Charles Warfield Interview One

Sierra Moore: This is Sierra Moore, interviewing Dr. Charles Warfield on February 11th 2013. Thank you so much again for being part of the Engaging the Wisdom Oral History Project. Would you please tell us your name and your current address?

Charles Warfield: My current address… My name is Charles Warfield and I live at 211 Woodward Circle in Kalamazoo. I'm really in the township, not in the city per se, but… 211 Woodward Circle, Kalamazoo.

SM: People often have an interesting story to tell regarding their name or namesake. Do you have…

CW: No. No.

SM: You're not named after anyone...

CW: No. Not that I know of. My parents are originally from Kentucky, so I don't have much history about that. Although there are Warfields who live in Battle Creek who I understand were from the same area, but never made contact with them.

SM: So when and where were you born?

CW: Here.

SM: Here?

CW: Kalamazoo.

SM: And what year?

CW: 1938, yeah.

SM: Being born and raised in Kalamazoo, do you remember what the racial makeup of your neighborhood was?

CW: All black. Yeah I was in what might be typically called, but they never used that term here, what would have been called the black bottom. I mean it was a very… small area, which black people lived in. Although there were scattered sites around the city, but the area I lived in was predominately black.

SM: Growing up, who in your family was especially important to you?

CW: Oh, both my parents. My father was a Baptist minister here in town. So that was another reason why we knew about Kalamazoo College, periodically got up here because we were Baptist Church and this was a Baptist college. And so they, the college, kept pretty good communication with my father. And so there were times when he would come up here to religious camps that were sponsored by the Baptist denomination. And sometimes we would be able to work. When people were coming, 00:03:00we would carry their bags from their car to their rooms up here and people would tip us, so we would make money as youngsters. So my father, there used to be a group called Camp Furthest Out and they used to meet here every year. And my father became the song leader for that group. So I got to know Kalamazoo College quite well.

SM: Are there any memories of your mother that stand out?

CW: Oh yeah, my mother was a… was a very fair skinned woman. She was much lighter than my father and that puzzled me because I didn't know that much about our history. And a very dominate figure, very strong willed, wanted to be, not 00:04:00wanted to be, was a strong influence in my family's life. She was about five foot five, five foot six at the stretch of it. But very dominate force in the family, not only the immediate family but the connected parts. On my dad's side as well as her side.

SM: Did you have any siblings growing up?

CW: Oh yes. There were two sets of youngsters in my family. There was one set that was out of the house before I was born. They were off, and married, and going to school on their own. And then… oh twenty years after their first child then my brother was born. And then 22 years later… No, no it would be 00:05:00twenty years for me, 18 years for him. So after 20 years, the first child which was a female, was out, I showed up after 18 years. Then I had a brother who was two years older than I was.

[Interview interrupted by a phone call]

CW: And so, I apologize for this. So there were two sets of families. So, the group that was out of the house before I was born, they were almost like aunts and uncles. They were… we would go stay with them over the summer. One lived in Ohio and one lived in Chicago and Indiana, and then they moved to Virginia, 00:06:00and places like that. So I was never home with all of the children. I basically grew up with a brother who, as I told you earlier, went to Kalamazoo College. But they all passed away now so, so I'm the only one left.

SM: Did you have any other family members, aunts, uncles, grandparents, who lived in Kalamazoo?

CW: Oh yeah, one of the things that often-times happened to black families would be that one group would come and establish themselves. And then, slowly but surely others would migrate from the South to wherever the first family had migrated to. And so, my father was one of the first to come this way. And so 00:07:00shortly after that, the rest of his family came this way. And, my mother's family came this way, but they settled in Chicago, as opposed to Kalamazoo. So I had aunts and uncles who were here. One lived in Battle Creek and the rest lived here in Kalamazoo.

SM: Can you share a particular childhood incident that was especially important to you?

CW: Oh boy, I… My childhood was pretty good. Because I was the minister's son, and the Second Baptist Church was one of two historical churches. The 00:08:00Second Baptist is still very much alive here in town, not in the original place, and the other church was Allen Chapel, African-Methodist Episcopal, and they're still very much alive. So because I was a pastor's son, there was certain privileges that went with that, relative to those in the black community. And my father was well known as a… a community voice for, at that time it wouldn't be called racial justice, but it would have been called for equal opportunity. And so once people found out who you were, then you got privilege, there was 00:09:00privilege. And I admit that, quite freely, that I had things happen to me that other youngsters didn't have happen. We had a relationship to the First Baptist Church, which is downtown, in the downtown circle here in Kalamazoo. And they looked out for us because we were Baptist. And the Pastor's name was Wiley… T. Thomas Wiley and he and his wife did a lot of things for the family and for the church itself.

SM: What first memory comes to mind as first bringing to light your racial identity?

CW: Well, my father did things and told us stories about black people that kept 00:10:00us in touch with who we were, in terms of color. And he talked about things that I didn't find out, I mean, not… He told us things that I didn't find out 'til college. But he told us about them. So when I learned about them, that was not new to me. And he talked about things that happened in the South. He talked about people in the South. He talked about characters that I needed to know. When black ball players like Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige, Larry Doby, and 00:11:00people like that were playing ball, they were usually playing in Chicago. And what he would do, would, my brothers and sisters would come home periodically, and my brother lived here, my older brother lived here. My other brother was living with me. And they would all get in the car, come by and get us, and take us to watch the black ball players. My sister lived in Robbins, Illinois for some time, and they had black ball teams there. And so when we'd go stay with her in the summer we'd get the chance to see these all black ball players play, and they were so colorful, I mean [laughs], nothing like a regular game like that goes on now. I mean they would stop the game and argue about whether someone was out or not and I mean I used to just, I used to just get excited 00:12:00about that and then after they got through yelling and hollering at each other go back to play ball. And so, and he also talked about some of the poets. Langston Hughes was one of his favorites. And he, we read the book about Simple, which is one of his -- one of my favorite books by him. And so, we also took the Chicago Defender, which was a black newspaper that came out of Chicago. It was [clears throat] 'scuse me, a man by the name of Mr. Booker and he used to go all through the black neighborhoods selling this newspaper, which was the Chicago Defender, which brought you up to date on what was going on, particularly in 00:13:00Chicago. And so, we did, there were things that I knew that I knew other students, particularly black students, and or white students, didn't know.

SM: So, growing--growing up then in Kalamazoo you were in the Kalamazoo Public School system?

CW: Yes.

SM: What was that like?

CW: Lincoln School.

SM: Lincoln School.

CW: Lincoln School. There were two black schools - to black elementary schools that were…black schools. One of, one of them was Roosevelt School, which has since been torn down. That was on the east side. And there were pockets of blacks on the east side of Kalamazoo. Then there was, um, Lincoln School, which is right there on Burdick Street, across the street from Mount Zion Church and 00:14:00that, that's where I went to school from kindergarten through the 6th grade. And it was an elementary and junior high school together at that time. And it was predominantly white and/or, I mean it was predominately black, and/or low-income whites. And most of the people--most of the blacks that went there, we were all poor, so at least I didn't know anybody, and I didn't know I was poor until later on.

SM: And the, the teachers at your school, were they, was it entirely integrated?

CW: No, no, no, no, no, no. No, no integrateds. No integration. There were no black teachers during that era. We're, we're talkin' about [sigh] in the early 00:15:00'40s. There were no… And you know, every once in a while there would be something that would happen, and…which was racially motivated. And I remember my father having to come to the school about…stor--There was a book that caused a lot of controversy when I was in the kindergarten, when I was in kindergarten. There was Little Black Sambo. It was about this tiger who--. Um…It was about an African child in Africa and the name of the book was Little Black Sambo…. And so, that didn't sit well because we didn't like the word 00:16:00"black" during that time. I mean, colored was okay--colored people. And that's basically what we called ourselves. And so when they said black and… then they pointed out…the teacher. I'll never forget this: one of the teachers pointed out, they asked the class, which my kindergarten class was predominately white. They said, "Who in here looks like Little Black Sambo?" And so they pointed to a friend of mine, who was a twin. And that night when I went home, I told my mother what had happened. And she immediately got on the phone and called the mother of the youngster, who she knew. Because being a preacher's wife, she knew most of the women in the community--black women who attended 00:17:00church. And so a group of them got together and came to the school and confronted the teacher. I don't know how that took place, but I do know that they did come to the school, they did confront the teacher, and that was kind of the first civil rights piece that I was aware of and I was, you know, 5 years old at that time.

SM: You mentioned your, your brother went to Kalamazoo and you went to Western?

CW: Yes.

SM: What was, what was it like in Kalamazoo during your college years?

CW: Well, let me, let me speak a little bit about high school. I left the public schools. My brother and I left the public schools when I went to the 7th grade. He was in the 9th grade. We left--my folks took us out. And what 00:18:00happened was…what I think happened was…the University High School, which was the campus school for Western, called my dad and said, "We need to talk about some black students coming up here. And we want you to put your, your youngster's name on the waiting list." And so, I didn't know that he, he went up and he put our name on a waiting list. And not--I don't think the family really thought they would ever…let us into the school, but it was a token gesture. And low and behold after we left the…graduated from 6th grade, my 00:19:00mother told us, "You're not going into the junior high school, at Lincoln." And, and I said, "Why?" And they said, "You're going to University High School." And I can remember saying, "But I don't know anybody there. All my friends are, you know, at this school and I grew up with them and we come through elementary school together." And so forth and so on. Oh, and by the way--I happened to be… they had--There were three grade levels within every grade. So you had… If you were in the 3rd grade you were either in 3-1, 3-2, and 3-3. Okay so, I ended up… I started out in 3 and I ended up, by the time I was in the 6th grade, I was in 3-1, which was the top class, which made me the only black youngster in 3-1. So everybody else was…all my friends were in 3-2 and 3-3, which caused me some problems because you know people said, 00:20:00"Well Warfield, you know, you're not one of us anymore. You're up there with those [indiscernible]." But I dealt with that. But then when we, when we left the public schools and we went to high school and we were basically the only blacks in the entire school arena--that was very different. And, it was a much tougher school than we got when we were in the public school. I mean, it was like, "what, you know, what is going on?" And we had projects and we had homework. And you know, we never had homework in public schools. We had homework and projects, which you had-- And the projects call for you to have the materials to carry out the project, because they would give you projects, I 00:21:00mean things you had to do and have it done by the next day. It wasn't like you got it on a Monday and had, had to have it on Friday when you turned it in. You got in on Monday and they'd look for it on Tuesday and you were graded on all that. That was pretty traumatic starting out. And, and so then… we played football, basketball and so people got to know my brother and I. And at one point we played on the same football team. And he was on one end and I was on the other. And people… "Oh there's, there's the Warfield boys." So we were the only blacks on the and…and… and when we played other teams, 9 out of 10 chances, he and I were the only youngsters of color on either team. And one thing I do say is that the…the white students--many of the white students that I played with were very protective of us 'cause it was not unusual for somebody 00:22:00to call you a name. You know. I mean. But that…they would ask, some of the big tackles and guards who played with us, they'd say, "Did so and so call you…a name?" And I'd say, "Oh, I think so." They'd say, "Yeah, we'll--we'll deal with that." [Laughs] And the next play, they'd be carrying somebody off the field. You know. They didn't… And, and … and there were those who were very much into Christianity…and they made it a habit to go out of their way to make…to invite us to their house. I stayed all night at their hou--at their homes. I got invited to their parties and things of that nature. But that was uncomfortable for me in terms of…But, there were…a lot of the folk who 00:23:00reached out to us were …had strong Christian backgrounds and believed in equality and all that. They weren't standing on the corner, you know, hollering about equal rights, but…they had no problems inviting you over to their house for the weekend, not just for Friday, so you'd be there Friday and Saturday. And usually we…we would go home so we could be going to our own churches on Sunday. But there was a few families that made it very clear where they stood, although they weren't standing up hollering, "civil rights, civil rights." They…we would come back and everybody knew whose house we had been in for the weekend. Okay.

SM: Now I have here that you participated in the 1963 Equality March. Could you uh…tell me more about…

CW: Where? Here?

SM: Um…

CW: Where was this at?

SM: I…I believe it was…

CW: You mean, Washington?

SM: In Washington. No? It wasn't that one? Was there one here then?

CW: [drinks water] We kept a lot of things going here…when we got older… …You know I might have--some things have slipped away from me over the years. And…but I don't remember….going to that. But you know, it wasn't like we weren't doing things here that were marches and we were picketing and …and I used to do a lot of that kind of stuff myself because I went away to school to the University of Oregon. And …boy that was a different…whole different 00:25:00scene. And there were…there was a group on campus called the Black Panthers, who you might've heard of. But most people did not hear about the Students for a Democratic Society. You ever heard of the SDS? Oh! They were all white. And they made the Panthers look like…schoolboys. I mean… Those guys were… They did not joke around. I mean… [guttural noises] I went to…I went out there as a freshman. My brother…older brother had already gone ahead of me. And he said…and I was married and I had two children…and he said, "Chuck, it's time for you ta." --I got my Master's. "It's time for you to come out and get your Ph.D…I've set it up for you." You know… I applied, I was accepted, I got housing for my family and all like that. So I moved. I looked 00:26:00like tobacco road goin' [laughs]…pullin' all that stuff I had. But anyway, I went, I went there. And we ran into these guys who I didn't--and you know…they had the, the big afros. And a lot of these guys were from San Francisco State and University of California and places like that and they were very, very adamant and very militant. And then the, the Students for a Democratic Society were…they were…and my brother was in the midst of this. I mean…he was sort of the centerpiece for the black students on campus. And he also was kinda the, the go-between between the Students for a Democratic Society and the black students. Because they made it very clear, "You've got some stuff to do with white people…we'll deal with the administration. But 00:27:00your job…you can't integrate our organization because you all tend to take over when you do." So they said, "Oh, okay okay." But, but see the Students for a Democratic Society were, were across the country just like black student unions were. I mean, I mean, they had SDS folk in New York as well as they had 'em in the West Coast. And these guys, well, they did not joke around. I went to the--my brother said, "Come and go with me; I want you to get to know these guys." So we went up to this apartment, and the lights were really low, and everybody knew--"Hey, John!" (His name was John.) "Hey John, who you got with you?" He said, "This is my brother. This is my brother." So everybody got up, came up, and spoke. And so, they said, "We need to get this meeting out of the way." And so I went over and I sat down on a box. And the guy pointed to my 00:28:00brother and he said, "Get your brother off that box." I said, "What? What's he talking about?" And my brother said, "What!?" He said, "Get your brother off that box." So he said, "Chuck, get off the box. Find you someplace else to sit." So, my brother looked a little bit agitated, and I was a little bit agitated. It was just a box, you know, I thought. Well, they went over and opened up the box; it was a box full of hand grenades that they had gotten out of the armory, you know. And I can remember my knees started shaking. "Oh--what have I got--Warfield, you're married, you've got two kids, and here you are out here with these people. They are just a wild bunch of--" You know, I was for civil rights, but I didn't want to die. You know what I mean? [Clears throat.] But I learned, I mean, these guys were intellectuals too. They weren't--they weren't just rabble-rousers. I mean, they had done their 00:29:00homework, and they had studied the great revolutionaries, and what they had done, and they could espouse this stuff for days, you know. And they used to have what they call "teach-ins," and then they would take over a--a classroom. And they would have these teach-ins that would run in the morning until late at night. And they would have these--people coming in, and talking, and discussions, and all that kind of stuff. And they were children, basically, of middle-class--middle and upper-class white people who could afford to do this. And then, of course, we had the Black Panthers that were on campus as well. And so, because of who my brother was on campus, I got elevated quickly, to--a place of,--a place higher in the hierarchy of the college campus. And, plus, I was older, because I was a graduate student as well. And so it turned out to be 00:30:00a--a real pleasant experience. Then when my brother left, then I ascended to the next position, but I was coming out shortly after him, because he would spend a whole lot of time in his leadership position as a civil rightist; I was doing that, but I was putting in more time in school, and--you know--getting my classes, and getting ready to get out of there because I wanted to come back, back home. Okay.

SM: Um, and so at the--uh--the school in Oregon, you got your PhD in Education?

CW: Yes.

SM: Yes.

CW: Curriculum and Instruction. I had a guy named--I had a really great professor, who was my advisor. Name was Arthur Pearl, and he's still alive, he's in his late nineties, I know. And he is--he was such a bright guy. I mean, he was so bright. And he was of the Jewish faith, and he would tell you 00:31:00that quick off. But, God, he was so good. And what he would do, that he was so bright, that school districts would bring him in, and he'd say, "Well, I'll come, but you got to bring--you got to pay for two or three of my, my students to come with me." And not only would they pay you, but they would pay you to consult. So when we came in, he always was looking out for his students. And he'd always have a team of us that went with him. And I got to be one of his favorites, so I traveled a lot with him across--and then a lot of times, once you would go, he would tell them, "Warfield's in charge. I'm not coming back. He knows as much as I do." And we would stay and work with teachers, and all that kind of stuff. So, it was an experience that most graduate students never have. We would go to his house on Saturday nights. And,--some of the guys 00:32:00would bring beer, and we would just sit until the wee hours of the morning discussing educational issues. I mean, it was--and what happened, people were finding out about it and more and more people kept showing up. And more and more people kept showing up. And pretty soon there was no room; if you didn't get there early, there was no seat. Or you had to stand up, or--and people didn't care. I mean, they would just stay, and stay, and stay. And they would challenge each other with theoretical underpinnings about what we were doing, and why that wouldn't work, or why this wouldn't work, and, I mean, and they would challenge--and sometimes it would get pretty heated, you know, and he'd have to come in and he'd say, "Alright, settle down." You know, people'd start standing up, you know, like they were going to, and--uh--anyway, anyway. But I have to give him all the credit, and even as I think about it now, I got to call him. I'm going to call him in the next day or so, because he was incredible. 00:33:00And he fought the University when they were wrong, and he knew they were wrong. And he would go up and just raise all manner of hell up in the--up in the president's office, and--[laughs]. I got to be head of upper bounds, in upper bounds, you know, and that's where, that's where I got my money to stay, you know--and we were negotiating to get our students, you know, once they'd finished upper bound to get into the university with packages. You know, you had money to get in and so forth. Because most of the people in those counts were, were poor. We had the Indians, Indian students, we had Mexican-Americans, and then we had blacks, all of them in the same thing, and that's an uneasy, you know, that's--they're alright with each other, but they're not alright with each other, right? And so, I was--I had a group of them. About fifty of them, maybe 00:34:00even seventy at some point. And my job--I was the director of the program: Upper Bound, you've probably heard of it. Oh no, it was High School Equivalency Program. And we would go to the Indian reservation, and recruit students from the reservation; we would go to the--to the fields where the Hispanic-American kids were picking--[indecipherable], and we would go to Portland to get black students. And you had to go in, and recruit them, and talk to their parents and all that kind of stuff. And it was a real [indecipherable] you go to the, you go to the reservation, and you got to go in, you know--you know, to some of those huts and talk to--you thought you were talking to the main person, but [shakes head] he would be around in the back. And we'd say, "Okay, you're going to come?" and they'd say, "Well, you've got one other person to go by." And then you walk in, and this guy'd be sitting there with his pipe. Hispanic-American kids, the father was the person who said. It didn't make a 00:35:00difference what Mama said, or the kid said. If you didn't go to the dad and get him to nod his head--and, and see, when you took somebody, that meant that that was money coming out of their pocket, because that was one hand that they didn't have to, to pick and bring money to the family, so it was a sacrifice for them, even though they weren't getting any money. We were going to take care of the youngster, but we were taking money out of their pocket. And for them to--and they did. You know, they took kids, but we used to have some horrendous--sometimes it almost came to fights. But we never did, of course, some of the guys that worked for me were as tough as the kids were, you know. And, but it was a great, I had a great experience there. So when I, when I graduated, I, I was armed here [points to head] as well as theory and practice. You know, that--that I understood what civil rights was, I understood what 00:36:00social justice was because I had had a chance to practice it. The--the youngsters from the University of California, who sat in against the war, okay, they would block off the, the entrances to the recruiting places. And the police would come in with mace--and these were all white kids mostly. And they would spray all these folk. You know, they'd be grabbing at--and then, you know, once they got them so they couldn't see, then the police would come in with billy clubs and just--they would beat a path wide enough to get to the 00:37:00door. And--and then they would come to the University of Oregon--to heal up, okay, because their skulls were split open, they were, you know, had big black and blue marks where they'd been beaten up by the police. And so they would come, and we would put them up. And a lot of students would let them come and live in their rooms, and--and because University of Oregon had a medical school there, we got the medical students to come, and look at them, and take care of them and all that kind of--soon as they got here, about--they go right back and get beat up again. I mean, it just used to hurt my heart. I'd say, "You just left here!" They come back all bleeding, and beat up, and--or maced, you know, their face would be all burned by the mace--was so strong, and--whatever. That 00:38:00really had an impact on me. You know, I said, "At least you could have gotten healed." And they'd say, "No--" But, and see, then, there was some pretty violent stuff that went on too, because I had an office in one of the Quonsets--it was houses that were built after the war. There were so many--and a guy came in, and he walked in, and he said, "You CW?" This was about two o'clock in the morning, and I was writing my dissertation, and he says, he says, "You Chuck Warfield?" And I say, "Yes." He said, "I've been told to tell you to get out of this building." Well, I had sense enough--I said, "But, what, what, what?" He didn't say anything; he just turned around and ran out of the building. I started grabbing my dissertation stuff--that was before computers, right. Started grabbing my [indecipherable]--but I quick run--I'm driving a little green Volkswagen bug. I get in my Bug; I get about a block away, and there's this huge explosion on campus. And those SDS guys had blown the, uh--the, uh, police--their Quonsets were adjacent to ours. And so, what they 00:39:00did--they put too much dynamite on--on this Quonset, and it blew, not only that building to pieces, but it blew the building where my office was to pieces, right. But not only did they do that, but they also blew the, tried to blow the doors off the banks. And they tried to blow the doors off the churches. Not--a church, a major church at--because they targeted any institution that they said, that was harboring this racism, this, this elitism, you know, that were being discriminatory, that they thought. And the army was one, that was not discriminatory, but they were the military, so forth and so on. That really shook me, when they did that, and … but they called my brother, afterwards, 00:40:00and they said, "Did your brother get out okay?" which meant they knew I was in that building. They must have, because the guy came and told me. And he--my brother said, "Yeah," because he knew all those guys, you know. But, they had, they had him, they used to take my brother down to the police station quite often, you know. Wanted to know what he--"I don't know anything," he said. "All I know is what happened afterwards, just like you." But anyway, that's--that's that part of the story. But then, I came back, and I was just kind of radical too, you know.

SM: Yeah. So after having all of those experiences, and, um, being exposed to all of those, the concepts of social justice and radical change, when you came back to Kalamazoo, how did you try and reintegrate--

CW: [laughs]

SM: … back into your old community and use this information?

CW: Well, I, I left with very short hair, and came back with this huge afro. And we still have pictures of it. My wife also had a big afro. And my children--I said, "No, you don't cut their hair." [Laughs.] And they, you know, they understood what it was all about. And so, I got involved in--sort of the local politics in the black community. And the church never was that militant. But I was, ok. And so, again I started, you know, social action stuff. And I didn't wait for anybody else. That was the other thing. I went because that, when I tried to convince something, people would start giving me rationales about, 'beside,' 'because,' you know, or reasons why they couldn't do 00:42:00what I wanted them to do, so I didn't care I'd just go do it by myself and [sigh] If I heard on the radio that the City Commission voted a particular way to disenfranchise some group, and there were city commissioners at that time who were so nervous about, they carried guns, that they had permits to carry guns, in, in the City Commission thing. And so I would hear the vote, and there were a couple of people who were very, uh, anti any kind of, you know, civil right piece for minorities or poor people, you know like that. And so I would find out where they lived and I would go to their house. Next morning I'd be at their 00:43:00house with a picket sign. And the police would show up and they would drive by real slow and, and I had been told … It it's really interesting because, there were some policemen that said "Hey, Warfield, we can't arrest you unless you block the driveway" and then they would drive off. So I knew what my picketing rights were, as long as I didn't block their driveway, I could picket. Well, you know, you're in an all-white neighborhood and here's a black guy with big afro walking up and down with a sign. You know, immediately they would call the police and they would say "Yeah, we know. We know he's there he's not breaking the law. As long as he stays on … what he's doing" so… and then the media would come would come out . "Oh whatrererrare?" and I'd tell 'em "Oh hmrm hrmrm hrm" you know, I'd tell them I didn't agree with what he'd said, what he'd done. I did that, I went, I--I used to work for the school district, and, walking 00:44:00around with my afro and dashiki and they used to have fits but you know at that point in time, I didn't care. And then I went … Tthey finally got me out of the school district and they gave me a job at Western as a, a, a professor. Something happened with the, the board at Western voted for something which I thought was not, justice. So I went down in my basement, started building signs. My, my wife came down and she said "Chuckie, what're you doin?" I said "You know what I'm doin'" She said "OK" So I got my little sign and I, I picketed the administration building. People came out, they said "Doc! You work for those people!" I said "I don't care. They're not right. I don't care." They said 00:45:00"They're gonna fire you!" I said "Yeah, they probably will but I'm gonna, I gotta, I gotta do this. I gotta do this", you know? And they said "Well, we'll be right back!" And then, so they would go home--they'd go home, change their clothes, and come back out. But when the media came, once the media came and talked to me why I was there, I'd say, I'd leave. All I wanted to do was get the, the word out, that why, what'd happened, that somebody disagreed with them. And then my wife, this is a personal thing, my wife told me, I had two small kids, and they're about two years apart, and, she said "I knew there was something wrong with you when I married you" She said "I knew the kind of person you were" And she said "We got these two kids now," and we had gone to Oregon and come back. She said "They're eventually gonna fire you, because you're … nobody can stop you from doing what you're doing. And not that I disagree, but 00:46:00they're not gonna tolerate that" you know. So she was working with, for the county, as a social worker. And she said "Let's, let's save one check, and if you just kind of back off a little bit, 'til we get one check. Then if you get fired then we have a year for you to find another job." And so that's what we did. I didn't back off that much, but I wasn't yelling as loud as usual--and once we got that then, but the …it never happened. Yeah, I never did get fired. People would threaten me, or people would call my dad and say "Can you get him to back off, just for a minute?" And my dad would say "He's grown. I can't do that" We picketed Van Avery's over there. You know where the Ecumenical Center is? We picketed that. And that … most of the folk that picketed that 00:47:00came out of my father's church. And they'll tell you right to this day, they, they are the reason why Kalamazoo woke up and began to be … to integrate and give jobs to people. That, one of the things that happened during that period was the Upjohn company began to, to, was gonna build here, and they let us know early on "We will not discriminate against people because of race," and immediately they began to hire black folks. Matter of fact there were people in town who said that that's the problem. They hired so many of our people on the picket line, we didn't have anybody to picket during the day. The line at night would be triple the size because people got off work and they would come and picket, butwe kept looking. And a lot of them were young people like myself who were looking for jobs and they, and a lot of them were, were college, some 00:48:00college students. And there are people here … I'm trying to think of his name, that, he, he was part of the teachers' union at Western. Red-haired guy. God, him and Ron Kroll and some other people. They were there; they were white, out of the education department, and they were out there with us day and night. And the place stayed open from nine to nine so we had twelve hours of picketing to do. And eventually they, they ran out of business, we ran them out of business.

SM: Well, you were, you've been a very active member of the community - Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at Western, a former school board member for Kalamazoo Public, and the President of the Kalamazoo chapter of the NAACP since 2009, I have it here? Is that…?

CW: That's about right.

SM: So, how do, you know, all of these life experiences and all the activism you did, how do you incorporate that into your leadership positions today?

CW: Well what happens is, [sigh] I think many people would be surprised about the numbers of people who call me and ask for advice. They say, they're almost like you, they say "You lived through this era. What should we be doing? What do you think about this? We're thinking about doing this." And, and some of it is politically motivated, but others are … it's about, the word I'm looking for, it's the human-ness that they're trying to get at. "We shouldn't treat people like this," you see what I'm saying? And, and so I get, there's [laughs] I'm 00:50:00not, I'm not without being busy. I mean the, the calls that I get are from a lot of different places. We, when went, for instance, to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in Washington, D.C., we were called in because they gave us a small education grant to do some things. And so we're going around the room, and they were saying, they were saying "Introduce yourself, introduce yourself, introduce yourself" And, and when it came my turn, there were people that said "You don't need to say anything, we know who you guys are" Ok. Not so much that we had been, , you know, that militant and that 00:51:00photogenic and,and in the paper and all that stuff, but because we spoke with a strong voice, because I had been around so long in a lot of different venues. And it's not unusual for people to call and say "Doc, you don't know me but I know you and this is what's going on here. What do you think?" you know, and they can be from anywhere. Now, I don't beat my chest about that and say, you know, that that's… because in many instances, it's a pull on your psyche. And when you're not, when you're not generating as much energy as you used to, and people call you with what they feel like are not life-threatening situations but, career-threatening situations, things that are gonna affect their children, 00:52:00their family, and things like that and they say "What is it?" You know, "what do you know?" People who start organizations call, particularly black folk call and say "Chuck, what, what, what should we be doing? You've lived through this stuff before, looks like it's coming around again." I, I just found out the other day that I'm getting the Isaac Award for leadership, and people call me up [laughs], people call me up telling me that before I knew it. And, but we work with Isaac because Isaac is a, a social justice organization. Hispanic American Council, we went to their big rally they had, and they had us up as a speaker. It is not that you sleep well, you know, I mean, you know, I can smile and grin and what 00:53:00say you, but there are a lot of times when I get … you don't sleep well because people put things on your mind and they want you to give them some answers. Not only do they want you to give them some answers, but they want you to go with them, ok? And a lot of times the people you have to go see are not kind. You know, so, but I, I love, I wouldn't give it up for anything, you know. I mean, that's sort of who I am.

SM: Well, I think we're out of time for today but thank you again so much for being part of this project and sharing your stories with us today. There will be a, we'll have a follow-up interview later this week.

CW: Right. I was trying to tell you everything now so I wouldn't have to, you know [laughs]

SM: I have, like five more questions to ask.

CW: No, that's alright, I'm just playing, that was just playing around with you [laughs]

SM: Well, thank you so much.

CW: Always glad, always glad. You know, one thing I gotta say, you don't have to tape this but Kalamazoo College has a rich history in social justice. I mean, 00:54:00when I, I used to have parish school learning center, I got a lot of money to do that. I didn't have to call Kalamazoo College, they called me. They said "We got some students you can use" and they would bring a bus load of students three days a week, and they would come into that center and work with those black kids, and I mean, I mean we had, people still talk about it. I, I run into students that a lot of the Kalamazoo College kids tutored, and and they're grown now with families of … and they say "Warfield, who was that young lady that came?" And I say "Man [laughs] I don't, I don't know who, but" K College has always been on the front of social action in this town. Whenever we called, we 00:55:00were never turned down, never turned down. Always out front, always there. And not two or three, but twenty, thirty, I mean, our, on, at night at our place it would be lit up and it would be just, , and, and because of that, we kept getting refunded, the federal government. They would come in from Chicago, the regional office, they'd come in, they'd see, they'd say "Warfield, you got a model here." Right. The state came in and saw us. They gave us money. We were able to open up another whole building that was just for counseling of young people. K- College was, was right there. And I, I don't have anything … You got a guy came in not too long ago to evaluate. They were doing some kind of evaluation on the univer--on the college or something. I say, you know, you're not gonna get a bad word out of me. I said I don't know, I'm not connected with them as well as I used to be, but I know what they were and what they meant to 00:56:00me and what they meant to this community, so. And, and see the other thing I like about [laughs] I say, you keep Western honest. You keep my school honest, cause when K shows up, they say "Wait. You know, maybe we have, don't we have some social work students that need to be involved in that kind of thing?" you know, and that's good. That's good.