Philip L. Brown (Finding Aid)

Philip L. Brown

1909 - 2009

Favorite Color: Blue

Favorite Food: Candied sweet potatoes; crabcakes

Favorite Time of Year: Summer

Favorite Vacation Spot: Hawaii

Interview Length: 105 minutes

Interview Date(s): June 4, 2004

Interview Location(s): 3502 Narragansett Avenue, Annapolis, Maryland

Abstract

Author, historian and educator Philip L. Brown, born in 1909, recalls growing up in a large working class family in Annapolis Maryland. He describes his parents, their close African American community, the all-black Stanton School, where he attended both elementary and high school, church activities, and recreation he enjoyed in his youth. Author, historian and educator Philip L. Brown talks about his high school years at the Stanton School, the first school for African Americans in Annapolis, Maryland. He tells of his experiences at Bowie Normal School, playing football and socializing while studying to get a teaching certificate. He describes his early teaching assignments for Anne Arundel County, his marriage to another teacher; the formation of the Colored Teachers Association of Anne Arundel County and a lawsuit to protest inequality in salaries of black and white teachers; his and his wife's graduate studies at New York University, and the integration of public schools in Anne Arundel County in 1966. Author, historian and educator Philip L. Brown continues to tell about the integration, beginning in 1966, of schools in Annapolis, Maryland, where he was a vice-principal. He shares his experience of education for African Americans in Anne Arundel County over the course of his forty-two year teaching career and gives his thoughts on integration, busing, test score bias and teaching methods. Mr. Brown also talks about his first two historical books, 'A Century of "Separate but Equal" Education in Anne Arundel County, Maryland' and 'The Other Annapolis: 1900-1950.' Author, historian and educator Philip L. Brown reflects on his life, his career as a teacher and his seventy-two years of marriage to Rachel Hall Brown. One of his greatest worries is America's loss of manufacturing jobs that paid a good living wage to many black people. He gives advice for those wanting to teach and says it is important for young African Americans to study black history, to learn that "many extraordinary things are done by ordinary people."

32 Stories (See Ordered Story Set)