Brown, Byrd, October 20, 1998, tape 1, side 2

Michael Snow: This is tape one side one-- side two, of the State and Local Government Archives interview with Byrd Brown. You were talking about deferment and going into Yale Law School. Byrd Brown: So I walked in there and I asked her how much did it cost to apply? And they said, if you go to Yale College, nothing. My father would be trying to send me several money orders that were blank to apply to Michigan, Columbia, and Harvard, all the other great law schools in the country-- because I think you do. I didn't really like Yale. I didn't want to stay there in New Haven with that social climate and no girls [laughs]. So I got the application. I filled it out. I filed it. I took those money orders. I said, You say this was about my father come down and get me and put my name on them and went to Miami for two weeks. Snow: Oh, wow. Brown: So if I had not been admitted to Yale Law School, I would not have been admitted to any law school, because I didn't apply to any backup, I didn't apply to Pitt or Duquesne or anything like that. I had no backup. And I'd been-- so after that I never would have been a lawyer because there wasn't anything I was supremely interested in doing. Snow: No. Brown: I was probably [unintelligible]. Snow: Were-- were you that brilliant that you could-- that you knew you would get in? Brown: I think I was being silly or childish. Snow: Okay. Brown: Well, yeah, I had scored over-- in the upper 95% that was-- that wasn't the reason I had--

Brown: I just would have done it anyway-- I just was-- I-- when you were in an isolated situation all your life. Like my father was always somebody and I felt I was always somebody because hey I was the only child. I think it would be a little bizarre, maybe. I was-- you could totally be like everyone else, or are you going to be a little different? Sometimes I was a little different you know. I tried to be like everyone else, but usually I wasn't. Now that I look at it, that was like a damn silly thing to do, you know. Snow: Especially with Korea going on. Brown: Well, especially since you're in law school. The hardest law school Snow: Absolutely to get into, which I did not know. I mean, see, Harvard had a different theory. Harvard had a theory that there were a bit more people. And it was a famous thing at Harvard, the professor said, look on the left of you and look on the right of you, because by the time you graduate, two of you not gone be here. Snow: Hmm. Brown: So Yale had this theory of only admitting the number they intend to graduate. So-- here I was in a situation where the probability of getting accepted was not that good, but I just-- I saw these blank money orders and I had to do something, but it was a great trip to Miami. I stayed in the [??] hotel, because I drove my girlfriend's mother's car down there, and [??] the hotel.

Brown: We weren't allowed on Miami beach or anything like that. And in the hotel-- the Dodgers were trading at Vero Beach. So the Black Dodgers you know Roy Campanella and Jackie Robinson and Don Newcombe were at the hotel, and the tennis match-- Althea Gibson was at the hotel. Sugar Ray Robinson-- there was a boxing thing-- Sugar Ray Robinson was at the hotel with his entourage. There was a lot of celebrities-- Snow: Yes. Brown: A little bitty Black hotel, you know, and it was quite an experience because we weren't allowed to be out. Okay, anyway, I got tied up a little. Snow: And in law school you said that you shared a bathroom suite with Brown: No that was in college. Buckley. Brown: Bill Buckley and I shared-- Snow: Oh, that was in college. Brown: We lived across the hall from each other. Snow: I see. Brown: It was in college and we shared a bathroom. Snow: Did you have much interaction with him? Brown: A little bit. Snow: That's a good. That's close. Yeah. Brown: [unintelligible]. That was it. Snow: We're through with the first page, so. Brown: How many pages you have? Snow: Four. Brown: Oh, good, good, good. Snow: Did you have a particular mentor in law school that affected you in later life? Brown: No. Snow: Okay. Brown: I didn't get a mentor in law school [unintelligible]. No. My father was a lawyer, but he was here. Snow: Right. Brown: No. Snow: I just asked because the people I've asked who went to

Snow: Duquesne or Pitt had worked with just one lawyer and then-- Brown: Oh. Snow: but that [Brown: I had never saw a courtroom]

Snow: --affected their life.

Brown: I've never seen a courtroom when I was in law school. Snow: Wow. Brown: Yeah, I did. I-- I saw my uncle in court in Detroit once.

Snow: And then-- after graduating from law school, you went into the army. Brown: You'll have to excuse me I have to go to the bathroom. [tape paused] Snow: Before the tape stopped, I was about to ask you what stands out in your mind from your military experience?

Brown: I, uh-- gave-- when I was at Yale Law School-- That gentleman came by and recruited the entire senior class to join the Army Reserves. Uh, and we would start as corporals. A corporal is like a specialist. Second class, I think. So about 45 of us did that. And then when we graduated from law school, they said they'd give us time to graduate, go take our bar exams, and then we could get activated through the reserves as corporals rather than be a draft of this province. Snow: Oh. Brown: So I did that and I gave them an address. My buddy's address at Brooklyn, New York as my home address because I wanted to be at the second Army area, so I took the bar exam. The draft board called me for August 18th. I got myself activated from Brooklyn, New York, August 17th. And I got to Fort Dix because if the draft board had drafted Pittsburgh to the third Army area, which would have been Fort Campbell, Kentucky, or Fort Jackson, South Carolina, I think it was-- I may be wrong about the geography, but I would have been sent to the South. Snow: Okay. Brown: And at that time, we're talking about 1954. They were killing us. I mean, there was-- the South was just-- you know it was Emmett Till Snow: Right. Brown: There was no way in the world I wanted to go in the South with my attitude and everything. I just was not going to the South, if I could help it. So I got to Fort Dix and they gave us intelligence test and they-- out of 18,000 people that I understood, they screened down to 20 people to be assigned to intelligence duty at Fort Holabird or whatever that is.

Brown: So I was one of the 20, and they had to send an-- officer come ask me questions. And me being a smart ass like I probably always have been, always hopefully maybe will be, was sent to Livingston anyway. Snow: right. Brown: He said, What do you think about communism? And I said, I think it's pretty bad shit, almost as bad as racism. Now, what did I say that for? Snow: Uh oh. Brown: At the same time, Joe, Senator Joe McCarthy was investigating. And of course, I was basic training and not really reading the papers. I will say this anyway-- whatever-- He also asked if I had a college in source. I said, well, I went to a meeting once on the campus and-- it was supposed to be a Trotskyite fellow, and I asked him if they abolished God, what makes the dialectic-- the Hegelian dialectic move as they claim it does? And he put me out of the meeting, and the truth-- because they can't answer that question. Snow: Uh huh. Brown: And I said, well, sir, I went to a dance in New York with my best buddy-- who was Jewish-- a trumpet player. and he played at a dance. They had Black and White people, [??]. Now, maybe some of them, you know-- and that's that's what was my answer. At the time, it was-- there were-- Joe McCarthy was investigating communism in the Army at Fort Dix that week.

Snow: Oh, wow. Brown: And it was Roy Cohn and David Schine. I don't know if you remember that. Snow: Yeah. Brown: Okay. So, they held me as a security risk. And they had a guy named Zukovsky. He went around to see everybody I know, my mother's friends -- they was-- did I smoke dope?-- I forgot. Was I a homosexual?-- If I smoke dope, if I was as a homosexual, was I-- something else-- anyway. And if anybody said yes to any of that I would have been cooked, you know, because they weren't-- they did not confront you in those days. And the Lebell [ph] twins-- all the Harvard Law School people were there with me in security risk because we were all the second Army there, because McCarthy with the Harvard Law School, everyone pled the fifth amendment. Okay. He started asking the questions. They all played the fifth amendment. They all got drafted. They were all in the Army with me. So they-- so they-- I'm a corporal. I'm a non-commissioned officer. They can't treat me bad. They can't give me KP and guard duty. If they give, I'd be corporal of the guard, you know. So they put me aside-- put me in charge of the-- I marched the people around. I could call cadence about as good as anyone ever. But anyway, the-- of all the people held as security risk, I'm the only one they didn't bring any charge against. I mean, there was no way in the world. I wasn't involved in anything, you know. Snow: I see. Brown: But all the ones from Harvard, all the other ones, the Army brought charges against them-- discharged them.

Brown: They took them to federal-- took them to court, and the Army lost every case. So that was interesting. In any event, the Army finally released me to regular duty, sent me to Fort Bragg at the headquarters of the 18th Airborne Corps where they taught academy and I was sitting there-- all these top-secret things going across my desk and I still had no security clearance for it. I just thought how stupid they could be. Snow: No doubt. Brown: And I had a lot of bizarre experiences in Fort Bragg as far as the Army. They would arrest me for stealing my own car. I had a-- I had an Oldsmobile with Pennsylvania plates. And they said, Nigger you stole this car. And I had the owner's card and-- because I knew what they were going to do. Snow: Right. Brown: I had the owner's card and the title and everything else, you know, well they arrested me for being a prowler. It was just-- it was a tough thing. And I never went off the post in the Army uniform. I always put on a suit and a tie and I carried a briefcase. So they said, you a smart one huh. I said, no officer. They always thought I was the NAACP first. And I said, no, officer, I'm just-- whatever you say, I'll just go with you, you know? So they didn't always let me go. But that was interesting being in Fayetteville-- so uh-- lot of interesting experiences. Snow: Yes.

Snow: And North Carolina was supposed to be more tolerant. That's amazing.

Brown: Well, if it was, I couldn't imagine-- Snow: No doubt. Brown: Well, yeah, in Mississippi, they probably would have just dug me in. Snow: Absolutely. Brown: Because I was-- I had a daughter, that accent I could really-- you know-- and I had this daughter's license plate. They wouldn't care about me. They see the license plate on my car. Snow: Right. Brown: In fact, it was-- one time they arrest me for stealing my car. What kind of car? They said we got a bastard and a Nigger and a so and so. I said, well that's terrible, what color car? Of course, they couldn't tell the color of my car cause it was dark. [laughter] Now, that I think about it, I probably should have treated them differently. It was kind of risky to even say anything, I guess. Snow: Right. Brown: So I ended up as a corporal when I started out. But I shared it with the-- unless you were the combat thing, they became spec two, spec one, spec two. I forgot-- I forgot what I was and I transferred myself. I wrote the papers, because I was in the headquarters, to the second logistical command because being in the headquarters of the 18th Airborne Corps-- that was the 82nd Airborne Division and the 77th Special Forces. Those were soldiers. I mean, those guys all jumped out of planes and being serious about this stuff, of course, my classmates and I, we weren't very serious about the Army. It's just, you do your duty for the country and country said, do two years. You do two years. But that is it. They got their pick of places. They went to Europe. They went all over the world. I didn't because they held me as a security risk.

Snow: And after you left the military, what were your plans? What did you do?

Brown: When I left the Army, my uncle, who lived next door to us, Everett Utterback, he was General Counsel for the Highway Authority, and he had gone to law school late in life. And we were in a little [coughs] suite in the Bakewell Building. 608. I set up a law-- my first act before the court was to present my father's commission as a judge of the Common Pleas Court, which was-- that he was the first Black to be on that court and he was the first Black to be elected judge in Pennsylvania, period. But he had been on the county court, which was a court of lesser jurisdiction, a different jurisdiction. Snow: Right. Brown: And we set up this office in the Bakewell Building. And 2 or 3 days later, Boris Berger came to me as daddy's father and asked me if I wanted to try a case with someone in his office, and I said okay. So I tried a case about a fella who was accused of breaking into someone's house and hitting him on the head with a hammer or something like that. And I didn't know where to sit because the old law school did not teach you how to try-- they didn't teach you anything about practicing law of people. Okay. I mean, you might be able to go to Wall Street and the big banks, but you don't know anything about practicing law of people. I mean, I had people about-- so I didn't know where to sit. I didn't know who made the opening for the opening statements or closing-- I didn't know nothing. And all I did-- I told them this is my first case. I hope-- I hope you don't hold it against my client, and they acquitted him. So I said, wow, this is pretty cool. Anyway, so from then on I just tried cases and I have to say that I-- because of being father's son, and our fairly unique position in the community.

Brown: I was offered just about every job any Black lawyer had around here in the political system. Like assistant this and Assistant Solicitor this. We're always assistants, you know. Snow: Okay. Brown: And my hero in life is that man right there. His name is Adam Rowlett. He's my great great grandfather. I should have mentioned him. He's-- he's my grandfather on my-- father's side. He's my grandmother on my father's side. And I said I never saw-- that's her father. And his name's Adam Rowlett-- that's right where I got the little name from. I have all three last names. Snow: Right. Brown: All I knew is that it was slavery in Chesterfield County, Virginia. He never worked for a White man. So that was my thing. So I could not accept their jobs. And my dad said, if you want to stand up for your people, that's what we have to do. He didn't say I had to do it or we had to do it. If that's what you choose to do, then you can't accept these jobs. Snow: Hmm. Brown: If you notice the unfortunate, tragic thing about-- we have Blacks that get up and speak out this, that, and the other, and then they give a program, you know, or they get a job. They still speak out, but not quite the same and the targets tend to not be the people that have the control or have the control of the program or the job. So that's the way I practiced law. My practice has always been a people practice. If you're working for a White-- kiss em, goodbye, you know. I think so. What else? So I've been fortunate like that.[footsteps] Oh, thank you. [unintelligible]

Snow: The last question was-- was what were-- what was your occupation and what were you doing after leaving the military and you were talking about--

Brown: I set up a practice.

Snow: Being a personal lawyer.

Brown: I started law practice. Right. The next day. [clinking silverware]

Snow: And when did you begin your involvement with civil rights activism? Brown: Huh. Snow: When did you begin your involvement with civil rights activism?

Brown: You have to understand, my father was an honorary president of the Pittsburgh NAACP. He was a president for 25 years. So I don't know when I wasn't involved. Snow: I see. Brown: I mean, it was just what you-- what we did as Browns. I was elected to the board shortly after coming home, out of the Army. [unintelligible] I don't remember. And then Jim McCoy and Henry Smith-- Jim McCoy was chair of the UNPC, but he was a representative of the US-- steelworkers and Henry Smith was a judge. And he later, I think, became state president. Or maybe he was then-- came to me with the [??] and asked me if I'd run for president. But I said okay. I ran and made the win by two votes. Now when I was elected to the board, the incumbent people opposed me for some reason. They were supporting Wendell Freeman [??], and I beat him by one vote. Two votes. The person I defeated was [??] and-- we went on from there. [clears throat] It was clear to me that-- well in those days. Not like now, there-- right and wrong was much clearer. It's much easier to say, I want to sit at this lunch counter and them say, no you can't sit there, than to say-- I mean segregation was clear. The targets were clear. You could you could generate the villains. You really can't have heroes without villains. And uh-- so it was kind of clear that we had to do something, what we had to do or how to do it-- none of us had any conception of it because we're-- we're doing all this before King and Martin Luther-- you know, the people marching in the South. And I just finished the book Pillars of Fire, and I found it very interesting. But the point is that in terms of time, what we were doing in Pittsburgh was on the margins of things. It was before what they were doing in the South.

Brown: So we didn't have any any model to follow. Snow: Hmm. Brown: And the concept of nonviolence was just. I mean maybe you had Gandhi. But I mean, to me that didn't-- it was not so well articulated and it didn't make any sense anyway. Snow: I see. Brown: No way in the world I-- in the context of Pittsburgh, no way in the world that I'm letting any of these people hit me in the head and I'm not going to do something, and we were not in Mississippi. So what I'm saying is that for that time, for that milieu, I think nonviolence was probably the appropriate and best tactic in the South. In the North, we weren't violent, but we didn't say, well, come on, hit me in the head. Or if you hit me in the head, I better lay down and pray. So I've sent out letters to about 90 organizations, flower clubs, block clubs, to meet at Central Baptist-- and they all said, I think that response was like 90%. Snow: Wow. Brown: Representatives that we forged, to me the NAACP did have a middle class image. We were middle class and we had to find a way to get in touch and communicate with the community as a whole more effectively. Now, you have to understand people can say what they want, but the NAACP is the only organization that we owned and controled. Now, now they got this Ford Foundation, but we were-- the NAACP was us. It was our dues. We had dues paid members. And when I was president, we had we-- we had up to-- we peaked at around 10,000 dues paying members. That's as big as the as Farrakhan has of members of his national church now. We were a big organization--

Snow: The local chapter, had 10,000 members.

Brown: Yeah, this chapter. Snow: That's amazing and great.

Brown: And we didn't have any-- you know, people say [unintelligible]. They might have had five people. You know, I don't want to run them down because they were very-- what they did in the South was just-- absolutely just incredible. But in a middle class conservative community like Pittsburgh the NAACP was the ball game. But we were-- White people give us such a middle class image that we had to overcome that and find a way to get the entire community involved and [??] we are-- we're a very structured organization. We have a board that meets every month at the same time and meets, you know, we have protocol, we have rules, and we have a national organization that-- most of their telegrams I didn't pay much attention to. But, you know, but we were obliged to follow them, and we sent money to them. So all those people came-- in the basement of Central Baptist Church. I'm saying this because nobody really knows all this. Oh, it started out with Charlie Harris. I don't know if you came across his name, but he spoke at all of our meetings. And he came to my house one Sunday, my parent's house. He says, Byrd, you got to get the people together. He says if you call again, they'll follow you like Pied Piper. I didn't know this guy. And that's exactly what I did, and they formed our United Negro Protest Committee which did all of the demonstrating, and chairman of United Labor Municipal Committee was Jim McCoy, so he's chairman of our Negro Prot-- well, I-- well he's foreman chairman of the United Negro Protest Committee because I didn't want to look like I was the NAACP taking over all these little organizations.

Snow: And what had he been chair of? I didn't hear you.

Brown: My Labor Municipal Committee, the same thing. Snow: Okay. Brown: --Municipal Committee of the NAACP, which is supposed to help us get jobs, and breakthrough employment. Snow: Right. Brown: So we just so we created a United Negro Protest Committee, which was to help us get jobs and breakthrough employment. So he's the chairman of that now. And they met on their own. And they had-- they met and they'd formulate their own policy, except every Wednesday, they met in my mother's basement. That's where-- and we had like a guy, a [??] committee. But, you know, they didn't have any structure like we had a structure. I can remember once, that they called for a boycott of Coca-Cola. And a newsman comes into my office to interview me about something, but I have a Coke bottle on my desk. They didn't even tell me anything to boycott. But I like that, you know, go-- go get it, you know. But they otherwise had the first Duquesne Light march. But it really was us because, you know, anyway. That's what we did to get rid of the middle class image because-- Black people will get snookered in by descriptions of us by the White dudes there as quickly as-- as White people who tend to to believe it. So. On the bright side, if you look carefully, a lot of stuff you got the Negro Protest Committee for.

Snow: When was it formed?

Brown: I don't know, because-- you have to look at old snippets. I think 1963.

Snow: That's what I was thinking too. Brown: Huh. Snow: That's what I was thinking, too.

Brown: We had a big rally at Central Baptist Church. The church was filled to the rafters. Reverend Hacker gave a great speech. He said, let's march. I will never forget that speech. Then we marched out around Duquesne Light. That was with the first arrest occurred. It was Jim and Lailee [??] and myself. And of course, the Whites are gathered in Mellon Park. Duquesne Light was next to the William Pitt Hotel where [unintelligible].

Snow: Right. Oh, Mellon Square downtown. Brown: Uh huh.

Brown: So the Whites were gathered by the park and we were marching around Duqusne Light. And you have to understand, we had no concept of what could or would happen. In other words,this had never happened. We didn't know if the police would shoot us, beat us, or let us march. Because all of our marching, they were saying, well, what about the permit, we ain't getting any permit. They said, where are you going to go? We're going to march where we want to march. If it blocks traffic so be it. If you want to arrest us do what you have to do. So we just marched. So the police arrested the three of us, but they were smart here in Pittsburgh. They took us to the police station, and then the people started getting restless because--

Snow: Excuse me one minute. [tape ends]