00:00:00FERNHEIMER: All right, so I'm gonna officially get started now. Um, thank you so
much for joining us today, um.
ALLEN: Okay, thank you.
FERNHEIMER: My name is Janice Fernheimer, and I am the Zantker Charitable
Foundation Professor and Director of Jewish Studies and Professor of Writing,
Rhetoric, and Digital Studies, and a James B. Beam Institute Faculty Fellow at
the University of Kentucky, um, and I'm conducting this interview today as part
of a new initiative that I launched in collaboration with my spring class this
semester called "Bourbon Oral History," and we're focusing on the achievements
of women in the Bourbon industry. And so, it is my great honor to be here with
the amazing and inspiring Ms. Elmer Louise, uh, Allen.
ALLEN: It's Lucille Allen.
FERNHEIMER: Lucille, I'm sorry. I misspoke in my, like, nervousness and
excitement to talk to you, --(laughter)-- which is embarrassing, but it happens.
Um, today is March 24, uh, 2021, and I just want to thank you for
00:01:00joining me today. Um, we're about a year into this pandemic, and as we've spent
the last, uh, twenty minutes trying to figure out how to make the technology
work, uh, I just wanted to see-- how are you doing?
ALLEN: Well, I can't complain. I--I'm busy every day doing something.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah, I can see that you've got a lot going on. In fact, uh, I was
excited to--to learn about your art opening, um, your big exhibit, uh.
ALLEN: Yes.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah, and that's--that's actually what reminded me that I wanted to
be able to talk to you for this.
ALLEN: Okay.
FERNHEIMER: Uh, how has the pandemic affected you and your family and your art?
ALLEN: Well, as far as the--uh, the pandemic, well, during the pandemic, I was
able to do so-- some scanning, and I'm donating some things to the Filson
Historical Society, so I was able to--I was able to do that, and--and--and
another thing is that having access to a computer really saved me,
00:02:00'cause I was able--still able to communicate with everybody. And--and then in
September of last year, I was able to go back to school, to U of L, and take
ceramics classes on Mondays and Wednesdays from--no, on Mondays and Wednesdays,
and we all had to wear masks. It was--and the class sizes were totally different
because, uh, they used to have anywhere from twenty to twenty-five, and we were
down to 'bout ten people.
FERNHEIMER: Amazing.
ALLEN: It was--it was totally different, yeah, but I was--I been busy, and--and
when I go--main thing I was doing the first part of the pandemic, the only place
I went was to the grocery store, and that was it. Yeah. So that was it.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. Has that changed lately in the last couple months?
ALLEN: Well, it's changed because in fact, the first time I went to a restaurant
was this past--last week. I went to the restaurant, the one here in Louisville
called--you know, it's terrible, you can't forget words like--The Café, which
is on Brent Avenue, and I met, uh, Madeline--Dr. Madeline Hicks,
00:03:00who's a dentist and teaches at University of Kentucky and Carrie, uh, Jones,
Carrie Franklin Jones, uh, and met her, and we--and we went there just--just to
get out. Well, that was the first time that I had been out to a -----------(??),
but they were--all the seats were seated six to eight feet apart, so it--it was
nice, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: How did you feel? Did you feel comfortable? Or--
ALLEN: Well, you know, I--I--I felt different because I hadn't been in a space,
and another thing, The Café had moved from one side of the street to the other,
so, uh, they had to tell me, Lucille, you're going to the wrong place.
--(laughs)-- But it was a brand new space that they had bought, and it was
great. It--it was a large environment and had--had high, tall ceilings, and so
you were able to sit--sit six feet or more apart, and it was only four people,
and we kept our masks on until we were ready to eat. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: How did it feel to finally be out after spending so much
00:04:00time at home?
ALLEN: Well, that was strange, you know, just to--just to see people, you know?
Uh, and just to be in that environment, it's--it's totally different because I
usually--I usually eat out at least a couple of times a week, you know, and just
to be confined to the house is something. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. Yeah, it's been a challenge for everyone.
ALLEN: It is. It has--it has been, but I--but I've had both of my vaccines, and
both of my sons, the one who lives with me, my other son who lives in
Louisville, we've had ours, and then my daughter lives in Florida, and she's
been testing the vaccine in Florida, so we've all had our vaccines, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Wow. It feels like a real difference, huh?
ALLEN: Well, it is different, you know, because you--you know, it--it--it's just
a totally different environment, and I don't think things will ever get back to
what they--where they were before.
FERNHEIMER: You think? What do you think will stay the same? What do you
think--what, what do you mean by that? Tell me.
ALLEN: Well, you know, it's--it's like now, when you think about people doing
entertainment, like you think about entertainers, entertainers had to
00:05:00go from New York to California. Now they're doing it by Zoom, so you're saving
money, and you're still able to see those people and to see them act, and
you--and you can be in your own environment. So it's--so that's--and I'm
wondering how that's going to affect--it has totally affected churches.
FERNHEIMER: Mm-hmm.
ALLEN: You know, they're--now they've been closed, and it's just a lot of things
that I don't think they will ever go back to like--like they were.
FERNHEIMER: So you mean from an entertainment and getting together perspective,
or do you think we'll all continue to wear masks, or--
ALLEN: Uh, well, well, I think that we'll be--I'll be wearing masks for a long
time because I think there's still--there's still--diseases are still be able to
be--but I think people need to wear--a photo that I have, I've taken, I took a
tour to Bernheim to see uh--uh--uh, f--uh, doc, uh, Gabriel Morris (??) who had
done a print-making exhibition, and there were seven people, and none
00:06:00of us had ever met each other before. We'd all been online, so what I did, I
made two by three, uh--uh photos with their names underneath of it, and--because
I didn't--I didn't know who I was looking at, and I think people--I--I see--I
saw--I went to a Dollar Tree, uh, yesterday, and I spoke to this lady in front
of me. I said, "Hello, how are you?," and she said, "Oh, Lucille, I wouldn't
have recognized you if you hadn't spoken to me because you cannot recognize
people with a mask on." So--so I just don't--I don't know how it's going to go
-----------(??)---------- but I think we do need to wear photos of ourselves and
our names because I don't know who you are if I speak to you. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, so much has changed. I want to kind of--we'll
come back to this, I think, when we talk a little bit more, but I want to
back-track a little bit and hear a little bit more about your life before the pandemic.
ALLEN: Okay. --(laughs)--
FERNHEIMER: And, um, I, I know this is gonna sound awkward because we
00:07:00already did introductions, but for the official record, can you state your name?
I know you were born in 1931, but where and when were you born?
ALLEN: Okay. My name is Elmer Lucille Hammonds Allen. I was born in Louisville,
Kentucky, and I was the oldest of three children.
FERNHEIMER: Okay.
ALLEN: I lived at 1724 West Chestnut, which is now known as Russell area in
Louisville, Kentucky, but at that time, it was just the West End. And when you
go back, and I pass that neighborhood every time I go up Chestnut Street, and
there are still some houses there that were there when I was a little girl, and
I can tell you who lived in those houses. And, uh, my brother is named Elmer
also, and my father's named Elmer, so there were three Elmers in the same
household, and so they called my brother Bud, and they called me Cille for
Lucille, and then we just called Daddy, Daddy. And my sister was
00:08:00named Mary Elizabeth. And, at that time, we lived between Seventeenth and
Eighteenth, and that was a totally African American community, and there was--
on one corner, on the northwest corner--or the northeast corner, was a
grocery--was a drug store called Heller Drugs (??), and on the southwest corner
there was a grocery store, and the name of that store was Fine, F-i-n-e. And so,
talking about seeing, uh, uh, white folks, I never saw them, or if I did, it was
maybe on the bus, and then a-- that time we had street cars. There were not
buses, we had street cars. And so I babysat for--the drug store was named Heller
Drug Store (??), and so I--I babysat for her, and I was telling
00:09:00someone the other day--even though I was a babysitter, and I took her down to
Sha-- Shawnee Park, which was a park that African Americans could not go
to--they did not even want me to go to the bathroom, even though I was
babysitting her. So, but I would take her on Saturdays, I would take her to
dance class, and then also take her--I would--while I was taking her to dance
class, they would have me to go to the bakery and pick up something from the
bakery, so I've been working ever since I was thirteen years old doing--doing something.
FERNHEIMER: Wow.
ALLEN: And I look at the house next door to me. The house that I grew up in was
a three-story house, and it was--my mother--my mother and father rented this
house, and, and it was called a rental house at that time, so--
FERNHEIMER: Can you say that again?
ALLEN: Rental, r-e-n-t-a-l, rental, rental. So she rented the rooms out to
individuals in--in this house, the second and third floor. Even though we had
water, you know, bathrooms, we could not go to the second and third
00:10:00floor because there were men in the house, so we had to take a bath in a tin tub.
FERNHEIMER: What is that?
ALLEN: In a tin tub. It's a great big tin tub. If you've never seen one, I'll
send you a picture of one, in a tin tub, and--and we also had to use--we didn't
have gas at that time, so we had coal stoves heating, you know, and we cooked on
those coal stoves. But I also, while I was little, I stayed in the--
FERNHEIMER: Where was the tin tub? Was it on--which floor did your--did you and
your family occupy, the bottom floor or the top floor?
ALLEN: No, we bottom--we lived on the first floor.
FERNHEIMER: Okay.
ALLEN: The first floor. It was the first floor. It was three floors, and so we
took a bath in a big, tin tub. Oh, you'll have to go--go--it's a great-- it's
great, you can sit in it. You can't--you know, you can't--you can't lay down,
but you can sit in it, and in those days, you filled it up, and everybody washed
in the same tub. You know, they didn't empty the water. And, so, but, this--
people don't understand that, but to take you back, I also stayed
00:11:00with my grandmother. I stayed with my grandmother partial of the time, and in 1937--
FERNHEIMER: Sorry to interrupt, what was her name, your grandmother?
ALLEN: E-l-l-a, Ella, Juinn, J-u-i-n-n, and my grandfather's name was Lucien, L-u-c-i-e-n.
FERNHEIMER: And was that your mom's--your mom's parents or your dad's parents?
ALLEN: That was my mother's father and mother, and they lived at 611 East
Finzer, which is one block south of Broadway, Hancock--Hancock and Broadway. And
I--we stayed there, and in 1937, that was when they had the great flood of
Louisville, Kentucky, and we were staying with my grandmother, and we came out
of that house on a boat--in a boat at that time.
00:12:00
FERNHEIMER: Wow.
ALLEN: Yeah, yeah in a boat, and that house eventually had six feet of water in
that house.
FERNHEIMER: Wow.
ALLEN: And we went over, and the boat took us over to Hancock and--and--I think
it was Hancock and Chestnut on the other--on the north side of Broadway, and
then we--and then they took us to what is now known as the Chestnut Street YMCA,
but it was called the Pythian Temple, P-y-t-h-i-a-n, Pythian Temple. It's at
Tenth and Chestnut in Louisville, Kentucky, and it is now--it is now known as
Chestnut Street YMCA, and we stayed on the sixth floor there.
FERNHEIMER: Was your whole family there during the flood, or?
ALLEN: That was my grandmother. My--my--my sister and brother and my
grandparents, but where I actually lived at 1724 West--they did not have water
in the house. There was water on the street, so we eventually went
00:13:00back there to my mother's--to my own home.
FERNHEIMER: Tell me about your parents. What did they do? Um--
ALLEN: Well, my mother was a cook and a maid, and my father was what you call an
L&N Pullman porter, L&N Pullman porter, and when--Pullman, P-u-l-l-m-a-n,
porter. He was a Pullman porter, and, when he was not working there--well, no,
at all times, he was a taxi cab driver, and he drove for Empires (??) Taxi, taxi.
FERNHEIMER: And what was your mom's name? I know you've said your father's name
was Elmer.
ALLEN: His name was Elmer Johnson Hammonds, Elmer Johnson Hammonds. My mother's
name was Ophelia, O-p-h-e-l-i-a, Gwen Hammonds. Yeah, that was her name. But she
was a maid and a--and a cook, so she worked at what you call in-service, and
that was what she did, so we stayed with my grandparents most of the
00:14:00time. And then also I stayed with my grandmother. When uh, my step-uncle went in
the service, I stayed with her, so--so I really lived in two places. And--and I
also was a Girl Scout, and there's a photograph of me when I was nine years old,
uh, when I sold, uh--I sold the most cookies, Girl Scout cookies at that time.
And so I just had a mixed life. And when you sit down and think about where my
grandmother lived, she did not have hot and cold running water, she did not have
a bathroom, so we used the outhouse, and as long as she lived, she never had hot
and cold running water.
FERNHEIMER: Wow.
ALLEN: So we all--you know, we always had to keep water on the stove. And so
it's--it's an experience that people don't realize, you know, that you can, you
can live, even though you don't have electricity, and we didn't-- we didn't have
refrigerators. In order to get ice for the refrigerator--for
00:15:00the--I--I still call them ice boxes--you would put a sign in the window, say
twenty-five, fifty, seventy-five, and a hundred pounds, and then, then they
would bring the ice inside the house. So you had--so you always had to make sure
that you have to empty the water up underneath of the ice box.
FERNHEIMER: What happens if you didn't empty it?
ALLEN: It'd run into the kitchen. It'd run on the --(laughs)--
FERNHEIMER: Then you'd have a big mess to clean up. --(laughs)--
ALLEN: --(laughs)-- And, and, and so, my grandmother's house had three rooms on
the first floor and two rooms on the second floor, and--but we only used the
front and the back--the back of the house was where the kitchen was, what you
call the kitchen, and then there was a dining room and the living room, but
since we had to cook with, with using a heating stove, we only--we used the
kitchen all the time. That was the primary- you entertained, you ate, you
cooked, you washed and ironed-- everything took place in the kitchen,
00:16:00and--and so the only thing you did upstairs was that you went upstairs and
got--and went--and went to bed. You know that-- and it's so funny. She had what
you call one of them soft beds that you had to fluff up and get into, and it
was--you know, growing up, there were so many things that you have, that you
experience and you sit down and think about, you know, why you have to do all
this fluffing every time just to get in the bed, but that's what she did. And I
forget what type of bed you call that. And then my uncle, it was--it was like a
little attic, like, and that was where he stayed. But anyway, that's where--that
was it, and so when you talk about my education, uh, -----------(??)----------
all my schooling up through a junior in college, they were all African American
teachers, African American. Uh, I went to, uh, West End--West End Elementary
School, went to Madison Junior High, and went to Central High School.
00:17:00And my first two years of college, I went to Louisville Municipal College, which
was the white--which was the Black school for University of Louisville.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. Tell--that--that was one of the first, uh, schools for liberal
arts for African Americans in the country.
ALLEN: That's right. That's right. Well I-- well I went there for--I went there
from '49 to '51, and--and--
FERNHEIMER: --[crosstalk]-- Go ahead. (laughs)--
ALLEN: --and anyway, and the reason why whites and Blacks could not go to school
in, in Kentucky--I don't know about the rest--is because of the Day Law--
FERNHEIMER: --yeah--
ALLEN: --which said that whites and Blacks could not go to school together.
Well, when--when in 1951, when Municipal closed, only one African American
professor went to University of Louisville, and that was Dr. Charles Parrish. He
was--everybody else--no one else had a job when they closed.
FERNHEIMER: Wow.
ALLEN: And then I went--instead of--I could not afford--and I did not--at that
time, people didn't have grants. You didn't have loans, so I worked
00:18:00my way all the way through college.
FERNHEIMER: Okay.
ALLEN: I did all kinds of jobs. Uh, I worked, and--but I--but after I
graduated--after my two years at Municipal, I went to Nazareth College, which is
now Spalding University.
FERNHEIMER: Now, when you were at--when you were at Municipal College, that was
co-ed, right? Or was it--
ALLEN: It was co-ed. It was co-ed.
FERNHEIMER: But Nazareth was for women only.
ALLEN: It was--it was for only women then, and it was all nuns. The Sisters of
Charity ran that, yeah. And--
FERNHEIMER: How-- what was that like, moving from co-ed to an all-female--
ALLEN: --(laughs)-- Okay, I went from an all-Black school to an all-white
school, and--so it was totally different because you had to fit in, and like I
tell everybody now, is that you just have to learn how to adjust and go on,
which is what I do now. Now you have to accept who I am. When I come into the
room, here I am. Take me as I am-- and that's how I've survived all
00:19:00these years.
FERNHEIMER: Would you say--when were you cognizant of the difference of what it
meant to be Black versus what it meant to be white? Since you--
ALLEN: I really didn't know--well, you know, if you never experience it, you
never know that you--you never realize that you're segregated because all you
see is what you see, you know?
FERNHEIMER: Right.
ALLEN: At that time, you know, we didn't have a car, and a lot--and we didn't
have a phone, and then when you did get a phone, it was party lines, so you
really--you'd get one or two, three people on--on--on the phone call, and--but
then--like I remember going--my mother giving me money, cash money, for me-- and
I was a little young girl-- catch the bus to go pay rent. I would pay the light
and gas bill.
FERNHEIMER: How old were you at the time?
ALLEN: Oh, ten or eleven. You know, I was a lil' girl, you know, but yet and
still you had to go pay, so you had money, but you didn't realize--you--you
didn't realize what's going on, you know? If--if you--you--you'd get
00:20:00scared if someone tells you you need to be afraid, but you are not afraid
otherwise. And--and you never think about somebody taking anything because we
really never heard about people stealing, you know? So and-- that--that--that
wasn't something that was in my mother's mind.
FERNHEIMER: Did you--when did you--was college the first time that you started
to really engage or interact with--with whites, um?
ALLEN: Not--not until I went to college. No, I didn't. I had-- I had no reason
to, you know, because I didn't--the community that I grew up in was all Black
and Jews, so that's all--that's all I--I dealt with, you know? And Louisville, I
grew up at--I lived at Eighteenth and Chestnut, and majority of Blacks, the city
at that time, most of the Blacks lived between Twenty-Eighth Street. That was--
that's where most of them lived, and also at that time, we only had
00:21:00one park to go and--it was Chickasaw Park, and Chickasaw Park was the only
African American park that you could go to in--in the West End. And we had to
catch those street cars to go there, and we might go down there once or twice a
year. That's all.
FERNHEIMER: Were street cars segre--were the street cars mixed or segregated at
that time?
ALLEN: Segregated. You sat in the back of the bus. You sat in the back, yeah.
You sat in the back. And--but, you know--but like you sit down and think about
it now, but you don't think about it when you coming--as a little girl, you
wouldn't--you weren't thinking about that. Grandmother said we're going to
the--we got to sit in the back of the bus.
FERNHEIMER: So you just sit.
ALLEN: Yeah. Yeah, you sit there. But it--no, but I, I--what I say, all the
experiences and all my training, I give to the African American teachers because
they--they taught me how to respect myself, how to respect others, and never
take no for an answer. Now you have to keep on--you have to keep on giving,
and you have to keep on learning. And so I believe in lifelong
00:22:00learning. I'm still a student at U of L-- I tell them all the time--because life
doesn't stop. You know, you--you never stop learning, and--and in order to be a
friend, you have to be a friend, you know? So--so life is what it is, and so I
have people that I went to school with at Spalding, you know, that I--that
I--that I still know, you know, and it--it's--it's a totally different
environment, and now it's co-ed, you know, and you don't see nuns there anymore,
so it's totally different now going--going there, and at that time, it was only
one building, which is what they now call "the mansion," but they have really
expanded all over downtown Louisville, so--and then they have a wonderful, uh,
president named Tori McClure Murden. She's--she's an excellent president (??).
Yeah, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: I wonder. Can you tell me-- I know you said you had two brothers.
You had two--a brother and a sister?
ALLEN: I had one brother and one sister.
00:23:00
FERNHEIMER: And where are you in--what's the lineup?
ALLEN: Oh, I--I'm the oldest. I'm the oldest, and my brother is, was--I'm--I was
born in August in 1931, and he was born in October 1932, so we're just exactly a
year apart, and then my sister was actually two years younger than he, and she
was born on February 12, but they--but they are both--my brother died last year,
and my sister died of cancer years ago. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: I'm sorry.
ALLEN: My family has cancer. I've had cancer twice, yeah. But I refused to take chemo.
FERNHEIMER: Really?
ALLEN: Yeah. Because chemo destroys cells, all the good parts of cells, so I
didn't--and I told the doctor I didn't want to. You have--you have to control
what you take, and that's what I did. So I'm still here. (laughs)
FERNHEIMER: Amazing. You know, in preparing for this interview, I--I listened to
so many interviews you'd given, and I--I was reading up all the
00:24:00things you sent me, but then I also did some other research, and, you know,
pardon my nerves at the beginning, but I--I'm truly--it's very impressive. Um,
you've lived such a--a--a rich life and one where you--you know, I, I hear you
say over and over again how you're a lifelong learner, but you don't just say
it. You actually do it.
ALLEN: --(laughs)-- Yeah, I do it. And I was telling somebody the other day
that, uh, I don't have Venetian blinds in my house because, uh, I lived at 1724,
and I cleaned up the house on Saturday at 1722, and every Saturday, I clean one
room of Venetian blinds. So I clean Venetian blinds every Saturday.
--(laughter)-- So I said, I never want a Venetian blind in the house, and I
never have. --(laughs)-- But that was--yeah. But you know, but that was--no,
that was what I did. I worked, you know, but I--I babysat. I've done house
cleaning, you know, but you do what you have to do because like I say,
I paid my way through--through college. I didn't owe anything, and
00:25:00then when my daughter went to college, I paid for her, so she--when she came
out, she did not have any loans, and she lives in Florida now. She's a--she--my
daughter is--is a licensed embalmer, an undertaker, and she works for Apple Computers.
FERNHEIMER: Wow.
ALLEN: Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: And what's her name?
ALLEN: Patricia Lucille Patterson-Wetherill, and she's--
FERNHEIMER: All right.
ALLEN: And she's sixty-six years old. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Wow. And does she have children?
ALLEN: No, no. I have--my son--I have--my son--I'mma you my sons'--my children's
names. Patricia Lucille Patterson-Wetherill. Patricia--
FERNHEIMER: How do you spell her last name?
ALLEN: Uh, W-e-t-h-e-r-i-l-l, Wetherill, and the next son is Cruiste,
C-r-u-i-s-t-e, capital T period, Patterson, and then my youngest child is
Michael Charles Allen, Sr.
FERNHEIMER: And--
00:26:00
ALLEN: And he only has--and so I only have--only have one biological grandson,
and I have three biological grand--great-grandsons.
FERNHEIMER: Amazing.
ALLEN: Yeah. --(laughs)--
FERNHEIMER: And who--who has the children? It's--is it Cruiste or Michael Charles?
ALLEN: Michael Charles has one son, which is Michael Charles Allen, Jr.,
FERNHEIMER: Okay.
ALLEN: And then he has twin boys, and they are Myles, M-y-l-e-s, Allen, and
Mason Allen, and they're--yeah, and then.
FERNHEIMER: Awesome. And where do they live? Do they live here in Kentucky?
ALLEN: No. Well, they live in Louisville, Kentucky, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Okay. Um, sorry. We're kind of moving back and forth all over the place.
ALLEN: Go ahead, go ahead.
FERNHEIMER: Um, I read--I listened to you say, or I read an interview
00:27:00somewhere saying that your first experience with art was with sewing in the
seventh grade.
ALLEN: Well--well, you know. You know, well, I took--well, when I went to
school, they taught sewing and cooking. Well, let me start over again. In--in
the African American community, Madison Junior High, they had all crafts,
plumbing, woodworking, carpentry. At that time, people took typing, you know?
Typing, uh huh.
FERNHEIMER: I still took typing. -- (laughs)--
ALLEN: You did? Okay, and sewing and cooking, and--and so that was my actually
first being taught by somebody other than my grandmother. But I remember my very
first project in sewing was I made a muslin slip with a scalloped edge around it
by hand, and I still do hand sewing. All of my--all of my fiber work is still
hand-stitched, yeah, and--but now, if--in in order to take those
00:28:00courses now, you have to go either to a private--to a trade school, or something
like that, and that was part of--that was part of--it was not part of--it was
Jefferson county--it wasn't Jefferson county public schools at that--it had
another name to it at that time, but right now, they are not teaching those
things in all schools. Like I said, there was only one African American school
for people to go to. There was two, Jackson Junior High and Madison Junior, but
only one senior high school, which was Central High School, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: How big was your junior--like how many students were at, um, Madison
while you were there?
ALLEN: Oh, maybe about four hundred, I guess. Somewhere like that, four or five hundred.
FERNHEIMER: Was it six, seven, and eight, or seven, eight, nine?
ALLEN: Sixth, seventh, and eighth. No, seventh--seventh, eighth, nine, seven
eight nine, yeah, that one, yeah. And yeah. And then--and high school was tenth,
eleventh, and twelfth. Yeah, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Okay. Um, while you were there--so what--what drew
00:29:00you--so I understand you had to take sewing, or sewing was part of the required
courses there.
ALLEN: Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Were you-- were you drawn to that or any of the other arts at that time?
ALLEN: Well, I wasn't really--I, other than taking painting, I never took
another art class until I took trades--I, I took what you--like I sewed--I
learned--I learned how--my grandmother, like, always sewed, and so when my
daughter went to school, went to college, I made all--I never bought any--I made
all of her clothes for her, and when she was in the queen's court at Kentucky
State University, I had to make all these different outfits, so I took a--a
tailoring class, make-- you know, I did--you know, I hadn't sewed--I don't sew
at all other--other than my hand artwork, I don't sew at all because patterns
and things are so high, materials are high, and I can buy them on sale cheaper
because I'm only going to wear them once or twice, so why worry?
FERNHEIMER: Yeah.
ALLEN: But I really enjoyed sewing at that time, oh yeah.
00:30:00
FERNHEIMER: Would you say that then, when you were in school, you, you knew you
wanted to keep doing art? When did you know that you wanted to keep going in
that direction?
ALLEN: Well, well I didn't decide to go into art, per se, until after my son, my
youngest son, graduated from high school, and I was--I had arthritis in my hand,
and they suggested that I take ceramics classes, so I took my first ceramic
class in the late seventies, and it was taught at Seneca High School by--by an
art therapist there. And then from there I went to what you call mold ceramics,
where you make Christmas trees and cups and stuff like that. And finally from
there, I took classes at Metro Art Center, which is part of Metro Parks, and
there--that's where I really got involved in fiber and ceramics, was there. And
from there, that was where--and, and the teachers--the ceramics
00:31:00teachers was there, were students, or they were in the master's program at
University of Louisville. So his name was Melvin Rowe (??) was the primary one,
and later on, uh, Laura Ross (??) became one of the teachers, and she was the
one who encouraged me to take--to go to University of Louisville to take art
classes. So, I took art classes, continued to take art classes, and when I
retired in 1997, I was still taking classes, and then, in, in 1999, they said,
"Why don't you go on and work on a master's in ceramics?" So in order to get a
master's in ceramics, I had to take a second art class, studio class, and I took
fiber. And so I graduated in 2002 with a master's in ceramics and in fiber. And
my thesis was exploration of clay and fiber. Yeah. Exploration of
00:32:00clay and fiber, yeah. So I've been doing that ever since, but I'm involved in
the--I've been, been involved in the community all--all--mostly all of my life
doing something for the community. And back in the sixties, I had--I started the
Chickasaw little league.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah.
ALLEN: And--and that--
FERNHEIMER: I saw that.
ALLEN: And I started that because my-- my, I lived on--I still lived in the same
house that we built in 1960, and it's on the north--south side of Broadway,
so--and--but there was a--there was a little league in Shawnee park, but if you
lived on the south side of Broadway, you could not go. You could not join that.
So I raised money, formed an organization called Chickasaw Little League, it was
a 501(c)(3), and I was able to raise money and had six teams, and that was in
operation for three or four years. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: And you did--but you did that while you were working at
00:33:00Brown-Forman, so. My understanding is that it was 1969 when you formed the
Chickasaw league, and you had started working at Brown-Forman in 1966.
ALLEN: Well see, that's what I tell everybody, is that you have to fit in what
you want to do. I belonged to multiple, you know, organizations, because at the
present time, I'm a member of the Filson Club Suffrage Committee. I'm a member
of the Commission on Public Art, I've been a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha
Sorority for over, for seventy years, and West Louisville Women's Collaborative
(??), so I have been a community person in multiple organizations, and in the
late eighties, I formed the Kentucky Coalition for African American Arts, and I
had that organization for ten years, and I created two directories of African
American artists, and one was-- they were funded by the Kentucky Arts
00:34:00Council, and I hired two artists, and they went throughout the state and
identified, and I created two directories, but you have to--you just can't work.
You have to decide what you want to do. But I like working in the community. I
like--I like working with people.
FERNHEIMER: When did--where do you think that kind of commitment to the
community came from? Was that something that your parents encouraged or, or, or
modeled while you were growing up?
ALLEN: Well, I grew up--like I say, I grew up going to--at the--being a Girl
Scout, which is a community organization, and uh, maybe it started there, but,
you know, that was something I've--I enjoy--I enjoy being with people, and I
enjoy helping people. And--and--and you--and you do better helping people if
you're with an organization than you do by yourself. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Um, can we go back to that time where you talked about how you
started--one of your first jobs was babysitting for the--I believe it was the
Jewish Heller family?
ALLEN: Yeah, Heller, Jewish Heller, H-e-l-l-e-r.
00:35:00
FERNHEIMER: Yeah, tell me about that. How did you begin to start working with
them? What was the relationship?
ALLEN: Well--well, well they were Eighteenth and Chestnut, and I was 1724, so I
walked three houses down, across the street, and there they were, and at that
time, the--they lived above the grocery store. They lived above the drug store,
and the Fines who had the grocery store, they lived above that place, so I went
over there--
FERNHEIMER: Were the Fines also Jewish?
ALLEN: They were Jewish. The Fines were Jewish, and so you went over there, and
you helped them, and when--and when, when Passover and they changed the dishes
and stuff like--you helped them.
FERNHEIMER: You're singing my song. It's coming up. --(laughs)--
ALLEN: So I mean--so I, I helped them, and it was just--they were just
neighbors, you know? So you didn't think anything about it.
FERNHEIMER: Huh. Were there a lot of Jewish families living in Russell at that time?
ALLEN: No, they were just the owners--no, there was just those two, and they
were business owners. They owned the business, and there was another grocery
store up at Sixteenth and Chestnut, and that was Gardens, but that
00:36:00was another Jewish--no, but--but--no, you didn't--they--they--they weren't what
you--there weren't no super grocery stores like they have now. Yeah, they were
all--they were all neighborhood stores, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: How--what were the relationships between the, the store owners and
the neighborhood residents like?
ALLEN: They--they--they were all one, you know, because they knew everybody by
name when you came in. You know, it--it--it was a community, you know? People
know--they, they knew everybody, and everybody knew them, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Where did, where did their children go to school? Did they--because this--
ALLEN: I don't know Clarice went to school, and--and then, uh--I forget even
when they closed down. They closed, I think--across the street from us, they
built what is now called West Chestnut Street Baptist Church, and the men--and
some of the men stayed -----------(??)---------- with my mother when they were
building that place, but that was--I forget what year. I have to go
00:37:00back and see what year the Heller Drug Store closed, yeah. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. I--I'll try and dig as well, uh.
ALLEN: Yeah, okay, yeah. But that was--they were--they were right down the
corner, so they would be something like 1730 West Chestnut, and--and--and Heller
would--and the Fine Drug Store would have been--would be--would be 1800 West
Chestnut. Yeah, those were the two.
FERNHEIMER: You said you were about thirteen years old when you started
babysitting. How old were the kids you were babysitting for?
ALLEN: Clarice, Clarice about seven or eight, you know. Yeah, she was a little
girl. You know, taking dance classes, yeah. Uh-huh.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. Was it--and, like how did it feel to be working with this--I'm
assuming--were they white-presenting? The, the--
ALLEN: Well, you don't really think about that. Why would you think-- even think
about that? You know, that didn't even come into my mind. Is that-- I mean, they
needed somebody, and I was willing to work for them, you know, and at
00:38:00that time, if you made fifty cents an hour, you were doing good.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah.
ALLEN: Yeah, yeah you know, so it wasn't a matter of money, you know, but it was
also-- it gave me a chance to go downtown, you know, with her because at that
time, you couldn't try on clothes downtown. There was Stewart's drug--dry goods
store, and there was--and you know, Ben Snyder's (??) and Bacon's (??) and that,
but you couldn't try on, no, so it--it was just--you know, I was able--so while
she was dancing, I would be able to walk over, walk to the bakery and do things
for her mother, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. And are you still in touch with Clarice or the family at all?
ALLEN: No, I haven't--no, the last time I saw them, they lived--they moved to
the-- uh, Athens, uh, where my daughter went to high school. She went to Athens
High School, and the Hellers lived close in that neighborhood out there, but I
had not seen--a lot of, you know, I'm ninety, going on ninety, and they were
older than I am, so they uh, they wouldn't be alive now, no. Clarice
00:39:00would be, but I don't know what happened to her, yeah. And her brother's name
was Bor-- Boris Heller. His name was B-o-r-i-s Heller, yeah, so I haven't heard
from them.
FERNHEIMER: What was it like when you would take her to Shawnee Park? Um--
ALLEN: Oh, well I just sat down, and we--you know, we, uh, just--she rolled and
played and swang--swang and stuff like that, and it was just--it was an outing
for her, and it was--it was a good time for both of us. We were able to share,
you know. So I would just sit down and watch her, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Where--did you--and you said that that was--it wasn't really
accepted for African Americans to be there at the time. Did you feel that as a
young girl?
ALLEN: Yeah. I couldn't go to the bathroom, so yeah. --(laughs)--
FERNHEIMER: I imagine you felt that pretty uh, impressionably (??) --(laughs)--
So how did that work? Where did you go? Did you--
ALLEN: Well, no, I was probably--most of the time I would go before I
00:40:00left--before I left and took her, and so we'd be gone about a couple of hours,
and then we would go back home, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: And was she cognizant of any of that as a seven year old?
ALLEN: Oh, no. She wasn't-- No, nuh-uh. No, she was a little girl, no. No, and
sometimes, you know, we don't really think about things ourselves until later on
in life, you know.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. How would you characterize the relationships between the Black
and the Jewish families living in that neighborhood at that time?
ALLEN: Well, they all got along, you know? You don't--there, there was no--there
was no animosity at that time between the two, yeah. I mean, because they were
neighbors, you know, and--and you had to depend on them, you know. The drug
store, the grocery store, you had to eat, you know?
FERNHEIMER: How did that change over time, if at all? I know you said the
Hellers--I'm guessing--
ALLEN: Well I was-- I think after they closed, I think they, uh, they
00:41:00had a few supermarkets like--like Winn-Dixie. You know, they developed in places
like that, yeah, but that, you know--you know, as things--as things changed, you
know, things change. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: What would you say is the most--the thing that stuck with you most
from your childhood? Like is there a--a memory or uh, an experience?
ALLEN: Well, what--what I can remember, I remember it vividly, uh, sit-- every
day we'd have to take a bath, and we'd sit on the front porch--get dressed and
sit on the front porch, and watch people go up and down the street because we
weren't allowed to go outside. --(laughs)-- You know, we had to stay in our--in
our yard, and I remember on Sunday, we--you know, I--I went to, um-- my mother
was Catholic, so all while I was growing up, I went to the church at Plymouth
Congregational Church, which was at Seventeenth and Chestnut, and next door to
there was the Plymouth Settlement House, and that's where I learned how to do a
lot of things, crafts, and just--you know, that was--the Settlement House was
there. In fact, they just sold that building this year, and
00:42:00look--look up--look up the Plymouth Settlement House, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah, I'm looking.
ALLEN: Yeah, but it, it was a place where--where children went, you know, and
they did--had all kinds of activities and things there, and like I say, we--we,
we stayed in our neighborhood, you know? And that was within a two--and also at
that time, there was a community park called the Shepherd Park that had a
swimming pool in it. Well, eventually, that-- they, uh, the pool was taken out,
but that was where-- but that was the only park that we could go to, was the
Shepherd Park. So that was the Seventeenth and Eighteenth on Magazine.
FERNHEIMER: Was that one of the only places, um, African Americans could swim
before desegregation?
ALLEN: Yeah, uh, just probably so, as far as I know. That's the only park that I
ever remember going to as a child. And I, ike, no--like they--they had--like
they had Fontaine (??) Ferry. We couldn't go to Fontaine Ferry, which
00:43:00was in--you know. So there are a lot of things, no, you--but you don't really
set up--you don't even think about things when you're growing up, but you go
back and think about what you couldn't do. But I still remember say-- getting
dressed, sitting on the front porch, and we had a big, had a swing, so everybody
knew me on the street, you know, so you spoke to everybody, which, you know, I--
you'd go to the fence and talk to them. And like I tell people-- every day, I
get dressed every day, and I put on earrings and a necklace every day, and
people say, "Why?" I say because that was--you know, I say, I see people on Zoom
that I'm embarrassed to see how they look.
FERNHEIMER: --(laughs)-- Sorry.
ALLEN: --(laughs)-- And I just--and it--it bothers me, you know, that--that
you're not presentable because you don't know who's going to see this eventually
because it could be worldwide, so yeah, so that's what I'm thinking.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah, is that something that--that you picked up yourself? Was that
something your mom inscribed for you?
ALLEN: Well, I tell you what my mom told--what my mom did and what I
00:44:00don't do. My mother drank coffee. I don't drink coffee to this day, but my
mother never weighed more than 160 pounds, and what she said when she got 160
pounds, she cut back, so my goal was 150 pounds, and I've never weighed more
than 150 pounds. I just watch--I watch--I watch what I eat, and I still do.
FERNHEIMER: And why is being presentable so important?
ALLEN: Well, I think--well, it's, well first of all, it keeps you from having to
buy new clothes, for one thing. --(laughs)-- And I know--you know--I
still--and--and right now, since this pandemic, there are so many fat people.
Did I say that?
FERNHEIMER: I--it's okay. --(laughs)--
ALLEN: You know, but you know, people are just staying in the house, and they've
consumed a lot of--a lot of soft drinks, a lot of food, and I go through--I go
to the grocery store, and people have six--five and six things of soft drinks
hanging on their thing, and I don't even think--I don't, I, I don't
00:45:00drink soft drinks, but also, you have all this sugar, and it's just--it's
turning to fat. But I'm very fat-conscious.
FERNHEIMER: So is it more about being healthy, or is it more about an image to
present to the outside world? Talk to me about what you mean.
ALLEN: Well, well, main thing is, it--it was size, you know, size, image, yeah.
In other words, people portray you as you look, yeah, and you know, and so
that's what--that's what I--that's what I was brought up to do, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Do you think that was--I mean, how do you think--let me try and ask
a good question here.
ALLEN: Ask it. Ask whatever. --(laughs)--
FERNHEIMER: Well, do you think that that--part of that had to do with--with how
important it was to present or to represent African American culture or to be
representative towards the outside world? I mean, I know--
ALLEN: The main thing is representing yourself. It's self--it's self-image.
How do you--how do you want to look toward everybody else, you know?
00:46:00And, you sit down and think about today or tomorrow, people that know me ten
years ago, well, I almost look the same I did ten years ago, you know? I
have--you know, people say--I've always had long hair, but I never--I never--and
I see people now with all this hair, and I still wear my hair in a
top--like--well, this is the way I did when I went to Brown-Forman in 1966, and
I'm still wearing the same. --(laughs)--
FERNHEIMER: I saw some of those images.
ALLEN: I have not changed. I have not changed. I have not changed at all. But
you know--but if--but you had to portray an image that you want--that you want
to carry on, you know? You know, and so it's--it's--it's self-image, self-image.
I think that's very important. And when I sit down and think--and, and I sit
down and I think about dressing, when I worked--when I went to Brown-Forman to
work, women could not wear pants at work.
FERNHEIMER: I wondered about that.
ALLEN: They could not wear pants, and then--and then they went to,
00:47:00uh, uh pants suits.
FERNHEIMER: Mmm hmm. When was that? Like the late sixties, early seventies?
ALLEN: Yeah. In other words, everything had to match. It had to be a suit. And
then they went to just slacks, but now people look horrible.
FERNHEIMER: --(laughs)--
ALLEN: They do. They do.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah.
ALLEN: Yeah, I mean, there is no dress code now, you know? And--and I--and I
really admire looking at TV and looking at the, uh, news reporters. They all
have on suits and ties, but you very seldom see that. Unless you're in a high up
position in these companies, you don't see shirts and ties anymore, and that was
the-- uh, that was the norm back years ago, regardless of what job you had,
unless you was a janitor or something like that. You wore shirts and ties. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: How do you think that impacts the kind of work culture, uh, the way
that people dress and how they present themselves? Do you--
ALLEN: I, I think it downgrades. I think you have more respect for
00:48:00everybody when you dress well, and, you know, I, I think so. Yeah, I mean, it
helps--I think it helps your image when you walk in, because I used--I always
had to catch the bus to go to work. I wore pants, but when I got to work, I took
my pants off, you know, because it was cold and while you're standing outside,
but that was--but that--but that was the dress code. Yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Let's, um--let's go back a little bit. I want to hear more about
your experiences at uh, Louisville Municipal College and at Nazareth College.
Uh, you were there, you know, in the--
ALLEN: Well, well, when I was at Municipal, it was from '49 to '51.
FERNHEIMER: Right.
ALLEN: Yeah, and at that time, at--at Municipal, most of the courses were what
you call survey courses, where they would--yeah. So--so when I went to Nazareth--
FERNHEIMER: Like general education kinds of classes?
ALLEN: Yes, yes, so I went to--I had to decide what I wanted to take,
00:49:00and when I went to Nazareth, you had to take--it was required at that
time--twelve hours of religion and twelve hours of philosophy. And so, I took
chemistry and math, so when I graduated, most of my--I had--I had enough credits
to get a--a major in chemistry and a minor in math, so that's how I got--that's
what I got a degree in--because in addition to that, you had to take psychology.
You had to--I had to take speech. Had to take English, and I had once thought
about being a med tech, but I had to go to school five years to be a med tech,
so I said no, I did not want to do that-- I wanted to graduate in four years.
And then, like I say, I was working every day, you know, working, and I--I
worked--I worked at St. Augustine Church, you know, when--you know, when they
had bingo and stuff like that, just all these kind of little odd jobs.
FERNHEIMER: Mm-hmm, and so you were working the whole time while you were in
school. How did you--when did you know that you loved--I mean, I
00:50:00don't know, maybe you didn't love--when did you come to chemistry and science as
something to pursue?
ALLEN: Well--well, when I graduated, that's-- I had my degree in chemistry and a
minor in math, but I could not get a job in--in Kentucky, so my first job, I
applied for a civil service job, and my first job I did was a clerk typist at
Fort Benjamin Harrison and I did that, and then I eventually went and--I did med
tech, but I wasn't certified, and I--I worked at General Hospital in
Indianapolis, and I worked at Methodist Hospital, and I helped set up the lab at
Community Hospital when it opened, and these were all at Indianapolis. Then when
I came back to Louisville, I worked at Children's Hospital. I worked at American
Synthetic, Medical-Dental Research, and then I went to, uh, Brown-Forman, so
that was my-- that's where, that was my whole career.
FERNHEIMER: When--but you know, you--you liked sewing as a
00:51:00young--young woman, and did you know you liked science and math early, too? When
you were a little girl, what did you imagine you would be when you grew up?
ALLEN: No, I never thought about it. --(laughs)-- No, I never thought about it
at all because you didn't--other than--other than being a school teacher, I
could have--that was the only thing that you--an African American woman could do
years ago was to be a school teacher or a nurse.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah.
ALLEN: And I didn't want to be either one of those.
FERNHEIMER: So how did--so where did you get the idea that you wanted to go to
school? Was that something your parents pushed?
ALLEN: No, no, no. My parents didn't--my--my parents did not even have a high
school education. So I was--my--my--my, my background was--was--was fashioned
after--after African American teachers. Those were your examples. Other words,
they were--and in--and at that time, African--teachers couldn't--couldn't be
married at that time. No, women, no, teachers-- female teachers could
00:52:00not be married. I forget what year when teachers could get married and teach.
So--so--so your examples every day, they came in fully dressed, heels,
stockings, and all this. And so your role models, every day you-- your role
models were your teachers. And--and today, young men--young African American
students do not have what I had. Because I mean, I had--I had role models to
follow, and they do not have. Plus your teachers, the average teacher now
teaching class could come in with a pants suit on. They've got jump suits on.
They are not dressed, so you don't really have examples to follow, other than
that their career, but as a person how to dress, that is not--that is not--you
do not see that now in the classroom.
FERNHEIMER: Who was the teacher that you connected the most with, or that, you
know, inspired you the most?
ALLEN: Francis Munford (??) was my English teacher, and, you
00:53:00know--and you sit down, and writing is very important, you know, how to
communicate, and you don't realize--you don't realize what impact writing has,
and--and I can tell you, anything--anything that I want to say, I put in writing
because there you can say here it is-- because what you verbally say really
doesn't mean anything till you put it in black and white.
FERNHEIMER: And where--where was Ms. Munford? Was she junior high, high school?
ALLEN: Well, she was at Madison Junior High, and then when I went to Central
High School, I had, uh, Betty Douglas (??) who was an English teacher. I--I
liked--and then I had, um, Maude Brown Porter (??). I mean, there were--I could
name teachers after one another that were important, but they all--you know,
they all--they stress for you to do, to do--to be the best, and like I was
telling you the other day, I told you, I was a second honors student when I
graduated. And I had to-- and I learned--I wrote my speech, and my
00:54:00speech, but then I stuttered all the way through twelve years of school, and I
had to go to talk--I had--I had to go to Ms. Kirkland's (??) class, who was an
English teacher, every day, her last period class, and read--and--and--and read
my speech. So I learned one--one sentence at a time, and I went home and talked
to a mirror, so you add--you make one sentence, and you add another sentence and
say that. And so--so I--unless I get mad, I don't stutter today. I could not be
talking to you today if--if I was eighteen years old.
FERNHEIMER: So that was in high school that you did those classes, after school?
ALLEN: No, that-- I was graduating from high school.
FERNHEIMER: So it was after--
ALLEN: I was in the twelfth grade. I was ready. I was a second honors student
graduating, and I stuttered all the way through.
FERNHEIMER: Wow, and she worked with you.
ALLEN: And you always say, "I said, I said"--you say something--"what you say?,"
I said. So, that, you know, you always repeating what you say.
00:55:00
FERNHEIMER: Mm-hmm, so wow, so that was pretty late in life?
ALLEN: Oh yeah, that was--I was eighteen, yeah.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. And so, okay, so these are all English teachers that you're
talking about,
ALLEN: Yeah, yeah, uh huh.
FERNHEIMER: ---(??)--- the importance of communicating, so tell me, when did you
make the leap to math and science, um?
ALLEN: Well, I Well--
FERNHEIMER: Was it love or interest or was it what was available?
ALLEN: Well, I en--I enjoy science, and like I tell everybody today, everything
that we eat is--is really a Science (??). You think about water, H2O, you think
about salt, sodium and chloride, everything, and when you think about--when you
think about math, everything-- if you think about a triangle, a square, a
circle, that's all mathematics. So science and mathematics, they--they go--
actually go hand in hand. Because when you look at a building, it was a concept
from somebody in the art, then they put it on paper. So they put
00:56:00triangles and circles, and--and they--and they make a building, so when you say
now, everything we do and everything we see every day is science and math, and I
enjoyed it. I just--I enjoyed--Sister Mary Adelaide (??) was my--was my
science-- my chemistry teacher, and \ was only--it was two--it was two people in
her class. Uh, it was two of us that graduated, and the white girl got a job,
and I couldn't, so that's it. No, it was just thing were segregated-- you know,
it just was what it was. Life is what it was.
FERNHEIMER: So, so it was work that brought you to Indianapolis, so that you
could actually work in your field.
ALLEN: Yeah, uh-huh, and--and then as a civil service job, and then I went in--I
went to science. Other than that, I've, I've never been in any other field but
science since that-- andI've been that the whole, my--all my life.
FERNHEIMER: Yeah. Well this--I--I know you said that I shouldn't keep you more
than an hour at a time, so this feels--it feels like a good stopping place, and
we can kind of pick up, um, at the next--on Friday talking more about
00:57:00what it was like in those early jobs and, and your experiences at Brown-Forman.
I, I want to--I'm happy to keep talking, but I want to keep good to my word.
ALLEN: Okay. --(laughs)-- Okay, okay, okay.
FERNHEIMER: So, so you let me know. If, if you want to keep talking, we can.
ALLEN: Well, we can-- we can go for an hour, and then I'll come back--we'll come
back on Friday and talk, yeah.
[End of interview.]
