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"collection_name": "Duluth African American Oral History Project (UMD)",
"collection_name_s": "Duluth African American Oral History Project (UMD)",
"collection_description": "The Duluth African American Oral History Project was initiated by the board of Clayton Jackson, McGhie Memorial, Inc. to aid in the documentation of the history of Duluth’s African American community. The funding came from a Legacy Grant from the Minnesota Historical Society. The African American Oral History Project includes interviews designed to document particular aspects of Duluth’s history and/or important local institutions, such as the Institute for Afro-American Awareness, the local branch of NAACP, St. Mark’s African Methodist Episcopal Church, Calvary Baptist Church and the Juneteenth Celebration committee, as well as document African American life more generally. The interviews were conducted between November 2016 and February 2017.
Taken as a group, these interviews were conducted in order to document the many aspects of life in Duluth, particularly as experienced by African Americans. Business people, educators, laborers, commercial seamen, fire fighters, military veterans, civil employees, community activists and other civic leaders of various kinds, as well as regular folks, were interviewed. Some interviews are brief, lasting 60 minutes or less; others are more extensive, lasting up to three or more hours. The interviewees talk about their parents, their upbringing (often outside Duluth), their experiences in school, their careers, and their achievements. They discuss everyday life as well as the big events in the history they lived. The interviewees offer their own perspective on events, and while there are many areas of agreement, there are events that they each remember in their own ways.",
"title": "Interview with Rodney Phelps, Part 1",
"title_s": "Interview with Rodney Phelps, Part 1",
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"Phelps Horton, Rachel",
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"Phelps Horton, Rachel",
"Davis, Yana"
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"state": [
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"country": [
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"contributing_organization": "Archives and Special Collections, Kathryn A. Martin Library, University of Minnesota Duluth",
"contributing_organization_name": "Archives and Special Collections, Kathryn A. Martin Library, University of Minnesota Duluth",
"contributing_organization_name_s": "Archives and Special Collections, Kathryn A. Martin Library, University of Minnesota Duluth",
"contact_information": "Archives and Special Collections, Kathryn A. Martin Library, University of Minnesota Duluth. 416 Library Drive University of Minnesota, Duluth, MN 55812; https://lib.d.umn.edu/",
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"UMD_U6213_00020"
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"date_added": "2019-09-23T00:00:00Z",
"date_added_sort": "2019-09-23T00:00:00Z",
"date_modified": "2020-11-23T00:00:00Z",
"transcription": "Duluth African-American Oral History Project\nInterview with Rodney Phelps Part 1\nInterviewers: David Woodward, Rachel Phelps Horton and Yana Davis\nDate: February 12, 2017\nDavid Woodward: This is the Clayton Jackson McGhie oral history project, and it is February 12th, 2017. And it is approximately 1:40pm, and we are interviewing Rodney Phelps at the University of Minnesota history department's conference room. And the interviewers are Rachel Phelps Horton, Yana Davis, David Woodward. And we are interviewing Rodney Phelps. Thank you.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Phelps for letting us interview you today.\nSo we'd like to begin to discuss your early life. So where were you born and what was the date?\nRodney Phelps: I was born in Fairfield, Alabama. June 12th, 1959. At 7:59 on a Friday morning.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Interesting. And what are your parents’ names, and what did they do for a living?\nRodney Phelps: My parents... my mom's name is Mae Fleta Allen now, and my stepfather, his name was James Dee Campbell.\nRachel Phelps Horton: And what was your mom's maiden name?\nRodney Phelps: Mae Fleta Phelps.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Can you tell me about your family's history and anything about your early life in Alabama?\nRodney Phelps: I kind of grew up in a farm type of setting, like on the outskirts of Birmingham actually. And probably about 20 miles away from Birmingham. So, from what I can recall of it, I used to love eating figs off the fig trees and...there was an elderly couple that lived down the street. I used to go there...[phone rings; recording paused] So yeah, the elderly couple down the street. That's where my mom, if they ever wanted to locate me, I used to sneak off and head down there because the lady always had cake and cookies... it was kind of like Dennis the Menace.\nAnd then all the things about it, it's just stories that people told me, you know. Some of it I remember, some of it I don't. Riding, riding in the car. Yeah, that's about it. And then, come around 1963... Stepdad came up to Cleveland before '63, and then we followed him in '63.\nDavid Woodward: So you were about four years old.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah, about four or five.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Did you attend school in Alabama at all?\nRodney Phelps: No.\nRachel Phelps Horton: What schools did you attend when you moved to Cleveland? Rodney Phelps: Went to Chesterfield Elementary School. Harry Davis Junior High School.\nFrom there, when I was still in the seventh grade... we moved to Cleveland Heights in 1971. It was still kind of winter out, and that's when I transferred to the second junior high school, was... Kirk.\nI forgot the full name, William H. Kirk or something... It was Kirk Junior High School. It used to be a workhouse. They changed a workhouse into a junior high school.\nDavid Woodward: And I'm sure the kids recognized that, and said \"the prison continues.\"\nRodney Phelps: [laughs] That what it kind of looked like, man... the big windows...\nYeah, that thing didn't look like no junior high school. [laughs] I went there from '72-'73.\nAnd from there, I went to my high school, it was Shaw High. Wrestled and played football. Shaw High was ninth grade through twelfth grade, so from '73-'77.\nDavid Woodward: And you graduated in '77?\nRodney Phelps: I graduated in '77 with a 3.26 average.\nDavid Woodward: Nice.\nRodney Phelps: And part of that.... I was... I went to two... our high school was split into two different high schools. One was academic and the other one was career. And I took welding up in there, for my career... vocational, that's what I meant to say— Part vocation and part academic.\nFrom there, Career Day, me and a buddy of mine that was in our welding class, Antoine Barnett. He somehow talked me into going into the buddy plan in the Coast Guard, and we went to boot camp together and... The summer of '77.\nYeah. I didn't even have time to even ... have summer, because when we graduated... I graduated on my birthday or commencement day and that following Monday. I mean one week, because we had one of the largest graduating classes, but they had to hold it down at the Cleveland Public auditorium. So it was like 900— like 963 people that graduated.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Wow.\nRodney Phelps: And I was number 200 and something... So that was a lot of people, man.\nDavid Woodward: Took all day to get up through the stage.\nRodney Phelps: Oh man, I mean...\nRachel Phelps Horton: Sounds like a nightmare!\nRodney Phelps: And then you got your parents stopping you up there, taking... it was a mess.\nBut yeah, after graduation, went to boot camp... that following week I was in boot camp, and spent nine weeks there.\nI was on the honor guard, training for a while until I decided I couldn't handle that. That was too stressful. So I ended up getting off the honor guard, and then I got kicked, pushed back a week... So that made me be there for 10 weeks.\nDavid Woodward: What kind of responsibilities did the honor guard have then?\nRodney Phelps: Basic, up standing... I mean, it was just rough.\nYou know, you're disciplined. They were more disciplined. How can you put it? If we was in line for food, we got to go in front of everybody, our class was... we took the same classes, normal boot camp stuff... But we had more privileges. And then there was just practice, turning, training...\nYou had your basic training. But then at the same time you had honor guard, ceremony type of training... and...\nDavid Woodward: Marching and...?\nRodney Phelps: Oh god, just better marching... You had to do everything better.\nYeah. You got yelled at twice as much. I mean I don't think I ever heard my name. I was other names they would call you. Yeah. Rodney Phelps, I don't think I heard Phelps in nine weeks! It was very...\nSo after boot camp, my first station, I got sent to Holland, Michigan.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Holland?\nRodney Phelps: Holland.\nRachel Phelps Horton: OK.\nRodney Phelps: A bunch of Dutch descendants. And they had the Heinz pickle factory was there. The Coast Guard was just a little small thing, but it's kind of like a rich tourist town. Hope College was there, and downtown looked just like.... West Duluth, basically. On 18th there? That's how, you know, they had these little shops, but that's how big it was. But it was a really really nice area. I was there for like eight months, and yeah, it was really nice. From there, I mutualed to Lorain, Ohio, where a guy, he wanted to come, you know, because he was from Muskegon, Michigan. So he wanted to come, so we mutualed. And I went to Lorain, Ohio. Until... I was on search and rescue...all of the places, I was on search and rescue. During that time, I... we pulled out a few dead bodies, drowning victims. My first real taste of it was a 14 year old Black child that had drowned. And we went to get him, and the thing about it... We had to get him off the rocks, and when we got him off and we put him in the bag... we was able to kind of float it, because we couldn't get but so far, and so we was able to kind of float it to the sheriff's there. And you could see right when he got on the land, and they went to open up the bag, he must have let go, because you could see the guys...\nThey were just like turning they head, man, and I'm like, I'm glad it didn't happen, you know, to us, but the next time, the next body be pulled out...\nYeah, I got a taste of it. He was a elderly gentleman that fell off of one of his boats, and they had to cut him... He was... his body had got on the intake manifold to the water treatment plant. And on the big screen, they had to cut... they had to close the plant down, and they had to go down there with underwater torches and cut him off, so when we him up on to the break wall... Oh my God, he just looked like he was sleeping, but it was, you know, with that screen and stuff... and no sooner, I think he must have be five minutes later, man. I mean it was like, we couldn't have had time enough to put him in that body bag before bodily fluids just let go, man, and just... yeah. And I was like, ooohh. I was sick probably that whole next two days from that. It was pretty bad.\nDavid Woodward: Something you would never really get used to, I would imagine.\nRodney Phelps: The water... another thing about Lake Erie is it's warmer, so he wasn't a pretty sight. You know so... And then after my stint in Lorain, I did all my courses that I had to do for fireman...for the mechanical side of that.\nAnd I was able to go to A school. And that was in Yorktown, Virginia. And that was a machinery technician school I went to. Another nice place, Yorktown. I was there at Yorktown for three months.\nGoing to school there, what was it? 16 weeks... 17 weeks... something like 16 or 17 I was there.\nDavid Woodward: That would have been in the early 80s?\nRodney Phelps: That would have been... let's see, '78?\nOh man, now you've got me there. Got out of boot camp in '77. '78 I was in Holland. '79...\nSo I was there between '80 and '81, because I had about two years in by then. Yeah. So I had about two years in, and when I got out of A school, the top 10 people were supposed to get where they go. They lied about that one. No, I wanted to go to Guam, or one of them places, but... It was me and another guy, we were E-4s coming out, and that's how I ended up in Duluth. Yeah. My orders were to come up here for search and rescue.\nDavid Woodward: Well. And, I don't know if this is the case but in another military like the Air Force and that, it wasn't a well-regarded place to go. It was like almost a punishment to go to Duluth, in the Air Force.\nRodney Phelps: I don't know, man, because... [laughs] it was a commander, or a chief warrant officer there, and he was stationed up here and I asked him, you know, he was in one of my classes, and he was like, \"Oh, you'll really like it, I've been stationed up there for four years now, you know.\" And I'm like, Duluth, Minnesota? And I looked where we were, and then I looked way up... And I'm like, oh my god man. That's at the end of the earth, you know. And you're talking about what, an 18-year-old kid, man. And so needless to say, I was nineteen when I got here.\nI got up here on June 15. It was three days after my birthday, I arrived in Duluth Coast Guard station. And from there, I was a boat engineer. For all the small boats, basically. The 41-footer. The 44-footer. We had a 30-footer, 41- and a 22.\nDavid Woodward: Smaller...\nRodney Phelps: Yeah, the old inline 671, that was a 30-footer. That was a nice little boat.\nDavid Woodward: And the Sundew would come through, to break ice. But you never worked on any of those.\nRodney Phelps: No, I never worked on a ice breaker. But when I got here, it was the Mesquite. Yeah. That's the one... that's where I thought I was going. But I'm like, no I didn't put in for no buoy tender, you know, so... So I ended up at the station, and there I really enjoyed it. I did a lot of boat rescues and we pulled a lot of deceased bodies out. Two boys did drown from UMD there. It was out there on Lester river. We pulled one that was down the shore, one was way down on Park Point. The lady that that one guy that killed his wife... I was on that search and rescue. The one that made it to the backyard.\nDavid Woodward: I didn't hear about that one.\nRodney Phelps: Oh yeah, he... Race...David Race or Dale Race? Yeah, that was a bizarre rescue operation. Here, this guy had a 36 foot boat, and he had two life rafts that was on there. But he say he put his wife on one... He sent off flares, and he put his wife on a raft and... let her go. That was kind of bizarre, so we're doing all these patterns... We was out there from midnight to like 9:00 in the morning and doing all kind of... Traverse City sent down a helicopter, and... It was like 12 hours\nwe were doing that search and rescue for. Then we got a report that she was found 50 feet from a person's backdoor on the north shore. And that's how we.... And I think he got prison time, about 25 years for that. And it was bizarre, man, because it's like... you stay with the Velso regardless. But why would he put her in a life raft and he stayed on the boat, and then he shot flares... It didn't make...\nDavid Woodward: And the boat wasn't sinking, was it just broken down?\nDavid Woodward: Yeah, I think he ran out of gas or something like that, you know. But yeah, it was a few hours before he made the call, and all of that. So yeah, I'm like, man he killed his wife. That was my thought, you know all this time out there, and there was no sighting of it. Yeah, cases like that. And you know, I used to love patrolling. Used to go out and... Yeah. Once I realized I liked Duluth, I stayed. I got off the regulars in 1982-'83, somewhere in there. And I stayed in the reserve for another eight years.\nDavid Woodward: What's the major difference between that, what's your time commitment on the reserves versus.\nRodney Phelps: Every four years.\nDavid Woodward: Every four years? So what's... how does that work? So you work weekends then, or...\nRodney Phelps: The reserves, yeah. One weekend a month. Yeah. You did one weekend a month, and then once a year, you had to go in and keep yourself upgraded. You know, going to school and everything. So you had to do that two weeks out of the year... out of every year.\nDavid Woodward: So similar to the Army Reserve then too.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. So where I used to go... I used to go back to Yorktown, because that's where that school was for the mechanics, you know. So that was enjoyable, man. Yeah. Them two weeks, I enjoyed going back to that place, you know. And then after I gave up the Coast Guard, I enlisted in the Duluth Army National Guard Reserve. And I was in there for about two years.\nAnd prior to that..\nDavid Woodward: And what did you do for the Army National Guard?\nRodney Phelps: I was with the light maintenance crew. We did all the set ups, our crew, we hooked up the generators and the lights and whatever, wherever. When we played Army, when we went to Fort..., down in the Cities there... it's not Fort Eustace, but... that one down in the Cities. We used to go down there, and had these little war games you know... Camp Riley! [laughs] And we all set up whatever our battalion had to do. It was a convoy going down and them noisy trucks, man. Oh God I hated that trip. But after that...\nDavid Woodward: Those big Deuce and a halfs.\nRodney Phelps: Oh yeah.\nDavid Woodward: Loud and...\nRodney Phelps: Oh man, ever so loud. And then after that, I got various jobs working in Duluth.\nI worked for Pizza Hut, Kentucky Fried Chicken... Who else did I work for? United Way.\nOh let me back up... After.. during the Coast Guard time, I was also going to DBU. I was going to school, checking out the regular... I went to DBU, for two years, and that's where I got my associate’s in accounting and business.\nAnd after graduation, I went and applied...\nThis was in like 1984... I hawked Minnesota Power. I mean, every day I was down at like 8:00, man, waiting for an interview. And one day I got called, a delivery guy... It was like, it was in November... November 19th, 1984. And I got a letter from the mail guy... the courier. He dropped off, and at that time I had my pitbulls too. [laughs] He was afraid because they were barking at him. And he didn't put it in the mailbox. He taped it to the window. I'm like coming home one day, and I'm like, what the hell is this?\nAnd pulled it off and it said, Joe Burton from Minnesota Power... he said I was hired for... if I wanted the job, to work in the mailroom. I was a mail room clerk.\nSo needless to say I was very happy, man, because I was getting ready to pack up and move back to Cleveland. Because, you know, the low jobs, and so... After that I got hired at Minnesota Power... worked in the mailroom for about a year.\nAnd by that time I was able to, because of my accounting, I was able to go and be accounting clerk. After about a year there. From there I was accounting clerk for the distribution side of the power company, for the eastern half, western half ... East, west and north. That was for distribution.\nI took care of the material... the capitalization ledger. I was in charge of that. I mean the expenditure ledger, I'm sorry. And my other duty was also damage claims, which ... anybody that did damage to Minnesota Power property. Like I said, in all those areas, you know. Little Falls all the way up to Thunder Bay, Canada. You know.\nDavid Woodward: That would be the transmission lines, everything?\nRodney Phelps: No, not the transmission. Another girl did transmission... We was broke down into transmission... Also the power plants. So we had like four or five accounting clerks. We had three accountants and then we had a supervisor. So that's what our little area was comprised of. And during that time I got to rewrite the way we do damage claims. The way I was taught... I said no, man, there's got to be a better way to account for this. So I ended up rewriting on how to do damage claims... set up the forms and everything. And that was one nice thing I was proud of myself, having done that.\nDavid Woodward: Achieving that.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. And after the accounting... apprentice programs we had up there, to work on the line crew. And I applied for it and I got it.\nDavid Woodward: And why would you want to move out of accounting onto the line crew?\nRodney Phelps: I found I wasn't an indoor person no more. Yeah. I kind of missed outdoors, you know. And yeah I really missed it. And that's why I left. Plus for more money too.\nDavid Woodward: The cubicle can only go so far.\nRodney Phelps: And yeah, she was born by then too, so... I had to get some money... more money! [laughs] So yeah, Rachel was born during that time and that's why I left... one reason why I left. Because it would make more pay. And then once I got on that, I went on the training crew for...\nThree and a half years. I was like, I was at my seventh, eighth month of my apprenticeship,\nand then, Things just started happening, man. I got let go from the training crew. I think it was, I got whitewashed. It was a couple of guys, and back then, you know... It was only one other Black, Thurman Barnes. He was other Black lineman, and... And I thought, hey if he can do it... And I didn't make it. And so I did find other work at Minnesota Power.\nDavid Woodward: Yeah. Well, being whitewashed, what was that sort of process like?\nRodney Phelps: You know, I did everything that they asked me to.\nAt one point I went to put myself in treatment... AA treatment, you know.\nSo I did everything that they ask, and didn't party no more. And so I was, during that time... I wasn't even on the train crew. I ended up going to Hibbard steam plant. Well prior to that, I had a whole few other various jobs, looking for work... After the apprentice training. So I ended up on various jobs, forestry department... it was just a lot of different jobs. And then I ended up with a permanent job at Hibbard steam plant as a maintenance helper. They called me like a oiler. I walked around that whole plant, man, and changed the oil in all....\nYou name it! [laughs] Greased bearings.\nYeah. I went from the basement all the way up to the tall... you see that stack out there? I had to go all the way up to this, like they call precipitators. And as part of the ash system, man, I had to go all the way up there, man, and greased those bearings. This was like every day, you know, it was like WOW, man.\nHad to grease the wood... that shredder where they also burn wood... they had these big hammers, man like, they used to pound that wood up and all of that, and I used to have to grease the wood system too. And I'm like, man, this is crazy!\nSo finally ended up getting more pay because the union submitted my thing to the supervisor, and ended up getting more pay for that job. So that was really nice. So I was there for about two years then. And then, a opening came back up again for the underground crew. Well, I had already...\nDavid Woodward: Minnesota Power.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. So I'm not... it's still distribution, but I wasn't on the training crew, but I was still... All my skills allowed me to do that. And I had like six months... I was on that training crew for six months. Not the training crew, the underground crew. And they never really had me working with the underground crew. I was always, you know, I was mostly climbing poles and all of that. You know, I was like... And so the supervisor at that time, this was the one where I felt betrayed.\nRodney Phelps: When the guy said, \"Well no, I don't feel that you are able to work with the underground crew, and all that.\" I'm like... And his name was Jerry Maki, and I'm like, \"What the hell was that supposed to mean?\" I said, I did everything that y'all asked me to do. I asked questions. I didn't take no shortcuts in all this...\" When I was watching journeymen take shortcuts and stuff... But all of a sudden that was it, man. That was kind of the last straw.\nDavid Woodward: You think it was a personality conflict, or do you think...\nRodney Phelps: I think it was a lie... I think it was just a race conflict or whatever, man, 'cause... it was really hard to understand that, you know. How.... yeah. That was a sad point in my life, but I held my head up and all.\nI got a job as a meter reader, and I did that for... I left in '98. So I was reading meters for almost three to four years. Up until... I kind of got it all. So from '84 to 98, I spent 14 years with Minnesota Power. Yeah, that's the way I can remember it... for almost 15 years.\nAnd from there I just got tired of the nonsense in it and I left. And I got a job at Jeno's. When I left Minnesota Power, I got a job working at Jeno's, Paulucci, and Northern Lights Landscaping. So I was keeping myself busy you know. I'd go to Jeno's from 10:00 at night to eight o'clock in the morning. And then from there, I changed clothes and went to Northern Lights landscaping from 9:00 to 5:00.\nDavid Woodward: Wow, that's a long day!\nRodney Phelps: Yes it was, man. So from nine to five, I did landscaping. And from... the other one was the maintenance at Jeno's.\nDavid Woodward: And that was for his line of...\nRodney Phelps: Spaghetti. We did the macaroni and cheese, they had a spaghetti. He had two lines...\nDavid Woodward: Angelina's, was it Angelina's? Rodney Phelps: Michelina's. No, we didn't do Michelina's. The Cities had that portion. Because we only had two lines. So we had the macaroni and cheese and spaghetti... And there was one other one that we did... we did like three entrees. And so, I was there for a year.\nYeah. July 1st, 1999, I applied and I was trying to get on the railroad, you know. But I applied...\nI got my sailing license, a card, and then I applied to work on the trains. But at that time, a director or whatever he was... pretty high on the ladder... asked me if I ever want to work on the boats.\nAnd I said, not really! [laughs] I'd never worked on them big babies and all that, so he gave me a interview. Like that Monday. Because I dropped off the application there, and I had a physical that Friday. And I was on the Clarke that next Monday.\nDavid Woodward: Jeez.\nRodney Phelps: That's how fast I got hired there, man.\nDavid Woodward: They probably like Coast Guard... people with Coast Guard experience?\nRodney Phelps: Aw, one chief on it didn't... He didn't like the Coast Guard. He like, \"You think you all wanna be sailors\" and all. And I'm like... this coming up because I had... me and him got into it quite a bit. So I went on as a deckhand, and I was a deckhand for.... I'd say almost a year and then... Doing it, I'd say about seven to eight months, and then I switched over. Because I wanted to be in the engine room. So I finally got my fireman's paperwork done, and I ended up in the engine room. The Clarke was my first steamboat.\nDavid Woodward: It was a steamer?\nRodney Phelps: Yeah, it was a steamer. The Anderson, the Clarke, the Munson... and at that time there was another older..the Taylor.\nDavid Woodward: And what do they burn?\nRodney Phelps: They burned number six fuel oil.\nDavid Woodward: Fuel oil, yeah.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah, number six was like... tar. It had to keep heated it at like... almost eight, nine hundred degrees so it could be pourable, man. And we used to put a additive in it, you know, so it would kind of thin it out, you know and... Oh yeah, I did that. Then they sent me to Traverse City, where I got my paperwork for... what do you call it... my handyman... In other words, I became a qualified member of the engine room department.\nDavid Woodward: Okay, yeah.\nRodney Phelps: They call it a handyman certificate. It's where... I was qualified to do anything and everything in that engine room. You know, [unintelligible] would stand watch, and that was left up to the engineers, which... anything that they worked on, I worked on it right with them. Do welding.\nDavid Woodward: What ports did you go to?\nRodney Phelps: All of 'em.\nDavid Woodward: Buffalo?\nRodney Phelps: Yup. Buffalo... Oh man, there's so many. We did the Great Lakes... Only ones we did up here, we come to Two Harbors and Duluth. But along the way, Detroit... Yeah. Detroit...\nConneaut, Ohio... up and down Lake Erie. Yeah. A lot of ports... Dunkirk, Fairport... Yeah... it's a lot.\nDavid Woodward: And do you remember any major storms... or was there any times that you felt a little bit nervous about the, like November gales and all that: Or was it pretty copacetic?\nRodney Phelps: It didn't get really bad, man. The only thing that really... even with the deck crew... And you go in the engine room, the weather, it was bad but... You know, I didn't feel threatened. You know. Only time it really got bad is when we iced up. That's when you got all this weight, and yeah... So the storms... we seen some pretty nasty storms out there, but I don't...I was never too worried about it because the seaworthiness of the vessels... I was pretty comfortable with that, you know. So, another... I did the boats for about another 14 years until I got out.\nWhat was it, 2010. I went from July 1st 1999... I mean, July 21st 1999 to October 21st, 2010. So you know... 2011, that's what it was.\nFrom there, when I got out, I did various jobs again, in part time work, until I landed where I'm at now. I went part time in various places. I worked for a refrigeration place, as a fabricator. And then I was working... I went back to landscaping again. Did that for a stint. I got a job full time as a janitor at HDC. And I was there for almost a year. And then I landed my current job for the County. When did I get that job? I've been there.. it'd be...I got hired on July 16th, four and a half... this year'd be five years.\nDavid Woodward: And what position is that?\nRodney Phelps: I'm a certified janitor now. [laughs]\nDavid Woodward: Certifiable!\nRodney Phelps: Yeah... well, no.... certified! Yeah, we got a certificate and all of that. You know, to know how to clean.\nDavid Woodward: And what buildings do you work in then?\nRodney Phelps: Just the GSC. the General Service Center.\nDavid Woodward: And that is the federal building on Second?\nRodney Phelps: Yeah.\nDavid Woodward: Or the government services building?\nRodney Phelps: MMhmm.\nDavid Woodward: Quite a employment journey there, from the Coast Guard, getting you sort of... you know, going through the paces with the Coast Guard and then, odd jobs. But then Minnesota Power for a long stint. And then on the boats for a long stint.\nRodney Phelps: Right. And I got off the boats because of my health deteriorating. Yeah. That's the only reason... the lifestyle... It just takes a strain on ... you know, you and the family....\nDavid Woodward: And what aspects of the lifestyle? I mean...\nRodney Phelps: Everything!\nDavid Woodward: Not enough sleep... eating wrong?\nRodney Phelps: Drinking.\nDavid Woodward: Hitting the ports a little too heavy?\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. The work wasn't.... I really enjoyed it, because we had, in the engine room... We had kind of the run of the things. When I was an unload engineer, I was in charge of the unloading system. So if I decide to shut that baby down or whatever, if I see something wrong, I had the authority to pull the switch on it. And I really like having that kind of power. Especially when you got to... when I was on the steamboats, and I was, you know, working doing that, I start up the system and warm it up and everything. And then you had like a first or second mate that did the unloading or whatever. And I had the authority over them. We used to kind of get into it sometime, but, hey, it's my system. Anything happen, they comin' at me, not you. So yeah, and I felt... that was the only time that I did have power, is when that system was running.\nDavid Woodward: And you said you ran into some problems with... where was that... with that person... Was it in, not on the boats. So maybe it was at Minnesota Power...\nRachel Phelps Horton: Jerry?\nDavid Woodward: Jerry.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah, Jerry Gool, man. He got fired, or whatever, but... but he just wasn't...\nI don't know. I don't think he gave me a fair shake. You know, it was just the kind of character he was, and everything... So that's really kind of hard to... He was a really hard person to take. I think he was power hungry, and, but he was just... he wasn't like the other bosses I had, or whatever, you know. So with him, you know, that was something. But oh yeah.\nWhen I got out of the Coast Guard, yeah, and moved into the red house there... That's where... I was telling you about conflicts and racism and all of that.\nDavid Woodward: And the red house was... was that along London Road there?\nRodney Phelps: No, that's 1814 East Superior Street. That's the one where I said a guy... When I was in the Coast Guard, they separated the station and the command center. And so everybody had a chance to get S and Q. They said everybody...only the S and Q went to the married couples. But then they wanted no crew in that building except for the crew working that day. David Woodward: So S and Q means money to live off base?\nRodney Phelps: Living, yeah off of base. Yeah. And they finally gave us that. And that's how I ended up at 1814 East Superior Street. That's the house where that guy came and gave me the paperwork.\nDavid Woodward: Could you explain what sort of went on with that?\nRodney Phelps: Oh well... during that time, with the clash with racism... It was a white guy, Mike Keehus. He was seeing... This one guy... She was visiting... so me and Danny was the only Black people, you know, in the building. And I lived on the first floor... I mean, the second floor. Danny and Mike lived on the first floor. and Karen and MG lived up on the third floor. So...\nDavid Woodward: All Coast Guard.\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. All Coast Guard. I was able to get them places there. And it was a really nice older house, you know. So, during that time, Mike was seeing this girl, a white girl. And the guy, his brother in law was a dog catcher. So I'd encountered him a few times. But one night me and a girl I was seeing at that time, Sarah... We just came back from a movie or something. She... I dropped her off or something to go get us a pizza. So I'm over there at Mr. Franks getting a pizza. And I heard like a car backfiring. So, I didn't think nothing of it. Then, why about the time I'm getting the pizza, I heard a backfire again. I'm like, what the hell is that? So I finally get back, get home across the street there. And Sarah, she's kind of meeting me half way on the steps, 'cause we lived on the second floor, and she's like, \"Somebody threw rocks at the window!\" And I'm like, \"What?\" And I went to the front window, man, and I lift up the shade, and I'm like... I said, \"Sarah, that ain't no damn rocks!\" I said, \"That's a shotgun blast.\" So he had shot that one window twice. And then that same sound, I heard it coming back, and we was in the dining... in the kitchen. And up above the refrigerator a little bit, it's a little small, like a window about that big. And as we was coming, I can just hear it...\nI'm like, \"Sarah, DUCK!\" No sooner we was heading for the door to get out of the apartment, and he'd shot out that little window. It was 'bout big as that up there... and that glass, man! It was just like a big wind blast, 'cause I kind of was protecting her. And I just got really pissed. I'm like, I'm a kill him. I mean, glass was everywhere, man! And they burnt rubber and took off. So me and Danny and Mike, we was trying to figure out what the hell is going on.\nBy this time, he had shot out... one, two, three, four... five windows! The last one he shot out... when we heard the car, we ran up to Karen and MG's house.\nAnd at that time, we was all up at the window, and we was looking. And he pulled up, you could see the shotgun come out the window. BOOM! And he blew out that one bedroom window that was on the first floor on the east side of the house. And that was it, man. Couldn't... The cops came. It was a 12 gauge shotgun he used, and it was like 6 to 8 casings that they found. And so we did the best we could to identify the car, which we... you know, knowing cars, and I said, man, it was a dark colored... you know, nighttime, but I could see it was a Oldsmobile. And somehow or another... didn't have a license plate on it. But they were able to locate that vehicle. And it was the dog catcher and his brother in law. His brother in law was the one who was upset that was doing the shooting, because of his girlfriend... thinking it was me or Danny that she was seeing... Because he was kind of prejudiced... he was prejudiced.\nDavid Woodward: And so his... it would have been possibly an ex-girlfriend.... was seeing...\nRodney Phelps: Thinking she was going out with a Black guy, and that's what was pissing him off, and it wasn't us. It was Mike! And... [laughs] Needless to say we went to court on that. And\nhe was found guilty. He was sentenced to two years up there at NERC. And his brother in law, the dog catcher, he was fired. And that was Miletich— he was the chief at that time. And he like, he said, \"I am so sorry about...\" He said, \"I don't have the time for disrespect for anybody in this city, and somebody working for me that's going to, you know, go like that... what that person did...\" and he fired the guy right there on the spot. And then think about it... I'm looking at it, \"Hey, that guy only got two years!\" I said, \"That could have been attempted murder, man!\" But no, they didn't look at it like that then. You know, and it's like, come on! But we didn't have no lawyer either. It was like, we just went in front of a panel. You know, it was the chief... it was the city prosecutor I think... And it was another person, I can't remember what it was... But we all... it was at a table, you know, with chairs and we got up there and spoke into a mic, like...\nDavid Woodward: Yeah. Well if you would have been walking in as he was shooting, he would have shot you!\nRodney Phelps: Oh yeah! We would have been killed! Yeah. And that was one hell of a horrific night, man.\nDavid Woodward: And that would have been, '81, '82? Or maybe, right in the early eighties anyways?\nRodney Phelps: It would have been... Let's see. I was going to DBU... so yeah, it's all around in that area, because Karen and Mike was here and... Yeah, it was all during that time period.\nDavid Woodward: That's sort of a... And that would be your first place off base that you lived... a nice introduction to the neighborhood!\nRodney Phelps: Oh yeah.\nI actually... that wasn't the first... The other place I had... until I found that place, I was boarding with some other coasties in a house up on... right where Mesabi is now... that used to be... that was Mesabi, but where you going down by the church there, that used to be Third Street.\nAnd yeah, 'cause when you came down Mesabi, you could still see the new Mesabi, that was the original Mesabi. And that wall is in, right at that wall, that was Third Street, man. And we used to... it was like five of us living in a...[laughs]\nA one and a half bedroom house! [laughs] We was crammed into that place, man, it was like we had nowhere to go. We had to get off the base.\nSo you got five of these guys, man... One guy had the bedroom, and rest of us had pull out beds... cots! Oh man, that was one...that was a party house! I mean... Oh my gosh.\nThat was... they had one bedroom and five Coast Guards... coasties, staying in there, baby. So yeah. That's when I got out, rode around town. And that's how I found the red house. I'd seen a for-rent, and then I met the owner, Dr. Paul Gregg. He was a anesthesiologist in town here, at that time. And I told him, you know, I got all these skills, and I said, you know, can I be a handyman around your building for my rent? So that's how I ended up... yeah, being a handyman there and taking care of that building and going to school and doing the Godfather Pizza thing and all of that.\nDavid Woodward: And then living in Duluth... you know you said you're at the end of the Earth... Before you got here, what were some of your first impressions of Duluth, do you remember?\nRodney Phelps: Oh man, when I first got here, I was wearing shorts and a T-shirt! June 15, it was freaking cold! I just left 80-90 degree weather in Cleveland, man, and soon as we got on that tarmac, and that wind blew up in there, and I'm like, \"Are you kidding me?\" You could see the sun was out. But it was not warm, man... Yeah!\nDavid Woodward: Well, yeah. Even in the middle of July if you're out on the lake at all, it can be pretty damn cold!\nRodney Phelps: Oh, man. Yup. And that's when I got in to the cab, the guy took me to the Coast Guard station. And the first... Yeah he was my first one. I was getting all my stuff out of the cab, and next thing you know, I'm putting, you know my sea bag and everything in the building, and next thing you know, this guy...I still got my stuff in the trunk!\nMan, he wheels on out of there, and I'm calling the cab company and all of this... I'm like, hey man! That guy still got my stuff in his trunk! So they found him, and he brought it back and all that...Then he's standing up there with his hand out, like, you know, a tip. I ain't tell you to, you know, take off with it! Aw man, he burnt rubber from that front door all the way to the....\nOh, he was pissed at me, man. And yeah. And I stayed with, like I said, that one night... Right before I was getting out or whatever, And I'm looking at the city, the lights on the lake. Me and Tim, we was out doing boat patrol at night, and it was so pretty. So I said, I'm staying. You know, it's so tranquil and... yeah. And that's why I stayed. Yeah. And when I was going to DBU, that's when I met her mom. She was taking secretary, or stenography or whatever. You know, what she was doing?\nAnd yeah, that's when, you know me and her mom ended up hooking up, yeah.\nDavid Woodward: And you have the one daughter Rachel, who's 28?\nRachel Phelps Horton: 29.\nDavid Woodward: 29. And then you have a grandson?\nRodney Phelps: Yes, Barrett.\nRodney Phelps: How old is Barrett, five?\nAnd I have a son. His name is Noah. He's 21. He's a welder out in Texas.\nDavid Woodward: Did he grow up here in Duluth?\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. Mostly with his grandmother... his grandparents, but yeah, he lived up there off of Piedmont. With his grandparents, yeah. Morris Thomas Road. That's how I can remember it. And his mom is still here. Matter of fact I ran into RaeAnn the other day... But his mom is still in here. He has a brother, but my son, he's in Texas now.\nDavid Woodward: And you actually have two kids?\nRodney Phelps: Right.Two that I claim. And then I got like, love kids, I call my grandkids, you know. And that's... Xavier. Alyssa. and Caden. Before Rachel, those three grandkids or whatever, the mom... I was very really close to Melissa. When I met her, she was like, well by the time me and Michelle hooked up, Melissa was like, two or three years old. And I consider her my daughter, you know.\nDavid Woodward: She would be like a stepkid.\nRodney Phelps: And I really cherish that girl, man... so I kind of took it upon myself to, you know, be her dad. And to this day, yeah, I never look back, and her kids call me Granddad. I'm the only one they ever known. And yeah. I'm still there, you know, for them.\nSo yeah, that's mostly the family that I consider.\nDavid Woodward: Are they in Duluth?\nRodney Phelps: Yeah. Michelle, their grandmother, who I was seeing at that time... She's a nurse for HDC, and she... They all here. Yeah.\nRachel Phelps Horton: Wow. Well thank you for all that info. So I don't know, maybe we could just go back and touch on a couple of things. In your big long job history. So after you first came to Duluth, you noticed it was really cold... and then did you know any other people when you moved here?\nRodney Phelps: Nobody. No one.\nThe only people I knew was... I learned... was the people I worked with. We was just a tight knit little... that was our community, you know. Until I branched out... and... Yeah. I had to find more, going to clubs, meeting new people... I mostly stood... I mostly hung out at the airbase.\nDavid Woodward: The air base, yeah.\nRodney Phelps: 'Cause that was our only entertainment. And at that time I couldn't really drink. When I got here, the Wisconsin drinking age was 18 and Minnesota's was 19. So I was kind of able to drink at that time with my military ID, but then Minnesota went to 21.\nSo I had to go over to Wisconsin, because it was still at 18 and, yeah... That's when we started going over the bridge there, man, and between there and on the air base... And then through time and everything, I started meeting a lot of people and...\nDavid Woodward: And was there an African-American community at the air base that you connected with?\nRodney Phelps: Oh yeah. Big time! You know they took me on as one of their own...",
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