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AI: Well, it's very interesting to me that both you and Ralph were very active in these kinds of things that hadn't been done before, and here he was doing Upward Bound and working with kids in their high school years, getting them off to college. And then at the same time, you had mentioned earlier in the interview that after you came back from Ralph's sabbatical in Berkeley, that then you were recruited back into, into working at CAMP, and working with kids on the, on the younger end of the spectrum. So can you review again a little bit about... was it 1966 when CAMP hired you, after you had come back?

EH: Uh-huh.

AI: And you were hired as education director?

EH: No, I was hired to direct daycare, because in the mid-'60s, there were virtually no daycare centers. There was one daycare center, Seattle Day Nursery at Broadway and Spruce. That was the one Community Chest funded daycare. And they were fully licensed, but virtually noplace else was there a daycare program. And if you could think of the employment situation then, employment was also very limited. You could, you couldn't get a job, practically. We knew a John Cornithan, who came probably in 1950, he was also at the Church of the People. He tried to get into City Light, and they would only assign him janitorial jobs. There were lots of situations like that; they could get into the post office, but...

AI: And you're referring to African Americans.

EH: (Yes), (yes). Women could only get into domestic work, and even then, even if you're doing domestic work, you have to have child care. But what happened was in... I think it was early... well, they started, probably started planning on this, in this, in maybe late '65. You have to do a lot of planning if you're (going to) do a mammoth, multi-service agency, because you also have to write grants, and you have to know where your money's (going to) go, and how many employees and that kind of thing. But I think in early, somewhere along there, three children died in an apartment fire because some guy who was supposed to be taking care of them forgot and flipped his ashes, cigarette ashes, in a wastepaper basket and the whole place went up in flames, and these kids died. And so Walt Hundley, who had been recruited to run -- they were called OEO programs, Office of Economic Opportunity -- and Walt was hired to direct CAMP, and he said at that point, "Okay, daycare's going to be number one. Come hell or high water, we're (going to) have daycare." So they called me in Berkeley and asked if I would direct this, and I really didn't want a full-time job with four kids. [Laughs] So I said, "Okay, I'll, I'll do it on, on a part-time basis." And just to get me on, they said, "Yes."

Well, when I got on the job, then there was no way you could run a daycare program -- especially in those days when nobody was trained, there were training programs, and you had to comply to Licensing. People barely knew that there was a license for this. So there was a lot, lot to do. There were some people already hired by the time I got on it in July of '66, but that was an interesting transition period, because nobody was trained, the gal that had started it in April was a beautician, hard-working gal. But they were firmly into spanking and washing hair and ironing clothes, and I said, I came on and I said, "Now, look. You know what kind of message you're sending home, that the parents aren't doing an adequate job." And they're saying to me, "You don't know how embarrassing it is to take dirty kids to the Public Market, or to the, anywhere, to the parks. We're not (going to) travel with kids looking like this." I said, "Okay, if that's the case, let's call the parents in and say, tell them what your concerns are. And if you need to help them learn how to do this, let's do that. But we're not, we're not (going to) have you washing hair and that. Ten years from now, these kids are (going to) look back on this and they'll use it as ammunition against their parents when they get into an argument and that kind of thing."

So, but also at that time, while I was, the year I was gone, community colleges cropped up. And community college were also quick, on the ball. Head Start was probably beginning, let's see... when we had the enrichment programs opening in the first of, early part of December, or '60s, Head Start hadn't happened. And, but when we were going with the enrichment programs, Head Start was just coming on, and they were beginning training programs on the university -- and probably all across the country on university campuses. But before that even happened, maybe it was Licensing, somebody wanted an enrichment, Madrona Enrichment group to help with training to get other people aware, and so at the university, we were beginning to do this. And, and then Head Start came on, oh, almost at the same time, overlapping. And Head Start wanted to use Enrichment program as demonstrators. So we were racing from our workshop, we were having a workshop at Leschi school, and we were racing between Leschi and the university, trying to meet everybody's needs or demands. But when... I remember talking to, at the university, there was, it was in an auditorium and people were there from Yakima, and asking, "What would you do in a migrant work situation?" But those were exciting, challenging days, and there was beginning to be an awareness of daycare needs. Anyway, one of the things that I had to really revamp when I got back into Seattle was do a structural change in the -- at that point, they only had one unit, thank heaven.

AI: When you say "one unit," do you mean one...

EH: One daycare center. But people were willing to help. The Grace Methodist Church was on, I think, Dearborn and Thirtieth, and they were providing the space free, they were allowing us to use the kitchen to prepare meals, but I had said to Walt Hundley and the CAMP administration that, "Hey, I've got to hire at least an education director that's qualified, has a degree in early childhood," and eventually I had to hire a secretary and if we're going to do transportation, we've got to have some bus drivers, but I've also, we have to have excursions, we're (going to) lay some rules down. Just any old guy isn't (going to) do it. But the... it worked. At one point, I knew that blacks always want to run their own program if they can, because they've been deprived of this opportunity. And here was government money proposed for this kind of program, and I was beginning to get some flack, but I finally said to Walt Hundley, "Look. I'll go back to the Family Life staff, because I could understand why they want to run their own program, but I'm not going to tolerate spanking, and I'm not going to tolerate bathing and changing clothes. That kind of thing belongs to the family, and somehow, we've got to get that across." And Walt said, "No, I want you to stay. We'll find a place for the director." And they did; I knew she was, it wasn't (going to) be easy. It wasn't (going to) be hard to find a place for Odessa, she was a born leader and very strict about what staff can do and cannot do.

But Walt wanted me to stay and so I can't remember whether at that time I had an education director, but eventually I had to have a staff of sixty-five, because I developed five centers. And Grace Methodist was first, Temple de Hirsch opened up their facilities, and First Baptist, I think, was the next one. University Presbyterian, St. Peters Episcopal, which was a Japanese Episcopal, opened up. Blaine Methodist allowed, allowed me to help Centro de la Raza use that facility until Centro de la Raza got on their own. But I had to talk to the women and the administrators and talk about cost and be willing to sign papers, CAMP would be willing to sign papers about what to expect and what we will guarantee not happening. But by and large, people were really willing in those days. They knew that things had to change, and people were willing to learn.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.