South Bend's Own Words

Lois Clark is a tireless advocate for peace and justice. For four decades she served with the local Head Start, educating scores of children. As Mayor Pete Buttigieg put it when he honored Lois in 2013,"She has made an incalculable impact." But many in South Bend recognize her as one of the people who stand, or in Lois’ case, sit, on a downtown street corner protesting war. She hold signs that say...

Anita Roberts is descended from one of the first families of color in South Bend. Her grandfather worked as a foreman at the Studebaker wagon factory, and her grandmother as a domestic worker in the Studebaker family home. As an adult, Anita moved to New York to embark on a long career, first as a union activist and later as a representative for the International Council of Shopping Centers. She p...

Willie Coats lived almost his entire lifetime in South Bend, mostly on West Washington Street. As a child, he lacked the historical framework to understand the racism he  encountered. As an adult, and after he read The Autobiography of Malcolm X, he could put his experiences in context—like the racial slurs shouted at him by white neighbors, and witnessing a black man shot by police in 1967 a...

David Healey was a part of the first Indiana University South Bend Freedom Summer class in the summer of 2000. Fifteen students toured the southern U.S. to learn how the civil rights movement unfolded there. It changed the student's lives. Two of them decided to start a South Bend civil rights center, and they asked David to join.  David got to work researching the history of the civil rights...

Father Theodore Hesburgh is an author, educator, and advocate for justice who served the University of Notre Dame for over three decades. Among his many actions, he served under Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon on the U.S. Commission for Civil Rights.  In 2009, the day before the inauguration of the first African American President, he shared stories from his life and his wo...

Oscar Jones, Jackie Ivory, and Bobby Stone were heavily inspired by the Mississippi Delta blues they heard growing up. As teenagers, they’d sing doo-bop music on street corners on the west side of South Bend. It led to lifelong careers in music for both Bobby Stone and Jackie Ivory, and a lifelong love of music for all three. They performed together in what was known then as the “chitlin’” circuit...

John Charles Bryant is descended from of one of the first African American families to call South Bend home. His ancestors moved here in 1858, seven years before the city officially incorporated. Every generation since has contributed things big and small to this city, and John Charles has detailed information about all of them. He has an encyclopedic knowledge of this city’s history—and he’s happ...

South Bend, Indiana residents have likely seen a group of people holding signs on a downtown street corner saying messages such as, “Honk for Peace." Reynaldo Hernandez is one of those people. He and his wife, Glenda Rae, have been active fighters for peace and social justice issues in this city for decades. Born in Texas to parents of Mexican heritage, Ray later pursued a life as a minister. When...

Don Willman came to South Bend with his mother at a young age. He became involved in the theater program at Central High School under famed director James Lewis Cassady. Cassady helped open a love for theater that stuck with Don.  As a teenager, Don met the love of his life. He and his partner Burt became both business partners, and life partners. They shared their lives for three decades unt...

When Barbara Brandy was nine years old, a group of her family and friends tried to come into the Engman Public Natatorium to swim. At the time, the city-owned pool was segregated by day. Monday was the only day African Americans could swim. Barbara and her friends came after church on Sunday. The white man behind the ticket booth told them, “No.”  This day was just one in the 68 years she spe...

Paula Gonzalez came with her family to South Bend in 1948. They came through the migrant farm track from Texas. As a child, she spent a few months working with her family on the farms. She then spent the rest of her life with organizations that helped make migrant farm work safer and better.  September 15 through October 15, 2017 is Hispanic Heritage Month across the United States. With so mu...

Leroy and Margaret Cobb were two of the 26 people who fought severe housing discrimination in order to build a safe, stable, and wonderful neighborhood. The organization was called the Better Homes of South Bend.  Read more about Better Homes from Gabrielle Robinson’s book, _Better Homes of South Bend_. Check out a copy at any of the libraries listed below, or purchase your own copy here: htt...

George McCullough dedicated most of his professional life to educating thousands of South Bend school children, first as a counsellor and then as long-time principal of South Bend, Indiana’s Washington High School.  He grew up on South Bend’s west side in an area sometimes called LaSalle Park, sometimes called “Beck’s Lake.” In the first half of the 20th century, LaSalle Park was one of the f...

Ruth Tulchinsky was a young Jewish woman living in the shadows of the Holocaust. At the age of 16, fortunately, she and members of her immediate family managed to escape Nazi Germany and arrived in South Bend.  Ruth had experienced life in Hitler’s Germany, but did not expect to see elements of it  here. Yet, she did. The divisions between white and black were eerily similar to those she...

Jose Arevalo was five when his parents brought him and his nine siblings from Mexico to the United States. They were migrant farm workers, chasing harvesting jobs from Texas through Michigan and Minnesota. He enrolled in school but, without knowing English and without support from his school, he failed the first grade. Luckily, a teacher who spoke both Spanish and English helped him bridge the gap...

Helen Pope grew up on the west side of South Bend, Indiana during the 1920s. She watched her city grow and change over the eighty years she lived here.  She earned a nursing license from Ivy Tech and a degree in early childhood development from IU South Bend. She worked as a nurse at the old Northern Indiana Children’s hospital, back when they segregated their patients by race. Helen helped e...

Episode 1 of "South Bend's Own Words," featuring edited versions of oral histories told to the Indiana University South Bend Civil Rights Heritage Center.  Created and produced by Kevin Tidmarsh; hosted and co-produced by George Garner