- Collection:
- Donna Novak Coles Georgia Women's Movement Archives
- Title:
- Davis talks about her early life and segregation (4:16)
- Creator:
- Davis, Jean
- Contributor to Resource:
- Millen, Susan A. (Susan Ann), 1951-
- Publisher:
- Atlanta, Ga. : Georgia State University Library
- Date of Original:
- 2005-01-22
- Subject:
- Feminism
Social movements
Women's studies - Location:
- United States, Georgia, Coweta County, 33.35346, -84.76337
United States, Georgia, Coweta County, Newnan, 33.38067, -84.79966 - Medium:
- audiocassettes
- Type:
- Sound
- Format:
- audio/mpeg
- Description:
- Born in the segregated South to politically active parents, Jean Davis became politically aware as a young girl in Newnan, Georgia. Her early aspiration was to work as a missionary in Africa but instead, she attended Morris Brown College and taught public school in Atlanta. As a student at Morris Brown, Davis was involved in the Civil Rights Movement and participated in boycotts of Rich’s Department Store and sit-ins at Woolworth’s. Davis also worked with the A. Philip Randolph Institute as well as the Georgia AFL-CIO and the National AFL-CIO. Through her work with different union organizations and her activism in civil rights, Davis became interested in the Equal Rights Amendment. She felt strongly that the Coalition of Labor Union Women (CLUW) was necessary in order to bring union women on board with the ERA and also to establish an organization that would place women in leadership positions. In addition to her work with the ERA, Davis worked on a number of campaigns from local school boards to notable politicians and continues the struggle for human rights.
Aware of racial discrimination at an early age, Davis begins by recounting her childhood in segregated Newnan, Georgia. Her emerging activism, she believes, was influenced by her community-oriented parents and by her cousin, a railroad worker, and union member. Davis discusses her internship at the A. Philip Randolph Institute, and how that led to her work with several different social justice organizations, including the AFL-CIO. Davis articulates her struggle to find a way to support both the Civil Rights Movement and the Women's Movement -- which was largely considered to be a white, middle-class effort. She recalls, "I couldn't see how I wanted to be a person who advocated for white women; when white women weren't advocating human rights for everybody." Davis also explains that one of the reasons more women of color were not involved in the ERA was because there was economic disparity between white women and women of color. She says that her opinion of the women's movement changed when Sarah Butler couched the issue not in terms of race or class but in terms of human rights. Davis ends the interview by talking about the importance of community activism for all generations, and discusses the various causes and organizations she continues to support.
Transcript of this excerpt: Listen to the audio clip for this transcript SM: Was it an integrated school? JD: No, it wasn’t. It was segregated. We passed white schools to get to our school. I lived in a place called -- what they call Rocky Hill. And I had to walk all the way to the other side of town to go to high school. In my walks, I’d have to go all the way through town to the other side of town to [go to] school. Because of segregation. SM: So they didn’t even have buses for you? JD: NO. We walked. SM: You had to walk. How far would that be? JD: I would say it was about 5 miles. SM: You walked 5 miles? This is like, “I walked to school with 2 feet of snow” kind of story, isn’t it? JD: Yes, it is, you know. And I was always afraid to go over this bridge. And my sisters, who were older than me, were always late for school because it was hard for me to cross the bridge. If there was no train on the track we could cross there, but if there was a train on the track, we’d have to cross over this bridge that I was scared to death of. [laughs] So, it was a difficult thing for them, but they got through it and I did too. When they built the new school, Central High, which was like 10 miles from my home, they did have a bus. We had to walk to the elementary school and catch the bus to go to that school. SM: And how far was the elementary school? JD: The elementary school was about 3 miles from my home. SM: Wow. So if you couldn’t get to school, you just were out of luck! JD: You just didn’t get to school. I don’t believe I missed a day of school. I remember walking to school when it was so cold that the ice burst open the earth -- the red clay, and you could see ice on this clay, you know, red clay. Because we were poor, my shoes had holes in them. We did have what you call goulashes. SM: I remember goulashes. My children don’t but -- JD: Our clothing wasn’t so wonderful, and when we’d get to school the teacher would tell us to put our hands under our armpits to warm them up because we didn’t have the gloves to, you know -- SM: That was your space heater there, right? JD: Yes, there was a space heater there, at Ruth Hill Elementary School. The teachers would always allow us the opportunity to get near the heater and put our hands under our armpits -- SM: How big were the classes? JD: Classes were big because usually two grades were in a class. The Principal was in charge of 1st and 2nd grade. Then another person was in charge of 3rd and 4th. And then 5th and 6th. And you know, we had those desks where you had the desk in front of you and you sat in a chair behind it with the stuff under there. Everybody just did what they had to do. Of course, you carried your lunch because there was no cafeteria. SM: So there were probably a lot of hungry kids at the school too. Those who couldn’t do lunch and bring them from home. JD: Well, of course. You brought something from home. SM: You brought something, whatever you had. [laughs] JD: Yes, exactly. And that was always a joke -- when it was so cold that your moms made you put Vaseline on your face so your face wouldn’t get so cold, that children would tell you about the grease on your face. And you’d say, well, I had steak and biscuits for breakfast. That’s why this grease is on my face. And they would say, “You mean Strickoline?” [laughs] So growing up was -- I didn’t see it as being -- I didn’t know that it was not what other people did. So it wasn’t a big deal to me. What really always challenged me though Susan, was going downtown to the drugstore. I loved to read and I would always have a problem that I couldn’t stop at the comic book section and read comic books. Because I saw everybody else doing that -- not everybody else, but white people doing it, and then they’d be able to get ice cream from the fountain and read those books. And I was always getting myself in trouble. Because I was determined that that’s what I was going to do too. - Metadata URL:
- http://digitalcollections.library.gsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/coles/id/2091
- IIIF manifest:
- https://digitalcollections.library.gsu.edu/iiif/2/coles:2091/manifest.json
- Language:
- eng
- Additional Rights Information:
- Copyright to this item is owned by Georgia State University Library. Georgia State University Library has made this item available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International License. For more information, see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
- Extent:
- 51 pages (two cassette tapes)
- Original Collection:
- Georgia Women's Movement Project Collection
Donna Novak Coles Georgia Women's Movement Archives - Holding Institution:
- Georgia State University. Special Collections
- Rights:
-
