had a Kwei [?] there during the Feat [?] of Lights and sitting around - you had to take your shoes off in the temple, but you could smoke - it was okay to smoke and talking with the local Burmese there. Many of them of course spoke English. The rumor that went around with the Burmese was that Britain had borrowed so much money from the United States that they had pawned Burma to the United States and we were there to see that it was being taken care of and the British didn't get away with anything. FRANK BORING: Let's now go to the day of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. How did you first hear about it and what was your reaction to it once you had heard? Because you had stopped off in Honolulu and you had spent some time there. I don't know if you knew any people that were at Pearl Harbor or not - but what was your reaction and how did you find out about it? R.M. SMITH: Well I remember on December 8th, which was a day different than on the other side of the International Date Line, I remember getting up and going down to the field and someone told me the Japanese have bombed Pearl Harbor. And I though uh oh, what shall I do. But I was scheduled to go out and look for equipment and I thought well, we're going to need it, so I did. When I came back it seemed to be - lots of rumors were flying around. The Chinese wanted us I think to go to China, the British wanted us to go to Rangoon to protect Rangoon and there were a lot of radiograms being sent all over the world, I think, to finally decide what we should do. So after 2 or 3 days, the word came one squadron is to go to Rangoon, the other two to China. The ground crew were to go up in convoy, because we didn't have any planes to take �equipment and men, so started up with trucks and Studebaker sedans, started up the road. FRANK BORING: Bob Locke had told us that the Studebaker sedans were not exactly the best mode of transportation for the Burma Road. Did you run into this kind of experience? What were the loading of equipment like, the trucks, the Studebaker's and all that? R.M. SMITH: The trucks that we had were mostly, in fact all, were American made I think Chevrolet's. The Studebaker sedans, I rode up the Burma Road and then later I had one at my station, they were comfortable. Of course it wasn't a jeep and occasionally we'd get springs broken, but they got us up there. FRANK BORING: What was the experience like, traveling up the Burma Road? R.M. SMITH: I enjoyed the trip up the Burma Road. I remember the first night we stopped at Mandalay and Mandalay as portrayed by Kipling, it always sounded very romantic to me, but Mandalay was a hole. It was down in the flatlands, dirty, no place to eat, we ate out of tin cans by the side of the road. We fixed cots and slept outside - no hotels, no hostels. So the next time up the road we stopped I think the next stop was Lashio, which was up in the hills and that was much nicer. It was a British colony where the British went during the summer months, so they had - I think there was a restaurant there or at the railroad station. FRANK BORING: What were you expecting to find at the end of this journey? Had they told you anything about where you were going or what you were going to go to? R.M. SMITH: We were told, when we started out on the trip up the Burma Road that our destination was Kunming and we had not much other information. I didn't really know what I was going to get into or what to expect. But what little we had seen of the Chinese up to this time, we knew we were going to be welcome. In fact the �Chinese General came and visited us at Toungoo and gave every man in the outfit a Fifth of Johnny Walker Red Label whiskey. I remember it rather fondly because I hadn't been drinking much scotch before then because a number of my friends did not drink, so I was also able to get their bottles. So we were looking forward to going up to China. It was - and after all Kunming is beautiful it's about 7000 feet above sea level in the tropics, so the climate is excellent. FRANK BORING: Could you describe for us your arrival in Kunming? Your impressions of it the first time you arrived there. R.M. SMITH: My first impression when I hit Kunming was good. We were billeted in hostel Number 1 which had been a college and we were assigned two men to a room with nice twin beds and the hot showers. The first time we'd had a hot shower I think - a regular shower - since we'd left the ship. The showers in Burma were a bucket, a wooden bucket with a shower head on the bottom of the bucket. These were filled with water and you had kind of a pulley that pulled them up over you. So you'd turn on a little bit of water, wet down, turn it off because you've only got one bucket for a shower. So to find nice hot showers with plenty of water in Kunming was the best we'd seen for a long time. FRANK BORING: In Kunming, once you had settled into the hostel, what were your immediate duties there? Were they any different than Burma - cite some of the differences? R.M. SMITH: When I first got to Kunming I was placed in charge of communications supply and they had a fairly large warehouse there and I know that I had a bunch of carpenters building desks and file cabinets and so forth like that. And I was there for several weeks and then I was sent down to Kunyang to relieve Richardson, who was our radioman down there, for a week's vacation and then after I relieved him, I came back to Kunming and then was sent up to the radio station VO2 at Chengyi [?]. �FRANK BORING: What were these radio stations like? Can you describe them to us and what was their function? R.M. SMITH: Each radio station had one transmitter which was - RCA 4 channel - you could transmit on any one of 4 frequencies, very powerful 400 watt transmitter. Then we had 3 receivers and power units to power the transmitters and the receiver rooms. The station equipment was fine. The quality of the housing for the equipment very drastically from station to station. Quite often our radio stations were set in a temple, because in a small town or village, the only public building is the temple and the natives, the people in China used that for their weddings, to put guests, whatever, the only public building in the village. So quite often we were housed there. FRANK BORING: So these radio areas were part of the warning net? R.M. SMITH: Yes. They were superimposed. We had thirteen radio stations in the AVG in Yunnan Province in China. Later on we had more, but we also closed some that we had down near the Burmese border. They were superimposed on the Chinese air raid warning net. My station at Chengyi [?] was at one of the Chinese net control headquarters for the area, there were three Chinese net control stations. One at Chengyi [?], one at Kunming and one at Yunnanyi. The Chinese nets fed in from either radio or telephone lines into these net control stations, but the stations themselves were somewhat interlocking. In other words, there was not only information feeding up and down, but also between stations, particularly the radio stations of course. FRANK BORING: I'd like to get a better perspective of how all this interwove, how this all worked together. You had Chinese stations, then you had the AVG stations. What was the effect of the whole together? Were they separate from each other? Did they interlink with each �other? Where was the central location for controlling it and operating? R.M. SMITH: The Chinese air raid warning net was of itself independent and completely separate from the AVG net and they fed in to the various population centers warnings of any enemy, Japanese activity. Our 13 stations were placed in strategic places where we could 1) collect information from the Chinese, the radioman or whoever was there and 2) communicate with our pilots in the air if they should so happen to be over our station. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Flying Tigers Interviews and Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Chinese World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Description An account of the resource Collection contains original 1940s films and interviews conducted in the 1990s, documenting the history of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) "Flying Tigers." The Flying Tigers were organized by the United States to aid China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Original filmstrips were recorded by AVG crewmen Joe Gasdick and Chuck Misenheimer, as well as Chinese Air Force Interpreter P.Y. Shu, who was assigned to assist Col. Claire Chennault as he trained Chinese pilots and established the AVG. Interviews with members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) “Flying Tigers” were conducted by Frank Boring for the documentary film Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers, which he co-produced with Frank Christopher under the production company Fei Hu Films. The AVG Flying Tigers were a group of American aviators, mechanics, medical and administrative military personnel, led by Col. Claire Chennault to assist the Chinese Air Force in their defense against Japanese air strikes from 1941-1942. The AVG Flying Tigers also flew in defense of the Burma Road, a major Chinese military supply route. The group disbanded and returned to regular U.S. military service after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Boring, Frank Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films Research and Production Files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938/1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Fei Hu Films Christopher, Frank Gasdick, Joseph Misenheimer, Charles V. P.Y. Shu Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4; application/pdf Language A language of the resource English; Chinese Type The nature or genre of the resource video; text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-1945 World War II Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88_Smith_Robert_M_1991-04-25_v03 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Robert M. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1991-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Robert M. Smith interview (video and transcript, 3 of 6) 1991 Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert M. Smith by filmmaker Frank Boring for the documentary, Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers. Smith served in the American Volunteer Group (AVG) as a Communications Specialist. In this tape, Smith discusses his reactions to the airplane radios of the AVG, the news of Pearl Harbor, and traveling up the Burma Road. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Boring, Frank (interviewer) Christopher, Frank (director) Fei Hu Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films research and production files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/05a90feddad941b58551d8a69e26d576.mp4 79fa4fa126fa5d665fac899078436ff4 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/809f726c725eadaf89cde21dc7567606.pdf 7c612478c00c18e4099e3065fb1f21dc PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Special Collections & University Archives RHC-88 Fei Hu Films Flying Tigers Interview Interviewer: Frank Boring Interviewee: Robert M. Smith Date of Interview: 04-25-1991 Transcriber: Frank Boring [TAPE 4] FRANK BORING: If we could continue on with your description of the overall communications, the warning net, the Chinese warning net, the AVG warning net, how they all fit in together and what was the purpose of it and how it all fit into Chennault being able to know what was going on during a given day. R.M. SMITH: The American Volunteer Group radio network operated on 648 kilocycles. We had just one frequency, so this meant that of all our 13 radio stations and our planes all were operating on one frequency so they could communicate. Any plane could communicate with any one of the AVG stations. Also, General Chennault maintained a radio in his office tuned into this frequency. The pilots on the field in the ready shack had a receiver listening to this frequency so that they would get information as quickly as possible. The Chinese nets would report and the station at Chengyi [?] and Kunming and Yunnanyi, the AVG stations, would pick up - because we were interconnected by telephone with these. So we would call if we heard of enemy activity, for example, like heavy engine noise in Section L22 - we would call this immediately by voice in the clear to Kunming, so the pilots, any pilot listening or Chennault and our headquarters operations of course, knew immediately what was coming on and they could start plotting. All of Yunnan Province was divided up into sectors with an alphabet across the top and numbers on the side - these were 20 kilometer squares and theoretically there should be a �Chinese air raid radio warning in each of the squares. So if we reported L22, other people with the map knew exactly where they were and generally the first warning would be heavy engine noise that was what they'd hear. Later on it might be 10 two engine Japanese bombers, much more specific. But the first was quite often just heavy engine noise. FRANK BORING: Where were you on December 20th, with the attack on Kunming when there were bombers and the first AVG encounter with the Japanese? R.M. SMITH: On December 20th, on our first encounter, our pilot's first encounter with the Japanese, I was on the Burma Road going up to Kunming, so I was - I spent Christmas day in Lashio and there we heard about this deal, by word of mouth, I don't know how we got the information. But were just driving through and spent the night there, so we heard about it in Lashio. FRANK BORING: What was your reaction to this? R.M. SMITH: I don't know - I kind of thought it was to be expected. I kind of just had a feeling that our guys would do right. Although when we first went over there, I was real dubious and I wondered if we'd ever be as famous as the Eagle Squadron in Britain. FRANK BORING: Why is that? R.M. SMITH: Well, the Eagle Squadron was very famous in those days and I really didn't know what the future was going to hold. FRANK BORING: But why did you have any doubts about it - was this during the training period when the airplanes were being cracked up and all that. Let's go back to that for a second. R.M. SMITH: This was one of the depressing things about the training down in Toungoo, that we lost pilots and we lost planes. Our first casualty �was Army Armstrong. He went to Kansas State, my own college and I talked to him one day down at the hangar, he was riding his bicycle and we talked about Kansas State and a few days later there was a crash and he was gone. It was very discouraging because we lost a lot of planes in training accidents. Some of the pilots, I used to hear comments, all they'd ever flown was a big boat in the Navy. So it was discouraging then. FRANK BORING: Once you arrived in Kunming when was the next encounter that you can recall? They didn't come back to Kunming for… again. R.M. SMITH: The Japanese planes did not come back to Kunming after that first attempt in December 20, 1941, as long as the AVG was in Kunming. Later on, when I was back with the Army Air Corps, I was in bombing raids in Kunming and they were bombing it later, but they didn't try to bomb it while the AVG was there. FRANK BORING: After that initial flurry of battle there, Kunming settled down. Were you still in that area? Where were you transferred to say in January, February, that area? R.M. SMITH: I was transferred from Kunming to the station at Chengyi [?], which is about 140 or 150 miles northeast of Kunming. It was a very good station. The station was set up with a hostel for 200 Americans, they had a good cook, they had a barber - who's only job was to watch my hair grow so he could cut it, which was kind of ridiculous, but we had a good platoon of central troops with wool uniforms guarding the hostel. So it was very good. FRANK BORING: So you said it could house 200 Americans. Were there actually 200 Americans there? R.M. SMITH: No. At that time I was the only American there. Later on - much later when the Americans came in, they did station a squadron there. But when I was there with the AVG, I was the only American in the whole area. �FRANK BORING: Let's talk a little bit about that, being the only American there and your inter-reactions with the Chinese. Who were the Chinese you were interacting with, did they speak English, were they an educated group, did you deal with soldiers, did you deal only with your own group? Tell us as much as you can about that particular period. R.M. SMITH: I was very fortunate at the radio station in Chengyi?. In the first place, the Chinese who was assigned to this station, Captain Chen Nan Ming, was a very intelligent guy with a degree in electrical engineering and spoke excellent English, so we got along real fine, no problem at all. The hostel manager spoke English and the barber didn't, but that was no problem. So it was a very… FRANK BORING: Let's talk a bit about your duties there. What was the routine like, what was your interaction with your fellow workers, did you feel special that you were the only American there, did you feel uncomfortable while you were there? Let's talk about your daily kind of routine. R.M. SMITH: My daily routine at the radio station was to get up at about 5:30 every morning to go open the station. I had it open by 6 o'clock, so the first day that I was there I asked the houseboy to wake me up at 5:30 in the morning. (break) FRANK BORING: You were telling us about your first day there, the houseboy was gonna wake you up - start at the very beginning. R.M. SMITH: On my first day at my radio station in Chengyi, I told the houseboy to wake me up at 5 o'clock in the morning and he looked at me and didn't say anything. Pretty soon, a half hour later he came back and loaned me an alarm clock. He wasn't about to get up at 5:30 in the morning. So anyway I had to open the station at 6:00 and I'd call in to Kunming and report and every station would come in and report. �Then we would sit and if nothing happened, if there was no Japanese activity, it would be mostly just sitting there listening to the receiver crackle. About 8:30 I'd leave the station, which was about almost a mile from the hostel, in charge of the Chinese, and go back and have breakfast and then come back again. I frankly used to look forward to Japanese activity because it was exciting, it was something happening. The way I got my information, there was a Chinese telephone operator who had a desk and an office right next to my station in the same building and he was a key link in the Chinese network. He had I think 8 or so telephones coming in, reporting in to him, which he then reported on to his net control station. So any reports that he got, either from his station or from below him, he would come and tell me. He was very efficient. He'd come in - but the problem was he did not speak English. He had one word of English "Okay" and he'd come in and say "Jing bow" meaning Chinese air raid. And I would say "Sumo di Fong" where? And he'd go over to the big map and he'd start pointing and finding the name and then I could see ah that's sector L22, so I'd call Kunming, "hey heavy engine noise in sector L22". FRANK BORING: Spell for me if you will, the station name R.M. SMITH: C-h-e-n-g-y-i FRANK BORING: If you could explain to us the people that you were working with immediately within your confines of the office there? R.M. SMITH: At the radio station at Chengyi, In charge of the Chinese staff was Captain Chen Nanming, who was a very intelligent and really top guy. Under him was a Lieutenant Chief Operator and two or three other Chinese operators and two or three Chinese mechanics. To guard the station, we had six Yunnanese troops who guarded the transmitter, which was about 1/2 mile away from the receiver station. The receiver station and the transmitter was connected by a telephone - the old Army telephone in a leather case, I think it's EE-8 or something - I've forgotten. Down at the transmitter station, �where the guard was on duty 24 hours a day, there was the transmitter and the car unit that governed and furnished power for the receiver station - was locked, padlocked. But outside the door was two buttons so that the guard there could press a button to start the engine which would give power and we could start the transmitter. Or he could push the off button and kill it. So when we wanted the power, we would ring the phone, he'd say "Wa eh" and I'd say "Kai jiji" that means start the engine or open (technically) open the engine and when we were through with power and were gonna operate on batteries, I'd say "Kwan jiji" shut off the engine, and he'd say "Wai wai.” FRANK BORING: Were there any particular incidents that happened while you were there, that stick out in your mind. I mean you had a daily routine, but was there anything in particular that stuck out at that time, any events, any news perhaps that came in? R.M. SMITH: One thing that we did almost every day at the station was to tune in to the BBC at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. We had 3 radio receivers so one was a battery one that we used when we didn't want to waste gasoline. But we always listened generally to BBC at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. The Chinese would often gather around and then after that was over we would tune to Chung King and they would listen to the news in Chinese which was almost a routine. Most of the time it was very boring for not only me but for the Chinese operators, because they didn't have too much to do. I remember one time I got a long coded message all numbers, from Kunming and I was sitting there copying the code and I started to break because Boogy [?] was going too fast for me and I looked and there was a Chinese operator and he signed they were copying away. They hadn't missed anything, they were faster than I was. So I just stopped copying and leaned back and then when the message - I said Okay and went back to voice and said "Fine Boogy [?]" and he says "Boy you're getting better in your code speed Smith". I never told him. �FRANK BORING: Could you describe any details of encounters or air battles that came over the radio or anything of that nature? R.M. SMITH: I looked forward to Japanese activity. Occasionally, not too often, but occasionally we'd have some real activity. Particularly down near the Burmese border when we were losing Burma and we would watch and we could hear the pilots in the air, we could hear the ground men, the radiomen working back and forth with them and this was dramatic and interesting and exciting. But most of the radioman's time was just sitting there listening to a receiver crackle and nothing happened. We used to play bridge though. I had two interpreters, by the way, assigned to the station and they both played bridge of a sort, so did I. So we'd - but we'd always bid in English and even when I wasn't playing with them and they'd play bridge, they would always bid in English, but then they'd do all their discussions of hands of course in Chinese. It seemed like towards the end of April, that the Japanese were coming up the Burma Road faster than we did in convoy. The whole front collapsed down there. Our planes were pulled back from Rangoon to Toungoo and then back to Lashio and then into the fields around the Burma/Chinese border. This became a very dangerous time for us, at least we felt it was dangerous. I remember talking to Captain Chen and figuring out what if the Japanese did break through, what would we do? Well we had plenty of gasoline and we had a truck and the Studebaker sedan, but we started figuring out the only place that we could go would be north to Chinese Turkistan, towards the Siberian border. But we figured out that we could not carry enough gas to get us there, so we decided that the only thing we could do was pray and see what happened and stick there, because we could not run. The scenes in Paoshan down near the border - we had a radio station at Paoshan but it fell to the Japanese - the scenes there were terrible. Refugees were coming through, there were British troops, Chinese, all trying to get out of Burma and the scenes on the highway and the roads were terrible wrecks, confusion, a lot of people died in that flight from Burma. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Flying Tigers Interviews and Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Chinese World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Description An account of the resource Collection contains original 1940s films and interviews conducted in the 1990s, documenting the history of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) "Flying Tigers." The Flying Tigers were organized by the United States to aid China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Original filmstrips were recorded by AVG crewmen Joe Gasdick and Chuck Misenheimer, as well as Chinese Air Force Interpreter P.Y. Shu, who was assigned to assist Col. Claire Chennault as he trained Chinese pilots and established the AVG. Interviews with members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) “Flying Tigers” were conducted by Frank Boring for the documentary film Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers, which he co-produced with Frank Christopher under the production company Fei Hu Films. The AVG Flying Tigers were a group of American aviators, mechanics, medical and administrative military personnel, led by Col. Claire Chennault to assist the Chinese Air Force in their defense against Japanese air strikes from 1941-1942. The AVG Flying Tigers also flew in defense of the Burma Road, a major Chinese military supply route. The group disbanded and returned to regular U.S. military service after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Boring, Frank Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films Research and Production Files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938/1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Fei Hu Films Christopher, Frank Gasdick, Joseph Misenheimer, Charles V. P.Y. Shu Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4; application/pdf Language A language of the resource English; Chinese Type The nature or genre of the resource video; text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-1945 World War II Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88_Smith_Robert_M_1991-04-25_v04 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Robert M. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1991-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Robert M. Smith interview (video and transcript, 4 of 6), 1991 Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert M. Smith by filmmaker Frank Boring for the documentary, Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers. Smith served in the American Volunteer Group (AVG) as a Communications Specialist. In this tape, Smith describes the overall communications for the AVG, in addition to the attack on Kunming and working at the radio station in Chengyi. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Boring, Frank (interviewer) Christopher, Frank (director) Fei Hu Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films research and production files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/a6b7da8f1f51bae67cdf5d5b689c553a.mp4 fb19a0014649738806910e9b061acd22 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7a34f9d992afef54c4842703425caf9d.pdf 822cc1553ff8b1e4a37eda2d8b2ac767 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Special Collections & University Archives RHC-88 Fei Hu Films Flying Tigers Interview Interviewer: Frank Boring Interviewee: Robert M. Smith Date of Interview: 04-25-1991 Transcriber: Frank Boring [TAPE 5] R.M. SMITH: The radio station at Chengyi was the most efficient in the Chinese net. The cooperation, the reports of enemy activity came in through that Chinese net control station much faster than at Kunming or Yunnanyi, so I generally got all reports of enemy activity before anyone else. I remember one time I called Kunming and reported that there was Japanese bombers over Yunnanyi. Well Morgan Vaux was the radio operator down there, so he called me direct and said "Hey Smitty what are you talking about? I haven't had any reports." I said "Well I don't know, that's what I've got." He said "Wait a minute" and a couple of minutes later he came back and says "They're overhead, they're dropping bombs. I'm going to the slit trench." That station at Yunnanyi was in a temple and it was a hole and Morgan Vaux used to - was bored, nothing to do and he didn't have the nice set-up that I had. So he would write poetry in his very bad poetry, mostly having to do with the way the Chinese fertilized the fields. And he would write them on this - I saw them later - he would write them on the white walls of the temple. Then in the morning when he was pretty bored, he'd call up all stations from PB-1, "this is the poem of the day" and he would read them. There was a lot of gossip going on, on the frequency. Remember radiomen are gabby people, whether they're on CW or voice, and there was Sasser, old Sasser was a radioman down at Munksa [?], now Munksa [?] is on the old railroad line down in Hanoi, about 100 - 150 miles south of Kunming. Sasser was shacking up with a Chinese woman. He would come on the air and go into explicit �detail about his sex life - how he got his gun, she got her gun there was a bunk there in my radio shack - and I'd lie on that and I'd roar at the incredible stories that he was telling. And I realized that Chennault was on that frequency, the pilots were on that frequency. But when I went back to China the second time I decided I ought to report in and I came back with AACS Communications outfit and I thought I ought to report in to Chennault, courtesy, although I was not under him. So I went over and his Secretary was Doreen Lomberg, whom I had met before and so she got me right in to see Chennault and I saluted and said "Happy to be back" or whatever and he looked at me and he says "Do you remember Sasser?" I said "Yes, Sir" "I had to get rid of Sasser" he says. FRANK BORING: Do you remember any of the poetry? R.M. SMITH: No. But later when I was at Yunnanyi for a few days I read this poetry on the wall and it was pretty bad. FRANK BORING: Did you get the chance to get to know Chennault after a while or when did you really start to get to the point where you had more contact with him? R.M. SMITH: I didn't have much contact with Chennault either in the AVG or even later. I didn't really meet and talk to him too much until we started having our reunions and he was at our last reunion in 1957 at Ojai. I remember when Doreen Lomberg escaped from Hong Kong. She was engaged to a staff member, Davis, I believe and when she - she hitchhiked, she escaped from Hong Kong and she hitchhiked and when she saw my car, the Studebaker sedan in front of the station on the Burma Road with AVG on it, she stopped, got off and came up to the station. Then I called - I had direct telephone lines to Kunming, so I called Kunming and told Davis and so he came up the next day and got her. But she, that night we spent a lot of time, she telling about the situations in Hong Kong �and the complete collapse and the Japanese. But she had a foreign passport and was able to escape and get out of there. FRANK BORING: After you finished up at that particular place at Chengyi, where did you go from there? R.M. SMITH: From Chengyi, I stayed there until about a week before we broke up, so it was the end of June and I went down to Kunming. FRANK BORING: Once you arrived in Kunming were a lot of the other guys there at that time? What was your reaction when you arrived there? What were you expecting and what happened when you arrived there? R.M. SMITH: Well I think the general morale was kind of low at the time. We had lost perhaps 30% of our pilots, either in accidents - mostly in accidents, or enemy action or captured and we were, I think, ready to go home. Generally you don't keep a fighting unit that long in combat without relief. Today I think in front lines they keep combat maybe two weeks with relief and we'd been there for 7 months. So the mood was, let's go home, we've had it. A few stayed - I've forgotten how many - maybe 20 or so pilots and ground crew did stay, but most of us came back to the States. FRANK BORING: I guess what I'm looking for is when you arrived there was two weeks before July 4th - about two weeks just before the July 4th breakup - a lot of people stayed on for two weeks after July 4th. R.M. SMITH: No, I was in Kunming perhaps a week before July 4th and then from there we were officially disbanded on July 4, 1942. FRANK BORING: Was there any attempt to ask you to stay? R.M. SMITH: Yes. I went in before the board. I had told them I wouldn't stay when I was in Kunming - I mean when I was out at my station in Chengyi, I told them I wouldn't stay. �FRANK BORING: Who were they? R.M. SMITH: I got a radiogram from Williams offering me First Lieutenant if I would stay at my station in Chengyi and stay in the Army. I told him no and was relieved by I think, an American Sergeant and so I proceeded down to Kunming. But when I was in Kunming, I started feeling guilty for not staying so I told them that I'd go before the board. So I went in before the - Chennault was there and there were several officers. I do not know - remember who they were, but I also remember that they weren't very friendly. The only question I think they asked me was "Mr. Smith did you graduate from high school?" So I had and I had almost got a reserve commission for three and a half years ROTC in college, so the next question they said "well, General Chennault what rank did you want for Smith?" and he said "Second Lieutenant" and I said "I thought I was going to be a First Lieutenant" and Chennault said "Okay, maybe in 3 months we'll promote you." So I agreed I'd stay. So I went out from the meeting and Ernie Bonham, who was in charge of radio operators AVG, he said "What did you tell them Smitty?" and I said "I said I'd stay" and he said "You can go down to Yunnanyi and relieve Vaux, we've got to get him out of there." So they flew me down, Parker Dupouy flew me down in a twoseated trainer, I think it was an AT6 and landed and the Yunnanyi station was dirty and a mess. There was dust all over the transmitters and the equipment and I was blaming Vaux for not being a good housekeeper. So the first day I spent cleaning it up and getting things in shape. The next morning when I came in it was just as dusty, the dusty old temple had a lot of rats in it and they just stirred up the dust. But then, I got to thinking that I hadn't been sworn in and the guys were going over and saying goodbye and I felt kind of alone. But I still would have stayed. But then I got an abscessed tooth and it was really swollen up and I was hitting myself because there was no dentist, there was nothing I could do about it. So I was hitting myself, trying to break it and then I thought they didn't swear me in. I'm not in the Army - if they'd sworn me in I'd have had it. So I called up in clear and said �"Hey I haven't been sworn in. I've changed my mind." And of course they had to release me and so they came down and brought some poor Sergeant down to relieve me and the pilot - I think it was Dupouy again, Parker, - the weather was bad and he wanted to get out of there and he said "Come on" and I said "I've got to show you where the station is." So I took him up and I said "Do you know anything about codes?" and he said "No" and I said "Well here's the code book." I heard later it took 2 or 3 days before he really got on the air. FRANK BORING: I'd like to go back briefly to… (break) FRANK BORING: Before you do that could you just give us an idea before you made the decision to sign up, why did you want to leave - before the abscess - the first time? R.M. SMITH: I think the reason that I wanted to go, return to the United States, was I think we were tired. Our morale was down. We had been living at the end of the pipeline. The food - well the Chinese fed us - it was well and good - it was certainly not America and there seemed to be a sense of futility. There was no replacements, very few - there were some replacements of P-40's but not many, no spare parts. I think it was just a morale problem. I think it was just we'd been there too long. And remember we worked 7 days a week. We never had a day off. It was from 6 in the morning until dusk and sometimes at night too if something happened. FRANK BORING: I'd like to get a sense of the last day you left the radio area, not Kunming. You had made good friends with Captain Chen, you'd made some close relationships with the Chinese people around you, or at least you'd worked with them. What was your feeling in terms of leaving there? Was there a sense of loss? Was there a sense of you would never see these people again? Was there a sense of accomplishment for what you did? What was the feeling �like when you left that radio shack you'd been working out of for so long? R.M. SMITH: I was sorry to leave my station at Chengyi because of the friends and the people. The local Kiwanis Club at a nearby town had invited me down to speak. There was a local Chinese Colonel who had a wife who was half English, who spoke English and invited me to dinner many times. But they'd started to break up the station. Captain Chen had been ordered out to go the east China to open new stations and as it happens in wartime, things are transitory and while I was sorry to go, I felt that we had done what we'd been hired to do and our contracts, they had definitely - the American the Army they had decided that our contracts would be up on July 4th. We had not said that and if they had continued our contracts, I'm sure we would have stayed longer. FRANK BORING: When you left to come back to the United States, you mentioned you had a culture shock arriving in China, what was it like coming back to the States? R.M. SMITH: When I came back to the States it was different. Of course it was a war atmosphere. Before it had been peace time. But I knew when I came back that we were going to be in this war for a long time and I wanted to be a part of it. When I got back I had a telegram from the War Department offering me to re-enlist in one grade higher. So I decided I would go back. So I went down to March Field and there I argued with the recruiting officer whether I'd be a Master Sergeant or a Tech, so we compromised on Tech Sergeant. While I was down there taking my physical at March Field, I ran into Pappy Greenlaw. Now Pappy Greenlaw had returned to the United States too and he was down there attempting to re-enlist in the service. I also, when I took the physical, the doctor looked at me and he said "I don't know whether you Flying Tigers can pass the physical or not" and I said "What do you mean?" and he said "Well I had two of them in here trying to enlist and I had to flunk them both. One had a punctured ear drum, the other had syphilis." �FRANK BORING: I mean you guys had a lot of air play, on the radio, newspapers, Time Magazine, what was the reaction of the people around you when you arrived back in the United States? Did they know you were a Flying Tiger? R.M. SMITH: Yes. My folks were living in Alhambra at the time and a newspaper man came from the Alhambra Daily Advocate and wanted to interview me, which he did and I think I still have a copy of the clipping. So they were quite interested. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Flying Tigers Interviews and Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Chinese World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Description An account of the resource Collection contains original 1940s films and interviews conducted in the 1990s, documenting the history of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) "Flying Tigers." The Flying Tigers were organized by the United States to aid China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Original filmstrips were recorded by AVG crewmen Joe Gasdick and Chuck Misenheimer, as well as Chinese Air Force Interpreter P.Y. Shu, who was assigned to assist Col. Claire Chennault as he trained Chinese pilots and established the AVG. Interviews with members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) “Flying Tigers” were conducted by Frank Boring for the documentary film Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers, which he co-produced with Frank Christopher under the production company Fei Hu Films. The AVG Flying Tigers were a group of American aviators, mechanics, medical and administrative military personnel, led by Col. Claire Chennault to assist the Chinese Air Force in their defense against Japanese air strikes from 1941-1942. The AVG Flying Tigers also flew in defense of the Burma Road, a major Chinese military supply route. The group disbanded and returned to regular U.S. military service after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Boring, Frank Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films Research and Production Files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938/1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Fei Hu Films Christopher, Frank Gasdick, Joseph Misenheimer, Charles V. P.Y. Shu Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4; application/pdf Language A language of the resource English; Chinese Type The nature or genre of the resource video; text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-1945 World War II Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88_Smith_Robert_M_1991-04-25_v05 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Robert M. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1991-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Robert M. Smith interview (video and transcript, 5 of 6), 1991 Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert M. Smith by filmmaker Frank Boring for the documentary, Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers. Smith served in the American Volunteer Group (AVG) as a Communications Specialist. In this tape, Smith discusses the experience of having to leave his station at Chengyi and later returning to the United States. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Boring, Frank (interviewer) Christopher, Frank (director) Fei Hu Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films research and production files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/269b00832e50de2d96e64a7a2d2cd707.mp4 2dec03e49c930b420f7d3b5ba1fba6a4 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/bcbd242bb9007be75b75201b286728ee.pdf 397a2229bbdfb0632fd23583699b6687 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Special Collections & University Archives RHC-88 Fei Hu Films Flying Tigers Interview Interviewer: Frank Boring Interviewee: Robert M. Smith Date of Interview: 04-25-1991 Transcriber: Frank Boring [TAPE 6] FRANK BORING: We're gonna cover now just some of your personal evaluations. Not so much what you heard or what other people said, but your own personal evaluations. The AVG from the very beginning, in fact I think you may have reported in your own diary, you talked about this rich and rowdy group of guys. Misunderstood and what not - I was just wondering what your impressions of the AVG was? R.M. SMITH: My impression of the members of the American Volunteer Group is mixed. One thing, particularly the enlisted men, they were released from bondage. When you're in the service, you are kept down. But over there out of the country, they did about and said about what they pleased. Now I don't mean to imply they didn't do a good job or do their job. Some of them were absolutely incredible in what they did, but they didn't hesitate to say what they think. If people's customs were not theirs, they would express themselves as to their opinion. Many of them were heavy drinkers. Some didn't drink at all. Some even got religion over there. But they were in some ways, some of them were rather wild. FRANK BORING: Looking back now from the perspective of your life now, how do you evaluate the AVG from this perspective, from where you are now? The men of the AVG, what they accomplished? R.M. SMITH: Looking back now at the AVG, I feel real proud that I was lucky to be a member. �(break) FRANK BORING: You had described the AVG from the perspective of that period. I guess what we're looking now is from your perspective here, now at this time, the men of the AVG and what they accomplished? R.M. SMITH: I think, looking back that being a member of the American Volunteer Group was one of the high points of my life. I'll never forget it. I made some very good friends there that I have seen year after year at the reunions. Some of which of course aren't with us anymore. But I'll never forget the guys - and we had gals too - we had four women in the AVG. They've been good friends and I've always been very proud that I was able to be a member. FRANK BORING: You also had an opportunity to do a lot more in your life after the AVG and you've also done some research and studied China. You've taken it upon yourself to build a library that has a great deal to do with China. Looking back now, where do you think AVG fits in terms of history? In terms of China's history? In terms of America's history? R.M. SMITH: I think the AVG will be remembered because we were the one bright spot at the time when we were losing Singapore, the Philippines, Rangoon. We were the one organization - American organization - that was having victory and why it was important I think it was an omen of the things that were to come. The Japanese learned that Americans could fight and would fight. They had been told our pilots were afraid. So it was the beginning of the great victory that, we, the allied powers won in World War II. FRANK BORING: How about for China. Where do you think we fit - you've had a chance to study China - where do you think AVG fit in terms of the history of China? R.M. SMITH: The relationship that we had with the Chinese was amazingly good. I always liked the Chinese and the Chinese liked us. I �remember there was an INS newspaper correspondent, his name Lee, that came through my station at Chengyi and he commented on that. He couldn't get over the fact that the relationship with the Americans and the Chinese was so good. Part of the reason I think was, in some ways Chinese and Americans look at things the same way. They both are very proud people. They both consider themselves worthy and they recognize that in each other. There are some races that seem to have an inferiority complex, or at least that's the way it comes across to us who perhaps don't know them well, but I think we, the Americans respected each other and it was the beginning of a good friendship. FRANK BORING: Before we were talking about the Salween Gorge and you guys were preparing to leave, could you tell us about what you thought the AVG did there? R.M. SMITH: It was in May 1942, when the Japanese were advancing up the Burma Road and we were very much afraid that they were going to capture Kunming and be completely cut off. We were making plans to leave, evacuate if we could, but we had no place to go. We couldn't carry enough gas to get us to Siberia. But our pilots helped the Chinese. The Chinese made a stand on the Salween River and our pilots went in - very dangerously. Tex Hill was part of the group - went in and bombed and while this may not have been the only thing that stopped them, this was one of the factors, with Chinese troops dug in on the other side, this was one of the factors that stopped the Japanese advance into China and if that had happened, that would have been a disastrous event and China might have gotten out of the war completely, releasing Japanese troops and energies for other ill-advised adventures. FRANK BORING: If you could make a couple of comments on - you had mentioned earlier about a dinner that Madame Chiang Kai-shek hosted and she always considered you her darling boys. But I understand this night it was not exactly - she was not exactly happy with you. I wonder if you could talk about that a little bit? �R.M. SMITH: In Kunming in January 1942, the Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and Madame Chiang came down to Kunming and hosted a very nice banquet for us. The Generalissimo gave scarves to all members with his chop on it and spoke. Madame Chiang translated and then she gave a little speech and she kind of chewed us out. Our reputation as far as morals was not too good and she told us all about that. I think she called us "her angels without wings." FRANK BORING: One other comment if you will. When you were on the radio, did you hear about the battles? I mean you got reports back on how the battles went. Did you also hear about some of the pilots or ground crew that got killed? R.M. SMITH: Yes. Of course a radio station is a good place to get information, but we didn't get a lot of it over the air because that would have to be in the clear and we would sometimes hear reports. We did have telephone lines that we could use, but not heavily like we do today. But we also had quite a bit of road communications from Kunming up either going to Chung King or out to the far eastern stations, so we would get reports and rumors, sometimes second or third hand of various activity. But of course sometimes it would be a little garbled, but we had kind of a grapevine I think. FRANK BORING: Was there any of the guys in particular that either got hurt or you were concerned about, even one that perhaps had died, that had a particular effect on you? Do you recall in terms of your being isolated, knowing that battles were going on - or in Toungoo for that matter when the training part of it, were there any guys in particular that you were friends with - that had an effect on you? R.M. SMITH: It was always very difficult when we lost guys, either in accidents or in combat. This was something that affected all of us very deeply. It was particularly sad when someone that had been very popular died. I remember when Army Armstrong was killed, he had gone to the same college that I had and some of the early �accident deaths were from very popular pilots that all the ground crew felt deeply at their loss. FRANK BORING: You had mentioned before about Doolittle's raid and how Chennault sort of got excluded from knowing about the raid and perhaps could have done something about it. Can you comment on that for us? R.M. SMITH: I remember talking to General Doolittle when he attended one of our reunions at Ojai many years after the AVG, and I asked him why they didn't have some homing beacons - or they hadn't let us know, because we could have guided the Doolittle Raiders into some of those eastern fields. That's what those fields had been designed for. Well Doolittle told me that there were two things: 1) that they were afraid to let Chennault know because he was so close to the Chinese and they were afraid that it would get out and it would destroy the mission if any word got to the Japanese, and 2) they had a plane, a C-47 filled with communication equipment and a homing beacon, it was flying out to China to be installed on one of the airfields, and this plane crashed on the road out there, so that's why all the planes were lost and many of the crews, the Doolittle Raiders. FRANK BORING: You told us a couple of stories about Olga Greenlaw, and we'll let you choose whichever one it was that you'd like to have on camera, but you had mentioned a couple of humorous ones. R.M. SMITH: I remember when we were down at Toungoo, we were down at the railroad station one night having dinner, there was a bunch of the ground crew and over at another table, there was Olga Greenlaw and her husband, Pappy Greenlaw and four or five of our pilots around a big round table. All of a sudden, Olga got up and all the pilots followed her except one and he sat there talking to Pappy Greenlaw, who was drinking rather heavily. About half an hour later, one of the pilots came in, tapped the one talking to Greenlaw, on the shoulder, they traded places, Greenlaw didn’t notice, and �the other one went out. Scene Two: the next morning at headquarters AVG at the airport, the clerk told me this. Olga walks in, throws her purse on the desk and says "Well I sure made a bitch of myself last night." FRANK BORING: The story about plugging the radio…? R.M. SMITH: When I got up to Kunming, I was in a nice room on the first floor. Olga and Pappy Greenlaw had an apartment, these two rooms, on the second floor. Word was passed down that Olga Greenlaw wanted a radioman because her radio didn't work, her radio receiver didn't work. Well, I'm not really a good radio mechanic but I was the only one there so I went up. It was something simple like it needed to be plugged in or a wire on the antenna or something - I've forgotten - I wasn't there long - 10 or 15 minutes. When I came down all the guys started Ha Ha and laughing at me. "Oh what happened?" I didn't understand what they were talking about. FRANK BORING: A lot of you guys wrote diaries. Why did you decide to publish yours? R.M. SMITH: I decided to publish my diary because I figured it was a footnote to history and it would tell a different point of view than what had been put out by many people on the Flying Tigers before. Also in most books published on all wars, very rarely do you find a book published, written by an enlisted man, they're always by officers or generals. There was one other book by a Navy Seaman that was published that was very good about World War II. So fortunately I found a publisher that - Tab Books, Inc. - that was happy to publish it. But now it's out of print. FRANK BORING: (Inaudible) R.M. SMITH: Well to me the AVG was probably one of the most interesting military units in history. Rowdy, hard drinking, incredibly naive in �some ways, but it ended up the greatest killer fighter unit in history. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Flying Tigers Interviews and Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, Chinese World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Description An account of the resource Collection contains original 1940s films and interviews conducted in the 1990s, documenting the history of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) "Flying Tigers." The Flying Tigers were organized by the United States to aid China during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Original filmstrips were recorded by AVG crewmen Joe Gasdick and Chuck Misenheimer, as well as Chinese Air Force Interpreter P.Y. Shu, who was assigned to assist Col. Claire Chennault as he trained Chinese pilots and established the AVG. Interviews with members of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) “Flying Tigers” were conducted by Frank Boring for the documentary film Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers, which he co-produced with Frank Christopher under the production company Fei Hu Films. The AVG Flying Tigers were a group of American aviators, mechanics, medical and administrative military personnel, led by Col. Claire Chennault to assist the Chinese Air Force in their defense against Japanese air strikes from 1941-1942. The AVG Flying Tigers also flew in defense of the Burma Road, a major Chinese military supply route. The group disbanded and returned to regular U.S. military service after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Boring, Frank Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films Research and Production Files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938/1991 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Fei Hu Films Christopher, Frank Gasdick, Joseph Misenheimer, Charles V. P.Y. Shu Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4; application/pdf Language A language of the resource English; Chinese Type The nature or genre of the resource video; text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-1945 World War II Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-88_Smith_Robert_M_1991-04-25_v06 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Robert M. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1991-04-25 Title A name given to the resource Robert M. Smith interview (video and transcript, 6 of 6), 1991 Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert M. Smith by filmmaker Frank Boring for the documentary, Fei Hu: The Story of the Flying Tigers. Smith served in the American Volunteer Group (AVG) as a Communications Specialist. In this tape, Smith describes his impression of the members of the American Volunteer Group and his sense of pride in being a member, in addition to their place in Chinese history. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Boring, Frank (interviewer) Christopher, Frank (director) Fei Hu Films Subject The topic of the resource Oral history United States--History, Military China--History, Military Veterans China. Kong jun. American Volunteer Group World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/540">Fei Hu Films research and production files (RHC-88)</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives. Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/9378a82c74f13e419051f00673e44193.mp4 5dfd765051a02127233aae6d20274f1f https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b5f19865aa338d959612bcace77b9725.pdf 159a46df6684d9403448abba6d6d5ab6 PDF Text Text William James College Interviews GV016-16 Interviewer: Barbara Roos Interviewee: Robert Mayberry Date: 1984 Part: 1 of 2 [Barbara] I really want you to start by talking about our placement – our historical placement – the sense of continuity before and after James. Where did we come from? [Mayberry] I would say – which maybe I was not all clear about the time and may or not be all clear about now – but it seems to me that William James College came from two long run movements. The one called Progressive Education, which is really founded by the pragmatic philosophers, especially Dewey, but James played a role in that beforehand and what's called the General Education movement. And both of these are movements that responded to quite major reorganization of American education that occurred, more or less, in the eighteen-eighties and eighteen-nineties – in other words, relatively recently and the grandest historical scheme of things – but a reorganization that in effect replaced the traditional American college, which had as its purpose the education of undergraduates, primarily the liberal education of undergraduates for citizenly roles by the research university on the German Model. And among other things the replacement of the MA (which was the traditional teaching degree coming down from the middle ages from England) by the PhD, which was the research degree in the German university. So once the new university – which Johns Hopkins was a pioneer – had effectively consolidated its control in the places where the old colleges like Harvard and Yale were and smaller colleges also came under some pressure to imitate this new model, the functions were kind of left over and undone that used to be specifically undergraduate functions because things – the curriculum especially and departmentalization, which had followed upon this free organization – had kind of taken away the general and liberal education functions. So there began to be a persistent appearance of movements every – I don't know the sequency of it, but every decade or so – to try and get a general education back. On a Deweyan side, or the progressive side, I think there was also the sense that for democracy, specifically, liberal education ought to have direct relevance to what people do and of course the citizenly role is again involved, but to their work lives. Along about the middle of the nineteenth century, you had kind of a really strict interpretation – our purist interpretation – of the old classical liberal ideal. That sort of gradually made the idea become that liberal education, by definition, was something useless; that if it could be put to use, you were maybe corrupting the liberal education part of it. And I think progressive education tried to deal with the elimination of the sort of class bias of that �uselessness idea. To get the liberal ideals reattached to the things that someone seeking education in a democratic context would need and to get critical thinking applied, even to occupational concerns. [Mayberry] So, if you take those two movements, kind of converging, and not everybody who came to James certainly aware of those two movements. Nevertheless, we were precipitated, I think, into our attachment to them by being named for William James because when we read William James and try to take William James seriously and were led to the other pragmatic philosophers, like Dewey and Whitehead, we find these two questions – the question of how to relate specialization and generality and how to relate liberal education and occupation – dealt with very centrally and the tradition that, almost by accident, we had been placed. [Barbara] [Inaudible] I'm curious… excuse me, I didn't mean to cut you off. Were you still completing a thought? [Mayberry] Well, after those two – which are long run patterns converging – seems to me the immediate impetus (and this was probably more on people's minds who came here) was the demand that students had in the period, let's say, sixty-eight through seventy-one. That their chief concern - meaning the war – be somehow meaningfully addressed as, indeed, I would say it ought to have been by the materials, even the classical materials of college education; that room be made for the student and be able to meet in the curriculum a sense that curriculum could help the student deal with this overwhelming moral and political problem outside the classroom. And teachers who had wanted to respond to students making that demand and had found themselves blocked by the then highly specialized, highly departmentalized, highly research-oriented university, were looking for a place that they could do some practical work in the reform of education. Which the plural system here – the college system – seemed to offer. So, you take those two long run movements and that short run immediate concern, and I think that's where we came from. [Barbara] Let me check the [Inaudible] and I'm keeping it running. I want to ask you, as an appropriate question, to ask you. But why does it cycle? [Laughter] In other words: forget about how often it cycles. Why do we have some [Inaudible]? Why did we have to be…? I don't mean specifically James. Why does it have to be a cycle, why is there [Inaudible]? [Mayberry] Well, I mean, that's a huge question and I don't know any better than anybody else, but I have some glimmers of ideas. The reorganization of the university was also the professionalization of the faculty and professions, in general, guard their own prerogative. And since that professionalization became effective, movements to reform the university and the colleges themselves are apt to be �viewed as, I think, as threatening to the professional structure of things which can be praised by a defender of it. [Mayberry] By saying that it's threatening to scholarship and research and all those good things that no one really means to attack. So, I think you have a very entrenched set of structures, habits, interests, and powers that's very, very hard to change. I think it's notoriously conservative. On the elementary and secondary level there was a book by Roland Barthes on open education, which is a movement that more or less corresponds to the James movement on a college level. The opening sentence of his book is something like this: "We do not have in the United States, as they do in France, a Centralized Ministry of Education, but we might as well have." I mean it’s a very brilliant sentence of that sort. Because if you take this power structure and social structure and habit structure, I mean, it gets to be unconscious. There's no conspiracy involved. But if you add to that probably the increased market responsiveness of education overtime, you have a pressure for education to be uniform. So that I think the problem remains unsolved, despite repeated attempts to solve it. And every time the perception dawns again that the problem isn't solved – mainly in general education and the relevance of education to life - that we're not getting that solved, you have some new resurgence of the movement to try to deal with it. And there was a third thing I wanted to add there that now I can't think of, besides market responsiveness. [Barbara] [Inaudible] You know I'll cut this part out. [Mayberry] I really can't. I think it got swept away in a parenthesis somewhere. It might come back okay. [Barbara] Okay, I thought that was very, very clear. I mean what you had said was very clear. My second big question was… stop the deck. I'm still… we’re rolling. [Mayberry] So, if you've got that institutional inertia – leaving problems perpetually unsolved, which occasionally call forth somebody who wants to solve them – and you have increased market responsiveness, the question would be: “What is there about market responsiveness that leads to uniformity?” And I think that is something like competition or something like supply and demand. You tend to converge towards products, toward commodities, and education almost becomes a commodity in that context… that there are like products or commodities that have already succeeded. So, I think we fell under some pressure recently, as the times got harder, to do a kind of education that was recognizably the kind that was in demand. The trouble being, of course, that you can never get a demand recorded for a commodity that isn't offered. But there got to be a real sense that Grand Valley ought to be made more like other places. That was operating not just at Grand Valley by the way, but around the country. And so, we entered a cycle of one of the periodic cycles of reaction to the reformers. �[Mayberry] The third thing as to why it should be cyclical is really much more mysterious to me because I used to think it was American culture that tended to be polarized, but it may be Western culture or some people might say it's the human condition, but somehow, we tend to be oppositional. That whole business of reform or stasis becomes a debate rather than a multi-side discussion and so if one side is in the ascendancy, the other side is out and there really isn't anybody in the business of looking for the synthesis that you inquired about. [Barbara] And each other. [Mayberry] I think that when we started in seventy-one, and we were not the first college in the cluster, in fact it was said, well that's tricky. It was said of us that by being the third we had truly made it a cluster. But at the same time, we had perceived that we were coming into a matter that had been settled. There were to the multiple colleges here and that that was, in that sense, the constitution and we could therefore appeal as constitutional to a value like plurality, and the provision of choice to students, and the creation of really distinct approaches to education on the part of faculty. We could appeal to those things as values that were shared. And it is important, I think, from that point of you to remember that a commonness that we did share – unrecognized by almost all participants maybe in the whole thing, but a commonness that we did share, at least with the original CAS faculty – was of being educational innovators and experimenters. They came here to provide an alternative to education such as was offered in the region. Number one: public, because most of the other education off the junior college level is under private auspices. And number two: they were also deeply concerned to recover the liberal education mission for undergraduates. In any case, as long as times were good, the appeal to plurality often worked in context of discussion. That is people [Inaudible] of governance. People were willing, in a way, to adopt a live and let live attitude. Though, as I say, the deeper foundation of why we might have all been committed to that I think went unknown to the participants. Which was really too bad because that might've made the crisis work differently. I think it was also really too bad on the level of public discussion, too, the administration felt that they had set in motion a kind of competitive game, if you will, among these colleges for the sake of promoting enrollment. And from their point of view, anything could persist in the cluster as long as enrollment figures paid off. But their hands-offness was not so much the constitutional live and let live as the above the frayness; seeing people compete with one another and congratulating them when they did well and calling them on it when they did poorly. So, on that level, I think, had we but known some work had not been done to really make the constitution acceptable to everyone. �[Mayberry] And on this other concealed level, there were conversations we didn't know we ought to be having with fellow educational reformers because we were locked in competitive debate. We thought with CAS as the local representative of the kind of institution we'd all come from elsewhere and which we wish to provide an alternative. So, the common ground was not present and when times became bad, the depths of the hostility in certain quarters toward the whole cluster idea – which had been bidding its time to express itself – emerged to a degree, I think, that shocked all of us. I think we did not know the degree of hostility to the very idea of multiple colleges. Which wasn't so much directed with any particularity at William James, it was just directed at the sense that the original mission of Grand Valley had been lost. And, of course, William James was easy to see in that context as one of the waves of professionalism, professional education, which was – from the point of view, again, of the old-time folks here – a grave compromise with the liberal ideal in education. They were just as much upset, of course, with the growth of professional schools and CAS itself as they had been with the growth of anything like William James. And, again, didn't know that James had as much quarrel with a segregated professional education as it did with the segregated liberal education. The notion of the synthesis that we were working on to try and make professional education liberal and liberal education practical – that crossing of the lines was pretty much invisible to people. And I'm not sure that's our fault. That particular segment of the problem I'm not sure is our fault. There again, I think, is where you do run into the problem of the cultural matrix more broadly in which you're trying to present an idea that just is plain hard to see, as clear as you try to articulate it. The dichotomy of liberal and professional is so strongly built into the inertial structure of education, elsewhere people maybe may not even hear the words that you're uttering, clear as you might make them. And I think we made them very clear from time to time – conspicuously clear. Students understand it better than probably either our colleagues or our administration did. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource William James College Interviews Description An account of the resource Videotaped interviews of William James College faculty, students and administrators by Barbara Roos. William James College opened in 1971 as the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. Curriculum was organized around three concentrations that were meant to be interdisciplinary career preparation offerings: Social Relations, Administration and Information Management, and Environmental Studies. The college was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Language A language of the resource eng Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16_GVSU_24_Mayberry Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Mayberry, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Title A name given to the resource Robert Mayberry interview (1 of 2, video and transcript) Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert Mayberry by Barbara Roos, documenting the history of Grand Valley State's William James College. William James College was the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. The college opened in 1971 and was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley State. Robert Mayberry was one of the founding faculty of William James College and an integral part of the creation of the School of Communications. In this interview, Robert discusses William James College's historical placement at Grand Valley and in society at that time, including its place in the progressive education movement and becoming the third college at Grand Valley. This interview is part 1 of 2 for Robert Mayberry. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/a6916b8b00300e7d9c374af6663c350f.mp4 d3ef918560bbce498bb16016831b5178 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/93b920cd55b002ebd4ff45a2aa11d9be.pdf 7d8a1926235dbdf13f1dd712ed1b6c8a PDF Text Text William James College Interviews GV016-16 Interviewer: Barbara Roos Interviewee: Robert Mayberry Date: 1984 Part: 2 of 2 [Barbara] I'd like to talk about how critical the not giving grades was to the process. [Mayberry] I think that it was essential and after a certain amount of time, those of us whose ideas were maybe stereotype as the most radical to begin with became known as old curmudgeons really because I personally would not rely it on the grade question. We had requests from students to have a certain number of courses optionally graded at James and so on. But I think that it was really essential that it be ungraded for several reasons. Dealing with the question of work seemed to me that what we were after was the notion of vocation. That is that people did things with their lives that they felt called to do and therefore loved to do. That it was genuine work worth doing and for its sake. And it seemed to me that working for grades, which not so much maybe grades as the keeping of a grade point average, the normal accompaniment of the grading system is the grade point average. Working for the grade point average is a standard barrier to the student actually experiencing in their own soul, as Plato would say, what it is like to work for the sake of the thing being done rather than for the external reward and competitive ranking. For the same reason that I oppose grades, I oppose merit raises, by the way, and I was very glad that we did not have merit raises in William James for a lot of reasons. But the same – or very similar – considerations come from the liberal education side. That is to say, liberal education is studying a subject for its own sake and studying it in such a way that one becomes the master of it in a sense and being a free human being in relation to that subject. That it possesses a power of judgment and has not learned something by routine and has not learned something just by the rules, but knows how to do it and, again, it is worth doing, it is worth studying, it is worth knowing for its own sake. Whether that subject is to be a useful subject or one of the classical liberal arts subjects, which incidentally have their own usefulness, from my point of view. That's another subject. But from the two directions – from the liberal side and from the vocational side - it seems to me very important that we not have grades. And my experience now that we've switched back to the grading system (and I'm sure my colleagues who did not go through this transition will find it very mysterious for me to say this), but I really think it was possible to operate with higher genuine standards in an ungraded system because there was never an inhibition on the teacher, say in the conference or in responding to a paper or project. There was never an inhibition about being genuinely critical, and you knew, and the students knew that if you got into a �discussion of that assessment, it was a genuine assessment, and one was not arguing about the grade that was going to be attached to the paper. One could stick to the intellectual questions of the assessment in a way that I find confused and troubled, and I would almost say corrupted by the imposition of the graded situation now that I am to try and discuss these problems with students in the new system. I think we had better criticism and better standards from that point of view. [Mayberry] I think it's true that people who depended upon coercion to work, could slip by a certain distance in the ungraded situation and they were not – because it would've been a contradiction and a hypocrisy – punished by the low grade for doing. But that to me does not represent the absence of standards. That represents the people that we were not within a good time able to reach to convince of a better attitude toward education. And I think it was the risk we had to take to avoid lying to ourselves and to students about what was really important that some students took advantage – took undo advantage – of that system. [Barbara] But a Clover says: "They do now." [Mayberry] Yes, they do now. [Barbara] People slip through now like crazy. [Mayberry] There definitely was doing it under the grading system. And maybe it’s harder to reach those students under the grading system. Because you haven't really tackled – and no one is collectively attempting to tackle – the question of what the truer motivation ought to be: to study and to work. [Barbara] I have to stop this because I'm going to shut the door. Okay. [Mayberry] I think there was a change in the student generations, which my recollection is from about nineteen seventy-four. And it goes back to the polarity question and how someone who is attempting to articulate a synthesis not usually made is perceived or not perceived, but I think it is a rough generalization. In the period seventy-one through seventy-four, the opening years, we were chosen by students who saw us as what was then called alternative education, and they had a degree of commitment to that and they accepted because of that commitment what we said was important about having meaningful work to do. It's kind of like you had to convince them, in those days, that they needed a major. Along about seventy-four, the term career education, which we had been employing, you see, all along, we were career and liberal education from the very beginning, that was all he said. And alternative education being a version of liberal education that people perceived as offering. All of a sudden in seventy- �four, because I think their official policy change of some kind under the Nixon administration, which I'm forgetting the details of, but career education suddenly became a national theme and a national policy. But again, without the synthesis with liberal education. So that suddenly we got students who saw the career side of our programs very clearly – that’s what they wanted. And those students had to be convinced that some of the alternative education systems, like ungradedness, were important in the way that the previous students had to have been convinced that really taking seriously, doing meaningful work, was important. [Mayberry] In each case, what it meant was there was a transition into our kind of education that, again, maybe we did not take consciously enough the need for doing with all our students or did not put into place systematic ways of making that transition. Though, I think most faculty were very much aware of the need for it to happen and did it in their own way and after a while you heard from students that that transition was being made – that their attitudes were changing. The force of personal example maybe on faculty and already established student's part… did that work for us that we had not consciously worked out. But it was one of the real tragedies, I think, in the loss of the collegiate system that people who deal with the questions we dealt with now kind of have to do it alone. There was a support structure for it to be done, there was reinforcement, there was discussion, there was an atmosphere, there was a life that helped to be done and it did not leave the individual teacher out on a market research-oriented limb if trying to deal with some of these deeper issues. [Barbara] Robert, if you had to - and you have to because I'm asking – in a sentence or two, very briefly, what was the essence of William James College? [Mayberry] I don't know if I can do it in a sentence anymore. Well, there was an experience… there's many essences. There was an experience that was recurrent – that’s certainly one of them – and it's an issue we haven't talked about earlier, except very, very tangentially. But the professionalization of academia meant the departmentalization of the university. Students here came to a place that didn't have departments, and therefore where all faculty felt, at least, some imperative to try to deal with general questions and with education and its moral context. Students would come and they would say to visitors: "I can't believe it but the thing I studied in that class turns up in all my other classes. It's like magic!" And you know we never did consciously sit down and say: "Now I'm going to do this today in mine, so you do that in yours." It happened because that discussion began to thrive across the lines. That's at least one of the essences. [Barbara] That's super. Nobody said that clearly to date. No one… you are the first to say that. �[Mayberry] Do you remember when the people for accreditation came and so forth? I think we were in at least one of those committees together when students said that and they never said that to us before and they said it to the… [Barbara] Alright, we need some kind of a comment about the fact that our curriculum… [Mayberry] I think that goes back to two things. I think it goes back again to what it was that we meant by liberal education. And it goes back to what was that original impetus toward what was then called relevance. The liberal education part I think is this: the old American liberal, small liberal arts college, on a religious foundation. And I have to say I went to that kind of college, so I was probably thoroughly inculcate it in it. But it took as the specific mission of undergraduate education a thing that in the early nineteen century was called mental disciple. The idea was you study what were then very classical parts of the curriculum – like logic, rhetoric, and grammar – because they were arts, disciplines, art in synonymous terms, worth knowing. And that lead to the capacity of judgment that I referred to earlier. When the university got reorganized again, and professionalized again, and departmentalized again, I think we ended up with a much more content oriented definition of what liberal education is. It's stuff… it's some of the things that come in some of the packages. It’s a stuff definition, it’s a content definition and not an arts definition of liberal education. And we were saying, I think, that you could vary the stuff some, you could vary the content some. Particularly if there were students who were demanding that liberal education connect with the things that were vital concern to their lives. And you could, nevertheless, hope that out of different kinds of stuff – sometimes in unrecognizable packages – you could still get to the important questions about art, and judgment, and discipline, and thinking, and criticism, and self-direction. That you didn't have to have all of those packages be the packages out of which the issues of great concern could be drawn. You can't have no content. Again, the dichotomizing tendency made people think that if we were stressing the art then we would do without content. You can't have no content. But the idea was that the content could vary and that we would be clever enough to see, in the old-fashioned terms, the mental discipline problems that may arise from quite a variety of content. Nor did our content ever vary to the extent that TJC's did. On this campus, I think maybe we were misperceived somewhat because we had involving parts of the curriculum and another part that was quite steady. Well I think the reason that it was allowed to vary was that we saw the demand for relevancy as a legitimate one on the part of students and we saw the possibility of getting the classical arts issues out of various content and not just out of the packages that have recently been packaged. I mean in the last fifty, sixty years the packages have been invented that everybody says are traditional… [Barbara] Alright I'm sorry, just a false start. Please go ahead. Please do it again. �[Mayberry] Oh, you’re restarting. [Barbara] Yeah. [Mayberry] Another essence thing occurs to me and that is, I guess, if I look back at what really typified James for me, as a family member, it was that when we discussed things in our council – let’s say grading policy or some action to be taken or some decision to be made. People sat around and related the things they were studying and they were teaching to the issues under question. You could also call that, I guess, the matter of relevancy on the faculty level as well as on the student level. That was a real example, it seems to me, on the part of faculty to students that what we study is directly related to the questions of our life and without that example and with the more or less general refusal, usually, of people to let that happen and university discussions, I don't know where the students can get that connection. It was a lived connection, very exciting. [Barbara] Thank you. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource William James College Interviews Description An account of the resource Videotaped interviews of William James College faculty, students and administrators by Barbara Roos. William James College opened in 1971 as the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. Curriculum was organized around three concentrations that were meant to be interdisciplinary career preparation offerings: Social Relations, Administration and Information Management, and Environmental Studies. The college was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Language A language of the resource eng Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV016-16_GVSU_25_Mayberry Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Mayberry, Robert Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1984 Title A name given to the resource Robert Mayberry interview (2 of 2, video and transcript) Description An account of the resource Interview with Robert Mayberry by Barbara Roos, documenting the history of Grand Valley State's William James College. William James College was the third baccalaureate degree granting college for Grand Valley. It was originally designed to be an interdisciplinary, non-departmentalized college consisting of concentration programs, rather than majors. The college opened in 1971 and was discontinued in 1983 during a reorganization of Grand Valley State. Robert Mayberry was one of the founding faculty of William James College and an integral part of the creation of the School of Communications. In this interview, Robert discusses the grading system and how it related to William James College, in addition to the generational shifts among the study body and the overall essence of WJC. This interview is part 2 of 2 for Robert Mayberry. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Roos, Barbara (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Grand Valley State University Michigan Universities and colleges Oral histories Alternative education Interdisciplinary approach in education Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/69">William James College faculty and student interviews (GV016-16)</a> Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/54db89d28694f8d8cb2589b4769434d4.jpg 224cc1f6704e507be19013c5c213866c Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Robert H. Merrill photographs Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1909/1950 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Robert H. Merrill papers (RHC-222) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-222 Description An account of the resource Photographs, negatives, and lantern slides digitized from the papers of engineer and archaeologist Robert H. Merrill. A Grand Rapids native, Merrill held an accomplished career as a civil engineer. He founded the company Spooner & Merrill, which held offices in Grand Rapids and Chicago. From 1919-1921, Merrill lived in China, working as Assistant Principal Engineer on a reconstruction of the Grand Canal - the oldest and longest canal system in the world. Merrill became fascinated by archaeology, and among other projects, he traveled to the Uxmal Pyramids in Yucatan, Mexico, with a research expedition from Tulane University. Merrill's photo collection includes images of his travels and projects, friends and family. Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Merrill_LS00663 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1938-11-16 Title A name given to the resource Robert Merrill Genealogy Chart Description An account of the resource Black and white lantern slide copy of a genealogical chart of Robert Hall Merrill. Subject The topic of the resource Lantern slides Genealogy Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Merrill, Robert H., 1881-1955 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Robert H. Merrill papers (RHC-222) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource In Copyright Type The nature or genre of the resource Image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource image/jpg Language A language of the resource eng Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/2dfa906588273768e52129cec00ee861.pdf 5d76a774a6ab3644b5ac4d2139fa8e46 PDF Text Text Speaking Out Western Michigan’s Civil Rights Histories Grand Valley State University Special Collections Interviewee: Robert Perra Interviewers: Collin Wojtowicz, Bradley Bordewyk and Megan Perra Supervising Faculty: Liberal Studies Department Location: Grand Valley State University Special Collections Date: 12/7/2011 Runtime: 00:49:33 Biography and Description Robert Perra discusses his perception of the history of civil rights in western Michigan. Transcript Collin- What is your first and last name? Robert Perra- (laughter) Robert Perra Brad- Can you tell us about your family members? Robert Perra- Are you talking about family of origin or are you talking about uh current family? Brad- Both. Collin- I guess uh, yeah I guess just start with origin and move to current. Robert Perra- Well uh, my family of origin, my mother was a mountain girl from Arkansas. My father was a little town uh guy from Westerly, Rhode Island. Um, war broke out, my father decided to drop out of high school and become a pilot. He was taught how to fly in a box with a stick believe it or not. And uh, his first plane was a triwing, so not even a bi-wing they had three wings to hold a guy up in the air. So he became a pilot in the US Army Air Corps and met my mother in Texas she was working for some company there. He knew her for a week. He went off to the Pacific to fight the war after marrying her after knowing her for one to two weeks. She went to Rhode Island. They had several children of those that are current or those that survived birth would be my oldest brother Frank, my sister Santa immediately, my brother Jim, myself, and then my youngest sister Ovita. Grew up in a military family, my father traveled all over the world and we kind of tagged along. He remained in the military for some thirty years, always found it interesting he retired flying, well he was in charge of communications at the Pentagon but worked in the communications field but he was Page 1 �also a pilot. From the tri-plane that he started at the beginning of the second world war he was flying B-52’s and F-16’s when he ended his career at that point. Is that the kind of information you were looking for? Collin- Yeah, yeah I think so. Yeah. Robert Perra- So that’s at least some of my background. Did my living or growing up in different places in the United States; Omaha, Nebraska, Massachusetts, California, Washington D.C., Spain. Traveled Europe, North Africa, so just kind of never stayed in any one place more than uh 3 to 4 years maybe. Brad- I guess we can jump around then. What places have you lived in throughout your life? All the different places. Robert Perra- Oh my. Well the ones that I would call, ya know, my major places, the ones that I really have some real strong memories off at air force base. Omaha, Nebraska my father at the time was part of the strategic air command Torhone air force base Madrid, Spain uh was before that. Eureka, California, Westerly, Rhode Island, Washington D.C., did uh three maybe four tours of duty there. So I mean those are the places that I can really recall well, um we did an awful lot of traveling as kids. Collin- Okay, um so I guess going off of that um. Like in terms of the places that you have lived, what was society like in that point in time? Robert Perra- What was society like? Collin- Yeah, I guess. Robert Perra- Well it depends upon my age and it depended upon where I was. Uh, in Spain, I was born in 1952 uh so I’m coming up on my 60th year. Uh, we were in Spain we started there in ’58 so that tells you, ’59, so that tells you that early on I was six or seven at that time. Uh, Spain had uh just come out of a uh revolution, a civil war to be specific. Uh, that particular civil war was over in the 1930’s uh and of course in the 1950’s the aftermath was still there. We were one of seven American families uh that were uh going to Spain if you will to try to forge a relationship from the United States and Spain. Um, the United States had just finished getting out of a conflict called the second world war, it was in the newspapers you might have read about it. Um, that was before obviously I was born, but uh that war was a war against fascists and fascism. Uh, I don’t know if you know what fascism is but basically uh fascism is when the government has all the answers and if you don’t uh believe in what they believe is the answer uh then you are either marginalized or in the case of uh uh Germany, uh killed. And the programs that they used were called eugenics. I don’t know if you know anything about eugenics? But, uh eugenics was the betterment of society and that meant that the group in power got to say who was the better. Um, all of that is kind of Page 2 �important in the sense that in Spain they were a little asyncratic with the rest of the world and um the guy who won the war in Spain uh was fascist. So the winners who had just um beat fascism and destroyed fascism were now going into a fascist country to try to become friends. And um, if you knew anything about Franco he was a good buddy of both Mussolini and uh Adolph Hitler. Uh, in fact if it had been later in his civil war he would have uh gone into the war on the side of Germany. So that kind of makes it a schizophrenic country. So I grew up early on learning a lot about what you are not allowed to do in a fascist country. Uh, if you weren’t Roman Catholic you were uh, you better keep your mouth shut. If you were not um, if you didn’t have all the answers, you can uh, you can kind of kiss it goodbye. Uh, the first person I saw killed was when I was 10. Um, I was walking away from the University of Madrid uh and a guy in a trench coat, I mean this sounds so surrealistic, uh comes over and picks me up and carries me away. So obviously I was being watched; they knew who I was. Um and when you looked over the guys shoulder um there were some protesters at the university, university students about your age. And a group of people came in with uh submachine guns and just opened fire. So you didn’t want to tell anybody in power that they were wrong. It was an extremely uh authoritarian country, very safe I mean it was really simple you knew that nobody was gunna hurt you because the penalty for that was death. So don’t j-walk. And uh the Spanish at that time were uh, were terrified of them. Uh now, just til the uh, this is kind of jumping to today because they’re just, but it gives you an idea of the, the mentality of the people in that time of the, the world. Um, and it was wonderful by the way to be in Spain. I loved the people, I loved being there. But as a kid a lot of what I learned I had to put together into what the hell does this all mean because that’s not, that’s not the way that I I grew up in this country understanding. And uh, if you were been listening to the news over the last uh four or five weeks uh it has now come out under Franco that if you were a nun, or priest, or lawyer, or a majestrate, or anyone of power. If you happened to be a pregnant woman during that time period, uh if they decided that you weren’t really fit to raise the child, they were able to mark you. And when you had the child, they would take the child from you and tell you that the child died in uh child birth. And then they would sell the child to somebody who they thought was more fit. Ya know, a good Catholic family, somebody with money, uh people that looked like them because if you didn’t look like them you were no good at all. Uh, and then the state would rearrange the uh birth certificate so it looked like you were just given birth. This is what a fascist country does, ya know, they make it up. And uh, that went on until 1973, so you have to understand that is part of their eugenics process. Um, the United states eugenic pro, eugenics processes started to die out in 1973 as well. That is when we would sterilize drug addicts, prostitutes, criminals, anybody that we didn’t think should have kids; we just ripped their ovaries out or take off their testicles. Uh except in North Carolina and South Carolina, they continued to do that until 2003. But, you have to understand what it means when we talk about fascism. Because that is the background of what I grew up in, and why when Page 3 �you start asking me questions about the civil rights movement. All of a sudden what I am looking at, this is, this is through the eyes of a 10, 11, 12, uh 13 year old who is looking at a world that people not only are telling you what you are believing, telling you what you should believe, but will either kill you or rip your balls off, or rip out your ovaries, or imprison you. If you don’t agree with them. Uh, this is the time in which uh Amnesty International was founded because in Portugal two people just raised a glass of wine and said to freedom. Both were arrested and never seen again. So does that giving you a little bit of the social culture that I grew up in? In Spain and in the United States. Collin- Definitely. Robert Perra- So in the United States uh ya know, from Spain we came to Washington D.C. And Washington is really the city that I remember the most because of uh my father’s three tours of duty we always came back to there. But the world was the same, same structure. Um, famous people who agreed that this was a good thing: uh Woodrow Wilson, Oliver Wendel Holmes (the jurist), Alexander Graham Bell, Lindberg, President Bush’s, the last one’s grandmother was a eugenicist. Collin- Really? Robert Perra- Um, yeah. I mean these, well ya know, the last President Bush was a fascist. He uh, he just, he had all the answers. He was, but he was he really was an effectual it doesn’t matter, he was also lazy. He took more vacations than any other president ever since the country was founded. Uh so, but but I’m jumping too many decades. The decade we are talking about is the late 50’s and early 60’s at this point. And uh, that’s what was my foundation if you will. That’s, that’s the world that I looked at. And uh, grew up very much becoming a uh in that period of time a radical uh inclusivist. That every human being has the right to hear and say what they wish to say and as long as it doesn’t infringe on the uh respect and or honor of other human beings that’s their right to do so. That there are multiple answers and that uh, that’s, that’s not quite what the American dream was at that point and still isn’t. But, uh that’s what we were hopefully moving toward. So I was there for four years. Um, society. I bought a baby lamb, from there was a lamb, uh uh a herder, a sheep herder next to the high rise that we lived in. And I bought one of the lambs and I brought it home. I paid a loaf of bread, if you are getting an idea of how starved people were. My mother brought in a ward from the uh orphanage, who used to steal the mashed potatoes and stick them in his pockets because he was only allowed to, could only afford one meal a week. He was, he roomed with me when he stayed with us. Um, my mother and I being the youngest, she would go and buy food and bring it to the orphanage. And uh, I remember once she left the box alone and uh one of the children uh trying to get at a Page 4 �can of beans and basically tried to bash another kids head in. That’s the society I grew up in. What does your society? Collin- Not quite the same as that. Robert Perra- Hmmm. Collin- (Laughs). Grand Rapids, Michigan, I’ve lived for my entire life so. Brad- Yeah. Collin- Yeah. Robert Perra- But you can imagine as a yound child food, equality, um that became passionately important to me. And the amount of, when we came back to the United States, let’s see it would have been four years so ’59, ’62, ’63, um the prejudice in this country or the segregation in this country was unbelievable. Uh, just so that you get a sense of of what that means. Uh first of all, my daughter who is sitting with you wouldn’t be allowed to be in this room. In fact she wouldn’t have been allowed to go to your classes. That's one. Umm, I was walking down the street a little town called Marshall, Arkansas. People were still wearing sidearms at this point, this was the 1960s. I had a cousin who was shot because he was cheating at pool, coroner said he had it coming, so I guess he did. Shouldn't cheat at pool. But I remember walking down the street, I must have been, eleven? An old woman walked by just, you know, like any town. She dropped a can, I picked it up, I put it in her bag, said good day and walked on. I was later pulled over, told that I should not interact with blacks. Collin- Really? Robert- Blacks were not allowed to be at my high school. My uncle probably insulted me the most when I was in eight grade and didn't even know it. Uncle Leo. Thought he was being a nice guy, but it gives you an idea of what we call “comfortable couch prejudice.” Umm, I went to a Catholic church at that time and uh, that was an important part of my life. Uh, t was Blessed Sacrament in Alexandria, Virginia. And the old Monseigneur who was Irish, and Irish kind of people are questionable too, you know, uh, they were, they assimilated because they were white but they had a hard assimilation. Umm, but Quinn, Monseigneur Quinn was a heck of a guy. He always believed that if he could spend a dollar twice he outta. And there was this little Baptist church across the street from Blessed Sacrament. And he hired the Pastor there to be the janitor, uh, at the church which I/he thought was a great idea and as an adult I'm thinking “very clever.” Uh, you know, if you really believe in church kind of stuff you're kind of spending your money twice [Collin-right] you're taking money from your church, you're giving it to another guy who's gonna run another church I mean that's pretty clever. It's kind of uh, his own little pyramid scheme of sorts but, uh, I just thought it was very clever. And uh, in doing this, um, the guy was always nice to us you know the guy all he did was he cleaned the damn church and the school, you know, but he always had a nice thing to say and he was just a really nice guy. And so in the Roman Catholic tradition uh, at Christmas time they have the uh, a midnight service, Page 5 �you know they just kind of get together and light some candles, throw some incense, do some songs, that kind of thing and uh, midnight mass, and that's not a very Baptist kind of a thing. You're not gonna burn incense in the Baptist church across the street. So this guy and his wife would come over to the midnight mass at Blessed Sacrament. And my family would have uh, a meal, um, after midnight mass so that means everybody from church or anybody who wanted to, would come over to our house for uh, a breakfast. And uh, we just invite anybody. Well I invited him and his wife you know, why not? And he came over to the house for breakfast and, delightful time, great guy. My uncle, the great liberal, uh, about three days later pulled me off and to the side, he wanted to congratulate me and tell me how proud he was of me that I could invite a black man and his wife to my home for breakfast without asking my father. And he never had an idea in his head what kind of a bigoted statement that was, or how insulting it was, because that had never crossed my mind, it wouldn't, uh, you know, but in his mind, you know, it was so subtle, that that idea of bigotry, of of exclusivity, of pushing aside. And uh, what can I say, that's that's the society on this side of the Atlantic. If you were poor you obviously had done something wrong to piss off God and you were actually worthless thank you very much good morning. And I remember my father and family actually getting up more than one time, well, twice where we'd be in a restaurant and a black family would come in and be told to leave, we don't serve your kind here. And it didn't matter where we were in the dinner we would get up and leave, we'd just pay the bill and leave, even if we hadn't received any food yet. So, my wife went to a segregated school in Sanibul Island, Florida, I went to a segregated school in Alexandria, Virginia. There's the society on both sides of the Atlantic, now, what do you need to know about it? Brad- Um, well I guess you left off with school, what was school like for you? High School and College. Robert- Wow. Well high school, um, by this time I guess I was a, by this time I was pretty, pretty aggressive and pretty much a of an activist, um, I went to a Catholic school for the first two years. Bishop [Ierton](sp). Um, my grades were okay, but I wanted to take French, they told me they couldn't give me French um, because they didn't feel that I fit the profile to take that course, so I figured they don't need my father's money, I left. Again, profiling was something by this time that angered me and I was a real jerk, I had my ideas of what the world should be and when it didn't go my way I flipped people off and walked on, pretty much like I do today to be honest. Um, so not too too different. So I went to a public school, Hammond High School where I enjoyed that. The end of my junior year my father retired and I moved to Westerly Rode Island um, and at that point I went to Ward Senior High School. I had a really hard transition um, Hammond High School was a couple of thousand students, it was a large school, uh, it was all white as I said and the same held to true I think with Ward Senior High School. Of course I couldn't imagine a black person in Westerly at the time, there may have been one or two I don't know. Uh, but uh, it was, I think my entire graduating class was under a hundred and so it was a real, real shock to move from a school that was inclusive to one that was very, very exclusive. Uh, very Italian and very Catholic. Um, joined the football team, uh at the first game we were forced to say the Lord's prayer so I wasn't part of the football team anymore. There was a Jewish kid on the team, they didn't give a rip that he didn't uh, wasn't Christian, they were gonna Page 6 �force him so I wasn't gonna be uh, associated with that. So the school immediately put me into counseling and told me my problem was that my father was a football player and that I couldn't live up to it. And I thought, well, this is an interesting psychologist. Asked my father if he had ever played football and he said no, he went to war. But, the psychologist had the answer for me. And uh, I finished uh, that year um, I was, the Vietnam War was going on at this time, that was a major issue. The uh, draft was going on. Uh, I had been eighteen so I applied for my conscientious objector status uh, that particular draft board as far as I know it never given anybody a CO. And uh, I think that was part of my, oppositional disorder that I had at that point in my life, that I still have. Um, and my father uh, I remember coming to the uh, the hearing, cuz you had to prove that that you didn't believe in war to be able to be giving a conscientious objector status, because Catholics believe in killing and so, if you're Catholic of course you're going to be a military you know, and uh, if you're Protestant they know you believe in killing, so, didn't matter you know? Uh, Quakers, there were a few Quakers in Rode Island they were given status but usually not very often, and not in Westerly. But my father came and gave testimony for me and I was given uh conscientious status conscientious objector status. I worked on campaigns I was politically very active, uh, at that time a democrat. Um, my uncle was the sergeant at arms of the United States senate, uh Hubert Humphrey was family friends, uh, with him and had met him. So you kind of get a sense that political life was something that that was not something that uh, feared us, or feared me at least. And when I graduated I uh, joined the Franciscan Order and I started being a postulate in the monastery or to be more accurate a friary and went to Saint Thomas More Scholastica to Catholic university and so that started my college education. Um, you have to jump years ahead after that I uh, decided that the monastery wasn't for me, moved back to Rode Island, met my wife she was my boss, I was working at a camp for the retarded, uh, children. Um, got married, took off to uh, Albertly, Minnesota. During all this time I had sang as a musician on a stage, I did church music , I had, you know, did whatever I wanted actually I was a cook and a chauffeur for a while to a priest, I mean, we paid the bills. And uh, Tom Driscoll was a great guy, that's the priest. Um, then a guy by the name of Curtis, uh, Father Curtis, uh, brought us to Albertly Minnesota, took a job there and decided that I really needed to get uh, more education. So, I was being a church musician and liturgist during a time immediately following uh, something called Vatican two, which was a, a change in the Roman tradition to become inclusive instead of everybody going to hell, maybe everybody has something to offer, and uh, so the Vatican two changed the liturgy from Latin to English or the vernacular. And while I was in the church in Albertly during the summers I drove to Collegeville, Minnesota about 250 miles north and I got a uh master's degree and bachelor's degree from Saint John's University in Collegeville in pastoral arts and liturgy. There's my college background at that point. From there I was hired by the Diocese of Kalamazoo. Uh, new Diocese, just founded and they needed somebody to run the office of Christian Worship so I came to Kalamazoo, Michigan. Didn't like the job, liked the place. Uh, went back to school, um, studied um, counseling at Western Michigan University, uh, still liked working with the down and out so uh, was the clinical director at a methadone maintenance clinic, worked with addicts and street people, um, got my doctorate in Clinical Psychology. Needed to do an internship so my wife and I moved to London, England and did my doctoral internship with the National Health Service of Great Britain. '86 came back worked for Blue Cross Blue Shield for a while, decided that they really weren't interested in people, left them real fast, uh, worked for the Page 7 �substance abuse counsel in St. Joseph county, and then uh, opened twenty years ago my own practice and have been in Sturgis ever since as a Clinical Psychologist. And for the last twenty years have uh, taught part time, Addictionology and Addictions at Western Michigan University. So, I don't know how you split, give me your education out from your life, but there it is, pull it out. Collin- Several answers have been questioned [questions have been answered] in one so we're kind of moving around. Robert- I'm sorry. Collin- Huh, no it's fine it it actually works out really well. Brad- Yeah I was gonna say we're down to like three or four left. Collin- Okay, um, okay, so, how about, you wanna do this one? Robert- How bout those Mets? Collin- Yea Brad- Did we already do that one? Collin- We might of yea. Collin: How was the way that you view yourself and your identity changed as you’ve grown older, like how have you identified yourself like 20 years ago compared to today? Robert Perra: I’m more sad and less angry. I think that one of the, one of the things about being a radical inclusivist and trying to be an activist is coming to an understanding of when a inclusivity and tolerance has a tendency to fail, um things that a would irate, make me irate as a child and young man, uh everybody just seems to think that’s how it is today, and so they don’t seem to have very much passion. When I was 15, as an example, this would have been 1987 [1967] when I was 15 um a guy who that you would probably only know as the name of a street uh was alive, his last name was king, and most people don’t really know what his message was, they thought it was a black thing, and it really wasn’t, it was a people thing, he believed very strongly that people should be viewed by their integrity and their creditability not by artificial factors, blacks were put aside but not only blacks, my goodness we throw people that were from Japan and descendents we had them in concentration camps we marginalize Jews, anybody who was not uh part of the main stream, you know, it’s a little like being in Grand Rapids and that phrase if you’re not Dutch you’re not much. Well add that little bit larger, because that phrase is that type of exclusive and its if you’re not us your nothing, and that’s what he was fighting against. When he was assassinated, first of all what he was working on when he was assassinated was a few months, what came to fruition came a few months later, but when he was assassinated a lot of cities went up in smoke. Um this would have been in 87 [68] and this is much different than the Detroit riots of 86 [67] that was a different powered kick that was um when a cop and 4 or 5 police officers were sanctioned to go beat up the blacks and that riot started because they were holding a funeral for a young man who was killed in Vietnam and the police decided to break it up and took the mother and the father of the young solider into Page 8 �custody and beat up his brother and the black community there so that was a very black thing but in in this when when Washington DC blew up uh congress ordered that no food could be sold in Washington DC because they were going to starve the uh um rioters out and uh that infuriated me uh as a 15 year old who didn’t even have a drivers license it really pissed me off so uh I ran down to the blessed sacrament of the church uh grabbed the white van we had a food pantry I filled the van along with two other people full of baby food, dippers, uh formula and uh choose to come into Washington DC through Rosslyn, if you had money you’re always going to be safe so if you go in through Georgetown you knew darn well the soldiers are going to be real careful because you’re probably either a senators son, a lawyers son, or a doctors son or somebody that’s important. If you come in across the bridge it’s too close to the White House you’re going to get shot. Now a lot of people did get shot bringing food in um so I came in through Georgetown then I broke through the barricades there to take food downtown uh in Washington I remember driving by the uh um White House of course there were machine gun nests all over the White House uh same over congress I mean we are talking about 50 calibers uh they’d rip you apart and uh uh national guard were out of course I’ve never driven before so I was stopping at stop lights as buildings were blowing up but that’s a different story that’s kind of just insanity but I was incents uh got the food took it too St. Stephens in the incarnation which was an Episcopal church downtown um unloaded it um got the truck a little bit further was pulled over and clabbered by a couple of police officers and thrown in jail uh the Swiss Embassy got me out because I was uh under the armband of the American Red Cross but by that time the American Red Cross had uh disavowed us feeding children they were of course apart of congress and congress was still wanting us to starve out the city (cough) international red cross they changed our armbands so it had something weird on it pulled me out of jail, got two more runs then they found out I was only 15 so I got shipped back to Alexandra where my father picked me up. Um but there’s passion, today 1 out of 6 children go hungry out of the United States and nobody gives a flying shit. That’s a difference, the initiative for the poor people’s campaign which was what king was working on when he was in Atlanta getting ready for it. I went downtown I, I brought people it I was building shanties on the uh, in, in the city we were building temporary housing for poor people, uh the campaign of course was attempting to have legislation uh past an anti poverty legislation, an anti poverty legislation occurred uh you know would occur what that basically was saying not that poor people would be given money but that every American would have the right as any other American to compete on their credibility, their value, and their quality and that just because you were born poor your shouldn’t remain poor, that’s in essence what that entire group legislation meant and uh it was flawed and I mean I kept building the houses uh I was very much an activist and fighting for that. I remember Abernathy coming by uh I was just putting some nail in, told you I was always oppositional his aid looked at him and said they needed to get back to the Georgetown which is a 4 star hotel, pissed me off, he awet to be down in the shanties, I was so I yelled out to him and said “oh Rev. Abernathy, this one’s for you, ready for you to move in.” Got some real filthy looks, of course I’m just a white kid what the hell do I know. But there’s injustice everywhere in that sense and he went back to his 4 star hotel. The Legislation didn’t pass, and what people don’t recognize or understand and and I guess I was lucky because uh I remember my uncle talking about it I remember Hubert Humphrey talking about it, I remember my father talking about it, it basically said that in the law and under the law all people are treated equally as much as humanly Page 9 �possible because back then as even a lot today white privilege is what counts or right now we don’t have white privilege anymore its green privilege and uh that’s the direction that it’s been going well it failed and I’ve still worked for justice as far as I can but people don’t seem to have the passion. In the 1990s I had a little bit of hope uh the SNL crisis uh that’s when some bankers in the savings and loan um fraudulently ripped off a good number of Americans and uh the attorney general went after them um put a quit good number of them in jail. The paper trail when you do banking is always clear so I mean when you screw up in the banking, if they are interested they can put you in jail. Its its its very clear um now we are in 2009 we have another banking crisis its 70 to 700 times worse than the SNL there were three FBI warnings to congress. Bush didn’t give a crap, so guess what you know how many people have been legislated against or I mean uh uh taken to court for that action under Mr. Obama’s rule? Zero. It’s ok under Bush it would have been zero too. Um they screwed up how many millions of people, made them homeless and the attorney general of the United States, the President of the United States and the Legislator of the United States and the judiciaries of the United States don’t care. That makes me sad, because you see the paper trail is there. A first year law student can follow it you don’t have to be a lawyer and that’s the end result of the whole issue of the poor people’s campaign and the poverty, anti poverty legislation that’s what it was trying to attend to but today in this country that’s why you get the match on Wall Street at the moment. And they call 99 1 percent of the people have the green and there above the law. And according to the President well as far as we can see his eyes are green and his attorney general has green eyes too and so do all the republican candidates so this isn’t uh Democratic bashing exercise. So how have I changed? I guess I’ve changed by becoming instead of passionate and angry, sad and cynical, I think I liked myself better when I was angry and passionate. Don’t know if that really answers your question. Collin: Nope yeah mhm. We are very organized Robert Perra: I’m sorry I must be boring the crap outta you. Bradley: How does living in West Michigan, How does is it different then the other places you’ve lived? Robert Perra: Well when we moved to Kalamazoo and decided to have children there were two things I wanted for them that I didn’t have, one was I wanted them to have stability, I have very in fact I have no childhood friends, I am a nomad um I have no roots, um I have family I don’t see very often, uh we were made hyper independent and um not very interdependent on the society and what I wanted for my children was to have roots to say I’m from here you know, uh I have kids that I went to school with, I know who I went to my elementary school with my high school my college. Um I wanted people, I wanted them to have a sense of lifelong understanding so I made a choice to live in Western Michigan because number one it was small It was quiet, and the Alexandr, uh Richland and Kalamazoo area, uh It was relatively safe. Um when I was in high school in uh uh Alexandria, Virginia um there were some interactions between blacks and whites. uh uh whenever Hammond High School or TC Williams um played George W, George Washington uh there was always a riot afterwards in the stands, blacks and whites would be beating the shit out of each other, didn’t matter who won. And so you would get things in the newspaper uh “TC Williams won on field GW won in the stands.” I mean it was that Page 10 �that’s craziness, people were shot fairly regularly in Washington DC. And it never even reached the news paper. uh Washington DC growing up was one of the most corrupt cities in the world had to many police officers and to many police forces and none of them did anything because not only did you have the FBI but then you have the secret service and then you had a military service for each branch of the government and then you have Washington DC cut in four and each of the four had their own police department now half of Washington is from Virginia so the Virginia state police would come into one half and now the other half is from Maryland and so the Maryland state police would come in, now we also had the executive police because the executive police were responsible for the diplomats and of course they have authority there and then of course the white house has its own staff so we have there protection. And the judiciary. Well you have so much you have none. And so when I decided to come here I wanted to be in a place where I was somewhat comfortable that my children would wake up one morning and still be alive. Now that sounds very really strange, but that’s why I grew up and raised my children in Michigan because drive by shootings although they happen they don’t happen often. And uh the wagon train with the Indians doing the drive by shootings uh uh with arrows that hadn’t happened sense the 1880s so it seems safe. Now once my children all grow up and leave, I’m not certain where my wife and I will uh move too. I’ve always liked North Africa and London was great fun and we like Florida and but we stayed in this part of the world for the safety of our children. Is that what you really wanted? Bradley: yeah, that kinda answers the last one too. Collin: mhmm, I think, I think that’s it I believe that concludes the interview Bradley: yeah Robert: Now did you get anything that you can use out of this? Collin: yes we did. Robert Perra: Good! END OF INTERVIEW Page 11 � https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4366b1146376d5f6535fe8b073446aff.mp3 4ad6d35e22cbb5dbfa94840219bcec08 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Speaking Out: Western Michigan Civil Rights Oral Histories Subject The topic of the resource Civil rights--Michigan--History Personal narratives Oral histories African Americans--Personal narratives Gays--Personal narratives Lesbians--Personal narratives Bisexual people--Personal narratives Transgender people--Personal narratives Veterans--Personal narratives Women--Personal narratives People with disabilities--Personal narratives Muslims--United States--Personal narratives Hispanic Americans--Personal narratives Homophobia Discrimination Islamophobia Stereotypes (Social psychology)--Upper Penninsula (Mich.) Description An account of the resource Collection of oral history recordings documenting the history of civil rights and social justice advocacy in Western Michigan. The collection was created by faculty and students as a project of the LIB 201 (formerly US 201): "Diversity in the U.S." course from 2011-2012. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. Brooks College of Interdisciplinary Studies Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Speaking Out: Western Michigan Civil Rights Oral History Project (GV248-01) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-05-02 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio/mp3 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Type The nature or genre of the resource Sound Text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV248-01 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1930-2011 Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV248-01_Perra_Robert Title A name given to the resource Robert Perra audio interview and transcript Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Perra, Robert Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Wojtowicz, Collin Bordewyk, Bradley Perra, Megan Description An account of the resource Robert Perra discusses his perception of the history of civil rights in western Michigan. Subject The topic of the resource Civil rights--Michigan--History Language A language of the resource eng Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Sound Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio/mp3 application/pdf Relation A related resource Speaking Out: Western Michigan Civil Rights Oral History Project Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2011-12-07 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7bb38fdc07b797cf3c4580523881c67a.pdf 82a486e39f1a4786c702490a90dabd09 PDF Text Text Speaking Out Western Michigan’s Civil Rights Histories Grand Valley State University Special Collections Interviewee: Robert Robson Interviewers: Kyle LeMieux, Amanda Hengesbac and Tara Yax Supervising Faculty: Melanie Shell-Weiss Location: Grand Valley State University Special Collections Date: 10/26/2011 Biography and Description Robert Robson is a military veteran who was born and raised in Grand Rapids. He signed a contract with the navy in 1962 and spent 4 years in active duty and 2 years in the inactive reserves. He has a lot of memories from his time in the navy and talked about his views on the military and being a veteran in the United States. Growing up in Grand Rapids he had a lot of stories about some of the things that have been changing in the area including diversity. Transcript YAX: Ok here we go. Hey. Ok so I’m here with Robert Robson, Yes? Ok. Here we go. So where did you grow up? Where were you born? ROBSON: About a mile from where we’re at. YAX: Really? ROBSON: Yeah YAX: Born and raised in Grand Rapids? ROBSON: Yep YAX: How was that? ROBSON: I started out in Gailwood, is where the first home that I remember. it was a middle class low income middle class at the time because that’s what everybody made at that time. You know I mean it wasn’t as the middle class obviously progressed over the years you have the income increase too. But it was it was just a middle class neighborhood. Everybody was equal. my parents we kind of went through, kind of went through the depression and everything. when just before I became school age about four and a half years old and we moved about, about a mile and a half, two miles from where we, where I was raised. And I stayed there until I left home. and I graduated from Lee High school. YAX: Oh ok ROBSON: In 59. So. Page 1 �YAX: So what was it like going through the depression? Do you remember a lot of it? ROBSON: Well I was really really young then. I just remember that, I remember more of the war being over cuz I was, well because I was born in 41, so I, I, but I remember more of the war being over. I remember, vaguely remember fireworks and guns being fired when the war was over [laughter] Of all things. There there’s sort of a you know an oxymoron you know. Guns being fired the war is over. but and, and I remember when we would play we had the tokens and different things. The scrips and different things that we had, my parents had during the war and, and, and through the depression they had little tokens that were worth 5 cents or 5 dollars or a dollar or something. Then they had the, the scrips, which were small little paper chips like and they had values written on them in place of money. And so it’s, it was kind of like, it, it, it was kind of like a forerunner to the food stamp thing. my parents had to pay a certain amount, then they would get these chips and then they could go to the grocery store or gas and buy produce or other stuff with it. YAX: Oh ok ROBSON: And I remember running across a book after my mother died of prices that she paid at a second hand store for, for clothes for us kids. I had two younger sisters and two older sisters and there was prices in there like a pair of socks for a nickel, blue jeans for like fifteen cents, you know. And I would just, just page after page in this book, which was about an inch and a half almost two inches thick. And it was a daily recording of everything that she spent. it just that they had to watch their pennies that closely. YAX: Wow ROBSON: my grandparents actually are the ones that bought the house for my parents. at the time there was a lot of money. I mean the house that we lived in was a very large two story. It had 3 bedrooms, and a bathroom full bath upstairs, and then down stairs you had a, a kitchen and a half bath, a sunroom, and a breakfast nook, and then you had a dining room and a living room. And then the basement was the basement [laughs]. There wasn’t furnished, but it wasn’t a Michigan basement either. It was just a low basement made out of cement blocks and stuff. But that house and it sat on a lot and a half, it was on one of the bigger lots on the street and they paid 5,000 dollars for that house, YAX: Wow ROBSON: Which at that time was a lot of money for a house that big, but we had we figure 5 children and 2 adults living in that house so we needed all the room we could get. And it had a sun porch on the back, which eventually my parents had made into a closed in room. And my mother moved all of her sewing equipment up there. But it also, it also served as an extra bedroom and stuff. YAX: So you lived in a three-bedroom house with five kids? ROBSON: Yeah it was a little crowded [laughter]. Yeah it was a little crowded. But it eventually as my two older sisters got out of high school, my oldest sister, she and her fiancé, he was in the army and he came home eventually they got married and then my other older sister she moved out on her own so then it was just my two younger sisters and myself at home. But still it was, it was it was tough because Page 2 �things were starting to change businesses were, my dad really didn’t have a good trade at that time and he met a man who became a friend and he owned, this man owned the tool and die shop out on 28th street, which is no longer there, the building is no longer there. And he taught my dad how to be a tool and die maker. And so, and my dad was very good with numbers so he caught on pretty quick. so he, he he learned how to be a tool and die maker and then from time to time he worked at American seeding at one time. He worked at Reynolds aluminum, which is now down there on [unintelligible]. It’s a conglomerate now with smaller, with smaller businesses in there, but it used to be Reynolds aluminum. Reynolds metals company originally. He worked there as a tool and die maker and then he, he got, aluminum kind of took a dive for a while there and so he got laid off for a short time and then he ended up working at Steelcase and he retired from Steelcase as a tool and die man. he quit school when he was 16 so that tells you, and he was from a farm he was from the wayland area, which is about what, 30 miles south of here, so 25 30 miles south of here. And, and because he lived on a farm it was the thing for most of the boys to, most boys anyways to go to school until they were about 16 17 years old and then they would quit school and then spend their time helping on the farm. Well he was an only child so his extra hands were needed on the farm. But it was you know his, his grand, his parents lived on this big farm, and they didn’t have a lot of things either. They had a the most modern thing that I remember down there was that they had a a propane tank and that they had a gas stove. That was probably the most thing. Because their, their water, they had a hand pump on the sink you know. they had they raised a lot of their own vegetables and stuff. My grandmother would, would can and they had a what they called a fruit cellar. And that fruit cellar was actually nothing more than a hole dug in the ground, under the house, [laughter] and back under the house a ways, so that there was no heat in it. But in the winter time it acted as cold storage, [laughter] and they would have, she would have all of her stuff, all of her things that she canned during the summer would be sitting down there and so they had food all winter long and then they had this big garden and they always had a lot of potatoes and stuff so they would throw them down there. And there’s nothing worse then spoiled potatoes [laughter], But they had a small farm. It was an 80-acre farm and they did a lot of bartering. Now we’re talking, I was born in 41 so this is the end of the 40’s, early 50’s, and they still bartered with the neighbors. my, my grandmother might have some excess, they might have some excess food out of their garden so if, and they might want to get some eggs so they would take some vegetables or my grandmother would do sewing and they would take that to another farmers house and they would exchange that for say butter and eggs. they didn’t need milk because he had his own milking cows, and he had, he had, we had, they had some chickens, but they only had like a few. Every once in a while one of them would upset my grandfather we’d have it for supper [laughter]. So, so the eggs, so the eggs came out kind of short once in a while. But they had a, they had a pig you know a couple pigs, you know. It was a typical small, small farm really. He farmed, with horses, he didn’t have any machinery, modern machinery you know like tractors and stuff. The first time I saw a tractor on his farm was when they were gonna move from Wayland to Middleville, and what they did was they, they swapped with a man and his family in Middleville who had an 80-acre farm but it wasn’t farming, and what he wanted was a working farm, so they just swapped. And my grandfather wanted to get out of the, because he was getting up there in age, so that’s what they did. And then but they brought over all kinds of people to help harvest the wheat, and the grain and stuff that summer, and do the baling and all that so that all of this stuff could be figured into the costs of the farm, and how much of it you know money wise my Page 3 �grandfather was going to get. Because it was a working farm vs. a non-working farm he had a little bit more of an investment then this other guy did. So he had to, this guy had to pay him some dollars in cash. But so when they moved it. But I remember I never saw so many people, I never saw so much food, [laughter]. And that’s the first time I saw tractors and baling machines. And, and mechanical thrashing machines. YAX: Wow ROBSON: Otherwise my grandfather did everything with a team of horses. He would plow, plant, harvest, everything with his horses. and I would, I got around five or six, about five years old, four or five years old my parents would, I would go down on the farm, and when I was about five or six years old I knew how to drive a team of horses, you know. Which I thought was pretty cool [laughter]. And you know, how many kids in my neighborhood back home that were older then me, they couldn’t drive horses, but I could, you know. So, but It was it was that’s the kind of the way the lifestyle was you know. then, oh and then right across the street there was a lake so they did some fishing. They had fresh fish, and my grandparents had a well YAX: Wow ROBSON: A fresh water well on their farm, which was about four feet, or about, I don’t know, six to eight feet long, about five feet wide, and about eight feet deep about half full of water. And that water in there was clear as glass, and it was just as cold as can be, about forty some degrees. YAX: Oh ROBSON: And it bull heads in the bottom of it to keep the algae out. They would eat all the algae. So they kept the water clear. They had Indians that came over that were in the area down there in Wayland, that picked pickles for some of the neighbors, and they would come over to my grandparents and get fresh water from them. YAX: Oh wow. ROBSON: And these people didn’t have, these people had absolutely nothing to speak of. My parent, my grandparents were rich compared to them. But these people were proud and they would come over and get the water, but they wouldn’t just take the water. They’d get something in return for it. They would do it, and this goes back to the barter thing. they would sharpen grandma’s knives that she needed sharpened in the kitchen or they would take care of grandpa’s tools for him, you know, sharpen tools that needed to be sharpened or and then they would, but they had these huge crocks that you see where they would have the yolks and they would have these two big, on the neck yolks you know, and they would have these big crocks filled with water. These things held about ten gallons each. And there would be women that would carry them on their heads, you know, and hey would take them over to the fields and then they would have that cold water, and these crocks were, would keep that water cold as long as the kept it out of the sun, and the crocks didn’t heat up. You know. but I remember one of the Indian families had a death in the family, and my grandparents took some food over to them, and I remember there was an awful lot of people living in one small house. It was probably, the house was Page 4 �probably twice the size of this room that we’re sitting in, length and width wise. And it had a loft up above. That’s where all the children slept, were in the loft. And it had some rooms down below for their parents and it had a fireplace. That’s where they did all their cooking was in the fireplace. YAX: Ah ROBSON: it had a dirt floor in most of the cases, and it was a paper tar shack, but it had real windows in it, real glass windows in it. But they didn’t have much. Those people didn’t, and but they were good people. They I mean I thought it was really an honor to know real live Indians, you know, and, and know the, I, I knew the chief. I can’t tell you their names cuz I don’t remember them it was so long ago. But they but they were really nice people, you know. but that was how my grand, my great grandfather lived in the reed city area and I went to his farm one time and you talk about something that would, that was desolate. I don’t know how he made a living on that farm, but he did. You know. I mean that farmers in, in, my background being from the farm, these people were, were rugged individuals but they were and tenacious. They wouldn’t give up. You know. And they, they would just as time went on you know, and things got better and better my, my mother and father finally after my dad retired were able to have save enough money and go places. Visit you know, and see some of the world. You know, they and but it, it all came with time, you know, as, as these things advanced and things got better for us kids. We had better clothing we could, we could get dress up clothes [laughter] you know, that we didn’t have before, and so it, it all, it, it you know as, as, as it evolved, as the economies got better and everything after the war and that things got better. The neighborhood was nice I go to that neighborhood now today and it doesn’t look any different then the last time I was there as a kid. YAX: Really? ROBSON: it doesn’t, it hasn’t changed that much at all. The same houses, and I could go down there and name the people that lived in the houses you know. It’s really wild. but it but still it hasn’t changed that much. It’s still a blue-collar neighborhood and it most of the kids still go to Lee. there’s some of them that go to Holy [unintelligible], which is the catholic school over on Godfrey there’s a few of them that, that when I was growing up, up on Grandville avenue there was a Christian school called southwest Christian, and it was a went up to the 7th or 8th grade and then from there they went downtown to Christian high school, which is now I believe where the state now has welfare offices in there, its on Franklin I believe it is. at the top of Franklin and its, its that’s, that school up there is was transformed into a, a welfare office and stuff, and then, because then they built South Christian out south of town, and then the other Christian school over off in Plymouth. YAX: Right. ROBSON: So they didn’t need that big building downtown anymore. So the state bought it and that’s what they use it for. So it’s been a lot of changes and stuff you know, YAX: Right. Page 5 �ROBSON: Around, but it but that’s how my beginnings were, basically my, my parents, my grandmother and grandfather on my mothers side were farmers they lived in Burton Heights right across from Burton school as a matter of fact, and that house is still there. But they had a huge garden in the back too. YAX: H. ROBSON: you know, and you, the amazing thing about my grandfather was he was about 6 foot 3 or 4, he was a big man, but he didn’t drive. And he got a job at Steelcase. YAX: Hmm ROBSON: He would walk everyday to work. From Cutler and Buchanan all the way down to hall and Buchanan to Steelcase. At, actually he’d walk down there to Century and Hall is where, is where it was. Everyday, unless the weather was really, really, super, super bad. And then my grandmother might drive him down or someone would pick him up as he started to walk down there. But, they didn’t have a whole lot either. Their house is you go into that house and its quite small. YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: It had, I’m trying to remember, I’ve only, I was only upstairs in that house a couple times, but I think it had a a storage space and a bedroom upstairs and then it had, then downstairs was another bedroom and a kitchen and a dining room and a living room and then it had a Michigan basement under it. And it’s, I remember one thing about the house, the stairways were very narrow YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: Really, really narrow. so it wasn’t and course they’d be, being in the city they had gas my grandmother didn’t have to use a, a coal stove or anything like that. She had a, but it was an old fashioned kitchen stove YAX: Mm hmm, ROBSON: I mean compared to what we have today. But, one of the things I’ll say about my grandmothers, both of them, they could cook! [Laughter]. They were excellent cooks. and, and my mother and, and my mother and my sisters, older sisters I think gathered something from those ladies and the way they did cook you know. these ladies could cook without recipes and the food was you know, really good. And bake, oh man they made the best pastries in the world. I know my, my dad’s mother used to make sugar cookies that were probably oh 6 inches in diameter, [laughter] and they’d just melt in your mouth and then my, my mother’s mother she made the best peanut butter cookies in the world. And they were just really good. But those, they, both those ladies could cook, so the food was good. My mother had to learn to do all that stuff. She would go, my mother and 3 of her neighbors [laughs], this was always room for, they would go through the paper and pick out sales that were going on, at Kroger, or A and P or, whoever the stores were around, and then the 4 of them would go shopping together. But what was funny is they might travel, they might spend, use up 5 gallons of gas to save a dime on food or something, which was kind of funny. But they would do that, I mean that might be an exaggeration a little bit, [laughter], but, but that’s what they would do. They would go from, they Page 6 �might go to one store and only pick up 2 maybe 3 items, and then go to another store and get a bunch more, but when they came home they had all the groceries that they went out to get, but they got them at, on sale. Also, we, where my, my parents lived over there, off in Gailwood there over by Lee school there, there was a man named Noel. He lived on the corner of prair [pause to think], what is that prairie, no not prairie anyway down there in Burlingame right on the corner, I cant quite think of the name of the street right now, Beverly I think it is, or right near there, and he had a muck farm, a truck farm, and he would pick fresh vegetables and stuff, and he had a big truck, and he would load it up with ice and put all these vegetables on it and he would go through the neighborhood and sell these fresh vegetables. And you could buy bunches, you could buy a watermelon that was as big as you were you know, YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: For 15 cents. you could buy a dozen ears of corn for 15 cents. You could buy lettuce, either leaf lettuce or head lettuce, either one for leaf lettuce was maybe 4 cents, and head lettuce was maybe a nickel. Or you could get he had everything. He had fresh beets, he had just you name it, he had it. He had Carrots, radishes YAX: Right ROBSON: You know the whole thing. And it was all fresh. And you, and he would come down the street you know, and the women and other, everybody would come out you know and buy stuff, [laughter], and he’d go on until he sold all of his produce for that day. And that’s how I mean that’s kinda how he got started. He, he, he evolved, I mean he had several boys, and a couple of daughters I think, and they, they farmed the land for him and stuff. And their boys, I know a couple of their boys and they all turned out to be very hard workers. he they, I cant say that they had a lot. YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: but they were all very, very hard workers. Most of them spent a good portion of their life with produce like that, bringing it around to the neighborhood. So that’s all still part of, of the post war period, right after, a few years after the war. YAX: Right. ROBSON: Before things really started to change. And, and you know or big time. It was, you went through a lot of other changes and stuff in there politically and so forth but it was, it was a whole lot different then. you didn’t have anywhere near the crime that we have today, mainly because I think of two things. One everything you wanted you could get at a reasonable price. And, and two I don’t think you had to be, everybody was equal. You know, they didn’t have, you weren’t you’re neighbors had the same thing that you did. Ah yeah maybe they, they saved their money a little bit differently and maybe they were, they might dress a little bit better, but not that much, you know. and their job might be a little better, but it was all basically on the same plane, YAX: Mm hmm. Page 7 �ROBSON: Same scale, same level. So you, so you you were all pretty equal, so you didn’t need to steal from anybody, or, or anything like that. Its not to say that you weren’t mischievous [laughter], but I, but yeah. I and my neighbor boy buddies, we got in our share of trouble for doing things we shouldn’t have. But the for a ling time Wyoming was a township. And so it didn’t, it, its, its police department was a branch of the Kent County sheriffs department. So even though for a long time it wasn’t a for, it was quite a few years before they kinda can honestly say they got their own police force. But then, I was away when I graduated in ’59, and then shortly there after I went to J C for a short period of time and then I went into service. And then it was while I was in the service that Wyoming incorporated into a city. and then, a lot of things changed then obviously. a lot of the, the neighborhoods that were individual neighborhoods now were all one, and if you go down on Chicago Drive between Burlingame and Godfrey or between Burlingame yeah, well, actually it, its not just between Burlingame and Godfrey, but if you, you start at Burlingame pretty much and go East on Chicago drive, you can see what was there. A lot, every, practically every business that is there today was there when I was a kid, but it might have been something different. some places there’s a used car lot that used to be a standard gas station. There’s a barber shop where there used to be a Clark gas station. There’s a restaurant where there used to be a dairy and I don’t know, what’s in that big, at the big store there that used to be a general store that was run by a woman and it was like a nickel and dime place for us. We’d go in there you know and if you had 10 cents in your pocket you’d go down there and buy yourself a bottle of pop or something. We used to sit on her front step and go in and buy a vernors ginger ale and see who could shoot it the farthest. [Laughter]. But because it was so carbonated. YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: like down through, you could go down through there and you could see the different buildings. There’s, there was one place that used to make donuts or something like that, I think it’s an awning shop now. There’s another gas station that does something different. There’s a place that used to be a bike shop that I don’t know what they do there anymore. There’s a body shop that used to I don’t know what they do anymore either but right next door used to be a restaurant, well that’s gone now and there’s a funeral home that took up that whole property. then beyond the funeral home there’s a drug store that’s been there for years and its gone form one thing to another. and as you go on down through there and then you work you’re way down Grandville Avenue up Grandville Avenue, and then down into the city of Grand Rapids. Matter of fact at Clyde Park is where the city of Grand Rapids and the city of Wyoming meet. YAX: Oh ok. ROBSON: And so there on the corner used to be a a hardware store that it was the dpiest, junkiest hardware store you’d ever seen in your life. But if you wanted anything, if they didn’t have it upstairs they would find it in the basement. and it burned to the ground one time. And then behind them used to be Calvinators, which was, they used to make stoves, refrigerators, YAX: Oh ok. Page 8 �ROBSON: And things like that. and they that was a big company in there. Matter of fact for the Lee school district that was one of their big tax people, that was one of the properties that helped Lee school for many, many years and then they had Calvinators kind of fell on hard times, and then the main building, which was about 4 stories high they caught on fire, actually it was set on fire by, by somebody living in there or something, and it burned down, they tore it down so now if you go down there there’s, there’s quite a big vacant area. But some of the smaller parts of the factory are back in there and they’re all individual buildings now, but they’re all still parts of the original factory. and then right across the street there’s a big cement building, it looks like a bank, but that used to be the corporate headquarters for Calvinator in there. I don’t know what’s in there now. But there’s, it’s changed around there a lot. There’s some stores in there now and the used to be up on Grandville Avenue it was you’re white middle class was most of it. And it’s now changed quite a bit too. There’s a lot of Hispanic up in that area. there’s also some, some of your the blacks are up in that area. and that kinda continues on pretty much all the way down towards Grand Rapids and to the east toward what used to be South High School, which is now also a building that, that was a public school but, it has some department of help of some form in there you know that take care of families and stuff like that in there. and they do do some educating there too I understand but I don’t know how much. My, my cousins graduated from there. YAX: Oh ok. ROBSON: my mother went to school there. That’s what used to be South High School. Matter of fact I have a cousin who when he graduated he was the last class that was there. And, they had a chimney right, and this chimney it was a tradition for many years for the senior class to write their class year on it. Well when my cousin Russell was there they cancelled that. But somehow his graduating nber got written up there on the chimney. And nobody knew how it got there. YAX: Hmm. ROBSON: So Russell I’m gonna tell on you, [laughs]. My cousin was the one that did it. He went up there and painted it [laughter]. But, he, he he had 3 brothers, and a sister. they were my mother’s nieces and nephews, my cousins. 4 of the smartest kids I’ve ever known in my life. first of all my uncle was extremely smart. Unfortunately he ruined his life because of alcohol, which was too bad. His wife was just an absolute genius. I, I think that any, any, I mean she was just incredibly smart, and fortunately all the kids gained that. to be honest with you I don’t know where any of them are today. I know that they’re all still alive. There’s one of them lived in Hudson, er Byron center. The last I heard my, my cousin Russell I think lived, was retired from the navy and he was living I think in California or Florida. I don’t know, maybe he had a place in both. And I don’t know where the other two boys went. One used to live out on 68th street someplace, but he moved so I don’t know where he went. so I, I don’t keep real track of my family but I just know that, that most of them are middle income people. YAX: Do you keep track with your sisters? ROBSON: Yeah, yeah. Cuz they live close by. YAX: Ok. Page 9 �ROBSON: I have one that lives in, well, well, with one exception, which is my sister Martha. She lives in, in Florida. But occasionally we call once back and forth on the phone or something. and she is, she is actually my father’s daughter she is not my mother’s daughter. YAX: Mm ROBSON: and she was given up for adoption by her birth mother. And the thing about it is, is that she lived right here in Grand Rapids for a nber of years, and I even knew some of the same people she did. then my two older sisters, one lives in, in Hudsonville, the other one has passed away. But, they were my mother’s daughters. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: and then my two younger sisters and myself we all had the same mother and father. And so there’s quite an intersession of families in there. my, my sisters, the two older sisters they’re father was in vaudeville. and he knew all of the big names in vaudeville. But, I, I tried to talk to my oldest sister and she, about what, and she was pretty young then so she didn’t, she couldn’t tell me a whole lot about them. Which I, I found, which too bad. Because a lot of the people that, that he knew, I mean I’ve heard them myself you know. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: And some of them might be even heard, they’re, they’re entertaining you know. Fred Allen for one. Jimmy Durante for another. YAX: Oh wow. ROBSON: and a lot of the people that went through vaudeville George Burns a lot of the bands, I don’t remember all of the band people, but he, he, he knew a lot of the musicians at that time too. so he, he had you know, quite some connections. And, so it would have been, I wish I could have gotten or my sisters would have gotten more information you know, but that’s the way it goes. But just knowing that, that they knew some of the, some of the people that were the starters of the new, YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: Business of show business is quite, quite a shock when I knew about it you know, and I found it to be quite quite nice. quite interesting. but the family as a whole, my family, myself I’m middle class, by no means am I rich. I got some money yeah, I worked for a long time to get that money but I got some money. I have two daughters that I, I help out quite a bit. I would have had more money if I didn’t have to do that, [laughter] but, but I consider myself the dad and that’s what I have to do. You know, I have to help my family. I’m divorced. My, my ex wife’s family is all middle class farmers by nature most of them. They were Dutch they can, they can trace themselves to Dutch immigrants, from from Holland. I don’t know a lot about them. I just know that, I know her mother and father’s backgrounds a little bit. And we had a lot in common, you know as far as the background and stuff goes. her brothers were very smart, all of them. her sister who had a birth defect but it didn’t get in the way of raising three boys, and teaching school. she was a very good schoolteacher she retired from the white hall Montague area. and Page 10 �she just passed away here a few months ago. But the boys, one of her sons is extremely smart and he has a very good job writing programs for computers. He’s self-employed. she has another son that is, he is my daughters cousins that he lives in Florida with his wife. She is into the medical you know like elderly, helping the elderly you know as a nurses, as a nurse. and David is a, is very handy with his hands. He can do a lot of things, but, he suffers severely from arthritis. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: Which is too bad. and their youngest brother lives up around the White hall area, even today and he has a good job at some company up there, I don’t know which one it is anymore but he has a good job and his wife is a schoolteacher. their they have some other cousins that, one of them I forget what he does but he’s got a, it’s a good white collar job, it’s in an office. He has another one that, that is very artistically inclined. For a long time he went out to Connecticut or somewhere, yeah I think it was Connecticut, he built furniture. YAX: Oh. ROBSON: as a request. You know specialties. You know one of a kind. U, he built some stuff for his mother and dad that was incredible. Just, and he, he graduated from what’s that design school here in Grand Rapids? YAX: Kendall ROBSON: Kendall. and he’s the one that doesn’t let any grass grow under his feet. [laughter]. He’s something else. [Interruption]. ROBSON: Sorry bout that. YAX: it’s ok [laughter]. ROBSON: but he, and he, he is moved back to Michigan now but he still works, or no he still lives out east but he, someplace, I don’t know. But anyway he still works with furniture, but he works more on a, on a, in a design portion of it now rather than a building part of it. And then their sister, their oldest sister, she graduated from nursing school and then she went on and got a masters degree in nursing I guess it was and then she, she does transcripts at home. taking and correcting insurance papers and, and medical papers so that the wording and stuff, and she does that at home. she has, she was married, she had two boys and now I think she’s got a, I don’t know if she’s married again but, I know she has a new, a new friend. but her mother and dad, he worked for Consumers, and Mary was a nurse. YAX: Wow. ROBSON: So you know, but, out of all of, all of these people that are, I’m related to, we’re all pretty much at the same level as far as we’re in the middle class I got one cousin that plays in a Dallas symphony but what his younger brother does I have no idea. but I know he has, he has a family and he works but I don’t know where it is. I’ve had I can’t say that, that they’re, there isn’t, I know there’s some Page 11 �parts of my family that have money, but they don’t flaunt it. They don’t you know, they use it for whatever and but, we all pretty much stay about the same and I, I tribute that to the way that most of us were brought up. We were brought up in that middle class white neighborhood you know. I remember going down to Ann Arbor visit my sister down when my brother in law was going to the University of Michigan. and that’s where I came in contact with my first black people on a daily basis. There was kids down there that we used to play on the playground with all the time. Come time to go home they’d go their way, we’d go ours. Next day we’d come back, and we’d play on the playground. YAX: How old were you at this point? ROBSON: At that time I must have been 8, 9 years old. but, I never, I don’t ever remember racial things being spoken in my family. or disregard for anybody. we had my, my, one of my older sisters, one of her best friends was a black girl that lived out West of, out off of West Chicago Drive. The street isn’t even there and neither are any of the 6 houses that were on that street. [laughter]. But they all used to be, when I, when I delivered the paper, the Grand Rapids press, they were all my customers. And I knew this family really well. They were really nice people. so you know, racially I didn’t, I was really quite ignorant about what was going on around me. we had some black kids at school. I didn’t, one of them was in the band played a saxophone I thought, and he was really good. I don’t, I remember when we had minstrel shows at, in high school. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: but I don’t remember being actively aware of racial discrimination in those days. it just never occurred to me. or I don’t, and I don’t know if my parents were or not. I don’t know cuz I, like I say it was never and all my sisters and everything it was never discussed. They had, they had black, a black girlfriend. She, she had been to our house so it, I, that portion of relationships never bothered me until I got to be much older. then I found out what was going on and studied it more and, and I think I waffled between being a racist and a non racist like everybody else did and started, until I got to the point where I could really start rationalizing what was going on and so, well for heavens sakes all this time I thought we were already equal. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: And it didn’t turn out that way obviously. Ha still hasn’t as far as that goes. But it, it was, it was I mean I played football with, with guys that were, we played against at the time we played against Reese Puffer from Muskegon area. YAX: Yeah ROBSON: And at that time Reese Puffer was primarily a black school. It was another football team. We didn’t care what color they were, we went out there and played football. YAX: So you had a mixed high school? Or ROBSON: Yeah it was. It only, was only one black family but they had I think they had, it was the Jones family. They had a daughter, and I think the two boys. Page 12 �YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: And that was primarily it. Now the school is, is integrated with Hispanic, black, everything now. I think. I don’t know, I haven’t been over there in years but, it’s pretty much integrated to, to all of that today, that, a lot like I said earlier a lot of that, that area now is Hispanic and black mix. so that’s, that’s in the school over there now but my kids are, are both of my daughters went to Rogers and they, that was a mixed school. and I don’t know that they had a lot of problems there. Matter of fact one of the stars of the Rogers football team when Becky was a senior was a black kid. YAX: Hmm. ROBSON: and, and I know that, that he was, he was thought of very highly by everybody. I don’t know if it was because, if it was more of his talents or whatever, but he was a good kid. I mean I met him. I talked to him. He was a good kid. We had, then both of my daughters were in the band and they had mixed races in the band. and the black kids that they had in the band, I, were really good people. matter of fact I was in the band in high school, I played football, and ran track and stuff, and, but we had a, I remember one time we had three rivers band came up here. and we were gonna march in the tulip festival and enter into a competition at the, the Holt College football field over there after the parade and they were too. And it just so happened that we found out later on that we were both in the same flight. And but they needed, they were gonna come up here and they played a concert at our school and they, they were a pretty good-sized band, and they needed places to stay. Well at that time we had a house trailer YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: For going camping with and we had all kinds of room. I mean that house that my parents lived in was pretty close to a hotel [laughter]. I mean we had, I don’t remember how many kids we had there. But three rivers had several blacks in their, in their band. And some of them didn’t come up here YAX: Hmm. ROBSON: But one of them did and he stayed with my parents. they didn’t have an assigned family for him and my mother says he will stay with us, and he did. The kid was more fun than you could shake a stick at. He played piano by ear, YAX: Wow. ROBSON: And my mother had a piano in the house so we had a great time. We had all of these kids, all of these girls, we had some of the, some of the kids from my daughter, er my sisters classes along with these girls, you know to help show em things and we had a great time. and this, out of all the kids that came up here the black boy was the only one that came over to my mother and father and hugged my mother and shook my fathers hand and thanked them for the hospitality. The rest of them said thanks but it was like you and I would say thanks to somebody. YAX: Right. Page 13 �ROBSON: But he went out and he, he emotionally got involved with them by shaking their hands and hugging my mother. And that was quite a bit. Quite something. but it still didn’t, it didn’t dawn on me personally that there were still problems. YAX: Yeah ROBSON: You know. Until we got into the what, the ‘60’s and stuff when the marches and things started to take place and, and it, it, it came around then and I was, by that time I was in the service and that. But we didn’t even seem to have that much problem in the service. [clears throat]. Our ship when I was aboard ship, we had blacks and Hispanics, and whites, YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: And Jews, and everybody else. We’re all kinda you know, here’s Heinz 57 variety and we had one, one goal and that was to protect the United States. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: You know. And so I didn’t think too much of it. I didn’t really didn’t think too much of it until after, actually I came home from California. Is when I seem to, maybe because it was, more people were talking about it. I had a supervisor at work make, make a, a remark one time in a meeting about equality and he said that in a meeting that he was in someone asked that if if I was a, if we were asked to work with a black guy you know that’s the way it had to be but they said what if a black guy refuses to work with a white guy. And my supervisor said well then you discuss it, and he used the n word. And and that was the first time that I can honestly say that I got kicked between the eyes when that, when I really started to pay attention to what was going on. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: but even then I can't say that, that we had a problem with it blatantly, in other words out in the open, but it was there. it was obvious. Certain things that would happen at work you could see it. But what you did is like everybody else at the time, you just went about doing your job and let, YAX: Yeah ROBSON: Kind of hope that if you closed your eyes to it, it’d go away, you know. YAX: So how old were you when you went into the service? ROBSON: 18. YAX: So just right after high school? [Mood changes with change of topic from childhood to military] ROBSON: Yeah, yeah. I, I went in, I went, well, I was, yeah, yeah cuz I graduated on my 18th birthday, so I I went to J C for a short time to the first marking period. Well I played football down there too and then the grades came out and then I decided I wasn’t really going to be much good at college [laughter], at Page 14 �this point in time so, a friend of mine he and I, and he, I used to run against him in track. He went to Rogers but he was a friend of mine. [clears throat]. And we went down and signed up in the navy together. YAX: Why did you choose the navy? ROBSON: Well the Air Force wouldn’t take us cuz they wanted college education, YAX: Mmm ROBSON: And neither one of us wanted to be a ground pounder and neither one of us wanted to be a marine, so we just decided we’d go in the navy. [laughter]. And when we talked to the navy recruiter he made good on some things that we could go to school and stuff and get some education there too also. Not realizing that what he meant was they were navy schools for navy work. But still, they were good schools and he, he guaranteed that to us. YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: And the other ones didn’t do that. So, with the exception of the Air Force that they wanted you to have a four-year degree. But, and I understand. But, so we went in the navy. He ended up on nuclear submarines. YAX: Ooh ROBSON: on the Polaris submarines and I ended up on the ships that look for submarines [laughter]. And so that’s the way, and you know I got, I got a lot of electronic schools and training while I was in the service leadership schools and stuff like that, that were valuable for military and stuff. and then and he got a lot of computer training, working with the, the polar, Polaris missiles and stuff. YAX: Mm hmm ROBSON: So he, he had he had a good education and I, and I got a good background to do what I did when I came back and joined a phone company. And he, he ended up last I knew about Ron, he was working for IBM. Now where he is today I don’t know. I haven’t, I haven’t heard from him in a long, long time. YAX: So how long did you serve in the navy? ROBSON: 4 years. 4 years active duty and then 2 years in the reserves but that was inactive reserve so I didn’t go to meetings or anything. YAX: Oh ok. ROBSON: The contract that I signed was a 6-year contract so I had to, I had to decide how, what I wanted to do you know. YAX: So that was early ‘60’s? ROBSON: That was 1962 through 64 was my active duty, Page 15 �YAX: So nothing, ROBSON: So I was officially out of the army, er out of the navy in 1966. In February ’66 is when my, is when my obligation to the navy ended. YAX: So there was nothing going on then was there? like, ROBSON: Yeah, there was. YAX: Was there, was there Korea or Vietnam? ROBSON: well I was in when, when Kennedy was killed, YAX: Oh! ROBSON: Matter of fact we were out in the pacific on an operation when the word came over that Kennedy had died and had been killed, had been assassinated and that a radio tower had been blown up in Arizona. And the, the group that we were working with were given immediate orders to head for the Panama Canal. YAX: Ooh. ROBSON: And we just made a u-turn and headed straight south. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: by the time we got on station and got everything organized and everything, word had come that there was a single person that shot Kennedy and that that person had been killed. and then, but they, what we did is they asked us to stay on location for I think it was 32 hours, 2 days roughly. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: A little over 2 days, day and a half, something like that. And so we did. And then we went back to our exercises and stuff. But, we immediately set to getting the ship war ready. Cuz we, no we didn’t have any, you know, the, the group did not know all of the details and so it just became straight go to this and be ready for anything. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: So that’s what we did. And that was kind of nerve-racking. but the ship that I was on had been blown up during world war II, I mean it had hit a mine so. But it was ok. It floated. [laughter]. But YAX: You’d think they’d get new boats for that. ROBSON: Yeah. No they rebuilt this one. [laughter]. Put a new bow on it and everything. But yeah that was and then I think, [pause], I was stationed in Pearl Harbor when the first rangers quote advisors went to Vietnam. YAX: Mm hmm. Page 16 �ROBSON: These guys were, were something else. They were, they were, I remember seeing some of them go over on the, on the beach of liberty and stuff and you could comb your hair in the buttons on their, their uniforms. These guys were spit and polished. And they never went anyplace alone. There was at least two or maybe three of em together at all times. YAX: Hmm. ROBSON: but they were, they were the first Green Beret’s that went over there and we, I was, at the time I was stationed at the submarine base and 5:00 in the morning you’d hear those clowns running through the base [makes sounds to imitate the running], you know doing their calsenic’s or running through the base. But, they were good guys. They really were. All of them were, had to rank a sergeant. YAX: Mm ROBSON: And but they were really good guys. Yeah, you go to talk to these guys and you could talk to them anytime you wanted to, you know. if we’d meet, if we’d meet them on the, on the beach or something we’d sit there and I’d, I don’t know about the guys with me but I always liked talking to them, finding out where they were from and stuff. And, these guys were, were good guys. They were they knew that, where they were going, they knew what their job was gonna be and, and they knew that some of them probably wouldn’t come home. But they they were really good people. and they were very military people. I’ll say that much for them. [laughter]. But they were, their uniforms were spotless. I mean absolutely spotless. You couldn’t find a lint on their uniforms anyplace. Their boots, you could see your face in them, in their boots. YAX: My goodness. ROBSON: But they were, they were really, really squared away people. and they didn’t get in any trouble nobody gave them any trouble either. but they were good people. YAX: So you said you were in, ROBSON: I was stationed in, YAX: California? ROBSON: California when, when Kennedy got killed and I was stationed in Hawaii when Vietnam started. YAX: Now did you ever have to go over to Vietnam? ROBSON: No. No. No. when I was in Hawaii we went to what we called west pack. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: Which was Western Pacific and that included a 6 month tour over there where we would go to, where did we go? We went to the Philippines, we stopped at the Philippines. We stopped at Hong Kong and then Japan. And and then back home to Hawaii. Well, I was also in when they did the atomic bomb test. When I was stationed in Hawaii they did the atomic bomb test in the South Pacific and blew up an island. Page 17 �YAX: Did you get to see it? ROBSON: Oh yeah. That is one thing that having seen an atomic bomb go off, is that I don’t ever, ever, ever want to see anyone, another one go off. I saw 2 or 3 of them go off and the best place to be if one goes off is right there underneath it because you won’t even know what hit you. It’ll, you’ll be a cinder in a blink of an eye. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: [pause]. The first one we saw was set off at night and we were, I don’t know how far away we were. I know we were beyond the horizon. Horizons are 10 yard, 10 miles. YAX: Ok. ROBSON: Cuz that’s, the earth curves every, about every 10 miles. And, when that mushroom cloud came up over that horizon, first of all it was one of the most spectacular, and beautiful things I ever saw in my life. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: The colors in it were so vivid, it was just hard to explain. And then you think about, that was the energy that was released, I mean that wasn’t all the energy that was released. That’s just the energy that burn up. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: it was scary. It really was. It was scary. they dropped, the biggest one that they dropped turned out some of the lights in Honolulu, from the flash. It was in the newspaper out there that, that some of the traffic, er some of the lights were affected by it, which is incredible that man could make something like that. And the last one that, that went off they dropped from a B 52, and it went off 500 feet above the ground. YAX: hmm. ROBSON: And, when they let us come out topside it looked like daylight but, it was green. The, the color was green. Cuz it was overcast. YAX: Mm hmm. ROBSON: And it actually was about 4:30 in the morning. [laughs] YAX: Wow. ROBSON: There wasn’t supposed to be any sun. And then it slowly faded away, and I mean really, it was, it faded away so slowly that your eyes didn’t really realize what was happening. YAX: Mm hmm. Page 18 �ROBSON: until all of a sudden it was dark again. And, we were quite a ways away from that but the first one was enough for me. I, I know, I know I’ve, I’ve thought about it many time. About an atomic bomb, and every time I see the ones that were dropped during World War II I, this is gonna be hard to explain but I, I think how lucky the people were that were at ground zero versus the people that were 10, 15, 20 miles away. YAX: Right. ROBSON: Because those people are still suffering YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: From the radiation burns and stuff. [phone call] YAX: So why were they setting them off, I mean if it was after World War II? ROBSON: In World War II they were setting them off to end the war. YAX: Right. ROBSON: They were setting them off to make the Japanese surrender really. YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: Because if the allies had invaded Japan the loss of life would have just been catastrophic. And, Truman made the decision to drop the bomb, and they dropped the first one but the Japanese wouldn’t give up so they dropped the second one, and the Japanese instantly decided that enough is enough. YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: And that’s why. And then, in the sixties when they were doing it, when they were testing them, it was because it was before the nuclear test ban treaties and stuff went in. YAX: Oh, OK. ROBSON: So everybody was testing. And then we tested some out in Utah and some of the other places in the silos, and in underground bunkers. They were blowing them up under there. But there underground, less radioactivity was released into the air. YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: And they dropped a couple of hydrogen bombs also. But the atomic bomb, people talk about it like it’s a pill. And it is. It is a very deadly pill. Like I say, the best place to be if one goes off is right at ground zero. Because at least it will be over for you, but the people who are out at the fringes will suffer for years and years and years. As a matter of fact, the one island, Christmas Island, out there where they had people that used to live, and they moved the people off the island to another island. And they Page 19 �won’t let them go back there because it’s still radioactive. And the half-life of radioactivity is twenty-five thousand years. That’s the half-life. So when you reach twenty-five thousand years, that’s half-life you’ve another twenty-five thousand for another half-life, and another twenty-five thousand for another half-life. In other words, nobody will live long enough to see that radioactivity be nothing. YAX: Wow. ROBSON: That’s why it’s so dangerous, that’s why it’s terrible. Nasty, nasty stuff. But yet, you can harness it and do good things with it. But at the same time it’s just [moment of silence] Yeah every time I think about it I don’t wanna see one go off. YAX: So do you disagree with the decision to drop them on Japan, or what are your thoughts on that? Since you’ve seen what it can do. ROBSON: Well, what I saw in the sixties, that one bomb was more powerful than both of those put together in Japan. However, the bomb that they dropped on Japan wouldn’t fit in this room. YAX: Right. ROBSON: It was hungous. Because of all of the electronics and everything that had to go inside of this, in order to set it off and to get the chain reaction going inside of it. And those bombs never touched the ground. They went off above the ground. Because it sent the force down and then the shock waves went out. YAX: Oh, OK. ROBSON: And everything went with it. I mean that’s why, if you’ve ever seen some of the videos from the cameras where they had a simulated village, and they dropped on and it looks like a wind storm. And that’s all of the radioactivity, carried with all of the power of this thing. And, it just blows things over. I guess, I mean I was just a child at that time, when they dropped the bomb. I know that I had a brother-in-law that was in World War II, I had an uncle that was in during World War II, both of them came home. My uncle trained pilots, even though he was an enlisted man, he trained pilots. In propeller planes, because they didn’t have jets to speak of. And my brother-in-law worked in an ammunition depot. Well he only had one eye, he had a glass one. He got shot by his dad hunting, it was a hunting accident. And he accidentally got shot by his dad and it put his eye out. So they couldn’t send him overseas so they kept him on, and I had a brother-in-law who served in Korea, and he was on a gun crew. He was a spotter for a gun crew. They were all killed except him and the other guy who was him down below. And they said he was a different person when he came home, cause I didn’t know him previously. I had a brother-in-law who was in the air force during Korea. But he had a desk job. But it was handling important stuff. And I had a brother-in-law who was in during Korea, or just towards the end of Korea. And he was at a supply depot, because that’s what his background was in. And he was good at it and they needed people who were good at that for logistics and stuff. My cousin, that I told you about from high school, he was an officer in communications and he had a top secret clearance. And when Vietnam broke out he was called back to active duty. And that was when he retired, he was from the Navy. These guys, none of them had, none of them, witnessed an atom bomb. I don’t know all Page 20 �the truth about the atom bomb in World War II. I do know that one of the biggest reasons was to end the war, they knew it would end the war. It killed thousands of people, innocent people. And it maimed even more. Ground zero is still there, they haven’t restored it. It looks just like it does in the pictures. It did end the war that’s what they wanted them to do. That’s what both bombs did. They ended the war. One of the stories was that because the allies were getting closer and closer to Japan, they had pretty well beat up their air force, and had pretty well beat up their navy. But they had hundreds of thousands of people that they could put in as infantryman. And the casualties to invade Japan, like I said, based on history, would have been catastrophic for both sides. It probably would have gone on longer, obviously, if they hadn’t dropped the bomb. But the allies probably would have won out. Because we had everything the Japanese didn’t have. We had more resources than they did. Based on history, I didn’t have to make that decision, but I’m sorry, to a point, that it was the United States that used it the first time, but it was the United States that used it the first time. Because if any of these other dictators or countries that have or want to build a nuclear bomb want to see what it does, look at the films. As far as a nuclear proliferation goes, I agree with that. I mean we have guns that can shoot an atomic bomb shell fifty, sixty miles or a hundred miles. I mean it’s stupid. We got ships that can launch thirty-two missiles. Each one of them could be equipped if we had to. It’s stupid, what do you gain by blowing up half the world? Then you can’t live in it anyway. You know? So you go the biggest and the loudest toys, big deal. I don’t see a single conqueror that wanted to rule the world ever succeed. I don’t think any of them succeeded. And had they, the Roman Empire was probably the closest anybody came because they controlled so much of Europe. And look what happened, they folded from the inside. The British Empire, for years the sun never sat on the British Empire. It does now. YAX: [laughs] ROBSON: Because most of those countries are now independent. So you don’t gain anything by ruling other people. I don’t see any positive stuff coming out of it. All I can see, is thank God that the bombs that we did drop are not the bombs we have today. YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: So you know we got ships floatin’ out there all over the world. We got airplanes, we got so many ways of delivering atomic weapons. Just conventional bombs, for crying out loud, will kill hundreds or thousands of people. We don’t need atomic weapons to do that. And the fact that people, Japan is a good example of that when they’re, when that powerhouse got hit by the tsunami. We really don’t know all there is to know about atomic energy. We know it can be useful. But at the same time, it’s kinda like how long before it turns around and bites you. It’s kinda like a rattlesnake, you can pick it up for a long time but eventually you’re gonna get bit. And then you hear that the United States has one hundred and four of them built over faults, and they knew the faults were there when they built them. What does this tell you? You know? The newest one that was built, that I know of, in Michigan was up north near Charlevoix. What is it Flat Rock or whatever they call it? Little Rock. The other one, they tore it down because it was too small to serve the area, plus it was one of the first ones built. And it was falling apart anyway. So they built a newer one, bigger one, more efficient one, to feed a bigger area up there. A B-52 crashed in Lake Michigan, making a bomb run. On that one up there. Strategic air command used to practice bomb runs, and it crashed up there off of Lake Michigan. The said there Page 21 �were no nuclear weapons on board that plane. Nobody ever bothered to argue about it. But they did get all the weaponry off the plane. Even though it was laying in the water. So they’re vulnerable, you can’t protect them all. South Haven, for crying out loud, it’s built right on the beach for Pete’s sake. YAX: [laughs] ROBSON: The reason why is it was built so close to the water was just for that reason, it was close to the water. YAX: Right. ROBSON: They could pump the fresh water in, keep it cool, pump the hot water back out. Well they’re doing the same thing with the power plant over by Grand Haven. The Conser’s plant over there, it’s a coal operated plant, but they’repumping water in, and they’repumping water out. And it’s changing the environment in the Great Lakes. You have the big one up by Ludington up there, where they pump all of the water up into the reservoir, which is humongous, it’s one giant lake. But it goes up through big screws, kills all kinds of fish. And then when they want to generate electricity they release it and let it flow down, spin the turbines and generate electricity. We have power that comes from up there. So we got a lot of things we got to try and answer. But nuclear bombs are probably the one answer I don’t want to see anybody use. YAX: So what are your thoughts compared to when you went into the service to now, on the U.S. as a country? Did you have more patriotism when you went into the service, and then lost it as the U.S. has developed? ROBSON: No. YAX: Same thing? ROBSON: I don’t feel any different. I mean, it’s like anything I’ve done in my life, there are always things that I don’t like. Decisions that people have made that I don’t like. When you’re in the military you may not like the decisions, but you kind of, sort of, have no choice but to follow the laws. YAX: OK. ROBSON: And especially if you’re in the navy, the shortest distance to land from that ship is ten miles at any given time. And it is usually straight down. So you don’t have a lot of choice[Both laugh.] You know? But, I get very upset when I see Americans destroy the American Flag. I get very upset when I see Americans cuss the government. I get very upset when I see people, in our own country, disrespect our president and even our congress. And I don’t like anything that’s going on right now, but that doesn’t mean I have to disrespect the people that are there. And I probably do. [Both laugh.] By some of the things I say, you know? But, basically it’s not the people, it’s the position that they hold is what deserves the respect, you know? The president of the United States, that job doesn’t come with a hand book. Congress, to be a senator doesn’t come with a handbook. To be a representative doesn’t come with a handbook per say. But, what it comes with is an expectancy to be an adult at all times. Page 22 �YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: You know? And to understand, to make it a point to understand what the constitution says what you can do and can’t do, what the laws read. There was a discussion the other night on T.V. about when Ford pardoned Nixon. I understand why he did it, I didn’t agree with it, but I understand why he did it. The thing is, is that there is nobody that I know of, in this country, that’s a citizen or a non-citizen, that is above any of those laws in this country. I don’t care how much money they have, or how little money they have, nobody is above the laws of this country in my opinion. And I feel the same way as I always have, it’s my country, if I want to kick it I’ll kick it, but at the same time, don’t try and take it away from me. And that’s kind of the way I felt when I was in the service, it’s my ship, I live on it. And I’ll fight with the guys aboard my ship, but if you fight with one of the guys aboard my ship, you’re going to fight with me. YAX: Right. ROBSON: I think that’s the way it should be. I don’t expect everybody to like what’s going on, but I expect everybody to be respectful of the people. Just like I don’t like what the cops are doing, or the local governments are doing about these people that are, peacefully, demonstrating. Using tear gas and things to get people to move. I also don’t think that if they were told “you can’t be in this section of town because it hinders the business of the overall town.” YAX: Like downtown? ROBSON: Yeah. I don’t think they, well I mean, in some places like in Chicago they used tear gas and stuff. YAX: Oh, like the recent protests? ROBSON: Yeah. They used the recent protests because they I agree that there was a lot more that should have been done, when the crash came. There is obviously some things that were not done according to Hoyle. They may not have been outright crimes. But they definitely should have been looked into, to make sure that what they did was out of stupidity, and not out of want and disrespect for the law. That any one of those CEO’s, or CFO’s, companies, any one of them I think should have been taken out of office. And I think some of those big banks should have been broken up. They broke up AT&T because they were afraid of AT&T, they were making a billion dollars every quarter. They were huge, and they broke them up. But, they made kind of a mistake. They made seven AT&T’s. [Both laugh.] ROBSON: And they didn’t put anything in the restrictions about getting back together. In other words, buying each other out to make them bigger. And that’s what has happened, you don’t have the seven operating companies, per say, anymore. Ameritech, or SBC as they were then, bought AT&T for sixtyfour billion dollars or something like that, it was a steal. Because we paid four hundred million dollars, or billion dollars whatever it was, for Southeast Bell, just to get the cellular part of it. Because that’s the way the deal was. And also, the CEO, at the time, of SBC was a true in the wool AT&T man. And at the time the present management of AT&T was running them into the ground, and he couldn’t stand it. And Page 23 �that’s why we bought AT&T. And that still isn’t complete, that’s still going on. In fact, I used to laugh when I looked at my pay check because it said up in the corner “Michigan Bell”. [Both laugh] And it was drawn out of a bank in Louisiana. But what it comes down to is that, all of the franchises and stuff were in Michigan Bell’s name. Even though you change the name of the corporation, you still have all of these individual things that don’t change because it would cost too much and take too much, you wouldn’t be gaining anything anyway. But, I always used to laugh and say “ah I’m still working for Michigan Bell”. YAX: So, going back to like service and stuff, a couple years it was really big, people protesting service peoples funerals. ROBSON: Well, that particular group, I don’t know if they had any of their members die in the service or if their members had objections to going into service, I don’t know. YAX: Well what they were protesting… ROBSON: I didn’t agree. I knew what they were protesting. They were saying God was allowing Americans to die because of homosexuality and other things, but I think homosexuality was the biggest thing they were using at the time, or was one of the things. And I’m thinking to myself, “what’s that got to do with it?” But, I don’t, as far as the first amendment goes, the freedom of speech and the right to assemble, yeah OK do it. But remember that you and I have a right to bury your dead in a peaceful matter, as much as I have a right to demonstrate. But, even if I demonstrate I don’t have the right to interfere with what you do. Because then I have crossed a line. Or vice versa. And when you’ve crossed that line, then I think it’s time that you, that one should have legal sanctions. I don’t care how much noise they make, as long as, if they have got to stay on that side of the side walk. I don’t like it, I don’t like it at all. I think it shows total disrespect, and I think what it is, it’s one man it’s another Waco, Texas all over again. The way I look at it. YAX: another what? ROBSON: Another Waco. Where they had the one guy, he got all of these people in there and then the house caught on fire and they all burned up; in Waco, Texas. YAX: When was that? ROBSON: Just, not too long ago. A few years ago. YAX: Oh, I don’t watch the news very often [laughs]. ROBSON: I forget what this guy’s name was. But anyway, he thought that he was the messiah or something, was God or something, and he got all of these people in there and all of these girls in there and was having relationships with young girls, and all the children that were in there. But they had fifty caliber machine guns and they were armed to the hilt. Well I don’t know that the people in this church are that way, but this is the same guy that was going to burn the Quran. This group that’s been protesting the cemetery, or the funeral, and he was the same guy that was going to burn the Quran. And he didn’t do it. I think there was a lot of pressure put on him not to do it, and because he thinks that these people are all heathens and everything else. I don’t agree with the war, I didn’t agree with it Page 24 �when Bush started it. I thought it was a case of trying to save face because his father was, when his father was in war he was forced out, you know, and he didn’t finish the job or whatever.And personally I’m getting a little sick and tired of the U.S. going into these limited wars and letting the people in Washington run them. It has been that way since Korea. Truman wouldn’t let MacArthur go beyond the thirty-eight parallel, which divides the country so we ended up with two Koreas. And in Vietnam, Johnson didn’t want to blow up the country and go after it full hawk the way they should have. And that was an unpopular war just like the ones were going into now, the only difference is, is that were welcoming the soldiers back now with a little more enthusiasm and appreciation than we did for the guys and gals from Vietnam. And that’s too bad because I had some friends in Vietnam, and I know what they went through over there, I was glad they came home in one piece. YAX: Right. But I wish people would go back to the days of civility and honoring your neighbor. I know it sounds a little biblical, but it doesn’t take that much, it really doesn’t. I don’t like everything that I do. This sounds like a self-incrimination, which it probably is, but if I haven’t hurt anybody when I did it, then I don’t feel too bad about it. Because most of the things I do, I do more to just break down some stress, it’s my way to deal with stress. And I figure if I go down I’ll take everybody with me, and we’ll all have a good time doing it. [Both laugh.] ROBSON: But I don’t like the way they did it, and you haven’t heard too much about them lately. But they’ve had some pretty serious losses filed against them recently here, and it has kind of quieted them down here. Kind of like the abortion issue I think is one that can really become a sticky wick. We got the law that abortion is legal. OK, fine. We’ve got laws that say that you can’t use federal government money. OK, fine. That’s the law. And now everybody else wants to add their two cents worth to it. Which, to me, is nothing more than duplication, and time wasted. I don’t agree with what happened out west, when that guy went into the church and killed that doctor. I don’t, I can’t even condone that. That guy had no right to take that doctor’s life. Just like I have no right to take yours or any other. I don’t believe that destroying a person’s private life by publishing their phone numbers and their address, and their children and everybody else. I don’t believe that’s the way to deal with an issue. These people are trying to put themselves above everybody else, using the old quotation, they’re holier than everybody else. And they’re not, they’re not different than you and me. They put their pants on one leg at a time, you know? So I don’t know where they get off trying to be so radical. In the paper, recently I read about a young boy, nineteen years old, killed an eighteen year-old. Because he thought that the eighteen year-old had taken advantage of his ex-girlfriend. So what does he do? He stabs the guys twenty-five times, but that isn’t what killed him. What killed him was when he cranked him in the head with a shovel. So what did the kid gain? Not a thing. Like the boy’s father said, “all you have to do is call the cops if that’s what you think”, it would have solved the problem. You know? Your family wouldn’t be feeling the way they do because you’re going to spend the rest of your life in prison, my family wouldn’t be without a son. And there’s a girl out there no that can’t feel too proud of herself, because of what he did. So there’s a minimum of three families that have been affected by this. Anytime the radicals decide to do something it is narrow, and I don’t think they look at it from a broad picture point of view. And I Page 25 �don’t think they intend to. Just like the animal rights people who burned down that laboratory in Michigan State a few years ago. That’s a crying shame they did that. They destroyed a lot of medical information. We were here to be put in charge of the animals, and whether it sounds right or wrong to use animals as guinea pigs, no pun intended. [Both laugh] I didn’t create the animals with some of the DNA that they’ve got in them, and that’s close to you and me. But, if it helps to make my life easier, and if one of those little critters dies, I’m sorry, but that little critter can take credit for saving a lot of lives. It might seem inhumane, but take one of those people and do one of those experiments on them once. And if they think it’s inhumane, look what they’d have to go through. And chances are, the human body being what it is, they’re not going to find a cure out of the human body anyway. YAX: Right. ROBSON: Although there are people out there that have certain strains of DNA in them that do have some positive things that could be used. I understand radicals have their place, they have their rights just like I do. But, I don’t agree with all that they do, especially when it comes to taking life. And when it comes to, I brought up about the abortion thing, I think that a woman should be able to go to her doctor, with her husband, and say, “We don’t want this baby. It wasn’t planned.” And it’s early enough, I think abortion would OK that way. And I think the husband should have a word in it as much as the wives do. And maybe that’s why so many men are the radicals, I don’t know. [Both laugh.] But, tomorrow my opinion of that could change, I don’t know. I’ve had sisters who have had miscarriages. My ex-wife had a miscarriage. I know what it did to my wife, mentally for a while. And, I know what it did to my sisters, mentally for a while. And, if they had, I know my sisters well enough, I don’t think they would have had an abortion if their child could have lived. I don’t think there was anything wrong with the child, it was just that their body wasn’t ready to have a child. I don’t know. And, in the case of nowadays, I think spina bifida is one of the things that if they catch it early enough in a fetus they can fix it, and the child will be born without it. That hole will be taken care of and the child will progress through pregnancy normally. I read that in the reader’s digest, or someplace, I don’t remember. But they can do that, if they know that the baby has that problem. And there’s other things that they can do with the fetus, that if they’re aware of it, they can fix it while it’s still in the mother’s womb. And the child will be born normal. One of the things with abortion is that people want a perfect child. When you decide to have a child you always flip a coin, and it always lands on the edge. It doesn’t land on heads or tails, it lands on the edge. And that is just the coin’s way of saying “I don’t know either.” You know? I remember when my wife was pregnant; they asked us, “what do you want, a boy or girl?” And we said that we didn’t care, as long as it was healthy. So we had two girls. Which just adds the toll up of people in my life that are female. [Both laugh.] ROBSON: So it doesn’t make a whole lot of difference. YAX: So you should understand women fairly well then? ROBSON: No I don’t. [Both laugh.] I sat one day and figured out all the women in my family and all the women on the outside of my family. And I sat there, looked myself right, square in the eye and said, “You know, I have absolutely no idea what women are about.” [Both laugh.] And I’m not going to lie, I don’t know. I mean I know some of the things that women like, but I don’t know what goes on in a Page 26 �woman’s body or in her mind. I know a lot of things that go on in a woman’s body because I went through it went I was married, and I have five sisters and two daughters; two mothers and two grandmothers. I mean, mother and mother-in-law. I can’t even count all the nieces I got. And all the young ladies in my life and all the young ladies that I’ve known up at Applebee’s, you being one. But, I don’t know there’s things about you ladies that I don’t know, and there’s things about you doctors don’t even know. [Both laugh.] ROBSON: So I don’t feel too bad. Sometimes it’s true, you can’t live with you and you can’t live without you. You know? And it works both ways. So there’s when women can’t live with men and there’s times they can’t live without them. Women can’t figure out men, and don’t feel bad because we can’t either. [Both laugh.] YAX: Alright last question; it’s kind of a big one. Looking back at your life what are some life lessons that you’ve come up with, and is there anything in your life you wish you could take back or do over. ROBSON: Oh boy. [Both laugh.] There are so many things that I would do over. But, I think [silence and indiscernible words]. I remember there was two young girls in my life who I really cared for. One of them got pregnant by another guy while we were going steady, so that hurt, and then another girl that I was going with, when I went into the service, I told her not to wait for me. Because I didn’t know where I was going to go, or when I was going to come home. I knew I was going to be in for four years, but that’s a long time to ask somebody to wait. And I wish that I had, in a roundabout way, I had asked her to stay for me. But I didn’t. And one of the mistakes I made was when I got married right after I got out of the service. And that was a bad mistake. I wasn’t any more ready to get married than the man in the moon. YAX: So you were twenty-two or twenty-three? ROBSON: Yes, I was around twenty-three, twenty-four somewhere around there. And that marriage ended in a divorce, I left her and came back here. I was single for four years, so I played the field quite a bit. That’s when I did a lot of stupid things. When I finally met my wife I thought, when I first met her I didn’t know she was married. She was going through a divorce and I didn’t know that, it was a couple of months before I found out. So we kind of played it sort of cool. I like her mom and dad. The amazing thing is that I knew one of her older brothers, I knew him from high school. YAX: And you guys met in California? ROBSON: No I met her when I came back here. YAX: Oh, OK. ROBSON: But I knew him from high school because I ran track against him. He went to Comstock Park. But my first marriage I did a lot of dumb things; a lot of dumb, stupid, immature things. And the best thing I did was when I left her, I did her a favor and I’m sure she knew that. And, for four years I just sat around, I kind of played the field, but I did a lot of thinking. In the meantime I had gotten a good job with the phone company. I was living at home, I was the only kid at home, both my younger sisters were married by then. I had a lot of time to think and do things on my own, and I decided it was about Page 27 �time to grow up a little bit. The military helped me a lot, to grow up, it did a lot of good things for me. But anything you do in life, I’m sure that if you meet any of your high school friends who didn’t go to college, you can feel a difference. You feel different. Not about them, but mentally you know there’s something different between the two of you. And that’s how I felt. So I made up my mind that I was going to do everything I could not to make the same mistakes that ruined my first marriage, when I married my second wife. And, I honestly, truthfully don’t know why she left me. Because I was working really hard not to be a pain in her neck, but I know I became one, just out of frustration. So we got divorced and we had the two girls. Well fortunately, the two girls, one was out of high school and I think on was a sophomore or a junior then. But one thing I learned about divorce was that the older the children are the harder it is on them, it makes no difference. It’s hard on young kids, but time will heal youngsters I think a little better. Unless there’s a lot of physical things involved, or a lot of abuse, physically or otherwise. I know a lot of the decisions my girls made was based on what they felt they had to make, because they didn’t know if they could trust my decision, or their mother’s. And I know, based on that, is partly why I do what I do today for my kids. But, it’s also because my mother and father never asked me any questions, they let me stay at home, they didn’t ask me why I broke up with my first wife, they didn’t make over demanding demands on me, they left their door open for me, and I have done the same thing for my girls. Up at Applebee’s I do a lot of listening, if you watch me, I’m not always talking. And I’m just watching and listening to what is going on around me, and it has helped me a lot. Knowing that the way they were talking is the way I was headed that same way so why don’t I change? Or, “I wonder if I was to ask this person a question, would I get an honest answer?” or “why don’t I just tell them I’m your friend and I’ll be here if you need me.” YAX: Yeah. ROBSON: I’m finding out that, as I get older, that means more than anything. And the mistakes I’ve made I can’t really correct them. But, I can do my damnedest to not make them again. And, sometimes I get a little carried away, but overall I try hard. That’s one of the reasons why I do some of the things I do in church. I like doing the sermons when they ask me to, I like doing the readings when it’s my turn. I don’t know if I like being on the church council or not. [Both laugh.] Because I was on it before and I found it to be a small, you know, it’s good, good things happen. And I’ve always said anybody that belongs to a church, should be involved on their church council somehow, if they want to know anything about their church. I’ve had a couple of pastors here that are good friends, one of them, his wife was a good friend of my wife’s. The pastor that’s in the nursing home right now, is a retired colonel from the army. He was a chaplain. I consider him a friend of mine and the present pastor we got is a friend of mine, I consider him a friend of mine. So I do like that, and it helps me sometimes to remember. YAX: Very cool. Well, thank you so much Bob. END OF INTERVIEW Page 28 � https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/05e8e38e9243d22c5d94c0e2ddeab3b0.mp3 7228e6e9ba7e061ed824f60fca4ec970 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Speaking Out: Western Michigan Civil Rights Oral Histories Subject The topic of the resource Civil rights--Michigan--History Personal narratives Oral histories African Americans--Personal narratives Gays--Personal narratives Lesbians--Personal narratives Bisexual people--Personal narratives Transgender people--Personal narratives Veterans--Personal narratives Women--Personal narratives People with disabilities--Personal narratives Muslims--United States--Personal narratives Hispanic Americans--Personal narratives Homophobia Discrimination Islamophobia Stereotypes (Social psychology)--Upper Penninsula (Mich.) Description An account of the resource Collection of oral history recordings documenting the history of civil rights and social justice advocacy in Western Michigan. The collection was created by faculty and students as a project of the LIB 201 (formerly US 201): "Diversity in the U.S." course from 2011-2012. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. Brooks College of Interdisciplinary Studies Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Speaking Out: Western Michigan Civil Rights Oral History Project (GV248-01) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-05-02 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio/mp3 application/pdf Language A language of the resource eng Type The nature or genre of the resource Sound Text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV248-01 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1930-2011 Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context GV248-01_Robson_Robert Title A name given to the resource Robert Robson audio interview and transcript Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Robson, Robert Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource LeMieux, Kyle Hengesbac, Amanda Yax, Tara Description An account of the resource Robert Robson is a military veteran who was born and raised in Grand Rapids. He signed a contract with the navy in 1962 and spent 4 years in active duty and 2 years in the inactive reserves. He has a lot of memories from his time in the navy and talked about his views on the military and being a veteran in the United States. Growing up in Grand Rapids he had a lot of stories about some of the things that have been changing in the area including diversity. Subject The topic of the resource Civil rights--Michigan--History Veterans--Personal narratives Language A language of the resource eng Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a> Type The nature or genre of the resource Sound Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio/mp3 application/pdf Relation A related resource Speaking Out: Western Michigan Civil Rights Oral History Project Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2011-10-26 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives