Contents
1. Transcript
1.1. Session 1A ( July 10, 2006)
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STEVENSON
- Hey, good morning. I'm starting an interview -- do you want to get the
door? Can we --
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MCCLAIN
- Oh, yes, yes. OK.
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EDUARDO
- Ready to go? Full crew today?
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MCCLAIN
- Eduardo.
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EDUARDO
- (inaudible). Can I get somebody a water?
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STEVENSON
- That's fine. Good morning. I'm starting an interview with Cliff McClain
on Monday, July 10. First of all, I'd like to ask you about when and
where you were born, about your parents and siblings, your family
background.
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MCCLAIN
- OK. Well, I was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, March 31, 1940. And so that my
kids might here this or see this, it was:10:00 in the morning, so
Claudia, it was not April Fool's Day. (laughter) I am the son of my
father, Reverend C.C. McClain, and my mother Juanita Stephens. They were
not married; they didn't get married. My mother moved to California from
Tulsa, Oklahoma, and she's now with my stepfather, Ivory Scott, and have
five children, five girls. My father went back to Louisiana, and he got
married, and he had one girl, Claudette, and three boys, John, Cliff,
and Asriel. So altogether, there are ten of us. My sister Claudette is
just a couple of years younger than me, and then John, I think, is a
year or so younger than her, and Cliff is a couple of years younger than
John, and then Asriel was way down there; he is probably about seven or
eight years younger than Cliff. Now, my oldest sister, Jessye, is 13
years younger than me, and then there's Nita, who's a year or so behind
Jessye, Mikeal, who is a year or so behind Nita, and then Barbara, a
year or so behind her, and then Merri, who is two years older than my
oldest daughter, Karen. And then -- you want me to go on to my children?
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STEVENSON
- Well, I'd like, if you can, tell me something of what you know about your
grandparents.
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MCCLAIN
- OK. My grandfather, Mike Stephens, was in construction. It is said that
he was the first to make those -- you know how they have those stone
fronts? He developed that. Didn't patent it, so we didn't get rich from
it. (laughter) But he also worked in a brickyard, they made bricks, and
he came to California, I guess in the late '50s, I think. Mid to late
'50s. And he was there in Oklahoma; he was born in -- well, the house
that they lived in was on the line -- as a matter of fact, this year my
mother and I are going down to see if we can find it. It was right on
the Georgia -- I guess the Georgia/Mississippi or Georgia/Alabama --
whichever state line, you know. And so we're going to go down to see. He
always said that the front of the house was in Georgia, and the back of
the house was in Mississippi or Alabama. (laughter) So we want to go see
that. My grandmother was really the pillar of the family. I mean, she
left Oklahoma and went to Stockton, California, and as I grew up, I
spent a year in elementary, a year in junior high, and a year in high
school in Stockton. Because every time things got a little lean here,
we'd go to grandma's. And she was the place where we all kind of came
to, it was sort of the center. So on my father's side, I only knew of my grandfather, and I went to a
funeral, my Aunt Belle, who was a pillar of the community down in
Ruston, [Louisiana], which is right outside of Grambling [State
University]. And she was an entrepreneur, and very well known and widely
respected, and at her funeral, 1962 -- it was the first time I had gone
to Louisiana. And I remarked, after the funeral, to my aunt, I said, you
know, I know Aunt Belle was a revered in the black community, 'cause
she'd done a lot to help with Grambling, and she was trying to do this
that and the other, I said, "But it was really nice of all those white
people to come." And she said, "What white people?" I said, "Those white
people there." She says, "Those are not white people; those are your
relatives." And to top it off, there was a picture on the mantle of this
gentleman, this impressive-looking gentleman, and I'm not just saying
that because he was my grandfather, but he was -- I saw him and I said,
"Wow, who is this?" And I said, "Who is that white man?" She said,
"That's no white man; that's your grandfather.But anyway, my grandfather was a preacher; he was an entrepreneur; he had
-- as a matter of fact, I'll say, I had a platinum spoon -- I was born
with a platinum spoon that was snatched from me before I got here,
because my grandfather owned a lot of land, he had a sawmill, it was
said that he always bought two limousines: one for the kids and one for
him and his wife. (laughter) And he, you know, was a man of means. But
the irony of it was that he had a falling-out with a gentleman, white
man, and the white man had done something, and my grandfather roughed
him up a bit, and he came back and waited in the bushes and shot my
grandfather in the back. And the guy who did this, his brother became
the executor of the property, because I think either the youngsters were
too young to assume control or something, or as I understand it, my
father had an older brother who was a bit wayward. And so they wined and
dined him, and somehow they got much of the property. But my father
being underage, they forged his name, so when he got older, he was able
to come back and get his piece of the property back. And we still have
it, it's still in the family.And my grandmothers on my fathers side -- I just know of the first Mrs.
McClain, who was -- I forget what they call them, a Beecher or something
-- there was some term they used, it was a very dark, Indian -- like
Indian/African mix. She was dark, but she had this long black hair. So
most of the older McClains, my father's older siblings, were
brown-skinned, long-haired, straight-haired types. My father's mother, I
don't know very much about her, but she had some children as well, and
they were of a lighter hue. But I never really knew that much about her,
sort of a legendary talk about our first -- (laughter).Now, as far as my parents, my mother, she still lives; she is 87 years
old. She is a pillar in her community; I mean, I run into people all the
time that tell me, "I see your mother, she still gettin' around,"
because she walks to church, her church is about five or six blocks from
the house. She goes to Ascension Catholic Church; she walks up there for
Mass most every day. She's very active in the community, she's always
been a help. As a matter of fact, she got me involved in the adult
library reading program, teaching adults to read; she's done that for
years. She -- I remember when Maxine [Waters] first ran, she had us all
out to walking, campaigning. And she's just been one of those civic
leaders, not upfront but always there. And to the extent that people
really recognize it. She's been my best buddy. And a mom, she gets the
respect, but we do have that close relationship.
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STEVENSON
- All right. A couple of things. One, in terms of your mother's activism,
which is what I think it is, did she set the stage with that with you
when you were young? I mean, if you can -- looking back on it.
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MCCLAIN
- Well, I think my father -- since I wasn't around my father, and a lot of
my family, especially my Aunt Lena and my Uncle John, they used to tell
me tales about my dad. My dad was an activist. I didn't know much about
my dad. As a matter of fact, the one thing that really bothered me for
awhile was the fact that my dad had so much knowledge that I didn't tap
into. I've always admired George Washington Carver, for what he did and
his meek manner. I don't know if I could have been that. You know, if
you have it, flaunt it. I don't know if I could have been that
mild-mannered (laughter) and accomplishing the things that he did. I
mean, he's done so much -- this country owes him a great deal.But I found out, when I went to my dad's funeral, went to his church, and
there was a Shreveport Herald or whatever the big paper is in
Shreveport, and it had this front-page article on my dad. And I found,
in reading the article, that he had jumped on a train and went to
Tuskegee [University] to go to school, and the first person he ran into
was George Washington Carver, and he became an assistant, because he was
an agricultural major. So that -- I just said, "Wow, I missed that
opportunity to really --" My mother has instilled in us this need to
share with our children and our grandchildren, so we have family
reunions, we have grandchildren's day, we have a lot of different things
that we do as a family. We practice Kwanzaa; we do all of these things
that kind of really bring the family along. And -- which is good,
because a lot of times, much of your history and much of the strength of
that family fabric is lost because you don't pass these things on. So
that's why I'm glad you're doing what you're doing, so as a village
that's raising this child, we come together.
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STEVENSON
- OK. Tell me something about your grandmother and her values. You
mentioned she played a real integral role as you were coming up.
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MCCLAIN
- Oh, Jessie Kern -- because she was married to Barney Kern, who was a
contractor up in Northern California -- a real quiet man who didn't say
much, but when he spoke, you heard him. Not only because of that booming
bass voice, but you knew he wasn't playing, he had a smile, but you took
him seriously. And everybody, adults, white folks, everybody seemed to
take Barney seriously. But anyway, my grandmother was -- she was that
old school, go get me a switch (laughter) type grandmother, and if you
wasn't dead, you went to church. And she had the last say. And she
taught some real strong lessons; I mean, she truly was a remarkable
lady. I remember I had this friend Petey, we were playing sandlot
football, and I hit Petey, and as a result of my blocking him or
tackling him or whatever, he broke his arm. And my grandmother said,
"Now Petey's folks are struggling like all the rest of us, and you have
caused them some harm. So all those new school clothes you have in there
-- you and Petey are about the same size; you're going to have to give
them to Petey, because his mother had to spend some money on the arm,
deal with Petey's injury." And that bothered me at first, but then as I
looked back on it, I think it kind of helped me to be more appreciative
of other people, and more aware of my actions and how they might affect
others. And she taught me a good lesson on that one. And really may have
helped me to really be the person that I am, because I am concerned
about other people. I feel good about the fact that I have been able to
work and help other people, as well as be blessed as I have been
blessed, as far as my family is concerned, although there are a lot of
people that I've come in contact with, such as your father, who have
given me advice and shown me examples of being concerned and caring for
other people.
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STEVENSON
- Let's go back to maybe your elementary school years when you were young.
Could you tell me something about your neighborhood, your neighbors --
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MCCLAIN
- My neighborhoods. (laughter) Well, we started out on Vernon [Avenue] and
Morgan [Street]. And -- well, my mother came to California in the late
'40s -- no, mid-'40s, because she came before the end of the war,
because she worked at Douglass Aircraft, and she was in Long Beach. So
she left Tulsa, [Oklahoma], because she worked there, and then there was
an opportunity to come west. Well, she had an opportunity to go to
either Chicago, [Illinois] or Los Angeles, [California], so she chose
Los Angeles -- well, actually, it was Long Beach. And you know how kids
are; they want to be where their mommy is.So I stayed in Oklahoma with my grandfather for a couple of years, and
then I had this opportunity, or my mother decided, I guess after the
war, in '45, she says, come on. But coming here, she wasn't quite as
stable as she needed to be, so I stayed with some McClains, my Aunt Lena
and my Uncle John, who are brother and sister as a matter of fact, but
they had a real strong relationship as brother and sister. They were on
Morgan and Vernon, had a theatre right there, and so I remember living
there and going to -- starting out at Ascot [Elementary School]. And
then we moved over to 53rd Street, which was where my Uncle John stayed,
and he had a house right next to -- a little shotgun house, it's still
there, as a matter of fact, on 53rd and Wadsworth [Avenue]. And then I
left -- when I went to 53rd and Wadsworth, I went to 49th Street, second
grade, started in second grade.I still relish the opportunity to interact with kids that I grew up with
in that neighborhood. I run into them from time to time, and it's really
like a family reunion. 'Cause we were really a family; I mean, you know,
this gang stuff, we had a thing -- if you lived on 53rd Street, others
in the neighborhood had your back. It wasn't like we were out going --
looking to beat up anybody, but if you got into a little hassle, I had
your back. We just -- that was sort of -- really a village. And like I
said, when I see people that -- and it was more than 53rd; it was 53rd,
54th [Street], 55th [Street], 56th [Street], all of those kids right in
that area, we just all kind of met in the Delgados, and the Swaiters,
and -- let's see, what was Betty's? -- the Johnsons. Oh, it was just a
whole bunch of folks that we just all came together. And then it went on
down to I guess 51st [Street], the Hendersons and the Grosses, I think
they were on like 48th [Street] and 49th [Street], and we just really --
just one big family.
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STEVENSON
- So -- so this is in the '40s, like late '40s?
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MCCLAIN
- Yeah. This was like -- I went to 49th Street in 1947, and I graduated in
'51. I went to [George Washington] Carver Junior High for a year. Then
we moved up to Stockton, stayed in Stockton for a year and came back to
LA, and went to [Thomas Alva] Edison Junior High. Now, my group at
Edison, which includes [Los Angeles County] Supervisor Mike [Michael D.]
Antonovich, the late Paul Winfield, Congressman Henry Waxman -- it was
just a bunch of -- Larry Doby -- I mean, not Larry -- Winston Doby. Oh,
just so many.
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STEVENSON
- OK. A stellar class. So it sounds like your neighborhood in Los Angeles
was very mixed.
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MCCLAIN
- Mm-hmm. And as a matter of fact, about two weeks ago -- wait a minute,
let's see, I hope there's someone -- well, that's OK. The -- about --
let's see, when was it? It was around the end of -- no, it was around
the first of July, we had a reunion, because we do this about maybe
three, four times a year, we come together, that group from the
Edison/Russell/Fremont area. Because many of the youngsters, Mike
Antonovich and Del Rosario and Ruíz -- many of them, they went to
Russell [Junior High School], and then on from Russell, they came to
Edison. And I came to Edison that last year, in the ninth grade. And
Mike and some of the others that went to Russell just kind of kept in
touch, so it's just kind of now expanded to where -- I think we had
maybe 30 people at the last gathering, and we usually meet at Mike's
office and just kind of get together. We've done some things -- we went
back to Edison to do a Career Day; we tried to assist the principal in
some way, but I think she was a bit intimidated by the group. And so we
wanted to do something; Fremont's been having this difficulty, and that
group is black and brown, but it's like family. And so we thought maybe
we could help to deal with some of the black and brown conflict, but we
-- also, we haven't found a way yet to deal with the school in the
manner the school wants to be dealt with, I guess. (laughter)
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STEVENSON
- I see. OK. Going back to your neighborhoods, plural, it sounds like the
interrelationships were harmonious. I mean, any racial tensions at all?
And also, like I said, going back to your elementary school, near or in
your own neighborhood?
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MCCLAIN
- I don't recall much of a problem in elementary school. Except for in
Stockton; I do remember my first real conflict, which was in the first
grade. I had this little girlfriend, she was white, and we were really
buddies. And there was some white kids that had a problem with that. And
so they confronted us, and I won't forget this probably never
(laughter). I mean, I've forgiven, but I haven't forgotten, you know
what I mean? But she sided with them; she said, "Well, OK, if you're
upset about me being with him..." and she was kind of... And that really
hurt my feelings. It wasn't the male/female thing; it was the friend
thing. And it really, really upset me. That was one thing.And I remember also, back in that same period of time, we lived by the
railroad tracks, and there was me and mainly the Mexicans, and I really
thought I was a Mexican, I guess, because we just -- we were -- and
there was one incident where there was one kid who drew a distinction,
but it wasn't nearly as -- it wasn't a confrontational thing. But there
was -- I understood there was a difference, but like I said, it wasn't a
confrontational kind of thing; it's just that there was a difference.
But then later on, in junior high school, we had a race riot in
Stockton. And the Latinos and the blacks -- well, the blacks were --
what happened was there was some people who came in from Oklahoma,
called them the Okies, and they had a problem with the harmonious
environment, because -- I mean, there was no tension, it was like -- me
and my friend John, there was these two girls, one was Italian and one
was Irish or whatever, and we used to just -- I mean, junior high
school, so we used to talk and such. And I think the girls were a lot
faster than we were (laughter), we were just talking. And I just
remember the different relationships that I had; I had this teacher,
Miss Sweet, she was old San Francisco money: red hair and gold teeth.
And -- because I think there was something about that San Francisco
society, about having gold teeth or something, because I think every
tooth in her mouth was gold. I think if these youngsters really
understood where some of this came from, they might be able to kind of
let it loose. (laughter) But anyhow, Miss Sweet, I never thought of her
as being racist; I just thought she didn't like me, you know what I
mean? It never -- the racism piece never came in.But then we had this flare-up, and I remember that white folks was --
they were coming at us pretty heavy, and the Latinos and Mexicans came,
but they came prepared; that's the first time I'd ever seen motorcycle
chains used as a weapon, and the little girls would have the knives in
their hair and stuff. And so when they came to our aid, it appeared that
maybe white folks weren't going to be able to have their way, so then, I
remember, the state troopers came in to guard us, going back and forth.
And when we were the prey, it was like, "Well, you know..." but then
when it seemed like, "Well, uh-oh, some of these white kids might get
hurt," then they responded. And truly, they -- some of them did get
hurt, because our Mexican friends who came to our aid, they came ready.
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STEVENSON
- So the whites, or the Okies, as you termed them -- looking back, it seems
that they were importing racism from where they came from, trying to
import it into this harmonious --
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MCCLAIN
- Right. So -- and you know, when I look back, I really kind of felt badly
about it, because being from Oklahoma, I didn't recall -- well, you
know, when I was Oklahoma, I was five years old when I left, so there
was all good feelings for me there, and never really understanding
anything about racism or anything, and I'm sure from 1940 to 1945, there
was certainly plenty of it, but I was never exposed to it. And then to
have them do this, and I was really an Okie; I pull for Oklahoma as a
football team. So it kind of really bothered me a bit that these folks
-- but then when I really looked at the history of what happened at
Tulsa and all of that stuff, I can understand it.
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STEVENSON
- Yeah, that was going to be my next question, if you could -- being from
Oklahoma, did you speak to either the Tulsa race riot, or any -- there
were a lot of all-black towns in Oklahoma --
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MCCLAIN
- Yeah, we -- but I mean, there was like -- you never thought of it as
being that, but it was; I remember I had an uncle who -- I think he was
in Beggs, [Oklahoma] or Muskogee, [Oklahoma] or something, and he had a
lot of cows and stuff, and I used to love to go there, because they
lived real good. And then I didn't know anything personally about the
Tulsa situation; I learned about that later in life. But in looking at
that, it was something that I thought this country really owes black
people an apology, because they have treated us real badly in certain
situations. Not only -- I mean, when you look at here in California --
what's that place over there near Bakersfield?
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STEVENSON
- Allensworth, [California].
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MCCLAIN
- Yeah, Allensworth; it's like, how could you, you know what I mean?
Goodness gracious.
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STEVENSON
- Right. Let me ask you, when you were a child, when would be the first
time you ever had race or racism discussed in your home?
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MCCLAIN
- In my home.
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STEVENSON
- Or was it?
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MCCLAIN
- No, as a matter of fact, my mother and I had a conversation later in life
-- when I say later in life, I must have been -- I was probably going to
Carver, so it must have been probably about the seventh grade, so I had
to be 11, 12 years old. And I asked her, "Why didn't you say anything to
me about these white folks?" And she said to me that, "I figured you'd
figured it out for yourself." She said, "I didn't want you to draw any
conclusions based on my experiences; I figured you would see it for
yourself." And I certainly did. (laughter) And I still didn't -- but
then I understand my mother, as I step back and look at it, that she
would do something like that, you know, want to be fair and impartial,
you know. But like I told my son recently, and he's 28 years old, I told
him that there are things that he will experience and things that he has
experienced that he has to experience on his own, but whenever I saw the
opportunity, or felt I could, I tried to tell him what point I ought to
show him some things, not to try to give him a biased opinion, but just
based on the facts of my life. And hopefully it helped, although
sometimes he didn't seem like he heard me; he had to figure it out for
himself. And that wasn't on race, but it was just on life in general.
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STEVENSON
- OK. What effect would you say having lived in multiracial neighborhood,
having multiracial circles of friends, has had on your own views on
race, racism?
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MCCLAIN
- Well, I think a lot of what happened to me as a young person gave me
almost a superiority complex, because -- I mean, I tell people, they say
-- they refer to us as being "culturally --" what was the term they
used? -- there's a term that they used, I can't really think of it --
impoverished, in a sense, you know what I mean? And I had -- I woke up
to Dorothy Donegan playing the piano, you know? I mean, I was on Central
Avenue, and all that stuff that was going on -- I mean, culturally, if
anything, I felt I was a billionaire. I don't know, I just -- I remember
there were times when we'd go over to the [Los Angeles] Coliseum or
something, because -- I had my time in the street; my mom, being a
single mom, she couldn't see everywhere, although at one point, I really
thought she was clairvoyant. They had a real network. But they'd jump on
some little white boys and take their coats or something, and I would
kind of get in and say, "OK, you got the coat, leave him alone. You
don't have to beat 'em up." So I was always the kind of wanting to be
fair kind of guy. And I really wouldn't participate in the negative
stuff. I might be there, and that's the thing I think that kind of kept
me out of jail, was that I had this ability to see stuff coming, and
know when to say -- you might say I'm chicken, but I'm gone; I think
you've crossed the line --
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STEVENSON
- (inaudible)
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MCCLAIN
- Yeah. (laughter) There were a number of times, the police would come
knockin' at my mom's door, and I'd be sitting there, and somebody may
have given my name up, because I might have been with them before we
crossed Central Avenue, and then when I saw where they were heading and
what they were up to -- "See y'all later." (laughter) And I might have
even been involved in the conversation that got us to that point, but I
thought you know I was kidding. But that's one of the things that -- I
know, sometimes there's been a divine intervention that kept me out of
jail. (laughter) But I've been -- I'm able to say that I don't have a
record.
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STEVENSON
- OK. Can you tell me about the role of religion in your upbringing?
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MCCLAIN
- The role of religion. I think that's why I'm still here, because my
grandmother, as I said before, she used to make us sit on those little
hard benches at Second Baptist Church in Stockton, [California] and
listen to that boring preacher. (laughter) But it was there, you know,
and then later in life, we came to stay on 53rd Street, there was a
little church on 52nd place, Calvary Baptist Church, between Central
[Avenue] and Wadsworth [Avenue], and we started going to that church
when we moved on 53rd Street, and there came a minister, young man, real
young man, who was a friend of my father's, Manuel Scott. And Reverend
Scott just -- I don't know, there was just something, because we had a
lot of preachers who came in and they said very little; they did a lot
of hooping and hollering and stuff. But Manuel, the priest -- Manuel
would send you to the dictionary. This man was remarkable, and he made
it all make sense to me.And so I, at the age of nine, I joined church, and I believed, truly
believed what was being taught, and it -- like they say, you train up a
child -- and I've been -- I've made some twists and turns, even as a
Nationalist, I couldn't turn loose my religion, you know what I mean?
Because people would down the church, and they'd talk -- but then I
would think about the people I came in contact with at Calvary Baptist,
because my mother was a very attractive young lady, but the help I saw
her getting wasn't men trying to get next to her; it was families
helping a young single mother. And I mean, I saw all the good stuff, so
that really stuck with me. I mean, it sticks with me today it's like,
that's what I feel we ought to be about. And I think -- and this
probably is after -- but I think that had we, during that real militant
black period, stayed closer to the church, there'd have been -- and I
think Malcolm [X] really had a spiritual sense. He may have said Allah,
but I really believe that he had a deeper religious understanding. It's
like I heard Minister [Louis] Farrakhan speak of Jesus in a very -- I
consider to be a correct way. And it really kind of shocked me a little
bit. But when he said it, he said it in a way that he wanted folks to
know; he said, "I'm not crazy." But he did, he mentioned Jesus as the
son of God, and I said, "Wow." So we do have more in common than may
meet the eye.And so I'm saying that as we, us Nationalists [HOLDS UP FIST], if we had
kept more in tune and intact with our religious upbringing -- one of the
things that we wouldn't have done, is we wouldn't -- the drugs would not
have been around. The corruption would have not been as prevalent. And
we could have truly come together and done the things that we needed to
do. Maybe there was just a little bit too much anger involved for that
to happen, because we were angry; I know I was angry. Should have been
more love for those that we -- and there was love, I mean; we love black
people, but we didn't have to hate white people. We could have done
without some of that negative energy. Because, you know, when you think
about it, as you get older and you kind of look back, I mean, we've done
some dastardly things ourselves. Like Jesus said, you know, cast the
first stone, if you've never done anything wrong. So we all would have
had to put our rocks down. (laughter)
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STEVENSON
- Let me ask you what emphasis your mother, your grandmother, and other
adult relatives places on education when you were coming up.
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MCCLAIN
- Well, they placed -- my grandmother -- I think my grandmother looked at
more getting a good job, because -- I don't know how much education
Barney had, but he had skills, he had sellable skills, and he was able
to amass quite a bit. They lived real good. But he had the skill, he was
a contractor. And so her thing was probably more, "Get a job." My mother
-- education was key to her -- I know my sisters, she tried to push them
all -- like my older sister, she got her Master's; she went to USC
[University of Southern California] and got her Master's. She went
straight on through school. The next sister, she wanted to go to work;
she went to Cal Poly [California State Polytechnic University, Pomona]
because that's where my older sister went -- and when I say older, she
was 13 years younger than me, but Nita went to Cal Poly for a year and
came back home and said, "Mama, save your money; I want to go to work."
She went to work for the County, she's still working for the County.
She's a supervisor -- I mean, she's worked her way up. But school, per
se, was not her thing at that point in time. My mother went back to
school, she became an LVN [Licensed Vocational Nurse].So she -- I think education, to her -- and I think with my mom, her thing
was: read, study, investigate for yourself. I mean, you can do it
formally in education, but do it. So -- now, my father, that was --
because he wanted me to go to school, he wanted me to go to school. And
then I had an Aunt, my Aunt Ruth and my Uncle George; they really pushed
the education thing. They were like, "You've got to go to school." They
wanted me to be a lawyer, because they said I'd argue with anybody.
(laughter) So there was education -- emphasis placed on education by
folks in the family around me. Like I said, my mother, her thing was,
"You need to go to school, you need to, but do what you have to do."And I tried the school thing; as a matter of fact, I was on my way to
Grambling, and my girlfriend at the time got pregnant, and as I look
back on it, sometimes I think her family really faked me out, because
they seemed to treat her so badly I couldn't just leave her to that, so
I came back, and we got married. Probably if her family had been a bit
more supportive, I would have just went on to school, and figured we'd
work it out, but I didn't want to leave her to have to deal with that,
fend for herself, so to speak. And sometimes I -- I really -- there are
times when I should have gone back and didn't, and I look at it, and I
say, wow, that's an opportunity missed. And -- but then I've never let
it get in the way. You know what I mean? It's like if I want to do
something, I try to do it. And it's like this particular position that
I'm in now, you're supposed to have a degree, but then I had so much
experience that they counted that. I know in the early '70s when we were
making the changes, we institutionalized the experience factor, so that
it would take -- have the same weight as education.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Can you tell me something about your recollections, remembrances, of
Central Avenue? And I guess this would have been probably the tail end
of its heyday.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. It was really the tail end of its heyday, because -- I remember,
there was a club -- when we lived on Morgan, there was a club on Long
Beach [Boulevard] that I could hear the music -- I mean, it was jammin',
jammin', jammin'. There was a lot of things going on on Central Avenue,
but being a kid, I never got a chance to really go down there. So later
on in life, when I was able to just kind of go where I pleased, all of
that had dissipated, except for the Lincoln Theatre. My mother used to
take me up there, I saw a lot of good entertainment at the Lincoln
Theatre.
-
STEVENSON
- Like who?
-
MCCLAIN
- Lionel Hampton. What was it, Johnny Otis. Oh, wow. Just so many folks.
But those were the prominent, because they were always there. And just
remembering such good music. And they had the Million Dollar Theatre
downtown; I don't remember exactly where it was, but I know it was
downtown, we went to some things down there. And then I remember the
pool hall, Mr. Specks Pool Hall.
-
STEVENSON
- Mr. Specks?
-
MCCLAIN
- Uh-huh. And one day, I said -- I kept telling myself that I was going to
go down and get a picture of Mr. Specks sitting in front of the pool
hall; I just wanted to have that picture. But I never got it, he passed
away before I did it.
-
STEVENSON
- And Specks is spelled --
-
MCCLAIN
- Like Specks, he had freckles, and they just called him Mr. Specks.
-
STEVENSON
- Oh, OK. And it was located --
-
MCCLAIN
- On 52nd Place -- between 53rd and 52nd Place on Central. Specks Pool
Hall. A lot went on that pool hall. And then there was Al's Store, on
the corner of 53rd and Central. What was Al's last name? I should never
forget that. Anyhow, Al had a market, but I think he made his money
after-hours. (laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- All right.
-
MCCLAIN
- And I think he made a lot of it. (laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- So the pool hall was -- the store, rather -- was a front?
-
MCCLAIN
- The store was -- it wasn't a front, he just sold liquor after-hours. He
was not -- I mean, he wasn't into drugs or anything like that. Well,
except that is a drug, but, you know. But no, he just -- you could just
get you a pint or whatever at any time of day. And Specks Pool Hall,
there was probably a lot of -- I remember my Uncle John had a -- when we
stayed on 53rd Street, in the back there was this big barn-type thing.
And they had a couple of pool tables back there, and they used to shoot
dice, used to have serious after-hours -- and I think that was Mr.
Specks, and I think it started out with my cousin John T. And I think
John went to jail or something, and I think then Uncle John kind of
stepped in and kind of kept it going. But I think they did pretty well
back there. But Central Avenue was fading, I guess, when I was of the
age to really appreciate the music and stuff. But like I said, we did --
we did the Lincoln Theatre, and the Million Dollar Theatre, which was
downtown. And so we -- and I did get some of that rich musical heritage.
-
STEVENSON
- Can you tell me what some of your mother, your grandmother's political
views might have been, or did they ever voice them? And also, at this
time, there were many things going on in the South, still a lot of
violence. Did you ever discuss any of that -- did they ever discuss
that?
-
MCCLAIN
- My grandmother, I don't think we ever had any political conversations. I
don't think she ever shared any of her views. She -- like I said, her
husband, Barney, Mr. Kerns, he was not a forceful person, but I think he
was pretty firm, and he had the ability to deal. So he was pretty
successful. Stockton was not the South, but it was not as liberal as it
may have appeared to be. I mean, as long as you're on your side of the
town, probably everything was cool. (laughter) But I think there was
this underlying thing, and I think what happened in our junior high
school, when we had the race riot, it just kind of brought it out, but
it was not -- I mean, it seemed to be really an OK place, but I'm sure
there were barriers. But my grandmother was more into us having
spiritual, correct upbringing than anything else. Now, my mom, she was
an activist of sorts. She used to tell me about the Marcus [Mosiah]
Garvey parades and stuff like that. She -- as a matter of fact, there's
a picture of her and Rosa Parks. She was quiet, but like I said, she had
us -- when Maxine ran for Assembly the first time, she had us out there
-- (telephone rings) Excuse me.[END OF McClain.Clifford.1.07.10.2006-a]
1.2. Session 1B ( July 10, 2006)
-
STEVENSON
- OK, you were talking about your mother's political views, and you were
referring (inaudible) --
-
MCCLAIN
- Oh, OK. Yeah, because Rosa is -- she is related to my girl's mother. I
don't know exactly where, but they're somehow related, because I know
when she was here -- like in this picture here, when they honored her in
Duchamps, this is my cousin Barbara, and Barbara was carrying her
around, so there's some connection.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Some familial connection. OK.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah, so. But this was -- we had Rosa out for -- I don't know, it was
some kind of family something, so my mother -- she and my mother were
there together, and so I took that picture.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. If you could tell me about how far you went in your education?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, I graduated [Thomas] Jefferson High School in 1957, summer of '57.
I went to [Los Angeles] Trade Tech [College] -- well, it wasn't Trade
Tech at the time, it was Los Angeles Junior College of Business. I was
going to go for accounting, and I decided I really didn't want to be an
accountant; I wanted to deal with people. So I started -- I took some
classes at UCLA Extension, and I was taking tests for the City of Los
Angeles. First for an auto messenger, and I got 100%, but I wasn't 18,
so they couldn't hire me. So in August -- I think it was August of that
next year -- August or July? Anyway, I got hired on for the city, and
then I said, well, you know, I could do pretty good with these city
tests, so... So at any rate, I got a promotion, took the clerk typist
test, got a promotion. I said, well, maybe this city thing will go, so
the school thing was sort of, I'll take a class here or I'll take a
class there. Took a test, again got 100%; went in for the interview, and
I was told that -- and this was the City of Los Angeles in about 1959 --
I was told that there were no blacks -- well, I don't know if they said
blacks, they said, "None of your kind," that was probably what they said
-- in the department, and we don't think you would fit.
-
STEVENSON
- And which department was this?
-
MCCLAIN
- It was something to do with maintenance, auto maintenance or something.
And so that kind of crushed me, so I took a test for the post office, I
passed it and moved on to the post office, because I could see that
there was opportunity to move in the post office for blacks. So -- and
in the process, I still was going to UCLA; I hooked up with -- I forget
who it was, somebody over at UCLA was giving me scholarships, or there
was some kind of reduced rate, so I could take classes at the UCLA
extension. So I did that, and I did it along the lines of -- I had
thought about international business or something along those lines. So
I was taken classes moving in that direction, but did some
organizational things, and -- which helped me.And then -- '65, things changed. And I decided I wanted to get involved.
I thought I wanted to be a revolutionary, but Miss Opal C. Jones
convinced me that I wanted to be a change agent, which is a little more
palatable. But it was probably closer to what I really wanted to be,
because I said I was a Panther without a gun. (laughter) So anyhow, I
did a class, Reverend -- Reverend, he was like a saint -- Bill Williams,
Professor Bill Williams over at USC, put together a class - I think it
was like '66, '67, at USC. And through this class, he really taught us a
lot, and what helped me -- it was a certificated program, a bunch of us
went through it; I can't remember who all was in it, but it was a lot of
us in there. And everybody in there just kind moved on. So from that
certification program, I was able to use that to kind of move along. So
it was -- the educational piece was not as necessary for my upward
mobility.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. I have another follow-up to your early life. You mentioned your
mother worked at Douglass Aircraft during the war years; can you talk a
little bit more about that?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. As a kid, I must have been three or four years old, I remember she
took us -- took me to Douglass Aircraft, because she was there in Tulsa,
and I fell in love with airplanes. And I don't know where I got the term
from, but I had decided that I wanted to be an aeronautical engineer. I
didn't even know what that was, but that's what I wanted to be. And I
remember going to Jefferson High School in tenth grade, going and
sitting down with this young white counselor, and he asked me, "Well,
what do you want to do?" So I said, "I want to be an aeronautical
engineer," and he fell out laughing. And he said, in earnest, "Your
people don't do that. You might want to be an auto mechanic or
something." And that really -- that -- the devil used that a lot.
-
STEVENSON
- Yeah. That wasn't that common even well into the '70s, tracking black
youths -- white counselors tracking black youths. And I guess this would
be an example of this.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. And like I said, he didn't -- I felt no malicious intent. It was
just his response. And I'm sure it wasn't his alone; it was probably the
response to give, you know?
-
STEVENSON
- Right, exactly.
-
MCCLAIN
- And -- but I know it really hurt my feelings, and kind of changed my --
took some of my enthusiasm about school. Because I -- I mean, I never
really thought about cutting class until -- you know, it was just like,
what the heck. It was then, let me hurry up and get out of here.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. What was it your mother did at Douglass Aircraft?
-
MCCLAIN
- She was a riveter.
-
STEVENSON
- A riveter. So like Rosie the Riveter.
-
MCCLAIN
- Mm-hmm.
-
STEVENSON
- And so were you aware at the time that there were other African-American
women also working at Douglass Aircraft?
-
MCCLAIN
- Oh, there probably -- I would assume; I mean, I probably -- I don't know
if I knew any, but I'm pretty sure that it wasn't an odd thing.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Why don't we stop there for today?
-
MCCLAIN
- Fine with me. OK.
-
STEVENSON
- Because I want to --[END OF McClain.Clifford.1.07.10.2006-b END OF Clifford McClain Session
One]
1.3. Session 2 ( July 17, 2006)
-
MCCLAIN
- (inaudible) or anything?
-
STEVENSON
- This is all digital, so it's good. Good morning, it's Monday, July 17;
I'm continuing an interview with Clifford McClain, and I want to pick up
where we left off in 1965; I'd like you to discuss the beginnings of
your activism. And also, that being the year of the first Watts
Rebellion, if you could speak about that as well.
-
MCCLAIN
- Well -- good morning. (laughter) '65. '65 was a good year. What happened
for me in '65 was, I kind of had things, I thought, kind of had things
figured out, in terms of how I was going to approach this thing of
husbandhood, fatherhood, you know, and all of these positions of
responsibility. And I had thought at first that the City of Los Angeles
was going to help me, and as I told you, things happened that showed me
that that wasn't going to happen, so I was in the Post Office, and I
decided that I didn't want to be a supervisor, but I wanted to do
something more. And one of my patrons, Mr. Simpkins, a realtor, on
Arlington [Avenue] just south of Jefferson [Boulevard]. And one day, I
went in, "Mr. Simpkins," -- he had this big diamond ring, and he was
always dressed nice -- just a real classy guy. And he treated his wife
-- I mean, his wife was always like -- so I admired this man.So one day, we got into conversation, and I said to him, I really -- I'm
kind of tired of this, you know what I mean? I used the post office as
sort of a developmental thing for me, in terms of dealing with the
public. I mean, I had a route that my patrons waited for me to come
back, you know. They'd talk to me about their wayward grandchildren,
they just -- (laughter). And so consequently, I had one of the shortest
routes, and they were really upset when (inaudible) because I was such a
young person, I was maybe 25. And -- but it was because I told my
patrons, when you see me coming with that white man, don't you run. You
come out and you bring two glasses of lemonade. (laughter) So
consequently, when I checked my routes, they'd -- it lasted a long time,
but they weren't very full. So -- but anyway, Mr. Simpkins told me, he
said, "You know, when I was a young man, I felt pretty much like you; I
was working for this post office." I said, "You worked for the post
office?" He said, "Yeah." He said, "And one day I just came in, and I
told my wife that I wanted more, and that I was going to do something
different. And I just walked out from the post office, and I haven't
looked back." And I said, "Wow!" (laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- So did you see the post office was sort of a stepping stone, as it was
for many African-Americans?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. It was. It was -- as a matter of fact, I remember when I told my
grandmother that I was going to leave the post office, she just couldn't
understand. "Boy, why do you want to walk away from that good job?" Now
to look back, I could have been retired. But I didn't really feel the
administrative part of the post office, at least that that I saw; I
didn't want to live like that. And it seemed like to me, they were kind
of pushing people, you know what I mean, trying to get -- and a lot of
times, you had to get folks to produce. So -- but anyway, I kind of
looked at politics, and I began to kind of look and see what it took to
get into politics, and I couldn't understand why there were not more
blacks involved. And so -- and then I looked, and I looked at the
demographics, and I saw that there were areas where we may not have had
the majority, but we had a good portion, and we had some very
influential people, like the district that I finally did run in 1966 --
there was a lot of substantial folk in that district.So at any rate, '65 also, my wife became pregnant with our second child,
and so this whole fatherhood thing was really taking some form. And in
August, when my baby girl was born, the riot broke out. Now, I'm going
to share something here, and I hope that whoever reads this will read it
understanding that I'm just trying to be truthful. I had a real
misconception about what marriage was. (laughter) I had a real
misconception about what marriage was, and I kind of felt, because of
some of the -- and I'm not going to blame it on anybody, but I did see
-- well, let me just put it this way. One of my role models was my
cousin John T. McClain, and anybody who knew John T. would understand
why I might have some difficulty. (laughter) Although John T. always
tried to show me the other side; he always discouraged me from runnin'
the streets; he always encouraged me to go to school. As a matter of
fact, during that period of time, he had a nightclub called the It Club,
and I worked in the It Club, and I would want to get involved with --
you know, entertainers and all of this, and I'd want to get involved in
the parties and the different -- if he ever came in and I was there, the
party was over. And he would reprimand people, you know -- "He does not
belong." (laughter) And -- but I, as a young man, I kind of took it
like, well, why can't I have fun. But then later in life, I truly
understood where he was coming from, and I love him today for that. He
really tried to steer me in the right path.But any rate, so during the -- and I'll tell you why I shared that, is
because I was out partying when the riots broke out, and I -- as I was
coming home, I noticed the police were looking at me real funny, and so
I'm on my way; now, my wife is pregnant, so I come home, and she goes
into a false labor, so we go to Kaiser [Permanente] up on Sunset
[Boulevard], and so we're there for a bit, and they said, "No, take her
back home." So we're coming back home, and as we're coming home, I turn
on Western [Avenue] and Venice [Boulevard]; there was a blockade there.
And as I turned, I guess my headlights startled a young man, looked like
he was no more than 17 or 18, National Guard. And he just brought his
rifle right down, as though to aim it. And I stopped my car and got out,
raised my hands up, and told him -- and these words, I don't know where
they came from -- "It's OK. It's OK." And he like -- it seemed like he
almost broke into tears. I guess it startled him, he made a reaction,
and I guess he saw the mistake he could have made, and it just shook him
up. And I got back in the car. But that's a real vivid recollection
there. That was will stick with me forever probably.So -- but now, '65, the riots, which happened in April -- I mean, in
August, so it was sort of like the tail end of the year. I was -- I
guess I was listening a lot to Malcolm [X] and John Coltrane, and it --
something was happening in me. Something was -- I was -- yes, I was for
-- oh, and I was also going to Bootstrap, Operation Bootstrap, and Lou
Smith -- well, I always say, Lou Smith, Walt Bremond, and Danny Bakewell
showed me, beyond a doubt, that pigmentation had nothing to do with
being black. (laughter) Had nothing to do with being black, because
these are the blackest people that I know. And Lou and Walt, to me at
that particular time, because they had the education, the access, I mean
-- they could do whatever they wanted to do, but yet they were still
down here with us.So I admired those two tremendously, and I tried to hear what they had to
say, and somewhat pattern my life after them. It was like, yeah, we've
got to do this thing, and as I said before, they weren't trapped in it;
they could have -- I feel they could have gone wherever they wanted to
go, but they were here, and they were setting a great example. So, but
any rate, all of this was going on. Lou used to have this thing at
Bootstrap; he had these little books, and that's where I really found
out about Denmark Vesey and -- what's his name? -- one of my real heroes
-- oh, Nat Turner. And he just -- he had had these -- maybe a dozen
little history pamphlets, and folks that I had never really come in
contact with. And so -- and then Lou also developed these dialogues with
the outside community, and as a matter of fact, I remember once I had an
opportunity to go and speak -- where was I? -- it was in the Pacific
Palisades, I think the guy's house that we went to, he was the
chairperson or the chief operating officer or something of -- what is
it? -- oh, my goodness -- oh, it'll come to me. It's in Santa Monica
now; sort of the think-tank type --
-
STEVENSON
- Rand?
-
MCCLAIN
- Rand, yeah, right.
-
STEVENSON
- Rand Corporation.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. Very gracious gentleman, but really an incident that happened as I
was speaking, there was a brother there, and he was a little uneasy with
my presence. And as I got to talking, and I hit a few points, the next
thing I knew, this brother was cheering. (laughter) I (inaudible), you
know, maybe I could share what I'm feeling, right? So I hope it didn't
hurt him. (laughter) But he did, he kind of came out, you know? So
anyway, and then getting around, like I said, as we came into August,
and we had the riot rebellion -- as I was in the streets, as I said,
when it happened, I came home to make sure my family and everything is
all right, and then we're dealing with this situation of my daughter
being born -- she was born on the 24th -- I began to get out in the
streets, and as I was in the streets, I ran into some young people -- I
remember one day probably about three days into the riot or the
rebellion, I ran into some young people I went to high school with. And
they had -- well, when I ran into them on the street, we were talking,
they said, "Man, we're socking it to the Man, I'm socking it to the Man
with you." So I went with them to their place and go in, and there was a
Hudson's on Slauson and Main. And they had gone into Hudson's, took
boxes and boxes and boxes of these shoes, and -- you know the shoes that
the gang bangers were wearing at one time? They were sort of a house
shoe, but they were sort of corduroy like? A bunch of those. I was so
disappointed; it was like -- and I told them, I said -- they said,
"Yeah, man, we going --" I said, "Look. When you get to Wilshire
[Boulevard], I'll join you."But speaking of disappointing, probably well into that week, I have a
cousin, Warner Wright, he's the son of Crispis Wright; he has an
apartment up on Doheny just south of Sunset. Real nice, nice place. And
he and another friend, Lynn Dixon, the three of us were sitting in
Warner's living room. Beautiful living room, a tree growing up in the
middle of the room -- really just a classy, classy place. And we're
sitting here, there's a riot raging, or a rebellion. And I'm thinking
more rebellion than anything else. And so as we're sitting there
talking, and I'm reflecting on Malcolm and all of these other things,
and some of the things that I'm feeling, and Warner and Lynn together
kind of just said, "Gene, wake up." "What?" Said, "Man," -- and I don't
know if I should say it this way -- well, I will, I'll put it this way
-- "When those Negroes sober up, if you go out there, you're going to be
out there by yourself." And I said, you know -- it hit me. I was like,
wait a minute, no, it's not quite that bad. But then I really went out
and started looking, started paying close attention to what I was
seeing. There were liquor stores being -- there were a lot of people
drinking and doing some real strange things. And I kind of really looked
at it to see that it wasn't what I -- it wasn't that romantic type of
thing that I was really feeling, that we were finally saying, "Hey,
we've had enough." Yes, we did; we did have enough. But that wasn't the
context, or the total context, in which this thing was happening. And it
did kind of bother me. And then as I reflected on my friends that I had
gone to school with, and how they responded, it just kind of drew me
more into this thing of, we've got to do something. And as I said
before, I thought I kind of had things figured out about how to raise my
family, and what I was about to do. But the need to include more than
just me and mine began to really develop.So there was this group after the riot, rebellion; it was called TALO:
Temporary Alliance of Local Organizations. And this group came together
as a result of Walt and Lou and I think the Men of Tomorrow, and Dr.
Ballard, and everybody, Celes[tus King, III] -- everybody just kind of
came together. And we used to meet on Central, I think it was Central
and 46th or 40 -- maybe it was 48th; there was a little corner building
there with a glass front on it, so you know we had a lot of nerve. And
we met there regularly; I don't remember how often the meetings were,
but I remember -- and folks came, [Maulana] Karenga, everybody came
together. And there was some rough times, but we really, for a minute,
seemed to be willing to come and sit together, from the NAACP [National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People] to US to SNCC
[Student nonviolent Coordinating Committee] to -- everybody. And I don't
know it dissipated, but it did. But I think probably from that, that's
probably where Walt thought about this whole thing of the Black
Congress, a more formal structure, a place that you could kind of
control the environment, and also sort of incubate groups, because you
have office space -- which I thought was a great idea. I'm sure there
was a lot of organized intervention, because you hear people talk about,
you know, who was this and who was that, and I don't know, I can't --
and everybody that I knew and know now, I mean, I just can't see them
being anything other than just some young black folks trying to do --
now, they may have been misguided or misdirected, perchance, but I don't
think anybody was openly engaged by the CIA [Central Intelligence
Agency] or anything like that.
-
STEVENSON
- Well, let me ask you this. So TALO was a direct result of the Watts
Rebellion?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yes.
-
STEVENSON
- And then -- so TALO really is the forerunner, you would say, of the Black
Congress?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. It was something that just came together; I don't know who all
pulled out -- I know Walt was involved, I know Lou was involved, I know
that Dr. Ballad was involved, Karenga was involved. But I'm seeing
probably Celes and Walt and folks like that pulling it together, and
like I said, it operated for awhile, and I don't remember what happened
-- I know we had some misunderstandings. Media, I believe, was the fly
in the ointment. It was -- things -- the disagreements developed around
media.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. More specifically?
-
MCCLAIN
- I think there was this lady, and I don't know -- I can't remember her
name, I think it was -- I almost want to say Fran Savage; I'm not sure
if that was her name, though. But she was a Jewish lady, and she kind of
caused some friction. And what happened was, a couple of guys got into
it, and I don't know whether it was partly personal or was wholly a
problem with somebody getting more media than somebody else, something
like that.
-
STEVENSON
- Could that reporter have been Jessica Savitch?
-
MCCLAIN
- Maybe it was -- was it Jessica Savitch? I'm thinking her name was Savage,
though.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. We can probably check that with the time period. OK. So the Black
Congress -- what was your understanding of its philosophy, organizing
principles?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, I may have had some specific ideas about it at the time, but as I
reflect, I really -- I just know that coming together down there on --
right off of Florence and Broadway -- that it was a good thing that --
it was a necessary thing, in the sense that groups needed to come
together, needed to have some space, needed to have this opportunity to
sort of formulate their plan, and see how they can fit it into the
master plan, so to speak. And I saw that happening through this effort.
I also -- you know, the thing is, the real outstanding quality of Walt
Bremond, to me, was to get Walt into conversation meant that you were
going to bring some resources. If you were talking to Walt about
something, and there was a need that was identified, every time I know
I've been in a conversation like that, Walt found some money or
something. It was almost expected, you know? He just -- it was like, OK,
well, I'll do that, and then the next thing you know, that was not the
issue, the lack of money; the issue was, let's get it done. And so that
was what I saw, the Congress coming together, because here was Walt --
and others -- who were helping folks to get off the ground. And it was
-- I mean, it was US, it was the Panthers, it was everybody, militant
and not so militant, and they all had a place. Now, I wasn't there on a
regular basis; I was busy doing something else during that period. I was
trying (inaudible). And so I saw it happening; I would even go through
there, but that wasn't my spot.
-
STEVENSON
- Well, let me ask you this. The major issues that led to the rebellion:
could you discuss that a little bit? And secondly, were those the same
issues, conceivably, that both TALO and the Black Congress were trying
to address?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. I would say the issue of the police, certainly. The issue of lack
of jobs, lack of opportunity, all of those things, came into play. I
think what TALO was trying to do mainly was to stabilize things. Tried
to bring people to a point where they were looking for some constructive
ways of addressing this. And really kind of seeing what we could do as a
group, because as I said before, you had the Men of Tomorrow, you had
US, you had everybody at the table, so we could talk about how we move
forward. And it wasn't about tearing up the place; it was about
building, which was a good thing. Now, I think the Congress -- Walt -- I
think its basic philosophy was institutional, building, institution
building. He wanted to put things in place that would outlast an
individual. What happens often is that, you know, you have an
individual, dynamic leader, and when that leader's gone, whatever effort
that is just falls by the wayside. Walt's thing was, let's
institutionalize the effort, not only in terms of one entity taking it
on, but maybe a thrust in that particularly direction that might be
carried by a number of different entities. So I think that's really
where he was coming from. And I think that's really what we need to look
at, because I've seen so many things just fall by the wayside. Like your
father's involved in one for instance, that whole thing with the
[George] Washington Prep[aratory High School], with your dad and --
-
STEVENSON
- Ten Schools Program.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. Dr. Martin and George McKenna. That to me should have been
replicated and spread all over, you know? But maybe we didn't have
enough Al Moores and Dr. Martins and George McKennas to carry it out. I
don't know. So even if you go and look at those neighborhoods now, I'm
wondering what you see. I know I took a peek a little while ago, and
(inaudible).
-
STEVENSON
- I see. Could you talk a little bit about the War on Poverty, in terms of
its effect -- in terms of its programs, how successful were they, and
chronologically, how it fits into this whole scheme, starting with the
Watts Rebellion and even before that time, and whether there was any
cause and effect there?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, the War on Poverty worked for me, worked for me and my family. When
I say me and my family, I mean my whole family: my sisters, my children,
we all benefited. One, for instance: my oldest daughter was one of the
first graduates of Headstart. She went to Frederick Douglass Headstart.
I knew there was a problem, because when she went to 24th Street
Elementary School, and she graduated from Headstart, I asked her, I
said, "Baby, how was school?" She said, "Daddy, I don't like school." I
said, "What? You used to get your mom up at 5:00 in the morning, talkin'
about 'Come on, Mama, let's get ready.'" She says, "Yeah, Daddy, but all
I do is play, and I got better toys at home." And so we were down at the
school, I said, "Wait a minute, what's up here?"So what they did was that there were a number of kids who came into that
school from Headstart that were creating a problem, because they were
bored; they didn't have -- they were not prepared for these kids. So
what they're trying to do -- one of the things they did, they skipped my
daughter. So it was like, they were trying to do some makeshift things.
Now, we paid close attention, and we did the things that we needed to
do, so consequently, out of our children, we have two University of
California graduates. I mean, this is out of a household that college
was -- (laughter) wasn't the thing. But since then, their mother, my
ex-wife, went back, and she has two Master's degrees. But starting out,
that wasn't the case. My problem with, or the problem that I saw with
the whole thing of the War on Poverty as it relates to Los Angeles was
that the city and the Board of Education, and probably the county as
well, but I know the city and the Board of Education, because I saw it
firsthand, did not participate in good faith with what was going on.
-
STEVENSON
- This is the War on Poverty program?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yes. They blocked a lot of things; they just messed up a lot of things.
They really weren't the good-faith operators in this endeavor. I mean, I
could -- there were situations -- we had in the schools, New Careers in
the Schools. We had mothers who had been on welfare who came and got
involved in the program. Wasn't making a lot of money, but making a
little money. Your self-esteem was going through the roof, because they
were doing things, and they were able to help their communities. I
remember this one lady over in East LA, her mere presence broke up
fights. I mean, always say, "Here come Miss So-and-so," and everybody
disbanded. And you had other campuses pretty much run that way. This
whole thing about the gangs would have never happened if we had been
allowed to do what it was that we set out to do.And we had five positions that we wanted to institutionalize with the
school setting. One of those was dealing with attendance, having a
person who'd check and see who's not coming and why. There was a social
service person who was going out and developing resources -- you know,
one of the reasons some kids didn't go to school the first of the year
was because they didn't have any new clothes, so they kind of held back
and waited and kind of blended in. So most of the kids come in on the
first day of school, the first week of school, they've got it going on.
So a lot of students just didn't make that. Now, I know there was this
program, Operation School Bill, which I thought was a marvellous program
that I ran into years later, this was back in the '80s when I ran into
this program. It was put on by the Junior Achievers or something, the
wives of doctors and lawyers -- young ladies. And they had this little
house over in Hollywood, and I brought a group of youngsters over there
from Compton. The school wouldn't do this; I had to do it on my own.
Took the kids, they had clothes laid out; they talked to them about
color schemes -- it was like going to Giorgio's, you know what I mean?
It was truly a beautiful experience, uplifting experience. And all of
those kids left out of there feeling good about themselves. And if they
just had the draw for that for a year, they had something, you know what
I mean? But there were things that could have happened.And then we looked at also the delinquency problem; we had a person that
would go out and find the kids that were ditching, go to the places
where they went to play the games when they should have been in school,
talked to the proprietors about, maybe you need to change your hours, or
at least not let them in, things like that. But, you know, you had --
like I said, these five positions that could have helped any campus be
successful, would have utilized people from that particular
neighborhood, so increasing employment opportunities, and the automatic
buy-in for putting the effort into that particular school. So I mean,
just stuff like that. There were probably a number of things that I
could draw on that could show that if we had been allowed to do what it
was we were supposed to do, it would have worked. Even with some other
areas of the New Careers Program, there were some people -- like I
remember, I went to, a few years ago, a lady retired from probation, and
she was one of our New Careerists, and she came in and she worked her
way up, and she went to school, and moved up the ladder. But she had the
opportunity, and I think we could have done a lot more, if we'd had the
participation and cooperation and the money that we needed along the
way.
-
STEVENSON
- So had government been more invested in the War on Poverty programs, do
you think it would be a stretch to say that even the first Watts
Rebellion could have been averted?
-
MCCLAIN
- If we had started early enough, yeah. It could have been. It could have
been, but see, there's one thing -- it could have been averted, is that
it might have been a flare-up because of what happened -- unless you
change your police, you're going to always have an opportunity to have a
flare-up. It can last a long time, or it can last a short time,
depending on the conditions. Just to show you. Mayor [Thomas] Bradley --
and I don't think we give Mayor Bradley the credit that he deserves.
Yes, he was the first black, but Mayor Bradley had a way of doing it.
When that second verdict after Rodney [King]--
-
STEVENSON
- King?
-
MCCLAIN
- Reginald -- no, what was it --
-
STEVENSON
- Denny?
-
MCCLAIN
- -- [Reginald] Denny thing, yeah. What Bradley did, Bradley said, "Look,
we're not going to have the same thing happen." He came up with this
Neighbor-to-Neighbor program, hired a bunch of us, community organizers,
go out and work and do some things. We also did some gang intervention
stuff; I had the ability to hire a number of youngsters at Banning High
School and Jordan High School; there were others who had the ability to
do it other places, get the kids involved, have them doing some very
positive, constructive things. When that verdict went down, folks were
upset, but -- and there may have been some flare-ups, but it wasn't this
mass thing, because we began to work with people, we had done some real
positive things in those communities, and so folks said, "Yeah, OK, so
it didn't go right, but look, we're doing something..." But then not too
far after that, when the Mayor went out and [Richard J.] Riordan came
in, then all of that went -- disappeared, all of that energy and effort
that should have been, I think, really built on. So we've had some
opportunities to take some steps, I think, to make things better. I
believe -- you know, we talk a good game, usually -- this whole thing
about community policing -- it really should be community policing, but
it should be community policing on our terms.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. The community's terms.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. See, and the police -- it's still a them-and-us kind of situation.
And there are some good -- there are some people I truly believe in in
the police department, but they're up against it, because the culture is
so inept. Really, it's -- because of what's happened in the past,
there's going to have to be a complete -- what's the word I need? -- a
re-culturing; the whole culture's got to be revised, revitalized, in
some respects, because where it is now, I don't think it -- there's
still a them-and-us.
-
STEVENSON
- So has the culture of the LAPD changed that much from the days of William
Parker, and further down the line, Darrell Gates?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, I would say yes. But that change -- [Bernard C.] Parks and I, I was
probably his most loyal supporter at one point, but I think he distanced
himself from me, because -- he used to tell me, "Cliff, you cannot hire
and fire," and that was my thing. I need to be able to hire and fire. I
need to be able to have some say about who patrols my neighborhood. If
you get out line, you need to know, I can fire you. When I say "I," the
community.
-
STEVENSON
- Right. And isn't that what community policing --
-
MCCLAIN
- That's what it needs to be. And -- but Bernie's done -- he did some
things, I think he -- one of the things that he did which really got
some folks upset was, he said, "You can get fired." And some folks
really -- they didn't take that well at all. They felt that once I put
on this blue, this is for life. "I'm a blue for life."
-
STEVENSON
- So some people felt there should have been more loyalty on his part.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. But I think his loyalty was due to me. I'm the one back here trying
to make sure that you get an opportunity to change things, so...
(laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- Could you talk a little bit about, I guess as it relates to the Black
Congress to the extent that you can, or just dealing with issues in the
community, other than Tom Bradley, and maybe you could talk a little bit
more about his role -- who were the African-American elected
officeholders that addressed issues in any kind of concrete way during
this time?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, I think Merv, Merv did a lot. Certainly Bradley. Gus Hawkins. I
think Gus really has not received the -- all the love he deserves. Gus
did some stuff that, you know, from what I understand, Miss [Opal C.]
Jones wrote the NAPP [Neighborhood Adult Participation Project] program
on the back of an envelope and gave it to him and told him to have this
done.
-
STEVENSON
- That's Opal, Opal Jones?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. So, I mean, and NAPP, one of the things that we should have done is
we should have institutionalized NAPP. We should have made sure that
neighborhoods really have a place in their development.
-
STEVENSON
- So by institutionalized, you mean in the way in which the Brotherhood
Crusade, or, say -- because I also include, when I talk about
institutions, like, say, the King Hospital, or the Watts Health
Foundation -- institutionalized in terms of making it a long-term --
-
MCCLAIN
- Long-term, but longer-term. You get to a point where there are no poor
people, you don't need NAPP. Everybody's off doing whatever -- and I
don't know if we can ever get there. I think you'll always have a need
for NAPP. Anyway, so you're going to have a need for NAPP if you have
immigrant communities coming; there's always going to be somebody at the
bottom. So how did they get their justice without a NAPP? So
Neighborhood Adult Participation, gotta be able to participate. And
oftentimes, people are locked out at certain levels of participation. So
consequently, their growth is stunted. Unless you find some other way,
sometimes it's illegal, to amass some money, you can hang it up.
-
STEVENSON
- Right. You said that you weren't as involved with the Black Congress as
some of the other people I've interviewed. Could you talk about what you
were doing -- I'd like you to elaborate on your campaign, that you ran
for office -- was that Assembly?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yes, I ran for the Assembly; I ran against -- see, I always do these
kinds of things: I ran against the chairman of the Democratic Party,
Charlie Warren. And I got my heart broken a couple of times, because I
thought that folks could appreciate what it was that I was trying --
another thing was that if someone had came to me and said, "Cliff, you
know what? We like what you're trying to do, but we don't think you're
the one to do it, so we're going to put so-and-so." I would have been
able to accept that, because I didn't know (inaudible), but I knew
something needed to be done. And I was learning by the seat of my pants,
I was reading and just trying to figure out which way this thing really
goes. So I remember, I had -- Lois Davis Jones, Lois Davis, (inaudible).
But I mean, her kids were like my brothers and sisters, and Dr. Davis
was -- oh, man, this guy was -- he was phenomenal, this gentleman that
created all of this, he was just -- he was a person that I really held
in awe. Truly remarkable. But anyway, I went to talk to Miss Jones, see
Lois, and she told me, "Cliff, I love you," -- because I was one of her
kids -- she says, "but I need Charlie." And my thought was, "Well, what
can Charlie do that I can't do if I'm in the position?" Yes, Charlie has
far more in-roads into stuff. But I'm thinking that through me, you're
sitting at the table; through Charlie, you're getting whatever he gives
you. And really, I couldn't get that, I just couldn't get it. To me, it
was like, you need somebody at the table; I was sick and tired of this
leftover stuff. I said we've got to move it beyond. Now, had I known
about -- maybe if I had done my research and known about an
Assemblyperson, Mr. [Frederick Madison] Roberts, who was a Republican --
-
STEVENSON
- Fred Roberts.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. Then maybe I might have taken a different approach; I might have
been a Republican before (inaudible). Because let's face it, Democratic
politics, at one time -- Plantation Politics. And as good as Merv was,
he still had to go through Jess. Now, I think Merv later in life
developed -- well, look at what he did; he had -- Bill [Greene] came
through him, Teresa [Hughes]; a lot of people came through him. And
probably if I had had a little different attitude, I might have. But
Miss Jones warned me about that, though. She said, "You don't want to go
that way." And so I kind of understood it. Not saying anything against
Merv; I think Merv is a great guy. But I think Merv also has his way of
dealing with and seeing things too. And I don't know; I can say this
because I've never held office. But I believe I would do with an office
much different than anybody that I have seen in there, because of my
motivation.And my motivation is, I would want to be like Gus. I would want to be
like Adam Clayton Powell [Jr.], you know what I mean? My thing would be
that it's not about what I amass; it's about what I'm able to do for my
community. I think I would want to be judged by the monuments that have
been built within the community. So -- and that's not to say that
everybody doesn't go -- I've known Maxine [Waters] for years, from the
beginning, and I know Maxine wants to do -- but then I also know that
there are distractions, and I guess being human, you kind of succumb to
some. But I just think -- it's the same thing with being in the
Republican Party; I am a Republican, I do believe in Republican
principles, but I'm also a black man, and anything that goes against my
people, I have to be in opposition to it. So because it's the Party's
line doesn't make it mine necessarily. There are some things that I
believe black folks need to relate to, such as family values. Without
family values, we would have never come this far. And as we lose those,
we get to the point where we see so many black people on Jerry Springer.
(laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- Could you tell me what it was about Fred Roberts' persona, or the way he
ran his campaign, his political office, that you wish you would have
taken more to heart? And the same question about Mr. Hawkins.
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, the thing is is that Fred Roberts, I know during that period of
time -- that's probably why we didn't know anything about him -- to do
anything to help black folks, which he did -- civil rights legislation,
just stuff that he did during his tenure, in spite of -- now, I don't
know what the political climate was then, as it relates to his party; I
don't even know right this minute who was governor, or I don't know
whether he had access to the throne, so to speak. He may have, I'm
thinking he probably did; there's a reason why he was able to get so
much done. But he did quite a bit, and so knowing that, I think I would
have used that for my argument for making sure that we have an
African-American in office, if we could have one, because that's where
we can make a difference. That was really what I wanted to do. The other
thing was, in terms of Mr. Hawkins, Gus had a -- well, he did quite a
bit; he did quite a bit. But he had a connection to the community. He
never -- I think Adam had more sense of community, he would have never
have gone through what he went through. I think Gus, I don't think there
was no way you could have taken Gus down, because Gus was loved. He had
his -- yeah, Charlie Knox was a good guy, so he had some folks -- not
only that, Bill, Bill Williams. So we had some folks that did community
stuff, and you have to do that; you have to maintain that connection.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. What was your platform when you ran?
-
MCCLAIN
- Dorothy Donegan, my cousin, she used to -- she'd see me coming in, "Here
he comes, there's the man with the clean air..." -- what'd I have, clear
air, good water, better schools. Anyway, I had this thing, and she would
run off these things whenever I would come into the room. But that was
-- my thing was, you know, improve the environment -- and that was back
then --
-
STEVENSON
- Which was -- what year was it when you were campaigning?
-
MCCLAIN
- '66. And also, I wanted to do something about the police. I don't even
remember exactly how I had it formed, but it was something probably
about Civilian Review Board, something -- some kind of way to be able to
-- 'cause my thing was, I believe when you say to a police officer, yes,
we appreciate you; we're going to take care of you. But if you get out
of line, you can (inaudible).
-
STEVENSON
- OK. And so you ran against Charlie Warren, and you obviously lost hat
race by how much?
-
MCCLAIN
- Oh, quite a bit. I think I must have got maybe 30% of the vote,
(inaudible).
-
STEVENSON
- OK. I see. Could you talk a little bit about, as much as you know -- I
know that the Black Congress played a role in keeping the peace after
Dr. King's assassination. So could you talk about that in detail, which
is something every one of the other interviewees have talked about. I
know there was a rally called at the Coliseum, and that -- I've read
some Times articles about how the Black Congress in particular played a
role in bringing people together and trying to keep the peace, and did
keep the peace, that was acknowledged in the press.
-
MCCLAIN
- I'm trying to think of what -- I'm really trying to think of what I was
doing during that period. I guess I was in -- NAPP, I guess -- yeah, it
had to have been NAPP. So I didn't have time to go to the Black
Congress, I was at my outpost doing the stuff that I felt I needed to
do. Now, I know there was a lot of tension around the time of his
assassination. And there was a lot of talk about keeping things down. So
I guess through the Congress, you got folks to buy into "Let's keep a
lid on it." And so -- but like I said, I was just so busy at my center,
outside of the NAPP family, I probably didn't see too much else, except
for them when I got into the Brotherhood thing, around '68. But up until
that time, I was just planning to get through my day-to-day obligations
with NAPP.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Perhaps you could discuss in detail for me the Neighborhood Adult
Participation Project, its genesis, what its mission and goals were, and
your involvement in it.
-
MCCLAIN
- It started in '65, I think it started before August -- I'm thinking it
did, but I know funding came after August, that's finally when
everything just got opened up. But I think Miss Jones had given its
outline before. But anyway, after it took hold, I came -- it was really
funny, I was standing in the parking lot at Ralph's on Western[Avenue]
and Olympic [Boulevard], and I was out there -- I don't know what
exactly it was, it might have been something from SNCC or something I
was raising sand about. I was passing out flyers, and Miss Jones, who
lived right down the street, and I guess she must have shopped at that
Ralph's, and she walked up in, and she says, "Young man, do you really
want to make a change?" And I said, "Well, yes, ma'am." And she said,
"Would you let me help you?" And she gave me her card; she said, "I want
you to come, we're having a meeting, and I want you to come."So I went to the early NAPP meetings, and I got involved; went to the
Board of Education, we were talking to the board about some changes that
needed to be made, and I spoke, and she asked me if I want to work on
NAPP. And -- $333 a month. (laughter) And I took it, and I worked there
-- and Mr. Wills, Carl Wills, was the director at the Exposition
Outpost, we were right across from the Health center on Western [Avenue]
and 38th [Street]. So I went there, and then Mr. Wills made me his
assistant, and then we got some funding for some bigger program, and Mr.
Wills moved up and then I moved into his spot as the director, or the --
I guess that's what they call us, the director -- of the Exposition
Outpost. And we had neighborhood workers -- I had a board, I had Maxine
Waters as the chairman of my board -- I had a board, and I had
neighborhood workers that we could hire, and then we had Operation
Mainstream, people to be placed in agencies. And Operation Mainstream --
this was the philosophy of NAPP. NAPP said that the recipient of service
should be an integral part of the service delivery team. And so that was
-- two people, say someone who had been on welfare, coming off of
welfare, going to work, who could sit in a welfare office and help
bridge the communication gap between the intake workers or the social
workers and the folks that were coming in, who could assist you, who
might go out and help you with making a visit into the projects where
you might be a little bit timid about going in by yourself, but she
could go in and kind of -- you know.So what we were saying is that we all have something to bring to the
table, and if you bring me in, utilizing me at the level that I'm
comfortable with, and then train me, then you can bring me on in and
make me a part of this -- an integral part of this service delivery
team. So that was why we tried to do community work, I think the CETA
[Comprehensive Employment and Training Act] and the SEP and all of that.
So but originally, it was the Operation Mainstream, where we paid the
people's salary, placed them in these government and community-based
organizations. And then a little bit later on, we developed the New
Careers programs, that came in in about '69, maybe '68. And so this is
where we sit down, and we wrote this New Careers in the Schools program,
where we were going to take the new careerist and place them into the
schools; we had these five different positions, and we wanted them to go
to school, and so we had academic release time, and then we had core
training where they would come to the Center, and we would deal with
whatever their particular issues were. One thing, it was like having
people make sure that they had their tickets taken care of, because a
guy would get a job, he's working, and on his way to work, gets pulled
over by a cop; he's got a warrant, gets taken away, loses his job, you
know. So we're trying to deal with folks on the level of, hey, all these
things (inaudible), let's take care of. And then, they had issues, how
you deal with somebody on the job that such and such -- you're normally
used to smackin' folks that get out of line with you. So we would work
through those issues.And that first year, we would pay the whole salary. The second year,
then, the school or community-based agency or whatever, they were
supposed to pick up half of the salary, and then the third year, you're
on your own. We were doing that, and so I got the opportunity and -- I
think it was around '70 -- they had just about run out of funds, they
weren't going to re-fund the New Careers program. So I went to Miss
Jones, because I wanted that program, because I had helped to write it;
some of the job descriptions I felt were what I wrote. Some other folks
(inaudible) the same thing, but anyway, I said, "Wow, I just want to
have this opportunity," and so I went to Miss Jones, and she told me,
she said, "Cliff, we only have funding for three more months," and she
said, "(inaudible) coming out of your position and giving it up." And I
said, "Well, I'll take the gamble." I said, "If you will do one thing
for me, I want the job." And she said, "What's that?" I said, "I want
you to go with me to the DOL [Department of Labor], and let me talk to
them."
-
STEVENSON
- That's Department of Labor?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. Dr. Aguirre was the Head in San Francisco. So she did, we went to
San Francisco, and we had no problem meeting with Dr. Aguirre. Miss
Jones came in, she said, "This young man wants to talk to you." So I
told him what I thought and how I thought it would work, and we could
do... He called in Bob Reynolds and Grace [Montanez] Davis, and told
them, "Give this young man whatever it is that he wants." And it was on
from there. We had a good run. We were able to -- (inaudible), what does
it do with the schools? What happened with the schools was that I think
I was a little bit out of step with the workers, and most of the workers
were former welfare mothers who needed the job, first of all, liked the
idea of doing the stuff that we wanted to do, but the way it was
proposed to them was, "Look, you either go in this classroom and become
a teacher's aide, or we're going to get rid (inaudible)." And so I
couldn't convince them to take a chance, so I just kind of (inaudible),
that's what you want.But what I did was I began then to concentrate on what we did outside of
the school system. Slots and Lowly's place, Hillsman's Central City,
Bricks Kick, that place -- a number of people who have -- Evelyn
Knight's castle program was a part of community services. And I had some
-- quite a few people placed in Avery's Boys' Home. The reason I did
that was because I thought we could have an impact on the juvenile
justice, because what I tried to get Avery to understand was that if you
hired or trained your staff, you could get more done. I said, you guys
are talking about just taking bums off the street, saying, "Hey, you can
sleep here; I just want you to watch these boys." So what happens? Guy
gets three or four checks, he's able to get the dope he wants or the
booze he needs, he's gone. You'd better hope he's gone, because he may
be trying to stay there and do it.
-
STEVENSON
- So it didn't address rehabilitation?
-
MCCLAIN
- No. See, and my thing was that we want to deal with that; we want to
bring them in, do the core training, we do all these things, we want
them to go to school, we want them to be prepared, equipped to deal with
these kids, because these kids are so frightening. You've got some dummy
up here, they'll run circles around him. So somebody who's not really
thinking, especially if he's into drugs or alcohol or whatever, he's not
going to be able to help this situation. So we didn't get the
cooperation that I thought we should. As a matter of fact, I formed an
organization called the California Council on Youth to deal with that.
But -- California Council on Youth wound up being my avenue to deal with
kids. First, I thought in terms of developing something similar to what
California Youth Homes do, because California Youth Homes had a big
facility over in Inglewood; they had hundreds of kids, they even had
their own school -- I forget what it's called, Masada or something like
that.
-
STEVENSON
- Masada?
-
MCCLAIN
- Masada, was it Masada?
-
STEVENSON
- Masada maybe.
-
MCCLAIN
- It's out in -- what is that? -- Lawndale, something over there. And so I
said, "Wow. They can do it, we can do it," especially since most of the
kids placed there were black. And so -- but never was just able to gel.
I put a little bit too much faith in one of our folks, and he was moving
into retirement, he was a placement officer for the county, and between
you and I, he liked to -- you know -- and this never -- But what I did
was I began to develop activities for kids, camping, and develop a great
relationship with the Department of Parks and Recreation, State
Department of Parks and Beaches, and they helped me a great deal. As a
matter of fact, they developed a program that's called Famcamp, and now
they have about eight trailers located in various state parks with
camping gear, from tents and sleeping bags, Coleman stoves, lanterns,
dishes, everything, to outfit about 32 people for a camping experience.
-
STEVENSON
- Famcamp.
-
MCCLAIN
- So they did a lot to help me, because Jack Shu was the guy that put that
together; I (inaudible), want to go camping, but got to try to find the
money to buy sleeping bags. Folks mainly out of -- I was dealing with
Compton and housing developments, and -- well, these families, camping
gear was not a priority. (inaudible) I'd take some kids on a camping
trip, they didn't have a jacket, much less a sleeping bag. So -- but
anyway, I don't know how I progressed to that, but the whole thing of
NAPP, again, was having people in the community, showing them that --
this was one of the things that Miss Jones would ask us -- find a
project that you can do. Just find something that you can do, organize
people around that, get that done, and then don't stop. I remember we
did this thing where one of the bus lines coming up Normandie Avenue,
and I remember -- we did a survey, we asked people what they wanted, and
this was what most of the people want. So I said, OK, we'll try that. So
we went and talked to the -- so it's RTD [Rapid Transit District] at
that time, and we had these meetings, and I think it was -- Billy Mills
was the councilperson at that time, (inaudible). And so we got
everything lined up, and we did these petitions, and sure enough, they
changed the line; they made the line come up Normandie [Avenue]. And boy
-- then we had folks, they thought we could turn the world upside, you
know? And we were able to get some things done, but like I said, we
really should have institutionalized in some way.
-
STEVENSON
- So how was Councilman [Billy G.] Mills able to facilitate this, or what
was his role in this line up Normandie?
-
MCCLAIN
- I think -- one of the things he did, he got us a meeting with the people,
with the RTD. So he -- one of the things about -- and this is something
about Judge Mills -- Billy was always there. Any situation that we found
ourselves in, he was always there, you know what I mean? He -- that's
why I really hate that we didn't get in to become supervisor; I
(inaudible). Boy, a missed opportunity.
-
STEVENSON
- So he was a real advocate, it sounds like.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. And sharp, really was -- I don't know if you've had an opportunity
to --
-
STEVENSON
- No, he hasn't been interviewed.
-
MCCLAIN
- Is he still living?
-
STEVENSON
- I think so, but I think the stroke debilitated him.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah, because he was sharp; he was really -- he helped me -- what I did
was I kind of just told my staff, I said, "Here's a man, he's running
for office, he's in office, in the Council," and every time we'd call
him, he comes through for us.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Why don't we stop for the day, and -- [END OF Clifford McClain Session Two]
1.4. Session 3A ( August 7, 2006.)
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah, this was my class I was telling you about. Byron Simmons belongs in
there, he didn't make it that day.
-
STEVENSON
- That's a nice [truck?]. You ready?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah.
-
STEVENSON
- Good morning.
-
MCCLAIN
- Good morning.
-
STEVENSON
- I am continuing the interview with Cliff McClain on Monday, August 7. And
I'd like to spend this session wrapping up and doing some follow-up
questions. Looking back, can you tell me what you think the long-term
legacy is of the Black Congress?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, the long-term legacy is that it demonstrated that varied aspects of
the community could come together and could work together, and could
benefit by such an association. I think, as maybe a fallout from that
effort -- I think that it spoke volumes to the fact that groups, even
dissimilar groups, could come together and work together. So it probably
made it more difficult for people to speak against the NAACP, the Urban
League, Core, and so forth, you know, working together. And even to the
point of the churches. So I think that's what it gave to me, I mean, if
there was ever a discussion about, let's work with this group, and
someone said, well, we can't -- that was not a valid argument, because
it had been demonstrated that these various and varied groups came
together and worked together, even though there was conflict -- there
was some serious conflict between some of the groups -- they were still
able to get beyond that.
-
STEVENSON
- Anything that we can take from those days that would be instructive for
dealing with some of the challenges we're facing now in the community?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yes. One thing is that we have more in common than we have that separates
us. And that we really can get more done if we collaborate and
cooperate. Even now, working in the field that I'm in, collaboration is
key. Some funding sources, they look for collaboration; they want to see
something of groups coming together, organizations working together in a
true collaboration. So -- and I think the idea of collaboration helps in
the broader community as well, because oftentimes, what happened was
co-opting, but collaboration is a much better situation. So hopefully we
can all see that. It just makes me feel good to see -- and I really
believe this is a good thing that you're doing -- is because I'm seeing
a lot of young people who are interested in doing the work, and perhaps
if they see something like this, because it may not be presented to them
in a way that they can understand, by just their normal day-to-day
carryings-on, but here, they could see, and maybe get an in-depth view
of something that happened in the past that they could. Because at
least, oftentimes at least, in this work, what you have to have is
faith. You have to have faith in the fact that your cause is just, faith
and the fact that you will overcome, because sometimes it looks so
difficult. And so when you can see something that says, "Ah, it can be
done." It was done in this context, so...
-
STEVENSON
- OK. In our last session, you talked about a lot of groups, and work you
did with at-risk youth. And you talked about some of those groups --
California Council on Youth, California Youth Homes. Could you talk a
bit more about that? And also, again, some of the things that worked
when you were working with youth at risk in those days -- what can we
take from that for dealing with some really serious problems? And yeah,
if you could say some more about maybe some other groups you worked with
as well?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, I tell you, if -- I keep saying I'm going to write a book, and I
said I was going to call it "A Feeble Attempt." (laughter) If I could
redo something, I would go back and I would really put more emphasis and
effort on the work I was doing in the group homes, and working with
at-risk youth. The camping trips, the things -- I think I should have
been a bit more aggressive. I went and I talked to people like Elbert
Hudson, who would give me $400 or $500 to get a bus, and people who --
from Golden State [Mutual Life Insurance Company] that would help me
out. But what I should have done was been more aggressive, because we
really needed to dedicate more resources to that effort.Now, Lou Danzler did a great job. He's one of the reasons why the name of
my book will be "A Feeble Attempt." Because Lou did so much with so
little, but he was very aggressive; he played the political card much
better than I did. He went to some folks and got some resources and got
some help, and he really parlayed it into a wonderful thing which
Challengers Boys and Girls has become. We need more of that. We need --
and the thing is is that, we said, "Well, we've got the Boys and Girls
Clubs, we've got this that and the other," but one of the things that we
have to accept is that in this country, color does make a difference.
And we can wish that it didn't, but it does. So you have to operate from
that point of view. That's not to say to be anti -- I think the Muslims,
black Muslim movement, would have been much stronger if it had not been
so anti-white, if it had -- yes, white folks were a problem, many of
them, but I think they should have been more specific; they should have
said, "Now, here's George [Corley] Wallace," and even George tried to
change, from what I'm understanding.And to me, when I look back on people who influence me -- Barry Goldwater
had a very strong influence when I read his book, "Confessions of a
Conservative," something, I can't remember the exact name of it. And it
really turned me to politics, because the errors of our ways -- and when
I say the errors of our ways, oftentime black people take a spectator
view in this society. I used to be somewhere in that vicinity. But one
day, me and the good Lord was talking, and I said, "This country is like
a train," and I really thought about a situation when I was a little
boy, my Uncle Paris was driving -- (telephone ringing) -- I'll call you
back. Driving while drunk. And we were on Central Avenue, I never will
forget coming down Central Avenue going north, and I looked over and he
had fallen asleep, and so I just reached over, turned the key, and
grabbed the steering wheel. And he woke up and cussed me out. But I was
just a kid, I was maybe nine, ten years old, but that was the thing that
I thought to do. So as I'm thinking about this train that I see heading
for a collision -- and I really did see this country coming to a point,
because I knew as a young man that I didn't want to grow up in this
repressive environment, and I -- anything I could do to change it, I was
from -- whatever. And like Malcolm [X] said, by any means necessary. And
I know I wasn't the only one.So as I saw this trainwreck, the good Lord said to me, "Well, where are
you?" And I thought, I'm on that train. So then, you know, the analogy
of what I did with my uncle to save our lives, you know, I have to do
here. I'm like, "Well, you better try to grab ahold of that steering
wheel or do something." Because you too are on this train. So in that,
we have to take some responsibility for making this change, and today, I
truly believe that white folk are not our problem. I really -- I think
we've moved beyond that, because we have the resources -- I mean, I
spent two weeks in the Hamptons this June, and I saw black people -- I
mean, they're living as large as anybody else. (laughter)So we have the resources. It's just -- like I said, taking some
responsibility, and we have to look at that lesser accomplished group
within our ranks. We can no longer look at these kids -- and the rappers
have -- they've done some things that are offensive, yes. They curse a
lot. But they've told the truth about a lot of things, and I will never
forget Coolio [Artis Leon Ivey, Jr.], because I wasn't really into -- my
son was into rap, and I'm trying to hear, what the heck is he listening
to? And I remember, I heard this record by Coolio, and it was called A
Can of Corn. And it made me cry, because it talked about a young man, on
a good day, would go into the cupboard and find a can of corn. My kids,
it's like -- some of them don't even want to eat leftovers, you know
what I mean? It's like -- I mean, I have never -- I don't believe I've
ever gone hungry because there was nothing to eat. It might have been, I
didn't want what was there, I was being stubborn, you know -- which I
finally gave in, I'm sure. But it's just to think that there are -- and
some of the work that I've done when I was with the Taking Our Community
Back campaign, and working in Avalon Gardens, I got a chance to see up
close some of the despair and hardship that many families are going
through.But worse than that, I had an incident at -- when I was working with
Youth Gang Services, I was at a school -- because what I did in Youth
Gang Services, they said, "We're going out here to try to do something
to prevent gangs, prevent these kids --" And I thought, I said, "Well,
the best place to do that would be in continuation schools," because
that's where most of the kids go -- at least these kids are going to
school. But then when they get out of school, they go back to the block
with their homies. And maybe if we give them something positive, they
can take that back. And I didn't realize how strong that influence was,
going both ways, until one day I went over to Jordan Downs, and two very
impactful things happened to me. One, I was also working on the SARB,
Student Attendance Review Board, I was a member of that. And we had this
kid, and so we had a group of kids, and I said, "Well, I'll go and check
on these few." So I went to Jordan Downs, and I went to a unit that said
this is where this kid lived, and I went to the door, and I didn't
knock, because I said, "No one lives here. I know no one lives here."
This has to be an abandoned building. And as I was walking away, I heard
something. So I did go to the door and it was open, it was ajar, and I
just kind of pushed it, and there were some kids. And there were little
stair-steps, and I come to find out the kid that I was looking for was
there, but he was babysitting his siblings, that's why he wasn't going
to school. Didn't know where his mom was; there was no lights, there was
-- I mean, it was just -- again, I cried. It was so depressing.And then, coming out of Jordan Downs, I saw a young man who went to --
was in one of my groups over at Simon Rodia [Continuation School], which
is Jordan's continuation school. And when I saw him, I said, "Hey," I
started going towards him, and he ran. So I was at Jordan Downs, I went
to five different continuation schools, one day a week, and I guess
Simon Rodia was my Tuesday or Thursday or Wednesday or whatever, so that
next week when I went to the school, I saw him, and I said, "Hey, man,
why did you dis me like that? I came, I wanted to talk to you." He said,
"Mr. McClain, you had on a suit and tie, so you looked like the Man."
(laughter) He said, "Man, if I'd have come over to there talking to you,
I might have gotten a little flack, wanting to know why I'm talking to
the Man." So there was -- it was like, whoa, you know, is it that bad?
And I think that's something else that we have to deal with. We have to
break down some of these stereotypes.And I know I have a daughter that is -- she just got her Master's from
Tulane [University], she did her undergrad work and was magna cum laude
at Spelman [College], and she's probably going to go and do her
doctorate at George Washington [University]. Brilliant young lady -- I'm
not just saying that because she's my daughter. But I remember having to
chastise her early on, probably in ninth grade, because she said to me
one day -- I was talking to her and I corrected her, and she said, "You
just want us to talk white." Boy, did I go off. I said, "Since when do
white folks have a lock on standard English? As much as you want to
spend money, you better speak the money language." (laughter) So anyway
-- and it must have took, because later on in life, she understood. But
we have to tear down some of these stereotypes, because we have some
kids that hold desperately to that. Because I guess that's all they
have.So they've got to -- so what we have to do is we have to show them, no,
no, no. I'm sorry, I know it's painful, but like my teacher, Miss Nellie
Render, would do: she would not accept anything less, and she worked you
hard enough to get you to the point where you understood. She put in the
time and the energy -- I don't know how that lady -- she used to come
dressed, hair in place, and she would leave somewhat (inaudible), and I
wonder how she did that, because we worked her. (laughter) I mean, we
worked her. But she -- that was -- she thrived on that. And I -- as I
look back on my fellow students at 49th Street [School], she did a good
job. She did a tremendous job. As did many people around; when I look at
[Thomas] Jefferson High School, there was a lady -- I never had her as a
teacher, but I saw her from afar, and I heard all of this acclaim she
was given from my fellow students. Her name was Mama Campbell, and that
lady -- she was just a beacon. And -- but I do remember Coach Brice
Taylor, and I did have the opportunity to be very close to -- almost too
close from time to time, because he'd hit you with that numb, he was
born with a deformed hand. (laughter) But I mean, you had people who
wouldn't accept less there. And I remember, even the custodian at
Jefferson High School, Frank, he had -- and that was one of the things
that really helped me to make the decision to do youth work, because
Frank didn't have a PhD; Frank probably might not have had much more
than a high school education, but he had wisdom and he had the students
interests at heart, and I can remember him counseling us on many
occasions. I mean, people, when they got in a little trouble or had a
little difficulty or something, they would come to Frank, and he would
talk to them and make a lot of sense.So we do, as a community -- we keep talking this -- it takes a village to
raise a child -- we really need to put that into practice. George
McKenna used to always challenge me, we'd be sitting up at a Brotherhood
Crusade board meeting, and I'd be telling about how good my girls were
doing, and what they were doing, and he'd say, "What about little
Bubba?" or whatever name he'd used, and I said, "What?" "What about
little Bubba, the little guy down on the corner? Doesn't have a daddy,
doesn't have all that going on. What you gonna do about him?" I said,
"Well, George, I'm doing what I can to take care of my household." He
said, "Look, if you don't bring Bubba along, your daughters are not
going to be able to come home; they're not going to be able to park them
BMWs in the driveway and have those Blaupunkts be there when they come
back out. Which is true, and we really -- we do, we have to do all that
we can. Like the Lou Danzlers, who took his truck and put all the kids
in it and took them wherever. I did -- I didn't have a truck, but like I
said, I'd go to Elbert and get a bus, and later on I found out how you
could go to the politicians and get some buses, and I started moving
things around so maybe I'd get one in the 15th district, and then we'd
go and ride over into the 8th district and pick up some kids, and then
maybe we'd start in the 8th district, get one from there, and come and
pick up the kids at the 15th. So we'd just kind of move it around,
because you could get from each council district so many buses, so we
were able to work that.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Would you say, if I were to ask you about your overarching philosophy
for dealing not only with at-risk youth, but also at-risk families,
would be to bring along those that are at the bottom of the
socioeconomic ladder, or whether employment, whatever, and like you
said, putting into practice, it takes a village not only to raise a
child, but a whole community.
-
MCCLAIN
- Right, yeah. And I think the church is the best place for that, because I
know it happened in my family. My mother was a single mom, and I know my
church, Calvary Baptist Church -- I'll never forget that church, it was
on 53rd between -- 52nd Place, between Wads -- what is that? --
Wadsworth [Avenue] and Central [Avenue], and those people just embraced
us. My mother was a beautiful black woman, and I know that often the
tendency is for men to try to see what benefit it might be, you know, to
embrace, but I didn't see that. I mean, these were folks that were
genuinely interested in us on our behalf, and I mean, that's one of the
reasons why -- I don't know if we talked about this, but that's one of
the reasons why I wasn't able to relinquish my religious beliefs as I
picked up my political beliefs.I believed in black power, I believed in all of the things Malcolm talked
about, but I couldn't give up my Christianity, because it had worked for
me. I mean, I had seen so much good that it overcame -- I saw the
Brennans, and I saw the different ones that were doing the stuff,
whatever they were doing. But I mean, we all make mistakes. Like Jimmy
Swaggart. It's -- there are some issues that I have with the church, but
it's with church members that I have the issues. I think the church is
an institution that can take us where we need to go, because the
philosophy is there. Your basic philosophy is to help your neighbor.
Actually, it's to hold your neighbor in higher esteem than you hold
yourself, which is a difficult thing to do in this country, because you
don't get that support from anywhere. If you adhere to the doctrine,
then you can do that, and that's what's actually necessary. I have this
cartoon in my head, and this came about because I was working in
Compton, or -- yeah, I probably was working in Compton.And this thing just came on me, about this -- it takes a village. And
some of these kids are so bitter, and rightfully so, if you can see how
they came up, how neglected they were, and how the adults in their
environment, whether you be police, teacher, social worker, neighbor,
saw this abuse, and did nothing, said nothing. So I mean, kids are --
they're not stupid, and they can see that, and then quite naturally, at
the end of the day, you're saying, "Wait a minute, now y'all see all
this and you're saying nothing? Only time you go off is on me." They get
kind of calloused. So in this callousness, I just saw this kid standing,
and he had rocks in his hands, and there were other kids coming, and he
was throwing it at them. And he was saying, "This is my village. Go find
your own." So, you know, it was just a thought, 'cause really, we do; we
have an obligation. And I think -- because some of these youngsters are
so bright -- you know, I took a group of kids, and I have a friend
that's all -- every time he introduces me, he tells people, "Cliff
McClain was doing this way back when; he had some Bloods over here, some
Crips over here, we took them on a trip, and no problems." Because my
thing was, I'd tell the kids, it doesn't matter whether you live in
Nickerson [Gardens] or in Avalon Gardens. Y'all have the same situation
going. Only thing is Nickerson is a little larger. You're in an economic
situation where you need, your family is experiencing some difficulty,
you probably don't have as strong a family structure as many folks do.
So if your mother moved to Avalon, you'd be a Crip, and if she moved to
Nickerson, you'd be a blood. You're not having anything to do with that.
Around here, "I'm a Blood; I'm a Crip." And I'd tell him, I said, "The
gang that you're in is my gang, and this is the way we do it." And they
would come in, you know.The thing that -- I guess the point I want to make is that these kids
need -- these families need leadership, and we can provide it. I mean, I
remember we did this program, it was LA Bridges -- this was another
program I was involved in through community development department. And
this young lady comes from a fine family; she was running one of the
programs, because each middle school -- well, not each, but certain
middle schools within the city had this LA Bridges program. And her
school was Bret Harte [Junior High School], and I know back in the day,
Bret Harte was sort of on the upper crust. But any rate, so we had these
kids, and we were taking them to Washington, DC, there was a program --
I can't remember the name of the program right now, but it was a program
that took them to DC, they met with Congressmen, and they met with their
Senator, and it was really a great, great program. And they talked about
issues, and they presented some issues to their elected officials, and
it was really just a great program.But this young lady, who came from wealth -- her family had -- they owned
a Golden State Mutual, so I mean -- but it was really something, how she
took her kids, took them shopping, money out of her pocket, getting them
ready for this trip to Washington, and she was so flabbergasted, because
one of the young ladies that she went to pick up to take to buy some
clothes confided in her, when she took them to Robinson's or Macy's or
whatever, that that's the first time she'd shopped in a store, she'd
always shopped at a swap meet. I mean, it was something. It really kind
of floored her, but it wasn't a shock to me, but it was one of those --
hmm. Because there's probably a lot of other kids. And it's like, until
I say that, to say there are some basic things that we need to do. I
know there used to be programs where they taught kids how to set tables
-- I mean, they just went the basic manners thing, and I don't know
where that is now, but we're always saying, you know, "What happened to
please and thank you?" Well, it was taught. I mean, it's not a natural
thing for you -- unless you've got it at home, some of us, you've got it
at home. But then there are some homes that are in such disarray that
that might not be -- you know, a good day is just you don't get cussed
out. (laughter) We get to thank you and please much later on, maybe.
-
STEVENSON
- Yeah. I'd like to ask you, as opposed to 30 years ago, what are the new
challenges to dealing with at-risk youth, including gangs, that you
didn't see then? I'd like to know your thoughts on that.
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, today -- there's a real disconnect. I even hear adults -- there's a
young man that said he wanted to be a police officer, and some adults in
the community were -- I mean, I couldn't really understand where they
were coming from. They thought that was a no no. And -- now I know from
the kids, this has been for some time that this chasm has been there.
But for the adults to feed into that, that bothers me, because their
despair runs so deep -- because I can remember, back in the day when I
was a kid, that there was some folks who had little hope for themselves,
but they had great hope for me. There was a lot of fear and
apprehension, whether it was about me being able to survive to get to a
point where I could do whatever it was for me to do. But to just have
that much despair going, to where the adult can't find uplifting words
for the kids -- that bothers me. So we really need to work on that.My thing is that until we assume the responsibility for public safety,
we're going to have this mess that we have. And we have to assume some
responsibility, because without public safety, what else can you have? I
can remember, when I was at Dominguez High School, the coach said one
day, he says, "Man, with this gang truce, I'm going to have the best
team --" and they did, went to state, I think they took state -- because
the kids were afraid to stay after school to practice, because they had
to go home. So rather than come to school there, they would go somewhere
else, or they wouldn't play. So when we can get our communities safe,
and -- safe.We are the problem, as again, I said, white folks are not our problem at
this particular point in time. We need to really work on us. We need to
take some of those Operation Bootstrap and things that we did, and we
went out and we tried to talk to white folks about straightening up
their act. We need to do some home cleaning. And as you said, we need to
look at the families, because I can't remember who it was, but I read
somewhere, and then a guy was talking about the levels of a
acculturation. And he was saying that there are some folks that have not
made the transition. I mean, they are really a subculture. And that's --
I mean, there are some things that I will never give up, you know what I
mean, sometimes I listen to -- what is it? -- 88.1 [KKJZ Radio Station],
the Jazz program, and some of the music that I hear is like -- I just
turn it off and listen to my CDs. Thank the Lord that the Blue Note
stuff and the -- I can't remember -- Impulse stuff, all that old stuff
they have on CD now, so I can hear my Trane [John Coltrane] and my Miles
[Dewey Davis] and my Lee Morgans and my -- you know. (laughter) So
there's some things -- but that belongs to everybody. That's not just a
black thing. There are white people who appreciate jazz.But I'm just talking about my -- and that's to say that white folks can't
play jazz. But this is what I grew up on, and this is what got me
through. And I just -- I'm not going to give that up, so I'm not saying
that you -- and really, I put it on a higher plane anyway. Yes, I like
[Ludwig van] Beethoven and [Johann Sebastian] Bach, but I like
[Thelonious] Monk and Trane too. So -- but the point I'm trying to get
to though is that there are folks who have not -- it's not so much --
it's like, OK, so you like to eat hot-water cornbread or collard greens,
and whatever. That's fine. I love it too. But you need to understand
that all that pork is bad for you. There are other things that you can
do. And still they're talking the salt pork and putting it into greens
-- maybe you can take some smoked turkey wings or something. So I don't
know if I'm making the point.
-
STEVENSON
- Yes, you are. OK, let me go back to something you said about not leaving
your Christianity behind when you became politically involved, and I
take it that you saw other people who perhaps did live their religion
behind. Do you see that that has changed at all, with people that are
becoming politically involved today?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. I hear -- like when I hear [Harold] Ford [Jr.] speak, I mean, it
really just -- it just knocks my socks off. And I'm a Republican, but it
knocks my socks off to hear that young man, and to hear his beliefs come
through. So one of the things that -- see, the whole thing of the black
power, I think one of the strongest things, and one of the things that
was left out of the history books, and one of the things that we don't
talk enough about, one of the groups, which was really one of the groups
that I idolize, and that's the Deacons of Defense. These were church
folk who had an influence, because I remember when I was in Louisiana,
and a young man had gone berserk, and he'd shot up a whole bunch of
folks, and the police went to the Deacons of Defense to go and see if
they could handle the situation. And they did; they went and they
handled the situation. And I thought that was -- I said, "Wow, now
that's a step in the right direction."
-
STEVENSON
- Now, who comprised the core of that?
-
MCCLAIN
- These were, as far as I know, some men of the church who decided that
they were not -- I mean, they were listening to what [Martin Luther]
King, [Jr.] was saying, and they were non-violent, to a point. But they
also heard what Malcolm[X] said, I believe, and they were willing to
defend themselves and their families and their communities. And they
were not aggressive, in terms of going out, but they were men, and they
were going to stand up to whatever forces came against them. And I know
my father was that kind of guy, I mean, he was -- as a matter of fact,
my wife, she tickles me, she says, "Yeah, that old preacher was
packin'." But he just -- he had this thing about -- he just wasn't going
to take any mess. They threatened to come ride a horse up in his church
if he let King come and preach, and he says, "And I'll get my
non-violent riflemen to blow your brains out." (laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- OK. (laughter) Could you talk a little bit about your involvement with
the Brotherhood Crusade over the years?
-
MCCLAIN
- The Brotherhood -- it was an honor. It is an honor, to be involved in the
Brotherhood. I was drafted by Mrs. [Opal C.] Jones, I'm sure, because I
was working for NAPP, and she had said, you know, Walt[er Bremond] was
doing this thing, and we needed to support him. So I don't know exactly
how I got on the board, I was in this group, and I found myself on the
board, and I really felt a part, because we went to Goleta for a
retreat, to kind of really focus on what it was that we were going to
do.
-
STEVENSON
- And that's spelled how?
-
MCCLAIN
- Goleta is G-O-L-E-T-A, I believe. It's up near Santa Barbara. And --
beautiful place, had some very interesting things happen. Had my little
girl fall off a ledge and it scared me to death, but -- well, we were
there for -- I was kind of lost in that -- but was to really kind of
come up with a strategy about how we were going to do this thing. I
couldn't understand, but now I do, why there was such a fuss about us
trying to raise some money. It was like, why is everybody -- and even
down to -- I can remember almost going to jail, which I could have done
then, because Celes[tus King III] was alive -- we went -- who was that?
-- Edison. [Southern California] Edison was really just vehement about
-- they did not want to let us in for the payroll deduction thing. I
mean, they fought it. And I just couldn't understand why, and as a
matter of fact I made a few people very angry, former mayor Riordan was
really upset with me, because we were on a program or something and I
said something about United Way. Now, there were some people in United
Way that I didn't know about that I met later on that were helpful to
Walt, but as a whole --
-
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN
- Hi.
-
MCCLAIN
- Hello.
-
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN
- (inaudible)
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. The what...? [END OF McClain.Clifford.3.08.07.2006-a]
1.5. Session 3B ( August 7, 2006.)
-
MCCLAIN
- Now, where were we?
-
STEVENSON
- Oh, talking about the Brotherhood Crusade, and this was an organizational
retreat at Goleta...
-
MCCLAIN
- Yes. But the thing was that the United Way, I felt, was unduly
apprehensive about our development. And I understand; if you can have a
monopoly, you want to maintain that. But I just felt, and like Walt
said, he said, look, we've got to be willing to fund our own stuff,
because there's some things that nobody else is going to fund. And
there's enough philanthropic money out there, enough black folks giving
money to United Way and whomever, to be able to do this. And so we need
a Brotherhood Crusade, we need a Black United Fund. Now, the Crusade
happened, and I think Danny [Bakewell] had a great deal to do with it,
because we had Buck Newsome, Buck did what he could do; we had Charles
Grey who did what he could do. But Danny was --
-
UNIDENTIFIED MAN
- (inaudible)
-
MCCLAIN
- Oh, OK. OK. [END OF McClain.Clifford.3.08.07.2006-b]
1.6. Session 3C ( August 7, 2006.)
-
STEVENSON
- OK. Charles Grey?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah. And so when Danny came, it was really something, because I knew
Danny, and I didn't know that he had the ability to do this. I mean, I'd
seen him operate, but I'd never seen him operate on this level. And he
came and he said he wanted the opportunity, so I said, hey, I support
you. And he took it, and he just blossomed before our eyes. I mean, he
went places that I just never thought we'd go. And did some things and
developed some relationships, and just -- he had this thing -- I called
him the Leverage King; he knows how to take what he has and leverage it
to make it better.
-
STEVENSON
- At this retreat, who else was in attendance? Mr. Bremond, of course,
Danny; who were the other --
-
MCCLAIN
- Opal -- no, I don't think Danny was there, because Danny had not come on
the scene yet. Yeah, Buck was there, Opal was there. Who else was there?
Probably [Edward] Abie [Robinson]. Could have been -- because at that
time, Elbert Hudson was a part of the board, I even believe -- what's
his name? -- [Herb] Carter, what was Carter's first name? -- Carter, he
used to be -- he left the Brotherhood, he became a chairperson or --
yeah, I think he was chairman of the United Way for awhile -- Herb, Herb
Carter. Herb Carter. Norman B. was there.
-
STEVENSON
- Is that Houston?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah, Norman B. Houston. Probably Cliff Jones.
-
STEVENSON
- Other women that were in attendance, besides Opal?
-
MCCLAIN
- Maybe. Maybe Bertha [Bremond] was there. You know, I can't really think
of -- I really can't think. Nobody just jumps up. That was a long time
ago.
-
STEVENSON
- Yeah. I do have a question, though. Other than wanting to keep control or
monopolize the fundraising, could you speculate on what the United Way
was really afraid of?
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, I think it's like -- oftentimes, people give money because they
want to help the underprivileged, or the most needy. I think the thought
was that the Crusade would show them up, would really be able to bring
about some change, would do some very significant things. And then, you
know, people would be able to kind of say, "Well, do I want to go here;
do I want to go here?" It's almost like, do you want to go to
Nordstrom's, or do you want to go to the outlets, because you might get
more bang for your buck.
-
STEVENSON
- So you think it was probably as simple as that, because certainly there
have been other racial/ethnic groups, like say the Jewish community, who
had fundraised around a racial/ethnic group.
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, and the thing is is that I believe the Jewish group was a national
-- you know, they always put -- the Jews take Israel, and whether they
believe in it or not, they put that national or international thing up
there. And -- but we still don't do that. I don't know; I kind of feel
that that's coming.
-
STEVENSON
- Making it global rather than local, or making it national rather than
local.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah, yeah. I really -- but there's some serious work. But I see
everything in place, though. I actually see everything in place, from --
my thing is this; I remember years ago, they used to say, "You're either
going to the [United States] Army or you're going to jail," so folks
would go to the Army. I see some of this gang stuff being nipped by
something similar.
-
STEVENSON
- So channeling gang members into national service, and that might not
necessarily be the Army, or it might be?
-
MCCLAIN
- Could be. But it could be a force. It's like -- you know -- let me just
say this. There are some good things that happened with television, and
there are certainly some bad things that happened with television. I
think maybe the term might need to change, but "soldiers for hire," sort
of mercenaries and all that. Or a privatized force might be a good thing
in some instances, because there's a lot of corruption that's stifling
the development on the [African] Continent, and I believe, really, that
as the Continent goes -- I mean, look at Israel; Israel is what, that
big, and here you've got this big old -- so can you imagine what could
happen if you've got this organized and moving in the right direction?
We'd all probably be like the Saudi elite, we'd be --
-
STEVENSON
- Right, or as the Native American community is becoming a force.
-
MCCLAIN
- Yes. And I'm a Republican, and I go to the conventions, and they have the
biggest ramp and the biggest strawberries covered with chocolate.
(laughter) I'm looking, going, "Where are the poor folk?" I went in
there; they're all wearing Armani, you know. So, hey. (laughter)
-
STEVENSON
- OK, well, I think I'd like to wind it up by asking you about your more
recent political involvements, and also if you could talk about -- there
were -- Neighbor to Neighbor, but any groups that you've worked with
that are dedicated to community empowerment, and actually, the
Brotherhood Crusade falls in that category too.
-
MCCLAIN
- Well, Neighbor to Neighbor was a good effort, I really -- that was one of
the things that I thought [Richard J.] Riordan messed up on. He had an
excellent opportunity, because [Thomas] Bradley had put this force
together, we were working with people in the community, and people were
really getting a feel for coming together. We had an opportunity as well
because we had a youth component where we were taking these high school
students to elementary schools, paying them to work on the campus and
tutor -- it could have been a great effort, I believe.
-
STEVENSON
- And what year was this program?
-
MCCLAIN
- That was in '92, I believe. And -- well, it was right after the [Rodney]
King, and just before the Reginald Denny trial. So -- and it worked,
because we -- and there were some people who were really down on it,
saying that we were working for the man. We were working for ourselves;
we didn't want our community torn up. If we wanted some issues to
explode about, it wasn't because some black guys were going to go to
jail for jumping on some white guy; that's no reason to -- I mean, go to
jail, if you -- I mean, I understand if you're mad and all that, but
still, I was really appalled at the display. It was really sickening.
But -- so the thing, too -- there was another thing, I mean, the
Neighbor to Neighbor thing was a good thing, and we put some resources
together, we took some community organizers, black and brown, and put
them out there, and we really -- we had the opportunity to alleviate
some of this tension between blacks and browns as well; we had an
opportunity to kind of sit down as a neighbor to talk about some
standards.So one of the things that tickled me is that this is a group that I
really think we should have put some money into. We had that Taking Our
Community Back campaign. And we didn't put any money -- and I became the
executive director, and I think all they did was give me somewhat of a
salary, and that was it. I didn't have any real help. I could go to
Brenda [Marsh-Mitchell] and get her to twist some arms and do some
things, but outside of that, I didn't have near the help that I needed.
And one of the things that I found -- I remember going down on -- I
think it was 88th or 89th Street -- no, going that way was going -- so
probably 87th Street -- going down towards Central, and there's this
nice house, painted yard, immaculate, and this little lady who was a
widow, and they probably bought that house years ago and it was paid
for, so she can do pretty good with her Social Security and whatever, so
she's not hurting. But I stopped, I said, "Ma'am, how you doing?" She
says, "I'm fine." I says, "I'm trying to do a survey trying to find out
what you think the problems are in your community." She says, "Them,"
and she pointed to some Mexicans. And I said, "What?" She says, "They
hang their clothes on the fence, they do this; they got chickens in
their yard..." I said, "Ma'am, when did you come here?" She says, "I
came --" '40-something, whatever. I said, "I kind of remember some
chickens and things..." and she had to laugh herself, because in a
sense, where a lot of the immigrants are is where we were when we came
here.And yes, we've moved, we've progressed, but you know, you've got to help
people. And I think really -- like my mother helped a lot of Jewish
families, 'cause she was a domestic. A lot of the immigrants can help
our families. And so I mean, I think there's this process that we could
go through if we would that could be helpful to everybody. So rather
than being upset with folks -- and I'm not saying -- I don't believe
that you -- well, talking about politics -- one of the things that I
believe that I would advocate for is the taking of Baja California, and
making it a part of California, annex it into California. Now, that's
going to create a problem, because people can come over from the
mainland readily, but, you know, the thing is is that if we just went by
the rules that we have in place -- if you act up -- I don't mind people,
if people come and they try to do the right thing, fine. But if you come
and you're acting up, God deal with you.But how often do we allow stuff to go on as long as it's contained? Now,
the minute you go to Westwood and you start acting up and acting the
fool, we're going to come down on you real hard. Go down to Santa Monica
Bay, and... But if you stay out there in Compton, or if you keep it
Inglewood, or you keep it down in South LA, it's OK. So we -- I think
that's where the problem lies, is that we don't regulate as we should.
And the only way we're going to really ever be able to regulate is to --
for one thing, you have to increase your constituency. When you're
talking about law enforcement, they talk about community policing, we
ought to have truly community policing, the community's involved. This
was one of the things that Mr. [Bernard] Parks and I used to have a
problem with. And I love Bernie, I do. But my thing to him was, Bernie,
you need to let me help you hire and fire. As a community, I need to be
able to have some input. Now, I'm looking for -- with John Mack, I'm
looking for a change. Now, I don't know -- as a matter of fact, I've
been threatening to go down and talk with him for awhile, and I do
intend to. I'm wondering if there's some effort in the community that we
might need to have.
-
STEVENSON
- Well, vis-à-vis your definition of true community policing, how do you
deal with the LAPD culture, historical culture? Is that a problem in
implementing true community policing? And how do you do that?
-
MCCLAIN
- Cultures change. Cultures change -- cultures truly change. Case in point:
we had, we have had, two Secretaries of State of color [Condoleeza Rice
and Colin Powell], in an administration that don't like black people, so
they say. Two key -- had a Secretary of Education of color. Then you go
back to Ron Brown, you know what I mean? So we've had some changes in
the political culture, and we can have some changes in the police
culture. And the way you do it is, in Los Angeles, you recruit from
within. The reason they go to Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, other
places, is they got some folks that can have the mentality that they
feel they need to have things work. I believe, because I happened to be
able to sit in on an interviewing panel -- and it was so funny, I've
never seen so many white people who had black friends -- I mean, that
was how they started out -- some of them might have even said they were
raised by -- (laughter). But that was a very important statement to
make.But we hired this young man who grew up in the neighborhood, he became a
senior lead officer -- he was great. Then he promoted and went on, but I
mean, that's OK. But there should have been 10 or 12 behind him to fill
in his spot. But we need to have young people who are willing to do the
job. I started going in law enforcement, but what kept me out of law
enforcement is, I know I would have been trigger happy; I would have
just shot somebody. Unintentionally, but they would have made a wrong
move, reached for a cigarette, or did something, and I would have shot
them, because I'm going to hurt you before you hurt me. So -- but so
therefore, I didn't go into it, because I knew -- and I think there are
people that need to be screened out, certainly. And there are some
folks, I think they know they don't -- but we don't have anybody, so we
can lower our standards, so to speak.So what I'm saying is that we really need to -- and we need to start --
we need to do this at home, need to do it in the church, need to do it
in the school; need to have these young people understand that law
enforcement is an honorable profession, and if you don't do it, we're
going to get somebody that we don't want. So we really need -- and then
not only that, there are various aspects of law enforcement. If I had
known I could have been a ranger, I would have gone into that, because
I've met some rangers, 'cause we do a lot of camping and things, I said,
"Wow, now that's a beautiful profession." It just so happens I was
40-somethign when I met them. But if I had known about that in my '20s,
that might have been a role that I would have taken.
-
STEVENSON
- Lastly, would you like to say anything more about your involvement with
the Brotherhood Crusade?
-
MCCLAIN
- Yeah, the Crusade is really like home. I mean, yes, it's Walt's baby;
it's Danny, he's put the finishing touches on it. So it belongs to them,
but I feel I have a part. I would not want to see it go away. I do want
to see it prosper, because I feel that the Crusade is the place -- I
mean, there are some things that I -- what I would like to see with the
Crusade, I would like to see us come to a point where we could sit the
Al [Alfred S.] Moores and the Dr. Martins and the George McKennas down,
and the Bertha Bremonds -- and I say Bertha because she was a teacher
par excellence. Bertha, she really -- she's someone that I really wish
we could duplicate, as far as teachers are concerned. And there's
others, to sit them down and say, "Hey, what do we need to do?" Have
them come up with some plans, with a plan of action. Sort of like what
Minister [Louis] Farrakhan was talking about when he was saying we want
to sit -- but you want to also be able to have -- and this is what Walt
showed me -- you've got to have money, because when you come up with a
plan, then the next thing is, how do you implement it? And you don't
need to have to spend a whole lot of time trying to run out and find
ways, because there are some people who will say, "Well, I'll fund this,
but I'm not going to fund that."So you've got to be able to reach in your own pocket, because some of the
things that we may want to do may be very radical, because -- well, some
of the stuff that we did, going to take a radical move to get us out.
And when you talk about how many dropouts we have, when you talk about
the kids -- I mean, I went to -- my daughter graduated from Tulane,
Tulane had a thing over in Century City a couple of years ago, had a
thing a couple of years ago for the parents and alumni, and I went to
it, and the guy was saying, "It's going to take a 1400 SAT score to get
in," not only into Tulane but into [University of California] Berkeley
and Stanford [University] and a whole bunch of schools, it's going to
take that, and we've got kids that are barely making a 700. So, you
know, we really have a ways to go, and we'd better hurry up and get
there.
-
STEVENSON
- OK. All right, thank you, Cliff.
-
MCCLAIN
- OK. (laughter) [END OF McClain.Clifford.3.08.07.2006-c END OF Clifford McClain Session
3]