"My [maternal] grandfather's family was in the cattle business... and he supplied the principality with the horses they needed for the town [of Cloppenburg]. He was very-admired and well-respected.There were about 15,000 people in the town. There…

“Memphis is preparing to spend several million dollars in development of Mud Island for aviation purposes and the plan is to make it one of the most modern and finest fields in the entire country. Birmingham, Savannah, Augusta, New Orleans,…

This guy’s name was Kenzie. He’s from Chicago. He was a young hoodlum, and it matched my background because I was the poorest kid in a poor neighborhood back in Buffalo. I was a scrounger, and he was a scrounger, and we put things together.Editor's…

"But now as far as the attitude, I went into the Army at age 20. And I -- I guess I have been familiar with the number of forms of discrimination that blacks were subjected to. I've lived all of my life in the south. I was born in Johnson City,…

"[My mother's name was] Alice Lillian and my dad’s name was Kil Owe. And they were born in 1925 and 1926, and they met right after the war [at Englandsparken Athletic Club]—they were both very athletic—and they were runners and jumpers and, you…

"They met by accident. Kurt and Alexander, my grandfather, were walking out of their store at lunchtime, and they saw a woman trapped between two electric cars, or electric streetcars, down the road from where they were working, and she was…

"My father was born in December of 1924 in Berlin. They were fairly well-off economically. He was one of two children. He was the older of the two. His sister, Ruth, was born a couple years later. My grandfather was a leather maker-- at…

"I was born in Prichard, Alabama, February 8th, 1922. I had one brother and two sisters. I lived with them for about 3 or 4—maybe 8 years, and then it was decided that…I should live with my grandparents. You must remember, in the early days,…

Editor's note: Louvinia Jordan was born in the house that her father, Cornelius Vanderbilt Kern, built with his brothers. "My father and his brother built. They cut the timber off of the farm, and dressed it, and built the old house. And…