>> Peter Robinson: In Birmingham, Alabama, 60 years ago, black students, some still in elementary school, marched for an end to segregation. They were met with police dogs, fire hoses, and handcuffs. Today, three people who can remember those events because they themselves were students right here in Birmingham, businesswoman Mary Bush, university president Freeman Hrabowski, and former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice on Uncommon Knowledge now.
>> Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: So my friends, they did not die in vain. God still has a way of wringing good out of evil. History has proven over and over again that unmerited suffering is redemptive. >> George Wallace: Freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom. >> Peter Robinson: Welcome to Uncommon Knowledge. I'm Peter Robinson. Mary Bush grew up in segregated Birmingham, then went on to a career in finance and business that saw her earn an MBA from the University of Chicago.
Work at Citibank in Chase Manhattan, serve in the treasury department during the Reagan administration. Sit on the boards of companies including Marriott and Texaco, and found Bush International, the consulting firm which she now serves as president. Freeman Hrabowski III grew up right across the street from Mary Bush. He went on to a career in academia, earning a doctorate in higher education administration and statistics from the University of Illinois.
Beginning in 1992, Doctor Hrabowski served as president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, one of the twelve universities in the University of Maryland system. During his tenure, UMBC became the number one producer in the nation of African Americans who went on to complete STEM PhDs. Doctor Hrabowski stepped down as president of UMBC just last year. Condoleezza Rice grew up here in Birmingham, in the same neighborhood as Mary Bush and Freeman Hrabowski.
She went on to earn a doctorate in international relations from the University of Denver. She then went on to a career at Stanford University that saw her rise to provost and that she interrupted to serve during the administration of George W Bush as national security advisor and secretary of state. Secretary Rice now serves as director of the Hoover Institution, the public policy center at Stanford.
We're gathered in Birmingham today in the Westminster Presbyterian Church, where the pastor in the 1960s was the Reverend John Wesley Rice Junior, Conde's father. I've only been here a day and a half, but it seems to fall to me to welcome the three of you back to your hometown of Birmingham.
The spring of 1963, April 3rd, a local civil rights organization, the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights, led by Birmingham's own Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, is joined by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr Southern Christian Leadership Conference in conducting sit ins at downtown lunch counters. April 6, Reverend Shuttlesworth leads a march on city hall more than 30 protesters are arrested.
April 11, Doctor King is served with an injunction against boycotting, trespassing or encouraging such acts. April 12th, Doctor King, Reverend Shuttlesworth and others lead a march protesting the injunction. They're arrested. April 14th, Easter Sunday, a thousand protesters attempt to march on city hall. Police block their way, arresting more than 30.
April 19th, the New York Post publishes excerpts of a document that Doctor King, using fragments of newspapers, has composed in what would soon become known as the letter from Birmingham jail. Doctor King writes, quote, I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Anyone who lives in the United States can never be considered an outsider.
May 2nd, young blacks begin leaving school to march. They walk in groups of 10 to 50 across Kelley Ingram Park, the city square, intending to protest at city hall just a few blocks away. They never reach city hall. The Birmingham commissioner of public safety, Bull Connor, orders his men to assault the students with fire hoses and police dogs. Many of the young people are injured. More than 1,000 are arrested.
May 10th, a settlement is reached under the terms of the Birmingham truce Doctor King, Reverend Shuttlesworth, and other civil rights leaders agree to end the protests. Birmingham business leaders promise in turn that within 90 days they will desegregate businesses and public facilities. For the most part, they keep their word. And official segregation in Birmingham, unofficial segregation would continue for a long time, but official segregation in Birmingham comes for the most part to an end.
That's not by any means the means of the story and we'll continue to what happened afterwards. But for now, let me ask you about those events, what is now referred to often as, the Children's Crusade. You're the last generation who experienced the old south and the civil rights movement that rose against it. Mary Bush, you were only in your teens, but if I understand this correctly, you heard Doctor King speak. >> Mary Bush: I did.
>> Peter Robinson: Tell us about what he was like, what it meant to this town when he came here. >> Mary Bush: The time that I heard Doctor King speak was at my church, 6th Avenue Baptist Church. >> Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: The federal government not could have fit in unless it decides to face the realities of desegregation. >> Mary Bush: The church was absolutely packed. My parents and I went.
And it was really a momentous event because here was Martin Luther King, who had become well known for his civil rights activities. >> Peter Robinson: He was a famous figure coming to town. >> Mary Bush: He was a famous figure coming to town. So it made a huge impression on me, one to hear him speak and to talk about freedom. When the children's marches were organized, I wanted very much to participate, but I had a father who when he said something, he meant it. He said, no, you cannot go.
However, I will tell you one other part of the story. As you probably know, my friend Freeman Hrabowski did participate. It's a very interesting story as to how he got to do it, which maybe tell you, but he was arrested. And I came home from somewhere one day and my father is in our front yard and there are tears strolling down his face. And I said, daddy, what's wrong? And he said, Freeman has been arrested. Well, you see, Freeman was like his child, too.
>> Peter Robinson: Freeman lived across the street. >> Mary Bush: He lived right across the street from me. So my father was in much distress because he didn't know what was going to happen to Freeman, because this was a city that reacted to people trying to get their freedom in very violent ways. >> Peter Robinson: So Freeman, Mary's father said, no, you're not marching, right? Did you get your parent's permission? Did you march in spite? Let me explain the question.
It's easy, looking back on these events 60 years ago, to think that the black community rose as one. Well, you were united, but there were hard decisions to make every day. There was violence all around, this notion of children marching was not easy. Doctor King himself resisted it for a number of days before deciding it had to be done. So how did you and your family address that? You were how old at this stage? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: I was 12. >> Peter Robinson: 12 years old.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Peter Robinson: You were still a child. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, but I was in the 9th grade, I was about to go to the 10th grade, I had skipped a couple of grades. And [COUGH] I should tell you that most people saw Doctor King as a, certainly a hero, but he was also a troublemaker. He was gonna change things. People don't realize that in that it was uncomfortable. People were worried, particularly people who were maybe buying houses.
The word had gone around that, my goodness, banks could pull mortgages, right? People were saying, we don't know what's gonna happen. It wasn't like everybody was saying, this is the right thing to do. When you look back on it, it seems like this was all a good idea, no, people were very confused about what to do and about sending children out. So it wasn't a given that, this is the right thing to do. They were proud of the idea we're doing something.
But no, we went home, I didn't wanna go to church anyway. Who wants to go to church in the middle of the week? I was rebellious kid, and they placated me by letting me take my math. I loved the math, Reverend Rice knew I loved the math. So I'm sitting in the back doing my math, and this man at the lectern says, if the children participate, they'll go to better schools. Now, we loved our teachers, but we always had been told that white schools were better.
We wanted to see what that was all about. And I wanted to see if they were as smart as people said they were, cuz I knew I was smart, because to me, smart meant you could work hard, right? And you could solve the math problems. So I'm doing my algebra, and this guy says this, and I look up and of course it's Doctor King. And here's the point, I went home and I said, I want to go. And they said, what? Absolutely not. >> Peter Robinson: The same reaction Mary got.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: Absolutely not, and I said to my parents, in typical Freeman form, you guys are hypocrites. You made me go, I listened, and now you say no. And what will your parents say? Go to your room because you are not supposed to tell your parents they are hypocrites, right? And so I was punished, they sent me to my room. The next morning, they came in, they had not slept, they prayed all night. I knew I was in trouble, and they said to me with real distress on their faces.
It wasn't that we didn't trust you, we don't trust the people who will be over you, because if you march, you're going to jail, but we're gonna put you in God's hand. Now my students say, Doc, you must have been really brave. I was not a brave child. If a fight broke out at school, Freeman was running the other way. The only thing I'd ever attacked in my life was a math problem, you get that, right? But I did want a better education. My teachers were wonderful, we did not have the resources.
We didn't understand what great education might be, we didn't understand what it might be. But I did go and it was a horrific experience. They treated us like slaves, like animals. Too many kids, stinky, not enough bathrooms. >> Peter Robinson: This is in prison? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, in the jail. >> Peter Robinson: So what was it like when you were marching? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: It was both inspiring and frightening. >> Peter Robinson: [COUGH] These are hard questions to ask.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Peter Robinson: I don't know if you noticed this, but I'm white, that makes it very uncomfortable. But I keep thinking- >> Freeman Hrabowski III: And we're in Birmingham, Alabama, all right [LAUGH]. >> Peter Robinson: But what was it like to have an encounter with a white person?
What was it like not to be able to go to a certain store or during this event, to have an encounter with the police and you knew they were going to be against you just because you were black? Do you avoid them, do you shrink from it? How does this work? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: It's interesting that Doctor King's.
>> Peter Robinson: This [CROSSTALK] is gone now, but you remember- >> Freeman Hrabowski III: No, all the people and the two things I would say we are all from privilege in that we have these wonderful parents, working mothers and fathers and of faith. We were going to church all the time. Sixth Avenue Baptist, Westminster, and her father, Reverend Rice, our beloved Reverend Rice, Reverend Porter, dear friends.
And Reverend Rice was our youth fellowship advisor, is amazing Presbyterian who would come to sixth Avenue. We would have these wonderful conversations about what it meant to be teenagers, right? And talking about ideas in our honor society, he was an advisor to our honor society, right? And he was an intellectual and we would have these. So in our community, we could talk about ideas, and yet we, tell me about you all, but I've never talked to anybody white. >> Peter Robinson: You never did?
>> Condoleezza Rice: No, the only time I remember a white person was, we went to visit Santa Claus and I was five. You would go down to Pizzet's or down to Loveman's to visit Santa Claus. And this particular Santa Claus was taking all the little black children and holding them out here, he was taking little white children and putting them on his knee.
Now, you knew my father, my father said to my mother, Angelina, if he does that to Condoleezza, I'm gonna pull all that stuff off of him and show him to be the cracker that he is. [LAUGH] So there we're sitting there, I'm five. Daddy, Santa Claus, daddy, Santa Claus. [LAUGH] What a way to meet Santa Claus, and so- >> Mary Bush: That's Reverend Rice. >> Condoleezza Rice: So I think somehow Santa Claus could see my father, who was 6'3 and a football player.
And when it came time, Santa Claus took me and he put me in his nice little girl. So that was the only, back to your question, it's the only white person I'd ever seen. >> Peter Robinson: That's context. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yeah. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Peter Robinson: Before we depart, we'll return to it in a moment, but before we depart from those events in 1963, your father, as we've heard, was a beloved figure.
>> Condoleezza Rice: Yes. >> Peter Robinson: He was Reverend in this church, the black community was, as I've listed, it's about 100,000 people. It strikes me that the pastors, the ministers, must have known each other. >> Condoleezza Rice: They did. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Peter Robinson: So your father knew Reverend Shuttlesworth. >> Condoleezza Rice: They were good friends. >> Peter Robinson: Good friends. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yes.
>> Peter Robinson: Of course, you were a very little girl, but do you remember at the time, these tensions? It's fascinating to me to think, once you think it, it seems obvious, but the assumption that there's this uprising of righteousness and peaceful, nonviolent protest. But of course, it was more complicated than that. Doctor King was an outsider. This notion of putting children in harm's way. Do you remember your father talking about that at home?
>> Condoleezza Rice: I do remember my father talking about it. I was little, I'm a little younger than these two. And I remember a couple of things about it. I remember my father saying to my mother was standing in our little hallway. Angelina, I'm not gonna go down there and pretend to be nonviolent, because if a policeman takes a billy club to me, I'm gonna try to kill him and my daughter will be an orphan. Because my father actually didn't believe in the nonviolent part.
Do you know who one of my father's great friends was? Stokely Carmichael. >> Peter Robinson: Really? >> Condoleezza Rice: Yes. He somehow found in that more confrontational side, something that he admired. And so when the children's march came along, it was a little lot like Mary and, and Freeman's parents. My father said, why would you send children into bull Connors henchmen? Why would you do that? I wouldn't let my daughter go. And he was very much against the children's march.
But, his students were all carted off to jail, he came down and he walked around, he had good relationship with the police. They let him walk around and he would call parents and say, I saw your daughter, she's smiling. >> Peter Robinson: [CROSSTALK] And I repeat, more than a thousand kids. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yeah, yeah. >> Peter Robinson: Were jailed. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yeah, not too far from here. The jail was not far from here.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: [CROSSTALK] And he was wondering when I came back, he just took three parts of the story to show [CROSSTALK] you guys close. First of all, the reason they allowed me to go was that I challenged my mother. My mother had led a protest in 1948. >> Peter Robinson: Really? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: For the equalization of teacher salaries and was fired for that. And she was always proud of that, in another county. And one of her best friends was the mother of Angela Davis.
>> Peter Robinson: Really? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, and my mother and Angela Davis's mother taught together over the years. And my mother taught Angela Davis and her sister, and my mother, and Angela Davis's mother taught me. And they had this great sisterhood about fighting for justice, all right? And I reminded, I said, mother, you fought for justice. She said, but I was an adult. And I said, but you taught me to think. And they did allow me to go, it was amazing.
About her father when we did get back to school, he and George Bell gave me special attention to see how it was psychologically. And he said to me, remember, you are an A student, you are an A student. He wanted me to remember that. He wanted me to remember how to define myself. It was very important.
Just as Mister Bell, who was the uncle of Alma Vivian Powell, General Powell's, [INAUDIBLE] >> Condoleezza Rice: You know, there's something else, >> Freeman Hrabowski III: [LAUGH] >> Mary Bush: Something else you need to know about Doctor Bell, >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Mary Bush: He was the principal of the Oman high school, [CROSSTALK] >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Of the high school that we were, [INAUDIBLE] >> Mary Bush: [CROSSTALK] That Freeman and I both went to.
Doctor Bell was an amazing man. He was very much about excellence. He would come to our classes, he would give the students extra problems to solve, but he was also a disciplinarian. So even the really big guys who might have a tendency to act out were coward by Doctor Bell, because he had this [CROSSTALK] goldman voice and he was a tiny man, [CROSSTALK] but we loved him because he was all about hard work and excellence and always striving to be the best you could be.
So when my class was going into its senior year, Doctor Bell was about to retire, and we literally begged him not to retire. This shows you one how close the principals, the ministers that we've talked about, the teachers were to the students, so it was our parents, >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Mary Bush: Who really pushed us about hardwork, and excellence, and the value of education, but it was also our teachers and our principals.
>> Condoleezza Rice: [CROSSTALK] You had [INAUDIBLE] twice as good, right? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah. >> Mary Bush: Twice as good, twice as good. >> Peter Robinson: So, I find this so striking that here you are in the Jim Crow south, and you've got parents, who are wonderful parents. >> Mary Bush: Yes. >> Peter Robinson: And schools that are good schools. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yes, and good teachers.
>> Peter Robinson: And good teachers, dedicated, I mean, honestly, truly, I hear you describe the circumstances in which you grew up, and I wouldn't hesitate, would not, now, my children are older now, but I'd have dropped my children in black Birmingham like that because of the education, the self confidence. >> Mary Bush: Yeah. >> Condoleezza Rice: But let me, [CROSSTALK] >> Peter Robinson: So what am I missing here?
>> Condoleezza Rice: Let me step back a little bit, because I wanna say two things, first of all, about the principals. To be a principal in a school in Birmingham was like being a God, we admire, revered position. So Alma Powell's father, Mister R.C Johnson, was the principal of Parker High, which was the largest black school. And her uncle was the principal of Oman High, which was the second largest.
When Mister WW Whitstone, who was the principal of our elementary school, died, his funeral was like that for head of state, because teachers were revered, principals were revered. But there was a dark underbelly to that, which is that if you were an educated black person, you really only had a couple of good options, and teaching was the best option. And so it was, in a sense, a lack of opportunity for black professionals that led to the best and brightest going into teaching.
And another time, [CROSSTALK] >> Peter Robinson: So in that funeral, everybody understood this is a man who holds a position of importance to us, but he's also the best we have produced. >> Condoleezza Rice: The best we have produced [CROSSTALK]. And if you were a teacher, you were really highly regarded, and, and in another generation or two, people would have other options, and some would take them. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: A few exceptions who became physicians and lawyers.
>> Condoleezza Rice: You had a couple of lawyers, a few physicians. >> Mary Bush: I call this the best minds. We got the best minds because Justice Condi said, the generation before us, our parents and teachers, they didn't have the other opportunities. The doors were not open, so they became teachers. And we were the wonderful, blessed recipients of that. I see, I see. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: [CROSSTALK] but I wanna go back because you talk about your children coming here.
It depends on what background your children would have had, because again, I wanna say this, we were so privileged. They gave us the piano lessons, and we had books in the house, >> Condoleezza Rice: French lessons >> Freeman Hrabowski III: And French lessons, and all of that. >> Mary Bush: The symphony, >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, yeah [CROSSTALK] >> Mary Bush: Which we couldn't go to, [CROSSTALK] but they did it at home.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, yeah, we couldn't go into the museum, but my mother would get the pamphlets and we would read stuff on the outside. And so my parents sent me to Massachusetts to get extra education, to see what it would be like to be in classes with white kids in the summer, is that I saw the difference between the southern education and the education of New England. And I saw the superiority in Massachusetts, you see, in chemistry, in literature.
And here's the point, clearly, the money that they were putting into education in New England would make that education there far superior to any education in public schools for black or white in Alabama. And you see it in the standardized test scores for children in general. You see, as I look at, as I studies test scores, whatever level, all right? Number one. Number two, when you look at beyond the well educated families, as we were from it, the working families, all right?
When you look at poor children, white and black, here or in America, but in Alabama, and you see what happens to those children, back then and today, the future is not bright. That's the challenge. >> Condoleezza Rice: But Truman, I wanna just I want to challenge you on one thing and agree with you on another. I'm not sure it was superior, right?
The New England education, because I'm not sure I could have turned out better if I'd gone to school in New England, or that you could, or that Mary could. And I look at Amelia Rutledge, and I look at Cheryl McCarthy. But we weren't actually elite. We were kind of professional class, middle class. There was a more elite black community that lived over past Smithfield, all right? So- >> Freeman Hrabowski III: But I'm looking at, I'm particularly at math and science.
I'm looking at math and science, all right? I'm looking at chemistry. I'm looking at those areas. And I'm looking at, for example, what was covered in chemistry in Massachusetts, and what was covered here. And then I looked at what happened when I took some courses at the University here, at the White University, compared to there. It was superior, as a mathematician, I'm saying. >> Condoleezza Rice: Now, all that I'm saying is the resources may have been superior.
I'm not sure that the instruction was. And I'm gonna tell you why, because I then went to Denver, and I went to one of the best high schools in Denver, St. Mary's Academy. When we arrived in Denver, I went to St. Mary's Academy because my parents, who were educators, said the Denver public schools are not as good as the schools that you went to in Birmingham, all right? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Well, let's say this. >> Condoleezza Rice: So they made that choice.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: I love the fact that we can disagree like that, because we also disagree on philosophy of some other things. Let me just say that. Let's go there, too. Let's go there, too. And I always say middle class Birmingham may love each other in many ways, but politically, we have some differences. We have agreed to disagree. [CROSSTALK] But let me tell you my [INAUDIBLE] as a mathematician, standardized test scores.
All you need to do is look at standardized test scores in Massachusetts compared to Alabama. And my point is made, QED. >> Condoleezza Rice: No, well, I don't know about standardized test scores. I know where you ended up. [LAUGH] So let me go back to a place where I agree, but I wanna extend the story, all right? So it is absolutely true that if you were poor. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
>> Condoleezza Rice: In the communities here where Mary, and Freeman, and others of our friends grew up. Faith, family, education, all right? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yes, yes, yes. >> Condoleezza Rice: Faith was first, family was, and we had two parent families that cared, and then education. Right behind this church, there was a government project, as they called it, in those days, called Loveman's Village. And those kids were poor. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yes.
>> Condoleezza Rice: But my parents were determined that those kids were gonna get some of what they were able to give me. And so my father would have when he would have there was a dentist who came here on Tuesday nights to do dentistry. >> Peter Robinson: To the church? >> Condoleezza Rice: To the church. Those kids got to come. When he had math, and algebra tutoring, and French, those kids got to come. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: 6th Avenue has them. >> Condoleezza Rice: 6th Avenue had those.
And so I don't wanna give the impression that we just sat on our privilege. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: That's right, that's right. >> Condoleezza Rice: Our parents were determined that that privilege was going to be extended to those who might not otherwise have had it. >> Peter Robinson: I'd like to return to the events of the spring and autumn of 1963, but can I just. I wanna go back to this notion of what deprivation you felt. You said that Sanda held black children out here.
>> Condoleezza Rice: Yes. >> Peter Robinson: That's something everybody can get. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yeah. >> Peter Robinson: You said your parents had to send you to New England to see-. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: And they were geniuses. I'm gonna say something that they wouldn't say, okay? Both of these young women, and I say this based on my own education, they're geniuses. Yeah, they both are geniuses. They're just that damn good. >> Peter Robinson: Okay, pretty good.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: No, no, no. She's playing it down. I mean, of course, they went ahead and they had a good, solid education, but they're geniuses. They are. But they are. >> Peter Robinson: In what way? I mean, I am conscious. I'm conscious that the year 1963 began in this state with the inauguration of George Corley Wallace. And he said, January 1963. >> George Wallace: Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever.
>> [APPLAUSE] >> Freeman Hrabowski III: I will never forget looking at that man's face when he told me I couldn't go to the University of Alabama. I was sitting in front of the TV crying. And you know what my mother said to me? You don't have time to be a victim. She said, get the knowledge. When I was in Massachusetts, I called my parents and I said, they don't like me because, you know all am I talking about the quality of the education? Nobody would speak to me there either.
They wouldn't speak to me. The children wouldn't speak to me. The teachers wouldn't speak to me. I'd raise my hand when nobody else was raising them, cuz I was getting an answer. I was 13 and they were 16, all right? I'd raise my hand. Yeah, I was precocious, and I'd have the answer. They'd look right through me. It was my first time understanding what Ellison meant by the invisible man. And I would be so hurt. I'd be raising my little fat hand, trying to get them to call on me.
They would not call on me. I called my mom and dad, and I said, they don't like me. And she said, how many more black kids in the class? I said, none. She said, how many people do you think from Birmingham are there getting that education? I said, none. She said, you know I love you, right? I said, yeah. She said, have a seat. I sat down. She said, son, suck it up. >> Mary Bush: [LAUGH] >> Freeman Hrabowski III: She said, suck it up, because you know what? The world is not there.
>> Mary Bush: Let's talk about- >> Peter Robinson: How did you experience it in your life? How did you experience this? >> Mary Bush: Deprivation? >> Peter Robinson: Deprivation, yes. >> Mary Bush: Well, okay, I couldn't drink water from a White water fountain, but there was a Black water fountain. And I'll tell you a funny story.
One of our other friends, Otto Stallworth, said that he was downtown one day with his mom, and he sort of ran away from her while she was buying something, and he drank out of the White water fountain. And he ran back to her and said, mommy, mommy, their water tastes just like ours. Okay, so deprivation was not being able to go to a restaurant other than the one Black-owned restaurant or hotel, other than the one Black-owned hotel. And to Kiddieland.
Yeah, or to Kiddieland Park. But what I found out years later, after we could finally go to Kiddieland Park, when I was adult, I said, I gotta see it. It was horrible. It was dirty. It was just unbelievable. So we were not really deprived, except for things that Freeman is talking about, like going to some of the schools that we might have wanted to in Alabama. So our parents made up for what would have been deprivation. We could only go to the symphony downtown one day a year.
We could not- >> Peter Robinson: Blacks were allowed one day a year. >> Mary Bush: Blacks were allowed one day a year. We could not go to the Birmingham Public Library downtown. We could only go to the community one, which is a few blocks from here. However, our parents made sure that we had exposure to the symphony, to classical music. Condi's mother and grandmother taught her classical piano, and some of my other friends, they were taught ballet, so they made up for it.
They made sure that we read broadly and widely. I read so much. Freeman loves to tell this story. I almost burned our house down once. [LAUGH] >> Freeman Hrabowski III: With the flashlight or something under the cover. >> Mary Bush: Yeah, a naked lamp bow, because I didn't wanna stop reading. And after that- >> Freeman Hrabowski III: We were reading broadly. We were doing that for the privileged kids. >> Condoleezza Rice: Now, Freeman, I have to keep talking [CROSSTALK].
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: All these children at school, in our schools. >> Condoleezza Rice: Our parents were I doubt my parents ever in their lifetime made more than $80,000 together [CROSSTALK]. No, but. But let's stick with this, because to say we were privileged, I think, is to underestimate what our parents achieved. That's right.
When you think about what Mary said, we have a friend, Deborah, who said that she wanted to go to Kiddieland, and her parents said, you don't want to go to Kiddieland. We're going to Disneyland. >> Mary Bush: Right. >> Condoleezza Rice: So they found ways. But when I think of privilege, I think of it was almost ordained, and I don't think you can say my parents worked. My mother was a teacher, my father was a teacher, football coach, minister. He had more jobs than you.
We talked about Denise McNair's father. He was the milkman, the mailman, the photographer, and he taught. So they did everything to give us opportunity. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Absolutely. >> Condoleezza Rice: And I think they worked hard to make sure that other kids could. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Six jobs. Six. My father had a college degree. He left it to become a steel.
Working a steel because he could make more money working in a steel factory and doing the reading and writing for his white supervisor, who was illiterate. All right. He worked in at the railroad station and doing the same thing for the white. And then he worked at the funeral home on the weekend. My mother worked a math and English teacher, but then she did GED in the evening. >> Peter Robinson: She tutored kids. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Tutored? No, no. She taught it people to get the GED.
And then she sold insurance to give me the best. And yet. >> Peter Robinson: You had multiple jobs. >> Mary Bush: My father were three jobs. My parents were not educators like Condes and Freeman's, but they were passionate about education, and to a large extent, they were self educated. They grew up in a small farm town about 90 miles from Birmingham, and the black high school went to the 10th grade, whereas the white high school went to the 12th grade. So my mother got a 10th grade education.
My father, unfortunately, had to stop school when he was 13 years old because his father died, and he was the only boy who could work the farm. And that hurt him all of his life because he passionately loved education. However, he read everything he could get his hands on, newspapers, books. He was the center of conversation at dinner parties my parents would give.
I can remember him talking about things in the international world, the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Cuban missile crisis, what Khrushchev was doing, what was happening in Asia. And I think that's where I got my love of international things. It started there. So they both really educated themselves. >> Peter Robinson: Let's go back to the late spring and the early autumn of 1963. Another timeline here. We ended the timeline a moment ago with the truce. Now here's what happens.
Official Birmingham, the business leaders in Birmingham promise to desegregate and they begin to do so. But they can't control all of Birmingham. And the white racists continue a fight. May 11. The bombing at the Gaston Hotel. You mentioned Mister Gaston. He was the black businessman who owned the one hotel in town. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Now, we'd agree he was privileged. He was privileged. >> Condoleezza Rice: He was rich. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: He was our millionaire.
>> Peter Robinson: All right, so there's May 11, a bombing at the Gaston Motel. May 12, President Kennedy sends troops to bases near Birmingham intending to use them to restore order if necessary. May 20, the Birmingham Board of Education orders the expulsion from school of the more than 1000 black students who had been arrested in the protests. Two days later, a federal judge reverses the expulsion ordering the schools to admit those students. July 23, summer schools out.
The Birmingham council votes unanimously to repeal all of Birmingham's segregation laws. August and early September, a series of bombings take place. Among these incidents, there are too many for me to list. Two bombings at the home of Arthur Shore as a black civil rights lawyer. Firebombs thrown into the home of Mister Gaston Ag Gaston. Once again. September 9, Alabama Governor George Wallace turns black students away from state universities including the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
September 10, the day afterwards, President Kennedy federalizes the Alabama National Guard ordering secretary of Defense McNamara to enforce the integration of Alabama schools. And this brings us to the Sunday morning of September 15 when the 16th Street Baptist church is bombed and four girls are killed. Three were 14 and one was just 11. You remember that morning?
>> Condoleezza Rice: I remember that I was right here in this church because my father was the pastor, my mother was the minister of music. And so we were here early. And of course, no cell phones. But word started to spread. You could feel the church shutter because it's not that. >> Peter Robinson: You felt the explosion. >> Condoleezza Rice: You felt the explosion. And down at 6th Avenue, I'm sure you did too. You could feel it. >> Peter Robinson: You were in church that morning as well.
>> Condoleezza Rice: I was not. I was one of the few Sundays we did not go to church. But I felt it in my home. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: We all felt it. >> Condoleezza Rice: We all felt it. And you knew what it was because there'd been so many bombings. And then word started to spread. It had been at 16th Street Baptist Church. It was. There were four little girls.
They were in the basement, in the bathroom and then the names started to come out, and everybody knew at least one of those little girls, Denise McNair, who had been in this church kindergarten. I have a picture of my father giving her her kindergarten certificate. My uncle taught Addie Mae Collins, and he said that Monday morning when he woke up and went to school, her chair was empty, and he just broke down and cried. Cynthia Wesley, everybody knew these little girls.
>> Mary Bush: Yeah. That's a day I will never forget. It brings me almost to tears now, because these four little girls would have also have been stars. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yes, they would have. >> Mary Bush: Denise McNair was the daughter of one of my elementary school teachers, so she was the youngest, so not in my age group, but she always came to her mother's classroom after her classes, so knew her very well.
Cynthia Wesley had just been at my birthday party a few months before, so this was an unthinkable, unimaginable, and it just tears at me to this day. It really does. >> Peter Robinson: But again, difficult questions here. You've been thinking about this all your life, so difficult questions for me. But was there, what was the effect? Was there any thought that it had gone too far, that maybe it all had pushed the white community too far too fast? That criticism of Doctor King had been validated.
>> Condoleezza Rice: I think if anything, this one did reinforce the sense that these were awful people. >> Peter Robinson: Who had to be stood up to. >> Condoleezza Rice: Who had to be stood up to. And I just remember being for the first time, really scared because my parents, I thought, could deal with anything. I never worried that I was. But that night I asked if I could sleep in their bed. >> Peter Robinson: Did you? >> Condoleezza Rice: I did, that night.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: And this is the difference in ages. >> Condoleezza Rice: I was a little girl. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: She was a little girl. Remember, I was in 10th grade, you were in high school. Two people said to those of us who had gone to jail, if you all hadn't done this, those girls would still be alive. >> Condoleezza Rice: Really?
>> [CROSSTALK] >> Freeman Hrabowski III: They told King that they told those of us who had gone to jail, if you all hadn't done this, if Doctor King hadn't come here, things would be bad. >> Condoleezza Rice: Where was that coming from, Freeman? From blacks. Yeah, but I mean. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah, it was very clear. It's very clear, very clear. And Doctor King felt that when he took courage when he came and had to look into the faces of those mothers- >> Mary Bush: At the funeral.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: At the funeral. And I was chosen to represent Ullman DE. >> Peter Robinson: I'm in high school. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: All in high school. And my parents had said I could come to the funeral and Doctor Bell saw me and he said, come here son. And I didn't have on an appropriate tie at that time. You were supposed to wear a dark tie, and I just put on a tie. And he took off his tie, he had a black tie, and he tied the tie on me, it was so special.
And he said, you're representing all of us. And he said, just remember, you're representing all of us and we're proud of you. It was so special, really was. But this is the point, Doctor King, and I looked in his face, I was sitting up in the balcony looking right at him. And he said, when he was looking into the faces of those mothers, and I'll never forget the three coffins with little Denise's little coffin in the middle, I'd never seen multiple coffins this. There were only three.
One mother refused to allow her daughter. Yeah, it was only three coffins, but the baby, the niece, they left in the middle. And he said, life is as hard as steel as he looked into those faces. >> Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: Life is hard at times as hard as crucible steel, it has its bleak and difficult moments.
If one will hold on, he will discover that God walks with him and that God is able to lift you from the fatigue of despair to the buoyancy of hope and transform dark and desolate valleys into sunlit paths of inner peace. And no greater tribute can be paid to you as parents. And no greater epitaph can come to them as children. And where they died and what they were doing when they died. They died between the sacred walls of the church of God. And they were discussing the eternal meaning of love.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: Mm-hm, and he was just, what do you say to those mothers when he know what people are telling them? That it's your fault. That was, I'll never forget that feeling. The other thing, though, that I've talked about before. It was the first time in our church, I had seen white people on the right hand side, men of all faith, of all rabbis, Muslims, priests. And it was the first time I'd seen white men crying. >> Mary Bush: I think, as heinous an event as this was.
I think it's one of the things that really started changing minds and hearts in America, in Birmingham and in America. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: To see, I didn't know white men could cry about black girls being killed. They had never thought about that. >> Peter Robinson: So that event, to some component of the white community in Birmingham, that event, they said, this has to stop. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Not just in Birmingham, but in the country.
>> Condoleezza Rice: I also think that you mentioned the truce and what was happening in black businesses. And I'm gonna say something fairly controversial. For a lot of the white community, segregation had become just a pain. >> Peter Robinson: Yeah. >> Condoleezza Rice: It was just an inconvenience in some ways. And so I remember my dad was highly regarded by a man named Clay Sheffield, who was the head of guidance counseling for the whole city.
And my father was kind of his protégé in some ways. And my mother got a very bad infection, a bad bronchitis. And so she kept trying doctors, and nothing was working. And so my father mentioned this to Mr. Sheffield. And he said, I want you to take her to this doctor, Doctor Carmichael. And so we went, and the black. This was probably 1961 or 62, maybe. And the waiting room was for the blacks, was next to the pharmacy in the paint was peeling. And you had to go up the back stairs.
And Doctor Carmichael saw my mother. And then he said to my father, Reverend Rice, Angelina needs to come every week to see me, but why don't you come after 5? And then after 5, we could sit in the regular waiting room. And so you could sort of see that, we forget there were people of conscience who were white.
And so I do think this was catalyzing, but even before then, beginning to think my father had a very close relationship with the pastor of Shades Valley Presbyterian Church, which is over in Mountain Brook. And they would exchange youth fellowships and so forth. And then- >> Peter Robinson: Mountain Brook, the white enclave, wealthy, white. >> Condoleezza Rice: Wealthy, white enclave. But when 63 happened, they had to stop because it was so violent. But there were things going on underneath.
We should acknowledge. >> Mary Bush: That this is a very, very good point. My father's three jobs. He was a steel worker, and he would go there from 7 to 3. He would come home, have dinner, get a little rest, and then he would go to his two other jobs, which were to clean two buildings. He was the janitor for Liberty National Insurance Company and for the US Steel credit union. And so I tell everybody, I got my start in finance very early.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: [LAUGH] >> Mary Bush: Because my brother and I, sometimes on a Friday evening or sometimes even during the week, we would go with him and my mother, cuz she would help him sometimes, and we would do our homework while they were finishing up the work. Sometimes there were and it was, of course, all whites who staffed both organizations. And the ones who were still there were just so very kind to my brother and me, to a person.
And whenever they had parties, they would leave little treats for us. So there were people of good conscience and people who really cared about what was going on and didn't agree with what was going on. >> Peter Robinson: Two final questions, if I may. And here's the first one. Here we sit, six decades later, your own lives have turned out pretty darned well. An amazing career in finance and business, the presidency of a major institution, secretary of state.
When you return to this town, do you feel, looking back on those events? That they had to happen, that it was right, and that the events of 1963 represent a victory? Or when you look at this town today, where there's just no racial tension, at least that I've experienced, do you say, well, it was inevitable. Somehow or other, segregation had to end, maybe that wasn't necessary. Maybe it would all just wash itself out in time.
>> Freeman Hrabowski III: So let me say something that's controversial, people think of Connie as the secretary of state. I see her still as this amazing force who still, to me, was a little girl walking with her father with a book. Because when she left Birmingham, she was only maybe eleven or so, 1965. So we still have this argument she was privileged, all right?
>> Condoleezza Rice: [LAUGH] >> Freeman Hrabowski III: And I don't care what she says, she was- >> Peter Robinson: She's not gonna let that one go. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Let me say why? Because our Church and 16th Street were privileged churches. This was a privileged church, a Presbyterian church. A black Presbyterian church is a church of privilege, now, compared to whites, it's a different word. But in the black community, usually you're gonna have a larger percentage of educated people.
In the sixties, only 3% of blacks had a college degree. Let's think that way, and you'd have more blacks who could play classical piano. So in that sense, all right, now, why do I say that? So we were challenged in the sense that there was segregation. We couldn't go to places, all right? Today, educated people have done well in America, and in Alabama, in Birmingham. The head of medicine for the University of Alabama, Quite Frankly.
An African American, a Mentee of mine who recently moved to New York to a big position. So it's a big deal, big deal, at the same time, in this state, you still have major challenges. While you may have a black who is the Mayor, all right? And you have some blacks at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, you've got the same challenges. That you have in other cities, that the vast majority of black children still cannot read well, and you still have the segregation.
So, yes, we needed the sixties, and what it showed was that even in the most privileged of churches, like 16th street, where you did have a number of educated people. >> Peter Robinson: Are you proud of going to jail? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: I'm very proud of, I'm very proud to have been. >> Peter Robinson: Are you proud of it? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Very much so. >> Mary Bush: Absolutely Yes.
Absolutely >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yes, we made, yes- >> Condoleezza Rice: Of course, but I wanna come back to what we should celebrate and what we shouldn't. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yes, good. >> Condoleezza Rice: So I won't use the word privilege, I still don't like that word. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: [LAUGH] >> Condoleezza Rice: But were we in a position to succeed? Yes. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Good.
>> Condoleezza Rice: I'm not even the first PhD in my family, my father's sister has a PhD in Victorian literature [CROSSTALK] Not even first PhD. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: [LAUGH] >> Condoleezza Rice: So were we, in that sense, were we given a head start absolutely. But that head start came from Mary's parents, who your father, who had to drop out at 13.
So in that sense, the head start, the privilege, if you will, came from an attitude about what to be our lives and our prospects and our horizons. >> Peter Robinson: When it was almost like Bull Connor is not going to own our children. And so that was the privilege that we had, people who believed that. It is still the case that there are people who are trapped in the witch's brew that is race and poverty. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yes.
>> Condoleezza Rice: If you are black and educated and doing well, yes, there are still some awful things. The young man, Aubrey, who was running and was shot, it happens. But for the most part, you can make a great life in America. And now you can go to a restaurant, and now you can go to the University of Alabama. And if you want to take your kids to Kiddieland, they'd be happy to have you. So that constraint, that ugliness, is gone.
But we have to remember that, we can't celebrate as a country when so many people are left behind. And now not all of them are black, if you live in the Rural South- That's exactly right. Your prospects are not very good. And so people like us, what our parents taught us, what our teachers taught us, is not to just enjoy your privilege. That you have to extend to others ,you have to care about others.
What Freeman has done as an educator, is really remarkable because your students didn't all come from privilege. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: That's right. So- And they're all black, black and white. >> Condoleezza Rice: Yes, and so to be able to extend that hand of, I need to pull you up too. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Yeah >> Condoleezza Rice: That's what we need to do, because we should celebrate what Birmingham produced in us and in others.
But Birmingham's got a lot more work to do, and so does every city in this country. >> Peter Robinson: Last question again, I'm taking you back to the events of the spring of 1963. Students listening, well, let's put it this way. Freshmen at your institution at Stanford were born four decades after these events, four decades ago. They stand farther from the events of 1963, than you stood from the World War I, when those events were taking place.
This is old history to them, can you give me a sentence? I mean, really compress it, what do they need to grasp? What do they need to hold on to? >> Mary Bush: Is that a lot of life is about attitude and belief. Now, I know, as Freeman and Condi have beautifully pointed out here. That there are many people, many young people, many children, who live in such circumstances that it's hard to take on that attitude and belief.
But it's made harder by either parents or society, or whoever tells them that they are limited in what they can do and what they can be. We were told, despite the circumstances here in Birmingham, that we could do and be anything that we wanted. Our parents believed that they had that vision, our teachers believed it. They said we knew change was coming, and that we had to have you in a state of readiness.
That's what one of my teachers said to me, and that is the message that we all need to carry to children today, to parents. Particularly those who live in circumstances that are very, very challenging. I chair an organization in Washington where our kids come from the poorest areas. There's a lot of violence in their neighborhoods, but we get the mentors, people who can help them see that there are opportunities and that they can be those things as well. That's part of the purpose that we serve.
>> Condoleezza Rice: Yeah, I would say that there are two messages depending on where you sit. So if you sit in a position where you have been fortunate enough to be able to really take advantage of what America is and what it, then by all means, go and help somebody who has less. Because the thing that sometimes really gets on my nerves about young people and that means I'm getting older, is that sense that, woe is me, things are.
If you go and help somebody who has less than you have, you will never again ask, why do I have so little? You'll say, why do I have so much? >> Mary Bush: Absolutely. >> Condoleezza Rice: And so, if you're in that position, then I don't care what you do, volunteer to go help a kid, work at the boys and girls club. Do something to help others. If you are that young person, and I work with boys and girls clubs and I see them, the kid living in a car, where the parents are totally dysfunctional.
But you can still make it, there are still ways up and out, you have to work very, very hard. But to Mary's mentoring point, there has to be an advocate for that child. It has to come from someplace. But I just feel so badly when kids will sometimes say to me, 75% of the people in my neighborhood never finish school, and they think of themselves as a statistic, and I say, be in the 25% with us beyond that.
>> Peter Robinson: So a 19 year old student of yours says, you went to prison, what was that all about? >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Right, I say that I hear so many elected officials today talking about moral clarity. Now, here's my moral clarity, that I talked about when I was 12. We must speak truth to power. And I believe in our country. And so, the first thing I'm gonna say to young people is that we must vote.
And I'm not gonna tell you to whom to vote for, but I am gonna say this, vote for people who tell the truth. >> Mary Bush: Thank you. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Vote for people who care about children, okay? Vote for people who care about poor people, right? Who want a country, who don't wanna see poor people at the bottom killing each other, that we can be better than this as a country, where poor people are dying every day.
That's what we have to be, we can be so much better as a country, we are better than this as a country. >> Condoleezza Rice: We're better than this, and Birmingham, I think, shows that we can be better than this, because despite its long and difficult and tortured history, it did produce-. >> Freeman Hrabowski III: Some of us. >> Condoleezza Rice: Some of us.
And by the way, it is a different place than it was, when I would travel around the world as secretary, and people would say, how can you speak for America? Your country was slave owning, you grew up in segregated Birmingham. And I would say, since when did people tell you that democracy was ever a finished product? And in fact, that is the one lesson that Birmingham shows. >> Peter Robinson: Condoleezza Rice, Freeman Hrabowski, Mary Bush, thank you. >> Mary Bush: Thank you Peter.
>> Peter Robinson: For Uncommon Knowledge, filming today at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, Alabama. I'm Peter Robinson, Thank you for joining us. What a beautiful sunny day. >> Condoleezza Rice: Isn't it gorgeous? We got very fortunate about it that. >> Peter Robinson: Did you see Doctor King at all? >> Condoleezza Rice: I did, I saw one of his speeches. I saw him leading and marching close to our neighborhood, I never met him.
I've met his children and I knew Coretta Scott King, but yeah, I remember him well. >> Peter Robinson: Condi, I have to say, prepping for our visit here today, I read and re-read the letter from Birmingham jail. >> Condoleezza Rice: Birmingham jail, yes, yes. >> Peter Robinson: This document, all that he was doing comes out of his notion of the church. >> Condoleezza Rice: And children of God. >> Peter Robinson: And children of God.
>> Condoleezza Rice: If you are a child of God, then how could you treat other children of God this way? He also, we tended, what happens with a figure like Doctor King is that over time people put on him whatever their thoughts are and their beliefs and their ideology. And we have to keep going back to the essence of who he was. He believed in this country, actually. >> Peter Robinson: Yes. >> Condoleezza Rice: He believed this country could redeem itself.
>> Peter Robinson: Yes. >> Condoleezza Rice: He believed in a colorblind content of your character. And yet sometimes he's used to talk about other ways of thinking about race. And he would have a long legacy, actually, beyond the civil rights legacy because he would get concerned about human rights across the world and the treatment of workers and the like. But the essence of what he did here was to try to make America be what it said it was. [MUSIC]