Joel Buchanan Archive of African American History: http://ufdc.ufl.edu/ohfb Samuel Proctor Oral History Program College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Program Director: Dr. Paul Ortiz 241 Pugh Hall PO Box 115215 Gainesville, FL 32611 (352) 392-7168 https://oral.history.ufl.edu AAHP 077 Samuel Taylor African American History Project (AAHP) Interview conducted by Paul Ortiz on September 5, 2009 1 hour, 22 minutes | 34 pages Abstract: Sam Taylor grew up in the 5th Avenue neighborhood of Gainesville, Florida, raised by a father who was a business owner with an eighth grade education and a mother with a master’s degree from Columbia University and an undergraduate degree from Tuskegee University. He relates the general lack of connection that he experienced growing up between the University of Florida and the Black community of Gainesville, other than once sitting in the segregated bleachers at a UF football game, and having an uncle who worked as a custodian. Mr. Taylor attended Lincoln High School in Gainesville, and he describes his family life and what it was like to grow up in Gainesville during the Jim Crow era. He also describes some of his family history and the impact that his parents had on him growing up, as well as Lincoln teachers who had particular impact. He matriculated into the University of Florida in 1964, and later went on to become the first Black student body president. He describes the importance of those leadership roles in terms of their impact on his later life. He also was running for president during Black Thursday, the student demonstration that led to the founding of the Institute of Black Culture and the African American Studies Program, and he describes the event as he experienced it. Keywords: [African American History; Alachua County, Florida; Lincoln High School; University of Florida] For information on terms of use of this interview, please see the SPOHP Creative Commons license at http://ufdc.ufl.edu/AfricanAmericanOralHistory. AAHP 077 Interviewee: Samuel Taylor Interviewer: Paul Ortiz Date: September 5, 2009 O: We’re here this morning with Mr. Sam Taylor. And we’re honored that, Mr. Taylor, you can take time from your busy weekend schedule to talk to us. My name is Paul Ortiz, I’m director of the Oral History Program at UF. And I wonder if we could start with some history questions, if that would be okay with you. T: That’s fine. O: Okay. Mr. Taylor, can you tell me a little bit about your family’s educational background? Maybe your parents or grandparents. T: Certainly, mmhm. My grandparents attended high school, but actually I don’t know whether they graduated or not. The subject never came up. Both of my grandfathers were deceased when I was born, but both grandmothers were educated for the day. And my maternal grandmother, who lived with us, read every day—the newspaper, and she’d sit on the porch and read that. I’d pick up that habit from her, and an appreciation for reading as well. My parents are an interesting combination. My father is a business owner; he always owned his own businesses, and had an eighth grade education. The schools didn’t go any farther than that in rural Louisiana where he grew up. My mother had a master’s degree from Columbia. That was during the time where there were no Black students at the University of Florida. So even though we lived on Fourth Street, and she could have walked to campus, she could not go to school here. So, she had to get her master’s from Columbia, her undergraduate degree is from Tuskegee University in Alabama. AAHP 077; Taylor; Page 2 O: Do you know what years she was attending Tuskegee and then Columbia, around what decade? T: For Tuskegee it was in the 1940s, early [19]40s; Columbia in the late [19]50s. O: Okay. So, you grew up in Gainesville? T: Yes, I was born in Alachua General, two blocks from campus. O: Now, your parents—of course, University of Florida is a historically White institution. Did you ever think growing up that—well, actually let me back up: what kind of contact did you have with the university growing up? If any. T: None. None. O: Okay. T: Well, other than public events such as Homecoming parades. Those were always fascinating to me. I was in band in high school, and had taken piano as a child, so I loved music, and would thoroughly enjoy the parades. So, I have vivid memories of those; the floats, and that being a major production. Gator Growl. That was the extent of my exposure to the university, other than the occasional person in the community, African American person, who worked at the university. During those days, all employees that I knew of at the university were janitorial- level personnel. In fact, one of my uncles was also at the university as a janitor for many years, and he would share occasional information. In particular, just conversation about the school. But one major memory that I have is my father, who had no real like of football, bringing me to a Florida-Auburn game when I was twelve. So, that was rather interesting, because he had never taken me to a football game before. We did things together. But he felt for some reason that AAHP 077; Taylor; Page 3 that was important. And we came to the campus, went to the game, and during that time even the crowds were segregated. So, we had to sit in the end zone and watch the game. But I liked it. I felt very comfortable in the setting, even though there was this major barrier of segregation there. During that time, the Gainesville community—and this whole part of Florida—was completely segregated. There was no breach that I knew of, in that façade. I would not see role models anywhere, except the occasional doctor or dentist— O: Maybe A. Quinn Jones, or some educator? T: Well, yes, educators, but my mother was a teacher. So, I had an appreciation both for the education professionals’ love of their work, and also the very limited economic results they got from that. But my mother was passionate about teaching, thoroughly loved it. So that helped me to develop a love of learning, as well. O: What types of values did your parents really raise you with that really stayed with you? T: That’s a good question, because I think that made a huge difference in the person that I am. Their sense of the world was honed by the era that they grew up in, so they had to proscribe their world within the knowledge that you can only do so many things in a segregated society. But, what they did impart to me was that I could do anything I wanted, and could be anything that I wanted. So, I had a very strong sense of self coming from them, and it was reinforced. So in spite of the barriers, in spite of the courthouse and other public places having White- only and Colored fountains for drinking—you know, water fountains, things of that AAHP 077; Taylor; Page 4 nature—those were things that I saw, but I didn’t accept. Neither did I get angry because of the way they raised me; it was more of an optimistic—“possibilistic” is one way to look at it—perspective on what can be done with my life. Traditional values: you don’t steal. You don’t lie. You work with people. My mother was a primary grades teacher, so I’m thinking of Robert Fulghum’s book here, Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. Fulghum. But in any case, that was the kind of setting that I grew up in. Very strong values when I grew up. O: Okay. If you could think back, Mr. Taylor: your senior year in high school; what were your aspirations? What were you thinking about in terms of the future? T: Well, I had expected in my senior year to begin seeing some breaches in that façade with segregation, because the times were changing there just a bit. The Civil Rights Movement was gaining some steam, and I wanted to begin crossing, or just removing, some of the barriers that existed. So, I wanted to do things like go to—just to visit—Gainesville High School. Interestingly, we had to go to Lincoln High School, even though the original location for Gainesville High School was maybe a five minute walk from my house. O: Really? T: Yes. I had to go to A. Quinn Jones Elementary School, in order to catch a bus to go all the way across town to go to Lincoln High School. So, the controversy over bussing a few years later I always thought was rather interesting, because we had always been bussed, even though it was have been very easy to—physically easy—to attend the nearest high school, but we couldn’t go there. O: What street did you grow up on? AAHP 077; Taylor; Page 5 T: 4th Street. O: 4th Street. Okay. T: 4th Avenue and 4th Street, so I was four Gainesville blocks—which are short blocks—from downtown, and could walk everywhere, pretty much, that I needed to go in that community. I wanted to go to restaurants. Could not go to restaurants when I was a kid that were not Black restaurants. The Florida Theatre; again, four blocks from my house.