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Oral history interview with Clyde Cook, July 10, 1977 interview H-0003, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007). Cover Image E-book

Oral history interview with Clyde Cook, July 10, 1977 interview H-0003, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)

Interview with Clyde Cook, July 10, 1977 (portion title)
Interview H-0003, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) (other title)
Cook, Clyde 1912-1988 (interviewee). Hester, Rosemarie (interviewer). Southern Oral History Program. (Added Author). University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project) (Added Author). University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library. (Added Author).

Summary: In 1916, Clyde Cook's father moved his family to Badin, North Carolina, in order to find a job at Alcoa Aluminum Company. Cook describes growing up in Badin, focusing on his experiences in segregated schools. Because the schools were owned and operated by Alcoa, Cook blames the company for the inequalities he and other African American students experienced. Cook began to work for Alcoa at the age of 16; although there were times when he was laid off and found other employment as a journeyman bricklayer, he worked for Alcoa during most of his working life. In describing his experiences at work, Cook focuses on his frustration with racial hierarchies and the limits imposed on mobility for African American workers within the plant. According to Cook, the election of Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 marked a turning point for these kinds of economic injustices, although there were still obstacles along the way. For instance, Cook describes how African Americans were discouraged and intimidated by their employers during the process of unionization. Nevertheless, enough African Americans joined the ranks of organized labor that conditions gradually began to improve for them throughout the 1940s and 1950s in the plant. Finally, Cook briefly discusses his other activities in the community, focusing on his work with the NAACP. At the time of the interview in 1977, Cook was beginning his second year as the president of the NAACP in Stanly County, North Carolina. Cook describes the persistent lack of job opportunities for African Americans and his goal to open new opportunities for them.

Electronic resources

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Record details

  • Physical Description: electronic resource
    remote
    1 electronic resource
  • Edition: Electronic edition
  • Publisher: [Chapel Hill, N.C.] : University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill, 2007.

Content descriptions

General Note:
Duration: 00:58:44.
Interview participants: Clyde Cook, interviewee; Rosemarie Hester, interviewer.
Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner. Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers.
This electronic edition is part of the UNC-CH digital library, Documenting the American South. It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.
Title from menu page (viewed on July 3, 2008).
Type of Computer File or Data Note:
Text (HTML and XML/TEI source file) and audio (MP3); 2 files: ca. 82 kilobytes, 107.6 megabytes.
Original Version Note:
Original version: Southern Oral History Program Collection, (#4007), Series H, Piedmont industrialization, 1974-1980, interview H-0003, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Transcribed by Jean Houston. Original transcript: 23 p.
Funding Information Note:
Funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this interview.
System Details Note:
Mode of access: World Wide Web.
System requirements: Web browser with Javascript enabled and multimedia player.

Search for related items by subject

Subject:
Cook, Clyde 1912-1988 Interviews
Aluminum Company of America.
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Stanly County Branch.
African American men North Carolina Badin Interviews
African Americans Employment North Carolina Badin
African Americans North Carolina Badin Social conditions
Blue collar workers North Carolina Badin Interviews
Metal-workers Employment North Carolina Badin
Metal-workers Labor unions Organizing North Carolina Badin
Badin (N.C.) Race relations
Genre:
Oral histories.
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