American Experience; Freedom Riders; Interview with Catherine Burks-Brooks, 2 of 4

[Interviewer] What was it about growing up in the south, talk about growing up in the south and what it was like as a young black girl in the south, what was it like? [Burks-Brooks] What sticks in my mind in growing up in the south is when my mother would carry me downtown, as we called it, to shop. And as soon as we got off the bus I was hungry, I wanted to get me a sandwich because I loved to go to the restaurant but of course I resented it, having to leave from where we were shopping to go down in the colored area to get a sandwich and also I resented that when white people approached us she would pull me in front of her and that was to keep them from bumping me. And I didn't feel that that was right and-- [Interviewer] Why didn't she want people to bump you? What was the trying to-- [Burks-Brooks] She was trying to protect me from them either bumping me or pushing me to the side. Yes, she was protecting me from them

pushing me to the side. But now of course maybe when I was in Selma with my grandmother, which sticks in my mind, this was Selma, Alabama where my family originally came from, and we called my grandma my mama, so mama never pulled me in front of her. So I don't know if they knew mama or not, but no one bumped me in Selma. But in Birmingham I was always pulled in front of her and but now when I got to go downtown by myself, and this was in the fifth grade, in which I would've been I guess what maybe about eleven, and I had to go across town to school, I didn't step aside, so either the whites stepped aside or we bumped. In my neighborhood, our little school went from the first grade to fourth grade and we got to the fifth grade we had to attend school out of our area. And so I was sent on the other side of town where I had to transfer and no school buses now, I had to transfer two buses out of my area, get

a bus downtown, and going into another black area and so then I was in contact with white people and moving aside or not moving aside or bumping from, let's say, fifth grade to throughout the twelfth grade. And I resented that. [Interviewer] It seems that in some ways for a black person living in the deep south at that point was kind of a series of these humiliations and also not knowing when you're going to be humiliated. I heard somebody say that one of the most horrible things about it was that you just didn't know when something might happen so you kind of always had to expect something, you know what I mean? [Burks-Brooks] Yes, I know exactly what you mean, so I always expected something to happen, whether it did or not, and sometimes I was surprised if it didn't. [Interviewer] Talk about that just a little more, because it seems that in some ways there's something really,

there's something there about not having, living your life expecting something that, that something might happen. [Burks-Brooks] I think this is also what helped me to be prepared to take part in the Freedom Ride and the sit-ins and the stand-ins at the movie theaters. Because I had been wanting all my life to do something about this, I felt that it was wrong and I can recall, and this was probably when I was in high school, that we would take the sign off the bus and throw it out the window. Now, but now this was not the bus we used with the white people on it because in transferring, going into the black area, to my black school, at that time was Parker High School, which was the largest black high school in the country, and it wasn't nothing but black people on that bus but the sign was still up, saying "colored" and "white," and we used

to do it just for fun. Just take it and throw it out the window. We didn't do it that often and this was a form of protest and resentment. And now, still keeping in mind that I was say, not all of us, of course not, but maybe two-thirds of us did have that type of experience but there were a number of blacks down here who didn't have that experience because they went to school in their little area. [Interviewer] Okay, I want to get back to the Freedom Rides because I want to get there with you. So you guys had the meeting after the bus burning and after the bus riot, the riots in Birmingham and you decide you're going to continue on the rides and people were selected, were you one of the-- you were one of the first group-- [Burks-Brooks] Yes, I was in the first group and we volunteered, yes we did,

to go. [Interviewer] Okay, I want you to just tell me the story, I'll be quiet. [Burks-Brooks laughs] [Burks-Brooks] Well in our meeting we all felt that this was, we were called the Central Committee, and we had a rotating chairman, and at that time Diane was our chairman, and so you know we had Marion Barry and James Bevel had been our chairman, and we decided that we was going to take up the Freedom Ride. It was just no second thought, really. And then we decided how we was going to do it, we knew we had the money, but we had to decide how we was going to get the money from the adults' group, the Nashville Christian Movement that was, the president at that time was of course Reverend Kelly Miller Smith. And we met with them and told them what we want to do, of course they felt that it was too dangerous and so the Reverend Shuttlesworth asked us not to come,

but we was calling him, not to give permission, but telling him that we were coming and my girlfriend, Lucretia Collins, we attended Tennessee State at the time and we went to our dormitory-- not dormitory matron-- but our advisor, woman advisor at Tennessee State and told her what we were going to do and so she saw that we were for real and so she didn't try, really try to talk us out of it and so to get it legal she asked me to have my mother, since I was from Birmingham, to invite Lucretia down to visit me and so therefore we would be leaving the campus legally. And so I called my mother and told her and so she didn't try to discourage me either because she always said, " well you know she came feet first," so I was born feet first, and "she's moving."

[Interviewer] Now you guys are trying to get out of here. When? [Burks-Brooks] Well we were trying to get out to get the bus, find out how much it will cost and everything, the number of us that was going, and what we would need for our tickets, and the SCLC, the-- not SCLC, the Nashville NCLC-- [Interviewer] Start this again, just start this again for me. [Burks-Brooks] Well we knew that the adults had the money and but now we had helped raise that money but it was a matter of us getting that money from them and there were two treasurers and this was the NCLC, the Nashville Christian Leadership, and we met with them and told them what we wanted to do and seemed as if one of the treasurers was out of town and he couldn't sign the check or he didn't come to the meeting, so we was not going to let that stop us

and someone suggested that the numbers man would cast a check. And he knew he was going to get his money. So we got out of town and by the numbers man cashing the check. Now the people helped in different ways. [Interviewer] Now you're out of town, you're on the bus, talk about what happens when you get to Mississippi. Bull Connor is the first thing that happens, right? [Burks-Brooks] You mean Birmingham. [Interviewer] I'm sorry, Birmingham. [Burks-Brooks] Mississippi is-- [Interviewer] Ok, ok, ok, I know-- [Burks-Brooks laughs] [Burks-Brooks] Okay, when we get to, just before we entered Birmingham, old Bull Connor, I just like to say the "old bull," he was the city commissioner. Stops the bus, get on the bus, and Paul Brooks, which I later married, was sitting at the front of the bus with Jim Zwerg and Jim Zwerg was white, and he asked them to separate

and for Paul to move to the back and they refused so he took them off, the two of them, and the rest of them. And then we, and I think they got off the bus and we came on into Birmingham but they refused to let us off the bus and I don't know, I think we maybe stayed on the bus, maybe about two or three hours, they refused to let us off, and so when they did let us off we went into the bus station and then they later arrested us, they said, for our protection. [Interviewer] Let's cut. [cut] Okay, so I want to start speaking start over with-- so you're husband and Zwerg and the rest of you are off the bus, so talk about-- so now you roll in finally, you roll into the city of Birmingham. [Burks-Brooks] Mm-hmm. So we entered into the city, into Birmingham, Greyhound bus station, and probably about ten minutes or so, Bull Connor had his men to put paper around the windows so no one could

see us on the bus and we couldn't see out of the bus. And so we stayed on the bus about two or three hours, I suppose it were two or three hours, and then he eventually let us off, we went into the bus station, and then he came in and then arrested us all, he said he was taking us to jail for our protection. [Interviewer] That didn't take long, for you to get arrested in Alabama. [Burks-Brooks] No, it didn't. And so Lucretia and I and [Selene?], [Selene?] was the white girl with us, of course she was put into a different cell, and Lucretia and I went on there are started playing cards with the other inmates and then I guess maybe around ten o'clock we just had to get into the bed and go to sleep, we had to play cards, we had had a little food and everything, and one of the guards came in, woman guard, and told us to get clothes on, that we were leaving, and so Lucretia and I got up and put our clothes on, and we

waited and waited and waited and she didn't come back so we put our clothes off and got back into bed. And so then she came back and said, "didn't I tell y'all to pull y'all clothes off?" and so we said, "well, we waited and you didn't come back so we thought you were not coming," so she said, "I said get your clothes on," so we got our clothes on. And then walking out of the cell and seeing Bull Connor and he said that he was going to take us back to Nashville. So we had-- [Interviewer] Let me just start that over. So start, I just want to get-- keep getting little pieces. So you walked out of the cell, start there. [Burks-Brooks] And then we walked out of the cell, saw Bull Connor, city commissioner, and he told us that he was going to take us back to Nashville and I knew that I didn't want to go back to Nashville because

we were headed to Jackson, Mississippi, and then to New Orleans. And had been taught that if you don't want to cooperate you just go limp, so I went limp, I just stretched out on the floor. He had one of the guards to pick me up and take me to the limousine, he had three limousines, I think, that was out there to carry us that we thought was to Nashville. [Interviewer] Great, great, that's a great piece. So tell me about that ride, because I heard you and Bull Connor became good buddies on that ride. Talk about the seating arrangement and your talks with Bull. [Burks-Brooks] Well Bull-- I was in the center, in the center seat of this limousine, long black limousine, and Bull was at the window seat, and at the back was John Lewis, Lucretia Collins, and a

newspaper reporter from the Birmingham News. And on our way to Nashville, I thought we were going to Nashville, Bull and I had a conversation. And Bull was just carrying on and talking about the old south, I considered the old south, and he even mentioned the the 48th convention, and this time, by this time and what the conversation, that was kind of calming everything down and Lewis knees had stopped knocking. And before the convention-- I knew nothing about the 1948 convention but I didn't let it on, but I understand, which Bull explained, that was the beginning of the Dixiecrats, when the southern representatives, these southern

representatives walk out of the convention of the Democratic convention, and they had their meeting at the Birmingham City Auditorium and this is where they elected Strom Thurmond to run as the president during that year, 1948. And as we also, another thing that sticks out in my mind, that Bull made a joke about, about one of the sundown towns here and in Alabama although we didn't necessarily call them sundown towns at the time, but we knew by the time sundown comes, black people not supposed to be in those towns. So we were approaching Cullman and Bull says something to the effect that "well I guess we better pull the curtains, cause blacks not supposed to be up here this time of night." Well it was probably about oh, two, three o'clock in the morning and for some reason we

stopped in Cullman and picked up what I used to say was a priest because he had on the collar, and to us anytime you would see a man with a-- of course, he was white-- with a collar on, we thought a religious collar and then we thought he was a priest but then I learned later didn't necessarily have to have been a priest and so I don't know why he picked him up but he got in the car with us and he sat in the back. And on the way to what I thought was Nashville, we were still carrying on our conversation and I even invited him to have breakfast with us in Nashvhille because I knew at that point there was nothing we could do, so we may as well just cool it and enjoy the ride, but we knew that we were-- as soon as he put us out we were coming right back. And but to our surprise that when we

got to this little town on the state line, Ardmore, Alabama, the car all of a sudden stopped, and he said, "you all get out," and they got out, opened up the trunks, and almost threw our luggages out. And Bull pointed to a building, a group of buildings, that he said that he was a train station and that we could get the train back to Nashville. And of course I couldn't let Bull have the last word, so I told him we would see him back in Birmingham by high noon. Well now during that time, high noon, we watched a lot of cowboy movies, so everything was going to happen in a cowboy town by high noon, if something was going on, there was going to be a fight by high noon or you better be out of town by high noon, so I told him we'd see him back here, back in Birmingham by high noon. And we walked over to this, what we thought was a train station but it was a warehouse, that we learned later. So at

that point now, you know, we said "oh boy, the Klan must be coming now." So a little fear set in. [Interviewer] Okay. Let's cut for a minute. [cut] --comes and gets you, pulls you out of jail in the middles of the night, so there must be a little bit of fear there, and also I just want you to tell me, so you're sitting there in the middle, so Bull Connor is on one side, driver's on the other, and you have a black woman sitting in the middle with these, I guess, Bull Connor's beefy, wasn't he? [Burks-Brooks] Well Bull Connor didn't show any anger. And I was asked once before how could I talk to Bull, the way I talked to Bull, and I didn't really have an answer for the author, it was the one that wrote the children, and he said-- Okay, and so-- [Interviewer] Let me ask you a different question, talk about--

[Burks-Brooks] Now I was going to tell you why I felt later I could talk to Bull that way. [Interviewer] Why? [Burks-Brooks] I had no fear of Bull. [Interviewer] Okay, tell me that. [Burks-Brooks] I could talk to Bull the way I talked to Bull from Birmingham to Ardmore, because I had no fear of Bull. I had no fear of Bull and we had decided that if we must die, then we was going to die, and once you have decided that it's alright to die, then that's it. [Interviewer] But there was some fear, you talk about John Lewis's knees knocking-- [Burks-Brooks laughs] [Burks-Brooks] Well your knees can knock but you can still move, you can still move and then that is just, I didn't hear his knees,

but everything kind of with our conversation, then everything was relaxed after that. [Interviewer] Can we cut for a second? So talk to me about where you're sitting in this car. [Burks-Brooks] I'm in the middle of the driver, me, and Bull Connor. And we were carrying on this civil conversation and Bull was not growling, and even if he had been growling I can't say for sure what I would have done, but I probably would have too. But the only thing I can say, at this point I had no fear of Bull. Now one thing you have to also, that we have to keep in mind, is that the world had their eyes on us. Mm-hmm,

that's right, the world had their eyes on us, and I've always wondered why Bull picked up that Christian minister. And he was in the back of the car. [Interviewer] Why? [Burks-Brooks] I think he wanted him to verify that he didn't do anything to us. That he didn't turn us over to the Klan, that he didn't beat us up. [Interviewer] Let's get closer. So you're now in this town, is it Ardmore, was the name? [Burks-Brooks] Mm-hmm. [Interviewer] And they let you out, and you realize, "okay now we're in this," talk about the fear there, because that's got to be kind of scary. [Burks-Brooks] Well when we found out that that was not a train station and that it was no lights or nothing going on in that building, and we thought "oh boy,

the Klan may be coming," so it was a little fear coming up but then we knew what we had to do and so we had ourselves a little fast meeting and decided that four of the boys would go out and look for a black family and of course they came back and maybe about twenty to thirty minutes and they hadn't found a black family, then we decided that we would all stay together and we would walk down the track, knowing that whites live on one side of the track and blacks live on the other side of the track, and so we came to a group of houses and we looked on one side and looked on the other side, and then we assumed that on that side, which was, come to think of it, knowing it was the right side of that track that that was where the blacks lived, and we were right. And we walked down off the tracks and went up there and knocked. The man came to the door and we told him that we needed to use his

telephone, that we were Freedom Riders, and that Bull Connor had put us out. Well he was a little afraid, and we could understand that because he was a fear of what would happen to him if it was found out that he had helped us and so something came in the back of my mind what my mother had always told me, that you need some help, then you try to talk to the lady of the house, and I said, "let's talk loud and wake up his wife," and we did, and we woke her up. And then I could hear her say, "let them children in here." And we could hear the locks then coming off the door. And we went on in and called back to Nashville, our office was open twenty-four hours, and spoke to Diane, and told her of what had happened with us and that we had had a meeting and that we needed for them to get a car to pick us up and we were going back to Birmingham. [Interviewer] Good. [cut] --that Bull Connor stops the car, throws you out in the middle of nowhere, and at that

point, it was dark-- whatever you want to say, what it sounded like, what it smelled like, and it's dark, and what's going through your mind at that point. So Bull Connor, they're driving this big car, they stop, what happens? [Burks-Brooks] Okay, when he stopped, wondering, "what is going on?" because I'm thinking that we're going on to Nashville. They throw the luggage out, and he says that, "you all can go over there, there's a train station, and get a train back to Nashville." So, wondering then, says "no, we're going back to Nashville, we're going back to Birmingham." And of course I can't let him have the last word and I tells him that we gonna see him back in Birmingham by high noon. [Interviewer] Talk about, a little bit of

fear that sets in when you realize that you're stranded. [Burks-Brooks] The fear sets in, little fear sets in when we found out that that was not a train station, at that-- when we walked from where he put us out in the road, we thought that that was a train station but when we walked over there, there were no lights, and this is about, maybe about three or four o'clock in the morning. Pitch black and that wasn't no train station. And then we thought "ok maybe the Klan's coming," then, they are gone. So now we must find a black family to use a phone, of course there were no phones, no street phones. [Interviewer] Okay, that's good. So you guys get a ride, Diane Nash is helping you get a ride

back into Birmingham. What happened when you got back to Birmingham? [Burks-Brooks] When we got back to Birmingham, we went straight to Reverend Shuttlesworth house. And Reverend Billups was there. And he carried me home to see my mother and I went over to see her to let her know that everything was alright, that I'm still breathing and still walking, and then he carries me back to Reverend Shuttlesworth house and we have some food and then we went straight to the bus station. And by that time another group from Nashville was there. And we had, others had joined us, I remember a group from Atlanta had joined us, Ruby Doris Smith had joined us and so they're we were in the bus station just looking around, walking around, I think it was something like 18

hours because we couldn't get a bus out of Birmingham to go to Montgomery, all the bus drivers refused to drive us.