Newtown Alive

Sheila Sanders has a sweet smile but

don’t mistake it for weakness. She organized a boycott of the Sarasota Federal

Bank as a third grader at Booker Elementary School. At that time, her class

learned money management by filling out savings deposit slips for their

pennies, dimes and nickels, but the students could not take tours of the bank

as children from other schools did. Sanders persuaded her classmates to send

deposits to Palmer Bank where they could tour.  Her actions foreshadowed

future activism. The teenager proactively participated in the NAACP

accompanying leaders John Rivers and Maxine Mays to local and state meetings. In

high school, Sanders learned about the political process by reviewing the agenda

of school board meetings and attended the meetings by taking the city bus.

“Some things won’t be said just because you’re sitting there.” 

Sanders, William “Flick” Jackson and

John Rivers joined Dr. Edward E. James II as plaintiffs in a lawsuit against

the City of Sarasota. They successfully pushed for single member district

voting that opened the way for African American representation on the Sarasota

City Commission.

The memory of Sarasota Mayor Willie

Charles Shaw is razor sharp.

 He was reared in “Black

Bottom,” a swampy land in Newtown near Maple, Palmadelia and Goodrich Avenues.

There were no streetlights or curbside mail delivery. Overtown had its own

neighborhood with the same name because of its rich black soil. Shaw can

quickly rattle off the locations of community landmarks, dirt paths, swimming

holes, citrus trees and bus routes; and the names of neighbors. Newtown’s dusty

roads were paved in 1968, but the first paved streets followed the route of the

city transit bus. His grandmother and family members owned land along Orange

Avenue and 31st Street. When there was a death in the neighborhood, Mrs.

Herring, Fannie McDugle, and Mrs. James formed an unofficial neighborhood

association with Mrs. Viola Sanders at the helm. The women collected food and

flowers for grieving families. Shaw’s mother sewed a heart or a ribbon on the

right sleeve of the bereaved.

The retired letter carrier attended

the Booker schools with teachers Barbara Wiggins, Mrs. McGreen, Prevell Carner

Barber, Aravia Bennet Johnson, Foster Paulk, Esther Dailey, Coach Dailey, Janie

Poe, and Turner Covington. “I would have to say that the entire learning

experience at Booker groomed me into a leader. We were taught that you always

had to be better, do better. You had to.”  

Shaw was among the African American

students who traveled on a bus across the Skyway Bridge to attend Gibbs Junior

College. He served in the U.S. Air Force, then became a letter carrier

following in the footsteps of Jerome Stephens, the first African American in

Sarasota hired by the postal service.   

At age eight, Mary’s family moved to

unit #10 in a public housing complex in Newtown. The differences between

conditions in Overtown where they lived before, and the new complex were like

night and day.

 The new apartment had a

bathroom, electricity, a yard with grass, and sidewalks. Before that, their

shotgun house had no running water. They pumped water for bathing, washing

dishes and laundry.  There were three tubs to wash, rinse garments, and

rinse again. Before Clorox, a boil pot whitened clothes. An outhouse 15 feet

from the house was used. A portable oil stove was the major kitchen appliance

and kerosene lamps provided light.  An imaginary boundary line kept

community children from veering past 10th Street. Simmons only ventured across

the line to grocery shop with her grandmother. “We would walk down Main Street

and smell peanuts in the five-and-dime store. I remember asking, ‘Granny can I

have an ice cream cone.’ She said, ‘sit here.’ I sat on the curb. I never

forgot the place, Oleander’s. Granny went in, got it, and brought it outside. I

looked at her, looked at the cone, looked at the people sitting inside. But you

didn’t ask adults questions. You just did as you were told.”

Sheila Sanders has a sweet smile but

don’t mistake it for weakness. She organized a boycott of the Sarasota Federal

Bank as a third grader at Booker Elementary School. At that time, her class

learned money management by filling out savings deposit slips for their

pennies, dimes and nickels, but the students could not take tours of the bank

as children from other schools did. Sanders persuaded her classmates to send

deposits to Palmer Bank where they could tour.  Her actions foreshadowed

future activism. The teenager proactively participated in the NAACP

accompanying leaders John Rivers and Maxine Mays to local and state meetings. In

high school, Sanders learned about the political process by reviewing the agenda

of school board meetings and attended the meetings by taking the city bus.

“Some things won’t be said just because you’re sitting there.” 

Sanders, William “Flick” Jackson and

John Rivers joined Dr. Edward E. James II as plaintiffs in a lawsuit against

the City of Sarasota. They successfully pushed for single member district

voting that opened the way for African American representation on the Sarasota

City Commission.

As an African American public health

nurse, the late Gwendolyn Atkins spent a lifetime healing bruises in the

community.

For nearly three decades, retired

nurse Gwen Atkins walked door to door in Newtown neighborhoods, public housing

areas and in migrant camps teaching young mothers about childcare, treating

childhood diseases, monitoring the health of aging residents and making sure

seasonal workers received medical services. She set up a makeshift clinic in

the garage of Stephens Funeral Home. “We’d treat impetigo and ring worms. She

became extended family members of their patients.

The line between work and play often

blurred. Nursing and being on call, accessible and always available was a way

of life. “If I had to do it all over again, I would choose public health

nursing and I would choose serving my community. That’s what I love more than

anything else,” Atkins said.

Estella Moore-Thomas owned Moore's Grocers when Black residents couldn’t shop at Publix and Winn Dixie. The Newtown business that still bears the family’s name supplied the community with groceries and fresh produce. Before Moore’s, Thomas rented a store in the building once occupied by Eddy’s Fruit Stand. Harriet D. Moore, her daughter, helped operate the store.  “We were one of the few stores that gave credit to people,” Harriet chimed.

Moore grew up in Sidell, Florida located 50 miles east of Sarasota in a turpentine camp. The home remedies used to treat illnesses consisted of turpentine, Epsom salt, castor oil and cobwebs. “When I came here, we didn’t have electricity. I opened the door of the refrigerator and the lamp fell and broke. Right there, just cut it to the bone. They filled it up with cobwebs. No stitches or nothing. No doctors, but I lived through it.”

The elder Moore didn't finish high school because the responsibility of helping at home as a teenager stood in the way, but she made sure her children received the best education. Harriet earned a doctorate degree and was the Sarasota County School district's Director of Innovation and Equity. “The way that it used to be, I miss rallying around people who didn’t have and making sure that nobody went hungry around here.”

The late Elder Willie Mayes was

proud of the family church that began in his parent’s home with six members. He

began pastoring New Zion Primitive Baptist Church in 1984 and operated a cement

finishing business for 45 years.

 The company is among the

oldest Black owned enterprises in Sarasota. At age 14, he stopped attending

school to help his family make ends meet financially. Mayes earned meager wages

doing farm work in Fruitville near where the family lived. Children in the

settlement of approximately 50 residents attended school in a little church. The

people walked a quarter of a mile to pump water for daily use. In 1944, the

family moved to Newtown where Mango Avenue is situated between Highway 301 and

the railroad tracks near the city dump. “The smoke bothered us for years. We

stayed in the house most of the time to escape that smoke.,” Mayes said. His

sister Rosa Lee Thomas believes their neighbors on Mango died as a result of

the fumes. She keeps a record of their names as a memorial. An unforgettable

moment in Thomas’ life was being chosen the 10th grade attendant of Miss Booker

High School with another attendant Willie Mae (Blake) Sheffield.

The late Dr. Thomas Clyburn remembered

hearing the sound of his patent leather loafers on the floor of a Blue Bird bus

while stepping out of his seat and walking down the aisle to the front, then

down the steps on the first day of school in 11th grade. The setting was unfamiliar.

Earlier that day, Clyburn showed up

for class at Booker High School where he was an honors student. He was asked to

wait outside, near the main office and didn’t know why. A bus pulled up. “Are

you Thomas Clyburn?” driver Robert Graham asked. “Yes, I am,” the teenager

replied. “I’m here to take you to school, not here.” The driver and passenger

took the route from Myrtle Avenue to North Washington Boulevard to Sarasota

High School. Students were everywhere. “Good luck. I’ll come back to pick you

up.” The bus driver dropped him off in front of the gothic style building. When

he stepped off the bus, the world in front of him froze.

“Everyone was looking at me. My

pulse rate in my throat went to the roof.” He 

walked to the administration office. “It was really, really, really quiet.

The principal [Gene Pilot] introduced himself. He asked a few questions.” Then

a teacher escorted him to homeroom. Some students were silent. Some whispered.

“That was my first day. It was a challenge. You would think those days would

get better over time, but in many ways they got worse.”

Clyburn, no longer in Booker’s

cocoon of nurturing teachers and classmates was chosen for a pilot program to

integrate Sarasota County schools in 1963. “I was sitting in homeroom looking

out of the window. A kid with a big German shepherd walked toward the building.

I heard a loud pop. Six men racing toward me said ‘get in the center. Don’t say

anything. Follow us.’ We went to the principal’s office. They locked down the

school to look for the student.” Willemina Thomas, a BHS classmate was also

selected to participate in the SHS pilot program, but their paths never

crossed. Clyburn, a behavioral psychologist was university director of learner

affairs at Capella University.  

School integration caused trauma and

fear for Carolyn Mason and rightly so.

 She lived in Overtown’s “Black

Bottom” located at the corner of 8th Street and Central Avenue in segregated

Sarasota. There was a dividing line at 3rd Street or present day Fruitville

Road. “I call it the Mason-Dixon line. North of Fruitville was the Black

community; and south was downtown for the more affluent community.” The

communities did not mix. “My senior year in high school should have been my

best year, but it was full of apprehension. I couldn’t think past the fear of

being around people I had never been around before. I didn’t know what I was

afraid of, but I was afraid. Somebody should have talked to the children – all

of the children – about what to expect. Somebody should have said, ‘You don’t

have anything to worry about.’”

Mason began a career in public

service after viewing a theater production in Sarasota that lacked a diverse

cast. Frustrated, she became the go between for talented African American

artists and arts organizations. “I offered myself as a bridge. I was probably

on the board at one time of every arts organization in Sarasota County.” She

was elected to the Sarasota City Commission and served from 1999 to 2003. She

was Mayor of Sarasota from 2001 to 2003. Mason is the first African American

elected to the Sarasota County Commission in 2008 and served as chair in 2013

and 2015. Social issues are the focus of her work.  Carolyn Mason’s oral

history was provided by interviewer Hope Black.

Betty Jean Johnson is a voracious

reader who loves traveling to faraway places through books.

Her teacher Prevell Barber stoked an

appreciation for the written word. “I always had to read something in her class

or around her. The fact of it is when I read, I travel. We didn’t have TV until

later.” Johnson thought her college education would lead to a career in social

work.

Instead, a high school class in

“library procedures” changed her trajectory after graduating from Gibbs Junior

College in St. Petersburg. Back then, Manatee Community College, now known as

State College of Florida was off limits to African Americans. Mary Emma Jones,

a well-respected entrepreneur and community leader orchestrated the hiring of

Mary Thomas at the Sarasota Public Library.

Thomas helped Johnson land a job

there. The facility was not a welcoming place for African American patrons.

Johnson understood what Newtown residents encountered. “For a book report, I

had to go to that library for a book because we didn’t have it at the Booker

library. There were ‘closed stacks’ closed to Blacks. The lady at the desk had

to go to the stacks to get the book. When I started working there, those same

people were there.” For years, a perplexing question dogged Johnson. “What can

I do to get more Blacks to use the library?” A solution to the conundrum came

while preparing to work a split shift. She would ask the boss for use of an old

book mobile the library was about to replace. Instead, administrators provided

an outreach van that made books accessible to African American children.

From a van to a storefront library

operating on a shoestring budget, Johnson and supporters kept pushing, even

though for years their efforts seemed fruitless. Finally, the North Sarasota

Public Library opened as a result of the seed of an idea that Johnson planted.

The facility is named after her.

Alberta Brown is known in the

Newtown community for her sumptuous southern-style Sunday throw downs – a big

roast seasoned to the bone, a large pot of collards, long pans of buttery yams,

melt in your mouth mac-n-cheese and moist cornbread with crispy edges.

 It is as if a small army of

people are dinner guests. Extended family members, church friends and drop-ins

are part of the platoon stopping in for a plate. Brown’s family members were

sharecroppers from Alachua County. They moved to Palmetto and found work

picking tomatoes and green beans. Brown later worked as a live-in on Siesta Key

for a physician’s family. She took care of the couple’s little girl. When help

was no longer needed, she followed in her sister’s footsteps, training to

become a cook. The position at her next job evolved into more. Jane Bancroft

Cook, heir to the Dow Jones & Company family enterprise was looking for a

cook. Through a recommendation from a previous employer, Cook met a tall,

soft-spoken woman and hired her on the spot. Brown recalls the interview that

day. “She looked at me and said, ‘oh, you’re beautiful.’” What followed was a

friendship with Cook until her death in 2002 and a lifelong kinship with the

family that remains today.