James Munford

Parts of this transcript were autogenerated and there may be errors.

Hailey Finch (HF):Alright, my name is Hailey Finch, and today I am interviewing James Munford, who lived in Danville through the time he went to high school. I am here with Jeffrey Shenton, Caroline Dahl, and Michael Hughes. Today is April 13th, 2022, we are recording this interview in the Danville-Boyle CountyAfricanAmerican Historical Society, and today we will be discussing James Munford’s experiences during Danville’s urban renewal process. Caroline, do you want to get us started?

Caroline Dahl (CD): Yeah, so, Mr. Munford, I know that you told us prior to the start of this interview that you lived in Danville up to high school. Would you mind telling us, for the purposes of the interview, just telling us a little bit more about yourself?

JM: Well, I grew up on 6th Street in Danville, it was across from the National GuardArmory. I started [Bate School] when I was 7 years old ‘cause of the– back then they had a rule that if you was 7 or 6 after October, you couldn’t start until the following year. And I did, I graduated from Bate High School in 1964, I was the last all-Black graduating class from Bate before they actually closed it down. I left from high school and went to the military, Navy for seven and a half years. I returned back to Danville briefly after my naval service and didn’t stay long, then I went to Louisville and worked at GE, where I retired [after] thirty-two, thirty-three years or something like that. After that, I had an impulse, and picked up and packed and moved to Florida for the next twelve or fourteen years, and back to Danville in-between that time for four or five years, and I got a taste with saltwater, which wasn’t here, so I moved back to Florida.And I stayed down there another, I don’t know, four or five years, and then I came back to Danville in 2015, and been here ever since. So, I’ve anchored here for the duration.

HF: When you were growing up here, about what time would that have been?

JM: I graduated in ‘64, and you go back, what year would that be? ‘54, I started, ‘52 probably, when I started school from Sixth Street, from my home, original home. Played all the sports that they offered at the time, and getting close to graduation, the principal and the librarian, they thought I had a few scruples up here (points to head) so they offered to help me go to college if I decided to and, my grandmother raised me, and, you know I didn’t have a lot of input from her, on making those kind of decisions, so I was a little apprehensive about college, I didn’t know what to expect and things. And I had buddies that played on the football team with me, they encouraged me to go to the military, and I didn’t really wanna do that. But the principal talked to me, and told me to make sure I did something and didn’t end up just staying here and being dormant, you know. In other words, he was encouraging me to get out and see the world a little bit. So with that, I went to the Marine office with one of my sports buddies, and he kinda laid it on the line, and that kinda scared me, and I said “I don’t think I wanna be a Marine.” And I went across the office to theArmy guy, and they said I was flat-footed, so they wouldn’t take me, then I went to the Navy office, and they said “Where do you want to sign?” From there, I went to the Navy and after that, after bootcamp, Vietnam was my first cruise on my ship, which was an aircraft carrier. We stayed over there from nine to ten months, came back, and I got to see the world. I've been to almost every continent in the world, I guess. I can name the ones I haven't been to. But I've been to every country that you can think of. I got to see a lot of poverty and stuff over there compared to here, and different cultures, which kind of gives you, enlightens you on what you left and what's going on in the other parts of the world. Africa and India and some of those countries stand out because of the poverty that I saw that, a lot of people over here, they might get glimpses of it on TV or whatever, but you know, I seen some of it in person. The mud huts, no water, the street ladies, the meat markets with flies all over the place. It was, it made you look at things different, you looked at the world a lot different.And I continued, I actually, I got out, I did my four years after the Vietnam two, I did four years on this ship here, I got out. I went back to GE and during that time in ‘69, I think it was, GE had a working population of like 24,000 people at the plant about that time. And in the Spring the farmers would go on strike, they was planned so they could get the crops planted. Well, anyway, they went out for a hundred and some days, a hundred and two days, a hundred and one days, and I didn’t have a job, so I came back to Danville for, I don’t know, a few months. I was living with my kin folk here and I felt like that was kind of a burden on them. They had kids, young kids. So, I reenlisted and went back in the Navy for another 2 1/2 years. Then I got out and went back to my GE job. Like I said, I stayed there till I retired, and then after I retired I went to Florida.

HF: If you could elaborate on an earlier point a little bit, how do you think your experiences abroad kind of shaped how you viewed your hometown specifically? You know, aspects of Danville.

JM: Well, there's two different worlds. Here you know, we was just all friends and at that time period you know it was segregation like it was everywhere at that time period. But going overseas and seeing some sights over there compared to here was, I guess it was kind of depressing. Here, I knew we were poor, but that was a different kind of poverty. So, I guess I felt like I didn't have it as bad as I thought I did, after seeing what those people were going through. And coming up here in Danville, I mean they was, you know, the segregation thing was quiet, you know it was – we knew it existed. Again, going back to my grandmother, she didn't elaborate on that kind of stuff. I I know as kids playing on the street, I’d pass by racial slurs that wouldn't really-I'd heard them but I was young and didn't really know the--what was behind ‘em.And one day in the street we was playing and this car came by with some some white guys and they told us “little N-words" to “get out of the street,” and I asked my grandmother about that and, she kinda—she didn't elaborate on it, but she let me know it was derogatory.
But growing up we had to go in the back doors of--I'll use the Bun Boy Restaurant down on StanfordAvenue as a focal point, because the cook down there was, his kids was my friends, we was in, a lot us was in the same grade and we didn't, I don't think we experienced the, I guess I'll say, violence and stuff that the Mississippis andAlabamas did. We just knew there was a separation in there and, we kind of, I won’t say we accepted it, we just knew it was there and we just, we dealt with it. Like I said, I didn't have a lot of problems. And everybody in school was really, we was pretty close. We enjoyed each other. We stayed, we stayed that way all throughout highschool.
My first job during high school was at the Danville Country Club. I was a caddy, and actually, I caddied for, one of the staff members, it was a coach at Centre College, Briscoe Inman, and during that time period, doing that work at the golf course, it's where I learned how to play golf. The pro out there at the time he was, he was a pretty liberal guy. Our supervisor, when it was too wet to go out and work the grounds, he would go to the club members’ shack where they store the clubs and we’d take clubs and he which ones to get and we’d hack around for eight or nine hours until it got, the dew got off, you know where we could cut grass and you know, the ground maintenance so, that was an experience right there.And the pro was a prankster, he used to come out and he'd set firecrackers often, though we had a particular area where we were supposed to stay. You could go to the clubhouse if you bought something, but you had to go back to that particular area. We weren’t supposed to go across the street to the pool, but that was basically it. That was my first job till I went to the Navy. I did do yard work around town for some of the people. I don't know what. That was kind of where I started in school and my little work history and then graduating and military.

CD:And you said you went to Bate High School?

JM: Mhm, Bate High School, it was up on StanfordAvenue. It started as, I think it was a one room school and Dr. Bate grew it to where it had twelve, we had twelve grades, one through twelve I think there was only three principals there, Dr. Bate, can't get the other guy's name, and Principal Summers. They were all pretty sharp guys. We had good teachers. We had good teachers.I wanted to-I wanted my sophomore, junior year-I wanted to take typing, only because the class was full of girls.And the principal, he wouldn’t let me do that, he says “No, no– let the women do the typing.” So they made me take chemistry, because, again, they thought I had a little scruple, few scruples, so I went into chemistry class, I did pretty good. When I started out I kind of didn't when I started out, so I didn't put a lot of effort into it, so it comes from teacher at the time she pulled me on and, she said she knows I was capable of doing the class, so I ended up getting anAin the class, I I turned it around. Get back to you guys now.

CD: Was Bate High School, was that integrated by the time you graduated?

JM: No, we were still all Black, we was the-I was the last all black graduating class in ‘64. Then after, like I said, I went to the Navy in ‘64, I graduated in May and I went to the Navy inAugust. And I don't know when they built the middle school, they ended up tearing down the original old Bate. But like I said I wasn't here, but I was the last all Black graduating class. Everybody behind me went to Danville High School.And speaking on that, we had the option to go to Danville High School in ‘59 I think it was. I guess Danville High School looked a little more to the future and they said, sometime or another down the line this is going to happen. And I had some older friends, they did go attend Danville High School around ‘59 or ‘60 and some of them came back to Bate and finished up. But yeah, I was the last graduating class, all Black graduating class before integration.

CD (to HF): Do you have any questions?

HF (to JM): You mentioned that the integration of schools happened soon after you graduated, so I'm sure that over the course of your lifetime, you've seen a lot of pretty big changes happen. How do you think that's affected your relationship with the Danville community, especially after leaving and coming back so many times?

JM: Well, I just think Danville was catching up with the rest of the country that had already gone through this process. That's what I mostly got out of it, was that where we kind of get into the 21st century or whatever, the next one was here, things were changing, had changed quite a bit, so I guess I would say we was making slow progress.

CD: You mentioned that there was an individual at the country club that you worked at that worked for Centre College athletics. Is there anyone else that you know that is connected to Center at all, or do you have any other connections to Centre that you’d like to speak on?

JM: My only connection right now is the street I live on, Tom Spragens Road. Dr. Spragens was the president of Centre College back, I guess it was the 60s or maybe a little later. The street I live on, they named it after him in my subdivision, it's named after him, but I didn't know him personally. But other than Coach Inman that’s the only other connection. We used to run our track and field meets over at Centre, over there, because we didn't have the facilities to accommodate the track meets and stuff, and actually we played our district basketball tournaments and things over there and with that, personnel-wise the coach was the only one that I had a personal interaction with, I knew a little bit.

CD : Have your interactions with Centre students and the Centre community, have those been generally positive?

JM: Say that again, please.

CD: Have your interactions with Centre students and the Centre community since you've been back in Danville, have those generally been positive?

JM: I haven't actually had any interactions with anyone over there. I had thought about coming over there to see if I could find a Spanish tutor. That was something that was on my bucket list, but I haven't had any interactions with the college since I've been back to Kentucky.

HF: So, obviously we are conducting these interviews to learn more about the urban renewal process, and while you mentioned you were here mostly in your adolescence, we were interested in knowing, you know how much you knew about the urban renewal process while it was happening, or perhaps, in retrospect, anything you'd like to speak on in regards to that.

JM: I guess going through school at the time that I was here, I didn't really notice a lot of urban renewal going on at that time. The only urban projects that we knew of was the projects themselves, as far as housing and stuff like that. We still had a lot of little individual Black communities spread out over the town, across town and so forth, and I guess that may have been one of the big things, differences I noticed after I came back, that a lot of those communities that disappeared and people had moved into subdivisions, from that standpoint, and I wasn't really here when all that took place exactly, but I could see that difference from when I was here because we had Black communities on Southworth or on Bates Street I grew up out in the West End of town. We had Duncan Hill which is South Danville. Like I said, all those communities just spread out, and a couple of them, one or two of them, Lebanon Pike and the Duncan Hill area are still predominantly Black areas. The Bates Street area has all been, it's more business and Centre College over there now has bought everything, so some of a lot of that area disappeared.And the 4th Street area, that used to be, it's still--some of the area’s down there, but not much. But like I said, all of that urban renewal stuff, that all just took place after I was gone, but I just noticed the communities that when I was in school, they were the Bate Street area, and they weren’t there anymore, basically. So, it was sort of an after the fact thing with me. It had happened when I got back.

HF: Did you hear any talk of it from family or friends that were still here while you were away?

JM: No, no, I didn't, really. I was in and out of here. Well, even when I lived in Louisville, I come back off and on and I could notice little small changes then, but like I said, I wasn't here a lot so. I guess the big changes were going on while I was away. I guess after retiring from GE and then, that's when I could see, it was noticeable, when I could see the effect of the urban renewal.

CD: So, when—I guess kind of going off of that, coming back to Danville and living here, having a more permanent residence, what is the--what do you--if you had to name one thing that is the most significant change that you've seen growing up in Danville versus being back, what might that be? In terms of businesses or just community, anything like that.

JM: Well, speaking of businesses, I notice there's a lot of banks for such a small town. So that kind of makes me think that there's a lot of business going on around here, 'cause I hadn’t noticed this many banks in a town this size. That was a big--that was one of the biggest things I've noticed.And then the Whirlpools and the plants. There's other plants that was in town that wasn't here before I left. So, I guess from a business standpoint that was, that’s two of the biggest things I’ve noticed, the number of banks and then the industry that has come to town.

HF: How do you think this process and these changes that have happened in the community have affected individuals, whether those be people you know very closely or just other observations you've noticed in the community?

JM: Well, the growth. I guess it gives everybody opportunity to work and we make a decent living and support families and, it kind of I guess prevented poverty from prevailing. Everybody had an opportunity to work and make something of themselves, plus help family, and kids go to college and for their education, and so you know it was a positive from that standpoint, the opportunities that are presented.

CD: I don't think I have any more questions at the top at this time, unless you have anything Hailey.

HF: I don't at the moment.

JM: OK.

JS: Were you involved in any church communities growing up in town, or are you currently?

JM: I was baptized at the First Baptist Church, right there on the corner of Second and Walnut. About nine, ten years old I was baptized. I was a member of that church and now I'm currently a trustee at the Bethel Baptist Church out in West Danville. The old church on the corner, it burnt down. And when I was asked to be a trustee at my current church, they couldn't find my paperwork, it was in the archives, and I think it got lost in the fire so. There were witnesses [and] a process to which they could validate that I was a member there, and I just transferred my membership so that's currently where I'm at.

JS: Do you have any thoughts on the significance of the church community as part of the local AfricanAmerican community? What was the role of the church in the community?

JM: Back then or now?

JS: I’d love to hear about both, if you think it’s changed at all.

JM: Well back then, uh, at that age, I didn’t know what contributions the churches was making to the community, but now that the current church, we have people pay bills, work food banks, so we support the community and the church membership, the church family in that manner, and like I said I -at the First Baptist here in town -was probably too young and wasn’t involved in any of that. I mean I’m sure they was probably doin’ maybe some of those things but I just, y’know, didn’t realize or knew to what extent they were involved in the community.

JS: You said you grew up on sixth street, is that right?

JM: Yes, mhm.

JS: Where you grew up, what does it look like now and how has it changed in that specific location? What’s in that area?

JM: There’s still some houses right there off of Lexington Street. The housing they tore down, that was part of an urban renewal area, right there in that area, because old Rowe Street and right off of Fifth Street, I had an uncle that lived there and I see they built, uh, I guess it’s urban renewal houses there I guess.And Sixth Street, I haven’t actually been through there but I know they tore down the National GuardArmory that was there, that’s been gone quite a while. And like I said, I haven’t been all the way through where I lived but it-it’s changed quite a bit in that area. There again, Seventh Street -I lived on Sixth Street -Seventh Street used to run all the way back over to Main Street, but Centre College bought up everything so [laughter] so that disappeared. But a lot of them, the houses are newer, there was some development there, in that area.

JS: Was that area, where you grew up, like a neighborhood in the sense that people knew each other around as neighbors and spent time together, is that what it was like?

JM: Yes, my pastor -well, I knew everybody around the area, actually my pastor, back then we was kids, we’re about the same age, he lived down on the corner of Sixth Street and Lexington Avenue, and I lived on down on Sixth Street. I knew people all along LexingtonAvenue there, we all knew each other, so y’know, we played together, interacted all the way-as long as I was there, and then I moved out, like I said, on the west end of town. That’s where I finished up high school, from west Danville. From that resident.

JS: What did a day in the life of Sixth Street look like? If you had to describe what it looked like to occupy that street and to be there when you were growing up, what kinds of things were happening in that space?

JM: Not much, the most exciting thing, I guess, was watching the National Guard Armories do their-go through their training, ‘cause y’know we had all these big trucks and things across the street and other than playing in the field next door, our neighbors were white and we used to borrow sugar and stuff from each other. Again, that’s why I grew up and my grandmother -we didn’t talk about segregation and racial stuff. It wasn’t -it wasn’t around our dinner table. I think it was around other folks’s dinner table, in regards to blacks, but it wasn’t around our dinner table. But it was just pretty simple around, wasn’t anything to do but play and talk to people and just normal, routine life.

JS: So you said that segregation wasn’t something that was talked about around your table -do you think that was specific to your family? You said other folks in town probably were talking about that. Can you expand on that a little bit? Why do you think that’s the case?

JM: I’m saying that my grandmother, she, I guess her mindset -there was something that she didn’t go into, and I guess at my age at that time I didn’t have a lot of questions. I didn’t know what questions to ask her about that, because some things she didn’t want to talk about, and she would just give you a simple answer to get you to shut up. On the other hand, I was explaining that uh, there was more conversation about that stuff around white dinner tables than there was Black dinner tables. I think a lot of it is contributed to the mindset from that generation as to the way they looked at Black folks. Today it seems that -I don’t think some of the younger white folks are seeing -believing -what the older generation was telling them about Black folks. I think that’s a big change that’s kind of slowly taking place.

JS: So you grew up right near Centre College. Was there any sense of what the neighborhood’s relationship or theAfrican community’s relationship was to Centre College was while you were growing up? Did anyone have opinion on that?

JM: Well, some college was open to our, like I said, tracking track meets and stuff and we, we could come over to the football games. We got in free. There, there wasn’t any issues. You know, like I said, I went to football games and we did our track training over there and running track meets and, I guess it was pretty cordial, we didn't -it was okay.

JS: So you were an athlete in high school as well, is that right?

JM:I was a wannabe.

JS:Awannabe athlete [laughter]. One of the things, one of the themes that Mr. Hughes has talked about a lot is thinking through sports and town, high school sports and the old baseball leagues. Any of that -do you have any stories or thoughts on your interactions with sports or on watching sports? I know you went to football games for example, any thoughts on that?

JM: Well, as far as the old baseball teams, the -what they called, Michael?
Michael Hughes [MH]: The Yankees.

JM: The Yankees, I used to go to their games on Duncan Hill. That was a big deal on Sunday, I think it was. We used to go out there and watch games.And as far as my sports, it kept me occupied and kept me from I guess being in on the streets and maybe getting in trouble or whatever. Which my grandmother wouldn't have allowed that, she was, she was pretty strict. So that was an outlet, I guess they were an outlet for me at that time. There's nothing then, I didn't have anything else to do but go to school and study and do sports so.

JS: You played which? You played basketball or football..?

JM: I did track, football, and basketball. I was a lifeguard at the pool when they finally built the swimming pool. I think that was a, I guess that was kind of the urban renewal thing there too, cause we had a lot of young blacks, well not young, that was getting drowned at the -they were swimming in the lake out here, Herrington Lake, and whatever. So the community or whoever, the city. They got together and said well we need to -because we couldn't go to the -what was it, Sunnyside? Sunnyside pool out here on StanfordAve. We couldn't go out there so they built this pool and that was another. I don't know how I got interested in it, but I ended up being a lifeguard.

JS: So what was it like to go to a Danville Yankees game? Mr. Hughes has talked a lot about the Danville Yankees, but I’d love to know more about what was drawing the community together to go to those baseball games if they were so important to the community.

JM: Well it was. It was just like a big family picnic, a family gathering, you know. It just brought the black community together. People was cooking and and barbecuing and picnic and everyone said and it was just a big fun family day or something to look forward to and brought the community together. You seen some people you hadn’t seen and, you know.Again I was still fairly young, but I remember those games, it was -they were good times, you know. Peaceful, very enjoyable.And like I said, that was a big part of the black community. And I mean, as far as coming together. Family type atmosphere.

JS:And you said you worked for GE is that right? Could you tell us more about what you did with GE and what your career trajectory with them was. You talked a bit about your military career, but I’d love to know more about what your other career was like.
JM: I started out working on the assembly line.And uh, it was a rough job, So that encouraged me to go back to school, to college, so I went to JB Speed Engineering School in Louisville and I got an associate in chemical engineering technology.And then I went -started night school 'cause I want a chemistry degree. The little politics or whatever got involved in that. They cut some hours off. They wouldn't take the speed engineering hours over at the night school, that's -come on, I had 96 hours towards my chemistry degree. So anyway, I just flipped and went to Business School and I got a bachelors in business. Then when I went back to GE, I worked in our research and development lab for about 12 years and then I decided that -It was kind of whispered to me, “Don't stay in one place too long,” so I had to diversify my skills. So I took a jobin manufacturing as aprocess control engineer. Andthat's the engine-that ended up my retirement, I was a process control engineer and for painting industrial chemicals and all types of finishes, the whole paint processed equipment and the whole 9 yards so. That was from JB Speed School to, I think it's Mckendree College, that's one of those accelerated programs, they’re out of somewhere out in Illinois.And that's where I got my Bachelor of business. Like I said, I finished up as a process engineer for GE on retirement.

MH: [inaudible]

JS: Uh, go ahead.

MH: You know, your days in the music as a DJ, I know ­

JM: [laughter]

MH: We both been there, so. We did that then.

JM: It was just a hobby I picked up. My, my cousin was a -there was a club in Louisville, they called it the Retired Servicemen's Club because the club members were all retired military guys. And I just kind of started, um, I bought a couple turntables and that was my weekend hobby I guess. I guess you know, I didn’t take it seriously. I got to where I could do it, do dances. One experience I had a dance -me and his brother was, uh, Had a good dance going on and all of a sudden the equipment stopped. Everybody was sitting there waiting on us to get the
music going again and we fumbled around, we knew there was a reset button somewhere on the system. We couldn't find it, so we had to turn out a dance. I think that people got about 2 hours of dancing and entertainment and we couldn’t get the music going, so that was embarrassing. But um, I did that up until they -someone broke into the Retired Serviceman’s Club and stole all my equipment, so that ended my DJ career.

JS: When was that? What year was that?

JM: Oh, let’s see…I was uh, gettin out of military, blah blah blah…um, that had to be in the late ‘70s, early ‘80s maybe.

JH: Mhm.

JM: Late ‘70s -yeah, late ‘70s, early ‘80s. Cause I was married to my first wife, yknow. So it was somewhere in that time frame. ‘78 to ‘82, ‘83, somewhere along in there. JS: So you talked about how you were, uh, you were raised by your grandmother, is that right?

JM: Mhm.

JH: Is there anyone else in terms of family that you, uh, would be interested in talking about? You could talk a bit about your family life, and uh, whether your roots in Danville or elsewhere, where’s your family from and who are they?
JM: Well, I had one brother, my mother passed when I was -before I started school. I didn't know my father. And that's where I fell back on my grandmother. She took over from there. So I just had one brother and, like I said, my mother passed when I was young. So it’s kind of a me and Grandmother growing up on your own lot. Y’know, that's what I give her credit for. She instilled a right from wrong. So I kind of took that and I give her credit for, I guess where I am today, you know for not screwing up my life, you know, and doing something stupid. She she dropped the hammer on me so. But uh, other -My mother’s sister is here. They all hear from-in Danville. So that part of my family is still here.

CD: In Danville?

JM: Mhm.

CD: Okay.

HF: What’s your relationship like with that part of your family?

JM: Oh we, we, we -we good. Yeah, my, I guess my nephews -well my, my little sisters kids, but they got kids. But you know, we all we all close and their kids, they got kids. I was close with them. You know the Johnsons, they did cabinetwork around town. I don't know if you’re familiar with him or not, but anyway, he had a big cabinet shop so-he passed here a couple years ago. But I'm close with all of ‘em. I’m close with all of ‘em.

JS: If you had one, one memory or one place, or you know something that doesn't exist in Danville anymore that you think about or miss from when you were younger, what would that be?

JM: We used to, it used to be a big rock fence down at the bottom of 2nd St.And that was a congregation point for, for all of us. We, we -that was the fo-for the younger group, for our age group, that was the time we used to hang on that rock fence. When you go into projects down there, it, it goes in like this, and on the weekends, you know we just sit there.And then there was an old club across the street called Swinglandm that was a little party house. It was a, an old building that-it was-the floor was dusty. They still have to go in and put oil on the floor to hold down the dust. But we’d go in and get to kicking up dust, you know, and and dancing and carrying on. But, yeah that was one of them. One of the, one of the good memories there from coming up, form hanging out down there on that rock fence. By the projects. It was a big socializing, uh, point.

JS: So I've heard about the rock fence a little bit, so what what would you do, what would you actually do around the rock fence, were you, were you sitting on the rock fence? Were you gathering or what was-what was it like to be there?

JM: We sat on the rock fence. We stood behind the rock fence.At that time, the way the road was, you could kind of stand right in front of it. And then we was trying to do a little courting. We was trying to holla at the young ladies.And that's one thing my grandmother kind of had me a little gun shy about, the young ladies, sometimes, “stay away from them girls now, they're bad.” So I kind of-I was a little shy, but I'd go out and pretend, you know I'd hang out so…But there was a lot of fun, we was trying to court and do a lot of things and then going into the joint and dancing, and you know, just like a little party and socializing or gathering. So, so that was good memories from that. Alot of good memories.

JS: Was that after school, was it just on the weekends that you would do that, or was it like-when would you have that kind of-?

JM: For me it was mainly the weekends, cause after school y’know, you had to be in the house, you couldn’t -at least my grandmother, you couldn’t be out running around the neighborhood. So it was more of a weekend thing for me.And think for most of us, I believe. Would you say so?

MH: Yeah.

JS:Any other memories from, from Danville that you would like to share that to get on the record, so to speak?Anything that you can think about or remember that, that you would like to talk about?

JM: Well, I guess you can say. Going back with his brother and one of my sports teams, we, we left a little legacy at the school before we left, we won the 45th District Tournament two years in a row.

MH: ‘63 and ‘64.

JM: ‘63 and ‘64 and, uh that was a big memory. There a lot of the community remembers after I came back from service and two years later I run into people and they would say well you was on that team that won. the district. Currently I'm, I play golf at the Danville Country Club and I run into Sammy Burke, the Burke’s that own the bakery here, and I played Little League football against him and Jimmy Porter, I think was a big basketball star at the two years that we beat him. But yeah, that was that was a, one of the highlights, or good memories that left somewhat of a, I guess you could call it a legacy, little history for the school from the sports standpoint.

JS: Did you mention what sport that was, which-

JM: Basketball.

JS: Basketball

JM: Yeah, yeah, yeah, we and there’s a guy that I played golf with out here, he played for um..Nelson, [inaudible]… Hustonville! I play golf with him now, they knocked us out of the 12th region, the, the two years that we won, they beat us in the region every daggone year, we couldn't get past uh, Hustonville. So, uh, but we we had good laugh about that at the country club at the golf course out here since I've been back. Yeah, that was it. That was basically it.

JS:And with this just where this when you're playing on the sports teams, were they playing, were you playing other white schools or what? Who did you play against?

JM: We played, we played Lexington Douglass. We played Rockcastle County, Whitley County, all down through there, and everybody was really very nice football and basketball. Uh, Pine Knot, we played over in Paducah. What was that? I don't know if we took Paducah Tilghman or, something, we played them. We played white and black schools. The -our schedule was pretty, pretty split really.

MH: Hazel Gren.

JM: Yeah, Hazel Green, Rockastle County, Whitley County, all those going down there.

CD: Did you every play Scott County?

JM: Mmm, no I don’t think we did. I don’t think we did. No, we played Douglass in Lexington, we played Dunbar a couple times, we played Paris, Kentucky, and Mt. Sterling, uh…

MH: [inaudible]

JM: Huh?

MH: [inaudible]

JM: Oh, yeah, Lincoln Insitute, down at the Shelby County, yeah, we played them -that was kind of -we had issues with them. Yeah, those kind of turned into brawls sometimes, you might say. And uh, Lexington Douglass was the same way too. We had a couple of incidents there too, but it’s one of those things -you can’t take a shower, you gotta get on the bus. You can't go to the locker room, just gotta leave straight from the gym floor to the bus.

MH: Especially if you won.

JM: Yep, yep, especially if you won.

JS: So, Mr. Hughes, do you have any other questions that you want to ask?

MH: I think you know [inaudible] pretty good. Alot of memories.

JM: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MH: He was one of the best athletes that came through Bate School.

JM: Like I said, I was a wannabe, but-

MH: One of the things I think, one of the reasons I’ve said it before, that Danville High pushed for integration because we was beatin’ them. The last two years, I don’t think they liked that.

JM: Yeah, yeah I was surprised that, how quickly that changed, the “we gonna take Bate out of the system and, yeah it’s going to be integrated, is that okay?”Again, I was gone. I had left. That decision was probably in the works before I left.

MH: Yeah, well it was.

JM: But it didn’t happen until after I left.

MH: I think the first year that we won, one of the interesting facts was that my brother Terry was always the one that was picked for the all tournament team ­

JM: Oh yeah, yup.

MH:And two of the people on the other teams got put out of tournament, two of the people got put out of tournament first and that’s what we were dealing with. The second year they couldn't deny, you know.

JM: Right, yeah, yeah yeah no, it was the same on the golf course. You know you got to validate if you're playing a skims game, someone-like you have to validate it on the next hole. Well we validated it the following year so.

MH: They haven't come to a conclusion and you can't beat them join, so.

JS:Any other questions come to mind that you would like to ask?

CD: Um, I don’t have any at the moment.

HF: I don’t either. JS:Anything else you’d like to talk about while we have the mic?

JM: Well, I could probably talk about a whole lot of stuff. I'll, I'll let this do if you're satisfied with what you have, I’m-I'll cut it off also.

JS:Alright, well thank you Mr. Munford, thank you so much.

HF: Thank you.