Audio Transcription
Transcriptions of Interviews
Everybody’s Mommy
Olivia Rorie’s daughters, Debra Kelly and Luanna Rorie
Voices of children playing.
Luanna: My mother had a large lap. Everybody, my older brother and sisters had a bunch of friends, everybody called her Mommy because she was everybody’s Mommy. OK. She would nurture you. OK. She gave all she could for you. She also protected you, you know. So that was my Mama.
Debra: She was “Mommy of the whole neighborhood”.
Luanna: She always felt that, um, if she had some, she had to share it. Because that’s how you get--when somebody adds something to that pot, that pot gets bigger and bigger and bigger. So that’s, I think that’s the, um, the theme of how she did everything because whatever she got, she shared it with other people.
No matter what….
Debra: Because…because Mommy didn’t believe in some people having it all, having a lot, and other people having none. She thought it should be equal across the board. And she tried to make it equal across the board.
Luanna: Yes.
Debra: For all, for everyone. Not just for her, not just for her kids, but for everybody. And that’s why she fought the fight that she fought, for everyone to be equal, for everyone to have ….
Luanna: Have enough.
Debra: Have…Yes.
Luanna: Just to have enough. OK. Because you, I mean, being rich doesn’t make you happy. Being content and giving it to others, I think, is the best gift you can possibly, possibly have for yourself. I don’t know- I have never been rich, not with money. I was rich with love, friendship, and family. I think that’s, that’s it, that’s why we’re here, to share. And that’s what she taught me, to give back. Whatever I got, I’m not to hoard onto it because it isn’t going to do me any good by holding onto it. I’m supposed to give it out, and the next person’s supposed to give that out. And the next and the next and the next. So we all can be just as happy as, I mean, as each other. You know. I mean life‘s got it own knocks and stuff. But we don’t have to live in an ugly world as long as we are doing what we’re actually sent here to do, to look out for each other. OK. That makes God smile.
The Beginning-Olivia Rorie’s daughters, Luanna Rorie and Debra Kelly
“the beginning of the end”
Children’s voices
Luanna: And I remember an incident of river rats. They were huge! We got our basement converted into a kitchen. And they would, the rats would go from house to house through the pipes. That’s how open everything was. And we had three dogs, Paddlefoot and Jerry. We used to sit down in the basement because that’s, that was our defense for the rats other than throwing shoes at them and all, we’d sic our dogs on them. Because the rats were so fierce, they would battle with hound dogs. O.K.
Debra: Yeah, I remember one time Mommy had just bought a brand new couch. And she, I do believe she was at church or somewhere. And we were home, and this huge rat got into her couch. And we were trying to get the rat out of the couch. We ended up tearing up Mommy’s couch trying to beat this huge rat, and that was the beginning of the end.
So there she says, “unh, unh”. She starts trying to get the landlords to start cleaning up the houses, fixing them up. And they didn’t want to. They collected the rent every month. But they didn’t want to fix up the problem. Rats, roaches, you know, the bathroom facilities, all that needed fixing. So Mommy called a few of the neighbors together. All of them had the same grievances and decided that they had to do something.
“The Beginning”- Olivia Rorie’s daughters, Luanna Rorie and Debra Kelly
“living on Herkimer Street”
Debra: When we first moved in 99 Herkimer Street, there was a lot of prostitution. There were bums all over the place. There were two bars on the corner of Herkimer and Green Street, one on each corner. Friday, the weekends was terrible because there was a lot of fighting, and stabbings, and shootings, and prostitution. And Mommy had nine kids living on 99 Herkimer Street, and she didn’t want us to growing up, seeing all that, and experiencing all this craziness that was going on at Herkimer Street. So she decided that she needed to do something, not only get rid of the prostitution that was in the neighborhood, but also clean up the blocks. We had broken glass all over where the bums used to hang out. Bums just laying all over the street. And no one was doing anything about it. So she decided that it was up to her. Not only that, but the housing in the neighborhood was falling apart. We had young kids in the neighborhood, but hardly any running water. The bathroom facilities were a wreck, almost like going to an out-house. It was a mess on Herkimer Street.
On a Mission—Fighting City Hall
Interview with daughters Debra Kelly and Luanna Rorie
Debra: So that’s why Mommy went out there and she helped senior citizens. She helped
the young folk. She didn’t want to let anyone, I mean, the teenagers, down. So she set up jobs and the summer jobs for the teenagers back in the day. Also, she got the senior citizens’ homes built and meals into them. She, I mean, she had scholar…
Luanna: Scholarships
Debra: Yes, scholarship programs. I mean, she was out there fighting for everyone. And it was going. She had to fight city hall a lot. Mayor Corning, she fought Mayor Corning tooth and nail, and that political machine back in the day. They didn’t want it. They didn’t want the poor to have anything. They wanted to keep the poor down. She wanted to make things better, so she had playgrounds built. She had teen centers built. I mean the kids had some place to go to play other than the street corner.
On a Mission----Facing threats and helping others
Interview with daughters Debra Kelly and Luanna Rorie
Debra: Well she got a lot of flack for trying to make her community better. She had threatening letters in the mail. She had threatening phone calls. You know, stop doing what you’re doing or this is going to happen to you. And yes, we were afraid for Mommy. I myself was. Every time she walked out the door, I didn’t know if she was coming back. Yes, it got to a point where she was threatened for the work she was doing. But uh, it didn’t scare her; it did not stop her. She said, you know, it’s not going to stop her.
Luanna: She said…
Debra: She’s on a mission.
Luanna: She said she was doing God’s work.
Debra: She also helped people. I remember this particular family. They were a family of indigents. And they had a son. And they were homeless, so Mommy wanted to help them. She sent them down to Social Services to get, you know, some help from Social Services. Social Services did not want to help these people. They sent them back. “No, we can’t help you.” They went back to Mommy and told her they, Social Services, couldn’t help them. Mommy went down for a walk to the Commissioner of Social Services. You know, these people got help because Mommy wasn’t playing. She got them help, and they were productive citizens after that.