WEBVTT

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Mhm . Yeah .

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My husband was in the Air Force and I

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transferred in 1966 . And I came here

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and I started working in contracting

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and back then I believe I started as a

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stenographer and a clerk

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and progress through the ranks .

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And after I've been here for a while I

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left , I was gone for about eight years

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raising my family . And I came back in

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the early 80s . Um

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from the time that I left in the 60s

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until I came back in the 80s , things

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had changed tremendously . If you can

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imagine when I came in 1966 . And when

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you walked into the building there were

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open bays . You could see everybody . I

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saw a bay full of basically white males .

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And in the supervisory part again at

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that level they were basically white

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males . I knew that I was in a

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different culture . I knew that it was

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a plantation . There was no getting

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around that . But from how I was

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treated , I can't say that I was

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treated a lot differently than some of

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the other people . There were

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typewriters . Um uh You did have to

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clock in and out again an open

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environment . Um The good thing about

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the open environment , you got to see

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and talk to people as you walked up and

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down the owl . I remember the cards the

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huge things that they call the computer

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at the time . And heavens forbid I

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didn't work in that area . But if you

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had your cards already to put into the

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computer and you drop the box that was

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what a day's work that you had to do

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all over again when when I first came .

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Uh solicitations were basically either

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delivered by hand by the vendor or they

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were delivered by mail and of course

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I'm sure they had all of the uh

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security involved to make sure that it

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got here and it got here on time when I

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left . Of course things were more

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automated versus the manual way that we

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used to do them . Once , once the

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solicitations came in in , putting them

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in and writing up a worksheet . I

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remember sitting there working um , you

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had all the diesel blanks , you had to

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fill in manually pencil and pen filling

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out the worksheets and make an award .

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Um and then once I finished it , if I'm

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the buyer then I would pass it on to

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the contracting officer and that person

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will take his or her pin and go over to

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make sure that every um thing that's

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required on that document was required

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and was all done manually pencil and

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pen . When I came here , this

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was the Defense General supply center

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and I kind of knew the history of it

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because um I haven't been here very

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long when I started giving the command

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briefing . So I knew about the elk and

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how the elk out here . I knew how they

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acquired the land in 1942 from the

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Bellwood brothers . But what I remember

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most in coming into this gate was

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quarters one as you walked into this

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gate there was quarters one sitting

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majestically on the hill and that's

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where the commander and his family

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lived when I was here . It was a real

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officers club and that's where you

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could um invite your friends over for

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dinner at the evenings and they would

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have the brunches and um where you

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could get together to discuss things

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after work . And when the officers club

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went away again near and dear to my

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heart , I said , I cannot believe the

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Officers club is gone . Going

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back to I would say Desert Storm ,

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desert shield . I remember the push to

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get sandbags , lots of sandbags and

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I guess the challenge was just getting

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enough of them getting the raw material .

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Um because even a sandbag , you had to

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go through certain inspections , you

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can't get a sandbag when you pull it

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fill it and you know , all of a sudden

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the whole coming it , I still can

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remember all the people in Valdosta

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Georgia where we would get our sandbags

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from . And that was a big push . And um

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and and then of course us being

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procurement and and being an aviation

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um center , we

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prided ourselves in supplying our

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servicemen with all of the right items

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that they needed for the major weapons

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systems . I had come in

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earlier when I had just come out of

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school and I came in as a G . S . Two

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clerk typist clerk . And when I left I

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was Gs 14 I'm working in the command

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suite . Um uh We're gonna talk about

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people in a minute but I will tell you

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um Admiral Lippert hired me to be his

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um executive staff officer . He had all

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the characteristics of a leader . He

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was a role model and it was role model .

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Not just for the people in the command

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sweet but for everybody who worked on

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that sentence . Some of my fondest

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memories and always go back to people .

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And I mentioned um Admiral Lippard and

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the other person that I would like to

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mention and I'm sure you will hear his

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name . A lot of room around D . L . A .

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Is frank lots frank was a mentor . He

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was a person who cared for his people .

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And I remember him telling me that

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marry your people are your greatest

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resources . You take care of your

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people and everything else will take

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care of itself . I think that

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especially for here in Richmond we

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never forgot our social responsibility .

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It was more than just um we're here on

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this base of this plantation doing what

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we do . But we also had a social

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responsibility to the people around us .

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In one situation that comes to mind um

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when we were building the child

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development center we uncovered six

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graves . And if you can think

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about today what happens when graves

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are uncovered And these six graves

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happened have been graves of african

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americans . And back then

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uh when african american graves were

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discovered . If nobody knew it , they

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just paid right over them . Uh they

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kind of shoved them away . When these

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graves were discovered we went out ,

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we did an extraordinary effort to find

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out who these people were . These were

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real people . They were um a mother or

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father and Children . It was a family .

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So it was important to us to find out

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are their relatives , their ancestors

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here because clearly we had to re

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enter these people , we weren't going

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to just shove them away . So what we

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did and I was one of the people who

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kind of took the lead on that . We went

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out to churches and we looked at the

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census data , we looked at the

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Chesterfield County Historical Society .

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We looked at the Chesterfield County

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Cemetery Society trying to find out ,

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trying to make some linkage , get names

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and trying to link these uh people that

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we knew around that area . We took it

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upon ourselves to be their family and

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what we did here at Defense Supply

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center , Richmond , we planned a very ,

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very nice re interment ceremony .

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Um We had our african american

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males who came in with their white

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gloves and their dark suits who took

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these six little caskets with the bones

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and took them to their final resting

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place as we did the re interment

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ceremony . And as you leave in the

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center if you go out the back gate you

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will see a gated cemetery and that

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gated cemetery looks just like the

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cemetery of the owners of this

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plantation , The Bell Woods . It looked

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just like that and that's what we where

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we re entered . The remains of these

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six african americans who we don't know

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how they died , but they died here

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somehow on the center . And we thought

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that they should have a respectful um

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re interment because they deserve that

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and we were their families . And that's

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something that sticks with me .