Title: Oral history interview with Walter Durham, January 19 and 26, 2001
Description: Walter Durham, an African American community member of Orange County, North Carolina, recalls his experiences growing up in Carrboro and Chapel Hill. Born in the late 1940s into a land-owning family, Durham attended all-black schools in Carrboro until 1966, when the African American high school, Lincoln, merged with the newly integrated Chapel Hill High School. For Durham, school integration was largely a negative experience. He fondly recalls Lincoln High School as an extremely well-ordered and disciplined school with strong ties to the community and pride in students' accomplishments, particularly in football. According to Durham, black students' traditions were lost when the Chapel Hill schools integrated. This, along with tensions between white and black students, led Durham to participate in the 1968 "riot" at Chapel Hill High School.
Subjects: Interviews, Race relations, School integration, African Americans, Attitudes, Social life and customs, African American students, Education (Secondary), Segregation in education, Civil rights demonstrations, Lincoln High School (Chapel Hill, N.C.), Chapel Hill High School (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Places: Chapel Hill (N.C.), North Carolina, Chapel Hill
People: Walter Durham (1948?-)
Time periods: 20th century