- Collection:
- Oral Histories of the American South: The Civil Rights Movement
- Title:
- Oral history interview with Clyde Cook, July 10, 1977
- Creator:
- Cook, Clyde, 1912-1988
- Contributor to Resource:
- Hester, Rosemarie
Southern Oral History Program - Date of Original:
- 1977-07-10
- Subject:
- Steel industry and trade--Employees--Southern States
African Americans in steel industry and trade--Southern States
Blue collar workers--North Carolina--Badin
African American men--North Carolina--Badin
African Americans--Employment--North Carolina--Badin
African Americans--North Carolina--Badin--Social conditions
Badin (N.C.)--Race relations
Metal-workers--Employment--North Carolina--Badin
Metal-workers--Labor unions--Organizing--North Carolina--Badin
Aluminum Company of America
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Stanly County Branch - People:
- Cook, Clyde, 1912-1988
- Location:
- United States, North Carolina, Stanly County, 35.31199, -80.25092
United States, North Carolina, Stanly County, Badin, 35.40597, -80.11672 - Medium:
- transcripts
sound recordings
oral histories (literary works) - Type:
- Text
Sound - Format:
- text/html
text/xml
audio/mpeg - Description:
- In 1916, Clyde Cook's father moved his family to Badin, North Carolina, in order to find a job at Alcoa Aluminum Company. Cook describes growing up in Badin, focusing on his experiences in segregated schools. Because the schools were owned and operated by Alcoa, Cook blames the company for the inequalities he and other African American students experienced. Cook began to work for Alcoa at the age of sixteen; although there were times when he was laid off and found other employment as a journeyman bricklayer, he worked for Alcoa during most of his working life. In describing his experiences at work, Cook focuses on his frustration with racial hierarchies and the limits imposed on mobility for African American workers within the plant. According to Cook, the election of Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 marked a turning point for these kinds of economic injustices, although there were still obstacles along the way. For instance, Cook describes how African Americans were discouraged and intimidated by their employers during the process of unionization. Nevertheless, enough African Americans joined the ranks of organized labor that conditions gradually began to improve for them throughout the 1940s and 1950s in the plant. Finally, Cook briefly discusses his other activities in the community, focusing on his work with the NAACP. At the time of the interview in 1977, Cook was beginning his second year as the president of the NAACP in Stanly County, North Carolina. Cook describes the persistent lack of job opportunities for African Americans and his goal to open new opportunities for them.
The Civil Rights Digital Library received support from a National Leadership Grant for Libraries awarded to the University of Georgia by the Institute of Museum and Library Services for the aggregation and enhancement of partner metadata. - Metadata URL:
- http://docsouth.unc.edu/sohp/H-0003/menu.html
- Language:
- eng
- Extent:
- Title from menu page (viewed on July 3, 2008).
Interview participants: Clyde Cook, interviewee; Rosemarie Hester, interviewer.
Duration: 00:58:44.
This electronic edition is part of the UNC-CH digital library, Documenting the American South. It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.
Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner. Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers. - Contributing Institution:
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project)
- Rights:
-
