Oral history is spoken history, the stories and memories of the past that we speak to each other in formal and informal ways. Oral history projects seek to capture such spoken history by tape recording conversations where an interviewer asks questions about the interviewees life and memories. In addition to being tape recorded, the interviews are often then written out, or transcribed. The tape and the transcription become a record of the past and serve much the same historical purpose as a journal or a diary.
I am doing an oral history project about the Kenilworth neighborhood and Fellowship Haven Church, seeking to collect and preserve history and stories that would otherwise disappear. Both church and neighborhood people are contributing their time and their memories to this project.
This page of the web site will feature excerpts from interviews with different people on a rotating basis, so check back once in awhile for a new person's story.
Below are excerpts from an oral history interview I conducted with Mrs. Gladys Roy in January of 2004 in her present home in Mt. Rainier, Maryland.
In addition to rearing nine children by herself in Kenilworth, Mrs. Roy became involved in the resident management movement there. She was a manager in the Kenilworth Courts housing office for many years, where her steady hand helped keep the neighborhood stable. Her daughter Pat joined Fellowship Haven Church as a teenager and is still a member there. Mrs. Roy also attended the church for a time, and has been an integral part of the church-neighborhood relationship. These are stories of her life, in her own words.
When I was five my father was killed. And after my father died, my mother wasn't very strong on her own so she began to drink. And then she became an alcoholic. And we children were virtually kind of on our own, you know the bigger ones would look out for the little ones. I mean she was still in the home, but she wasn't providing like she should.
So I basically just took on what I knew I had to do. I didn't like living like that because I saw other families living better, but I had no other choice you know, I couldn't change my mother. So I just lived as best I could with the situation.
* * * * *
And then I moved to Kenilworth in 1962, because that's when Harriet was born. And then I lived there, I think Ms. Wimbush was the one in charge of the development and, I started going into the meetings. Then I started going to the schools, volunteer with the children. That's how I got involved in Kenilworth, through going to the meetings. I was concerned about where I was living at because when I moved there people used to fight a lot. And I didn't particularly like it, but I couldn't move anywhere else because I couldn't afford it.
And then after Wimbush lost her office, Kimi Gray got it. So we had meetings trying to think about ways to make Kenilworth a better place to live, and to live like other people live, you know not just public housing, but we wanted to be somebody just like other people are that own homes and have a decent home and a community. And we wanted all that too for our children, and better schools.
Kimi Gray said a lot of things that made sense. And we used to have meetings at each others houses, because we really couldn't use the office when we wanted to, and we would talk about the things we wanted to do to make it better than like it was. Like the times when the government was controlling it, if a refrigerator broke down it just broke down. I think occasionally your father brought some for us from the church.
And then they wouldn't fix things up in the house you know, the heat would be off for a long time. Because at that time the boiler room wasn't working properly, so lot's of times we didn't have heat, a lot of times through the winter. And then the water sometimes stayed cold.
So a lot of things came up, and we wanted to do it better. So we had meeting after meeting, and finally we asked the government would they let us run the property, to be in charge, because we said we knew how things needed to be done because we lived there, and we saw what was going on and what wasn't being done.
So we had to go to some classes downtown, and some people from the government had to come and teach us different things and what to do. And we had to take tests. I had to go to Virginia Beach to take a test to be a manager, and I stayed there for a whole week.
So we got that done and, when the people from the government finished with us, we were basically on our own. So we learned. We started in March, I forgot what year but I think it was '83, being resident management.
And we set up a lot of mornings, a lot of nights all night because we didn't have no heat, and we had to find people to work for us, you know like somebody who ran a plumbing company or a heating company, different things like that because we needed to get things done.
We passed out a survey in the community to find out what kind of skills people had. And some could plaster, some could paint, some knew plumbing. So we hired those people to see what they really could do, and we started fixing up the broken down units that weren't fixed and moving people in.
We did good for the first year of learning. I mean, it was really good, because I saw things happening. I saw changes in people's lives. They started classes where people could go to learn, apprenticeship to do different things. And people got jobs, mothers got off welfare and got jobs, and men you know in the houses they got jobs. So things looked better.
Then they had a GED class where people could go finish their education to get a job. And a lot of people did that, got their high school diplomas and got nice jobs. I seen people make a change in their lives, a better change you know to do things. And that makes me feel good when I see that.
And then when you saw young people going off to college, because at one time Kenilworth paid for children to go to college. They were given so much money up front and all they could get on their own, and they would go and finish, a lot of them finished and came back. A lot of them went off and graduated and came back home, they helped in Kenilworth with the other children. So that was good. I was glad to see young people go off to college and make something of their lives and do something worthwhile with themselves.
* * * * *
I first met Mr. and Mrs. Lapp when they were knocking on all the doors in Kenilworth. And, I said they were different. And you all were different because I'd never seen Mennonites, and I've never seen people dress like that. And I said sometime when you, when people are different you don't fully understand what they're all about.
But I learned one thing, that you all are about the Lord, and that was most important. And that's why I felt so good about allowing my daughter Pat to go to church, because she was learning good things. She was coming home reading and memorizing Bible verses.
Of course always talking about Gertie [an early church volunteer who still lives in the neighborhood]. But I enjoyed that, I really did through the years, you know I've learned to grow fond of Gertie. Gertie's like family, her and Cindy [a woman from the neighborhood who became, and is still, a church member]. And I've grown fond of your mother and your father. So it was good, it was good.
And then another thing I appreciate them for, they went out of their way to do things for people in the community who needed it, and a lot of churches out there were not doing that. They weren't doing that.
And I learned to appreciate the Mennonite way of life, because y'all, you live a life different. I mean y'all bake your stuff, you grow it, and you eat properly you know. Most of the time we don't. You all don't eat a lot of fried stuff like we do, that makes a difference and it's better for your health. You bake your bread, you bake your cakes, I mean you do so many things so different. And you, you make your clothes, you know the women do, and they make them nice.
And you do things in order. And so many times our lives are so unorganized, and all our treasures are not always in order. So you make life easy for yourselves, not so hard, and that means a lot.
But, I enjoyed those things. And you all were real, to me you were real, you know you wasn't fake. You wasn't putting on, you was being genuine for the Lord, and that meant, that made me feel good. And you got to know people for themselves, because you see them all the time, and they show you love. And that means a lot, that means a whole lot.
* * * * *
I think your parents left a mark on the neighborhood, because different people talk about your mother and father going, how they wished they hadn't gone or how they miss them. They left a mark on the community, those who knew them, they left a mark.
You see Joseph, you can't live nowhere and let the life of Christ be your life every day as you go, and people see that. They've got to see something different and want to be like you, even if they don't change, and they couldn't say nothing bad about him, so they have to say something good.
And your mother makes your father stand out real big, because of her spirit. Your mother got a big spirit. She got a giving and a loving spirit, and that makes a difference. The Bible always says, somewhere in the Bible it says a good woman makes a good man, your mother's that. She stands out she does. And people often talk about y'all. I was talking to a neighbor the other day and talking about y'all. You know, people don't forget. People don't forget.
Keep in touch - Joe (lappjoe@yahoo.com)