The color of water
Opus the Penguin
and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white use?
Specifically, I'm wondering about:
- Hispanics
- Asians
- American Indians
- Indian from India Indians
- Polynesians
- Greeks
- Spaniards
What about visiting dignitaries from African nations? Did we humiliate them
by making them use different fountains?
--
Opus the Penguin
Carl From Slingblade
>by making them use different fountains?
There was a cartoon in the Realist years ago. Black guy is sitting at a lunch
counter. The guy working there says " You're a foriegn exchange student from
Kenya? Oh, that's different. I thought you were a nigger".
It's hard to imagine why tourists from overseas would have wanted to visit the
deep south in the 50's amyway
.
kay w
>Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white use?
The last time I saw these, it was at the Birmingham (AL) Zoo. Probably 1959 or
so; identical fountains on either side of a walkway or stair, one with a sign
that said "colored" and one that said "white."
In 1959, there were no neither/nor folk that I was aware of; one was white, or
one was not white (unless, for some reason, one could speak with a charming
clipped foreign accent.)
I remember being terribly disappointed that the water from the colored fountain
was just as white as the water from the white fountain; I was expecting
rainbows.
kay w
Address munged. AOL isn't necessarily comatose, evidence to the contrary not
withstanding.
Rick B.
In 1931, the King of Siam came to New York for an eye operation. When an
executive of the Herald Tribune attempted to introduce the king to the
owner of a restaurant favored by the paper's staff, he was told to "get
that nigger out of here."[1] If that was the case in NYC, I would think
that if there was any question at all as to one's whiteness in an area
with de jure segregation, one had better use the colored fountain.
Rick B.
[1]From _The Paper: The Life and Death of the New York Herald Tribune_
by Richard Kluger (Knopf, 1986), pp. 265-66.
ra...@westnet.poe.com
> Remember back when they used to have separate drinking fountains for white
> and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
> question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white use?
> Specifically, I'm wondering about:
Actually, that may not be before your time: such practices continued on
embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
perpetuated even today.
As to the answer to your question, I'd figure that people would interpret
"colored" to mean any color, not merely black, i.e. non-white. So all of
the possibilities would apply.
John
--
Remove the dead poet to e-mail, tho CC'd posts are unwelcome.
Ask me about joining the NRA.
Matt J. McCullar
This question came up again recently (last year) when some old, dilapidated
water fountains in the town square of a small north Texas town (I think it
was Denton) were going to be fixed. They still had the "white" and
"colored" labels on them and hadn't squirted water in decades. Some people,
understandably, wanted the labels removed. Others wanted them left as they
were for history's sake. I don't know what they ultimately settled on.
Speaking for myself (as a white guy), there's a difference between
remembering the past and living in it. I've heard some people (blacks
included) say that we should at least keep items like this on display in a
museum, as a "lest we forget" kind of thing. That I totally agree with.
Tell kids today that America once rationed food during World War II and
their eyes widen with astonishment.
Hank Gillette
<opusthe...@nettaxi.com> wrote:
> Remember back when they used to have separate drinking fountains for white
> and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
> question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white use?
I think they did it on a case by case basis. Senator Daniel Inouye wrote
a book about his World War II experiences. He related how he and other
Japanese-Americans were sent to the deep South for basic training. The
locals decided that the Japanese-American trainees were allowed to use
the white facilities, but not date the white women.
--
Hank Gillette
Geoduck
<mccu...@flash.net> wrote:
(snip)
>Tell kids today that America once rationed food during World War II and
>their eyes widen with astonishment.
Even more frightening, they rationed *gasoline*.
--
Geoduck
http://www.olywa.net/cook
ctc...@my-deja.com
"Opus the Penguin" <opusthe...@nettaxi.com> wrote:
white
> and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
> question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white
use?
"People of color" is generally used to mean any non-whites.
"Colored" is generally used to mean specifically blacks.
But it would probably depend on the bravery of the individual and the
inclination of the local goons.
> What about visiting dignitaries from African nations?
Do visiting dignitaries use drinking fountains in the first place?
Xho
Sent via Deja.com
http://www.deja.com/
ctc...@my-deja.com
Hank Gillette <hankgi...@bigfoot.com> wrote:
> In article <92eg14$6q18d$1...@ID-58324.news.dfncis.de>, "Opus the
Penguin"
> I think they did it on a case by case basis. Senator Daniel Inouye
wrote
> a book about his World War II experiences. He related how he and
other
> Japanese-Americans were sent to the deep South for basic training.
The
> locals decided that the Japanese-American trainees were allowed to
use
> the white facilities, but not date the white women.
The flirting scene on the cosmopolitan campus has lots of talk about
the acceptability of interracial dating to each others family.
The general concensus seem to be that among non-blacks, 1) a
distressing majority parents are not very open minded. 2) they usually
have a hierarchy, not just "us" and "them".
For example,
White parents generally prefered their children to date whites. Indians
and (Oriental) Asians are reluctantly tolerated. Dating blacks is
abominable.
Asian parents genererally prefered asians of the same nationality, then
other Asians, then whites or Indians, and the least acceptable were
blacks and/or Philipinos.
tscottme
in Lewisville over 15 years ago.
Lars Eighner
the lovely and talented Opus the Penguin
broadcast on alt.fan.cecil-adams:
OtP> Remember back when they used to have separate drinking fountains
OtP> for white and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time,
OtP> thankfully) and I have a question. Which fountain did people who
OtP> were neither black nor white use? Specifically, I'm wondering
OtP> about:
OtP> - Hispanics - Asians - American Indians - Indian from India
OtP> Indians - Polynesians - Greeks - Spaniards
In Houston, in the 1950s, all of these were "honorary" whites. When
school desegregation came along in the early '60s, HISD's strategy for
evading it was to "integrate" African American schools with Mexican
Americans and vice versa - on paper this looked like progress toward
integration since the Mexican Americans were, and had been, carried on
the rolls as "white." There was once incident I recall in the
mid-'60s when an Indian girl, who had clearly Caucasian, even Aryan,
features, but was darker than many African Americans, was the subject
of some protest because she was attending an as-yet unintegrated high
school. But this was an upscale neighborhood, so it was possible to
explain that she wasn't really black.
OtP> What about visiting dignitaries from African nations? Did we
OtP> humiliate them by making them use different fountains? --
Jim Crow wasn't law everywhere. Outside of the South, Jim Crow
was mostly a matter of unspoken convention and "gentlemen's agreements,"
and in those places there weren't "colored" and "white" signs -
although Americans knew where African Americans were allowed and
where they weren't. Generally visiting dignitaries did not go to
the South, and could be made "exceptions" elsewhere.
--
Lars Eighner eig...@io.com http://www.io.com/~eighner/
Dynamic linking error: Your mistake is now everywhere.
Jake Schmidt
news:92fhnu$if8$4...@mycroft.westnet.com...
> Opus the Penguin <opusthe...@nettaxi.com> wrote:
> > Remember back when they used to have separate drinking fountains for
white
> > and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
> > question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white
use?
> > Specifically, I'm wondering about:
>
> Actually, that may not be before your time: such practices continued on
> embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
> perpetuated even today.
Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this? I'm not
talking about opinionated things like Rodney King getting beat on because of
his race; I mean things like "Once in 1982 I saw a convenience store that
wouldn't allow black people in the door"--things like that.
> As to the answer to your question, I'd figure that people would interpret
> "colored" to mean any color, not merely black, i.e. non-white. So all of
> the possibilities would apply.
>
>
>
> John
> --
> Remove the dead poet to e-mail, tho CC'd posts are unwelcome.
> Ask me about joining the NRA.
--
Jake Schmidt
Remove nothing to reply--this IS my
correct address...
Mr C
I'm afraid I don't have the answer for you, but I do remember the
solution to this racial conundrum as used by white-run Rhodesia.
In Rhodesia, which is now Zimbabwe, there were three classifications:
European, Coloured and African. An American white living in Gwelo, a
medium-sized city in the geographic center of the country, I
attended "European" schools, as did Spaniards, Greeks (in fact, Lucas
Trakoshis was Capt of Rugby), etc. There was also a school
for "Coloured", which included mulatto (mixed Euro-African), Asian (of
which Indians from India are a sub-set), Middle Easterners and would
have included Polynesians and possibly Hispanics had there been any
there.
Schools for Africans were rudimentary and mainly went to elementary
level. Occassionally, a very bright black African would get to attend
the Colored school in Gwelo.
The way I remember restroom facilities and such is that there was
always European and African, and sometimes Coloured/African, but those
were always nicer than African Only. Europeans and Coloureds could
swim in the City Pool, but Africans could not.
Steve "any CJR or Chaplin alums out there?" Campbell
Rich Clancey
+ Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this? I'm not
+ talking about opinionated things like Rodney King getting beat on because of
+ his race; I mean things like "Once in 1982 I saw a convenience store that
+ wouldn't allow black people in the door"--things like that.
This wasn't "institutionalized", but in 1969 I was working in
a bookstore in Greenwich Village. We used to get sangwidges in a
Jewish Deli down the street (E.8th if you must know). The two
obligatory old bald Jewish Guys in aprons had an assistant, a young
black man, whom they refered to as "Boy". "Boy, open some more
pickles." I'd read about that sort of thing, but was really bowled
over when I saw it happen.
--
rich clancey r...@world.std.com rcla...@massart.edu
:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:
It was practically held that the salvation of one's soul must
not be made too depressing, or the young people would have nothing to
do with it.
-- Wm D Howells _A Modern Instance_
*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
ra...@westnet.poe.com
> <ra...@westnet.poe.com> wrote in message
>> Actually, that may not be before your time: such practices continued on
>> embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
>> perpetuated even today.
> Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this? I'm not
> talking about opinionated things like Rodney King getting beat on because of
> his race; I mean things like "Once in 1982 I saw a convenience store that
> wouldn't allow black people in the door"--things like that.
A Cow Orker went to visit her daugter in college, they went to the caff,
when she got through the line, she found a table and sat down only to be
hastilly told in hushed tones "Mom, don't sit there, that's the Black
table". She moved, amazed that the school would keep such a policy, only
to find out that, no, it was not the school, it was the black students
that had claimed that table and prefered to be segregated from the rest of
the students. 1989.
Randy Poe
<nospa...@home.com> wrote:
><ra...@westnet.poe.com> wrote in message
>news:92fhnu$if8$4...@mycroft.westnet.com...
>> Opus the Penguin <opusthe...@nettaxi.com> wrote:
>> > Remember back when they used to have separate drinking fountains for
>white
>> > and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
>> > question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white
>use?
>> > Specifically, I'm wondering about:
>>
>> Actually, that may not be before your time: such practices continued on
>> embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
>> perpetuated even today.
>
>Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this? I'm not
>talking about opinionated things like Rodney King getting beat on because of
>his race; I mean things like "Once in 1982 I saw a convenience store that
>wouldn't allow black people in the door"--things like that.
Somewhere around 1978-1979, I went out with a friend on our mutual
birthday. We wanted to hit the local discos. We were stopped at the
door of the first place we went to and told that the place was full
and we couldn't go in due to fire regulations. After a few people came
out, I stood up to enter, but the bouncer again blocked the door,
saying it was still full. Then he let some other people in.
I was completely clueless. She, being black and perhaps more used to
this, got the point and asked me to take her back home. I think it
wasn't until years later when I read an expose of how all the local
discos were systematically blocking interracial couples, and many had
blocked black couples, that I finally got clued it (and yes, it was
still going on then, in the early 80s). This was a northern city, no
obvious Jim Crow heritage.
More recently was the chain of health spas that had systematically
discriminated against blacks, corporate-wide. This case was probably
in the late 80s. A letter code indicated race of customer. Black
prospective customers would be discouraged, not overtly, but by such
things as being shown different facilities, being offered
top-of-the-line undiscounted prices, etc.
Yeah, it happens. It still happens.
- Randy
Kathleen Fuller
: <ra...@westnet.poe.com> wrote in message
: news:92fhnu$if8$4...@mycroft.westnet.com...
:> Opus the Penguin <opusthe...@nettaxi.com> wrote:
:> > Remember back when they used to have separate drinking fountains for
: white
:> > and "colored" folk? I don't (before my time, thankfully) and I have a
:> > question. Which fountain did people who were neither black nor white
: use?
:> > Specifically, I'm wondering about:
:>
:> Actually, that may not be before your time: such practices continued on
:> embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
:> perpetuated even today.
: Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this? I'm not
: talking about opinionated things like Rodney King getting beat on because of
: his race; I mean things like "Once in 1982 I saw a convenience store that
: wouldn't allow black people in the door"--things like that.
When I was at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana (1991-1997), I remember a
major outcry when the school paper reported that a local bar had
displayed a sign saying, "In honor of Martin Luther King Day, all whites
drink free." I don't remember the year, but guess it was '93 or '94.
On another occasion, a friend went into a grocery store near campus and
asked where the Kosher foods section was, only to be told, "We don't want
that kind of people in here."
Earlham is a very liberal school. Any wonder there's a lot of town/gown
tension around there?
--Kathleen
Kathleen Fuller co...@prairienet.org
Big Iron5
>When I was at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana (1991-1997), I remember a
>major outcry when the school paper reported that a local bar had
>displayed a sign saying, "In honor of Martin Luther King Day, all whites
>drink free." I don't remember the year, but guess it was '93 or '94.
>
>On another occasion, a friend went into a grocery store near campus and
>asked where the Kosher foods section was, only to be told, "We don't want
>that kind of people in here."
>
>Earlham is a very liberal school. Any wonder there's a lot of town/gown
>tension around there?
Interesting -- a young lady friend of mine graduated from Earlham last spring.
I had never heard of the place until she told me about it last summer.
Big David
> When I was at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana (1991-1997), I
remember a
> major outcry when the school paper reported that a local bar had
> displayed a sign saying, "In honor of Martin Luther King Day, all
whites
> drink free." I don't remember the year, but guess it was '93 or '94.
Ahh.....lovely Richmond, the flower capital of the midwest.....we used
to go up there from Oxford when I went to Miami to play you guys in
lacross (early 80s). You had as many minorities on campus as we did,
which is to say, not many. I always wondered how Miami, being a state
school and all, got away with having so few minorities in an era where
affirmative action was the battle cry.
> On another occasion, a friend went into a grocery store near campus
and
> asked where the Kosher foods section was, only to be told, "We don't
want
> that kind of people in here."
The only Jews in Richmond went to Earlham, I would practically
guarantee. Ignorant clerk probably didn't even know what Kosher meant.
Trust me. I have relatives who live in the area.
> Earlham is a very liberal school. Any wonder there's a lot of
town/gown
> tension around there?
Well, at least Richmond is a town in its own right. Without Miami,
Oxford would dry up and blow away. And whats up with that no car rule
being able to be enforced throughout the town of Oxford? I always
wondered if I was a local and enrolled if I would have to sell my car.
--
Big David
If you want to send me email, you should be smart enough to figure out
how.
Briar Rose
>> embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
>> perpetuated even today.
>Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this?
In the summer of 1983, my brother and I joined the pool at
the Elks' Lodge. The pool allowed members to bring one guest
per visit. One time, I bought my friend Angela, who was black.
The woman at the snack bar apparently called my mom over
and told her, "I don't want to make a fuss in front of your
children, but we don't usually allow _those_ people in
here." My mother hustled us out of the pool, later told
us what had happened, and we never went back.
She wrote a letter of complaint to the Elks, and received
a note back apologizing and stating that that was definitely
not their policy, but the whole thing left a bad taste in
our mouths.
:) Connie-Lynne
--
And our future's standing still, we're dancing in the spotlight
Where is the leader who leads me? I'm still waiting ...
--Wolfsheim, "The Sparrows and the Nightingales"
Dana Carpender
Briar Rose wrote:
>
> Jake Schmidt <nospa...@home.com> wrote:
> ><ra...@westnet.poe.com> wrote in message
> >> Actually, that may not be before your time: such practices continued on
> >> embarrasingly long in isolated areas. Some low-brows want to see them
> >> perpetuated even today.
> >Good point--does anyone have any examples of practices like this?
>
> In the summer of 1983, my brother and I joined the pool at
> the Elks' Lodge. The pool allowed members to bring one guest
> per visit. One time, I bought my friend Angela, who was black.
>
> The woman at the snack bar apparently called my mom over
> and told her, "I don't want to make a fuss in front of your
> children, but we don't usually allow _those_ people in
> here." My mother hustled us out of the pool, later told
> us what had happened, and we never went back.
>
> She wrote a letter of complaint to the Elks, and received
> a note back apologizing and stating that that was definitely
> not their policy, but the whole thing left a bad taste in
> our mouths.
My husband and I went to a little inn way out in the country for New
Year's Eve. When we got there, it was a few hours till our dinner
reservation time, so we went over to the little bar and grill that had
supplanted the gift shop last time we were there, to grab a quick beer.
The place was small, with locals pitching quarters and generally having
a fun time -- but then the nigger jokes started, along with discussions
about which towns in the area were best for avoiding "them". We walked
out silently. It felt like a punch in the gut.
--
Dana W. Carpender
Author, How I Gave Up My Low Fat Diet -- And Lost Forty Pounds!
http://www.holdthetoast.com
Check out our FREE Low Carb Ezine!