Latest / Voices And Visions Podcast / Dr. Alice Palmer | NU PhD Alumna, Black House Dean, Illinois State Senator|Voices & Visions Podcast

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Dr. Alice Palmer | NU PhD Alumna, Black House Dean, Illinois State Senator|Voices & Visions Podcast · Voices And Visions Podcast

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Voices and Visions Podcast, alumni Jeffrey Sterling and Lauren Lowry's interview series exploring the black experience at Northwestern University amid a changing national landscape.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Let's learn together.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: Dr.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Alice Palmer obtained her PhD from the School of Education at Northwestern University and was the Associate Dean of African American Student Affairs, Revolutionizing the Black House until 1985.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: Hear her Northwestern Story on Voices and Visions podcast.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Listen to part two of Dr.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Palmer's interview on Apple, Spotify, and all podcast platforms.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: I started here.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: I was a graduate student.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, graduate students always need to have extra work.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: So I asked in my school, School of Education and Social Policy, if there were any places where I might work.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: And said, oh yeah, over there in that black house.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: I said, oh, okay, fine.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: So I came over, I met with Milton.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: He wanted a tutor.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Fine.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, in an earlier life, I had been uh an English teacher, English major, had uh written a book, so forth and so on.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so I enlarged myself on the third floor, and students would come in and we would have wonderful discussions about the papers they were to write and so forth.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: And Milton was next door listening.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: So when he got ready to uh go, unbeknownst to me, he recommended that I follow him and take his uh place.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_03: And what year let's uh just some demographic information.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_03: What year was this?
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_03: What years um were you at Northwestern as a graduate school student and when did you complete your studies?
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: I started, let's see, I finished in um 75, so I was in the black house before that.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: The memory is a little fuzzy then, but uh yeah, I was here for uh at least a year or so before I actually took the position as dean.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_03: So you had graduated at that point?
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, I was still um working on dissertation and so forth.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I would sometimes be here late at night with papers spread all over the place.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: So you were dean and graduate student?
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: Now you were Which lasted not that long.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_03: Now you you followed Milton Wiggins, you said.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_03: That's correct.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_03: So you were the second dean of African American Student Affairs.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: I think I was the third.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: The um I have all of this information written down.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_03: Um I was thinking that Milton was the inaugural one.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_03: That may not be correct.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_03: That may not be correct.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_03: Uh I have that information.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_03: But once again, you said something that's kind of important to put in historical context.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_03: You uh in in two different ways.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_03: You were Dean, and you were Dean of African American Student Affairs.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_03: Those are two things that were um created as a direct result of the 1968 Versaars office takeover.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, um, and I'm gonna ask you to speak to that.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_03: But that is clearly distinguished from the current um nomenclature and status um of the um way in which uh African American and black affairs are dealt with at the university.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_03: So um how did that make you feel?
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, that was that's pretty amazing to come out of of graduate school and to be given that awesome responsibility.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_03: Clearly, you had already shown that you could handle it and were perfect for the position, but how did that make you feel coming out of, I mean, you you basically went to graduate school to become our dean.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, understand, you know, uh as I said, my my life has been quite eclectic.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: I had uh been an English teacher, I had uh been a run a unit uh of um uh at University of Illinois.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: So I've been around for a while.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: I was not a a newbie to any of this, so I had been an administrator already and a teacher.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: And um coming to the black house though was all that one could ask for as a black person.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: And once again, to underscore what you were asking me, that's a perfect example of the the forward thinking of these students, that they insisted upon a building, they insisted upon positions that were integral to the university as it was, so that I became associate dean of students, as it was Milton before me.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: So that meant that I was uh he and I were integral to the Office of Uh Student Affairs under uh Vice President Jim Carlton.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: And that meant that we sat at the table when decisions were taken, when discussions went on, when it was sometimes necessary to defend the viability of having a black house and having African American student affairs.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I do want to uh to say uh again, among those the acknowledgments, I deeply appreciate the enlightened leadership of Vice President Carlton, Dean Jenny Landwear, um uh chaplain Jim Avery, because they never they never got in our way.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean that in the best sense.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: They uh they knew that we would act with integrity and wisdom, and so I appreciate that.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_03: That's um pretty awesome.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_03: And uh that's pretty good.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: Those were turbulent times, and I remember you know that uh there have been really some raucous times on this campus, and I was dean at the time that many of them took place.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_03: Sure, we're gonna talk about some of those.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but I I want to get into your student experience just a touch.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_03: Um based on the experience that you had dealing with students here, um would you say that your graduate student experience was similar or mostly different than what the undergraduates were experiencing at the time?
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: No, I suspect that it had some of the same characteristics.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: I remember when I went to one professor after I had uh co-authored a book and uh he dismissed it as uh irrelevant.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: So fortunately, I was a grown-up and just chuckled at him because uh the book went on to be quite, you know, with within its uh its purview, quite successful.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: So and I asked him, I said, he said, this is not a book of analysis.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: I said, yes, but we're in the school of education, and so the book that uh my colleagues and I have written is to teach reading and composition to adult learners.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: Now, is not that what we're being prepared to do?
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway, yes, I'm sure I had some of the same experiences as the undergrads.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and so I I set you up with that question to ask the uh following question.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, you were getting that type of um pushback as a graduate student, yet you decided to stay and play as our dean.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um, where did you develop your love um for the university?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_03: Was it based on the opportunity or was it based in the interactions that you were having in the black house?
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_03: Were you able to just push back?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: The interactions, the yeah, the black house, uh being able to uh be here and uh work with students um to learn from them because um they were the first ones.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: I remember this one uh young brother, he had to do a paper on South Africa.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I vaguely knew about the apartheid and so forth, but in working with him to write his paper so he could write his paper, it was enlightening to me.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, then I went on to be part of Chicago Free South Africa movement, the anti uh the divestment movement here on campus, all of that.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, and um that is exactly what you were known for, so you it it was a a bidirectional uh love affair.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: The Voices and Visions podcast is sponsored by Simco.
• 9:32
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• 9:38
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• 9:42
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• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there were areas that uh of contention.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, for example, the athletes uh were meeting in this very room, and I never interfered because in my estimation the black house was for organizing, among other things, for advocacy, for presence, for um comfort when necessary, and for hosting and all the rest of the uh uh those things.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so the black athletes were meeting in the living room, and um I was next door, so I heard them talking, and they were debating about uh marching over to the administration building.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I came in, I said, I don't want to interfere, I said, but uh do you want me to march with you?
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: And they said, You do that?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Yes, uh of course I would.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: And um Milton had given me some excellent advice.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Whatever happens, always call and let them know what you're doing.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Okay.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: So I told the uh the athletes, I said, now I'm going to the phone and I'm going to tell them we're coming.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: I said, it will not, it'll be fine.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: And Irene was uh Jim Carlton's secretary.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think she was the only black secretary in the entire administration building over there.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: Fine, excellent woman.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: I called her, I said, Irene, we're marching on you.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: We're coming to see um Vice President Carlton.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: She said, fine, I'll clear the building.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: So we marched over there.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: We went straight up to Jim Carlton's office.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: Ben Butler was a superb spokesperson for the issues of the racism that they were experiencing in the uh uh athletic department.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I had had uh Vernon Jarrett, who was a columnist for the um, I think he was at the Sun Times then.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: I had had him come out here and interview them, and he had written a column too, so there was a little bit of pressure from outside as well.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: And uh the next day or so, the um athletic director had to step down, and other changes occurred at the athletic department, and that's when Dennis Green came in as uh the first black coach.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_03: Let me provide some context to this because this is really a great and legendary story here.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_03: So the organization, the the athletes had organized under the banner of Black Athletes United for the Light, and they were um feeling put upon, particularly um inside of the uh football team, but throughout the various athletic teams, and they decided to um reaffirm their manhood.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_03: Um specifically, the complaints often were they weren't feeling as if they were being treated like men.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_03: And as such, they decided to uh meet with um BP Carlton to um have their feelings um known, make their feelings known and unbeknownst to everyone, as you point out.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_03: Um a huge part of the story is the way that the Black House was able to be used um to coalesce their thoughts and to organize and the support that they got from you.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_03: All of them talk about the support they got from you in this, and um, as you point out, um very shortly thereafter, um the athletic director um stepped down and subsequently um Coach Venturi, head of the football team, actually was made to quit.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_03: There's some very pointed conversations which Coach Venturi denied, but are on the record in terms of um racial epithets that may have been uttered that were all part of this.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_03: And yes, that led to Coach Dennis Green um famously becoming the second um head football coach in the entire country at a Division I school, and later went on to become coach of the year and broke our losing streak of 34 games, etc.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_03: So that's the power of what the Black House was and what it was when you were here as um Dean of African American Student Affairs.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_03: So thank you for letting me um round out that story.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_03: Um but again, you know, that story is unique and of itself, but can you just speak to the the campus environment?
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_03: You know, the athletes obviously had a a sheltered environment and sheltered issues all their own, but um, can you just talk about the n the dynamic of how the black house was, you know, many people from the years when you were dean and and I was a student actually um have described the black house and the um culture that it created as the equivalent of having a um HBCU inside of a PWI.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_03: And that was not meant to detract from the university experience in any way, it's just that the cultural relevance of this place was such that it provided the entirety of the resources that black students felt like they need to have in order to succeed.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um absolutely, because as I was saying, the black house was to be a place of comfort, a place of um organizing, a place of enlightenment.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: And along the way, there were things, for example, um the one here, we were a team, and everyone in this house was excellent at what they did.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Essie Williams was the dean, the den mother of the house.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: If a young person had a hard time, you know, or whatever, she'd take them over with her over the weekend.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Jare was right there with that too.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: Evurn Saxon knew every in and out of this university.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: So you were going to graduate, no question about it.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: And Duke, Duke was the strong male presence.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, that back door of his folk would be coming in there, and they didn't have to let us women in the front know it all.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: So it was a powerful team.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_03: It was an amazing team.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: One and we would sense when it was time to do things.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: For example, the Sunday suppers.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I was talking to a young woman.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: She I've forgotten where she was from, but uh, she was saying to me, I said, Well, have you been into Chicago?
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I said, Chicago is an extraordinary place.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: This is the home of the black migration to the north, the whole, you know, the Defender and all the rest of these.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: Oh no, she said, at uh orientation, we were told never to go south of uh the whatever the dividing street is between Evanston and uh Chicago.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: So I called a team meeting.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: I said, we have to deal with this.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's how the Sunday Suppers came about.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Said if they're going to be swimming to Chicago, we will bring Chicago to them.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: And in the course of that, we had Harold Washington, who was at that time a congressman, he would come in this living room, take off his coat, and he was famous for wearing those awful short sleeve shirts.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: When he got ready to run for mayor, we had to take him aside and say, now you're gonna have to tighten up the wardrobe here a bit.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we had Louis Martin, and Louis Martin is probably one of the he was uh second in command to at least four US presidents.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: With um he was with Carter, he was with Kennedy, he was with so on.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so I had him come here and speak to the students.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: He was also the owner of the Michigan Chronicle and part owner of the Defender.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: Very, very extraordinary man.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so he was talking to the students, and you know, on this campus, uh, I'm sure that the black newspapers were dismissed as irrelevant.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: And uh Louis said, so this one young man said, Well, I mean, why do we need black newspapers?
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: So Louis said, who else is gonna record your living in this world?
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then another uh Charles um Peters came.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: Charles was probably one of the brightest um graduates of IT, and he was far ahead of his time in uh understanding about alternative energy.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: Now, mind you, this is the 70s.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: So he's talking about it.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: And this one, we always invited students who were from the particular area.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: So we had invited the uh engineering students and the uh science students.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: This one young brother said, Well, my professor said that solar energy is only 30% effective.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so Charles laughed.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Son, did it ever occur to you that somebody had to get it to be 30%?
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe you'll take it the other 70%.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: And to look at that young man's face, you saw the light of enlightenment.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: He first, you know, he and then it dawned on him what the potential was.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: So, anyway, those were the kinds of things.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: And and Essie would cook, uh, Yvern had her famous lemon tea cakes, and I would cook, and we would serve them supper, and that was the Sunday Suppers.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: Dr.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Alice Palmer obtained her PhD from the School of Education at Northwestern University and was the Associate Dean of African American Student Affairs, revolutionizing the Black House until 1985.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: Hear her Northwestern story on Voices and Visions podcast.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: Listen to part two of Dr.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: Palmer's interview on Apple, Spotify, and all podcast platforms.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: The Voices and Visions Podcast is sponsored by Simcoe.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: Learn more at the SimcoSolution.com and FP Commercial Advisors.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: Learn more at FP Commercial Advisors.com.