Oral History Interview with George Esters

BETSY BRINSON: ...sixth, the year two thousand, this is an interview in Bowling Green with George Esters, E S T E R S. The interview takes place in his residence, and the interviewer is Betsy Brinson. Mr. Esters, could you tell me--I’m getting a voice level here with this--give me your full name please and your place of birth and birth date.

GEORGE ESTERS: Full name is George Esters. I was born in Bowling Green, Kentucky, May the thirtieth nineteen forty-one.

BRINSON: Okay, got some of that.

ESTERS: Sure.

BRINSON: Well thank you very much for agreeing to meet with me today. What shall I call you?

ESTERS: Uh, George will be fine.

BRINSON: Is that all right?

ESTERS: Yeah, that’s fine.

BRINSON: Good. I think I explained what this project is all about to you a little bit on the telephone, but what we are basically trying to do is document in Kentucky the effort from nineteen thirty to nineteen seventy-five, to eliminate legal segregation. And by that, we’re talking about acts of resistance, cities where there were sit-ins and demonstrations. But we’re also talking about people who tried, either individually or through organizations or churches, in some way to negotiate changes of segregation to integration; people who might have been the first in a new job area, first on the school board, whatnot. So, you come highly recommended to me, and thank you for being willing to talk with me today.

ESTERS: Well, I certainly appreciate you allowing me to give what information that I might know to you.

BRINSON: Let me start please, with a little bit of background about you. You said were born in Bowling Green. Tell me about your family, what you know about your ancestors, and when and how did they come to be in Kentucky.

ESTERS: My mother and father were born in Bowling Green also, and raised here. They uh, of course during their time, you had menial jobs. My mother was a cook. My father worked at a home, cutting grass, cleaning the house, things of this nature. And the persons that he worked for owned a department store. It was Norman’s Department Store at that time, so he did work in the home and at the department store. But of course, janitorial work and just very menial work. He also was a musician, so on weekends he played with the band. They moved from Bowling Green...

BRINSON: What did he play?

ESTERS: He played saxophone.

BRINSON: Saxophone, okay.

ESTERS: They moved from Bowling Green to Philadelphia, Indianapolis, but ended back up in Bowling Green when I was about eight years old. So, my, you might say former years, before eight, I remember going to school in Indianapolis and then coming back to Bowling Green to attend State Street High School. That was before High Street was built.

BRINSON: Did you not go to elementary school here also?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh, I started in Bowling Green in the fourth grade, but my first three years of school was in Indianapolis.

BRINSON: And what was the name of the elementary school here at that time?

ESTERS: It was part of State Street High School, but it was State Street Elementary. It was all in one building. So we had three floors. Elementary school was on the first floor, and I guess junior high, as you go on up, the high school was on the third floor. But we had a very happy home life, even with the rigid forms of segregation that I grew up in.

BRINSON: Did you have any brothers or sisters?

ESTERS: No, I was the only child.

BRINSON: What do you know about your grandparents or your great-grandparents?

ESTERS: My grandparents on my father’s side, my grandmother was a slave, great-grandmother was a slave. They moved here from Franklin, Kentucky. And in those days, your parents--grandparents didn’t talk about the past. I think the black people didn’t begin to talk about their past until after Roots; then people began to sit down and talk about their past. But those things that were hurtful, they never mentioned them or didn’t want to talk about them. But it seemed like the series of Roots opened up black people to their past, and to let out some of the things that were hurtful or harmful or something that they had carried around with them. My great-grandmother on my father’s side was a full blooded Indian. My grandmother was half-white and Indian and black, so she had a mixture.

BRINSON: Do you know which tribe?

ESTERS: No I don’t. They all died before I became matured mentally to really sit down and question. Now my grandparents on my mother’s side, I never got to know their history. Both parents died when they were forty-five and forty-six. I had no brothers, I had one uncle and about three aunts and they all passed at an early age. So, our family history on my mother’s side was really lost; and I could not go into really deep history on my father’s side.

BRINSON: I’m interested in your schooling, and I take it that you went all the way through a segregated school system?

ESTERS: Correct.

BRINSON: To graduation?

ESTERS: Right.

BRINSON: What was that experience like for you? Did you have any favorite teachers, favorite subjects? Did you play school athletics, or in the band?

ESTERS: It was a very enjoyable experience. Every teacher you learned to love. Each teacher took you under their arms, wings and motivated you; gave you good self image, so you really, I really had an enjoyable school life. They sheltered you from the forms of segregation that you were confronted with each day. You would have to ride on the back of the bus, stand a long time before you could be waited on in the stores. You had to go to the side window to get food. You had a colored water fountain you had to drink from, you had colored rest rooms that you had to go to . At the bus station you had a colored waiting room. But the schools--the people that and the church--the people that worked with you, helped you not to dwell on that. They helped you to overcome all of those negative things in your life. They made your life enjoyable. So you didn’t dwell on the negative, because they were constantly telling you, you can make something out of your life. They were constantly giving you positive thoughts within your life. So, you really felt good about yourself, you know, going through what you had to go through.

BRINSON: I want to ask you, because I’ve had a lot of people tell me what you’re telling me, is that the teachers gave them self esteem.

ESTERS: Right.

BRINSON: How did they do that?

ESTERS: They took time out. They were personal. We miss that in our larger schools today, because you are a number you’re not a person. In that time, you had small school situations, so the teachers were able to spend time with you and treat you as an individual. They would talk with you about the problems, they talk with you about what you were doing wrong. They gave you morals and values. They weren’t afraid to say this is right and this is wrong, you need to correct this, you need to do better with this. But they gave you their time. They stayed after school. The average teacher stayed after school. They came to your home. A lot of teachers that taught here lived, home was Nashville, but they spent the week in Bowling Green, and they roomed at somebody’s house. Back beyond then, some teachers lived with the parents, parents of the students, so you know, it was just like one big family. The teachers, of course, were not your kin, but they treated you as family, and that brought in, you know, that type of love and a close relationship.

BRINSON: When teachers came to a student’s home, for what purpose, usually, were they there?

ESTERS: They just stopped by to see, you know, how you were doing and to talk with your parents. And during that time kids were not allowed to be in the company when grown-ups were talking. So you really never knew what they said, because you were sent to another room or you were out playing when they stopped by, but you weren’t allowed to listen in on adult conversations. But it was, it was always in a positive aspect. It never was anything negative.

BRINSON: Why do you think it was that more of the teachers came from Nashville?

ESTERS: Well you had, at that time, it was said that the principal would not hire Bowling Green folk. People that had finished Bowling Green’s high school and went to college, could not get a job in Bowling Green. His policy was to hire out of state or out of town people. And you just had, you had different systems of prejudice also within the black race. But in the Bowling Green system, E. T. Buford would not hire teachers that had lived here in the community. I think Herb Oldham was the first teacher that he was convinced to hire, that finished.

BRINSON: And we are talking about what period of time here?

ESTERS: E. T. Buford? I have a brochure. He could be around the thirties or forties, on to the fifties.

BRINSON: Right.

ESTERS: Uh hmm.

BRINSON: So during that time, most of the teachers came from Nashville. Did they tend to come directly from the black colleges in Nashville?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh.

BRINSON: And they were well educated.

ESTERS: Right, right. Well, and then, for a black to go to school, there were no scholarships and they really had to be dedicated, committed to the work. Plus they had, they had an extra gift about them in order to make it through college, or even attempt to go to college, because there were no funds. I know when I attended school, I had some kids to work a year, go to school a year, work a year, go to school, so it took them eight years, because they had no resources. And you really got the brightest and best black to be in education.

BRINSON: And how far is Nashville from here?

ESTERS: About sixty-five miles.

BRINSON: Okay. I wonder, what year did you graduate and how many were in your graduating class?

ESTERS: Finished in fifty-nine, there were about thirty-three that graduated with me.

BRINSON: So your whole high school was probably about how many students?

ESTERS: In my class?

BRINSON: Just the whole high school.

ESTERS: I would say about two fifty, about two hundred and fifty in the whole high school.

BRINSON: Want to ask you a little bit about Bowling Green demographics here. I know as late as nineteen ninety, the census showed there were about forty-one thousand people in Bowling Green. I don’t know what percent black population that is or has been. Can you give me some sense?

ESTERS: I would say about eight percent, and it has remained about the same. Uh huh.

BRINSON: So you haven’t seen an outward migration within the African-American community in the last forty years. Most people have stayed?

ESTERS: In the last forty years, I would say, during the fifties you had migration and early sixties, on up until the factories opened up. When the factories opened up for black employment, then you had more blacks staying. But on up to about sixty-two, sixty-three, a lot of the high school kids that finished, went on to larger cities in the North, in order to find work that was not menial. The only thing that you could do here, was to cut grass, wash windows, be a house person and, or janitors. That was basically it. And the factories had opened up, were open up in the North; and that’s where a lot of the young kids went to get jobs, in which were not menial work.

BRINSON: Want to go back to your teachers for a moment.

ESTERS: Uh hmm.

BRINSON: Did any of them, or did many of them have advanced degrees, while you were in school?

ESTERS: They began to obtain that, once Western was, had opened up its doors, but the average one had, did not have an advanced degree until then.

BRINSON: And from what colleges did they tend to have graduated?

ESTERS: You had them from Wilberforce in Ohio; Tennessee State, those are the two main areas, that I might have, you know, known some of the older teachers attended.

BRINSON: I’m interested, you said your father was a musician. Did you inherit any of that?

ESTERS: No I didn’t. I, I...when I was younger I wanted to play drums and my mom wanted me to play saxophone, so I had a little stubborn streak in me, so I said I wasn’t going to play anything.

BRINSON: Okay.

ESTERS: But I was more so into sports, as you asked a while ago. I started out in about the seventh or eighth grade playing sports, and that took most of my time.

BRINSON: What did you play?

ESTERS: Football, basketball, track, those three areas.

BRINSON: Did you have any favorite subjects in school?

ESTERS: No, I enjoyed them all. I liked all of the subjects that we had. I guess because you enjoyed the personalities of the teachers that....And then it was a requirement by the home that you studied. We found that, and it was programmed into our minds that, in order to make it in a segregated society, you had to have education. And that was the main goal of the black parents then, to get you through high school, to get you an education, so they demanded that you studied. And so since they made this demand on you, you studied all the subjects and didn’t complain, since there was such a big priority placed on education.

BRINSON: Were you and your family active in a church while you were growing up?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh. My mother attended the Baptist church. I attended the Methodist with my grandmother. But we, the church was the place where the black kids’ talents were exhibited. Where you could be something other than a second class citizen. In the church, you were a first class citizen and you were able to exhibit your talents, you were able to demonstrate your talents. And the church had a powerful influence in the black community, and the black homes. And it still does today. Your leaders came from the black church. Your spokes-people, that spoke for the community came from the black church, so it had a powerful influence on the black community and home.

BRINSON: I wonder if you recall a particularly incident that happened to you, in which you were made aware that this was a racially segregated society?

ESTERS: You always had to be second. And I noticed that as a child, we uh, when you go to the store, you were second to last to be waited on. When you rode on the bus, they used to have buses here in Bowling Green when I was a child; and you had to sit on the back of the bus. Then the movie theaters, you had to sit in the balcony. And then you go in the stores, where they had water fountains, they had colored, colored restrooms, you had a place. So everywhere you went, if you were black you had a place, and your place was inferior to where the whites might go. And that you knew that in order to survive, you had to comply, you know, with what was set up.

BRINSON: Did you ever challenge that in any way, and by that, as a small child did you try and resist it and use the other water fountain or sit on a place on the bus?

ESTERS: When we were in high school, I remember when the--and we didn’t look at the news or anything like that--but there was a spiritual movement and I relate back to the times that were going on then. I was in high school, our resistance had begun to occur. But I know as, we were in about the eleventh grade and a group of us went to the white teen center. We didn’t have a teen center, might have been the tenth grade. And we went to the white teen center and began to dance. We danced with each other and we played the games that they had there. And that was a resistance, you know, to why don’t we have something nice like you have? And there was never no trouble, but the next year they built a teen center for the blacks, for the black kids. (Laughing) I remember also, once or twice a group of us would get together and we would go to a restaurant and sit in a seat in the front of the store. And when the man would come around from the counter, we would get up and run out. But it seemed like--I believe that the whole Civil Rights movement was a spiritual movement, because it happened in places in which people didn’t really know the method that was being used, what was being done; but they felt within their hearts that they had to challenge the system, that they had to say, We don’t like this, we don’t want this, and we’re going to, you know, we’re going to do something to make this change.” And I noticed that in fifty-four after the school desegregation order by the Supreme Court, little by little resistance began to take place. And like I said, around about fifty-seven, fifty-eight, we didn’t look at the news. We didn’t know any type of movement was going on. We didn’t even know anything about school desegregation. But there was something within our souls that moved us to take these measures or to do something that hadn’t been done before.

BRINSON: Do you recall any of the leadership in your church, or hearing about the leadership of other black churches here in Bowling Green, that actually addressed that in some way? Encouraged people to challenge?

ESTERS: No, not in Bowling Green. And as we were talking, I don’t see any type of movement in Kentucky, other than Louisville and Lexington, that challenged the system. The reason why Bowling Green changed was, this was through word of mouth that the city fathers heard that Freedom Riders were coming to Bowling Green to sit in. And that’s when restaurants began to open up and when things began to change a little bit.

BRINSON: And that would have been in the sixties?

ESTERS: Right, right.

BRINSON: Okay. So you graduated in nineteen fifty-nine from high school and then what happened for you?

ESTERS: I got a football scholarship to Arkansas, it was the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. It’s, now it’s the University of Arkansas, it was Arkansas A.M. & N. Black colleges were A & M; A. M and N; Normal colleges. They weren’t called universities during that time. But I got a football scholarship in sixty. After I finished school, I went to Indianapolis to go to school there. I wanted to be a radiologist. And I couldn’t get in the schools at that time. I spent a year in Indianapolis, came back and my football coach offered me a football scholarship to Arkansas and so I took that. But there again, I was told at one school that my grades didn’t come in, in time. And another school, which taught the subject, they said that five males and five females applied, so they took the five females. But you knew between lines, even in the North, you had racism and segregation to a certain extent.

BRINSON: You wanted to be a radiologist, so obviously you have an interest in science, or you had an interest in science. What do you do as a radiologist?

ESTERS: X-ray technician.

BRINSON: Oh, X-ray, oh okay.

ESTERS: Uh huh, yeah. X-ray technician. But after, well your occupation was limited then, too. So teaching, that was the main form of work, if you went to college, that you did. Because the majority of things were closed, you just, you know, you could be a nurse. If you wanted to spend maybe twelve years, and had the stamina, you could be a doctor. Or the insight of someone giving you the information as to how to, what to do in order to get in school, become that. So it was really closed to you.

BRINSON: Let me see, we might have this one end here. What did you major in, in college?

ESTERS: Majored in history and minored in education in college.

BRINSON: And then what happened to you when you finished college?

ESTERS: Came to Bowling Green, didn’t want to get work here. I wanted to get away.

BRINSON: And that would have been, did it take you four years to do your college?

ESTERS: Four years, yes. At that time, everything was lined out for you, the courses that you would take each semester, for Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, it was all outlined. You took those courses at the school. By you taking what was outlined, you finished in four years. And I got married my Senior year, the later half of my Senior year in college. Came back to work to, of course to get us money.

BRINSON: Did you marry a woman from the college?

ESTERS: Yes, from Arkansas.

BRINSON: So, she was not from Kentucky.

ESTERS: No.

BRINSON: Okay.

ESTERS: Two social studies jobs were open here, junior high and senior high, but I didn’t want to stay. I applied in Memphis and in Arkansas. I love the South, really love the South. But I got a job in the high school here. What happened, the principal was the Pastor of my mother and he told the other places that inquired about me, that I already had a job here, so they forgot about me. And I didn’t have an opportunity to go anywhere else, so I just went on and took this job.

BRINSON: So this would have been about nineteen sixty-four, sixty-five?

ESTERS: Right, uh huh

END OF TAPE ONE SIDE ONE

BEGIN TAPE ONE SIDE TWO

BRINSON: So you were teaching high school social studies, history in particular?

ESTERS: Right.

BRINSON: And as I understand the Bowling Green history here, that despite the Brown Decision in fifty-four, it took a while for Bowling Green to begin to integrate its schools. And it actually, help me here, I understand that this happened because of a lawsuit that was brought.

ESTERS: Right. Brought on by some people here in Bowling Green, by some blacks.

BRINSON: Right. So the point that you entered as a teacher into the system, where was the school system in terms of integration and where were you in the system?

ESTERS: It was about ready to integrate, and my first year of teaching was the last year of the black high school. During that time they were also building the high school and we felt, as a black community, that because they were going to integrate, this high school would still house just whites. And the poor whites and blacks would go to High Street. But when the court order--more so--made them have one high school rather than two, so that meant that the blacks had to go to the white high school that was just being built. It was very demeaning. Integration was very bitter to the black educator, in as much as we never were told whether or not we were going to have a job after they closed High Street. Many of the black educators sought jobs elsewhere, because they didn’t know whether they were going to have a job or not. We were the last to find out that high street was going to be closed. We felt like they would send all the whites that lived in this area and the blacks to High Street. So, we didn’t know it was going to be closed, we didn’t know whether we were going to have a job. And then when we, many of us went to, some of us went to the junior high, the first year of integration. And they, blacks had classes on the stage, they were set up in classes where the coal used to be stored in the junior high. So we were given very shoddy treatments.

BRINSON: Were you given all blacks students to teach?

ESTERS: No, no.

BRINSON: So you had a mix...

ESTERS: Right, had a mix.

BRINSON: ...student population.

ESTERS: Had a mixed student population. The head coach had won championships in this region. He had defeated every team in this region for three straight years, and he was made assistant coach.

BRINSON: Do you remember his name?

ESTERS: That was Ethyl Marksly. But see the sports were integrated before the schools were, so we played the white teams, the white high schools, two years before school was integrated. A few years, no I would say, we began to play them in fifty-eight, schools were integrated in sixty-four, sixty-five. So that gives you an idea how long we played against white schools, before we actually began to go to school with them.

BRINSON: After the schools were integrated, talk a little bit about the extra-curricular student activities, like cheerleading, student government. Were the black students encouraged to participate in those activities?

ESTERS: No, we were, there was still a resistance. We went into school integration with the same stereotypes; stereo thoughts that blacks were inferior; that blacks stole; that blacks were ignorant; that blacks couldn’t learn. Even when Western integrated, the average college professor said that he couldn’t teach blacks. So, we went into an integrated situation in which you still had these racist and prejudicial thoughts. So, a lot of our kids were expelled, suspended. They were excluded. They had been used to having teachers personalize with them, help them. But it was very, it was a turmoil. Black kids hated the high school. There were constant race, I wouldn’t say race riots, but race confrontations, on up until the early seventies. I can remember two or three episodes that I was involved in. I was, the kids called me from the high school to come to the high school to help them out or to....

BRINSON: So you were at the junior high.

ESTERS: ...intervene. I stayed at the junior high almost a year, and then I got the Directorship of Adult Education. So, they would call me at the office there and have me to come out to speak for them, or to intervene in whatever crisis was going on at the high school.

BRINSON: Can you tell me about some of those instances? Can you recall any specifics?

ESTERS: One that really, really got to me, was I got a call from the students, the black kids at the high school. I went out, and on one side--they were all in the gymnasium--I think this was just the bitter end of what had been going on. On one side of the gymnasium you had all the black kids. On the other side of the gymnasium you had police, the white teachers and some white kids. And the police really had their hands on their guns. They were ready to shoot. I got a couple of the leaders, the black leaders out and talked with them and got them to be bussed out, working with the principal; bussed to a church, in which we had them to talk and vent their anger and what have you. And then, you know, to resolve their conflict. But that was the scariest moment in my life to see adults ready to shoot children. And it was at that point.

BRINSON: What precipitated that?

ESTERS: Just one racial conflict after another. And the black kids did not trust the administration. They didn’t trust the teachers. And they were tired of being mistreated and tired of being, for the racism and prejudice, you know, they just got tired of all of what racism and prejudice can come to an individual.

BRINSON: Did the police force in town at that point have any African-American...

ESTERS: No, didn’t have any.

BRINSON: ...police? Do they today?

ESTERS: Yes.

BRINSON: Okay. So you went to be the Director of Adult Education, and you were there for twenty years.

ESTERS: Right, uh huh. With integration I had been coach of all sports. In segregation I had been coach, I’d been physical ed instructor. I was able to work with the kids outside of the classroom. And that’s how I function best, is working with them outside of the classroom in a personal type of relationship. With integration I was not selected as one of the coaches on the junior high level, and I was just in a classroom every period of the day. And I had begun to look for other jobs, outside. And I had gone outside of education to find a job. I could not function, you know, that way. Of course, with integration you, they had no black principals, no black counselors. They wouldn’t consider you as a counselor, as a principal or assistant principal, as a coach. You were just not considered to be in any position outside of, you were tolerated as being a teacher. And you knew you were tolerated with--you go into the faculty lounge, nobody would speak to you; and the only person, nobody would sit with you in the cafeteria, other than your own peer group. So, you just, you know, it was like you were here, but we don’t have to be bothered with you. So, I began to look for another job, and when this job became available within the school system.

BRINSON: Want to go back to what you’re saying here. Did you, you said you began to look for other jobs. Did you actually apply and were rejected for other positions?

ESTERS: No. I had thought about being a police man. I was just searching to see exactly where I might seek out, you know, another position.

BRINSON: How about within the school system, though. Did you apply officially?

ESTERS: No, I had talked with a supervisor about my wanting, you know, looking for another position. And I asked him if another position became available, you know, in the school system let me know, because I couldn’t really function in the classroom the way in which, you know, I was going. Ernie Garner, he was one of the supervisors at the time, told me that there was a position available. And that, with, during that period you can remember Lyndon Johnson began domestic programs. He called it, “The War on Poverty”. He was setting up a great society. And that’s when ( ) set his Urban renewal, and different governmental programs began to come into being. The adult learning center was an experimental, educational experimental program to work along with one of these great society programs. And that’s how that position became available, it was through Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society or “War on Poverty”.

BRINSON: And these were individuals primarily who had dropped out of school at some point?

ESTERS: It was found that--well you had black unrest, you know. Well, you had the demonstrations, things of this nature. It was felt that blacks had been kept out of the mainstream. And the Civil Rights Acts were signed in sixty-four. This was another program to try to get blacks in the mainstream of society. Get them in with the vocational training, along with building up their educational skills. So it was an Adult Educational Program working in conjunction with a vocational program. Along with giving the person a vocational skill, you upgraded his education. And see there were no, you know, blacks were left out of the mainstream in vocational ed. So it was, along with the Civil Rights Act being passed, these were programs to include blacks into the mainstream. Like I said before, what you could do was limited, so this was one governmental program to train blacks to become a part of the system, to let him in the door.

BRINSON: Right, and a couple of questions out of that. Your comment about blacks were limited in vocational ed makes me think to ask you, when the schools were completely segregated before integration, were the voc-ed programs different from the black school and the white school?

ESTERS: Well we were, we started, voc-ed was mainly in the black school. That’s where you had carpentry and different skills like that. But in the eleventh grade they began to bus or transport black kids that was in vocational ed to the area vocational school here in Bowling Green. And that’s where you had access to other vocational training.

BRINSON: Was that an integrated school?

ESTERS: No, you just had a vocational school in which kids would attend. That was on Western’s campus. The vocational school was in a community called Jonesville. And really Western campus was in an area called Jonesville.

BRINSON: Which is where the football stadium is now? Okay.

ESTERS: Right. That was a total black community, other than Western. And then of course whites were on the other side of Western. But one side of Western was all black.

BRINSON: But this voc-ed program that students were bussed to was also entirely black?

ESTERS: Well, let me say this, they weren’t bussed, they could drive their own cars or they had to get their own transportation.

BRINSON: So would they go there for a full day?

ESTERS: No, for a couple hours.

BRINSON: Or for a portion of the day and then go back to High Street?

ESTERS: Right, right. After lunch as I can remember. I never did attend vocational training, because I was strictly academics. I stayed in the academics. But I believe after lunch for a couple of hours, they went to voc-ed school.

BRINSON: The reason I’m asking this, is that in Covington, for example, when the schools were segregated, the white school had the print shop and they taught white boys print skills. And the black school had a completely furnished apartment and domestic laundry and they taught the black girls domestic work. And the two schools had an understanding that if the black school needed any flyers or anything, then the white school would furnish those from their print shop. And in return, the black school students would wash all the uniforms of the white football team.

ESTERS: Hmm.

BRINSON: And I just, that’s the only place I’ve heard of an arrangement like that.

ESTERS: No, there were no arrangements. And why they opened up the voc-ed portion to blacks, I’m really not sure. But it only began, that I can remember, my junior year, junior and senior year. But of course, you couldn’t use any training that you might have in voc-ed other than brick masonry or carpentry, because none of the other jobs [Laughing] in you might, what you say vocational ed, were just not open to blacks.

BRINSON: Was there an NAACP chapter here while you were growing up?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh. That was, while I was growing up, I can remember Jay Jones, he was the Pastor of State Street Baptist Church, as far as I can remember, used to be president of it. And he eventually became Principal of High Street School. But that, they I believe, I’m not sure, some of the older ones might be able to tell you, what if anything, what part the NAACP played.

BRINSON: But he was a leader in the NAACP?

ESTERS: At one time. Uh huh.

BRINSON: How about during the sixties and the seventies?

ESTERS: Well, the black community fell out of favor with Jay Jones in the sixties, once he became principal. Once he became a school teacher, seems like he had struggles with members of the black community. They felt that, during, with this battle to integrate schools, Jones sided with the School Board, that there didn’t need to be any integration at that time. So there became a big problem, you know, with him, with some of those that were spearheading school integration. And I think he lost favor in the black community. Then again, there was a lot of other dynamics going on within the black church at that time, and once he got his degree and began to be a principal of High Street, then the church itself, I think, turned on him, for whatever dynamics were going on in the black church at that time.

BRINSON: Did he become principal of High Street after integration?

ESTERS: Yes, after integration.

BRINSON: Was that hard for the black community to accept?

ESTERS: I think his stand on integration is what really, you know, he stood alone against integration. And I think that could have been the focal point then.

BRINSON: I’ve looked at some of the demographics of the schools here during and shortly after integration and it looks like while they moved the black students to predominantly white schools, they didn’t really move too many white students to the black schools.

ESTERS: No.

BRINSON: Is that your...?

ESTERS: No, that’s correct. You only had High Street, Parker Bennett came a little later. I’m not sure when Parker Bennett was built. But most integrating was done, was done by black students. That’s the way integration went, blacks had to give up their security, their comfort, their safe havens, their safe places. But the white community didn’t give up anything.

BRINSON: When Reverend Jones had the fall out, as you called it, did that, how did that affect the local NAACP chapter? Did the membership drop or did it lose its ability to lead?

ESTERS: I’m really not sure. I’m really not sure how that might have affected it.

BRINSON: Was it the NAACP that actually worked to bring the law suit?

ESTERS: No, I think it was just certain, a few members of the black community worked to bring the lawsuit. And there’s rumored, or oral type of stories and it could be many different ones, that really it was brought about because the blacks felt that the black teachers were inferior. And we get into another scenario in the black community where we still have that slave mentality among us. The house slave against the field slave mentality, and it really has prevailed throughout slavery. But it was felt, many blacks felt that the black teachers were inferior; and that they felt that with the white school that their kids were going to get a better education. They were going to have better teachers. They were going to have better facilities, and this did not happen in all cases. In some rural areas in the South, yes, but overall you had the best minds in education in blacks. Those that could have been doctors or lawyers, were teachers, those that could have been engineers, were teachers. And High Street had better facilities than Bowling Green High. We had a better Science department.

BRINSON: Was that before the new building?

ESTERS: Uh hmm, that was before. See High Street was built in what, fifty-four and so we had real good equipment. That was to keep segregation. So, you know, the fathers felt if we build good facilities, excellent facilities, they won’t want to integrate. So it was, it was just the reverse, what blacks felt was going to happen, never took place.

BRINSON: But before the new building, were the facilities as good?

ESTERS: No, we didn’t have a cafeteria. The cafeteria was, for State Street, had just recently been built before school integration. And our athletic facilities were not, you know, adequate. We needed more space, you know, classroom space. We got books that were twenty years old. We got the hand-me-downs from the white school.

BRINSON: Do you remember if you were provided the textbooks free, or did you pay for them?

ESTERS: No, they were free. But the teaching was so excellent, that irregardless as to the material that we got, we still received a good education. And you, like I said, in some rural areas in the deep South, the education was poor, but as a whole blacks still got quality education because of the excellent teaching.

BRINSON: Want to ask you specifically about the year nineteen sixty-eight, which was a pretty significant year, both nationwide with racial riots and the assassination of Martin Luther King. And here in Bowling Green, I understand that the Mountain Hebrew Presbyterian Church was bombed in nineteen sixty-eight. What can you tell me about that?

ESTERS: No, I don’t remember that. Uh uh.

BRINSON: So obviously it didn’t make the news or make even by word of mouth or whatever, was not construed as being something terrible had happened.

ESTERS: Right, uh huh.

BRINSON: Okay. Hmmm?

ESTERS: And that’s the first time I heard of that.

BRINSON: Okay. In February of nineteen sixty-nine, the Board of Commissioners here, passed an Open Housing Ordinance. And I believe, if I am correct, it was like the fifth community in the state to do that. Do you remember, I want to ask you one, if you remember that, but I want you also to talk to me a little bit about housing patterns in the community between black and white.

ESTERS: Okay.

BRINSON: Have they been segregated and then are they still segregated? What’s happened in the whole effort with housing, particularly in the black community?

ESTERS: Well housing, that which was passed in sixty-nine, was just paper. It had no effect, no meaning in the black community, or for the community as a whole. What really opened up housing in Bowling Green was General Motors; the Corvette plant that came here. That really opened up open housing. But before then...

BRINSON: How was that?

ESTERS: Well, the blacks coming out of Saint Louis and Detroit and different areas, had been used to a certain quality of living. And they had been used to buying where ever they wanted to buy. And as they moved in and began to challenge the housing--the realtors here in Bowling Green--the realtors really had to give in, because they could be sued. So, with people coming in from General Motors with expertise and knowledge as to how to shake the realtor, the real estate concerns, then that’s the only time you had housing really being integrated in Bowling Green.

BRINSON: So these were individuals who already were working for General Motors and they were transferred here.

ESTERS: Right, right. You had black supervisors and you had blacks with money to buy anywhere. But before then, you didn’t have blacks with money to buy anywhere. The average, well black in sixty-nine, sixty-eight.....

END OF TAPE ONE SIDE TWO

BEGIN TAPE TWO SIDE ONE

BRINSON: At the end of it, you were saying that those who were working in the factories made more than teachers.

ESTERS: Right. But they were used to having their own place, in other words, knowing where they could buy and where they couldn’t buy and so they did not challenge the system that had been set up. And with the coming of General Motors, they challenged the system and they began to shake up the Realtors here in Bowling Green. And individuals had quite a few problems moving into white areas, all white areas. But they moved in and persevered, others moved, you know, in. And so the community became, after a number of years, became adjusted to seeing blacks, maybe one black living in an all white area, you know, like so throughout the town. But before then blacks had lived all over Bowling Green, but in a black, they were in a black section. In other words, there was never any integration. Blacks lived in where Western is, blacks lived in the Delefield area, that’s...

BRINSON: Delfield?

ESTERS: Uh huh.

BRINSON: D E L F I E L D?

ESTERS: D E L E F I E L D. And this was called Shakewright this area. Then they lived off on the small house roads. So blacks in Bowling Green have never been concentrated in one area, they’ve lived all over Bowling Green, but always together, never in an integrated type situation.

BRINSON: Do those patterns continue today?

ESTERS: No, blacks are scattered throughout the community or city.

BRINSON: Of course, you’ve lost Jonesville, Jonesville?

ESTERS: Right, uh huh.

BRINSON: How about the second community you named?

ESTERS: Delefield?

BRINSON: Is that still here?

ESTERS: Yes, that’s still here, but it is integrated, housing-wise. Delefield is still here, and of course, Shakewright, but you have, the majority of the old homesteads are gone. That was done by Urban Renewal. But a lot of the old homesteads are gone. You can’t come into the Bowling Green committee, community and say, you know, such and such used to live there, or that used to be, that was where my grandmother lived, or that’s where I grew up as a child. You can’t do that, because the majority of the black community has been done away with - houses.

BRINSON: I’m sort of interested that they put the convention center out of downtown, which to me seems different than you find in many towns and cities today. But it is almost like they’re, I get a sense without knowing the area well that they’re just developing away from the downtown area.

ESTERS: Right.

BRINSON: The whole Scottsville Road area.

ESTERS: Right, right.

BRINSON: Is that correct?

ESTERS: That’s correct, uh huh. Downtown is mainly lawyer, offices, mainly downtown.

BRINSON: Who are the large employers in the area today?

ESTERS: It’s a diversified employment here in the Bowling Green area. And I couldn’t say who might be, the highest paid, of course, would be General Motors. But Bowling Green’s employment is highly diversified. It has different manufacturing concerns that’s not independent on others, you know. But it’s highly diversified.

BRINSON: Want to ask you some questions about, sort of the power of the vote to the African-American community. Can you tell me, for example, about the history of blacks being elected to school boards, city commissions, other elected positions?

ESTERS: None other than Joe Denning, and that was in the, what was, he was, was it the beginning of the eighties. In the eighties, Joe Denning was elected to the School Board, but and then right now I can’t think of the lady’s name, now. She is--we have a black School Board member, but other than that, that’s it. We have never had, and the black vote is, is not, does not have the power that other communities, that it has in other communities. It just doesn’t have the power here in Bowling Green.

BRINSON: Is the School Board election an at-large election?

ESTERS: Yes, it’s an at-large.

BRINSON: It is, okay. Which would make it more difficult for blacks.

ESTERS: Right. City commissioners also.

BRINSON: Have there been any black members of the City Commission?

ESTERS: No, uh uh.

BRINSON: Have there been people who ran for that position from the black community?

ESTERS: Not city commissioner--yes, I believe Thomas Mitchell could have, yeah you’ve had several, Thomas Mitchell and a few others. But they haven’t been blacks who the community would support. Here you would have to have white vote as well as black, so you’d have to be supported by both communities in order to win. And you’ve had people to run, the majority of them to run that just simply would not, you know, be a leader, what you consider a leader or black people even consider.

BRINSON: How is your mayor selected here?

ESTERS: That’s through the popular vote.

BRINSON: Do you think if there were district elections as opposed to at-large that you would have more African-Americans who’d been elected?

ESTERS: It would be interesting and I couldn’t say. We haven’t been a community which has rallied behind any concern. And as I said to you over the telephone, the leadership or those that would participate in community affairs left Bowling Green for better jobs elsewhere. So Bowling Green was drained of its potential leaders, or drained of people that would be community minded. And you just don’t have as a whole the black community being community minded or ones that would rally behind any given agenda. It’s, it has, you know, been like that for a long time.

BRINSON: At some point in the sixties and I don’t know the exact date, there was a local Commission on Human Rights that was established here. Can you, can you tell me what you know about their involvement in the sixties and the seventies? Were they viewed as an effective body to take a complaint to? Were they, did they speak out on issues? Issue reports?

ESTERS: Yes, they did what they could, with the support that they had. They would investigate complaints and speak out. But it wasn’t, where you really have your power is when you have--when you are supported by the community. And like I said before, that’s the main thing with the black community, it never gained support for any--if you fought the fight, you fought it by yourself. So the city commission, I mean the Human Rights Commission has fought the fight, but it’s been, you know, by themselves and not with any support.

BRINSON: Do you know how members of that commission were selected?

ESTERS: I believe they were appointed by a governmental body.

BRINSON: Is the commission still active today?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh. And yeah, mainly they were appointed. Could I....could you stop that?

BRINSON: Want to take a break?

(Tape goes off and on)

BRINSON: Thank you, it’s nice to have a cup of coffee. I notice looking around at all the photos on the walls, a lot of young children, maybe your children, your grandchildren?

ESTERS: Grandchildren.

BRINSON: Grandchildren. Tell me about your children.

ESTERS: I only have one, one son, and it was like that in our family. My father, as far as I can go back, my father was an only child, I was an only child, I only had one child. But our son has broken that tradition, he has three. So, have one son in Lincoln, Nebraska, that’s married with three grandchildren.

BRINSON: Okay. That’s a good distance from Bowling Green.

ESTERS: It is. We don’t get to see them grow up, unless things change.

BRINSON: You think they might move here? Or you might move there at some point?

ESTERS: They would have to come this way. (Laughter)

BRINSON: Okay, okay. I want to ask you, George, I’m very interested in all of the work that you have done with the church. How did that begin for you?

ESTERS: Began as a child. We were raised in the church, and after going to school, of course, we got out of the church with the new life changes; but eventually got back into the church and began to work in the church. And then when I was called to the ministry, that’s when I began to pastor.

BRINSON: When were you called?

ESTERS: That was in eighty-three, in eighty-three. We have always been pastoring or working outside of the Bowling Green community, rather than within the community. There is a scripture verse that says that, ‘A prophet is without honor in his own hometown and among his own countrymen.’ In other words, there is a resistance to a person that has grown up in his community somehow for many different reasons. So we found that our work has been outside of the Bowling Green community, rather than here pastoring.

BRINSON: So you have been at churches that are without, outside of Bowling Green. For example, your resume here talks about you at the Cedar Grove Baptist Church.

ESTERS: Right, in Hopkinsville.

BRINSON: In Hopkinsville?

ESTERS: Uh hmm.

BRINSON: And Hopkinsville is about how far from here?

ESTERS: It is about sixty-two miles from here. And we travel just every day except Mondays. So we are on the road every day except Mondays.

BRINSON: And where are you going to Hopkinsville, or are you going other places also?

ESTERS: Mainly in Hopkinsville.

BRINSON: Okay, when you say “we” who is we?

ESTERS: My wife and I have the ministry together.

BRINSON: I wanted to ask you about her, because I stopped and asked you when you married and whatnot. But tell me a little bit about her.

ESTERS: She grew up on a farm. And she grew up in a system of segregation that was more demeaning than the system of segregation that I grew up in. So you have some folk, some blacks that grew up in a worst form of segregation than others. She, her father, you might say, worked on a plantation in the South, in Arkansas. She grew up having to work also in the fields. A large family versus my small family. And she went to school, finished the same school that I finished from, came back to Bowling Green. She was here about two years before she began to teach in the school system. She’s moved from that, and when I retired they hired her as Director in my place. So we kept it in the family.

BRINSON: Oh, oh.

ESTERS: And she’s retiring this year, but she has many different talents. She’s a seamstress, she’s co-ordinates weddings, she’s very active in the community and in church. She belongs to a sorority. She’s into everything that she can get into. She’s very energetic. She’s the very opposite of me.

BRINSON: You don’t think you’re energetic?

ESTERS: In my own way. (Laughter)

BRINSON: Tell me what The Hopkinsville College of the Bible is, that you are now the President of.

ESTERS: It’s....when, with segregation, after slavery, blacks began to form institutions of higher learning in order to train blacks, as we were talking about, in vocational arts or in education. Hopkinsville College of the Bible is just one of those schools, that in eighteen and eighty-three was formed to educate blacks. And there’s been a whole history that to overcome segregation, to overcome slavery, to make it in society, you have to be educated. And so the Hopkinsville College of the Bible was formed to educate blacks in vocational training, in teaching and in biblical studies. Right now, since schools were established in each community for blacks, it’s just a bible college now. So the other areas, that other slack that it took up in, due to the community taking on, or including blacks in the field of education, they released, you know, their...

BRINSON: Is it an actual, physical building?

ESTERS: Yes, it has right now two buildings, it’s the school that has a study, and then it has a dormitory, because blacks used to have to have someplace to stay to go to the bible college. And the dormitory has been changed into a bookstore now. So it’s a physical building, school, along with a separate building that is a bookstore.

BRINSON: And how many students are there?

ESTERS: On the average, we have about thirty per semester. It only goes at night.

BRINSON: Okay, and these are individuals...?

ESTERS: To increase their biblical knowledge, and then some are there to get a degree. We give a, we’re accredited, and we give a Bachelor of Theology, Bachelor of Religious Education, Diploma of Theology, Diploma of Religious Education, Certification in Mission. So, it depends upon how long you wanted to attend, what your goal was, as to what type of degree or diploma you get.

BRINSON: And what kind of responsibilities do you have as the President of this institution?

ESTERS: That is to continue to keep this mission going, that is to educate the persons in biblical knowledge, plus to upgrade its curriculum, and to, you might say, be a spokesperson, you know, toward the history of the school.

BRINSON: Okay. Is there a printed history somewhere, that I could look at in some point in time?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh. I have it at the school. If I could, if you left me your fax number or something like that, I could..

BRINSON: I think, did I give you my card?

ESTERS: Yes, uh huh. Yes, uh huh.

BRINSON: It has a fax number on it.

ESTERS: Okay, yeah, I’ll remember to...

BRINSON: As a historian, I’d love to see more about that.

ESTERS: Sure, sure.

BRINSON: I’m very interested in, to something that you said early on in the interview about, you really thought that the Civil Rights Movement was a spiritual movement. And I want you to kind of help me think about that a little bit more.

ESTERS: Okay.

BRINSON: And certainly it is true in terms of that many ministers were very involved. There are also communities were the black ministry was not very involved.

ESTERS: Sure.

BRINSON: So help me understand why.

ESTERS: Okay it was, you could say it was a movement of a person’s heart and soul. And it was, its foundation was the church. The majority of the people that participated in the movement were Christians. It was rooted by the church. Doctor Martin Luther King lead, eventually lead this movement to break the walls of segregation down. Its resources were obtained from the church. Its power and motivation came from the church. It’s just like before Doctor Martin Luther King became the leader, if you look back in history, the pastor of the church that he was pastoring when he was elected leader of the movement, was....His last name was Jones. But he preached for seven or eight years to the people of his congregation how their cowardness kept the system of segregation in its place. So really he prepared the people to accept the movement, to follow Doctor King. He prepared the agenda that Doctor King had. So you had ministers that, you know, stood up and kept motivating the people to resist and to have hope. So the hope that the people had came through a spiritual connection.

BRINSON: Did you see that...

ESTERS: And then the non-resistance, non-violence came through the love that Christianity teaches.

BRINSON: Do you think that you could trace similar trends in the Bowling Green black ministry and churches?

ESTERS: No, as far as the changes here in Bowling Green? No the changes here in Bowling Green all came from outside the community. In other words, people reacting in the Bowling Green community to what was happening outside the Bowling Green community. And as I said before, in traveling through the South, and seeing the radical change that the South has made. It made such a change because it gave so much. So many people lost their lives. So many people gave up their comfort for this to come about, and because they gave up so much, they received so much. And where people didn’t give up anything, then they received very little. And you still find the state of Kentucky, or Bowling Green as a whole, still very behind in race relations or undoing prejudicial feelings. In the South, you only find two people, people that love you, people that hate you. There’s no one standing in between, in other words, they don’t say one thing and do another, or they for you....You know where you are. You don’t have to, you know, it’s just like you go to work and your boss either hates blacks or he believes that all men are created equal. But here in Bowling Green, you work for people that you don’t know how they feel, they could be in another year getting rid of you, because they still have these stereotypical, you know, concerns.

BRINSON: So I think I hear you saying that the black church leadership in Bowling Green did not really play an out-front leadership role in any way.

ESTERS: No never, played an out-front role. And that’s due to the people. Like I said, this is the type of people that you....Those that would be community minded, you just don’t have community minded as a whole, that were left here in Bowling Green. Community minded, a lot that are community minded left, that would be vocal.

BRINSON: You said you’re spending a lot of time in Hopkinsville now, I wonder how you would....If this is a fair question to even ask you here, but how you would compare the history of race relations in Hopkinsville with that of, in Bowling Green.

ESTERS: Bowling Green is poor, but Hopkinsville is worse. Hopkinsville, Kentucky has a very deep seated hatred, even that exists today, between black and white. When I first went there, it was just like leaving night and going into, I mean leaving day and going into night. They had a bitter race, ( ) process, in which, steel is embedded within the hearts and minds of both blacks and whites. Their integration of schools were bitter, very bitter and it’s still hanging over until today. But it’s a very poor, when it comes to race relations, it’s very poor. Here it’s congenial, there’s a lot of subtle prejudice and racism, but there in Hopkinsville, it’s open, you know.

BRINSON: How about surrounding communities here? Franklin and others. Are there any that you would say have been, have found it a little easier to develop race relations?

ESTERS: Still bitter and that’s due to the black population is not that great. I find that you are able to have a better relationship where you have blacks in population just as equal, or almost as equal with whites. Thereby you have more blacks that are in association with whites and you have more feelings that are made known. Here blacks--in the state of Kentucky as a whole--blacks and whites do not associate with each other; you know, you see each other on the job, but that’s it. Where there’s more blacks, just as many blacks as whites, you are always in association with one another, in one way or another. And so thereby you are able to sit down and vocalize, you are able to sit down and talk. Here, you go home and you don’t see one another, but where there’s more interaction, that’s where there’s more understanding. And there’s very little interaction with blacks and whites still here.

BRINSON: I’m coming close to the end.

ESTERS: Yeah.

BRINSON: But I want to go back and ask you a question about your all black school. In many communities in Kentucky, or in a number of communities I’m finding that the graduates of the all black schools even today, have annual reunions.

ESTERS: Right.

BRINSON: And I’m just wondering what the situation is with the school in Bowling Green? Do you have a reunion today?

ESTERS: Uh, High Street?

BRINSON: Uh hmm.

ESTERS: Yes. Uh huh. We have a reunion periodically. It started in the eighties. It didn’t start until the eighties. What you find, you get fewer and fewer participants because people are dying off each year. And say if you have one, once every four years, but it is still a joyful occasion.

BRINSON: Do you have the reunions here?

ESTERS: Right, here in Bowling Green. All of them are here in Bowling Green. I have a few annuals with, you know, program agenda, what have you. But they are always joyful occasions. And a lot of people say there is no such thing as the good old days, but there is such a thing as the good old days. Because you had respect for parents, you had a love for your neighbors. You went through hard times, but you were sheltered. And as, when you got to be an adult, you can see what sacrifices were made for you. And there are good old days, even with segregation, with racism, with prejudice, we still have the good, old days. And they come back and reminisce, you know, to come back, you reminisce over your friendship, the struggles you went through, how you made it, the people that were in your life, that influenced you, that helped you, the things that you really enjoyed, you know.

END OF TAPE TWO SIDE ONE

BEGIN TAPE TWO SIDE TWO

BRINSON: ...do you think are attending the reunions today?

ESTERS: Oh goodness, I would say over three hundred or plus.

BRINSON: And these are the graduates and also their family members? Tell me...

ESTERS: Right. Right. Well then...

BRINSON: Go ahead.

ESTERS: Well we have another event that takes place in Bowling Green, which people come back, it’s called the Par-Maker’s Golf Tournament. And that started around sixty-two, sixty-three, and that was, people came back for that from different states and different communities. And that was sort of a reunion, until in the eighties, eighty-three, I think, when we first had our first school reunion. But the Par-Maker’s Golf Tournament was a time in which people came back.

BRINSON: Par-Makers?

ESTERS: Par-Makers.

BRINSON: P A R ? Like par in golf?

ESTERS: Right, right.

BRINSON: Par-Makers, okay. Is that both men and women?

ESTERS: Right, both men and women.

BRINSON: And is it, is it just to play golf or do you use it to raise money for anything?

ESTERS: Just to play golf, but it is littered with social events, you have a dance, you have big picnics, people come with their picnic baskets. It’s like a homecoming. So that served as a sort of community reunion.

BRINSON: About how many people come to that?

ESTERS: Oh it’s, as I said three hundred plus.

BRINSON: And you said people come from all over?

ESTERS: Uh huh.

BRINSON: Outside of Kentucky?

ESTERS: Right, uh huh.

BRINSON: Okay. Do you remember, just off hand the furthest distance that somebody might come?

ESTERS: At times they come from California.

BRINSON: Oh?

ESTERS: Yeah.

BRINSON: So a lot of people have moved far away.

ESTERS: Right. A lot of Bowling Green folk are just about everywhere. They have moved everywhere. Of course, they concentrated with Indianapolis and Chicago, those two places, that people from Bowling Green moved.

BRINSON: Why those two cities?

ESTERS: Have relatives that moved there--Indianapolis, Chicago. You tend to move where your relative is; where you can have somebody to stay with until you find a job. And once you found a job, then you could, you know, set your own place up. And then, you know, cousins will say, you might visit them for the summer, and say, you can get a job here. You don’t have to wash windows the rest of your life, you know. So, you tend to move where someone else has paved the way and where you can have some place to stay until you could get situated.

BRINSON: Okay. Do blacks ever move back to Bowling Green?

ESTERS: Once they have retired, I find them moving back. Once they have retired, you find some moving back to Bowling Green. And I find that throughout the South, a lot of blacks are leaving the South; once they retire to go back to their home community because there is less crime, there’s a friendlier atmosphere. It’s a place that you grew up in and you still have friends there. So, if you live to retire, many blacks are moving back to their roots.

BRINSON: Do they ever come back to help take care of older parents?

ESTERS: Yes, sometimes they do, if their parents are still living.

BRINSON: Well, I think I’ve come to the end of my questions. I may have some more after I leave here and think about it.

ESTERS: Sure.

BRINSON: But I wonder if there is anything else, that we’ve talked about or we haven’t talked about that you want to add to the interview?

ESTERS: I can’t think of anything right now.

BRINSON: You may think of it when we leave, too.

ESTERS: Right.

BRINSON: Okay, thank...

ESTERS: Other than the community as a whole, right now is very prosperous; and as I said in, compared to Hopkinsville, Hopkinsville has not reached the point where Bowling Green is. And we find more of a challenge there in Hopkinsville in helping people. That’s what we’ve been doing all of our adult lives, is helping people. And we find a greater need in Hopkinsville than in Bowling Green. Hopkinsville doesn’t have the jobs, it doesn’t have the influence. It doesn’t have affluence. It doesn’t have the family structure that Bowling Green has. But in Hopkinsville, in the black community, the black family has disintegrated. And we find a, you know, greater need in the Hopkinsville community than in Bowling Green.

BRINSON: I know you majored in history in college. I wonder, do you still have any interest in history today?

ESTERS: Yes, I love to read up on history and go back in history and review history; because it has truth that has been lost. It’s just like, the Black Muslim movement, you can look at the different black movements and see the falsity of it, because you know history. And you can hear how people have been misled because you know the real history of it. And I think history has been re-written to be politically correct today, that has really, that are really leading people in the wrong direction; and giving life a lie, rather than restoring the truth.

BRINSON: Can you give me an example of what you mean by that?

ESTERS: Just in any respect?

BRINSON: Right.

ESTERS: Well, you take in the Black Muslim movement, it is saying the white man perpetuated slavery, but slavery was not perpetuated by any race of people. We find that slavery was an institution throughout history and it was something normal that both blacks and whites participated in. And if you really dig down in history, you find that it was the Muslims that were the middle men in the history of slavery. They bought and sold, or either captured and sold the Africans to those that were dealing with slavery. Racism is a new phenomenon. Racism has not been ingrained in history. It only came about, or was perpetuated by, as you go back in the history, with Darwin. So it is a new phenomenon. Whereas the average person feels like slavery has always existed, has always been white against black, but that is not true historically. In America, slavery came about after your first blacks were here. It did not begin....Blacks were not slaves when they first came here, they were indentured servants. Racism really did not get started, you could say, until after the Civil War you know with--and Jim Crowism didn’t start until the early nineteen hundreds. But we have a feeling that there was always laws, you know, separating blacks and whites, but that just started during the nineteen hundreds. So when you know history, you can really shed truth on life.

BRINSON: Do you have any optimism that we’ll see a better society in terms of race relations?

ESTERS: Yes. I see us, as things will get better rather than worse. But I think we’re going through a birthing stage. And wherever there is new birth, there is pain. But I see, as I see inter-racial marriages, which are becoming numerous today. You have kids that really are rainbow colors. And we go back, you know, to the beginning of time. If you look at the Bible, really you had blacks and whites, that saw no difference in race. Moses married a black woman. And you find in the book of Acts, the first disciples were black and whites, they were mixed up. And they really saw no color. And history does repeat itself. If you know history, you know it repeats itself. So, I see the kids being born that are rainbow colors. I find generations breaking down the thinking of inferiority, where they are now beginning to see, you know, people as being the same. But you’re going to have to have some pain in going through that.

BRINSON: Okay, thank you very much.

ESTERS: Sure. Thank you very much.

END OF INTERVIEW