Raymond Dawson

Raymond Dawson

Raymond Dawson became the Vice-President of Academic Affairs for the University of North Carolina during the 1970s. Raymond Dawson has seven interviews, which are available through the Southern Oral History Program. In this interview, he talks about the debate over placing the Department of Veterinary Science at NC State or NC A&T. He explained that Governor Scott had lobbied for the placement of the Vet school at NC State and the plan had been approved before the restructuring of the UNC system. Dawson remembers that the Coalition of Alumni and Friends, which was a black alumni group, tried to stop the placement through asking for a racial impact study in September 1974. Finally in 1975, HEW withdrew its support of the state’s desegregation plan, citing the Vet school debate. (pg. 4- 5)

Southern Oral History Project

Interview with Raymond Dawson by William Link, February 4, 1991. L-0133, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/sohp&CISOPTR=438&CISOBOX=1&REC=5

1991-04-02

Interview

oral history

ccl202

William Link

Raymond Dawson

Raymond Dawson:
And in the meantime, as I say, came the Vet School this year. The question came well, why not put the Vet School at A&T? And when the—let's see, the School of Veterinary Medicine had been authorized just before restructuring. The old Board of Trustees and the University under Governor Scott had gone on record, you know, we going to develop the Veterinary School, and establish the Department of Veterinary Science at N.C. State. And then, you know, we did a study about the Vet School, and then the decision was to locate it at State. And then came the proposal, "Well, let's locate it at North Carolina A&T." So along in, this would have been late '74, I guess, or maybe early '75, at a meeting of the Board of Governors, the director of the Atlanta Regional Office of the Office for Civil Rights, a Mr. William Thomas, just appeared at the Board meeting and asked to be heard on the issue of the location of the Vet School. It was an interesting kind of thing, because in the meantime, see, we were in the process of having to develop the medical school at East Carolina. And I remember one member of the Board of Governors asked him, said, "Well you, you've expressed all this interest in the location of the Vet School. What about the location of the Medical School? Are you interested in asking us to consider whether the new medical school should be at a historically black campus?" He said, "No, I'm not interested in that." He said, "I consider that a done deal," or words to that effect, "and I'm not going to get involved in that."

interview