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James L. Ross oral history interview 3, 2005 March 22

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@ University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Description

James Ross, a native of Mecklenburg County, discusses his experiences with racial segregation and civil rights activism in Charlotte, North Carolina. Growing up in rural Grier Heights, Mr. Ross attended Billingsville Rosenwald Elementary School and Clear Creek High School before being transferred to the urban Second Ward High School as a result of city expansion. Education was segregated at the time in North Carolina, and only black students attended these three schools. Mr. Ross discusses his experiences serving in the United States Air Force in Texas, where he worked alongside whites for the first time, and his subsequent career in job development and consulting in Charlotte. Mr. Ross also relates his involvement with the Charlotte Bureau of Employment Training Placement, whose goal was to integrate the Charlotte workforce. In addition, he describes his work with Charlotte mayor Stanford Brookshire and Charlotte police chief John Ingersoll during the 1960s and 1970s to help improve communication and relationships between white and black residents of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, which included sensitivity training for white police officers. In particular, Mr. Ross stresses the important role that negotiations, humor, and peaceful protests played in bringing about a positive change in race relations in Charlotte during the 1960s-1980s.
Type:
Sound
Format:
Spoken Word1 Audio File (1:32:08) : Digital, Mp3 + 1 Transcript (52 Pages)Audio/Mpeg
Contributors:
Howard, Debbie (interviewer)
Rights:
The materials included on this web site are freely available for private study, scholarship or non-commercial research under the fair use provisions of the U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, United States Code). Any use beyond the provisions of fair use, including but not limited to commercial or scholarly publication, broadcast, redistribution or mounting on another web site always require prior written permission and may also be subject to additional restrictions and fees. UNC Charlotte does not hold literary rights to all materials in its collections and the researcher is responsible for securing those rights when needed. Copyright information for specific collections is available upon request.
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Record Contributed By

University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Record Harvested From

North Carolina Digital Heritage Center

Keywords

  1. African American Neighborhoods
  2. African Americans
  3. Billingsville Elementary School (Charlotte, N.C.)
  4. Brookshire, Stanford R., 1905 1990
  5. Carver College (Charlotte, N.C.)
  6. Charlotte (N.C.). Police Department
  7. Charlotte Bureau Of Employment Training And Placement (Charlotte, N.C.)
  8. Civil Rights
  9. Civil Rights Movements
  10. Clear Creek High School (Charlotte, N.C.)
  11. Community Organization
  12. Discrimination
  13. Discrimination In Employment
  14. Group Relations Training
  15. Ingersoll, John E
  16. Johnson C. Smith University
  17. Race Discrimination
  18. Race Relations
  19. Ross, James L., 1934
  20. Second Ward High School (Charlotte, N.C.)
  21. Segregation
  22. Segregation In Education
  23. United States
  24. United States. Air Force
  25. Universities
  26. University Of North Carolina At Charlotte

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Charles B. Trexler correspondence Charlotte Placement Bureau William H. Barnhardt correspondence Good Samaritan Hospital report by Herbert Hitch Mrs. Leonard F. [Louise S.] Hatz correspondence D.E. Coltrane talk Bethlehem Center picnic Elizabeth Michael correspondence Judge Francis O. Clarkson correspondence John M. Belk to Stanford R. Brookshire correspondence Francis J. Beatty correspondence E.J. Moore, Community Relations Committee correspondence Pat Watters correspondence M.W. Crosland correspondence Joe H. Robinson correspondence Mrs. J.Z. [Louise] Watkins, Reverend Wilson O. Weldon correspondence John Harden correspondence
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