I SEE U, Episode 58: Slavery Ties That Bind Freedom [Encore]

[00:00:00] Eddie Robinson: In 1959, Betty Kilby Baldwin and her family were terrorized when they defied their local school board and the governor of Virginia to desegregate the only high school in their county. And yet, in 2007, she was willing to talk to a descendant of a family who had once enslaved her ancestors.

[00:00:22] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I think that it is up to all of us to find out who we are.

[00:00:27] Eddie Robinson: I’m Eddie Robinson, and stay tuned for a provocative episode that deals with forgiveness, acceptance, and reconciliation. We’ll speak with Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin, a Black woman who’s a descendant of slaves. And Phoebe Kilby, a white woman who’s a descendant of a former slave owner. How did they forge a bond of friendship despite dealing with their family’s painful history?

[00:00:53] Eddie Robinson: Oh yeah, I feel you. We hear you. I SEE U.

[00:01:02] Eddie Robinson: This episode deals with issues that could be difficult for some listeners, including rape and suicide. Discretion is advised.

[00:01:13] Eddie Robinson: It’s I SEE U. I’m Eddie Robinson. An unlikely pair connected through a history that’s been filled with racism, discrimination, bondage. And even rape. These two individuals are now sharing a bond filled with acceptance, forgiveness, redemption, and grace. On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on August 23rd, 1963, the Reverend Dr.

[00:01:41] Eddie Robinson: Martin Luther King Jr. During his infamous, I have a dream speech delivered a line that that left many folks skeptical while others felt a bit optimistic. The powerful quote that was said in partial, I have a dream that one day the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

[00:02:06] Eddie Robinson: Well, slowly through time, even if it takes one incident at a time. A dream is starting to become fulfilled. We here at I SEE U are so grateful to have with us a daughter of former slaves, a daughter of former slave owners, and together they’re sitting down at an I SEE U table of sisterhood.

[00:02:28] Eddie Robinson: Our first guest, Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin. She’s a pioneer in school desegregation. She grew up in a rural area known as Front Royal, Virginia. Thanks to her father’s determination, she entered and graduated from Warren County High School after suing the school board based on the landmark Supreme Court Brown v. Board of Education decision of 1954.

[00:02:52] Eddie Robinson: In 2002, she released the autobiographical, Wit, Wills and Walls, which tells the story of her family’s struggle for equality and how they literally had to force compliance of the high court case, outlawing segregation. The book also shows how she started out at the lowest level of a fortune 500 company only to become the highest ranking African American female in 1986.

[00:03:20] Eddie Robinson: Our second guest, Phoebe Kilby, a native of Baltimore, Maryland, Phoebe is the descendant of the family that once owned and enslaved Dr. Betty’s family. You see, Phoebe’s father’s family owned slaves, but growing up, he and his family would never talk about it. Her father had grown up in Virginia with family roots there since before the American revolution.

[00:03:45] Eddie Robinson: After picking up degrees in Botany and Environmental Management from Duke, Phoebe went back to school in 2003 to obtain a degree in Conflict Transformation from Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. She was inspired by a movement known as Coming To The Table, an organization that seeks to heal racial wounds of the past.

[00:04:09] Eddie Robinson: Well, the both of them teamed up in 2021 to write an inspiring book called Cousins. They continue their committed journey to a path of reconciliation, and they were recently featured in a series special on Netflix. We welcome them both to share their stories in hopes of building more relationships and healing for others.

[00:04:28] Eddie Robinson: Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin and Phoebe Kilby, thank you enormously for being special guests right here on I SEE U.

[00:04:37] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And thank you for having us.

[00:04:39] Phoebe Kilby: Thank you.

[00:04:40] Eddie Robinson: So, let’s start with you, Ms. Betty. Do you recall the first time that you heard Dr. King’s I Have a Dream speech back in 1963? Do you remember even hearing that former slave’s line and recall how you felt upon hearing those words from Dr. King?

[00:04:58] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Well, when we desegregated the schools. Dr. King was just Reverend Martin Luther King, and he came to Front Royal once, and I had an opportunity to meet him, but had no idea who he was. So on August the 23rd, 1963, I had just graduated from high school. I had put that whole traumatic journey behind me, not necessarily behind me, but in its proper place where I could function after I graduated.

[00:05:37] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: But I couldn’t get into college because my grades were so bad. And I was at the Perkins home taking care of their baby because that was like the only kind of job that I still could get in 1963. And I watched Dr. Martin Luther King’s speech on the TV. And I couldn’t really relate to it because I was still harboring a whole lot of hurt, but we were brought up to love and respect Dr. King. And so we did

[00:06:15] Eddie Robinson: Ms. Phoebe. You know what? What were your thoughts when you first heard that line in August of 1963? What was going through your mind?

[00:06:27] Phoebe Kilby: Well, let’s see. In August of 1963, I was 11 years old. So. I’m not sure I registered much of anything, or if I even heard it at the time, because, you know, so, I can’t really say that I, at that point, certainly, I didn’t know anything.

[00:06:49] Phoebe Kilby: I can imagine my parents being so conservative at the time, they probably didn’t even have it on the TV. So, it took a while for me to get to the point where I began to, recognize Dr. King, and I would say it started, unfortunately, when he was assassinated, and I was 15. And Baltimore, where I grew up, exploded in riots.

[00:07:18] Phoebe Kilby: And I remember seeing that on TV by that time, and thinking, understanding, or beginning, I should say, beginning to understand the pain that the African American community felt when he was assassinated. As much as you can when you’re a 15 year old kid. But I also remember going, Why are they burning their own neighborhoods?

[00:07:43] Phoebe Kilby: I thought, why aren’t they coming after me and my neighborhood, which is not that far away? And not, and just asking those questions, not understanding. But that’s when I really began to see that Martin Luther King was an extremely important figure. And then later on, in high school, I had teachers that brought this up, thank goodness.

[00:08:05] Phoebe Kilby: And that’s where I really began to change my mind and thoughts about race, because I had grown up in a racist household, and I had to come to my own conclusions as I grew up.

[00:08:17] Eddie Robinson: Brown vs. Board of Education. This was a landmark 1954 Supreme Court case in which the justices ruled unanimously that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, even if the segregated schools were otherwise equal in quality.

[00:08:35] Eddie Robinson: Here. Existed a law which gave equal access to education for Blacks, and it was fascinating to think, Miss Betty, that the high school which barred you from attending, instead of keeping the school open, the state of Virginia decided to shut down and close the school for six months in an attempt to delay the school from being integrated.

[00:09:00] Eddie Robinson: How did the Brown versus Board of Education decision impact both of your lives? Miss Betty, we’ll start with you.

[00:09:08] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Well, when my first brother graduated from high school, my father was offered to send him away to boarding school. And so he sent my brother James to boarding school, not realizing the Brown decision.

[00:09:22] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: When my second brother graduated in 1962, my daddy’s, he was not satisfied with sending my oldest brother to boarding school. So he went back to the school board to ask for other options. So they sent them on a round trip. 26 miles from where we live. They had to get up at 6 o’clock in the morning, they had to walk to the railroad track, and catch the bus.

[00:09:48] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: There was a white bus going, a bus carrying white children, going right on down the road, passed them, threw mud and water up on them when they hit the pothole. And so, my daddy wasn’t satisfied with that either. So my father decided that it’s time for me to graduate. He wasn’t satisfied with any of the options that the school board was offering him, but in the school, Black school, where my brother was going, was a man named Reverend Frank.

[00:10:19] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And Reverend Frank knew about the Brown decision. And he came to Warren County’s NAACP meeting and he told them about the Brown decision. And my daddy was real excited because Right there, as soon as he heard Reverend Frank talking about the Brown decision that allowed, outlawed, segregated schools, he was ready to send me.

[00:10:45] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And so he put together a, the NAACP in Warren County. And he went to Richmond, he talked to the same lawyers that was handling the original Brown decision in Farmville, Virginia. And when the lawyer heard his story, the lawyer said, Oh, we’ve been in litigation since 1950, 54. He said, but we haven’t, we’ve just kind of stalled.

[00:11:15] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: But we think we have a winnable case. And sure enough, they did. And so, because we didn’t have but one high school in the county, and that was for white children only. And he gathered up a group of families, and they filed the petition, and they closed, the governor of Virginia, closed the schools. And Virginia had already started putting together some laws called the Massive Resistance Laws that allowed the governor to close the schools should any judge order compliance with the Brown decision.

[00:11:49] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And the rest is history. The school stayed closed for six months, but on February the 18th. It was my case that brought about the first desegregation of the schools in Virginia.

[00:12:07] Eddie Robinson: Ms. Phoebe, how did this court case, Brown v. Board, impact your life? And, in essence, you know, as a white person during this Supreme Court decision, what were your honest thoughts about race at that time?

[00:12:21] Phoebe Kilby: Well, Baltimore City schools desegregated immediately. D. C., Washington, D. C., and Baltimore City desegregated immediately after Brown v. Board of Education. So, when it came time for, and I was born in 1952, so I was only two years old at that point. When it came time for me to go to school, what did my father and the family do? They sent me to private school. Now, I don’t remember them talking about this. But, you know, looking back on it, when I, after I met Betty and started thinking about it, I went, they sent me that school because they didn’t want to send me to integrated schools in the public schools in Baltimore.

[00:13:04] Phoebe Kilby: And this school was a private girl’s school that was all white. And my school did not desegregate. I think the first black girl came to the school in 1966, and the first two girls came into my class in 1967. Well, By that time, even though I grew up in a racist household, and I vividly remember, I, I don’t know whether he, my father used, uh, Dr.

[00:13:34] Phoebe Kilby: Martin Luther, Coon, that’s hard to say, but he did use that word at home when speaking about African Americans. I vividly remember that. He didn’t use the N word, he tended to use that C word. So I grew up in all this racism, but by the time these girls came into my class in 1967, what my parents didn’t know is that this private girl’s school had really intelligent teachers, excellent teachers, whose whole goal was to teach us to think for ourselves.

[00:14:13] Phoebe Kilby: And to reason things out. And by that point, I had separated from my parents in terms of my thinking. Not physically, but thinking. I lived in a different intellectual world, where I was beginning to explore these ideas of race and what it meant. And I had teachers that assigned books like, Black Like Me, which really impacted me.

[00:14:40] Phoebe Kilby: I also read the autobiography of Malcolm X, Sold on Ice by Eldridge Cleaver. Those are all books of that era, that opened up my mind. Now what I do regret, when I think about that time period, is when those two girls came into my class. I, I didn’t have many classes with them. I had been in that school for so long that I was taking very high level AP kind of classes.

[00:15:07] Phoebe Kilby: And so they weren’t in my classes, because they’d come from the public schools. Very smart kids, but you know, they hadn’t grown up in this private school environment. But did I really reach out to them? And befriend them? No. I didn’t do that. And I look back on that, you know, I was a very shy kid. And I, you know, wasn’t sure of myself, but I think I could have done better.

[00:15:36] Phoebe Kilby: So, I look back on that and I think, Well, Phoebe, you could have been more friendly. You could have struck up a friendship with those girls, and you didn’t. So, but that’s in hindsight. You know, when you’re a kid, you’re kind of clueless. You know, you’re worried more about what your hair looks like and how cool your clothes are than things like that.

[00:16:06] Eddie Robinson: Coming up, we’ll continue our chat with these two women, a Black woman and a white woman, who discover their past and each other. We’ll learn more from author Phoebe Kilby and how she took the initiative to start doing research about her family who were slave owners of Dr. Betty’s ancestors. Plus, find out what happens when activist family members of Dr. Betty… Discover that she’s been talking with the descendant of a former slave owner behind their backs. You can best believe that they were ready and waiting for some form of reparation. Yeah, reparations in the form of an 1865 promise for land made by the federal government to former slaves. I’m Eddie Robinson.

[00:16:46] Eddie Robinson: You do not want to miss our next segment of I SEE U right after this.

[00:16:57] Eddie Robinson: If you’re enjoying this program, please be sure to subscribe to our podcast, I SEE U with Eddie Robinson, you can hear all the past episodes and be notified when new episodes are released. Also, please take a minute to give us a review or comment. We love getting feedback from our listeners.

[00:17:30] Eddie Robinson: It’s I SEE U. I’m Eddie Robinson, and we’re speaking with author, Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin, a descendant of slaves and a pioneer in school desegregation. We’re also joined by author Phoebe Kilby. A descendant of the family that once owned and enslaved Dr. Betty’s family. Together, they’ve written a book called Cousins.

[00:17:52] Eddie Robinson: They both share and tell their story of how they were both able to reconcile their differences of race and start forging the path of healing. So here we are, January, February, 1959, the Virginia Supreme Court struck down the state’s resistance laws and ordered Warren County High School to open and integrate.

[00:18:15] Eddie Robinson: Miss Betty, if at all possible, walk us through what it was like walking up those steps of Warren County High School and share with us what all happened to you at school while you attended.

[00:18:30] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Well, we had been sent to school in December to Washington, D. C. to get us familiar with the integrated school system, and I really didn’t want to leave Washington, D. C. because the people that I stayed with, Reverend Carter, had a daughter, and she opened up my mind to who I really was. And so going back to Warren County was the last thing that I wanted to do, but she told me that I had to do it. And so we went back home, and it was the night before we were supposed to go to school.

[00:19:13] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And it was on February the 17th, and I was washing dishes, and shots was fired at our house. And you have to remember that I’m a little, at this point, I’m a little 14 year old girl. And when the shots was fired at the house, I fainted. I woke to my mother’s slap in my face, and she was crying hysterically.

[00:19:39] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And with that in mind, that night, we had heard about the little girl in Little Rock, Arkansas, who had gotten separated from her group. And so we wanted to make sure that everyone was protected. And we were together. So we had a meeting. And so rather than to continue to clean up the kitchen, we went to church to the meeting and my father was his voice was cracking.

[00:20:10] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I’ve never seen my father exercise any kind of fear, but his voice was cracking and he told the group what had happened at the house. Reverend Frank began to pray. We heavily relied on God to carry us through this journey. In fact, they told us that we were soldiers, soldiers in God’s army, marching to get an education for all of his children.

[00:20:40] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And we had our meeting. We talked about who was going to pick up whom. Because most of our fathers worked at the American Fist Coast Corporation, and they were not allowed to take off that day. And so we were, we had to ride with somebody else. I got up that morning, and as a 14 year old girl, I was scared to death.

[00:21:06] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And so at first, I did the normal thing. You make excuses for not wanting to do this. And my mother said, she made my favorite pancakes. And she said, as soon as you eat some of these pancakes, you’ll be okay. You just have butterflies in your stomach. Well, as I ate those pancakes, I thought that I was going to throw them up at any given minute.

[00:21:34] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: But I knew better. I knew what we had to do. So as I walked out the door, my mother says to my brothers, Y’all take care of your sister now. You hear me? You take care of your sister and I could hear the fear in her voice and the fear in her voice did nothing to calm me, but I got in the car and we went to the foot of the hill and I always wondered why they made us walk through that crowd.

[00:22:06] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And as I got out the car and we were walking up the hill and I walked past this big old fat white lady and she said, we’re going to kill all you little And I, I was, I was stunned and just stood there. And my brother pushed me in the back to keep me moving. And I began to recite the Lord is my shepherd.

[00:22:29] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I shall not want. And the next thing I know, I was saying, yay, though I walked through the valley, the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. And it empowered me. To keep on going and somebody in the group, uh, group began to sing, We Shall Overcome and always loved singing. I can’t carry a tune, but I love singing.

[00:22:53] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And we sang our way up the hill the first day of school when we met our principal. And I was brought up in the church. I was brought up to love everybody. And I was brought up to be polite and the polite thing that you do is you speak to somebody and I spoke to Mr. Duff and he looked at me with such contempt and he didn’t even speak back.

[00:23:18] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And so that was, that was like my first experience with a white official at Warren County High School. Death would have been more humane than to have to go through day after day being degraded in every way possible, spitballs being thrown at you, teachers not acknowledging you, not acknowledging what children are doing to you.

[00:23:46] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: We, the bus that carried us to school on the way up, we were able to talk about what was safe. And what was unsafe. And we were able to look at each other’s classes and determine, okay, we can hook up here and go to this class and hook up here and go there. And so the objective was never to be caught alone in any part of the school building.

[00:24:18] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Because when the kids came back. After our first year, they were mean, and they were ornery, and they were cruel. And so, in my senior year, there was so few of us left. I had gone to summer school every summer to graduate in 1963 like I was supposed to. We couldn’t go to our own school. school prom, couldn’t participate in sports.

[00:24:47] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: So we were just there and our leaders told us that we were there to get an education. There is no way that you can get an education living under the traumatic, under the traumatic state that I was going to. And in my senior year I had. Both my brothers had graduated, it was only five of us left and I started taking liberties instead of making the square going around to the class on the other side of the school building.

[00:25:23] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I decided to go through the auditorium and I went through the auditorium, went behind the stage so that I could, would not be seen from the doors in front and I was captured and raped. And it almost. Broke my spirit. I didn’t think I had anything left, nothing to live for, but my father was the leader and so there was no way that I couldn’t go on. I couldn’t tell my father because he would have wanted to kill somebody. Because there was an occasion when they fired shots at the house and my daddy got so upset that he got the shotgun and he went out there and he fired back.

[00:26:15] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Thank God that he didn’t get hit. And he scared the people so bad that they, they went on up the road. So I couldn’t, there was no way that I could tell him. I could not put him in jeopardy. And so I cried and I suffered for a whole weekend. But when it was time to go back to school, I went back, but I was explosive.

[00:26:47] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I wanted to die, but I couldn’t die because I had been raised in the church and the Bible says that you can’t kill yourself. And if you kill yourself, you go to an eternal hell. And I wanted the hell that I was experiencing down here on earth to be over. And so I went back to school. When I crossed the streets, I didn’t look both ways, hoping that a car would hit me and kill me.

[00:27:16] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Then I began to race out our little Happy Creek Road. And when I raced the first time, the guy that I raced with, he had been racing out the road all the time. And I told him that he could have the proper lane. And I took the lane that was the wrong side of the road. And we had a curve called Dead Man’s Curve.

[00:27:44] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: When we got to Dead Man’s Curve, I didn’t let up, and I just knew that I would lose control of the car, and that I would die on Dead Man’s Curve. And then one day I hit this lady’s chickens, and the lady’s house was right there at Dead Man’s Curve. And instead of being sorryful at that point in time, I said, fried chicken tonight!

[00:28:07] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: and just thumped on me, and she took the chicken, she put it in a cage, and she put it right there beside the road. So every time I went out the road, I could see that chicken in the cage, and I knew that I had done that. So I went to her house, I thought that she was just a white lady and that she would throw me down in the well, and the well would become my final resting place.

[00:28:36] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: But she asked me, she said, Are you kid, are you one of those children? who been racing out this road and I said, yes, ma’am. And she said, come here, child. And she made me promise that I wouldn’t race out that road. And she gave me a hug.

[00:28:54] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: That white lady changed my life that day because I automatically gave up the racing. But I was still out of control. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. So I ended up in the hospital. Another man, an orderly, a preacher from our church. He sat on the foot of my bed and he said, What’s wrong with you, child? I said, I want to die.

[00:29:20] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And all of a sudden he said, Me too. So it jerked me back into reality. Well, what’s your story? You know? And then he went on to ask me how long I’d been in that school. And I told him I’d been there for five years and that I’d graduate in June. And he said, you know, that was a big journey that God has given you.

[00:29:45] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And he said, The best part of your life is just ahead of you. And I believed him that the best part of my life was ahead of me. And so he. Put me back to where I needed to be in order to finish up and graduate.

[00:30:06] Eddie Robinson: Thank you so much. That is unbelievable survival story. Thank you so much for sharing.

[00:30:19] Eddie Robinson: It’s I SEE U. I’m Eddie Robinson, and we’re speaking with author, Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin. We’re also speaking with author Phoebe Kilby. Together they’ve written a book called Cousins and they both share and tell their story of how they were both able to reconcile their differences of race and start forging a path of healing.

[00:30:39] Eddie Robinson: There’s also a Netflix series documentary featuring their story. It’s called Stories of a Generation with Pope Francis, Episode Two. Miss Phoebe, I’d like for you to take us through your thought process of what led you to ultimately seek out Miss Betty. You know, as I understand it, you discovered this organization called Coming to the Table and they had played a key role in you deciding to connect with Miss Betty, right?

[00:31:07] Phoebe Kilby: Yes, I, uh, went to work at a university, you mentioned it earlier, Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. That’s a small little college, but it has an amazing Peace Building program. It’s actually known around the world for bringing together divided peoples and helping them work toward peace.

[00:31:28] Phoebe Kilby: And so I went to work there and that’s when I found out that they had been helping a group of descendants of enslavers and descendants of persons who had been enslaved to create this concept of coming to the table based on Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream speech. And when I came to work there, they had one meeting earlier in the year, and I heard about it and I thought, Wow, that’s really something.

[00:31:57] Phoebe Kilby: And I thought, I wonder if my family enslaved people. And I thought, this seems really probable. This seems really probable because, you know, my father’s racial attitudes and I knew the family had lived in Virginia for many, many years, it just seemed likely, even though my father had never talked about this.

[00:32:19] Phoebe Kilby: And I thought, I should, I should look into this. I should face up to this. And so I started the research, went over to the Historical Society and got them to help me. And within a few minutes, they helped me figure out that, yes indeed, my family did enslave people. Uh, we looked up my great great grandfather in the 1840 census and it was all there.

[00:32:41] Phoebe Kilby: Two slaves. It’s pretty sobering to see this, I must say. But, you know, I really wanted to know more than just my great great grandfather and two slaves. And they said, well, you know, to find names, you’re not going to find the names of these enslaved persons in the census. Why don’t you try the courthouse next door and look for wills and things like that?

[00:33:05] Phoebe Kilby: So I did, and I started finding wills of family members where they listed an estate inventory of everything they owned, and they’re listed among all the things they owned, like the land, the crop in the field, the horses, the plow, and things like that were slaves and it was shocking to see the names, and one will I found in particular from 1834 named a woman Sarah and her child Juliet.

[00:33:39] Phoebe Kilby: And now I had names of people from 1865. And I found, in the Historical Society, Betty’s book that she had written, Wit, Will, and Walls. So I thought, well, here’s this African American woman, she’s got Kilby in her name, this might give me some clues. So I read her book, and she tells her amazing story that she told you about desegregating the schools, which is obviously the most important part of the book.

[00:34:08] Phoebe Kilby: But what I did pick up were clues that we were connected. Because I found out that her father had grown up on a farm, and I could tell that it was like a mile away from where my father grew up. So this seemed really, uh, suspicious, right? You know, there’s gotta be some connection. Uh, same last name, grew up really close to each other.

[00:34:30] Phoebe Kilby: So I went to my Coming To The Table friends and, and, you know, To see if they could help me. I thought they’d help me with genealogical research advice. Like how to connect those people, Juliet and Simon and her kids to, to Betty and her father. And they said, no, no, you need to contact Betty. Next week is Martin Luther King Day and that will be a good day to do it.

[00:34:55] Phoebe Kilby: Wow. I mean, I just figured out my family and enslaved people and he’s, and they’re saying to me, Go ahead and contact Betty. So, I wrote up an email. I didn’t know what I was doing. I just sent it to her. And I didn’t hear anything. Nothing. You know, a day went by, two days, a week, two weeks. I thought, okay, she doesn’t want to talk to somebody like me.

[00:35:21] Phoebe Kilby: Why would she? Why would she want to talk to somebody who could be potentially descendant from her family’s enslavers? So I went back to the Coming To The Table people, and I tell you, those people were relentless. They would not let me off the hook. They said, well, Phoebe, you need to send her another email and tell her everything you know.

[00:35:40] Phoebe Kilby: So, that’s what I did. And within a couple hours I got a response from Betty. It turned out she wa she was having computer issues. She hadn’t seen the first email. The second one prompted her and she read both of them and she responded and the subject line of her email was, Hello cousin. I was blown away.

[00:36:09] Phoebe Kilby: I was, I was, I was very, I was excited, and here’s somebody who’d opened her heart enough to call me cousin when we really didn’t even know. I didn’t know if she was really my cousin at that point, but she wanted to talk to me. And she invited me to come meet her and her family. So that was how we got connected.

[00:36:31] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Well, what Phoebe didn’t realize was I had already, when I wrote my book, that was when I overcame. Because I had succeeded in spite of everything. And I had a philosophy that said, Success is the best revenge. So I had succeeded through the trauma that I had experienced when I was in high school. I had taken on a Fortune 500 company.

[00:37:05] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And climbed that corporate ladder from the very first rung to the, to a level 18. No other African American woman had done that before. So I was pleased with everything that I had done. And I had lived to write about it. But nobody told me that once you write a, write a book, and you’re relieved because you’ve been able to tell everybody.

[00:37:31] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: What happened to you when you couldn’t do it when you were a child? And so I had started, I’d gone around the world. I went to Germany, I went to, to, um, I went to, I went all over. I visited every state in these United States promoting my book. And the premiere was about to air. And here along comes Phoebe.

[00:37:58] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Right at the appropriate time, my mind was ready. for her. My heart was ready for her. And to be able to stand before that documentary play and say tonight I have the privilege of living Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream of the sons and daughters of former slaves and former slave owners at the table of brotherhood.

[00:38:28] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: So that was a tremendous opportunity that Phoebe had given me. I mean, it was almost the climax of my life. of my story, but yet it was just the beginning of the next chapter and of the conclusion that I always wanted when I started on this journey.

[00:38:58] Eddie Robinson: Coming up, more with Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin and Phoebe Kilby, two women connected through slavery. We’ll go deeper and learn how Dr. Betty discovered her path of healing. and reconciliation through so much generational trauma that she’s still experiencing to this very day. And how are white Americans whose families owned slaves grappling with stories and narratives of those descendants who are now tracing their histories linked to some form of slavery.

[00:39:32] Eddie Robinson: I’m Eddie Robinson. Our final segment of I SEE U happens. In just a moment.

[00:39:44] Eddie Robinson: If you’re enjoying this program, please be sure to subscribe to our podcast. I SEE U with Eddie Robinson. You can hear all the past episodes and be notified when new episodes are released. Also, please take a minute to give us a review or comment. We love getting feedback from our listeners.

[00:40:10] Eddie Robinson: You’re listening to I SEE U. I’m Eddie Robinson, and we’re speaking with authors, Dr. Betty Kilby, Fisher Baldwin, and Phoebe Kilby. Together, they’ve co authored a book entitled Cousins Connected Through Slavery. A Black woman and a white woman discover their past. And each other, Miss Betty, I’m sure you tell us about your family members when they discovered that you’ve been conversating with this descendant of the family who had enslaved them.

[00:40:38] Eddie Robinson: I mean, that had to have been sort of like a reawakening for them. And I’m sure you had family members that were saying, you know, where’s my 40 acres in a mule? And perhaps some saying, You know, I’ll take the 40 acres, but you know, I’ll settle for a Volvo, you know, how were some of them reacting when you told them about this?

[00:40:57] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Well, I forgot to tell them up until a week prior to the airing of a word of us coming together. And so I called them all one by one. Now, I’ve always been an absolutely crazy person. Because. I’ve done things that takes most people outside of their element. And so, it wasn’t an odd thing for me to do. But it was something that some said, yes, I’ll participate with it.

[00:41:35] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And others said, you, you have just got, you’ve lost your mind this time. My, my two daughters, my two older daughters, they were coming to the dinner. They both lived in the area and I had totally missed Christmas. So I had totally neglected my family because I was on a mission. I was going to get this book out.

[00:41:58] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: My daughters played, they ran interception for me, but my brother sat next to Phoebe and he did ask her, where’s my 48 acres and a mule? But the thing that we are accustomed to as African Americans is White folks coming around you, but they’re coming to get something. And so the question was proposed to Phoebe with, What was he, what were you after?

[00:42:31] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And how long are you going to stick around? You know, because when you are a family of activists, you’ve ruffled a lot of feathers. And most white people can’t stand the heat in the kitchen. But I’m going to tell you Phoebe had to be kin to me because she took everything and she everything and she just kept on coming.

[00:42:57] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Now, how do you not admire a person like that? She, she wasn’t afraid of anything. And I said, Ooh, that girl’s just like me. Except she’s white and I’m Black. Yeah. You know? Yeah. But that was an interesting time. And. It was really a fun time.

[00:43:15] Eddie Robinson: And I can think about Ms. Phoebe. I mean, like, how did you and your family, right, come together to initiate some form of communication with Ms.

[00:43:24] Eddie Robinson: Betty’s family? I’m sure you and your family were trying to decide what to do to start the quest for possible reparations. I don’t know. But were there any family members that opposed? You know, look, I’m sorry, we’re not interested in doing this. Phoebe, to the left, to the left, this is not, leave it alone. This was in the past. Did you experience backlash with your family?

[00:43:48] Phoebe Kilby: Well, you might be surprised, but no. I’ve had no opposition. And I think the big reason for that is that all the people who would have opposed were in my father’s generation and they have all passed along and I’m sure my father would not be appreciative of what I’m doing or what I have done, but he’s been around. So I did initially tell my sister and she was completely supportive and she lived in the area so that when Betty invited me to meet her family and go to the premiere of Wit, Will, and Walls the film I, I called, I asked Betty, can I bring my sister, and she said yes, and my sister came with me, and so she was very supportive, and then, I’ve had, uh, cousins, white cousins, who have heard about what I’m doing, and contacted me, and expressed their support.

[00:44:47] Phoebe Kilby: So I’ve been very lucky, so it’s been really wonderful and one cousin in particular, Tim Kilby, turns out is just a wonderful genealogist and he had taken the white family genealogy, had all that information, Well, he started working on Betty’s family, and as you, as you probably know, and others that are African American know, it’s often very difficult to do your genealogy, because prior to the end of the Civil War and through the 1870 census, you didn’t exist as a person, you were property.

[00:45:20] Eddie Robinson: That’s right.

[00:45:21] Phoebe Kilby: So, uh, you have to use the, unfortunately, the enslaver’s records to figure a lot of this out. Well, my cousin Tim has created a whole family tree for that enslaved woman I mentioned, Juliet. Thank goodness she had an unusual name. Right. That helped. And, um, he has taken her and all her kids and then just exploded this family tree into a mighty monarch.

[00:45:51] Phoebe Kilby: And, uh, this is now publicly available on Ancestry and other, other genealogical sites. So people in Betty’s family can go and find out more about their family’s, uh, history. More easily because the research is being done. And I would like to say that they’re coming to the table as a group, you know, has members that are African American and European American.

[00:46:16] Phoebe Kilby: But the European Americans have taken it on, many of us, to do this genealogical research and make it available to anybody who wants. And that’s, it’s taken on, as in a way, a very small step toward a very expansive view, I would say, of reparation by helping, uh, in, bring to light history that was hidden by our official system.

[00:46:43] Phoebe Kilby: And so, one of our Coming to the Table members, Sharon Morgan, who’s African American, created a website called Our Black Ancestry. And… He encourages white folks to post genealogical information there so that African Americans can access it and find out more about their history. So we, we, many of us feel it’s very important to do this research and not hide it, not keep it there at home in the family Bible or whatever, but to broadcast it out there so that African Americans have more opportunities to learn about their past.

[00:47:22] Phoebe Kilby: And it is. And that has spawned so many people to make these connections. I have many people who come to me and say, Phoebe, how did you do this? And what, how can I connect? And how do I figure out who’s living today that, that might be connected to my family? And I don’t have all the answers, but I help the best I can.

[00:47:43] Phoebe Kilby: And we’re all in this together. together to create these connections.

[00:47:47] Eddie Robinson: Yeah. And that, that is a great segue to this question. Do you think it’s up to white Americans to go through their family histories to help Black Americans find their ancestral roots? Whose responsibility is it?

[00:48:05] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I think that it is up to all of us to find out who we are. But at the same time, when Phoebe told me that we were connected by blood, that they had done the DNA test, and we truly were, I didn’t need a DNA test to tell me because I already knew that. And so, we need to start to come together, whether we come together to find out who we were, or we take where we are today, and just sit down with somebody who is different from us, to get to know one another, and that’s the only way we That we’re going to solve the race problem in America is to start facing it head on.

[00:48:54] Eddie Robinson: Miss Phoebe, do you think today that many white Americans whose families own slaves are fearful that If truth be told, and data or evidence that would exist that map them to a particular black family that’s living, that that white family may have to perhaps share or forfeit earnings of family inheritance, i. e. land, i. e. property, i. e. scholarships, as a form of reparation to those slave families and or their descendants, do you believe this could be a reason for their fear?

[00:49:29] Phoebe Kilby: I think, first of all, a lot of people don’t want to contemplate that their family might have done these things. They don’t want to, they think of it as a part of their southern heritage, perhaps, that it was legal at the time, so it was okay, and so they don’t want to, They don’t want to think ill of their family, and they don’t want to feel any kind of shame, and, um, I think that’s the first thing, and then, and then maybe they’re afraid of somebody coming after them monetarily, but, you know, this was done so long ago, statute of limitations, it’s not really going to happen, but I think they’re more afraid that somebody at the federal level is going to say, I want your cash and I want to give it to them.

[00:50:16] Phoebe Kilby: And that’s what the fear is. And my feeling is, well, one of my African American friends in Coming To The Table said, You know, Phoebe, there’s enough for all of us. When you think of all the wealth in the United States, there is enough for all of us to live a good life. And I feel like if you think of it in that way, that we can work together as a nation to make amends for some of these wrongs and do it in a way that is respectful of all and meets the needs of all. At least that’s what I hope.

[00:50:51] Eddie Robinson: You’re listening to I SEE U. I’m Eddie Robinson, and we’re speaking with authors Dr. Betty Kilby, Fisher Baldwin, and Phoebe Kilby. Together, they’ve co-authored a book entitled Cousins: Connected Through Slavery. A Black woman and a white woman discover their past. There’s also a Netflix documentary which captures their story through a series called Stories of a Generation with Pope Francis, episode two.

[00:51:19] Eddie Robinson: Miss Betty, how did you come to a place of healing after everything you’ve had to endure, everything you’ve had to suppress, everything you’ve had to bury, the feelings, the emotions, the psychological stress? How did you come to a place of healing?

[00:51:39] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I, uh… You know, it’s kind of hard to know where the healing came from when we were going through a Coming To The Table process. Uh, walking the, what’s that thing called, Phoebe?

[00:51:56] Phoebe Kilby: Coming To the Table has a model for healing from trauma. It helps people work through their traumas. Both, you know, trauma can affect both the perpetrators and the recipients of trauma. How they can work together and escape from this trauma. And we were in a Coming To The Table gathering, where They laid the model out on the floor, and you could walk around and look at all the steps along the way. And Betty and I were doing this.

[00:52:30] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: When I was doing the steps in the circle, I kept seeing words and feelings that I had experienced. And what I realized was, those feelings were deep down in my soul. And as I walked the circle, The feelings began to surface and it was like all of the trauma coming down on me at once.

[00:53:06] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And in all of the accomplishments I made, I made probably utilizing that trauma as my strength. As my revenge because success is the best revenge. But at this point in time, there was no pretense. I didn’t have to prove anything. It was just me and the circle. And all of the feelings that that walk in that circle brought back.

[00:53:43] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And I, I, I kept going through the bad part of that circle. Going back, just repeating, repeating that, the traumatic part of that circle. And then finally when I broke out of the circle. I couldn’t have stopped crying. I was an emotional mess and the, all of the African Americans who were a part of walking through this circle told all the white folks to leave and they encompassed me and they began to pray for me and they told me to let it out, release it.

[00:54:28] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And with just. The African Americans in the room praying, it became, it became a very spiritual thing. Having been brought up a woman of faith, and we prayed our way through releasing that trauma. My ex husband was wounded in Vietnam, and he had shrapnel that went in his back, came out his belly. And he had a wound that… was staying open and we would have to cut that wound and it healed on the outside but it didn’t heal on the inside and so we had to keep cutting away and irrigating the inside of that wound in order to make it heal from the inside and that was me That was me. I had had not healed on the inside, but everything on the outside had healed And just walking that circle and facing the past helped me to, to just truly come through it where I wasn’t amiss.

[00:55:43] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Now, I do have something called, I call PTSS. Post Slave Syndrome and I can, I still have flashbacks of the trauma. I was, was in Disney world in California and we stayed at a hotel outside of Disney world and the fireworks began to reflect through the window. And I thought that that was gunshots being fired and I became hysterical.

[00:56:20] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And I got down on the floor to avoid the gunfire. And this was like almost 30 years later. That sometimes there is a trigger that triggers it. And it never goes away, but at least you’re able to recognize it. And it doesn’t last for a long time. And it doesn’t destroy me. It just makes me stronger.

[00:56:49] Eddie Robinson: That’s right. And you are recognizing it and acknowledging it because, you know, I noticed in the Netflix documentary that you were holding on to your grandchild for dear life as you walked up those steps of Warren High School in Virginia, reminiscing about what that meant to you. that moment was like for you, in which you beautifully, vividly described for us earlier in the show.

[00:57:13] Eddie Robinson: And as I watched this part of the Netflix episode, I thought about my own grandfather. You know, he and his wife, my grandmother, was instrumental in eliminating Jim Crow laws of the South in Macomb, Mississippi, where I’m from. And I can remember when I would When I would be near my grandfather, he would talk to someone about the incidents of racism in Mississippi, and he would hold on to me, and he had this firm grip, whether if it was on my shoulder, whether if it was on my hand.

[00:57:44] Eddie Robinson: And he would discuss these incidents of what it was like for him in his journey. Interestingly enough, my grandmother could never hardly talk to us about anything that transpired with her and her journey. And so… Just watching you and your granddaughter, I can only imagine that during that walk, you know, that recollection walk of people calling and, you know, yelling names at you, um, during that course, it was just so painful, but describe for us how your family, you know, namely your grandchildren, you know, in some interesting and beautiful way have served to help provide you.

[00:58:24] Eddie Robinson: With a strength of encouragement to continue that journey of recollection, right? Because it feels it’s, it still feels a bit deep in the sense of the trauma that you’re still dealing with, that you’re still experiencing. And. I really loved that moment of you grabbing a hold of your granddaughter, and it puts a whole lot into perspective for me as a new father who has Uh, a one year old right now and my grandmother, I mean, well, his grandmother, my mom is through the roof, but it just shows you the amount of strength that you can pull from your family members, right? Especially grandchildren in this day and age.

[00:59:11] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And yes, with both Derek and Gabrielle, who are pictured in the book, who are recipients of the scholarship, they, they lived with me when Phoebe and I first started out doing, we did Cousins. Long before the book was written and Derek has been in presentations with me where he’s been allowed to talk to the audience and from a very young perspective, say how he feels Gabrielle, they they’ve been with me on book signings and if you know when you’re selling books and when I was selling Wit, Will, and Walls, I sold it mainly in military bases.

[00:59:58] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And I would do, I had a little 30 second spill. And a lot of people would just keep on walking. And my little Gabby would say, Oh, that is so rude! And I would tell Gabby that she had to, she had to be quiet. And so Gabby lives about 50 miles from me. She’s going to Texas Southern and, and she has a whole different perspective.

[01:00:26] Eddie Robinson: Wonderful.

[01:00:27] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And when, when my grandchildren who received the scholarship. They have to write a little essay for that scholarship. So they are becoming in tune with my journey and how my journey Impacts them today. So, Everything surrounding this book

[01:00:53] Eddie Robinson: Yes.

[01:00:54] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Helps us all to heal and to come together and to make this nation a better place. But we just have to get out there and touch more people in order to completely change this nation. And that’s, that’s why Phoebe and I do what we do.

[01:01:14] Eddie Robinson: Yes, and Ms. Phoebe, I would love for you to describe for us more about the scholarship fund, as I understand it was inspired by Ms. Betty’s family’s determination to receive an education, right?

[01:01:27] Phoebe Kilby: Right, right, exactly. You know, after, you know, I met Betty and her brother James and others in the family in 2007, so that’s a long time ago, and we’ve been on this journey for a while. But, and, and then… As I got to know the family and became close, I felt like I needed to do something to make amends for my family having enslaved theirs, and you can call that a form of personal reparation.

[01:01:56] Phoebe Kilby: And I went to Betty and James and said, I said, what can I do? Do you have ideas? How can I make amends? And Betty’s first response to me was, well, Phoebe, you didn’t enslave anybody. You don’t need to do anything more than you’re already doing. I just couldn’t let it go. I just thought, there must be something here, and then it just hit me.

[01:02:18] Phoebe Kilby: Education. Here was a family that put their lives on the line for education. Had their house shot at. And Betty, you know, terrorized in her school to get an education. What if I set up a scholarship fund? So I went to Betty and James and put forth this idea, and that’s something they could go for. And I really think the reason was, they weren’t looking for something for themselves.

[01:02:44] Phoebe Kilby: But they had these grandchildren at that point who were in junior high and high school and they were worried about whether they’d be able to afford college. So when I offered this idea, they said, okay, we can go for that. So in 2014, I set up the Kilby Family Endowed Scholarship Fund. It’s housed at a foundation in Pittsburg. It’s a African American run community foundation. It runs alot, it funds the scholarships for the NAACP.

[01:03:14] Phoebe Kilby: So I thought they would be a good place and they’ve been wonderful and we’ve been giving scholarships out since 2014 and this coming school year for 2022 and 2023 we’re giving out seven to different members of the Betty and her brother and other members of their family, their grandkids and four of Betty’s grandkids will get scholarships or getting scholarships for this for this school year.

[01:03:43] Phoebe Kilby: And that’s been phenomenal. I felt like it was an important thing to do. My family benefited from, uh, slavery, the free labor. We had, you know, wealth that could be accumulated because of that free labor. Not that my family was, you know, hugely wealthy when they, after the Civil War, but they did have so many advantages.

[01:04:06] Phoebe Kilby: Based on having slaves, being able to buy land, all those things. I feel like I should take some of that family wealth that I inherited from my fa father and put it into another part of my family. And that’s Betty’s. And that to me is something I am personally, uh, gratified to be able to. And it’s allowed me then to get to know some of these grandkids.

[01:04:33] Eddie Robinson: Yes.

[01:04:33] Phoebe Kilby: And, and…

[01:04:35] Eddie Robinson: Full circle.

[01:04:36] Phoebe Kilby: Broaden the relationship with their, with Betty’s family.

[01:04:40] Eddie Robinson: Miss, Miss Betty, this is for you. Did they ever find out who sexually assaulted you? Or has anyone ever come forward with information?

[01:04:49] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: No, because I never told anyone. The first time that I told somebody… Is when, 40 years later, when I’m writing my book, and I am so, I am so traumatized by reliving it, that I tell the story, and she writes it down for me.

[01:05:14] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: And she was the first editor of my book, Wit, Will and Walls. So no, I never tried to persecute her. But, after I had written my book, that was when I was putting them on notice. I am no longer afraid of you. I am a grown woman now. I’m no longer a little girl. So I was put, if you want me, you come and get me now because I spent a lot of time in fear of what if they came back to get me.

[01:05:47] Eddie Robinson: Yes. This is a question we like to ask our guests towards the end of the conversation at I SEE U. Ms. Phoebe, we’ll start with you. Out of all the accomplishments you’ve made. How you’ve now dedicated your life to helping white Americans, Black Americans, European Americans come together and look to uncover and explore their own truths of their experiences and help them move forward toward racial reconciliation.

[01:06:17] Eddie Robinson: Tell us what lessons have you learned about your life moving forward thus far?

[01:06:23] Phoebe Kilby: There’s so many lessons that I have learned. But I think what I have learned that. There are people out there that, like Betty, Who have such a wonderful open heart and capacity to forgive. And that we shouldn’t always be afraid that people are going to respond with anger when you bring up these kinds of history.

[01:06:50] Phoebe Kilby: That a lot of times people just want to know their history. And they want to bring about a better world in the United States. When I connected with Betty, I found out there are people that can, who will be willing to talk to you. And that then you can become, uh, partners together. Well, in our case, cousins together working to make the world a better place.

[01:07:17] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Ms. Betty, same question. As you continue your connection with Ms. Phoebe and make many more connections across this racial divide, all in an effort to create a more just, a more peaceful community, a more peaceful world, tell us what lessons have you learned about your life?

[01:07:37] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: I’ve learned that you’re stronger than you think. You can do anything. That you put your mind to do, but I do believe that we can change this nation. We can turn around the hate and replace it with love for one another. And I think that we can make this nation great as one people marching forward together.

[01:08:10] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: As Dr. Martin Luther King would have loved to have lived to see.

[01:08:17] Eddie Robinson: Thank you both enormously for sharing your stories, your narratives, your histories in such a vulnerable way. Thank you so much for this incredible, important moment of conversation that needs to take place. And I sincerely hope it builds and starts relationships of different races, ethnicities, nationalities, orientations across the world.

[01:08:40] Eddie Robinson: Thanks to the both of you for being a guest on I SEE U.

[01:08:44] Dr. Betty Kilby Fisher Baldwin: Thank you for having me.

[01:08:46] Phoebe Kilby: Thank you.

[01:08:49] Eddie Robinson: Our team includes Technical Director Todd Huslander, Producer Laura Walker, Editors Mark DiClaudio and Jonmitchell Goode. I SEE U is a production of Houston Public Media. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our podcasts wherever you listen and download your favorite shows I’m your host and executive producer Eddie Robinson, and I feel you we hear you I SEE U. Thanks so much for listening until next time