Interview with Betty Shannon Gibson

              Special Collections
Public Spaces in Miami: An Oral History Project
Interview with Betty Shannon Gibson
Miami, Florida, November 24, 2009
Interview IPH-0056
Interviewed by Cécile Houry
Recorded by Cécile Houry
Summary: This interview with Betty Shannon Gibson was conducted in November 2009. Ms. Gibson spent her childhood in the Bronx, New York, but in 1950 moved to Tallahassee, Florida. She became a media specialist in different schools of the Miami area, and lived in South Miami with her basketball player and later vice-mayor of South Miami husband. She witnessed
the changing race relations in the U.S. during the past sixty years, providing insight as to the process from strict segregation to desegregation and a more democratic America.
This interview forms part of the Institute for Public History (IPH) Oral History Collection, directed by Professor Greg Bush from the History Department and curated by the University of Miami Libraries Special Collections.
Copyright to this interview lies with the University of Miami. The interview recordings or transcript may not be reproduced, retransmitted, published, distributed, or broadcast without the permission of the Special Collections. For information about obtaining copies or to request permission to publish any part of this interview, please contact Special Collections at asc@miami.edu.
1300 Memorial Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33124-0320 * 305-284-3580 * 305-284-4901 fax Betty Shannon Gibson 2
November 24th, 2000
Cécile Houry: Friday 24th of November, and year 2000. I’m Cécile Houry and I’m doing an oral history of Mrs. Betty Gibson. And we are at her house 5780 SW 60th Avenue, South Miami.
So, to start with, can you tell me where and when you were born?
Betty Gibson: I was born in Fort Valley, Georgia.
CH: And the year please.
BG: The year? I’m not gonna tell you the year. [Laughing]
CH: You don’t want?
BG: I was born on October the 2nd.
CH: [laughing] Can you describe [to] me your parents, like their names, where they came from, their jobs?
BG: My father, I don’t know. He died when I was a baby. My mom was a very unusual person. She went to Fort Valley for me to be born. I had two brothers: one was fourteen years older than me, the other one was fifteen years older than I was. But my mom wanted all of her kids born in the same place. So she left West Palm Beach, where she was living, and went to Fort Valley for me to be born. She stayed there six weeks, she left Fort Valley, went back to West Palm Beach, stayed at West Palm Beach maybe a year, she left there and went to New Jersey.
CH: So that’s where you were raised?
BG: No. My mom worked at a Jewish resort in New Jersey, but we lived in the Bronx, New York. And I stayed there until I came to Miami. My mom died when I was in sixth grade and I spent a year with my brother’s wife and their little girl, and then they shipped me to Miami to my mother’s brother and his wife and my mom’s sister.
CH: I see. What was your mum’s religion and what was yours and how was religion important in your life? Betty Shannon Gibson 3
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BG: My mom was a Baptist in New York. I was going to school to become a Catholic. And I went through that until I came to Miami. And when I came to Miami, the people who were going to rear me, they were Baptist. They belonged to the Mount Zion Baptist Church on 3rd Avenue and 9th Street, and I still belong to that church today. Religion has always been important in my life because it was as though God was there to be the director, along with the teachings that I received from the school and from my parents…because I refer to them as my mom and my dad. But I didn’t call them mom and dad, I called them by their names, aunt this and aunt that. But whenever I talked with people, I would say my mom or my dad.
CH: What are your most vivid memories of your childhood in the Bronx?
BG: Being the youngest child on our street, being the girl on my street, and running away with the other kids. And one day, we rented bicycles, and I was nine years old, and we rode the bicycles to Palisades Park in New Jersey. We went across George Washington Bridge. We went from the Bronx to New Jersey and back. Yes! [Laughing]
CH: Was there any individual, place, or event that [was] were important in the neighborhood at that time? As you [remember] remind?
BG: Here in Miami?
CH: No, in the Bronx when you were living there as a kid.
BG: Well, it’s interesting because as a child, I’ve always been a loner. And, I would go with kids but I was always the youngest. And there wasn’t a theater in our area, but there was the movie. And I would go to the movie like, every other day, and I was alone, and I don’t guess that I was bad in that sense, but I would go to the kids’ movie after school, go to the bathroom, stand up on the toilet, until the kids’ movie was over, and then I could see the adult movie because they didn’t come back and double check to see whether all the kids were out of the movie. And my first time seeing a baseball game was in New York, because if you were in a certain class of education in school, in New York they had classes one-through and if you were in that one class, it told to anyone that you had extraordinarily ability to do things. And that class got to do more things than other classes did. And we went to the new things, we would go downtown, to New York library Betty Shannon Gibson 4
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and games and things like that, and I just happened to be in one of those one classes. How? I don’t know, but I enjoyed it.
CH: Let’s talk about your education. So which schools did you [go] went to and what were you studying?
BG: You mean after high school?
CH: Yes.
BG: After high school, I wanted to go to school in Georgia, to Spellman University, but I didn’t get the scholarship. There was a hang there. The scholarship was supposed to be for me and they gave it to someone else. So, I decided to go to the service, but no one would sign up for me to go into the army. So, then my mom and dad said, “We are not going to send you to the army, you’re going to college.” I said, “Where am I going?” They said “You go to Fort Valley State.” I said, “I’m not going to Fort Valley State.” If I had gone to Fort Valley State, I had to live in my home because my uncle lived right next door to college and they said, “Why spend all this money?” So I said, “Well, I don’t have any place to go.” My mom said, “There is a school in Tallahassee and you’re going.” And I went to Florida A&M [pause] and I got my BS degree from there, and I was one of Who’s Who Among American Colleges and Universities for 1959 and when I came out, I came to Miami and I got a job. And I said, “Oh well, goodbye University of Chicago.” I had applied there to go to grad school. Well, some place among there, I’d discovered, “Hey, I’m pregnant, I can’t go to school, I’m gonna work.” So I called my husband and I told him, I said, “Guess what?” He said “What?” I said “We’re going to have a baby.” He said, “What? What are you going to do?” I said, “I’m staying in Miami.” He said “No, you’re coming to Syracuse.” I said “Oh no, I’m not either.” I said, “Because when it comes time for this baby, I’ll be by myself and you’ll be gone.” And that as it turned out, the baby was a week old before he even knew we had her. And after that I went to school government. They were looking for nineteen librarians from the United States to do a study one summer. And I just decided at the top of my head I was going to apply. I said, “I’ll never make it and they are not going to come all the way to Miami.” But I did and I went to school that summer. But my husband was so upset. He said, “You’re leaving the baby. You can’t leave the baby.” I said, “But you know this is what…” He said, “No.” And I told him, “Okay, I will never go to school anymore until this baby goes to college. When she goes to college, I’m going back.” And I did go back. I went to FSU and I went to school there through 1994. Betty Shannon Gibson 5
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CH: I’d like to come back on when you moved to Miami. I think it was like, in your eighth grade. And you came from New York, so, what was the difference in terms of segregation between New York and Miami?
BG: I had gone to school in New York and it was completely desegregated. My school was. And when I came to Miami that was my first segregated experience.
CH: How was it for you? Was it hard to understand?
BG: No, it wasn’t hard for me to understand. New York may have been desegregated but segregation was there. And the only thing that was different, there was no place for black kids to go in Miami. Like we could ride bicycles and go places, we could go here and we could go there. That was not open to black kids in Miami. And I was in eighth grade.
CH: In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled segregation illegal in schools. And, how did that happen in South Miami, I mean the desegregation?
BG: There was no desegregation.
CH: You think?
BG: There wasn’t. The schools did not desegregate until 1967.
CH: So they did not apply the rule in South Miami?
BG: Not for education, not in Dade County, not in Florida.
CH: So that did not change, the rule did not change…..?
BG: No, I graduated from Carver Senior High School in Coconut Grove. G.W. Carver, 1955. The University of Miami did not even admit blacks. They couldn’t even go to graduate school here.
CH: What were your first impressions of South Miami when you arrived?
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BG: “I want to go back to New York.” [Laughing]
CH: Why?
BG: There was nothing here. I was a person that loved to read. And my first thing when I got here was, “Where is the library? I need books.” When I came from New York I brought two suitcases with me, and those suitcases were filled with books that I had gone down to the public library and checked out and brought here because I knew nothing about Miami. So I would read all the time.
CH: When you arrived, were there one or more neighborhoods for black people in South Miami?
BG: In South Miami?
CH: Were [was] there like a particular place where black people would move in?
BG: Sure. Basically it’s still there, but blacks live all over South Miami now. But basically they lived from Red Road, not immediately along Red Road, further around 59th Place to 62nd Avenue, and from US 1, where the railroad track comes, to 64th Avenue and maybe about three streets inward.
CH: How would you describe the conditions of black people who lived in Miami in the 1950s?
BG: In Miami or South Miami?
CH: In South Miami?
BG: In South Miami: hard working people.
CH: And their condition of life, their status in life?
BG: You know, I really don’t know because I’m gonna tell you something: I never knew that I was poor, black, and lived in the ghetto. I didn’t know this until I read ---------- book years later, and they talked about this. Because my family had a car, they owned their home, they had a bank account, we ate every day, and they worked every day but Saturday and Sunday. And I never felt a Betty Shannon Gibson 7
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pressure that, “I’m black and I can’t do this, and I’m black and I can’t do here, and I can’t go here and I can’t go there.” Actually I only lived in Miami, in South Miami, from ‘50 to ‘55 and then I went away. I went away to school and I had certain ideas that I adhere to. In college my mom started saving money because she knew I was going to jail because I participated in the marches.
CH: Do you think that in the 1950s, when you arrived, Miami welcomed people, like black people, to arrive or to move in the area?
BG: Did they welcome them?
CH: Was South Miami receptive of people coming in?
BG: South Miami has always been I think a very close community. People who came in, came here because they had relatives. And you could basically say, “These people either came for Fort Valley, Georgia, or Holly Hill, South Carolina.” And that’s how you identify, and most of the people within South Miami, they knew one another.
CH: I see. Was there a neighborhood that was considered better to move in inside South Miami?
BG: South Miami only had one neighborhood [laughing].
CH: That was too small?
BG: You either moved there or you did not move here.
CH: I see. Can you describe for me the black-white relationship in South Miami? How was it?
BG: It was tolerable. It was tolerable.
CH: Yeah? It was not like hardly segregated?
BG: It was segregated but we had a policeman. We had two black policemen, uh, who were very good, so I was told. And people just existed. In my opinion - they existed - and they worked to better what they had and to move up. Because when they started desegregated the areas in South Betty Shannon Gibson 8
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Miami, people who had the money to afford, they got better homes and so forth. But they were a lot of those who wouldn’t own one bedroom in South Miami. And interesting thing about it, there probably were about three black families who owned the majority of the property here. Yes, one, Mr. Williamson. That family, they gave the land to JRE Lee School and that entire area down there. They built the church there on 59th Place and they still have multiple interests in South Miami.
CH: In the 1960s, or in the 1950s, when you arrived, [were] was there some black areas that you would go to, like Overtown, Liberty City. Were you going there with your family?
BG: We went to church. When I say I belong to Mount Zion Baptist church, that’s on 3rd Avenue and 9th Street. That’s downtown, the heart of they call Overtown. That church still sits there. 95 made an interruption, because we laughed about it, we said, “Well, we’re shaking hands with the people on 95 as they drive by.” Because when they cut that street in, it cut right into our church yard.
CH: But except for the church, were you going to some stores, or to Bayfront, or to some parks?
BG: There was no Bayfront.
CH: To some parks there?
BG: No, I didn’t go to parks. I went with my family to homes of people they knew, either downtown or in Liberty City, because my mom was in the social club and I used to go with her to their meetings and etc.
CH: In the 1950s, when you arrived, can you describe [to] me the businesses that were in South Miami, and which ones were for blacks? Do you remember? Or one that was particularly important?
BG: [laugh] I know my mother’s sister and her husband owned a little store there on 64th Street, right next to their home. And then, there was another family who owned a store on 59th Place and 64th Street. And then, there was a Chinese or Japanese, one of the two, meat market up there on 64th Street, that was right here in this neighborhood. Now, later Winn Dixie had a store on Red Road Betty Shannon Gibson 9
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and I remember that, and we would go, as we said, downtown South Miami to the post office. I remember the post office was down there. The City Hall was down there, the library was there, and the little strip of stores that are basically there now. And then, there was a fruit concentration store and all the schools would come to that concentration store to get juice to sell “Icees” after school to kids, I remember that.
CH: Was there a particular place for black people where they would meet after the end of the day or during weekends? A popular place?
BG: No. There was a bar up there on that corner. I guess people who went to bars would go probably, but that wasn’t part of my life.
CH: I see. What was the chief form of entertainment in South Miami?
BG: [laugh]
CH: Was there anything, like church picnics or festivals at that time?
BG: I guess the church did that. But see I wasn’t connected to the churches of South Miami.
CH: So you didn’t really go out in South Miami?
BG: No, not really. Catch the bus to go to school in the morning, come home in the afternoon.
CH: Can you describe [to] me the different parks that you had access to in South Miami?
BG: Parks? The only park I know, that is the park that is called Murray Park now. That park was there but it was called Lee Park when I was a child.
CH: And did you use to go there?
BG: No.
CH: Who was going there? Was it more black people or white people? Betty Shannon Gibson 10
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BG: No, there were black people, used to go there and play ball and so forth, but I didn’t do that.
CH: Can you tell me who were the important personalities in the 1950s in South Miami?
BG: Black person? Mr. Williamson, Mr. Bowman, Manuel Holmes. Those were the people I knew and I’m sure there were others that I did not know.
CH: And they were doing things for black people?
BG: Yes. Like I said, Mr. Williamson, Marshall Williamson, he owned a lot of land, so did Manuel Holmes and Mr. Bowman. His mother was a very dynamic person, and she worked with the City Hall, and he became, I guess, involved with the City Hall. And Bowman just, they used to call Mr. Bowman “the black mayor of South Miami.”
CH: Really?
BG: Yes.
CH: When you arrived in Miami, the Community Center, which was later named after Sylva Martin, had already been built. How important was this center in South Miami?
BG: What center?
CH: The Community Center.
BG: There was no Community Center in South Miami.
CH: That is now called Sylva Martin Center. It was built in ‘35.
BG: The blacks did not go there.
CH: Oh, you didn’t go.
BG: Blacks did not go there. Here in South Miami? No. Betty Shannon Gibson 11
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CH: And did you know Sylva Martin?
BG: No.
CH: You didn’t know her personally, but you heard about her?
BG: Yes.
CH: There was also a Chamber of Commerce at that time. Did that play any important role in South Miami?
BG: The Chamber of Commerce? Not really, not really. And I’m speaking for when I came back here in 1960. Because before that, things that were happening in government, I knew about it and I didn’t know about it, and that did not interest me, because I was a teenager. And like I said, I was a one person, I read a lot, I kept up on the things that were going on, but South Miami was just one small ---------.
CH: I see. The City of South Miami is really close to the University of Miami, which is part of Coral Gables. What impact did the University have on South Miami?
BG: When?
CH: In the 1960s, 50s-60s?
BG: In the 1950s, I know they would loan their track field for meets, track meets. I remember that because the kids would walk from Coconut Grove to the school, and they would give them this day for track meets. And that is about the extent of University of Miami participation. Like I said, they did not accept blacks there. And in the 1960s, teachers went away to grad school for they couldn’t go to the University of Miami. The County paid for them. They went to Indiana, Illinois and so forth, to get masters degree because they couldn’t get them there. And FSU was a state school and they didn’t accept them.
CH: I see. And today, what do you think is the impact of the University on the community of South Miami? Betty Shannon Gibson 12
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BG: Oh it’s a tremendous impact because the University is open. They came in with scholarships to get black students because they found out if they participate and get black students, they’re gonna get federal money. That was the basics of what happened in the very beginning. If you had black students, you got more money. And it took a long time for the black universities to wake up and say, “We’re going to let white kids in here, so we can get federal funds.”
CH: I see. In 1960, South Miami Hospital opened. How important was it for the city to have its own hospital?
BG: My baby was born February 23rd, 1960, and I could not give birth to her at South Miami Hospital. South Miami Hospital opened February 1960.
CH: So where did you give birth to her?
BG: Mercy Hospital.
CH: Where did black people go to receive medical care at that time?
BG: Kendall Hospital or there was a black hospital over in Liberty City. So they would go there.
CH: And, were there some black doctors in the area, in South Miami?
BG: No, no black doctors in South Miami. They were downtown at Liberty City.
CH: I know that you moved inside South Miami, I mean you didn’t live in this house all the time. Can you tell me when you moved, and why, and from where?
BG: When did I move in this house? We moved here in August 1974. We moved away from 59th Place where we had lived from 1961 through 1974.
CH: Why did you move?
BG: Why did we move? We wanted to put an addition on our house. We wanted to add a bathroom and we wanted to close in our porch. And the contract wanted $ 15,000 to do that. When we Betty Shannon Gibson 13
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purchased the house it was $ 12,000. And my husband said, “No way, are we going to put that much money in this little house, so we’re going to find a house. We have to find it in South Miami,” because he was on the commission, so “You go and look and find a house.” I looked all over South Miami; I did not see a house that I wanted. This was the first house he showed me. We were eating dinner one day and he told me and my daughter, “Hurry up, I want to take you some place.” And he brought us here, he opened that door, and when he did, a million roaches started running all over this house. And I said, “No way, close the door.” And he said, “You’re sure you don’t like it, because you know you won’t hear the park.” I said, “No, I don’t like that house, let’s look.” And we looked, and we looked, and we looked, and we came back to the conclusion, because my daughter had always said that “If we buy another house, could we have a pool?” And he promised her, “If we get another house, we get a pool.” So I told him, “Okay, go on and buy that house.” I said “First of all, get the bank to come.” So the bank came, Security Federal. They came and they told him, “Buy that house, we’ll finance it. Because it’s a deal for what you’re going to pay for that house, buy it.” And we bought it.
CH: I see. Was there a difference between the neighborhood where you lived first and this one or was it the same?
BG: No, it wasn’t the same. There were three other black families on this street and we were like the fourth. The house directly across the street was integrated. [The phone rings] Oh my…., can we stop? [five minute break]
[side B]
CH: In the late 1950s and early 1960s, many Cubans moved in Miami in general, and I’d like to know if they moved in South Miami and then, what was the relationship between the blacks and the Cubans?
BG: I don’t know. I was away from South Miami from 1955 to 1960.
CH: But when you came back, they were still moving in?
BG: I didn’t see any drastic migration of people moving here. No.
CH: Today, there are Cubans living in South Miami? Or Hispanics? Betty Shannon Gibson 14
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BG: Cubans in South Miami? That’s something that has been very recent. It hasn’t been a whole lot of Hispanics moving in, I don’t think until maybe the 1980s, that you got large fluxes.
CH: And in that case, what was the relationship when they moved in with the black people?
BG: I did not experience any relationship, because I worked at South Miami Senior from 1971 through 1994. And when we first opened South Miami Senior, we had maybe about 17% Hispanics, that was about that much. And when I left South Miami, the Hispanic population I think was like 79%. Yes.
CH: You know, it is said that black people resented Cuban immigration because they said that Cubans were taking their jobs. Did you hear any sentiments like that?
BG: Of course I heard it, yes! But I didn’t see the tremendous impact here in South Miami. It did not impact South Miami as it did other areas.
CH: Why do you think it did not?
BG: Because there was no place in South Miami, basically, where you were going to work in South Miami. South Miami Hospital was the largest employer in this area, and when they opened, there was an agreement that they would pull people from this area to work in that hospital.
CH: I see.
BG: You know, I have always looked around in South Miami to say, “Where are people working in South Miami?” People live in South Miami-- they call us the bed and breakfast. You live here, but you don’t work here. There are people if they work here and you ask them, “You work in South Miami?” “Yes.” “Where do you work?” “South Miami Hospital.” And of course Larkins came in, and that was another influx. But those who had to go out for the jobs, they felt the impact, especially people who were doing domestic work.
CH: That’s what I thought too. You’ve been speaking a little bit about your job, can you come back on that and tell me where did you, when did you start working and what were you doing exactly? Betty Shannon Gibson 15
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BG: I started working in 1960 at George Washington Carver Junior/Senior High School in Coconut Grove. And I graduated from that school in 1955. And I was a media specialist. They changed our name from librarians to media specialists and I was the head media specialist there. There were two other people who worked with me. And I stayed there until 1969 and I went to Ada Merritt Junior High School. That was when forced immigration came about and they mixed up the schools. And they were supposed to move twelve people out of Carver to go into a predominantly white school. And some place along there, someone made a mistake and they had to move thirteen, and I was the thirteenth person, and they assigned me to Ada Merritt. And I hate to say this but, I went to work once a week to keep my contract intact.
CH: Why did you do that?
BG: Because I didn’t like the school.
CH: What about it?
BG: It was an integrated school and there was fighting all the time. But the interesting thing about it, it wasn’t fighting among blacks and whites, it was fighting among Hispanics and whites, because that was basically a Hispanic school. And one morning, I went to school and there were two young men who had been fighting and blood was everywhere, and I said, “I don’t have to take this.” And the way there were handling it, I refused. And then I went to an interview that they were giving the teachers and so forth, and I got up that night and I told them - everyone was talking about Dorsey, which was a predominantly black school and white teachers didn’t want to go there – I told them, “Not only you don’t want to go to Dorsey, you don’t want to go to Ada Merritt.” I said, “You sit there, roaches cross, crawl up your leg, urine comes out the second floor down to the first floor.” And it was the total operation of the school, I did not like it.
CH: And then you moved to South Miami?
BG: No, I didn’t move to South Miami. I applied for a sabbatical, which was to go off and study. I applied for transfer and I wrote a resignation. I did the three. And I called the person who was over that area and I said, “Mr. Norton, this is what I applied. Now, get me out of this school.” And he said, “Where are you going?” And I said, “I have a job.” He said “Where?” I said, “Killian Senior.” He said, “You have what?” I said, “Sure, I could have taken that job three years ago and I turned it Betty Shannon Gibson 16
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down because I wanted to stay at Carver.” But I said, “I want to go to Killian this year.” I said, “I talked to the principal, he said ‘Betty, come on,’” I said. But this man, the principal where I was told me I would upset his racial balance. I said “I am going to upset it because I’m not going back to your school.” So I went to Killian. And on my transfer, I put this: “School you want to transfer to: South Miami Senior under construction, Miami Killian, now Southwest.” Those were the only schools that I wanted to go to. And I told him I had a child, and I was not gonna leave my baby standing at a bus stop at seven o’clock in the morning, waiting for a bus to take her to school. So I stayed at Killian, and they had forty-two people to apply to South Miami and they were going to select three of them. And I was one of the three. So I moved out of Killian and I went to South Miami in ‘71.
CH: I see. To what extent did race play a role in getting a job, I mean, you talked a little bit about it, but was that like a barrier for black people still to get a job in schools, for instance?
BG: You know, some people had difficulties. I had no difficulty getting a job, because I came in from A&M in ‘59 and I interned at Northwestern and a lady name is Ida Radcliff. She was a terrific person. She accepted twenty-three interns in her building that year. She sent all of us to schools in Dade County to interview for a job, go to the school board and fill out everything. And I went to Carver for an interview and the principal there told me there was no way he was going to hire me in his school. And I said, “Why?” And he said, “Because you cursed me out your senior year” And I looked at him and I said, “You know something, I did curse you out but I never used curse words.” He said, “I know you did not but the way you can curse somebody out is worse than if you use profanity.” So I told him, I said, “Well, you’re not going to hire me.” His secretary said, “--------- you’re not gonna hire Shannon?” “No, I’m not hiring Shannon.” So I said okay, I said, “I am leaving but I’m gonna tell you something: I’m gonna work in Dade County.” He said, “Yeah, we’ll see.” Well, I was married, nobody knew I was married. So I applied for the job in my married name. And he hired that married person (laughing) because I was the only media specialist applying in Dade County and it was segregated school. So he hired me, and when they had the first meeting and I was siting there when he walked in, and he looked and he saw me, he asked me, he said, “What are you doing here?” I said, “I work here.” He said “No, I don’t have a Betty Shannon here.” I said, “But you got a Betty S. Gibson there.” And he said, “That’s you?” I said, “That is me.”
CH: When you worked in the schools, did you ever experience segregation? Betty Shannon Gibson 17
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BG: Yes, we had meetings. All the schools here were segregated except the four, there were four black schools here. And we had meetings and they started off, that the supervisor would meet the black media specialists. And then, all of a sudden, she decided no, she wasn’t going to do that. We started meeting together, and I had two sisters my first year when I came. One was the media specialist from Miami High, the other one was from Palmetto Senior. And any time I had a problem, those were the two people that I was to call.
CH: In the ‘50s, when you arrived, do you think that South Miami was a safe place to live? In terms of crime or?
BG: That did not even enter my mind. No, it didn’t. Nothing-- when I was a teenager, crime was not part of my life.
CH: And what about today, do you think it’s a safe place to live?
BG: In South Miami? I think it’s one of the safest places in Dade County.
CH: Do you recall having heard about any incidents between black people and the police force in South Miami?
BG: [laugh] In South Miami? Oh sure.
CH: There were a lot?
BG: Well, I don’t know about a lot, but I do know there were some, yes.
CH: And what was the kind of incidents happening?
BG: Things where policemen would tell blacks they had done anything, or see something and they didn’t particularly liked it. Then, that black person was apprehended. And there were a lot of bad things. And I knew about that.
CH: And did you hear about black people being mistreated by the police force?
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BG: Of course.
CH: They were?
BG: Sure they were. They were beaten.
CH: Just for things that they did or things that they didn’t do?
BG: Whether they did it or not. If you got a policeman who had an attitude, then you would go and get hit. And you had to be protective of that.
CH: And what is your opinion about the police service in South Miami today? Do you think that it is efficient and non-discriminatory or not?
BG: Non-discriminatory gives me a question mark. I won’t say yes, but I won’t say no. But they are good and the number of people we have as patrolmen in South Miami is tremendous with that population. That was one thing, when they went into increasing the police department – I know this because my husband told me – the total number per capita working with people, we were above some of the other places.
CH: What is your opinion about the development of South Miami over the years, in terms of growth, of buildings, and of traffic?
BG: The total thing in South Miami?
CH: In general?
BG: We have done more building, I guess, since the hurricane - I’m going back and trying to get a ten-year span here - than ever. And a lot of it is attributed to a lot of things. And I know here in basically the black area, if they’re working with drugs and they find drugs in my house, they kick you out, they keep that house, they tear that house down. And I’ve had some questions about “Why tear the house down? Why not just take it, redo it and sell it.” But I know about two places right around here where they tore the houses down. But it makes space for other houses. And with Betty Shannon Gibson 19
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Jimmy Carter’s housing development, we have, they have bided (?) and they have worked on that housing development, and it has been very good.
CH: I see. Some people opposed further development in South Miami, saying that, you know, more buildings or more condominiums would make South Miami overcrowded, would make the traffic horrible. What do you think about that?
BG: I don’t think we need to build anymore unless they’re going to build into something they are tearing down. Because the building that is here…, now and I am a citizen of South Miami and I hate to drive in South Miami now, because of all the parking and the way the streets have been done over. I think it’s tremendous. And I do not like driving in my own city, and I don’t believe that they need to put condos in South Miami. We are a small town, leave a small town.
CH: Speaking of the traffic problem, what do you think also of the public transportation in South Miami?
BG: Public transportation? [laugh] The bus that comes through and the Metrorail?
CH: Because some people have complained that they were bad.
BG: I don’t know. You know, I haven’t been on a bus, I don’t think in twenty some years, except charter buses. I ride Metrorail all the time. I drive my car down to the Metrorail station, I leave it there and I go any place in the city that the Metrorail can take me. And if I have to go to Liberty City to a meeting, I go on the Metrorail, when I get where I’m going, I call someone, “Hey, come get me.” They said “Where are you?” “I’m at 29th Street or I’m here or here.” I just tell them, they come and get me. After the meeting, they take me back, I take the Metrorail, and I pick up my car.
CH: I see. What is your opinion about the parks and about the recreational areas in South Miami? Do you think that there are enough parks and that they are well used or not?
BG: The park area, we have enough, they just need to be developed and maintained and have people to work them, that’s [are] going to work them, and provide the correct assistance to kids. Give the kids things they need, not necessarily what they want, to do to just play and don’t have organized--and they are attempting to do that now. And I am waiting for them to finish Murray Betty Shannon Gibson 20
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Park because that is a park that has felt the brunt because it’s basically within the black neighborhood.
CH: So you think this one is not as much maintained as the other ones because it’s in the black…?
BG: Of course they’re not. No, they have not been maintained. Some people will say, “Oh yes, we have this.” No, you have to look at the situation. What is happening now, they have people in there that are working and they are maintaining. The park was not maintained. It was not even given the materials to be maintained. You would go to Dante Fascell Park and you go to Murray Park, and you could see the difference and with the kids that are involved there.
CH: I see. I’d like to know your opinion about the new shopping center, you know, Sunset Place. Do you think it is a good thing for South Miami, I mean in the long term or not?
BG: I’m holding. I’m holding on that, because I think about the Bakery Center and all that money that was torn down. We are talking about millions of dollars that stayed there less than ten years.
CH: Why do you think it failed?
BG: What they used it for…what they used it for, and the stores that were in there. Their prices were horrible. I’m a person who goes into a store and buy if I see something, I have to have it. I don’t ask how much something cost. If I see it’s there, I’m gonna buy it. And I went in the Bakery Center one day when my granddaughter was born. And I was going to buy this dress for her, and when they told me how much the dress was, I said, “Thank you very much,” and I got my purse and I left. I said even I wouldn’t just walk in there and buy something. And it wasn’t maintained, the stores and the things that were there. It did not appeal to people.
CH: The way it looked?
BG: The activities that went on. The best thing, two things, there was a gym and the museum for kids. And the movies, half-way.
CH: Can you talk about the Holsum Bakery that was there before the Bakery Center?
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BG: Oh, that was just a bakery!
CH: But I heard so much about it.
BG: I loved it because during this time of the year, the area that faced US 1, they always did Christmas scenes, and everything there, and it was like, “This is a holy place,” and so, and it hired people. And they worked there, we could go to their shop and buy bread and so forth. And, uh, there is a section of Holsum bakery I did not like, but I don’t want to talk about it.
CH: Which section?
BG: [Laugh] Their employment of the people.
CH: You don’t want to talk about it?
BG: No, I don’t want to talk about it. [Laughs]
CH: Okay. Why do you think it moved then?
BG: Expansion, money. And they needed to expand. There was no place there for them to expand, and they have done well where they are.
CH: So that was a loss for South Miami when they moved?
BG: South Miami gained a lot of money when they moved. Yes, there would be stores and everything coming in and so forth. And as I said, the bakery is still fine. I have relatives who work for the bakery; that’s why I know things about the bakery I just don’t want to talk about.
CH: Okay, so we won’t talk about… I’d like to talk a little more about your husband and his basketball career. Can you first tell me when you met your husband?
BG: I met my husband in 1955.
CH: And what was he doing at that time? Betty Shannon Gibson 22
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BG: On every college campus there is some place where the guys get together and stand and watch the girls go by. At A&M, the corner was by the Administration Hall. And I was going by there one day, going to the cafeteria, and these guys started to swoop (?) at a group of us who were walking by. And I turned around - I was told I did this - I turned around, and I turned up my nose and I crooked my lips, and turned around and kept walking. And I never said “boo” to no one there. My husband was part of that group, and he was the one who told me I did that. And I was a freshman. And I never had [anything] nothing to do with him until my senior year. I worked in the dormitory for four years. And I saw him every week because he would come in to pick up a young lady to go out and so forth. And then my senior year, A&M opened up the last of their women dorms and they selected ninety-seven of us to live in that dorm because there wasn’t a night matron, you were on your own. And we had to go, if you were a counselor that was going to be your house for that year for the freshmen. We had to go to school early, we put that dormitory together. We unpacked all the furniture and everything. And I went to the student union one day and bought some ice-cream and as I was going out of the place, this guy said, “Hey girl, get me some ice-cream.” And I turned around, do my usual thing, and it was him. And I gave him a quarter, I said, “Go buy your own ice-cream.” And I walked back. And when I went back the next day, he was there, and we started talking. That was it!
CH: Were you interested in basketball?
BG: No. Not at all. No.
CH: And was he playing at that time already?
BG: Yes, he was one of the star athletes in the state of Florida.
CH: I see. How popular was basketball at that time compared to other sports in general?
BG: How important to me?
CH: No, to people in general?
BG: Oh, they loved it.
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CH: Compared to other sports, to baseball or football?
BG: Basketball has always been behind football. No one takes basketball over football but the players. [Laugh]
CH: Can you tell me about your husband’s career, like when did he start and who was he playing for?
BG: His career after college? Okay, when we left college - Wilt Chamberlain. What had happened, they had come looking for professional basketball players from A&M. And they were told they didn’t have any, and my husband went to school here. And that summer he went to Philadelphia, and he knew Wilt Chamberlain and Wilt Chamberlain told him, “Go home, pack your bag, and go to Syracuse. Be a walk-on.” And my husband walked on at Syracuse. Syracuse had a team which was the Syracuse Generals. And he worked with them, I think the first month, and at the end they told him they could not sign him, but they would put him on the farm team, which was the Baltimore Bullets, out of Baltimore, Maryland. And he played for them.
CH: And then I think he played for some other teams?
BG: He played with Baltimore and then he was supposed to go back with the Generals. And there was another team and I don’t remember what it was, but it was with the NBA. He was supposed to go with them. And in the meantime, they started the American Basketball Association. And he decided to get smart. You don’t jump leagues, I learned that. And he jumped from the NBA and went to the ABA. And the team he went with was the Chicago Majors and it was owned by Abe Saperstein, who owned the Globetrotters.
CH: So that’s how he met him?
BG: That’s how he met him, and Saperstein started and they played for two years, and the ABA couldn’t hold it, they couldn’t make the stand against the NBA. And then, Saperstein asked the players who played for this team out in Chicago, was there any who would like to try out for the Globetrotters. And my husband did.
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CH: I see. How were black players welcomed by white professional players at that time, like in the 1950s, 1960s?
BG: I don’t know. I guess they got along fine because when they went there, they played together. They may not have spoken once they got off the court, but they got on that court and they played together.
CH: And, how were they welcomed by the spectators?
BG: Oh, the spectators loved basketball.
CH: So they didn’t care whether it was black people or not?
BG: At that point, they didn’t call them the black seat on the floor, that I had taken place in the 1950s, I know.
CH: Is it true that black players were paid less than white players?
BG: Yes.
CH: Did your husband ever hear about the Globetrotters before he played for them?
BG: You know I have to take you back. Oh dear, my husband had things that he wanted to accomplish in life. And, I don’t know if I’m getting ahead of you or not, my husband did everything in this life he wanted to do, which was very unusual. And he told me, he said, “I’m gonna tell you this now,” he said, “You’re sick and I know how sick you are,” he said, “But I am sure that I am going to die before you.” He said, “I have done everything in life I wanted to do.” He said so, he just as well admitted this and I said, “Leave me alone, don’t tell me about this.” And this started continuously about a year before he died. But when he was growing up, there were things he wanted to do. And he wanted to be a Globetrotter.
CH: What did it mean for him?
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BG: He said he wanted to be a Globetrotter because he wanted to travel all around the world. And he knew that was one way that he could do that. And in order to do that, he had to get out of high school, go to college, get out of college, and he could get to the Globetrotters. And it was so strange, but when he wrote and told me that he was part of the Globetrotters, and I wrote back and said, “Call me.” And he said, “I’m gonna do it.” And I said “Okay, how many years you’re adding?” He said, “I don’t know, but I got to do this.”
CH: What was it for you to be the life, the wife of a Globetrotter?
BG: I didn’t see him as a Globetrotter. And I tell people this, I saw him as my husband. And all the stuff that he did, and people used to tell me things, and I would stand there and look at them, because I didn’t see him as a Globetrotter, as this or that, I saw him as the guy that I loved.
CH: How did he deal with fame, I mean when he was a Globetrotter he must have been famous?
BG: How did he deal with it? One day some kids were talking to him and I remember him telling them.
[end of tape one]
CH : This is Cecile Houry with Betty Gibson with tape 2. We were talking with how he dealt with fame. Can we talk about that?
BG: Okay, he was talking with a group of students and he said, “Fame is okay, but it was a job, ” and when you go on a job, you do the best that you can do, and all the fame that you want will come, if you’re good enough to achieve it. But you’re not going to a job saying, “I’m gonna be famous, I’m gonna be this,” you have to put your work in it, once you put work into it, and then you’ll get the rest out of it.
CH: What can you tell me about Abe Saperstein, like his personality or his financial crisis…
BG: The only thing I know about Abe Saperstein was that, when my husband went to work with him, and he signed a contract, he also signed a contract for me. I was paid by Abe Saperstein twice a month. I got a check on the first and the fifteenth of every month.
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CH: To do what?
BG: It was my money. My husband didn’t have to send me money. I got my own money. That part came out of his check, he never had to worry about whether he paid or sent me money, or anything, I got that every month. For four years I got that, and our house was broken into the sixteenth of every month [laughs], because I would take the tips (?) and leave them on top of the dresser.
CH: Some black players criticize Saperstein saying that he was using black people to make money, but that he didn’t really care about their integration, or them; do you agree with that?
BG: I never gave it any consideration. Basketball was not part of my life. I had a husband, who was a basketball player, and I loved him, and I never saw my husband play, but twice.
CH: Really?
BG: And we were married thirty-five years, before he died.
CH: Wow. But did he tell you how Saperstein was behaving with players?
BG: No. We never talked about it. We talked about things that happened, and travel, and everything, but we never talked about Saperstein.
CH: So can you tell how the team worked, like the organization?
BG: Ok, when my husband started playing, they had a situation that most people didn’t know about. When my husband played—
CH: What was the year he started? ’60?
BG: No, he started with the Globetrotters, [pause] ’63, ’63.
CH: So what was the team like, the organization?
BG: Now, there were three Globetrotter teams when my husband played for them. Betty Shannon Gibson 27
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CH: Really?
BG: Yes. And my husband played on the international unit. He played on the team that traveled around the world. And Meadowlark Lemon would be flown into the major cities to perform. So people never knew that Meadowlark was a United States predominantly player. And if they went into Germany in a certain town, that was outstanding, Meadowlark would get flown in and he would perform.
CH: So he was playing on the US team, and your husband was on the international one, and he was just joining them.
BG: My husband played on the international unit. Then they had one team that hit all the major cities and that was Meadowlark in that team. Then they had a lower team that went to smaller cities up throughout and around.
CH: How were the players selected for which teams?
BG: I don’t know. I don’t know how they were selected. But that was what happened. And, the one who has the bald head, oh, what was his name, gosh, [voice from background suggests Curly] Curly, Curly, played with my husband. They came out of college the same time.
CH: Did you know how they practiced, like how many times they practiced?
BG: I don’t know how many times, but I can tell you this: their practice was just like the other NBA and so forth. They had a book, and they couldn’t let that book get out of their hands, not one time. It was secret; you could not handle that book.
CH: Did the players have particular things to do or could they improvise during the game or the show, because it was a show?
BG: Everything came out of that book. Everything you saw them do, it was to a tee. You could go to page this, look on the page there, and you will see that is what is supposed to be done. And if you did it and you weren’t supposed to do it, you were fined.
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CH: What was his schedule like…practicing in the morning, or traveling; would they travel every night?
BG: I don’t know…they would travel, yes. The, I was home here in Miami; wives could not go anyplace. You could meet them. My husband would send me a ticket, I would take Delta, fly into Chicago…when they would finish in that area, I would get a plane, and come back to Miami. One time I took a train, I just wanted to see, how long would it take for a train to get there, and my husband told me, “Now when you get there, you tell the cab driver to take you across the street, because the Hilton Hotel is right across the street from the train.” He said, “If not, they’re going to take you around the loop, and they’re going to charge you all this money.” So when I got there, I told the taxi driver, “It’s cold, I can’t walk across the street, and I have a baby. Please take me across the street, go out the parking lot, down the street, and right there to the Hilton.” And in that way, you got out, but you know, they practiced.
CH: There was a debate whether the team was, you know like a good basketball team or just a good showmen team. What do you think about that?
BG: They were good basketball players.
CH: Compared to the NBA?
BG: They were good. They just weren’t good enough to stay with those NBA unless they wanted to. If they were that good…. because Chamberlain, he was a Globetrotter. And there were about four others that were Globetrotters. If they could get there, which you would find…and during that particular time when my husband came, you would talk about segregation, theywere not going to let too many black players on a NBA team unless you were super good.
CH: How were the Globetrotters perceived by the white people?
BG: Terrific. If you look at the audience, you see who was in the audience [….] They wouldn’t have survived if white people were not there.
CH: But do you think they were seeing them as basketball players or as clowns?
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BG: Both, both. Because that’s why sometimes they would take a NBA team and drop them with the Globetrotters to play. And I used to ask my husband, I said, “Were you all supposed to let them win?” He said, “It’s according to what Saperstein and the other coaches decide.” He said, “If they told us to go for it, we could beat the hell out of them.”
CH: Oh, that’s interesting. And how was they perceived by the black community?
BG: They loved them.
CH: And so they went to see them?
BG: Yeah, they went to see them.
CH: And how were they perceived by the NBA players?
BG: I don’t know. I would read about it…like I said, I was not- I had a basketball husband who was this and that, and I saw him play, twice.
CH: During the ‘60s, I know that black people criticized the Globetrotters saying that they would perpetuate black stereotypes, or like as “coons” symbol, Uncle Tom…what do you think about that?
BG: It happened because segregation was very deep during that time. During the ‘60s when they were playing, there was not desegregation, it was not there. They rode buses from one city to the next, unless they were coming to Miami, if they were coming to Miami, they’d jump a plane. But when the traveled, especially in the Northwest and so forth, they rode buses. The night my husband gave up the Globetrotters, he gave it up in Canada, playing on an outdoor court.
CH: Why did he give it up?
BG: Because he had been home for the holidays. They had come home that year. And he went back and he said all of a sudden, here he is a man on an outdoor court and it’s freezing. “Are you gonna be a fool and do this the rest of your life or are you gonna walk away and do something else?” Betty Shannon Gibson 30
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CH: What year was this?
BG: 196…66, 67, school year. That’s how I relate to things [laughs]. And that night the phone rang in our house, and I picked up, and he said, “Hey girl, whatcha doing?” And I said, “Nothing,” he said, “Come get me,” I said, “Come get you? From where?” And he said, “From the airport,” I said, “Airport?” he said, “Yeah, I’m coming home.” I said, “Thank you, God.” Remember now, he had been playing since 1959. And he would leave in August, and come back the end of March.
CH: When he stopped playing, did he still follow the results?
BG: No. You know, that was interesting. He told me one day, I said, “Are you going to see the Globetrotters.” He said, “You crazy?” He says no. I said, “Why not?” He said, “That was my job. That is not my job anymore. That part of my life is over.”
CH: I know that the Globetrotters played in several movies, I heard about two of them. Do you remember that?
BG: The movies? I have the movies somewhere. My husband was not in one them.
CH: Do you think the movies were popular?
BG: I don’t know. I really don’t know.
CH: What about the TV series? There was a TV series about them.
BG: It was a series, but it was a cartoon. It was interesting to the kids, but I don’t think the adults really tuned in that much. I don’t believe they did.
CH: And what do you think the goal of the program was? Just to show them basketball players?
BG: Show them basketball, show them Globetrotters, that they were part of an environment, and let them know about them.
CH: Do you think they played a role in the integration of black people? Betty Shannon Gibson 31
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BG: They played an important role because when Saperstein started the Globetrotters, black players were not playing with the NBA or any other. And he brought them in to say, “These people up there, they’re basketball players.” And they did, they performed under the most adverse situations you would want. Where they had to play, they could play in the Miami arena and then they had to find a home to find a place to sleep. And they did this, and this was part of the integration movement. Wilt Chamberlain went into the Globetrotters, and he went from the Globetrotters all the way up. He was a terrific person.
CH: What do you think about the Globetrotters today, because a black man owns them now?
BG: He is an ex-player. He played with my husband.
CH: Mannie Jackson?
BG: Yes.
CH: And do you think they still have effect here (?), touring around?
BG: Well, they’re still performing, and I went to see them, two years ago. I took thirteen kids. My granddaughter wrote a paper, sponsored by the Herald. They were bringing Globetrotters, and it was given to the public schools to get the kids to write essays on why they think the Globetrotters are important, and what would they want from them, and my granddaughter wrote this about her grandfather, was a Harlem Globetrotter, and the things he did, and she put in there, the one thing he said that was closer to him than everything else, was that one-man audience, and that was the coach. They played for the coach.
CH: How was it for him to play for the coach?
BG: He loved it. He said that was the best of everything, because this person, he knew, would watch him (…) (?). And my granddaughter wrote that. And she said, “And the part I want most of all, I want a Globetrotter shirt for myself, because my grandmamma won’t let us touch his.” [Laughs] And she won, and she got five tickets. But that was the first year I had ever - and I did this before she wrote - I called the Globetrotters’ office, told them who I was, and told them I wanted some tickets to take my grandkids to see the Harlem Globetrotters. And they called me Betty Shannon Gibson 32
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back, and asked me how many tickets did I need, and I told them I needed six tickets, and they said, “Ok, you can have it.” And then my granddaughter won the contest and they gave her five! [laughs] So we gave them…no, they have to be relatives, I cannot take kids to this game unless their relatives, because that’s what I told them. So I pulled together all the little cousins, and we took those kids over there two years ago. And when I got there, I started looking, and I said, “Oh, the coach, the coach,” I said, “No, it can’t be.” So afterwards, we had the autographs going, and I had taken one of the old programs, and I turned to the head coach and I went up, and instead of giving him the current program, I pushed this program through, and he looked at the program and then he stood up, and he was trying to find who had given him that program. And I just stood there. And he said, “Betty Gibson.” I said, “You remember me.” He said, “Yes. Your size has changed, but you’re still there.” But he autographed everything, and he asked me, he said, “Did you bring some kids? I know you did.” I said, “Yes.” He said, “Get all your kids.” And he led us across the way, and we went down into the locker room and the kids were…they just had a terrific time.
CH: I’m sure they did.
BG: And my daughter did, too, because my daughter had never seen the Globetrotters. One time, but she was a little girl, she didn’t remember it. So we all went and we took all the kids and they got autographs, and they had fun.
CH: You said you saw your husband playing once or twice before- what was the difference with the Globetrotters you saw, when your husband was playing and—
BG: I never saw him play with the Globetrotters. I saw him play once at college, and I saw him play once with Chicago.
CH: I see. I’d like to come back a little back on his life. When did you get married?
BG: 1959.
CH: And how many children did you have?
BG: One.
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CH: One daughter.
BG: I had one daughter. He had a son before we got married.
CH: And can you tell me what he did after he retired from basketball?
BG: Ok, when he retired from basketball, it was the year I got the federal grant from the government to go to school, and he had been telling me that he wanted to be a policeman. And I said, “My God, please don’t do that, please. I can’t sleep if you do that.” He says, “Ok, I won’t.” Well, every summer he had come home, he had worked with Firestone Stores; he was the, how would I say this, it wasn’t a mortgage, it was the bill-reducer. He would have all the accounts of people who had not paid their bills, and he worked on those during the summer. So when he came back, he went back with Firestone and he was working there. Well, I packed my bags, and I went to Virginia State that summer, and he would write, and he would talk to me on the phone, but he would never say, this is happening, this is happening, he would just say, “We’re having a good time; I’m going to Tallahassee for the weekend,” and so forth. Then I opened a letter from my mom - I guess I had been there for about five weeks - and here was an article from the Miami Herald, and it said, “From Court to Court.” That meant from the basketball court, to the court, and there was my husband standing up there in a police uniform. I said, “Why did he do this. He didn’t do this.” So I called my mom, she said, “I just want you to know, don’t tell him I told you, don’t say anything, just come on home.” And when I got home, and he picked me up, my daughter said, “Mommy, Daddy is going to be a policeman.” And I said, “What?!” He said, “Yeah, I’m in the Academy.” I said, “The Academy, what is that?” He said, “They train me to become a policeman.” I said, “Who are you going to be a policeman with?” He said, “The City of South Miami, of course!” I said, “I don’t believe this, I thought—” He said, “That’s what you want, it’s not what I want.” So he joined the South Miami Police Department, and he worked there four years, and from the police department they started talking to him about running for Council.
CH: Talking about politics, in general, black people have been a strong supporter from Franklin Delano Roosevelt. I’d like to know what he represents for you.
BG: Who? Teddy Roosevelt, I mean, Franklin Delano Roosevelt? He wasn’t part of my life.
CH: How do you remember him? Betty Shannon Gibson 34
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BG: I remember he ran three times, and that changed the Constitution. [Laughs] He put on there, no more three times. Twice, go out, stay, and come back. [Laughs]
CH: Most black people are Democrat, and I’d like to know your political affiliation on the national and local levels.
BG: Now, I am a Democrat. I was an Independent for umpteen (?) years.
CH: Why?
BG: Because I didn’t want to be associated with neither one of the parties.
CH: And why did you change?
BG: Well, you start thinking, who is going to influence this country, the Independents never were. Your ideas could be listened to, but nobody was going to act on them. So you decided, do I want to be a Republican, do I want to be Democrat. This is my reasoning. Franklin Roosevelt, I read about him. I read about Herbert Hoover, too. And all these different things…what do they have that is influential in this country? What is going to make this country work-- nothing really, but who is going to do the best job?
CH: And what about the local level? What do you base your vote on?
BG: With South Miami, the best person, the best person, who is going to the job here in South Miami. And are they going to be man enough to go beyond our small politics and include the politics that is happening in Florida and Dade County.
CH: Can you tell me about your husband’s involvement in South Miami politics? When did he start running for office?
BG: He became a policeman, in 1966. And there were certain things that he thought that should be included because he figured that blacks were not given a fair deal, because they didn’t have anyone down there on the council. My husband was the first black man elected on the South End. Betty Shannon Gibson 35
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CH: That’s what pushed him to be elected, because he wanted to better black people’s life?
BG: That’s right, and especially young people. He had a craving that young people needed somebody. They needed an example of somebody who was going to talk to them, be an example and push them along the way, and let them know that they could achieve far more than someone saying, “Go to school. Once you go to school, you finish school, that’s the end of your life.” And that’s the beginning of your life. And he just wanted that. And one thing he was very fed up with South Miami, and here we’re back to the park situation.
CH: I heard he did a lot with Lee Park.
BG: He did. I used to get so upset. And one time he was pushing for a pool. They needed a pool because there wasn’t any blacks around here with a swimming pool. Kids could not swim. Kids were drowning over there at Blue Lake and so forth. And he pushed, and pushed, and then the city manager said “We’re gonna get a pool. Commissioner Gibson, we’re gonna get a pool.” And when the pool showed up, my husband got so upset, I thought he would have a stroke or something. You know what the pool was? Take a guess.
CH: It was like really small, tiny.
BG: It was a rubber pool, that’s what it was. You know, and they said, “This is something the kids could play in.” He told them they didn’t want anything they could play in, like that.
CH: So you told it, he was the first black city commissioner, so that meant for the first time black people were represented directly in the city council. So what other measures did he push for in favor of black people?
BG: I know one thing he did. His things were always for kids. And they started, it was like an after school house, but it wasn’t an after school house. It was a place that they could go and have something to do. And it was down, where? It’s a market there now, 62nd Avenue. It’s next to the service station. It’s like a mini market. And he was able to get a federal grant to bring in this particular program, where kids could go there, play cards, shoot pool, and do a little bit of everything in that facility. But what he objected to, it wasn’t operated the way he wanted it. Betty Shannon Gibson 36
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CH: What about? What did he want?
BG: He wanted someone in there who knew what they were doing, not just to put anyone in there. My husband was a person that, you just don’t put a person there to say, you’re covering, these are black kids. Just have someone, I hire you because you want the job and you are doing what you need to do. Because you weren’t trained to do that. And he pushed that. And the next thing he became a part of, was the police department going into the schools. He was the one that pushed that program and it is now all over.
CH: You mentioned first when he stopped being involved in the political system in South Miami and I read that it was during an election, a debated election, with Mrs. Janet Launcelott. Do you remember that?
BG: No, not with Mrs. Launcellot.
CH: Who was it about?
BG: It was with, what’s the other lady? No, it wasn’t with Launcelott. She became the mayor. McCann!
CH: Oh, because I read an article about an election for a commissioner seat that was really close between…
BG: No, it was McCann.
CH: So what happened?
BG: She beat him.
CH: And that’s when he stopped?
BG: That was in 86. He was elected from 1970 to 1986.
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CH: And why do you think she beat him?
BG: I would hate to say this because it is what you’re doing here, but I’m going to say it: she lied, she lied. She knows she did it, I know she did it, and both those campaigns, people know she did it. And I wanted to bring her down, I really did. And my husband said no. He said, “You don’t win elections by lying; you can win it here, but it’s gonna catch up with you.”
CH: What did she lie about?
BG: I can give you an example of what happened. We were doing a revision of one of the charters. And I was on it. My husband had suggested this, he was pushing this program. And they had to gather a committee to work it. I was on the committee; Cathy was on the committee, and the others. We had to elect a chair person for our committee. And we decided to be very cooperative, the entire committee. And we elected Cathy as chair of that committee because she wasn’t there that night, so she couldn’t give it up. So the committee, we operated that entire year. We came up with a lot of problems and so forth. And in her campaign, she put down there that my husband showed up to not one meeting. My husband was not on the committee, I was. I was the one that had to send all my credentials to the state of Florida. My husband didn’t have to send nothing for he wasn’t on there. And it was things like this.
CH: So that ended up your husband’s career in the political system of South Miami?
BG: Well, legally he was not part of the commission anymore. My husband never stopped fight for South Miami.
CH: Can you reflect on his political career in South Miami in general, like was he, did he enjoy it or was he frustrated about it?
BG: No, he wasn’t frustrated, he enjoyed it too much.
CH: Really?
BG: Yes. If there was any type of disturbances in South Miami, he was there. I remember in 1980 when the riot was. Betty Shannon Gibson 38
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CH: What was the riot about, can you tell me?
[End of Tape 2 Side A]
BG: There was a riot which was the outcome of a policeman killing a man. The riots were extended all over Dade County, and of course, there was reaction here in South Miami. My husband stayed up three nights, day and night, up there on the corner trying to keep things under control. And they had a city council meeting during that particular time. And this guy got up in the meeting, and he wanted to know what were the council people doing; they couldn’t keep order so he could sleep. And he just went down the line, tearing each one of the people to pieces. And that’s the night I got thrown out of City Hall. My husband told me, “Get up and leave.” You never knew when my husband was upset, because he had a peaceful demeanor about him. And I got up and I told that man, I said, “You could sleep because my husband didn’t sleep.” I said, “Whenever there is something going wrong in South Miami, you know that Spike Gibson is up there on that corner, because that’s part of his life.” And this went on, but he stayed on that corner, he was always there on that corner.
CH: I heard that Mayor Block once proclaimed a “Leroy Spike Gibson Day.” Can you tell me about that, like when it was and why exactly?
BG: Yes. There is a plaque that’s on a shelf back there. It’s a proclamation if you want it, you can take a picture of it. The proclamation was given the day that Florida A&M included my husband in the Hall of Fame for the state of Florida. And I think we had about eighty people who went from South Miami to Tallahassee to see this particular ceremony.
CH: After his political involvement, I think you started a business of your own. Can you tell me about that?
BG: Okay, we started that business in 1970 when he first became a member of the council. We had a security business.
CH: So what were you doing exactly?
BG: We provided security. Betty Shannon Gibson 39
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CH: In South Miami?
BG: All over the County.
CH: And you’re still doing that?
BG: No.
CH: When did you stop?
BG: We closed it down in ’88.
CH: I’d like to know what you think today is the most urgent need for South Miami?
BG: [pause] Urgent in what respect?
CH: The urgent measures to be taken for South Miami concerning, you know, whatever aspect you want, like traffic, or…What do you think is really needed right now?
BG: [pause] What I really see in South Miami now, I see a decline in blacks here in South Miami, and it has bothered me because we see all the new housing that has been initiated, but I also see blacks moving out. I see all the blacks dying, their homes being sold, and blacks are not buying in South Miami. They are other people; when I say other people, they are not black.
CH: Why do blacks not come in South Miami?
CH: I’d like to know what you think today is the most urgent need for South Miami?
BG: South Miami is an old community. It’s a settled community and blacks are not trying to come into the little small towns because it’s expensive. When you try to buy a home in South Miami, and you go to Liberty City, you’re going to get twice as much for your home, and you’re going to pay less there than the three bedrooms you want to buy here in South Miami. I have had people right around me who were black who moved out. And their homes were going to other people. Betty Shannon Gibson 40
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CH: Just to conclude, I’d like to come back on something that you mentioned before. You said that your mum was saving money because she thought you would go to jail, because you were doing the marches. Can you explain [to] me exactly what happened?
BG: Well, my sophomore year at A&M, we were in an assembly and all of a sudden, someone came in with a paper that said a bus driver had thrown a student off the bus because she refused to move to the back of the bus. And that was during the time when Martin Luther King was marching in Alabama and so forth.
CH: What year was that exactly, do you remember?
BG: My sophomore year, that would have been ’66-67, some place in that area. And we decided at that point that, no, we were not going to let this happen. That bus had to come through our campus. And I’m a sophomore and I’m sitting there, and I’m voting yes, we are not gonna let this bus come through this campus. So they turned the assembly out and everyone in the assembly walked to that street. That was my first time doing anything like that, and then later, I thought about it. I said, “You were stupid. You were a sophomore and you got on the front line with the seniors.” And I was-- here I am on the front line; if the bus is coming through, it’s gonna hit the person on the front first.” But we went through that, and we started getting instructions: how we do certain things, how we go downtown, and don’t sit here, we are going to sit there, and so forth. And it became part of our life.
CH: And you did some other marches, some other sit-ins?
BG: Yes. I would go out at night, but I had permission from higher-ups, how to get in and out of dorms. And I did this, and I told my mom I was doing it.
CH: But you never got arrested?
BG: If I had gotten caught, I would have been thrown out of campus because you had to be in the dorm by a certain time. But one of the guys who worked on campus, he had his car the places we would meet and etc, and he would bring us back on campus. And I told my mom, just save some Betty Shannon Gibson 41
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money. And she said, “I knew you were gonna do something.” She said, “I knew it, because I know you.”
CH: And did you do any protest when you got off college, like in Miami?
BG: No, I never did it. I just, I wrote things, and I wrote things and I protected black kids.
CH: What did you write things for?
BG: Opinions.
CH: But I mean, were they published in the newspapers?
BG: No, no, no, they went to the places I would want them to go.
CH: Can you give me, like a particular example about that?
BG: Well, say, no, I can’t use the name, I’m sorry. [laughs] But some politicians, if I wanted something known, I would write someone in Washington, or I would write someone in Dade County. I would do this, and they knew exactly what I was looking for and things had to be done. And even right there at South Miami Senior, one lady told me one day, she said, “You know, you’re a radical.” I said, “No, I’m not. I just don’t want you messing with my kids.” I said, “You criticized them when they are bad, and you straighten them up. Don’t tell them their clothes look good, that doesn’t mean a damn thing to their brain.” I said, “Now, either you work with the brain, or leave them alone.” And it was just that. I’ve always protected kids, not only black kids, I protect all of them. One of my best-known cases is with a Cuban kid. And I still have her. She calls me wherever she is, she calls. And that’s why I got very uptight when they start talking about-- separate kids from their families, their moms and dads, and let them stay with an uncle or something--you have to be very careful with your kids, that way.
CH: I see. But you were never involved in groups like the NAACP?
BG: Of course!
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42
CH: You were?
BG: Yes!
CH: In Miami?
BG: Yes, I’m a member now.
CH: So, can you tell me what you were doing with that group?
BG: Whatever they did, I supported them because my minister was the president. He and Father Gibson went all the way to the Supreme Court with Miami.
CH: Can you tell me what for?
BG: Integration of schools, integration of schools. Father Gibson’s son was one of the first black kids to go to a white school.
CH: And, were you involved with the black women’s movements, like the National Council of Negro Women?
BG: No.
CH: I’m gonna thank you for answering all of those questions. That was really nice.
BG: I hope that they help you. It didn’t seem like I’ve done anything. [Laughs]
CH: Sure they did. I would ---- without you helping me knowing what happened. Thank you very much.