beans, mashed potatoes, and homemade rolls. As we gratefully accepted it, I couldn’t help thinking that home-cooked food is a bond between poor people, Black and White, a special pleasure that the rich cannot fully appreciate.
As soon as we got some money, we rented a three-room apartment and bought just enough furniture to get by. I went to Cheli Air Force Base in Maywood and applied for a job as a data processing trainee. They were only hiring six trainees and I had to take a comprehensive test in all kinds of academic subjects. The test lasted for four hours and it was difficult. I was skeptical about my chances of being selected, but a few days after the test I was called and told to report to work. My test score had been a ninety-four, the highest actual score made. Another trainee had gotten a score of ninety-six, but she had had five points added on because she was a veteran.
During the next few weeks, I learned how to operate IBM data processing machines and how to do minor repairs when the IBM cards were torn and got tangled in the machines. I liked the work and they seemed to appreciate the seriousness with which I approached it. In three months, I was promoted to supervisor at Cheli and taught others how to operate the machines.
On Sundays, I attended the St. Mary’s Baptist Church with Cousin Frances. It was a far cry from the “shotgun” house church I had gone to as a young child. St. Mary’s was a huge, beautiful, pink stucco structure which had cost more than a million dollars to build. Sunday services were broadcast live on the radio every week.
Robert Harmon, the tall and stylish pastor, was in his late thirties. He had a smooth, mocha-cream complexion and a voice to match. The man was an actor in the pulpit. Each Sunday after his sermon, he would leave the podium while the choir sang a couple of songs. Ten minutes later, Harmon would re-enter wearing a complete change of clothes and “open the doors of the church” to new members. After a few Sundays, I responded to the call to be saved.
The church clerk asked “Do you believe Christ died for your sins and rose again?”
“Yes,” I answered.
“Will you come by letter or baptism?”
“By baptism,” I said.
I had never been baptized by immersion in water. Two Sundays later, the day of the baptismal service, the clerk called out the names of those to be baptized. My name was not called. Thinking it was just an oversight, I went down anyway and was baptized. As I was leaving the church that day, the pastor asked me to come back to the church at six o’clock that evening. “I want to talk to you about church doctrine,” he said sternly.
I did as was requested. When I went to his office that evening, he locked the door. It was soon clear what “doctrine” he wanted to discuss.
“Were you wearing a bra when you were baptized this morning?” he asked. When I didn’t reply, he went on. “Your name wasn’t called because I wanted to personally baptize you this evening.”
He put his arms around me and embraced me tightly. I was caught off guard. Even though men had made unwanted advances toward me before, no minister of the Gospel had ever tried to seduce me. He tugged at me, trying to kiss me and pulled at my dress until he tore the seam under one arm. I continued to resist and finally was able to get to the door, unlock it, and run.
I stopped going to church; there was no way I could sit and listen to Harmon after that. Later that same year, the Los Angeles Sentinel reported that a girl had charged pastor Harmon with trying to seduce her when she joined the church. As I read her account of what had happened, it was like a tape replaying in my head; he had used the same words with me. Once again, as when I had been raped, I kept the fear and humiliation engendered by the incident to myself, continuing my childhood habit of keeping my own counsel and bearing my sorrows privately.
I was still in California when I read in the newspaper about the Supreme Court decision on school desegregation. The very concept of “separate but equal” schools had been struck down. The Court ruled that segregated “schools were separate, but inherently unequal.” The landmark decision caused me to remember the five-year-old, obsolete, hand-me-down books passed from the White schools to students in segregated Black schools. By the time we got them, they had been written in and pages were missing. This had emphasized to us that because we were Black children, we were not first-class citizens.
On December 1, 1955,1 first saw Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on national television. He was responding to questions from a reporter about the arrest of Mrs. Rosa Parks, an attractive, Black woman whose dark hair softly framed her face. She was a charming and respected member of the local chapter of the NAACP in Montgomery, Alabama who had refused to give up her seat on the bus to a newly-boarded, White, male passenger. I was impressed, surprised, and happy to see Black people confronting the discriminatory bus system. But I was afraid for them, thinking of the danger they would face in the days to come.
The reporter asked Dr. King, “What does the Negro want?”
He responded, “What the Negro wants is absolute and unqualified freedom and equality in this land of his birth, and not in Africa or some imaginary state.”
I thought, this man is expressing my thoughts and feelings. This is what I want.
The reporter asked, “A majority of the bus passengers are Black, how will they get around if they don’t use the buses?” King said, “Where there is a will, there is a way. Many will walk, others will use private cars and taxis.”
Watching the television intently, I felt my own pride growing. By facing the Whites who opposed their bid for equality without visible fear, Blacks were dispelling the image of being scared and slovenly people with low self-esteem. For the first time, I was seeing Black people as a race rise up against their oppressors and I knew eventually Black people would get justice in this country. I wanted to be there.
By then, Nicky was working at the California Gas Company as a laborer. With two salaries coming in we were able to move to a better apartment building called “Cadillac Square.” The circular design of the building enclosed a large swimming pool. On Christmas Day 1955, nearly a year after we had arrived, we spent the holiday California-style, swimming in the pool.
A few months later, Nicky and I bought a two-bedroom house in a suburb of Los Angeles. We were working hard, but we still found time for family outings. We enjoyed going to the beach in Santa Monica and went there almost every weekend. Nicky would put Billy on his shoulders and wade out into the surf. While they played in the water, I sunned on the beach and watched them.
Although I told myself that I should be happy with our new home, a good job, and our young son, I still thought about Jim Powers. Soon after we got to California, I had written to him explaining that I had to get away to try to make a life for myself—but distance did not erase my feelings.
That August I made one of my usual Sunday calls to my family in Kentucky. When I asked about everybody, there was silence on the line. “We’re all well except Carl,” Mom finally said. “He’s been lying around all day and he’s got a temperature. I’m taking him to see a doctor tomorrow.”
The next day, when I called I found out that a Dr. Rosenbaum had examined Carl and done some medical tests. On Thursday, he sent for my parents and broke the shocking news that Carl had acute leukemia and had only three months, at the most, to live.
When my brother Phillip called to tell me, I couldn’t believe it. Though I knew older people who had died, no one in my family had. I couldn’t believe such a thing could befall my youngest brother. Still in a daze, I went to work the next morning and arranged to be off for two weeks. I left Billy, who was nine, with Nicky and took the Super Chief
