Interviewee: Mr. Michael Searles, male, African American, Augusta University, Georgia Interviewer: Dr. Niki Christodoulou, Augusta University ******************** Dr. Christodoulou: Mr. Searles, tell me a little bit about yourself. Like, your name, date of birth and your ethnic background. Michael Searles: Ok. Alright. I’m Michael Searles, Michael Nathaniel Searles is my full name. I taught at Augusta State University for twenty years full time. My area of interest and history of my academic area is again, is African American history. And I’ve taught United States history, African American history and a course called Blacks in the American West. And so my specialized interest, my specialty is really the Black Cowboy, the Black West. And that’s basically a little bit about me in terms of just who I am and what I’ve done at least at the institution. Yeah. Dr. Christodoulou: So I know they call you Cowboy Mike. Michael Searles: They do. Dr. Christodoulou: Tell us why. Is this related to your specialization, maybe? Michael Searles: Yes it is. Yes, um quite a few years ago, maybe it’s thirty years ago I started doing research and discovered there were Black cowboys. I always taught, I had been teaching Black history for a long time but I didn’t really know much about Black cowboys. And once I discovered there were Black cowboys um, again I began to do research, collect materials and artifacts, and various items. Um, and affected a cowboy dress. I got my cowboy hat and bought some cowboy boots and working clothes etc. and I began to do presentations. I began doing presentations at elementary schools, middle school, high schools and then eventually universities on the Black West. And as I would go out to do these presentations I would introduce myself as Cowboy Mike. In fact, there are a lot of people who only know me as Cowboy Mike, it’s a name that a lot of people know me by and that’s just fine. A lot of people call me Cowboy Mike and that’s fine. (1:57) Dr. C: Alright, very good and very interesting. So, I’m interested in your contribution in education in the CSRA. Michael Searles: Okay. Well you know I think education occurs on several levels there is formal education and I had an opportunity again to teach both middle grades and high school as well as the university level. In that situation of course your meeting with classes on a regular basis and you’re addressing various subjects. As I said before, I taught United States history and then I taught African American history and I taught Blacks in the American West that’s a very important function. It’s an important function for a variety of reasons. One is that not only- you do a couple things. There are a wide range of students who come through the university who are not history majors and their not majoring in the social sciences, their science majors, their physical education majors etc. And they really need to be introduced to history. They need to be again, I used to tell my students that, that was an important part of citizenship. Again, to know a bit about the past and one of the quotes I used to use, I think it was actually taken from Cicero. But, one of the presidents at the University of Colorado used to cite this all the time, again in its basic the notion that “if you only know your own past, you remain forever a child”. So the idea of knowing about the past becomes very important not only instructing you as an individual but making you a better citizen. So there are a variety of students who came through the class who basically were not history majors, were not social studies majors that I though had benefited. I had individuals who were teachers who were planning to become teachers who came to the class and was told later on, that teaching classes in African American history in particular was a great advantage to them because they were gonna be teaching in primarily Black schools. And so while they might not be teaching history they thought it was important to know a bit about the history of the African American experience in this country. And they’ve come back at times and have told me how valuable that really was. So, that’s kind of the formal aspect of teaching, but I think there is another form of teaching that’s less formal and sometimes called public history. When I would go out into the communities and I would go to elementary schools or middle schools or high school, universities and talk about the Black past and talk about African Americans in the West this was a way of addressing the public and I also talked- I also used to speak to citizen associations and various citizenship groups, senior citizens groups and etc. And again talk with them about and share with them about this history. They were not taking a formal class and they weren’t taking it for credit but it was a way again or broadening again their historical understanding. So, as things came up as they watched things on television- for example, you’re watching a television program and you see a Black cowboy do you say well what is he doing there, was that just put in for political correctness? Is there any historical accuracy behind this? By folks being introduced to again the historical information that’s out there on Black cowboys you’re broadening the public’s understanding. So I think that- and I guess I have spoken to I can’t say every elementary school or every middle school in the CSRA but I’ve spoken to a lot of them over a period of thirty years, I’ve spoken to a lot of school groups and a lot of citizens groups. So I think that in that way it contributes to education in the CSRA in a broader sense. And that’s what I’ve tried to do. (5:45) Dr. Christodoulou: So you were invited in schools or you were actually teaching in school classrooms? Michael Searles: No, I was not teaching. Except I did teach the public schools, I taught public schools for five years but, generally it’s invitation. Usually would be in February, because it’s Black History Month and quite often teachers are doing so kind of unit around Black history and so they contact me. And so, they say well Cowboy Mike are you available to come on this day or that day and sometimes- most of the times I was speaking to the whole school, sometimes to just a few classes but ordinarily I was speaking to the whole school so the whole auditorium would be filled the whole gymnasium would be filled or cafeteria would be filled with students from whatever grades were there. And sometimes I would come and I would speak three times during the day. I spoke to the first two or three grades, then this next two or three grades and then the next two or three grades again on the subject- often the Black West and Black cowboys. And so these were with invitations that’s correct. I would be invited to do that. Sometimes I have a chance to also write articles- I write now-write articles for the newspaper- for my local newspaper. And I would be asked at times to write subjects around Black history which I’ve done as well so both in terms of formal classes informal presentations and writing newspaper articles. Again I think that kind of how I have addressed the issue of education in the CSRA (7:07) Dr. Christodoulou: You mentioned before that you taught middle school and high school. Was that before you started teaching history at Augusta College? Michael Searles: Yep. Well actually yes and no. I have been doing these presentations for a long, long time so when I was- initially when I came to Georgia I taught at a private school, Boggs Academy and that’s when I first started doing presentations. Then I taught in public school at Henson Middle School, I taught in Henson Middle School again for five years before coming here to – and I taught also at Georgia Military College and so I taught in various places. Once I came to the university I still was invited out so I would be teaching here at the university but elementary school would call me or middle school would call me or high school would call me and so I would leave my- I wouldn’t quite leave my classes in mid-sentence but majority of the time I wasn’t teaching a class I would go out and talk to them and I continued to do that yeah. (8:03) Dr. Christodoulou: So you are not from Georgia, right? Michael Searles: Not from Georgia, but I have been here again um about almost about forty years now. Dr. Christodoulou: Forty years? Michael Searles: Yeah, yeah. Dr. Christodoulou: And how did you manage to spread the word? Michael Searles: Well, I didn’t really try to spread the word. In other words I never hired a public relations agency or again have an agent that would call schools and say oh Cowboy Mike’s available would you like to have him. It was just by word of mouth, uh-students. I’ll tell you a funny story. I would always ask my class, why are you taking my class? And one young man stood and he said, well the reason why I’m taking your class is that you came to my elementary school, and of course he is in college now- you came to my elementary school and you talked to us about old Blacks and old Black cowboys. And because you came to our elementary school I was familiar with you and familiar with your name and so I signed up for your class. Well, that’s really how it happens. One teacher would say well I want to have a Black history program, who should I call? And someone would say, oh why don’t you call Cowboy Mike or he came to my school or he was here a few years ago. And so after a while- of course from time to time I would be featured in the newspaper. I was featured in the Augusta Chronicle a couple times and so or a local newspaper thing so people might have seen me there. I might be interviewed on TV because I would be asked sometimes to be on radio shows in the area and I had been on TV. And so people might see you on TV, they might appear on a radio show, they might have seen me in the newspaper or someone might have said oh yeah Cowboy Mike does that. And so after a while you don’t- I never asked people can I come to your school it was always would you please come. Sometimes too they might be doing a unit, wouldn’t necessarily be February on Black cowboys and so the kids would be reading about the West and they would be reading a book and things like that. And they would ask me to come in and things like that I would sort of ducktail off the book and talk a bit about Black West. (9:53) Dr. Christodoulou: So, has history class changed? Did it used to be different? Are there more on Black people now? Michael Searles: Yeah, I think that textbooks for one have broadened and have included more about the Black experience. There was a time some years ago the only time you saw any reference to African Americans in a textbook was during slavery. But now you’re more likely to hear something about Crispus Attucks or about Blacks in the Revolutionary War. Or you might hear something again about Blacks during the Civil War, like the fifty-fourth Massachusetts regiment or you might hear something about the Buffalo soldiers or- so now textbooks have more fully integrated these aspects of the Black experience into them. And then there are teachers for example, you know these teachers that would call me where they take a book of fiction again about- a story about a Black Cowboy or his family- it’s not part of the textbook but it’s something the teacher has selected for the kids to read and to talk about. And so in that way I would say definitely that’s changed a great deal. So that African American experience is not that strange, it was at one time only- mainly Black schools might have something about Black history but now it’s much broader than that. (11:14) Dr. Christodoulou: What are some of the events that have happened in the area; important historical events that maybe you have experienced that make you feel like talking about Black Cowboys? Michael Searles: Well I would say one thing that I was able to do when I was here is to bring events to campus. I used to bring the Buffalo Soldiers to campus every year, now these are reenactors. These are basically folks who have studied about the Buffalo Soldiers- let me tell you about the Buffalo Soldiers first, give you a little background. After the Civil War, Black Soldiers were for the first time in U.S. history allowed to join the standing Army. Now this was not the first time Black Soldiers had participated or fought in wars, that happened back even before the Revolutionary War, Blacks were fighting but they were fighting as volunteers. But, after the Civil War Congress authorized the establishment of units so that Blacks could become part of the standing Army. When they went out West, places like Kansas, places like that again the most popular sort of story about how this happens is that they were seen by the Indians in Kansas and it was the texture of their hair that reminded them of the buffalo and so they begin to call the Black soldiers, Buffalo Soldiers. So there is a real history- a whole tradition in fact right now I’m writing a book about the Buffalo Soldiers right now. Again, the ninth and tenth cavalry were initially the Buffalo Soldiers, but after a while all Black soldiers in the infantry and the cavalry were called Buffalo Soldiers. Well, there are a number of groups around the country that have basically embraced this notion of being a Buffalo Soldier. So some of them again have horses, and they have the uniforms that again the Buffalo Soldiers would’ve had and they would come to schools and they would ride and show their horses etc. Even a motorcycle group called Buffalo- that again that adopted the Buffalo Soldier signature and they are also interested. Well I used to bring the horse group of, the cavalry group to the campus here. And so they would come from Atlanta and places like that and they would bring their horses and then I would show a little film on the Buffalo Soldiers. And they would ride around and do different formations and students and community people would come and I watched them and after they were through they would talk to them and they would take pictures of them, out the kids on the horses whatever things like that. Now that’s something that again I think broadened at least a number of the students here and of course some of the TV stations would come too and they would photograph it and we would be on TV as well. And once I had a cookout once where again we had folks who were cooking in a traditional fashion that folks would get a chance to eat what the Buffalo Soldiers would eat or that kind of thing. So, on campus I was able to do a few things like that to broaden the focus. Now, I really again I really began to think about this things before I came to the university so I can’t say the university inspired me to do that. But, I was at the university when I was first asked to write again- first I was at the university when I was first contacted by Dr. Quentard Taylor who is a professor I guess out at the University of Washington now. And he again contacted me and asked if I would write about the national American biography, multi- volume set that was by the University Press, he contacted me and asked me if I would do an article, would I write for them. He knew that I- I had known him a long time ago we met at various conferences. He knew I was interested in Black cowboys and I was doing research and presentations on them. He asked me to do a research- write an article for them which I did, it was published. It was about a Black cowboy and here’s where it’s interesting and of course again today you get into language that’s a little- becomes a little problematic. The Black Cowboy was mainly known- only known really as Nigger Ad, a word that is today banished from the lexicon because of its offensive nature, but that’s how he was known. And so I began to do research on it and a lot of research on him to try to discover a little bit of background about him and I found somethings about him. Eventually, I discovered what his name was, his name was Adison Jones and so that I wrote this article for the American National Biography and then later on. Sometime later on I was contacted by Sarah Massey, who was editing a book on the Black Cowboys of Texas and she had found my name out there somewhere and she called me here at the university and asked me would I be willingly to write a chapter on a Black Cowboy, Texas Cowboy, and I said I’d like to write about Ad so she said okay great. So I wrote a chapter in Black Cowboys on Texas on Adison Jones or Nigger Ad. So being here gave me an opportunity to bring events to the campus in fact I was able to bring Dr. Quentard Taylor to campus and he spoke not only to my students but to the university at various times and also had a chance to co-curate a museum exhibit on Black West up at the Booth Museum of Western Art in Cartersville, Georgia. So, yeah so somethings have happened since I was at the university, but again I brought some of that with me some information with me. (17:17) Dr. Christodoulou: Excellent. Do you remember any experiences or stories that made you think that, “oh, what I’m doing is important”? Michael Searles: Yeah, uh a couple instances in that regard. I was at a middle school here in Augusta and I was dressed up in my cowboy, I wore a little bit different but my cowboy clothes. I was ready to go and speak to a middle school group, two things happened there that I’m gonna mention. Before I spoke to them I was meeting with some teachers and counselors we were just sitting around before the presentation and one said well Cowboy Mike, don’t be disappointed if you don’t get the full attention of the students; she said, well you know how students are. I said okay, alright, I knew that wasn’t going to happen but I said okay. So, I’m waiting to speak in an outer area to be introduced all the kids are inside, most of the kids are inside one Black kid comes by and he looks at me, he starts laughing, he just laughs and laughs. He laughed so much that he falls on the floor, he’s practically in a- he’s all curled up again just like an infant. After laughing, this laughing must have gone on for about three or four minutes he finally gets up and walks away. Now he never says a thing to me, he never asks a question or never engaged in conversation, he just looked at me and started laughing. Now, my interpretation was that seeing me dressed up like a cowboy was just so far from anything he could imagine, a Black cowboy that all he could do was laugh. Now, that again in itself told me that a number of students that I was going to talk to that day and had talked in the past probably had a notion probably in a kin to his notion that obviously you couldn’t be Black and a cowboy, because all cowboys were White. And to be dressed up like a cowboy was just a complete forest and so that was one thing that made me realize- that made an impression on me that this was important. It was important for people to see and for them to experience. And to see images on the screen of real people who lived many years before who were cowboys and a little bit about their exploits. Another experience that wasn’t mine personally but a friend told me about that I thought was very important. He was a- he works for again the- he works for the National Park Service and he is also a reenactor- an African American fellow also a reenactor and so he was showing some images of Blacks during the Civil War a public presentation. After the presentation a White couple comes up to him and they said, “You ought to be ashamed of yourself,” he said, “What do you mean?” Photoshopping those images in a sense to fool the public, what they assumed he had done was to put Black faces on the images that they saw. That those weren’t true images that really wasn’t the way it was, those were not soldiers that fought during the Civil War but something that he had developed or invented. I found that and he did too, to be amazing. The people who come to National Park service are generally speaking folks who have- well a lot of people come but people who generally have a high school education, many college education but people who have a broader knowledge. You know, you are not going to remote parts of this country where people are again distant and away from basic information. Yet, this couple were convinced that what they saw was false, was not true. And so I think that we assume so many things about the public. Oh the public knows this, the public knows that or we assume that people have an understanding and sometimes they don’t. And so when you are able to bring information to people that they maybe never heard before and convince them that this is historically correct and true and not something that has just been invented, then I think you’ve made a contribution. (21:58) Dr. Christodoulou: Um, so what is the impression of this on White people? You told me before about how Black kids react, what about the White kids? Did they react differently? Were they more surprised? Michael Searles: Well, I think that the public in general- unless you come into contact with folks who’ve had first-hand experience. I’ve been in classrooms where at least some of the students are teachers. For example, I have come from parts of the West where they have seen physically seen Black cowboys. So, that’s not extraordinary but I think from most of the public that there’s little, very little information or there is very little knowledge or very little contact with Black cowboys or with the knowledge that Blacks were in the West. If you turn on your TV and you watch a movie and you see homesteaders you don’t expect to see a Black homesteader. You don’t expect to see a Black family out there. You don’t expect to see a Black deputy sheriff riding after outlaws, like outlaws and arrest them. You don’t expect to see White sheriffs doing that or White marshals doing that. And so that I think that for the general public I say this- well and that- I never had an experience like that young boys experience anywhere where Black students were just incredibly incredulous, but I assume that there were some that just basically had a similar feeling until they saw the information. But, no I think that Black and White students probably equally, fairly equally that unless they’ve had some experience unless they’ve been introduced in various ways to the actuality to the fact that there are Black cowboys then their again I think somewhat surprised that’s the case. Yeah. (23:43) Dr. Christodoulou: So you’ve been here for forty years? Michael Searles: I’ve been in Georgia that long. Dr. Christodoulou: You’ve been in Georgia? Michael Searles: Yeah, I was at Augusta State for twenty years- twenty two years. Part time two years, but twenty years full time. Dr. Christodoulou: Augusta State meaning- Michael Searles: This university now- well when I first came here it was Augusta College. Then it became Augusta State University, then it became Georgia Regents University and now of course Augusta University. Yeah. Dr. Christodoulou: So you experienced all of these changes? Michael Searles: I experienced all those changes from Augusta College to Augusta State University to Georgia Regents University to Augusta University. Of course by the time it became Augusta University, which it has just become I was retired. But, yeah, yeah. Dr. Christodoulou: So, in the forty years that you have been in Georgia are there things that you are noticing that are changing or did you participate in any events that are of historical importance? That may not be yet, but may be considered significant later? Michael Searles: Probably the events I was involved in that are historic were probably before I got to Georgia that was when- the time of Dr. King and the civil rights activities in Washington, D.C. I was active in some of those activities etc. Since I’ve been in Georgia probably nothing that would just kind of I think raise its level to that, other than my presentations and speaking at various places, things of that nature etc. Probably more so there than anything that probably arises to the level of state importance etc. just those kinds of things. Yeah. Dr. Christodoulou: Tell me a little bit about your experiences before Georgia. Michael Searles: Well, when I was in D.C. I was there during the time- well I was in D.C for twenty years and so the civil rights movement was very much in full fledge. It was in full swing when I was there. I was there for example when Dr. King was assassinated. Dr. Christodoulou: Do you remember what year it was? Michael Searles: Let’s see, that’s a good question, let’s see here, that would’ve been again the late sixties when Dr. King was assassinated I’m trying to think exactly when that was. I know that I came to D.C in 1965 or maybe 1964 so around that time. Around 1963, 1964 when I came to D.C. And when I came to D.C I came- I ended up going to Howard University to get a master’s degree in African history, African/African American history and was involved in a number of things that were going on at the time. There was a Black power movement that was going on and so I was actively involved in that. And of course, beginning to again learn a lot more about Africa, because I didn’t know much about Africa, I taught- I had been acquainted with African American history before I got to Howard but not much about African history. But, there was a real kind of movement there, it was a whole kind of community that was fascinated by African history and becoming more involved. I was taking formal classes and also involved in some of the events that were going on because African history and African culture were sort of in full bloom. There were groups coming to Washington D.C that were again cultural groups, that were involved in African dance and African presentations and things like that and so you began to hear about those things or participate in those things or watch those kind of events going on. So, I was there at that time again and there were civil rights marches coming to Washington D.C things of that nature so it was a very exciting time, very exciting time. And so, I was involved in groups there like the new school for Afro-American thought and things like that. And, again I was a community organizer there in D.C. during the poverty program days and I was there during the days Dr. King was gaining notoriety and actually gained fame and prominence. And I was there when he was shot, was killed and I think it was about ’68 or so when he was assassinated I think that’s when it was. And so, the day that Dr. King was killed, wow, what a day it was in D.C. It was like the world stood still. And I was at the house with my wife, I was living in Northwest Washington, went down to down to the main part of D.C, down to fourteenth street leads to the main part of the Black community and I saw Stokely Carmichael coming down the street telling people that Dr. King had been assassinated and suggested that they close their stores. And it seemed like seconds after- minutes after that the whole section just kind of broke out, people began to throw bricks into stores and set stores on fire and things like that and it was just- it was horrendous, it was something to watch- something to be really there. I didn’t break any stores, I didn’t break anything, didn’t set any stores on fire but I was there watching and participating as an observer, watching what was going on. And so events were just extraordinary because it lasted for a lot of days, it wasn’t just a one day thing, it took a while for the city to quiet down and police come in and troopers come in and all kinds of things happen. I had one experience I thought was just phenomenal, because I had been a community organizer in D.C. and so I knew the area well, particularly the Shaw area. I saw again shortly after this buses leaving downtown, workers from D.C leaving downtown on their way to Maryland. And I was down there I think on ninth street and I saw some women breaking into some liquor stores and I assumed they were just gonna take the liquor but they brought the liquor out in carts, in shopping carts and as the buses were passing by they threw these- mainly wine- wine bottles at the buses. Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! My goodness, what a protest! It wasn’t to take the wine or liquor to take home to drink it was a kind of rather emphatic statement that, the wine and the cheap wine etc., etc., that so affected so many people’s lives, so many men’s lives, was something again that they were very much again in opposition to and one way of showing their opposition was to throw those wine bottles against those buses with mainly White workers on them heading out of D.C. to Maryland. I just thought that had a profound impact on me in terms of it. D.C was an interesting place to live, it was an exciting place- I testified before Congress while I was there on various issues. I spoke to various groups again about the Black power movement and things of that nature. It was again an exciting time, exciting times. Yeah. (30:47) Dr. Christodoulou: Tell me a little bit about the analogy you made. So you said there was a deeper meaning when they got the wine. So the wine was… Michael Searles: Yeah. Well, I think it was symbolic because wine and liquor of course affects poor people and poor Black communities, seriously, very detrimentally. I mean alcoholism and all the kinds of things that are associated with that, things like that, that again disrupts families and makes life more difficult etc. I think that it was- it was that, it was that. Now I didn’t talk to them, so I didn’t interview them. I just watched them and so I worked in that area where they were located as a community organizer, because I worked in D.C in various capacities being an organizer, I did that and then I worked- I was part of the faculty at the University of the District of Columbia, when it first started it was called Federal City College and I was a part of the first charter faculty there. I was teaching there at that time- during that time I was there, I was doing both organizing and later on teaching there. But, yeah it was just a profound statement. It surprised me, it surprised me again a great deal. So, yeah I think that’s what it was, it was a protest. It was a protest and I don’t know what the people felt who were inside the buses, but when those bottles hit those buses it sounded like bombs going off and they were just throwing them with all of their might at those buses heading back to Maryland again with those- again mainly White workers from D.C on them. Yeah. (32:19) Dr. Christodoulou: Um, do you think that you have done some different things than some people that you know? And what is it that enabled you to become who you are? Michael Searles: Well, you know I think that your experiences have a lot to do with you. I wrote an article for my newspaper called, Blind Spot and that we see based on our experience, our life experiences and what we see around us. And if that’s a fairly narrow experience that’s from which you speak. I’ve been very fortunate in my life, I’ve lived in different- I was born in Illinois, I grew up there so I have some sense of the Midwest. I lived in Washington D.C for twenty years and I had a chance to be involved with a lot of different people on a lot of different levels, etc. And, I’ve been in the South for again another thirty, forty years I’ve been in the South. I had a chance to travel, I’ve been to every state in the United States, I’ve had a chance to travel across the country. I’ve been to Africa, been to Europe and had a chance to talk to and be with a lot of different people. I think that those experiences again, have helped me understand people I come in contact with. I don’t think I could meet almost anyone and not have a conversation with them. I’m as close to you as I was to one of the leaders of one of the White nationalist parties. Now you say how did I get this close in conversation with one of the leaders of one of the White nationalist parties. I was in a little seminar, about eight or nine people when I was in D.C. It was organized by a couple of teachers and they said well friends and they brought together a number of people to talk to this guy. He was like –he wasn’t a member of the White citizens council but one of those White Confederate- well one of those groups like that. We had a chance just to talk, he could share why he felt the way he did, he could ask questions and he could engage in conversation. I’ve been with people who are desperately poor, people who are homeless, people who are hobos hopping on trains and traveling like that, to Native Americans to folks who were again in working cowboys. To folks who were Black working class and Black middle class, and people who are a part of the Black upper class and etc. and the same thing true in the White community. And, so if you’ve had those kinds of experiences and you’ve really taken them to heart and there not just experiences that you say, oh I’ve been here and done that, but you’re really listening to people, you’re listening to people so that you really kind of feel what they feel in their hearts or what they really believe and I think it helps. Then if you’re standing in front of a classroom and you have a person that has never had any contact with a Black person at all or you’re standing in a classroom and you’re standing in front of a Black person that has very deep angry feelings towards White people. Then you find ways of trying to bridge those gaps and trying to bring both individuals into a broader understanding of the world of why people do the things they do. When I was teaching class I would talk about the interment of the Japanese, I said in my class, what if you were someone who either directly or indirectly experienced your parents, your grandparents being taken away. Your living in sadness, your living in California, they are just working people, they have a little business doing okay and one day someone knocks on your door, it’s the FBI and they tell you that in so many days you are to meet at a bus station and your gonna be shipped away into the American desert and you’re gonna stay there until they tell you that you can go. And you’ve got so many days to dispossess yourself of your house, your furniture, your car and of your business. And you meet that person or a relative of that person and they are angry, wouldn’t you be angry? I mean there is no crime. There is one thing to commit a crime and be arrested, it’s another thing to be a law abiding citizen and just be taken away by the government and just forced to live in a concentration camp or whatever. Well, when people hear stories like that, then feelings that they sometimes have had, that are deep feelings, that are angry about this or that, or not understanding why are these people angry why are these people mad about this or why don’t they just appreciate what they have, it broadens their understanding. And I think unless you’ve had experiences for example, have I just gone through high school and college- I had just started teaching at the university and if I hadn’t this experience in my neighborhood I don’t think I would be the person I am today and I don’t think I would be as effective of a teacher as I’ve been. I think I’ve been an effective teacher. Just a few days ago I had an experience that was kind of funny. I’m walking through Walmart, a guy says I remember you, you were my professor at the university thirty years ago. I still talk about you today. I said wow, thirty years ago. I still talk about you today. I mean that’s the kind feeling that you’d like to have as a teacher, but I think it really does help if you have a broader life and broader kind of understanding. (38:03) Dr. Christodoulou: So public historic is a major contribution of yours. Do you feel that sharing your experiences, the wealth of experiences you have accumulated is needed and useful in this area? Maybe you can speak from your experience, visiting schools and so on. (38:38) Michael Searles: I would say it’s needed in this kind of way. We should always- and it would be great if schools did this more- bring in older people from the community to talk to younger people. I mean whatever, just bringing in older people, because I think what it is, is that it’s just so hard for us to imagine the way things were. It’s so funny you ask me this question, yesterday I was invited to come and give a sort of a field trip tour to a number of Mennonite students. There is a Mennonite school in Waynesboro and I was asked by the principal to come and I did. We had- I had about twelve students there, the teacher and about twelve or thirteen students in a little van and we’re driving down Quaker Road, we’re going up to Boggs Academy and I was trying to get them to imagine Quaker Road forty, fifty, sixty years ago in the earlier part of the twentieth century etc. Little houses on the road, those houses have families and those families are mainly sharecroppers. Their working the land right behind their house and their growing cotton and their job is to plant the cotton, tend and harvest it etc. and get a portion of what’s left over and sometimes the portion leaves them in debt. And we stop at again Boggs Academy and we talk about when it was established in 1906 and the fact that there were very few opportunities for Black people to go to school, that education was very, very limited or that the fact that you pass by a little ole- small little church and realize that, that church was also a school for Black kids because there were no other schools, that was the schools. And, you go by- we went by the Lone Star Society House in downtown part of Waynesboro and I said what do you think this was for. And they said was it a church? What was it for? I said well mainly it was a place where people could gather but also- it was also housing burial societies because White insurance companies would not sale Black people life insurance. So, what the people did is they gathered together and they would meet maybe quarterly and you’d register each member of your family and you put a dime in for every member of your family. So that if a member of your family died they would give you say $25.00 towards burial expenses. Well, if you don’t talk about those things if you don’t hear people saying that this is the way it was or we pass by a school bus I say well- many times Black students didn’t have school buses, they had to walk to school you know and people walked a lot more than they do today, they didn’t ride as much etc., etc. So, that kind of information which doesn’t require a profound professor or a history professor to do that’s just someone with past experiences. So when people hear those stories, oh my goodness, is that right? You mean there was times when could be traveling with your family down the highway and you guys couldn’t pull into a hotel and say I’d like to spend the night here? And they say well I’m sorry we don’t serve Black people, Black people can’t stay here. Or you go into a restaurant to sit down to eat and the waiter or the host would come over and say I’m sorry we don’t serve Black people, you have to go someplace else. Well, if you go into a restaurant today, people look like they’re happy to see you and they smile and they seat you or you go into a hotel and they say we just need to see a credit card and driver’s license and how’s your trip been etc. Then they assume that’s the way it’s always been, they never assume that there was a time when you had to go into the community and knock on someone’s door and say do you know where I can spend the night? Well Ms. Jones she takes in people like that or Mr. Smith does down the street there, turn left, turn right. There’s no- there would be no knowledge of that and people need to know that. People need to know history. History shapes who you are. History shapes how you see the world and if you only know – how does the expression goes? … if you only know your own history, you will remain forever a child and you’ll be less respectful and understanding of other people. So yeah I think schools need to bring older people in and just have them talk. Yeah. (43:54) Dr. Christodoulou: Um, what do you think of education in the CSRA? Also, as we are reaching the end of this conversation, is there anything else you would like to add? Any final thoughts about education? Michael Searles: Well, I think that- I think there are good efforts being made to again education to prepare teachers for schools and things like that. I think that it would- and to some extent I’m sure that it does happen- teachers have the experience of going to the schools directly and do student teaching before they actually have the experience of being there. I think whenever you can broaden a teachers experience and whenever this can be done- I know there are a lot of courses that people have to take and are required to take etc. to get their degree. Whenever you can broaden that in any kind of way by looking a bit outside the curriculum again at what’s going on etc. you can do that, then that makes a better teacher. And I think that, that’s just so important and that’s the only thing I would kind of add to any curriculum that if I were engaged in or designing in education specifically that’s what I would seek to do and try to do. I also would say this, too, and this is about teachers, I think it’s really important for teachers and this really requires the system to broaden a bit- to get to know their students, not just as students in the classroom but a bit about the community in which they come from, where they would spend more time or have time to go into those communities so you can see how people are living. It’s one thing to see a kid come to school who hasn’t been properly bathed or a kid coming to school in clothes that are not well kept or not cleaned, its one thing to say well that parent is not very responsible, that parent should do better than that etc. You go to that home and find the challenges that parent is faced with, you might say, well, I don’t know if I were in this particular situation that I’d do a lot better. I’d like to think of myself doing better because I have a very good impression of myself as an individual as a responsible person. You go and find out that they have a washing machine, but the washing machine is broken. I was working with a family like that, it took them months to get that- it was a new washing machine- it took them months to get it replaced. They came and repaired it, but it took a while to get a new one. What happens to your clothes when your washing machine is broken? And you just don’t have twenty dollars to go out to a laundromat, you may not even have a car to take you to a laundromat to buy all the things you need to put money in the machine to wash your clothes, what happens then? Well, that sort of understanding- when people have that sort of understanding they are much more generous and much more accepting and maybe they find ways in which they try to help a child in that situation. In the old days they used to do that. In some of the old schools, I talked to Black teachers that would take a kid in that situation and make sure their hair was combed and make sure that they were bathed, make sure that they had clothes to wear out of their own pocket in many cases so that kid wouldn’t be ashamed and things like that. Yeah. Yeah. (47:44) Dr. Christodoulou: Yes, this is important to know instead of not knowing. Any final thoughts on your contributions, anything else that you feel like you want to add? Michael Searles: Well, I don’t have anything I just wanna add, I just hope that the project goes well and that it achieves its intended purpose. And that I made a small contribution to it. Dr. Christodoulou: Thank you.