Mortiño

Hello my name is Cassandra Davis and I would like to first thank you for agreeing to be

interviewed for my dissertation. I am interested in knowing how you view the present, past and articulate the future of Durham’s Black students. This interview should take 1 hour and 30 minutes to 2 hours. I will take notes and voice record this discussion. The information that we discuss will be kept confidential. Do you have any questions before we begin? Okay let us begin.

1. Tell me about your relationship to Durham County. Beginning with a Picture

Open with a picture from the Hayti District (please view attachment). 2. What are some of your first thoughts when looking at this picture? 3. How would you describe the Hayti District?

Continue with influential Black leaders

Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. DuBois, and other influential Black leaders spoke a lot about Durham during the early to mid 1900s. Durham was even sighted for being the Black Mecca of the country.

4. How, if at all, were you aware of this?

a. How did that influence you in school, in life, in general? Continue with urban renewal

Project introduced in 1957 where they the county could receive funding from the government to revitalize Durham. This project was funded 2/3s by the federal government and 1/3 from local funding. After meeting with city planners, they determined the project would cost $600,000 to fully revitalize Hayti. Construction companies came in and began the first process of knocking down Hayti, however the second process was not initiated.

5. Do you remember the reconstruction and/or destruction of the Hayti District?

6. Tell me about the atmosphere in the Black community during the destruction of the Hayti District.

a. To what extent were their tensions between elite/middle and working class Blacks?

Continue with School desegregation

A quote from Judge Johnson Hayes8 _{in 1951,“While the buildings and facilities for the Negroes} may be adequate, they are not substantially equal to those afforded the whites…Under laws laid down in this circuit…it is necessary for the defendants to provide substantially equal facilities for 

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the Negro children as compared with those furnished to the white children out of public funds” (NY Times,1951 p. 24)

7. To what extent did the closing of the Hayti District affect Black schools?

a. In addition, how did the Brown v. Board of Education decision affect Black schools?

Continue with Data

 The DPS graduation rate for Blacks is 63% and 87% for Whites

 According to DPS in 2010, 76% of student dropouts are Blacks and 10% are White  In DPS Blacks account for 52% of the student population

 Black students make up 81% of short suspensions and 83% of long-term suspensions in DPS

 67% of the homeless population are Black  Over half of those incarcerated in NC are Black

 Higher rates of unemployment and poverty for Blacks

8. What are some of your first thoughts when listening to these statistics?

9. According to these statistics, they suggest that Black students are failing in Durham County.

a. What do you think are the reasons? b. What do you think are the solutions? Continue with a Quote

“To-day there is a singular group in Durham where a black man may get up in the morning from a mattress made by black men, in a house which a black man built out of lumber which black men cut and planed; he may put on a suit which he bought at a colored haberdashery and socks knit at a colored mill; he may cook victuals from a colored grocery on a stove which black men fashioned; he may earn his living working for colored men, be sick in a colored hospital, and buried from a colored church; and the Negro insurance society will pay his widow enough to keep his children in a colored school. This is surely progress” (Dubois, 1912, p.338)

10. In 1911, Dubois described progress as Blacks supporting Blacks and utilizing products created by Blacks and for Blacks. How do you describe progress for the Black Durham community nearly 100 years later?

11. Is there something from the history of Hayti that can be used to benefit Durham’s Black population today (i.e. schools, businesses, beliefs or traditions)? Please explain your response.

End with Questions on the Future of Durham

12. How would you describe the future of Durham’s Black students? a. What hope is there for improving their future?

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13. Since we talked about the past, present and future of Durham, do you have a final message you would like to give to the Black population in Durham County? Final Thoughts

Thank you for allowing me to meet with you and hear your accounts of Durham. I will be sending you the transcription of this interview for your review. If you think of anything additional, please feel free to call, mail, or email me. I will be getting in contact with you in a week for a follow-up interview that will only take 30 minutes. Again thank you for your time and I hope this was as beneficial for you as it was for me.

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APPENDIX B – WORKING WOMEN OF HAYTI 

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