audio Alma Fisher BMB chp 2
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[00:00:00] Jean Greene: So this program is a continuation of our podcast, , about the Black Man's Burden and joining me today. Is Miss Alma Fisher, Miss Alma Fisher is my illustrious predecessor as the director of library services and archives for the Utica campus.

She laid the groundwork for our archives and she also laid the groundwork for efforts to restore the house, the home of the founder. I am so happy that she was able to join us. Welcome, Ms. Fisher. Thank you so much for joining us.

[00:00:43] Alma Fisher: Thank you so much. My successor, Ms. Jean Green, it is a pleasure to have this opportunity to participate in such a momentous [00:01:00] occasion.

The first podcast and I am elated. Thank you for having me. 

[00:01:08] Jean Greene: Oh yes ma'am. Today we're going to be talking about chapter two. Can you tell me a little bit about how you re reacted and related to chapter two in Black Man's Burden.

[00:01:21] Alma Fisher: Chapter two of Black Man's Burden continued the early growth of William H.

Holtzclaw with his parents Addie Holtzclaw and dad Jerry Holtzclaw and of course their children. He is a Sibling of, I believe there were six of them with the mother being married prior to his marrying the dad. We see a family, a loving family, however, a [00:02:00] struggling family and chapter two takes it up when Will, little Will, was about four years old, and I believe that he was plowing. They had to subsist on the plantation by being sharecroppers. And Lil Will was a good plow hand because, as my parents used to say, he had eaten up all of his long white bread. And when you do that you gotta go to the fields and be a contributor to your family's need and mine did not they have those needs.

I believe his brother was the one who steadied the plow. I think Will was on the mule And the brother steadied. So it [00:03:00] apparently was an older brother. I know he had a younger brother. I can't see a child two years old, steadying a plow for his time had not yet come. If someone must correct me about that age, then I will be very, very much delighted to get that.

But Will was one of the field hands as he began to help his parents. And then Will also began to take his dad's lunch and breakfast. to the place where he worked the sawmill. And that was a pretty tough Journey for he and his little brother to go through all of those wooded areas, you know, times were where it was very dense forest, [00:04:00] snakes and all kinds of wooded animals I'm sure they probably saw. They did go there and the man for whom Mr. Jerry holtzclaw worked was a man who had a sawmill and at that sawmill they were getting as much of the wood cut and milled ground up and so they could go on and Do it across the country. And sure enough, The man left, but before he left, he had established the schools.

We know that this was right after Reconstruction, during the Reconstructions, right? People did not have any schools devoted to them, especially the blacks in the south. [00:05:00] And of course, the white men had, well, the white student schools had just begun. So, you know, that these two schools were not going to marry at this time.

And this man, Mr. Weathers started a school. Got a house and started a school for the black children. And it so happened that many children did not take advantage of many of the parents thinking that, well, gee whiz, these people are not going to do anything with education. They need to get a little more into politics.

I don't know what they meant about that, but maybe they had seen Hyrum Revels and, and some of the other Black people getting into politics just before that reconstruction period. But what happened is Mrs. Addie Holtzclaw was a [00:06:00] stickler for education, and she was a spokesperson in that household about things that were going to benefit her children the most. And she and Mr. Jerry got so deeply involved with education of the children in the area, not just their six children. They wanted everybody, but however. Everybody didn't come, but the man, Mr. Weathers, had finished his work there in that particular area, and he left. 

[00:06:41] Jean Greene: That was the sawmill, right? Sawmill. The sawmill.

[00:06:45] Alma Fisher: Exactly, that sawmill. And what happened is that... Mr. Holtzclaw had been so convinced and thankful for the generosity of Mr. Weathers, because Mr. Weathers was [00:07:00] considered a man of good report. He was very, I think he was Very generous and as much kindness as he could be to the Black people without of course, breaking the laws, the laws, of course, we know Jim Crow South laws and right after slavery.

But Mr. Jerry got some men, he gathered up these men and they went out and my, my, my, did they not come back and build a house, a schoolhouse where pines, where they split even the pine, I guess the pine poles and make a school of crude, it was crude, we know that it was because It was, these people didn't have any, any professional skills.

They were making houses as, as the ones that [00:08:00] they were staying in without floors. The floors were dirt floors. 

And, and you know what the benches that they made in these schools were so high until I'm sure that even when the children, the smaller children stood, the benches were above their heads.

And when Will sat down, his legs did not touch the ground and they, there were some swelling in his legs most of the time. And when he would get up, guess what happened? His feet had been, it felt like as if they were, had been pricked by pins. And they would hurt when, when the teacher would call on him for recitation.

And so what happened is he would get a flogging. Now, isn't that something? Even these people were so, you know, so [00:09:00] incompassionate to the little children. And the dad didn't like it. Of course, the mom didn't like it either, but they would get, he would get a flogging when he got home. You know, that was that, that was just our nature.

Until we learned the better because the job was. Not you know, he was not a very knowledgeable and he was hurting, but he, but the mom did. And I am going to stop here and ask you, what was the question? It was not to give a summary of the book. 

[00:09:36] Jean Greene: No, no, no. This is, this is great. Oh, what I wanted to hear from you is. What you felt and what you got from this chapter and you are summarizing it, which is great. because, you know, you're bringing it home about how important education was to these two people. It was so important that when the man [00:10:00] who had the sawmill left. And they didn't have a school, holtzclaw's father rallied his companions and they built one. And like you said, it was crude, but it shows that Jerry Holtzclaw wanted his children educated, 

and Addie wanted her children educated. And even though they weren't educated, they really pushed that for their children. So yes, ma'am, carry on.

That's exactly what I needed.

[00:10:25] Alma Fisher: Yes, and I think it was so wonderful. Thank you. I think it was so wonderful that they had this kind of, you know, innate abilities just to know. That education was going to uncover a whole lot of ignorance, a whole lot of conditions by which they were just being swallowed up with.

And so they did everything they could do [00:11:00] physically. Mentally, emotionally, and just that love for the children were so great. And by that time, I'm sure they had about five and a sixth one was on the way, I believe, because we are going to see where the children were there together. But at this time, I'm going to say the impact.

It's great about these two people's determination and desire for their children to achieve the best that was offered in education. And they knew that with education would come the successful people, a society that would eventually grow and develop into a people being Of the world in which they lived and a world by which they could operate and be a [00:12:00] part of that operation.

And at this time I'm thinking about the voting, how it becomes so important for us to participate in our own destiny. And that I see. One of the reasons why they were so valiant uh, in, in getting their children to, you know, move and excel. Will was a very smart guy. He was, didn't say, well, this is his autobiography, so I can't say that he said too much about the others, but he was a brilliant young man.

At this time, he was just probably about seven, maybe. And You know something, Gene, his mother would get him and I remember now that walking was very encouraging, but it was no more encouraging to me about him walking the three miles to school more one way, of course, that's six miles a day for a small [00:13:00] child.

Of course, I did the same thing. I would get out there and here right down in this Utica. Edwards learned area, we would go three miles a day. And we had a very steep hill, as they called it, and some curves, and you had to get on the, on the bank. When you heard an old jalopy coming because these people would not see you and I'm sure that I will experience some of the same thing.

You probably had a few black people with vehicles, but there were some white ones who had it and, and probably had that bus kicking up dust. Also. Where the white people were going to school. 

[00:13:55] Jean Greene: I hate to interrupt you, Miss. I know what you're saying the [00:14:00] making the comparison between then and now is really important.

The fact that. Holtzclaw's parents, even though they didn't have any education, were pushing their, their children helped create a focus, I think, within William Holtzclaw to push forward and expand his reach it 

helped him 

Later to approach Booker T. Washington and asked to go to Tuskegee, even though he couldn't afford it, just like they couldn't afford anything else.

And then that compare that to now we have students coming to us. They can't can't afford it. Their parents can't, but that does not stop us from reaching out like he did. To help those students. It doesn't stop us from trying to reach out to the parents and encourage them to keep encouraging their students.

So, when we look at this story, like you're looking [00:15:00] at it, it just, it just is inspiring to me about how he came from quote, unquote, nothing and, we have people who perceive themselves as coming from nothing. , but we can encourage them like his parents did, like he did with the students who were here to push forward.

[00:15:23] Alma Fisher: That's so great. And so that is so true, and we do have people doing that. However, because our, perception and perspectives have expanded so beyond what Dr. Holtzclaw was dealing with, then sometimes we get caught up in legalism, you know, the systems like affirmative action that was supposed to have, you know, been created or to help people of color get more, you know, things to be [00:16:00] more equalized and for admission and working on board.

However, we do find that Holtzclaw, like us, had a, and when I say us, I'm talking about those who had many members in their families, as I did, whose parents are main focus was to get an education. When one gets an education, he does better in life, and they wanted us to do better than they did.

Williams parents wanted them to succeed and be able to, I'm sure this school that he Had his mind focused on after he saw Booker T. Washington plan, especially became just a just a total, almost an [00:17:00] obsession. However, as we begin to look back at our chapter, we see that Holtzclaw had so many.

And when we say obstacles. He had some devastating obstacles because his father had to go out and go away just to earn a little bit of money for the family's keep. That didn't stop them. And when I look at this now Jean, I think about how we are not. The, the boys and girls, the men and women now are not stopped because there may have been a death in the family.

You have people coming to the rescue. You have those beloved people who fall in love with you and at schools, and they know. of your[00:18:00] potentiality. And so they call on you and they offer you certain kinds of resources to assist in getting that education that you need in order to pay it forward.

Carry out those you know, those situations and and struggles that you have. just Walked through that you have crawled through and that's what Booker T Did for just to be there to allow Will to come to school when Will Wrote a letter to Booker T just addressed with his name on there 

[00:18:44] Jean Greene: You're you're so right. When you talk about how Booker T. Washington encouraged him and provided the impetus for him to move forward and to expand what he thought his, his efforts would be in [00:19:00] the, in the field of education.

[00:19:01] Alma Fisher: So yes, that's right. And that's right. And that was, that's so important. I think that getting Will to that school just expanded his, you know, whole horizon when he walked out there. That day, you know, the first of the first day that he walked, it was the second day on campus. The first day, how he saw all of the curriculum the programs in action, and it was just overwhelming to him I think he used the word bewildered.

Just I imagine he looked at the girls and they were picking berries and probably do sewing what, maybe not sewing because they wouldn't have the machines out there, but some other things they were doing, they probably were, you know, I would say whatever it was, it was in the kitchen, you know, [00:20:00] they had these particular you know, jobs assigned.

And divided among, you know, roles, , they had the roles. For men and women in these, but when he saw that, how many oxen spread across and had those wagons ready to go to the sawmill and oh, just so much cane, I believe he had the. There were sugar cane and all of these kinds of foods, agricultural you know, progressions that have, that were made on that campus out to serve other people and feed them.

Booker T knew that this was a, well, I won't say a consummation a very good Summation of the dream that he was following, that's what we do [00:21:00] when we want to, you know, get our minds, our heart, our souls on. Into a particular area, and we do all that we can do, and we are not satisfied until it is the right fit for us, right?

We are going to have many people helping us. I looked at. Jackson State the other day how sometimes when the students may come back, and they may not have housing on campus, and the people in control may have underestimated the number of students will come, but they get other housing.

For those people off the campus or on the campus or in the neighborhood and those students, they continue to just fight for what they want. And though we have [00:22:00] many, many people. We are not looking at just we don't have that tunnel vision that we have because education, believe it or not, has made us spread wide and see people in all of their situation.

And with that in mind, we do have great resources and ideas that really make us successful in that which we set out to do, and that was no different for Will except his resources were so very limited. We know that there were some funny things that happened.

Funny things happened to us when we first go off to college. We don't have the clothes to wear for but we see others. And we of course were probably in a little better situation than many of us who go off to these. Big [00:23:00] school. Some of us even go to Ivy League schools, but People are so now dressed down and when I say dress down, we don't just to put on certain things that that were expected of will will I think he had to wear us.

Did he have to wear a suit. He had to dress up in a tie, and I remember when he left home, he had his neighbors and friends, many of them were very encouraging, but you know, there were some of the neighbors who were talking about, Oh, you don't need to go. This old school, old Baptist schools, go there. Do nothing but feed you bread and water and cornbread at that.

[00:23:47] Jean Greene: Right, right. They did. They were discouraging some of them. 

[00:23:50] Alma Fisher: So, yes, quite discouraging. And Will was kind of moved by that, but it was something within him. I [00:24:00] call it, a a plan. I call it God's plan for his life. And with that in mind, he could not stop because there was this spirit within him, moving him on to that goal.

And that goal was accomplished point where that particular, let's say that one objective was accomplished to when his dad freed him. We remember how dad freed him 

[00:24:31] Jean Greene: on christmas, wasn't it? 

[00:24:33] Alma Fisher: Christmas morning. Wasn't that something? And his mother, he thought that his dad was crying and his mom, we know that his mom and he and, and will himself.

But another thing which happened, the dad was so broken up because he had to tell his son that he was not going to get anything better than than he had if he stayed there with him. [00:25:00] I believe this, these oldest sister who was such a beloved member of the family had passed away to during that time they experienced mega troubles in their lives and they didn't have any resources to assist them. 

But at any rate, This, through the providential powers of God, this family made it, and they made it because the mother, the dad, I remember Will said, that he had never seen his father come before the altar.

And this particular time after the sister passed, after they had been, independently farming, that is so important that they had I won't say failed because they didn't because of the dad is not knowing how to manage and the sharecroppers, the [00:26:00] plantation owners didn't give them any you know, 

I guess you would call them mentees. They didn't know how to do it. And the crops did not work out. That was four years. Now, Jean, I tell you what I saw in these attempts, you know, there were four attempts. This family to succeed. All four failed. But then I see a determined William H. Holtzclaw when he set out to found the black school in the South.

He did those attempts, you know, they would call him back to work at the school in Snow Hill, Alabama. He would come back and one time he left and he said, I won't be back this time, but when he came back, his colleagues saw him back and they kind of, funny, you know how they tease one another. But I see a man who had unstoppable courage [00:27:00] and with this courage, he set out to get that institution of learning for 

black boys and girls in the South and he came as far as Utica. Right. That's when all of these, I see his, early attempts. to establish Utica Normal and Industrial Institute.

Because when he got here, we know that it was an effort to get the black men to trust him. And you know, the white men were not so very trustworthy, but you had some who were understandable and allowed a little money here and there. But you also had some black men who began to come and you know, just support him with [00:28:00] their land.

There were some black men who had land and of course, I knew some of the children from those land owners. In fact, there's one young man here today. They are still here. One of the young ladies were in our library. You know area district. And so she, but she passed away a few years ago.

[00:28:24] Jean Greene: What family was that? 

[00:28:25] Alma Fisher: Oh, the family was a Scott family. Her name was Rosa Barnett. Do you know Rosa? 

[00:28:30] Jean Greene: I remember y'all talking about Miss Rosa scott. 

[00:28:33] Alma Fisher: Okay, so she is one of the families who had land. Her dad had land and of course he served as our janitor.

Okay, look. John Page's grandfather. Okay. Huh. And I believe Mr. Dallas was his grandfather. Wow. So he got those, he got as many men as he could. The [00:29:00] Mr. McCadney. Pledges McCadney, you know, the building that's named after him. They, they rewarded those men with buildings named after them, especially those who you know, contributed resources, donated, and they became members of that.

Black Belt Society, the Farmers Conference. That was so exciting to me as a student, because I was not able to you know, just identify the full perspective consequence of that. But I was, I was just excited to see so many visitors on campus. My uncle would come and we would say, wow, wonder what Uncle Kim, they say he has land.

That's why he is there today. And so they are bringing little communities in, especially, and anybody was invited, [00:30:00] especially the black men, because he was teaching in that farmer's conference. Not only was Mr. Holtzclaw' s idea was to utilize the farm animals in, in, in barbecuing, you know, the, I guess, whatever it was, the 

beef, 

and the pork, all of that good stuff.

And so he They had all of them to come because it, it grew into a full fledged program where people came and talked about how to, you know, how to learn how to do this, how to make cakes, how to till your soil and make it healthy and all of these things.

And Mr. Holtzclaw was very. Instrumental in utilizing steps, you know, in all of his development of this great institution. [00:31:00] Please ask me a question. I know I'm off. I know I'm off. 

[00:31:03] Jean Greene: No, ma'am. I am enjoying it because you're doing exactly. This is exactly the kind of response and input I was expecting and hoping that I would get in, in some of these chapters.

So, no, I'm not stopping you because I'm going, yeah, she's just going right along. Yes, ma'am. We're about we're about ready to close it up because you've covered. A lot. You've covered his time with the sharecropping.

You know, you've covered his time with his family. When his father got had to leave. You've covered the time where he got to Tuskegee and was in awe of what he saw there. And I'll have to tell you this little side story. My first trip to Tuskegee with the HBCU Library Alliance, I got there and it was overwhelming.

It was like going to the mother campus 'cause that's exactly what it is.

[00:31:54] Alma Fisher: Yes. 

[00:31:55] Jean Greene: And I was, I was so enamored. Of this [00:32:00] place that when I came back, I wanted to take people with me because I wanted them to feel that too, and maybe get in energized and excited. And so when we have people come to this campus and we start telling them Holtzclaw story.

I want to see that same energy and excitement, like you're talking about. 

[00:32:21] Alma Fisher: Yes, yes, beautiful. 

[00:32:24] Jean Greene: So you you have done exactly what we need and we're almost at the end of our time.