Raleigh, North Carolina
In 1966 our family moved out of the house at 26 Franklin Street in Binghamton, New York and went south to Raleigh, North Carolina. Dad worked for IBM in Endicott, New York. He assembled large printers and - I believe - punch-card sorters, the kind used in banks at the time. He was not a software developer or a professional engineer, he was a 'technician'. I make an analogy between cars and computers: there are those who design cars and develop the machinery and technology to make the cars work, then there are those who put the cars together - assemble the cars - on the line. My father worked on the line. In the early 1960's what is now Research Triangle Industrial Park between Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill did not exist. IBM was one of the first companies to move into that development and my father was chosen to help set up the facilities there for IBM.
When the family moved down to Raleigh our house was not ready. Dad had bought a brand new house - a split level - in a new suburban development called North Hills, just off Six Forks Road. The house wasn't completed yet, so we lived in a Holiday Inn hotel on Route 1. We lived there, all six of us, in two rooms for about a month. Dad went to work during the day and we hung around the hotel.
The house we lived in was at 214 Westridge Drive . I was 13 years old when we moved down just after the New Year in 1966.
When the family moved down to Raleigh our house was not ready. Dad had bought a brand new house - a split level - in a new suburban development called North Hills, just off Six Forks Road. The house wasn't completed yet, so we lived in a Holiday Inn hotel on Route 1. We lived there, all six of us, in two rooms for about a month. Dad went to work during the day and we hung around the hotel.
The house we lived in was at 214 Westridge Drive . I was 13 years old when we moved down just after the New Year in 1966.
At that time North Hills was a raw development. There were several houses being constructed on our street and in the immediate neighborhood. The lot our house sat on was clay: no grass, no plantings. The shopping plaza on Six Forks Road was still under construction with only a few stores finished and open.
I didn't really think about then, I didn't consider the implications. It wasn't until I was older that I wondered how odd it was that my mother's sister, her husband, and my cousins also moved to Raleigh. Our uncle was an engineer, so it makes sense that he would find work there. My father's sister, her husband, and my cousins also moved to North Carolina. They lived in Cary, just outside of Raleigh. So, in a minor migration, our family - a small support unit - moved from New York to North Carolina at the height of the Civil Rights movement of the mid 1960's. It was helpful to have family close. I think it helped my mother and certainly it helped ease my loneliness to have cousins near to spend time with.
There were other families in the neighborhood from New York, from near Binghamton and Endicott, probably also working for IBM. I had a friend up the hill from us on Westridge Drive. His name was Kevin, but I don't recall his last name. He had come from Endicott, New York. We spent lots of time together. During the last month we lived in Raleigh I broke my head open badly (a stupid act with a stupid story). Kevin walked me back home with blood streaming from my head. Twenty-four stiches and a concussion. He was also with me during that summer in 1966 day when I first saw Anne. Kevin and I were walking down Westridge Drive towards Lakemont. A car passed by on Lakemont and a girl in the backseat saw us and smiled. We ran down the street to see where the car went and saw that she lived in a house the next block over, on East Rowan Street. That summer I fell for Anne, but couldn't put my courage to the sticking place. I failed to let her know how much she meant to me. In fact I embarrased myself by allowing other boys in the neighborhood to intimidate me by belittling my attraction to her. As they taunted me she reached to take my hand (to walk away together) but I pulled away and hung my head. I don't have memories of what happened after (maybe we did finally walk away?), but I was too embarrassed by the harrasment to gain any confidence with Anne, unfortunatley. I remember she was very friendly and kind.
Another family from Whitney Point, New York lived on Lakemont. Their backyard faced a pond that has since been filled in to make way for homes on Little Falls Drive. I don't remember the name of the family, but I do remember they had chickens and I spent a day at their home when their father butchered the chickens and I learned to pluck them.
We New Yorkers were not really welcomed in Raleigh. We were Yankees and interlopers. One day at school I went into a class and one of the students was handing out applications for the KKK. I was aghast that he was openly soliciting for the KKK in school. I was 14 years old, a child still, but old enough to understand the brutality and racism inherent in this act.
We stayed in North Carolina for 10 months, moving back to Binghamton in November. My mother couldn't take it. She was very unhappy and unsettled. She was the driving force that caused my father to move us back to Binghamton. The experience of moving to North Carolina, of living there in a new house, going to new schools, living in a suburban neighborhood and being from New York in the South in the mid-sixties was transformational for our family; at least for my father, my mother and for me. I have spoken to my sisters and my brother about that time and my youngest sister, told me that she doesn't have the strong memories that I have; that she might have been too young to have experienced the changes I did and that I sensed in our mother and father.
I didn't really think about then, I didn't consider the implications. It wasn't until I was older that I wondered how odd it was that my mother's sister, her husband, and my cousins also moved to Raleigh. Our uncle was an engineer, so it makes sense that he would find work there. My father's sister, her husband, and my cousins also moved to North Carolina. They lived in Cary, just outside of Raleigh. So, in a minor migration, our family - a small support unit - moved from New York to North Carolina at the height of the Civil Rights movement of the mid 1960's. It was helpful to have family close. I think it helped my mother and certainly it helped ease my loneliness to have cousins near to spend time with.
There were other families in the neighborhood from New York, from near Binghamton and Endicott, probably also working for IBM. I had a friend up the hill from us on Westridge Drive. His name was Kevin, but I don't recall his last name. He had come from Endicott, New York. We spent lots of time together. During the last month we lived in Raleigh I broke my head open badly (a stupid act with a stupid story). Kevin walked me back home with blood streaming from my head. Twenty-four stiches and a concussion. He was also with me during that summer in 1966 day when I first saw Anne. Kevin and I were walking down Westridge Drive towards Lakemont. A car passed by on Lakemont and a girl in the backseat saw us and smiled. We ran down the street to see where the car went and saw that she lived in a house the next block over, on East Rowan Street. That summer I fell for Anne, but couldn't put my courage to the sticking place. I failed to let her know how much she meant to me. In fact I embarrased myself by allowing other boys in the neighborhood to intimidate me by belittling my attraction to her. As they taunted me she reached to take my hand (to walk away together) but I pulled away and hung my head. I don't have memories of what happened after (maybe we did finally walk away?), but I was too embarrassed by the harrasment to gain any confidence with Anne, unfortunatley. I remember she was very friendly and kind.
Another family from Whitney Point, New York lived on Lakemont. Their backyard faced a pond that has since been filled in to make way for homes on Little Falls Drive. I don't remember the name of the family, but I do remember they had chickens and I spent a day at their home when their father butchered the chickens and I learned to pluck them.
We New Yorkers were not really welcomed in Raleigh. We were Yankees and interlopers. One day at school I went into a class and one of the students was handing out applications for the KKK. I was aghast that he was openly soliciting for the KKK in school. I was 14 years old, a child still, but old enough to understand the brutality and racism inherent in this act.
We stayed in North Carolina for 10 months, moving back to Binghamton in November. My mother couldn't take it. She was very unhappy and unsettled. She was the driving force that caused my father to move us back to Binghamton. The experience of moving to North Carolina, of living there in a new house, going to new schools, living in a suburban neighborhood and being from New York in the South in the mid-sixties was transformational for our family; at least for my father, my mother and for me. I have spoken to my sisters and my brother about that time and my youngest sister, told me that she doesn't have the strong memories that I have; that she might have been too young to have experienced the changes I did and that I sensed in our mother and father.