Oral history interview with Ann Brothers Currin, 1990 [text/print transcript]

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UNCG CENTENNIAL ORAL HISTORY PROJECT COLLECTION
INTERVIEWEE: Ann Brothers Currin
INTERVIEWER: Missy Foy
DATE: March 7, 1990
[Begin Side A]
MF: I guess the best thing is—if you could start out just by telling me about your education and
what you did after Woman’s College [of the University of North Carolina]—like, you know,
when were you at Woman’s College and—
AC: I went in the fall of ’47, and I graduated in the spring of ’51. [laughs] And I went as an art
major and then, you know—and continued to do that. I became an art teacher, so I really just
got an AB [bachelor of arts] and as opposed to a BFA [bachelor of fine arts].
MF: Oh, okay. The BFA program had already started then?
AC: I think it was fairly new then. I’m trying to remember. I had people in my major who did get
BFAs, but I do think it was fairly new.
MF: Yeah, I think it was right about that time when it started.
AC: I think it was. And I believe you could change over so—some way or other, which meant
you took a lot more art than I was taking.
MF: All right. [laughs]
AC: A lot more labs [unclear] and I had enough.
MF: A lot more time. [both laugh]
AC: Yeah, right.
MF: I know. I know how that goes. While you were on campus at Woman’s College, I know
there were a lot of things going on. The war [World War II] had just ended, and the Korean
War [1950-53 war between the Republic of Korea and the United States] was just starting
up before you graduated. How did some of those things affect the student life?
AC: We had veterans on campus—male veterans at night, I believe. They had night classes. I
think I’m correct. We also had some resident counselors who had been in service—you
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know, the counselors in the different dormitories. And I don’t know if you’ve ever heard
Captain [Katherine] Taylor [dean of women, dean of students, dean of student services
and director of Elliott Hall] spoken of—she was in—I believe she was in the WAVES
[women’s division of the United States Navy]. I believe she was an officer in the WAVES.
Okay. So I think they had drawn on that for a lot of their counselors. And I’m trying to think
about the Korean War. I remember thinking—we were all thinking how unfair it was.
MF: Unfair?
AC: Well, we’d just finished the Second World War [1939-45 global conflict] and—
MF: Oh, yeah. Okay. I see what you’re saying. [both talk at once.]
AC: —so we figured that all these people that we were dating and going with were going to have
to go to war, and the next thing you knew everybody had to go on, including my husband,
eventually. And we, you know, thought this was just wrong—not that the war was wrong. It
didn’t go to that. We just thought it was unfair that this should have to happen.
MF: Right.
AC: Exactly.
MF: Okay. And what was student life like? I know they still had a lot of the parietal rules with
the signing in and out and all that.
AC: Yeah.
MF: What was student life like?
AC: Well, I think we were considered a very liberal girls’school, believe it or not. And the
freshmen—I was thinking—we had closed study the first semester. Has anybody spoken to
you about that?
MF: No. As a matter of fact, not.
AC: Well they went from—I’m trying to think, from about 7:00 to 7:30 [pm] until 10:30 pm]. I
don’t remember the exact time. We were supposed to be in our rooms studying or, if we
weren’t there—this was during the weekdays—if we weren’t there, then we had to sign out
to go to the library or a meeting or whatever we had like that. But we weren’t dating, so to
speak. And Monday night was closed night. That was for freshmen and for upperclassmen,
meaning that the business of the dormitory and everything, was carried on Monday nights
by the house president of the dormitory and the counselor. So that this would be—if you
were a freshman, this was after—house meeting was after closed study. If you were an
upperclassman, I can’t—I think it was about the same time, it was maybe 11:00 [pm]. So if
you had other meetings and things you had to attend to—it was 10:30 or 11:00 pm]—you
could go on to that and then, you know, be back in time—and you were required to be there
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unless you were sick—which was not a bad idea because you kept up with everybody. They
kept up with you. I think—to me it’s a terrific way to run something. I would—I tried very
hard to get my daughter to go. She was born on Founders Day [October 5th], and I thought,
“Oh, this is wonderful.” No, no way. She just thought she was going to Carolina [the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill], and that was it. She did.
But we did have that. And then second semester you had what I think was called
modified closed study or something like that. Anyway, you didn’t—they weren’t as strict
about it. I don’t remember exactly what was different. Maybe you didn’t have to sign out on
campus, or something like that.
But I remember—I guess when—just the summer before my senior year, they had
a—I don’t know what they called—a conference, but of the student government officers and
house presidents and people that were in charge of various committees and things for the
student government. And we always had a meeting before school before freshmen came,
and it was several days then. And we would hash and rehash all the things that we felt were
good and all the things that we thought were bad and made recommendations to the
administration and the faculty. And I remember asking them to please get rid of closed
study, because it was a farce. [laughs] I had been a junior house president, and I had spent
my time going up and down the halls. You could hear the doors close. You know, people—
you weren’t supposed to go in anybody else’s room without permission from the house
president.
And so—and the house president was not paid. This was not a paid job. This was
strictly volunteer. It was an honor. You had to be elected, and it was an honor to be elected.
It came through the student government and—you know, I think it was a modified closed
study—let’s just have that both times because it’s—it was a real farce—sneaking back and
forth into their rooms. And then when you found them you had to do something about it or
warn them or something. It just wasn’t working out. However, I think that the closed study
business was a very good idea because it kind of brought you from home to some semblance
of rules that you had to be—whether you were in there studying or not—you had to be
around, and you knew that you were on your—to a degree you were on your own—but not
just all of a sudden turned out into the world. And it would be, “Here I am,” and not—a lot
of people failed because they just couldn’t handle it—not ’cause they weren’t smart, but just
because they couldn’t handle the curriculum here.
MF: Didn’t have the structure—
AC: Exactly. And we sort of—of course there were fewer people here, you know—like maybe
2,500.
MF: Yeah. Quite a lot more there now.
AC: Oh, I know. And I thought 2,500 was tremendous. I came from a little school, a small
high school [unclear].
MF: Yeah.
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AC: I’ll tell you a funny—if that helps and you know [unclear]. There’s a dormitory there
named Coit [Residence Hall] now, right?
MF: Right.
AC: Not Coit, Grogan [Residence Hall].
MF: Right, there’s—
AC: Grogan Hall, and it—but Coit, which was in the Quad right there—
MF: There is a Coit—
AC: Coit, is it still a freshman dorm? Or does it matter anymore?
MF: I’m not sure. I know Jamison [Residence Hall] is [for] freshman.
AC: That was where I was a house president [unclear].
MF: I think North Spencer [Residence Hall] used to be freshman—
AC: Really?
MF: —I don’t know if it is still now.
AC: Well, when I was there all but—there were six freshman dormitories on the Quad there.
MF: Right.
AC: And then Sh—is Shaw [Residence Hall] still there?
MF: Yes. That’s the International House.
AC: Right. Well it was a—it was an upperclassman dorm but, just the six—and they were all
freshman dormitories. And I lived in Coit. And Miss [Ione] Grogan [Class of 1913,
professor of mathematics] was our counselor. You did not call them house mothers. They
were counselors. [unclear]. And she was—could be very intimidating—especially to me
she was. She was a wonderful woman but very intimidating to a lot of scared little
freshman girls. And this was sort of the way a lot of us were. And I will never forget that
we could never come in the front door to the parlor during the week, only on the
weekends, so we wouldn’t wear the carpet out. Always—I will never forget that as long
as I live. So that would make good sense because we would’ve tramped through it, you
know, so we came in the end all the time. Now if you had a date or you had company on
a weekend, then they came in the front door. But nobody else did. [laughter]. She was a
fine lady, though—very encouraging.
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MF: You had mentioned Miss Taylor before. What about her? Some other people had
mentioned her but—
AC: I did not know her well. She was—I don’t believe she was dean of women at that time,
was she?
MF: ’46, ’47 somewhere around that time. Maybe I’m wrong, but I think it was somewhere
around there.
AC: I only knew who she was [unclear]. I was never in any meetings with her to my
knowledge. I think that she was a counselor at the time I was there.
MF: She might have been.
AC: I believe that she was. Somehow I do.
MF: You might be right.
AC: I was always impressed with her bearing and demeanor and felt that she was very much
in control of her life and everything else.
MF: I saw a picture of her in a yearbook yesterday dressed up in a costume or something for—
I guess it was some type of dance or something. There were several of the counselors
dressed up in funny costumes.
AC: What year was that? Do you remember?
MF: ’46 or ’47.
AC: This is Mrs. Currin, not Missy speaking. Let me see if I got that in here. I’m going to get
it for you. Can you turn that off a minute?
MF: Yeah, I can stop it. Which society were you in?
AC: Cornelian. I’ve forgotten the names of the others but they’re in there.
MF: Right. Right.
AC: Isn’t that terrible? I can’t remember.
MF: There’s the Adelphian, Cornelian—I don’t remember them right off the top of my head
either. Those are the two I—
AC: Are they—they aren’t still in existence are they?
MF: No.
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AC: I didn’t think they were.
MF: No. I just happened to remember those two though. What were the societies about,
basically?
AC: I don’t remember. They were mostly social is what they were. And the officers in the
societies were marshals in that they were—when you had various events at Aycock
Auditorium, like plays and concerts and things like that, they always, you know, handed
out programs and took care of those sorts of things for the university or college at the
time.
MF: What about the marshals that were chosen?
AC: You mean for graduation?
MF: Yeah, the marshals that—well, for some of the events during the year. Were they still
choosing marshals from the society?
AC: I think they did that all at one time. I know that you ran again to be the president of the
society. We’ve had—I guess what I was saying about—it was a fairly liberal college—it
was a girls’ school—in that I was very impressed with the student government and
participated in it. We had a honor system. Do they still have that?
MF: There’s an honor system but—
AC: And we abided by it very strictly.
MF: What did the honor system entail for you?
AC: For us it—I can’t remember all of it. In other words—if you were che—okay, we’ll pick
up cheating which is the first thing that people—but that wasn’t all of it. What you would
do was, if you saw somebody in your class while taking an exam or test or something—
cheating, you would punch somebody else and get them to see what you were seeing and
back you up. And then you would report them to the—did we have an honor council—
honor board council, I believe?
MF: Yes.
AC: And, of course, it would be their word against your word, and you would have to come
up before the judicial board, which was composed of students and a faculty advisor. And
then they made recommendations. That wasn’t the only thing that came before the
judicial, but that was that. There were certain things—like if you came in late there were
written rules that you could just follow and you didn’t have to be—hall board—that’s
what I’m trying to think of. If you were house president, then you had hall board, which
was people had violated rules and it met on certain nights of the week. And you had
people in the dormitory that were elected to participate on hall boards. And you heard the
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various complaints and rules broken about it and made your decision, and then those
who—the very worst ones went to judicial board. But the others were taken care of
within the rules of the—like maybe you were—had to stay on campus for a weekend. I
remember being late coming back from a basketball game at Davidson [College,
Davidson, North Carolina]. And I was house president.
MF: Oh, God.
AC: And there was no way I could have gotten in any earlier either. The game was late, and
they were driving me back, so I was [unclear] wherever the game was, I don’t know. And
so what I did was, the next day I just called the president. I don’t know whether it was
student government president or president of the judicial board—I don’t remember—and
explained to them that I was late. And I knew what the punishment was because it was
written down there—it was like being “campused” for the next weekend or whatever it
was. And that was taken care of.
MF: You already knew what consequences you would suffer if you did something.
AC: This was not the case for everything. But a lot of things like being late or missing events
or cutting too many classes or those kind of routine things which I can [unclear]. And
people, I think by and large or maybe I was very naïve, abided by it. And it was a great
deal of emphasis placed on our honor system. This was something you learned when you
got there as a freshman.
MF: Oh, really?
AC: You had a handbook, and you learned everything that was in it, and you took a test on it.
MF: Oh, a test too?
AC: Yes, given by the student government. It was very good. You’d be amazed what you
could do and what you couldn’t do.
MF: So the honor policy was real important?
AC: Yes. I think it was a very good thing. But living together as you do, you knew the rules
and the regulations, and they weren’t stifling. Well, they may have been for some people.
But—and they definitely were if you were dating somebody steady, and you wanted to
see them every night [unclear]. But if you were doing that, then you weren’t going to stay
in school anyway.
MF: Right.
AC: Because you didn’t have time, you know. They didn’t have time to come from where
they were, and they certainly weren’t studying when they came to see you. So you
weren’t either—you know, this kind of thing.
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MF: Yeah. What is—what about as far as dating? What kind of rules did they have set up for
you?
AC: Oh, gosh, let me think. Well, I told you about freshmen. You could only date on the
weekends. The first six weeks that you were at WC, you could not go home. That was
difficult—of course, not for town students. This was a good idea because they wanted
you to get used to being away from home.
MF: Right.
AC: Now people could come and see you, I believe. I’m not sure—on the weekend come to
visit. But I was a long—considering then, I was a long way from home. I was—from the
coast all the way to Greensboro.
MF: That’s—yeah, that was a long way.
AC: Oh, it’s not now, but it was considered so then.
MF: Well it was at the time, right?
AC: And then you could date a—you had to have permission to go out of town for the
weekend from your parents as a freshman. I remember that very well. And if had to—you
had to have written permission—I think it was the first semester—in order to go
anywhere. Say you wanted to go to Carolina for the weekend. Seems to me you had to
have it to go any good distance. And then there were certain places that you weren’t
supposed to go.
MF: Like?
AC: I’m trying to remember. In Greensboro—gee, I just can’t remember. They just weren’t
considered very good places to be. Battleground—is that a place?
MF: Battleground Avenue?
AC: That’s an avenue, but there was a—like a drive-in place there too, I think. I think there
was.
MF: I’m not sure.
AC: I can’t remember the place, but in general you had to have approval of where you were
going. And hopefully you were going to be there [unclear] wondering where you were.
MF: Right.
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AC: —which never happened to my knowledge. But you had to do that—but you did have to
get permission to—. Upperclassmen, I don’t remember—I don’t think you had to have
any kind of permission to go out of town. But you did have to let the house president—
you had to sign out—know that you were going out of town, so that if anybody needed to
get in touch with you, they could.
MF: Right.
AC: That was fairly liberal for that time, really.
MF: Yeah.
AC: I’m sorry that they don’t do it more now.
MF: Don’t do what?
AC: Sign out on—so they know where you were.
[both talk at once]
MF: Oh, no. No.
AC: I know they didn’t at Carolina when my daughter—which was no problem, but I—there
were a lot of parents who said that they didn’t want to deal with it.
MF: Right. I heard that.
AC: Know about that.
MF: Oh, yeah.
AC: Which was kind of bad really—not so I just feel like it’s common courtesy. If I were
going out of town, I would get in touch with you, a member of my family, and say, “I’m
going out of town, and this is where I’ll be if you need to get in touch with me.”
MF: Right. Yeah.
AC: But for some strange reason, they felt this was an infringement on their rights.
MF: I don’t know. What, the students—?
AC: Later on.
MF: Yeah.
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AC: [unclear]
MF: That’s what I mean.
AC: Yes. Yeah. I think—you know, to me it’s a matter of common courtesy and common
sense.
MF: Yeah.
AC: But it wasn’t that way so—at any rate, that’s what we did and what we had to do. Didn’t
always happen that way, but that’s what we were supposed to do.
MF: What about Tuesday Chapel? Did they still have Tuesday Chapel?
AC: Oh, yes. I’d forgotten about that. Yes, we did. And I had forgotten it too—it usually
rained every day. And you were required to be there, and that was—the business of the
whole college was conducted on those days if it needed to be because just about
everybody could get into the auditorium at that time. And you had, what was it? They
checked on you to see if you were late. You were assigned a seat.
MF: Oh, okay.
AC: Alphabetically, you know [unclear]—and you—by class, so I remember that now. I had
forgotten it—by classes. You sat with your class, and it was alphabetical, I believe. And
at the end of the year it was a great ceremony. I’m trying to think if the senior class sat
down first, which were the best seats. So that at the end of the year, the last Chapel, the
senior class walked out, and the—all the classes moved up.
MF: Oh, I see.
AC: You know it was great—
MF: Sort of symbolic?
AC: Yes. It was very symbolic. And it was—I had forgotten that—’course we wore our class
jackets so that everybody knew—you wore your class jacket out—wore it all the time.
MF: Tell me about the class jackets.
AC: Well, each class had a different color, and it was very important that you had a class
jacket ’cause it identified you. It—we thought in terms of class—I mean college class.
And in terms of the college and to—so that if you saw a gal walking around in a red
jacket—that was my class—you knew that she was the Class of ’51. You didn’t have to
ask anybody, you just knew. It’s just one of those things. And it identified you for good
or for bad.
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MF: There was like a certain amount of importance and—
AC: Of belonging—belonging to a—I don’t know if it signified a great deal of importance.
It—
MF: Well, as you got closer to being a senior, I would imagine—[unclear]
AC: You’re right. It did.
MF: —that this would be—if you had the right color jacket you looked a little more important
perhaps.
AC: Yes, it did ’cause we had a freshman orientation day in which freshmen had to do things
for upperclassmen.
MF: Wasn’t that called Rat Day?
AC: Yes, Rat Day.
MF: Rat day. Yeah, I haven’t had very many people tell me about Rat Day. Can you tell me
about that?
AC: Well, it wasn’t terrible. You might have to carry somebody’s books. I remember having
to write to this boy that I had no idea who he was—some kind of love letter—and sign
my name. [unclear] just tell me who he was. [laughter] That’s what they thought—that
was cute, but it wasn’t too bad. You know, you had to bow down when a senior came by
and said—or upperclassman, I should say—[unclear]—you had to wear—oh, that was it.
You had to wear beads and things and whatever they told you to wear and that sort of
thing. It sort of was very [unclear]. It was fun. It was nothing bad, but it was a lot of fun.
That was it. And you looked forward to your turn.
MF: Oh, I’m sure. Did you get a chance to have a freshman for Rat Day?
AC: Yes, I think I did. But I don’t remember what I did. I always remember things like—
come polish my shoes, clean up my room—things that were necessary to be done. Those
kinds of things because I don’t know what they had when you were here, but we had
inspections in the rooms.
MF: Oh.
AC: I know when you were freshmen—I’m trying to think of the upperclassmen. And her
name, I shall never forget, was Miss Moxley. It’s a name I will never forget. And I don’t
know if it was every—you didn’t know when she was coming. So she could check, and
then she had a pass key, and she could check every room to see if you were keeping it
neat and clean. We tried to find out when she was coming because there was no way—
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now there were those few people that could keep their rooms that way. [laughs] But we
didn’t. And I remember a friend of mine had gotten a little kitten, had found a little kitten
and had kept it in her room. And we had to keep up with when Miss Moxley was coming
so she could be on the hall, grab the cat, put the cat in a pillowcase, and go out with the
kitty cat before Miss Moxley came or before anybody would know that the kitty cat was
there. I don’t know how long she kept the cat—that got to be kind of old.
MF: I’m sure.
AC: I do remember, I had forgotten that. [laughs] But it was that kind of thing. I don’t know
whether you got—what did they do to you if you didn’t—I don’t remember what
happened to you. Nothing bad, I don’t guess. Maybe you went to hall board or
something. I don’t know or remember any of this stuff. And it kept the rooms from
looking like my son’s room did in college.
MF: Yeah. Right. I can imagine that.
AC: It was just too—I loved being there. My freshman year I hated it. I was so homesick. It
was so large. And I think I just was very homesick and did not like it at all—and came
back my sophomore year and loved it.
MF: What was the change?
AC: I don’t know, really. I guess I grew up my freshman year and—so that when I graduated I
cried all the way home.
MF: Oh, gosh.
AC: Oh, yes—these were people that I was never going to see again—and that’s true—and
people that I had lived with for four years and at that time that seemed like a very long
time. And they were my close friends and good friends and I had made a lot of friends,
and I had enjoyed working and being with people. We had a good time, and I really
missed it a whole lot.
MF: Yeah. What do you remember about the Daisy Chain? What was the Daisy Chain?
AC: It was the sister class to the senior class, a sophomore class. And I’ve forgotten whether
you were chosen by grades or how you were chosen. I was on the Daisy Chain, and we
went out—you stayed for graduation as a sophomore. And you went out and picked all
the daisies you could find in the field and made the daisy chain. And then the seniors
walked through it for graduation.
MF: How long was it usually?
AC: How old?
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MF: How long was the daisy chain? I hear people say the seniors walked through it, and I try
to imagine how large of a chain we’re talking about.
AC: Well, it was probably—it’s not a—it was not a metal chain—
MF: Oh, I know that, no—I know.
AC: It was a rope—
MF: Rope, right.
MF: Made out of daisies, yeah.
AC: There may be a picture in there, I don’t know. Somewhere in it.
MF: Okay.
AC: Oh dear, I can’t remember. Depending on the—oh, maybe as long as—I have no idea. It
depended on the number of people that were in, you know chosen for the Daisy Chain, I
guess.
MF: Oh. That makes sense, yeah. How many daisies they could collect for [unclear].
AC: We got a—we could get a lot of daisies. There were a lot of fields then [laughs] to get the
daisies out of.
MF: I was just going to ask you—I see in the yearbook here that Ed[ward Kidder] Graham
[Jr.] was chancellor.
AC: Edward Kidder Graham, right?
MF: Yeah. And I was going to, oh yeah—Dean Katherine Taylor.
AC: She was a dean. Okay, well she must have—well, I guess so. I just never went to see her
in that capacity [unclear].
MF: Yeah, right. Do you—what do you remember—do you remember anything about
Chancellor Graham?
AC: Yes. He was a small man and full of nervous energy. [unclear].
MF: Nervous energy?
AC: Yes. When I came there—I think that was his first year when I was a senior. Dr. [Walter
Clinton] Jackson was the chancellor. And then when—I thought it was when I was a
senior when he came.
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MF: I think that’s about right.
AC: Yeah, it would have been ’50, ’51. Is that right?
MF: I think so. Do you remember anything about him?
AC: No, not really.
MF: I know being his first year that would be kind of—
AC: No, and I remember seeing him in Chapel. I think we probably had a reception for him,
and I guess I met him. Again, I remember him as being a very—Dr. Jackson was a—not a
tall man but a large man—very friendly, who walked always—quite the old southern
gentleman. Everybody loved him. Oh, I say everybody, but the girls did. At least, I—and
he always walked the cam—up and down the campus, and then he spoke to us and shook
hands with us and—sure I—he was older than William—Bill Friday [head of the
University of North Carolina System], but he had that sort of appeal—a folksy,
gentlemanly appeal for women—for girls—well, for everybody really, but being a girls’
school—as again I just remember [unclear]. So I don’t really know. Can’t remember that
much about him, and I don’t remember if any of his policies changed our lives or—
MF: Or anything?
AC: Or anything. I wish I could, but I can’t.
MF: Did he seem to be as involved in the campus as Dr. Jackson was?
AC: Not in the same way. I didn’t see him that much. But that doesn’t mean he was not
involved.
MF: Oh right.
AC: I was involved with student government, which was class government as well as student
government. Everything sort of had a hierarchy to it. My senior year—I was on judicial
board my senior, which was a wonderful experience. It prepares you for being on the
juries of this world.
MF: Yeah.
AC: It really does. It and have it—we had a Miss [Louise] Alexander [Greensboro’s first
female lawyer] was our faculty advisor, and she was a “women’s libber” and—terrific—
and just a really great woman. She was a political science professor. She was really great.
She would talk about Douglas MacArthur [United States Army general] being the same
as Julius Caesar [Roman general and statesman], and she’d get up there, and she made it
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live for you. She compared the two, and now when I look back on it, I think she was
probably right. [laughs]
MF: When you just said MacArthur, it made me think of—just because they’re similar
sounding names—McCarthy [United States Republican senator from Wisconsin, claimed
that there were Communist and Soviet spies and sympathizers in America and in
American government]. Do you remember McCarthy—?
AC: McCarthy hearings [1954]—?
MF: Yeah, with the—
AC: They were after I graduated.
MF: Right, but he was starting that—his inquisition, if you want to call it—
AC: Crazy, yes, it was inquisition I guess. I don’t remember that. I remember participating in
the presidential vote. We had our own straw vote when Harry Truman [president of the
United States] won. And then, of course after I graduated, I was able to vote really for the
first time, which was really exciting for me. But as the nation went, so did our campus.
So Harry Truman won on campus as well as in the nation. I remember that. We were
really more involved in the Korean War [1950-53 war between the Republic of Korea
and the United States] and thinking about that. And then the other thing I remember that I
was talking to a friend about was Israel had just—
MF: Oh yeah.
AC: —come into being about this time. [unclear] about that.
[both talk at once]
AC: And I’m trying to—we had exchange students, and there was a beautiful young girl who
was—I can’t remember her name—who, as soon as she graduated was going to Israel to
live. And we were just in awe of her because—now, she graduated before I did—and this
was very exciting for all of us to have a nation created—
MF: Oh, yeah.
AC: —like that. You know, for some reason this was very important to us.
MF: It seemed like history in the making.
AC: It was. And she could—she would speak about David Ben-Gurion [founder and first
prime minister of Israel] and all. And then we had an Indian, (India, Indian) exchange
16
student—I think my—I think our class did my senior year. I remember her. And that was
very interesting. I don’t—I didn’t learn all that much about her, but her name was
Ronnie. I remember that. And she dressed as an Indian would and not as we did—very
spoiled young lady.
MF: Oh, really?
AC: Smart, but spoiled.
MF: You were saying something before about the veterans taking classes. What do you
remember about that?
AC: Nothing. I just knew that it went on.
MF: Oh. You didn’t have any in your—
AC: No, they didn’t have—oh, I take that back. There were some girls that were—or I should
say—I thought they were women at the time—who had been in service that were regular
students with us. But very few, just a few. And then by veterans, I meant men.
MF: Right, that’s what I—
AC: There may have been some women among them. And I think there were night classes.
MF: So they had classes that were sort of separate?
AC: Separate from us, yeah.
MF: Okay. And trying to jump back again to the atmosphere of the war that had just ended
and the war that was just starting. I know during World War II [1939-45 global conflict]
they had sugar rationing and stuff like that. Was there anything like that going on on
campus that seemed particular just to a wartime situation?
AC: No. I didn’t—I was unaware of it. They may have been as a freshman. I think the
upperclassmen were probably very much aware of it. I remember a friend I have here in
Durham [North Carolina] who was a junior at the time I was a freshman and the year—
the fall that I was a freshman was when all the hemlines dropped.
MF: Oh, yeah.
AC: And so, anyway, they wore it like what we wear right here—down to here or here. Prior
to that they had been up to here.
MF: So they dropped from knees to your ankles?
17
AC: They dropped. So you could tell a freshman from an upperclassman simply by the clothes
she wore. An upperclassman had either—if they were very rich, had maybe one or two
new—that had dropped here. Or they had skirts with little bands on them to—
MF: To make them a little bit longer?
AC: Right. So they’d be in style. But the freshmen had them in the new clothes—had the
dropped skirts and all. I remember her saying that, which was funny because I hadn’t
really thought about it at the time.
MF: Right.
AC: Yeah, and they continued to get long the whole time that I was in college here.
MF: Okay.
AC: Yeah. That’s not probably not the thing you wanted to hear but anyway—
MF: Oh no.
AC: —that was just a—no there weren’t—I think about all the cars on campus now. We were
not allowed to have a car until our second semester senior year on campus.
MF: Oh, so for only one semester?
AC: Well, there was no place to put them.
MF: Oh, true.
AC: And people just didn’t have cars like that. If you went anywhere, if your date had a car,
he’d probably went home and got it or maybe he was lucky enough to have a car. And
some of them were—or have a friend who had a car. Or you would’ve got on the bus and
went where you were going for the weekend. That’s just the way it was.
MF: Were there, during I guess ’50 and ’51, were there a lot of people who had boyfriends
and such in the war?
AC: In the war?
MF: Yeah.
AC: I’m trying to remember. No, I don’t think so because if you were still in school, you
didn’t have to go. I had a friend who had been in the [United States] Navy and went back
in the Navy for the Korean War. He was at Carolina after being in the Navy during the
Second World War. I think he graduated though, and then went back in.
18
MF: Right.
AC: I believe that was the way it was. But I don’t—they were older. If you had an older one,
yeah, they were gone. If he was your age or still in school, no.
MF: Right. ’Cause I know—during the Second World War a lot of people have told me that
the post office on campus was a very important place.
AC: Well, it would have been anyway, but more so because of the war. This is true, I’m sure.
I’m very sure—no, I was unaware of that, if it was. It certainly was not anything like the
Korean War.
MF: Right.
AC: I was more aware of it after I graduated than—I was trying to think—was it ’50 that it
started?
MF: Yeah.
AC: ’49 or ’50?
MF: I think we sent [United States] Marines over there in August or September of ’50. I think
September of ’50.
AC: Well, okay. Yeah. This is what I was thinking because my husband went in in the spring
of ’52.
MF: Yeah, so it was—
AC: Went in service—he didn’t go overseas, but he went into service in the spring of ’52.
MF: So it was just getting started. I think it was probably March of ’50, somewhere around
there, where it first broke out in—I think in [the Battle of] Inchon in September [1950.
AC: I think so.
MF: Yeah, that sounds right to me. I’ll probably go home and look it up.
AC: You know already—you studied it in history. You see, I didn’t study it in history, so I
don’t really—I relate only to the very personal things that happened. And a lot of it was
very personal.
MF: Yeah. I’m sure it was. Do you remember Miss [Harriet] Elliott [political science
professor, dean of women]?
AC: No, she was not liv—I don’t know if she was living when—
19
MF: Yeah, I couldn’t remember it—’cause I knew you said you started ’47, and I couldn’t
remember if you—
AC: Maybe she was that first year or two. But I remember the social science forum, which
was really great. I—but I did not know her. [unclear] I think that she was still living
[unclear].
MF: Just checking to see how much there—the tape won’t pop up when it stops, so I keep
checking it. One of the other things I wanted to ask you about was—I know there’s this
apparent rift between the Alumni Association and Chancellor [William E.] Moran right
now, and I was wondering—do you know anything about that because I really don’t
know much about it? I just try to catch a little bit here and there from people, so I was
wondering if—?
AC: I’m ashamed to say that I don’t know as much—I got a—I had gotten correspondence
from [Barbara Hardy] Bunn [Class of 1977], and I have been sort of wrestling with this
cancer for about a year now.
MF: Right.
AC: So I really haven’t paid any attention—
MF: Oh, I’m sure.
AC: —to this that probably I would’ve in that—somehow I got the impression that it had to do
with funds and control of the Alumni Association. Is that correct?
MF: I think so. Like I said, I’m not sure, really.
AC: I don’t know if it has to do with representation on the—is it Board of Governors?
MF: Oh, okay.
AC: Or the—what do they call the board at UNCG [The University of North Carolina at
Greensboro] again?
MF: I know what you’re talking about, but I can’t think.
AC: But I’m afraid I—you’re asking the wrong—and I think—because usually I keep up with
everything on campus. But this year some other things have taken precedence.
MF: Oh, I can understand that, sure.
20
AC: I have not really done my homework on that one. And I missed that—I really have—was
involved with the—let’s see, I am the treasurer—everlasting treasurer of our class. I think
that’s right. If there’s anything I shouldn’t be, it’s the treasurer.
MF: Why is that?
AC: Well, I just am not mathematically inclined, and I don’t keep books well and all that sort
of thing. I missed our last reunion. I’m sorry—I had not missed a single one till this last
time. And we were going on a trip, so I had to go on a trip at that time, so—
MF: Right.
AC: But I was just trying to think of the different things that happened and—my daughter
went to UNCG for Girls State [summer leadership and citizenship program sponsored by
the American Legion for high school students] and stayed in—
MF: Was that the Governor’s School [North Carolina summer residential program for gifted
high school students]? Oh no, State, that’s the governing, student governing—
AC: Yeah, political, right—
MF: —student government in high schools.
AC: —they set up a political system, right. I remember. Okay. I know what it is.
MF: And I was very excited that she went.
AC: Oh, yes.
MF: And met her college roommate there. They were both there, so it worked out fine. Neither
one of them went to UNCG. And it was a real surprise to see the rooms and things. My
senior year Ragsdale [Residence Hall] and Mendenhall [Residence Hall] were brand new
dormitories.
AC: Oh, yeah.
MF: Residence halls. And because I had been a house president and was living in a freshman
dormitory, residence hall—see it was [unclear] my upbringing is going bad. Should say
residence hall. We got to choose where we wanted to live. So we didn’t have to draw
names out of a hat. I don’t know if you do that now or not. Do you know—have they got
housing for everybody?
MF: I’m pretty sure. I haven’t lived on campus as a graduate student.
AC: Well, undergrads do, haven’t they?
21
MF: I would imagine so. There are all the new high-rises now.
AC: So it was really exciting to go back and see these—there were two beautiful residence
halls, you know, with paneling—
[End Side A—Begin Side B]
AC: and all th—it was so luxurious as compared to the older ones. Well, we even had a
lavatory in our room, I mean—
MF: So Mendenhall was new at the time of—?
AC: Ragsdale and Mendenhall—new in ’50, 1950.
MF: And what about Weil and Winfield [Residence Hall]?
AC: Oh, they were there. They were there when I got there.
MF: Right. I know that—I think it was ’46, ’45 that Winfield—Weil Winfield—
AC: Was built?
MF: Was built. It was so—somewhere around there because I know that at that time some of
the students from then have told me that those—Winfield was very much the dorm of
choice.
AC: Right.
MF: Was it still when you—?
AC: Yes. That and the Spencers.
MF: North and South Spencer?
AC: Yes.
MF: What made them so attractive? Why were these the dorms—sellout dorms?
AC: I think because it was new—Mendenhall Ragsdale, Ragsdale Mendenhall?
MF: Ragsdale Mendenhall, I think, I don’t [unclear]—
AC: Right. Because it was new and it just had a lot of—it was new. If you wanted to live—
Spencers, the Spencers—I never visited the people that lived in them. They were just
22
really—they were doers and had things going on, and that was the other attraction and—
[dog barks]
MF: Yeah, okay.
[recording paused]
MF: What were we talking about?
AC: Gordon Gray [president of the University of North Carolina System].
MF: Yeah, okay.
AC: He became president of what we called Gray University at that time—I believe the year I
was a senior because we had lots of ceremonies that we attended for him. I think it was
that year. Was either ’49 or ’50.
MF: Okay. One of the things I just realized I neglected to ask you about was the faculty.
AC: Oh, okay.
MF: What were the faculty like, and what was the student-faculty relationship like?
AC: Well, it depended on your major a great deal, I think.
MF: Yeah. That would make sense.
AC: And so I knew the art faculty better than I knew any of the other faculty except—mostly
the art faculty. And the head of the art department was Mr. [Gregory] Ivy [head of the art
department]—I started to say Dr., but I think it was Mr. Ivy, who was a very liberal man.
He said that he thought that everybody while in college should start or participate in a
revolution.
MF: Oh, my.
AC: Oh, he was well a real neat fella. Very good, and we liked him a great deal. And my
faculty advisor was an art professor. And she was from Waco, Texas. And she convinced
me that that’s where I should go and teach school. I never got there. Tried really hard—
didn’t get there until my son went there to work. I finally got to Texas thirty years later.
So it was really—but, you know, they were the people that we knew well—and we knew
them—I don’t think—I was not very close to them really—I mean, we knew each other,
but as far as being good buddies with any of them—no.
MF: More of a formal relationship?
23
AC: Yeah. Friendly, very friendly and could be open, but more formal, yes. Much more
formal I think than perhaps people have now.
MF: Yeah. What about the quality of the faculty?
AC: Excellent. And I think at that time WC [Woman’s College] was rated very high
academically as a girls’ school. I think that was one of the things I hated to see when it
became—whether coed had anything to do with it or not, it began to drop. And I have
been to a couple of McIver Conferences talking about this very thing. It’s been a few
years ago, the last one I went to. It was—you were defin—to get accepted there, you
were in the very upper, upper portion of your high school class. And, of course, we had
out-of-state students as well, which you had to have done very well to get accepted. And
you had to work very hard to stay there. Well, I don’t—as I said before, I don’t know
how you go to a coed school and stay in school—I was not all that bright. I had to work
very hard and stay in school. ’Cause I didn’t have time for any of that during the week,
you know, I just really had to work hard and study a great deal. I think labs had a lot to
do with it too. I had a lot of time-consuming things. Plus I had an—I was taking a regular
course—it’s the first two years—I don’t know if they still do it now or not—you took two
years of English, two years of a language, two years of science and math, history and
sociology. What have I left out? Electives, I guess, which was art. That was an elective.
So I had two or three of those. That’s right, you carried fifteen to eighteen hours a
semester.
MF: Eighteen is like max now.
AC: Is it?
MF: And twelve is the minimum for full time.
AC: I think that’s the same then because the year I was a junior, I only carried twelve. I went
to summer school the year before because I knew that doing the house president and
doing art labs—
MF: —would be—
AC: —would be pretty rough, and so I went to summer school the year before and got two
courses off.
MF: Oh, yeah. Now I forget what I was going to ask you.
AC: Did it have to do with—you were asking me about faculty.
MF: Right. Well, I forget what—well, in particular, I was going to ask you about—but as far
as the faculty goes though, I know you were saying it seemed friendly but more formal of
24
a relationship. Did the—at the time when you were a student there did the faculty seem to
be more male or more female, or do you see it being a mixture?
AC: Well, I never thought about it one way or another. It never occurred to me. I’m going to
say again, I had the best of both worlds—of what might not seem liberal to you but to me
was a liberal education—an academic liberal education, that’s what I want to say.
’Course you know the motto—did you know the motto of the college as it was then was
“The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world?” [Ed. note: the college motto is
“Service.”]
MF: No, I didn’t know that.
AC: Which is true. Meaning, you know, if you go out there and in some way shape people,
children, then you have shaped the world—maybe a teacher, which is what I think that
they were referring to because it was a teacher’s college at one time. Now people in my
family that were teachers went there. And my mother went there, my aunt—great-aunt
went there too. And they were teachers. And I was a teacher. And so it meant you could
mold character. You could make—I still think that’s true.
MF: Right.
AC: That’s very important. So I just—I had that, but I had a lot of freedom that people that
went before me didn’t have—being able to—more than being a teacher, yet being able to
choose to, if I wanted to, to be married and stay home and raise a family if it was
financially possible. And that’s what I wanted to do. But then everybody would come
down on me which—I think the other way around is discrimination, too. If somebody
wants to do that, why not?
MF: True.
AC: If you don’t want to, you have that—you have a wonderful opportunity of doing other
things, and yes, I felt the pride of being a woman and being able to do something besides
I—we shouldn’t put just housework—but being able to do—being able to think and to
participate in work. And that was the opportunity that I felt a girls’—this particular girls’
school gave to women that a coed school did not in that we had all the responsibilities.
You didn’t have to run against a man to be president of student government. You were
running against another woman, and you got to be that so that when you went out into the
world, you’d already had that experience. If you went to a coed school and they wanted
all males to be that, you never got that opportunity.
MF: So it wasn’t coed in the sense of equal, but coed as in the sense that you were almost
trespassing on a male university?
AC: It was an opportunity to participate in a male role and have that experience that the world
outside was still extending to males and a few females.
25
MF: Yeah, okay.
AC: And it gave you an experience that made you perhaps a little pushier than a normal girl.
[laughs] It was a wonderful experience. This is why I wanted my daughter to—this is
why I didn’t want it to be a coed school. I just felt that there was so many benefits there
for women that frequently women didn’t take advantage of in the coed situation because
it—if you didn’t get the fella you wanted, or it made you look bad or something—and it
really didn’t matter though. It didn’t matter.
MF: Yeah.
AC: You were what you were, and whatever you got, you got on your own. At least I felt that
way about it. It had nothing to do with—like, if your mother went there or something like
that, you might have had a little special treatment, but not much. Everybody was treated
pretty—I felt everybody was treated very equally and democratically, and it was not who
you were but what you were that was the most important thing.
MF: Right, more equally than they would have gotten at a coed—?
AC: Well, I can’t say that now though.
MF: Oh, no. But then.
AC: I guess I’d say a private school. This was being state run, so therefore you couldn’t—a
private school, as far as the opportunity—you didn’t have to work as hard I guess against
the male in order to get there. You could get something—president of student
government, Phi Beta Kappa [academic honor society in the liberal arts].
MF: Sort of sheltered from the discrimination that you might face as a woman?
AC: Yeah. A training ground really. So that when you went out to face the real world—I
mean, this was sort of an in-between between a sheltered life and real world. They gave
you a—which is what I think it ought to be—a training ground so that you had
experienced some of these things, and you weren’t ignorant of it, and you could handle it.
MF: Right.
AC: You could handle it. And I—you know, I felt like—not everybody could, but the
opportunity was there.
MF: I’ve had several people tell me it was the training ground for them.
AC: It was.
MF: Especially as far as being involved in student government.
26
AC: Well, that was a regular organization, and there was a great deal of emphasis placed on it.
And the other emphasis was placed on serving.
MF: In what respect?
AC: Your community, mankind, not just me. However, when you did serve, it did serve you.
You know, it worked both ways. And yeah, it was a great deal of emphasis placed on
serving the community. And student government did that. You know your participation in
it—there were a lot of religious organizations on campus, none of which were state
sponsored, but which were very active. And the Interfaith Council, which was a great
learning experience for me and those who had never set foot out of our own little
community to be learning with all types of religions—and they were there. And you
could learn by serving in the Interfaith Council or by just attending. It was a really great
experience then too.
MF: With student government, was it—did it seem to be considered a very honored position to
be elected to student government?
AC: Yes. Well, I thought so.
MF: Right.
AC: And I didn’t hang around with those people who didn’t, so I don’t know. I considered it
that way. I have to be honest with you. I hear there were a lot of people that probably
thought it was “Mickey Mouse.” But then, you have those kind of people everywhere.
MF: Oh, sure.
AC: We had large campaigns for elected president of student government and a great deal of
participation in it. To vote was important. To use your power, to influence something was
very important for all of us.
MF: All right. I’m remembering you saying something about Phi Beta Kappa and the
opportunity to be inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa. And as a women’s college, do you
recall—were there a lot of women inducted into Phi Beta Kappa? Because I mean that
originally—it originated as a fraternal—[a Greek-letter fraternity at the College of
William and Mary in Virginia].
AC: A fraternal order.
MF: Yeah, originally, historically, it was—
AC: I don’t know what percentage of us. Well I believe.
MF: Well, it’s the top three percent of the graduating class now, but I don’t know what it was
then.
27
AC: Is that right? I can’t tell you ’cause I don’t know. It’s listed in there somewhere. The
other thing that took care of—a lot of people that were in Phi Beta Kappa was—it was
known as Who’s Who—what is the name?
MF: Who’s Who Among American University Students?
AC: Yes. But—It’s Mortar Board [national college senior honor society]?
MF: It’s what?
AC: Mortar Board. Let me see that [yearbook]. No, that’s not it. What is it?
MF: Was there Golden Chain?
AC: Golden Chain. Mortar Board it was, and then it became Golden Chain—which honored
all-around, not just academic values but all-around things.
MF: Oh, okay.
AC: And they took in quite a few—so many from each class each year.
MF: Was that—were people selected for that, or were they nominated or—?
AC: I don’t know how it first started, but I think it perpetuated itself. They had a faculty
advisor. Because I—each year they’d have a breakfast, and they are selling things like for
a certain kind of scholarship or whatever is needed at that particular time. I think that in
the front of the senior class—come back this way and you’ll see—see if I can get it. Okay
that’s the judicial, does that give you—? [looking at the yearbook]
MF: Right, the student government.
AC: Is that the student government? Okay. And turn over—that’s judicial board up there?
MF: Greater University Council?
AC: Oh. Okay. Right, okay. Then—
MF: Judicial Board.
AC: Right, that tells you how many people—you can see how large it was.
MF: Oh, yeah. Oh, and they have the honor board. Okay. [pause]
AC: That was Chapel, I think, that you just looked at, isn’t it?
28
MF: Oh, okay. This picture?
AC: Is that it? Or is it a class? It may be a class that you’re looking at.
MF: It doesn’t have a caption on it.
AC: Okay. And that’s the senior class officers.
MF: Did the—getting the yearbook, was that really important?
AC: Yes, it certainly was. And it was a big honor to be—I can’t remember if—I think you
were elected the editor of the yearbook too, I believe.
MF: Oh, really.
AC: I think so. I’m not sure but I—we had our own magazine [and] our own newspaper which
came out every week—magazine every quarter or something like that. The—those two
publications were the two that we had. You had to be chosen to be a reporter; you had to
pass certain—you just didn’t go and get—do it—you had to pass certain qualifications.
Mostly we were allowed to run our organizations. We all had—there were faculty
advisors for all of them. Just as—I go back to the judicial board because this was the—
we tried—well, see, no drinking was allowed on campus. So that was one of the things
that we always tried—were any kind of offenses like that.
MF: Did you have many like that?
AC: No many.
MF: Was that a serious offense?
AC: Yes, very serious. You could be suspended or—
MF: Expelled?
AC: Expelled, yes. We could only recommend—
MF: Right.
AC: —to the administration and the faculty. Then they did the other. But we—they let us
alone, and we recommended.
MF: Did they usually go by what you recommended?
AC: Sometimes, yeah. We weren’t that hard on them, I don’t think, but we were fairly hard.
MF: Do you think you were harder than, say, a faculty board would have been?
29
AC: I don’t know because the faculty advisor always met with us, and she—this was Miss
Alexander.
MF: Oh, okay.
AC: She was very good, I thought, and very fair. It—they see—it seemed fair to me.
MF: Right.
AC: And that person usually came—in other words, they knew they were breaking the rule.
MF: Yeah.
AC: And I—who turned them in depended on who heard about it and who was willing to do
it, who was willing to—the thing I think that made it honorable to turn somebody in
while cheating on tests or examinations was that it ruined the curve.
MF: Right. [laughs]
AC: And so you were sort of protecting yourself as well as the other person.
MF: Right.
AC: It was that sort of thing. And—what was fair for one was fair for the other. A lot of things
came up. I don’t remember anybody being totally ostracized. I do remember people being
reluctant to do these sort-of things, as I think you should be. You shouldn’t want to just
run out and sue the world. [laughs]
MF: Okay, I just want to make sure—. Are there any other things that you want to make sure
you mention? I’m sure you’ll probably think of a million things tonight.
AC: Maybe. I guess so. I guess, as I said, it was [unclear], the last three years—well, the
freshman year was fine. It was just a problem of adjustment for me—were hard-working
years but wonderful years, and I thoroughly enjoyed every one of them. And got to know
so many people—especially people across the state, and a lot of out-of-state students,
which made it very—a lot of people from New Jersey that still come down, do they not?
MF: Oh, yes. It’s much cheaper.
AC: Right, exactly. Even out of state is cheaper.
MF: Oh, it is, yeah.
30
AC: I’m trying to think—New York—a lot of places like that came, but the majority of the
people were from North Carolina because it was a state-supported school. You being a
New Jersey person, you understood—why did you come?
MF: Why did I come down here?
AC: Yes.
MF: My parents had moved down here. My father got a government job.
AC: Oh, I see. So you were already here—you had told me that—when you went.
MF: Right. Yeah.
AC: Did you want to go there?
MF: I’m not sure if it was so much a conscious decision that this was the only place that I
wanted to go as much as it seemed like a good school to go to.
AC: I’m glad you thought it was ’cause I—you know, as I said—what—when did you
graduate from high school?
MF: From high school?
AC: Yes.
MF: ’82.
AC: ’82, so you’re younger than my daughter. She graduated from college in ’81. And it was
considered good then. I’m glad to hear that.
MF: Yeah.
AC: I knew it had—I always thought it had a terrific art department that—for the state and
also was not that expensive.
MF: Right.
AC: But maybe because it had a very good art department, that’s why I wanted to major in it
or thought I did—didn’t dream that it would be so big. That was the thing that just
overwhelmed me—was the enormity of it. And then it was seventy-five people in my
graduating class in high school, so the fact that the freshman class had four hundred
people in it was just unheard of for me, plus all the other people that were there too. It
just seemed enormous—and so many places to go—and get there. In the [unclear] it was
tremendous.
31
MF: I’m sure it—I’m sure. And I’m sure also that the physical size of the campus was kind of
shocking compared to a high school.
AC: Oh, definitely. I was just trying to think of anything else that was outstanding, and I will
think of other things, I’m sure. I don’t know. Jokes and pranks and things that were—that
people still—I guess people still play on each other. We did.
MF: Right.
AC: And you were assigned a roommate unless you knew somebody you wanted to room with
freshman year. Then after that you made your own—what do I want to say—not
preparations, but your own assignment. You got the person you wanted to room with. But
Valerie [unclear] lived together all four years. She was from Durham, and I was not, and
we lived together for four years there. It worked out very well. We had different majors.
We travelled in different circles as far as what we did, and yet we were very good friends.
It worked out very well.
MF: Okay.
[End of Interview]