Oral history interview with Madge Hopkins, October 17, 2000

Madge Hopkins, a graduate of West Charlotte High School and the vice-principal of the school at the time of the interview, describes her experiences growing up in segregated Charlotte and desegregation at West Charlotte. Hopkins remembers the humiliating environment segregation created, but she describes herself as "traditional" -- she was reluctant to join student protests at West Charlotte being instigated by a younger generation of African American students. Her belief, at the time of the interview, that the majority-black West Charlotte was a separate and unequal school indicates her concern that the promises of desegregation might not yet have been realized.