Lewis, Barbara

This interview was recorded on November 7th, 2019 in Tucson, Arizona and it covers the following themes:

b. 1937 

  • Parents and move to Tucson from Texas in 1938. Mother’s beauty shop and father’s work in manufacturing and construction. 

  • Childhood downtown. 

  • Employment opportunities, discrimination, and small black-owned businesses. 

  • The A Mountain Neighborhood in the 1940s. Attending Dunbar. South Park and Sugar Hill neighborhoods. 

  • Recreation. Road trips to Eloy, Casa Grande, and Texas. 

  • Downtown businesses: Ronquillo’s Bakery, Tito Flores’ pharmacy, theaters. 

  • Catholicism and religion. Social organizations, sororities. 

  • Memories of World War II. 

  • Experience at Dunbar School. 

  • Family building their own house. 

  • Tucson High experience. 

  • Relationship to the Civil Rights movement. California versus Tucson. 

  • Pre-medical classes at UA, dropping out, moving to Los Angeles in 1961. 

Aengus Anderson