Abstract
In this 2012 interview, David and Frances Namkoong describe their journey from Cincinnati to Cleveland in the early 1960s. Encountering anti-Asian discrimination, they soon moved to the Ludlow community where they became actively involved in the integration movement. As the Civil Rights movement was beginning to stir in the US, the Namkoongs agree, that for Ludlow, the movement was quick and was "thrust" upon them. As the Fair Housing Act approached, the couple began to shift focus to their Asian-American heritage and used writings and radio to spread the importance of Asian-Americans to the history of the United States.
Loading...
Interviewee
Namkoong, David (interviewee); Namkoong, Frances (Interviewee)
Interviewer
Halligan-Taylor, Gabriella (interviewer)
Project
Shaker Heights Centennial
Date
6-13-2012
Document Type
Oral History
Duration
62 minutes
Recommended Citation
"David and Frances Namkoong interview, 13 June 2012" (2012). Cleveland Regional Oral History Collection. Interview 915011.
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/crohc000/502
Transcript
David Namkoong [00:00:01] Yeah, well, you know, I scratched it.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:00:04] Well, I’m just going to start out with just kind of some general things. Where did you guys- How did you guys come to Ludlow?
David Namkoong [00:00:12] Well, that’s a long story. Want to begin with that?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:00:15] Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
David Namkoong [00:00:17] Okay. That was back in 1961. We were in Cincinnati, Ohio, before coming here. I’m an engineer, and I was working for General Electric in Cincinnati. And NASA through the, at that time, Lewis Research Center were looking for engineers. Anything having to do with aerospace, which I applied and which they asked me to come up. And so this was again in 1961. And at that time, Fran had our two children, a boy and a girl, and she was pregnant with our third at this time. So we came up to be interviewed by NASA here, and it looked like we were going to accept the offer here. And while I was doing a lot of that thing, Fran was looking around the Cleveland area to see possible places to stay. Now, I would say that Shaker Heights was not the first thing that we considered, though we understood the tremendous reputation you had as a community, and especially about the schooling. It’s very important to us. But as you may or may not know, NASA is right next to the airport, and that is on the extreme West Side. And coming over to the East Side, it looked like it was a long travel. So the first thing was for us to look on the West Side. And Fran looked at several places and saw a home in Bay Village, which he thought would be very good. So we both went over and looked at it and said, yeah, that looks like a nice place. So we submitted an offer, which they said they accepted. Then this was in the afternoon, in the evening, we received a call from the real estate agent there. And they said, oh, they are so sorry, but will you take back your bid? And he said, you know, why? Why did you want to do that? And it was determined that they changed their minds. And they did want an Asian family to move there. And as far as we figured, we were trying to say, why didn’t they say that in the first place, for one thing. And the story that we got is that it was the woman alone, I think, that had offered to sell it. And the husband was working, and evidently when he came in, he didn’t want this to go through. Not only that, I think didn’t they take a survey of the neighborhood to ask them whether they would mind having a Asian family there? And I guess the majority said, no, we don’t want them there. So that was the reason why we contacted us. And so this is the first time this ever happened to us. And we were really shocked at the response to us. And we said, well, it was pretty apparent that we didn’t want to go to a place that was this. That had this kind of an attitude. It meant they were not only talking about Asians, but anyone that’s other than white, evidently. So we withdrew our offer. And then I think it was almost the next morning or very soon thereafter that we got a call from a reporter from the Cleveland Post [Cleveland Press], I think that was. That was the evening newspaper at that time. And he said that there was a lot of reports throughout the community about our being rejected to come into Bay Village. And then we found out later that it was going throughout the whole area, which was very surprising to us. We saw next day the Plain Dealer had it on its front page. The Post had it. We had radio reports all about it. So it was a big thing. And I think they characterized this as Cleveland’s West Side Story. That thing happened. So we had a lot of responses, a lot of individual mails and organizations and so forth. Just about 100% which decried that their stand on this. And among them being, of course, a lot of offers to look at their homes and a lot of organizations, which included the Japanese American Citizens League and so forth. And one of them being Ludlow. I was contacted by an engineer at NASA who lived in Ludlow and made a special effort to have us look at the area. So I think that time you had to go back to Cincinnati.
Frances Namkoong [00:06:57] Mm-hmm.
David Namkoong [00:06:58] I think it seemed apparent that we were not going to find a place before she would be delivering the third child. So she stayed there while I did the hunting and went over with. His name was Sam Stein from NASA at that time. And he had me meet people and look at some houses and so forth. And, yeah, I was. I was very not surprised, but. But I enjoyed the company. The people that were there, they were clearly very intelligent and they were very dedicated to Ludlow, which I found out what Ludlow was all about from the talking there, that they want to maintain this as a. An integrated community. And they were right in a situation where there was beginning to be this white flight, where all the whites would be moving out and a lot of blacks would be moving in that situation. And so we sympathized certainly with that attitude. Well, that’s how we chose Ludlow, anyway, as a place to come. And not at all disappointed. Right?
Frances Namkoong [00:08:27] Yeah, there was a big to do about us to begin with. So I think it was very apparent that we needed to show our faces and be there. So we did. We made the right choice. I think. We’re not sorry. It was an integrated community, and that was very nice for us.
David Namkoong [00:08:51] They wanted to, for it to continue as-
Frances Namkoong [00:08:54] Continue it as an integrated neighborhood.
David Namkoong [00:08:57] And so this was- We moved in 1962, which is 50 years ago, as of today’s interview date.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:09:11] That’s awesome.
Frances Namkoong [00:09:13] Well, it was. We were one of the first to take a stand in that because up to then, there had not been sort of an integration with such a- It’s just a word that nobody took seriously. But I think we made- We hit the headlines, unfortunately. But nevertheless, we survived that.
David Namkoong [00:09:42] Then we found out that this was one of the first neighborhoods that were trying to maintain a continued integrated neighborhood rather than to succumb to the panicky flight, the white flight.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:10:03] In Cincinnati. Were you guys in an integrated community or did you come across any discrimination in Cincinnati?
David Namkoong [00:10:10] No. That’s funny. You know, Cincinnati, we think as such a backward city as compared to the progressive Cleveland, but we didn’t. Let’s see. I don’t remember encountering anything, but we.
Frances Namkoong [00:10:23] Did very little there anyway. We were just one of the many people around.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:10:28] Right.
Frances Namkoong [00:10:29] But.
David Namkoong [00:10:30] So we did buy a home there.
Frances Namkoong [00:10:32] Yeah.
David Namkoong [00:10:33] And there’s no trouble at all there.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:10:37] Where were your parents from?
Frances Namkoong [00:10:40] All the parents were from- Mine were from- Well, they were- My father was born here, too. He was served in the First World War here, so he was a GI here. But they’re from China. But nevertheless, they did very well here. Since my father was an ex-GI. It was very nice. And when we had this unfortunate incident, it was quite a shock because it was the first time ever.
David Namkoong [00:11:18] My parents are Korean. Both my father and mother were born in Korea.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:11:26] I thought that. That’s funny that both Asian Americans and then you came to the Bay Village and you all of a sudden encounter that you don’t want an Asian family.
Frances Namkoong [00:11:38] Right. It was weird, right?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:11:40] Yeah. With. I don’t know how old both of you were, but with World War II, did you encounter anything with the concentration camps going on?
Frances Namkoong [00:11:52] No, we didn’t. Did we?
David Namkoong [00:11:54] No, that was with the Japanese American.
Frances Namkoong [00:11:56] That was a Japanese American, I think, solely.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:11:59] Right. Well, because I was reading that sometimes they would mistake other Asian heritage for Japanese, but I feel like that was maybe more on the West Coast.
Frances Namkoong [00:12:10] Oh, yeah. It was entirely on the West Coast. Yeah.
David Namkoong [00:12:12] Supposedly that was the rationale because, because the West Coast was more open to attack from Japan than the East Coast. So there was no trouble at all as far as that’s concerned.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:12:27] What did you think of that, though?
David Namkoong [00:12:28] At the time of the relocation experience? Oh, we thought that that was terrible. We knew that especially the circumstances, that. That this undoubtedly was the result of the farmers there who. They found a lot of competition among the Japanese American farmers against them. So this is one of the things that had the. Had the support of the farmers of, I think, their main newspaper editors there. I forgot the name of the person who, through their newspapers, really, you know, instigated this thing about.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:13:30] More biased and discriminatory?
David Namkoong [00:13:32] Yeah, right. And so it was there, I recall, I was in the World War II talk to tail end of the war, drafted, and my relatives lived in San Francisco. And I took a furlough there, and I was astounded how much. How much prejudice there was against Asians at that time. My aunt there was looking for housing. So one of the first things I overheard the conversation says, are there any rules and regulations against Koreans buying there? That was the first thing they asked for. So I said, wow, that indicates how bad it is on the West Coast. But we didn’t have anything like that. We’re both New Yorkers, actually.
Frances Namkoong [00:14:35] New York was more cosmopolitan, and it was-
David Namkoong [00:14:37] Not the West Coast.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:14:39] Right. So when you came to Bay Village, you were kind of shocked.
Frances Namkoong [00:14:42] Oh, yeah.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:14:43] What happened to you?
David Namkoong [00:14:44] Yes, very shocked.
Frances Namkoong [00:14:46] Because this was before, way, way before fair housing ever was thought of. So I guess that was how they felt that they didn’t want us, and we felt that was too bad.
David Namkoong [00:15:00] But in a way, we’re glad we found out at that time before we took a house there.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:15:06] Right. Yeah. And it’s kind of great that they got so much media coverage.
David Namkoong [00:15:11] Yeah, that was the thing that was very surprising.
Frances Namkoong [00:15:15] That was way, way early in the game, before integration was even thought of. So I guess you might say we were kind of like pioneers or something. So of course, we survived it. We just went along with. Not went along with them, but we stood our ground that we were entitled to. You know, this was fair housing before it was even thought of the term. You know, so we were pioneers, you might say.
David Namkoong [00:15:47] I like one of the- I don’t like. But I mean, one of the statements that was made there, the rationale as to why they didn’t want us. Well, they might not be doing us any harm, but they certainly can’t help us.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:16:04] Right.
Frances Namkoong [00:16:05] So how we became leaders in the field is something that was thrust upon us at first, but it led the beginning of a fair housing movement, which was.
David Namkoong [00:16:17] Yeah, well, there’s a big story on that.
Frances Namkoong [00:16:19] Yeah, that’s a big, big story on that.
David Namkoong [00:16:21] But, you know, it’s a funny thing that listening to the radio and hearing your name over it, you know, first time that it happened and it felt strange.
Frances Namkoong [00:16:32] It was a little embarrassing, but. Oh, you know.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:16:35] Right. Oh, wow.
Frances Namkoong [00:16:37] Yeah.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:16:39] You said it was radio. And what was. Was tv. Still was tv?
David Namkoong [00:16:43] TV was coming in there, but most of us still hadn’t had the TV yet.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:16:50] Right. When you did actually move into Ludlow with three kids, right?
David Namkoong [00:16:57] Yeah. Now, three kids.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:16:58] Were you the only Asian American family?
David Namkoong [00:17:03] No, as far as I know, there was one other Asian family, the Asamotos, and they lived on the other side of Ludlow around east of 140th Street. That is still within Ludlow. They were Japanese Americans, as a matter of fact. And they came through the- I think he was in the Army. I don’t know what part of the- If not the 442nd-
Frances Namkoong [00:17:42] Something like that. Yeah.
David Namkoong [00:17:48] The 100th. I forgot what the military term was. I think. I think he was one of those who were decoding Japanese messages, things like that. I’m not exactly sure, but he was-
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:18:01] He was involved with that.
David Namkoong [00:18:02] He was involved on 442nd. And his family had this relocation experience. And then they came to, I think, the One area, or maybe it’s the Quakers or some group like that accepted them into-
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:18:20] Oh, the Shakers?
David Namkoong [00:18:22] No, they were in maybe in the Hough area or someplace like that that invited. Welcomed them to Cleveland. So they were very grateful for that. So, you know, they were Japanese Americans. And traditionally Japan had colonized Korea before that, and Koreans did not look with pleasure upon Japanese. But as far as we were concerned, we were both second generation and there was no feeling like that. And we were more moved by this relocation experience than anything else.
David Namkoong [00:19:03] And we got along very well.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:19:05] Was it kind of just like history.
Frances Namkoong [00:19:09] As well? Right.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:19:18] Was there any tension between the Asian American families and the Black families and white families?
David Namkoong [00:19:23] No, not here.
Frances Namkoong [00:19:24] Not here at all.
David Namkoong [00:19:25] No, they welcomed us. I think I got the feeling that the more variety you have, the better. That’s the condition. That’s the feeling you got.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:19:42] So did your kids any experience, like, have any experiences with discrimination, or was it just very same experience as you guys? Just very.
David Namkoong [00:19:51] Yeah, very accepting, very accepting.
Frances Namkoong [00:19:55] It was a wonderful experience. I mean, living in Ludlow was wonderful.
David Namkoong [00:20:00] Well, one of the big pluses was going to Ludlow School here. At that time there was the principal, Mrs. Foss.
Frances Namkoong [00:20:10] Marjorie Foss.
David Namkoong [00:20:11] And I think she. Her home was within or very close to Ludlow, and she was like part of the whole community, too. So it was not just education separate from what was going on in Ludlow. And she went really out of her way to make sure that the children here were going through the same kinds of programs as the rest of the.
Frances Namkoong [00:20:44] She was wonderful that way. Yeah. Very, very forward looking.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:20:49] Very involved.
Frances Namkoong [00:20:50] Very involved. Yeah.
David Namkoong [00:20:52] And with the number of Blacks there and us being Asians and at that time, mostly white kids. So it was very, very pleasant. Very good.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:21:11] Was Shaker ever kind of secluded as like, that integrated city in other Cleveland areas? Was there any kind of separation like that?
David Namkoong [00:21:24] Well, they were talking.
Frances Namkoong [00:21:25] Ludlow was famous for that. It was the first integrated neighborhood, which was a plus, really.
David Namkoong [00:21:35] Yeah. Now it’s more from the feeling I get from what the people who are more involved with Ludlow than we were. But they felt that the rest of Shaker was trying to keep things just within the community of Ludlow, especially with the housing program. The Ludlow housing program was twofold. One was to prevent white flight there. And then, of course, they had to deal with the situation that blacks also wanted to come to Ludlow. So there was that sensitive element in there in trying to persuade the Blacks to go into other areas that needed integration rather than to come into Ludlow. And I gathered that that was probably not to the liking of rest of Shaker Heights. And therefore, I think they wanted to keep Ludlow isolated, away from.
Frances Namkoong [00:23:00] Did you get newspaper clippings on Ludlow?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:23:03] I have not, no. I. I’ve read some articles, but I haven’t actually had any original newspaper clippings. I’ve read, like, you know, I read some stuff on the 75th anniversary, and there was a. There was a TV special a couple years ago about the. It was called, like, the Reunion, and it was about all the kids.
David Namkoong [00:23:22] What was the.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:23:23] It was called the. It was called the Reunion, I believe?
David Namkoong [00:23:26] Oh, yeah, we saw that. That was. As I remember, that actually was a combination of two taking by the photographer. One was purely the integration picture in Ludlow, and the other one had to do with the racial incidents in school. And they tried to put that together, and we saw that. And it looked like you could see the seam there between the two movies that were taken.
David Namkoong [00:24:09] But in itself, it was good.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:13] Did you see some headlines? Did you get any newspaper clippings?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:24:17] No, no, I haven’t.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:18] Did you have any-
David Namkoong [00:24:20] We have it someplace.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:21] Someplace.
David Namkoong [00:24:22] It’s all you.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:23] But it was big news, and we were kind of like, oh, my goodness.
David Namkoong [00:24:26] But that was 1961. Yeah, about August or September or thereabouts, because Kevin was born in October.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:24:39] What was a big headline? Just the integration movement or-
David Namkoong [00:24:43] But that’s about the Bay Village thing.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:24:45] Oh, right, right.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:46] That hit the headlines and we were like, oh, my goodness.
David Namkoong [00:24:50] Yeah.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:50] When we went through that, we were shocked.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:24:53] If you guys can find those.
Frances Namkoong [00:24:55] Oh, yeah. I think community came, not Bay Village.
David Namkoong [00:25:02] But I don’t know how. Well, I’m sure that Plain Dealer.
Frances Namkoong [00:25:05] Plain Dealer did very well by us.
David Namkoong [00:25:08] Yeah. They have archives that would reach back there.
Frances Namkoong [00:25:10] Yeah, all the Plain [Dealer] would have archives.
David Namkoong [00:25:13] The Post [Press] went out of business, so I don’t know what they do with their archives.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:25:18] I wonder maybe if another newspaper bought them out or something and kept them. Probably. I’m assuming.
Frances Namkoong [00:25:22] Yeah. It hit the headlines.
David Namkoong [00:25:26] I think the Plain Dealer had most.
Frances Namkoong [00:25:28] Yeah, it did.
David Namkoong [00:25:29] And also the Sun Press.
Frances Namkoong [00:25:31] Sun Press had it.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:25:32] Oh I had a paper route with them back in the day.
David Namkoong [00:25:34] Oh, yeah?
Frances Namkoong [00:25:36] We were kind of embarrassed, you know, seeing our names and headlines and all that. But we survived that and it turned out to be a good thing because it sort of began the birth of interracial, you know, communities. So we were shocked in the beginning, but I think it worked out very well.
Frances Namkoong [00:26:04] Yeah.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:26:04] Yeah. And it’s great that it’s not just Black and white.
Frances Namkoong [00:26:07] Right, right.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:26:13] About America.
Frances Namkoong [00:26:15] Right.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:26:17] So were you. Were you proud of Shaker for kind of taking the initiative?
Frances Namkoong [00:26:22] Oh, definitely.
David Namkoong [00:26:23] Oh, Ludlow particularly. And then later on, Shaker accepted the inevitable and has been doing pretty good after that.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:26:35] Was there some anti-integration feelings among Shaker as a whole at first?
David Namkoong [00:26:41] I think so. As I said, that’s why they wanted to keep things to stay within Ludlow rather than spread out. I think it was still the fear of this white flight that they were still concerned about. I don’t know the specifics of what the administrations of Shaker Heights did in order to have the transformation from all white to integrated. I think that was the attempt to make it integrated rather than cutting it out altogether.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:27:26] Right. Rather than one race or one group.
David Namkoong [00:27:30] I think one of the things was that each of the school areas had a community association like here, it’s the Ludlow Community Association. And I think it was through those community associations like the Moreland School Association. I think it was through them they tried to have more of an acceptance of integration. I think it was through those community associations that they worked through.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:28:10] When you. When you kind of settled in, kind of on the broader spectrum, were there any kind of places that you and your family would go on any outings or anything like that? Like theaters or like parks or anything?
David Namkoong [00:28:28] Well, I think those days we were so busy. I think the whole community was supporting this, Ludlow. And that included a lot of things, too, like Fran was involved with. She was on the board of the Ludlow Community Association and was particularly involved in public relations and in fundraising. Now, fundraising was a very important part of. Of this because, generally speaking, throughout the whole country, about whenever a community tended to have this white flight occur and the total change over like that, it didn’t just happen by themselves, but you had the real estate companies, when this happened, they would just take out all of their agents from that area and make no attempt to try to entrust people to buy into that area. They just pulled out. And those realtors who were targeting the Blacks, they would be getting telephone calls and saying, you have this great bargain in there, and encouraged blacks to go in there. So that accelerated the turnover from white to Black. So that was a situation that Ludlow faced. And so what Ludlow had to do was to transform some of their efforts toward a real estate function. And that meant a lot of money. So fundraising was not just for doing fun and games within the community, but it had a function that had to do with a vital point of having your community integrated. So you were involved in a lot of those fundraising.
Frances Namkoong [00:30:45] It was a big thing because it was the first of its kind. And although I was the target of all this discrimination, that I was really thrust to the forefront. So I did what I could to advance the cause. All the things that we did when I was leading the group, we had Ella Fitzgerald, that was one of the big names. She came and sang at Severance Hall.
David Namkoong [00:31:21] It was a sellout.
Frances Namkoong [00:31:21] It was a sellout. And that was really a big thing for our cause. And Nancy Wilson was followed on that. And the Fifth Dimension was followed that. So we had quite a. Yeah, right. But it sort of started a movement. The civil rights movement really, in those days was just very small.
David Namkoong [00:31:47] And then I think Tony Bennett.
Frances Namkoong [00:31:49] Tony Bennett, yeah. So we were very fortunate in that those people came to our, you know, took that whole issue of civil rights so seriously. And that was the beginning of a big, big thing that we know as now as Civil Rights.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:32:11] Were you aware that you were part of the Civil Rights movement at the time?
Frances Namkoong [00:32:15] Well, it happened so quickly. And, you know, when you’re in the midst of it, you just sort of like, oh, wow. You know, we just go with the tide and people that. Calling us, calling us, calling us. And they came to the fore. Nancy Wilson came to the forefront, the Fifth Dimensions did. And we were really surprised, but so pleasantly surprised. And we ran with it, of course, because it was something so. Oh, my goodness, you know, this is really more than we expected, but it was good. It’s good stuff.
David Namkoong [00:32:52] So I think it was at the beginning primarily a local activity at first.
Frances Namkoong [00:33:02] Yeah. At first, yeah.
David Namkoong [00:33:03] But then we realized that it couldn’t be something that would last forever, that the. The marketing for houses was so severe among the Blacks, you know, that. And they were being shut out and they would only go into places that would accept them, which meant that any integrated community would, you know, by itself, you know, go terrifically from, you know, white to Black in no time.
David Namkoong [00:33:42] So it was realized that this local Ludlow endeavor had to be in line with the national fair housing thing.
Frances Namkoong [00:33:55] That was open housing.
David Namkoong [00:33:57] That was beginning to be a key point in the civil rights and that was fair housing. So a lot of the effort went to beyond Ludlow. Like, you attended some hearings.
Fran Namkoong [00:34:10] Right. Legislative hearings.
David Namkoong [00:34:17] Some legislative hearings from states and city to push for civil rights, fair housing.
Frances Namkoong [00:34:28] This was in the very early days. It was part of the.
David Namkoong [00:34:33] Part of fair housing.
Frances Namkoong [00:34:38] Yeah. Right. So that was early, early, early history.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:34:43] Right. Were you. Were you aware of things going on, like kind of outside Cleveland and outside Ohio, like similar kind of early movements or?
David Namkoong [00:34:56] Yeah, the earlier days Chicago had and a tep like this integration there, there were not many.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:35:07] Not many?
David Namkoong [00:35:11] I think we heard from people from around the country, you know, contacting us for information and more than are seeking some of guidance from any place else.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:35:24] So that was kind of the first?
David Namkoong [00:35:27] Yeah, one of the pioneers, right?
Frances Namkoong [00:35:30] Well, my name was mud for a while, I guess. Well, I was a pioneer. Pioneer. Yeah, I was. Anyway, he worked for NASA, so he couldn’t involve himself too much. But I was targeted because. Oh, boy. But it was. It worked out all right.
David Namkoong [00:35:53] But the interesting part, that going from local to national as far as civil fair housing was concerned, then you got concerned with the national picture of fair housing, and that became part of the whole Civil Rights Movement. And we just naturally got into some of the other aspects of civil rights.
Frances Namkoong [00:36:22] In fact, that was more than just fair housing. That was one of the headlines, open housing.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:36:33] So kind of started off with fair housing rights.
Frances Namkoong [00:36:38] David could not participate because he worked.
David Namkoong [00:36:41] To some extent, for instance, at NASA. They had the equal employment rights kind of legislation that at least other government agencies had to institute this EEO Equal Employment Office to try to get the employee group to be accessible regardless of race, religion and so forth. So I participated in that. I think, especially from the point of view of Asian Americans, though we worked with other groups, groupings like Hispanics, Blacks, women, disabled, things like that too. So that was almost a natural thing to do after the fair housing. You get into these aspects of civil.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:37:52] Rights, you couldn’t really stop.
David Namkoong [00:37:55] Right.
Frances Namkoong [00:37:55] Well, it’s a little embarrassing because my name is on the front page so many times.
David Namkoong [00:38:06] One of the things before we leave the area of fair housing, Martin Luther King came through here. And at the time, she was actually operating past looking at Ludlow. But you associate yourself with. With the Urban League, Operation Equality. And that one time Martin Luther King came through and she got a picture taken with him.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:38:41] Is that you and Dr. King? Wow.
David Namkoong [00:38:42] Yeah.
Frances Namkoong [00:38:45] So it was quite an honor.
David Namkoong [00:38:49] And it was so surprising that a lot of younger people who only heard of this, you know, through almost like history books, when they see something like that.
Frances Namkoong [00:39:00] It’s amazing. It makes an impact.
David Namkoong [00:39:03] Yeah, that was surprising.
Frances Namkoong [00:39:06] Oh, yeah, he was really something.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:39:08] Writers, speakers, everything. A lot of people. It’s a shame that people my age only know his “I Bave a Dream” speech.
Frances Namkoong [00:39:14] It’s a beautiful speech.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:39:16] But all his other work.
Frances Namkoong [00:39:18] Oh, he was fabulous, fabulous. David could not participate in all this because he would work for a government agency like NASA. But I was all alone in being instrumental in all these things because I was not. I did not belong to NASA or anything like that. So I felt freer to do what I wanted to do. But it was really in the early days of open housing. It was not easy. It really was. So it took someone like Dr. King and other people like him to really push that movement forward. And I was never sorry for that.
David Namkoong [00:40:01] But even civil rights itself was going beyond just the civil rights. I think then we were talking about the goal desired goal is diversity and to treat everyone the same. And that kind of argument. And that was about the time that we got involved with the Asian communities. And I think we can almost pinpoint where the. It was the event of the bicentennial celebrated nationwide 200 years since 1776, which was 1976. And Cleveland, among all other cities and states, was having all kinds of programs to look at the different aspects of America over 200 years, years. And we found that Asians were not represented. So Fran and I were part of a small group of Asians, not any particular nationality. And we were saying, you know, we still have these other organizations around, and we’re not doing anything about trying to make ourselves known as part of America. And so we contacted what Japanese American Citizens Organization of Chinese Americans, the Indians.
Frances Namkoong [00:41:40] So that was the beginning of multicultural.
David Namkoong [00:41:44] Well, we said that we should be part of this bicentennial. So we organized all of the Asian Americans. And this is the first time that all of the Asian Americans organized into one group just for this bicentennial. And we had a terrific program over at. I think it was Cleveland State University. We used the hall and we used a lot of posters and so forth having to do with the relocation program against the Japanese Americans. We talked about the Chinese, the number of Chinese participating in the building of railroad at the beginning, transcontinental railroad. And. And we had other things specifying the various contributions by Asians. So that was a great big hit. And it motivated all of the Asian American group to have this group permanently. So we started a permanent Asian Pacific American Federation which represented all the groups.
Frances Namkoong [00:43:15] And I was the first president, 1982.
David Namkoong [00:43:18] And so it’s been about 30 years then where we’ve continued this. And one of the outcomes of this, as a matter of fact, we had a Asian event this just about a month ago. It was in May. May has been designated the official Asian American Month. Before that, we had a big event over at Asia Plaza at East 30th and Payne Avenue. You might have heard about that.
Frances Namkoong [00:43:53] And all this time he kept his profile low because he worked for NASA.
David Namkoong [00:44:00] No. Well, this is much after.
Frances Namkoong [00:44:01] Yeah, I know, but still you did. And I was, you know, practically the only woman in Cleveland or Cincinnati was in the beginning that. So it was quite a load to carry. But I think the movement has grown and grown and grown so that it was really began to have a life of its own. So that was very nice.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:44:24] Right. And that was. And that’s national, isn’t it? What, the Asian.
David Namkoong [00:44:30] Asian American. Well, it’s not national as such, but there have been these individual Asian groups like. We belong also to the organizations of Chinese Americans. Even though I’m not Chinese, I participated in that. And that started out as targeting mainly the efforts of the Chinese and Chinese Americans here. What kind. That was a very big discrimination, but they have grown.
David Namkoong [00:45:15] So now they’re represented, representing all of the Asian Americans too. And I think these other Asian organizations are doing the same thing. So keeping the core recognition for their ethnic group, but still encouraging all of the Asian Americans.
Frances Namkoong [00:45:36] And all this time he could not participate because he worked for NASA. So that was a sticky situation.
David Namkoong [00:45:45] Nothing to do with-
Frances Namkoong [00:45:46] I know, but still that, you know, you were bound by NASA to pay a low profile. You went out of that profile. But then. Well, that’s another story.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:46:01] Okay, is there- Is there- You have a whole full list. Is there anything- I don’t want to not talk about things that you wrote down.
David Namkoong [00:46:15] I think probably that’s about more important things, anyway.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:46:21] Oh, I mean, we still have about 10 minutes.
David Namkoong [00:46:28] Well, one of the things that I participated in is this thing of some years ago, I guess back in around 1980 or thereabouts, they published this announcement that they were going to incorporate something which encouraged people from the different groupings, whether the ethnic or whatever, to submit articles for the newspapers. And of course, those things presumably thought to be most important for that particular group. And they called that the Board of Contributors. And so I sent my name in there and was surprised that it was chosen as one of a large number of board of Contributors. And so I wrote some 50 articles from 1983 to about 1997, which included things like we were talking about, about Ludlow, about Asian Americans, about NASA. Really anything that I thought would be interesting in which I might have some more information than the public.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:48:21] So that coincided, right, with the 75th anniversary of Shaker, didn’t it? 76 anniversary would have been ’85?
David Namkoong [00:48:34] Well, no, I don’t think it had anything to do with it. I don’t know. It was before or after, but.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:48:40] Oh, okay.
David Namkoong [00:48:41] Yeah.
Frances Namkoong [00:48:46] And I was active in the movement, of course, but so that was exciting time. Goodness, was very important to have the civil rights. The Fair Housing act. And that was a big thing at that time. Fair Housing act came to pass. And I was luckily very nicely saying I was part of that.
Frances Namkoong [00:49:10] It was very nice.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:49:11] And so even talking about Ludlow in the ’80s, I mean, was there still was an effort to keep Ludlow integrated and to kind of have integration going on in the Shaker area? Was that still an effort that had to continue past the ’60s and ’70s?
David Namkoong [00:49:32] Well, yeah, I guess there was one negative element there which I think hurt Ludlow, and that was that it was decided that the decrease in population reflected itself in having fewer kids in school. And they began closing schools. And Ludlow was one of those that they pinpointed. And this was a really heated argument between the Ludlowites and Shaker or whoever took care of the education there. And unfortunately, we lost that argument. And Ludlow, which was so much a part of the community as far as school is concerned, I think has really been hurt by that. Now our community doesn’t have a local elementary school to encourage kids and families to come in here. And I think that might have cut down the number of individuals with families to come to this area. I think because of that, and I think. I think that has hurt us. And we still have Ludlow Community Association. Again, I think we could have done a lot better.
Frances Namkoong [00:51:15] Very good speakers. We show Nancy Wilson was one of the people who performed at the Carnegie. Not Carnegie hall, but Severance Hall. Nancy Wilson and Fifth Dimensions and so on. They were all. We were very lucky. Ella Fitzgerald. So that was a long time ago. But the movement has taken off by itself so that it really worked out well. Working well.
David Namkoong [00:51:52] I think it’s as good as what Shaker is doing. Speaks for all of Shaker, including Ludlow. We have programs still, but I think it’s mainly influenced by what Shaker as a city does.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:52:10] What Shaker City does, right. Do you think Shaker is still, you know, a diverse community and still a good place to live?
Frances Namkoong [00:52:18] Yeah, it’s taken for granted now. It’s just part of every day. So at the time, it was big and new and we were one of the first, you know. But now it’s really taken for granted. Yeah. So that was exciting.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:52:42] Just going back to Dr. King for a second. When in ’68, when the assassination occurred for Dr. King, did that hinder the love of community or did it kind.
Frances Namkoong [00:52:55] Of motivate it motivated them? You can see that picture of. That’s me and Dr. King. And he was an idol in the community. So it didn’t hinder. It sparked it even more. But that was then.
David Namkoong [00:53:15] Yeah. Well, what he did, I think, established a lot of the programs initiated. And then I think a lot of people were for these kinds of things. And then they populated these directions that Dr. King had shown. So he did his part in laying the groundwork. The rest of us.
Frances Namkoong [00:53:48] Absolutely. Absolutely.
David Namkoong [00:53:50] To take.
Frances Namkoong [00:53:53] He added a great deal.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:53:56] Mm-hmm. Right. Is there anything else that you guys think is worthwhile in regards to [inaudible] integration?
Frances Namkoong [00:54:06] Seems like a long time ago, doesn’t it?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:54:10] Anything that we didn’t touch on?
Frances Namkoong [00:54:12] No, I think that’s going well. Civil rights is no longer that big of a dividing issue.
David Namkoong [00:54:22] Yeah, that’s a different.
Frances Namkoong [00:54:23] But then it was.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:54:24] In a different form.
David Namkoong [00:54:25] Yeah. A different form. Yeah.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:54:27] I think we’re still struggling as a country a little bit.
Frances Namkoong [00:54:29] Yeah. Right.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:54:30] Just because racism is so ingrained.
David Namkoong [00:54:33] It takes different forms of discrimination and such.
Frances Namkoong [00:54:39] At the time, it seemed very difficult. Yeah, it really was. And I felt like I was all alone because David could not participate since he worked with NASA for a government agency. And a lot of the. Not glamour, but really tough things that came along, I had to be and had to stand up for it.
Frances Namkoong [00:55:08] So that was difficult. But nevertheless, it worked out well.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:55:12] Not impossible.
Frances Namkoong [00:55:13] Yeah, in fact, it was. I’m glad we went through that process.
David Namkoong [00:55:19] You know, one of the things down here, it was an interesting venture, but A friend of ours, a businessman, Anthony Yen, of what time on radio? Its dial is 1300. I forgot what the, you know, the letters. So this was called the Asian Hour.
Frances Namkoong [00:56:01] That was good. That was really good.
David Namkoong [00:56:05 So anything having to do with Asian season either in Asia or Asian America, he would be talking about that as far as the news to the public is concerned. He had us there one time, and evidently he liked us enough so that he asked us to participate every week on that. So we did that for about a. I think about three years or so. I think he’s gone off the air by now, so that was a very interesting experience. So we could be talking about Asia itself, in which Fran and I was on a part business and part pleasure trip to Asia. And this is our first time setting foot in Asia. We were born here in the United States, but this was the opportunity to visit Japan, China and Korea. And the thing that Fran was most enthused about was walking the Great Wall.
Frances Namkoong [00:57:15] Oh, that was exciting. That’s a big wall.
David Namkoong [00:57:19] And then I had the opportunity to visit my grandfather’s grave there. And that’s the whole story in itself, but he is famous in history, Korean history, and particularly in his effort to overcome Japan’s effort to stifle Korean culture, language and so forth. He was tortured and things like that. So his name is still deified even to this day. So I have the opportunity to go there to see his grave. And the village there still has all of these inscriptions on the wall and statues and so forth. So this was very meaningful to me, too.
Frances Namkoong [00:58:26] That seems like a long time ago now.
David Namkoong [00:58:28] It was around 1998, I think, around that time. Wow.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:58:35] I would love to go to Asia. Diverse.
Frances Namkoong [00:58:39] Yeah.
David Namkoong [00:58:40] Large area.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:58:42] Yeah.
Frances Namkoong [00:58:44] And the Great Wall. We were on the Great Wall. That was a huge.
David Namkoong [00:58:48] Besides that. Yeah. Tiananmen Square City, Forbidden City, and terracotta soldiers.
Frances Namkoong [00:58:57] Yeah, Terracotta.
David Namkoong [00:58:58] So that was-
Frances Namkoong [00:58:59] That was exciting.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:59:00] I’m a- I’m a sucker for archaeology. So the terracotta soldiers are like-
Frances Namkoong [00:59:04] Oh, yeah. Amazing. Amazing. Just how they did that.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:59:10] Yeah. There’s- There’s at least. There’s thousands.
David Namkoong [00:59:13] Yeah. Right. And they’re uncovering that all the time, more and more. And there’s one pit there in which we see all the pieces, and somehow they know how to put the pieces together to make a hole so that they could join this line of soldiers there.
Frances Namkoong [00:59:31] That was amazing how they, you know.
David Namkoong [00:59:34] Talk about jigsaw puzzle. That’s jigsaw puzzle to the nth degree.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:59:38] Right. But even with all the pieces, there’s so many surviving that are whole. You know that are amazing shape.
Frances Namkoong [00:59:50] Yeah, it was an amazing experience. So. So we did get to go to China.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [00:59:55] Yeah, I remember there was a. I don’t know if it was an Asian exhibit or if it was specifically China, but at the. At the Science center, they had a couple years ago.
Frances Namkoong [01:00:08] Oh, yes, yes.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:09] Didn’t they have. I don’t know if it was a replica or the real one, but they did have, like, a little tibit on the terracotta.
Frances Namkoong [01:00:16] Right, right.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:17] Was it specifically China?
Frances Namkoong [01:00:19] I think, yeah.
David Namkoong [01:00:20] Terracotta would be China.
Frances Namkoong [01:00:21] The terracotta. Yeah.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:22] I’m trying to think of that exhibit if it was specifically China, if it was Asia as a whole. I can’t remember.
David Namkoong [01:00:28] Was that at the Science Center?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:30] Yeah, that was the Science Center a couple years ago. I think it was maybe 12-ish. I think would have been a long time ago.
Frances Namkoong [01:00:41] Yeah, I was in the middle of a lot of things. That’s amazing.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:47] Right, yeah, I would love to go. I’m jealous.
David Namkoong [01:00:52] Well, you have time.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:54] Yeah, I do have time.
Frances Namkoong [01:00:55] You’re with what group now With.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:00:59] I’m with Cleveland State, yeah.
Frances Namkoong [01:01:01] Yeah, Cleveland State.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:01:02] I go to school there, so.
Frances Namkoong [01:01:04] Very nice.
David Namkoong [01:01:05] But how many interviews are you taking?
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:01:08] Well, for Shaker, there’s two other undergrad student interviewers as well, so there’s three of us total. And for Shaker, we want at least 50.
Frances Namkoong [01:01:21] Wow.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:01:23] So, yeah, I myself have done about six already.
Frances Namkoong [01:01:26] So that’s good.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:01:30] Yeah. Yeah. I like talking to people.
Frances Namkoong [01:01:34] That’s good.
Gabriella Halligan-Taylor [01:01:35] Interesting. But I think we’re out of time.
Frances Namkoong [01:01:41] Yeah. Okay.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.
