Oral History Project: With my Grandma (Chestine Gorley-Haddad)
During the interview on April 29,2015. My grandmother and I spoke on the topic of her childhood and how she really never seen or experienced racism. The audio first started off with the few questions I had as it went on she spoke on how she didn't care for racism because race didn't play a big part in her life. She witnessed a lot horrible things but only in the south, she never backed down when there was a problem with race. She also talked about how she lived in majority white / Jewish neighborhood. Her best friend was white she went to a school name Stokley which is no longer existence but she did attend Benedict College that’s when she started to see the racism existed. As an young adult she helped in her community with the Strawberry Mansion Civic.
Research
Promoting place- Strawberry Mansion neighborhood and environs... Pride of place and connecting opportunities ... "building bridges". In this document I found for the planes of ‘The strawberry Mansion Neighborhood Association “ it gave what they were about and why they did it. The Strawberry Mansion neighborhood was the first area to receive neighborhood planning support and to complete the planning process through the issuance of this document. The planning process has involved the residents of Strawberry Mansion and community input has been a key component in this process. Several community meetings were held with area residents at Strawberry Mansion High School where citizen comments were documented. Informational reports and presentations were also given at these meetings in order to facilitate discussion and ideas to support the plan.
“The Jewish history of Strawberry Mansion is documented in the book, Strawberry Mansion: The Jewish Community of North Philadelphia, by Allen Meyers” talked about the neighborhood my grandmother lived in the 50 and 60’sTRANSCRIPT
A.E:What is your name
Grand: Chestine
A.E: when were you born ?
Grand:March 14th 1949
A.E:where were you born
Grand: Philadelphia Pennsylvania Hahnemann hospital
A.E:what were your parents like
Grand: umm my mom was born in Georgia my dad was born in New York uhh we came from a middle class background both parents worked were my mother worked as a cafeteria cook Philadelphia School District
A.E ok so what was your spouse and children
Grand: Uhh My husband name was Gerald he was and uh elementary school teacher I was a uhh secondary school teacher uh I taught health and physical education in the Philadelphia school district uhh I have 3 children uhh they attended Greenwood elementary school year end 1980 we moved to Los Angeles California uhh there I taught Linwood school district my husband uhh taught in the private sector un in California. My children attended a private school in California as they became of older uh, one attended bale high school the one attended Inglewood high school and one child went to long beach Polly high school .
A.E: okay so what is your religion ?
Grand: I'm a muslim
A.E : okay did you ever have any community involvement?
Grand : Yes umm in college in uhh as an adult work with the Strawberry Mansion Civic Association uh we did a lot of community project uh which involved teenagers umm, I taught dance kids in my neighborhood and we did a lot physical activities within the neighborhood
A.E : Okay what was it like growing up during the civil rights era?
Grand: umm uh for me growing up in the Strawberry Mansion area It was an area uhh I guess uhh I guess during the early 50's uhh it was an integrated neighbor hood actually one of my best friends was an Caucasian her name was Ann I remember her so vividly because uhh the neighbor which I lived was mixed black, white uh primary a Jewish community and so I didn't see too much uh segregation until I attended college in Columbia South Carolina. Benedict College I first saw a sign that said colored only which to me a back because I never experienced that before, so that was strange uh setting uh I didn't realize it was segregation until I went to College Uh I attended an all black high school in Philadelphia color was never really an issue I never thought about color or segregation you know as i said until I went to college that's when I begin to see uh difference in in the world
Grand: Anything else?
Source
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