by Studs Terkel
I was on the prowl for a cross-section of urban thought, using no one method or technique. I was aware it would take me to suburbs, upper, lower, and middle income, as well as to the inner city itself and its outlying sections. (I was about to say “neighborhoods,” but this word has lost its meaning.)
I guess I was seeking some balance in the wildlife of the city as Rachel Carson sought it in nature. In unbalanced times, balance is as difficult to come by as Parsifal’s Grail.
In no instance did I deliberately seek out the bizarre in people. It would serve as much purpose as visiting a Topless A-Go-Go (as drearily unrevealing). And yet: the part-time Syndicate tiger is as indigenous to our city—any large American city, I suspect—as the social lioness. Each has pertinent comments to make on urban life in the twentieth century.
So, too, with the window washer newly arrived to the middle class and the two ad-agency men, one of whom loves his job as much as the other loathes it; the tortured house painter—home-owner, who seeks respectability in his restricted neighborhood, and the wife of the ex-Wall Street lawyer, who risks respectability to integrate hers; the ADC mother seeking beauty, and the affluent steelworker for whom life’s beauty has fled; the cabdriver finding his lost manhood in the John Birch Society, and the schoolteacher celebrating her humanhood; the Appalachian couple scoring in the big city, and the auto-body shop foreman who refuses to score; the blind woman who sees, and the sighted girl who doesn’t; some going with the grain, others against.
Accident and improvisation played as much part in the making of this book as any plan. More. I had an idea of the kind of people I wanted to see: homeowners, homemakers, landladies, project dwellers, old settlers, new arrivals, skilled hands, unskilled, the retired, the young, the haut monde, the demimonde, and the solid middle monde—like Margaret Fuller, I was out to swallow the world. My world was my city. What with the scattering of the species, it had to be in the nature of guerilla journalism.
A tip from an acquaintance. A friend of a friend telling me of a friend or nonfriend. A nursed drink at a tavern where a high-rolling bartender held forth. A chance encounter with a bright-eyed boyhood companion grown into an unquietly desperate man. An indignant phone call from a radio listener. A face, vaguely familiar, on the morning bus. A stentorian voice, outside City Hall, calling out my name. A wintry night in an Appalachian area, a hailed cab, the driver talking of a film, its impact on him, the meaning of courage; an appointment the following morning, a nearby bar. My seat companion on a bus, a Negro grandmother, bitter and strangely gleeful. The housewife next door, prototype of TV commercial heroines. An accidental shove on a crowded Loop corner, while awaiting the change in traffic lights; an apology; a phrase that holds my attention; we go for coffee; a life unfolded at the restaurant table. All these urban phenomena were factors in the making of this book.
An unexpected obstacle, in some few instances, was my identity. I had appeared on television and radio programs in the city and thus was a “celebrity.” Possibly there would be a tendency in the other to say things he thought I wanted to hear. The encounter would, in this event, be wholly worthless. This was not so in most cases, though at such times I was impelled to use self-deprecatory profanity to clear the air. To many, my name and face meant nothing; that was a valuable timesaver.
I realized quite early in this adventure that interviews, conventionally conducted, were meaningless. Conditioned clichés were certain to come. The question-and-answer technique may be of value in determining favored detergents, toothpaste, and deodorants, but not in the discovery of men and women. It was simply a case of making conversation. And listening. Talk of childhood invariably opened the sluice-gates of dammed-up hurts and dreams. From then on, there were occasional questions dependent on the other’s flow.
There were, of course, key questions, asked idiomatically rather than academically, that would occur and recur. I had to be sure, though, that my companion was ready. It was in sharp contrast to conversations I had conducted on my radio programs with celebrated figures, who were ever-ready (This is in no way a reflection on the latter group. The themes were their professional as well as human concern. They were accustomed to talk as well as write about them.) It should be made clear, however, that a number of people in this book are highly literate; they’re merely noncelebrated, that’s all. As for articulateness, each person found it in his own way and in his own good time.
Often my companion introduced the themes himself: civil rights and Vietnam were two notable examples. Passions ran deep in these matters, even among the more diffident. Time itself and the flow of words brought them to the surface. Neither was much prompting needed for reflections on automation; here, too, strong feelings were quickly surfaced. The Bomb was something else again. In almost all cases, I introduced the question. The thought of it was simply too overwhelming for them to willingly put into words.
Surprisingly, God was an also-ran in their thoughts (again, with several exceptions). Like a stage mother, I had to push Him forward. Once He was introduced into the conversation, He was immediately and effusively acknowledged. (And in a few cases, rebuffed.) Whether God is dead or merely sleeping or really is a has-been is for theologians to have a high old time with. It is not the subject of this book. It is merely an observation. You will notice, too, that His son fares in a rather astonishing manner.
We come now to the role played by the tape recorder. On occasion, it might have become an inhibiting factor, making for self-consciousness, were it not for my clowning. I’d kick it, not too hard, in the manner of W C. Fields with a baby or a recalcitrant picket fence. With him, it was a state of war; with me, it was merely a matter of proving my ally’s neutrality. Since the tape recorder did not retaliate, its nonviolent nature was made clear to my companion. With most, its presence had no effect one way or the other.
When the recorder went wrong (this happened a number of times), I swore at it. During each of these instances, my companion laughed and seemed to feel more relaxed. (This may provide its own commentary on man’s true feeling about technological advance.) I soon became aware that my playing Jacques Tati’s Mr. Hulot helped break whatever tensions might have existed. (It came naturally to me, since I have never been able to drive a car, ride a bicycle, roller-skate, swim, dance, or engage in any such form of coordinative activity.) Yet, paradoxically, without my abused mechanical ally, this book would not have been possible. There is such a thing as base ingratitude—even to a machine.
The locales of these encounters were varied. Frequently it was the home of the subject, or his place of work, or a quiet corner of the radio studio, or my house, or a booth in the restaurant, or the front seat of a car. On occasion, there was coffee or a can of beer or a shot of whiskey, or in the case of a gracious elderly lady, a memorable meal. (“Even cooking takes love,” she said.)
Most of the guests in my mother’s hotel were single men. Many were skilled craftsmen: tool-and-diemakers, coppersmiths, chefs, master carpenters. They were a proud and stiff-necked lot. There were occasions when, for no likely reason, a fight would break out, a furious one—a pinochle game, a dispute over a nickel. The men earned what was good money in those days. Why, then, the fist and the blow over a lousy buffalo nickel? I didn’t understand.
Now I understand. It wasn’t the nickel. It was the harsh word, the challenging word, in the presence of peers: “Liar!” The nickel was not the matter, nor the dollar. Humiliation was the matter. Unless strong measures were taken. “Let’s sit down and reason together” had no meaning while one had lost face.
Though there may be fewer such craftsmen today than there were then, face is still the matter.
Another recurring theme, to put it harshly and, perhaps, cruelly: the cop-out. “What can I do? Nothing.” This plea of individual impotence had ironic overtones. It was voiced more frequently by those who called for a national show of potency and, indeed, violence than by the fewer others. Each of the subjects may have come to his belief or lack
of it in his own ornery way; yet evidence seems overwhelming that mass media, with their daily litany of tribute to things rather than men, played their wondrous role.
Each of the subjects is, I feel, uniquely himself. Whether he is an archetypal American figure, reflecting thought and condition over and beyond himself, is for the reader to judge, calling upon his own experience, observations, and an occasional look in the mirror.
Although there is a Division Street in Chicago, the title of this book was metaphorical.
FLORENCE SCALA
I was born in Chicago, and I’ve always loved the city. I’m not sure any more. I love it and I hate it every day. What I hate is that so much of it is ugly, you see? And you really can’t do very much about it. I hate the fact that so much of it is inhuman in the way we don’t pay attention to each other. And we can do very little about making it human ourselves.
What I love is the excitement of the city. There are things happening in the city every day that make you feel dependent on your neighbor. But there’s detachment, too. You don’t really feel part of Chicago today, 1965. Any more. I don’t feel any.
I grew up around Hull House, one of the oldest sections of the city. In those early days I wore blinders. I wasn’t hurt by anything very much. When you become involved, you begin to feel the hurt, the anger. You begin to think of people like Jane Addams and Jessie Binford40 and you realize why they were able to live on. They understood how weak we really are and how we could strive for something better if we understood the way.
My father was a tailor, and we were just getting along in a very poor neighborhood. He never had money to send us to school; but we were not impoverished. When one of the teachers suggested that our mother send us to Hull House, life began to open up. At the time, the neighborhood was dominated by gangsters and hoodlums. They were men from the old country, who lorded it over the people in the area. It was the day of moonshine. The influence of Hull House saved the neighborhood. It never really purified it, you know what I mean? I don’t think Hull House intended to do that. But it gave us...well, for the first time my mother left that darn old shop to attend Mother’s Club once a week. She was very shy, I remember. Hull House gave you a little insight into another world. There was something else to life besides sewing and pressing.
Sometimes as a kid I used to feel ashamed of where I came from because at Hull House I met young girls from another background. Even the kinds of food we ate sometimes...you know, we didn’t eat roast beef, we had macaroni. I always remember the neighborhood as a place that was alive. I wouldn’t want to see it back again, but I’d like to retain the being together that we felt in those days.
There were Negroes living in the neighborhood even then, but there was not the tension. I’ve read about those riots in Chicago in the twenties—the race riots. But in our neighborhood it never did come to any kind of crisis. We used to treat each other as neighbors then. Now we look at each other differently. I think it’s good and bad in a way. What we’re doing is not understanding, some of us, what it was like then. I think that the American-born—the first generation, the second generation—has not hung on to what his mother and father had. Accepting someone naturally as a man. We don’t do that today.
I think that the man who came over from Europe, the southern European especially, who was poor, could understand and see the same kind of struggle and have immediate sympathy for it. He accepted the Negro in the community as a man who is just trying to make a way for himself, to make a living. He didn’t look upon him as a threat. I think it was the understanding that both were striving. Not out of some great cause, but just in a human way.
I’m convinced that the first- and second-generation hasn’t any concern about the other person’s situation. I think money and position are hard to come by today and mean an awful lot, and now they see the Negro as a threat. Though they may say he’s inferior, they know darn well he’s not. He’s as clever as we are and does many things better than we can. The American-born won’t accept this, the first and second generation family, especially among the Italians and Poles, and the Irish, too. Remember Trumbull Park? 41
Through my teens I had been a volunteer at Hull House. After the War, Eri Hulbert, Jane Addams’ nephew, told me of a dream he had. The Near West Side, our area, could become the kind of place people would want to live in, close to the city. Did I think this was possible? I said no, people didn’t care enough about the neighborhood to rebuild it. But he introduced me to the idea of city planning. He felt the only hope for big cities, in these communities that were in danger of being bulldozed, was to sit down and look and say we have a responsibility here. He convinced me that you could have a tree on the West Side, see?
That’s where my life changed. I became involved with a real idea and talking to people like the banker, the social worker, and the Board of Trustees at Hull House. But I suddenly realized my inadequacy. I simply couldn’t understand their language, you know? I had to go back to school.
This is where I began to lose the feeling of idolatry you have about people. I think that’s bad. I idolized the people that were involved in Hull House. I thought they could never make a mistake. I was later to find out they were the ones who could hurt me the most. I feel that people have to be prepared always for imperfections in everyone, and we have to feel equal, really, to everyone. This is one of the things lots of slum kids, people who came out of poor areas, don’t have. Not to be afraid to say something even though it may be way off base. I did this many times and I’d be embarrassed, realizing I had said something that had nothing to do with what they were talking about. But Eri Hulbert kept saying it makes no difference. Just keep at it. You’re as good as they are.
Miss Binford and Jane Addams resented being treated as special persons. This was the kind of thing they had to cut through all the time. Yet we insisted on treating them as special people, in an uncomfortable kind of way. These feelings of confidence, you know, ego, so necessary—most of us in the neighborhood didn’t have it. Most of us hung back, see.
In those days it was a new idea. You had to fight the politician who saw clearance and change as a threat to his power, his clout.42 He likes the kind of situation now around Maxwell Street, 43 full of policy and hot goods being sold on the market and this kind of stuff that could go on and on without too much interference from authority because it’s so oppressed. The rotten housing and no enforcement of codes and all that business. We had a tough time selling the Catholic Church, too. From ‘47 to ’56 were rough years. It was tough selling people on the idea that they could do it for themselves, that it was the only way it could be done. Their immediate reaction was: You’re crazy, you know? Do you really think this neighborhood is worth saving?
All the meetings we had were so much frustration. Eri Hulbert was trying to lead us in a democratic way of doing something about our city. The misunderstandings never came from the neighborhood people. It arose out of the Hull House Board’s unwillingness to understand. He couldn’t get his point across.
Eri Hulbert committed suicide before our plan was accepted by the city. His death, more than anything else, opened a door which I never dreamed could open. You know, there’s a real kind of ugliness among nice people. You know, the dirty stuff that you think only hoodlums pull off. They can really destroy you, the nice people. I think this is what happened to Eri, the way he was deserted by his own. I think it really broke his heart. What disturbs me is that I was a grown woman, close to thirty, before I could see. Sometimes I want to defend the rotten politicians in my neighborhood. I sometimes want to defend even gangsters. They don’t pretend to be anything but what they are. You can see what they are. They’re not fooling anybody, see? But nice people fool you.
I’m talking about the Board of Trustees, the people who control the money. Downtown bankers, factory owners, architects, people in the stock market. The jet set, too. The young people, grandchildren of old-timers on the Board, who were not really like their elders, if yo
u know what I mean. They were not with us. There were also some very good people, those from the old days. But they didn’t count so much any more. This new crowd, this new tough kind of board members, who didn’t mind being on such a board for the prestige it gave them, dominated. These were the people closely aligned to the city government, in real estate and planning. And some very fine families, old Chicago families. [Laughs.] The nicest people in Chicago.
Except for one or two of the older people, they made you feel that you had to know your place. You always felt this. That’s the big argument about the poverty program today. You cannot have the nice rich people at the top passing on a program for the poor, because they simply don’t understand, they can’t understand. These people meet in board meetings once a month. They come by the main street into the building and out they go. They’ve never had anybody swear at them or cry or ask for help or complain the kind of way people do in our neighborhood. They just don’t know.
In the early sixties, the city realized it had to have a campus, a Chicago branch of the University of Illinois. (There was a makeshift one at the pier out on the lake.) There were several excellent areas to choose from, where people were not living: a railroad site, an industrial island near the river, an airport used by businessmen, a park, a golf course. But there was no give. The mayor looked for advice. One of his advisors suggested our neighborhood as the ideal site for the campus. We were dispensable. He was a member of the Hull House Board. It was a strange thing, a very strange thing. Our alderman, he’s not what I’d call a good man—even he tried to convince the Mayor this was wrong. But the Mayor was hearing other voices. The nice people.
The alderman alerted us to the danger. Nobody believed it. The priest himself didn’t believe it. They had just opened the parish, a new church, a new school. Late in the summer of 1960, the community could have been touched off. But the people were in the dark. When the announcement came in 1961, it was a bombshell. What shocked us was the amount of land they decided to take. They were out to demolish the entire community.