Kent Merritt

At Walker we had a dance.  I had become friends with a white girl.  We were friends, and we were close friends.  But I remember the principal coming up to me before the dance and asked me to stay away from her during the dance.

George Gilliam: To stay away from the dance or just  —

Kent Merritt: The white girl.  Yeah.  At the dance.  “Could you just kind of stay away from her?”  And I did.  But I don’t remember too much at Lane socializing.  I think basically the races just kind of socialized on their own because nothing sticks out to me along those lines.  But I’ll never forget that at Walker.