Primary Sources: George Nichols

A Trailblazer for Change

George Nichols has made an indelible mark on the history of East Tennessee State University.

Mr. Nichols was born and grew up in Johnson City and graduated from Langston High School as Salutatorian of his class. After graduating from Langston, he was one of four African American undergraduate students who integrated East Tennessee State College, now ETSU, in the fall of 1958 and was one of the first Black members of ETSU's ROTC program.

Hear more about his story and the history he lived in this special episode of Primary Sources hosted by Dr. Daryl A. Carter, associate dean and professor of history in the ETSU College of Arts and Sciences.

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• Podcast Transcript

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Welcome to "Primary Sources," a podcast produced by East Tennessee State University that highlights the important research happening at ETSU. Joining us today on "Primary Sources" is Mr. George Nichols, an individual who has made an indelible mark on the history of East Tennessee State University.

  Mr. Nichols was born and grew up in Johnson City and graduated from Langston High School as salutatorian of his class. After graduating from Langston, he was one of four African American undergraduate students who integrated East Tennessee State College, now ETSU, in the fall of 1958. During his junior year, he enrolled in Advance ROTC, and he became the first African American to be commissioned a second lieutenant from ETSC's, now ETSU's, Army ROTC program. Mr. Nichols served seven and a half years on active duty as a field artillery officer, serving in Vietnam and becoming a decorated officer due to his service. He began his civilian career at Citibank in New York City, starting as an entry-level officer in the banking industry and progressing to senior vice president, managing operations with budgets of more than $20 million and staffs in excess of 8,000. While working full time, Mr. Nichols completed his MBA from Adelphi University's Robert B. Willumstad School of Business. In addition to his impressive military and corporate careers, Mr. Nichols was actively involved in the civil rights struggles across the nation, participating in marches, walking picket lines, and serving as vice president of the Central Long Island branch of the NAACP. In 2013, he was inducted into the ETSU ROTC Hall of Fame. In 2016, he was selected as one of 300 inaugural inductees into the Army ROTC National Hall of Fame in Fort Knox, Kentucky. Among the inductees in his class were General George Casey, former chief of staff of the Army, and General Colin Powell, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and former U.S. Secretary of State. It is a true honor to have Mr. Nichols back on campus at ETSU for a visit.

  Mr. Nichols, thank you for joining me on "Primary Sources."

  George Nichols

  My pleasure.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Welcome back to Johnson City, Mr. Nichols. You know, I know much about this area has changed since you grew up here in the 1940s and '50s. Take us back to that time when you were in high school. What was it like to grow up here, and what was it like for African Americans in particular at that time?

  George Nichols

  
  Well, there are two ways to look at it. Number one: It was home and was something we were used to, something that we had grown up with; that is on the good side. Number two: Anytime there was a gathering of people, whether it be schools, churches, cemeteries, recreational facilities, everything else was segregated. We could not go, for instance, there was one theater that we could attend, the Tennessee Theatre, and we could only attend it by going up to the balcony. We could not attend any other park in Johnson City with the exception of Carver Park; to show you how crazy segregation was, the white people could come to Carver Park and play in a softball league, but Black people could not go to any of the white parks. There was no restaurant that would serve Black people. There was no hotel or motel that would accommodate us, would give us rooms. Now, one of the ironical things about it, my father worked in the John Sevier Hotel for 40 years carrying bags, and I worked in the barbershop adjacent to the hotel. And one thing I noticed, if a person came from Africa and that person had an accent, they could get a room in the John Sevier. Baseball players who were from Latin American countries who were playing for the Johnson City Cardinals, which was a farm team of the St. Louis Cardinals, those players could stay in the John Sevier. However, if you were an African American and walked in with no accent, you could not stay.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Wow; that is absolutely incredible. Yes. Could you tell me a little bit more about the Tennessee Theatre? Yes. Where was it located?

  George Nichols

  
  On the corner of Main and Boone, I do believe. Main and Moon? Boone. Boone? Okay. I believe. I'm not sure of that. Okay. But it was thoroughly segregated during your childhood. Yes. And I know within, virtually everything was in walking distance because we didn't have cars. My father had a car, but if he was working, I had to walk. So they would give me a dime to go to the movies. I would go to the movie. It would cost nine cents. I would see, they would have a double feature and a serial and a cartoon for a dime. I would have a penny left. I would stop at a small grocery store on my way home and get a piece of bubblegum. And that was my Saturday. Wow. That is absolutely incredible. And I assume then that movies were a large portion of your childhood recreational experiences. Only on weekends. Only on weekends.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Okay. So was that something that everyone looked forward to at the end of the week as you're approaching Saturday?

  George Nichols

  At a certain age, yes, but not everyone. I would say the teenagers, no. Below the teenagers, say 10, 11, 12, yeah.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Okay. Wonderful. And as I read in your bio, you became one of the first African American undergraduates to integrate East Tennessee State University, or College, as it was known then. Around the country, there were stories of violent encounters and protests at schools and universities as the integration occurred. How did integration of ETSU compare to what was happening at other places?

  George Nichols

  
  There was no violence here. Absolutely no violence. I never in four years, I never had any words or actions directed toward me that I was aware of. So our, you can't compare what happened, let's say at the University of Mississippi, University of Georgia, with what happened at ETSU. However, there is one thing, another thing that -- most of those universities only integrated after a court order, even though they were after the Board v Board of Education in 1954, ETSU did not have. We did not sue to get here. The Johnson City Schools, which integrated some seven years after we did, had to have a lawsuit to get in, but we did not. And I think one of the reasons why everything was as quiet as it was here, and this is just my thought, is because the press was not informed. I don't think the administration informed the press because I never saw a microphone, I never saw a camera the day we came in. We just came in and registered, just like all other students.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  How did the faculty and staff at that time treat you and your fellow students?

  George Nichols

  
  I didn't see any difference.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Okay. And of course, you were not alone in this experience. The first African American student to attend ETSU was actually a graduate student, Eugene Caruthers, who was your teacher at Langston High School. And when you arrived on campus as an undergraduate and you had three classmates alongside you, how did these individuals impact your experience?

  George Nichols

  
  Mr. Caruthers definitely impacted my experience because he really is probably the cause that I went and remained at ETSU. Uh, Mr. Caruthers, I should talk about him a little bit. Uh, he came the, the year or two years before we did. And he was here during the time, let's say of the Little Rock Nine, attempting to get into Central High in Little Rock, and the president having to send in the 101st Airborne Division to restore order. Mr. Caruthers came out here by himself at night while all that was going on. He, that is bravery, and my hat goes off to him. He talked me into coming here. And when I was thinking of dropping out of here, he talked me out of that. Well, let me stop you there and ask, you just mentioned that you thought of dropping out. Can you tell us why? Um, during my junior year, I didn't feel I could take it anymore. Let's take today. Let's say today is my school day. Mm-hmm. Okay. I get up in the morning, and I go to class. I come back from class, I change clothes, and I go to work in the John Sevier shining shoes, where I might run into somebody I know from ETSU. And I've still got to shine their shoes. I come home after work, after cleaning up the barbershop. I come home. I study. Now, Langston had biology and chemistry and general science in the sciences. In math, they had two years of algebra, one semester as I recall of plane geometry, and that was it as far as math is concerned. There was no physics, no trigonometry, none of that. So I'm walking into a classroom where kids have already had that, and I'm having to catch up and keep up at the same time. My mother had a book that was about a foot and a half thick called The Lincoln Library, and that book had subjects about everything. And if I was having a problem, let's say having an issue in organic chemistry, she would go into The Lincoln Library, find organic chemistry, read it, understand it, turn around, and tell me what it was in language that I could understand. If it was a calculus problem, she would go into Lincoln Library, figure it out, do the same thing: Tell me what I in a language that I could understand. So I was tired of catching up and keeping up at the same time and at the same time going during periods of like the summer when other students who were going to HBCUs, were talking about the things they were doing and all the fun they were having. I wasn't having any fun here. So, that's basically the reason.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  When you mention having to catch up academically, were the students that were coming, for example, from Science Hill High School or from Dobyns-Bennett High School in Kingsport, Tennessee, would it be a fair assumption to say that they had some educational opportunities that were not available to Langston students?

  George Nichols

  
  Oh, yes. Okay. I just explained, Langston had no math other than two years of algebra and a year of plane geometry that I can recall. We didn't have trig at Langston. They did at Science Hill. Um, they had physics. So, I mean, I'm walking into a physics class, and I don't know anything about it when I walk in.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Well, I asked that question mainly for our listeners to this podcast who may not be as informed as you or I about what separate but equal really meant.

  George Nichols

  
  Oh yeah. And that was common throughout the American South, which was there is no semblance of equality there. Right; that's correct. The Black students usually had to have the secondhand materials, books, equipment, and they had far fewer academic choices than the white students and across town. That is absolutely correct. We did have hand-me-down books at times for some courses that you could tell because there would be writing in the books. Some pages tearing up, but not all. But some.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Now, you said Mr. Caruthers helped you stay here despite the fact that you were very unhappy. How did he do that?

  George Nichols

  
  Uh, one day I had left the barbershop, and I was looking in the window at the Air Force recruiter, and I hear this horn blow. I turn around, and it's Mr. Caruthers. So I got in the car with him. He, uh, he took me to his house, and I bet we talked for two or three hours. Um, the, I went back. I went home. I told my parents what I was thinking. My mother's first thought was, "I knew you were unhappy, but I didn't think you were this unhappy." Um, and she talked me into going back the next day. I didn't, I didn't go to my advisor. I didn't talk to anybody who taught, who taught a course, so to speak, that I was taking. Instead, I went to the ROTC building, and I talked to two of my instructors in ROTC, and they actually were the ones who talked me into staying. Oh, that is amazing. That is amazing. What did they say to you? I don't remember the exact words, but they got me to change my mind. Well, that is absolutely fascinating because there's a lot of evidence of the U.S. Army in particular taking a very real interest in finding promising Black young men to become officers in the late fifties and early sixties. Colin Powell is arguably the most famous one who got on that track, and ... I was already on the track ... you know ...and that was one of the things that I assume they threw at me because I was then in Advanced ROTC. And I knew that when I graduated I was going to be an officer. And I was thinking, "Okay, if I go in the Air Force with only two years of college, I'll still be an officer." But one thing I didn't realize at the time, that was in the middle of the Cold War, and B-52s in those days as, I believe right now would be going on a one-way trip. But naive me, I didn't understand that at that time.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  What initially made you think about the Air Force as opposed to other branches?

  George Nichols

  
  I don't know. I can't answer that. I, I, uh, I was in the Army. I knew about it, but nobody else was allowing an officer to come in with two years of college. You had to have the degree, the four-year degree. You also had the, as we mentioned earlier, the distinction of being the first African American to be commissioned from our ROTC program.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  And you have said that ROTC was where you found community, and your community, and your place at ETSU. Can you talk a little bit further about what it was like to be in the program at the time on a day-to-day basis and how it continued beyond just keeping you in school, playing a role in your experiences here on the campus?

  George Nichols

  
  Okay. Uh, I had a couple of instances which enabled me to do that, but let me go back. We could not belong to any organizations on campus. So as a result, the only people that I knew to talk to were people whom I had classes with. So the bell would ring. Everybody comes in, sits down. Bell rings again. Class is over. Everybody gets up, and walks out. I'm not talking to anybody. Um, as I, in 2011, when we came back, and I can't remember their names now, but I could of all the courses that I took in four years here, I could only remember at that time two people whose name -- other than my ROTC classmates. Let's take them out and put them in another box, and I'll come back to them later.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Mm-hmm.

  George Nichols

  
  But I could not remember somebody that I had English with, somebody that I had history with, somebody that I had chemistry with. I could not remember their names, but the two people that I can remember -- and I think this is very significant -- one was from Lebanon, the other one was from Iran. Now, ROTC. Two -- number one, we had the opportunity there to talk to each other, to get to know each other. The military is a family, and they, the instructors brought some of that feeling of family into the ROTC organization. Another thing that happened, we went on a field trip to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, my entire class, roughly 100 of us. They had a dance for us at Bragg. There was one Black girl who they had brought in, and I knew that girl was for me. They had thought that far ahead. When we came back, on the way back, we stopped at a restaurant, and I said, "Oh, man; what's this going to be like?" I don't remember where it was, but it was somewhere in North Carolina. So we went in, and I sat at the counter. There was a classmate on my left, classmate on my right. The waitress came along, and she gave a setup to the fellow on my left, skipped me, went to classmate on my right. Then she came back to me and said, "I can't serve you in here." So I tell one of my classmates, "Get me a sandwich, and I'll go sit on the bus, and bring it out to me." Put his hand on my leg and said, “No, sit still." I had noticed that they were talking among themselves before this happened, and so they all, bottom line, they all made their orders, and they waited until everybody had been served. All the food was out. And then everybody got up and walked out and left the food.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Wow.

  George Nichols

  
  Now, that let me know my guys had my back. And another thing was when I was invited to join Scabbard and Blade; that again, let me know I'm one of them. And they would do something that nobody else did. They'd talk to me about different girls on campus, and so that's, I felt a part.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  So it sounds like to me that it was like a family in ROTC and that there was real respect among the cadets.

  George Nichols

  
  Yes. And that the cadre felt the same. Yes.

  
  
  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  But did you feel compelled to compare that to your experiences with white people in Johnson City and the differences there, or was?

  George Nichols

  
  No.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Okay. No, not at all. How often did you socialize with other cadets on or off campus?

  George Nichols

  
  Never. Never. Unless it was something like we would go off campus occasionally and have things called bivouacs, that's where we'd sleep outside all night, but we would all be together. That's the only time.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Okay. And let me switch a little bit here. Can you compare that with your experiences on active duty when, when you were commissioned, when you were in the service, when you were in Vietnam, did you have that same sense of family there that you did here? If not, what were the differences?

  George Nichols

  
  Yes. Let me go back to, yes, the quick answer is yes. The Army is a family, and especially the officer corps is a family. My wife would have what I call the coffee clutches, and all the wives in the neighborhood would gather at somebody's house, and they would talk, and they would talk about what women talk about, the guys are at work. I know when we were at Fort Bliss, Texas, I was in school, and we lived in a housing complex with other classmates. And the kids would come and get my daughter, who was the youngest one. She was maybe 5, and you'd see the kids running throughout the camp, the complex, all complexions, all together. They would stop in somebody's house, and they'd give 'em lunch, and then they'd bring my daughter home about 4 or 5 o'clock before we got home at night. Now, at Bragg, one of, I had a number of jobs; my last job at Fort Bragg was as a battery commander, which meant that I was responsible for 150 guys being ready to go anywhere in the world within 24 hours, which was pretty, had a lot of responsibility. But it was, it was not taxing. It was everybody knew what we had to do, and we did it. And it was just, it was just a good thing.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  When you were off post at any of your Stateside assignments, did you encounter the same color line that you would have in Johnson City or other areas once you stepped off post?

  George Nichols

  
  Yes. When I got, when I initially got to Fort Bragg, which was my first duty assignment, they were having demonstrations because there was one theater in town, and Black folks had to go upstairs in that, in that movie theater; right beside it was a coffee shop in which Black folks could not attend. So I heard on the Black radio station that there was going to be a meeting about a march, and it was at a church. And I said, "Okay; I think I'll go and see what this is all about. “So I go to the church for that meeting, and I expected an older preacher to be running the show. No. It was a young lady, a very, very sharp young lady, and so I tried to, I talked to one of the fellows who was there and to find out more about her; naturally, he didn't know me, so he wasn't going to tell me anything. I can't remember how I finally talked to her, but she ended up being Mrs. Nichols. And our first date was a march, and she was going to Howard. She was a member of SNCC. And through her, I met a lot of the civil rights community. I met people like Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, even met Fannie Lou Hamer, Jesse Jackson, what's his name that organized the march in D.C.? Bayard Rustin. Yeah. All these people I met through her and SNCC. She was arrested seven times in D.C., and when she, she passed away recently, and she still had problems with her back because she was thrown into a paddy wagon, and her back hit the edge of the paddy wagon, and that bothered her for the remainder of her life. But she was one tough sister.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Wow. I'm sorry to hear that she has passed. Thank you for telling us that story. That is marvelous. I want to switch gears just for a second. Okay. You were a field artillery officer.

  George Nichols

  
  Yes.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Which is a combat arms ...

  George Nichols

  
  Yes. Field.

  
  
  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  Uh, why a field artillery?

  George Nichols

  
  Well, I wanted to be a career officer; in order to be a career officer, you had to have, or it was really expected that you be in one of the combat arms. I did not want to be in the infantry. I didn't want to be in armor because they called tanks steel coffins. So artillery sounded pretty good. And from what I had been able to gather, it was a good, good branch to be in. And I was correct in that. Tell us what attracted you to Citibank. Okay. Initially, when I got out, decided to get out, I could not visualize myself sitting behind a desk; that just was not me. I wanted something where my adrenaline would be flowing, and I would be out doing something. So I, I applied two places -- one the FBI and second the CIA. I didn't, was not aware of COINTELPRO at that time. I was thinking of catching bank robbers and all that kind of stuff. The CIA was interesting. After I applied, I would get a letter with no postmark, no stamp, no return address, just a letter in the mailbox. And it would tell me the next step. The application, they wanted to know your dog's uncle's third puppy's name. Well, I went through all of that. Then they asked me to come to a certain place in Oklahoma City, a certain motel, certain motel number in Oklahoma City, at certain dates at a certain time. I did that. The person who interviewed me conducted what I know now to be a stress interview. He opened the door. He didn't say anything. He just motioned for me to come in. There were two beds in the room. One bed had his credentials on it. He motioned for them. I looked at him, and then he motioned for me to sit down. I sat down, and then we stared at each other for about 15 minutes with neither talking; nobody saying anything. And then he set up the next interview. I think he was waiting to see if I would crack. I didn't say anything. He didn't say anything. So there was another interview. Again at Oklahoma City, another motel, another agent, and this fellow talked. He asked me what I'd like to do, and I told him. Oh, before he asked me what I'd like to do, he told me the way different agents had been caught overseas. Okay. For instance, one fellow was in a country where the soles of the shoes were leather, and he had rubber soles, and they caught that. Another agent was caught because Americans cut their meat and switch hands. He did that; in this country, they didn't. They would cut their meat and take their fork with, let's say with the left hand, and put it in their mouth. He was caught that way. And he went through another one that I can't remember. Oh, a fellow was crossing the street, and every time he'd cross the street, he'd look to the left first. In this country, the traffic was on the right side of the street, so they caught him that way. So, this fellow told me these stories. Okay; I don't want to be an agent anyway. So he said, "What would you like to do?" And I told him I'd like to be an analyst. An analyst takes information from all these different sources and puts them together and figures out that puzzle. What is it doing? What's it telling you? Now, that is exactly what I was doing in Vietnam. Taking, taking information from all of these sources, putting them together, and figuring out what are they doing? Where are they? What time? If you do this to 'em, what do they do? And taking countermeasures to that. So I wanted to do that with the CIA. He said, "That's not what we had in mind for you." Okay. What do you have in mind for me? And he said, "We think you're good for our counter military agency." Hmm. He said we would send you to Langley School, and you would go, you've already been to Vietnam, so you don't have to go through jungle warfare school. We might send you to cold- weather warfare school, and we'll take care of you that way. Your tours, instead of being a year, will only be six months. But you come back 30 days, and then you go again. Okay. And the money was not as good as I was making in the Army. So I could just see myself in some place like Cuba, trying to start a revolution against Castro, and so I said, "Thanks, but no thanks." So that, after then, now I don't have a job. Oh, let me go back to the FBI. FBI put me through a number of interviews. Two or three of them were in D.C., and they assign a handler to you. And a handler is an agent in the town that you're going to whose job it is to make sure you're ready to go to Quantico. Quantico is their school. So my handler in Oklahoma City kept saying, "I can't understand why we don't have a date for Quantico." Okay, so now time for me to get out of the Army is fast approaching. So I reached the time where I got out. The FBI switched me to a handler in Johnson City. Didn't know there were agents in Johnson City, did you? There are. And he was saying the same thing. Can't understand why you don't have a date to go to Quantico because you've passed everything else. Then one day I get a letter signed by J. Edgar Hoover himself. And sorry, but no thanks. We don't need you. And my, one of the, a friend of a handler told me the reason they turned me down, and I could kiss her for it now. They turned me down because my wife was a member of SNCC. And that, she saved me for probably being in COINTELPRO. And for our listeners, COINTELPRO, also the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission, and other entities were used to spy on the civil rights movement. They were used to spy on individual activists. They were used by the FBI and J. Edgar Hoover in particular to develop detailed files on the activities of individuals and organizations involved in the freedom movement

  in the United States. A lot of this came out in the FBI, excuse me, in the congressional investigations in the late seventies that detailed FBI and CIA abuses of power.

  
  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Can you tell us how that impacted your beliefs and activities in regards to civil rights and your participation in civil rights activity.

  George Nichols

  It didn't.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  
  But it did lead you to the private sector?

  George Nichols

  Yes. So I, now I don't have a job. So in the Army Times, which is an Army newspaper there, I saw an article, not an article, but an ad, written by, put in by a headhunter for looking for military officers getting out. The article said military officers getting out, interested in coming to the Northeast. I don't care; I'll go to China, Africa, wherever. And I went to them, and it was two officers who had gotten out and had formed a headhunting firm. They wanted me to stay in New York for a week to two weeks. I could only stay a week because they weren't picking up my hotel tab. And the first two days, they conducted nothing but mock interviews. No, before then, they went over my resume. I didn't know how to write a resume. They wrote my resume. They conducted my mock interviews for two days in a row. The third day, they sent me to a company that they did not think I was a fit for. But they knew well the folks, the people that I would be interviewing with. And I was to call them as soon as I got out. And they would get the feedback from that person on what my strengths and weaknesses were. Okay. They sent me to Texaco, and Texaco, exactly as they thought, there wasn't a fit there. But the fellow told me, told them what my strengths and weaknesses were. That afternoon, we're back into the mock interviews again. This is two and a half days of nothing but mock interviews based on what he had told them of what he saw my strengths and weaknesses were. The next day I go for the real interview, for the first time. Bottom line, I ended up getting five interviews. Five offers. After I'd gotten the offers, they sat down with me, and they laid all five of 'em out on the table, and we went over each offer. For instance, I had an offer from J&J, Johnson and Johnson, that was for quality control in Band-Aids. It was shift work. They said, "You don't need that." Another offer came in from Pfizer. Pfizer wanted me to do pharmaceutical sales, and my territory would be southern Connecticut. They said and that one had the potential of paying the most, which would have given them a larger commission. They said, we don't, they, in addition to the salary and the commission that I would get on my sales, they also included a car. They didn't, they said, "We don't recommend this. “Said it's a high-rent district that they're putting you in, and it's very cold in wintertime. We don't recommend it. Bottom line, their recommendation was Citibank of all the offers. And that's the way I ended up in Citibank.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  And I've heard an interesting story about your time at Citibank, where you were able to use your position and authority to work, quote unquote, under the radar, so to speak, to quietly integrate the corporate headquarters. Can you tell us about that?

  George Nichols

  Yes; this is the first time I've told this story. Uh, my workplace at Citibank was at 111 Wall Street, and the majority of my staff, what we were doing was typing information to transfer stock from you to me. The section was made up was one section of a three-section department. The other two sections were a verification section, verified what the typists had typed, and the third section was a mini data center with optical scanners that scanned the scanner sheets that the typists were typing on. I had roughly 100 typists. My typists had to be extremely fast and extremely accurate. They were all either Black or brown. Virtually all were Black or brown. At the corporate headquarters at 399 Park, if you went up and you looked at all the secretaries, they were all white. So I had these girls in my area that were super, super, super typists. They may not know how to take shorthand, but they could type very fast and very accurately. So I made some friends up at 399, and I said, "Hey, next time you need a secretary, instead of getting somebody who just came out of secretarial school and is typing x number of words a minute, I'll give you a typist who is typing x times five words per minute with minimal errors." And in that way, I began to ship my girls up to 399 and the secretaries in the corporate headquarters were no longer lily white. Well that's terrific. And I imagine that there was quite a bit of gratitude directed toward you. Oh yes. They, the girls getting that opportunity to work at 399 was something they never dreamed of. And at 399, at 111 Wall, all you ever saw were Black and brown people. You spent quite a lot of time at Citibank over the years. What kept you there? I loved it. Citi, Citi was tough. At the time I went, we were in a fight with Chase to see who was going to be number one in the world. Citi gave you, it was something like the Army. It was very much like the Army in that there was no room for error. It was a pass or fail. If you couldn't take the pressure, you didn't belong in Citi. And you remember I said earlier that I was, I didn't want to sit at a desk. I wanted something. Well, Citi gave me that. And another thing, when you looked at, there were some banks that were not good for people who looked like us. They were very prejudiced and things of that nature. Citi was not like that. Citi was very, very demanding. But, and you could go up quickly, and you could make money quickly. And you could be promoted quickly.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  I'm going to come back to this, this question here in a second about, you know, decades of change. But I would be remiss if I didn't ask a question about your mother.

  George Nichols

  Sure.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  That Mrs. Ruth Nichols played such an important role in your life, as you indicated earlier. She was one of the first five African American women to serve in the American Red Cross Gray Ladies during World War II. What were the Gray Ladies, and how did they serve our country? And your mother's role in that?

  George Nichols

  The Gray Ladies were volunteers, and they were a hybrid between the VA and the Red Cross. They wore red crosses on their uniforms, but they worked in veterans hospitals. And they would write letters, talk to the fellows, play cards with them, do anything to uplift them, uplift their spirits, because many of them maybe were wounded or sick or far away from home. And they would try to be that bridge. And that's, now when she went initially, there were no Black Gray Ladies, and white Gray Ladies would not service the Black soldiers in the VA. Here, here at Mountain Home. Or anywhere, Mountain Home or anywhere. Wow. So they were the first help that Black soldiers got in the United States.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  That is absolutely incredible. Thank you for sharing that. How long did the Gray Ladies exist?

  George Nichols

  I can't answer that. I don't know. I was small. Mm-hmm. And I would say when the war ended, I don't know. I can't remember if she went after the war ended. I don't know.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Okay. It sure sounds like Mrs. Nichols was, was a role model for you.

  George Nichols

  She was. She definitely, both she and my father. My father was the son of sharecroppers.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  How did your father impact your life?

  George Nichols

  Okay. Getting ready to tell you that. He went to the fields when he was 5 years old. There were 10 in his family, and all older than him. He was the cutoff point, worked in the fields. The way the family set it up was the older ones worked, the younger ones went to school. All of those that are younger than him have master's degrees. All his age and older have no degree. Wow. So, and another thing the family would do would be to even though he had what he called a roughly fifth-grade education, but -- I put a big capital "But" in bold there -- each of the brothers learned a skill. His skill was negotiation. So he would negotiate, he would negotiate the buying and selling of livestock, of lumber, that sort of thing. And he would take his youngest brother, who was assigned to him, and when he passed away, was a school principal. He learned the negotiation skill from my father. Okay. Now, my, that brother, his youngest brother, and the brother next to him, both played football at Morris Brown. My youngest uncle, the one who was his tagalong, evidently had a serious head injury in the game. And for that reason, my father, who was very family-oriented, disliked football since "They hurt my brother, so therefore, I have nothing to do with them." Oh, so he was not a sports enthusiast. He didn't know anything about it. He didn't care about it. And I think that came from a combination of things. One, his brother getting hurt, but more so, he didn't have a childhood, when I think about it. If he were going to the fields and working all day from five on, and the only time you go to school is when you go to a one-day, one-room school, when they are, when they can't work in the fields, you don't have a childhood. So he worked all of his life just like a slave would. And then he comes to Johnson City, and he works in the John Sevier, essentially doing the same thing. Now, what did I learn from him? Hard work. Don't let anything stop you. Now, where he learned this, I don't know, but he drove it home to me all the time. And I have driven it home to my kids and my grandkids. If a task is once begun, never leave it till it's done. Be the labor great or small. Do it well or not at all.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  I think that is absolutely marvelous.

  George Nichols

  Thank you. Now where he got that, I don't know. But that's the way he was. He, another thing he did, although the younger, and this is where I probably got the military thing, all the younger brothers went into the military during World War II. He tried to go. He was turned down because he was too old and he had a family. Now, I said he was working at the hotel. He quit for 40 years. He quit the hotel and went to Kingsport to a place called Holston Ordnance, where they were making ammunition. And he did that throughout the war.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Well, we're at the end of our time, sir. And I would like to take just a brief moment to for you to consider, you know, as you look across the decades of change, what lessons do you hope that people will learn from the past, from your life and example, and from the struggles that people of color have faced in the United States?

  George Nichols

  I am greatly concerned right now. If we go back in history, and I know you are a history professor, but we have to know our history because if we don't know our history, we're bound to repeat the mistakes. So if we go back to slavery, and after slavery came Reconstruction, things looked great. We were doing well. Then after Reconstruction, there came Jim Crow, and things went down. That's right. Now, that was followed by the civil rights movement. Again, things going up. Civil rights bill of 1964, the voting rights bill. Things are going up. We're doing well. We've got it made. Obama is elected president. Oh, we're great. And now look at today. You've got people who want to change history books. Things are going back down again. So we're going to have to fight just as hard as our ancestors fought. The battle is not over. The war is not over. We've got to fight now.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Thank you so much. And on behalf of all the alumni, and myself included, of East Tennessee State University, we thank you for your service to the country. We thank you for paving the way for all of us who came after you and for what you continue to do. And we are extremely proud to have you here today and to have you back home here in Johnson City for this visit, and on behalf of the institution, thank you for, for your service and what you've done here today. And we look forward to continuing this conversation with you. Any last words?

  George Nichols

  Yes. Continue to fight. If you're a student, study for all you've got. I'm going to tell one more story, and then I'll stop. But this story will illustrate what we are all up against. I had a next-door neighbor who was an engineer from India, and he told, told me about a school, a college in India. And students started preparing for this school when they were in the eighth grade. The classes, the classes for to prepare them for this school were from 4 a.m. until 8 a.m. Then they would go to their normal school. This went on from the eighth grade through the 12th grade. Then at their 12th, at the 12th grade, they would take a class, a test. If they passed the test, they may be accepted into this engineering school in India. They had as their backups, these students had as their backups, MIT, Caltech; our very best were their backups. That's who you're competing against; students, that is who you're competing against. So do what you gotta do. But nobody is going to be lazy and make it. You have to work hard.

  Dr. Daryl A. Carter

  Thank you, Mr. Nichols. Thank you for being here today.

  George Nichols

  You're very welcome. Thank you.