- [Deborah] March the 26th, 2011. This is an interview with Mr. John H. Adams. Mr. Adams just informed me that he is 93 years old. So, I thank you, Mr. Adams, for taking your time to volunteer to share your story with the research library and for future researchers. When we're going to talk about today, your experience during World War I,

- [John] Two.

- [Deborah] Or, during World War II, and in doing that, let's just start out with how you happened to become a part of the military during World War II.

- [John] Well, I was living at 2020 North Third Street. I was a motion picture projectionist at the Princess Theater, which is on 5th and Franklin.

- [Deborah] And this is in Kansas City, Kansas?

- [John] Kansas City, Kansas. I had graduated from the Sumner High School.

- [Deborah] What year, do you remember what year you graduated from Sumner High School?

- [John] Oh, yes. May of 1936.

- [Deborah] What kind of memories do you have about Sumner?

- [John] Well, Sumner High was the only high school that blacks could attend at that time, at least in our area. It was a very, I'd say, dedicated school as far as the teachers giving their all, as far as trying to help the students do their best in their particular sorts of academic excellence or their jobs afterwards. We had some of the most dedicated teachers I think we have, all black. I would rate them Class One, Class A, as far as their dedication to the students.

- [Deborah] Any favorite teachers you remember you had?

- [John] Oh, yes. My favorite teacher I guess was an English teacher Miss Scotty P. Davis. She was a single woman as far as I know, very particular. She wanted the best for her students, to perform in any way possible, and she was very adamant about making sure that you had prepared for your classwork when you came to class, and I think Mr. A.T. Edwards, the gym teacher, was quite dedicated as far as allowing students like myself, who finished and was, I had no idea about attending college at that time. I was permitted to come back and take his college course in architectural drafting. He permitted me to be a part of his classroom. I don't know whether that was possible with the principal or not, he allowed me to attend classwork there, take his college work, and hopefully that I would be able to attend some college work later. I had numerous teachers in my school, the science teacher, Mr. Horwell, Mr. Thompson, Max Spears, English teacher Miss Penlin, Miss Jackson. There's so many teachers there, Mr. Mober in, was it, woodwork, and metalwork. All of those teachers gave their time and effort to make sure that the students who came under their jurisdiction prepared themselves not only for the regular work, but for their college afterwards or their work afterwards, and not many of them were going to college. It was a poor area back in those days. I think that was the time of Depression, 1930s. I guess that's one reason I wasn't preparing to go to college, because I had to help take care of my parents. My father was ill, and I had a chance to take over his job as a projectionist there. So, I wasn't going to attend college; I had a job.

- [Deborah] Okay. So, you were living in, and you were a projectionist at the Princess. How did you view the war before you be-- I assume you were drafted?

- [John] I was drafted; I did not volunteer. I was placed in and later to the particular family, taking care of my parents as I was, I was put in either III-F or IV-F at the time. Later, I guess there was need for more volunteers, and they weren't coming forth, I was classified as I-A, and I was drafted. So I went to the Service in October of 1942.

- [Deborah] Really.

- [John] Yeah.

- [Deborah] So, did you have any sisters, brothers or sisters? I had one living sister, Alice Laurie who was a year ahead of me. She was married and not living at home at the time. I had a younger sister. She died at three years of age from spinal meningitis. There were only three of us in the family.

- [Deborah] Okay. So what was your view of the war before you were getting involved in the military?

- [John] Well, I really didn't give the war too much consideration, as far as I was concerned. I wasn't going to volunteer, but see again, working as I was, and obligated at that time to help take care of my parents. I had to register in the draft, so it wasn't necessarily a means of avoiding it, but if I were drafted I had no problem with going, but I wasn't anxious to volunteer, I'll tell you that.

- [Deborah] At the time that you were drafted, do you remember what race relations was like in the community at that time?

- [John] In the community?

- [Deborah] Uh-huh.

- [John] Well, living where I was, at the time, there wasn't too much to be concerned about as far as race relations. It was a segregated school that we attended. There were whites all around some of the places, and some of the students had to pass right by the white high schools and junior high schools, in order to get to Sumner, as a senior high, and to Northeast as a junior high. So as far as I was concerned, I accepted the segregation as it was. Not a problem with me.

- [Deborah] So at that time, did you hear about or read about in the newspaper any of the race riots or civil rights protests that were going on at the time?

- [John] Oh, yes. I was aware of those things, that it existed, and I know that, as far as we were concerned, segregation in the downtown areas, Kansas City, Missouri for instance, and other places that were locally, segregation was a prime problem. I remember going down to, I think it was Taylor's, or one place, some of the stores downtown to get, as a extra job, and everyone in line ahead of me was given an opportunity to take an application. And when it came to me, the particular person who was handling that, those interviews and handing out the particular requests for work, she told me "We have nothing for you, "so you can exit at the next entrance there," and she took the person in the line behind me, and I thinking there were only one or two blacks in the particular time requesting work at that store at the time. But when they came to me, she said, "Well, we won't have anything we can offer you." So I was aware of that we could not sit down in the restaurants, in the, what was it, dime store or dollar store. We had to stand at the counter, or take our food out, and participate in eating it outside of the place. All of those things existed as far as being out of your own community. But I say, as long as you were in the area where most of your own race existed, why, we didn't have a problem. Now, we were aware of what was going all around us, though.

- [Deborah] How did your family respond to your draft enlistment, your enlistment?

- [John] Well, there wasn't anything they could do about it. So, when they say you have to go, I go.

- [Deborah] Where did you go? Where did you enlist? You remember?

- [John] I went to Fort Leavenworth, as an enlistment, after interviews and tests there I went to Jefferson Barracks, Missouri. That was the first camp where we were sort of quartered in tents, until we were given a destination as to what place we were going to go for our training. I went from Jefferson Barracks to, what was it, Boston, Massachusetts. I was selected to participate in the drafting class where there was engineer drafting and topographic drafting. I had had that work in school, and I guess that was an influence on my selection to participate in that activity. So, I went to Boston, Massachusetts, and attended Franklin Institute of Technology, where I was enrolled in engineer drafting, and as a result of, there were six of us, I believe, out of a class of probably 40, and one of the whites did not simply perform adequately, so I was given an opportunity to move up to topographic drafting. As a result of that, at graduation, you had an opportunity to select what you want, where you wanted to go, because they had several places: Oklahoma, California, Montana, Texas. And having an aunt in California, Los Angeles, I selected to go to March Field, which was in, just outside of Riverside, California.

- [Deborah] Well, tell me, let's go back through the enlistment process itself. How did you travel from your home to Leavenworth, and did you have a going-away party, or do you remember anything like that? What kind of preparation did you have to be making to leave home?

- [John] Well, exit from your job was one thing if you had one. We traveled to Fort Leavenworth by bus, and went from Fort Leavenworth to Jefferson Barracks by train.

- [Deborah] What did you have to do to leave your job? What did you have to report to them? Do you remember what you had to do?

- [John] Just in tell your employer that your were drafted, and you would be leaving.

- [Deborah] And what did your employer say?

- [John] Have fun and come back when you get a chance to be discharged from the service.

- [Deborah] Okay, okay, all right. Were there other people around there who were leaving for war, too?

- [John] Oh yes, they had a great gathering of friends and family members at, I think it was the bus station, at 8th and State I think at the time, and quite a few friends and family members there from I think both white and black at the time. But I don't know whether it was segregated buses or not, but I think we all joined on it together on that one or two buses that were leaving from 8th and State to go to Fort Leavenworth.

- [Deborah] When did you have to take your physical exams, or whatever else, and get into your uniforms? Was that at Leavenworth?

- [John] That was at Leavenworth. They gave you your wearing apparel, shoes, your coat because it was wintertime at that particular time, and they performed the, let's see, physical, and the mental exercises as far as examinations, at Leavenworth, They made sure that you had the shots you were going to get, you were prepared: haircut, shaves, and all that sort of thing. You weren't permitted to have mustaches, or you had to have a certain amount of hair taken off of your head, you had to pass the physicals, and then prepare to get your equipment and be prepared to ship out.

- [Deborah] Was there anything about that process that you didn't like?

- [John] Oh, yes. I didn't like shaving off my mustache, for one thing. And I wasn't particularly fond of the clothes I was going to have to take, but I didn't have much of a choice about that.

- [Deborah] When you were going through this process, was everybody there who was checking you and engaging that, were they African American or were they white? Or do you remember?

- [John] Well, there was a PFC, that's a Private First Class, who met us as we got off the bus, and he acted like he was the company commander, I guess, the way he was giving instructions and all, but militarily I don't find anything necessarily segregating as far as his voice was concerned, but he just had a job to do, to get us processed to get ready to go, so he was pretty strict about how he wanted things carried out.

- [Deborah] Was he black or white?

- [John] White.

- [Deborah] The other guys who were going through the line, getting the distribution of the clothing, were they white or black, or was it a mixture, or was everyone black?

- [John] I think it was a mixture.

- [Deborah] Okay. So, did you stay overnight at Leavenworth, or?

- [John] Overnight. We were ready to ship out the next day, and we went to Jefferson Barracks, Missouri.

- [Deborah] Okay, what was that like?

- [John] Cold. They had us in tents. We had to sleep in our particular clothes, wearing the coats and all, because they didn't have heating facilities in the tents. We were there in the evening, and the next morning, we had to go through physical exams, mental exams, checking as to whether or not we needed any dental work, that we had the proper supply of clothing,

- [Deborah] In those tents, was it also racially mixed, in those tents?

- [John] No. I was with four or five blacks, I believe. It was large tents, but the sleeping quarters is all were were provided for at that time. But we were all segregated as far as I know.

- [Deborah] Do you know where the whites were? Was a white company nearby, or anything?

- [John] I wouldn't have the slightest idea.

- [Deborah] So, everybody in that area where your tent was, was black or white?

- [John] Black.

- [Deborah] Everybody was.

- [John] Mm-hmm.

- [Deborah] So, did you have some who were officers, black officers, or anything like that, or do you remember?

- [John] Those coming in?

- [Deborah] No, those that were in your tent area.

- [Deborah] No, we didn't have any commissioned officers. We had non-commissioned officers.

- [Deborah] We're talking about your experience in the barracks, in Jefferson, where was it?

- [John] Jefferson Barracks, Missouri.

- [Deborah] Jefferson Barracks, Missouri. What time of year was that?

- [Deborah] Winter. November, December.

- [Deborah] Wow.

- [John] Because December, when I went to Boston, of course there was a great deal of snow there, but that tent in Jefferson Barracks, I say, there was no heat there, so the four or five of us in that particular place, we slept in our clothes, but we were just there overnight.

- [Deborah] Did they provide you with any food or anything?

- [John] No, no. This is late in the evening when we got there. I think we ate breakfast the next morning. But as far as food that night, there was none, unless you had something that you want to knick knack on yourself.

- [Deborah] Did you quickly get friends with the guys in your tent, or did you?

- [John] Well, if I can remember this, most of it was, I say, trying to keep warm. I don't think there was too much-- and it was late at night, and most of us guys just wanted to go and get to sleep! And I remember that's what I did, because I dozed off until next morning when they came in to wake us up and say "It's time to come up and get set for your test" and that sort of thing. So, it was a matter of, not too much in the way of conversation at that night, and then the next morning, we're just marched off in order to get our particular examinations and all, so, being friendly to an extent before we going to be together, wasn't something that we really considered, because we weren't going to be together too long. We were separated into whatever designation they wanted you to attend, whether it was schooling, or work, quartermaster, supply, what.

- [Deborah] Were you happy with what choice they made for you?

- [John] Oh, yes. There wasn't anything wrong with going to school. I had made up my mind when they took me out of my little private life, that whatever I was involved in, I was going to try to do as best I could at it, because I wanted to be successful in the-- and not necessarily before I heard about the army, with KP duty, and latrine duty, and all those things for those who were trying to get out of the service rather than trying to make good of their particular time there.

- [Deborah] What about the trip to Boston. You said it was on a train?

- [John] On a train.

- [Deborah] Do you remember anything about the train ride?

- [John] Oh, yes. Well I was in about, I'd say six of us, six blacks going to Boston, at Franklin Institute of Technology, and we became quite friendly, because we were housed in one little place. It wasn't little; it was a boarding, a boarding house I think. We were segregated. Six of us, six blacks were in one group, and I don't know whether the other, what was it, 25 or 30, 35 maybe, who was housed someplace else, but we all attended the same classroom, but we had such segregated sleeping quarters. But it wasn't bad; we had six guys all came quite friendly, and got a chance to associate with one another on the train, reading the manuals they gave us, soldiers' manuals, guard manuals, what to be expected of when you were in the service, and how you perform, what your chances were advancement for. So it was quite pleasant, and the six of us had quite a nice little deal together for the months that we attended school.

- [Deborah] Who were some of the other men? Do you remember many? Did they come from Kansas, or did they come from Missouri, you remember?

- [John] Well, to be honest, they came from all local areas as far as I can remember. Their homes were altogether different, but I don't know whether they were attending school. Some of them were only 18, and some of them were in their 30s. I was 23 at the time, I believe.

- [Deborah] So it was a wide range of ages that were together.

- [John] Oh, yes.

- [Deborah] So, what was Boston like?

- [John] Well, as I said again, we lived in a segregated barracks. Most of the time we were attending class. We had an opportunity to have some type of social activities on the weekends. They would have soldiers' and sailors', ah, what do they call that, service units, where there were a group of young ladies, I think, under the guardianship of either some organization, would come out to the camp, and they would have, at the recreation center, they would have dances, and games, and that sort of thing for entertainment.

- [Deborah] Did you enjoy that?

- [John] Oh yeah, weekends were fine. We had a chance to, I say, and, but we met only with whites; there were no black women at that time, young women at that time. It was a chance to associate with and mingle with whites, who came out as a group. Now, I don't know why that was. Maybe there were no blacks at that time who wanted to attend that. But they were quite friendly. It was quite a very good sociable event to have for the the weekends.

- [Deborah] So did you dance with white women?

- [John] Sure. That was a part of the activities, and they didn't object to it, so they were there, and the fellas that I knew of, I don't remember, I don't remember whether the, no, there were no black women that I saw, so the whites, if they were a part of it, they had to accept the fact that the black men were dancing with the white girls, but there was no really, I'd say, other than a social relationship, there wasn't anything to be concerned about, or be indignant about, so, but it was just something to do, that the organizations had it for the weekends, period.

- [Deborah] So where did you eat, if you wanted to eat outside of the institute? Where did you go to eat?

- [John] Well, you mean like, going to town or something of that kind?

- [Deborah] Yes, sir, I guess.

- [John] Well, I don't think I ever, for me in Boston, I don't think I ever went out to eat anywhere in Boston. We had preparations in the barracks where we were housed, and as far as going to town, you had that privilege, to check in and check out. But I wasn't anxious to leave, where I knew where I was, and what I expected as far as the association activities and that sort of thing, so I stayed in and studied, and we had a recreation center there. I liked to play the piano, so I spent the greatest of my time playing piano.

- [Deborah] Oh, you did?

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] So did you ever play for some of the events there when you had the social events? Did you ever play, and--

- [John] Well, during the time of intermission when they had musical groups that came out, they would permit the fellows who could play, whether it's piano or guitar, or horn or whatnot, to come up and join in. So, I took the opportunity to mingle to some extent with some of the events, but not all of them.

- [Deborah] So, music had been a strong interest to you throughout your life, is that--

- [John] Oh yes.

- [Deborah] So did you take formal training in piano?

- [John] No, my parents gave my sister and me piano lessons when were were young. I guess I was about maybe eight or nine years of age, and at that time, they could not afford both of us, so they gave it to my sister, and I just copied the work. I think I took lessons for about, maybe six months, maybe less than a year, but it was just something that, at that time I learned, I played by sound, I don't play by note, by reading it. If you put in front of me what I can play, I wouldn't be able to read it, so I know simple things that I can solve, but as playing as an accomplished musician, I wasn't.

- [Deborah] But you still enjoyed it.

- [John] Oh, yes. Anytime I came around a piano--

- [Deborah] Did you play at Sumner, in any of their bands or anything?

- [John] No. I didn't even take music in Sumner.

- [Deborah] Oh, really?

- [John] No, I took drafting, and gym work. What else did I have? Tennis, swimming. I didn't swim in the school, but they had exercise that they would allow you to participate in. At that time I don't think swimming was a part of the schools. But I did great deal of woodworking, metalworking, and that sort of thing. Mr. Mober's class. Activities there, I say, I wasn't big enough to play basketball, but I did a lot of tumbling. Football was out of the question. I was more or less a bookworm, more than anything else as far as school was concerned. I enjoyed school and reading and studying.

- [Deborah] Yeah, that's good. So what were your teachers like, and that, you remember anything about your teachers at Franklin?

- [John] Well, they were all white, and as far as I'm concerned, they were just as fair as they could be between, and as a matter of fact they gave me an opportunity to move up from drafting engineering into topographic engineering, and they didn't have to pick that. They didn't have to allow me, I don't know whether it was grades, or the alphabetical order of the last names that made it possible for me to move up from drafting engineering into topographic, because when you graduate, those who graduated from the topographic class became corporals, they had two stripes. Those from the drafting class, as the engineering draftsmen, they were PFC; they only gained one stripe. So, it was an advantage to have a opportunity to be a topographic draftsman.

- [Deborah] Wow, so you moved up.

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] So, after Franklin, then, did you graduate or how did it go?

- [John] Oh, I graduated there, but out of the class, I think all of us were assigned to different places, but those who graduated in the top were able to select the places they wanted to go, and I say I had an aunt in California, so I chose California. I had a guy from St. Louis, Cletus Bardow, whose home was in St. Louis, but he wanted to go to California, too, so he and I became buddies on the train riding out to March Field, where we were both assigned.

- [Deborah] So did you contact your aunt when you got there?

- [John] Not immediately, but after I got acquainted with the March Field rules and regulations and knew where she was, I contacted her by phone to make sure it was all right, if I had an opportunity, to visit her, that she would not object to it. But I make contact with her later on.

- [Deborah] So, did you write letters back and forth to home while you were doing all this?

- [John] Oh, yes. Quite often, taking care of keeping in contact with my parents and the lady friends, that I had left there at a particular time, been dating for some three years, I think it was, and I kept corresponding with several friends, male friends and female friends, so, as well as my parents.

- [Deborah] That's great. Did you keep any of those letters?

- [John] No, not--

- [Deborah] That they sent to you?

- [John] I think I did for a while, but I began, too much extra baggage was not permitted,

- [Deborah] Ah, yeah, that stuff was...

- [John] So dispose of it, yeah.

- [Deborah] Okay, so let's see, what was it like in California? What was that setting like? You want to describe it, who were the people? What were your living quarters like, that sort of thing.

- [John] Well, it was a regular barracks, all blacks, no whites were involved as far as March Field. It was a segregated area there too. But it was nice, got a chance to, inasmuch as I studied drill, and calisthenic exercises, I was made personnel in charge of giving drill instructions in calisthenics and got a chance to move up and earn my next stripe, became a buck sergeant. As far as the barracks and all were concerned, there were several barracks with two levels or floors, maybe 25 on the first floor, 25 on the second floor, to accommodate the particular company.

- [Deborah] What was the name of your company? You remember?

- [John] No, I, the only thing that I can remember was an aviation engineering squadron, engineering company. We had about 200 maybe, or 300 individuals in that particular group.

- [Deborah] And they were all African American.

- [John] All African American, yes.

- [Deborah] Were there any officers? Did you have any black officers?

- [John] Now I'm trying to think, did we have black, yes. Well, I know we had noncommissioned officers that were black but more than that, we had noncommissioned officers that were black, but not commissioned officers. I don't remember seeing too much of those, even in our parades. We didn't have, nah, I take that back. The company commander was probably white, because we had to pass and review in front of that particular stand several times during our stay there, but they were white, maybe, I think they were probably integrated to that point, white officers and black officers in there but different positions, but the noncommissioned officers were all black.

- [Deborah] Did they treat you okay? Did you all get along well, or

- [John] Well, I can certainly remember one incident, let's see what was that, not in March Field, no, one incident in March Field, as far as volleyball exercising, and we didn't have a tennis court, basketball courts, they had mixed groups playing in different sports, particular volleyball, as far as March Field was concerned, it was still a segregated unit, and segregated until, yeah, until I went to Alabama.

- [Deborah] Okay, well tell me, what town was this barracks located? What town in California?

- [John] In California?

- [Deborah] Uh-huh.

- [Deborah] March Field is close to Riverside, California.

- [Deborah] Did you ever go the city there?

- [John] Yes, coupla times.

- [Deborah] What was it like?

- [John] Segregated. You stayed away from, and I had a couple of ladies who invited me to their homes, to meet their parents, who came out on that, I think that regular weekend service unit to meet with the fellows and to have that social events, had a chance to go into Riverside and meet the families of those particular young ladies. I say again, they were still in apart far as I can remember, there was no great mixture, even though the young ladies, because I went to their homes. Didn't really have any type of racial reaction at March Field at all. We stuck to what we were doing in a group. It was fine.

- [Deborah] Okay. So after California, where did you go? Do you remember?

- [John] California, I had an accident of doing the calisthenic exercises. I broke the small bone in my left leg, the tibia. And the organization was put on alert as to go overseas. Well, I guess fortunately in one way and unfortunately in another, I was left behind when the company was ordered to leave, and I stayed in the hospital with a cast on my leg for about 30 days I believe.

- [Deborah] Wow.

- [John] When I was released from the hospital, I was assigned to another company. Inasmuch as I could type, they put me in the office, and I worked as the company, I don't know what position it was, but other than the fact that I was one of those who was handling the orders and doing the typing, working with that staff. That's when I had an opportunity to see on the list on the board. They were seeking blacks who were interested in trying to be a part of the cadet training for a possible future as a pilot, bombardier, or navigator, with the 332nd group in the Air Force. I took a chance on, since I didn't have two years of college training that was required, then the list dropped that particular requirement and said if you can pass the test, mental and physical test, you would get an opportunity to, if you are accepted, as a cadet or a student. So, on my application, I had to send for my high school records, and my dad got those things for me, sent them in and I was accepted to participate in the cadet corps to a possible future in flying.

- [Deborah] So you really wanted to pursue this.

- [John] Oh, yes, I didn't want to stay behind with a company where there was no need for me. The company that I was trained with had gone overseas. So, this was an opportunity since the requirements were, that I could meet, as long as my academic credits were all right, they accepted me and I was accepted to go to Tuskegee, where I took mental, physical, academic, aptitude tests, and passed those. Got a chance to be sent to Tuskegee to be a part of the flying program.

- [Deborah] So, you went to Tuskegee.

- [John] Oh, yes.

- [Deborah] What was it like? How did you get there, by train?

- [John] Oh, yes. Well, I stopped off at Kansas City. I had two or three days to stay there, to visit my folks, and when I left there, I got on the train--

- [Deborah] How long had you been away from home then? About a couple years, or about a year, or what?

- [John] Oh, close to two years. We went there by train, and when we got to some border, I think leaving for either Kansas or Missouri, We had to change to a train, which was the segregated train, and we had to, all blacks had to be in one area and the whites be in another far as the soldiers were concerned. That was my first encounter with the, what they call it, the Mason Dixon line.

- [Deborah] Right. Jim Crow--

- [John] Yeah, Jim Crow. My first opportunity to be a part of that. And we left the fairly decent train, and got on a train where the smoke was coming in, and the cinders were flying in through the windows. It was a pretty sad affair as far as passenger train was concerned.

- [Deborah] So you were relegated to a certain car.

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] And there were other cars that the white soldiers went on.

- [John] I assume that. I didn't come in contact with them, because they say, it was a passenger train. We had all kinds of individuals going from one place to another.

- [Deborah] Right. It wasn't just military.

- [John] No, no. It was, as I say, it was a Jim Crow deal, when you pass that borderline, wherever it was, You had to transfer, particularly with the military, now I don't know about the regular people who paid their way there, but as part of the military, a soldier had to leave that particular area and get in back of that, get in that train. Now I don't remember seeing any whites in that area, and I don't remember seeing necessarily black soldiers. But there were other black individuals on that particular train, where I said.

- [Deborah] So you were traveling by yourself.

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] So then, how did you get to Tuskegee? From the train, what did you take?

- [John] I went by bus. I made the mistake of going through the doorway that was marked "For Whites Only." I didn't recognize that fact until I had gone through the door. And so on the other side, they had a fountain up there, drinking fountain, whites only, and the colored on the other side. And when I turned around and look up, I had I had passed through the door that said "For Whites Only," which I wasn't supposed to do, but I guess they say "This stupid soldier doesn't know where he's going anyways, so they didn't pay any attention to me. But I remember that explicitly because of the fact that there were two doorways there, and they had separate drinking fountains. I had read about that and heard about drinking fountains for blacks and whites only, but I had never come in contact with anything like that. But I didn't have any trouble with it. I guess they overlooked me 'cause they thought I didn't know where I was going, what I was doing anyway. But I got off the train, and they had a bus there.

- [Deborah] You had your uniform on?

- [John] Oh yes. Yes, see I had progressed to Tech Sergeant. I had three up and two down on my particular enlistment. I didn't mean anything, so they put me on a bus that was there particularly for soldiers, and they took me to the, I guess it was Moton Field where Tuskegee school was.

- [Deborah] Right.

- [John] So I traveled in a different area there, not from the institute itself. We attended the institute as far as our academic work was concerned, but Moton Field was where we were going to get our flying training. So that was an experience, me with, I'll never forget that.

- [Deborah] Yeah, so you got to see Tuskegee University. You go to see the college itself.

- [John] Oh yes, we attended school there.

- [Deborah] Where did you stay when you were at Tuskegee, at the institute?

- [John] We had a barracks that was, it was close to the Tuskegee campus, where the other students were attending class there. But we had an area that was entirely separate from the Tuskegee Institute itself, and we had to march from our barracks into Tuskegee for our particular classes, and go back to our barracks, change clothes, and go down to Moton Field where we had our flying training.

- [Deborah] So at this place, is that where you ate, and did everything?

- [John] They had a separate mess hall, yes.

- [Deborah] So you didn't mingle with the college students, the institute kids at all?

- [John] Not during school time. Afterwards you could. They had little places where they had social events. Their campus was open as far as people attending, and you had the privilege of leaving the base and going into town or going off campus to wherever you wanted to in town itself.

- [Deborah] Did you ever go in town?

- [John] Very seldom.

- [Deborah] What was the town like? Do you remember it?

- [John] Well, it was segregated as far as I know, and I did not enjoy the possibility of encountering some difficulties that I had heard when I was a younger person someplace else out of Alabama, about some of the things that you would encounter, the way that you would be treated. We had all kind of games and things on the base, until I went to Riverside, I went there several times, I would always go to spend the weekend with my aunt in California, become acquainted with her, because she was by herself. She had lost her husband, and I got a chance, I hadn't met her before that time, so I got an opportunity to meet her, just to visit with her.

- [Deborah] Was that your mother's, or your father's--

- [John] My father's sister.

- [Deborah] So, tell me about the training at Tuskegee. What was that like? What did you do?

- [John] Flying training?

- [Deborah] Flying training, yeah.

- [John] Well, we started off by going down to the Moton Field. You were introduced to an instructor, and those were mostly blacks that I remember, mine was, took me up in a Piper Cub,

- [Deborah] What's that? What is a Piper Cub?

- [John] It's a small plane with just one wing, mono wing, on the top, not over the canopy and all itself, for the two-seater. It gives you an opportunity for the instructor to put you through the paces to see if you have the ability to withstand the flying, whether it's simple loops, figure eights, spins and that sort of thing, and to acquaint you with what you're going to come in contact with.

- [Deborah] What did you think about that? Were you sure at that time you wanted to fly?

- [John] Well, that was my first experience in a plane, and I looked forward to it. I didn't become ill. I enjoyed it, and we spent just a small period of time in the Piper Cub. Then we had to take several tests as far as aptitude tests, mechanical tests, finding out whether or not you were going to be qualified, better qualified, to be either a, training for a pilot, training for navigator, or training for bombardier. You put you through your paces on that.

- [Deborah] What did you want to do?

- [John] Well, I enjoyed the flying. It wouldn't make any difference to me in what position they felt I was qualified to perform, so. You have a choice, and I think your size meant a great deal. The larger fellows would not necessarily fit into the smaller planes for the fighters. Most of them went to twin-engine I believe, which is a larger plane. But, as I say again, it was something that I really enjoyed at the time, and my first flight was successful enough with my instructor, that we went from the Piper Cub, to the lower basic. We had lower basic, upper basic, lower advanced, upper advanced. So from primary training we were the two wing job, the biplane. It was the closest thing at that particular time to a fighter plane, open cockpit, where you have an instructor and a student in the same plane. That was what we called in primary training. I don't know just how many months we spent in that, but most of the time, we just kind of get an opportunity to become familiar with the requirements of the plane, studying the plane, knowing how it works, attending classes to understand the principles of flying, and then you had a chance to take your first opportunity to solo, after a certain amount of training with a flight instructor. After soloing in the primary, you spent a certain amount of time there with flying by yourself, doing the different phases of instruction. You went from there to BT-13 which is a much larger plane, still have lower basic, yet with a fixed landing gear, the closest thing to the AT-6 which would be the advanced plane that you would fly in. Spent a certain amount of months in lower basic, and when you completed lower basic satisfactorily, you went to upper basic. Upper basic you went to lower advanced, and from lower advanced you went to upper advanced. Then if you were will able to be a part of the group you graduated.

- [Deborah] So how long did all that take?

- [John] Well, let's see, about a year, a good year and maybe 14 to 16 months. If you're able to survive primary, and you were put through your paces then and you soloed all right, well you could make it, provided you had no incidents that would wash you out because of lack of ability, carelessness, poor grades, or something of that kind. But I think the whole course was, from the time I went in, until, '43 until almost, good year and a half.

- [Deborah] So you were talking about your flying training--

- [John] Yeah, see the different phases from primary to basic, to advanced, and if you're able to qualify and stay in and get your grades that are satisfactory, and your performance is satisfactory, then you can look forward to the possibility of being put in either pilot training as a pilot, or as a navigator, or as a bombardier. Wherever their need was, it's what you, if your flying training would more or less equip you to be a pilot. Your navigational training or your bombardier training which was performed someplace else as far as I can remember, but I guess my size, and being able to pass the tests for the single engine fighters, I was trained as a fighter pilot. Graduated in 1945, as class '45 C, got my commission as a second lieutenant, and went from there to Eglin Field, Florida for gunnery training, and Godman Field, Kentucky for other training, Walterboro, South Carolina for additional training, where I found out that we were getting ready to be shipped overseas, to replace some of the pilots returning from the old 99th group, and then the war ended. They had an excess of pilots, navigators, and bombardiers.

- [Deborah] Okay, Mr. Adams, you were saying about, you were going to be called up, and then the war ended?

- [John] After that, well see, there was no great need, and we became surplus, I guess, to the service, so they made the stipulation that they wanted all of the fighter pilots to decide to stay in the service for two additional years, or they were going to have to make some changes, either in their particular location, their commissions, or whether they wanted to be a part of it. Two months later they came back and said it'd have to be a three-year enlistment or they were going to have to, possibly lose your commission, be put back as a noncommissioned officer, or be submitted to some other group, because there was no need for the additional pilot training at that particular time, so they started giving us inspection duties, and officer in charge of guards, and all that nonsense. We were only permitted to fly four hours month in order to get our flying pay, and I got a little bored with the inactivity, and decided that if there was no need for me in the service, as a pilot anymore, and there was a need for me to be back home, that I would leave the service and get my discharge, which I did in '45. I was not one of those who went overseas. I was fortunate enough to graduate from flying school, and I value that particular part of my life, but if I had been aware of the fact that I would only have one year guarantee of returning to my job, as a form of employment, if I had known that that was all I was able to secure, I probably would have stayed in for the three years that they wanted you to stay, and took my chances on being able to come out at the termination of three years , maybe we'll get that job back, or another, or attend some school someplace where I could get some information and training as to another type of employment.

- [Deborah] Well, you know, let's go back to the Tuskegee training. When you started these grades of flying skills, where were you all flying? Were you flying over the institute? Where did this flying take place?

- [John] You mean the area in which--

- [Deborah] Yes, sir.

- [John] Well, most of it took place over Moton Field, but we had lower altitude cross countries, night cross countries, high altitude performance over Alabama, Georgia. We feel a variety of roots, traveling let's say between lower altitude cross country, yeah, I think we may have crossed parts of Georgia. We had certain destinations you had to arrive at at certain times, whether it was night or day. To perform at night was quite a thrill, too . I became lost on one of my night flights, missed my destination by some points of time, decided that I would do a 180 degree turn and get back on course to Tuskegee. We had had, unfortunately, the upper class captain in the class of '44, I believe, '43 or '44, abandon his plane on a low altitude cross country at night.

- [Deborah] How did he abandon it?

- [John] Well, I guess he became lost, and bailed out. He lost the plane, and I guess he had to get back from wherever he parachuted to safety, but they washed him out because of that. It was a night flight, and I couldn't understand why he didn't use his instrument training, his night viewing problems that he had come in contact with, but for whatever reason, he bailed out. And I had encountered the same problem myself, on a low altitude cross country at night. I guess the wind blew me off of my compass reading, but unfortunately, or fortunately for me, I didn't bail out. It was a matter of doing instrument flying training that I had, made 180 degree turn and went back to the direction in which I had come, and was able to go down and buzz the towns that I passed, and each of those towns has a name printed on the top of some of the buildings. We have to carry a chart with us, strap it to our thighs as a general rule, in case we came disorientated, we could go down and buzz the town, find the location of it, and head back to where hopefully get back to Tuskegee. So that was fortunate in my case, I was class captain too at that time, had been to the upper advanced. I didn't have the same fate that the classmate ahead of me had, but I got back safely to Tuskegee, including the next night flight that I had . I had an instructor check me out as my flying capabilities, and I made that successfully. So, I didn't have that problem anymore, but it was an experience that I say that I never forgot.

- [Deborah] I can just imagine. Did any of the guys who ended up flying overseas, did any of them come back to Tuskegee and see you all, or did they ever come back to the place of training?

- [John] We met some of them in Walterboro, South Carolina, which was the shipping point for returnees. Whether they went back to Tuskegee or not, or got training or accepted to the instructor or not, I really don't know.

- [Deborah] What kind of stories, after you had gotten to Moton Field, what kind of stories had you heard about the men who did go across seas and were able to fly? What kind of stories had you heard about them?

- [John] Well, their inability to be placed, where they thought they had earned the privilege, and the priority of being trained and able to fly, with some of the other more experienced pilots. I heard that, that they were not given that privilege. I can understand that to a point, because as a person having graduated from training at Tuskegee, and with little or no experience as far as flying in combat, or in a theater of operation, they were limited as to what they would be permitted to do until they had the experience of either the bombing, the patrol training, or whatnot. I can understand why they necessarily would not have been given the opportunity at first, but after they had become qualified, and they had to undergo a great deal of training in a theater of operation what was all combat tactics involved. Now, whether or not they were given that opportunity when they thought, but in the end, it must not have been, because the Red Tail pilots that I read about, were given the credit for not having lost any of the bombers that they escorted to their particular places, or any of their other craft. I guess the idea that inexperienced people just graduating from flying school would not have the qualifications of a seasoned pilot until they got the adequate training in their theater of operation. So, I don't know what factors were involved in that, to substantiate what the write-ups were saying, they were not given the opportunity. So I say again, I wasn't involved, in my training in Florida over Eglin Field was shooting at the moving targets, some gunnery field trials I had to take, were experience, but that's altogether different from flying, flying at a tow target, and flying somebody shooting bullets and bombs at you, so I really don't know what they went through. I have no adequate knowledge of saying that. There was one fellow that lived in Kansas City, not far from where I lived at home, John W. Davis, was credited with one kill, I think, and one probable. Now, I never really talked to him about his experiences because we never really came in contact with one another. But I can understand the, I'd say the exemptions that they made, until they were qualified. But they meant, those who did fly the protecting for the bombers and their missions they were assigned to, did an excellent job. Whether is was destroying the enemy equipment, or the planes, or protecting the bombers that they were supposed--

- [Deborah] Okay, I get--

- [Deborah] Is that another?

- [Deborah] When you were in Florida, and your other training after you left Tuskegee, were you in all-black units, or were you in integrated units?

- [John] Still all black.

- [Deborah] Did you ever enter into an integrated unit of--

- [John] Of flying?

- [Deborah] Right. No, the only encounter I came across in realizing that there was another school of training there, when a low altitude cross country, I landed at a place where the same ships, the same coloring and all, the same type of markings, and when I pulled up to company headquarters in the plane on the landing strip, there were all white cadets there, and white officers. I had landed in the field where they were training whites. And they told me that my particular location that I was seeking as a destination, was about 20 miles, I forgot the direction where I was going, it was altogether ahead, still in Alabama but still not that particular place. That's the only time I recognized the fact that we had whites training at a different place.

- [Deborah] Were they angry with you, or they just told you where--

- [John] No, they were surprised, I guess, to see a black man getting out of an airplane! And I was surprised to see all those white faces with the same kind of ships that we were flying from Tuskegee. But they were obviously training someplace, and there was a guy up to, where was it? Brotherhood Bank, was in a training program for whites. Now, I didn't ask him where he got his training, and he didn't get overseas either. But, he took a separate course from the same type of thing because of the fact they had dropped the college requirements, and he got his training in the South, but he was working in the same mail room I was with Brotherhood Bank as a part-time job. But he didn't get overseas, either.

- [Deborah] But he was white.

- [John] Yeah, he was white. And that's the only time that I came into any contact with white cadets or students flying planes in Alabama.

- [Deborah] When you were in the South, did you go the any of the towns off the base area? Did you go into any of the towns?

- [John] Oh, yes, but not so far as visiting the restaurants. I went to private homes. I think you're seeking something about race relations. I had an incident of passing about four white soldiers, where was I coming from? Visiting my aunt, I believe, going back to the bus station, and they say, "Here comes a nigger lieutenant. "Let's salute him." They saluted me. I saluted back and went on my way. But they call themselves, I guess, being smart or funny or whatnot, but it didn't make any difference to me.

- [Deborah] Well, when you were in the South, I notice you said that things were different. You certainly recognized that. But did you ever go out into the larger white community in any other way in the South?

- [John] No.

- [Deborah] Stayed right--

- [John] Came in contact with white officers in different places, but--

- [Deborah] How were they? How was their treatment of you?

- [John] Well, far as I know, the only incident I can remember that brought something questioned to my mind, I was leading a group of soldiers, going I guess from the mess hall back to the barracks. But I wasn't an officer then, but I passed this, I don't know whether he was a second lieutenant or first lieutenant. I was a tech sergeant then. I passed him and I gave the command to salute the officer. They presented arms; we passed him; I saluted the officer as I passed. He asked somebody in his group to stop me, and he wanted to talk to me He wanted to address me because he thought I was being smart by addressing him, recognizing his particular status with a hand salute. He thought I was being smart or something, and he brought me back and had me back to stand at attention before him, and said, "I didn't appreciate that attitude that you presented "as you came by here. "Was that supposed to be something clever?" I said, "I was merely recognizing your status "as a commissioned officer, sir, and when I get to be "in your same position, I hope to get the same kind "of respect."

- [Deborah] What did he say to that?

- [John] He said, "Carry on." That's the only time I remember being addressed by an officer who felt it was being, it's a group of black soldiers going by him, and recognizing, I thought he'd return the salute. I don't know whether he did or not. But it was just something I always felt, you show that respect for his bars, not necessarily his face, whatever it is. But he was either a second lieutenant or a first lieutenant, and as I say, I was a tech sergeant then, but that's the only I time I can remember any incident with a white officer that I came into contact with.

- [Deborah] When you were working with the Tuskegee Airmen, what was the social relationships like within that group? Who were some of the other people? Do you remember? Not necessarily by name, but you remember, where did they come from? Were you the only one from the Kansas area, or?

- [John] You mean of my class?

- [Deborah] Right.

- [John] No, I had a fellow, a classmate named Clarence Bee, who lived in Kansas City, Missouri. We both graduated as second lieutenants. I had a William Knight who lived in Topeka, Kansas. He graduated as a flight officer. I don't know what qualified the--

- [Deborah] Did those of you from that area, did you all hang together, or

- [John] Well, we were in the same class. I think we had 60 members started out together, in primary training. And 23 graduated.

- [Deborah] Wow.

- [John] So, William Knight, Clarence Bee, were all Kansas individuals. I kept in contact with several guys, Casey in Chicago, Powell in New York,

- [Deborah] Clayton Powell? No.

- [John] No, no. His name was William Powell. He got a job as a probation officer when he left the service. A lot of the fellows, I say, I used to keep in contact for a few years, and then they just suddenly dropped--

- [Deborah] Sure.

- [John] But as I say, out of our group of 60, 23 were left.

- [Deborah] Did the other guys just have to leave, is that what they had to do?

- [John] No, some stayed in. Those who accepted the idea that they were going to either be put back, or they wanted, some volunteered, I guess they stayed in three years. We had one classmate, well he wasn't in our class after he left, Kenneth Walker. He stayed in. He dropped back to get married, left the class in '44 I believe it was. I don't know whether it was sickness in his family or what, but he left and went home and came back, but he was put in the class following ours. Instead of graduating in '45C, he probably graduated in '46 something. But he stayed in, and he retired a lieutenant colonel.

- [Deborah] Wow! So he made it kind of a career, almost.

- [John] Yeah, he made it a career and stayed in Minnesota.

- [Deborah] Looking back on your experience, particularly your Tuskegee training, what do you think you liked most about being in the service.

- [John] Well, the chance to get an opportunity to fly a plane that I'd never thought I'd have, 'cause I couldn't afford it as a youngster. Didn't want to put the money into it, and all the training as a civilian, but I always enjoyed the idea of flying. I couldn't have done that on my own. I could not have gone to Boston. I was proud of what I was able to achieve, as a person who was drafted. My technical training, the flying capabilities, and the opportunity to put four years of college in, which I spent in an art school, to get my master's degree,

- [Deborah] So you had gone to college after being in the service.

- [John] Yeah.

- [Deborah] What did you experience in the military that you did not like, the least thing that you liked, the least thing that you experienced.

- [John] The thing that I didn't like was the idea that even as a graduate from the flying school, I was not able to put the time, and acquiring the knowledge, of how to work around a plane. I don't know anything about inspecting the wings, or ailerons, or flaps, or anything. If they had allowed us to go down to the flying line, and mingle with the mechanics or whatnot, learn that plane, observe how it handles outside-- Knowing how to handle the controls is one thing, but knowing what makes those controls work, and how to inspect that plane, so that you don't leave it to a crew member to do it, put us to good use in studying what can be useful to us as pilots on a plane, and not necessarily have to have flying time, we had all those days and hours, we could have been put to use. I'd rather go down there and or learn how to manipulate some of the mechanics of a plane, the motor, the construction of it, the controls of it, than sitting down making some stupid inspections, doing nothing. I just got bored.

- [Deborah] Tell me, the people who were maintaining those planes you were flying at Tuskegee, were they black maintenance people or were they white?

- [John] I really don't know. From what I can understand, we had black, those who were in Tuskegee that I knew, were black.

- [Deborah] Were black, uh-huh, yeah.

- [John] Now, whatever obligation they may have had, I don't know. But those who came out to put the gasoline in the planes, to inspect them before we took them off, were all black. There was no whites around there at all. Now I don't doubt that there was some white someplace on the line, whether it was-- They had a white group of flying cadets flying someplace else. I'm quite sure they were white, but they were not together. But I just get bored. You're going to take me from flying four hours a month to save gasoline, and here you want to send some graduate over there to possibly, even staying in later, if I had thought I would have had to retraining, and the flying experience with another war or whatever else that could have been done, I wouldn't have mind volunteering for three years. It was a come back to nickel-and-dime job that I had, and then taking care of the family was fine. But, even at home, I'm finding things to do. I have radio, television servicing. I've got a job, I work at the post office. I do radio, television servicing. I make rubber stamps. I sell mutual funds, life insurance. You give me something to do, and you keep my busy, then I'm satisfied. I have to have an income for a family, but I don't like to be bored, and seem like wasting time. And that was the thing, all the years I spent, years I spent in the service, there's just so much that could have been done with that time, that would make it enjoyable and make it useful.

- [Deborah] In terms of your discharge, what was that like? You remember what procedure you went through?

- [John] No, I just let them know that I decided to, that I'm going to apply for my honorable discharge, and far as I can remember, whether the office work that was necessary, just going in to the company commander at that particular base, let it be known what you wanted to do. Apply for it, and in due time you have it. Really, really no great procedure to that. A lot more simple than being drafted to go in the service.

- [Deborah] When you were discharged, then what did you do?

- [John] Well, I came home; I got my little job for the one year that I was guaranteed, for when I came back they had a, the black operators were segregated from the white operators in the international stage employees and motion picture projectionists. That's an entirely white organization, white only. They had seven people had gotten together, some qualified, some not qualified, that's what my dad was trying to do, to get together to form a union comparable to what the white international 170 had. When I came back, the blacks had been given an opportunity to, not only with the three theaters they had, to get two more, the Lincoln and the Gem, from the white organization. That would have given them five theaters, and they had seven required members in order to become a part of that. Well, Norville Parker had been instrumental in getting that organization started. They had the Lincoln and the Gem theaters, which made five. So, they put the Princess on the same roll of one of those theaters in their union, which qualified them to have a charter from the international. When I came back, my guarantee for one year, made it mandatory for them to release that job at the Princess, and I'd get it for one year. Then after that, they can get it back. But they said as long as you were qualified, and you've had the experience as a motion picture projectionist, we need you to help run our five theaters. So I got the job as a relief person working at all five theaters.

- [Deborah] Wow.

- [John] Not back at the Princess. At the Lincoln, Gem, Carville, the Regal, the Princess. And the Castle.

- [Deborah] Wow. So, over a period of time when the stereophonic sound came in, and we had the managers at some theaters weren't too proud of having blacks in that particular place. But the one place that--

- [Deborah] So some of these theaters were not, were white theaters.

- [John] Well, they were white only, yes. In fact, most of them were white only.

- [Deborah] But I mean, were they relegated to white patrons only, or was it a mixed, were they--

- [John] Blacks could only attend certain theaters. It was segregated, unless you wanted to sit in the crow's nest in some places just as I can observe.

- [Deborah] Okay. Did any of these theaters that you were working with, did they have the crow's nest?

- [John] Not the blacks. The Electric and the Grenado on Minnesota Avenue did.

- [Deborah] But you didn't work there.

- [John] No, no. I couldn't work there.

- [Deborah] So you only worked in places where the patrons were all black.

- [John] Yeah, until the time that the international set up the segregated unions and the affiliated 170A, which was black, all the aid organizations were all auxiliary, they were black. They have to be joined together. So, when that happened, we lost, because of patronage on the theaters, business fell off. Blacks could go anywhere they wanted to, so they had to close some of the theaters where blacks were attending only. They could go where they wanted to go. But, we became part of that organization. I think I was the only one, yeah, I was the only one in that particular time, because they lost the other theaters, and the other guys had other jobs. But I was of the organization which I had worked up to, and we were mandated to be a part of the white organization. 'Course, it was still segregated, and some of those operators didn't want blacks anywhere near them, so-- When it was mandated that they had to be together, then they had to accept us as members, but we had no tenure as far as positions were concerned. We had the bottom of the list.

- [Deborah] Even though you had spent a longer time.

- [John] Yeah.

- [Deborah] So you had start at the beginning.

- [John] Well, no, you didn't have your position--

- [Deborah] You didn't have seniority. They didn't count the years at your job.

- [John] That's right, that's right. You were on the bottom of the list as far as work was concerned. But they gave me, what was I at? I worked at some of the white theaters, Annie Op, 63rd Street Drive-In, Banister Mall, Union Station, several of those, all whites. White 170 had those, but they had to give it up, to some of us, and I was the only one left who said, who was who wanted to stay with them and be a part of the organization. So I was accepted, but I was still some that didn't want me in that group because I was black and taking their job. That's what they didn't want. But again, I got along swell with most of the organizations, and stayed with them until I retired from the post office and the motion picture theaters in '84. But up until that time, in '60, what was it, '61 or '62 I think, when we had to drop out entirely, I was always a part of 170. Previously 170A where we had seven charter members, and five theaters--

- [Deborah] Did you all ever have to go on strike?

- [John] I went on strike for the white organization down in La Plaza. I walked the picket line there with them at the Plaza Theater. Now I don't think they ever got anything out of it as far as, that didn't stop people from attending the place, but the 170, the mother organization, or the parent organization, didn't have any great success with that because they were putting management and operations together. Well, they have big platters now; they don't have two machines in one booth. I worked at the Banister Mall, there were five theaters. One operator took care of five theaters. They were on big platters like you have on tapes, one platter over the top of the other, and they were about five rows of film for a two-hour show, could be put on one big platter about four feet in diameter, and it would run from one tape to another, just like a tape does, from one place to another, just like that cassette there. And that way, one operator could take care of five theaters, which at Banister Mall, that's what I had for awhile. But some of the other places, the Antioch only had two machines. 63rd Street Drive-In, two machines. Kimo on Main Street, with two machines. I worked in all of those places.

- [Deborah] So when you left the military with a honorable discharge, you went right back, you were able to back to your job for at least a year with the projectionists.

- [John] Mmm-hmm.

- [Deborah] Did you have other kinds of employment? How did you get employed by the post office?

- [Deborah] Well, I carried mail during the Christmas periods, it was several years, before I went in the service, and I decided that I was going to apply for a permanent job. I could work the motion picture theaters at night, work the post office in the daytime. So, I took the test for it and asked for Clerk first, and passed the test, and when I, they told me you'd have to work nights as a clerk, that would interfere with my night job, so I passed that up and took the test again and asked for carrier. Passed that so I worked post office in the daytime and theaters at night.

- [Deborah] So what was your daily routine like? What time do you have to get up, what was your time schedule like every day?

- [John] Well, you have to be at the work at the post office at seven o'clock in the morning, you work from seven to 3:30. I had to be at the show at an hour ahead of starting time, 6:30, from 6:30 to midnight, and then go home and sleep, and get up at six and get to the post office at seven, and then work from seven to 3:30, five days a week. But I had Saturdays and Sundays off from the post office. Worked at the show Sunday, from 12:00 until 12:00, and then the rest of the time, when I first started, when I came back from the service, I didn't get my old job back working seven days a week, but they let me go at the Castle Theater, until they got those other two theaters. The Greeks family that I worked for, at another Castle Theater, they owned, with three theaters, the Castle, the Regal, and the Princess. When I left the Princess and I came back, they gave me the job at the Castle for house manager until the local got the Lincoln and the Gem. Well, with my experience, the manager at the Lincoln demanded that I work there, because the others didn't have any stereophonic equipment experience. So, when Norville Parker became ill, insisted that I get his job, which I had. I took Norville Parker's job, and worked as a business agent, all through the time that I worked at the motion picture theater until it was joined together, then I say again, I worked at all of the white theaters that they had access to.

- [Deborah] When you left the military, did you get married?

- [Deborah] Yes. That was one reason for getting back home, for a little lady, Barbara Harris. She was graduated in 1943 I guess it was, yeah. Got married in 1946, and had my one year at the Princess, then I went to the Castle for a few months, and then I worked as a relief operator and worked all five theaters that they had, until Mr. Norville Parker became ill, and then I got the job at the Lincoln. And I stayed at the Lincoln until I retired. So, I worked at post office--

- [Deborah] Yeah, but those were two good-paying jobs.

- [John] Oh yes. And I did radio television servicing on the side, did my hard work on the sides, and

- [Deborah] What hard work?

- [John] I have a master's in painting. I went to the Kansas City Art Institute and Kansas City Junior College in order to get my academic credit to get my BFA, Fine Arts, get a BFA, and then I got my master's of fine arts.

- [Deborah] Now, when did you pursue those degrees? Was it immediately after leaving the army, or was it later?

- [John] No, it was a little bit later. I had a lawn service out in Leawood, and I decided that I wanted to try to do something with my army time that I had four years of college. I didn't have the contacts here that I needed for architectural training, and I took my DeVry Institute out of Chicago for my electronic training, so I had art that I could attend classes there, and still work .

- [Deborah] Did the military pay for that?

- [John] Yeah, four years. I got four years of schooling for my time in the army. Spent 37 months in the service.

- [Deborah] So they paid for that.

- [John] Oh, yes, with the exception of six months, to get my master's, I had to pay six months of that in order to complete it. But otherwise, my army time allowed me to have that free training.

- [Deborah] So you didn't get married until after you left the service.

- [John] Right. Left in '45 and got married in '46.

- [Deborah] Okay, did you have children?

- [John] Well, yeah, we have four sons. That little photo there is my wife, and our four sons there: Robert, David, George, and John.

- [Deborah] So, is your wife still living?

- [John] No, I lost her in '98.

- [Deborah] And her name was Ms. Barbara Harris, was there--

- [John] Her maiden name, that's it, Barbara Harris.

- [Deborah] Did she ever work outside the home?

- [John] Yes, when the boys became of age, she was a librarian for Quindaro School, worked in the educational system, and she got her degree in library science.

- [Deborah] Is that right? Where did she go, to get her degree in library science?

- [John] She got it through the junior college here, and her training at, where did she get it? Hawthorne School gave her the academic hours she needed to graduate. They gave her credit for that.

- [Deborah] That's great, 'cause I went to Atlanta University, and a lot of people have gone to Atlanta to their library school, but that was a long time ago.

- [John] What was your particular field?

- [Deborah] My field was history, but I went to Atlanta University for my graduate degree.

- [John] Atlanta University?

- [Deborah] Mm-hmm.

- [John] I'm thinking of a young lady down there. One got her nurse training in Tuskegee, and another was attending... I forgot the name of that place. But she got her training in Georgia, in Atlanta, Georgia, but I can't remember the place that she was.

- [Deborah] And you had four children?

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] Did your children attend school here in Kansas City?

- [John] Oh, yes. When they dropped the segregation, I guess they split the area. Let's see, John and George went to Wyandot for their graduation, and Robert went to Washington High, David went to Wyandot, too. See, instead of going to Sumner, they could graduate from Wyandot.

- [Deborah] Right. So none of your sons went to Sumner. Because Sumner didn't close until '78, right?

- [John] That's it.

- [Deborah] So let's continue talking about your experiences after leaving the service. So you got these several jobs. Tell me, when you came back, did you live with your parents? What was that situation like?

- [John] Well, I lived with my parents at Third and Shroop until I decided that the young lady and I were going to try this married life together, so in September the 18th of 1946, we went through the marriage ceremony. And I left my parents and moved into the old Douglas Hospital, as it had been turned into an apartment house, and I lived there with my wife until my number one son, John III, was almost five years old, and that was in 1955. We moved out to 3133 North 38th, where I live now. I have been here for some 50-odd years.

- [Deborah] Was it a neighborhood at the time, or were there just a few homes here?

- [John] Well, Brentwood, which is north of here, was being developed, and Weaver Estates in the same area was being developed. There were whites around us, and they were moving out. Of course, we had white neighbors on the west of us, and we had black neighbors on the south and the north of us, in this particular area, but as time progressed, Weaver Estates and Brentwood area developed, and people moved into that particular area, and they developed it all as far west as 38th Street. But we lived here all those years with our neighbors, until Brentwood became developed, attended Quindaro School with our children, and I worked my lawn service until I I got a chance to go in the post office. Between the motion picture theaters and my rubber stamp work and selling mutual funds and insurance, television and radio operation and servicing, I decided that art school was a thing that I liked to fulfill my ambition of being a portrait artist. So I attended art school, got my academic credits required from the Junior College here in Kansas, and then was able to get my BFA and MFA from the Kansas City Art Institute. Since I didn't want to teach school, I just professed the idea that I would do my developing paintings in oil, keep working at the post office, and I didn't have time for lawn service anymore.

- [Deborah] What were some of your subjects of your paintings?

- [John] Well, I did not pick notable individuals; I painted my family, my mother, my sons, my wife. I did paintings for Roosevelt Butler, for Reverend William Dancy and Mrs. Dancy, beautiful woman. Let's see, what else. Did several paintings for the church, Church of Ascension, which was at Third and Steward at the time.

- [Deborah] So you're an Episcopalian?

- [John] Well, I consider myself a Methodist, but at that time I guess I was an Episcopalian because I attended church with my mother. But when my mother passed, and my wife was a Methodist, and our sons were baptized and attended the Methodist school First AME, I joined that church as a family and made that a successful event-- still a member there.

- [Deborah] Of First AME.

- [John] First AME, at 8th and Nebraska.

- [Deborah] What other sorts of activities or positions have you held at First AME?

- [John] Well, really, at First AME I've just been a member. Tried to be active as far as finding ways for the church to earn money, doing the painting requirements that they wanted for signs painted, or-- I didn't do any of the painting on the walls, or anything of that kind, but when they had conventions and they wanted signs painted I took the liberty of doing that for them, working around the church.

- [Deborah] Did you ever paint portraits of some of the people in the congregation?

- [John] No, not for them. I had several individuals that I did. As I say, Reverend Dancy and his wife, Dr. Dyer, Ben Boyd's daughter, a couple of friends out in California that I did--

- [Deborah] Did they pay you for your--

- [John] Oh yes. Sometimes you make it as a gift, and I say again, I have done a painting for a woman at Faith House in St. Louis. My son was a director there, and wanted a painting done, so it gave me an opportunity to do that one. I painted portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Jones, Sr., at the funeral home in Kansas City, Missouri. But when I found out there was no great demand for paintings when you can have a photograph taken, and people prefer a photograph in many cases, more so than a painting. You don't have the time to sit for it, so--

- [Deborah] Yeah, it's a different-- Where did you do your, did you have a studio here, or where did you do your painting? Well, when I was working in the motion picture theater, sometimes I'd do my artwork doing the shows I worked at. When we had our Douglas Hospital I did it in the attic of the old Douglas Hospital, and here in my home, I have activities I can work sometimes out in the yard, sometimes in the house. It's just a matter of where you have your greatest need, and you have the time to do it. But I found, many times, it's more profitable for sell mutual funds and insurance than it is to try to get people to pay for artwork. So, as I say again, I tell them, "Take a picture of me and enlarge it, and that way you don't have to worry about people sitting up for it.

- [John] Dr. Gill wanted a painting -- Dr. Gill and Mrs. Gill wanted a painting done of their mother. I did that. Many times, it's just to try to accommodate others, and I did not want to travel around to try to make myself known in different places and all that

- [Deborah] That's a whole different ball game.

- [John] It sure is. I can understand how some people can have thousands of dollars for, if I asked $400 or $500 for a painting that I put 60 or 70 hours on, I'm not going to pay that kind of money for that, and I don't blame you, go take a picture. And then, do like some people do, spread some shellac over it and make lines on it, and you have a painting that satisfies some people. I went over to the art institute, not the art institute, Bruce Watkin's place is where there is all kinds of enlarged photographs, beautiful work. People don't want to pay to have someone sit there for an artist's interpretation of some things. I did a painting for Will Florence, in her particular area.

- [Deborah] Who is that?

- [John] Will Florence Robins? You don't know her. She was very active in the YWCA, quite active in the local chapter here.

- [Deborah] You mean the Yates?

- [John] Yates, uh-huh. That painting that I did is still down on, used to be 13th and Washington. But she had a painting done, the person to I thought did a terrible job of putting in and spoils what I felt Mrs. Robins looked like. I knew her from years back. My wife worked with her in the YWCA, and my wife was one time a national officer in the Y, through Mrs. Robins' contact. But this painting, the person did a terrible portrait of Mrs. Robins, old, and drawn-out, and cold like, and I talked to her cousin, who had control of her property into allowing me to take that painting and do it over. And I did a more pleasing portrait of Mrs. Robins, I think and I did. People say I flatter that which I see. Maybe I see beauty in everything, and I don't have anything wrong with that, because maybe sometimes you take a photograph, iron out all the lines and things that you don't want in there. I don't try to do that, but I try to see beauty in whatever I do, and with my paintings, I say, I don't try to rob people as far as money is concerned. I tell them, "Go take a picture." I take pictures of it in many poses, and put them all together as to what I feel I'm looking at. Sometimes that's good and sometimes it isn't.

- [Deborah] You said you were living in the apartments in the old Douglas Hospital. Did Douglas Hospital operate at that particular time, or do you know? You went there in the early 1950s, right?

- [John] Mm-hmm.

- [Deborah] Was there a Douglas Hospital operating at that time?

- [John] Out on 27th, on the north end of 27th Street was out there then. It was fully in operation then. But this was the old building, on Springfield and Quindaro.

- [Deborah] Okay, all right. Who owned...

- [Deborah] Mr. John Adams in his home in Kansas City, Kansas. Today is Thursday, May the 12th, 2011. My name is Deborah Dandridge, interviewing Mr. Adams, and this is the second interview. We're going to go into some more detail than we may have missed in our previous interview. So, Mr. Adams, we were talking about when you got to the Tuskegee Army Airfield. What kinds of things did you go through from there do you remember?

- [John] Well, after the preliminary preflight training with one of the instructors, which was my first encounter in an airplane at all, gave me a training mission of different maneuvers, I guess, to familiarize the student with a particular phase of training where it's going through spins, or dives, or rolls, to see if that student was able to physically endure the travel in the air. It didn't give me any difficulties, so we flew around for a while, making me familiar with the town and the area, and went back down after about an hour and a half of preliminary flying. From that preflight, we went to primary training, which constitutes an instructor in the rear cockpit and the student in the front, and the possibility after a series of maneuvers with your instructor, you get an opportunity to fly solo. After solo flights, you're enabled to take that plane up by yourself, and hopefully bring it back successfully with no damage to it. You were able to complete that particular effort after the preliminary training with the instructor. From there, you were told to go up and practice certain maneuvers, whether they be figure eights, low altitude cross areas, stunts, stalls, spins, snap-rolls if you have read the instruction book on how to maneuver them and you can try to execute them. So, it's the basis of, once you have finished soloing, and have been able to complete the primary course, you advance to lower basic. Basic is the first opportunity to fly low-wing, I guess simulated fighter ship, with fixed landing gear. You have the basic the maneuvers to execute in lower basic, you are exposed to short field, long field take-offs and landings, low altitude flying, you go up on your own without the instructor and practice your different maneuvers, whether they be simulated combat flying with another instructor, another student. Sometimes you have formations flying in basic. You have exposure to instrument flying, flying under the hood, which enables you to fly a fixed airplane model, with simulated instruments inside it, and you have blind flying, basically judging your altitude, airspeed, horizontal instruments and that sort of thing, to guide you without leaving the ground , It's what they call "hood flying." That's to enable you to be able to fly instruments in darkness, over areas in which you have no sight of the ground, above the clouds. That's in lower basic. After you've completed lower basic, you advance to upper basic. Upper basic gives you an opportunity to fly with numerous other students, and their instructors. Simulated formation, simulated combat, flying as a group, instead of just one or two, flying wing-man positions. You fly with 8, 10, or 12 ships, fly in formation and simulated battle. Once you complete upper basic, you have an opportunity to go to advanced, where you fly the first time with an airplane that has a retractable landing gear. The BT-13 in basic had fixed landing gear, which you could not pull it up once you left the ground. In advanced, lower and upper advanced, you had an opportunity to fly the AT-6, which has a retractable landing gear. It is a much faster ship than the BT-13, but it is occupied by a student and the instructor for the first basic principles of flying. More or less it's simulated combat, formation, short field take-off and landings, night flying, night flying on cross country, take-off and landings at night, simulated battles, formation flying, and once you have complete those particular steps in advanced, you have reached that stage which you have been able to complete the course successfully and get a rating, and you'll be able to receive your graduation notice with a second lieutenant or a flight officer. I don't know the difference the two, but that was the epitome of flying once you have completed advanced courses. That was the ultimatum of flying, and from there, once we graduated, we went to Eglin Field, Florida for gunnery training. Went to Godman Field, Kentucky. Walterboro, South Carolina for flying with an actual fighter that was being used overseas. In our cases, class 45C, we used the P-47 the Thunderbolt, or called the jug, a much heavier plane, retractable landing gear, used as a bomber and a fighter. That was the next step prior to the P-51s, which was more or less, I think, designated in our outfit as the Red Tail Angels, as they were called, those who had been overseas and able to fly in that particular formation, escorting the bombers to different positions. I never did get an opportunity to engage in flying the 51, but I did fly several training hours in the P-47. When I found out that they were no longer needed as far as pilots to replace those who were coming back from overseas, they put us in several details of inspections and I guess general services around the airbase in which we were attached. But we were limited to flying only four hours a month in order to get our flying pay. And since I felt that they no longer wanted us, and they wanted an opportunity to either encourage us to volunteer to stay in the service for two years, that was the first qualification for it. Then they came back about two months later and said three years was the least that they would accept you on a volunteer basis to stay in the service, or you may take an opportunity to leave the service at your will, or possibly you might be demoted and lose your particular status as a second lieutenant or as a flight officer. So, I took the opportunity to, since I wasn't needed there, to vacate the service and come home.

- [Deborah] That's excellent. Thank you for summarizing all that. What was it like when you first got on that airplane. Do you remember what you felt? What kind of feelings did you have about the training itself? Do you remember, was there some things that surprised you? Were there some things that you expected? What was it like, and your feelings toward it, towards the airplane flying.

- [John] Are you speaking of before we started primary?

- [Deborah] Yes, or anytime.

- [John] Well, as I say again--

- [Deborah] Well, before you started the primary, when you first stepped into the plane, what did you think about it?

- [John] Well, it was my first experience of being in a plane and in the air. I was more or less thrilled to be given the opportunity to see what it was like with somebody else piloting the plane. It didn't upset me at all. Sometimes I understood that the violent maneuvers in an airplane, you could become airsick. That didn't bother me whatsoever. It was just a thrilling ride, like they have on some of the play areas where they have the certain rides. I don't know what they refer to them now. Rollercoasters where they have excessive speeds and they go up and down and twist around and that. That same type of action I guess you can experience the plane. But in a plane you're sitting on a parachute, and you're strapped in, where in the rollercoasters and things I think you're exposed to a great deal of openness that you don't have in an airplane. But as I say again, it was more thrilling more or less to me, just to be able to witness that and someone else flying the plane who was qualified to do all the maneuvers that I expected to do in the future.

- [Deborah] And that person who was in that plane with you during your primary, what were they, black or white?

- [John] Uh, black. We didn't have white instructors in primary that I remember. Now, they may have some in advanced class, because the number of qualified black instructors was limited as far as I can remember. There was some white, I believe, who took care of the advanced classes, but most of the--

- [Deborah] Is there any particular reason why there were fewer African Americans?

- [John] Well, I guess not too many of them were qualified in college to give that instruction to the college. Some of them gave from a college I believe, and they had a opportunity to, sure they had the money and the desire to become part of the training, yes.

- [Deborah] Tell me, what were the things that you found most easy about flying? What things were never a challenge for you?

- [John] Well, I can't say that every part of the plane was a challenge as far as becoming familiar with what made that airplane move, either go up, down, right, left, or whatnot. Getting acquainted with the different maneuvers that you have to go through. But as far as learning, we have to spend a certain amount of cockpit time as a experience, read the manuals, sit in the plane and become familiar with the instruments, how to observe them, how to handle the controls, what forces the plane to go up and down, use of the flaps, the ailerons, whatever instruments that you have to have to maneuver.

- [Deborah] So, did you ever do some of this on your own, outside of the training sessions themselves, did you ever try to familiarize yourself by yourself? You know, do that on your own, or?

- [John] No, other than reading the manuals. They give you a manual when you first become a part of the training session. You have to study that. You have the privilege of sitting in the plane at times it was not being used.

- [Deborah] Is that right?

- [John] And become familiar with the cockpit procedure as they call it.

- [Deborah] Did you do that on your own a lot?

- [John] Not really. During the student time in training we had a certain amount of time to spend in school, in classes, learning the aeronautical theory, and then we had the time to go out on the line, sit in the planes, become familiar with all the instruments and things, and to end them, put into practice what you learned in the classroom, and put it to use there before you got a chance to fly with your instructor.

- [Deborah] In these classrooms that you were exploring the aeronautical theory, who were in these classes? What kind of issues would you all discuss as a class? You remember, or do you?

- [John] Well, I say again, the theory of flying what forces the plane to go up and down, what maneuvers are necessary to divert, to control, how do you recover from spins, what you know, the technical terms of stalls, spins, of figure eights, or slow rolls, the snap rolls, spin recovery--

- [Deborah] Did you ever do a figure eight?

- [John] Oh, yes. A figure eight's a very simple maneuver. It's just like tying a bowtie on our tie, or your shoes. You just execute on a straight and level, but the figure eights. Spins and stalls are altogether different. You put that plane nose up until it stalls out and no longer able to fly, and it's going to drop nose first, toward the earth. You have to learn the procedure of recovery, whether it spins to the right, or the--

- [Deborah] Did you do that? Did you do those kinds of things?

- [John] Oh, yes, yes, that's part of the training. You have to stall it first, let it drop down, renew the recovery procedure, how to recover, how to go up, make loops, how to make snap rolls, slow rolls, all those things. You read it in the books--

- [Deborah] It sounds exciting but also very frightening. You never found this frightening?

- [John] No. Not once you knew what you were doing.

- [Deborah] Do you remember the first time you began doing those routines? What was it like?

- [John] Well, thrilling. After all, you're flying at about 5,000 feet. You got plenty of space to recover. Perhaps you read the manuals, and you go through those things with an instructor. You don't do it by yourself first. The instructor's in there with you, and if you have the proper procedure, you do all those things before you solo. But you have the privilege of knowing those things. That's what they teach you in the classrooms. And you put what you have learned in the classroom then, when you have a chance to go up and execute those maneuvers at certain levels. But that's the interesting part about it, just like driving a car. The more you drive it, the better you become familiar with it.

- [Deborah] Right. You did some flying obviously on your own. I remember your talking about flying to Georgia and back.

- [John] Well, low altitude or high altitude cross countries, yes. Those were planned things by the instructors. You have certain points of contact that you're supposed to pass over and recognize, and you have a regular pattern you're supposed to fly. Sometimes three or four places making contact, by visual contact, and you make the last contact back at the base as a rule, unless you have been instructed to land at a certain field to practice short take-offs or short landings. But that's a part of the regular procedure that's given you, whether it's in the day flights, or whether it's night flying.

- [Deborah] During all of this training, what worried you the most? Or what worried you at all?

- [John] Well, being able to satisfactorily complete the course, and get a decent rating where I can become a licensed pilot, I would say it that way. In this case, it's to get your commission saying you have completed the course, you had no problems. Your grades will decide whether you have one status or another I assume. I don't know that. Otherwise, whether you stay in the program to complete it, is based upon whether you have the fortitude, the aptitude, and the physical and mental endurance to be able to control that plane.

- [Deborah] Did some of them not make it?

- [John] Oh, yes. We started out with a class of 60 people, and in primary we had 45. Fifteen, they either washed out, for some reason or the other, and then graduation, having completed advanced class we had 23 graduated in single engine, out of 60 at the beginning.

- [Deborah] So that wasn't a very great survival rate, was it?

- [John] No, not really, but they have numerous reasons, I guess, that they washed you out. Because of the fact, some of them maybe their academic work wasn't satisfactory. Sometimes their physical endurance wasn't satisfactory. Sometimes their flying wasn't and executing the maneuvers that you were supposed to be doing was not satisfactory.

- [Deborah] Did you ever meet, and work with or talk with, any of the white pilots during this time?

- [John] No. We never came in contact with any whites. I take that back. Coming into contact, when I was going at a low altitude cross country, I landed at the incorrect field. I recognized, I thought, from the distance height that I was flying, that this was the field that I was supposed to land in. But when I landed and rolled up to the flight line, all I saw was white faces around the planes and the flight line. Went into the headquarters, and I asked if I had made an error of landing at the wrong field, and was instructed, "Yes." The field that I was supposed to go to was on course, but it's about 20 miles, I guess, I forgot what direction I was supposed to go.

- [Deborah] So you had to get out of the plane, and meet these people.

- [John] Oh, definitely. Oh yes.

- [Deborah] So how did they treat you?

- [John] Well, just as normal as far as I can say. I guess they were surprised to see my dark face, and I was surprised to see their light faces, too, so I guess they feel this guy's either stupid, or he's off course one way or another, but I didn't recognize the fact that white and black were not trained together. Obviously there was a place in Alabama that was catering strictly to whites, or other than blacks or Asians, or whatnot. Caucasians had one place I guess they were training, and the blacks had another.

- [Deborah] Did these guys treat you okay? They just helped you on your way or--

- [John] Oh, yes. I didn't have any contact other than a couple of people in the office, and they were officers and flight instructors. Whether the people that were around the planes there, I had no contact with them at all, because the minute I found out I was in the wrong field, I merely go on back to the plane and took off, and headed for the direction I was supposed to land, at the field where our training course or headquarters was.

- [Deborah] So they didn't bother you?

- [John] No, no. I had no problem whatsoever there.

- [Deborah] So, after the military, what was your life like after you decided to go on and leave the military? What was your life like after that?

- [John] Well, I had a job as a motion picture projectionist at the Princess Theater where I--

- [Deborah] And that's the job you had before you went in.

- [John] Before I went in the service. I had the opportunity to go back to that, with the idea that I had at least one yeah of positive assurance that I could not be taken off that job. That was my guarantee from the service. But I didn't realize the fact that many things had occurred there. They had a union had formed, and the operators were all unionized, even though there was a separate organization from the parent organization, and I was not able to hold onto that job after the year's time because the management of the theaters had the obligation of giving me that for one year, and they were kind enough to give me a job at another theater in Kansas City, Missouri, the Castle Theater, to make up for whatever time I may have lost. Before this operators' union, which was all people of color, they had a need for season operators because they were going to get two other theaters that they did not have access to prior to that. That's the Lincoln and the Gem theaters. Then after about seven or eight months of working at that Castle Theater as a house manager, they accepted my application to become a part of the Union 170A, and I went to work as a relief operator at the five theaters they have, one night a week at each theater.

- [Deborah] So when you came back home, trying to work at the Princess, it was a union shop at the Princess? Everybody was union, and you weren't, is that right?

- [John] Right.

- [Deborah] Is there any reason you couldn't join the union then, or?

- [John] Well, they had no need. They only had three theaters, and they had seven operators.

- [Deborah] Okay, so they had reached their fill on that.

- [John] Yeah. When they got the other two theaters, the Lincoln and the Gem, well they needed someone to fill in. They needed someone who could work for them because they were already handled by 170, which was the white organization, and the managers of those theaters were insisting upon that they have qualified operators, so I went to work as one night at each of the theaters, the five theaters they had, one night--

- [Deborah] Were you union by then?

- [John] Oh, yes.

- [Deborah] You were union by then. What was it like getting into union?

- [John] Not a problem. I was qualified; I had five years--

- [Deborah] What steps did you have? Did someone ask you to be, did you go into it? How did it happen?

- [John] No, I applied for it, because I wanted the job that I had had. I'd worked the Princess for one year as a qualified operator, so my experience was well known as far as they were concerned. But they had no need for other men to come in and take the place of those who were qualified already, with only seven men and three theaters, they had enough as far as employees in order to take care of their jobs. With the additional two theaters, they needed someone else that they can depend upon to put to work immediately, which, as I say, my experience put me in a position to accept that. I applied for it with initiation fee and whatever else was required. That's all I had to do, and I went to work right away.

- [Deborah] Did you ever work in the union itself, you know, doing union meetings? Did you ever participate in that sort of thing?

- [John] In due time, I became, the treasurer I think was my first promotion. After the treasury job, I took on the job of a business agent, since the--

- [Deborah] And what was the name of this union?

- [John] Local 170A; it was an international alliance of stage employees and motion picture operators. 170A, and A indicated that they were not a Caucasian group. 170 was strictly all white. That was a part of their particular requirements, I say, it was a white local, no blacks, no Asians, anyone else involved. But the mandate came down from Washington that the parent organization must take in the A locals. There should be no separation between auxiliary locals and parent organizations, so when that happened, why, we became part of the 170; we dropped the A. But there were only took in, let's see, we didn't have too many theaters at that time because our tenure was low. But I think three of us, at least, started working with the so-called 170. I was one of those three. Whereas the other fellas had other jobs, they didn't particularly care about being a part of it.

- [Deborah] Were you one of the few African Americans in that union, then, once it dropped its color blind?

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] So you were treasurer and--

- [John] Well, I was treasurer and business agent of my local, in that local one, and we were joined together; I was just another member.

- [Deborah] Did you ever move up in the ranks of the union when they merged?

- [John] No.

- [Deborah] Did you try?

- [John] No.

- [Deborah] Why not?

- [John] Well, first of all, the parent organization was, I guess, being interested enough for those who wanted to participate to allow them to join. I had an opportunity to be accepted in that local and go with them on some of their meetings, with some of the managers of different theaters, since I was the only on there. But I wasn't going to try to jump the gun and trying to say, because I was a minority, that I had to have a prestigious job over some of the others because of my tenure. Anybody who came behind me, would still did not have the tenure that I would have had. But, some of those fellows had been in there for 30 or 40 years.

- [Deborah] So seniority trumped the race card, yeah.

- [John] Seniority played a part, sure.

- [Deborah] So they had been in there longer than you. How did they treat you, when you all merged? How were you treated by the white union members?

- [John] I had no complaint whatsoever. I know there was some that didn't like my being in there, but there was some that--

- [Deborah] How do you they didn't like that?

- [John] They expressed themselves.

- [Deborah] What did they say?

- [John] Not necessarily saying. It was the idea of, why would he be given some of the theaters that were their privilege to have at that particular time. They felt that the 170 should give them preference. They wanted an explanation as to why any p-- I joined the picket line and everything else that they were a part of, so I didn't feel that I was-- I had paid union dues, so I had the same privilege that the rest of them had, depending upon what number of years that I had become a part of that.

- [Deborah] Right.

- [John] So I had no problem.

- [Deborah] But they resisted you.

- [John] Some did, yes.

- [Deborah] Did they intimidate you physically?

- [John] No.

- [Deborah] Yeah, they were just not nice people.

- [John] Mm-hmm.

- [Deborah] Were you raising a family then?

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] So you had married and had children by that time.

- [John] Oh, yes. I had married in '46, and then I had that first child in '51. I had, let's see, '56 we had three in the family, all three boys. I had no great amount of difficulty racially, I'll put it that way. I have grant you that segregation as far as people of color were concerned, took away many of the so-called opportunities for our theaters to stay open, businesses to stay open, particularly the theaters when the general public could go to other theaters and be accepted, not necessarily have to sit upstairs, or sit in certain areas. They had much better opportunities, and the newer movies and presentations were at some of the other theaters who had the more prestige and the more money. But, the black theaters, those that were attended mainly by black, were not able to get the main productions as soon as the other theaters, so blacks went where they could go. But that was an acceptable thing, something to be expected, whether or not it was in the restaurants or clubs or whatnot. The segregation in some ways was beneficial, and in some ways it was hurting in some. Jobs, and locations, and that sort of thing.

- [Deborah] So when the black theaters finally went down here, what did you do?

- [John] Well, I , I had another job, too. In fact I had two jobs.

- [Deborah] Okay, tell us about it.

- [John] Well, I worked in the post office. Went in and applied for a job as a clerk, because I thought I'd want to work inside, but when they told me that if you pass the examination for clerk, you'd have to work nights. And I didn't want to lose my job as a projectionist, because I wanted to have both of them, so I passed that job up, took the exam again, and asked for carrier, where I could be working outside, and it wouldn't interfere with my night work. So, I worked, when I went on as a sub, I worked a limited number of hours, but it became regular I guess it was in about two years. I worked a regular route in the daytime, and worked theaters at night, and I had a lawn service out in the plaza in between, and went to art school.

- [Deborah] What a minute. Let's talk about this lawn service. Was this your own private business?

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] So how did you get started into that?

- [John] Well, I worked for the Greek family who had the theaters, and in doing the work in their homes out in the plaza and on Leawood, numerous people would stop by, and they asked, after I guess I became acquainted with the neighborhood, asked if I had any time that I could give them, and worked up to where I could work six days a week if I wanted to, in private family. From one person to another, and from friends asking if I had time that I would be able to give them, so I had a thriving business for six days.

- [Deborah] So you were working three jobs for about how many years?

- [John] Well, let's see,

- [Deborah] Just an estimate.

- [John] I'd say almost eight or ten years on three jobs. On two jobs for about, from 1957 until '84, I worked two jobs: post office and then the theaters. I did the lawn service in between. When I attended art school I had to drop the lawn service, because I had to go to art school to try to get my degree in illustration and painting.

- [Deborah] And what was the motivation for doing that, for entering art school?

- [John] Well, all of my young life, I'd say, I had been able to draw, and I always found a great interest in drawing and painting. And, just thought I'd take an opportunity to put it to use, thinking I could make some headway as a portrait artist.

- [Deborah] What was that art school, what were the classes like? Did you enjoy them?

- [John] Well, yeah. The art school was more or less biased too, in some ways. I went to the Kansas City Art Institute, and they had a limited number of black students there, and from what I understood, they had certain rules that blacks and whites sometimes did not have the privilege of doing associating, not in the classrooms, but around the campus and off campus, I guess, in that particular area. But, that was to be expected, I guess, in most schools of that kind. But, I had no great amount of difficulty in that school as far as race was concerned. It was just how you treated people, how you handled yourself

- [Deborah] Okay, Mr. Adams, you were talking about your experience with the art institute as a student.

- [John] Well, I did very well as far as the associating with the young men and the young women in the classroom. I had no difficulty with the teachers. I had all high scores, and honor record as far as the school was concerned, and I had opportunity to gain a commission to do a painting for a funeral home on 47th and Passee, I forgot the name of it now. They had a contest, on doing presentations to be awarded a prize from the school. I participated in not only that, and was granted the award for that particular company. I had some of my work accepted by some of the so-called artists out of town to come through the area and ask to send them a particular copy of some of the lithos that I did in lithograph class. Several models whom I gave personal drawings because they felt that it was something that they wanted to keep.

- [Deborah] Mm, my!

- [John] I think I was not only blessed, but just very lucky to be able to do something that I had enjoyed doing basically all my life.

- [Deborah] What years did you attend the art institute? I mean, was it in the '50s, or '60s, do you remember?

- [John] You know, I think it was in the late 50s and early 60s, I think it was, yes, late 50s and early 60s. I got my BFA, and one year I left there to go to junior college to get my academic credits and came back the next year and spent another year to get my master's. So, I was able to get two degrees from the Kansas City Art Institute.

- [Deborah] So, after that, you went on and sort of did some self-portraits I remember you talking--

- [John] Oh, yeah, around locally, yes.

- [Deborah] Who were some of the people that you did your paintings? You remember some of the people?

- [John] Roosevelt Butler, Dr. William Dyer, I did a painting for the crucifixion for Saint, Episcopal Church down at Third and Stewart. I did a painting of Mrs. Will Florence Robins, for the YWCA. I did several paintings for people in the movie business, Mr. Louie Capullis. I'd take pictures of the particular individuals to save them the time of posing, and then I have a composite painting that I do, in order to satisfy what that person may want for their family. I've done a painting of Dr. and Mrs. Gill, who live out on Georgia. Did a painting for Reverend William Dancy, did a painting of his wife of Reverend Dancy. I did a painting for Benjamin he's an insurance agent.

- [Deborah] That's all right; you don't have to remember his name.

- [John] I've done several locally, but--

- [Deborah] So you did your art work outside in another building, outside the house. Where'd you do your artwork, where did you do these?

- [John] Sometimes at the theater at night, sometimes at home, sometimes--

- [Deborah] So you didn't have a studio, or anything?

- [John] Oh, no, no. My studio was either my family room, or out in the yard. When I was in Douglas Hospital as an apartment I did it in the attic, wherever I could work, whatever I had at the time.

- [Deborah] When were you in Douglas Hospital?

- [John] The time from when I was first married, the wife and I moved to Douglas Hospital after our marriage in 1946, stayed there until 1955.

- [Deborah] Was it operating as a hospital then?

- [John] No, it was apartment houses. Mrs. Emersaire Pendleton took it over and operated it as an apartment. There were eight families living there.

- [Deborah] But by that time they had moved to Western, is that it?

- [John] No, they were out on 27th Street, at the end of 27th Street.

- [Deborah] Oh, the hospital itself.

- [John] Mm-hmm.

- [Deborah] So the hospital was still operating. It had just moved from those quarters.

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] Did you ever go to Douglas Hospital as a patient?

- [John] As a patient? No.

- [Deborah] Where did you go for hospital care?

- [John] Let's see, when I went to the hospital because I was bitten by a dog, I went to Bethany, down on 12th and Central. I was bitten by a dog, and I had to go there for--

- [Deborah] Was that when you were carrying mail?

- [John] Yeah.

- [John] Ah, let's see, where else did I go?

- [John] Did I go to Providence St. Margaret's? I was trying to think whether I had been.

- [Deborah] Before you went into the military, where did you go to the hospital?

- [John] Didn't go.

- [Deborah] You never went to a hospital?

- [John] No.

- [Deborah] What about your folks, or anybody, or your friends, where did they go to the hospital?

- [John] University of Kansas.

- [Deborah] Okay. They didn't go to Douglas?

- [John] No, they went to physicians, I guess, Dr. Alexander treated at, I think he treated at Bethany. He had hospital privileges at Douglas, too, but I think my mother and father went to University of Kansas, yes I know that. My mother and father went to University of Kansas for their difficulties. Whether it was contacting the Dr. Dyer, who my mother worked for, or whether it was just the acceptance of that particular place. Because Douglas Hospital, once they left Springfield and Quindaro, they became known as a place where they did a lot of abortions, and I don't think too many people wanted to frequent that place, that required services.

- [Deborah] But that wasn't during the '40s. That was later, right?

- [John] Yeah.

- [Deborah] Yeah, that was much later. By that time, that must have been around the late '50s and into the 60s then, is that correct? It's hard to put a time on that, isn't it?

- [John] Well, having left there at '55, it must have been. I carried mail in '57. It had to be '60s.

- [Deborah] Yeah, the '60s, that it had become that-- So, do you remember anybody going to Douglas Hospital before that time, when it was on Western University's old campus? Do you remember anybody going to Douglas then, when they had moved there?

- [John] Well, I carried mail out there. They were on my route, but no, I don't necessarily know the people who attended that place. But they had a good patronage as far as I was concerned, and they had, whether it was abortions or whatnot, they were still very well, I'd say, frequented as far as people coming there for service.

- [Deborah] Who was your family physician?

- [John] Dr. William H. Dyer was my physician my mother worked for, and he attended my parents most of the time. Dr. Alexander was another.

- [Deborah] And he was African American.

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] And did you know any nurses in the community or anything?

- [John] No, I knew a Dr. William Love, I knew Dr., the guy that did, I had a small tumor removed from my left testicle. Becker.

- [Deborah] Oh, Dr. Becker.

- [John] Dr. Becker.

- [Deborah] Because he's a urologist, yeah, right.

- [John] Who else did I know? Most of the doctors that I had any contact with at all, as I say, whether it was dog bites, or anything of that kind, were black. As far as attending whites, I didn't have that necessarily need, the need for specialist, if I were referred to that, like Dr. Norman Foster. I went to him for a cyst I had on my left wrist, and I was referred from Dr. Foster to Dr., what the heck is his name? The surgeon. And from that individual, as much as I know his name, I can't think of it now.

- [Deborah] That's okay.

- [John] The only surgeon I knew of around here, and he has a very attractive wife, is very friendly and knowledgeable, Watson.

- [Deborah] Oh, Dr. Watson. Dr. Watson, from Dr. Watson I went to Dr. Perry, William Perry, and from Dr. Perry, I went to Dr. David Emmett. That's the first white physician I went to. But he was because he was a specialist the particular field, and I wasn't getting too much satisfaction from some of us, shall I say, Dr. Forester for one. And Dr. Perry I didn't particularly care for his tactics, so when my son who was in St. Louis made the mention of his contacts with different physicians in St. Louis and physician here that, they got me an appointment with Dr. David Emmett. He was supposed to be one of the top oncologists in his particular field, so that's how I came in contact with him.

- [Deborah] I think you may have mentioned this to me, but what careers or employment did your children go into?

- [John] Well, let's see. My number one son, John III, is in St. Louis. He went into business administration, got his master's from Fulton, Missouri, Fulton U, yeah, he got his master's there. Number two son, George, went to KU, in the field of music. After his second year he decided he wasn't getting the musical training he wanted, so he dropped out of that, went into TWA, working as an employee there. Number three son, went to KU for two years and decided that he wasn't getting the kind of training he wanted to get there, so he dropped out and went into business as, in working an ice cream business. He has his own little business now. Number four son didn't go to college. He finished high school and decided he wanted to be a musician, and went to Brady for years. And now he works with me on helping take the blind person, plays for a certain church, Greater Jerusalem Church on--

- [Deborah] What does he play?

- [John] Drums and keyboards.

- [Deborah] Wow.

- [John] He also works with a Mrs. Tony Oliver and part of the teaching staff that she has, and works several night spots, I guess, in Kansas City, Missouri and local places out in the city, whether it's in Horton, Kansas, or Hiawatha, Atchison. He has been overseas to Holland.

- [Deborah] Travel due to music?

- [John] Yes.

- [Deborah] Tell us something about your wife.

- [John] Oh. My wife was a very talented woman. I think that she would not only have beauty, but she had skills in administrative qualifications. She was a part of, one of the first blacks to be a part of the national headquarters of the YWCA, through the efforts of Mrs. Will Florence Robins. She participated in that for years before she decided that she was going to have children, and prior to that, let's see, she went to Horace Field down in Kansas City, Missouri, for a job. She worked there for a while, and she was noticed by the employees of Cricket West, out in the plaza. She was asked if she would take a job there as working as one of the buyers, and she left Horace Field and went to Cricket West.

- [Deborah] Did they have any other African American women doing that buying then?

- [John] Nah, I'm not sure. They must have had a few out there.

- [Deborah] It's no wonder I loved Cricket West. They had good choices.

- [John] Well, whoever the person was that there, came down to Horace Field numerous times, and my wife worked for a Jewish lady. She was using her as a stock girl. And she said what seemingly talent and appearance she had, and her personality. They were going to put her in charge of one of these departments at Horace Field. But, they had an offer from this person from Cricket West, who was trying to develop the store there, and offered her a job there. So she had an opportunity to be one of the first blacks to be hired in that area.

- [Deborah] How long did she stay with that?

- [John] Until, let's see. Butch was born in '51, and moved out to where we are now in '55. I think she stayed with Cricket West about three or four years.

- [Deborah] And so that was in the '40s.

- [John] Yeah. Late 40s, when I came back from the service, yeah.

- [Deborah] Wow. So, what did she do about

- [John] I say until our sons became of age, where they were, could be depended to come home and be by themselves, my wife stayed at home. When that passed, she worked as a Cub Scout leader, and she worked in the church, and she worked at Quindaro School, in the parent teachers' group, and was head of the parent teachers' organization for years. And she finally had a job offer as a librarian--

- [Deborah] You were talking about Mrs. Adams.

- [John] Yeah, she had a job at Quindaro School as an assistant in the library department, and some contacts that she had in the the board of education in her parent teacher meetings association, she was asked if she would be interested in participating and becoming a qualified librarian. She'd have to go to junior college or someplace in order to get her academic credits. And she accepted that, attended the junior college out here on 77nd, attended night classes, and she became a qualified library assistant, working with Val Forsythe, who was a librarian. She was a Caucasian who was in charge there. She got my wife the job as her assistant, and Barb stayed that until the time that she retired from the board of education. I've forgotten what year that was, but she was in her 70s when she quit there. But she liked that work. She liked working with children. At Quindaro she was, I say, the first black as far as the head of the parent teachers in that area in that school, so she did a marvelous job between the Cub Scouts and her school work and being a career mother and librarian and commmunity leader, church worker at First AME. I don't know how she handled all those things, but she's a very talented, gifted woman. Very patient, as I say. In the time that I was trying to pursue my career, as working two or three jobs, that she did the same thing with her activities in the YWCA and in Quindaro School, and the national organization. She made trips back and forth to different places where she was participating in her official capacity. And as Hawthorne librarian for years, she retired from there. So, she was busy as a woman and a mother and all those other things, a housewife I say it again, she's done extra hard and a hard working individual. Very proud of her.

- [Deborah] What did she do after retirement?

- [John] Well, between the church, First AME, and as far as the school was concerned, she kept her activities going in different places, and then between the library calling her for different bits of information, she spent most of her time at home and I say being whatever she could be of service here. But they called on her for numerous things, acting in different organizations, making club dedications. Different clubs asked her to come in and give their officers presentations and that sort of thing, where she was knowledgeable about Robert's rules, and club organizations and that sort of thing. Busy woman, I tell you. She had, unfortunately, contacted diabetes, and that sort of limited her ability to get around, and that eventually helped to take her life, but other than that she was a very busy, dedicated woman, a mother, and a wife.

- [Deborah] Thank you very much.

- [John] Yeah.

- [Deborah] We appreciate your time, and thank you so much, Mr. Adams, thank you.

- [John] My pleasure.