Interview with a Bolling School Alum
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Mr. Alex Pryor, December 15th, 2021
I respected all of them. And, you know the thing about it, ah…, we didn’t have a lot of kids in classes, so we got a lot of one-on-one. If we didn’t understand something, then they were right there…to try to make you…to try to get you to understand…you know, ah…they had that time. And I don’t know about the other kids that went here, but me?...I was grateful for that because I got out in the world early. My father died at sixteen. I had to quit school when I was a junior in high school…to take care of my mother and my brothers. So, a lot of the things that they taught me…not just school, but about life…I had to apply that at a early age, and it got me by in…at several times. So the teachers…? I didn’t like their discipline…no…but as far as…I love them…all of them…all of them." |
This is Gospel Hill…that’s the beginning of Gospel Hill…okay, ah, all black folks live up here. |
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Mr. Marion Gordon, December 9th, 2021
…but as far as having any dealings with any of the, uh, white people downtown, we didn’t. And then when I went to Lewisburg okay, that was my first mixing with white students…people, teachers...whatever. And, uh, and I saw…I saw a lot of discrimination there. We would have to…well, back then you could go downtown for lunch, and when we went downtown, the white kids could go in the front doors, and the Court Restaurant used to be there where, uh, the Green Space is now…right in the area in the bank parking lot all that was the Court Restaurant, and we had to go around back where the garbage cans were and the bees and the trash and sit on the steps, whereas our fellow students (white students) they could go in the front door. |
Mrs. Alma Hogsett, she was the county music teacher, and she would be on the radio every Wednesday [...] and every week there was a certain theme, and, of course, the teachers would put the song for that week on the board and you had to copy it down and you had to draw a picture relat…relative to the song…and at the end of the school year they would have a music festival here at Bolling in the gym, and all the students from throughout the county would bring their folders with all their pictures and all their songs that they had written down and then you got awards for the best…first place, second place, third place …so it was competitive…that was competitive, and, uh, and then I’ll never forget Mrs. Coleman…I’ll never forget Mrs. Coleman because she was very…ah, I don’t know the word, but she emphasized handwriting…your manuscript [...] she was religious about that stuff, and, uh, but now, you know, I appreciate it, and she was the lady who I think made me competitive because everything we did…we competed everything we did in that class...[..] Mrs. Coleman was very, ah, influential in my…in my coming-up." |
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Mrs. Elizabeth Keys, February 15th, 2022
I remember this one teacher, Mrs. Jackson always said, "A hint to the wise is sufficient." My 1st grade teacher always asked us what we had for breakfast. I used to slip and eat Sugar Babies in class." |
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