Riots and People: Robert and What He Taught Me

Robert was a young black man that I got to know when he was 18 years old and a senior at Central High School in Newark. I got to know Robert, his problems, and his aims in life because I went to work for about one week with Army troops with loaded machine guns posted at the corner of our office building. Everett was a brilliant young man who worked for me at the time. He also was a key link in my getting to know Robert.

In the riots of the 1960s, a part of Newark was burned and 16 people died. During these riots, we went to work with horror and fear, thinking on one hand that perhaps the armed troops stationed at the corner of our building could not protect us, and on the other that they might shoot and kill some innocent people in the streets below us.

After the riots were over, Everett decided to do something to help. He talked to a number of us and asked if we would work with him. All agreed we did not want to ever again see such a riot. We agreed to help him in any reasonable preventive steps that could be taken.

Everett went to the Central High School in Newark, which was at the core of the riot area. The student body was almost entirely black. He talked to the school officials and asked if there were students in the school who were ambitious, wanted to get into college, and could use some tutoring to help improve their qualifications. The administrators responded eagerly, "Yes -- there were some." As a result, a program was set up with about 12 students involved, each of whom were to be given special tutoring.

We agreed to tutor these individuals one-on-one in our company offices. The arrangement was that each student was to come to meet their tutor one afternoon a week at about 4:00pm and the tutoring lesson was to last until 5:00pm. Since quitting time was normally 4:30pm, the individual tutor gave up about one half-hour of his time and the company gave about one half-hour from the normal work period. I was assigned Robert because he wanted tutoring in biology and plane geometry--subjects with which I was helping my own 16-year old son.

The first time Robert came into the office, he was not dressed well. He was not particularly clean. He was obviously worried and frightened. He did not know how to act. He had no experience in a large office building. He was in a foreign society. During our weekly meetings Robert and I got to know each other. I learned that Robert had no father. His mother worked hard and tried to instill in Robert the desire to be a good person and to succeed in life. It was because of her that he was coming for these tutoring lessons. I stressed that he could become a part of this kind of working force, if he wanted to, and I would help him.

As we worked together, I found Robert had a good mind but was perhaps three or four years behind my own son in the level of his education. We talked weekly about biology. One day we discussed reasons why if his finger was cut off it would not grow back. Yet, if we took a newt or salamander and cut off its tail, it would grow back. I could see his mind begin to open--his curiosity mount. I explained to him that there were many phenomena of this type which we did not understand and there was a need for young people to do research in biology and medicine. Perhaps if we could learn how the salamander grew replacement limbs, we could do the same to help people who are badly injured. Robert's interest in biology intensified throughout our work together. Why things grow the way they do and why our bodies function the way they do became questions to ponder. He obviously had never been exposed to any sort of teaching that would encourage him to ask "why."

One day I asked him what he learned in school. He said, "I don't learn anything. I just don't make any problems." The situation at Central High School was one where the prime concern of the faculty was to maintain discipline, keeping violence to a minimum, not teaching students. It was not to get them to start asking "why" and teaching them that reading and pursuing answers to questions on their own could be fun.

One day, we were going over one of our geometry lessons and I asked Robert a question about the angle bisector of Angle B. He pointed to Angle C in the triangle. I asked Robert why he was pointing to Angle C. He said, "Oh, I don't see so good." I said to him, "Look at some of this material and read it to me." He could read it, but only with a great struggle. It was then that I found that Robert needed a pair of glasses and did not have any. No one had taken the time or trouble throughout the 17 years of his life or through the 12 or so years of school to discover that he needed glasses. On inquiry, I found an agency in Newark which would give Robert an eye exam and a pair of glasses for the nominal sum of five dollars. I told him that he should go and get them. His response was that he did not have the five dollars. I asked, "Doesn't your mother have five dollars?" He answered that she worked but there were other children and money was a very scarce commodity. I said to Robert, "I will give you the five dollars, but I want you to repay me. You can pay me a dollar a week for the next five weeks. Find yourself some work, even if it is just delivering packages or unloading trucks." I gave Robert the five dollars and he got the glasses and his work improved considerably. He also repaid me the five dollars, one dollar at a time.

I asked Robert if he knew why I wanted him to return the five dollars. He said no. I asked, "Do you think it was because I couldn't afford to give it to you?" He said, "Well, I'm not sure." I said, "I could afford to give you that five dollars. But I want you to learn to stand on your own feet, to be able to earn what you get. Don't be dependent on me or anyone else. In life, you must earn your own way and you should take pride in earning your own way." I could see Robert's understanding grow.

One afternoon at 4:00pm, Robert didn't show up. He didn't show up at 4:30 or 5:00. He didn't show up at all. The next week when he came at the appointed time, he had a bandage on his head. I let him know I was unhappy with him and I let him have it. I said, "Robert, you know I say here and waited for you for an hour last week and you didn't come. Why didn't you call me if you couldn't make it?" I was astounded with his answer. He simply did not know that if one could not make an appointment, they should call and explain that they would not be there. It was something he had never been taught or learned!

We talked further and I asked him why he hadn't shown up. He explained to me that there had been some trouble in his neighborhood and that there had been some knife fights. He had been hurt in one of the scuffles and had a cut on his head that had to be stitched. After the incident, his mother had told him to go to stay with his aunt for a week or so in Morristown until the whole situation had cooled down. He had done so. This helped me to understand that Robert lived in a jungle where his own safety was at stake daily. Under these conditions, I should not expect him to know all of the rules of my culture. He had grown up and survived by learning the essentials of his culture.

Robert and I proceeded with his lessons and he progressed rapidly. He was an intelligent person. Here was a good mind going to waste unless someone was willing to help him. I was quite pleased when Robert informed me that he had taken his exams and had been accepted by the Hampton Institute.

I will always remember our last meeting. I talked to Robert a little about what he had learned from me. He didn't say much but before he left, we shook hands and he said, "One thing I want to tell you. If I ever have a son, I will try to do for him what you have done for me." That made my day.

That is not the end of what Robert helped teach me. The program was also successful with the other individual students and tutors. It was so successful that some in the Federal government heard about it. The end result was an appropriation of Federal funds to increase the program significantly the next year and allow the high school to take over its administration. The net result was failure. The mere appropriation of funds cannot solve the problems of our inner cities and the problems of our young people like Robert, who do want to learn, who do want to progress in our society, and can become valuable contributors.

The Federal program was conducted in the high school. That meant that young people like Robert completely lost the experience of coming into a large office building and learning that they could be accepted as equals. The growth in confidence that Robert gained from participating in an activity outside of the ghetto area was extremely valuable. Most importantly, Robert knew, as did the others in Everett's program, that we were helping them not because we were being paid but because we wanted to help them. That created a bond money can never buy.

Robert's lesson for us is that our urban problems can only be solved if they are tackled by people one-on-one. Without this, an appropriation of funds to be administered by bureaucrats, many of whom really don't know or really care about the individuals with whom they are dealing, is doomed to failure.

July 1997

Previous | Home | Next