quote:
About 40 years ago these businesses had lots of money to build entirely seperate restrooms for colored folk.
I agree with your sentiments but I think this statement is factually incorrect. Most places simply didn't have restrooms for "coloreds" (bus stations and train depots were among the rare exceptions). If my memory of MS history serves, the law back then required only a very few types of businesses to maintain any restrooms at all. Restaurants, for instance, were required to provide them for patrions if an indoor, sit-down area was available. But most white restaurants either didn't serve African-Americans at all, or they did so only through walk-up windows. Thus, since there was no sit-down area for "coloreds", there was no need to provide them a restroom.
Some employers would provide facilities, but not all of them. Quite a few older black men around here can tell you about having to either go all day without using a restroom or find a secluded outdoor spot. Black women didn't suffer this precise indignity quite as often, if only because they tended to work inside white homes and had access to at least one bathroom there.
W.W.E.D.?
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