Transcript
Index
00:00:00 - Introduction
00:00:31 - Gordon family backround near Houston, Mississippi--grandparents from Africa, settled at Ross Hill
00:03:49 - Backgrounds of parents--schoolteachers--the Ross Hill community
00:07:17 - Parents' training as teachers--father Grant Gordon remembered as a teacher by other Beloiters
00:11:29 - Influence of the church in Mississippi--inability of parents to teach in Beloit
00:13:28 - Interracial relations in Houston--denial of political rights in Mississippi--father's voter registration activities in Houston, resulting problems caused him to leave--Bible as key influence
00:23:01 - Reasons for moving to Beloit--availability of work in Beloit--mother supported decision to move--further comments on father's efforts to continue teaching in Beloit, no opportunities--A.G.'s sister became a teacher in Milwaukee
00:28:28 - Early reactions to Beloit--first family in the Edgewater Apartments--housing differences between whites and blacks in Beloit
00:31:28 - Father's work as a scalesman at Fairbanks-Morse--desire for better work--father left F-M to become a teamster hauling ashes and dirt--father Grant Gordon continued political activities in Beloit-- discouraged by employers--friends in the white community
00:40:23 - Further comments on father's work at Fairbanks-Morse, need to visit end politic--father and J. D. Stephenson--father's reading habits, Crisis and Chicago Defender
00:45:19 - Ambrose Gordon's attitudes toward W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington--A.G.'s sister, Louise, as a student of Du Bois--Dubois as a teacher
00:52:23 - Father's attitudes toward wealth and poverty--relationships with white workers at Fairbanks-Morse
00:54:12 - Black churches in Beloit--father helped organize Emmanuel Baptist--differences between churches in Beloit and Mississippi--differences between ministers--contrast between Rev. Barksdale and Rev. W.E.W. Brown
01:02:40 - Introduction to part two
01:02:48 - Story about Rev. Barksdale's son--Rev. Barksdale's humility
01:04:33 - Criticism of the personal style of ministry--A.G.'s style of worship--sense of religious superiority in black churches
01:10:10 - Differences between religious practice in Beloit and Mississippi--worldliness
01:12:41 - Recollections of family farm--farm as a truck garden
01:16:07 - Recollection of elementary school--Riverview school--name calling and fighting--color generally “not that big an issue”--intervention by teachers
01:23:09 - Ambrose Gordon's children in school--serious problem for youngest daughter
01:28:57 - Further comments on A.G.'s elementary school--good teachers--recalls Frank Turman, the marble champion
01:34:06 - Gordons purchase farm, help from brother Jim
01:36:29 - Influence of church on A.G. as a youth--awareness of hypocrisy--decision to join church, baptism in Rock River--Rev. Dillon of New Zion
01:51:08 - Further comments on religious faith
01:58:36 - The “double-minded person”--car accident at sixteen--miraculous recovery from cancer
