The Nigger Factory

by Gil Scott-Heron

  Her musing was interrupted by a clap of thunder followed quickly by a jagged snake of lightning that blazed across the darkened sky, as drops of silver-paint rain appeared on her windows. She got up and closed the huge windows that looked out over the back of the yards, her carefully tended gardens, and down perhaps a quarter of a mile where a thousand lights still shone bright inside the dormitories on Sutton's campus.

  The lightning flashed again causing the lights in the Calhoun bedroom to blink. The wind was picking up. Once again the vision of the young Calhoun, the young Black radical, the advancer of new psychological theories based on the experiences of Black people, danced through Gloria Calhoun's mind.

  ‘It's so sad,’ she was thinking, ‘to think of what has become of my knight in shining armor . . . my knight in rusty armor.’

  31

  Faculty Only

  Ogden Calhoun enjoyed the luxury of an extra hour's sleep on Friday morning. He had ignored the seven-thirty alarm that generally started his day and informed his wife to wake him at eight thirty instead. He was expecting a long and trying day on the campus once he got there, a day crammed with meetings, conferences, phone calls, and unexpected problems. Upon arriving on campus shortly before ten o'clock, however, he was happy that he hadn't elected to report to work any later. Fenton Mercer, the portly second-in-command at Sutton, was sitting in his office fidgeting with a damp handkerchief.

  ‘Mercer!’ Calhoun exclaimed with his best everything-is-roses greeting. ‘So early in the day and you're here already. What's up?’

  ‘There's a meeting I think you should know about,’ Mercer said nervously. ‘I recalled when I heard about it what you had said about my not informing you about the last impromptu meeting that was called and . . .’

  ‘My God, man!’ Calhoun snapped, placing his attaché case down on the desk. ‘What in hell is it?’

  ‘There's been a Faculty Only meeting called in the Dunbar Library,’ Mercer managed. ‘I went over there, but they didn't admit me.’

  ‘Who?’ Calhoun asked. He had greeted his vice-president with a bit of sarcastic comradery, but now he was all business. ‘Who wouldn't admit you?’

  ‘Well, they didn't exactly bar me,’ Mercer admitted, ‘but they told me that I wasn't welcome.’

  ‘They who?’

  ‘Arnold McNeil . . . I heard about the meeting when I first got here this morning, but when I tried to call you your line was busy and Miss Felch had told me that you weren't expected to be late so I waited. I called again ‘bout ten minutes ago, but the line was still busy.’

  ‘Gloria was probably talking to somebody,’ Calhoun muttered. ‘What time was the meeting scheduled for?’

  ‘Ten.’

  ‘It's a little after,’ Calhoun said checking his watch.

  ‘I went over at ten, but they hadn't started.’

  ‘Who called the meeting?’ the president asked.

  ‘I didn't find that out,’ Mercer admitted. ‘Nancy said there were notes placed in all faculty members’ mail boxes.’

  ‘Probably Thomas or MJUMBE,’ Calhoun said, placing his case on the floor and searching through the papers on his desk until he came up with a pipe cleaner. ‘Let's go.’

  The meeting hadn't started on time because the assembled faculty members were waiting for Earl Thomas, the man who had called the meeting. Arnold McNeil and Edmund Mallory stood at the entrance to the library talking quietly. Both were hoping that Earl would appear, and neither of the men felt that the Student Government leader would come late.

  They were wrong. Just as McNeil was about to take matters into his own hands Earl came through the library door with Lawman and Odds at his side. He smiled vaguely at the two tense faculty members and then slid inside where the rest of the professors sat talking among themselves and smoking.

  Earl wasted little time. He went directly to the small table that was in front of the audience and put his notes and papers down. Odds and Lawman sat in the seats where the secretary and presiding officer of a meeting generally sat. Earl never sat down when he was speaking, and did not do so now. The SGA chief waited until everyone present had been seated. McNeil and Mallory were in the last row waiting. Earl lit a cigarette.

  ‘Good morning,’ Earl began. ‘I had given serious thought to not attendin’ this meetin’ at all even though I called for it. When the thought of a meetin’ with the faculty first occurred to me several things had not taken place that have become overwhelming factors in the student stance during the current crisis. First of all, when the meetin’ was called school was still open. That has a great deal to do with our stance.’ Earl smiled a bit, realizing that he had stated an over-obvious fact. ‘But more important, when I called for this meetin’ I wasn’ aware of the lengths that our president would go to, to make sure that Sutton University stands still.

  ‘Granted that perhaps President Calhoun considered himself under attack when presented with our “proposals”, I still deny emphatically the fact that these issues had never been broached by students at Sutton. I will remind you all of the proposal last year presented by then SGA president Peabody that Sutton go on the meal-ticket system to cope with the inadequacies of the food served up by the Pride of Virginia Food Services. In brief, this was a system where students would buy a monthly meal ticket with a certain amount of holes that could be punched out when a student attended a meal. At the end of the month the tickets would be turned over to the central SGA office and another ticket would be issued. At the end of the semester all holes not punched would be refunded from the initial fee paid by boarding students.

  ‘This is an example of the type of thoughtful proposal that President Ogden Calhoun says he is in favor of. Yet this proposal was rejected and the students were never informed in detail as to why. The only explanation given was that it might be difficult to keep track of food tickets; that some might be lost or stolen and that other students who were not paying might be eating on a friend's meal ticket. I agree that in case of a lost or stolen ticket the university might suffer, but only if the lost tickets were unnumbered and the hole puncher in the cafeteria was not given a list of tickets that had been reported lost and were no longer valid. In other words, all of the objections to the tickets were things that could've been easily worked out. The real reason that the idea was rejected, I suggest, is that the Pride of Virginia Food Services is aware of the quality of their meals and knew that no one would eat in the cafeteria if they had an option.’

  Earl paused to light a cigarette. ‘Perhaps that's enough about the food. Issues two, three, and four called for the resignation of Gaines Harper, Professors Royce, and Beaker. I suppose that everyone here has read the newsletter published yesterday by members of MJUMBE, but for those of you who haven't, it simply states that Gaines Harper is not presentin’ the image that students need to see in order to confide very personal information. I'm sure that some of you will remember your college careers an’ a lack of finances that made some of the goin’ extremely rough. I'm sure that you didn’ relish the idea of discussin’ your family circumstances with anyone, but I assure you that you would find it doubly difficult to discuss these matters with Gaines Harper . . . As for the two professors referred to, I will take this opportunity to assure them that it is not a personal condemnation. What the students seek is a way to be better prepared for what awaits them after graduation . . . I have here a petition signed by ninety per cent of the majoring students in both the Language Department and the Chemistry Department who feel that new department heads are needed for progress.’

  ‘He's a diplomatic bastard, ain't he?’ Odds asked Lawman.

  ‘He has to be,’ Lawman said. ‘But he's sincere.’

  Odds nodded and lit up a cigarette of his own. He was beginning to relax a bit. Earl's diplomacy and ability to articulate had surprised even him, and he had sworn that nothing Earl would do could surprise him after the upset SGA election victory. He took a drag on the cigarette and leaned back. The issues of the deman
ded resignations from Beaker and Royce had been the matters that had troubled him all night. He had wondered how Earl would enlist the faculty support while asking for the dismissal of two of their most respected colleagues. The whole meeting would be a snap from here.

  The next snap Odds heard, however, was the snap the entire assembly heard as the door to the auditorium had its lock sprung and Captain Eli Jones of the security guards ushered Ogden Calhoun and Fenton Mercer into the meeting. The only man in the room who responded was Arnold McNeil, who was instantly on his feet.

  ‘You were not invited to participate in this meeting,’ Calhoun was told by McNeil.

  ‘I'm well aware of that,’ Calhoun remarked openly. ‘But as the president of the university I am also the chairman of the faculty until such time as a replacement is found for me. Any meeting of this sort should definitely be of interest to the chair . . .’

  ‘Then I so move,’ McNeil said fuming.

  ‘Motion denied, I bet,’ Odds quipped behind his hand.

  ‘The purpose of this meetin’ was to inform faculty members of some things that the students consider important,’ Earl said, facing Calhoun at the top step of the elevated platform.

  ‘Let me tell you somethin’, Thomas,’ Calhoun said pointing a finger at the younger man's chest. ‘I hold you and Baker personally responsible for damages to this university that may yet total more than ten thousand dollars. Did he talk about that?’ Calhoun asked, turning to the assembly. ‘Did he bother to go into the actions taken against Sutton yesterday at our meeting?’

  ‘That's not the point!’ Arnold McNeil said, rising from the seat he had slumped into and coming toward the stage. ‘I, for one, am tired of being forced to see every issue from your point of view. I think that faculty members have as much stock in this community and in the particular situation that has come up as anyone else, and that our feelings and opinions to this point have been based primarily on hearsay and biased reports. I think,’ he said, turning to his colleagues, ‘that we need to hear the other side of the story.’

  ‘Could I ask a question?’ Mrs Pruitt singsonged above the hubbub of the gathering.

  ‘Please do,’ Calhoun said as though he were chairing the meeting.

  ‘Just what do you hope to accomplish, Mr Thomas, or should I say did you hope to accomplish by calling this meeting?’

  Earl paused. Lawman nodded to him. All eyes were on him.

  ‘We had hoped to enlist the aid of the faculty,’ Thomas said.

  ‘I mean,’ Mrs Pruitt interrupted, ‘there had to be more to this than simply informing us about things . . .’

  ‘We wanted to suggest two possible alternatives,’ Earl said. ‘I will be glad to go into them if this meeting is returned to its former state. I mean faculty only.’

  ‘What have you got to say that I can't hear?’ Calhoun asked defiantly.

  ‘This is not a debate!’ Earl said facing Calhoun squarely. ‘The purpose was not for you an’ I to argue points here. You know my perspective an’ I know yours. You called a meetin’ yesterday morning an’ Captain Jones had his men on the door. That was not an open meeting! This is not an open meeting!’

  ‘I think we should hear Thomas out,’ McNeil suggested. ‘Doesn't anyone want to hear the students’ side of this?’

  ‘I do!’ Coach Mallory said speaking out for the first time.

  Unfortunately the coach was the only faculty member who chose to speak out. Earl couldn't decide whether the others were speechless because of Calhoun's presence or because they simply had nothing to say.

  ‘I was goin’ to ask members of the faculty to go on strike with us,’ Earl said through the icy silence with a weak grin on his face, ‘or suggest that certain faculty members safeguard the readmission program in order to establish a buffer for the repression. But I don't suppose the questions I wanted to raise are relevant any more . . . how can you seek protection from a fellow victim?’

  32

  Exodus

  Friday on the campus of Sutton University was generally a day of preparation for weekend activities that almost always included a mixer of some description that night and post-mixer parties in the dorms that lasted far into the morning. The student body would open its collective eyes by noon on Saturday, eat a hurried sandwich in the cafeteria or canteen, and get a good seat from which to cheer the football team (in the fall), the basketball team (in the winter), or the track team (in the spring). If the events were on other campuses, there would be cars loading on Friday night or Saturday morning to take students to the contests.

  The cars and buses were leaving on Friday afternoon this week. The Saturday game had been cancelled. The students were milling about in front of the dormitories and the Student Union Building discussing the campus developments and waiting for a break in the depressing atmosphere.

  The clouds hovered gray and forlorn over southern Virginia, reminders of the showers that had fallen the previous night and threatened to return.

  Aside from the emptying resident facilities there were three centers of action on the campus early that afternoon. Sutton Hall, the administration building, was one. Carver Hall, where the student government was housed, was another. The third was the Sutton fraternity house's third-floor Strike Communications Center.

  The five members of MJUMBE were closeted in a closed meeting at one o'clock in the back room of the Strike Center. They were planning what had become for them the most important phase of their strike program: a meeting with the parents of female students who were coming to deliver their daughters from the campus. It was now the most important phase because it would be their last opportunity to gain a measure of protection against the force that Ogden Calhoun was bound to use to clear the university buildings.

  ‘Is it clear to everybody why we're usin’ the same papers that we passed out yesterday?’ Abul Menka asked.

  ‘I still think it's gonna be a little tight on the oldies, man,’ Cotton grumbled. ‘Especially dudes an’ chicks who graduated from here because they come off like a buncha Toms . . . when you be rappin’ ‘bout how ain’ nothin’ gone on here since they opened this crypt, man . . . whew! I don’ know . . .’

  ‘Some of the things we said won't be very acceptable,’ Abul admitted. ‘But you heard ‘bout what happened to Earl when he tried to hol’ a closed meetin’ this mornin’. Ol’ Assbucket broke in on the set an there wasn’ nothin’ nobody could do.’

  ‘We could use the enforcers,’ Ben King griped.

  ‘No good,’ Abul said stiffly. ‘That would never get over wit’ Calhoun-type people. We gotta face some facts, man. The folks who comin’ to the meetin’ is only comin’ because their daughters is tellin’ ‘um to. They basically don’ wanna come, think it's a waste a time, an’ ain’ gonna like the looks of us from jump street.’

  ‘What you sayin’ is that we really ain’ gonna do no good to have the meetin’,’ Baker said.

  ‘I s'pose thass the truth,’ Abul said, sitting back down to the table. ‘But we can't possibly give out new statements. One a them administratin’ flunkies is boun’ to point out the diff'rence. So there can't be none.’

  ‘We definitely be sunk if Calhoun come over an’ rap all the bullshit that the parents wanna hear,’ Cotton said with a sigh.

  ‘He won't be there,’ Abul said. ‘That may be a point in our favor. The bastard's confidence may be gettin’ the best a him. All we really need is a handful a chicks. Then everybody in the community would be poised to leap on his shit if he sent big guns after us.’

  ‘How you know he ain’ comin'?’ Cotton asked.

  Abul fished around in his dashiki's breast pocket. He brought out a package of cigarettes, a book of matches, and a piece of folded paper. He lit a cigarette and unfolded the paper. ‘It sez here,’ he began, ‘if you wanna know why school is closed an’ you wanna talk wit’ us, schedule an appointmen’ wit’ the secretary for nex’ week.’ Abul took care to slow his speech into a drawling slur to mock the president.
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br />   ‘Man, these folks ain’ comin’ back out here nex’ week. Thass a lotta bullshit an’ Calhoun knows it. I think we should move on all these bastards!’ Ben King got up and paced the floor for a minute pounding a huge fist into his palm. He seemed on the brink of an explosion. Even more so than usual.

  ‘Jobs,’ Cotton mumbled to no one in particular. ‘People got jobs to go to. They prob'bly think comin’ out here today is a pain in the ass. An’ anybody who ain’ got no job an’ can afford to live nowadays ain’ sendin’ his daughter to Grade D Sutton University.’

  ‘Thass the point,’ Abul said. ‘All they gonna know is what we tell them. Unless they run inta one a them flunkies like Mercer.’

  ‘No-Check Mercer,’ Baker laughed. ‘Thass a worthless muthafuckuh.’

  There was a period of silence while members of the group pulled their thoughts together.

  ‘We have ta do a heavy sympathy thing,’ Baker commented. ‘Otherwise we get our asses kicked t'night.’

  ‘We need to wipe out all a them pigs from Sutton,’ King urged.

  ‘We can deal with t'night when it gets here,’ Abul said. ‘Let's list a few things that we want Baker to rap about when the party starts. After we do that Ralph can move off to the side an’ organize the stuff in whatever order he wants to present it.’

  ‘I don't buy it,’ King said. ‘I don’ buy all a this crawlin’ aroun’ an’ sayin’ this instead a that an’ doin’ this instead a that like we in the wrong. Man, this iz some bullshit!’

  ‘You gotta face the truth some day Ben,’ Abul said as though to calm the fuming giant. ‘Everything that we after you can't take. Everything you wan’ ain’ available jus’ ‘cause you're bigger than the nex’ cat or you got some “enforcers” to back you up. Some things depend on yo’ ability to convince people with words that you're right. When you bang somebody in the head they may go along wit’ you, but they always layin’ for a chance to go up ‘side yo’ head too. Thass why people who take things by force can’ never sleep.’