WPT Archives: 1960s

children talking

Fred Dura and his family have lived in this house for eight years, but they live in the K-3 urban renewal area, and they have to move now. There are 13 of them, and they are black and poor, so they won't be able to find a decent home on their own. Here in Milwaukee's inner core, there are hundreds of families like the Duras. It make me feel like exploding. Then there are no people-- Other people, outside this area, is living like kings and queens, and to see the black people have to go through it... with this. It can build up a lot of hate in you. Perhaps many of you are familiar with our public housing project. We are now working on a new type of-- That's off the track. I don't care what you've got planned for the future. Like what about those who have been here for some time in these dirty, rotten houses? Between houses that are rat-infested with windows broken and standing there vacant, what about those now? We don't wanna know about what you plan to do in the future. Like the people here are suffering now. What do you want to do about it now? What are you gonna do about it now? How many homes do you have available now for dislocated people?

voice from crowd

None. I am not in position to answer that question. Why!?!

people talking at once

For over 200 years, telling us what's good for us, instead of us deciding what is good for us for our own selves. And if it's left up to me, I'll take all of you and instead of burning them damn projects, I'll burn you bastards' homes down.

cheering

loud crashing and crushing

In the inner city, every time they tear down more houses for an expressway, or an urban renewal project, that means less houses for people who have to move. Since 1960, the city and county, between them, have torn down 7,500 homes. The K-3 urban renewal area is uprooting 1,200 families. Most of these are black and can't move out of the core. Most of them have a lot of children, and no one wants them anywhere. That's why the black community sees the city as a white establishment that doesn't care. That's why you hear angry voices. Hey, friend, you know you pay rent for a lifetime, and you have nothing at the end, but a bunch of receipts, and you can't make a fire with those that lasts 15 minutes, friend. But I've got the magic thing for you here. As little as $250 down, and you could be into a home of your own at no closing cost. And I don't mean these are old run-down, dilapidated homes, baby. These are choice homes. Call now. All right. Okay. That's the Oxford Realty. Everybody gotta groove now.

groovy rock music

This film is about one thing alone, what it means to be black and living in Milwaukee's inner city, because if you're white, you live in a different city. The Negro sees himself trapped in the core. Stuck with bad schools, menial jobs, arrogant police, and run-down houses. This film will look through his eyes, at one of his problems, urban renewal, and feel his mood of growing frustration.

groovy rock music

Fred Dura's wife died a year and a half ago. He's disabled and the family lives on welfare. He, and his oldest son, Carl, run the family, and they are trying to find a place to move to. This what half keeping me sick. I can't find no place to move to and The Man on me about his rent, but I told him I wasn't, and they don't wanna do nothing, see. It's worrying, you know, and your kids ain't satisfied with here and they ain't got a decent place to hang their clothes or nothing. See, it wasn't too bad when they were little. Now they growing up, it's pretty...

indistinct conversations

Cab? Huh? Come here. A lot of people have been promising to find the Duras a house, including the city's K-3 relocation office, and the county welfare department, but so far Mr. Dura has heard nothing more encouraging than promises. Well, the guy was Mr. Chapman. He is the main man I talk to when I go down there. He said, "Well, you just hold on, Mr. Dura." First time I went there, he say, "You'll be out soon." I said, "Well, I like to be moved by Christmas." And even my son, he been had some peoples working with him, and they supposed to get us out. I don't know. I know ain't nothing doing. And ain't much, ain't much but to go about by here, 'cause I got to go somewhere. Sit down. Robert, I wanted to give you a buzz this morning to check with you on one case that we... ah, are working on here that I think needs some extra special attention, and that is the "Dur-rah" family. And I think maybe this isn't a bad-- It wouldn't be a bad idea if we held an inter-agency conference here on this case. And perhaps... Right, as the situation stands at the present time, the heating particularly, since we don't own the building, we have no control over this phase of it, except that maybe we should counsel 'em and tell 'em to get a hold of the health department. Whereby the health department-- Robert, would you have anything in your files, right at the moment, that you could use in terms of housing resources, to relocate this family, right within the near... in the immediate future, within the next day or two? Well, we are getting a couple of these scattered site houses which will be available from the housing authority, but I can't tell you whether they'll-- I know we expect to get this one Friday, but this is the one that Taylor is getting. Now, I don't know whether they're going to get any of these other ones this week also. So I, without checking with the housing authority, I would not be in a position to say whether there would be a possibility of one of those... The first step would be is to have a conference with the landlord to determine whether or not he's aware of the furnace. Get some kind of evaluation of what's wrong with the heating situation.

kids chatting in background

I think I got to work, like what I'm trying to do now, work between the real estates and myself, and get me a place because they ain't doing nothing. It's been October, as long as they've been trying to find me a place, and I ain't going nowhere yet. Well, I looks in the paper, and then I go check out ask Really, I go to a different real estates, and ask them about what they got, you know. And what have you found so far? I ain't found nothing. They say, "Well, we'll look and see." Because with my family, they need a big house, see. But to find a five bedrooms to rent, then you would have to pay over a hundred dollars for that and no you just-- - Yeah, I know that. We just do not have a house that large. They say, "Well, we'll take your name, and if we come up with something, we'll let you know." Then, when you tell them you got 12 kids, that's it. They don't even want you in the house. We don't want these many kids, and all that. You know, they always got some excuse to give you, so ain't nothing you can do. Mrs. Taylor is having trouble getting out of K-3, too. But she has a friend who got mad and got results. This other lady was down here. She was a... Water was all in her basement, she didn't have no heat, and kids was in the house cold. Then, we all got together, and went up to the welfare place and sit up there till they promised her a house, and she did get her house, but I ain't got mine 'till yet. But now, they gonna promise me one for the 5th of January. And this make the fourth house they done promised. Mr. Osheim, is he in here? I got to see him about a house today. I mean business today. I done been put off long enough. So, we're here for what? They promised me this house for Friday the 5th. The 5th? - The 5th. Yeah, okay. I'll look into this. Well, I wish you would. The 5th, that's when I'm supposed to get this house. And I would like to see it today. I got to have a house one way or the other. We don't own the house where you're living yet, I understand. Yes, the city do have it, too. Yes, the city do have it. Oh, that's right, yes. That one we own. I was thinking of the other one, yeah. You got the wrong sales. The city been had that house since September. Yeah. And they been finding me house ever since September. Who promised you the house for Friday? Mr.... I guess it was you. You're Mr. Osheim, right? Right. - Right, you. Because you talked to Ms. Price, I was in her office. Well, I understand that, Mrs. Taylor, but we had offered you another home, had we not? You have offered two or three of them, and I ain't got 'em. Sure have, you right. Two or three of them, and I ain't got now. So, yeah. But, see, I know there's a lot of houses in Milwaukee is for sale, and the city ain't got nothing to do but buy a up story house, a duplex. That's what I'm in now, a duplex. You understand? And put me in it. Well, this is what we intend to do, and this is what we will do. I intend to see to them doing it, too, right away. I don't believe it will be done this Friday though, because, as he said, it had-- Well, that's as far as I can go. I'm gonna wait, and I'm gonna see. I got to do a lot of doing this week, because Friday's the time when I'm supposed to be getting out of that shack. 3364 North 3rd, huh? You will be scheduled for this house, as far as I understand from the housing authority, but it would not be available to you this Friday, I'm sure, on the basis of what John just said here. It will be available for you as soon as we acquire it. You shouldn't take over one, two, three days. I'm gonna give them 'till Thursday to have it ready. Well, because I'm intending to get in there on Friday. I'm gonna have everything packed up and everything. Well, this here done went far enough. Long enough, I'm tired of it. But I know I'm gonna call Thursday. And Thursday morning, and see what is they doing about this place. I know, after I see it today. 'Cause I'm gonna have those clothes ready and everything for to get out of there, Friday. Don't want me to have to go up there. I know they don't want me to carry all of them kids of mine up there. Go up there, it'll be enough to fill up the place. I know they don't want me to come for to sit down up there, and wait for a house. I have to go through so much, I'm telling. Ten days after she stormed the relocation office, Mrs. Taylor got her promised house. Unexpectedly, Fred Dura got one before the Taylors. The city bought a house under its Public Housing Scattered Site program, and moved him in. They got a nice basement to play in. They got a nice backyard. They didn't have that over there. Now this is better. They got nicer rooms, and everything just convenient. They got their own bath upstairs. I know it's convenient to me. I think by y'all filming me that day, that caused me to get in this place. 'Cause I had had houses promised to houses promised to me, and had never got 'em yet. One, they said, it wasn't big enough, but they find one when y'all went with me. I think just 'cause I got it. If it hadn't been for that, I wouldn't have it now. Wondering if you ever thought about that it-- Wouldn't your life be easier if you didn't have so many kids? I don't know. I've been used to them, I don't think it would. See, I've been used to them for about 17 years, and if one go away, I miss 'em right away. See, I'm used to them. Maybe if I wasn't-- They gets on my nerves since I've been kind of sick, but I don't think so. I'm just as happy now with them, as if I didn't have one. To me. They's a lot of trouble, it's true enough. But I figure this way, I got them I got to take care of them, too. It doesn't bother me too much. The Taylors and the Duras are lucky. Their lives have been changed and given new hope, because of the difference that a decent house in a decent neighborhood can make for a family. They are two of 11 families for whom the city went out and bought homes. But in March of 1968, there were still hundreds of families left in K-3 with nowhere to go. One of these is the Sheridans, Homer and Dolores, and their eight children. Yeah, I'll tell you this corner right here on 18th Street. I look at these houses with the windows out, and it's dark and it's dreary looking. There's no feeling, no happiness there. There's a feeling of just gloom, nothing but gloom. And you want to turn around and go back. And then you say, well what the hell am I looking for? We was keeping on a dump, or sleeping at the mission, if you gonna do like this here. I sleep laying on the floor. Right there. A man got eight kids, and he makes pretty good money, and he can't get into decent housing because he's a Negro, or because you got too many kids. That just don't seem right.

baby crying

What's the matter with him? It's like you're just working in vain. Then they wanna, like, they say, "Well why does this man--" They'll say, "He's not hisself no more, he's drinking." He done start to drinking. And a lot of guys, that's a little outlet, maybe for an hour or two. And you come around the corner, when you maybe half-high or something, then you might see the house look a little different. Until you wake up. Things look better to you sometimes when you're intoxicated than it do when you're sober.

laughs

Say, "How come you don't come home right on time?" And then you say, "Well, I don't wanna come out lookin' at all that." Now, he's neglecting the family because he's so disgusted, and then he got a job, well, they want you to have a job, and then when you go to the city and say, "You got a place for me to go?" "No, I'm sorry, your family's too large," you know, and all that kind of stuff. There's a whole lot of red tape when you're getting into public housing. And it just seems, I don't know, intolerable to me. Just in vain. I'm mean, for a grown man that work everyday, and pay them large taxes that they have, and you come and you not come home to nothing. It's just pitiful. And there should be something done about it, right? You know, right now because it's just nerve-racking. You ain't got no peace in the home now, like we had before. That's all I got to say about it right now. Maybe Mama, she got something to say. But I'll tell you that gets me riled up, to just to even just think of that. It's made a big confusion between me and my husband, I can tell you that. It makes him feel, I imagine, that he just don't care. He ain't got nothing to care for. Yeah, well you care for your family-- Yeah, that's what I mean. I mean, he cares for his family, but the proper provider is for his family. If he see that he can't make 'em, well, I mean, what can he do about it, you know. I mean, the home that he has isn't in proper order. His kids isn't in proper order, and he's not in proper order, and his wife is always angry. So, I mean, what has he got. He's got a miserable life, I can tell you that. And also, his wife and kids is miserable, trying to cope with the thing. I mean, it ain't no sense in saying that you ain't coping with it when we're staying here everyday. We gotta be coping with it. I mean, we have to 'cause we ain't got no other choice.

engine chugging roughly

If you rent your house, like the Sheridans, you even be lucky compared to people who own theirs. In an urban renewal project, the neighborhood falls apart fast, and so do the property values. The city pays you what your place is worth when they take it. Down the street from the Sheridans, live the Shillings, who own their own home. Well, we bought this place 11 years ago, and we paid $12,100 for it. And now they come around with a price of $4,500 for this place. Well, I think that's ridiculous, you know. What can you do with $4,500 today? You can't buy another place or anything. So, I don't know. I don't really know what to think of that business with them. Well, what do you mean? Who is offering you $4,500? Well, I think it's the city. There's some guy called me up one day, and wanted to come over while I had something to do. So, I asked him what regards it was to, and he said about pricing your house, and what you're gonna get for it. So I asked him over the phone, I don't know who he was, and he told me $4,500. And he asked me, "Should I come up and talk to you?" I says, "Well, there's no need of you coming up unless you're gonna come up with a better deal." Well, nobody has come over here, so I don't know who I spoke to. It must've been somebody from the city, though. But the people that bought their homes, not only ourselves, there's a lot of them around here that bought their homes within the last maybe 10, 12 years. They're taking a hell of a beating. How does that make you feel, Mrs. Shilling? How should I feel? I feel very bitter against it because I-- When we bought this home, it was intentions that this was to be our home for the rest of our days. And what can you do? You can't even buy an improved lot for $4,500. This is our life, and our home. It's really a shame. You work all your life for something, and after you just about got it, and there's somebody come and just, I'd say, takes it away from you. That doesn't seem fair to me. No, they working on the sewers-- More and more, Negroes are putting pressure on the city to get results. There are people in the city government who are trying to help, but they have limited means to work with. There are not enough houses on the private market, public housing funds are limited, and the city is not alone. It has to work within the slowly turning wheels of the federal government. But to the Negro who is looking for a home, the city is the man across the counter who seldom has good news for him. What has been done for these 49 families? Mr. Baldwin has been working on it. Mr. Baldwin with the department? Yes, he's one of the aides here. He's been working on it. And Mr. Szelicki in social services has a got a copy of the list, and he's also working on it. We'll get to these people, and we will house them. Well, so far you have not found any people here homes. - No, sir. You have not went to visit them so far, any of them? No, the first ones that we are working on right now are people that are in acquisition buildings. Have you at any point before talked to these people? Any of them? Well, most of these people have been contacted by the aides... with informational letters, yes. Well, shouldn't you already know then what they need? Well, in some cases yes, and in some cases no. Now, our letter said that we wanted you to relocate them immediately. Since you haven't done this, well we have to take some kind of further action. We aren't playing about this. You don't have any idea of about how many families are left in K-3, right now? Well, I would guess that there are probably about 400. Now, I prepared a list, I think Frank's got it, of welfare clients living in K-3, and I came up with 289 families, welfare families. Now, I think when it comes right down to the end, most of these people are going to be big welfare families. I haven't done any research onto the size of the families, but I can see just going through this list, that they are in the seven-up category where housing is hard to find. So I think-- What I'm scared of, I'm scared that it's really gonna blow up. Well, why aren't you able to talk to me, I'm his superior? Well, what is welfare to you? Well, you are dealing with the Department of City Development, The Redevelopment Authority, and I have been delegated to handle the meeting for the department this evening. So, if you have any grievance, you have it with the department, and if you have questions, and I'm in a position, or other members of our staff here are in a position, to answer your questions, we'll be happy to try to do so. If we are not able to we'll take your questions, and attempt to get the answers for you. If you don't care to deal with us, with the department, this is entirely up to you, of course. Well, there is one other thing. Like

inaudible

sent to your office a list of their demands. Let us state that we investigated this entire project, and found a number of things that were really out of sight, just bad things. If you are the head of this department, and you received our letters, then how come you up or before this point here have not been in contact with us? Nothing was addressed to me. The question he have been asking you, as far as I know of, that there was a letter forward to you, to the office of Mr. Osheim. And you know nothing about it. So, otherwise, you in succeeding for Mr. Osheim? If you're-- And you know nothing about it, so how can you be superior-- I have with me the grievances. Is this what you're referring to, Mr. Highwell?

people talking at the same time

I stated that I had not received any letter from you. Right. So, if you'd like to sit back, and I'll read your questions, and read answers that have been prepared for your questions, I'll be happy to do so. Would you like me to do that? What do you wanna do? Let's see what he has on his paper first. Okay. We want to see what you got. There's no date on this form. I believe this is the one, though it's a copy of it, and the first question states, "The relocation office "is not providing standard housing for all "of the people in the K-3 area." Would you like to have me read the so-called solution that you also suggest? In other words, read your entire portion. Ah, yeah, if you could do that. All right, it says, "The city said there was not enough standard housing "when they proposed this project, "and we demand that they now provide it." And a rough draft, evidently this, as you can see, is not in letter form yet, a rough draft has just been prepared, and was run off. And the reply is as follows, "Estimates as to the availability of standard housing "were made during the planning period, "and revised as recently as of March 1967. "The city's estimates were accepted as valid "by federal officials after close scrutiny "of procedures used. "Standard housing is therefore available for those "displaced by the K-3 project. "For those who have special problems--" Just how long you jokers figure that the niggers gonna sit back, and let you peckerwoods tell us what we supposed to have?!

crowd yelling

You all have done this #### for over 200 years, telling us what's been good for us, instead of us deciding what's good for us for our own selves! You here, you gonna represent The Man, tell the people what they wanna know, tell what it is! You niggers deserve on a reservation. And all you peckerwoods ever knew downtown. And if left up to me I take all of you, and instead of burning them damn projects, I'll burn you bastards' homes down--

yelling and clapping

Let me finish. You gonna see how we feel when you tear our houses down, we don't have nowhere else to move, you won't give us an open housing bill, when your shack yourself, and when you have to live in a rat-infested den! See your kids denied every darn thing that your white kids got, then you would understand! You wouldn't pocket the money that the federal government-- We feel that there is a great problem, and that nothing is being done about it. We all feel frustrated. We are tired. We have marched for pretty near 200 days, and our demands have went unanswered. And we feel like if the black man don't get his rights through peaceful demonstration, which we have proven to the nation, that he has a right to violence. Even if he have to lose, at all costs. But we do feel that it has been effective in some way, but the main way of this here non-violence have not been effective. Because the young kids are the ones that are most frustrated, and they'll go off, I say half-cocked, and do something. And quite naturally, it's gonna involve the rest of the black community because we're not gonna sit around and watch our kids get shot down, or fight a war, and we don't take part. While we know how, and we can think out, and act out accordingly, and wait for our chance, kids are not doing that. And that puts us right in the middle. America don't have time. She has to do in the next couple of months what she didn't do in 400 years, as I said previously. Because as you know this here, I noticed this year we haven't even had much snow or anything, and it's gonna get hot quicker than it did last year. It's only take one incident to set it off. And I think Milwaukee's in more trouble than any city around this country. Because it has a greater problem that it's not dealing with, but is ignoring it. Then, I think on something where I heard people say about Stokely Carmichael and Rap Brown, and they've used me an example once, say I was advocating violence, and I do not advocate violence, but I do say this, the real advocates of violence are those that sit behind a desk and deny people their God-given right. Not Stokely, not Rap, but people make laws just to get elected, and laws that'll only benefit one people, and not the other one. Those are the advocates of violence.

children singing

lumber and bricks crumbling, falling