00:00:02Alexander Stephens: Okay, it is July 11, 2014. We are in the Russell Gallery of the Special Collections Library at UGA in Athens, Georgia. My name is Alexander Stephens, and could you introduce yourself please with your full name?
00:00:19Bennie McKinley: My name is Bennie McKinley.
00:00:21Stephens: All right, thank you, Mrs. McKinley. Thanks for being here. Today we're going to be talking a little bit about the history of Civil Rights demonstrations in Athens, as well as the history of Hot Corner in downtown Athens. So to start out with, could you tell me a little bit about where you were born and where you grew up?
00:00:44McKinley: I was born in Athens and I grew up in Athens. I grew up on Lyndon Row, that's across Baxter Street. And I moved--I lived there until I was in the eighth grade and we moved to Rocksprings Homes. And when I entered high school, we moved to Broadacres.
00:01:06Stephens: And when were you born?
00:01:07McKinley: I was born in 1945.
00:01:10Stephens: Okay, so you grew up on Lyndon Row. How big was your family? How many people were in your family?
00:01:16McKinley: I have one sister and two brothers.
00:01:20Stephens: Okay. And your parents both at home?
00:01:23McKinley: Yeah, they were both home.
00:01:25Stephens: What kind of work did they do?
00:01:27McKinley: My mom worked for Snelling, uh, for the university, and my dad was a brick mason.
00:01:32Stephens: Okay. What are some of your favorite memories from growing up on Lyndon Row?
00:01:39McKinley: Learning to ride a bicycle on a dirt road, and when you get down off of going down Lyndon Row there's a pipe that runs across a little stream, and we used to go down and walk that pipe to the stadium, University of Georgia Stadium.
00:01:59Stephens: Do you have any memories from your early life related to Hot Corner?
00:02:05McKinley: Not my early life, not until we started demonstrating, that's the only time I had dealings on Hot Corner.
00:02:13Stephens: So y'all didn't go into town as kids?
00:02:15McKinley: No.
00:02:16Stephens: Okay. Could you tell me a little bit about why y'all had to move from Lyndon Row?
00:02:23McKinley: Because the University of Georgia had come in and took over the people homes and things over there.
00:02:31Stephens: About when was that?
00:02:34McKinley: I can't rightly remember. I was young then. I can't really remember exactly what year that was.
00:02:41Stephens: What did it mean to y'all to have to move from there?
00:02:45McKinley: We felt really bad because all of us grew up right there and--everything that we had was right there until the university decided they wanted that land. And we were renting; we didn't own the houses that we lived in. We were renting the homes that we lived in. And of course the people sold out to the university.
00:03:08Stephens: Who was--do you know who owned the home?
00:03:10McKinley: The home that I lived in the people were--Fred Brown was the name of the man that my mom and them rented from.
00:03:19Stephens: And what was that community like before y'all had to move?
00:03:23McKinley: It was really a tight-knit community, you know, just like all of us was family. You knew everybody and you knew everybody live--where they lived and how many people they had in their family, you know we were just just like a big family on that street where we lived.
00:03:42Stephens: What about the church that your family went to, where did y'all go to church?
00:03:46McKinley: Hill Chapel Baptist Church. At the time it was down on West Broad Street where the Travel Lodge is located.
00:03:56Stephens: And your--the school you went to growing up?
00:03:59McKinley: The school I went to was Reese Street School in elementary and Athens High and Industrial for high school.
00:04:07Stephens: So were a lot of the kids that grew up on Lyndon Row with you, were they in your church and your school as well?
00:04:13McKinley: Yes
00:04:14Stephens: What do you think the significance of that was, seeing the same people at all those different places?
00:04:19McKinley: Well, it made you feel good that know that everybody that lived on your street. Just about everybody that lived on your street went to the same church because we all went together. And we all went to school, we walked from Lyndon Row to Reese Street to school every day.
00:04:36Stephens: Okay.
00:04:37McKinley: We didn't have buses.
00:04:39Stephens: And were there were there teachers who were in the neighborhood as well?
00:04:42McKinley: No, they weren't in our--we didn't have any teachers in our neighborhood.
00:04:45Stephens: Where were most of the teachers living?
00:04:47McKinley: They mostly lived Uptown.
00:04:50Stephens: What's--what's up? Could you explain what's Uptown?
00:04:52McKinley: Oh, Hancock. Some of them lived on Hancock and Reese Street. That's where most of them lived.
00:05:02Stephens: Okay. Could you tell me about some of your earliest memories of segregation in Athens?
00:05:11McKinley: Well, I remember we couldn't go to certain places. You know, we would have to go inside doors and--no doors at all, some places we couldn't even go in, you know. We would go to sometimes like going to downtown with our parents. We used to go on Saturdays sometimes and there were fountains that said "colored" and "white" and we knew that we weren't allowed to drink from the water fountain that said "white" and I didn't understand that because it's all the same color water. You know, I was looking for Black water over here and white water over here but I didn't see none so it all was the same color to me. But you know, we discussed that as children, you know, when we would go back home we would talk about, "I wonder why they don't want us to drink out of that white fountain down there?" You know. That type of thing.
00:06:12Stephens: What were some of the places where you had to go in the side or the back?
00:06:15McKinley: Kress's. Well, not Kress's. We couldn't--we could go in, but we could not--certain things--places in there, you could go and certain places you couldn't. Like you could go in the front door of Kress's, but there were counters, and we could never go and sit down to eat at those counters when we were small children.
00:06:37Stephens: At Kress's.
00:06:39McKinley: Kress's and Woolworth's. And when our parents went to get medicine at Horton's Drug Store, they had counters also. But we weren't allowed to sit there and have a soda or anything like that.
00:06:53Stephens: You could order food and go outside with it?
00:06:58McKinley: Outside with it, um-hm. But you couldn't sit.
00:07:01Stephens: So when y'all had those conversations when you were a kid, and you would come back home and talk about the different water fountains--
00:07:06McKinley: Um-hm.
00:07:08Stephens: --What did your parents say in those conversations?
00:07:10McKinley: They explained to us that we was living in a segregated society, and that it had been like that for a long time.
00:07:22Stephens: What did they seem to think about it?
00:07:24McKinley: They weren't pleased, but at that time, you know, there wasn't anything they could do about that. But to tell us, you know, to try to steer us away from stuff that's gonna hurt us, that's what my mom and them did.
00:07:39Stephens: What kind of stuff?
00:07:40McKinley: Like talking about drinking the water, from those fountains and things that they knew would hurt us if we went to do that type of thing.
00:07:53Stephens: So they were trying to protect you?
00:07:54McKinley: Right, right.
00:07:56Stephens: What were some of the fears that they had, do you think?
00:07:59McKinley: Well, I think they had, my mom and them came in an era where they were hanging Black people, and--killing you, coming in your house, taking you out, killing you and whomever. And, you know, there wasn't anything done about it. So they didn't want that for us. They was trying to save us, keep us from being hurt. So that's the era that my mom and them came up in.
00:08:26Stephens: So you remember mostly having conversations with your mom about that.
00:08:28McKinley: Yeah.
00:08:31Stephens: What about your dad? Did he participate in those talks?
00:08:35McKinley: Not really, not as, you know, like my mom did. But he was, you know, he made us aware of things that we couldn't do and the reason we couldn't do 'em, you know. But my mom, you know, she was always a hold over us to make sure, you know, that we really understood what was going on. Because she used to work, well, her job was, before she got the job at Snelling, was to go in to--the white people's homes and take care of their children, wash and clean and do for them, you know. And she heard stuff that they were saying, I'm sure, and she understood what the repercussion would be if we did that.
00:09:21Stephens: Do you think that they had different conversations with you and your sister and your brother? Do you think there were different conversations that they had with the boys and the girls?
00:09:31McKinley: No, they had the same conversation with us.
00:09:33Stephens: Same ones. So you decided to demonstrate?
00:09:41McKinley: Yep.
00:09:42Stephens: When was that?
00:09:44McKinley: That was back in the 60s, about I guess it must have been about '61, '60 -'61, around there.
00:09:52Stephens: So in spite of the the conversations that y'all had had and the the very real dangers that you knew you faced, you decided that you would participate in sit-ins. Why?
00:10:04McKinley: Because first thing is we saw how Charlayne and Hamilton was treated at this big University of Georgia that--they didn't want them to be part of it. Only thing they wanted was education and it's nothing they could have done, Charlayne couldn't have done over here that was going to kill anybody if they got the education here at University of Georgia. So we felt, we said, "Okay, well, if they're being treated like that, then just imagine when we get to that age, how we would be treated if something is not done different now." So when they came up with the--integration and all that, we decided it was time for us to step up. We was--I was seventeen. And I decided this is what we need to do. And my mom, I talked with my mom and she said, "If that's what you feel," you know, they never discouraged us from reaching for what we wanted to do, you know. So she said, we talked about it and I told her that's what I wanted to do. So she said, "that's fine."
00:11:22Stephens: Did y'all know Hamilton Holmes and Charlayne Hunter?
00:11:25McKinley: Nope.
00:11:27Stephens: So you were just witnessing what they were doing.
00:11:29McKinley: They were two Black people being mistreated, you know. So, and if you, I guess, if you look at something like that happening and you're younger than them--supposing I wanted to come to the University of Georgia when I graduated, then if--they are gonna be treated like this, if there's something we can do now that's gonna prevent that's happened to one of us, then I thought that we should try.
00:11:58Stephens: Did your early experience with having to move from your home have anything to do with your decision to participate?
00:12:05McKinley: No, but I, you know, I guess it was in the back of my mind how the university had done us as being Black people. We were--there were only Black people on our street. And just to think that they would come in and just take over, and a lot of people didn't have anywhere to go, you know. And I kind of think that might have been in the back of my mind, you know.
00:12:33Stephens: Were there a lot of other young people who had lived there who were participating in the demonstrations?
00:12:38McKinley: Oh yeah, um-hm. Just about everybody on our street that--Geneva, Elizabeth, Katie. It's about everybody on our street. We demonstrated.
00:12:50Stephens: So a lot of the people from Lyndon Row later ended up, a few years later, ended up in the demonstration.
00:12:55McKinley: Demonstration, yes.
00:12:56Stephens: Or actually, not even a few years, pretty soon after that.
00:12:58McKinley: Pretty soon after, um-hm, yeah.
00:13:04Stephens: Could you talk a little bit about--who the young folks were with you, who were demonstrating, how y'all met, how you knew each other, and, I guess, some of the names of people who were involved.
00:13:19McKinley: Well, we were classmates, and we lived on the same street. It was Geneva Blasingame, Gloria Weaver, Elizabeth Taylor--Katie Thomas, Abe Thomas--all of us lived in the same vicinity.
00:13:49Stephens: And were there any older people in the community who sort of mentored you in the demonstration process?
00:13:56McKinley: Yes, we had--our headquarters really was Ebenezer Baptist Church, West. That was our headquarters when we started demonstrating. And Reverend Hudson was the pastor at that time. I think we met about two or three times at Hill Chapel Baptist Church. And Reverend Mitchell Tate was the pastor there at that time. And then we had Deacon Morse and Deacon Eddie Gillam. And they were--and Red Weaver. They'd come in and have meetings with us as to how we ought to conduct ourselves. And nonviolence was the cause. That was it right there. If you didn't think that you could demonstrate without fighting, you know, saying something, they asked you not to come.
00:15:00Stephens: What kind of training did y'all go through before?
00:15:03McKinley: Well, it wasn't a physical training. They just taught us how we are supposed to, like, if we are gonna march, whatever they say, we just march. We don't look left, right, or say anything to whomever it is that, you know, spitting and pushing and all that. We just have to keep marching and not say anything. That was, it wasn't anything physically, you know, that's showing us, but telling us how we are supposed to conduct ourselves if we are going to do the demonstration.
00:15:44Stephens: So y'all didn't practice those sorts of things?
00:15:52McKinley: No, we didn't practice. They just talked to us and told us how we had to conduct ourselves.
00:15:52Stephens: Did you feel like it was really the young people driving it, or did you feel like it was the older generation?
00:15:52McKinley: It was the young people. And the reason I say that is because a lot of people, the reason they didn't, I think, get involved or let their children get involved, because they were working for white people. You know, back there, Black people worked in, just like I said, in white people's homes, kept their children or ironed, you know, stuff like that. So, a lot of people felt like that was take away their livelihood. People would fire them, you know, or something like that. That's what I think. But the young people was, I wasn't afraid. I don't think any of us was afraid when we start, nor when we stop.
00:16:42Stephens: Were there any organizations involved? Anybody like CORE or SNCC or anybody else coming in?
00:16:47McKinley: No.
00:16:48Stephens: So, it was really sort of an independent movement.
00:16:50McKinley: Yeah.
00:16:52Stephens: Did you see it as a movement at the time?
00:16:55McKinley: I really didn't. I don't know. Well, I wouldn't say it was a movement. I didn't see it as a movement at that time. I guess in our mind, we were just out there to show the people that it was time, time to stop having segregation and not let us go into where we want to go in and eat where we want to eat, you know. So, that's the way I saw it.
00:17:25Stephens: Could you take me through the first time you participated in a demonstration? Describe that.
00:17:33McKinley: Okay, first time when we got together at Ebenezer Baptist Church. We marched from Ebenezer Baptist Church to the courthouse. I believe that's where we went the first time. We marched to the courthouse. And then, we just, what we did, we just marched to the courthouse and had signs and things about segregation. And then another time we would leave Ebenezer and walk to downtown. And that time we were targeting Horton's Drugstore, Kress's, Woolworth's, and Tony's, that was a restaurant down on Clayton Street. And then we went to Davison's, which was a clothing store, and we picketed down there. A lot of those places we picketed and went--every morning we would meet at the church and get our assignment as to where we would be going that day. So we would go downtown and do those places that I just named. Plus, the Varsity was downtown also and we did picket it and go in there. They didn't have anywhere for anyone to sit downtown at the Varsity. But they had a counter and the people would stand at the counter and drink coffee or whatever they were doing and eating. And we would go in there and just sit on the floor. We'd just sit on the floor. And when time, when they called, called a policeman for us, we never walked out. Any place we sat in, we never walked out. They had to carry us out each time to the police call. So that's how we, you know, that's how we did it.
00:19:34Stephens: So why did y'all choose the locations that you ultimately chose?
00:19:39McKinley: Because they had counters, eating counters. Horton's had a counter, Kress's and Woolworth's. And Tony's was a nice restaurant, and he had, you know, he had a counter in his restaurant.
00:19:55Stephens: The protests were well organized.
00:19:57McKinley: Very.
00:19:58Stephens: What sorts of strategies did you employ? You mentioned a specific--a specific strategy that y'all used, could you talk a little bit about that and some of the other?
00:20:08McKinley: Well what we would do is, some days we would come down Clayton Street, but it would be everybody. And me and another young lady would come up Clayton Street, and see, by the time everybody get to looking at these people down here, then me and her would just walk in and sit down. And when they come back in, we sitting at the counter. And I remember we went to Tony's, that restaurant downtown, and the man came in, and Elizabeth and I was sitting at the counter, "No, no, no, time not right, time not right now, no, no, no, no, no, no, time not right." So, we just sit there, we didn't say anything, and of course, he called the police, and then we were carried out, you know. But that's how we would do--some days we'd come, crowd would come left, and two or three people would go in right. All you had to do was get a crowd right here, and they focusing right here, and we coming from right here. So, that was the way we would get into the place.
00:21:11Stephens: So, y'all would plan that ahead of time.
00:21:13McKinley: Right.
00:21:25Stephens: So, after the police showed up, what sorts of things did you do? Did y'all resist in any way when they came, or what was the plan after the police arrived?
00:21:38McKinley: Well, when they came, we didn't resist because we knew we were going to jail. But once we got in the police car, we would (pounding on table) do that right there with your feet, just stomp, stomp, stomp in the police car, and that would just run them crazy, making that noise. And I never will forget, the sheriff, the chief was Hardy in Athens at that time. And whenever he would come with some of the police, he would tell us, y'all gonna kill me, y'all gonna kill me, please, can y'all please just wait, just wait, stop, y'all gonna kill me, why y'all doing me like this? And we wouldn't say anything, but it was--we thought it was funny. That he would think that we just gonna stop 'cause he said we gonna kill him. But, you know, it was just--some days it was really great to do that. It really was.
00:22:33Stephens: What, um--did y'all know him outside of that? I mean, did y'all know him from growing up? Did you know Chief Hardy?
00:22:38McKinley: Well, our parents knew him. He was, um--He was a nice person because--the reason I say that is because he did associate with Black people. He did that. You know, so it was just funny to see him say what he said to us, and you know, "We're gonna kill y'all. Y'all please just wait. Just wait." We didn't say a word. We just kept going, and that was kind of funny.
00:23:09Stephens: It sounds like the owner of Tony's and the police chief were kind of saying the same thing. They're saying the time's not right. Y'all need to wait. Why were y'all not willing to wait?
00:23:20McKinley: Yeah, why should we? You know, our money is green just like everybody else's money is. So why can't we just sit here? The only thing we want to do is order food. So we didn't see the meaning of, "Just wait, just wait. Why are y'all doing this," you know?
00:23:38Stephens: Do you think Athens was different from other places in that regard? In that maybe there wasn't--well, what kind of opposition was there to what you were doing?
00:23:47McKinley: The Ku Klux Klan. They was our own opposition that--well, we had other white people that didn't like what we were doing, but most of those men were Ku Klux Klans anyway, so they--I never forget, we was at the Varsity uptown, and they came one day, they walked beside us, the Ku Klux Klan did, and of course they talked, and we just act like they weren't there. And the next day they came, they came on horses the next day. They rode horses and they rode horses beside us because we walked on the same sidewalk. We didn't, one on one side and they on another side. We walked on the same sidewalk. And the horse was walking, they would go one way and we would go the other way. But it was no incident at that time.
00:24:44Stephens: Were there ever any serious incidents?
00:24:46McKinley: Not that I can remember.
00:24:49Stephens: Did y'all have a plan for sort of worst-case scenarios?
00:24:53McKinley: Well, no we didn't. We just was gonna take it as it came. That's all we could do because we could not know what they were gonna do, you know, so it wasn't anything for us to do but do what we were supposed to do and that's march in silence.
00:25:12Stephens: Do you think that maybe--and this is what I was gonna say before--maybe Athens was different from some other places where you saw more violence against protesters?
00:25:26McKinley: I think so.
00:25:27Stephens: People were still saying to wait.
00:25:29McKinley: Yeah, but at least nobody put water hose on us, you know, and did all that type of stuff. So I think ours was more of a peaceful demonstration than some other places.
00:25:43Stephens: Why do you think that is?
00:25:46McKinley: I have no idea. But maybe we didn't have the meaner white people in Athens as they did somewhere else. I don't know. I really don't.
00:25:58Stephens: I wonder about Chief Hardy's role in that, too.
00:26:01McKinley: Yeah. He wasn't--you know, he wasn't a person--he never talked down to us or anything, you know, when he had to come. He just didn't want us to sit down and his men have to pick us up. That's what he didn't like. He didn't want--he wanted us to walk to the police car.
00:26:20Stephens: So he was inconvenienced.
00:26:21McKinley: But that wasn't doing it though.
00:26:25Stephens: What was the feeling of being a part of a demonstration here? What did--what did it feel like?
00:26:32McKinley: Felt good. It really felt good, especially when we felt like we had accomplished what we started out to do. That's the, that to me was the--made me feel good that we had some part in fixing things in Athens so the Blacks could go eat where they wanted to go eat and go to school where they want to go to school and all of that.
00:27:00Stephens: So what was your ultimate goal when you when you set out on the sit-in movement?
00:27:06McKinley: Hoping that we would accomplish the segregation dispelled. That's what--that's what our accomplishments were at the time.
00:27:18Stephens: I guess I'm also wondering, aside from achieving your goal, which I can imagine felt very good, what did it feel like to actually be walking there on the street on Milledge Avenue or downtown on Clayton Street? I guess what was going through your head and what emotions were you experiencing? What, what do you remember hearing?
00:27:39McKinley: I hope I make it through today. That, that was one of the things, because I remember one time we marched from Ebeneezer and where Shane's Rib Place is now, we all started across the street right there, but we all sat down in the street right there and just--disrupted traffic. And I prayed when we sat down, because cars were, you know, coming both ways, and we just were told to just rest it right where we were. Nobody ran over us, you know, anything like that, and that was, to me, that was scary. Sit down in the middle of the street, and cars coming both ways, but nobody saying--that's another thing that I thought about, too. I say, to me, that was dangerous, but just think, we did that, and nobody hurt any of us. And the people in Alabama and those places, they couldn't walk down the street unless they had water holes and dogs and things on them. So I felt like, you know, I felt like the people weren't quite so bad in Athens. It was just that they had to realize that time is changing.
00:28:56Stephens: What did people in the cars do when y'all stopped?
00:28:59McKinley: They just stopped and cussed us out. That's what they did.
00:29:03Stephens: So they weren't happy about it?
00:29:04McKinley: No, no, no, no, they were not happy at all.
00:29:07Stephens: Did any of them threaten to hit you?
00:29:08McKinley: Of course. But they didn't. Because we didn't move. None of us moved until we got the word to move.
00:29:16Stephens: And who was giving the word?
00:29:18McKinley: We had been told. See, when we go in Ebenezer in the morning time, we were told what we were going to be doing that day. So Reverend Hudson and we had Deacon Morrison. We had a lot of older people there to instruct us.
00:29:38Stephens: Did y'all sing songs or do anything else like that when you were marching?
00:29:42McKinley: Yeah. "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Us Back." Yeah, we sung those type songs.
00:29:47Stephens: And how did that contribute to the feeling, the experience?
00:29:51McKinley: Felt good. Felt real good when we sang those.
00:29:56Stephens: Were those songs that y'all had grown up singing or were they kind of new to you?
00:30:01McKinley: Yeah, they were songs that we had heard, you know, during other demonstrations.
00:30:09Stephens: We hear a lot about male civil rights leaders, but it sounds like there were a lot of young women involved in the movement here. What do you see as having been the role of women in particular?
00:30:22McKinley: Well, it was like we had Miriam Moore from the East Side, and they were--we have strong Black women in Athens that were there for us, you know, to help us along the way. And we had some men too, but the women of Athens, we had really strong Black women. They're all deceased now, but--but they paved the way for us.
00:30:56Stephens: Yeah. What kind of memories do you have of, of leadership roles that women took or maybe specific times when you saw some of those strong women you mentioned stepping in and taking a stand.
00:31:09McKinley: They were Mrs. Moore and--they were--anytime that there was a disagreement or anything wrong against white people, against Black people in Athens, they stood up to them and spoke strongly against what they were doing as being wrong. And they didn't back down.
00:31:42Stephens: Can you think of a specific time when you saw that happen?
00:31:45McKinley: Right when we were demonstrating, and after the demonstration was over, these ladies took a stand to a lot of stuff here in Athens that pertained to Black people--that needed to be said, and they stood up. Corene Neely was one of them also. They stood up and defended the Black people in Athens without fear of any kind.
00:32:14Stephens: In what sort of setting was that?
00:32:16McKinley: Well, they go to the Board of Education, they go to the commissioners' meetings and speak up for things that needed to be said, you know.
00:32:28Stephens: And this was all in one summer?
00:32:31McKinley: Yeah, well, the summer and--because it was during the summer when we did it. Yeah.
00:32:38Stephens: Summer of what year do you mean?
00:32:40McKinley: '60s, '61, somewhere like that.
00:32:43Stephens: Okay. And I know that you, you said earlier that you kind of got more familiar with Hot Corner during the demonstrations.
00:32:54McKinley: Right.
00:32:54Stephens: What was the significance of Hot Corner for y'all?
00:32:57McKinley: The significance for the demonstrators were that that's where we had lunch every day. When we would go to lunch, we'd go to Hot Corner and Manhattan restaurant, it's another restaurant, I can't remember the name of it, but it was right beside the Morton Theater was a restaurant there. I can't remember the name of that one, but whenever we would have lunch. Those people would fix lunch for us every day.
00:33:27Stephens: And they did that for free, right?
00:33:28McKinley: Yeah, for free.
00:33:30Stephens: Who were some of the people at Hot Corner who kind of took care of you all and made sure you got what you needed?
00:33:35McKinley: Well, Mr. Wilson, he was down there. He worked real close with us. And I don't know, I can't remember the person's name that used to own the Manhattan. And the other little restaurant, I can't remember that. But I do remember Mr. Wilson.
00:33:53Stephens: And what did it mean to have a place where you could--I would imagine that felt safe.
00:34:01McKinley: It did.
00:34:02Stephens: What did it mean to have a safe space for y'all at that time?
00:34:06McKinley: Right. It--when we--because if we had not been able to go there and eat, then we would have had, everybody would have dispersed and go to their homes. And that would have taken away from our routine for that day. So if all of us could go downtown, down there on Hot Corner, eat and relax, you know, that was better for us.
00:34:32Stephens: Because you were, like you said, when you were marching, you were thinking, I just hope I can get through the day. And then to go to that place where--
00:34:40McKinley: You can relax a while. Yeah, you know, this is ours. This is our place here. Yeah, Hot Corner belonged to us.
00:34:49Stephens: And what was the vibe at Hot Corner during those lunches?
00:34:53McKinley: Nice, really nice. You know, we'd chit-chat about what we had done that day, but mostly we just laughed and talked. You know, it was just, it was just relaxing to go down after you demonstrated.
00:35:08Stephens: And did you ever go there for anything else or was it, did you ever go there at night or anything like that?
00:35:14McKinley: No.
00:35:15Stephens: So you weren't participating in the nightlife as a high school student?
00:35:17McKinley: No, I wasn't.
00:35:20Stephens: Okay, so it really was just during that time. So how did the demonstrations get resolved here? Was there an ordinance passed?
00:35:32McKinley: It was, and I'll never forget, we had one night at the Varsity. We went to the Varsity. It wasn't nighttime, but it was one day we went to the Varsity, and the chief had--I guess, it was winding down then, I guess, when he had the buses and they had buses and things to--they did put us on buses a lot of times, but this time it looked like they had more buses than they did anything to put us on, but--we don't know what happened. All of a sudden, the buses started leaving and police started leaving, so we didn't really know what happened to make them leave. But it was said that the chief had decided that segregation was no longer for Athens. Everything would be integrated and then we just, that was the end of it.
00:36:32Stephens: So after that day, you were able to go and--
00:36:35McKinley: --Yeah. Mm-hm.
00:36:39Stephens: I know Archibald Killian was on the police force at that point.
00:36:42McKinley: Yeah.
00:36:42Stephens: Were there any other Black police officers?
00:36:45McKinley: Yeah. His cousin Donald Moon, Commissioner George Maxwell. Um--I can't think, it's Smith, his last name's Smith--Robert Smith. I think it was five of them, Moon, Killian, his cousin Donald, George Maxwell, Robert Smith. I think it was five of them on there.
00:37:19Stephens: And what was their role?
00:37:21McKinley: They didn't have a role. They didn't have a role when they were given those jobs. They were told that they could only arrest Black people, but when we were demonstrating, none of them arrested or bothered us.
00:37:40Stephens: So you never saw them as part of the--
00:37:41McKinley: No.
00:37:44Stephens: Do you think they had anything to do with--the chief's decision?
00:37:48McKinley: Probably. I assume that Archibald did. He's a very, very outspoken person. And he's a person just like those women I was talking to you about. He was never afraid to say anything to anybody about anything. And he's still like that, believe you me. He is. You just don't get too much braver than him. Yeah. As he said, though, he said he had told us that he wasn't going to bother us, when we were demonstrating, especially at the Varsity. Cause, he said he told him he wasn't going to bother nobody. Because he wanted them children up there, he wanted to do the same thing the children do, to come in there sometimes. So he said that he wouldn't be bothered with that. He told us, you know, he had talked to us and said that we didn't have to worry about him bothering us.
00:38:51Stephens: So what did you think when you learned that the buses had turned around?
00:38:55McKinley: We didn't know what to think, because we didn't know what was going on, you know. We were inside.
00:39:01Stephens: Did they serve you that day?
00:39:02McKinley: No, they didn't serve us that day. But we came back. I never went back to the Varsity, but some other peoples went back and they did serve them.
00:39:13Stephens: Why'd you never go back?
00:39:15McKinley: The Varsity is not a place that I really like to eat at, so I really never went, I never went back to the Varsity. So it really wasn't about the hot dogs or hamburgers for you? It was about me, if I want a hot dog and a hamburger from your place of business I think I should be able to do it. Whether I like it or not, somebody else might love it and they should be able to go just because I don't like it, you know. But it wasn't about eating there, that we had to eat there. It was just the idea of you not wanting me there. And I think I should have a choice of if I want to eat at your establishment or not, because my money is the same as yours.
00:40:02Stephens: Where do you think your determination to bring about that sort of society or where do you think that sort of principled stance that you had and you took very firmly, where did that come from?
00:40:19McKinley: I guess it came from being taught that you have to fight sometimes for what you want. Everything is not going to be given to you on silver platter.
00:40:30Stephens: And who taught you that?
00:40:31McKinley: My mom. Some things you have to work a little harder to have. And anything you want, you know, sometimes you have to work for it a little harder than--people don't give you everything. And everything that you want, you should be able to have if you work and have it.
00:40:53Stephens: So after the buses turned around, some people were able to go back to these places and get served. Did you ever go to any of the places you'd been sitting in?
00:41:02McKinley: Yes. I went to Kress's and Woolworth's. And the Horton's Drugstore, you know, they took their counters out, so.
00:41:13Stephens: They took their counters out during the--
00:41:15McKinley: They don't, after the demonstrations, they don't have counters in there anymore. Kress's and Woolworth's, they're gone. They don't even exist anymore.
00:41:23Stephens: So Horton's took their counters out and never put 'em back?
00:41:25McKinley: Mm-mm. I think what they have there is nice candy. When you first walk in Horton's Drugstore to your right, there's a little aisle-like place where that's where that counter was. I get tickled every time I go in there (laughs).
00:41:46Stephens: What would you say was the reaction from people in white communities in Athens? They probably knew that you had participated, so when you would go around town, what was, what did it seem like people's reaction?
00:42:01McKinley: But you know, I don't even know whether people knew I participated or not, I really don't. Nobody ever said anything to me, you know, about that, so I, I don't even know whether they knew I ever did that or not.
00:42:16Stephens: Well in general, was there a change in the atmosphere?
00:42:19McKinley: Yeah, it is.
00:42:22Stephens: In what way, how did things feel different?
00:42:24McKinley: Things seemed better. But you know what, I don't think a lot of white people were really against having us there to those establishments. And, you know, you don't know who the people are or who they weren't that wanted us and didn't want us. So after the demonstration, I have not been attacked by anybody about anything like that.
00:42:54Stephens: Did you ever feel like people were resentful?
00:42:58McKinley: No.
00:42:59Stephens: And were there any white people involved in the demonstrations?
00:43:02McKinley: I don't remember any, not physically. But they say that we did have people that were giving money to the organization. So I don't know who they were.
00:43:20Stephens: And how about in Black communities around town? How did people react or respond to what y'all had done?
00:43:28McKinley: Well, they were fine. Some of them were fine. Just like I said, some of them were afraid because of the repercussion that would come to them for working for some of these people.
00:43:39Stephens: Do you think that the demonstrations were a success?
00:43:44McKinley: I think so.
00:43:47Stephens: So what came next for you after that? What did you end up doing?
00:43:51McKinley: I just went back to school and finished. I finished Athens High and Industrial School.
00:43:57Stephens: What year did you graduate?
00:43:58McKinley: I graduated in '63.
00:44:01Stephens: And then what'd you do after that?
00:44:03McKinley: Well, I started working at a sewing factory here in Athens, Belgrade. I worked there for a long time. And then I worked for Kmart for twenty-three years on Atlanta Highway and worked at Big G. I always worked retail. I worked retail before I started the job here.
00:44:27Stephens: Did most people kind of, most of the people who were involved in the demonstrations sort of move on to other things?
00:44:33McKinley: Yeah.
00:44:35Stephens: Was there any sort of movement that you saw after that or did a new generation of young leaders take over?
00:44:42McKinley: I hadn't seen anything.
00:44:44Stephens: Why do you think that is?
00:44:46McKinley: I guess they felt like we had done what they wanted, I guess. I don't know. I just haven't seen anything.
00:44:54Stephens: Did you ever feel like or do you feel like maybe there are still things that need to change?
00:45:00McKinley: There are--I'm sure it is because you know people, some of the people I think that were back there were resentful to us or still resentful to us today, but they're just--in a different way. Segregation is still in Athens. It's still here. But it's just people are doing things differently. They say a man can dress up in a suit, but his inside is the same as a man that's had on raggedy clothes. And I think that is part of what's happening now. You know, we have not--gotten where we should be as far as segregation is concerned. They're just high things, people are doing high things that not like they did back in the day. But it's still, it's still racism in Athens.
00:46:01Stephens: How do you see some of that manifest in Athens?
00:46:05McKinley: It's a lot of things. You know, you think a person is one way and then you find out, underhanding is their way of doing things. It's just a way of how they are covering things now. Not like when I was coming up, they were out there just all in your face, but they're not like that now. But there's still racists in Athens.
00:46:32Stephens: Why do you think, if that's the case, and that's always been the case ever since y'all were demonstrating, why do you think there hasn't been sort of a passing of the torch to younger leaders?
00:46:45McKinley: I don't know, I really don't.
00:46:52Stephens: Why do you think a lot of people in Athens don't know about what you did?
00:46:56McKinley: I, that's--it was surprising to me when Nicole did the segment and people saw it, and it's on my Facebook, and a lot of people were saying they never knew this, you know, but you know, it was surprising to me. It really was. It was surprising to me that nobody knew we did that. A lot of people didn't know that we did that.
00:47:20Stephens: I assume the newspaper was covering it.
00:47:23McKinley: I assume it was, but we haven't been able to find anything. So, but Nicole said that she, you know, tried to find something about the time that we were demonstrating. The reason she did that is because she had--we talked about it to her so much. So that's one of the reasons why she wanted to do that.
00:47:48Stephens: And this is Nicole Taylor, who was born and raised in Athens, went to Clarke Central, and you knew her as she grew up, and then she directed the recent film.
00:47:59McKinley: Right. Yeah, she and I--
00:48:02Stephens: What's the film? Could you say the name of the film?
00:48:03McKinley: If I So Choose.
00:48:04Stephens: Okay.
00:48:05McKinley: Another young lady, Gabrielle, she also helped Nicole, and she was from Athens.
00:48:15Stephens: Why do you think it's important for the younger generation of people to know about what y'all did?
00:48:22McKinley: I think it's important for our young people to know what we did because to let them know that everything that they're enjoying now, iot wasn't given to them by somebody white. We had to fight. We had to fight so they would have things better than we do. And a lot of our young people, a lot of our young Black people don't know that. That we was spit on, coffee poured on us and stuff like that. A lot of young people don't know that in Athens. And it's just--I'm just excited that they are excited about wanting to know what happened here in Athens. That's my thing. I'm really excited about her doing that. And I think it's going to help a lot of young people. It really is. Because we're going to do, we're going to take our young people at our church and we're going to show them that part. And we're going to bring in other people to talk to them about--how we did it, you know, how we worked to get them to where they are, some of the things that they are enjoying now. And I'm really excited about it. And I was excited when Krista asked me to do this. Because I think it's important that they know what we did.
00:50:03Stephens: I guess, are there things that--are there particular things you feel like young people should be standing up for today?
00:50:12McKinley: Well, I think they should stand up for anything that's right. That's anything that's right and anything that's gonna make their life better. I think that, you know, I really think that they should stand up for it. Because that's why I try to get my children stand up for what you think is right and, and you know, I just--I just really feel that that's the thing should do.
00:50:44Stephens: Do you ever go back to Hot Corner today?
00:50:46McKinley: Yeah.
00:50:46Stephens: To any of those restaurants that you went to?
00:50:48McKinley: Yeah I go. They're not open though. The Manhattan--I used to go to Wilson when they were down there. I just go eat down there. And I enjoy going to the Morton Theater. That's another place down there that I enjoy going. Knowing that a Black man is responsible for that being down there. I enjoy going down there.
00:51:11Stephens: What does it feel like to be back there today?
00:51:13McKinley: Feel real good. Bring back a lot of memories when I go down there. Yeah.
00:51:21Stephens: Well, thank you so much, Mrs. McKinley.
00:51:23McKinley: You're welcome.
00:51:24Stephens: Is there anything I didn't ask you about that you wanted to talk about?
00:51:26McKinley: No, thank you.
00:51:28Stephens: Okay, thank you. NOTE TRANSCRIPTION END
