Kent Merritt

Until the ninth grade, I lived in the Grady Avenue neighborhood.  Most recently 12th and Grady until I moved here in the ninth grade.  And my mother lived in this house.  We were the first family in Charlottesville to integrate a neighborhood back in ’65?  I think it was.  Yeah.

George Gilliam: Did they light a fire on your lawn?

Kent Merritt:  Well, almost.  The neighborhood tried to buy the house from the person that was selling it.  They tried to discourage us from moving in.  Now, we didn’t get a cross on the lawn, but, yes, I moved in here ’65, the same year that Walker was completed.  We were the first class to graduate from Walker in the ninth grade.