Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

Description of the video:

Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.

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Question I have is, do you think of yourself as a leader? As a leader, yes. Well, I don't really think of myself as a leader. But looking over my past, I, even through elementary school, I seem to have been in positions of leadership such as president, student counsel, and elementary school and various organizations that thereafter. I don't really know how it happened, but it just seemed to happen. So I don't know, it's for others to say, I guess you know whether or not I was a leader. I tried to put my ideas over and try to see them through. So if that's the definition of a leader, I guess you could say it to that extent. So as you think about your career, how do you go about putting your ideas over and persuading people to follow you? Well, you know, it's something that is not necessarily you're born with. I don't think it's something at least I had to learn over the years through experience and working with people. And what you mentioned that I was living in, in Lockville in my early, early years. And that's true, and this was like after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and 41 is when I was born. So I kind of grew up with that environment, so to speak. We that lived in the Lockville Gardens projects, even though we were children, we still had kind of an adult outlook, so to speak. Maybe because of that, I don't know in terms of the war, but we basically had the war did have an effect to the extent that we would form, I guess what could be called gangs of kids, you know, everybody with a particular persuasion one way or the other. We had different kind of like mock, I mean, it wasn't a to the extent of gangs today where you're using firearms and that kind of thing. But we did have rocks and sticks and so forth. Did, as I say, group efforts from the playground activities. I guess to that extent, maybe this is where, I guess looking back, you might say, helped develop leadership qualities. I wasn't always the sweet, innocent young man you see before you today. I lived in the Lockville Garlens from birth to basically age eight years with children there. A lot of things that happened in the child's life, from bullying to getting along with other children and that kind of thing. It was like a microcosm, let's say the war with the war going on, we had that environment. We would come up with terms like on guard. I mean, you know, you had to be ready at all times, you know, for anything that happens, so to speak. We had, you know, there was a elementary school, 24 which was right at the corner of North Street, but it was in the Lockville Gardens complex. You may be familiar with that. So we went there was a kindergarten in the Lockflle Gardens projects on the corner of Blake Street and and Indian Avenue, which we attended. I always jokingly say these are probably the best years of my life because we had crackers and milk and we had rest time on the max. I really enjoyed that as a child, as I remember going to like first grade and second grade at the school, 24. Sometimes when leaving the school, you had to kind of establish your position, so to speak, socially. And there were times when I would be engaged in pistocopes or try to be, you know. And sometimes I was given detention after school and that kind of thing. So, for that time period, you were a normal young man? I suppose you have to ask my parents, they're no longer on the earth. Well, I'm roughly your age and I know what you're talking about. But, but at any rate, you know, I guess looking back, you kind of, you know, determined what buttons to push and whatnot to push to. So to that extent, it kind of follows, I guess. So, so when, when you were growing up and developing your career, were there any leaders that you admired or inspired you? Oh yeah, definitely. Who, who, who comes to mind? Well, there were quite a few actually. I mean, any, any adult in the area was inspirational for the most part. You had, of course, policemen that were assigned to the area for protection and serve to serve and that kind of thing. There was a gentleman by the name Bruiser Gaines, James, Bruiser Gaines, who was one of the persons that extended, developed what was later to be called the Dust Bowl basketball game. And he would be a person that everybody kind of looked up to as children and adults actually. But there were others on a national level, you had athletes such as boxers Joe Lewis who I looked up to and you know, whenever he was fighting. I've often remarked that just about every radio there were no TV's at the time. Every radio in the complex is pretty much tuned to that fight. And then when he was successful in the fight, you could hear the roars, the cheers and whatnot around the complex. I later got a chance to actually meet him. He was a golfer and my grandfather was a golfer. And they were at Coffin Golf Course on 30th Yeah. Riverside area. And I was maybe about a knee high at the time. A little bit higher maybe. But Joe Lewis happened to be playing on the course and I was introduced to him, which was very interesting. Got his autograph and that kind of thing. So that was the golf course in Indianapolis where African Americans could play golf? Where everybody actually everybody did. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But yeah, we, you know, African Americans might not have been able to play at other courses, but they were able to play at caucus, So Okay. Those are some of these and of course some of the soldiers, some of my father's friends were in the war. We had one of his friends that was tank commander. Actually, I think he was the tank commander under General Patton. Okay. And you know, but when they would come come home, they would come by the house. At that time, Lockville had what they called apartments on the west side of the complex. And then they had group houses on the on the same side of town, but usually would be just north of North Street. And, you know, they're like, sort of like townhouse, which you would call townhouses. They but, but whenever they would come to town, they would they would come to visit. And then of course and my family, I had people we looked up to because we had my father's family was in Indianapolis and one of his uncles was Dr. Guy Grant who was one of the founders of Kappa Apoye Paternity in Bloomington in 1911. And he actually majoring in chemistry and became a dentist. Went to the IU Dental School and became a dentist. And then we had his brother, one of his brothers, well actually three of his brothers were attorneys, but one brother became. His name was Wilber Grant. He became state legislator with the General Assembly, and also later in life became he was a Juvenile Court Judge, and then he became Marion County Superior Court Judge. But all of my father's side of the family. One where they weren't all necessarily professionals, but they were all people that you would look to for various situations. Sell We say they came from New Albany, Indiana. Go on the Ohio River? Yes. And you may have heard of there was a tornado that struck back in in Indiana history that was a few years ago. It was denoted at the state house with pictures and the damage it did and that kind of thing. But they were in elementary school down there at the time and they were in that tornado, which did damage. My father was really old enough to go to school, but he would go to school with them, with his uncles and aunts. And he happened to be at school that day. And fortunately, you know, nobody got killed in the family, so But So that was in New Albany? New Albany Indian, yes. It's it's I don't have the exact date of seven, but I'm sure that's in record with with the state library or whatever. And then but then one of my father's cousins from Louisville, Kentucky, his name was Harvey Russell, They called him eight Harvey Russell, he had been in the Coast Guard and had trained at Lake Michigan facilities. And he was at the time they had what they called Joe Lewis punch. It was like a soda. Soda pop, uh huh. And he was one of the salesman for that. He later became the first black vice president of Pepsi Cola under Joan Joan Crawford, the actress. Well, she was the chairman of the board, I guess so. And so these are the kind of people that the kids in our family could look up to. And then so do you think he did them proud? I I don't know. Sometimes I wanted because they did so much for so little, in many cases, you know. We also looked at line of artists who was the manager of Lockfield Garden. He also was a member of Capsid fraternity. And then you had people like the Francis. There was a facility, the Senate Avenue YMCA you might have heard about. They used to have what they call monster meetings and they would bring in some of the black celebrities to speak. It was very popular, we had a chance to see. So you attended some of those monster meetings? I did not. I was not much too young. Okay. But my father and, and that generation generation did, they, it was, it was quite, quite quite the thing of the day back then also. Let's see other people in terms of looking up to then. My mother's mother's family, we she was from Gary, Indiana and but she was she was from a family of 722 boys and five girls. And she would travel to Gary every summer with us. We had to ride the train from Union Station. That was also always a big, big deal. You know, you have a big trunk and she had to pack the clothes and everything and we had to get that loaded on the train and ride the Mon and ride up to Hammond, Indiana, which was the station. And then some of the relatives up there would come pick us up. But anyway, her father was Charles Evans and he worked at Land Steele. And he actually became the first black foreman at Land Steel, as I understand it. Her mother was Baby Love Evans, B, ABI E. And she was very outstanding as a leader even though she didn't necessarily work. You know, like back in that day, the women usually didn't work, they stayed at home, would raise the children. And probably was a better situation than we have today where both parents work and then the children are left to their own devices. But anyway, she was she was an outstanding person and very involved spiritually with the Baptist church and as well as my mother. And but anyway, she she was kind of found of wisdom. And my mother attended Mount Zion Baptist Church, which was at that time at 12th and Fayette, right near Christmas advertising. Yeah. You know, they changed that of course. But but anyway, there was a Sunday school bus. We had to get up every Sunday and ride the bus and go to Sunday school. And, you know, looking back on it, I said, wow, You know, But that was where were you found over leaders? There was a pastor, Reverend R. T. Andrews, you may have heard of, who was an outstanding pastor of the time. And he basically had been a businessman in Texas, and I think either Houston or Dallas, I'm not sure. But he had a business background and he utilized that. He could he could get loans when other folks couldn't because of his business background, I guess. And ultimately, he had a philosophy of cradle, the philosophy where he eventually put that into effect. We moved our church to 35th and Graceland, between Graceland Avenue and Boulevard Place. And let's say he had a cradle to grave philosophy. And he was able to finance, or get financing to build two apartment buildings on Boulevard Place. And also sort of a nursing home, I guess you could say, in that area. So, he was quite a leader. The community and others he had of course, the deacons and elders, you may have heard of B. J. Jackson who ran people's Sal home which was located on just south of Indiana Avenue on West Street. You know, there, there were quite a few leaders that not all you had people like Blackburn who was of the planner house. Yeah. But you had people that you looked up to while you were. Oh, definitely role models. There, there were people that you definitely looked up to.