Ernestine Hill (1923-2012): Transcript DVD 1 (17 pp.), Transcript DVD 2 (17 pp.). Hills’ family moved to East St. Louis and then to St. Louis in the 1940s. She and her husband moved their family to Newberry Terrace, which is parallel to Lewis Place, about 1959 and remained for approximately 18 years. Hill discussed her parents and their backgrounds; described her husband’s work on the railroad (a painter); the neighborhoods they lived in prior to Newberry Terrace including Pruitt Igoe; how the neighborhood has changed; how Fred Weathers encouraged her to become a committeewoman in the Eighteenth Ward; her duties as a committeewoman; and her duties as chair of the First Congressional District in the Missouri Federation of Democratic Women. Interview and release signed., 2008 Nov 20

File — Box: 1, Folder: 3

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

From the Collection:

The collection is comprised of ten oral history interview transcripts for interviews with nine individuals conducted by historian Gwen Moore of the Missouri Historical Society for the Lewis Place Oral History Project. The video interviews were conducted between September 2008 and January 2009. The transcripts are arranged alphabetically by name of interviewee. Moore began each interview with questions about the interviewees’ backgrounds (family history, education, etc.), which revealed St. Louis’s segregation history. Some other topics included reasons for moving to Lewis Place or to the neighborhood, reasons for remaining in the neighborhood, causes and effects of the neighborhood’s decline, and the pros and cons of Lewis Place being a private street. Five of the individuals interviewed lived on Lewis Place (Buchanan, Goldston, Johnson, Renner, Talley); two lived on neighboring Newberry Terrace (Hill, Sampson); and one lived on Lewis Place as a child (Kennedy). John Wood was vice president for education at Ranken Technical College. Several of the interviews discussed the role of Ranken Technical College in the Lewis Place neighborhood. In 1909, David Ranken, Jr. located his School of Mechanical Trades on Cook Avenue near Lewis Place. The school later changed its name to Ranken Technical College. Ranken did not admit African Americans until 1963, which affected its relationship with the surrounding area. In the 1990s, Ranken began working in the community to build homes with community input.