Oral History Interview with Michael Fields

“Stories From the Balcony”

Interviews about the Grand Theatre in Frankfort, Kentucky

Interview on Video with Michael Fields

On Location at the Grand Theatre

Tape 004JTH_DV

Conducted by Joanna Hay

October 30, 2006

This project has been supported by the Kentucky Oral History Commission

and Save The Grand Theatre, Inc.

Tape begins with Joanna Hay and John Hay doing a sound check.

Location is sitting in the balcony of The Grand Theatre.

HAY: How old were you for your first memories of The Grand Theatre?

FIELDS: Oh, gosh. . . probably 14, 16, in that age range.

HAY: Is when you first came, remember coming. . .

FIELDS: Yeah.

HAY: Now, was that when your dad was working here?

FIELDS: No, just as a, a kid coming here, and I really don’t remember exactly when my dad worked here. I just remember helping him.

HAY: You do?

FIELDS: Yes.

HAY: How old were you then, do you think?

FIELDS: I was probably about 16. Mmmhmm.

HAY: That’s why you were looking for that extra change, you really needed to spend that on.

FIELDS: Well I’d need it, yeah, you know. I’d need it to take a young lady to the movie with you.

HAY: Yeah. And you’d come here?

FIELDS: Oh yeah. Couldn’t go anyplace else in Franklin County, so, this was it.

HAY: Tell, tell me about it. Tell me about what it was like coming to The Grand,

bringing a date, and what, what years, what 19 6…

FIELDS: Probably… let’s see, I was born in ’48, so I’d say the late 50s, early 60s. I guess as an African American, this was the only place that we could, you know, go to the movie theatre. So, you would save up your money so you could come and to The Grand, and it was fun. You know. We knew there was something different I guess, now I don’t really remember exactly when the capitol was built…we were never allowed to go there even after it was built, but we had as much fun as we would have had there also, so. It really didn’t matter.

HAY: Do you remember what movies you came to?

FIELDS: Oh gosh, no.

HAY: What kinds of movies were they showing?

FIELDS: Oh, Westerns, Science Fiction. I’d probably very rarely come to, you know, a love… thing. But a lot of Westerns… a lot of Westerns.

HAY: Even if you had a date, wouldn’t you bring a date to a romantic story?

FIELDS: No, I didn’t know what dating was back then, you just, you know, wanted to spend some time with your girlfriend if you could, so. You know, you’d sit, and as with anyone, with your arm around her. It would go to sleep on you basically, but you’d put it there anyway, so….

HAY: [Laughter – Hay] Do you remember where you sat?

FIELDS: Oh, yeah, and if you had a girl, you’d always sit in the the up, upper area because it was darker, and no one could see, you know, you kissing her on the cheek, or on the lips, where ever. So, but you’d never sit with a girl down here because everyone above you could see what you were doing, so you would go as far back up as you possibly could if you had a date.

HAY: And there are some real corners up in there.

FIELDS: There are.

HAY: Behind the projection on the side.

FIELDS: Yeah.

HAY: So, what did you feel when you walked up here, a few minutes ago for the first time in…

FIELDS: It was just kind of déjà vu all over again, and and, just, flashbacks of the concession stand out front, and even sitting in certain locations, I could kind of remember. Now I can’t remember who I was sitting with, I was….very popular back then, but I can remember the locations, and I’d either sit on, you know, the left side or the right side, but very rarely would I ever sit in the lower section. We’d just come down here and look over, throw popcorn… down on people, we didn’t care who, so.

HAY: Right. You commented how low this, this railing was. You mentioned how low this railing was.

FIELDS: When I look at it now, I mean, it just looks very low. And back then it didn’t seem to be as low as it is right now.

HAY: And then you also mentioned… how different the size… of the theatre is.

FIELDS: Well, yeah, and especially, the size of that was set aside for us, I mean, it just seemed back then to have been much larger, but, now that I look at it, this was very small space, and I guess with you saying it basically held… 600 plus people. What, there’s probably less than… a hundred seats up here, so. I guess it wasn’t separate but equal back then either.

HAY: Just a little tiny corner.

FIELDS: That’s all we had. But we had fun. So, that was what was important.

HAY: You had the best view from up here.

FIELDS: We really did, we really did. You know, I don’t even remember ever… sitting on the lower area.

HAY: Would you have come down there after hours... with your dad?

FIELDS: Yeah, because we cleaned up the entire facility… I didn’t find as much money down there, unfortunately, as I’d find up here. But I always, you know, always found money. I mean, there wasn’t a time when I helped my dad to, to clean up that I didn’t find some money.

HAY: So what might be your… earnings on an evening?

FIELDS: Oh, you could find two or three dollars worth of change easily.

HAY: So you could figure out what to do with that.

FIELDS: Oh yeah. You’d save it so the next time you came to The Grand, you’d have money to, to buy some concessions.

HAY: What kind of things did they have in the concession stand, what did you buy? What, popcorn and…

FIELDS: Popcorn, Milk Duds. You know, I don’t think they had Mike and Ike candy back then, but Milk Duds was my favorite anyway. You can almost just smell the popcorn right now.

HAY: So when you walked up those stairs, did you almost… smell that popcorn?

FIELDS: You could, but I mean, the, the runner just looked like that same runner from way back when, so.

HAY: Tell me again about the stairwell that you think…

FIELDS: Well it was a double wide because, I have distinctly remember a handrail going up the middle of it. So… but it was much wider than it is right now. But it was very steep. But I don’t think that it was, I don’t think that it was as steep it as it is.

HAY: Must have shortened that, that lower bit, to make room for those offices.

FIELDS: But the ceiling, as I said, that, it looks like the same blue… the last time I was here in the building.

HAY: And all that, look at all the… where the air ducts, dirt around those air ducts.

FIELDS: Yeah, yep.

HAY: Yeah, around Frankfort, there are a lot of different opinions of The Grand Theatre. People say, “Oh, that dirty old place?” or they’ll say, “I had great memories there” and…

FIELDS: Well, you know, it may have been dirty, but… you know, for those of us that this was all it was, you know, we appreciated it. Think, otherwise, you know, we’d have to go to Lexington to go to the movie theatre, so.

HAY: And that’s a long drive.

FIELDS: It was, plus you didn’t have a car anyway, you know.

HAY: Right.

FIELDS: I know what being poor was [Laughing].

HAY: Well, I’m glad you could make those… dimes and nickles, find those dimes and nickles on the floor [Laughing]. So, your, tell us about your dad… and what he did here.

FIELDS: Oh, my dad was a character… he’s probably a, a legend in this community anyway. But as I said, he was responsible for, the cleaning it up, every single day, among other jobs that he had. And I remember, I guess, JCPenney’s was next door. And I can remember he worked over at JCPenney’s, and then just worked on his own during the daytime, and this was kind of like a night-time job.

HAY: He was working all day long.

FIELDS: He was.

HAY: Was he the only person keeping this… place… clean?

FIELDS: Yep.

HAY: A crew of one?

FIELDS: A crew of… and me.

HAY: And you, yeah, yeah.

FIELDS: And it would take, you know, several hours, but… you know, once you… because you’d come through, fold all the seats up, sweep, take it up… you know. Mop out here in the hallways…

HAY: Tell me about those seats, so… they were wooden.

FIELDS: Wooden, fold down. They weren’t real comfortable, but, hey.

HAY: What kind of arms?

FIELDS: They were wooden also… but there were metal parts on the, the lower part, and wood on the top.

HAY: So, so, when anybody would sit in them, they’d sit, they’d flop down.

FIELDS: They’d flop down, kind of curved.

HAY: Then you’d, at the end of the night…

FIELDS: You’d come through, and lift them all up… because that’s where you found the money.

HAY: [Laughing] So you went through first to find the money, and then your dad came behind you to sweep the popcorn.

FIELDS: Well, you know, as you’d go through, you’d see the money because it was real obvious once you turned the lights on if there was any money laying down there, along with the popcorn and the chewing gum and, everything else that people discarded.

HAY: Spilled drinks…

FIELDS: Spilled drinks.

HAY: People, let’s see Cokes and what did everybody drink?

FIELDS: Primarily Cokes back then.

HAY: Pretty interesting. Tell me your dad’s name.

FIELDS: In this community, he’s just probably known as Big Ike, but his name was William Isaac Fields, Sr. But everybody just referred to him as Big Ike. And he wasn’t a big man, so… I don’t know where he got that nickname.

HAY: Big personality?

FIELDS: It wasn’t a big heart [Laughing], so it must have been the personality.

HAY: What else did your dad do? You said he worked at JCPenney…

FIELDS: Well, he was self-employed. He hung wallpaper and painted. There are probably very few houses in this community that he didn’t hang wallpaper in or he didn’t paint at some point in time in his life. Did a little carpentry, but primarily he was a painter and hung wallpaper.

HAY: And that was all around downtown?

FIELDS: Any place in Franklin County, yeah.

HAY: So did you grow up… which street did you grow up on?

FIELDS: Grew up on Blanton Street… 314 Blanton Street. And then when Urban Renewal came through… we moved to South Frankfort on Third Street, and our address on Third Street was 314 East Third Street, so that number stood with me.

HAY: What year was that move for you?

FIELDS: That would have been Urban Renewal came through… so, and I know, so, they built Douglass Avenue for the people who were living down at the Bottom at that time, and that’s what we called it, the Bottom. So that would have been probably….’68, 72ish. In that area.

HAY: And that’s… did they call it Urban Renewal at the time this was all happening?

FIELDS: They did.

HAY: And they they pretty much… sort of took out the neighborhoods that were…

FIELDS: They took out all of the Bottom, yeah, and built Douglass Avenue specifically for African Americans.

HAY: And that was the same time as all downtowns were all… dying, too, so we saw the way The Grand Theatre closed, and how all this downtown stuff… decline, and I guess people moved to suburbs, and neighborhoods were shifted around.

FIELDS: They were. I can remember the house we bought in South Frankfort, and renovating it. But I guess we were the first in our neighborhood to have television, too, so… it was like, all the kids always gathered at our house to watch television. But the kids were afraid of my dad, so, when, you know, when they would come, he would come home, they would all run out the back door.

HAY: Big Ike… he was a big, big figure.

FIELDS: Yeah, but my brother and I, we were… laughing and joking about it, and how creative he was back then. Because when you would come in the house, the TV was on a, a pedistal swivel, and he cut a… a hole, a square hole in the wall so you could sit in the living room and you could watch TV, but then when you’d go to the dining room, you just swiveled the TV around, and the screen was in… the opening that he had cut in the wall, so, hey [Laughing].

HAY: That’s pretty smart.

FIELDS: It was. But once, because the dining room was so small… there was just enough room to squeeze in, so once you got in, it wasn’t any going back out [Laughing] until everyone else left, but yeah. I can remember swiveling that TV and… so.

HAY: That’s pretty clever.

FIELDS: It really was.

HAY: And it kept dinner time on time because… you didn’t have to interrupt your show.

FIELDS: No.

HAY: [Laughing] The TV around… And you mentioned you were the first ones in your neighborhood to have a television, and, of course, with televisions becoming… in everybody’s houses, it changed the nature of the theatre… in a, in a town, because everyone… you suddenly had entertainment in your living room.

FIELDS: You did.

HAY: And you, and a lot of the theatres like The Grand closed down also because of that. People could watch shows at home and didn’t have to go out.

FIELDS: Yeah, but you couldn’t date at home, so…

HAY: The theatres still serve a purpose.

FIELDS: They did.

HAY: [Laughing]

FIELDS: And they still do today! [Both laughing] Hadn’t changed one bit. People still take someone to see the movie, and you put your arm around her, and it still goes to sleep on you, so [Laughing].

HAY: A lot of guys can tell that same story.

FIELDS: Oh they can. They can.

HAY: That’s great… Let’s see, the physical, the actual building, we talked about the, the lobby downstairs. Do you remember any of these designs, like those stenciled designs?

FIELDS: I do.

HAY: You remember?

FIELDS: I do. And I remember the little… trim out here, the wood… crown molding. It all’s… every, it’s coming back. And, and the blue.

HAY: I love that blue. I’m sure that’s the… same scheme that will stay… the color scheme will stay.

FIELDS: You know, and it, even the concession stands back then were different. I mean, ours were so small and had a limited, you know, things to choose from, but the one downstairs was much larger and had a lot more, so.

HAY: Do you think it was double the size downstairs?

FIELDS: Oh, easily. Yeah.

HAY: And more variety?

FIELDS: More variety.

HAY: Well that’s not fair.

FIELDS: Well, I don’t think we were fair back then anyway, so.

HAY: It was a different era, wasn’t it?

FIELDS: It was.

HAY: When you think of The Grand Theatre, or when you think of… Civil Rights movement, and all the things that shifted in the 60s, and you were coming of age and a young adult during that time… does The Grand Theatre… I don’t know how to… does The Grande Theatre sort of represent some of that to you? Of what it was like, you know, before, when there was so much segregation, when there was segregation in this community? Does The Grande represent that to you in some ways, or? What other, what other buildings or institutions or a physical place might… might make some of those…

FIELDS: I guess to me, really, I guess, was Sarafini’s, which used to be Horn’s drug store… because I can remember the counter. And we could, African Americans could go in. We couldn’t sit down at the counter, so, you’d stand there and order your ice cream or Coke, and you had to leave with it, and that always, even to this day, when I go in Sarafini’s right now, it still rings very clear in my mind that we never were allowed to sit at the counter. And I can see the little round stools, and… I remember Mr. Horn. He was a nice guy too, but… those were the times. It was reality back then.

HAY: And that’s a strong feeling?

FIELDS: It, it is.

HAY: And as it was all shifting and changing, and there was, the struggle was happening, you felt it even more strongly, I assume.

FIELDS: Yeah. I remember, I guess….when Martin Luther King came to Frankfort to march. Because my mom was working at the governor’s mansion at the time, and the state troopers had told her… not to let her kids go, because they anticipated that there was going to be trouble. And, and, so I didn’t participate in that march because my mom… told me not to because she thought it was going to be trouble, but….I remember that.

HAY: That was an amazing….march. I’ve seen the pictures of that here in Frankfort.

FIELDS: Yeah.

HAY: Did you… leave, move away from Frankfort and then come back?

FIELDS: Nope, I’ve lived here all my life. I guess I had, what, four brothers. No, I didn’t have four brothers, I had two brothers and two sisters. They’ve all moved away, but I’m only one that’s still here. It’s been home. I’ve lived here all my life with the exception of a, I lived in Louisville a year and Cincinnati three months, so.

HAY: Do they still come back and visit?

FIELDS: They do.

HAY: This is home.

FIELDS: This is home. So… But we visit, and we, you know, laugh and joke and… we had a good life, you know, in comparison to… how things are. We were happy. We always had good food to eat, warm bed to sleep in. And I had money… when I was cleaning up up here [Laughing]. But I’ve always, my dad taught me how to paint and paper, and, so… The skills that I have today are, I can, you know, thank him for them. And none of the kids, you know we were always… not afraid to work. So they instilled good values in all five of us. For that, we love them.

HAY: What about your mom? Tell me about your mother.

FIELDS: Oh, my mom? I guess… she, just loved to cook and… I guess another memory I guess was the old Simon’s furniture store on Mirrow, I believe. Because she used to you know, cook for them, so… and then she’d cook at the governor’s mansion and the lieutenant governor’s mansion. Guess she started cooking when Wilson Wyatt was lieutenant governor. And I remember each Christmas he would always have in our family up to the lieutenant governor’s mansion for cookies and punch. So…

HAY: Want to hear what a small world it is? I… I was born in England, I, I have English parents, and we came to America in 1968 when I was…

FIELDS: I know your dad. He lives around the street from me.

HAY: Exactly. So I ended up growing up in Louisville, and Wilson Wyatt’s granddaughter was my friend from the age of six until we graduated from high school, and they were the nicest people. They would take us… they would take all these rowdy teenagers and let us hang out at their house and… and, so Wilson Wyatt, that’s a, a big name for me.

FIELDS: Small world.

HAY: So you met my dad, huh?

FIELDS: Mmmhmm.

HAY: Now you know. So I should have told you Joanna Thornewell Hay when I…

FIELDS: Well, I think the first time I met him was at a South Frankfort Neighborhood meeting. When they were trying to organize a couple years ago. But then I’ve watched I guess over the last few months where he’s been renovating and redoing his front yard, so…

HAY: He did that nice garden, didn’t he?

FIELDS: He did!

HAY: [Laughing] He, he worked really hard on that.

FIELDS: He did.

HAY: Yeah, that’s great.

FIELDS: It’s a, it’s a great neighborhood we live in in South Frankfort. Great neighborhood.

HAY: It really is a great neighborhood. If I didn’t live in the country, that’s where I would live.

FIELDS: If I could afford, I’d live in the country [Laughing].

HAY: But then you wouldn’t have your neighbors, and… and everything… what, tell me about your job, what’s your job here?

FIELDS: I am the, I work for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services. I’m the Undersecretary for Human Services.

HAY: So you work for the state?

FIELDS: I… worked for the Housing Authority from 1980 to 2000 as the Executive Director. And then I retired for a couple of years and got bored, went back to work for the state, so… And I’ve enjoyed it thoroughly.

HAY: Good, well it seems to suit you. Let’s see… other thoughts that I have to ask you… Describe who came to The Grand.

FIELDS: Who came to The Grand… Oh, well because it was the only theatre that we were allowed to, I mean… everyone in the neighborhood from the old crawl, came to the, came to The Grand. And then I guess, people from East Main Street. But… it was always packed. Always packed. Because this was, you know… the primary entertainment we had, unless you were going to a house party. But as far as… outside entertainment, The Grand was, The Grand was it.

HAY: So now, you came and helped your dad, but, let’s say… aside from that, did you come to the movies with your friends or with a date once a week, twice a week, three times a week…

FIELDS: Oh, probably, you know, weekly, we’d come.

HAY: Weekends?

FIELDS: Weekends, primarily. On the weekend. Saturday night, Saturday afternoon.

HAY: Then everybody would be here?

FIELDS: Everyone would be here. You know, the younger people would come earlier, and then the older ones would come later, because we had to be in.

HAY: It’s the opposite now, isn’t it? The young people are all out, and…

FIELDS: Yeah, and us old people are home! [both laughing]

HAY: So, so the younger ones would come to, what, like a 7 o’clock showing or?

FIELDS: Oh, it would be early, like 4 in the afternooon, yeah.

HAY: And all your friends would be here.

FIELDS: And then on Saturdays, you’d be lined up, you know, because they’d open up around 12, 1, so you’d come real early.

HAY: So you’d be hanging outside, and get your ticket, and visiting, and…

FIELDS: Well, I wouldn’t call it visiting, you know.

HAY: With your friends, no, you wouldn’t hang out with your friends out there?

FIELDS: Well, when you got here, it was time to, to come on in. But, as far as just hanging out on the street, that wasn’t something you’d do.

HAY: That wasn’t the time for that.

FIELDS: No.

HAY: You have to tell me about these things because… I don’t know. [Laughing] When you would come… girls, girls come by themselves, boys come by themselves, and groups of girls?

FIELDS: Yeah, girls would come together, guys would come together, and then, you know, you’d have boys and girls coming.

HAY: Sitting in the corner, and the groups of girls and the groups of guys together…

FIELDS: Yep. And aside from throwing things down on, you know, the lower level, you’d throw things down on people that were sitting in this area that we’re in, too.

HAY: It’s kind of an instinct just to…

FIELDS: It really was.

HAY: Can’t help but…

FIELDS: You’d walk along there, smack somebody up against the head, so… But there was never any violence, you know, it was always in fun and so… I can’t ever remember, you know, a fight breaking out, so.

HAY: So you would come to the earlier ones with your friends, but then you’d stick around late, do late shows with your dad.

FIELDS: Well, I’d go back home, and then, because we would wait until it closed, and then we’d come back, you know and clean up, rather than come early on the weekends before it would open up to, to clean up.

HAY: So the last show would end at what time?

FIELDS: Oh, around 9 or 10.

HAY: And then that’d be the, you’d clean up, 10 o’clock, 11 o’clock, or?

FIELDS: Or come early the next day on the weekends before they would open up, yeah.

HAY: Interesting. Did you have any thoughts when you heard that there was a movement people around the community trying to get The Grand Theatre going again, what were your first thoughts about that?

FIELDS: It just brought back memories of, of what it looked like here in the building. But I thought it was a great idea, in the Save the Grand committee or board to be commended for what they want to do because this community is so desparate in need of this type of entertainment downtown. And, I think downtown, you know, if it’s to survive, and it’s going to take The Grand and hopefully the new library that we’ve is going to bring people back downtown.

HAY: So are you involved a lot with the new library?

FIELDS: Very much so.

HAY: Tell me about that, tell me what’s the… I know it’s opening soon.

FIELDS: Well, I’ve been on the Library Board since about 1982, so… I guess Bill Kirkland is probably the longest serving member because he was on it for like twenty-four years. But I’m currently the President of the Library Board, so I’ve been very involved with the construction of the new building as the owner’s representative, and we’re excited about the opening this weekend. And it’s unique, it’s… we will have… it’s been a hundred years… since the first library was open in this community, and throughout that hundred-year period, there never has been a facility that was originally designed for a library, so we’ve always modified buildings to accommodate, you know, the books, so this is the community’s first library, and we’re very excited about it. And we think it’s going to a, a great addition, and, it’s a fantastic building. And on the night, we passed the ….the tax increase….back in 1990, I was the Vice Chairman, but the Chairman was not there, so I was the one chairing that meeting when we passed that tax increase.

HAY: That’s great. What was, what was the budget in the end? What did it cost?

FIELDS: Probably the new facility’s going to run us about 9.5 million dollars. So.

HAY: Beautiful building.

FIELDS: Yep, so I passed the tax increase when we started saving money and I guess I’m gonna, you know, dedicate the new facility on Sunday. I will have made the full circle. Then I can ride off in the sunset like Hopalong Cassidy. And I do remember watching Hopalong Cassidy and the Lone Ranger here in The Grande.

HAY: Yep. You probably don’t remember like the live shows, that was before your time.

FIELDS: No, that was before my time, [Laughing] way before my time.

HAY: You’d have to be in your mid-seventies to remember that, at least. Well, gosh, congratulations on that library. Full circle that you’ve done, that’s incredible. Well, let’s keep our fingers crossed that The Grande Theatre can be next.

FIELDS: It will be. It will be.

HAY: What’s your opinion of how arts (and that includes, you know, movies, films, theatre, music) what role arts can play in a community?

FIELDS: I think the arts expose people… and not just in entertainment, but exposure to other cultures, and, you know, it enriches our lives. So…

HAY: Otherwise, people don’t get to see how other people live and other people feel and…

FIELDS: And it’s something, though, that, I think we need to promote more. I’d venture to say that there are probably a lot of people that haven’t been to live, you know, musicals, and you see it, and you think, well, that’s not very entertaining. But until you go there and are a part of it, you can’t appreciate it. So I think The Grande will, you know, expose more people in the community to, you know, live entertainment.

HAY: About a month ago, we had Hasan Davis come perform York, which he wrote. I don’t know if you’ve seen his performance or…

FIELDS: I haven’t, but I know him. I served on a board with him.

HAY: Of all the things that have gone on in the theatre, since January, we’ve done programming here, but he stood up there for 45 minutes and did his performance, and it was… absolutely incredible, and there were only about… there were probably about 45 people here. And I just kept thinking of all the people that just would have loved this so much, but they didn’t know, or they’re afraid of live theatre, or they’ll think it’s boring, or you know, and I can’t wait for more of this community to embrace. They don’t know, I mean… They didn’t know what they would be getting.

FIELDS: They really don’t… and I don’t know how you get people to try something. It’s like trying, you know, something that you haven’t eaten before. You just have to try it. And I think that for those people, you know, that haven’t been exposed to live entertainment, they just need to try it, and then they’ll like it.

HAY: And kids.

FIELDS: Especially kids.

HAY: To get the kids coming in grade school, middle school, high school to programs here, and a thousand kids are coming next week, starting tomorrow to see the Lexington Children’s Theatre, so that’s a start.

FIELDS: You know, and I think that will be so important to, to get young kids and… exposed to something here in this community that they otherwise wouldn’t have or would have to go to Lexington or to Louisville, but having it right here in Franklin County is going to make a big difference. I think The Grande’s got a very bright future here in the community.

HAY: Well I think so, too. I think those are my main… those are all the notes that I had to cover. Is there anything else you want to, any other little story, any little juicy tidbit of a story you want to tell?

FIELDS: No, because I’d probably leave somebody’s name out. You know as I’ve set here, I’ve tried to think about some young ladies that I… came to The Grande with.

HAY: You want to list their names?

FIELDS: No, I do not.

HAY: Then they can be listed in the [Laughing]

FIELDS: No, no. Sometimes it’s best to be, to leave well enough alone. 1:00END OF INTERVIEW WITH MICHAEL FIELDS

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