When a bridge symbolizing division and connection was set for demolition, Dr. Price and People for People came together to repair it–literally and metaphorically–showing what’s possible when a community unites.
When a bridge symbolizing division and connection was set for demolition, Dr. Price and People for People came together to repair it–literally and metaphorically–showing what’s possible when a community unites.
http://www.nnp2p.org/
Dr. McKinley Price: My name is McKinley Price.
I was born in the southeast part of Newport News, close to the end of the block 710 27th Street. On that street right next door was a candy store. And in those days, when I grew up, a nickel could buy you a whole bag of candy, you know. You had Johnny Cookies that were, almost like a big biscuit.
So, (I) have quite a sweet tooth, which continues today. It's ironic being a dentist that I have a very (laughs) good sweet tooth.
(R&B style music , layered with sounds of cooking)
So My Grandmother lived upstairs. It was a two-story. My mother and father and I and my older brother lived downstairs. So my Grandmother ran sort of a boarding house. So she would have a couple of rooms up there that people in the shipyard coming in and out ,and she cooked.
Most of our meals were just fabulous. I mean, Sunday, especially you could have fish, (laughs) eggs, chicken, you know, it was like a smorgasbord of food on Sunday. So I grew up enjoying a very good life, both good food and good candy.
Nichole Hill: At the age of five, Dr. Price’s family moved from 25 and J to 31st and Marshall–but he was still in biking range of his grandmother. His family was so close that he had a set of double first cousins!
(Music fades)
Dr. Price: High school was wonderful. Where we moved I was one block from Huntington High School, which I loved. I was also one block from recreation centers.
Segregation was very strong in those days, so there were two recreation centers one block apart. One for black, one for white. Now, as I remember, the nephew of Collis P. Huntington, who was the founder of the shipyard, his nephew gave the money to build two supposedly separate but equal recreation centers.
So there was a lot of interaction going on in those days between the races. But Huntington, being an all-Black school, and being the fact that a lot of teachers couldn't find jobs anywhere else, I had the fortune of having some PhDs as teachers. So the education quality of that High School was phenomenal.
You'll hear about a lot of great academics and athletes that come out of Huntington High School.
Nichole Hill: Including him.
(Sound of tennis balls bouncing on a court, sneakers on a court)
Before Venus and Serena, there was Arthur Ashe inspiring a generation of Black tennis players including a young Dr. Price.
Dr. Price: Well, Newport News, because of segregation, we practiced at Dory Miller. They had tennis courts there, which was one block from my house. So, it was automatic. I'd play all day.
Then as the city became more integrated, we also had tournaments where you could play. But You know, I just fell in love with the game. Still love the game. Still play. Still play competitively. I just love tennis.
(sound fades)
Well, it's funny, on my block. And the next street were two other tennis players that were on my team. So Jeffrey Banks and David Williams, who I play doubles with were, you know, we could whistle. (sound of him whistling)
That's the signal. Hey, meet you at the court. (laughs) So, we would play all day.
Nichole Hill: His love of tennis earned him a scholarship to Hampton University. After graduating he went to Howard University in the early 70's to study dentistry. There was trained extensively. Then he got married, returned to Newport News, and saw a need.
Dr. Price: We didn't have minority specialists. So there were no pedodontists, there were no endodontists, no oral surgeons. So we were trained at Howard to do most of everything.
Nichole Hill: So he starts his own practice
Dr. Price: I sedated a lot of kids that were, not that happy about coming to the dentist
(Sleepy into Dreamy music, birds chirping)
Because I had a guaranteed income, we were able to purchase a house.
Found this house, fell in love with it, grapevine in the backyard, quiet street. Bought the house.
(Pause. Music stops)
And we wound up replacing my picture window three times.
We found out that the, I think the grand dragon of the state ku klux klan lived in the neighborhood. (laughs) We didn't realize how segregated it was till we went to vote.
And we were the only Black couple to show up to vote. We were the first ones to integrate the regional pool in that neighborhood. I mean it was a big deal to let us in to go swim! I mean it–the times were just changing and it was so obvious that things were so set in stone for so long that people didn't realize how antagonistic even just showing up at a meeting could be, if you were Black. You walk into a room and, you know, I'm like, oh my god, you know.
We were behind in the times in those days.
Nichole Hill: This jump started Dr. Price’s community leadership.
Dr. Price: I got involved quite a bit with a lot of things like the school board. I was on the school board for eight years. I was chair for two. I got involved with being on a college board. Thomas Nelson Community College. So I got very active in the community. And there was an incident.
Actually, three incidents that occurred. Normally, because in those days you were appointed by City Council to the School Board. So normally when a Black was, reached their term and went off, they were replaced by another Black. That did not occur when I left the school board.
(Basketball sounds that stop abruptly after “terminated”)
Nichole Hill: The second thing was:
Dr. Price: There were some basketball courts that were terminated.
They took the rims down in a predominantly white neighborhood because there was too much noise going on.
Nichole Hill: And the third incident was the biggest one. It was the straw that broke the camels back…
Dr. Price: And then the third thing was, a bridge was deemed unsafe on 16th Street. Now, 16th Street goes over a little creek, and they said this bridge was unsafe. They closed it. Well, also, the perception is that on one side of the bridge is public housing, and on the other side of the bridge, Chesapeake Avenue starts, and it's very eloquent housing.
Nichole Hill: So-it was metaphorically, and quite literally the only connection point between the Black neighborhood and the white neighborhood in a VERY segregated town. The bridge is only 85 ft. across–but without it, the neighborhoods would essentially be cut off from one another.
Dr. Price: So to the community, it looked like they were making this wall. At that time there were all white men on City Council, and they made the decision to close the bridge versus fixing it.
So there was a group called NOW. The NOW group was a group of businessmen, )and there were a few women on it), who would do things in the community that were non-political.
For instance they did a big thing at the end of the Vietnam War for the veterans that were coming back. Things like that that the government couldn't do or the city didn't have the resources to do. These businessmen would put up the money and do it. So I was called in at the time because I was somewhat in the community and doing a lot of involvement.
And the businessmen were really afraid that this city was going to erupt. All of this happened during the Rodney King days. So they were scared that this city was going to blow up behind those three things that happened. So we formed out of that NOW group what's called People to People. It was a group headed by Herb Kelly, who was a prominent lawyer with Jones, Blackman, Walsh, and Kelly.
There were eight of us, I think, that were originally on this committee. And we started meeting at each other's houses to try and see if we could make sure that the tensions in the community would be solved or calmed down.
(Slow music underscores the following)
We would meet at each other's homes and talk about things. Try and show them the differences between the communities that were going on.
For instance, I asked Mr. Kelly, who lived in, I think, in the middle of the city, Heidenwood area. I said, what time do you get your Sunday paper? And he would say, “Oh, Huck.” Huck is my nickname. H U C K. So, he said, “I get my paper about five thirty, six o'clock. I said, well, I get mine about ten thirty.”
I said, “I'm reading history, not news.” So, I remember also one time when they were over at my house and said, “Oh, Huck, let's get a pizza.”
“They don't deliver pizza to my house.”
“What do you mean they don't deliver pizza? You live in a beautiful neighborhood. You're here on Shore Drive. You can have a State Congressman, a State Legislator, two State Legislators on your block.”
And my, my block was integrated at that point. This was like 1985, 86. I said, “Nope, they won't deliver pizza to my house.” So we started seeing things that were different.
(Music ends)
So we start organizing and start having large meetings, and we had prominent, we had Julian Bond to come in, we've had Sam Proctor, and this man, he financed the whole thing. He would pay for( at least once a quarter), speakers to come in, and we would meet at high schools in the cafeteria.
We would have up to two to three hundred people to come in and talk about. their experiences in their neighborhoods and trying to get people out of their comfort zone to talk about racial issues and differences in the quality of life. So that's how that all started with People to People. We were supposed to change chairmanship every three months. Herb Kelly and I were chair for 20 years. (laughs) The organization is still going on. They're still meeting, actually.
Nichole Hill: But back to the issue of the bridge…
Dr. Price: We approached City Council and talked about why that bridge should be repaired and gave them the perception, these seven white men,who were on city council, how this looked to the neighborhood. To them, they didn't realize it was--to them, it was an economic decision. It was a million dollars to fix the bridge.
We say, hey, fix the bridge.
I use the bridge as my thing. We want to bridge the community.
So I would always have a bridge in the background, all my campaign material, and say I want to be a bridge between the communities, I want to be a bridge between economic development. Because the racial disparity was just so, so, so, great in those times. So that bridge was really symbolic of beginning to solve problems in the city.
It's really interesting to see how far we have come in, in the 50 years that I have been here, how things have changed and I think gotten better. And I think once people realize that if you live with people and know them, things will be different.
The minority community led with People to People approaching the city government to show them getting them out of what they're making a pure economic decision to show the impact emotionally and, and how it's going to affect the community. I think once they realize that, that what their action was...
People do things without thinking. If you're just looking at bottom lines, If you're just looking at, Okay, let's just close the basketball course because there's too much noise.
Well, what is the implication of that? When you look at it from, from the other side of the community, What you've done is a racial act. The only people that are playing basketball were Black kids. So you're taking that away from them. You're taking a road, but you look like you're building a wall between affluent neighborhood and a poor neighborhood.
You understand what I'm saying? So the perception of your actions, you have to look outside. You have to put yourself in other people's place. When you make decisions, you can't just make black-and-white decisions or economic decisions. You got to look at the impact of those decisions on that community.
Nichole Hill: We were a little surprised. We asked, "Did the all-white city council buy that?"
Dr. Price: The bridge is there. It's repaired. We go over it every day.
You know, what's also ironic, the bridge is named after my father in law, C. Waldo Scott.
Nichole Hill: Dr. C. Waldo Scott was THE doctor in Newport News from the late 40s up to the 80s, was the first Black person on the school board, he went to Howard, and is well-loved for the care he gave the community–Not unlike Dr. Price…
Dr. Price: So it's, it's just full circle. A lot of things are just full circle with me. It's ironic that, that those basketball courts are now up.
(Sound of basketball fades in gently)
Mr. Bethea, who was a football star, has come back and now is building basketball courts and donating them throughout the city.
(Upbeat music begins)
Nichole Hill: These victories were due in no small part to community organizing. Speakers from all over the country commented Newport News for how progressive they were in grappling with their racial issues.
Dr. Price: Because you remember there were, there were riots and whatnot. We didn't have those in Newport News. We didn't have that because people sat down and discussed problems and issues. And I think it kept us from being so against one another racially because we had done the groundwork to get people to understand the impact of decisions on other people's lives.
(Music swells)
Nichole Hill: Visit our website Truthbetoldcommunity.com to find out ways to get involved, and share this episode with friends.
This series was written by Jackie Glass and Hannah Sobol, edited and hosted by me, Nichole Hill, Sound Design by Trendel Lightburn, and our work has been supported by the Virginia African American Cultural Center through a grant from Virginia Tourism Corporation. Follow our work by subscribing wherever you get your podcasts. We couldn’t do this without people brave enough to share their experiences, so thank you Dr. McKinley Price.