The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections has made every effort to transcribe the oral interviews as recorded. It is standard in transcriptions of oral histories to retain dialect, grammatical idiosyncrasies, and the natural rhythm of the spoken word. The transcript is meant to reflect verbal conversation as recorded rather than a polished written document. Our transcription policy adheres to this protocol. While each interviewee was asked to read and edit his/her interview transcript to ensure the proper spelling of people and places, all transcriptions retain their original wording. Any post-interview content additions or corrections are placed in footnotes. Occasional interviewee requests to remove selected passages have been honored, and the point of such removal has been designated. We believe this policy preserves the integrity and spontaneity of the original interview.

This set of oral history interviews was conducted beginning in 2008 by historian Laura Warren Hill in conjunction with her research project, "'Strike the Hammer While the Iron Is Hot': The Black Freedom Struggle in Rochester, NY, 1945-1975." Statements in these interviews are those of the interviewees alone, and in no way speak for the University of Rochester as a whole, or for individual members of the University community. The University accepts no responsibility for the content of these interviews

Laura Hill: I’m Laura Hill, here with Mr. Clarence Ingram, on June 10^th, in the University of Rochester’s Rare Books and Special Collections. Mr. Ingram if you, if you could tell me—you came to Rochester in 1953? Is that correct?

Mr. Ingram: [1]  I came here in ‘52, really.

Laura Hill: In ‘52. What were the circumstances of your coming to Rochester?

Mr. Ingram: It’s a long story.  [Laughter]  Okay, I’m a native of North Carolina.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And I was—I came outta the Army in 1946.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: World War II.

Laura Hill: Uh-huh.

Mr. Ingram: And I got together with a bunch of fellas in North Carolina, and we started singing.

Laura Hill: I read that.

Mr. Ingram: I—we called ourselves the Royal Harmony Singers.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: We did quite well. We ended up in Philadelphia, livin’ in Philadelphia and we were—you probably can’t remember back that far, but we were on the radio program once a week, with Arthur Godfrey.

Laura Hill:      Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Advertising Coca-Cola.  In 1949, two of the fellas were drafted in the Korean Conflict.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: So that was the end of it. There were only four of us, so two of us were still left.

Laura Hill: Sure.

Mr. Ingram: So one of the fellas came to Rochester, New York. He had an older brother living there.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And so I went to New York City to live. So I was in New York City, bummin’ around, trying to find myself—

Laura Hill: [Laughs]

Mr. Ingram: —and incidentally, I’d just come outta school because I came outta service and went back to school in Philadelphia.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And I got a—earned a degree, an undergrad degree in business administration. B.B.A., they called it then—Bachelor of Business Administration.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So I didn’ know what I was gonna do with it, but I just gonna find a job. So I tried to sell insurance.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And starved.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]

Mr. Ingram: So that didn’t go over very well so I went to New York City and I was workin’ for a Koret  Manufacturing Company. And in 1950, the Korean Conflict was over.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So the kid that came outta service—when the two came out of service, one went back to North Carolina and went in business. The other ‘un decided he would go up to Rochester, New York where his brother was—they were brothers.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And they would—they talked the fella in North Carolina to come to Rochester, too.  So we can get togetha’; it’s a very nice town.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And we did some rehearsin’ and go back down to New York and make big time. So they talked the fella from North Carolina to coming to Rochester, where they were.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Then they used to come down and visit me in New York City every month, at least once or twice a month. And they were tryin’ to talk me into coming to Rochester. So one day I decided to do it.  So, sure enough, January of 1952—

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: —I came to Rochester. I’ve been here ever since. But we never did do anything. We attempted to, but the fellas were young, I was the oldest one of them.

Laura Hill: Uh-huh.

Mr. Ingram: And I was only 25.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And uh, I think they discovered—they began to discover females.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]  That’ll derail the best of plans.

Mr. Ingram: And they didn’ have time to do any rehearsing.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: If they did, it had to be a short while because they had a date.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And all that kind of thing. So it never happened.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So one of the fellas that went to North Carolina decided he would leave and go back. So he did. And I stayed there in Rochester. And I’ve been here since ‘52.

Laura Hill: Okay. Okay. Were you—when you came to Rochester, and in the next ten to twelve years, were you aware of a Civil Rights Movement happening?

Mr. Ingram: I didn’t get that.

Laura Hill: Were you aware of a Civil Rights Movement, of Civil Rights Movement activism happening in Rochester?

Mr. Ingram: In ‘52?

Laura Hill: Um, until ‘64. What was your understanding of what was happening here?

Mr. Ingram: Well I knew that Rochester was kind of a—I would say it’s a big city.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But operating on a small scale. Like a small town.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Ah, during that period, I didn’t know very much about Rochester. I wasn’t interested in the history of it anyway.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]  Sure.

Mr. Ingram: But I got a reputation of it—I mean I got a opinion of it. That it was dominated by George Eastman.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And ah, whatever he wanted—so what Lola wants, Lola gets.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]

Mr. Ingram: Well, what George Eastman wanted—he got it. That was his town.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Anything that had happened had to get his approval stamp before it could happen. But Rochester had got to be a place that—there was no really opportunities in Rochester.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: It was—no employment, though alotta employment, but it was menial jobs, you know, just somethin’ to do.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: No professions around.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And there were a handful of schoolteachers, and that’s about it. And then, durin’ the early ‘60s, I began to read about the different movements, the freedom marches, and—

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: —sit-ins, and all that kind of thing. But I didn’t really get involved in ‘em.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Now, you asked me about before the riot period. They call it the “urban unrest,” they don’ use the word “riots.”

Laura Hill: [Laughs] That’s probably a better term.

Mr. Ingram: But I was in Rochester when it happened in Rochester.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: I was very much aware of it.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But—the—it was two days of it.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: On Friday evening, it started accidentally. Saturday, it was planned.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And they implemented it. They got involved and just wrecked the place. I guess they call themselves makin’ a statement.

Laura Hill: Well they made a statement.

Mr. Ingram: They did that.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But Rochester is not—wasn’t a bad city, I don’t think.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: My opinion of it wasn’ a bad city. But there were certain things, it was the status quo—you did certain things, and certain things you didn’ do. And I’ve never been a crusader.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: You know, just get somethin’ started—.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Threaten somebody to make it happen or that kinda thing, you know. I could—I was able to maneuver around and I’ve had a good life in Rochester, really.

Laura Hill: What were some of those things that you didn’t do, in Rochester?

Mr. Ingram: That I didn’t do?

Laura Hill: You said, in Rochester, there’s certain things you could do, and there’s just certain things that you didn’t do. What were some of those things that you just didn’t do, in Rochester?

Mr. Ingram: One of the things—it was hard to get out of your neighborhood into another one—different one.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: You were isolated. You were all in one spot. It was called the Third Ward. And you lived there.  And if you went into the Eleventh Ward, or Nineteenth Ward, you had problems.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: I can remember a—I got—I was very involved in a church—

Laura Hill: Which church?

Mr. Ingram: —in Rochester. The Mount Olivet Baptist Church.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And I—it sounds real funny now, because the area, the Nineteenth Ward, I would say is 75 percent black.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But in 1960, just as late as 1960, the church purchased a parsonage in the Nineteenth Ward.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And it—the day they closed it, there were people passing signs around, trying to get—keep the person from movin’ in.

Laura Hill: Because it was a black church.

Mr. Ingram: Mmm-hmm. A black minister.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But the pastor of a white church in the same area discovered it was Mount Olivet Church and his minister, and that minister, that was moving there, he went around and talked to people, to quiet it down. “This minister’s okay.  He’s not the run of the mill.” You know, “He’s a Colgate graduate” and this kind of thing.

Laura Hill: He’s a good black minister.

Mr. Ingram: He’s a good one.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So it was that kind of thing; that was in 1960.  I remember that because I was a trustee of the church.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And I was very much involved in it.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And I can remember they had a lot of civil rights, ah, cases that were going into court.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: You couldn’t—you couldn’t rent outside of that area, they just didn’t rent it to you.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: They find all kinda reason, they wouldn’t just flatly—then sometime they would. I can remember—what year was this? In the ‘60s.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: I attempted to rent an apartment and it was—there were blacks in that area.[2] 

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But—in certain spots, there was.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And the lady—she talked to me on the phone, I made an appointment, and when I went to see her, she opened the door, when she saw me, she stood and looked at me and started cryin’. She told me she could not rent me that apartment. She said if she did, all her tenants would move out. And she wouldn’t have anybody to rent to and she said, “Why don’t you buy it from me?” she would like to sell it.

Laura Hill: She wanted to sell it to you?

Mr. Ingram: Yeah, she couldn’ sell it. She couldn’t sell it because it was primarily a white spot, white tenants there.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And I guess it was her livelihood. It was about five apartments in that building.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And if she rented to blacks, her white tenants were gonna move out.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And it was that kind of a city, you know.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And we sat down and talked a long time. I felt sorry for her, really.  But it was that kind of quietness, you know, they did things, but they did it quietly.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: I know people that personally went to Kodak lookin’ for a job, with the application and everythin’, but it wasn’t professional.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But they would say it blatant, like, “We don’t have any colored jobs.” They would tell you that.

Laura Hill: Yeah.

Mr. Ingram: They got some jobs, but nothin’ for you.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: You know, that kind of thing.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And there were certain places that you worked when you got into those places. That that’s where they expected you to work. And it was real funny too because I went to work for a graphic arts place.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And I stayed there twelve years. And I got to know the director of personnel very well. I went there and put in an application at that place. This was some years ago.

Laura Hill: Okay.  At Kodak?

Mr. Ingram: No.

Laura Hill: Or at the graphic arts place?

Mr. Ingram: This was the graphic arts place.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And I met this—the lady. She was very nice. She said that she felt that I would make a good employee and they would—they could definitely use good employees, but at that moment, she didn’t have anything, but she was gonna  attempt to try to put somethin’ togetha’.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And she was gonna try to make sure that I got somethin’.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: I ran an ad in the paper, in the Seeking Employment, and the owner of a company called me up on Sunday night. I was in her office on Friday, talkin’ with her.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Sunday night I got a phone call. He invited me over to talk with him the followin’ day and he asked me to talk with him. His name was Andrew; he wanted me to talk to Mr. Clifford.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: That was his brother.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: They owned it. I spent about three hours talkin’ with him.  He interviewed me, took me around, and introduced me to different people, and offered me a job.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: In cost accounting.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And then he said, “Clarence, just for the record, will you fill out an application for our files?” I told him I had one there.  I just filled one out Friday. He said, “Here?” I said, “Yes.” So he called this lady, personnel, to check her files and see if she had an application there from Clarence Ingram, and to bring it down to the office. So she did, but she showed me—her eyes got ‘this large. She had just told me Friday afternoon that there’s nothing that she had, that she could offer me.  And then her boss was tellin’ her to bring my application down to his office. Now what happened there? This company hired black people.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But they only put ‘em in certain places.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: They worked in the bindery, or shipping—somethin’ like that.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And when she saw me, I think, the only thing was in her mind was, “Here’s a nice black man that’s lookin’ for a job. We could use him.” But she don’t have nothin’ in shipping. She didn’t have anything for the bindery. So what she tell me? She don’t have anything.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram:    That job that they hired me for, in cost accounting, was there Friday.

Laura Hill: But she couldn’t offer it to you.

Mr. Ingram: She didn’t think about it. It didn’t even cross her mind to offer me that job.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: It was that kind of—.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: They did it that way.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Just did things that way. And I stayed there twelve years. It was a small company, family-owned company that had outgrown itself. Very successful.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But they weren’t set up as a company. I mean, they were a corporation, but they didn’ operate like a corporation. It still was a family-owned business.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And they decided they had to change some things. So they hired an outside accountant, Stone & Dickman, to come there and look it over. They wanted to set up a cost system.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So they set up one. Now they got to find someone to implement that system. So I came along and got hired to implement it.

Laura Hill: And so does that give you the experience that you need to work with RBOC?

Mr. Ingram: Pardon?

Laura Hill: Does that give you the experience that you needed to work with RBOC?

Mr. Ingram: Yes and no.

Laura Hill: Okay. Tell me about your experiences with that.

Mr. Ingram: Okay, um. I worked there twelve years.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: I had a very good relationship with the family that owned it.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But I was the only black that ever had a job in the office.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And when I left after twelve years, they replaced me, but not with another black.  [Laughs]  But what I was going to say was—when I decided to leave, I had just got married—

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: —and I decided this wasn’ for me. I needed to get something better than this. And I talked with the owners about it. And they understood and they agreed.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Now, they were very instrumental in helpin’ me find a job.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: I went to work at Central Trust Bank—

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: —as an internal auditor. I had to go through the management training and all that kind of thing. But in 1970, under Nixon’s administration, he called it his “new date”—“new deal,” he called it.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: He set it up under the Department of Commerce an agency called OMBE, O-M-B-E.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Which was the Office of Minority Business Enterprise.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And under those agencies, under the agencies, he set up BDOs, which was Business Development Offices.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And BRCs, Business Resource Centers. And scattered ‘em all over the country. Rochester’s was unique under the help of George Eastman, Eastman Kodak Company. They set up their own BDO.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Business Development. They called it the Rochester Business Opportunities Corporation.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And it was new, not only to them, but it was new to the country.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But they were doin’ quite well with—they had their own financing  gig.  And it was goin’ quite well.  When Nixon, years ago, and he came to Rochester—at least the Department of Commerce did—and just looked at what we were doing to get some pointers as to what they were going to do.

Laura Hill: Okay.    

Mr. Ingram: I was doing some work as a consultant with—they would—they hired me. Not for my expertise, necessarily, but I could deal with blacks better than they could.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]

Mr. Ingram: I know why they did it, but I was  workin’ with them off and on.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And once they got started, the government came in and wanted to become a part of it. So they agreed to let the government come in—and they would—the government would run the BRC,  and the business community, in Rochester, ran the BDO.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And I began workin’ for the BDO.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: That’s how I left Central Trust and went to work for them. And I stayed there until I retired. That’s how I got there.

Laura Hill: What kind—?

Mr. Ingram: That was an interesting experience, and I learned a lot along the way with that.

Laura Hill: I bet.

Mr. Ingram: Because I’d get thrown into things that—I went into business leagues, into conventions all over the country, and the government required us to attend their seminars throughout the year.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And that’s why I said I did some post-graduate work ,you might say—I took some courses out here in marketing.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And I took some at RIT. And I had a good life.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]

Mr. Ingram: I retired after nineteen years with them.

Laura Hill: Okay. What kinds of—what kinds of projects did you do in Rochester? What kind of businesses opened and operated under RBOC?

Mr. Ingram: When we first started, it was unique. It was right after the riots.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So they decided—when I say the business community, I mean the larger business community, got together and decided that they would set up an agency that could provide financial management and technical assistance to minority businesses in Rochester, in the Monroe County Area. That was the scope of their operation.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: The men in the streets—now I’m talkin’ about the brothers—

Laura Hill: Uh-huh.

Mr. Ingram: —they would say “Ah, that’s not gonna do anything, that’s another game they’re gonna run on you.”

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: So to prove that they were wrong, everybody came down to the office and wanted some help, they got it. But it was only—we called them ma and pa type businesses—grocery stores—

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: —dry cleaners, gas stations, garages.  You know, that kinda thing.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: But as they grew into it, then they  decided they better expand their effort.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And establish some businesses that had some meat in it. Somethin’ you could get your hands on. The radio station that’s going today—that’s one of the businesses that got started.

Laura Hill: Which radio station?

Mr. Ingram: WDKX.

Laura Hill: Okay. Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Locally here.

Laura Hill: Uh-huh.

Mr. Ingram: It’s number two in the market.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: So says Arbitron .

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: It’s owned by a black guy—Andrew Langston.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: That’s one of the businesses that got started from RBOC.  There was a Rollins  Containing Corporation. And it’s goin’ very well, very well.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: There’s also a Eltrex Industries.

Laura Hill: Now Eltrex  is the outgrowth of FIGHTON?

Mr. Ingram: Yes.

Laura Hill: Is that correct? Tell me that story. How does that happen?

Mr. Ingram: Okay.  During that period, everybody was tryin’ to get somethin’ goin’.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Kodak was doing a lot.  Xerox—that’s Xerox’s baby.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: Eltrex got started by Xerox, they called it the FIGHTON.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: But they didn’ run it like a company. They ran it like a social agency.  It wasn’t a social agency—supposed to have been a money-making venture.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But they were hiring, supposedly, the unemployable. People that didn’t have any skills at all and trainin’ them to do things—you know.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: But they weren’t makin’ any money.  Who was subsidizing it? Xerox.

Laura Hill: Did they never make money with it?

Mr. Ingram: They didn’, no.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: They didn’ make any money; they were havin’ a rough time.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And after a while, you know, I don’t care how good your intentions are, you can have a lot of reasons for doing somethin’, which is good.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But if you’re not makin’ any money, those reasons are no good.

Laura Hill: [Laughs] Okay. Fair enough.

Mr. Ingram: So Xerox were havin’ a rough time—that thing was drainin’ them.  They was spending money at it, money, money, money.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So they decided they should look at expanding it.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Running it like a business, gettin’ some professional people to come in and see what could be done. So—this is—now I’m talkin’ about the street talk. Kodak says, “I want no parts of it.  See, we didn’ get no glory out of it when you started, now it’s your baby, you run it.”

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: So they were havin’ a rough time.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: So different managers, presidents, or whatever they had would come and they’d stay a while and then they would leave because they couldn’t do nothin’  with that thing. So then, when RBOC got involved—that’s my agency.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: They looked at it as a business.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: We got a lot of expertise in the community. One of the—one of my main members on the board of trustees— was Dr. Eugene Fram who was the head of the school of RIT.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Marketing school.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: They were out lookin’ for a person after the last person had left there. ‘Til they hired the president now, Matt Augustine out of—he was workin’ for Polaroid in Boston, Massachusetts.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And they brought him to Rochester, where—after he accepted the job.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But they were broke. They didn’t have any money. The FIGHT organization owned it.

Laura Hill:     Mmmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram:   They owned 60 percent, or 59 percent, 51 percent, or something—

Laura Hill:      Mmmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: —of the corporation, but they were bankrupt; they were just in bad shape.

Laura Hill: Mmmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So now RBOC got to go out and find some money to put in it, to get it going.

Laura Hill: Mmmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And you’d be surprised how well the community supported it—supported RBOC; that was their baby.  You know I went out to Kodak and talked with  the vice president of—I called it the gift committee.  He was in personal relations or something.

Laura Hill:   Okay.

Mr. Ingram: To try to sell him the idea.  He sit and listen.  He said, “Clarence, that might work.”  He said, “Let me think about it.”   Then he called in Ken Howard[3], who’s another person with a social background.

Laura Hill: Mmmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: You know, two days later, Kodak sent me a check for $190,000 and asked me not to cash the check.   I could hold on to it, but not to cash it until I got at least another 190 from somebody else because they didn’ want it to be a Kodak baby, they wanted it to be a community baby.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram  About another week later I talked to Xerox.  They sent me seventy-five thousand.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Bausch and Lomb gave fifty thousand—that kinda thing—you know, we got it togetha’. But the day they went to Kod— it went to FIGHTON then—the FIGHT  Company—at least  they had Matt[4] to do it—and  talk about buyin’ the controlling interest from FIGHTON—they were broke.

Laura Hill:     Mmmm-hmm

Mr. Ingram: So they offered ‘em—we offered them forty thousand dollars  for it, and they took it—the company did.  Matt offered ‘em forty thousand dollars for the controlling interest of the company.

Laura Hill:       So who did that forty thousand dollars go to?

Mr. Ingram: Went  to the FIGHT organization.

Laura Hill: FIGHT got forty thousand dollars for it?

Mr. Ingram:     Matt came to RBOC; RBOC supposedly loaned  Matt forty thousand dollars. They didn’ loan it they gave it to ‘im, but they supposed to loan, it was put it in the books as a loan.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Matt bought the controlling interest from the FIGHT company.

Laura Hill: What year is this?

Mr. Ingram:    Must have been ’68, I don’t remember the exact year.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Two weeks after they bought it, they changed the name on it.

Laura Hill: Uh-huh.  Who’s running FIGHT at that time—do you know?

Mr. Ingram: Matt was; he was the new president that we had brought here from Polaroid.

Laura Hill: Not FIGHTON.

Mr. Ingram: No, not FIGHTON—oh the—.

Laura Hill:       Who’s the president of FIGHT at that point?

Mr. Ingram: Let me see, who was the president at that time?  Franklin Florence still had a hand in it, but he wasn’t the president.  Bernard Gifford had left.  I can’t remember.

Laura Hill: Raymond Scott?   Does that sound right?

Mr. Ingram:    Yep, he was still there too.  Yeah.

Laura Hill:      Okay, okay.

Mr. Ingram: It was something like, some kind of way—I told you, I’m not a crusader.  I didn’t get involved in all that stuff.

Laura Hill: That’s okay, you’re a great storyteller.

Mr. Ingram: But anyway, they changed the name on it. Now, why did they change the name? If you mention the word “FIGHT” to any white organization in Rochester, they might throw you out the window.  They didn’t wanna hear nothin’ of that.

Laura Hill: All right.

Mr. Ingram: So, if they change the name, you forget about the FIGHT organization.  You forget about FIGHT, you think of Eltrex.

Laura Hill: Right, let’s talk a little, if we can, Mr. Ingram, about FIGHT. How does that, umm, I mean, to your understanding, how does FIGHT come about? Whose baby is that?

Mr. Ingram: The FIGHT organization, was set up by a psychologist, who came there from Chicago, by the name of Saul Alinsky.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: He sold the idea to the Rochester Council of Churches—that he could set up this agency that could work with minorities in the country—in Rochester.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: It’s funny about things too—you know, people change all overnight. So he came in and worked, and worked. He worked real hard. He did a heck of a job, I give him credit for that—Alinsky did.  And got it, organized it, and set it up, and they hired Florence.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: Uh, what’s Florence’s first name?

Laura Hill: Franklin.

Mr. Ingram: Huh?

Laura Hill: Franklin.

Mr. Ingram: Franklin Florence is the president, first president. Now, I, I’d known Franklin since he came to the city—he was a minister.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: Very quiet, easygoing guy. Once he became the president of FIGHT—?

Laura Hill:      Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Saul Alinsky trained him, pushed him out there and told him the tack to use and all this kind of thing.  He loved it.  He loved that position he had.

Laura Hill: Yeah?

Mr. Ingram: And, uh, he rubbed everybody wrong.

Laura Hill: [Laughs] Okay.

Mr. Ingram: But he got through.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And got over with it.  Then when they had a—after a few years—he lost the presidency—somebody else took over.  I dunno if that was Scott then?  Or was it—Bernard Gifford took over.

Laura Hill: Uh-huh.

Mr. Ingram: His whole—oh he had a—turmoil. He, he fought like crazy to try to hold on to that job.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: But he didn’t. But what a change—you look at people, how things happen—even though he was working to promote, uh, strengthen  the community, the black community, he took FIGHT personally, that was him.

Laura Hill:      Bernie Gifford did?

Mr. Ingram: Pardon?

Laura Hill: Bernie Gifford did?

Mr. Ingram: No. Franklin Florence.

Laura Hill: Franklin Florence did, okay.

Mr. Ingram: When he lost the president, now he’s a nobody—he don’t have nothin’ to storm up. Storm and march in your office and threaten you, and all this kind of thing.  [Coughs]  So he decided he was goin’ up on Main Street, there was a fella’, that had set up a Hess gas station there.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: He decided—he got to have somethin’ to do, somethin’ to keep his name going—so he’s going to go up there and challenge Hess—comin’ into the black communities, taking the money, taking it back outta town—you know, that kind of thing?

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: He stormed into Hess gas station and took Hess on.  Hess just sit there and looked at him, let him go.  He went on and on and on, so when he finished, Hess asked him if he’s finished—he said, “Yes.”  He said, “I’ll tell you what I’m gonna do, I’m gonna give you this station.”

Laura Hill: [Laughs]

Mr. Ingram: That took him for a loop.  He didn’t want that station, he wanted a fight.

Laura Hill: That’s right.

Mr. Ingram: Hess gave it to him under a few conditions. Number one, if you sell it, you can’t sell it to anybody that’s gonna put up a gas station here.  ‘Long  as you run it, it’s yours. He gave it to ‘im. And he run that through to the rock. He didn’ know how to run a gas station, and he didn’ know how to—he didn’ know anything about business.  He went down to the clerk’s office and got him a D.B.A.[5]—certificate to do business.  And put some of his church members—in their name—didn’ pay any sales tax, didn’t do anything, and it got to be a mess.

Laura Hill: [Laughs]  What happened to it?  I’ve never heard this story.

Mr. Ingram: The state closed ‘im down for not paying his sales tax.  Oh, two or three thousand dollars  of sales tax, so they closed it up.  The guy that put their name on it, the owners got stuck with all that money they owed people to this.  I went down to the state and made an offer to compromise  and got ‘im out of it, but it was a mess.

Laura Hill: It sounds like a mess.

Mr. Ingram: The station eventually got closed—the state closed the station up because non-payment of—they didn’ have anybody on the payroll—they were payin’ them under the table, so to speak.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: You know, that kind of thing.

Laura Hill: Right. Is there, is there a way in which FIGHT was run in a similar fashion?

Mr. Ingram: Pardon?

Laura Hill: Was FIGHT run in a similar fashion? Did they have the same kind of financial troubles that this gas station did?

Mr. Ingram: Yes, mmm-hmm.

Laura Hill: Tell me about that.

Mr. Ingram: I don’t know very much about that because I did not get that involved with it, really I didn’t get involved in it.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: Because it was a conflict.  See, they looked at the RBOC as a front.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And I was a general manager, I was their flunky.  [Coughs]  So I, I stayed away from them, I didn’ get—I didn’ become an integral part of their operation, or look at what they were doin’, or try to talk to them or anything. In fact, the guy that—he got to be a friend of mine—the guy that Frank put his name on that  certificate?

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: I, I said I’m gonna keep my hands off of it all, and I did, for about five years, but then I felt sorry for the guy. I do some tax accounting, and I went to his house once to do some accounting, and I saw the condition he was living under.  The state had everything, his wife had thrown him out of the house, he wasn’t livin’ with her anymore, he had lost a house.  He had a rented piece of property that had had a fire and the insurance company paid him and he took the money and did something else with it.  He had a mess, and I said somebody has got to help the guy out.  So I did have some connection with the state because I worked with them all along.

Laura Hill:      Sure.

Mr. Ingram: So I went down and told the sad story.  The fellow said I could tell the story so bad, so sad, “when you finished, I felt like cryin’ myself.”  But it was fun, but I had a good time.

Laura Hill: Yeah.

Mr. Ingram: So the state compromised it real good and they had garnished—the man worked at, at  one of the corporations here for forty years.  And they garnished his wages, you know, to get that money—took 10  percent of it is all that they could take.  Over five years, just took it. He never paid—never could pay that debt off.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: So, when I went in, and talked to the powers that be about it, the revenue officer got real teed about it, but the listing officer, the higher-up, said that he agreed that it was harsh treatment—you know that kinda thing.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And he actually compromised for practically nothin’ and made the state give—give him almost all that money back that he had paid.

Laura Hill: Wow.

Mr. Ingram: I worked out a real good deal for him.

Laura Hill: It sounds like you did.

Mr. Ingram: But uh, it was interesting.

Laura Hill: Yeah.

Mr. Ingram: But then, I had the community on my side. And they, the people on that board, of trustees, if I had tried to operate it like a U of R professor, I wouldn’t have gotten anywhere.

Laura Hill: How did you operate it?

Mr. Ingram: First of all, you have to create, not businesses necessarily, but you had to create an atmosphere that people wanna do business with you.

Laura Hill: I see.

Mr. Ingram: And make sure that they did what they were supposed to do. And not just like some shoe-string put together, you know, and tied it up and think it’s gonna work.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: But we had some good, some successes—we lost a lot of money though.  Wasted it.  We didn’ lose it, we just wasted it. Because, you know, you learn a lot.  People do things, and you wonder, why they doin’ that?  We had a client that lost two hundred thousand dollars, and the banker that loaned him the money said to me, said, “Clarence, we have lost that.” So one day, I got to walk into the committee, the loan committee, and tell them that we just lost two hundred thousand dollars. He said, “The timing is bad.” So, he kept puttin’ money in, knowing that he, he said, “What difference does it make?”  He said, “We lost that two hundred thousand dollars, so if I give them another ten, they lose it, so what.”  The timing was, you know.

Laura Hill: Mmm-hmm.

Mr. Ingram: And when the time was right, he went in and told them they had blown it, there wasn’ nothing they could do with it.  You know—that kind of thing.  But, you know, I learned from those kinds of experiences—how they, how the system works.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: And if you gonna get anything done, you got to work within the system.  You can’t take on the system because you’re gonna lose every time.

Laura Hill: It sounds to me like what you’re describing is that, in many ways, um, RBOC became a foil to the way FIGHT was operating in Rochester.

Mr. Ingram: Oh, and it was controlled by a board of trustees.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: And those trustees were not the run of the mill people.

Laura Hill: Okay.

Mr. Ingram: You know, they were, they were Joel Benetti, who was the president and CEO of Rochester Telephone; they were Howard, Howard—oh what was the guy’s name?[6] The president and CEO of Sybron Corporation.[7] One time the president and CEO of Kodak[8]was on the board. And, uh, but they made decisions and did things that the average person—I don’t care how smart you were—couldn’t do unless you had some clout.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: We did things through the agency, like ah, certain things—you got a non-profit agency that you’re operating—certain things you can’t do, certain things they call pass-through, but they did them quietly.

Laura Hill: Right.

Mr. Ingram: But nobody’s going to challenge ’em.  Which if I had, when I was there by myself and did it, they would have thrown me outta the eleventh floor window.

Laura Hill: Sure. Ah, Mr. Ingram, I just want to thank you so much for doing this with us.  I would love to chat with you some more, but we’re running short on time.

End of Interview

[1]  Mr. Ingram made additions/corrections to his transcript in April  2009.  Spelling corrections are reflected in the transcript text.  Content additions and corrections that change the transcript text have been included in footnotes. 

[2] The apartment was located on Tremont Street -- on the east side of Jefferson Avenue -- Mr. Ingram later indicated.

[3] Mr. Ingram later identified Kenneth Howard as Director, Urban Affairs, Eastman Kodak.

[4] Matt Augustine

[5] The certificate’s acronym refers to “doing  business as”, Mr. Ingram later explained.

[6]  Mr. Ingram later added: Kenneth Howard, Director, Urban Affairs, Eastman Kodak.

[8] Mr. Don Gaudion, Mr. Ingram later added.

[8] Mr. Lou Eilers, Mr. Ingram later added.