Roddey, Cynthia P. (Cynthia Plair)

Murphy, Hope

Charlotte, North Carolina

J. Murrey Atkins Library Special Collections and University Archives, University of North Carolina at Charlotte

2004-05-17

1 audio file (1:20:58) : digital, MP3 + 1 transcript (64 pages : PDF)

sound recording-nonmusical

spoken word

eng

Cynthia Roddey was born in Rock Hill, South Carolina. She graduated from Johnson C. Smith University and Winthrop University and was employed as a school teacher and administrator, college librarian, and as an owner of a beauty salon and a religious education consulting firm.

Dr. Cynthia Roddey describes her education in Rock Hill, South Carolina and Charlotte, North Carolina and her experiences as a teacher after graduation. She attended segregated schools during the 1950s, including Biddleville Elementary and Immanuel Lutheran College for high school. She describes attending college at Johnson C. Smith University and Winthrop University from 1964-1967, where she was one of the first African American graduate students to attend. She also recalls participating in sit-ins during the Civil Rights Movement in Charlotte. Dr. Roddey describes her experiences teaching in both segregated and integrated schools in the Charlotte area, and compares the education of her youth with high schools that she taught in around the time of interview. She shares her opinion that African Americans gained access to new opportunities through integration, but they lost some of their rich heritage and traditions in education at the same time.

MP3 access copy created on ingest from WAV preservation master. Interview originally recorded on two minidiscs and reformatted using a Digidesign 003 rack.

School administrators
High school teachers
Librarians
Businesspeople

Roddey, Cynthia P. (Cynthia Plair)

Immanuel Lutheran College (Greensboro, N.C.)
Johnson C. Smith University
Winthrop College

African Americans--Education
African American families
Middle class African Americans
African American schools
Teachers
Segregation in education
Civil rights movements
Race relations
School integration
Social values

South Carolina--Rock Hill
South Carolina--Rock Hill--Boyd Hill
North Carolina--Charlotte

Interviews
Oral histories

1930-2010

The era before Brown v. Board of Education

Interview with Cynthia Roddey, January 22, 1979. Louise Pettus Archives and Special Collections, Winthrop University (http://digitalcommons.winthrop.edu/oralhistoryprogram/166/)

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audio/mpeg

BB-RO0009

http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.13093/uncc:2017