Lessons Learned. Katrina Davis Bias
children attend school in “town,” which meant Los Angeles proper. They left with their parents for work, dropped off at a relative’s home, and went to school from there.
Our little group had about a mile walk to school, directly through a dairy’s cow pasture. Since none of us were from the farm, we had a lot to learn about cows. We learned when to avoid getting too close to the mean cows that would chase us, learned not to break through the herd, and learned how to tell when it was time for calves to be born. We became accurate at identifying the cows that were ready to give birth and planned to be there the following afternoon or morning to watch. We were late to school a few times because of these blessed events.
Contrary to their expectations, I was identified early by my teachers as a child who had some musical knowledge, having been playing for about five years by the end of third grade, and was sent to the music bungalow. Strike a blow for colored kids: they can be accomplished in the arts.
Since this was the mid 40’s, remnants of the industrial training movement were left over from the 1930’s. There was a loom bungalow, where we made rugs on big looms. There was some sort of ceramic bungalow where we worked in clay. There were a few others I didn’t visit. Perhaps this was an elective time or an exploratory activity—but I didn’t elect nor did I explore. I was sent straight to the music bungalow.
Mrs. Blanchard was our music teacher. I remember playing the piano in music class, but also remember being introduced to the violin. Mildred Hasakawa was an excellent violinist so I assume that they put me, the novice, with her the expert, in an intern-like relationship. I finally played a passable violin, and later during my elementary music classes I picked up skills to play wind and percussion instruments. Strike a blow for colored kids: they can learn without too much effort.
Mildred was always first chair in the school orchestra. We became fast friends and neither of us got as excited about music as our parents and teachers hoped we would. The summer after fourth grade, Mrs. Blanchard hired the two of us to work in the music bungalow. I think we did inventory and maintained the instruments that had been turned in at the end of the term. If we worked past noon, Mrs. Blanchard gave us money—a whole dollar—for lunch at a café near the school. We went alone, the two of us sat on stools and ordered hamburgers and cokes.
This was my first job in the “industry”, with music gigs continuing for decades. We were paid each week. At the end of that summer Mrs. Blanchard gave each one of us a lovely green leather-bound book, inscribed by her to each of us. It was Ellison’s Music Dictionary, which I used consistently, even in my college music classes.
Mrs. Blanchard was the first teacher that meant something to me; she respected me by trusting me to do important work, she appreciated me by paying me and gifting me, and she did not distinguish that I was exceptional “for a Negro child”.
Mildred’s home was behind the school, where we went that summer after school for lunch and sometimes just to play. Her parents were always away, working at the family grocery store. This was a few years after World War II and I now know that her family must have been in an Internment Camp some time earlier, although we knew nothing of these things then. Her house was in a small Japanese village composed of about five homes. The village had a traditional Japanese ornamental garden, complete with a red bridge and a koi pond. We colored in her Japanese-language coloring books and ate her family’s leftovers for lunch. I thought it was a grand adventure. We could never do anything together on Saturdays because she went to school (again?). She explained to me that at Saturday Japanese School they learned language and customs, and that it was mandatory. She also had family obligations that cut into our playtime because she had a “job” at her family’s grocery store in LA. Theirs was a little mom-and-pop outfit located on the street-car route I took to my piano lessons. I sometimes got off the street car before my piano-lesson-stop so I could go in and say hi to Mildred. We remained friends until the end of elementary school, when over the summer her parents closed their store. I never saw Mildred again.
One other memorable aspect of elementary school had an impact on me. Next to our campus was a large library—large to me. It was a county community library, divided in half with a children’s section on the right and an adult section on the left. Each class had a set time for a weekly visit to the Library. I devoured books….always finishing my weekly book allowance before it was time to return them. At around fifth grade, there were no more books for me to read in the children’s section, having read all the series of Clara Barton, Caddie Woodlawn, Nancy Drew and other clever girls, the picture books, non-fiction, everything. Apparently the Librarian did not believe I had read everything and walked me around, quizzing me about various titles. Because I have always had a good memory for details, I was able to respond to whatever she threw at me. It may have been my mother’s intervention or a teacher’s, but somehow I was allowed to check out books from the adult section. Strike a blow for colored kids: they enjoy reading. It felt so good on library day to cross over to the left side of the library and visit the adult section; it felt even better to check out books that no one else in the school could get. Talk about smug!
Elementary school was basically unremarkable, but I must have received a good academic foundation because I always did well in school.
The most memorable aspects of elementary school were my music, my friend Mildred, and my books.
What’s so Junior About Junior High?
During the summer of 1952 I turned twelve. I still read the L A Times with Aunt Lizzie every day. The headlines were about Queen Elizabeth being crowned and I thought she looked so young when we saw her picture in the paper. The sports section reported on the tragic loss of the Brooklyn Dodgers to the New York Yankees. I thought for sure the Dodgers could do it this time, but again they didn’t, and I lost the bulk of my baby-sitting money to pay a bet to my friend Rochester, our back fence neighbor.
America was invaded by television in the 1950’s, and we were the last family on our block to get a TV. We were not allowed to watch except Fridays and Saturdays because my mother felt after school and evenings were for homework. However, an exception was made so we could the watch major sporting events, as my mother was a big fan of both the Dodgers and championship boxing, particularly Joe Louis. I remember a few other special TV shows that were the exception, like The Jack Benny Show and Amos and Andy.
Our most loved movie that year was High Noon. My favorite screen personalities were the strong, silent cowboys like Roy Rogers, Gary Cooper and Alan Ladd. Cowboys led both exciting and quiet lives, fighting and shooting to root out injustice when necessary, but doing their real jobs of taking care of cattle, sitting around the campfire, while singing to the cows.
The three of us were going to the movies alone on the bus by now, on Sundays after church. We were not allowed to go to a movie unless we went to church, so we took the short-cut by attending Sunday School. The cost to ride the bus was 10 cents and 9 cents to get into the cheap movie theater. One dollar did the trick for the three of us. If we wanted to see more recent movies, like High Noon or The Greatest Show on Earth we had to pay 25 cents at the Manchester Theater. Sometimes we had a dollar each, but our movie allowance was usually one dollar between us, given to me, the oldest, to cover bus fare and admission. The dollar was tied into the end of my handkerchief for safe keeping. Because it was such an accomplishment for a Negro woman to be nominated for an Academy Award, we were given the full amount to go to the Manchester Theater to see Gone with the Wind, in which Hattie McDaniel played Mammy. It was a long and wonderful movie, especially when we heard Clark Gable say “damn.” There was a lot of talk in our community when Hattie McDaniel won the Academy Award and gave such an articulate acceptance speech. We knew white people were surprised, thinking she spoke as she did in Gone with the Wind.
Although I was not to turn twelve until later that summer, I was excited and ready for Junior High School. I was looking forward to wearing saddle shoes and skirt and sweater outfits of instead of my brown oxfords and plaid dresses with sashes in the back.
Enterprise Junior High had the same structure