Page 4-B
The Chapel Hill Weekly
"If the matter is important and you are sure of your ground,
never fear to be in the minority.”
ORVILLE CAMPBELL, Publisher JAMES SHUMAKER. General Manager
Published every Sunday and Wednesday by the Chapel Hill Publishing Company, Inc.
„ 126 East Rosemary Street, Chapel Hill, N. C.
P. 0. Box 271 - Telephone 967-7043
Subscription„rates (payable in advance and including N. C. sales tax)—ln North Carolina:
One year. $5.15; six months, $3.09; three months, $2 06 Elsewhere in the United States: One
year, $6.00; six months, $4.00; three months, $3.00. Outside United States: One year, SIO.OO.
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Letter*From Olympus (Carbon Copy)
University President William Friday
was sent a letter the other day by Rep.
Phillip Godwin of Gatesville, the Honor
able who introduced the new Communist
gay law in the Legislature.
The reason we know about the letter*
is that Rep. Godwin sent us a carbon
copy. The letter says:
“Our local paper published an editorial
carried in the Chapel Hiil Weekly, at
tacking my close friend, T. Clarence
Stone, and I do not feel that I would'
be doing him justice if I didn’t answer
the editorial
“You know firsthand what a friend
Clarence Stone has been to the Univer
sity. I know personally the part that he
played in the past appropriations for
the University. He called me in his of
fice one day and asked me to please sup
port the $750,000 appropriation for the
hospital, and it waA through his influ
ence that helped me vote in favor of the
appropriation, for he outlined to me the
efficiency of the hospital and the good
job that the administration of the hos
pital is doing, and cited to me individual
cases of the charity of the hospital. He
has always defended the University and
Reece Berryhill; Still Much To Do
•/
Some* men never retire, just as some
men never start, or perhaps rise late,
perform a handful of perfunctory chores
and grope their way back to inactivity.
Waiter Reece Berryhill is ciearlv the
cut of man who doesn’t want to retire
except to commence anew. Possibly few
of his friends and he himself could re
member with any certainty when he be
gan adding lustre to the medical pro
fession. To imagine him stopping, let
alone never having begun, is to contra
dict everything known about him. To
conceive of medicine in the State and
the Nation as untouched by him borders
on the preposterous.
For thirty years Reece- Berryhill has
worked at Chapel Hill in the tradition
of a body of men who brought first the
University and then its Medical School
to flower. Since 1941 the School of Medi
cine under his careful nurture has made
Now & Then
Upstream about 100 yards from
the Highway 15-501 bridge span
ning Morgan Creek is a sluggish
hole on a -twist in the stream
which was known by some of the
more irreverant among the small
fry of my day as Bare Bottom
Bend.
It was well named. For it was
here that most of the youngtuns
on the south side of Town burn
ed to swim back in the middle
1920'5, and all of ’em without
a stitch of clothing.
The. other day 1 went back to
take another look. All around
the old hole, things have chang
ed a lot the bridge is wider,
the highway is bigger, and a
huge excavation has been cut
from the hill we used to scam
pe rdown. to make way for the
city's by-pass to the west.
But the hole was about the
same, except that it seemed a
little smaller and somewhat more
sluggish, and the bank quite a
bit more precipitous, and the
whole of the place taken with a
tangle of weeds.
As I stood on the bank the
excited voices of young boys
came back to me lrom nearly
forty years past, and I envision
ed a small group of my youthful
companions, off the highway just
above the bend that turns back
towards the bridge, onto a well
worn path that skirted the edge
of "Preacher” June Smith's bot
tom-land corn field and came di
rectly to the creek.
As they began descending the
path closer to the stream their
vocal nonsease and their strides
sped up apace, and as they gain
ed the last few yards to the hole
they began shucking clothes so
as not to be .the hated "last one
inr ♦
* N
has fought for appropriations in its be
half since his freshman session in the
Legislature, and for the local paper to
abuse him and his character as it saw fit
to do in its editorial is beyond all human
decency in my opinion,
“I believe in freedom of the press and
would fight for such freedom; however,
I do not believe that the freedom ‘car
ries with it the immunity to personally
attack an honorable man such as T.
Clarence Stone.” $
Since the letter was addressed, to the
President of the University, we assume
that Rep. Godwin is suggesting that Mr.
Friday censure the Weekly or berate-the
writer of the editorial, or something.
Rut since Rep. Godwin has already plac
ed on Mr. Friday much of the burden of
screening out Communist and Fifth
Amendment speakers at UNC’s three
branches, we suggest that it is cruel and
inhuman to saddle him also with re
sponsibility for the Weekly editorial
” page. Mr. Friday would probably agree.
Anyway, we take great comfort in the
completely unexpected news that Rep.
Godwin believes in the freedom of the
press. Who would have ever thought it?
possible a newer, healthier generation of
North Carolinians and given the State’s
Good Health Program the substance that
only skill and resource can bring.
Purely beyond considerations of his
impact on medicine, Dean Berryhill has
set a pace and an example which if dupli
cated on every frontier of University
endeavor would have required five Chapel
Hills to hold the end result.
He is in many respects like a dis
tinguished former colleague, who, well
into his eighties, continued going each
day to his office— not out of any in
ability to break routine, but because he
sensed that there was something left
to do. Like his colleague, Reece Berry
hill is implementing that sense of “some
thing left to do” by assuming a regular
professorship after his retirement as
dean. He can be counted among those
men who realize that any work can
terminate but that none is ever finished.
At the bank the more adven
turesome of the group, now
completely shorn of clothing, af
ter wiid-Indian yells to attract
all eyes to them, frog-leaped in
to the air and ker-plunked gro
tesquely into a frothy spot of
the murky water, to spring back
up into sight (quite often with
bottom- scratches on face and
knees', streams of water spew
ing 'from their mouths.
The more timid of the group
chattered down the bank and
slid unobtrusively into the water,
but came up as vocal and as
ready for anything as their brav
er buddies, who had literally
risked their necks by soaring
down from atop the bank.
And now another bunch had
joined the first and a cacophony
of youthful voices and the whack
of flailing arms and legs and
the hissing of the rolled waters
filled the bottom for hundreds of
yards up and down the creek.
Out in the center of the hole
two of the youngsters were
matching their strength and
wiles in the old ducking game,
while on, the sand bank in the
corner oT the curve two more
poked sticks down into holes
made by some mysterious ani
mal. Another boy was squirting
water by compressing the palms
of his hands together and still
another was shooting spray at
him by scooting the heel of his
hand along the surface of the
water.
Occasionally one of the young
sters would rush out of water
and onto the gravel “beach"
proudly pulling a leach from his
thigh or from his behind and
noisily holding it up to view for
the “oohs” and "ahs" pf his
approving companions.
And everywhere there' wefe
Sunday, July 14, 1963
by Bill Prouty
swimmers in various stages of
progress, mostly dog paddlers,
frothing the water at both ends
like a double-ended paddle
wheeler. but some beginning to
use the more sophisticated crawl
strokes. And all hands making a
lot of fuss and having a lot of
fun. '
Suddenly the splashing and the
wild youthful voices and the
plunking noises of. the water
stopped and I was looking down
the bank into the slow-mowing,
torpid water of Morgan Creek
again. And all the youngsters
were gone from that long, long
time ago.
As I walked back up the hill
to the road I could not help but
contrast that old hole on Mor
gan Creek with the wonderful
swimming facilities the kids of
today have -- the irmnacufcttely
clean pools with their chlorinat
ed water, their dressing com
forts and their life-savers ever
ready.
But that hole and others like
it on Morgan and Bolin Creeks
ware the only places we young
'uns in Chapel Hill in the early
and middle Twenties had to
swim. And what we wouldn't
have given for places like the
Bowman Gray and Kessing pouls
at the University, or the ones"
at the Country Club and at Urn
stead Park. And how happy we
were w,hen Sparrow’s Pool at
Carrboro opened, or when we
could take an occasional trip
over to the pool-it Lakewood
Park in Durham,
But somehow we lived through
it all, and learned to swim, and
had what we thought was a real
good time', and, if pressed, we
mirfit admit that we're a little
proud of it, too.
We Get The Rough Edge Again
To the Editor:
Thirteen darts daily pierce the
flesh of every Negro, every sen
. sitive white citizen of Chapel Hill.
Thirteen businesses licensed by
this community, served by the
public facilities of this communi
ty. protected by this community
daily affront simple human dig
nity by denying their full ser
vices to men of dark skin. The
Committee for Open Business has
3 one purpose, one motive: to in*
*> sist that the community of Chap
el Hill remove these thirteen
darts from the flesh of a size
able portion of its citizenry. To
date we have limited the forms
of our insistence to the legal and
traditional means of the boycott,
the peaceful picket line, and pub
lic demonstrations of protest. We
have kept the issue clearly in
view. We have offered a reme
d U
Now The Chapel Hill Weekly
caHs for a halt to both picketing
and demonstrations on the
grounds that WE (!) are incon
veniencing the public, overwork
ing the police, endangering lives,
and inciting racial strife. The
editorial’s request and the rea
soning advanced to support it rest
on a saddening failure to under
stand the social revolution at
work in our town. The cause of
the increasingly disruptive dem
onstrations is the plain failure of
Chapel Hill to remove the thir
teen darts from the flesh of its
citizens. The editorial
that Chapel Hillians do not de
serve to be inconvenienced and
thrown into turmoil. Why do
they not? Our continued demwi
stratirns grow out of the dany
pain and humilation suffered by
real human beings who are given
thirteen slaps in the face every
time they walk or ride the streets
of this town; On what genuinely,
moral grounds are we asked to
stop inconveniencing a communi
ty that will not act responsibly
to outlaw the perpetual racial
strife promulgated by publicly
licensed, served, and protected
segregation?
It is not our Committee that
is overworking a brave and dedi
cated police force: it is the thir
teen segregated businesses in
Chapel Hill! It is not the dem
onstrators who are disrupting
peaceful life here but those who
stand inactive on the sidewalks
or peer from shop windows and
pretend that all this will go away
eventually without their doing
anything to remove the insults
and indignities that put the
marchers in the streets in the
first place, ft is not the pickets
who build tension on W'est Frank
lin Street but every reader of
this letter who has not felt deep
ly enough how much it hurts a
free man’s spirit to be made to
stand up where others can sit
and who. instead of removing the
reason the pickets are there,
complains about the bad light
they may cost on Chapel Hill.
It is not the Committee for Open
Business that wants to reap a
whirlwind; it is a community
newspaper that calls for a man
in pain to stop screaming rather
than to insist with greater ve
hemence that a bullying majority
stop twisting that man’s arm. It
“When Comrade Khrushchev Said Realistic Art,
He Didn’t Mean THAT Realistic!”
Letters To The Editor
is an editorial that distorts facts
by claiming that the demonstra
tions have brought no changes
when the three businesses that
lowered barriers “earlier in
May” did so in two instances a
few hours before the announced
demonstrations and in the third
"ere-the result of demonstrations
at an allied firm in Durham.
We are going to win the total
integration of Chapel Hill be
cause we are going to continue
to shift the inconvenience and
embarrassment of segregation to
where it belongs: in the laps of
the entire community that has a
legal means of solving the prob
lem and has not used that means.
No means short of a Public Ac
commodations Law will halt the
widening demonstrations. This
last spring in North Carolina
made very clear that all at
tempts to suppress demonstra
tions short of removing the
causes for them only feed them
in intensity and number. Chapel
Hill cannot keep two hundred,
four hundred, a thousand citiz
ens in jail. It cannot afford the
national image of its arresting
respectable citizens for furthering
a cause Chapel Hill claims to
support. So fer, the Committee
for Open Business has avoided
civil disobedience: deliberate vio
lation of civil law in obedience to
a higher moral law. We are now
preparing to use this morally
justifiable means to shake the
community awake to the reality
of our steady, reasoned insistence
that Chapel Hill has no alterna
tive but to outlaw the evil of
public segregation. If Chapel Hill
is so sure it has made sufficient
progress that it will not act as
32 states and a majority of the
citizens of the United States have
done to outlaw segregation in
public accommodations, then it
must face national news cover
age of mass arrests in the streets
of what was supposed to be the
'most progressive community in
the deep South.
WE ABSOLUTELY WILL NOT
HALT boycotts, picketing, down
tA vn demonstrations at peak bus
iness hours and. mass (civil dis
obedience until a Public Accom
modations Law is passed in Chap
el Hill. The motto of the Week
,ly is "If the matter is important
and you are sure of your ground,
never fear to be in the minority.”
We are not afraid. But Chapel
Hill has every reason to fear fur
ther delay in outlawing segrega
tion in businesses licensed, serv
ed, and protected by the public.
The convenience, safety, and mor
al honesty of the people, we be
lieve, now demand it.
The Committee For
Open Business
Dear Sir:
I would like to comment on
your forthright editorial (July 10)
on the protest demonstrations in
Chapel Hill.
It is difficult to challenge your
judgment that these demonstra
tions have not been very effec
tive in achieving desegregation.
It does appear that one restaur
ant owner was influenced to
change his policy by one of the
early demonstrations. With this
possible exception, it is probably
correct to state that the consid
erable desegregation which has
been achieved has come about
through the efforts of the May
• or’s Committee.
I find that I must also concur
with your judgment that furth
er demonstrations offer little
hope of changing the mind or
position of those proprietors still
clinging to a policy of segrega
tion. I think that you are right
in pointing out that the increas
ing tension makes further dem
onstration marches dangerous
for the individuals par
ticipating, and for the peace of
the community. The indications
that the Committee for "Open
Business is preparing to move
from demonstration marches and
picketing to "massive non-violent
civil disobedience" suggests that
this community is not far from
the ugly strife which has af
flicted so many other communi
ties. And surely there are many
of us who have hoped that this
would never be. or be considered
necessary, in Chapel Hill.
With that much agreement with
you. I must now take sharp issue
with you over the conclusion
which you draw from all this.
You ask that the Committee for
Open Business cease immediately
airpicketing and demonstrations:
and, in the event that they do
not. that the ’lwTl'-officials take
whatever steps are necessary to
end downtown marches. As an
alternative to these procedures,
you urge that negotiations be re
sumed by some new’ group form
ed'by the Mayor. At this point,
it seems to me, you fall far short
of understanding the real nature
of the situation which confronts
this community.
What hope is there that those
proprietors who have not re
sponded to the many urgings to
desegregate will, under any fur
ther persuasion, voluntarily de
segregate? Surely you have the
answer to that question on page
1-C of your paper, where Mr.
Carswell makes his position quite
clear.
It seems equally clear to me,
and to many others, that the
only means of wiping out the re
maining pockets of segregation,
and of protecting our community
from any future segregation in
businesses serving the public, is
that of passing a Public Accom
modations law. lam keenly dis
appointed that you have not
thrown the influence of your fine
newspaper behind that, but have
chosen, rather, to call for the
suppression of further demon
strations and picketing.
I have listened carefully to all
the arguments raised against a
Public Accommodations law, and
it is my considered opinion that
they are all irrelevant. They
throw up a smokescreen around
the real issue. Such a law would
not deprive any proprietor of
any right, save the "right” to
insult a selected portion of this
community. Doesn't it make as
much sense for the community
to decide that no person serving
the public shall be permitted to
dispense the poison of racial dis
crimination, as it does for the
community to decide that no per
son serving food to the public
shall be permitted to serve con
taminated meat? Or don’t we
value the mind and the spirits
of persons as much as we value
their bodies?
Our problem, Mr. Editor, is
that you and I are white. Since
we have never experienced the
humiliating effects of racial dis
crimination it is almost impos
sible for us to imagine how our
Negro brothers feel about this
matter. It may seem to us that
we have made much progress
and that it would be the part of
wisdom to be patient about what
remains. But that, obviously, is
not the way our Negro citizens
view the matter.
Therefore, I cannot agree that
the answer lies in using our in
fluence to suppress further dem
onstrations. The Community of
Chapel Hill has not done enough
to remove segregation practices
—not when it has failed to rally
support for the obvious means;
f.e., a public accommodations
law, of ending this kind of segre
gation. Certainly further dem
onstrations or civil disobedience
are a threat to the peace of this
community. But what other ave
nue of protest is open to these
who feel the sting of discrimina
tion? It is necessary that we
earn the right by achieving jus
tice for all of our com
munity. And that %e have not
done.
Sincerely yours,
''' Vance Barron
Dear Sir:
You are asking, in your editori
al of July 10, for a stop in dem
onstrations, in Chapel Hill. Un
less you want to stop the progress
of integration in Chapel Hill,
there is no reason to do so.
Until there was picketing of
segregated businesses in Chapel
Hill in 1960, there was no voice
raised in a newspaper or in the
business community for the in
tegration of facilities. Until there
was picketing of movies in Chap
el Hill, there was no voice raised
in the newspapers or in the busi
ness community of Chapel Hill
to offer equal service in the
movies. Unless there are furth
er demonstrations, which news
paper and which business leader
will not forget this troublesome
issue.?
For seven years (1954-1961)
there was at best token compli
ance with the law of the land
regarding school segregation.
During this time the taxpayers
of Chapel Hill paid for a frivol
ous law suit to deprive a young
Negro of attending the school he
had a right to attend. The rec
ord of Chapel Hill has not shown
respect for the law when it de
manded integration. Any meas
ure of integration in Chapel Hill
which has been achieved has re
sulted from constant prodding by
the courts and from pressure
through picketing, demonstra
tions and similar means.
Nothing has happened at any
time to show that anything except
public protests will lead to any
change in integration policy in
business and in the community.
If the protesters have been taught
anything, it is this: Unless the
smug attitude of the powers that
be is disturbed, nothing is done.
Only strong reminders that Chap
el Hill is not the Southern Part
y J y'. : : •
BILLY ARTHUR
I do love the editors of The
Weekly sos calling my contribu
tion, in /the Wednesday issue,
“gentle humor.” Thanks.
Now, let’s get on with this
thing and see just how gentle I
am. And how funny.
I tried being both gentle, seri
ous and humorous Wednesday in
my discourse on column writing
to the High School Scholastic
Press meeting here. And not till
I redd in the papers what I had
to say did I realize what a good
talk I had evidently made. Either
that or Pete Ivey has armed the
News Bureau with some good
reporters.
That's what I told them I was.
I have maintained all the while
that I’m not a columnist, that
I’m merely a reporter Who gets
his chit-chat printed under a
single headline, and that unless
r see or hear something I don’t
have a contribution to this space.
That I illustrated. I told the
high school students it just amaz
ed me to see in Howell Hall big
"no smoking signs” and then ash
trays all over the place
* * *
Jack Koonce brought"some On
slow County wisdom up from
Jacksonville this week. He said:
"The man who wins at chess
is the one who makes next to
the last mistake."
♦ • *
Our Annis Lillian wants to
know why I’m not enclosed in
one of those windows in the
Mobile Museum of History. I
wanted to know why so.
"You’re an old-timer, aren’t
Best story 'heard this week
of Heaven will awaken the people
of this town. The record on hum
an rights of Chapel Hill, of North
Carolina, or of any part of the /
South, has been first, to do noth
ing; second, to offer minimum
token compliance. Even mini
mum rights are only accorded if
forced by exactly those tactics
of which you say that they must
stop.
We are now engaged in a cru
cial battle for human rights. If,
in fifty years or so, we shall
write columns about our remin
iscences of Chapel Hill, will we
have to say: "We counseled equi
vocation” or shall be able to say
at the very least: "We marched
on Franklin Street”?
Kurt W. Back
Dear Sir:
Hurrah for the Police Depart
ment. On my way to supper the
other night I called the Police
Department and told them that
the workmen had failed to re
place the stop sign on Hillsboro
Street at the Rosemary Street in
tersection where they had been
working preparing the street for
paving. I had just seen a car
drive right on across Rosemary
Street without pausing to look
right or left, and I thought what
could that driver be thinking
about, w’hen I looked and saw
there was no stop sign in its cus
tomary place. I told the police
man who answered the phone that
it should be attended to immedi
ately, before someone was knock
ed into kingdom come.
He said it was the Highway De
partment’s responsibility, but he
would see what o6uld be done.
On my way home from supper,
I was greatly relieved to see the
stop sign, standing its guard, and
I felt that I could work and sleep
with an easy mind, thanks to the
prompt actions of the policeman
on duty when I called.
There is no telling what kind
of accident was prevented when
the sign was reinstated, since it
is impossible to see approach
ing cars because of the shrubs
in the adjoining yards on Rose
mary Street. When the paving
of Hillsboro Street has been com
pleted the Aldermen should see
to it that the shrubs in the yards
are properly cut back, or dug
up and removed. I have written
about this road hazard before,
but to no effect. Maybe the Al
dermen could take a few pointers
from the Police Department.
Otelia Connor
**
Dear Sir:
Frequently, taxpayers are told,
“If you don’t go to the Town
meetings, how can you expect to
know what’s going on around
here?”
This is a good question. . . .
which I propose to answer with
another question: How is the said
taxpayer to reach the second
floor of the City Hall if he is
physically incapable of climbing
stairs? I suggest*that when the
Fire Department moves from the
City Hsdl building to its new
quarters, there be arrangements
made to use the old quarters for
Town Council meetings; a level
entrance makes this area easily
accessible to anyone.
Sincerely yours,
Nonnie Bissell
was about the Russian who was
brought before the judge, charg
ed with murder, and the judge
said, “Comrade! I want you to
know that one thing you will get
here is a fair trial. So don’t be
frightened. Speak right op.
Which current do you prefer,
AC or DC?”
• * •
At last Pm finding away to
live within my income, but I’m
having to borrow money to do
it.
* * *
Overheard -ih Municipal Re
corder’s Court:
"I’ll bet if you skidded in a
ditch in this town, they’d give
you a ticket for illegal parking.”
* • •
Overheard in South Building:
“If m* wife used her library
card like she does her credit
card, she’d be another Einstein ”
* • *
I’m beginning to understand this
European common market bus
iness. As I get it, R means
Germany has coal to sell, Sweden
has cheese, Italy has oil, and
France has perfume. But to buy
it, they got to get the money from
us.
* * •
Overheard at Memorial Hospit
al:
“He suffers from an occupa
tional disease-work makes him
sick.”
*• • f
Now, the editors tell me to end
my “gentle humo " for this is
sue. They say they want no more
kw-pressare stuff. In fact
Mjey’re looking for the drip right