“Growing Up in a Different Era: Lessons and Stories Shaped by Experience” | NGP #04

In this episode, we hear firsthand experiences from growing up in a different era, navigating education through changing times, and building a life centered around service and community. From years in the classroom to life after retirement, this conversation also reflects on the reality of segregation and the lessons that still matter today.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:21

This segment of the Next Gym Patriots podcast is sponsored in support of the West Virginia Tobacco Quit Line. If you or someone you love is ready to quit tobacco, you're just one phone call away. Trained coaches are available to provide guidance, resources, and support every step of the way. Call 1-800-QitNOW for free coaching, helpful resources, and encouragement to help you break free from tobacco. That's 1-800-QitNOW to take the first step towards a healthier future. And uh I first off want to say thank you for joining us. Um you have been uh amongst the select few that have got to join us, and uh appreciate you taking the time. So thank you for answering. No problem, no problem. So let's dive on into this. We've got some uh interesting topics to talk about today. And uh so I kind of want to make this direct and to the point. So kind of give us a little bit of your back history. What are some of your interests and hobbies that you do every day or things that you find fun?

SPEAKER_00 1:38

Well, I um I like to read.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

I like CNN pretty good.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:47

I like to keep up on what's going on in the world, so I do that. But as far as hobbies are concerned, I um I'm involved with our high school reunion, uh, which has been a part of me for some fifty-six years, and on a daily basis I'm involved with that. Uh because we plan a reunion every year from year to year, of which we're planning our 56th one for uh for July. Wow. And so I'm busy with that. So that takes up the biggest portion of my day. Uh I have some exercises that I do on a daily basis, and that's basically for health reasons.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 2:35

And I like to cook.

SPEAKER_01 2:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

So I I cook something uh every day and um and talk on the phone, and that's about it, just the general stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And uh then I I I I need to leave home every day. So I go somewhere every day to make sure that uh I stay busy at what what's going on around me. So I go somewhere if it's nowhere to but to welch or to Goodson's, uh, up to the post office. I do something every day.

SPEAKER_02 3:09

Yeah, you gotta always clear your mind. Clear your mind. Yes. I have to get up every day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. So everybody kind of has introduction. Um, and so I kind of want to go a little bit through your career a little bit. Okay. So what year did you graduate high school and where did you graduate high school?

SPEAKER_00 3:27

I graduated Garrett District High School in 1962. Okay. Um, and uh had a great time in high school. And uh after that I I um I got married and had children, and uh my husband went in the army and I worked. I worked some some amazing jobs. I worked my first job was at Grace Hospital in Welch, okay, that no longer exists. And then I worked from there to we had a little sewing factory in Kimball, and I worked there um for a few years while he was uh in the service, and when he came home, we went to West Virginia University in 19 and uh '67. We both went to West Virginia University. Uh it was a struggle. It wasn't easy. Um because um integration was just starting at that time. And West Virginia University was quote unquote the white school. And uh and it was it was a difficult task, but uh but we made it when we took the college entrance exam. Uh we scored quite well on the test, and we were accepted there, and that's where we went to was up to Morgantown.

SPEAKER_02 5:02

Okay. So you graduated from WVU in 1975. Yes. Um so then after that you said you well, you got your bachelor's in education. So then you started at uh Tidewater Elementary School. So walk us through that.

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Well, uh what happened was I I actually when we left more when we were more leaving Morgantown to move to Welch, my husband was coming down to work in uh with Lawyer Cunningham and at the prosecutor's office. And uh the the Board of Education had been had a lawsuit for a special education case, and they needed to have somebody that was certified in special education, and and special education at that time was brand new. It was new because the federal law of 94142 was a new law that said that all children had to be educated, which included the special needs kids. And I had a degree in special ed that encompassed all of everything that was qualified to teach special ed, because there were different segments of it. There was physically handicapped, they had the mentally impaired of different sizes and segments, and I had certifications in all areas. So I was asked to come to the Board of Education to speak with the superintendent of schools, who was John Drosick, was the superintendent of schools at that time, about taking the position at Todwater Elementary as the teacher. And um uh I went down and talked with him and and uh uh I asked him a sort of off-track question. I asked him to look at my face and uh he he didn't quite understand and he said, What do you mean? I asked him to take a look at my face to see if there was a muffle on my mouth. And uh he said, No, there's no muffle on your mouth, and he was still confused about what I meant. I said, Well, Dr. Mr. Drosick, if I take this job, I don't want you to expect me to keep my mouth shut on nothing. Because I meant that. I wanted to have the freedom to say and do all the things that I needed to do to keep myself and the children that I taught safe.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:40

And I didn't want to be caught into a situation where the children could be cheated out of anything because I knew that I was getting ready to take on a new task with working with special needs kids. And having the education that I had got from West Virginia University let me know that we really had to be on our Ps and Q's to see to it that these children were taken care of because we were parents at Lightham, and we had to be a direct advocate for these children. And I wanted him to understand that by not having a muffle on my mouth, I would be just that.

SPEAKER_01 8:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:21

And uh that's how I got my job at at uh with the McDowell County Board of Education.

SPEAKER_02 8:27

Wow, that's awesome. So how long did you teach then? How many years did you teach in all?

SPEAKER_00 8:33

In altogether, I've taught about 39 years. Wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:36

Wow. So did you stay how long did you stay at Tidewater? Did you eventually be able to do that?

SPEAKER_00 8:41

I say at Tidewater about 13 years. It w is it Tide was was the small, it was the black school in the neighborhood. Kimball Elementary School was downtown Kimball, but they this Board of Education decided to consolidate Tidewater, excuse me, along with Kimball Elementary School, because these federal laws coming along let the boards of education know they could no longer isolate the children that need they needed to be incorporated in the regular school with the regular kids. Wow. And the only way they could do that was be to combine Tidewater and Kimball together. And so they combined Tidewater and Kimball Elementary. Rather than maintaining the my this the name Tidewater, even though the school was placed at the Tidewater site, they decided to make it Kimball Elementary.

SPEAKER_01 9:44

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 9:44

And so I went from Tidewater Elementary to Kimball Elementary and worked there about 13 years. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 9:50

That's awesome. So then what did you do after that?

SPEAKER_00 9:53

After that, there there again, the Board of Education had to.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

That's okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

They had to do something with the the children.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:06

So they had developed a program where they would move the kids to the McDowell County Vocational School, and they had to be involved with vocational education. So the only way they could achieve that was to put this program from Tidewater or from Kimball Elementary to the board of to the McDowell County Vocational School.

SPEAKER_01 10:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Though it was not part of the vocational educational program. We had to develop our own program where we taught the kids how to do independent living. And on teaching the kids independent living, that meant we had we had to develop a classroom that looked just like a house. So we had to bring the kids from Kimball Elementary to the vocational school, in this classroom that looked like a house. We had to train the children how to do everything as in a house: how to make a bed, how to wash, how to fold, how to do some light cooking and everything.

SPEAKER_01 11:23

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 11:24

And we did that at the vocational school. Now, while at the vocational school, we collaborated with it with the um little motel that's out there beside of the vocational school to take our children there to have some direct learning. So they we would train them in the classroom, take them there to the Count Galoo Motel, and they would work there for a small amount. And we worked with them and trained them how to change the beds and work the maid services at the hot at the motel. That was along with with independent living, the independent living skills, which really made a difference uh with the kids. We also collaborated with um Goodsons.

SPEAKER_01 12:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

And the children went from goods from the school to Goodsons, and they would do some stocking in the in the uh uh in the store. Oh wow in the shelves. But for some reason or the other, it didn't it didn't carry over after we we f we left there.

SPEAKER_02 12:36

Yeah and uh uh Do you think it was funding?

SPEAKER_00 12:40

Well, I don't know if it was funding or the the real direct line of collaboration. You needed to have some sort of relationship with those organizations to maintain that. They didn't maintain that relationship uh with those with those two uh businesses to maintain that. So that's what we did there at uh at at uh the McDowell County Vocational. Now the vocational school didn't have a lunch program. So that meant that for a short while the lunches were transported from Mount View to the vocational school.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

Oh my.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

Well, then somebody started looking at it and found that the kids needed to be transported from the vocational school to Mount View for lunch. So we went from the vocational school to Mount View for lunch, which made no sense to us. So there again, the Board of Education got on board and started looking at some other ideas because as you would get new uh uh directors in these programs, they would always come up with other bright ideas. But what happened was they didn't incorporate their teachers with them to really get a full idea of what to do. They would just make the plans and let us know that this is what we were doing. And there again, that's what happened with me leaving the vocational school. We stayed down there, I'm thinking about eight years. Wow. We left there and we transferred to Mount View High School. Wow. When they transferred us to Mount View High School, they had they needed to be with that for to integrate the kids with the other classrooms. So we did that. There again, these are all unilateral transfers that we got over the years, but we went along with it because we were taking the children with us along with us. And while we were at the vocation school, I planned my own graduation where my kids would have a graduation just like everybody else.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:02

And we did it there at the vocational school. We'd have a full graduation, we'd have a reception and all of that afterwards, but after a while that played out as well.

SPEAKER_01 15:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

And then we stayed at Mount View High School until I retired. Wow. But we had a, we did there again, we had the independent living program, and and um the same program is still there at Mount View with the stove and the refrigerator and all of that stuff that goes along with it. And I don't know whether they're still going to keep it, but they need to.

SPEAKER_02 15:38

Yeah, yeah. That's amazing. I never did he ever hear of that program. But that's that's really neat.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

And we had a 95% graduation rate.

SPEAKER_02 15:47

Wow. Yeah. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_00 15:50

They graduated from high school with the diplomas.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Yeah, that's awesome. So moving on here, so then you um from 2000 to 2005, um, you was part of the Children's Home Society with the specifically the Paul Miller Shelter. So what did you do there? What did that kind of entail?

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Well, when I worked at the Paul Miller shelter, I was also teaching.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:15

I went to work in the morning and worked all day, and when I got out from work, I went from work to the Paul Miller home. And I was the shift supervisor. That meant that I prepared the shifts for the workers that were there. Uh the comp the capacity of kids at at the shelter was 10. So we normally had 10 kids that were there with us. Uh in that, you made sure that your shift was run well, you were well staffed, all of the business was taken care of, and I cooked as well sometimes for the kids. And we did homework with the children, we did everything that you would do at home because these are homeless kids for the state of West Virginia, because West Virginia has a high rate of homeless children, which we don't talk about a lot of times. And uh the youngest that we had, I think was about seven, and they would stay there until they were 18.

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 17:25

And um they all went to school. But we did ever all the things that you would do as a parent. What? I would work from four o'clock to twelve o'clock every night, Sunday through Thursday.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

Wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

You had a packed schedule. I did, and um and on I went back on Saturday, and then I'd work Saturday morning to four o'clock on Saturday evening. Sunday evening I went back at four o'clock and worked from four to twelve. So I had a packed set schedule. But it was a wonderful life though.

SPEAKER_01 17:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

Because you do not realize that children without their parents are broken kids. They need a lot of stuff, they need a lot of attention, they need to know that somebody considers those children as something more than a child at a homeless shelter. They don't need to feel like they're homeless. They need to feel like that they have a home to come to, they have a hot meal, they have somebody that's gonna let them know that they love them and all of that. So, and we planned, we took the kids on trips. There was somebody there that met took them to, they got breakfast every morning before they left. Uh, somebody took them to the bus and they went to school. Somebody met the bus every evening. They came home, they did their homeworks, and they were they were fed dinner and snacks, just like everybody else does at the miller shelter. It was a great experience. It was a wild experience.

SPEAKER_02 19:10

I'm sure it was. And uh yeah, I mean, uh, wow, that that's a pretty packed schedule, but you was enjoying in the process. I was. So moving on here, so you're currently uh in 2021, you started as um the recorder for the city of Kimball, and then right now, as um starting in 2025, um, you're the current president of the McDowell County Commission on Aging. So you're still pretty active within the community, which is great, still at any age. You're a representation of at any age, you can be part of the community. But uh we appreciate your service. Well, so kind of moving into some of these segments here, um, you kind of hit on this a little bit, but I I really feel that this is really important to discuss in this episode specifically. Um and so I I kind of have some questions I kind of want to deep dive into in here with you. Um how did segregation and Appalachia differ from segregation then in the deep south, as most people know of?

SPEAKER_00 20:10

Well, we we grew we were we I grew up in Gary, West Virginia, who actually was US Steel. US US Steel in in during my my my time was the most coal producing place in the whole world. US steel produced more coal than anybody. So when we talk today about the energy in the world, we were the energy producers in Gary, West Virginia. We had everything that you could imagine. We had it. Uh we had housing that was belonged to U.S. Steel. We had, we lived in the community with everybody. The people that U.S. Steel, the owners of US Steel, they had a mindset of not of keeping their workers intact. So they put the workers intact um so that the men that they had working for them would be willing to stay there and work, produce that code that they needed produced. It was they knew exactly what they were doing. It was all uh pl everything was planned, well planned. We were in the community with a variety of people. We were in communities with white people, with Hungarians, with Mexicans, with the Italian. We all lived in a community together. We didn't go to school together or to church together. But we we socialized with each other. We played together. We knew that they had their school to go to, and we had our school to go to because we were happy. We were well taught. We had some of the finest teachers you'd ever meet. All of our teachers had master's degrees. All of the the black teachers, they all had master's degrees. So we got a fine education as far as education goes. We uh we, you know, didn't miss anything, nothing at all. And uh so living in with segregation in the South, they were segregated according to uh maybe uh uh a cultural thing or or what nationality they were. We didn't have that kind of segregation. Uh we were segregated, we were, we lived in areas, even in our community, we knew that the people that lived in in my on my street would come from a specific place in North Carolina so that we could all stay together. So there was there was not that kind of segregation. So we didn't understand that because we didn't have that kind of problem. We didn't have racial problems. We all went to the same store, we all shopped at the company store. Our fathers worked in the same mines, our fathers made the same money, uh, our mothers didn't work. Uh our parents, we had, we grew up with the same kinds of things that everybody else had. So we were not faced with segregation as they know they knew it in the South.

SPEAKER_01 24:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

And I didn't really face real segregation until I went to Morgantown.

SPEAKER_02 24:34

Yeah. One one thing I want to go back to real quick. So what was the reasoning um for the separation within schools? Was it a cultural type thing? Or something required like through the state or it was through the state, I'm sure it was state. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:49

Because it was just totally segregated all over the United States then.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 24:53

Segregation existed.

SPEAKER_01 24:54

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 24:54

And black and white kids didn't go to school.

SPEAKER_01 24:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:57

I mean, just it just didn't happen. And uh, but we were not com we were not bothered by the by that because we were well educated. We had, like I say, the finest teachers. Our teachers were uh all educated. Uh we we were taught the best of everything. Uh we were taught the best manners, you know. Uh we were taught how to cook. Uh we had, we could wear nice clothes from the company store just like everybody else. So we were not confronted. We didn't bother bothered by that, you know.

SPEAKER_02 25:40

So I want to go back then. So talk a little bit about then what segregation was like once you got to Morgantown. What what kind of things did you have to face?

SPEAKER_00 25:49

Well, when we got to Morgantown, we couldn't live in my husband and I couldn't, they wouldn't let us, they wouldn't give us uh married housing.

SPEAKER_02 26:02

Really?

SPEAKER_00 26:03

No. We they referred us to to live with a n a lady. They referred us to live with somebody else. And uh we had to stay there until we just got to the point where we just decided that we were gonna raise some cane in Morgantown. And they were gonna have to put us in the in the in the housing just like everybody else.

SPEAKER_01 26:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:26

Because it really wasn't a lot of us at Morgan, at West Virginia University at that time. We had some ball players that were there, but as far as the regular students, we didn't have a lot of regular students. And they didn't have they put us all in the same dormitory, you know. And and it was it was diff it was different. Yeah, you know, because I was thinking that, you know, we could go there and get a place just like everybody else. But that wasn't so. Yeah. You know, that wasn't so. So segregation really was segregation.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:58

But when I grew up, we didn't have just what you call real segregation, you know.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

We had uh just didn't have it.

SPEAKER_02 27:08

Yeah. So moving on, so how did segregation then, um kind of moving more into your your future of your life, affect job opportunities specifically like in the coal mining and local industries here?

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Well, the coal mining, it didn't affect at all. The US steel knew what they needed. And and the black men worked just like the white men do did. They worked in these jobs, they worked in the tipple, they worked uh, they were, you know, they worked uh uh with safety and uh and all of that. They were involved in all of that, that with U.S. Steel. There again, they U.S. Steel had a plan in place. Their plan was to get that code produced, and this is what they had available to them. They had black men, white men, Mexicans, Italians, everybody. So everybody worked.

SPEAKER_02 28:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:12

Our fathers worked.

SPEAKER_02 28:14

Yeah. They worked. What was it like in the other local industries like grocery stores or the bank or there again?

SPEAKER_00 28:23

Everything in our area here was built around the coal industry. The coal industry here was to produce coal. These coal producers saw to it that black folk had available to them everything that made them happy so they'd stay here. Yeah. Because they knew they understood that if you were here, and I don't care what color you were, if you weren't able to do something to care for your family, you weren't staying. So they needed us to stay.

SPEAKER_01 29:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Our fathers to stay. So they did what was necessary to keep us here. And that meant that the stores, they had they hired black folk. They didn't do it in an abundance, but they did it. They at the the company store. Our driver was a black guy. He took, he delivered all of our groceries. You know, so we saw our own people working in all of the industries here. We were um the the job opportunities were okay with us here.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

We had a good political base.

SPEAKER_01 29:47

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 29:48

We were involved deeply with politics. Our fathers and mothers were involved with that. Our organizations were strong. And uh so we kept all of that going here in McDowell County.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:02

McDowell County for us, though we probably had more black folk in the McDowell County than we did anywhere in the state of West Virginia. Wow. So we were we were visible. We were visible, we were focused, and we were involved in everything that went on in here.

SPEAKER_02 30:24

Yeah. So to kind of kind of take a little bit uh of a turn here, so what was segregation like uh obviously in Appalachian schools, but you've talked about WVU a little bit, but what about high school? Was it you know you talked about how you guys went to your separate schools, but outside of that, it wasn't much different. No. You guys were the just friends just like anybody else. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:46

We did we played our ball, basketball and football, and we were the best at it. We knew that we were, and we didn't have any problems in doing what we needed to do. And we went to segregated high schools. We liked each other. We enjoyed ourselves with each other.

SPEAKER_01 31:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:05

Um uh with with the school. The only thing, like with our books in McDowell County, we had to get the used books that the white schools got. They would get new books and we would get the old ones. But it mattered not because it wasn't what we got with the books, it was what was in those books. We had the best teachers, so they taught us well.

SPEAKER_02 31:30

That's a valuable, a valuable lesson right there. It's not always what's about the book. It wasn't about the book.

SPEAKER_00 31:36

Yeah. It was what we were taught from the book.

SPEAKER_02 31:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:39

And we got everything. Uh, even when we would um and our when we got to be seniors, we had to take the internal uh the um the federal test for to get federal jobs. Wow. We passed them.

unknown 31:56

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 31:56

We had folk that did some of everything. They worked for for the FBI from here in West Virginia. Wow. Most of the R people that graduated high school when they went to Washington, D. D.C., they are retired from the federal government in high-paying jobs. Wow. Even down to one of them that was placed director of GSA with Ronald Reagan. So we didn't miss anything.

SPEAKER_02 32:25

Yeah, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 32:26

Our and then our fathers went to to Detroit and worked in the uh the auto industry. They all graduated, they all retired from Chrysler and Ford and Gentlemotas. And this came right out of Gary, West Virginia. So we have we're products of good stuff now. Yeah, you guys are. We are.

SPEAKER_02 32:47

Yeah. So why do you think um so why is the history of black Appalachians often overlooked in the mainstream education nowadays? Because there's, as you just said, there's a lot of people that have come from this area that a lot of people don't know about.

SPEAKER_00 33:03

Well, what has happened is the politics have changed. Most of this stuff is all political. The politics of things ch things have changed. Because if you go back and look at politics from years ago, when you had guys like Ernest Moore that ran was in the in the Senate in down Charleston, and Cliff Moore that worked in Charleston, and all of that, we didn't have, we had representation where the times have changed and the mindset of some of the people that are involved with politics now has changed. Therefore, it swayed what has happened with us now. We probably see more racism now than we ever saw before. We never had to be bothered with that. And it's just the mindset of where we are, and I honestly believe it's just a sign of the times.

SPEAKER_01 34:15

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:16

And that's the only way you can look at it.

SPEAKER_01 34:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:19

Because it is what it is. And we have to accept it the way it is. We might not like it, but we have to accept it the way it is. And like now in the school system, if there's a a black teacher retires, they're never replaced. We have a lower percentage of black people in this working in the school system now than we've ever had before.

SPEAKER_01 34:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:47

You know, so we have that problem. Yeah. Or that's working at the Board of Education for that matter. You don't have any.

SPEAKER_03 34:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:56

Where we had uh supervisors that were working in the school system, you don't have that anymore. And then, but it's all of that stuff now is politically based. Yeah. Politics has changed the mind of um a lot of things. And it has changed the minds of a lot of people. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:18

So it's all politically based as far as I'm concerned.

SPEAKER_02 35:21

What was the most important lessons that you think from the civil rights movement um that sh still should be focused on today the most?

SPEAKER_00 35:33

From civil rights. I I think they need to to stay with um because everything is built around education. And I think that we need to stay more educationally focused on what's going on uh with education, with especially with the HBCU education systems, you know. And we need to keep our eyes on what's going on with that more than anything else. But there again, we still need to get to the point where we can treat each other like we like to be treated, you know. And if we can learn to do that, because that was one of Martin Luther King's favorite things, is to do unto others as you have them do unto you. And if we can live with that and keep our focus on that, then we'll be okay as far as civil rights. And there again, we still need to focus on the civil rights of each other. And what we have forgotten is what that means. The civil rights of each other. Because I have the same right as you do. And we need to focus on that.

SPEAKER_02 36:57

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:58

And just simple as that.

SPEAKER_02 37:01

Yeah. Oh, I think a lot of times, well, it it is a lot of times. It happens all the time. It's blown out of proportion. Right. Yeah. Right. They forget the civil part of it. Right.

SPEAKER_00 37:10

They forget the civil part.

SPEAKER_02 37:12

Either side, you know. That's right.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

It don't matter who it is.

SPEAKER_02 37:15

Whatever side, we forget, we forget that. Yeah. Yeah, I fully agree. So I kind of wanted to go back a little bit into your story. So you have two kids. Um three children.

SPEAKER_00 37:27

I have a daughter.

SPEAKER_02 37:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 37:29

Because when we did the thing on Facebook, my daughter called me, she said, Mama, did you forget that you I said, I didn't write it. I didn't write it. No, I have three kids. I have two sons and my daughter.

SPEAKER_02 37:43

Okay. So three kids. But you said you raised 10. So walk us through that story a little bit about how that all came about.

SPEAKER_00 37:50

Well, I had the three, two, my daughter and my two boys. Uh of course, Floyd is a public defendant. Eric is a teacher. He he's had a stroke, so he had to kind of sit down a little bit. And my daughter is a nurse.

SPEAKER_03 38:06

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 38:06

And she works up in Maryland, in Virginia, and she's a traveling nurse. And she used to work at the pavilion here in Bluefield.

SPEAKER_01 38:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 38:15

And um, but I had uh I had some gr grandchildren that I I I watched, I took care of, and two other little girls that were friends, their mothers were friends to my ch m children. And uh and then I got two little African kids. And uh uh I got the little African kids in the strangest kind of way. My granddaughter's name is Kamara. And uh I went to the pharmacy one day and the pharmacist was there, and he's an af he was an African pharmacist with right aid. And he asked me, he said, Who is Miss Anderson? And I said, I am. He said, Well, I see that you have a child named Kamara. I said, That's her name. He asked me to take a seat. So I took a seat and sat there. And when everybody left, he came and sat down beside him and he told me that God had sent me to him. And I said, Why? You didn't say that. He said, Because your granddaughter has the same name of a tribe in my town. I said, Okay. I said, Oh, really? He said, Yes. He said, and I have a little daughter that needs somebody, needs somebody needs to watch her. I said, Oh, okay. He said, Would you watch her? I said, sure I will. He turned around and called this little girl by name. And she came from behind the thing in the pharmacy. Wow. And he set her between us and he said, spoke to her in his language. He said, She doesn't speak English. And he asked me, he said, Well, I need you to take her home because his wife was in exile. They had left her out of this country because her visa wasn't right, and she couldn't come back to this country. And when they were coming home about three weeks before that from Africa, she had to go back to Africa and he had to bring his daughter on with him. They wouldn't let her go back to Africa. So there he was stuck.

SPEAKER_01 40:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:50

So I said, Yeah, I'll keep her. He handed her to me along with a Kroger bag full of clothes.

SPEAKER_01 41:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 41:00

And I took her home with me. She was five years old. My granddaughter was five. And the other little girl that I was watching was five. They were all five years old. Oh my. And I bought her in the house, and I told them, I said, she doesn't speak any English. But down the steps they went with this little girl with Anta. They went down the steps with Anta. The next morning I had to go to work.

SPEAKER_01 41:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:34

And they were the other two girls were in kindergarten. And I'm assuming that she was gonna be in kindergarten too. So I took all three of them to work with me. But when she came out of the basement, she could say good morning. They taught her how to say good morning. So I took her and kept her that year. Along with her father. I had no clue where he lived, nothing. Oh my he know nothing about me and I ain't know nothing about him.

SPEAKER_02 42:04

Did you ever see him after that march?

SPEAKER_00 42:06

Yeah, yeah.

unknown 42:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:08

One day I went back to the pharmacy and and I told him where I lived, and he told me where he lived up in Junior Polka. But I kept her at my house.

SPEAKER_02 42:19

How did you work like with the language barrier? How did you work through that? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 42:25

The children did that. Wow. That's amazing. And she learned to speak English. But in their country, they are taught English from birth. That's their second language. They speak they they but it's very broken language.

SPEAKER_01 42:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:42

But from birth they speak a little. So she had a little idea, you know. And we worked through that. And she went to school at uh at Kemble Elementary with my kids.

SPEAKER_03 42:55

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 42:56

And uh she was the ninth one. Okay. And uh but I just kept moving. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:04

You know, I didn't. It didn't stop you.

SPEAKER_00 43:07

I didn't stop. I mean, I just had the ki the kids and and I was working and and cooking and the children were playing and they were happy and the community had lots of children to play in and they played together. And um and then he went home for Christmas. And when he came back, he brought his son with him. He was a little boy. He bought him, and he dropped him off with me, and I kept him. So I kept the children until their mother could come, and it took about seven years for her to come. They went to school here, they went to high school in Mount View at Mountview. They both graduated. My granddaughter graduated high school. Okay. They did. My granddaughter went to West Virginia State.

SPEAKER_02 44:11

Okay. Wow. That's awesome. So they ended up having a successful career then. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 44:16

They live in Atlanta.

SPEAKER_02 44:17

Wow. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 44:18

And I still see them and I visited them. I went to Africa nine years ago. I flew to Africa and visited in Gambia with the family. And we still talk. As a matter of fact, they used to live on Stewart Street.

SPEAKER_02 44:34

Wow. When you talk about their family, um not them specifically, but their family from Africa. Okay. Wow, that's amazing. Did how long did the father is he still alive or did he pass?

SPEAKER_00 44:46

Yeah, he's still alive.

SPEAKER_02 44:48

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 44:48

No, he's still alive. He just he retired from um Walgreens. Three years ago, I think. He stayed with with Rite Aid and then they switched over to Walgreens. And then he got transferred out to Mullins.

SPEAKER_01 45:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 45:08

And he worked at Mullins, and his mother, uh his wife, she was a hairdresser up to the mall where Catherine was.

SPEAKER_01 45:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:17

And they were involved in the community and went to the Catholic Church and everything. So it was a it was a whole nother lifestyle.

SPEAKER_02 45:25

Wow, yeah, I'm sure. Wow. That's an amazing story. And I'm wow.

SPEAKER_00 45:30

And I took the I took her because of my granddaughter's name. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:33

And it was just That's something.

SPEAKER_00 45:35

And it just happened.

SPEAKER_02 45:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:36

And it was and it worked out. Yeah. You know.

SPEAKER_02 45:39

That's amazing. Especially what um was the was the little boy, was he able to speak much uh English too, or is it about the same? A lot he was about to say. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 45:48

And uh my mother was living at that time.

SPEAKER_02 45:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 45:51

And my mother fell in love with him, and he fell in love with her. And and and and he loved French fries. She made French fries and he learned to speak English, and they did well. But they did well in school, though. Yeah. They did well in school. Yeah. It took them a minute with their language, but after a while they caught on, and they did well in school.

SPEAKER_02 46:13

That's an amazing story.

SPEAKER_00 46:14

And that was the the the 10. And I just I still have kids that call me mama.

SPEAKER_02 46:20

Yeah. Yeah. That's sweet. So moving on to our next segment here. So I kind of wanted to talk a little bit about retirement. Uh, and not specifically retirement itself, but life after retirement. Um, it's something that's not really talked a lot about or focused on, um, especially with youth in general. But uh, I kind of wanted to focus a little bit more on your age range in this uh section. So, what were some of the biggest um fears or expectations going into retirement that you felt?

SPEAKER_00 46:52

See, first of all, folk don't understand that retirement is not physical. It's not a physical act. Folk look at retirement as quitting a job or completing your employment age or your employment space. That's not what retirement is. Retirement is a mental situation because there are so many things that go along with you when you're working. You have a routine for getting up, for getting dressed, for eating your breakfast, for managing your day. That's what your employment day looks like. Now, when you quote, retire, unquote, all of that stops, or at least it should. Yeah. Because it's been ingrained in you so long that it becomes who you are. You have to change the mindset of quitting a job needs to be done in stages where you gather yourself to be able to do these things. Because what need to you what why do you need to get up at 5.30 in the morning when you're not going anywhere? You know.

SPEAKER_01 48:21

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:22

And so it's a mental thing where you have to mentally put yourself in a position where you go to sleep at a certain time and you can change all of that. That's an hard that's a hard job, is retirement. It it has taken me the most of seven or eight years to retire because I didn't know how to stay in the bed. Or I'd get up and then I've I was fidgety because I had nothing to do. But you have to learn to change your mindset on what it is that you need to do for yourself.

SPEAKER_01 49:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:07

You need a plan in place as to what you're going to do. You need to have something else to replace that employment job that you had for doing nothing.

SPEAKER_01 49:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:21

And doing nothing mean it doesn't mean that you don't do anything. There's a vast difference between the two. When there's folks say you don't have, I have nothing to do. But you have to have something to do.

SPEAKER_01 49:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:37

You know.

SPEAKER_01 49:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:38

And you have to replace it with that. So with with me, I've had to find other things to do, involve myself in doing stuff, or find somebody to take them to the doctor or or, you know, be f check on the neighbor or have something to do within that day to make that day pass rather than just stumbling around doing nothing.

SPEAKER_02 50:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:08

Because you gotta have something to do.

SPEAKER_02 50:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:11

You know.

SPEAKER_02 50:11

Was there anything that you though, as far as before you retired uh from education, was there anything concerns or did you have what was your thoughts and feelings going into retirement?

SPEAKER_00 50:24

But I thought when I retired that I was just gonna go home and be just so happy that I didn't have to get up every morning to go to work. That's what I thought. Until the day school started without me. And the day school started without me was probably the hardest day that I've had. Because it was like a piece of me had died because I didn't, I wasn't, I wasn't going to be productive anymore. Yeah. Because my employment was my focus on life. And that had gone away with my retirement, you know. Yeah. So I was lost. But with me, what happened with me, I retired, and my sister and I, I told her, I said, well, let's go to Florida and stay a week. So when school starts, I won't be there. Because I knew that I couldn't stand it. But the closer it got time to go to school, the more anxious I got. So we went to Florida, and while I was down there, Barbara, I can't remember her, the lady that was over personnel, she called me in Florida and she said, Vivian, where are you? I said, I'm in Florida with my sister. She said, How soon can you get home? I said, What do you mean? She said, girl, we don't have anybody to fill your position. And we have to have somebody in that position. I said, What do you mean? She said, nobody applied for that job. So we don't have anybody. And you know that with the special needs kids, we have to have somebody in place.

SPEAKER_01 52:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:17

And I told her, I said, well, she said, can you make it by tomorrow? And I said, well, yeah. I told my sister, tomorrow we're going home tonight. So we left Florida and came home. I came home straight home to go back to work so that I could go back to work. So I started subbing. That's that same year I started subbing.

SPEAKER_01 52:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:47

In the same job that I had retired from. And I worked on that same job from retirement for about seven years.

SPEAKER_01 52:56

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 52:57

And I had to wean myself from the job to the point that I knew that I could go home.

SPEAKER_01 53:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:04

That I had to go home. So it's a process. You just don't retire.

SPEAKER_01 53:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:09

Retirement is not physical, it's a mental state that you have to go to.

SPEAKER_02 53:15

Um, so kind of we you've already touched it some a little bit, but how do you stay mentally and physically and socially engaged as you're as you age?

SPEAKER_00 53:24

But I'm just busy with everything.

SPEAKER_02 53:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:27

I uh I'm involved with the commission on age and uh I uh I attend everything that's going on in the county. Um I'm involved with that. I'm involved with my with the town. I I go to church and I'm involved with my church group. I have friends and we socialize with each other. We we we keep up with each other daily. And um I'm involved with with I have an outreach where I'm involved with the outreach. I'm involved with my Bible study, I'm involved with that. So it means that my studies are gonna stay up.

SPEAKER_01 54:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:07

Um and uh so everything that's going on around me, I'm involved with.

SPEAKER_01 54:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:15

I didn't turn my eyes blind to anything that goes on. Uh and then the one of the key things was getting involved here with the commission on aging. And I was involved with the commission on aging before Donald came, you know. We were involved with that to watch, to, to see through the things go on for our seniors here in McD McDowell County, you know. Because uh becoming a senior, you don't you don't just wake up one day and say that you're a senior. You have to walk gracefully into that. And so we stay involved with that. So I'm just involved with everything that goes on.

SPEAKER_01 55:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:01

And those people that are not involved with things, those are the ones that we miss a lot. But as we've grown here with the Commission on Agent, I've noticed that we take in more of the community because we do reach outside these four walls to see what's going on, you know. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:25

How how can seniors um continue to feel valued and needed in their communities today still?

SPEAKER_00 55:34

Well, we have to um things have to be put in front of them, the seniors. They have to be seniors need to be made aware of what's going on. Uh, unless we let them know or continue to make the seniors aware of what's going on, they won't know that. Uh, and and we do a good job of that here is to making seniors aware of things, just like the concert that we had on Friday night. Yeah. We did a networking where we let each one let somebody else know that what's going on, and we keep them engaged and stuff. It's a matter of just keeping the seniors engaged. If you don't keep them engaged, they won't be.

SPEAKER_01 56:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:26

But it's a matter of just keeping them engaged, uh, you know. Yeah. Just like uh your podcast. We need the community needs to, it needs to be. They need to know that it's available and how to get it and how to be involved with it. Because if they don't, they won't.

SPEAKER_01 56:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:54

They won't know. Now, for instance, like we have people in New York knows more about what's going on here with us than folk do here in McDowell County, because they are more in tuned to s to Facebook and what's going on here. Yeah. So if we keep them engaged, they will be. Yeah. So it's it's up to it's up to us.

SPEAKER_02 57:20

Yeah. Yeah. Even and I this I really wanted to hit at this question um because I I I see a lot that it seems like a lot of people once they age, um, they seem to lose their purpose. But even at an older age, how can you still feel a sense of purpose in your life?

SPEAKER_00 57:42

There again, it's getting them in engaged, engaging us, or keeping the seniors focused on things, or offering them things that are of interest to them. Um, there's a lot of things that seniors, other seniors don't do, yeah. That they would do if they had an open door to it. But a lot of folk don't realize what it is that we have available to them because they've never, it's never been, they've never been focused on that, you know.

SPEAKER_01 58:26

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:27

Uh uh, but we have a lot of, but there again, we're growing here at at our center because the folk keep getting focused on what's going on here.

SPEAKER_01 58:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:43

Our focus is the community. And if and the biggest portion of the people uh in McDowell County are seniors. You have a great population of seniors in our in our our county, you know.

SPEAKER_01 58:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:58

And it's just we have to find a way to to keep them focused.

SPEAKER_01 59:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 59:05

And to see to it that they're doing it.

SPEAKER_02 59:09

So I I have two ending questions for you. So what does leadership look like based on your life and your experiences that you've had? That's kind of a deep, broad question.

SPEAKER_00 59:26

You have to bo be who you say you are. You have to really be who you say you are. And what you represent and what you show me is what I see you as. Now, if you are going to lead me, you have to show me steps of leadership. And that means that I you have to walk such that I don't have a problem in following what you say that you're doing with me. The word leadership means a lot. That means that you're gonna be in front.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:22

And if you're going to be in front, then I have to look at your back.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:29

Your back has to speak to my face. It has to speak to my face. So that means that you can't slump in your shoulders.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:46

Your stride can't be selfish. And it cannot, it can never be arrogant.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:56

So in being a leader of anything, you have to wear a lot of hats.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:04

And and sometimes you know, you don't really understand what people see when they're looking at you. Or what your eyes are saying when I look at your face.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:24

The other day I spoke, this man spoke to me, and he said to me, You don't know who I am. I I had a clue who he was, but I wasn't sure. And I said to him, I said, I don't. I said, but I know who you are. I said, but if you take your sunglasses off, I can tell you who you are. He said, Well, why do you need me to take my sunglasses off? Because my theory is the soul of a man lies in his eyes. And if you're gonna lead me, yeah, you can look at me.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:01

Yeah, that's good. Yeah, that's deep. That's really good. Yeah, you have to look at me. Yeah, that's really good. So I have one last question for you as we wrap it up here. So, in your own words, how would you define success in life?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:23

Success is not who you are, what you do. Success is what somebody else says that you do.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:33

You can't pet you can't beat your own drum. Somebody else has to beat it for you. You have to have done something that has that somebody can say that you inspired them. Or gave them a reason for doing something. My mother was the most successful woman I know. Because she opened doors that I thought were closed, and she taught me stuff that nobody else could have taught me. And I think that we have a successful leader because you can almost see us like a little fish working. You know, from one thing to the next. Yeah, yeah. And if I brought stretch my shoulder and let you say to you I'm successful, then I might not have done anything to make you feel successful. I have to make you feel successful for me to be successful.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:56

I have to give something. You know, success is success is not you don't earn that for yourself.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:06

You have to give it to somebody else.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:08

Yeah. That's a good that's uh that's a good uh that's a good moral to have, just in general.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:13

Yeah, you have to give it to somebody else. You can't you can't keep it. Now if you keep it to yourself, you've not done much.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:21

You know, but if you've reached back and got somebody and if you've reached back and picked somebody up and stood them up, then and only then.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:35

Because I I believe that my life is based on not just my living, I l I live for so that when time comes for me to get out of here, I can go in grand style.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:55

Yeah. Yeah. That's what I live for. I don't live for just. Yeah. I want to be able to get up out of here. Yeah. And uh know that I left something back here that somebody else can say, you know, she helped me do this. Or she taught me how to bake a cake. Yeah. Or she said a good word to me, you know. Yeah. You know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:24

Yeah. I like that perspective of success. Haven't heard it like that, but that was amazing. That's that's the way I feel about it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:31

I look I I look, you know, I'm I have a lot of different things that I think about um in life because it's so easy to be arrogant. Yeah. It's so easy to be to raise yourself above other things.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:55

And then underneath there's nothing, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:00

It's easy to do that.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:06

But it's just if you've not done something else, yeah. Yeah. If you're not holding on to somebody else, you know, if you guys if you have somebody that's holding on to you, you have a jewel.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:22

Yeah.

unknown 1:06:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:23

Yeah. Well, uh, I I mean, I've had a great time with you this evening. And uh, as we kind of wrap this up, it's been a pleasure to speak with you. Uh, and thanks for taking the time to talk with us. And uh, we appreciate your endeavors to the community. It has not gone unnoticed. We know here at the Commission on Aging, if it wasn't for you, there'd be a lot of things that wouldn't be in place. So we thank you for that. And uh as always, we hope you guys uh like, subscribe, and follow us. And until next time, we'll see you guys in the next one.