Oral history interview with E.V. Dacons, March 4, 1991
Subtitle: interview M-0009, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)
Contributors: Wells, Goldie F. (Goldie Frinks), interviewer; Southern Oral History Program; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project); University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library
Edition: Electronic ed.
Publisher: University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill
Published: 2007
Place of publication: [Chapel Hill, N.C.]
Language: eng
Subjects: Interviews; African American school principals; African American schools; High schools; Administration; School integration; Race relations in school management
Other titles: Interview M-0009, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007); Interview with E.V. Dacons, March 4, 1991; Oral histories of the American South.
Description: Ebson V. Dacons discusses his career as a black high school principal in segregated and desegregated public schools. He was the principal of Lincoln Heights High in Wilkes County, North Carolina, from 1964 until 1968. Dacons favorably describes the segregated schools as places of caring and autonomous teachers and administrators, where parents respected school authority. He describes a culture of self-sufficiency and mutual cooperation as a means of remedying inequitable resources. In 1968, the Wilkes County school board decided to reconstitute Lincoln Heights High into an integrated specialized school. Rather than move into a central office position, Dacons assumed a principalship at the new school, the Career Center, in order to remain within the larger black community. Initially, the school had limited gender and racial integration, but Dacons heavily recruited [to] attract whites and females to the Career Center. Dacons regrets the loss of the power that he enjoyed as principal under the segregated school system and discusses additional differences in the organizational structures of segregated and desegregated schools. The interview ends with his discussion of the importance of mentoring black males.
Notes: Title from menu page (viewed on Nov. 14, 2008).

Interview participants: E.V. Dacons, interviewee; Goldie F. Wells, interviewer.

Duration: 01:32:05.

This electronic edition is part of the UNC-Chapel Hill digital library, Documenting the American South.  It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.

Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner.  Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers.

Text (HTML and XML/TEI source file) and audio (MP3); 2 files: ca. 90.2 kilobytes, 168 megabytes.

Original version: Southern Oral History Program Collection, (#4007), Series M, black high school principals, interview M-0009, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Original transcript: 17 p.

Funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this interview.

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

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