This interview has been edited for clarity.
You were the first Black editor-in-chief of The Pendulum and the first Black SGA president; what were some obstacles you faced by making those accomplishments?
“What went through my mind at that time was being able to garner enough votes to get me over the hump. I knew I had the communities in which I hung in … I figured it was about 150 [Black students], so I can count on many of those votes. But at that time, I guess my senior year, 1980, there were about 2,577 students on campus and there were 214 [Black students]. So now I know those numbers. I didn't know them then. But I sure was counting on those 150 that I thought I had back then. And in my community of athletes, they let me hang with them, though I wasn't an athlete.
I played a decent game of baseball back in the day, as my dad played in the Negro Leagues in Greensboro. But I figured I could count on them … So ironically, or not ironically, good that I had those votes, because it did get me over the hump … I wasn't too naive to know that, we had apathy in the student body or disinterested — ‘who cares about student government unless you're putting on a concert’ — but those communities got me over the hump and thankfully, I won and it was fun.”
Can you talk more about the communities you had? Especially because here at Elon, we really value those cohort experiences?
“I had probably about three or so communities that let me hang with them. The Black community of course, the 214 of us. We were a close knit family because we were, as we used to say back then, ‘we were all we had.’ So we were tight. I remember the snowstorm of 1979. The school was telling us ‘if you can go home because we can’t assure you that cafeteria workers, professors, administrators would be here and classes are certainly canceled.’ But crazy us, a few of us, especially my athletes circle, we stayed and boy, were we crazy. We thought we were getting warm by going down to Belk Gym and getting in the pool without realizing that we had to get out of the warm pool and walk back to the dorm in the cold."
How — specifically in the roles that you were in SGA president and editor-in-chief of The Pendulum — did you take everything that you learned from those roles into your professional life?
“When I decided to apply for The Pendulum position, I was prompted by the previous editor, Kemp Liles, and the adviser, Dr. Mary Ellen Priestley, she was a sweetheart. But she was always on me, telling me that it was something that I can do. I didn't have all of the confidence that I probably should have. But I ended up with a ton, and I can't be more grateful for Dr. Priestly, Kemp and then coordinator of student activities, Bill Sharp. He was a humongous supporter back in the day for me. Those three talked me into The Pendulum opportunity. That actually all started with my freshman English teacher, who used to always tell me I should consider writing for The Pendulum, because when we had papers to write, mine tended to be about sports. And she asked me, ‘You ‘oughtta consider doing that, Bryant.’ I took that under advisement and, of course, as you can see, I did do it.
I was student body president of my school when I was in elementary school, sixth grade. I was into student government in back then junior high school — Paige High School. I was into student government all my years there, so it was just ingrained in me. I don't know how much of a leader I was but it certainly helped me, gave me the confidence even to want to do it here along with being pushed with my SGA community and advisers. So that got me going, especially the writing part … That was so important: the ability to write. Whether you are managing people, you have employee reviews to write. We didn't have it back then, but emails. And you want to make sense on those, especially to the people that it needs to make sense to. Those were important things to me. Another thing that was really, really good and it was a blessing and not so much a disguise was, after I got in this position, I was not aware that the Pendulum position paid a stipend. I mean they’re paying me to do something I like. As I was telling the young lady earlier, find something that you love and call it work and put a little money in the plate at work. I would send, I would send half home to my mother and I’d put half in my checking account here. SGA the same thing — a stipend. I couldn't believe that. So I split it right down the middle, sent half home to my mother and I put the other half in my account here on campus. That was gravy, you know, icing on the cake.”
How do you go about celebrating [Black History Month] each year? And how should we as a campus go about celebrating?
“Well, I actually don't mean this to sound too cheesy, but Black history to me, I celebrate every day. There's something on TV, some person that you meet, somebody that you talk to, that makes you proud to be Black. Abby Phillip, CNN news analyst — smart lady; old school Donna Brazile, chaired the Gore campaign and chaired the Democratic National Committee — smart lady; Laura Coates; I mean, these are smart people I see on TV every day and what's not to be proud about to be Black?
I remember having to tell friends, and my girls when they were younger, I would hear at times, and hopefully they were being facetious, that why in the world did they pick the shortest month to let us celebrate our people? 29 whole days, 28 whole days. Well, you know what? That wasn't the choice, as I tried to explain to them. Ironically, a gentleman by the name of Carter Woodson, the second Black person to get a PhD at Harvard, started a Negro History Week in February back in 1926, where he would tout the accomplishments of Black people and negros back then. It wasn't given to him. He chose that month because it had the birthdays of iconic people at that time. Abraham Lincoln — February 12. Frederick Douglass — February 14. That's why he chose that month. And fast forward to Gerald Ford in 1976, where he made it a month-long annual celebration.”