Oral History Interview with Don Pratt

BETSY BRINSON: This is an interview with Don Pratt P-R-A-T-T. The interviewer is Betsy Brinson and it takes place in Lexington, Kentucky. The date is April 6th, year 2000

BRINSON: Don, just say a word or two so I get a voice level.

DON PRATT: Say a word or two?

BRINSON: That’s good. Okay. Thanks, Don, for agreeing to talk with me today. Uh, as I explained to you a little bit, and you know a good bit having attended the civil rights symposium, about what we’re trying to do. Uh, let’s begin if you would, tell me where and when you were born.

PRATT: Uh, 9/10/44 was the date and Hazard, Kentucky is birthplace . . .

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: . . . though my family lived in Hindman, Kentucky. Mom went to the hospital for safety reasons which wasn’t normal in the mountains but she did that.

BRINSON: Tell me about your family background a little bit, how long in Kentucky have they been here?

PRATT: My father is a Kentuckian. My mother actually moved to Hindman Settlement School where she met my father. My father was born and raised in Hindman though he left there to go to college at Centre College. He and she were both employees of the School, my mother coming there as a school nurse from Philadelphia, and, uh, my father just living down the road from the Settlement School. He took up teaching shop and, and, uh, industrial arts. My, my mother and father, uh, left there when I was three years old and, of course, we moved to Lexington. And we never went back though at one point I thought the reason he came here was to get an education to return to run the Settlement School; but there may have been some reasons not to go back which I’m not sure of but just have heard rumors.

BRINSON: What do you know about your grandparents or great-grandparents? Where, where is your family originate?

PRATT: They are from Knott County, Hindman, Kentucky. Uh, Leburn is actually the small community outside of Hindman. My mother and father, uh—my, my father’s parents lived and grew up on a small farm, a hillside farm and raised ten children. (coughs ) excuse me. And Dad was the oldest and therefore became part provider for the rest as well as, you know, the worker bee that helped produce food and raise the animals that they needed for their survival. And since it was a hillside farm, it was a pretty rough existence; but, uh, it was a very educational and rewarding existence apparently. Their family was a really good, close bunch. And Dad married Mom who was not really a family-type person for many reasons, including her parents weren’t family oriented as much.

BRINSON: And she was from Philadelphia?

PRATT: Philadelphia. And it was a much smaller family, and [cough—Brinson] she was the sister of twins; so they got the attention in both the household and everywhere else that they went. So (coughed) Mom wasn’t really close to her family due to that factor as well as distance. And Dad was—because Lexington at that time was quite a ways away, since the roads were not really truly as good for movement to and from Knott County; uh, we didn’t go back as much as my Dad would’ve liked. And, of course, my mother did not really want to.

BRINSON: Did your ancestors migrate from one of the European countries?

PRATT: I know they weren’t Indians which migrated from somewhere else. But I’m not really sure where my ancestry is. I would guess it’s Scotch-Irish so I don’t know if . . . Scotch-Irish is my mother’s origins, that’s the terms they used, but if it wasn’t both parents.

BRINSON: Do you have any brothers or sisters?

PRATT: I have two older siblings, a brother and a sister. Then I have an adopted brother who is younger.

BRINSON: Okay. Tell me about your moving to Lexington.

PRATT: I just vaguely remember it as three—I remember having a residence at the corner of, uh, Upper and High Street. And the only reason I remember that was there was a swing there, and it was a apartment house that Mom and Dad rented part of for, uh, their momentary existence. And then we moved to the house where I grew up on the north side of town but pretty close to downtown.

BRINSON: Do you remember the address?

PRATT: My house? It was 912 Royal Avenue . . .

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: . . . in Lexington.

BRINSON: How did your family make their living here in Lexington?

PRATT: Uh, my mother actually went to the School in eastern Kentucky to be a school nurse so she did that when she came here, working as a pediatrics nurse at Good Samaritan. My father went back to school to get an advanced degree; but while in school, the purchasing department was interested in his employment and using him. And he went to work for him as opposed to finishing the degree, I think.

BRINSON: Was that the University of Kentucky?

PRATT: Yes, uh huh. I think it was a master’s degree and, uh, I don’t really know all the facts as to why he did finish, or if he did finish and what he was headed for. (cleared throat) Excuse me. I’m having trouble.

BRINSON: You want to stop a minute?

PRATT: Maybe. (interruption)

BRINSON: Uh, Don, talk a little about your education and your growing up here in Lexington.

PRATT: Well, I, uh, actually started out in a church school because I was in an odd age; and there was a number of kids in that school that weren’t allowed to come because they changed the age you had to be before admission, or the date of birth that you had to have before admission to the school. So we started out in a church school until something changed, and we were transferred over to the first grade at the, uh, closest elementary school to us. I had actually gone to kindergarten at this same church so it was just a continuation of that group of kids. At, uh, the, uh, first grade level we transferred over to a school called Kemwick, which is now Julia R. Ewing, and stayed there through the fourth grade when the schools built--school system built Yates Elementary. And I went there for the fifth and sixth grade upon which time I trans--or graduated and went to the junior high which was Bryan Station Junior High, and then on to the senior high which was Bryan Station Senior High.

BRINSON: And you graduated high school in what year?

PRATT: 1962.

BRINSON: Sixty-two. Okay. Uh, I would guess certainly that the majority of your schooling was in a segregated school?

PRATT: Absolutely. I didn’t even know anything about black schools at that time.

BRINSON: But by the time you graduated, what was the situation in terms of integration?

PRATT: Well, my class was the first to integrate. I think what they did was they brought a few of the scholarly types, and maybe voluntarily, from the county black school into our school as an introduction to integration and a trial. And I remember that pretty well since the one fellow who was my friend in that--my class--in my class was black; and, you know, I didn’t realize he existed, or even school segregation existed for the most part. I knew blacks existed but it was a very limited, uh, contact. My parents weren’t social animals, you know. My father was sort of a, a mountain, isolationist type existence. My mother wasn’t really a secure individual so, uh, we didn’t have much contact with anybody other than through the church; and, of course, churches have been segregated for years. Uh . . .

BRINSON: Tell me about the church. Which church is it?

PRATT: Presbyterian. It was a pretty progressive church, and was the reason I also got involved in, uh, desegregation and the civil rights movement.

BRINSON: Which church?

PRATT: East Minster Presbyterian. East Minster Presbyterian.

BRINSON: East Minster.

PRATT: It’s on the north side of town, the corner of Henry Clay and Liberty Road.

BRINSON: Okay. What was it about the church experience that got, moved you to become involved in civil rights?

PRATT: Well, there was, uh, many—I’m sure that I don’t recall in terms of earlier years in conversations at the church or discussions of the issue, but it pretty much occurred at the college level. Uh, high school level I really, like my parents, didn’t socialize much either. But I also, I worked and I had a paper route, a fairly large paper route for us beginning in like the seventh grade; for a boy that size, it was huge. And it was a big responsibility due to both the indebtedness I assumed to buy the route--which is a method--and, uh, the size of the route which was complicated, because you had to take them—the, uh, producing office which was downtown, all the way to your route, which is at least a mile away and sometimes on a bicycle that was extremely difficult. And you know, I took on the task probably prematurely but my, my father, you know, asked me and I said, “Yes, I’d do it.” And so I worked all the way through high school and didn’t have much contact until college with any other group of people with like minds or challenging adventures.

BRINSON: Did you deliver papers to any black homes in the community?

PRATT: Not, not at the beginning, but quite a bit after the integration of those neighborhoods. The route was pretty, pretty much upper-lower class to middle class, and some upper-middle class. But when integration occurred in some of those neighborhoods, immediately the [coughed] prominent whites would move out; and so I ended up with a, a number of black customers as well as a number of black friends, primarily kids. Uh, I had an incredible following of kids all through the time that I delivered papers.

BRINSON: What do you mean you had a following? Did they literally follow you when you delivered or . . . ?

PRATT: Well, I was a means to make some money, and also they enjoyed the company. And a lot of these people didn’t have, uh, fathers that were home and certainly not fathers that were good examples. I experienced alcoholism at that early age, I experienced, uh, spouse abuse which, you know, just enlightened me to the point of being politically active . . . before my time.

BRINSON: You experienced that through the children who followed you and their families?

PRATT: Well, sometimes it was their families, but mostly it was independent events where I would go to collect and I would find a wife that was beaten up due to alcoholism. I would see alcoholism create negligence; in particular two children who, uh, uh--they lived with their grandmother, and their grandmother and grandfather were both alcoholics. So they spent a lot of time with me, even spending overnights with me long before that probably was an active part of our community. And, and I also experienced child death, because one of those two kids was accidentally locked up in a refrigerator. Uh, and that precipitated a letter to the editor which ended up precipitating a law, which you cannot leave refrigerators outdoors because--without a door removed. It was an accidental--retarded girl locking the kid up in a hide-and-go-seek game, and he never came home for three days.

BRINSON: That’s tragic.

PRATT: Yeah, but it was . . .

BRINSON: How did you—did you hire some of these young children to deliver papers or collect for you?

PRATT: Well, you know, I didn’t really pay them per se. One of the things I found is, uh, over time the route that I had, because of the reduction in income of the individuals that were living there, more and more people stopped the paper. I made up for it by actually selling newspapers a lot of times on the corner of the two streets that had a lot of traffic. And, and I found that I could make more money doing that at times--if I had the opportunity--than I could by delivering the papers; simply because there was more people going by, and second the tips were good. And the kids found this out, too. So the kids were quite willing to do it, and kids sometimes would make more money than I would do, especially during Keeneland. So the kids wanted the money and the income, and I enjoyed their company. And, you know, I was like a pied piper almost. Uh, and it’s also like I enjoyed kids more than I do adults anyway. I trust them.

BRINSON: Were the kids predominantly black?

PRATT: Uh, not at the beginning, you know. At the beginning there weren’t black kids in the neighborhood, but over time, uh, the black kids—it was predominantly black.

BRINSON: Okay. Let me go back to your high school graduation in 1962. [cough—Pratt] How many were in your graduating class?

PRATT: How many blacks?

BRINSON: How many total?

PRATT: Oh, I honestly don’t know. I would guess about a hundred, maybe a hundred and twenty.

BRINSON: And how many blacks would you say there were?

PRATT: I guess about six to ten.

BRINSON: Okay. What, what happened for you after high school graduation? What did you do next?

PRATT: I went to the University of Kentucky. I was a mediocre student at best but, uh, I, I learned probably more by a lot of contact with other students in the Presbyterian and Disciples of Christ center. It was called United Campus Christian Fellowship and, uh, that was essentially where I socialized. But I still worked. I mean, I wasn’t a disciplined- type student, still not a disciplined-type person.

BRINSON: Did you work at the paper business?

PRATT: Uh huh. I delivered pretty much through college.

BRINSON: And did you live at home or on campus?

PRATT: I lived at home.

BRINSON: What did you major in?

PRATT: I started out in business administration. My father was a Purchasing Director, and he was my example.

BRINSON: Sure. And did you—when you completed, was your major actually still business administration?

PRATT: I never completed.

BRINSON: Okay. So you went how long?

PRATT: Oh, pretty much six years; I really don’t know. (laughing—Brinson) It’s--I did five at the University of Kentucky, and then I did one at the University of Michigan. The University of Michigan I . . . did extremely good but I was also incarcerated at the time so . . .

BRINSON: Right. Okay. Um, so how did you become involved in the civil rights movement in Lexington?

PRATT: Well, I really couldn’t say exactly when and where. There was a number of university activities including one that was sponsored by the YMCA and the Disciples of Christ, or maybe the United Campus Christian Fellowship; and that one was really significant in that we went to Atlanta to study, uh, the civil rights movement. And it was right about the time the students were killed. (cough) Excuse me, it’s going to be bad.

BRINSON: In Birmingham? The students . . .

PRATT: The three that disappeared, four . . .

BRINSON: Oh, okay, in Mississippi.

PRATT: Mississippi--and the Freedom Riders and all those issues. And I remember it so well because we--and collectively in a bus, an integrated group—how many I don’t really remember—stopped at a, a restaurant or a truck stop. And, of course, we went in to get something to eat. Uh, and this is in Georgia, and we were literally threatened with death. And, of course, they thought we were some sort of Freedom Rider group, but we were just going down to study. And we had to flee that location and were scared for quite a while, you know, afterwards. Uh, because . . .

BRINSON: What do you mean you were literally threatened with death?

PRATT: These truckers and, uh, people in the restaurant, the truck stop, threatened to kill us, you know; because we were nigger lovers or niggers or whatever. I mean I just remember that, uh, they were, they didn’t want us there and they--we, we thought they were following us, too. And then we went into Atlanta, which was just almost a complete different experience. Uh, in fact, I marveled at how much better Atlanta was to me than Lexington was in terms of progressiveness and providing for the poor neighborhoods. They, you know, they took us to the worst parts of town, and it was never as bad as what I’d seen in Lexington. And we were exposed to everybody from Martin Luther King, Senior at the beginning; to Martin Luther King, Junior on a Sunday; to Lester Maddox who owned the Pickwick Restaurant, uh, and his racist policy. And he later became governor. And we had these kind of meetings and conversations with other people on the issue of race and the devastation to individuals as well as to the community as a whole.

BRINSON: How, how big was your group?

PRATT: I would guess we were eight to ten but I really . . .

BRINSON: And were you doing an independent study or were you part of some organized program?

PRATT: It was this independent summer event; it wasn’t a class. It was just an opportunity for us to get together and, and deal with this, uh, lack of attention for that issue. Along with work, you will probably study the civil rights movement. It was the civil rights era.

BRINSON: Okay. Do you remember anybody else by name who was on the trip with you?

PRATT: I’m pretty sure Willis Bright was with us.

BRINSON: Okay, tell me about him. I don’t know him.

PRATT: Willis Bright was an extremely dynamic black student at the University of Kentucky. I think he was later the recipient of the Presidential Award to the Student of the Year or something like that; Oswald Award I think it was called. He, uh, later went into the Peace Corp, uh, for a while, and was just really a conscientious, collective, handsome, young black man that, uh, I barely knew, again, because I barely knew anybody. It wasn’t because I didn’t want to, it was just simply I didn’t socialize much. Everybody assumes that I’m, you know, that kind of person.

BRINSON: How did the group break down in terms of race?

PRATT: It was probably two, two blacks and six whites . . . at the balance.

BRINSON: How about male, female?

PRATT: All males.

BRINSON: All males.

PRATT: Yeah.

BRINSON: Okay. Did you have a teacher leader or faculty advisor or . . . ?

PRATT: Well, I just remember the head of the YMCA on campus was the person that pretty much put it together. Maybe Doug Sanders went from the, the Disciples of Christ Campus Christian Fellowship. They had two ministers there but I can’t say for sure who the other parties were that were there.

BRINSON: Let me ask you, uh, is Willis Bright still living today?

PRATT: I, I would assume.

BRINSON: Do you know where?

PRATT: I would guess Bill Turner or—yeah, Willis Bright is, uh, probably up in Indianapolis. Did I give you that address?

BRINSON: No. I don’t think so. Maybe, maybe you did actually. How about Doug Sanders?

PRATT: Uh, he’s left here. I, I don’t know—he’s—there’s a difficult parting and he, from the, the religious organization out there but I wasn’t around at that time.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: One of the other things that was interesting about Atlanta, we stayed at Morehouse College. I think that’s a black school, so there were a lot of black students in and around the whole time we were there. Uh, but, uh, we went to see Lester Maddox. He said, “You know, I’m not going to let the government interfere with my business here.” And, uh, I’ll never forget ‘cause I looked over his head, and he had this exit sign. And I said, “Wait a minute. You let the government interfere in whatever you want to let the government interfere in.” He said, “What do you mean by that?” I said, “If you look right behind you, there’s an exit sign.” I wasn’t, you know . . . a kid. I mean I really—it was just a spontaneous moment. I said, “That sign right there is required by government and you let that happen simply because you’re willing to accept their, their judgment about, about the physical layout of your property and so forth. And they do it for a reason. Can’t you follow those kinds of rules in reference to your other policies?” Well, he was literally just tongue-tied. But, and it wasn’t rational or logical; there was no doubt about that. And it was, it was just a strange environment simply because he would not let blacks eat there but blacks served.

BRINSON: How, how long were you actually in Atlanta for this trip?

PRATT: Probably a week or two weeks.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: It was probably just a week. It was enough to make you aware—we also got spit on while we were eating because we were integrated in a restaurant. That was my first experience of that kind of—the second, because of the threats. Second. But you know it’s enough to make you aware that something’s not right. I’m more aware.

BRINSON: Was Bill Turner with you?

PRATT: I don’t know. Sorry. I really don’t know.

BRINSON: You don’t remember?

PRATT: No.

BRINSON: But you know, did you know Bill Turner?

PRATT: Yes.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: Not really that well but as . . . you know. Bill Turner and James Leet, uh, Jim Embry, Willis Bright. Again, like in high school, I knew the males but I didn’t know the females. I didn’t socialize or date, you know, much either. I didn’t date in high school, just rarely dated in college, and I think those were all, uh, set up because I was unconfident (laughing) or not secure enough. I was just not, wasn’t me.

BRINSON: Let me ask you, Don, because in the early sixties, of course, when you were still in high school there were sit-ins and demonstrations in downtown Lexington. Did you have any knowledge of that at the time?

PRATT: I, I can’t remember exactly when I first became aware of those activities; though I was quite aware of what was happening at UK in terms of demonstrations. That was probably when I first got involved and supportive. Uh, the demonstrations at Memorial Coliseum—like I said, I worked and so I didn’t have much contact with anybody or any issues for the most part. And not only did I have the paper routes which were, you know--you collected weekly at those places at the beginning, and then they switched to monthly. But then you had to go back, you know, on weekends to collect people who didn’t pay and weren’t good payers, [cough] that was nickels and dimes. But I remember I also had a job selling programs at the basketball games, which is really advantageous because I got to get choice seats—they would reserve seats for us; we had choice seats at every basketball game. We had choice seats at football games, and we got to sell programs and make lots of money; it was really good money. And then we’d watch the games. Well, uh, I remember my boss was Don Blevins, who is the county clerk here. And, uh, I remember the demonstrations outside the windows of students who I knew and I was supportive of in spirit, but never actively involved with them, uh, other than free speech kind of things.

BRINSON: Well, tell me about those kind of things. [drowned out]

PRATT: The comments of the people that I was with selling programs was obviously racist, and I was saying, you know, “Hey, wrong.” And, and you’d see these people have to change over time because eventually policies change. The other, other job that I held, which was a motel--was another--you know--completely confronting kind of time of emotionally distressing--when it actually, I had to deal with it. Uh, those people that owned it were very close to Adolph Rupp; and so when I was communicating with black students and white students who were for integration, I’d have people like my boss saying that Adolph Rupp and Harry Lancaster aren’t going to have no niggers on . . . that they’re not as good a players, you know. How ridiculous. They owned this motel and, of course, the policy was to discriminate at that motel even--and, uh, I didn’t, I didn’t have the actual chance to discriminate until one evening some, black man walked in with some other people and I, I quit. I said, “I’m not going to refuse you a place to stay.” And I went and got the owner and he said, “Sorry, we don’t rent. You can go to the Phoenix Hotel.” Well, I, I was ready to quit anyway so I just quit and, uh . . .

END OF TAPE ONE, SIDE ONE

BEGIN TAPE ONE, SIDE TWO

PRATT: . . . and then that . . .

BRINSON: What was the name of the hotel?

PRATT: Ranch, Ranch Motel.

BRINSON: Ranch Motel. On . . .

PRATT: It’s on Winchester Road.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: It doesn’t exist anymore. It was destroyed for a couple of other businesses.

BRINSON: Okay. I want to go back to the demonstrations at Memorial Coliseum. What was, what were they demonstrating for? What were the issues?

PRATT: One of the, one of the primary ways to integrate this community was to integrate that basketball team and, you know, I saw it immediately. After--I saw the, the established, uh, sports phenomenon of how much, how much UK plays in, in the community. It was just obvious that--that racism of that team would, would also affect the whole town. And, uh, you know, there were two things that I was involved in both in the community with Julia Lewis and, of course, Ron Berry and Abby Marlatt with—and that group.

BRINSON: CORE chapter?

PRATT: CORE chapter. But I wasn’t that tied to them as much as I was at the University of Kentucky. We had free speech where we brought Bernie Shively over to speak to the students and confronted him, and I think Harry Lancaster, you know, because they would say one thing :and, you know, I knew differently because I was working for people who they socialized with. And they would say, uh, that they were integrating and trying to recruit, you know; they were lying, just bold-faced lying. And, of course, there was lots of black students there confronting them as well; but there were a couple of student government people who were also interested in that integration issue, as was Oswald at the top level. And . . .

BRINSON: Oswald?

PRATT: John Oswald who was President.

BRINSON: President, uh huh.

PRATT: And one of the student government reps asked me to do an investigation of recruiting policy. So I was given the opportunity to make phone calls to people like Wes Unseld, who was a famous basketball player at that time, and, uh, Butch Beard; and I don’t remember how many others, asking them about their experience and what kind of . . .

BRINSON: These were all black athletes?

PRATT: Black athletes. And what kind of reason they didn’t come to UK. And people like Julius Berry, who had been a really talented black player in Lexington, who is currently tied to the Mayor, uh, Miller’s administration. I think he’s an assistant of some sort.

BRINSON: What kind of things did you find in talking to these athletes?

PRATT: Well, they were just literally cold shoulders--or not, very--few calls. There was visits to the house; it was just like, “Why do I have to be here?” Not, “Look, I’d like your talent with me.” And, uh, there was, it was obvious that they were lying both in terms of intent of recruiting, as well as their interest in recruiting. And I can remember extremely well the, the Texas Western-Kentucky game where all the blacks were cheering for Texas Western; and I was with that group, uh, at the event. And then, of course, they did integrate.

BRINSON: Let me ask you to try and recall a few details here. This would have been-- the demonstrations at Memorial would have been about what year? Do you . . . sometime between . . .

PRATT: Somewhere sixty-three; sixty, uh, six. Somewhere in there.

BRINSON: Okay. Okay. Uh, how many people would you estimate—were there a lot of people, were there six people who demonstrated?

PRATT: I would guess there was twelve, but I was inside and I could only see through the window.

BRINSON: Okay. Uh, do you know whether the demonstrations were organized by any group? Any organization?

PRATT: Uh, I would guess it was the Black Student Union at UK.

BRINSON: Okay. Um, did--how did your family feel about your involvement at UK?

PRATT: My father probably was supportive though he wasn’t in any sense active. I’m sure he had, uh, moral support and reason for religious support. My mother was rather—she was rather prejudice, there’s no doubt about that. She was different. She was insecure, period. And she wasn’t interested in me being involved any, anyway. Uh, she was image-conscious and, of course, the more controversial I became, the, the more it worried her. Uh, so there wasn’t that much support but there wasn’t that much, there wasn’t opposition. There really wasn’t opposition by my parents. Uh, there was opposition when I refused induction, but that was at another time.

BRINSON: That was later?

PRATT: Uh huh. Well, it was all about the same time in terms of my mind and age.

BRINSON: Well, I want to talk about that but I don’t want to leave, uh, the early UK experience until we’ve kind of gotten all that we can; that you can recall from that. Uh, you mentioned Julia Lewis and Abby Marlatt and Ron Berry.

PRATT: Right.

BRINSON: What, what was your—how did you get to them? What was your involvement with them?

PRATT: I, I really don’t know but I really had a great deal of respect for Julia Lewis. I really did.

BRINSON: You think that you . . .

PRATT: It was because I was in the community and I was active. I was probably invited to—and I remember going to the meetings. I think that they were at the old YWCA which is on Second Street or Third Street.

BRINSON: Second Street.

PRATT: Second Street. Second Street YMCA. But, uh, you know, I didn’t feel, feel really comfortable, uh, with Ron Berry ever, uh, but, you know, he was always out there. And Abby Marlatt has always been extending herself in support of integration and, uh . . . Of course, she suffered the consequences far more than I did on that issue, but, uh, I was just a college student . . .

BRINSON: How did she—what consequences?

PRATT: Oh, she, you know, the university punished her.

BRINSON: Uh huh, okay. I’ve heard that they demoted her.

PRATT: See, I wasn’t privy to all what the actual shifting was but, uh, I think what-- they discontinued the job or renamed the institution; and, of course, she was not elevated to the position she had been before. (interruption) There was another incident that was social, that was one of the few times I ever socialized that was integrated social. And that was—well, actually there was more than that. There was another one. But Willis Bright had a going-away party, and I’ll never forget because I went to it, you know; and I don’t drink, and most everybody at, at that age in particular socializes with beer or alcohol. And there was a very, very attractive young black woman who wanted to sit and talk. And I could tell there was a lot of black males that didn’t feel comfortable about me getting that much attention. And it turned out, I’m pretty sure, she was living with Barney Millers, uh, Harry Miller, the owner of Barney Millers. Uh, she was living with them, I’m pretty sure; but she was, uh, a nursing student and quite, uh, gorgeous. I mean, she really was. And I remember going away thinking maybe we, I would see her again or something like that, but I never saw her again. And, uh . . .

BRINSON: What do you mean she was living with Barney Millers?

PRATT: I think that’s where she lived. I mean, I thought—if I remember . . .

BRINSON: She was living with them?

PRATT: Living with them, right.

BRINSON: So there was a relationship there or she was just renting . . .

PRATT: No, she was just boarding with them or . . . I don’t know how they knew her or how she knew them, but they, she apparently lived with them.

BRINSON: Was that a white family?

PRATT: White family, right. And that sort of struck . . .

BRINSON: That would have been pretty unusual?

PRATT: Right. Uh huh.

BRINSON: Did she talk about that at all or did other people talk about it?

PRATT: A little bit. Not that I know of. I mean, I never heard more about that. I didn’t ever get her name. Again, I wasn’t a social animal so I, I didn’t make the right moves or write down phone numbers, probably too shy to do something like that. Uh, I really didn’t date until after I was halfway through college and so—it was just not for me. I, I met most of the, the girls I knew and really was close to at summer camps or church camp type things. And, and that’s another incident which was probably before it’s time. Uh, I, uh, did meet somebody who was really infatuated as well as I was, and was it really innocent. But, uh, she lived in Louisiana, and she came up to visit and she stayed with my mom while, uh, my mom and dad while she was staying here. But I had a party at this third-floor attic apartment. Uh, and at that time it was a, called All Souls Presbyterian Church, and it was an integrated church. It was an experiment, inner-city experiment to have, uh, races come together to attend church. Hunter, Bush Hunter was one of the members, I remember him, and he was a prominent Lexington doctor. The Hunter Foundation eventually was named for him.

BRINSON: He was white?

PRATT: Black. Black. The minister was Reverend Bob Brown, if I remember correctly, and, uh . . .

BRINSON: And what was his race?

PRATT: He was white and, uh, there were some really prominent Lexingtonians involved. There were Presbyterians and, of course, there were really some prominent black people who—the only one I remember were the Bushes . . .

BRINSON: And the name of the church again was?

PRATT: All Souls Presbyterian.

BRINSON: . . . Presbyterian.

PRATT: And it was on Second Street about three doors back towards town from the Second Street YMCA. It was in a house that they converted to a church, and I lived in a third floor attic.

BRINSON: So the church met in the same house that you . . .

PRATT: Lived at.

BRINSON: . . . rented an apartment?

PRATT: Well, they gave me free rent. It was unfinished; it was rough. It was, uh, it was no, no insulation or anything. It was cold but . . .

BRINSON: What happened to the church?

PRATT: Well, it couldn’t get enough support so it died and they—I wasn’t privy to the decision-making. I was just a member of it. And, of course, I worked so I really—I worked all through school.

BRINSON: Right.

PRATT: And that, at that party, that party, though, I had, people brought their own drinks so—cause I didn’t provide booze—but it was integrated. And, uh, she came from Ruston, Louisiana and she was so pleased and so shocked that I had an integrated party. And she was, you know, just so excited about it as well. It was a real challenge.

BRINSON: She was a nursing student, you said?

PRATT: No, no this, this was my—the girl that I met at a, at a church conference.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: A summer-type church conference and, uh, that’s the only social contact I really ever had ,so therefore any relationship was pretty much pen-pal kind of a relationship except she came to Lexington to visit. And she was a very brilliant student and a very attractive woman. I don’t know what she saw in me but (cleared throat) . . . I never consummated the relationship and I wish I had but, you know, glad I didn’t.

BRINSON: Did, did she go back to Louisiana?

PRATT: Uh hm. She--I understand she ended up—and I even visited her in Washington, D.C.--but she ended up marrying Jimmy Carter’s inflation fighter. I don’t know how—of course, that wasn’t a very successful job, primarily due to the oil embargoes and so forth. But, uh, she was in Washington, D.C. and a lawyer.

BRINSON: In, in 1964, uh, there was a rally in Frankfort to support the passage of the Public Accommodations Bill. Did you, uh, did you know anything about that rally? Did you . . .

PRATT: I don’t remember. I really don’t remember. I don’t even remember if I went. I mean, I remember that—and I’ve seen that story—but, honest, I was, what, I was a sophomore probably and I don’t remember.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: I was going to say I do remember that our church was going, and went, to Selma, Alabama.

BRINSON: The All Souls Presbyterian Church?

PRATT: What was . . .yes, uh huh. What was . . . the bridge? Was that into Selma?

BRINSON: March.

PRATT: March over the bridge. And I couldn’t get somebody to deliver my paper route. And I had three of them. I had took on more paper routes is what I did. In fact, the paper route that I took on was all black, or half of it was an all-black community. So I expanded my young black friends over time, including some that are still close. But they were kids and they always looked up to me as an adult.

BRINSON: So, did you go?

PRATT: No, I didn’t get to go ‘cause I couldn’t get anybody to take my route.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: My routes. I had three of them at that time.

BRINSON: But there was a group from the church . . .

PRATT: That went.

BRINSON: . . . that went.

PRATT: And I always regretted, you know, after that . . . but, you know, didn’t have that experience.

BRINSON: Do you have any idea how many people from your church went?

PRATT: No. Bob Brown was the minister; I know that he did. He went on to Texas and left the ministry and opened up an ice cream shop.

BRINSON: Okay. Or how they went? Did they rent a bus or did--was it just a couple of cars?

PRATT: No, I would imagine it wasn’t that many for a bus.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: But I don’t know, really don’t know.

BRINSON: Uh, how big did All Souls Presbyterian Church congregation get to be at its height?

PRATT: I would guess twenty-two to thirty.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: I remember John Wright who was Lexington historian, at Transylvania. Do you know the name?

BRINSON: No.

PRATT: John Wright was a member of the church as well. I think, uh, he and his wife were. But they are now up in Maine or New Hampshire, Vermont, somewhere like that.

BRINSON: Okay. Were there any other campus-related activities supporting integration that you were involved in? That you remember?

PRATT: No, only the rallies then, of course, the Vietnam War era. You know, I was, became much more involved in that.

BRINSON: The rallies were . . . ?

PRATT: The free-speech rallies on, on campus. I remember the recruitment of the black football player and rumors that he had been actually gang tackled and killed. I guess you remember that?

BRINSON: No, no.

PRATT: Craig Page Apartments was named after him. He was the first black recruit and he was killed in practice.

BRINSON: Oh, I imagine there was an investigation with those kind of allegations?

PRATT: Yes, uh huh. But, you know, the university was really, I think, very supportive of the family and really didn’t want anything like that to happen. I also remember the recruitment of the first black basketball player and, of course, the rumors that were there that he was a rapist and apparently he was. And the cover-ups actually existed because they didn’t want the bad image, but the university’s quite competent in managing images, (coughed) distorting the truth. So, his name was Payne. I remember he eventually ended up in prison in Atlanta for rape after he went pro. He was a huge man from Louisville and just couldn’t control his sexual obsession or his violence, sexual violence.

BRINSON: Talk to me, Don, a little bit about the anti-war movement at UK.

PRATT: Well, uh, at first it was—again, it started pretty much with two groups. The SDS were the people that had the first rallies and, uh, forums on the war; but they didn’t, uh, they didn’t really do any public demonstrations. Uh, I went with the, uh, United Campus Christian Fellowship to Chicago and, uh, and in Chicago that’s where I was confronted on the issue of Vietnam. I had been a second lieutenant, excuse me, and was pretty near graduation from that program, not from the college . . .

BRINSON: In the ROTC?

PRATT: ROTC at UK. And they were passing position papers on many issues such—I was naïve on such things as premarital sex and, and, uh, civil rights, uh, God is Dead theology. All these things were going on. And not being that active a reader, or a student and I was sort of naïve. And I enjoyed the company and certainly enjoyed the challenging discussions and was confronted on the issue of Vietnam and particularly by one, I think, SDS member who said, “What do you know? What have you read?” And I had to admit very little so he said, “Read the Vietnam Reader.” And I said, “Okay” and so I started reading Vietnam Reader. At the same time, oddly enough--and I very seldom read two books at one time--I was reading Martin Luther King’s, Why We Can’t Wait . And because--at that time there was this, or many times, there was a push to get blacks in leadership roles in the civil rights movement; and King was being completely forthright in this book: when you see wrong, act upon it. You have to. So I saw the wrong in the Vietnam War, so I started looking at people and listening to people in particular. Uh, we collectively organized a SDS teach-in, Vietnam War, Vietnam teach-in.

BRINSON: Were you an actual member of SDS?

PRATT: No, no, no, no. We—the campus religious group that I was part of—and, and Doug Sanders and Ed Payne Miller were both involved in that, uh, they were the two ministers. So we got together and organized a group called Citizens for Peace in Vietnam because we wanted not to be SDS, and we also wanted the community involved. And we wanted to, you know, do other things. So the thing that we immediately organized was vigils. And we would literally stand in line, whatever number we could get, over on campus where lots of people would pass, with signs, uh, silent vigil and to end the war in Vietnam. There would be, you know, five or six of us and that was all. And, uh, that’s when I became first involved. Though the teach-in was another time and the Chicago event was the time that I was really--I started. And so the more I got involved, the greater the support. I went to Washington probably three and four times on the Cambodian invasion. I went before, the march on Washington, the Pentagon, then there was another big rally below the, the, uh, Washington Memorial. So there was at least three times that I was there for that. We also organized a lobbying trip. And at that time John Watts was the senator, the representative from Lexington, uh, and the ignorance of the man was just so amazing. And the, uh, intelligence of some of the people that—I had, I had the good vehicle that I bought with my paper route money, and so they all rode with me. And it was an exciting adventure for a bunch of college students to go up and confront these senators and congressmen. But luckily we had two great congressmen, both Republicans, Morton and Cooper, John Sherman Cooper, who were leaders in the opposition to Vietnam. Uh, uh, so Kentucky had some opposition to the Democrats in Kentucky supported it.

BRINSON: Tell me, of the students who were active here in anti-War, were there, uh were there black students among them?

PRATT: Yes, uh huh. That’s where James Leet came in. He was pretty much a Vietnam veteran, I think, and, uh, he, he was quite outspoken; and, of course, he did a lot more talking than he did action. But he was, you know, one of the blacks in the forefront always. And there were others. Bill Turner and Jim Embry and others joined in the group whenever there was a big rally. And, of course, I didn’t know them all personally. Maybe--I don’t know when the Grundys came here but maybe Chester as well. But I don’t know when they came here.

BRINSON: Well, they both worked for the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights in . . . so you might have met them later.

PRATT: What years?

BRINSON: Well, they were there, I believe, like sixty-eight . . .

PRATT: Well, that’s the beginning, yeah, but they may not have been involved.

BRINSON: And then I think they came here after a couple of years there.

PRATT: Regarding Julia Lewis, and I now recall an event that I’ll not forget as well. We wanted to bring Martin Luther King here, uh, and none of the black churches would have him. So we picketed at—I think his name was H.L. Green or something like that--a Reverend Green’s house (laughing) which is our attempt, you know, to confront the prejudice of black ministers against Martin Luther King. Primarily they were angry at him because he took a stand on Vietnam. And so, uh, you know, I didn’t know him or didn’t know who the black ministers were in town, but Julia was one, one of the people that was involved in that picketing.

BRINSON: Well, I have been told also that Lexington may be rather unique in that black ministers really did not play an active role in the civil rights struggle.

PRATT: They didn’t, absolutely not. And there wasn’t a great deal of leadership anywhere in terms of civil rights in this area. The students probably were the foremost. I, I met a George Robinson, I think he’s a police officer, I’m not really sure of his name, in Louisville; and he talked about how he accidentally was designated a leader of the Civil Rights Movement. It was just purely accidental. He was in a bar at the time they all decided to go protest somebody being in jail. They ended up in jail or marching through town, and that scared everybody. But everybody sort of fell into different roles simply because nobody else was, you know, there.

BRINSON: Well, who designated him a leader?

PRATT: Uh, he was at the bar and he said, “Let’s go, (laughing) let’s go down to the jail.” And they all went to the jail or something, and uh, the police pointed him out as having been that person, or who knows where. But he, he said, “I wasn’t a leader. I wasn’t really . . . any serious discipline group.” There was a fragmentation all through this town, and always has been in terms of leadership.

BRINSON: Do you remember anything about the newspaper coverage of Civil Rights and anti-War activities?

PRATT: Well, there was—yeah, I remember that well, uh, mainly because Watts, uh Wachs, Wachs, Fred Wachs--he was not the owner. He was the publisher and connected to the family. The Stalls, I think, owned it. I’m not real sure of the families, but he, uh, he wouldn’t do anything regarding any issue like that. Once we, uh, decided to bring through town a Quaker Peace Caravan, and in advance we went around trying to get locations for them to speak and people for them to see. We went down to see Fred Wachs to have him [cough] talk with this group. And because I had a mustache or beard and long hair or something, he made some real sarcastic, nasty remark about he would never hire me. And I says, “I’m sorry.” Says, “I’ve been working for this firm for fifteen years or more —I had delivered papers.” I said, “And you’ll not get me to cut my hair regardless of what you think. It, uh, I am an employee, in essence, of your newspaper.” Of course, later I organized against that newspaper, and they bought all my paper routes back.. (laughing)

BRINSON: What did you organize against them about?

PRATT: Well, as I said, you had to go into debt to take over paper routes back then, because you bought the route, paying so much money per, per customer. And because inner-city routes changed from middle class to, even upper class, to low income residents with the white flight, you know, routes went down. So if you had three hundred customers and you lost half of them, and you paid $5.00 per customer, you lost a lot of money back then. And that’s what happened to my route. Uh, though I didn’t really need the money--I was making lots of money, had lots of money comparatively speaking-- they, uh, weren’t listening to carriers that had that kind of problem. So we called a meeting; and they were out in mass with their lackeys saying, to tell people, “Don’t come into the meeting” and so forth. I had it at the public library where I also had been working and, uh, but they began to buy all the routes back. And they did. They changed their policy of ownership of paper routes. So . . .

BRINSON: Okay. Uh, Don, I, I understand that you went to prison as a result of your involvement . . .

END OF TAPE ONE, SIDE TWO

BEGIN TAPE TWO, SIDE ONE

PRATT: . . . the forums, you know, the events in Washington. Everything convinced me more and more that this war is wrong. So, you know, I think what, uh, would answer that question best is: I was in the right place, at the right time to make a decision. I--it was really sort of a challenge too because here I was an ROTC student and graduate--uh, student some of the time and graduate--and when I became public with it, with these vigils on campus, they were quite upset. So I had to go through it as an individual. And I can remember where, where I was and that very moment when I decided I was going to refuse induction; I was going to be free of that and, uh, that very spot. I drive by it frequently and I remember how elevated I was, and I knew I was going to do something more, more important than anything I had ever done in the past.

BRINSON: Talk about that. Where is that spot?

PRATT: It’s, it’s at the end of the walk that leads from the Administration Building down to Limestone; and it’s a, a brick, not a brick wall--it’s a stone wall that actually allows people to cross from that location over to the Education Building which is across Limestone and across Upper Street.

BRINSON: Right.

PRATT: And I don’t even know why I was there, but I just remember that I decided then and there I was going to refuse induction and no longer participate. [cough] And, and it was, it was just an amazing feeling of freedom. Of course, it wasn’t--freedom doesn’t ever exist--but I was, the idea I was certainly free from that burden.

BRINSON: And you understood the consequences, that you could go to prison?

PRATT: Sure. I wasn’t afraid. Not really.

BRINSON: You didn’t think about going to Canada like . . .

PRATT: No, one of the interesting happenings, uh, during that time that I participated in, there was a nominating committee for president and vice president of progressive groups, and anti-War and Civil Rights groups; and it occurred in Washington, D.C. (cough) And the intent was to nominate King for president and Dr. Spock for vice president. And I went to that conference, and they were discussing position papers. I think they weren’t, weren’t really sure they could get King or Spock to join the ticket, but they were discussing position papers. And some guy sitting right in front of me was yelling and screaming, you know, “We don’t want to (cough) change the draft, we want people to resist the draft.” And he was, he was so adamant and just really obnoxious. And I turned to the lady next to me--who I didn’t know--says, “Why is he like that?” She says, “He’s got 4F status and it doesn’t matter. They won’t draft him.” And I thought that was quite hypocritical for somebody to, you know, tell everybody else to do something that they couldn’t do. I had actually become less and less eligible for, for a number of reasons. My lungs collapsed. Uh, physically I was no longer able to serve because of two major surgeries; actually, two times I was near death because of the close proximity to loss of air. And, uh, the, uh . . .

BRINSON: But you weren’t reclassified for medical . . . ?

PRATT: No. I wouldn’t let them exam me.

BRINSON: Oh.

PRATT: They knew it. I mean, everybody knew it but they had to do the physical. And the draft board literally tried to get me to come in and apply for CO, and I told them, no, I wouldn’t do that either. Because if somebody was to tell somebody else to resist the draft, they better be ready to suffer the consequences. And I also had friends that had gone to Canada, and again, I said, “You know, we got to offer the courage to stand up to this war and this draft and change it.” And I decided at that point, at that place, that I would resist the draft and, uh, that’s what I did and when I did it.

BRINSON: What did your family and friends have to say to you about this decision?

PRATT: Well, the, uh, support was minimal. My family was just opposed—and I’ll never forget, uh, my, uh, father at the time was real angry at me, uh, and to the point that when I went over he slapped me in the face. And I just, uh, said, “Well,” says, “If that’s your religious philosophy, Dad, uh, you know, hit me for my position on refusing to kill, go ahead and hit me on the other face, other side of the face.” And I just remember that from some, and, somebody turned their cheek and, uh, I did it. And he slammed the door in my face. Uh, later he was to come around and be a real strong supporter, uh, an amazingly strong supporter. For that very reason, my dad was not only threatened violence, bomb threats and so forth, but IRS audits—the University of Kentucky tried to fire him; they treated him like dirt. You know, it’s just consequences of my, my position. But he didn’t do it, even though he became supportive. My mother was just not there either like she wasn’t on civil rights. She really wasn’t, uh, one to be involved I don’t think or she was just, wanted to get by. She was insecure and not a happy person, period. So she was pleased that I was standing up for my beliefs, and at some times and some people [cough] within the church would make comments to her that really made her proud. But for the most part even her own church rejected me, and my dad left it, uh, became independent. I don’t know if he was religious anymore or not. But he left that church and he was one of the founding members. My mother never did. They did have a minister there that was seriously questionable both in terms of the war in Vietnam, but also questionable in terms of his, uh, Presbyterianism. He was sort of a fundamentalist kook almost. So . . .

BRINSON: So there was a hearing I assume.

PRATT: A hearing?

BRINSON: (clears throat) What, what, what transpired when you . . .

PRATT: Well, if you . . .

BRINSON: . . . with the Selective Service Board?

PRATT: What happened with the Selective Service Board was--the march on Washington, the Pentagon. (coughs) Don Edwards, the columnist, actually came to the university to interview myself and some of the students that were going to go. And he asked--I guess for sensational reasons—“What had happened to my draft card. Was I going to burn it?” And I said, “No, it’s already been burned.” And he said, “What do you mean?” I said, “Well, the city burned it.” Back then they had an incinerator out on Frankfort Pike and I says, “They burned it in an incinerator out there.”

BRINSON: The city had burned it?

PRATT: Yeah.

BRINSON: How did . . . ?

PRATT: I threw it in the trash and they burned it.

BRINSON: Oh, okay.

PRATT: And it was sort of a humorous remark.

BRINSON: Right.

PRATT: And the police picked, or the FBI picked it up or somebody, you know, told them. I don’t know if he called them and told them. I just know that they, they came and did an investigation at that point. And I told them I would no longer carry a card and support the war in Vietnam. I was honorably—before that time--I was honorably discharged from the Army ROTC program, because I was actually a second lieutenant-to-be at my graduation from college. So, uh, when they found out about my draft card, I did the investigation with the FBI in my mother and father’s home. I don’t remember if I was living in the All Souls Church at that time or not. The All Souls people were supportive. Uh, the Quakers were supportive . . .

BRINSON: ( )

PRATT: Pardon?

BRINSON: This was what year?

PRATT: Uh, who knows, sixty-eight, sixty-seven, sixty-eight. The Quakers, a few of the Quakers--of course, there was very few--I mean, were supportive. Uh, and the two ministers at the ( ) House and Jack, Jack, whatever his name was, with the YMCA was involved in those . . .

BRINSON: It was called the ( ) House?

PRATT: ( ) House. That was United Campus Christian Fellowship; it was called the ( ) House.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: Uh, and there was a lot people, you know, faculty members, brilliant people that were active, involved in it. You know, there’s always been the SDS people that were supportive but they, they were pretty involved in many issues. And I had no idea about . . .

BRINSON: How about people like Julia Lewis and Abby Marlatt and Ron Berry that you’d known from CORE?

PRATT: Uh, see, around campus is where pretty much everything was happening in reference to anti-war activities, uh, except, you know, for marches on Washington. And I went to New York you know. I walked with Stokely Carmichael, and odd things happened just accidentally more or less. But, uh, uh, that was with the march on New York. But, uh, pretty much everything was happening on campus, and the only time it went off campus was once when we were run off campus and we went over to Transylvania. But, uh, Julia Lewis and, and other people were probably not as involved. Maybe--or Abby would sign some of the anti-war documents that we would publish in the paper. Moratorium Now. I don’t remember if she signed those kinds of things but, uh . . . Peace Now. We’d put petitions and so forth, and publish faculty members in the paper. We had good support from them. There was a lot of people that I wasn’t really close to that I knew were there and support, supportive that were faculty and a few community members but not very many. Very few.

BRINSON: So tell me about the prison experience. When did that begin? (clears throat) ( ) to Michigan?

PRATT: Uh, could I use the restroom?

BRINSON: Sure. [interruption] We’re talking now about George and . . .

PRATT: George Edwards.

BRINSON: George Edwards.

PRATT: I didn’t meet Jean Edwards until later, his wife. But he had come to the ( ) House to give a speech, uh, after we invited him to--and he was a powerful speaker. And some high school students that I had helped put together an underground newspaper, uh, at their high school brought their student teacher who taught them French. And these were all very bright kids and their teacher was my soon-to-be-bride. And, uh, I don’t know why she was struck by me other than I was the famous draft resister, and these kids were so impressed with me that she, she followed suit. Or, you know, she was--I was catching her on a rebound. There’s probably a combination of all those things. Uh, I met her that night and was dating her, I think, the next night; and we were engaged three days later. So it was one of those whirlwind romances. But I was headed for prison, you know, and so prison doesn’t help marriages, that’s for sure. And, uh, it was a wonderful marriage as long as it lasted but between . . .

BRINSON: Did you marry before you started serving . . .?

PRATT: Yes.

BRINSON: . . . in prison?

PRATT: Yes.

BRINSON: Oh, you did?

PRATT: In fact, I was out for a little bit longer period of time. I had been in jail actually and gotten out on appeal. So the girlfriends that I had before I went to jail left me during jail, which is really a short period of time, forty-two--but they’d already--forty-two days; uh, but they’d already found some other partners and were involved otherwise. I wasn’t going to wait for them to dump them, but, uh, eventually they actually married both the partners they picked up while I was in jail.

BRINSON: But Reverend Edwards actually did the ceremony for you and . . .

PRATT: Yes, he did the ceremony and it was—speaking . . .

BRINSON: . . . what was your wife’s name?

PRATT: Uh, Kathy Wayneman--Kathy Pratt. She later became a Council member right here in Lexington and is still here.

BRINSON: And Reverend Edwards, I believe, was the founder of the Fellowship for Reconciliation in Louisville.

PRATT: . . . Reconciliation in Louisville and very active in civil rights, too. I’m sure he’s done more than I’ve done but, you know, it was a timing kind of thing. He and Jean Edwards are really bright, conscientious people. Uh, and speaking of them and his marriage of myself, uh, all these little black kids and all these little kids, uh, came to our wedding, which was in the Castlewood Barn; and were so, so wonderful in terms of they were dressed to the tee. And their parents had done such a good job of getting them to look good. And they all walked from their homes, from, you know, at least a half a mile away and came to this little wedding service. And we had the reception in the same place and, uh, they were dressed so nice and everything was okay until the reception and everybody got enough food, including themselves; and so then we had a food fight and all these kids [laughter] were throwing food all over. Luckily it was in a barn so it wasn’t too bad to clean up.

BRINSON: Now were these children that you’d known . . .?

PRATT: On the paper route.

BRINSON: . . . on the paper route.

PRATT: They had spent the night with us and, uh, you know, there were some, many of them and really all interesting stories and interesting kids. So . . .

BRINSON: Uh, so you were sent to Michigan to serve?

PRATT: Yes, but can I go back to the civil rights issues?

BRINSON: Uh hm.

PRATT: And one of the reasons I actually got out of involvement in civil rights even here in Lexington was they were having a rally, a black power rally. Of course, black power was part of the issues being raised by different peoples within the civil rights movement. And I went to it because the speaker was going to be of interest, and actually I brought with me a man from Canada who was doing a documentary on the civil rights, I think. I don’t remember how in the world I met him, but he wanted to go to this rally here in Lexington. And we were sitting there in the middle of Douglas Park waiting for the speaker. There was a small gathering of people at the beginning including the person that told me about it, invited me, it was Bill, ( ) McCann, who’s the person also who told me about the two leaders and ( ), you know, initially. But any rate, uh, ( ) had left the area and some of these guys we didn’t know came up and says, “Get out of here.” Says, “Honkies aren’t welcome here.” And there was enough of them and they were angry enough that we literally left. But ( ) who was really holding this event and he . . .

BRINSON: How do you spell ( ), please?

PRATT: I’m not sure. McCann is M-C-C-A-N-N.

BRINSON: Right.

PRATT: And ( ) may have stopped this from happening had he been there, but he wasn’t there. And we left without him knowing it until later. I don’t think he would want me to share his name though in reference to the other issue.

BRINSON: Okay. Okay. No, that’s fine.

PRATT: But that was one event, you know, and that’s one of the reasons I became less involved. Of course, I wasn’t a major theorist or knowledgeable source of information and certainly hadn’t experienced racism other than the few that I’ve cited already. And whether they were before or after doesn’t matter; it wasn’t like I was ever really that competent a source. The other incident was related both to the Vietnam War era and civil rights was when the Democratic Convention was being held and Humphrey was to be nominated. There were three of us that went—and I had the good car—and we went because we thought that, uh, there would be racial confrontation as opposed to anti-war confrontation. And the story was that the black community in, uh, in Chicago would be confronted by the police because they were going to be protesting; which eventually there were some people, black demonstrations, but it was nowhere near the events. In fact, the police oftentimes would protect them and try to keep us separate so that we didn’t join them in their--in support of, say, the, uh, King’s wagon. They had their wagon out there, and we all got behind it; but they came and attacked us at that location too. Uh, so, uh, you know, trying to be supportive and, and maintain contact was always there, but sometimes it was prevented as well as sometimes it wasn’t welcome. And the third, the third thing that happened in reference to civil rights and, uh, anti-war was on campus George Wallace was invited to be a speaker . . .

BRINSON: At the University of Kentucky?

PRATT: Yes. And we at that time decided [cough—Brinson]—it was a spontaneous suggestion again, uh, I said, “Why don’t we have a George, uh, Hippies for George Wallace march instead of anti-George Wallace march?” And, uh, Guy Mendez just loved it. So he jumped, “Yeah, let’s do it!” But he was a journalist and so he couldn’t participate; he was working for the Kernel. So we organized it and did it at the ( ) House. ‘Cause I actually had keys to that as well as the mimeograph machine for the underground newspapers and so forth. And, uh, we, we all came together and had this first-of-its-kind Hippies for Wallace, which threw a real funny loop into everything. When we were out there demonstrating in front of the, uh--the event people would come around, they’d read our signs. The ones who were really George Wallace fans couldn’t be too nasty to us ‘cause they were saying: “Get a Haircut for George or Take a Bath for George” or, uh, you know, really ridiculous remarks. And, uh, but we got a lot of press, including national press. So, uh, it was great, and there was more Hippies for Wallace campaigns and then we went . . .

BRINSON: How, how many of there were you?

PRATT: It grew from about eight to twelve of us to about thirty to fifty of us. And the funny thing was that some people, uh, at the original meeting to plan this didn’t want to do that. And one of them was Gatewood Galbraith, who came with his, uh, you know, George Wallace is a Fascist and all that kind of thing; so the irony of him saying something like that now and identifying with the militia, the right wing, is obvious. So, people go through changes.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: The other thing in Chicago was, just accidentally, we ended up being in the movie Medium Cool because they were filming the movie. And, uh, I’m in that movie now.

BRINSON: Hmm.

PRATT: Unbeknownst to me. So—but things happen. The other thing I remember, too, the, the event of my being honorably discharged from the ROTC program was the first in the nation--and maybe the first officer in the nation; but I had never been commissioned--the first officer, or first man, uh, honorably discharged for opposition to the Vietnam War. But (coughs) Guy Mendez may have been the person that reported that nationally through the college network. And suddenly there’s this boom of guys trying to get out honorably discharged. And, uh, that’s bad news for . . . I don’t know if it happened again.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: But those were things I recalled.

BRINSON: So how much time did you spend in prison before they let you out?

PRATT: Well, the first time I did forty-two days on an illegal bond that the judge imposed, and he was definitely prejudicial.

BRINSON: That was in the city jail?

PRATT: County jail.

BRINSON: County jail.

PRATT: In Louisville.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: And then I came back to the county jail for a short period of time before transport to Milan, Michigan where I spent—including the forty-two days—about a total of twenty months; until my father was killed in a petty robbery and I came home.

BRINSON: Well, we could spending a lot of time talking about all of that, but, but we’re not going to do that here today.

PRATT: That’s okay.

BRINSON: Um, that’s okay?

PRATT: Uh huh.

BRINSON: Uh, I want to ask you though, you’ve, you’ve really been a long-time activist in the community, and I know your involvement in the ACLU chapter. What, what other organization have you been involved with here?

PRATT: Uh, well, we organized so many during the anti-war days. Moratorium Now committees; uh, the, uh, the Citizens for Peace in Vietnam; uh, the Peace Now committee, you know, just a lot of those things. Uh, I haven’t been really a participant in many of the mainstream organizations in town. Uh, usually dealing primarily with issues is what I’ve always done rather than trying to identify with groups; but I’ve been involved most recently with such groups as MS Society, fundraising for it, because I have--a friend’s wife has been sick and I got involved for that reason. But the Foster Parent Association, which is not a controversial kind of thing other than I was probably in the forefront in opposition to privatization of foster care which is still going on; but they’ve changed the term from privatization to, uh, contract, uh, contracts and fees for service. And they’re reestablishing orphanages due to the lobbying . . .

BRINSON: Tell me, Don, how it came about that you became a foster parent?

PRATT: Well, it, you know--I’ve always been a kid-type person. And when I was married, my wife surprisingly became pregnant. I was amazed that, uh, she even wanted to have a child. And I wanted to have children and should have been married probably to somebody who was more of a child person. When we divorced, had the daughter. And I went to classes to become a foster parent a long time before I did and held off because of financial reasons. I was just robbing Peter to pay Paul and so forth as a businessman, and how in the world I succeeded, I don’t know. It’s amazing to me. But when I finally became financially secure, uh--about that same time, I’d actually sold some properties and owed much, much less money to anybody, which is really the reason I was not willing to take on any other responsibilities. Uh, I had a, had a son, almost, who was like my second child, and my daughter really respected him. He was like fifteen and she was eight. She really just admired him so much, and he was really a neat kid. He was the son of a friend of mine who had become quite political as well and a doctor in, in Lexington. He had a mother sort of like mine who was just not political at all, more materialistic and so forth. So he hung out at my house because he didn’t really like the politics of his parents, and he hung out at my house and my store a lot. And when he came back from Sweden he stayed there just all the time, worked for me; I started paying him. But he went and did a year in high school in Sweden and became very independent from his parents. [clears throat] Well, he was still living with them and when he graduated from high school, the week after he went to Atlanta and was killed in a car crash. And it was a really hard, hard time for me and for them, certainly for them more so than for myself because they lost their son. Uh, and that--so much had been put into that effort. I got a lot of the pleasure out of that kid. At the funeral I said, “I’m going to become a foster parent now.” And I went back to the classes that I had to take at that time. And about the same time, my ex-wife decided to move to Florida and take my daughter with her. I said, “Hey, I’m not going to be without a kid.” So I opened my home and immediately just after, day after I completed that class, they started bringing kids. And I always made sure that I would bring in kids younger than my daughter so I did. And I--she moved back and began to live—my daughter did—live with me then, and it’s been an event ever since.

BRINSON: So that was never an issue that you were a single person, a man?

PRATT: No, there was a, there were a lot of firsts in there, you know. I became the first, I think, person in Kentucky that had joint custody of my own natural daughter. I became the first, one of the first, foster, single foster parent—males, males—there’s always been single foster mothers. And I was almost certainly was the first single foster male that was given ( ) girls which was a real risk, ‘cause generally girls, generally all foster kids are sexually abused. And generally girls are abused, and it’s really a complicated subject because usually they’re abused by males.

BRINSON: How many foster children have you had?

PRATT: Forty.

BRINSON: Forty? Wow.

PRATT: And adopting two, or adopted one and adopting a second.

BRINSON: And you have how many with you now?

PRATT: Three.

BRINSON: Three.

PRATT: Yeah, the adopted daughter has moved out recently. But she’s still my daughter and she’s still welcome to come home.

BRINSON: Wow. Is there anything else that you’d like to add to this . . . ?

PRATT: Well I can’t remember it now. (laughing—Brinson) That’s the reason I’m glad you’re there to ask the questions.

BRINSON: Okay.

PRATT: You know, I was just really glad that I was exposed to so much and so exposed in such a timely basis; but I’m sorry I really didn’t participate more. But I didn’t know how, when and where and why. Uh, so, uh, I just came in at the tail end of what was already going on. And, of course, I wasn’t the victim, uh, and I really didn’t have to be involved but I chose to be. It’s a difference but it, certainly an interesting, uh, event in my life, civil rights ( ). Out of that came issues I got involved in as well. You know, the spouse abuse that I saw as a paperboy, that continued in terms of women’s rights movement. The civil rights movement preceded the anti-war movement, the anti-war movement preceded the women’s movement as well as the environmental movement.

END OF TAPE TWO, SIDE ONE

BEGIN TAPE TWO, SIDE TWO

PRATT: . . . the, the Women’s Movement and then the Environmental Movement, but I wasn’t really either of those. You know, I wasn’t a woman who really experienced all the real reasons to be involved in the women’s movement. I had seen early on--in fact, when I was a paperboy, when I saw that spousal abuse, I wrote a letter to the editor about that. And that was one of the two that—I mean here I was a high school kid writing something about—I didn’t know what the laws were. I just knew it was wrong; and, uh, so I had all these moral convictions and ( ) convictions. But at the same time these things broke, you know, divided people not because they really were against what they did before but because they put so much effort into the other issue they didn’t have enough time to give to the one they originally left. So a lot of things happened that, that ended. The student movement was there, too, the student movement, uh, radical politics which wasn’t just about Vietnam. It was many other issues, academic issues and so forth.

BRINSON: I wonder if so much of your early influence, uh, came from your, your religious principles, experience and whatnot. Are you still active today with any organized religious group?

PRATT: No, you know, with the anti-war times and era, I became agnostic, uh, with incarceration. There was first the open rejection by most of the church though there were many principled church leaders and church people involved in the anti-war movement as well as that’s where I originally learned why Vietnam was wrong. I began to see a lot of reasons that the church was wrong in its own beliefs, uh, and perpetrating myths and, uh, story-telling that I thought was just not necessary. And agnosticism seems much more logical, and I’m not atheist either. I mean I think atheists are just like religious people: they are absolutely sure that something’s right. And I don’t know if anything’s right.

BRINSON: Right. Okay. Thank you very much. (interruption)

PRATT: One of the things that happened as a result of the incarceration and the obvious tragic ending of, uh, my father’s life while I was in prison; he was killed by a young black man. I don’t even know who it is. But (coughs) because of that a lot of the black friends I had were very distant after that point, you know, they felt guilty. I mean it wasn’t their doings but they were afraid as well, you know, what my reaction to it was. But I’ve never blamed his race for it. I just knew it happened and so, you know, that identity with the civil rights movement in this town was strained by that very phenomenon too. But I’ve never also ever identified with black leadership in this town other than Julia Lewis, and she was sort of burned out or driven away; I’m not real sure what. There’s too much ego involved and, of course, every one of us is egotistical; and I’ve probably been accused of that too. But I’m more issue oriented and they’re more power oriented than I am. I also not only became agnostic but I became, uh, anarchic in the pure sense or utopian and pure sense of the word. So, uh, I’m not willing to, uh, identify with any group, commitment. If I feel they’re wrong, I’ve never hesitated to say, and you alienate when you do. So . . .

BRINSON: Thank you.

END OF INTERVIEW