WEBVTT - The A Building: 39 Years Old 0:00:05.040 --> 0:00:06.280 Coming up on the AID Building. 0:00:07.120 --> 0:00:11.360 Nineteen sixty eight, the murder of doctor King, which traumatized everyone. 0:00:11.840 --> 0:00:15.319 State patrol came to campus. They were beating students, they 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:18.000 were shooting tear gas into the dorm rooms of Clark. 0:00:18.320 --> 0:00:20.600 It's not just killing us as a humanity, but it's 0:00:20.680 --> 0:00:22.240 killing our neighbor's. 0:00:21.880 --> 0:00:26.720 Globally, the FBI had a role in the murder of 0:00:26.800 --> 0:00:28.160 a black panther leader. 0:00:28.560 --> 0:00:33.760 Sam Jackson was exploring his future on the Moorhouse campus. 0:00:33.520 --> 0:00:37.040 To be in what we really thought was a revolution 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:39.400 or was a revolution. I mean people were die. I 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:43.920 remember when doctor King was assassinated. I flew from Atlanta 0:00:44.080 --> 0:00:47.200 to Memphis in March with you know those people that night. 0:00:47.600 --> 0:00:48.680 I'm Hans Charles. 0:00:48.840 --> 0:00:49.880 I'm in Lechlamomba. 0:00:50.159 --> 0:00:52.839 And this podcast is about the student lock in of 0:00:52.880 --> 0:00:55.920 the board of trustees at Morehouse College in nineteen sixty nine. 0:00:56.760 --> 0:00:59.960 Samuel L. Jackson was one of those students. Martin Luther 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:02.360 King Senior was on the board of trustees. 0:01:03.160 --> 0:01:06.200 It's a story about protest, the struggle for black rights 0:01:06.280 --> 0:01:09.679 and freedom of speech that echoing today's world far louder 0:01:09.720 --> 0:01:12.520 than they should. It's a lesson to us now more 0:01:12.520 --> 0:01:14.640 than ever and it will blow your mind. 0:01:19.600 --> 0:01:22.960 The A Building Episode one, thirty nine years old. 0:01:34.000 --> 0:01:35.639 What is the Perfect tist? 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:39.720 Not of money, not of possessions, but of ideas. 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:42.840 In the nineteen sixties, America found itself in war of 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:47.720 ideas with high stakes. The stakes were the soul of America. 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:51.720 Leaders like Malcolm X spoke to these times in these issues. 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:56.200 Look at the American Revolution in seventeen seventy six. 0:01:57.080 --> 0:02:00.720 That revolution was for what for lane? Why did they 0:02:00.720 --> 0:02:02.200 want land independence? 0:02:03.520 --> 0:02:05.720 How was it carried out? Bloodshed? 0:02:07.040 --> 0:02:13.200 Right number one? That was based on land the basis 0:02:13.280 --> 0:02:17.239 of independence, and the only way they could get. 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:19.720 It was bloodshed. 0:02:20.720 --> 0:02:25.080 You haven't got a revolution that doesn't involve bloodshed. And 0:02:25.160 --> 0:02:30.760 you're afraid to bleed. I saw you were afraid to bleed. 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:33.760 As long as the white man send you to Korea, 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:37.880 you bled. He sent you to Germany, you bled. He 0:02:37.919 --> 0:02:40.440 sent you to the South Pacific to fight the Japanese. 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:42.959 You bled. You bleed for white people. 0:02:43.520 --> 0:02:46.200 But when it comes times to seeing your own churches being. 0:02:46.080 --> 0:02:49.480 Bombed in little black girls who murd you haven't gotten 0:02:49.480 --> 0:02:55.399 no good. 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:59.760 February twenty first, nineteen sixty five. Malcolm xis killed during 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:02.680 this speech in New York City. He was thirty nine 0:03:02.760 --> 0:03:03.280 years old. 0:03:04.000 --> 0:03:09.360 Doctor Martin Luther King Junior, a more houseman, a freedom fighter, 0:03:09.560 --> 0:03:12.960 another soldier in the war against oppression. At the end 0:03:13.000 --> 0:03:16.880 of his life, his rhetoric becomes more militant, a far 0:03:17.040 --> 0:03:19.920 cry from the hopeful optimism of the I have a 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:20.760 dream speech. 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:28.400 Strangely enough, I would turn to the Almighty and say, 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:31.720 if you allow me to live just a few. 0:03:31.560 --> 0:03:36.120 Years in the second half of the twentieth century, I 0:03:36.200 --> 0:03:46.720 will be happy. And that's a strange statement to make, 0:03:46.800 --> 0:03:47.960 because the world. 0:03:47.720 --> 0:03:48.680 Is all messed up. 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:56.760 The nation is sick, trouble is in the land, confusion 0:03:57.640 --> 0:03:58.560 all around. 0:03:58.920 --> 0:04:03.960 That's a strange statement. Something is happening in our world. 0:04:05.600 --> 0:04:07.280 The masses of people. 0:04:06.960 --> 0:04:07.960 Arising up. 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:11.800 And wherever they. 0:04:11.640 --> 0:04:20.080 Are the symbol today, whether they are in Johannesburg, South Africa, Nairobi, Kenya, 0:04:20.200 --> 0:04:26.040 Acro Ghana, New York City, Atlanta, Georgia, Jackson, Mississippi. 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:29.920 Are Memphis, Tennessee. The cry is always the same, we 0:04:30.080 --> 0:04:31.599 want to be free. 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:42.360 It is no longer the choice. 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:47.080 Between violence and nonviolence in this world is nonviolence on 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:48.320 non existence. 0:04:48.640 --> 0:04:49.960 That is where we are today. 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:58.760 April fourth, nineteen sixty eight, Doctor King is killed in Memphis, 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:04.480 Tennessee's nine years old. Here's Samuel L. Jackson discussing exactly 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:07.200 that on the Henry Wallin show back in two thousand 0:05:07.200 --> 0:05:07.599 and seven. 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:13.240 I remember the night Doctor King was assassinated. I was 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:17.000 at a campus movie. Me and revolutionary because I still 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:19.080 like movies. But so I was at a campus movie 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:23.000 and the movie was John GoFar Police come home. And 0:05:23.400 --> 0:05:25.120 a guy came in and said, Doctor. 0:05:24.960 --> 0:05:27.120 King has been killed. You motherfucker's sitting in here and 0:05:27.160 --> 0:05:28.160 watch a fucking movie. 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:30.000 We need to be in the streets tan some shit. 0:05:29.920 --> 0:05:32.039 Up, no, And everybody's like, all right, all right, all right, 0:05:32.320 --> 0:05:34.520 we will just let us finish watching the movie. 0:05:35.200 --> 0:05:38.839 On April nineteenth, nineteen sixty nine, a group of Morehouse 0:05:38.880 --> 0:05:41.960 College students hijack the Board of trustees meeting. They held 0:05:41.960 --> 0:05:46.440 the board hostage for two days. They made demands for 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:51.000 improved student services and curriculum. Martin Luther King, Senior is 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.960 one of the hostages. Samuel L. Jackson is one of 0:05:54.960 --> 0:05:59.839 the students. The students planned the heist a heist of idea. 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:03.359 Before you hear this story, you need to know the 0:06:03.400 --> 0:06:07.080 state of black America. After the assassinations of Malcolm X 0:06:07.320 --> 0:06:07.960 and Martin. 0:06:07.800 --> 0:06:10.520 Luther King, we wanted to speak with students were at 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:13.000 Morehouse during the time of the Locke in so. 0:06:13.040 --> 0:06:17.400 We spoke to doctor Michael Lomex, Morehouse alum, nineteen sixty eight, 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:21.040 president and CEO of the United Negro College Fund and 0:06:21.080 --> 0:06:24.200 former president of Dillard University in New Orleans, Louisiana. 0:06:24.680 --> 0:06:27.000 I think about one of the people who did lock 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:31.360 up the trustees, Sam Jackson. Sam was from Chattanooga, Tennessee. 0:06:31.520 --> 0:06:36.840 He was exploring his future on the Moorhouse campus. No 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:40.719 one would have ever thought that he was going to 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:46.200 become a worldwide recognized film actor. 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:50.440 And you will know my name is the law when 0:06:50.520 --> 0:07:00.839 I lay my vengeance upon the. 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:01.800 But his whole career and the approach that he's taken 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:04.480 to his career, as I've never said this to him, 0:07:04.480 --> 0:07:08.120 I'm saying this to you, has been informed by the 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:12.200 events of nineteen sixty eight, the murder of doctor King, 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:17.040 which traumatized everyone. You know, doctor King was in many 0:07:17.080 --> 0:07:20.640 ways prior to sixty eight, obviously a leader, but not 0:07:20.800 --> 0:07:25.080 revered in the way that he became after his martyrdom, 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:30.800 and elements of his voice were not really attended to 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:36.120 his opposition to the war in Vietnam, his focus on 0:07:36.400 --> 0:07:42.840 poor people, those were not the integrating of the establishment 0:07:42.960 --> 0:07:47.800 institutions that most people had signed on for. So after 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:53.600 he gets killed, there's not only a void in leadership, 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:57.760 but there are other voices that begin to be heard 0:07:58.840 --> 0:08:01.760 that hadn't got and the kind of attention when he 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:04.080 was on the stage. So you're beginning to hear the 0:08:04.160 --> 0:08:06.480 voices of Stokely Carmike. 0:08:07.280 --> 0:08:10.800 Violence is a part of America's culture as American as. 0:08:10.800 --> 0:08:12.920 Cherry pie and black power. 0:08:13.000 --> 0:08:18.080 You're beginning to hear the voices of other post colonial 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:25.120 African leaders and theorists about a more global, pan African 0:08:25.360 --> 0:08:29.640 approach to liberation. Black people begin to at some level 0:08:30.240 --> 0:08:41.200 connect with other oppressed people, like the Vietnamese, like the Palestinians. 0:08:44.280 --> 0:08:46.800 Welcome back to the A buildings. To gain a better 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:50.160 understanding of what might have motivated these students, we speak 0:08:50.200 --> 0:08:53.960 to Professor Philosophy at Morehouse College, doctor Elia Davis. 0:08:54.360 --> 0:08:57.480 First of all, Doctor Davis, I want to thank you 0:08:57.520 --> 0:09:01.080 for going to do this with us. This story has 0:09:01.240 --> 0:09:05.120 been an obsession for Hans and I for God going 0:09:05.200 --> 0:09:09.000 on five six years now. You know the folklore behind it. 0:09:09.600 --> 0:09:12.400 We've been talking about, I mean literally since we met 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:17.000 twenty years ago. We would just love to hear about you, 0:09:17.000 --> 0:09:21.320 your background at Morehouse, What brought you to Morehouse as 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:25.080 a student, and what kept you there as an educator 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:26.280 all these years? 0:09:27.280 --> 0:09:28.400 Am I supposed to be honest? 0:09:29.960 --> 0:09:30.120 Oh? 0:09:30.320 --> 0:09:32.559 Yeah, we will be honest absolutely. 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:35.000 I was born in July, the month before the Watch 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:36.760 Riot nineteen sixty five. 0:09:36.679 --> 0:09:39.240 Six days of rioting in the Negro section of Los 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:43.079 Angeles left behind the scenes reminiscent of war torn cities. 0:09:43.440 --> 0:09:46.199 More than one hundred square blocks were decimated by fire 0:09:46.320 --> 0:09:49.160 and looters, and few buildings were left intact. 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:52.760 They blew up my grandfather's home, and interestingly enough, his 0:09:52.840 --> 0:09:56.760 home was on the front of newsweek magazine Ablaze. And 0:09:56.800 --> 0:10:01.080 so because of that impetus, my mother quickly returned to 0:10:01.120 --> 0:10:04.000 her home of Atlanta, Georgia, and so I was reared 0:10:04.000 --> 0:10:07.000 here from about a year and a half until my 0:10:07.000 --> 0:10:10.000 mother said you will attend Morehouse College. And I didn't 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:11.920 want to because I didn't know what Morehouse College was. 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:14.720 I had no idea where it was. I lived two 0:10:14.760 --> 0:10:17.080 miles away from the campus. So I went to Morehouse 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:21.920 had no money. Few government funds assisted me. But after 0:10:21.960 --> 0:10:24.640 my first semester there after having joined the Morehouse College 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:27.679 Glee Club, I was given a full talent grant, which 0:10:27.720 --> 0:10:30.120 meant that they covered my all of my tuition, and 0:10:30.200 --> 0:10:33.319 I owed them singing until I graduated. So I'm in 0:10:33.400 --> 0:10:37.360 nineteen eighty nine philosophy graduate of Morehouse College, and I've 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:41.199 been at Morehouse ever since then, teaching political philosophy, Africano philosophy, 0:10:41.200 --> 0:10:44.800 intro the philosophy critical thinking, and now my position, I'm 0:10:44.840 --> 0:10:48.960 pretty much the dean director of freshman and seniors academic success. 0:10:49.240 --> 0:10:51.760 So I bring them in and the hope is that 0:10:51.800 --> 0:10:52.560 I'll take them out. 0:10:52.720 --> 0:10:56.400 When did you first hear about this lock in at 0:10:56.400 --> 0:10:59.200 Morehouse or this particular incident of what was some of 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:02.640 the kind of general folklore behind it. 0:11:03.000 --> 0:11:06.520 Just like behins, I'm sure it was apocryphal at best. 0:11:06.720 --> 0:11:09.959 So it's not even about whether that is true. It 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:11.800 was just a wonderful more House story when you get 0:11:11.800 --> 0:11:16.160 to Morehouse, true or not? No, no, because the fundamental 0:11:16.160 --> 0:11:19.240 point was motivating us to be radical. See that was 0:11:19.280 --> 0:11:21.679 the kicker. They don't give a damn whether or not 0:11:21.760 --> 0:11:24.920 it's true. We want you all to be radical, and 0:11:25.000 --> 0:11:26.800 it normally came from students. Matter of fact, I don't 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:29.240 think I ever heard a professor talk about it. It 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:34.000 was always upperclassmen. And not until Sam Jackson became Sam 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:35.480 Jackson did we even include his. 0:11:35.520 --> 0:11:36.920 Name to be in. 0:11:38.360 --> 0:11:41.559 What we really thought was a revolution or was a revolution. 0:11:41.640 --> 0:11:42.520 I mean people were dying. 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:46.360 I remember when doctor King was assassinated. I flew from 0:11:46.800 --> 0:11:49.840 Atlanta to Memphis in March with you know those people 0:11:50.080 --> 0:11:50.760 that night. 0:11:50.840 --> 0:11:53.360 Because when out the school he was a Sam Jackson. 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:56.040 Sam Jackson, So nineteen eighty five, eighty six, eighty so 0:11:56.520 --> 0:11:56.920 who is he? 0:11:57.280 --> 0:11:57.520 Yeah? 0:11:57.679 --> 0:12:00.839 Right, So it wasn't like now or they'll say Sam 0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:04.000 Jackson held the board. Yeah, we didn't have that. What 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:06.520 we did have was a story of Martin Luther King's senior. 0:12:08.960 --> 0:12:11.319 That was funny to us, especially those of us who 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:14.680 grew up in Atlanta with the bourgeois sensibilities that associated 0:12:14.720 --> 0:12:18.240 with them, is that, oh wow, they even locked up. 0:12:18.360 --> 0:12:23.000 Daddy came and I even went back. I read Gloss's 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:25.440 evaluations of what he called student protesting. 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:29.960 Doctor Hugh Gloucester was more House College president during the 0:12:30.040 --> 0:12:33.280 lock in. He had a conservative approach to managing the 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:38.120 student body compared to his predecessor, Doctor Benjamin Emains more 0:12:38.160 --> 0:12:39.439 on these two men later. 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:44.560 And Gloucester was a very refined scholar. And so on 0:12:44.559 --> 0:12:48.400 one occasion there was a group of students who were 0:12:48.440 --> 0:12:51.520 trying to protest and decided to go to Gloucester's house 0:12:51.880 --> 0:12:55.360 to protest. And he was infuriated and came out and 0:12:55.400 --> 0:12:58.240 told them it wasn't that important, and I fired, it 0:12:58.320 --> 0:13:00.000 offensive for you all to have come to my house 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:05.440 to protest, all right. It always amazes me how, like, 0:13:05.520 --> 0:13:07.880 you know, what a protest is supposed to really create 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:11.360 this sense of, you know, antagonism towards we're not on 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:13.920 your team. It was just funny when I hear people say, 0:13:14.080 --> 0:13:16.319 don't do that. That bothers me, irritates me. 0:13:16.720 --> 0:13:19.920 It's it's fascinating that you make that point. Because in 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:23.440 the research Melican, I found a letter that doctor Mays 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:27.800 wrote sort of in the moment, and he's taking notes, 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:29.320 he's sort of taking a diary. 0:13:29.480 --> 0:13:32.959 And the title is Prisoner in Heartness, Hall Black and Daily. 0:13:33.559 --> 0:13:35.920 He's writing from inside the lock in and he all 0:13:36.040 --> 0:13:37.720 he's pissed, and. 0:13:39.160 --> 0:13:44.720 I quote some of the group of students were most insulting. 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:50.240 So he curse and used vulgar language. And this was 0:13:50.320 --> 0:13:54.240 fascinating to me because they're you know, like there's a 0:13:54.280 --> 0:13:58.320 quote and they were doctor Doctor King Senior says that 0:13:58.400 --> 0:14:01.480 he doesn't want the name of his son to be 0:14:01.679 --> 0:14:04.800 hijacked for for whatever these radical students are doing. 0:14:06.920 --> 0:14:09.400 One of the demands that the student has was to 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:12.559 have the school's consolidates and to be named m o 0:14:12.679 --> 0:14:16.559 K University, and an m o K senior was Adam 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:17.199 Lee against this. 0:14:17.960 --> 0:14:22.720 And I didn't understand how these distinguished scholars who we 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:25.680 you know, revered you know, I revered doctor Mays, you 0:14:25.720 --> 0:14:30.160 know he has he has the memorial on campus, how 0:14:31.120 --> 0:14:35.840 there was no reconciliation of this moment of protests from 0:14:36.000 --> 0:14:41.920 from King MegaR Evers, Malcolm and to these students that 0:14:41.960 --> 0:14:46.040 there that that this distinguished scholar did not make this 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:47.680 through line m hm. 0:14:48.080 --> 0:14:49.560 And that's the question I. 0:14:49.480 --> 0:14:54.080 Have for you, like, what is your analysis of this disconnect, 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:55.960 this this lack of reconciliation. 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:02.480 He grounded his life in certain principles such that he 0:15:02.680 --> 0:15:07.560 would sacrifice any and everything to maintain them. Example, going 0:15:07.560 --> 0:15:11.080 to I believe it was a board meeting and it 0:15:11.200 --> 0:15:13.160 was getting on the elevator with the white gentleman he 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:17.000 was with black guy. Cleaner couldn't get on the elevator. 0:15:17.440 --> 0:15:19.960 Maze's response was, I will not ride the elevator until 0:15:19.960 --> 0:15:24.600 he can, and he would walk the stairs. Another thing, Hans, 0:15:24.640 --> 0:15:27.280 you never see Mays with a hat on. It is told, 0:15:27.320 --> 0:15:29.960 maybe apocryphally, but it was told somebody slapped the hat 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:31.960 off his head one time. He said, I'll never wear 0:15:31.960 --> 0:15:33.920 a hat. Want it allow you to knock. 0:15:33.720 --> 0:15:34.520 A hat off my head. 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:41.200 That's a very strong principal person, you understand. So it's like, hmm. Now, 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:43.440 when we came to Moorhouse and we were trying to protest, 0:15:43.440 --> 0:15:46.560 because we did some minor protest, they told us the 0:15:46.600 --> 0:15:49.320 story of students were protesting the food in the dining 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:53.640 hall and had gone to the office Harkness Hall to 0:15:53.760 --> 0:15:56.920 complain and Mays was coming back in town and he 0:15:57.000 --> 0:15:58.800 looked at them. He said, I'm ashamed of you all. 0:16:00.120 --> 0:16:02.160 Just left the country where people were fighting for the 0:16:02.240 --> 0:16:04.960 rights to vote for democracy, and this is what you 0:16:05.000 --> 0:16:08.440 all came in with the food. That's it. And it 0:16:08.520 --> 0:16:13.080 was always important for me to realize that's his principle, right, 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:15.120 that's unfair. That's what he was looking at this is 0:16:15.160 --> 0:16:19.200 not fair. It's not fair. I think he cultivated that 0:16:19.240 --> 0:16:24.800 since in Martin, Luther King, Junior, Maynard Jackson, Laron Bennett, 0:16:25.200 --> 0:16:27.680 I mean, you name it. From nineteen forty to nineteen 0:16:27.720 --> 0:16:31.040 sixty seven he was president. And so for us that 0:16:31.200 --> 0:16:35.000 stood out like damn, we need to be down with 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:38.720 you know. And again that's the same way we heard 0:16:38.760 --> 0:16:40.760 about the story of Hartin's Hall with the boy being 0:16:40.840 --> 0:16:43.760 held captive. They were trying to motivate us, to let 0:16:43.800 --> 0:16:45.640 us know, you can't be at more House and not 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:49.120 get with the program. And so even if you were, 0:16:49.360 --> 0:16:52.160 you all probably already read many of the nineteen sixty 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:57.240 nine Maroon Tigers. They are replete with story of the 0:16:57.320 --> 0:17:00.360 story of rebellion. It is a ma and I have 0:17:00.480 --> 0:17:04.440 several of them that I downloaded. I mean, these brothers, 0:17:05.400 --> 0:17:07.320 they're calling each other out in ways that I wish 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:11.480 my students were today. I mean, one guy says he 0:17:11.520 --> 0:17:15.679 didn't even know who he is at Morehouse because the 0:17:15.760 --> 0:17:19.000 teachers aren't letting him be who he should be. He 0:17:19.160 --> 0:17:23.040 was having an overwhelming impact on these guys, thinking about 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:24.880 when you commit yourself to a certain way of being 0:17:24.880 --> 0:17:30.240 in the world. So unlike I think Gloucester. I think 0:17:30.480 --> 0:17:33.119 Mays might have had a little more wiggle room for 0:17:33.240 --> 0:17:36.880 certain types of protests, because you remember the funt where 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:39.640 you know, one of the biggest problems was just having 0:17:39.640 --> 0:17:42.280 white people on the board. May's had a certain position 0:17:42.320 --> 0:17:45.399 about there. Remember when May's was given the opportunity to 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:48.160 write articles. I think he wrote somewhere fifteen hundred articles 0:17:48.200 --> 0:17:50.280 while he was president of Morehouse and all of the 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:55.080 black periodicals, Daily World, you name it, Pittsburgh Courier, and 0:17:55.440 --> 0:17:58.000 he was making an argument for integration. His point was, 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:03.160 if you all think integration is what you have claimed, 0:18:03.280 --> 0:18:06.480 if you think it's going to satisfy the social organization, 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:09.439 you think, why don't you bust white kids to our 0:18:09.440 --> 0:18:12.600 black schools? Because you said it was the same right. 0:18:12.960 --> 0:18:16.840 So obviously they weren't going to do that. But Mays 0:18:16.920 --> 0:18:21.679 was also interested in hiring white professors because this point was, 0:18:21.760 --> 0:18:23.920 how then do we turn and ask them to hire 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:29.480 our graduates. So he had some strategy here, and I'm 0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:33.159 associating that with the Board of trustees. His belief was, 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:36.280 you don't limit it that way. We're trying to live 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:39.879 in a world that has to embrace a certain type 0:18:39.920 --> 0:18:43.879 of diversity, because when we leave Morehouse, we're going to 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:46.680 ask to be members of these organizations that are dominated 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:50.000 by white people, And how do we do that when 0:18:50.000 --> 0:18:52.760 we say, we don't do it? And that's again, that's 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:54.920 a principal position. Whatever you're doing the left, you're doing 0:18:54.920 --> 0:18:57.000 the right. What is fan for one should be fair 0:18:57.040 --> 0:18:57.520 for the other. 0:18:57.680 --> 0:19:00.840 But that seems to be in the detail a of 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:03.560 Morehouse because when I was a student there, this is 0:19:03.600 --> 0:19:07.760 the exact thing that we wrestled against. We felt that 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:08.720 we were we. 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:10.440 Were just a part of the Morehouse man thing. 0:19:10.600 --> 0:19:12.440 This is That is kind of what I want you 0:19:12.480 --> 0:19:15.879 to speak to, doctor Davis, is this feels like the 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:19.600 mystique of the more House man. This this person who 0:19:19.680 --> 0:19:25.040 comes in and with this radical energy, but then has 0:19:25.119 --> 0:19:29.160 a framework, leaves with the framework of how to integrate, 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:32.200 and then just decides on their own when they leave. 0:19:32.320 --> 0:19:33.159 Can you speak to that? 0:19:33.280 --> 0:19:33.560 Is that? 0:19:34.000 --> 0:19:35.360 Am I reading that correctly? 0:19:35.560 --> 0:19:36.680 What are your thoughts on there? 0:19:37.040 --> 0:19:42.360 Well? Oftentimes, especially because of my present position, it's difficult 0:19:42.440 --> 0:19:49.000 to disabuse students of what they came to Morehouse with. 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:53.200 So I'll say it this way. So I think Morehouse 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:55.359 might be and I can't prove it, but I'm going 0:19:55.440 --> 0:19:58.439 to say it. It's the only school in the country 0:19:58.480 --> 0:20:04.320 where people send their sons to be saved. To be saved. 0:20:04.600 --> 0:20:08.640 We get these guys in, but they're filled with apocryphal stories. 0:20:08.760 --> 0:20:13.000 They're filled with myths that aren't most productive about Morehouse 0:20:13.240 --> 0:20:15.800 and then, believe it or not, I will get students 0:20:15.920 --> 0:20:17.760 every year who will come in my office and say 0:20:17.840 --> 0:20:20.960 things like, I don't think I belong here, I can't 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:23.679 do it, can't do what. I don't think I can 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:24.600 be a Morehouse man. 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:27.080 Huh. 0:20:27.320 --> 0:20:29.679 One kid comes to me and says, I can't be 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:33.320 here anymore. I'm not black enough. What do you mean 0:20:33.480 --> 0:20:36.400 not black enough? He's like, I have two white mothers. 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:40.240 She adopted me and my sister. And I just left 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:43.399 a class where the stories the students were telling I 0:20:43.480 --> 0:20:47.200 wasn't familiar with. I said, stop, I know your class demographics. 0:20:47.560 --> 0:20:49.720 They ain't made like that either. Now you off see, 0:20:50.560 --> 0:20:53.240 I'm like, you all have seen some nice movies, You've 0:20:53.280 --> 0:20:57.600 heard some stories, some rap lyrics. I know your class demographics. Dog, 0:20:57.720 --> 0:21:01.840 I know they're not and they shouldn't be made that way. 0:21:02.560 --> 0:21:03.399 Do you understand it? 0:21:03.560 --> 0:21:07.840 Yeah, huwork, I know you know. 0:21:07.800 --> 0:21:11.439 What I've never celebrated. That's nothing to be celebrated. Stop 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:16.200 walking around here celebrating poverty and danger. I will switch 0:21:16.240 --> 0:21:19.320 places with you. You all have to embrace the sacrifices 0:21:19.400 --> 0:21:21.960 your families have made. So all of this goes into 0:21:22.160 --> 0:21:23.080 the Morehouse Man. 0:21:23.800 --> 0:21:27.000 Let's sidebar here for one second. Whenever people talk about 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:31.000 Morehouse College, the conversation eventually turns to the Morehouse bestique. 0:21:31.200 --> 0:21:35.280 That energy, that aura the student's faculty and alumni seemed 0:21:35.320 --> 0:21:39.399 to personify. Doctor Benjamin E. Mays, a distinguished former president 0:21:39.480 --> 0:21:43.000 of Morehouse, was once quoted saying of the school, over 0:21:43.040 --> 0:21:46.199 the heads of her students, she holds a crown that 0:21:46.280 --> 0:21:49.919 she challenges them to grow tall enough to wear. Doctor 0:21:49.960 --> 0:21:52.679 Mays conceived of a set of ideals to build a 0:21:52.760 --> 0:21:56.320 campus culture and the characters of his students. He felt 0:21:56.359 --> 0:21:59.920 these ideals would help them succeed in and transform the world. 0:22:00.560 --> 0:22:04.840 He coined these ideals the more House mystique. Some of 0:22:04.880 --> 0:22:10.159 these ideals include leadership, fearlessness, honor in a deep rooted 0:22:10.200 --> 0:22:13.359 sense of morality, and if you met the challenge and 0:22:13.480 --> 0:22:18.840 reach these standards, you could call yourself a more Houseman. 0:22:19.920 --> 0:22:24.320 Even with the protests during you know what twenty twenty one. 0:22:24.920 --> 0:22:28.000 A lot of those students were motivated because they felt 0:22:28.040 --> 0:22:31.399 left out. They really felt left out, even if they 0:22:31.440 --> 0:22:34.920 were just intellectual gymnastics for them, as in they've heard 0:22:34.920 --> 0:22:37.560 about and now they want. 0:22:37.320 --> 0:22:46.800 To welcome back to the A building. Here's more from 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:49.600 our conversation with doctor Eliot Davis. 0:22:49.480 --> 0:22:51.480 And even that happened to me in nineteen ninety three 0:22:51.960 --> 0:22:55.200 when Rodney King verdict came out and I was in 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:59.240 grad school, but over at Morehouse Belman Cau. You know, 0:22:59.320 --> 0:23:03.199 they had we had our own little uprising where the 0:23:03.240 --> 0:23:07.360 police came, State patrol came to campus. They were beating students. 0:23:07.400 --> 0:23:10.159 They were shooting tear gas into the dorm rooms of Clark. 0:23:10.520 --> 0:23:12.800 They came a Moorhouse class. I had never been burned 0:23:12.840 --> 0:23:15.480 by tear gas until that day. They were shooting tear 0:23:15.480 --> 0:23:20.160 gas bottles at us YadA, YadA, YadA. Students Morehouse started 0:23:20.160 --> 0:23:27.200 covering their faces with bandanas, putting on hats, making Molotov cocktails. 0:23:27.280 --> 0:23:30.080 Hunh wow exactly. 0:23:30.320 --> 0:23:32.879 So as we were standing over in front of Sale 0:23:32.960 --> 0:23:37.119 Hall and the police had covered the entire gate area 0:23:37.240 --> 0:23:40.480 that led out, some of these students ran around the 0:23:40.480 --> 0:23:43.520 back of them, got an Atlanta police car, flipped it 0:23:43.560 --> 0:23:46.240 over and threw and blew it up with a Molotov contail. 0:23:48.080 --> 0:23:50.960