Oral History Interview with Jeff Bradshaw

“Stories From the Balcony”

Interviews about the Grand Theatre in Frankfort, Kentucky

Interview on Video with Jeff Bradshaw

On Location at The Grand Theatre

Tape 0022JTH_DV - Part A and Part B

Conducted by Joanna Hay

January 8th, 2007

This project has been supported by the Kentucky Oral History Commission

And Save The Grand Theatre, Inc.

Interview with Jeff Bradshaw begins with him seated with a brick wall under reconstruction behind him and Joanna Hay conducting the interview.

HAY: …thousand and seven. We are inside the lobby of The Grand Theatre before the 2007 renovation. I’m speaking with Jeff Bradshaw and my name is Joanna Hay. Jeff has memories of The Grand. Did you tell me you grew up across the street?

BRADSHAW: Well, actually it was down around the corner there on Lewis Street. At 415 Lewis. My family moved there…I believe it was 1958. I was five years old. My father worked at the distilleries for National. My mother worked at Fitzgerald’s Drug Store. Her name was Melba, and there were my two brothers and I. And, of course, the old Capitol Yard was where all the children played, and there were lots of children. I mean everywhere you looked…lots of kids down here. People lived here then with families. The kids from down behind the old Capitol there and what was known as the Crawfish Bottom…Crawl…or Bottom, whatever…played together. There were white kids and Black kids and poor kids and not so poor kids and…

HAY: I’m going to put you on hold just for a second because this is really good, but I’m getting a little motion from your mic.

BRADSHAW: Oh, OK.

HAY: What we should do…Batteries? We’ll just set…You’re ok there.

BRADSHAW: Oh, you just want to keep this some…Change position.

HAY: Lets see if that solves our problem. OK, we’re getting a clean signal.

BRADSHAW: Alright.

HAY: So, continue to tell me about Crawfish Bottom.

BRADSHAW: Oh, yes. That was the area commonly known as The Bottom. All the kids played in the old Capitol Yard. We all played together and we really…Jim Crowe didn’t work at our level, lets put it that way, ok. Except when it came to going to school. Anyway…and when it came to going to The Grand Theatre, because when we got up here there were, as I remember it, two lines. So a lot of times we’d walk up here together. We’d get in one line and they’d get in another. And they would go to the balcony, of course, and we would go to the main level. We always wanted to go to the balcony, [Chuckle] and they always wanted to go to the main level, so it was kind of a bit of a conflict. But, of course, when we’d get out, we’d regroup and go back to the old Capitol Yard and that’s kind of the way things were then. It was a very vibrant town. There were no empty store fronts. My mother worked at Fitzgerald’s, as I said, and everybody knew everybody. They knew our parents and if we got caught out here misbehaving, you know, they’d know about it before we’d get home, you know. It was that “It takes a village” sort of mentality here, you know. It was very prevalent here in Frankfort. We weren’t exactly loose to go anywhere we wanted, but I could come up here with my older brother and go to the movies unattended with hundreds of other kids and spend the afternoon. Watch the movies two or three times and have a marvelous time here, you know, at this grand old place.

HAY: How old when you first came here?

BRADSHAW: I’d say I was about seven years old. Well, I think I had a babysitter bring me here when I was about five or six and that would have been ’59. Somewhere in there. But, I remember coming here I guess about 1960. The Grand always showed the monster movies. The Capitol had all the first run pictures…all the big Hollywood spectacles…Cleopatra and so forth. The mainstream movies. Here you saw what they called the second run films, which would be more like drive-in pictures, you know. Hot Rod movies and monster movies and westerns and what they would call B Movies in those days. Which kind of made it a little more fun, you know. It was a little loose I guess you’d say.

HAY: So was there a very different crowd here than at The Capitol?

BRADSHAW: Oh, definitely. [Chuckle]

HAY: In what way?

BRADSHAW: Well, like I say, it was much looser here. I mean people would on a Saturday night, you’d get a more dressed up crowd at The Capitol Theatre. In Frankfort, it was one of those places that you kind of wanted to look nice. Here, it was much more relaxed, you know. It was more free and open kind of atmosphere, to put it mildly. Or some people whose parents wouldn’t let them go to The Grand Theatre, you know…”Oh, no! You can’t…” But, this is where the fun movies were. Just the monster flicks, all that sort of thing.

HAY: Do you remember any particular movies that you saw here?

BRADSHAW: Yeah. [Chuckle] I remember my father brought me here to see a film about the Seminole Indian Wars down in Florida. It was not the kind of movie that was shown at The Capitol. It was a B Movie, but, of course, I loved it. And I remember seeing…gosh, I can’t remember the title, but…a number of monster films here. The ones where they used little lizards, and they’d blow them up, you know, [Chuckle] and put frills on them to look like dinosaurs. And we’d stand in long lines to get into this, you know, because all the kids would show for the monster…and those lurid posters on the outside. [Chuckle] Pictures of big bright red, blood red colors…it was…

HAY: Were there actually posters on the outside of the building or on the window or…?

BRADSHAW: It seemed like they had some display. I don’t know if they had them on a board or if they had a display. Like at The Capitol, they had a display…like a little display frames…uuhhh…that had a glass enclosure that would go around. I think they had those here, but I’m not real sure. I remember The Capitol really a lot better than I do this, because I worked there as a teenager, as an usher. But this place was already closed by then.

HAY: So your years coming here were from, let’s say, five or seven, through your early teenage years or what would you guess?

0: 1:00 -0: 2:00BRADSHAW: I’m thinking they closed the place…what was it…’64 or ’65 somewhere in there…and in ’65 I was twelve years old so, you know, after that, of course, there was no Grand, but…it was before that. I was more like around my early teens and late grade school years.

HAY: So tell me what it was like being an usher at The Capitol.

BRADSHAW: Oh, at The Capitol? [Chuckle] Well, The Capitol was a great place. They had just remodeled it in ’65 or ’66, and so a marvelous theatre, beautiful place, with a great history of it’s own. I started the day I turned fourteen. Before that, I would go up there and they let me get in free, I’d arrange the posters and do all this work behind the scenes. They’d let me get into the movies free. So at that time you could get your work permit on your fourteenth birthday, so I already had the deal made. I was already hired. Got my permit. Walked in and they showed me this rather…this pretty awful coat that you were supposed to wear as an usher which looked like a doorman in New York, you know, at one of the hotels or one of the big apartment buildings. With a big gold rope…awful maroon…and buttons and all this stuff. My brother, Douglas, was already an usher there, so we would go to Lexington and pick us up some ( ) for the place. And it paid a whopping seventy cents per hour, which was below the minimum wage, but you see, people would tip you in larger cities, but not in Frankfort. [Laughing] So the idea was that you could get paid less in lieu of tips, but they weren’t too much forthcoming. But, it was still a wonderful job. Loved it. I worked a lot of Christmases and holidays and worked up until late at night. But, I loved the business, and it was a wonderful job. Wonderful teenage year.

HAY: So in those years then, The Grand had been closed by that time.

BRADSHAW: uh hum

HAY: So it was just The Capitol? Was that the only theatre for movies in Frankfort?

BRADSHAW: Yes it was. And there was a time, after The Grand closed, and before The Capitol became totally desegregated, that Black citizens in Frankfort had no place to go to the movies. I know that’s hard for people to imagine now, but it’s part of that awful past that we all share here, and it’s good to see those days over with, you know. But, yeah, there was a time…I’m not exactly sure exactly how many years it was, but there were a number of years there. Two, three, or four years maybe where Black citizens here had no movie theatre to go to. A terribly unfortunate thing. But, once they did…once we did…it was great. We had a fabulous audience every Sunday right after church. All the Black kids were all dressed up and they’d show up at the theatre and it was great, you know. It was all the old friends in the movie house, and it was a good time. There was a lot going on then, of course, in what? ’67, ’68, and ’69. A lot of stuff happening with movies and it was an exciting time. Yeah

HAY: I bet. And, of course, African Americans did not have to sit in the balcony then.

BRADSHAW: Oh, no, absolutely not. No, it was wide open then. As a matter of fact, a lot of people would sneak into the balcony [Chuckle] no matter who they were. But, The Capitol Theatre was a lot of fun. But, still, like I say, not as much fun as The Grand was, you know. The Grand was just a little more wide open for kids, you know, to really enjoy themselves and…[technical problems]…we weren’t bad or anything…but we could always hear down here and they weren’t hollering us down quite as much. [Chuckle]

HAY: So you really had to be on your best behavior, you are saying, at The Capitol. And here it was more relaxed no matter what age you were.

BRADSHAW: Sure, yeah. Here, it was just a little more wide open. Like I said, a lot of parents wouldn’t let their kids come here, you know. Not a lot, but some. This was a fun place. A lot of fun.

HAY: Your parents didn’t mind you coming?�BRADSHAW: Oh, no. Absolutely not. It was so close to home.

HAY: They knew you were in a safe place. They knew where you were, and knew that you were…

BRADSHAW: Sure. They knew all the fellows that ran the place. Mr. Lutes and Mr. Combs, and those people, and they knew that they were looking out for us, you know.

HAY: So do you remember Gene Lutes?

BRADSHAW: Oh, absolutely. Sure. Sure. Mr. Lutes, you know, he had a lifetime free pass at The Capitol Theatre, and was quite a gentleman. Quite a nice fellow. Very well respected and liked here in Frankfort. A great guy.

HAY: And who was the other person you mentioned?

BRADSHAW: Mr. Ali Combs. Mr. Ali Combs. He had a…he was a musician and was in the theatre business. I’m not sure to what capacity. He was an assistant manager, or maybe a manager here at The Grand. But, he was in the theatre business and like I say, he had a country band, and oddly enough, I got to perform here in September on the last night of the blues thing. And my aunt…she got to perform here…I don’t want to say what year…she wouldn’t appreciate me saying exactly what year that was. [Chuckle] It was when she was a young woman. With Mr. Combs band. So we both got to be on the same stage. We ( )

HAY: Isn’t that a wonderful thing?

BRADSHAW: Oh yeah. Yeah.

HAY: Hang on a second.

BRADSHAW: Sure.

0: 3:00 -0: 4:00HAY: So you were just telling me about your aunt, and that she played in a country band.

BRADSHAW: Well, she sang with the band, so she did the vocals kind of like I did with a group of local musicians. So we got a real big kick out of that. Her name is Rachel Doris Ward. She has contributed quite a bit to the History Museum here in Frankfort. The local history…the Frankfort History Museum. A lot of her stuff down there for Russ and the gang, but…yeah, she’s quite a lady and she spent a lot of time here at The Grand Theatre in her young years as well during the...

HAY: So her years of performing…you can just give me a ballpark range, just to put it into historical perspective…would have been when do you think?

BRADSHAW: Aunt Dot, forgive me. I would say somewhere around ’49 or ’50. Her and her ( ) came here to sing ( ) [Technical problems]…wish they had a recording like we have a recording now, you know, but there’s nothing left of that, so…but I’d say it was around ’49 or ’50 somewhere in there.

HAY: So from the sound of that story, it made me think of what a theatre means to a sense of community and local people getting together and doing their own performances like you did in September.

BRADSHAW: uh hum. Yes.

HAY: With local friends and local talented musicians and that’s really an interesting parallel and it talks about the importance of a place for community.

BRADSHAW: Yes, very much so. The idea…and of course, I know that everyone knows that live music is really nothing new to The Grand, but there were more live performances past the Vaudeville days than people know about, you know. You were more likely to see ( ) when she performed here, a live show than you were at The Capitol, I would think, you know. The Capitol I think had pretty much gone completely to movies, you know, except for rare cases. But, as I understand it, The Grand during the forties you would have live shows like we have been here lately so…

HAY: A mixture of the films and then the performances. Someone had told me…I don’t know if you’ve heard any of these stories…that Roy Rogers and his horse actually came. The horse would come onto the stage at The Grand Theatre. Do you remember any stories like that?

BRADSHAW: I remember people talking about Gene Autry. My aunt and my mother saw Gene Autry here which was a big deal for them because they came from…they were raised in Owen County and they moved to town which was like, you know, culture shock in those days. This was the big city for somebody who was raised out in the country. And they got to see Gene Autry here. And I don’t know if it was at The Grand or at the old State which was up on Main, up out where the radio station used to be which probably doesn’t tell you a whole lot.

HAY: We could probably look up those records.

BRADSHAW: I’m sure you could look it up.

HAY: I think more than one person said that Gene Autry was here at The Grand. So The Grand has been a mixed-use facility for a while. I wonder…now in 1941 is when they made the theatre… the big movie theatre, so when you are talking about your mom and your aunt, that would have been after ’41, ’42, right?

BRADSHAW: I don’t think so. I think that might have been before. That might have been in the…I would say between ’35 and ’40. More likely. I think Gene Autry was at his peak during those years, you know, the mid to late thirties, I’m pretty sure. It wasn’t unusual for these guys to go on tour and promote their films. Even in a town like this, you know, in small towns. And there was also another performer who came here by the name of Cowboy Copus. He was another singing movie star and he came here and sold records. I’m not sure if he had a horse or not. Of course, Gene had his horse which I can’t remember the name of the horse, but…very famous. Just kids would go nuts over this. Of course, I’m sure it was a pretty exciting day here on St. Clair Street. Yeah, but, the older folks used to talk about that quite a bit. [Chuckle]

HAY: I’m intrigued with how you would all…when you were kids…just be playing out in the Capitol Yard…the town was your playground. Would you be able to go up anywhere, or were there streets you were allowed to go to and streets you weren’t allowed to go to?

0: 5:00 -0: 6:00BRADSHAW: It was pretty much ok. I mean, of course, my mother didn’t much want to catch me uptown here alone, you know, but if…you know, like most of us younger guys would go with our big brothers and sisters. But, you know, sure we’d walk to The Capitol Theatre and we were pretty mobile and there were just so many people, and so many people knew each other here, and knew whose kids you were. You really couldn’t get away with a whole lot. [Chuckle]

HAY: So the streets were just crowded…

BRADSHAW: Crowded

HAY: with people being busy with their shopping or what were they all doing?

BRADSHAW: Tuesday afternoon. I mean the McClure Building there was full of offices for insurance companies and the like and the lawyers. People were here doing business all day long, every day. Tuesday afternoon at two o’clock in the afternoon, I mean you’re bumping elbows up and down St. Clair and Main. Or restaurants and bars. All over the place. Liquor stores. Broadway, of course, was notorious for liquor stores and bars of questionable…uh, how would you put this?…clientele. [Chuckle] But, of course, even with that, as long as it was the day light hours, kids were pretty much accepted just about everywhere, you know.

HAY: What did you mean by “uptown”? Where is “uptown”?

BRADSHAW: Well, I guess…( ) that you’d… [Technical problems]. But for all of us that lived on the other side of the railroad tracks down there, we called that downtown, ok. Lewis Street and beyond the railroad tracks, that would be downtown toward the bottom…down in the bottom, down there, ok. Up would be coming up to the other side of the tracks to Main, St. Clair, uhmmm…

HAY: So Frankfort literally was divided by the tracks?

BRADSHAW: The tracks…the railroad tracks…

HAY: So that expression “The other side of the tracks” would apply to Frankfort?

BRADSHAW: It works classically in this case. Really. Truly. Yeah. Always in a positive way, but you…and the river was also a divider.

HAY: What was the difference between this side of the river and the other side of the river?

BRADSHAW: There was a perceived social division there, you know, in terms of class distinction. And a lot of us were made aware of it, of course, when we…I almost hate to talk about this…but when we walked across the river and went to school, you know, it was like…there were class distinctions in that day.

HAY: Were you not treated quite right?

BRADSHAW: Well, I don’t want to say that. I don’t want to…I…but I think if you talked to a lot of the kids who came from North Frankfort, you would hear…in those days…that there was probably, you know…How do you say it? More than one level of…uhh…what’s the word I’m…two tier sort of…execution of education. I mean, I think that we were in the latter days of…oh, there was a pseudo-scientific name for it back in the day. When they…I can’t remember what they called it. But, it was actually a science of social structure that was practiced in the twenties and thirties, and I think a lot of the educators here still hung onto that idea even though it had become archaic after World War II. Because many of the laws that were passed under that structure were adopted actually by Germany during the thirties and forties…in the early forties…to persecute Jews and Gypsies and others. So it came kind of back to us to haunt ( ) [Technical problems] I can’t remember…Urology? No not Urology, but…I can’t remember what they called it, but it was a…But, I feel that a lot of us that were from this side of town kind of got the…you know…

HAY: The second hand education.

BRADSHAW: The second hand sort of…you know…

HAY: Set aside…

BRADSHAW: Set aside…yeah, you know. “You don’t want to mess with these kids.” “You don’t have to fool with these kids too much because, you know, their just kind of…there they are. Now, we can concentrate on these guys and get a little…we have a little more”…you know. That was the kind of feeling we had, you know, a lot of us. That’s why a lot of times you don’t see a lot of us at reunions and things because we never really felt like we were really a part of that, you know, a part of that whole experience. Our stuff was over here and…

HAY: So did the teachers make you feel ignored and just wouldn’t pay attention to…?

0: 7:00 -0: 8:00BRADSHAW: Well, I don’t…not all the teachers. There were those there who…you just kind of had an idea of where you were placed. I remember looking at…I remember being in the kindergarten class and I remember sitting over here with these kids and the sun was coming in the window, and there was kind of dust in the room so you could see these rays coming in the window. This was at Second Street School. And kindergarten mind you. And there was a little circle of kids over there and the teacher was reading to them and sitting over here. And I remember looking at those kids and thinking, “I bet ya that all the way through school, it’s going to be them, and us.” I mean, that’s kind of a heck of a thing at five years old to think, but it just seemed that way, and it pretty much kind of worked out that way, you know. But, for me, it didn’t really matter that much because I had such wonderful parents and family, but a lot of the kids weren’t so fortunate as I was.

HAY: What kind of an example when you say some of the less fortunate than you? What sort of an example could you give me? You don’t have to say anybody in particular.

BRADSHAW: Oh! No! I wouldn’t mention anybody’s name.

HAY: I don’t mean that. I just meant…just…

BRADSHAW: Well, it was kind of an understanding…sports…football…particularly football…they liked tough boys from the other side of town to be in that football thing, you know.

HAY: From the other side from you? From your side of town?

BRADSHAW: Well, you could get in football, of course, you’re a scrapper, you know, you’re from the tough end. If you’re going to do sports, you’re just not going to…They actually had three levels ( ) [Technical problems]…once you got to a certain grade. There was an enrichment group. Then there was the in-betweens. Then there was “those guys” so…[Chuckle] I’m not making this up, I swear. That’s kind of how it was. And a lot of times you’d see the middle end…those guys…at The Grand Theatre, you know. That’s how it was, you know, as I remember it.

HAY: Very interesting.

BRADSHAW: But a lot of kids from the county loved to come down here. And you’d see kids from outside of town. And how would they get here? They would have family drop them off and come and spend the day at the theatre, and that was a whole different existence, really, kids from the farms and stuff. Because you could come here for I guess fifty cents which was not always available, but fairly available ( ) [Technical problems] And for fifty cents you got in the door, and popcorn and a coke. And, of course, you might sneak in some penny candy in your pocket too. But that was a whole day entertainment for fifty cents for a lot of kids who didn’t have a whole lot of spare change, but it was available. It was great.

HAY: What was coming to the movie like every week for a kid would you think?

BRADSHAW: Big time. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I think so. You’d see all your friends and you’d see like these new kids like from out of the county, you know, kids you didn’t normally see. And just all the squealing, and the laughing, and the wailing before the movie would come on. Yeah, it was ( ) [Technical problems] Just a little piece of…the carnival, you know, [Chuckle] in your life. It was good. It was real good. It was a complete diversion from everything else. But, you know, like I say, all of us over here, we had the old Capitol Yard. We kind of looked like Little Rascals, you know. All these little Black and white kids running around. They couldn’t get any grass to grow over there. [Chuckle] As soon as they’d get some to grow, we’d just stomp it out, you know. There must have been twenty or thirty of us at any given time, just running around and dirty and having a ball. Our mothers would stop us on the front porch and whack the dirt off of us. We all had these little burr haircuts and they’d get a hold of our head and shake all the dirt out of our hair and go take us and throw us into the tub. But, that was how we lived. When you got a Saturday here, it was…or Wednesday. I believe it was here and The Capitol, they would have Wednesday…if you went to one of the merchants, you’d get a free ticket, and you’d come in and see a free movie. And it was sometimes an older picture. And they’d run a bunch of cartoons. And Three Stooges behind it…around it…and oh, it was great. It was hours in here. Here and The Capitol. They’d just call it “The Free Show” as I remember. And all the kids got in free. And it was just during the summertime, on Wednesdays. A lot of fun. [Chuckle]

0: 9:00 -0: 10:00HAY: When all the kids were here, were there many adults in the audience as well, or did the kids rule on those afternoons, or…?

BRADSHAW: Oh, yeah. On those free show days, we ruled. Now, of course, Mr. Lutes would…you know, he wouldn’t let anything get out of hand, you know, but…I don’t remember them saying a whole lot to us. We were pretty good, you know. We’d get noisy and have a ball and it was a pretty good time. It could have been a whole lot unrulier…unrulier? How’s that for a word?…than it was, but it all worked out pretty good. We had a great time. I wish there was someplace for kids to go now where they could just not have the big folks around. Of course, we’re all scared to death these days, you know. We were all having a pretty good time.

HAY: So what school did you go to?

BRADSHAW: I went to Second Street School and Frankfort High.

HAY: So you would walk to Second Street, which is on the other side of the river.

BRADSHAW: Yeah, right. [Chuckle] Yeah, we all walked over there. They didn’t have any buses. The city schools didn’t have a bus. And I remember being really small, and they had a school right down here on Miral Street. Of course, that was Jim Crowe, you know. That was the Black school where all the African American kids went to school. And though we played together all day long, every day, and hung out together and were friends, we couldn’t go to school together. And I remember asking my father, “Why can’t I just go to school down here?” [Laughing] “Why do I have to walk all the way over there for?” But then they tore that place down after desegregation. I always thought that was regrettable. If they could have left it open and just desegregated that as well, we could have all been in our more natural community, and probably been a little better, but it was ok. We had a pretty good time nonetheless.

HAY: That’s an interesting comment, really. So desegregation…what year do you…? It was when you were in those young years, like in between…

BRADSHAW: I think I was in the fifth grade? He first time we all got together. I can’t remember if it was the fourth or the fifth grade. Let’s see…ok…I was six years old in ’59. And then four years later…that would be ’63? That sounds about right. ’63, ’64, something like that in there is when we finally desegregated. It was a happy moment for a lot of us, you know, we were like “Wow”, you know, because it was weird for us. I mean a lot of kids didn’t live where they had Black friends. I think South Frankfort it was strange. They were divided over there. I lived over there for a year after we had a fire, and Black kids and white kids threw rocks at each other over there. It was strange. I mean it was a weird environment, and I was glad to get back over to the North side when we moved down on St. Clair behind the old Capitol. I guess I was about ten or eleven years old. Because that was very strange. [Chuckle] I never understood what that was all about. It just didn’t work that way over here. I mean, we all didn’t get along perfectly, but we got along a lot better than that, you know.

HAY: So completely different social dynamics between the two sides of the river?

BRADSHAW: Oh yes, absolutely. And I’ll tell you something else. I talked to friends before and they’ve told me…I’m talking about Black friends who said that “Well, you know the Black kids on the South side and the Black kids on the North side a lot of times would fight against each other.” And I said, “Ok, things weren’t bad enough?” [Chuckle] And the same is true, I mean, there was a definite division in North and South amongst the…for lack of a better word…white kids/Black kids. Don’t necessarily care for those terms, but just for the purpose of reference. [Technical problems] Well, you know, I don’t know how much they noticed it, but it was very noticeable to us, you know, to many of us.

HAY: Yeah, you have a very interesting perspective on that.

BRADSHAW: uh hum

HAY: One of my interviews…a Black resident of South Frankfort was talking about how she had…well, a couple of my interviews…they had to walk…

BRADSHAW: …to come to school. [Chuckle]

0: 11:00 -0: 12:00END OF TAPE 1, Part A and Part B

HAY: So, I was just wondering, did you all—did you all ever pass? [laughter]

BRADSHAW: You know—I guess we probably did—I suppose we did.

HAY: And—and they were wondering why they had to walk past—

BRADSHAW: Right.

HAY: --The school that was near them and you were wondering the same thing, why can’t I go to the school that’s in my neighborhood.

BRADSHAW: Sure—exactly.

HAY: It’s craz—it’s ridiculous.

BRADSHAW: Yes it is—

HAY: When you look back.

BRADSHAW: It’s the whole absurdity of segregation not—only in the just as being patently evil in its own—its own respect, but just completely absurd. You know, that would make sense, I guess they—they were probably coming across the singing bridge on this side, we were going over on that side [chuckles]. Yeah, probably did. We probably passed each other, it’s just so silly. But—but it was exciting to live in a time when that came to an end, you know. But, I don’t remember ever coming to the Grand—and have—and being able to go in the balcony, quite honestly.

HAY: It never integrated then because it closed—it would have closed—

BRADSHAW: Right about the time—

HAY: As an integrated institution, as everything was changing and then it never—

BRADSHAW: Yeah.

HAY: --It never merged.

BRADSHAW: But that’s one thing that I can definitely say about this theatre is that at least—um—all of our citizens could come here—in some sort of fashion and be here, at least be in the balcony. Whereas the Capitol [Theatre] was completely segregated and I don’t know about the State Theatre, how that was. Of course, that was gone before—you know, I would remember but—but at least they could home here, you know. 14:00HAY: Did you all have—um—let’s see, I always think about how television affected how everybody socialized. Because with the television, you could just stay home and. Did—have you thought about how television affected how people got out and socialized together and came to—you know, came to the streets, and came to the movies. I mean, think Frankfort had four or five movie theatres at one stage.

BRADSHAW: At one time.

HAY: And then.

BRADSHAW: Of course, that was all before television, I presume, right?

HAY: And I can’t help--

BRADSHAW: How much did television—what did it do to that? You know, that’s—that’s a good question cause I’m not sure, like I say, when the—the State [Theatre] closed or, I can’t remember, let’s see there was the Capitol, the Grand, and the State. That’s the only three I can remember. Do you remember the other ones?

HAY: I’m forgetting their names but--.

BRADSHAW: Yeah.

HAY: I think there were two more—

BRADSHAW: Two more.

HAY: --Well maybe in the 30s and 40s, but they would all---each—each closed according to—for economic reasons, I assume.

BRADSHAW: Sure. Sure.

HAY: People weren’t making money so.

BRADSHAW: Well that’s—and probably the Depression might’ve had something to do with that. And then of course, there was the advent of radio as well. Which came right upon—during the time of the Depression and you could stay at home and listen to that if you had one.

HAY: Because then you feel connected when you have that—with that radio, you felt connected and people before communications like radio and television they--it seems like they would come out--

BRADSHAW: They’d have to come out.

HAY: --To get that—

BRADSHAW: Connection.

HAY: Connection.

BRADSHAW: That’s true—that is absolutely true. Church was an entertainment, I mean, let’s face it, it was. Preachers would give long sermons. Political speeches, people would show up for that. Then of course there are the hangings [laughs] at one point, awfully enough. Yeah—I remember hearing that—over here at the YMCA, when the building was built, and they had the opening of the building, William Jennings Bryan came. And Bryan was one of those people who could speak for two hours and he was at the end of that era when—when you know, it was hours that people would stand there and listen to someone speak because again, there’s no radio, no television. You either read it or heard it. [chuckles] But, I think there’s some photographs you can see of that—quite a crowd.

HAY: When would that have been? What era are we talking about?

BRADSHAW: I’m thinking around 1900—somewhere slightly before or after, I believe. There’s a photograph of—of Bryan there. Of course Bryan was a—H.L. Mencken said Bryan was a guy who could speak for days on end and never actually complete a whole thought. [laughter] But—but he was--

HAY: Entertaining.

BRADSHAW: Entertaining. Great orator, nonetheless. [laughs] 15:00HAY: Very interesting. Very interesting. Let’s think—what do you think happened to downtown, where did it go, why did--?

BRADSHAW: Well you know, it’s a--heartbreaking thing for me because I loved living here. My—my mother walked to work; my father got a ride to work. We—we didn’t have a car until maybe 1963. We didn’t need one. We had the market house right here, we had three or four hardware stores, we had Bacon’s (??) Machine Shop that would fix things for you. We had barbers—I mean—everything was here. People were here—people lived here and I—it—to see it come apart, but I think the first sign of it was Eastwood Shopping and then another shopping center. And then—so then we ended up having to get a car because, it came to be that some things you just had to drive to. And, you know it—it was—I witnessed it along with everyone else. But, you know, we—we lived so close to the ground, my family that—it really—I still have dreams about it. I still have dreams where I—I’m walking down the street and everybody’s here you know, but it’s now, but you know, all the stores are there and people are standing and you know, standing on the corner smoking a cigarette just looking around, you know. –And people did that, I mean--they would come and sit in their cars. They would drive to town on Saturday nights, sit in their cars and watch the people walk by, from that—out in the county. And watch the guys get thrown out of the bars and watch the [laughs] watch the police come and pick a few guys up. You know, it was just, Frankfort was just totally alive, totally alive. And—but I guess we’ve—what’s happened to us has happened to the whole country, actually. We’ve been—we’ve been auto—auto mobilized, how’s that?

HAY: That works. [laughter] So, everybody has to get in their car to even get the simplest—

BRADSHAW: Yes.

HAY: ---Of—of provisions.

BRADSHAW: True 16:00HAY: So, Broadway, you spoke about it—hinted about it again. You’re saying that Broadway was full of—

BRADSHAW: Oh, yeah, we had—we had some pretty rough spots down there. Yeah it was—three or four--there were three or four bars, four or five liquor stores. Mr. Hauser (??) had a liquor store down there, Mr. Ernie Hauser. Mr. Ray Moretti (??) was a good friend of my father’s. And we’d—he’d—dad would take us out walking around on Saturday night. And we’d stop into Mr. Moretti’s liquor store. Now, imagine being in a liquor store with your two kids, right? –No one thought anything about it then. And Mr. Moretti was a great old guy and he my dad would light up—he’d—they’d both light up a cigar, and Mr. Moretti loved cigars. And they’d—sit there and smoke their cigars while my brother and I kind of goofed off there in the floor. And people would come in and out—buy—buy their liquor or something. But, you know it wasn’t—as long as my dad was with us, it wasn’t a fearful experience. And then we had the Pelosis (??) down there they had—or Paluso (??)—Paluso? Eugene Pelosi—Eugene, yeah, good friend. His family had a restaurant there in between all that—it’s a beautiful little family—they call it the family restaurant and he was good friends with my father and mother and wonderful people. And they had a little—they served diner food. And course on the other end you had Foot’s (??) the Venasi (??) family operated Foot’s restaurant. Beautiful place, wonderful Italian dishes.

HAY: And that was down further—

BRADSHAW: Down on the corner of Ann & Broadway, which is a parking lot now, unfortunately. But, yeah—but there were—that space between Lewis and St. Clair, there were a couple of pretty rough joints, you know. [laughs] 17:00HAY: So, the police would be down here—

BRADSHAW: Oh, yeah.

HAY: --Late at night and.

BRADSHAW: Sure, yeah.

HAY: And of course, when you were young, when you were kids, you wouldn’t be out wandering about anyway—

BRADSHAW: Oh, no—

HAY: --After dark.

BRADSHAW: Not after dark, no. It was—they’d pull us in at dark. And it was actually I think a legal curfew then, 9:00, I think kids had to be off the street, you know, unaccompanied by an adult, you had to be in off the street. That was the law, I think that’s been since repealed-- constitutional purposes or something, anyone under twelve, I can’t remember what the age was, but you had to be off the street. That was why it was a big id—big deal for me to be fourteen and working at the Capitol till 18:00till—or midnight and I could just be a bigshot come strolling home here at midnight, you know. [laughs] But— 19:00HAY: So, would you be cautious as you walked home—

BRADSHAW: Yeah—

HAY: Past the Broadway section there.

BRADSHAW: Yes ma’am. Yes ma’am. It—you’d never—a lot of people would come from different parts of the state and come here to—and the Bottom had--after hours was a--had a lot going on. I mean there were [chuckles] bars of course some rough—the Blue Moon, the Peachtree, J Boys, oh gosh. There were some—it was rough—it wasn’t un—you would hear gunfire from time to times, you know. If you’re sitting on your porch at night when we were kids. It was a dangerous place at night, you know. Because people would come in from out of town because there were not only bars there but there were [sighs] addresses of particular excitement I guess you’d say. [laughs] Which was—a wonderful bonus about being a kid nine or ten-years old here you know you’d—we’d---there was one on Madison Street, there was one on—down on St. Clair, there was one on Mero. And we all were you know, smarter than we needed to be and knew where they were. We weren’t really quite sure what it was all about, but we knew it was against the law [laughs] and it was interesting. But—yeah guys would come from out of the hollows and different parts they’d say—they’d say, “Hey boy, where’s that Bottom at?” [laughs] [points] “Right down there.” And even after they tore it down, guys would come—there’d be a carload of guys from out of town, “Hey boy, come here where’s that bottom at?” you know. [laughs] “Sorry, they tore it down, buddy.” 20:00HAY: So, the Bottom had a reputation that spread beyond—

BRADSHAW: Way beyond.

HAY: --Just the town of Frankfort.

BRADSHAW: Way beyond. Way beyond. I worked with a guy from—down in—outside of Bardstown and he talks about how his father used to come up here and carouse, and drink, and fight and all that, you know, it wasn’t unusual. 21:00HAY: What—I guess my question is did all—did those houses of such reputation attract clientele of all social levels would be the question.

BRADSHAW: You know, that’s a good question I—I [sighs] I mean, I have a any number of friends who are just a few years older than I who’ve had [laughs] had been to those places but, I don’t know if—I think they probably did. I—you know, I would say so. I think though—if you reached a certain level of status—economic status, I think that there were other provisions for that, dealing with reputation of and so forth. But I think that most of those places were maybe working-class to slightly upper—I mean upper-middle class, perhaps. –It would be my guess, you know, or at least a sense of it.

HAY: Because Frankfort is interesting in that it has this influx of these legislators and lobbyists and people coming from all over the state to Frankfort, which other towns never get that sort of traffic. And so it makes—a different mixture of people and activities, I guess, and then anyway. 22:00BRADSHAW: Well, you know, a lot of architecture like on the street where I live—Lewis Street, the house that I lived in was a four-plex, it’s still there at 415. But there were a whole string of houses behind where Gibby’s is now. There were—there were—like a little duplex and then there was a tall apartment building and then there was like a classic brownstone which was just right next to 415. And these were—and it had apartments in it. And a lot of—as I understand it—as I was told years ago, some of those were built for government workers and even legislators and of course where Gibby’s is now was a hotel at one time. What the front part where—not Gibby’s excuse me. It’s Buddy’s Pizza now on the corner there. Which when I was a kid was Mr. Johnny Guidi’s (??) Fruit Market—Fruit and Vegetable Market. But anyhow, that was a hotel, but I mean there were a lot more boarding houses and hotels that would—that would house all these people coming here to—for the legislature and lobbyists as a— 23:00HAY: And it sounds like they would be distributed both on this side of the river as—

BRADSHAW: Well—

HAY: --Or—

BRADSHAW: More over here before they—they opened up the—now when they opened up across the—the river, the new Capitol, around the turn of the century, when that—when they moved the legislature over there, then they built this other hotel. And they may—may have had other lodging over there too, but much of south Frankfort at that time wasn’t even there, you know. There was a distillery—the Old Hermitage down there on the river, which—if you know where Hermitage Drive is, that’s pretty much where it was over at the end of Fourth Street. But, yeah, there wasn’t a whole lot going on—where there’s—a matter of fact there’s—much of that—much of the houses over there were built on a landfill. But— 24:00HAY: In south Frankfort?

BRADSHAW: In south Frankfort yeah, as I understand it. Now, that’s—that’s what I’ve been told. 25:00HAY: So, the Bottom that—that means that north—that this side of the river was the earlier part of Frankfort. Well of course—

BRADSHAW: Right.

HAY: We have the old Capitol—

BRADSHAW: Right.

HAY: --Of course. But then the new Capitol came on the other side, but it didn’t probably get built up around for a while.

BRADSHAW: For a while. 26:00HAY: So, this would have been the hub here, over here still. So, the Bottom was always there or evolved—

BRADSHAW: It evolved as I understand it—from—as a river port. Frankfort was a river port. Now—before it was populated, it was a floodplain and—and they call it the Crawfish Bottom because it was clay down there you know, the soil didn’t get—very well developed being in a floodplain. And—but as they’ve—they built a port and—and then it was a cheap place to build (??) Blacks (??) were port workers. And then people came here, I heard this at one time, don’t know how true it is. People came here to take care of their families that were in the state prison. And coming from the mountains, they’re coming from a poor part of the state to take care of your relative—who was in the state prison, you know, you were seeking cheap shelter, you know. So, they built shacks and—they would oftentimes work on the river where they hauled the logs up and down the river. And—and a lot of things came at port, a lot of fruit and supplies, lumber, whatnot. And the chair factory and the river mills and the hemp you know, all went out on the river. The distillery goods, so the Bottom kind of, as I understand it, the Crawfish Bottom got populated by—by the—the river port traffic and all the people there. And also, the people here to take care of their families in the prison. So, you see why there was a—I mean I—I think I see why there was a [sighs] class distinction or a tendency for people to look downward to those who lived there, you know. 27:00HAY: And it would literally flood—I assume. Do you remember floods—

BRADSHAW: Sure, yes.

HAY: --Down there—

BRADSHAW: Yes I do. Yes I do. I remember floods well. I remember coming—the floodwater coming all the way to the end of St. Clair Street down to Mero and—I mean you could wade across it, but oh yes, a lot of my friends were flooded out of their houses, you know. 28:00HAY: What would happen to them? Those I mean did they have—

BRADSHAW: Go stay with relatives or go and you know it was--[chuckles]--hopefully you had someone, you know, that’s a good question. But a lot of people got flooded out of their houses. And when they built the—of course they built the public housing after they de—I almost said destroyed, after they--[laughs]—after urban renewal, up above the floodplains so they would never have that problem again, but. 29:00HAY: Is it—was it urban renewal that—kind of—that changed the Bottom and put in—

BRADSHAW: Absoutley.

HAY: What did they—what has—cause all of that’s gone now, the Bottom is all gone now, isn’t it?

BRADSHAW: It sure is. 30:00HAY: When did that happen?

BRADSHAW: Well, I guess that would be the mid-60s, ’64---thru’70. I lived on St. Clair Street then and well they star—from St. Clair Street back, so I watched the whole thing happen right across the street, you know. They tore down Mr. Jack Robb’s (??) funeral home there on the corner of St. Clair and Clinton. And he—there was an interesting man, he was very much a in the Black community and well-respected in the community at large. He was quite a—quite a gentleman. He’d—he would speak us—even speak to us kids and you know, and when we would say, “Hello, Mr. Robb,” you know. He was a—he was a really nice fellow. But, they—and there was nothing wrong with his funeral home, you know. And then the houses that were on St. Clair, I didn’t see what was wrong with them, you know. They—they could’ve used some fixing up, but—everything from there back got tore—torn down all the way to Wilkinson Street and everything on Wilkinson Street petty much. Mr. Fensel’s (??) Grocery, I guess from the railroad track on over and they just tore it down and started pouring concrete. [laughs] 31:00HAY: Is that when they put up the—this—

BRADSHAW: Right, the Plaza and all of that—all of that stuff. So, we’ve got a great celebration of the ninety-degree angle in concrete that will last a lunchtime (??). [chuckles] 32:00HAY: So, if you were right here, then you were literally watching—your friends were being moved out to other neighborhoods and—

BRADSHAW: Right.

HAY: --And the whole dynamic change—

BRADSHAW: Everything.

HAY: --And where were all the—were the kids still here playing in the---the old Capitol yard or?

BRADSHAW: No.

HAY: --Or did everybody start to disperse?

BRADSHAW: Everybody got dispersed. They tore down those—those houses on Lewis Street where a lot of the kids lived, and you see the parking lot there today. And of course, when they built the—the public housing there on Wilkinson Boulevard, right at the end of Mero, I think you know where—I forget what they call that development there. Then they built Walter Todd on down Wilkinson Street there. Of course, they already had the old brown brick public housing there right next to that, and that’s where they moved a lot people to. A lot of people bought houses, moved into houses down on Holmes Street and some went to south Frankfort. But, yeah it was—it’s gone, you know, it’s gone. I—I was—I was sitting out on the old Capitol yard about three or four years ago and the—the AME [African Methodist Episcopal] Church down there on Clinton and Lewis had a youth group down there and they brought up, oh, I guess it must have been about twenty-five or thirty kids to the old Capitol yard and let them all run around there. And I got you know [sighs] I kind of got a feeling seeing all those—it was wonderful seeing all those kids in the yard there, just for the hour and a half they were there, but I sat on the front porch. I lived—actually I moved back down to that little apartment building in another one of the four apartments and lived there for a couple of years. But, that was quite a moment to see kids in the yard again because, after—after urban renewal that was it, they didn’t come back anymore, you know. And they—they could—they’ve got plenty of grass there now. [laughter]

HAY: Yeah. You’re right, what a change. Really amazing.

BRADSHAW: Yeah. 33:00Hay: Where was Fitzgerald’s Drugs where your mother worked?

BRADSHAW: Okay it—

HAY: In which building?

BRADSHAW: Okay, it was on Main Street okay, where the bakery is. Okay if you travel—it will be between the bakery and St. Clair, it was just up two doors from the bakery. And—Fitzgerald’s was—it was originally down here on—where Horn’s Drug and where Serafini’s is now. But, they—he moved up there, I think in 1946, ’45, somewhere in there. And it was a great store, he had a record stop—a record shop in there, my mother and Mr. Clifford Harris ran that record shop for Sunny Fitzgerald for a number of years. Great record shop, everything, classics, jazz, blues, rock & roll, I mean it was—it really had a heck of a selection.

HAY: Was it inside the—

BRADSHAW: Inside the drugstore.

HAY: --The drugstore?

BRADSHAW: Um—hmm. And—they had a restaurant in there, soda fountain, restaurant, of course, a big cigar shop and it was a beautiful store, a wonderful store. 34:00HAY: What years did she work there?

BRADSHAW: I think she worked there from ’46 all the way to 1986. Yeah, and they mo—and they of course—by that time they had moved up to—behind where—off Louisville Road there.

1: 35:00HAY: Was that near where the Yagel’s—was that Fitzgerald’s?

BRADSHAW: Yes. Um—hmm. Yeah that was—yeah she moved up there with them and then she worked for Mrs. Fitzgerald had a--at a Walmart a few years there before she retired.

HAY: I’m gonna put you on hold here.

End of interview 1:00