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An Interview with Hollis Watkins

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An Interview with Hollis Watkins Singing For Freedom: An Interview with Hollis Watkins Interviewer: Michaela James-Thrower Instructor: Amanda Freeman Interviewee: Hollis Watkins February 11, 2018 James-Thrower 2 Table of Contents Release Forms . 3 Statement of Purpose . 5 Biography . 6 Historical Contextualization Paper . 8 Interview Transcription . 17 Interview Analysis . 52 Bibliography . 58 James-Thrower 3 James-Thrower 4 James-Thrower 5 Statement of Purpose When I was looking for a topic for this project, there were a million different things running through my mind. I knew only one thing. That it needed to be about something that I loved. I’ve always seen music as something that I needed. The Civil Rights Movement was a complicated time for black people. There were all kinds of moments and demonstrations that happened throughout the movement that people don’t know about. There were all kinds of influences throughout the movement as well. I soon realized that I needed to do this project on music in the Civil Rights Movement, seeing as it is one of the least noticed contributors. Even though I caused my parents headache throughout this project with my mix of indecisiveness and perfectionism, I know that this is something that I am glad and proud to have done. James-Thrower 6 Biography Hollis Watkins was born on July 29, 1941 in Lincoln County, Mississippi. He is the youngest of twelve children. His parents were sharecroppers named John and Lena Watkins. He attended Lincoln County Training School in Lincoln County. He graduated high school in 1960. He started Tougaloo College, but never graduated. He had his first job at the age of four as the water boy for his family. After finishing high school, Mr. Watkins was invited to a National association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) meeting by Medgar Evers. While going to college, Mr. Watkins had become involved with the Civil Rights Movement. Mr. Watkins became the first Mississippi student to become involved in the Mississippi Voting Rights Project of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in 1961. Mr. Watkins met Bob Moses and joined SNCC. He then moved all over Mississippi trying to increase voter registration in places such as Hattiesburg, Greenwood and many others. His first sit-in was to draw attention to black education. He was supposed to sit-in at the library but when he arrived it was closed. Mr. Watkins, determined to go to prison that night, walked to Woolworth Department store and performed a sit-in there at the lunch counter to protest the Jim Crow Laws. He was arrested for the first time for 34 days. In 1989, Mr. Watkins established Southern Echo, Inc., which is a non- profit organization that provides training and technical assistance to individuals, groups, and James-Thrower 7 organizations in Mississippi and throughout the South. Mr. Watkins continues to spread hope, love, and song throughout his community. James-Thrower 8 Let Freedom Sing Let music be the answer to all of our problems as it was and has always been. America’s history has been written on sheet music. From the Declaration of Independence in 1776 to Trump’s election in 2016, music has played an important role in decision-making. Music has an influence on most people throughout their day. A person’s mood can be easily changed while listening to a song. Those changes depend on many things like lyrics, chords, tone, and tempo. All of these have the power to affect someone in some way. There are songs that have moved people to hatred, and there are songs that have moved people to love. The Civil Rights Movement has no official start date or end date. Some may argue that the movement began in 1948 when Former President Truman issued an Executive order to end segregation in the armed forces. Some may argue that the movement ended in 1968 when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. The beginning and the end of the Civil Rights Movement depends on perspective. Although the dates may be up to interpretation, music’s vital role is not. To understand music’s impact on the civil rights movement one must examine the importance of music in black culture, popular songs of the time, and the meaning of the movement as well as gain first-hand perspective from someone who was there. Music played a complicated role in the lives of slaves. Slaves were stripped from their homes, the only luggage they carried being their music. During the Slave Trade, beginning in the 15th century and ending in the 19th century, Africans were taken from their homes and transported on ships meant to hold about 250 to 400 slaves. Those ships were often overpacked and held at least 600 slaves instead. On the ships, the slaves were allowed little space and barely any time was allotted for community. They were “allowed to unite while on deck in African Melodies which they always enhance by extemporaneous tom-tom on the bottom of a tub or tin James-Thrower 9 kettle.”1 Slaves traveled with their music. Keeping their united front through the songs they sang together. Slave owners felt that slaves were happier when they sang and played music which made them less rebellious.2 Slaves owners began to enjoy the music they heard from their slaves and shared the music with family. “Generations of white southern children, raised by black women, remembered being sung to sleep with negro spirituals, and associated them with warmth and security.”3 White children grew up with Black music and found it comforting. Which may have led to the belief that black people were comforting in effect. Slaves started to perform to entertain guests at their plantation master’s house. The complications between the slave master and African culture did not stop at slave melodies. Some sections in African culture were banned, such as the beating of drums.4 Slaves weren’t allowed to beat drums because, in African culture, the beating of drums is used as a form of communication. Slave owners were scared slaves would communicate hidden plans through their rhythms, but slaves found other ways to communicate with each other. “Despite their poor treatment, the land and the culture had become part of them.”5 Slaves had been taken away from their homes too long to return. Africa was no longer home, and slaves had to endure the new environment they were placed in. Slaves began to adapt to the white people around them. Maya Angelou says that it’s easy for black people to be portrayed as whites “because we’ve had centuries of having to study their faces. Understanding that a smile could mean “you get flogged today”. Or, a frown could mean “I’m selling you off to Mississippi?”6 Slaves had been told to 1 Black Music In America by James Haskins ,page 3 2 Black Music In America by Haskins, page 3 3 Black Music In America by Haskins, page 9 4 Black Music In America by Haskins, page 9 5 Black Music In America by Haskins, page 2 6 Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, directed by Bob Hercules and Rita Coburn Whack, 2016. James-Thrower 10 forget their culture and study their new environment, which they did. Slaves had to rebuild their culture and connection which had been maintained musically and spiritually. Slaves found their connection through religion. Slave pastors began to expect signals of agreement from the congregation. “Silence in a slave church meant that he was falling short in his delivery of God’s message.”7 It was understood that churches needed to be a space for slaves to speak in order to maintain obedience. “Slave preachers disguised messages of liberation in their sermons.”8 Sermons were disguised as words of encouragement to preserve on their journey to freedom. Preachers might say “ninety-nine and a half won’t do.”9 Which to slave owners might mean simply to work harder but slaves knew they were working towards something much greater. Through the messages and music shared in slave churches, a community was formed amongst slaves. Spirituals and gospel sustained value in the hearts of African American churches. “The exhortatory hymns that had resonated through black churches for decades were translated into anthems of defiance.”10 Gospel had become the main unifier of Black people. People had faith in God. Leaders of the movement saw that as an opportunity to help people put faith in each other and equality. Hollis Watkins thought “If music could do it for the people in the church then music could do it for the people who were not in the church.” Centuries later while classical music became common, African Americans like Maya Angelou sang and spread gospel, shocking people all over the world. This made churches a target for people who were against the Civil Rights Movement. Ed King, a member of the Mississippi Democratic Freedom Party 7 Say It Loud: The story of rap music by K. Maurice Jones, page 22 8 Jones, page 23 9 Jones, page 23 10 The Early Civil Rights Movement, Set To Music by Ben Brantley James-Thrower 11 (MDFP), says “the Klan bombed churches because they were a symbol of faith and strength.”11 Black people learned to overcome setbacks through song and that they were stronger together. Segregation sprouted after the Civil War which began in 1861 with the battle of Fort Sumter. The war did not end until 1865 when Former President Andrew Johnson proclaimed an end to the war. During the Civil War, Former President Abraham Lincoln introduced and put into effect the Emancipation Proclamation (1863).
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