Oral History Interview with George Logan, March 14, 2001

BETSY BRINSON: This is an interview with George Logan. The interview takes place at his residence in Lexington, Kentucky, and the interviewer is Betsy Brinson.

BRINSON: Need to get a voice level here, Mr. Logan, so give me your full name please.

GEORGE LOGAN: My full name is George Leslie Logan.

BRINSON: Okay . . .

LOGAN: I paused on that because everything you seen me signing is always George L. Logan . . .

BRINSON: Okay . . .

LOGAN: I do not like Leslie.

BRINSON: Well, thank you very much for agreeing to talk with me today, Mr. Logan. Let's start if we would with a little biographical background about you. For example, where and when were you born?

LOGAN: I was born in Lincoln County in the town of Stanford, Kentucky, February 27, 1929.

BRINSON: And that makes you how old?

LOGAN: I'm seventy-two now, in 2001.

BRINSON: Tell me a little bit about your family.

LOGAN: Well, my family, uh, my father's name was James Logan and my mother's name was Mary Woodford Logan. Ah, they were, I guess you would call, a middle class family in the town of Stanford. He was a truck driver for a milling company . . .

BRINSON: A what kind of company?

LOGAN: A milling company. They made flour and meal and feed. And his job was deliver it to the stores throughout eastern Kentucky. And for most of his life--and then later he was able to get trucks and he began a little trucking firm. And he was delivering--he drove. One truck was stock, was for livestock for the farmers down to Knoxville Stockyard for sales. And then later, we got another truck. We hauled feed from Cincinnati, Southern States to Southern States, in that area. And then, when . . .

BRINSON: Did your mother work outside the home?

LOGAN: Yeah. My mother was a . . . worked outside the home. She worked as a dietician in the local hospital for years.

BRINSON: At that point, was there a black hospital in Stanford?

LOGAN: No.

BRINSON: She did that as part of the white hospital?

LOGAN: She did that part of the white hospital. And . . . our town was sort of, it was segregated in one way and in another way it wasn't. Yes, you realized it but opportunities . . . we went to separate schools but the schools were back to back. We had recess at the same period. We'd come out and we'd have friends in the white school. We would play ball, softball, football, basketball, and then when the bell rings, we'd say, "Bye, see you after school." And, go in our own directions and when school was out, you meet your friends and you'd walk home. And, it was a very, I guess, it was a unique situation; everybody knew everybody and we played together and different other things. It was just according to your relationships in the various community. If you had the money, you could go into the drugstore and order what you wanted; and if you had the money, you could, if you wanted a soda you could get up on the stool and drink your soda just like anybody else. But there was one or two sit-down restaurants that they didn't want you in to sit down and eat. They wanted to take you in the kitchen and feed you but they didn't get no business.

BRINSON: Do you remember the names of those restaurants?

LOGAN: Yes, but . . .

BRINSON: You don't want to . . .

LOGAN: Well, one of them. I'd hate to do it because me and the guy's son, we grew up together and we're good friends even today and I just don't think it would be right to bring in him.

BRINSON: Did you have any brothers and sisters?

LOGAN: Yes, I have four brothers and--three brothers rather, I'm the four [laughing]--and four sisters. It was eight of us.

BRINSON: And where do you fall in . . . .?

LOGAN: I'm the second. I have a one older brother and I'm second in line, I'm next. And then all the other six are below me. Now I just lost in October, the baby brother . . .

BRINSON: Oh, I'm sorry.

LOGAN: And so, now there's seven of us.

BRINSON: What do you know about your ancestors?

LOGAN: My ancestors, they were, uh, farmers . . .

BRINSON: In Kentucky?

LOGAN: In Kentucky. And, uh, they, uh, on my grandfather's side at an early age, he married, well it was the, a part, he was an Indian . . . and this is something I have to do some more investigation on. Uh, I think at that time I think that was the convenient to say. But Aunt Mariah, I remember very well, she was, had very long coal-black hair, high cheekbones, and she favored an Indian quite a bit. But there was another family there in town that was very close related to her and they were some of the well-to-do families of the town and . . .

BRINSON: Do you know, does your family date back to slavery in Kentucky?

LOGAN: No. Uh, they were . . . they do but I haven't been able to find out. I've checked out several places that . . . I, uh, my father, we had traced him back to Missouri, grandfather rather. So there is where we kind of pick up, in Missouri, and . . .

BRINSON: And how about on your mother's side?

LOGAN: On my mother's side, we think that he came from Boyle County, Casey County, in that area.

BRINSON: Boyle and Casey . . .

LOGAN: Casey County. He was raised in Casey and then he, his mother later moved to Boyle County, and then he came to Lincoln County and that's when he met my grandmother, the Woodfords. And they lived in Rowland, at that time, it's called Rowland, Kentucky, and the home place is still out there.

BRINSON: Is that R-o-w-l-a-n-d?

LOGAN: Yes, it just about a mile from Stanford going South on [route] one fifty.

BRINSON: Stanford, is that Lincoln County?

LOGAN: Yes, that's Lincoln County.

BRINSON: Why is it called Lincoln County, do you know? Is ( ) through there?

LOGAN: It's one of the first counties in Kentucky. When the, uh, Virginia decided to divide the Commonwealth up, to Virginia, they divided it up into Lincoln, Fayette, and Jefferson County. And so those was three, Lincoln was the largest of the three, and that's, uh, it became known as . . . and Stanford, it was know, you know, from Colonel Benjamin Logan. His fort, that was . . . it has been mistaken several times in history--but they say Harrodsburg was the first permanent fort in Kentucky but--and they got signs up saying that Kentucky, uh, Stanford is the second--but actually it was the first, if you read history. James Harrod stopped in Fort Logan to get directions.

BRINSON: Now Fort Logan, is that any relationship to you?

LOGAN: There has been some indications in history about that. You know, there's a procedure that most of the times they named their slaves after the owners. There was a great deal of . . . Benjamin, Colonel Benjamin Logan had several brothers and nephews that came with him, and then there were some free slaves that came with him and they established that fort. And after several of the battles and so forth, you know, the Indians, it was a very unique fort. It was built on sort of like a hill like, it had an underground tunnel to go get water and that was the reason the Indians could never take it. And because they couldn't take the fort, they called it Standing Fort. And later they dropped the 'd’ and then put the standing and the fort together and called it Stanford. See, it was named St. ( ) Creek before it became know as Standing Fort.

BRINSON: Now do you have any reason to think that maybe your family's ancestors were among the free blacks who were a part of all that?

LOGAN: No, I have no indication. Uh, I've read several things about it. And there are some indications that--and I--that refers in some books that was in the libraries, that someway there was some descendents of Indians that were associated with Pocahontas and that area; but I never could find enough information to prove it, just a couple of statements. And me being in education and in the State Department and working so much for thirty years, I never did get the time to really go back and research that, and that's what I've been working on. I am researching all of that material and trying to find out what is true and what is--I've been so shocked each time I look into things, I find something so much different that what is normally written. And that really bothers me in a lot of cases, because later I will explain to you. I've spent most of life with publishing companies and with people that deals with textbooks, trying to convince them to write the truth. Write everything down when you study so that kids can learn to appreciate themselves and they don't have to go on a witch hunt to find out what's bothering them.

BRINSON: Let's go back, though, to your early education, what was the name of the school that you attended?

LOGAN: Lincoln High School.

BRINSON: Lincoln High School?

LOGAN: Yeah. I guess it did, it integrated with Lincoln County High School, oh, . . .

BRINSON: But you graduated . . . .

LOGAN: No, when I graduated it was Lincoln High School.

BRINSON: What year did you graduate?

LOGAN: In 1947. I left there in 1947. There was a unique school. I think the graduates of Lincoln County High School more of them attended and finished college than any school in the state of Kentucky ( ).

BRINSON: How many in your graduating class, for example?

LOGAN: For example, there was thirteen in my graduating class, seven of us went to college. All seven graduated, some of them . . . um, yeah, some of them are still operating pretty good.

BRINSON: So when you graduated in 1947, what happened then for you?

LOGAN: I took a college basketball scholarship and went to--and worked; because in those days you didn't get a full scholarship, not in Kentucky. I went to Kentucky State Univer . . . College then, later it was called a university. And I played basketball during the basketball season and I played football a couple of seasons. And then the coaches decided if you played in one sport, you couldn't play both. And so then, the next season you took a job on the campus. They would let you sweep the streets, or go get the mail, or work in the dormitory, or the cafeteria but you had to work to keep your scholarship. So I worked in the cafeteria cutting meat on my off semesters. And then during basketball season, I played basketball until my junior, no, my senior year; and I decided it was taking away from my studies and I just took a job in the cafeteria full-time and continued with my studies.

BRINSON: What did you major in?

LOGAN: I majored in history and government, sociology and economics. I had two majors. See, I had a history and government major and then I had a sociology and economic major.

BRINSON: That's quiet a load.

LOGAN: [Laughing] It was. Most of the time I took eighteen hours a semester and I . . . but it was something I wanted to do. It was something interesting because I had, I think, some of the best instructors that you could possibly have. They was so interesting, they made you want to go and do research yourself.

BRINSON: Was Dr. Chaney there?

LOGAN: Yes, Dr. Chaney was one of my favorite teachers. I took United States history and so forth under Dr. Chaney. I took all of my government under . . . who was Registrar at the time, Dr. Bradford, Dr. David Bradford, photographic memory, he could quote you the whole ( ) Constitutional Law book without even looking at and wouldn't miss a word. He would let you read the Constitution to him and he'd be looking out the window but if you mistake one word, if you said "a" for "two" he would stop you.

BRINSON: Tell me at what point in your growing up that you recognized that you were growing up in a segregated society?

LOGAN: Well, I recognized it very early but it wasn't to my--I guess my great eye-opener was one day I came to Lexington. I was about twelve, thirteen years old. I was with my father, and he was going to pick up some feed in Cincinnati; and I was going to do some shopping and catch the Greyhound Bus back. And what really shocked me, I knew it was segregated but after doing my shopping and I went to the bus station, I went to go into the front door of the bus station to buy a ticket. And the clerk in there says, “Get out.” Said, “You can't buy nothing in here.” Said, “You have to go around the building. Do you see that little room back there and that little door, window? When you get in there, knock on that window and I'll raise it up and I'll sell you your ticket.” And I proceeded to go around the building and I went in the room, and, I don't know, something just said to me, "This is not worth it." So I turned around and went out. I didn't ask for a ticket. I walked out, walked way out Limestone Street, and I started hitching a ride to go out twenty-seven. And I did . . . the bus came and passed me, right, and I didn't get home until about eight thirty that night. And my father had gotten home with the truck, and I hadn't gotten home so he was very worried. He had called over there and asked my, some of his relatives had they seen me? Was I there or something? And while they was in the process of looking for me, I showed up and I explained to them what happened. And then I, well I got lectured, and I got my tail-end whopped. Not for what I did but for not obeying and catching the bus and coming home. And he told me, he says, “Now you're going to have to live in this world and you're going to have to adjust so you just might as well now learn to make the necessary adjustments." He said, "I'm not telling you that you're no better than nobody else or that you're worse off than nobody else and that's something I don't want you to ever think. Whatever anybody else can do, you can do. But you must remember that at certain times you going to have to take the low road.”

BRINSON: Is that bus station still here today?

LOGAN: No, it's torn down. It was on Short Street right next to the, I think, the church of there made a cafeteria and stuff out of it. They . . . it's right there on Esterly and Short, right up by Bank One, right up beside it. That's where it was.

BRINSON: So you finished Kentucky State in what year, do you remember?

LOGAN: I finished in June of 1951, and then the war was going on . . .

BRINSON: Korea?

LOGAN: Korea. And I had received papers to go in . . .

BRINSON: To be drafted?

LOGAN: That said I was going to be drafted. And so I had already been approved to go, because Dr. Lyman Johnson had won the suit, to where we could attend in the daytime--the University of Kentucky. And him and Walker, this fellow that won the lawsuit, that also he wanted to go to lawyers' school; and so the three of us were enrolled to go the University of Kentucky in September, I guess it was September 21—or something like that--1951.

BRINSON: Now did the three of you know each other?

LOGAN: Yeah, we knew . . . I didn't know Dr. Johnson as well, I knew him by sight and I'd holler at him or something like that; but he was much older than the other two of us. But we were in college together, the other two. And so . . .

BRINSON: Okay, so give me their names again one more time so I'll know I'm spelling them correctly. Walker?

LOGAN: Yeah, I'm trying to think of his first name. But he went to the School of Law. And myself, I went to the School of Education and History and Government Graduate School. And those were the only three that I know was there at that particular time. Later there was some others that came. Uh, my first day, is what I explained . . .

BRINSON: Well, I'd like for you to tell me that story again if you would, so that we would have it on the tape.

LOGAN: I was . . . received a deferment from going, once I enrolled. The Chairman of the Draftee Board in Lincoln County--which I knew him very well--and he told me that as long as he had people to fill the quota for not for me to worry; for me to just go ahead and get my education. And so, I enrolled at UK. And my first day after, that's when it became very prevalent to me that this was going to be quite rough. I walked into the classroom where I thought I could easily hear the professor. It was about in the middle of the class, wasn't nobody there when I went in; and I took a seat. And when the other people came in, they saw me--nobody took a seat. They just start lining up, going around the wall. I guess about twenty-eight people were in the room, standing up; and in walks this other gentleman and he came straight up to me and he introduced himself and he says, "My name is Jess Gardner."

BRINSON: Jess Gardner?

LOGAN: Uh-huh. Says "I'm from Bardstown." Not Bardstown, uh, I don't remember . . . "Abraham Lincoln was born in Hodgenville and I'm from Hodgenville, Kentucky, and do you mind if I sit down?" And I said, "No, Jess, very happy that you would want to sit down." And he was telling me that, said that, “He doesn't why these people are acting this way.” But says that, “( ) with Negroes.” At that time, you wasn't blacks, you were Negroes—“They saved my life when I was in World War II.” He says, "I got shells and things in my legs now and they drug me out of the tank and we worked together everyday, you know." But when the bell rang, they was still huddled around the wall and they had increased to thirty-eight of them ‘cause this room held forty people. And so Dr. Thomas Clark came in, this was the first time I'd ever met him; and I felt sorry for him ‘cause he came in and he looked and he just turned, he turned red as a tomato and spun around and went back out the door. I said, “Oh,” I said to myself, “Oh my goodness.” He stayed out there about three minutes and got his composure and he said, "There's students, there's forty seats in here, and I got forty students. Now you either take seat and we'll have class or file out of here. One of the two." And so everybody grumbled and they gradually got in their seats and he went on with class. The next morning, I went back to class about the same time and this time everybody had gotten to class before me, and they had taken the seat that I had sat in the day before and they had put a rope around it and they had put a little sign on it that said, "For colored only". Now that day, I didn't sit down. I stood up. And so when Dr. Clark came in and he saw the seat and he saw me standing up, he was furious and he said, "Logan, would you please leave the room. Now, you're present and I don't want you to think I'm doing this but these people need to be talked to and what I've got to say, I don't think you want to hear."

END OF TAPE ONE SIDE ONE

BEGIN TAPE ONE SIDE TWO

LOGAN: And so, uh, so he says, “Go over to the student union and have a cup of coffee and come back to class tomorrow.” And I said, “Okay.” And so I never found out what he said to them. I didn't ask nobody because it just wasn't my business. Uh, but, after that, I never had anymore problems about seating. Uh, when I go back in I, my chair was sitting there and I take the normal seat that I normally had and we'd have class. I was the type of person--I never did--when he asked questions or something I wouldn't answer unless he called on me, or else nobody else in the room would answer; then I would raise my hand and answer the question because that was one of the things that I felt like I was way head of them because going to Kentucky State and had Dr. Chaney and Dr. Smith and Dr. Breathitt in those history classes. I knew there was nothing they could ask that I didn't know in that particular . . .

BRINSON: Let me ask you about the forty students. Were they a mixed group in terms of male and female?

LOGAN: Yes.

BRINSON: Okay, so it was both women and men?

LOGAN: Women and men, uh-hum. And so--but there was just a little coolness, but after a while we would discuss something every once and a while. But then when it came time for the first test, and you know how they give out the little blue books and those things; and it was two hours long. Well, Dr. Clark always reached inside his suit pocket and tore open an envelope and he had five essay questions he would write on the board. And he didn't believe in objective tests, write fill in the blank or nothing like that, like true and false, you had to write for him. And so the first time they had one, um, I guess I stayed in there--it was a two hour test--I guess it was about forty-five, maybe an hour, you know, I just signed the book and turned it in and left. They laughed. I guess they thought I didn't know what I was doing. And I went on to work, you know. About a week later, he gave out the papers and he put the scale up on the board. And so he told them, he says, “I'm very sorry about some of you failed and you're failing.” He said, "That test I gave, the highest score you could make was 120, the highest score we have on the test is 119 and I should have gave him 120 but he misspelled Magellan so therefore I gave, I took a half a point, a point off rather, and then the next closest score to that was 91." And he said, "The rest of you failed."

BRINSON: And you were the . . .

LOGAN: I had the 119 and Jess had the 91 and the rest of them failed. So after that, they wanted to know when I had time to study with them? Could I study with them? And I told them, “Look, I would love to but I have to make a living.” I said, “I work from three to eleven o'clock at the Good Samaritan Hospital as an orderly.” And I says, If you study with me you have to walk through the halls and read the books and answer questions from one call to the next; going in one room, out of the next room.” And I says, “I don't think you want to do that from three to eleven o'clock.” I said, “Some nights I don't get to look at the book ‘cause it's busy nights, especially on weekends.” They said, “Well can we meet after class? You've got an hour's wait and over in the student union, we can discuss some things.” I said, “If I have time.” But I said, “I've got an English class to go to and then I got United States civil war history under Dr. English, and modern European history under Dr. Cross, and I've got to attend those, too.” And I says, “That when I first came here, if I go get a cup of coffee in the student union building and you were sitting there at the table or in a chair, all of you would get up and leave.” And I says, “But I'm not holding that against you, but I just don't really have time.” And so it wasn't too long after they . . . but I didn't have any trouble after that in those classes but other problems ( ). I was forced to buy a student athletic ticket, and I.D. card so you can go to basketball games there.

BRINSON: But you didn't have to time to go to basketball games did you?

LOGAN: I went, I tried to go one game. I was put out.

BRINSON: Tell me about that, please.

LOGAN: They was saying, “You can't come in.” I said, "But I've got a student athletic ticket." They said, “We don't care, you're not wanted.” And so I left. The next day I was the first person at the President's Office in Patterson Hall, telling him, “You're going to give me my money back. I paid $26.50 for that ticket, for the I.D. card, and they said I couldn't come to school unless I bought it.” And I said, "Somebody's going to give me my money back. Today!" And so they argued with me for a while, and I guess I got loud; and they send a Judge Bart Peak up to talk to me. He was the director of they YMCA on campus.

BRINSON: And tell me his name again, please.

LOGAN: Judge Bart Peak.

BRINSON: B-a-r . . .

LOGAN: T. Peak, P-e-a-k. And Judge Peak talked me to me, and he said, “You go on to class, shut up, and let me do this.” He says, “Come to my office this afternoon and I'll tell you the progress of this. But you need somebody to mediate for you, you don't need to be in this.” And I said, "Well, Judge, I don't have nobody else to mediate with me. It's me." And he said, "I'll take care of it." And I, you know, he said, "Didn't I get you a job?" He was the one that got the job at UK, I mean at the Good Samaritan Hospital for me. I said, “Yes.” And he said, "Didn't I tell you to come to me with you troubles?" I said, “Yes.” He said, "Well, let handle it." I said, “Okay.” I don't know what he settled with the university or not, but when I came to his office that afternoon, I got $26.50. I don't know whether it was his money or the university gave it back, or what. But I know one thing, I never attempted or ever went to another UK basketball game until 1975, or 1974. Then I didn't pay for it because when Dickey Beal, Sam Bowie, and Jack Givens and that bunch, they used to come out here with my daughters, and we'd feed them at different--Thanksgivings and different things, a ( ) was ( ). And they would take their tickets and give them to my daughters and just beg me to come to a game. I went down there one time. And I told them, “Thank you, from then on, I don't want your tickets, give them to somebody else. It's just too hard for me to bear sometimes.” And then when they started to open up tickets to buy, where blacks could buy them, I bought a set of tickets from the university and I kept them that first year. No, I didn't even keep them that whole season because the first two games I went to, they had some very ignorant people from Eastern Kentucky and they called the black students that were playing ball out of their names. They had no regard for me and my wife sitting there at all. And I asked them, I said, "Would you refrain from doing that while we are here please?" And they . . . "You go to you know where." So I went to the Athletic Director Department, “Would they move my seats?” I said, “If you don't, I'm going to jail, and we're going to have a funeral.” And he said, “I'll move them, I'll talk to them.” That's what he said. Well, the next game it was the same thing. Then a buddy of mine said, "I wish I could get some tickets. You're lucky." I said here, “You've got some, just pay me the balance of what I got and they're yours.”

BRINSON: That was about when?

LOGAN: That was about seventy-two, about seventy-three, seventy-four. That's when Sam Bowie and Lee and Givens and that bunch was there.

BRINSON: So have you ever been back again?

LOGAN: No.

BRINSON: So you're not a basketball fan?

LOGAN: I'm a basketball fan, but ( ) but to go down to Rupp Arena to look at a basketball game, no thanks. Now tomorrow, when twelve o'clock come, I'll look at it.

BRINSON: [Laughing] Tomorrow starts the championship, right?

LOGAN: Yeah. It's a different atmosphere now to a certain extent. But I just basically--I have some feelings that, when I walk in there that I don't have in my own living room; and I have nothing against that team because they were not responsible and I'm an avid fan of the team.

BRINSON: And now they even have a black coach in Tubby Smith?

LOGAN: Yeah, I said, there's no reason for it. It's an inner feeling and something that . . . I have no hard feelings about it but there is something that nobody can't tell you that it doesn't bring about some unforgivable memories, you know.

BRINSON: Was Rupp Arena there during all of that for you?

LOGAN: No. When I first attempted to go, it was in Memorial Coliseum. See, Rupp didn't come about until what, seventy-four, seventy-five? And see, it's been twenty-five years since Rupp has been open.

BRINSON: So you finished UK and you did a Master's degree?

LOGAN: Yeah, I did a Master's degree but I never did go to get up or march. I got the transcripts and you're eligible to graduate and at that time my parole, not, the local board in Stanford said, “You must, you've got thirty days to make up your mind whether you are going to volunteer for a branch of service or if you do, call me and let me know ‘cause”--Mr. Watson was his name, he's dead now, he was a very good friend of my father. And he said, “If you do, call me and let me know. If you don't, I'll send you a letter and tell you when to report to Louisville to go into the service.” And so, I volunteered for the Air Force, and I called him up and told him that I volunteered for the Air Force and I'm on my way to Lackland Air Force Base.

BRINSON: Lackland, is that . . .

LOGAN: San Antoine, Texas. And I met a good friend on the way down [laughing] we're still good friends, which at that time I didn't know him. After we got into Atlanta and we got on the plane going to San Antoine, he told me he was joining the Air Force, too. His name was Alex Hall and he was a white young man, six-four.

BRINSON: And what was his first name again?

LOGAN: Alex.

BRINSON: Alex Hall?

LOGAN: Alex Hall and he's from Newton, Mississippi, and his father taught at Old Miss. I don't know whether he said Mississippi or Old Miss, I think it's Old Miss, taught. And we got to talking and he was a junior in college at that time so we got to be very good friends. And when we got to base, they put me in charge of one group of fellows and they put him in charge of the other group of fellows and we were both what we call squadron leaders, in different squadrons, and we competed against each other. And we had a lot of fun and we became very close friends. I saw him last year. But . . .

BRINSON: But you ended up in the Philippines?

LOGAN: I ended up in the Philippines. And I got to the . . . see, it was thirteen, sixteen. . . see, we had fifteen, sixteen weeks of basic training, seven weeks of Tech school. I got to the Philippines right in the middle of hurricane season, I guess it was. When I got there--I met--I put in a ( ), Dr. Krause, he was my European history teacher at UK here, he called me and told me that when I got there to--got to the University of Philippines and to apply for instructorship. Said that he had recommended me through the State Department to teach modern European history.

BRINSON: And you could do that even though you were in the military?

LOGAN: Yes.

BRINSON: Hum, okay.

LOGAN: Just as long as you did it after duties. So I taught at the University of Philippines in the afternoon and night classes. And sometimes on Saturday morning, I would catch a bus and go down and teach all day on Saturday. But a lot of the . . . I taught also on the base in the evening for a lot of the kids that were going to the University of Philippines and they could get college credits on the base for the Americans and well as the Philippinos. I did that for four years over there.

BRINSON: So that was your only assignment in the military was to the Philippines?

LOGAN: No. I went to, in 1954--April 1954--I was shipped at two o'clock in the morning to Saigon. We were advisors to the French when the French were fighting. And we was suppose to advise them on how to use the B-26 Air Force airplane, and how to do various things in camp, and use the ammunition properly and so forth. And I had a squadron of twenty-five men and we left about two in the morning. I was waken up in the morning, and got on the plane; and we were told not to open our orders until we got in the air. And I saw that on there and I said, "Oh, where in the hell is this." And we got to looking on the map, and I said, "Uh-oh, boys, we in trouble now." And when we landed, it wasn't two hours after we got the stuff off of the airplane and got ready to go to sleep; we was awaken by gunfire and tracers going through our tents and setting them on fire. And we was instructed not to shoot back. They said the French was there to protect us. Not to shoot because we would have violated a treaty if we did. And so, we'd just hide every night and get up under . . . we couldn't sleep in our bunks. We get up under the bunks, And then we'd teach them during the day how to start the B-26's, how to put the ammunition, the fifty-caliber rounds, how to put the bombs on the wings, different things so they could fight.

BRINSON: How integrated was the Air Force at the point that you were with them?

LOGAN: Oh, it was integrated, completely integrated. We were integrated at that particular time because, see Truman wrote the orders for the integration of the military service and I did have a letter right here. When I was in a history class I wrote to him and asked him why? How did he feel about it?

BRINSON: How did he feel about integrating?

LOGAN: Uh-huh.

BRINSON: Did you ever hear from him?

LOGAN: Yes.

BRINSON: You did?

LOGAN: And, uh, he wrote that he felt that this was the thing to do. Uh, that if they were going to be efficient, a fighting force, and that they were going to be absolute necessary so he had no reservation whatsoever.

BRINSON: So you had written to him while you were a student of history, for a course?

LOGAN: Yeah.

BRINSON: I see. So what happened to you, Mr. Logan, after your military experience was over?

LOGAN: Well, I came back. Completely after I was discharged?

BRINSON: Uh-hum.

LOGAN: I came back to, to Kentucky. And I had gotten a job to--in Detroit. I was going to a sales representative for Remington typewriters and I was going to sell Disney's products to the Big Three in Detroit; General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler. And I started that particular job and I really liked it and my mother told me, she says, "You've been gone most of your life and we'd like to see you around here, to be close." And I said, "Well, there's no jobs." And she said, "I heard that they were hiring teachers in Fayette County." And I said, "Mother," I says, "They got a list, a whole file cabinet full of people that want to teach in Fayette County." And I said, "I don't have no chance but if you want me to do it, I'll go do it." So this was in about August--first of August or the last of July in fifty-seven. And I came over and I wasn't going to make it easy. I grew a beard, I had all of my hair cut off, was bald-headed. And I came over and signed up and went and had an interview with the Superintendent, and so I couldn't . . . He says, "Well, leave your application. I don't have time to interview you today. I'll get back with you." I said, "Well, I'm leaving Monday and if I don't have an interview by Monday at noon, forget it because I have to go back to work." He said, “Okay.” And so I went on to Cincinnati to a jazz festival they was having up there. Then my mother called me at the hotel and says, "Mr. Ridgeway says he wants to interview you at ten o'clock Monday morning." I said, "Okay, I'll be there." So I went to the interview at ten and he says, "I talked to some of the other teachers and they remember you from doing your practice teaching here and they thought that you were a very influential young man, and think that you could do what we want done; and you certainly qualify. And I said, "Well what are you going to pay us?" And when he told me the salary, I said "No way." And so we argued around there for a day, around for about an hour and he said, "Well, I'll tell you what. This is the best I can do." He said, "I'll give you four thousand, seven hundred and seventy-five dollars a year, and if you work the summer months, you work four out of five summers, I'll add a hundred and twenty-five to it a month but that's all you're going to get" So I said, "Well, I'll let you know. " And I said, "By the way, what would I teach?" And he says, "Core." I said, "You mean English, math, and social studies? He said, "Yeah." I said, "No." I said, "That's seventh grade and I don't want to be bothered with seventh graders.” And I says, "If you go to the high school, let me teach social studies there, history, United States history, sociology, citizenship, things of that nature." Then he says, "I don't have any vacancies." Then I said, "Well then, I'm going back to Detroit." So he says, "Let me think about it." He went and got up and went and talked to somebody else and he come back and he says, "Can you teach drivers' education?" And I says, "Probably can." I said, "But I don't have a certification for it." And he says, "Well, there is--I've checked--there is a certification course going on at UK in two weeks." And said, "You can have that completed and you'll be ready to go, and I'll let you teach citizenship, world civilization, and drivers' ed at the high school, at Dunbar." I said . . .

BRINSON: Was Dunbar still an all-black school in fifty-seven?

LOGAN: Uh-huh, and . . . .well, it wasn't, I wouldn't call it an all-black. There was about three white students and four white teachers at that time. At that time, Dunbar was what we call a school of choice. You could go to it if you lived in the neighborhood and you wanted to go and Henry Clay was the same way. And they had, I think to my recollection, they had opened the schools up in seventy-five I believe it was, or seventy-four, something like that.

BRINSON: Well, you mean 'fifty-four . . .

LOGAN: Yeah . . .

BRINSON: After the '54 Brown Decision . . .

LOGAN: Yeah, fifty-four that’s when it happened, but they didn't get everything settled here until about fifty-six.

END OF TAPE ONE SIDE TWO

BEGIN TAPE TWO SIDE ONE

BRINSON: Your recollection of the Fayette County School integration, so you think that that the choice option started after fifty-six or so after the Brown Decision?

LOGAN: Uh-huh.

BRINSON: And did they go to busing at some point as another . . .

LOGAN: Yeah. It was in the later part of iffty-seven or fifty-eight they did busing. They divided the city like a big pie and they put elementary schools and--there were only four high schools and that was on the outer edge of the pie--and the kids in that slice had to go to that high school. And the elementary and middle schools was in that pie also. And it worked fairly decent.

BRINSON: And when they went to that system, what was sort of the ratio of white to black students in most of the schools?

LOGAN: It was suppose to have been, I think it started out it was started out it was supposed to have been fifteen to . . . ten, fifteen to twenty percent and I think it ran about fifteen to seventeen percent in most cases.

BRINSON: Were black students?

LOGAN: Were black students. Now at, at Dunbar, it was more the other way around. It was about eighty to about thirteen to fourteen percent white. It was not until sixty-eight, uh, they did away with Dunbar. It was sixty-eight--June of sixty-eight ‘cause that's when they closed it. And all the kids out of Dunbar then had to be shipped, bussed to the other three high schools.

BRINSON: Did they close it just because it was a deteriorating facility or . . .

LOGAN: No, they said that they, uh, the school population was down and they just wanted it closed; and it would be less expensive ‘cause they had built new schools out and it was a school board decision from . . . under my understanding. Basically, I always thought they were trying to get rid of the stigma that they was an all-black school, and that this school had had so many honors and so many things; and it was defeating them in everything they had ever hoped for. If they had a basketball tournament, the blacks beat whites, if they had a football tournament, the blacks beat white. It wasn’t just feasible for them to keep it. But they did say when the people did object, they said the very next high school we build, we will name it Dunbar. So when they built that last high school there on Man O'War, that's the reason they call it Paul Lawrence Dunbar High School.

BRINSON: Where was the old school located and is it still there?

LOGAN: On Upper Street. The only part, the part of the gym . . . and the gymnasium is all that is left besides the columns that has the name Dunbar on the front. They still left, they left that. It's on Upper Street, North Upper Street between Fifth and Sixth Street.

BRINSON: I think I know where it is.

LOGAN: And that's where the Parks Department is—they’re in that building and it's a recreation . . . they use that gym for community recreation and basketball for the kids; and the old folks have the care center there, and there is a small museum of all the trophies and awards and things that the old school had and it serves a fairly decent purpose.

BRINSON: Tell me how it was that you went to the State Department of Education.

LOGAN: Well, when I took the job of being a drivers' ed teacher, I never was quite satisfied with the certifications. Although it was real funny, the person that sat down beside me the first day I went to school when I came back from the service, and I went to the university to take that drivers' ed course for certification; guess who taught it? He was Dr. Jess Gardner. [Laughter] We, the first day I walked in, we had a big time. We laughed at each other, hadn't seen each other since . . . for a long time. And then he started class and then he told me, says, "Look, I've got to go to Philadelphia to a conference and I don't have anybody to teach this class." And I said, "Well, Jess, I just got here." And he says, "I know but all this stuff that you been in the service and I know this, and what you can do before you left me I know you know this because you've been driving trucks all your life." And I said, "Yeah." And he says, "Well, I going to give you the outline, I'm going to give you the books, and you just teach it. I'll be gone four days, you teach this four days and when I come back, we'll assess everything and see what you left out and everything." I said, "Okay, I'll do that for you." So I ended up teaching the class for those four days. And we had a very interesting time.” And Jess and myself have had a real interesting relationship every since. And he retired about two years ago and he still lives on, see out in St. Margaret. I have talked to him for a while ‘cause his kids went to Western the same time mine did. And, but, I went from there and I became interested in it. And the federal government was interested in having some training--some people to be able to administrate a new program they were going to put called Driving Traffic Safety Supervisors, Directors of the State. And so, I volunteered to go to that school and I was accepted at the University of Indiana and went one summer. And I went up and spent, um, I believe it was twelve weeks. And we had classes all day long, eight hours and sometimes twenty hours every day, on drivers traffic safety education; every aspect you could possibly think of. And then we all received--and I happened to be the only black person in that group, there were two women and myself--and we--most of us are real good friends today when I see them, because we all belong to the same organization for so many years. But they had, there was sixteen of us, and when they started the programs in 1957, I mean in 1967, they asked those people who were qualified under that program, they were entitled to run a state program. Now Kentucky Department of Education wanted the money, they applied to the federal government to get the money to start the program, but they had no person qualified. And they kept, they asked the Physical Education Supervisor that was in the state department, the superintendent of Kentucky was telling him, "You write the program into and he'll get it okayed." But the highway administration in Washington said, “No, you have to have someone that is qualified.” So they finally, after they turned him down three times, they finally says, "Well, who's qualified in my state?" And that's when my name came up and I was teaching at Henry Clay. This was in 1969 and I was teaching at Henry Clay at that time. And so, I got a call one day from the Superintendent of Public Instruction, Dr. Butler. And Dr. Butler asked me if I wanted to come and work for him. And I said, "Well, it depends." And he told me -- and I really think that they had the idea that if I would just come down and look at the program and say it's okay, that they were going to send it in and say they had me look at it and weren't going to hire me. And so I asked him when I went down for an interview. And he says, "We don't need no specialist." Then I said, “Well, call up Leroy . . .”

BRINSON: What was his name again?

LOGAN: Leroy.

BRINSON: Leroy?

LOGAN: Leroy. Dixon was his last name. And I says, "Well, call him up and tell him you don't need one and see what he tells you." And so evidently he did ‘cause it wasn't two days later, he called me, Leroy did. And he says, "Listen, Logan, I think they are trying to get around hiring you so I made them an ultimatum. I says until I see your name on their application as the Director of Drivers Traffic Safety Education, they will get no federal grant." I says, "You have to do that?" He says, "Otherwise . . . no I don't want to do that but that's what I told him, and that what I mean because otherwise they are not going to hire you." I said, “Okay.” And so about three days later, I got a knock on the door here and the Assistant Superintendent came in and he says, "We in a fix." I said, "What you mean?" He said, "The federal government says that they are not going give us the money unless we hire you. And so Mr. Butler says come over and see what it takes to hire you.” And I said, "Well, have a seat. We'll talk about it." And after that, we fell out about salary because I knew the rest of them were being hired, were getting salaries at twenty to thirty thousand dollars at that time. He wanted to offer ten thousand dollars.

BRINSON: That's a big difference . . .

LOGAN: I says, "Nope." I says, "I make that much now and I have drive to Frankfort from my home every morning . . . "

BRINSON: And you were married with children at this point?

LOGAN: Yeah.

BRINSON: How many children?

LOGAN: Five.

BRINSON: Five?

LOGAN: I have four girls and a son. And I says to him, "That won't do it." And he says, "Well, you know, you never know how these federal programs going to work. They give you money for a few years and then maybe a year, maybe a two, then they'll cut it out, then you have nothing." He says, "How about some--we work out something that will guarantee you won't be hired off of soft money. You will be hired off from state money and that way, whatever happens to that program, you'll still have a job." He says, "Now, can we work on that?" I says, "Yeah, we can work on that." ‘Cause I realized that with different elections and presidents and so forth, that in four years this new federal program might not be work a nickel. So we worked out a deal and I think my beginning salary was something like sixteen thousand, and in six months, a five percent raise and another five percent raise at the end of the year; and then every year was a five percent raise. Well, I said, "I can live with that." And then he says, "Well, you know, if we get--we have merit raises, in other words, if you do well and you get way behind, we'll just automatically give you a merit raise." I said, "Now you're talking sense now." I says, "I'll go along with that." And so I took the job.

BRINSON: And you worked for the state Department of Education for how many years, again, that you told me?

LOGAN: Twenty.

BRINSON: That's what I thought.

LOGAN: Yeah, from sixty-nine to eighty-nine. And I worked as Director of Driver Traffic Safety all those times. And then I worked also--after ten years--when all this drivers safety stuff got kind of slack. Federal level slacked back on money; I worked as the Director of Social Studies for the State Department. Textbooks, it isn't social studies, is the main objective of mine have been to get all of history all included. Now I think it's stupid to have United States history and then turn around and talk to people and they say they want black history, I want Hispanic history. Well, we are all live in this country together, we all did the same things, each one of us contributed different. So when you going to talk about history, why not talk about everything at one time. And then all . . . since we going to have integrated schools, all your citizens will learn at the very beginning how to respect each other. Let me give you for an example: I go around to classes, especially in February in Black History Month, and I tell them I hope I never have to do this again. But I start out to the young kids and the older ones and I said, "How many of you came here today on a school bus?" And they, most of them, raise their hands. How many traffic lights did the bus stop for before you got to school? One says two, three. I say, "You know who invented the traffic light? “No.” You see. ( ) right there in Paris. I went even to Paris to the Lions Club, and they didn't even know and they got a big sign up on the street.

BRINSON: Well, tell me. Because I don't know who invented the traffic light.

LOGAN: Morgan A. Garnett from Paris, Kentucky.

BRINSON: And he was African-American?

LOGAN: Yes and I told them when get to studying World War I, I says, "Who is responsible for saving all the Americans lives when the German sprayed them with mustard gas." "I don't know." The same man, he invented the gas mask, out of Paris, Kentucky. And, you know, and like I told them, I says, "We got shoes on today. Who do we give credit who makes shoes cheap enough where all of us can wear them. Before this man, shoes cost so much because they had to be made individually by hand, the shoe cobbler, and you couldn't afford it." I said, "If it was up to him, we'd all be barefooted other than the rich." And then they got to thinking. I says, "All I'm trying to do is to let you know all of us made contributions into society in, that we live in and we must learn to respect each other."

BRINSON: And so in your work with textbook companies . . .

LOGAN: I tried to get them to put . . . you know, they know it. They know this material. And I asked, “Why don't you put it together?” And they very simply told me the truth. When you get Texas and California textbook committees to vote to put it in, we'll put it in because they buy more textbooks than all the rest of the country combined and they said if you put it in, we're not going to buy your book, we're going to publish our own book. And he said that the reason you don't have it and you won't have it until you can get those two states to do it.

BRINSON: Have you looked at those textbooks in the last few years . . .?

LOGAN: Uh-huh.

BRINSON: You've been retired about ten years . . .

LOGAN: I looked at them. You've got nothing significant in them. All you got is other than before, uh, you got a paragraph and a half on Martin Luther King, you got Ralph Bunch and a couple of others that . . . and you don't even get the significance of why they, they in there and what's their role.

BRINSON: What about just in terms of Kentucky history which I believe is taught fourth grade and then picked up again in the eleventh grade . . .

LOGAN: Uh-huh.

BRINSON: How would you evaluate the black pieces of Kentucky history that are taught in the schools today?

LOGAN: Well, now I know I have spent at least five years as I seen the curriculum completely but when I left there's no significant black history in the Kentucky history books. Now, Dr. Chaney and Dr. Wright and some of them and I contributed to some of them, we wrote for the Human Rights Commission a little history book . . .

BRINSON: I know it well.

LOGAN: And I fought diligently to get the teachers to use it, but here’s the problem.

BRINSON: And you did a teacher guide to it as I recall.

LOGAN: Yes, yes, but the problem is this. In our colleges and universities in teacher education, they don't know nothing about it. They don't teach it, the kid, the teacher-to-be doesn't know anything about it cause they're getting younger every year and so therefore when you get there and they shove this book. But you can't even find the book in the high school today. I don't think it's been published for the last ten years.

BRINSON: I have to tell you there was an Antiquarian Book Fair down at the Civic Center about a month ago and they had a copy . . .

LOGAN: I've got two copies right there . . .

BRINSON: And it sold for forty-five dollars.

LOGAN: I've got a copy right there, that's what I'm saying. I've got the first copy we put out right there. And there's a whole set of black, uh, encyclopedias right there.

BRINSON: There is an effort by Dr. John Hardin at Western to go back and do a revision but I'm not sure that it's--he's working on it and it's done . . .

LOGAN: I would hate to see him do--I would love to see a revision but I'd hate to see it done in that same manner ‘cause I can't conceive why not if you're going to do it, put them all together. And you can find--like in that book--it tells you that there were, in Fort Harrod--it told you that there were twenty slaves and fifteen freedmen, and all of that and gave you the names. Now see, if I am going to write a book about early Kentucky, why can't I put that in there? And it just don't make sense, and that's the reason today--I received a lot of criticism when I was the Director of Social Studies because I would never allow black history to be taught alone as a course. I says, "The state law says you will teach them together and therefore I would be violating state law if I let you name a course black history." “Now,” I said, “There is no time that you can't teach history and put anything in it. Now if you don't know what to put in it, see me and I'll help you put it in there.” And so I got criticized quite a bit for that. But my contention . . .

BRINSON: Who criticized you?

LOGAN: Well, a lot of the school principals, because at the time when this was going on it was really popular to have black history in other states in their schools; and the colleges are still having it. But they, it has no significance over there by itself, it's got to be put in its proper perspective so you can discuss it. And so that's the reason and I tried to show people it's not an island, it can't stand out there by itself. Every interaction that it has, it was caused by something and to have any significance, you've got to put them together. So that's the reason why I've been confidently an advocate of teaching people all about human contributions if they are going to live together. And that really dawned on me when my little girl, my oldest girl was about nine, ten years old; and I made a habit--when I had a family--that every evening--I don't care what we were doing--that we would have dinner together around the table. Now you could go play basketball, you could play all day and you could do other things; but when dinner time comes, all that stuff was out the window and we had dinner and we discussed what happened today, each one of us. And one day, my girl said to me, said, "Daddy, did black people ever do anything?"

BRINSON: Say that again.

LOGAN: Said, "Did black people ever do anything? Have they made any contributions to this world?" I said, "Sure, Honey, why did you say that?" She said, "Well, I'm in sixth grade,"--or fifth grade or something--and said, "We always talking about what this person done and what this person done and how he made contributions to the world but I haven't heard nobody say anything about black people." I says, "Well, after supper I'm going to show you where you can find it and then each and every day we are going to talk about it. A different period, a different time." And I says, "And I want you to ask your teacher about it."

BRINSON: Okay, I have just a couple more questions I want to ask you. Tell me, please, about your work to get the Martin Luther King Day established in Kentucky.

LOGAN: That was very funny in a way because people never did take me completely serious. When I first went to the state Department of Education, it was in 1969. Dr. King died in sixty-eight. Well, the first year, uh, on his birthday after his death, in sixty-nine, I didn't work. And I told this, the people in the Department of Education that was over me, I says, "Now, you can do one of two things, I'm not going to come to work because I feel like if I do, I'm dishonoring this man.” Then I says, "You can either dock me one day, take a days annual leave for that day or a sick day for that day or a comp time day. Now, it doesn't matter which one of the three that you want to take but my work is complete, I'm caught up, but I will not be here." "Yeah, okay, I understand how you feel." That was Mr. Don Bell. And he says, "I can see that." And then then next year, the statue came into play. Everybody in the building teased me all the time.

BRINSON: And that's the statue of?

LOGAN: For Martin Luther King.

BRINSON: I just need you to say it so somebody who is reading or listening to the tape will know.

LOGAN: [Laughing] That's the statue of Martin Luther King. A friend of mine in the Department of Education, a consultant from Georgetown, Mr. Pollock, used to be Mayor, Sam Pollock. He was . . .

BRINSON: That P-o Pollock?

LOGAN: That's P-o-l-l-o-c-k. He was in Charlotte, North Carolina, in a conference. And Sam is the kind of guy, he loves antiques, he loves to go to sales, and all them different places. I always told him somebody going to beat him up one of these days hunting for something strange. He loves to work on watches and things. And he got on the phone and he called me at the office and he said, "Logan, guess what I found." And I said, "What?" He said, "I found an old statue of Martin Luther King.” He said, “It’s in good shape." He said, "It's odd." I said, "What they want for it, Sam?" He said, "Oh, I don't know. I imagine I can get it out of them for fifteen or twenty dollars ." I said, "Sam, is it worth it?" He said, "Sure." I said, "Buy it and bring it to me." I said, "Whatever it cost, I'll give it back to you." He said, "Okay." So Sam, he took a ribbing, everybody on the plane teased Sam ‘cause he couldn't pack it and he had to get on the plane with this statue of Martin Luther King. And, but he got it and he made it to the office with it, and I put it on a bookcase in my office and it stayed there the twenty years that I was there. And now it's the one you catch on display in the state capitol during black history month. See, I just got it back . . .

BRINSON: Oh, they borrow it from you?

LOGAN: They borrow it from me usually the day, the weekend before Martin Luther King thing and then they leave it until the last of February and Joan brought it back last week.

BRINSON: Did it take Kentucky a long time to decide to celebrate Martin Luther King day?

LOGAN: Yes, a long time. It wasn't as long as it has been for some states but to get the people in, I guess, the last law that was passed two legislatures ago, this was the first Martin Luther King day that they made the schools close. Because in eastern Kentucky and some of the counties where there was not a significant number of blacks, they didn't think it was significant. They didn't think it was significant enough to close the schools because I know the weather, and they have to be out during the wintertime; and so they wanted to take advantage of whenever they could. But out of respect for everybody and its needs and to get a significant ( ) this, back like I was talking about the black students need to know their history, so does the whites. They need to know what is significant about this event and, and what kind of policy and life, I mean, I don't think just to close school down and don't talk about him or don't have anything to say or don't show his significance to the world, that all has . . . what I'm saying is honor, but you should know about him. And that's the thing. So I went to the state government and I finally got a committee together and with various people, we finally talked the Governor into letting us have a Martin Luther King celebration during lunch hour.

BRINSON: And which Governor was that, do you remember?

LOGAN: Uh, let's see. I believe Ford and then, no, no. Not Ford, Jones. ‘Cause he'd always a little something. And then we got him to let us have one during lunch hour. And then when Martha, let's see, Jones come after Martha Layne, didn't he?

BRINSON: Uh-huh.

LOGAN: Well, then Wilkinson came in after Jones. I got him to appoint some state personnel to let us to have one. And then that's when we got--we started--I started the, uh, the work on the curriculum; where I wrote curriculums for the elementary, the middle schools and the high schools and we had an essay contest. Before that, just at the end of Jones' administration, I was chosen by my superintendent to allow me to go to Washington, D. C. to work with the Martin Luther King Commission to see the worthiness of having a holiday. And Mrs. King and all of us, and we decided--we drew samples--drew curriculum samples of things we wanted to emphasize. There was so many people at that time, you did not . . . and some of them now, do not realize what the man was trying to do and where he was getting his materials from. And he taught--everybody could quote you the "I Had A Dream" speech but very few of them know what he's talking about. Oh, it sounds beautiful but if you don't know the background behind it, then it doesn't mean that much.

BRINSON: So in 1989, the Martin Luther King . . . was that the year the state commission was actually implemented?

LOGAN: Yeah.

BRINSON: And you became one of the first members of that commission?

LOGAN: Uh-huh. And I just got off of the commission. I been there from eighty-nine until this last month. I got off at this last one, this year, 2001. And I felt that was long enough [laughing] but I still help with something that they need, something of that nature.

BRINSON: I want to go back and ask you. You were here in Lexington here in the sixties, in the early sixties . . .

LOGAN: No.

BRINSON: No, no?

LOGAN: Oh, early sixties? Yes. I got back here in fifty-seven.

BRINSON: That is what I thought. My question is in the late--fifth-nine and early sixty, sixty-one and sixty-two, there were demonstrations and sit-ins for public accommodations . . .

LOGAN: Right.

BRINSON: What do you remember about that?

LOGAN: I remember mostly that they were telling me, “No, don't you go. We don't want you.”

BRINSON: Who was telling you that?

LOGAN: The civil rights leaders. Uh, uh, they was telling me, like when we, they were going to sit-in in at Woolworth's Store and they was saying, "No, Logan, uh-un."

BRINSON: Why was that?

LOGAN: "You don't have the temperament. We are not inviting, you cannot put up with the type of treatment that will occur and we don't want disturbances." And I says, "Well, what else?" "You can work in the background. You can train the others, you can teach them how to act. But we know you and we don't want that. And no use you saying it, that you are going to allow it to happen ‘cause if somebody spits on you, they might as well kill you. And this is going to happen and they going to pour water on you, coffee, and call you names and everything and your makeup is not of such."

BRINSON: Who were some of those, the civil rights leaders here at that time?

LOGAN: Well, I guess Robert Jefferson was over there. You can't forget Ron Berry. And . . . it's quite a few of them but I guess Ron and Robert and his sister . . .

BRINSON: Audrey.

LOGAN: Audrey, let most of them. And, uh, and we had some ministers that was involved in it also. But during those times, I was busy going a lot but that was the main reason that I didn't get . . . I would take a group and talk to them and tell them what's going to happen to them, how we would like for this to act and things . . .

BRINSON: And when you did that, was there in Lexington any specific training around, non-violent resistance?

LOGAN: Yeah, there was some. They, they, you know, that was one of the things that they practiced with people as much as possible, to those that they knew that was going to have sit-ins. And even the--Jessie and the bunch that started the sit-ins in North Carolina at the luncheon stands. They just didn't go down there and sit down--they had--they knew that they was going to get abused. And I tell everybody, that it's a--to me, it's a special person that I would always respect can do that ‘cause there's no way in my makeup that I can do it.

BRINSON: Well, now given what you just said to me about your temperament, what happened for you when Black Power came along in the late sixties?

LOGAN: Nothing.

BRINSON: Nothing?

LOGAN: I thought they was stupid in a way. It's alright to protest, but have a reason. And to me, uh, I mean just to stomp and holler Black Power, and go do something silly; you erase what you were thinking about. Uh, now if you have black power, to me means that I'm going to know more, and I'm going to use my knowledge to better the whole shebang. But, just because, you know, to run around and raise my hand and my fist and holler, “Black Power” has no significance at all.

BRINSON: How weak or how strong was the Black Power Movement in Kentucky?

LOGAN: I don't think it was as strong because of the fact that nobody--oh they got personal--I think the better thing was the black power in Kentucky gave people--boosted their ego and gave people more, uh, self-worthiness than anything. And that was necessary. You know, we've been through crisis of identity for so long the call, you know, I'm sort of like the old guy, “I don't care what you call me but just call me to dinner.” And we've been, we've been through history; and I've always tried to explain to people that we are rich. We have something that everybody wants. When I say we, I'm talking about African-Americans, I'm talking about minority-Americans and that has been . . . we've been rich in culture, in music, in architecture, everything. And if you look at the very beginning of man, the gifts that we have given this world, sales, mathematics, the calendar, all of these things, and yet . . . see, I've got another book that I've written down now, I had . . . we took it to all the schools and things. I don't know how many world civilization classes that start in Kentucky, and when you talk about world civilization, you're talking about the early Babylon area and the Garden of Eden and all of this. Who do they think they talking to? Who do they think they talking about? They have no idea that these affluents were black. And so I look at it that this was a way of them to gather, gain self esteem and if it's going to do that, fine. That's the way I look it. And that's the point I tried to bring out all along. I have a speech that I give quite often is and I try to tell them, uh, what we had that everybody wanted was free labor. And we've been under siege for three hundred years and we haven't learned a thing. And if you look at the world, I could tell them a story all the time that Bishop Tutu often told, I heard it from him the first time and I love it to death. He says, “When the world was made, it was made in layers . . . “

BRINSON: Made in layers?

LOGAN: He says, “God was making man by the river, and said that he would make his image and got his mud altogether and made them. And said, “The first batch he put in, he let them to stay too long and they were burnt.” And said, “The next batch he put in, they didn't stay quite so long.” Said, “They come out kind of brownish and yellowish-like.” And said, “That last batch he put in,” said, “He just stuck them in and took them out.” Said, “Them were ice people. And he said then he set them out to go various places across the world at different levels and at different time stages.” And he says, “Just for the sake of it,” said, “We going to call the first batch of them the Africans and later the African-Americans. The second bunch was the sand people. The third bunch, the sun people. And the last bunch was the ice people.” And said, “When we scatter them across the world and they begin to migrate and integrate and now what do we have. And you can follow it. But the only thing, sun people still haven't learned. They the most hospitable group there is:” "Come on in." [Laughter]

BRINSON: I think this is a good place to stop. Thank you very much.

LOGAN: Okay. [Laughing]

END OF INTERVIEW