“I remember one time when I was in high school—it was during the war, the Second World War—I got a job during the Christmas vacation . . . I got a job with the post office delivering parcel post because all the able-bodied men were in the military all scattered all over the world. And I worked, the first year I must have been fifteen, and that year I worked with a black fellow who was a regular postal employee, and we used an army truck to deliver parcel post—guys were all over the world sending stuff back for Christmas for their families, and we were delivering them. And I liked him! We had a great time together. We worked together and ate together. But after he went back to being a postal clerk and I went back to school, I caught a bus going home after school, and he got on the bus, and it was full, and there were people standing in the front and back. Buses were segregated, and I was in the last seat before the black section. And the seat next to me was vacant. And when he came back there—I knew he had been walking and delivering the mail—I said, ‘Sit down.’ He said, ‘You know I can’t do that.’ I said, ‘Yes you can. I can have anybody sit next to me I want to have sit next to me.’ So he sat down. Then the bus driver turned around and said, ‘N*ger, get up and move to the back of the bus.’ And I put my hand on his knee and said, ‘You stay right there. I can have anybody sit by me that I want to have sit by me.’ Then the bus driver got up and came back there, and said it again, ‘N*ger, get up and go to the back of the bus.’ I said, ‘I can have anybody sit next to me I want to have sit next to me.’ And the bus driver reached over and grabbed me by the collar and literally picked me up and threw me out the back door of the bus. And I had to walk home. I didn’t have another nickel to ride the bus. And I was angry. And I’ve been angry about that kind of injustice ever since.” – A memory shared by Rev. Dr. Bob Puckett