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Additional funding by the African American Chamber of Commerce.

(soft jazz music) - It was a national mood that swept the country, I believe.

I think that we had just come through World War II.

We had just come through the Korean War, and I think people were prepared to try and see about having more equity, and more fairness.

- That's a source of real distress to me.

The fact that we allow ourselves manipulated, and we are so naive about it, to be manipulated by the political structure.

- I think the American Dream is just that.

It's a dream that never came true.

Being militant in the sense that you're actively concerned about a specific set of problems is quite different, and are willing to take specific action on those problems, is a kind of militancy I think we need.

(choir singing a spiritual) - I think the thing that sustained many of us during those years was we had a strong faith that things were going to be better.

- It was a significant time, cause you had a couple forces in play.

One was, of course, there was the breakthrough generation, the first series of so many of us were able to get into environments we had never been before.

- Understand that I wasn't playing by the rules, and the rules were that the white person controlled my destiny.

- Those of us of color, we had a wonderful opportunity to show what we could do.

And that's what it was really all about.

We were there primarily to lay the foundation so other blacks could follow.

- [Chris Moore] Freedom Corner is much more than a monument.

It was, and is the launching site for hundreds of marches, and thousands of dreams.

For Pittsburgh, it is a reminder of the brave men and women who risked everything by speaking truth to power, and in the process, changed city forever.

I'm Chris Moore, and we call them torchbearers.

♪ Sometimes I feel ♪ Like a motherless child ♪ Sometimes I feel ♪ Like a motherless child - The 1960s was nationally, as well as locally, a very dramatic, exciting time, a time that really, black Americans took center stage in the development of this society, and fundamentally changed the whole nature of race relations, of how whites thought of blacks, and how blacks thought of whites, and how blacks thought of themselves.

- [Chris] A man who forced white Pittsburghers to deal with the presence of Negroes in everyday life was Regis Bobonis, Senior, the first African American to report for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, in the 1950s, and for Channel 11 News in the 60s.

Regis literally appeared in their living rooms every night.

- Well, one thing, you can't lower your eyes and beg off and say, "I'm not a role model, "I'm not this, I'm not that," because if you happen to just be aware of your circumstances, you know you're in a fishbowl.

People are looking and watching, and evaluating.

That's just human nature.

So therefore, to be a torchbearer, has been the challenge of my life.

- [Chris] And the challenges weren't just philosophical.

There was equal employment, equal access, equal rights, and equal pay, seemingly new concepts to most of the people who controlled Pittsburgh, including the public utilities.

At the time of these first protests, Judge Livingston Johnson of the Court of Common Pleas was an assistant county solicitor.

He also was a Civil Right organizer who helped planned the Duquesne Light Protest.

- When I came back from law school in 1957, I was approached by Byrd Brown, and at that time, Byrd was the president of NAACP.

Our first target was the Duquesne Light Company, and we selected the Duquesne Light Company because they were essentially, a monopoly, a public monopoly, and we determined there was absolutely no justification and no defense that they could have for continuing to remain segregated, and bigoted.

Of the 3700 employees they had, if memory serves me correctly, 50 African Americans.

Of the 50 African American employees, 25 were laborers in their coal mine at Elrama, Pennsylvania, up near Elizabeth, PA.

And of the other 25, they were grass cutters, pushing lawn mowers.

- For a number of years, prior to the month of August, 1963, the month in which the Duquesne Light Demonstrations took place, I and many other members of the black community had been expending a tremendous amount of effort, bringing to the general public the inequities which existed in industry, in various types of industries, in the Pittsburgh area.

- As I recall at that time, there was a meeting with the United Negro Protest Committee, which was headed by Jim McCoy.

It was an outgrowth of the NAACP.

Jim was a labor leader, steel workers.

When it happened, he was chairman of the labor and industry committee of the NAACP.

But for organizations, some things took too long, took too long for Jim.

- [Chris] The protestors weren't content to wait for a pang of conscience.

They took to the streets of downtown, where they were met by many supporters, and a few well-placed missiles.

- All of a sudden, this pouch of liquid hit me on my head, and it broke, and I said, "Dag," wasn't dag, you know, but I said it, it began with a D, and I said, "Somebody hit me with some water," and there was a woman from Texas, Bevelina Jackson that was standing next to me, and she did like this to me.

She said, "That ain't no water, that's --" (laughing) I said, "I'll be darned!"

- The Duquesne Lights people were throwing urine, and spitting down on us, throwing water out on us from up above.

That's a six story building down there, trying to break our spirit.

- [Chris] Fortunately for the men and women on 6th Street, they had help from unexpected places.

- Our mole at the time, and I think it could be told now was Jesse Bolling.

We had enough training and education, ability and acumen to do as much electrical work as any electrician could.

They didn't hire him as an electrician.

They hired him as a janitor.

He would call me at my home, early in the morning, 5:30, 6:00 in the morning, and he would fill me in on statistical information that we needed, we would compare notes.

I'd tell him what I'd been told by parent and the Duquesne Light people the night before, and I'd run it past Jesse, and he would confirm or deny, as best he could.

- [Chris] After weeks of negotiations, the protestors finally reached an agreement with Duquesne Light that later resulted in many advancements for African Americans within the company.

Victor A. Roake was named president in 2001, and Regis Bobonis became public affairs manager.

- 'Cause when I first went to Duquesne Light, everyone that had been there, the old line engineers, who had experienced that, who had looked out the windows and threw bags of water down on the protestors had a real guilt thing, cause every conversation I had with senior management involving what we call the Mustang would mention, yeah, well that was a bad time, we certainly learned from that.

(soft jazz) One day, they were there in light clothing, and the next day, they were with heavy clothing and hard hats to protect themselves from the missiles, if you will, being tossed at them, but contrast this.

Over time, Duquesne Light became one of the best employers and during my time there, the business that it did with minority vendors went from zilch, practically, to over $2 million commitment.

- The respect we won when our course was right.

- [Chris] On April 4, 1968, Dr.

Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee.

(mournful jazz) Cities across America were set on fire, and Pittsburgh was no different.

- In '68, when King was assassinated, a number of us felt the tension in the community, in the Negro community, and on Friday night, we had a meeting at Ebeneezer Church.

- The burning of the Hill, burning of the Hill district, because I don't think they thought of what they were really doing.

It was just extemporaneously, someone said, "Well, let's burn this, "let's burn this store."

- Many of the young black Muslims were anti liquor, anti booze, and they were like, that's going first thing, attack the bars, and attack the liquor store.

So I left Ebeneezer, walked downhill around the corner to the liquor store, and there were three guys, one black and two white, standing up with brooms in their hand, looking scared to death.

So I talked to these guys, and I said, "You wanna close up?"

And he said, "Yep."

I said, "I just talked to the governor.

"Close up."

So they closed up right then, took their brooms, and got the devil out, and soon thereafter, the place was in shambles.

- Well, Wendell Freeland, who, himself looks white, and in these interviews I've been doing with K. Leroy Irvis, he talks about during the riots, when Irvis was down at Centre and Kirkpatrick, right in the epicenter of the riots, the main black leader who came down to work with him was Wendell Freeland, and Irvis told him, "Wendell, you gotta get out of here, Wendell.

"This isn't gonna work, Wendell.

"They're not gonna know, Wendell," and Wendell was insisting that he be out there with Irvis side by side, during the riots.

Irvis said he finally persuaded him.

He said, "Wendell, look.

"I tell you, you go down to the Number Two police station, "and you wait there, "so that when the guys get arrested, "you get 'em out," and Wendell, then, he agreed finally, "Okay, if I can have that role, "oh yeah, I'll accept that."

But Wendell was ready to be out there, right on the front lines, and he was always someone, he never hid his race, he never hid his identity.

- We had a meeting, another meeting at Ebeneezer, and went down to Number Two Police Station, and you could see the anger rising.

I mean, you could see smoke, almost smoke coming out.

(music drowning out narrator) Harvey was a sergeant then, I believe, and he came out, and these white cops were all gathered around.

Harvey got out there, with these cops, they were surrounded by, we were a mob, as I'm sure as they saw us, and call them to attention, and had them march in formation, just as if they were in a morning countdown, and that calmed it down.

- Wendell was our white boy.

(laughing) Yeah, he could pass, and so he often would, would penetrate before people knew that he was there penetrating.

- And so, as an ambassador from the blacks to the whites and vice versa, and I think I've served a noble role.

- I've been told by others that at some point, early on in every conversation with you, sort of like Catholics do, one way or the other, they'll let you know that they're Catholic, let's say.

Wendell in some way or another, would let people know that he was black.

During one of the marches, one of the demonstrations, when the police had formed a phalanx, a line that was blocking the demonstrators from proceeding on further downtown, Alma Fox got on her knees, crawled between the legs of the policemen, and went over to the other side, breaking through the barrier which they had set up.

- Well, we're trying to push through, we're trying to get through.

They're saying, "No, we're not," we look in the back, and the Hill district is on fire.

It was an amazing sight, but we're pushing, and we're saying we're going, they're saying that no, we're not, and the patty wagons were on the other side of the barrier, and I looked down, and there was this great big space between the legs, and I scooted under there, and I got over and I said to everybody, "Come on, come on, I could make it," so then everybody started to push, and they threw me in the patty wagon.

Four police officers, one for each leg, one for each limb, you know, threw me in the patty wagon.

- Alma Speed Fox in the whole movement, the NAACP and her activity, she was so important, because she brought in a dimension in the Civil Rights movement that we tend to overlook today, that is the important role of women.

Women were critical to the success of that movement, for a number of reasons, but one of the key reasons was that women had the ability to stay nonviolent, that if that movement had been exclusively male, if it had involved more than just a few men, there's a good chance it would not have remained nonviolent.

- We were doing what we were supposed to do.

We were not supposed to be in the forefront.

The protest movement, equality, was for black men.

That's what we were fighting for.

We wanted men to be uplifted.

♪ Swing low ♪ Sweet chariot - [Alma] We were trying to promote black men.

We were trying to get black men in the forefront so they could have the jobs.

The women were in the background, making things work.

- I think of necessity, the Negro community seems to have been marked by a matriarchal approach, because Negro men haven't always been able to secure jobs, or to take the leadership roles that men in other segments of the community have taken, so that Negro women have assumed, in a sense, a dual role.

They've gone out and worked, and kept the family together, but I think now, with the emergence of more opportunities for employment and education, there will be more emphasis on Negro men assuming whatever role they should assume.

- And women were very important in this regard.

They could be very aggressive, very militant, but they still had the ability to control themselves and not get so, you know, there's not that machismo involvement that when someone would attack them, they wouldn't say, "Uh oh.

"We've gotta go to the mat on this one.

"I'm not taking, that's an affront to my masculinity."

Well, it's not an affront to their femininity, so they could behave very aggressively and actively, but at the same time, keep the movement under control.

And this is what occurs in the 1950s and 60s, that during that era, it was not just a time that blacks became more physically involved in Civil Rights, marching, protesting.

They did that, but they also were moving in now with the credentials which enabled them to assume positions of leadership and direct involvement in many institutions in American life.

Helen Faison represents one of those women who did this.

That is, she came to table, she came to the movement, as a committed individual, but also someone with the credentials, that she could then move into that school system, in the operation, into the bureaucracy, and make a difference, make an impact, as an officer and a leader of the system.

- First of all, when I graduated from the University of Pittsburgh, raring to go as a teacher, I could not get a job teaching in Pittsburgh.

Pittsburgh had hired a few black teachers, primarily in music and physical education, a few, and special education, and that was about it.

(choir singing) You always wanted to be sure that you were chosen to do the job, because someone thought you could do it, and not simply because there was a pressure on to hire some black people, and there had to be the pressure.

I'm not belittling that, and there probably isn't enough of it there now, cause not only did we have our first teacher strike, at the end of my first month, almost, of being a principal, but that also was the year when Martin Luther King was slain, and I was Fifth Avenue's principal when that happened.

That was a rough time, and there was some sharp kids at that school then, and those youngsters really put the pressure on the teachers and principal and the rest of them to do something about having some black influence on the curriculum at the school.

- I was a chairman of the NAACP Education Committee.

Byrd Brown asked me to share that committee, and we started meeting together, trying to get the committee to understand what we were going to do.

We went to the Board and asked for action, new action.

- Cause some of the teachers were afraid.

They didn't know how they should behave, that kind of thing, and you had to be a step ahead for them, and couldn't show, no matter how you're trembling inside, you couldn't show it.

You had to be there every day.

You didn't dare miss a day.

I remember, for example, the morning after King was assassinated, I felt that it was our responsibility to be at school to receive the kids when they came, cause they didn't understand what had happened, they didn't know how they were to behave, and I got up and got to school as early as I could, and it probably wasn't that morning, but a few mornings after that, when I got to school, the National Guard was marching down Dinwiddie Street.

- See, in those days, they had, in the 60s, when King was assassinated, they had National Guards in the neighborhoods, there were Jeeps and soldiers around, who were keeping law and order, and one of the things that we did during those days was at the Centre, to keep the young black youngsters from confronting the police.

We stayed inside the Center and fed the kids.

- Well, Jimmy Joe Robinson was the counterpart of the Reverend Patrick, that is, a minister, a man of the faith, who put his own life on the line, down south, Alabama, in the marches there, which were very dangerous, and he did the same thing up in Pittsburgh, leading demonstrations for the employment, changing the employment practices of downtown Pittsburgh firms and the like, leading the demonstrations from Freedom Square, at considerable risk to himself.

- We saw that the unions were not incorporating young black males into the unions, and so some of us began to meet and to talk about ways that we could try to make the union open up their doors to incorporate young blacks into the unions, and they balked at it, and they weren't gonna do it, so we organized a group called the Black Construction Coalition, and we began to demonstrate daily, and picketing, and try and sitting down with the unions, to try to get them to open up their doors to put them into training, putting blacks into training in there, and there was some tough days.

- Bill Moore was a commander.

He was our savior.

As a commander, he did have great respect from the police department, which later eroded, and he helped us a lot.

He got us through a lot of things, and many people who would've been arrested were not, because of Mugsy Moore.

- Mugsy was a real help to me.

Mugsy informed me that my line was tapped, my phone was tapped.

Mugsy informed me that there was a group of white suburban women that came down to Manchester, and we were being funded by the Pittsburgh presbytery, that I had a straight line to turn, that I was a communist, and they tried to have a heresy trial on me.

I'm getting deep into the stuff that I didn't wanna talk about.

- So I told Slusser who was Willie's chief that you're gonna have to arrest me tomorrow morning, because we gonna stop these trucks from coming in, bringing in the cement, you know.

The truck came in, I stood in front of the truck.

So Slusser said to me, "At so and so, 544, YTD, XYZ," he says, "I'm gonna arrest you.

"If you don't move, I'm gonna arrest you."

I wouldn't move.

The truck kept creeping.

I said, "Lord," and I said, "Suppose this fella said his foot stepped off the brake," and I'm thinking this in my mind, but I wouldn't move.

That I was frightened, 'cause I didn't know, getting closer and closer.

Finally, about that far from me, he stopped the truck.

Well, I wouldn't move, and Slusser put me in the patty wagon, took me down to the Number Five station, Centre Avenue station.

By the time the police wagon got around quickly to the building, the building was full of blacks, Patrick been arrested, Patrick been arrested.

I'm hoping they'll put me, put me in jail, you know, have my picture taken behind the bars.

But they wouldn't do that, they didn't do it, had me stand out there and theres lots of weapon and called someone.

I suspect it was to call the mayor, I'm theorizing here, because he came out and gave me a lecture, and let me go, and I was not booked.

So the crowd dispersed.

- And so one of the key ways in which this redefinition took place was that blacks became active instigators, active agents in shaping their own future.

In the past, it had been, the future had been shaped pretty much either by whites, white liberals, let's say, or white racists, or it had been shaped in the boardrooms, and in the legal, let's say, backrooms of maneuvers that had taken place, but the people weren't, themselves, directly involved.

- So we had to demonstrate, and it was an ongoing thing, and so the Black Construction Coalition was the way to go.

It got rough.

In fact, it got so tough that they had to close down all the jobs.

It was called Black Monday.

I don't know if you remember it, because it got kind of violent, and there was some threats made that if you were thinking to do this, some of you are gonna really be taken down.

- They had protests, the building of the US Steel Building, about $60,000 building.

You wouldn't believe it.

That big building, and not one black working anywhere.

You know?

I said, you wouldn't believe it today.

♪ Blessed assurance ♪ Jesus is mine - Our ministers are some of the most radical people in the world, our minsters.

People like Bonhoeffer.

I wondered, I began to wonder if King had lived, and I saw that summer, where young blacks were beginning to question whether or not demonstrations were gonna bring about justice.

There was a lot of people who felt that, is justice going to be achieved by nonviolent means?

- Urine thrown down on us.

Urine, ahh, how gross can you get?

How gross can you get?

Bucket of urine on us.

That's just, that was, well, I'll tell you, what the man will do when he feels threatened.

I don't see why they felt threatened because we were orderly.

- [Chris] Protests about jobs were carried out in a variety of places, from US Steel Downtown to the Mine Safety Appliance Company in Homewood.

Wherever protests were held, people showed up enthusiastically, in great numbers, because it was all about getting blacks on the job, even during the construction of WQED-TV.

- And of course, it wasn't hard to get people downtown then, or any place else to march, if they thought a job was in the wake, because so many of us did not have jobs, and we were looking for jobs.

- Well, this is where I am, and you can't get it by praying.

You pray, and then go on and do what you gotta do.

- Naturally, the young people are not gonna follow in the footsteps of the older people, because you know, the church has really been an arm of the law, along with other social services that come into the black neighborhoods, to keep us in legal hell.

- These are the kinds of things that I had to think, that I had to come out of the whole idea of just being a compassionate, perfume smelling, handkerchief wearing black guy, in the Christian church, and if you wanna call it being radical, I didn't think it was all that radical, but everybody else thought it was radical.

They thought I was crazy.

- And it needs to be pointed out, and it rightfully had on the Negro, that Congress says, it will not reward the rioters.

It needs to be pointed out that it had not rewarded the responsible leaders, the Roy Wilkinses, the Whitney Youngs, had not been rewarded, either, you know.

So if you're not gonna reward them, you're not gonna reward the rioters, then what are you going to do?

Nothing, which is what Congress likes to do.

- Including participation in the projects by family -- - [Chris] African American clergy weren't the only ones involved in the struggle.

Monsignor Rice was famous for his activism.

In fact, he was nicknamed The Labor Priest, for his outspoken work in the labor movement.

- A priest should do what he can, in his own parish, or if he feels equipped, and have enough self confidence, he should, on a broad base, he should do what he can when he sees evils, he should speak against them, and work against them, and he should try to help people in positive ways.

I would say that the modern priest today, there's a compulsion, there should be a religious compulsion that he would do these things, because the power that he has to change and help is tremendous.

- You just can't do it in the pulpit.

That's, I think, one of the weaknesses of the pulpit today, that not enough of us in the pulpit that feel he must go beyond the pulpit.

The pulpit gave me what I needed then to keep going, 'cause I said, I'm not a social worker, but by golly, if Jesus can do this, then I can do this.

- And I was accused of saying that we were training, the Center was training these kids to build fire bombs, and was doing all that, but when the women from the suburbs came in with their aprons on, and stood in front of the Bidwell Center, and chanted and ranted and went on like that, our youngsters looked at 'em and laughed, but those were Presbyterians who felt that I was a disgrace to the Pittsburgh presbytery and to the Presbyterian Church.

- Oh, Jimmy Joe.

Jimmy Joe's on the north side, and I'm in Homewood.

Together we shook up this presbytery.

We shook up this presbytery.

- [Chris] The presbytery wasn't the only thing that Reverend Patrick shook up.

- Oh, he was truly an inspiration.

Many people have told me, I'm doing a history right now of K. Leroy Irvis, and Irvis himself is known as a firebrand.

He said, "You know, that Reverend Patrick, "he was my hero, my idol.

"That man went on out there, "and got in those pools, "didn't know how to swim, "put his life at risk, "and really told people "that it's time to start doing something.

"Stop just talking about what needs to be done, "and get on out and take a chance."

- When Reverend Patrick came to Pittsburgh, we weren't allowed to, when I say we, I mean people of darker race.

We weren't permitted to go into the Harlem Park Pool.

The pools weren't integrated at that time.

We had a pool in the Hill district called Canard Pool, but to go into Harlem Park Pool, we didn't have enough courage, but Reverend Leroy Patrick decided, and he had one of his sons with him, when he jumped in the pool, and i don't think he knew how to swim, but he was in the shallow part, but he integrated the Harlem Park Pool.

- Now there's where the irony was.

That man couldn't swim.

He was jumping in the swimming pool, (music drowning out speech) but we couldn't swim between us.

It was one of those times when the Urban League and the NAACP got together, and we devised a theory to sue the city.

The city has two roles.

One is a government role, and the other's a proprietary role, and certain services, policemen, that's government.

Proprietary may be, indeed, a swimming pool.

So anyway, we sued, claiming that the city was violating the Civil Rights Act of Pennsylvania, 'cause this was a place of public accommodation, and Negros were being denied entry.

- Wendell's a fellow who could give you the reasons, factual, the legal, the solid legal foundation that you would need to move along.

I've never seen Wendell excited, whereas I'm ready to bust in.

Wendell's calm and collected, and we did it like this.

Then we were meet at 1:00, at Harlem Park Pool on a Saturday.

There were about 500 policemen around that pool, and seeing that, oh, so many, and young people, you know, 1:00, not one of them showed up.

1:15, nobody showed up.

1:25, they looked down at (mumbling), got a white shirt, all these other guys had the blue shirts.

Where are the young people?

I'm beginning to say, "No, Lord.

"Let the ground swallow me up."

I said, "Oh, there must've been a misunderstanding.

"We were supposed to meet "at the grove for our picnic afterwards.

"They must be over there.

"But I'll go and get them."

I went there, and there must've been a dozen of my young people in that grove.

What do you mean, we were supposed to go swimming.

The girls said, "I don't like to swim."

The boys said, "I didn't bring my trunks."

Bell, Bob Bell said, "I have my trunks, "and I have an extra pair."

I grabbed him by the arm, and the next fellow nearest to me, I grabbed by the arm, and "Come on, we're going to the pool."

I'm not a swimmer, so the boys went in, they started jump in the water, and every white kid in that pool came out of the water, every one of them.

Not one was left.

My boys were startled.

I was not surprised, but they were sort of surprised.

And I was like, hey, we're having a great time here, pretending, like we're having a great time, and they did.

They went on the high rise, the high pool, and take a dive, and then they fight with each other in the deep water, and I'm back here standing, look like, say, "oh yeah, hi, go fellows, keep it up."

Well, and in about 30 minutes, "Reverend Patrick, can we go now?

"Can we go now?"

I said, "Oh, we can't go yet, "We can't go yet."

I felt we had not been there long enough to make a statement, you understand.

So on about 30 minutes later, maybe we'd been there about an hour, an hour and 10 minutes, I said, "Hey, fellas, we gotta get out of here now "'cause they'll eat all the picnic food "before we get there.

"We gotta get back in there."

That's for the crowd, you know.

That's why we're going.

Not because you're running us out, but that's why we're going.

See, when they got out of the water, they scoop their hands full of water.

"Dirty water, "Nigger water."

All the epithets, you know, were like that.

But we pretended not to hear it, you know.

You don't hear things like that, you just let it slide off you.

So we went back and got our clothes, and got in our clothes.

Officer followed us in the locker room, and I didn't have to hold their arms getting back to the grove.

The fellows were there before I got there.

So that was that experience.

That was my introduction to Pittsburgh.

- [Chris] As Revered Patrick and others proved, what should be child's play could sometimes become deadly serious.

For Herb Douglas, football was more than just a game.

- See, during that period, there were only 39 African Americans in Division I football.

But I look at the roster now at Pitt, there's 50 on our team, alone, and throughout the United States, there was only 39, as I just mentioned, so we've made a lot of progress, in football, we've made a lot of progress period.

- He's a great, great man.

We're just honored to know him, and when he ran track, for the University of Pittsburgh, he was a first, and they respected him.

Then he went on to be a world runner, highly respected.

- [Chris] But back then, the only people who really respected Herb Douglas and Jimmy Joe Robinson, the first black to play for Pitt were their teammates.

- West Virginia, they were very nasty, and I remember once, a guy wasn't even in the play, and he was coming over just to rack me up.

I was out of the play, and I saw him coming, and he just said, "Whoo," and called me the N word.

He just kept saying the N word, and as he got closer to me, my skinny elbow, I put up like that.

We didn't have face guards then, and he ran into my skinny elbow, and I guess he broke his jaw or something.

- I was accepted.

I was a good athlete, and on the field, it was equal.

It was off the field that it was unequal.

That's the way it is.

That's the way it was.

The teammates were always good.

I had families there that were good, neighbors were good, but on the football field, things were equal.

If you could play, and do well, then you were accepted, and that's just the way it was.

- Our teammates during that time, we were very close, and even today, some of us are close.

Had we not been in the capacity of winners, I wonder if they'd have been that close.

See, there's a difference.

When you're successful, people are around you, and when you're down, they're not as much.

- [Chris] Herb was a walk on at Pitt for football.

His real strengths were in track and field.

At Allderdice High School, he set three state records in track.

He went on to win a bronze medal in the broad jump at the 1948 Olympics.

(fanfare) - [Announcer] Wembley Stadium, concerned with a serious matter of Olympic contest, to make history.

In the long jump, American supremacy is again clearly shown.

We have teammate Douglas, also placed.

- You take going through school, even high school, I was state champion.

I won three state championships, the 100, the 220 and the broad jump, as we called them.

Now the media, they came through.

They gave me their headlines, but my yearbook at Allderdice High School, the school I attended, they never mentioned it, that I was a state champ, because I was African American, I guess, but it never bothered me, because I knew what I could do within myself.

- [Chris] Though Herb only played one year of football at Pitt, he made his mark in a game against Notre Dame.

- So finally, Shaughnessy looked down the bench, and said, "Douglas, go in there!"

So they never would put Jimmy Joe and I in at the same time, no, it'd either be Jimmy or myself.

So when I got in, I heard them say, "That's him."

Well, I went out in a banana type of run, and caught a touchdown right away, and went for a touchdown.

And then after that, they called me a lot of names, that I can't repeat.

I'm the only Olympic medalist to ever score against Notre Dame, that's period.

- You know one thing?

He lucked up and carried the ball like he had a loaf of bread.

See, he never played ball in high school, they never used him.

He didn't play that much.

He just, they lucked up and threw him in there, and the ball bounced in his arms, and he flew out there, and got the ball, and man, nobody could catch him.

He talked about that night, that week, that month.

He talked about that at his 80th birthday.

He ran his mouth.

Man, he never shut up about it.

- You know, it's really interesting, because Jimmy and I were in school, and how we went different ways.

You know, I went into the corporate community, and he went into the ministerial.

- [Chris] Herb's success in his chosen field is unparalleled.

He firmly believes that giving back is a privilege, handed down to him by others.

- Definitely, track and field opened the doors.

If I go someplace now, then they mention that I was an Olympian.

The door opens, but when you get inside, you have to be prepared.

That's what Pitt did for me.

Pitt prepared me, and the NAACP got me my job.

It's as elementary as that.

- [Chris] African Americans playing college football is something that we now take for granted.

Just like the ability to buy or sell a house anywhere in the country.

African American realtors owe that hard won ability to a single man, Robert R. Lavelle.

- So I have the same license you do, and yet, I'm behind in the opportunity to have the same income that you have, and I'm not going to permit it.

Oh, you're threatening us, then?

I said, "No."

I said, "I've been nice polite and kind," and I was all through seven or eight years, as this realtor who was accepted to clubs, well, they would allow me to maybe buy a house or sell a house in the area that they're leaving, I said, "Oh, that was fine," but the house maybe in Squirrel Hill, at the time, or Mount Lebanon or somewhere, well that was not the, 'cause people don't want you there.

- Robert Lavelle and the Multilist.

That was a very tough battle he faced, because housing itself, even today, housing is probably the most segregated part of American life, maybe, as they say, after the churches.

So it was no small matter when Robert Lavelle took on the Multilist and housing segregation.

- The Multilist is a group of realtors who come together voluntarily, in order to control the markets where they are.

East, the Multilist, and Mount Lebanon, whatever.

And in doing so, they had the realty homeowner understand that you have to list with Multilist, because you have maybe 20 offices selling your home, but one commission, but if you're not in Multilist, then you don't have any 20 offices to offer the homeowner to sell their home, you only have yourself, so I didn't have that type of input to be able to get listings, and besides, that was a way of keeping me out of those areas, black people from living in those areas.

- He has achieved all that he has through hard work and perseverance, and now he'll say it all came through God.

He has made it possible for black people to succeed in the real estate business.

- So we entered the suit, and right away, the realtors were all up in arms.

Why didn't I go to the Human Relations Commission?

What am I doing in federal court?

The Human Relations Commission would've slapped them on the wrist, fined them $100, and that would've been the end of it, and I said, "No," I said, "this is something that was to be done "for the whole country."

- You did not have the opportunity to sell houses that were in Squirrel Hill or Fox Chapel or Sewickley, or Mount Lebanon.

Then he sued the Multilist, and the Board of Realtors, and won the suit, which was very very costly, so that the houses that are listed in these expensive neighborhoods are now accessible to people who sell real estate.

- The people throughout the country, the realtors throughout the country start sending money here, to this institute, the white realtors, to fight this suit against this upstart guy, who thinks he can change rules and laws, and because of the need for equality, why didn't he just go through the proper channels to do that?

Why is he in the money areas of life, and commerce areas?

And well, when you try to do something on a national level, you have to be in federal court, so there we were.

- Bob Lavelle attempted to join the Multilist years ago, and the Greater Pittsburgh Board of Realtors in their racist history, and wanting to continue their racism, they rejected him, and refused to let him become a member and he brought a lawsuit against the Greater Pittsburgh Board of Realtors, and prevailed.

- We had five of those pre-trial conferences, five.

The fifth one ended with the necessity for, well, the fifth one ended with them capitulating, without going to trial, actual trial in the federal court, which would've been a Supreme Court thing, and when they capitulated, they capitulated for all the realtors in the country agreed to the same thing.

- There wouldn't be a black realtor in Pittsburgh who would have a business worth its salt if it hadn't been for Bob Lavelle.

- Every black person throughout the United States could buy a house, anywhere, whether it's through a black realtor or a white realtor.

- [Chris] What does it take to make history?

Is there a definable characteristic?

Or is it a simple matter of being at the right place, at the right time?

Is it a question of limits, that having taken so much that further acquiescence is no longer an option?

What motivated these men and women to lead exemplary lives?

Is it nearly as important as what they've achieved by doing so?

Theirs are the broad shoulders on which we continue to stand, as we make our way through a world that they helped make possible.

- Battles have just begun.

I really fear for the future generations.

We have lost so many battles in the past dozen years or so.

We have given to the opponents of justice, vocabulary is used against us, used affirmative action against us, used the language of King against us, we're measured by ability, by character, and not by the color of our skin.

Of course, we've been measured by the color of our skin for generations.

- Well, I stumbled into a lot of things and the way that it works out now, and I look at the journey of faith, I hope I've been able to make a mark to be able to, as I look back, that will give other youngsters some inspiration to be able to go and that they would give their lives to being able to help other people.

- Looking back now, I wonder how I did all these things.

Well, I think it comes from a spontaneous feeling that I said that I must make religion come alive on the streets.

If I don't make it alive on the streets, there's no point in trying to make it alive into my sanctuary.

But on Sunday morning, now, I must sell them answers from the pulpit, because if I don't keep those people's souls filled with the gospel, but I've always said, the gospel has another side.

You see, I've freed your soul on Sunday, but I gotta help you out on Monday.

What are you doing?

And that's been my motto.

- Fortunately, I have a talent of organizing, and a lot of that stuff I didn't do.

Maybe other people were doing it, and we were doing it as a group, and because I have a big mouth, I'm saying something that other people may have wanted to say, but were too shy to say, and so I get the credit, but if I had been a torchbearer, believe me, there had been a whole lot of people in back of me, sort of pushing me along, and if the flame went out, they were there to light the flame.

Nothing have I done in this life by myself.

- I feel as though that we're gonna find our rightful place, those of us of color, because we're just gonna have to use all bits of people to reach that, and they can't continue to put some people aside, 'cause they're a liability.

- Even when there weren't benefits in something for myself, if I could see benefits for others, I thought it was a battle worth entering.

- But to be a torchbearer, had been the challenge of my life, because it changed my life forever, in the way I lived, the way I raised my family, in my personal values, but at the same time, I knew that I couldn't demure by saying, "Well, I'm not a torchbearer, "I'm not this, I'm not that."

To the contrary, it was a significant challenge, and I just hope I carried that torch well.

- Oh, I think we owe them a tremendous debt of gratitude.

In fact, black people around the world owe them a debt of gratitude, and one thing that we as Americans, as black Americans are really not as aware of as we should be is how what blacks in this country have done is something that has inspired blacks in Cuba, blacks in the Caribbean, blacks in Brazil, blacks in South Africa, blacks in Kenya, has even inspired people like untouchables in India, untouchables in Japan, Aborigines in Australia, they have drawn inspiration that if you're able, and if you're willing to get out there and struggle and put your life on the line, you can make a difference.

♪ Sometimes I feel ♪ Like a motherless child ♪ Sometimes I feel ♪ Like a motherless child ♪ Sometimes I feel ♪ Like a motherless child ♪ A long way ♪ From home ♪ A long way ♪ From home - [Announcer] Major funding for this program is provided by the University of Pittsburgh.

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