Extraordinary, Ordinary People

by Condoleezza Rice

  Here I am sitting in Mother’s lap, my little foot poking out from underneath the blanket. Had I been born a boy, my father would have named me John. But Mother got her way—a girl named Condoleezza, meaning “with sweetness.”

  Mother believed passionately in the importance of the arts and organized student-led performances wherever she taught. Here, the two of us pose for the cameras after one of her productions. It was late, and I was clearly ready to go home.

  I started to play the piano at three. The little organ pictured here didn’t have enough keys in the bass, so after I learned “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” my parents found the money one day to rent a real piano. I began to play at recitals throughout the city. Here I am playing for the new teacher’s conference. I still don’t understand my mother’s decision to have me wear that fuzzy white hat.

  I spent the first three years of my life living with my parents in a small apartment in the back of Westminster Presbyterian, my father’s church.

  Mother and me, dressed in our swimsuits. I did not learn proper swimming techniques until I was twenty-five because Eugene “Bull” Connor closed Birmingham’s recreational facilities after the courts ordered him to integrate them.

  Here I am eyeing Santa Claus suspiciously. A few years later when we went to see Saint Nick, a racial incident almost broke out when my father noticed that the Santa in question was treating black and white children differently. Daddy was prepared to “pull all that stuff off him and expose him as just another cracker.” Fortunately, Santa got the body language and treated me very well.

  Mother filled our home with beautiful, well-preserved mahogany furniture. The sofa on which my mother and I are sitting resides in my home today. Courtesy of Chris McNair.

  I liked but didn’t love school. I got good grades despite a tendency toward procrastination. Clearly art (notice the string of Cs) was not my strong suit.

  Here I am standing outside the White House during a family trip to D.C. My father said that I proclaimed, “I will work in there some day.” I don’t remember saying that, but my parents did have me convinced that even if I couldn’t have a hamburger at Woolworth’s lunch counter, I could grow up to be President of the United States.

  Daddy established a kindergarten program at his church. Here, at a “graduation” ceremony for his students, he is handing a diploma to Denise McNair, one of the four little girls who were killed in the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing in 1963.

  Courtesy of Chris McNair

  Daddy’s youth programs were renowned throughout the city. Here I am standing with members of Westminster’s children’s choir in the back row, second from the left.

  It was in 1961 that Eugene “Bull” Connor decided to close Birmingham’s recreational facilities rather than integrate them. He received wide support from whites, like the author of this letter.

  Eugene “Bull” Connor Papers, Birmingham, Alabama, Public Library Archives, Cat. #268.8.12.

  Local civil rights leaders urged black customers to boycott white merchants who did not treat them equally. I was disappointed that we had to forgo our annual Christmas shopping but was old enough to understand the larger issues at stake.

  Birmingham Civil Rights Institute

  While the civil rights movement is remembered for nonviolent civil disobedience, that was not always the case. A full-scale riot erupted on May 11, 1963, with black protesters setting fire to police cars and confronting an armored personnel carrier rumored to contain Bull Connor himself. My parents and I went to survey the damage that next morning.

  Associated Press

  My school was selected to participate in the city’s first integrated book fair at the Tutwiler Hotel. Here I am displaying my reading project. Mrs. Green, our teacher, was very proud to say that our presentations were far superior to the “shabby” ones of the white kids.

  I took up figure skating while my parents pursued graduate work at the University of Denver. I was simply not very good. “It’s amazing you can do a jump,” one judge remarked. “You never actually leave the ice.”

  The rigorous academics at St. Mary’s Academy prepared me well for college. Life also revolved around trying to attract the boys at our brother schools, Mullen Prep and Regis High. Plaid skirts, bobby socks, and saddle shoes were part of the uniform.

  Courtesy of St. Mary’s Academy, 1969–1970 Yearbook

  During my senior year at St. Mary’s, Daddy “presented” me (top middle) at the Owl Club cotillion, a debutante ball for accomplished black high school girls. I felt totally out of place, since I had already transitioned to being a college student, taking classes at the University of Denver. Courtesy of the Denver Public Library, Western History Collection; photo by Burnis McCloud

  My father said that I couldn’t live in the dorm because “he knew what went on in there.” So I pledged Alpha Chi Omega. Here I am (back, right), pictured with my sisters.

  Courtesy of the Archives and Special Collections, Penrose Library, University of Denver

  As an assistant dean at the University of Denver, Daddy was the liaison to students during the raucous Vietnam War demonstrations, such as this one on Denver’s Carnegie Field in 1971.

  Courtesy of the Archives and Special Collections, Penrose Library, University of Denver

  I thought I’d found the man I wanted to marry, Rick Upchurch (center), a wide receiver for the Denver Broncos. He is pictured here with Rubin Carter, the Broncos’ nose tackle, and my father, who is holding two-year-old Brian, the son of wide receiver Haven Moses and my good friend Joyce.

  After deciding to abandon my dream of being a concert pianist, I wandered into a course in international politics taught by Josef Korbel (center). In one of those odd coincidences, the man who opened up the world of Soviet studies to me was the father of Madeleine Albright. Here I am (leaning forward) in Dr. Korbel’s “Comparative Communism” class.

  Courtesy of the Archives and Special Collections, Penrose Library, University of Denver

  I received my PhD in August 1981 with a job offer from Stanford in hand. That morning, Daddy gave me a set of classic books that Granddaddy Rice had purchased during the Great Depression, despite his modest means. It remains one of the proudest moments of my life.

  Stokely Carmichael (seated) was a regular speaker in my father’s courses and even at an adult education seminar at virtually all-white Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church in Denver. This radical black activist was a good friend of the family.

  Courtesy of the Archives and Special Collections, Penrose Library, University of Denver

  At Stanford, I developed a close circle of friends, including Randy Bean (center), Chip Blacker (left), and Louis Olave (right). My father loved Chip and Louis’s dinners, followed by music played on Louis’s amped-up stereo.

  Courtesy of Chip Blacker and Louis Olave

  Jendayi Frazer was a sophomore in one of my first classes at Stanford and, later, my first PhD student. She would go on to become the Africa specialist at the NSC, ambassador to South Africa, and the assistant secretary for African affairs at the State Department.

  I first flew aboard Air Force One while working for President George H. W. Bush. Here is my maiden voyage in April 1989 on the way to the President’s historic speech in Hamtramck, Michigan, welcoming revolutionary events in Poland.

  George Bush Presidential Library and Museum

  I first met Gen. Colin Powell while I was working for the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon. He was serving as deputy national security advisor for President Reagan, and this first meeting gave rise to a friendship that I value to this day.

  Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

  During one of our nightly phone conversations long after my mother’s death, Daddy told me he planned to remarry. His intended bride was Clara Bailey, a principal in the Ravenswood School District. I couldn’t have been happier for him, and I was thrilled to have the chance to travel back to California for the wedding.

  When
we scheduled the Malta Summit for December 1989, we didn’t account for the weather. Here I am trying to hold on aboard the Maxim Gorky, a Soviet cruise ship.

  Rice Personal Collection

  Here I am greeting Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev during the 1990 Washington Summit. Gorbachev was losing control of the revolution he had unleashed; the Soviet Union would cease to exist less than eighteen months after this picture was taken.

  George Bush Presidential Library and Museum

  A close mentor and friend, Gen. Brent Scowcroft (right) invited me to work at the National Security Council, where he served as national security advisor to President George H. W. Bush. Here we are toward the end of my service, standing with Brent’s deputy, Bob Gates, who would later serve as secretary of defense.

  George Bush Presidential Library and Museum

  After returning to Stanford, I provided on-air commentary for ABC News about Soviet affairs. I was pleased to learn that the President, pictured here at Kennebunkport, was still interested in my advice.

  George Bush Presidential Library and Museum

  President Bush successfully led the United States and its allies through the uncharted territory of ending the Cold War. He and Mrs. Barbara Bush have been wonderful mentors and friends. Here we enjoy a common love of tennis while vacationing at his summer home in Maine.

  Rice Personal Collection

  Daddy was so proud to see his daughter working for the President of the United States. Here we stand with President Bush and First Lady Barbara Bush in 1992.

  George Bush Presidential Library and Museum

  While I was Stanford’s provost, President Gerhard Casper and I led efforts to reform undergraduate education, establishing freshman and sophomore seminars. I loved teaching these small classes, such as this one on the Soviet Union.

  Copyright © Linda A. Cicero/Stanford News Service

  When budget cuts forced me to make difficult decisions, Chicano students set up a tent city on the Quad and staged a hunger strike. Here, Gerhard (left) and I face the students in front of our offices.

  Copyright © Linda A. Cicero/Stanford News Service

  Daddy served on the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges. Today, annual fellowships are given in his honor, a fitting tribute to his life’s work in education.

  Courtesy of the Chancellor’s Office, California Community Colleges; photo by Sam Wood

  Gene Washington, best known as a former NFL wide receiver, remains one of my closest friends to this day.

  I have been blessed with a wonderful extended family, including (from left to right) Will Alston, my uncle Alto, my aunt Connie, my cousin Lativia, Aunt Gee, my stepbrother, Greg, and my stepmother, Clara.

  In 1992, Susan Ford Dorsey and I tapped several other community leaders and launched an after-school enrichment program for disadvantaged children in nearby East Palo Alto. We called it the Center for a New Generation, and it thrives today as a part of the Boys and Girls Clubs of America.

  Courtesy of the Boys and Girls Club of the Peninsula

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  College Years

  AS IT turned out, I didn’t move immediately into the sorority house. It did finally begin to dawn on me how much money my parents had been and were still investing in me. Time was running out on our lease in university housing, which expired after two years. I knew that my parents couldn’t afford new housing and room and board for me on campus. So I relented and joined them in hunting for a house for us. I learned many years later that Vice Chancellor Blackburn had tried to get my father to buy a house. Daddy told him that they couldn’t afford to because “Condoleezza is our house.” My parents’ investment in me meant that they had no choice but to adopt the itinerant lifestyle of my paternal grandparents rather than the landowning lifestyle of my mother’s family. They would occupy four different rental properties before finally buying a house in 1979, ten years after moving to Denver. The fact is, my parents probably never made more than $60,000 a year between them. In retrospect, I wish I’d been smart enough to understand that at the time and found a way to relieve some of the financial pressure.

  So, needing to move out of university housing, we began looking with some urgency for a new place to live. One of my father’s friends had seen a house for rent in a neighborhood not too far from the university. It sounded perfect: three bedrooms and a large living room to accommodate my grand piano. When you own a grand piano it’s like having a child or a pet. You have to have the right place for it, and this was always a major consideration in house hunting.

  When we met the landlady at the door, I could tell that she was anxious and acting strangely. After showing the house, she said that she had some other people who were likely to rent it. That would have been an acceptable explanation, but she went on to say that she couldn’t rent it in any case to someone who owned a piano because it might disturb the neighborhood. It was a dead giveaway. She was finding an excuse not to rent to us because we were black. Somehow when you grow up in Alabama you can spot racism at a hundred paces. My parents and I knew immediately what was happening.

  My father challenged her. The house had been available only a day before when his friend had seen it. It didn’t make sense to rule out pianos. Didn’t any of the neighbors have stereos? Maybe some even had pianos? “You don’t want to rent to us because we’re black,” he told her. “And now nothing that you do can convince us to rent this house. But I hope you’ll enjoy dealing with the equal housing suit that we are about to file.”

  The woman almost fell over backward. No, no, she had just heard complaints in the neighborhood about music, she explained. We were such a nice family. Our piano would be no problem. My parents and I left and we didn’t file suit. My father said that the threat had accomplished its purpose because she’d never discriminate again. He would explain to Dr. Blackburn what had happened, and he was sure that Blackburn would extend our lease in university housing. Daddy went on to say that racism was clearly alive and well in Denver in 1972 and that he preferred the blatant racism of Alabama, for in the South “at least you knew where you stood.”

  I understood that sentiment because I’d experienced this implicit racism firsthand. There was, of course, the incident with my guidance counselor, in which she advised me to try junior college. And then in my freshman Introduction to Government course, the professor, Robert Eckelberry, had given a lecture on theories of racial superiority professed by social scientists such as William Shockley. Shockley had posited that blacks had lower IQs because of nature, not nurture. Eckelberry had given the lecture under the guise of simply introducing us to the literature, but I sensed that he bought into some of the theory. I was the youngest person in the class but I challenged him. “I speak French, I play Bach, I’m better in your culture than you are,” I said. “That shows that these things can be taught!” He was angry and said the next day that I had tried to silence him. I thought that this was a ridiculous exchange between a senior professor and a college freshman. But I persisted.

  Finally I went to the dean and complained, mostly to create a record should Eckelberry decide to retaliate. After a few days the professor asked to see me and then went on to compound the problem. He drew a little graph. Black IQs were charted along the bottom, with those of whites above them. “But sometimes there are people like you,” he said. He then showed my IQ line positioned above both, saying that I was special. Clearly, he didn’t get the point. I left determined to ace his exam, which I did. He told me that he’d be glad to be a reference for me at any time. I’d made my point but obviously never asked for his help.

  In this way, Denver was an odd departure from Alabama. On the surface everything was just fine, fully integrated. But underneath—in the occasional college class, or when we looked for housing, or in my high school guidance counselor’s reaction to my low standardized test scores—there was racism, perhaps unconscious and certainly unacknowledged. We hadn’t left racism behind in Alabama. And in
some ways this less explicit form of prejudice was more insidious and harder to confront.

  Many years later, when I was asked about my decision to become a Republican, I first explained quite honestly that the choice reflected my disgust with Jimmy Carter’s foreign policy and my attraction to Ronald Reagan’s worldview. But, pressed about the domestic agenda of the two parties, I gave an answer that came directly from my experience with the many forms racism can take. “I would rather be ignored than patronized,” I said, pointing to the tendency of the Democratic Party to talk about “women, minorities, and the poor.” I hated identity politics and the self-satisfied people who assumed that they were free of prejudice when, in fact, they too could not see beyond color to the individual.

  The fact is, race is a constant factor in American life. Yet reacting to every incident, real or imagined, is crippling, tiring, and ultimately counterproductive. I’d grown up in a family that believed you might not control your circumstances but you could control your reaction to them. There was no room for being a victim or depending on “the white man” to take care of you. That self-sufficiency is the ethos passed down by my ancestors on both sides of the family, and I have internalized it thoroughly. Despite the gross inequities my ancestors faced, there has been progress, and race is today no longer determinative of how far one can go. That said, America is not color-blind and likely will never be. Race is ever present, like a birth defect that you learn to live with but can never cure.