Oral History with Howard Feiertag, November 2, 2014 (Ms2015-007)

Interview with Howard Feiertag

Date of Interview: November 2, 2014 Interviewer: Claire Gogan Assistant: Jordan Laney Place of Interview: The Inn at Virginia Tech Length: 02:17:06 Transcribers: Claire Gogan and Jordan Laney

[Pre-interview conversation]

[Interview begins at 0:51]

Claire Gogan: This is Claire Gogan and I am interviewing, please state your name

Howard Feiertag: Howard Feiertag

GOGAN: On October 24, 2014 on the campus of Virginia Tech

FEIERTAG: October 24?

GOGAN: Oh, I'm sorry, it's [laughs] I didn't change that [on the script]. It is November 3, 2014 on the campus of Virginia Tech.

[Plastic crinkling sound]

GOGAN: Howard, do you mind sharing your date of birth?

FEIERTAG: My date of birth is July 8, 1928.

GOGAN: Thank you.

[Plastic crinkling sound]

GOGAN: I'd like to begin by asking about where you were raised and what you remember about the area.

FEIERTAG: Okay. I was raised in Brooklyn, New York. I'm a first generation American, my folks are from the Old Country. From Europe. And there were ten children in the family and I'm the youngest. And I stayed in Brooklyn, through my early years, through high school, and upon graduating from high school, I departed... If you'd like more about the community I lived in and what it was all about?

GOGAN: Yes. I would like more. Where is the Old Country? Like, where in Europe?

FEIERTAG: Well, my mother was from Austria, my father was from Russia.

GOGAN: Okay.

FEIERTAG: And they came over and they married here in the states.

GOGAN: Okay, okay.

FEIERTAG: And they got a family, ten children, I'm the youngest. Alright? And I was raised in an area in Brooklyn that was common to people coming from Europe, and from all countries. It was a very very highly mixed and very integrated environment because of the different languages and races involved, and we had every color you could think of as far as a race is concerned, and almost every language you could think of, everybody spoke—multilingual. And in my family, my older brothers all picked up—I was too young, I guess, but I had friends from all over. Also first-generation Americans, from their parents were from Greece and Italy and other countries, 3:00and Puerto Rico was involved there, too.And we all got along extremely well at school and played together, we never knew a thing about race relations. There was no such thing as race relations. What would that be? Whoever talked about, if somebody was back, or yellow, what color, or spoke a different language.I'm Jewish, so we have the Jewish faith, and my mother—my father spoke English fairly well, my mother did not. So she spoke with a very limited English, but with a Jewish accent that you hear about in the movies. So, and of course, she was a great baker, loved to bake every Friday night. She baked a wide variety of cakes and breads, and all my friends would come over Friday, they'd smell it, in the apartment we lived in.

We lived in a tenement house, they called it. It was six stories, no elevator, it was all stairs. And we were on the top floor, so you can imagine. And ten 4:00children. And everybody doubled up, everybody slept together, kind of. But mom had to go shopping every day and carry those big bags of groceries every day. There was no really, uh, refrigerator was called an icebox. And the ice man came, the ice man delivers the ice, and carries it on his shoulder up six flights, and then drops off the ice. And the water leaks through on the bottom, my job as a kid was to empty the bucket of water underneath the ice box because it would leak, you know. Just old-timey stuff you don't see today.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: But just cooked all day long, that's all she did, you know. Just cooked and washed and worked and I was never really taken care of by my mother.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: My sister and brothers looked after me. I was raised by them, really. And my father was kind of distant. My father was unemployed for a very long time, though I don't remember everything. He was a cigar maker when he came over 5:00from Russia.

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: He made cigars. He worked in a factory. And then, of course, machinery came in, and he was out of work, so he stayed out of work. And my father ran around with a lot of women. My mother told us about it, she was aware of it, but she was busy with the kids and the cooking and the laundry and the house cleaning. [Laughter]

GOGAN: [laughter]

FEIERTAG: So, she didn't care, I guess, I don't know. But she put up with it. And he played cards, and he smoked cigars, and the house was always full of smoke, so I got used to that. There's so many things you learn in an upbringing, in a family like that. You learn the work ethic. This is what I remember well. And now, at that time I didn't realize it. But you learn to work, everybody in the family worked. Out of the ten children, there were only four of us that graduated high school. Myself and my three other brothers that were born just before me. All the others, when we got out of grade school, they went to work. 6:00Somebody had to support the family. Money had to come in, so they all had to work. And of the four, I was the one to have been able to go to college. And I never expected to go to college, it was not in our thinking in those days, of college. There was no family education. There was no family culture. We didn't learn music and art and theatre or anything around the household. That was not our thing. Whoever knew anything about anything like that? So culture. We never were required to read a book, even. The family never pursued it. My sisters and brothers. Nobody seemed to care. A report card—I was the only one who cared. There was nobody to show it to. My mother had to sign it, I guess, but there was no feedback, as far as my education. No help with homework, my brothers and sisters were there. They offered to help, but that wasn't necessary. But there 7:00was no real education in the home. Music, instruments, or any type of entertainment, or learning about food. There was no education at home.

So, that was fine. We were all satisfied, we had our family fun, we always got together to go to the beach together, and we wrestled, I learned to wrestle, my brothers were wrestling on the beach, you know. So we learned how to do that. And that's about it. And I did well in school, only on my own. It was not that there was any family pushing me. I never played hooky. I did all the right things. I had friends, we played stick ball in the streets, in Brooklyn. You see in the movies sometimes about the kids out playing, if you see those old time movies.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: That was me out there. We used to play sewer to sewer. Stick ball. A broomstick was your baseball bat. Had a little round softball, tennis ball, we'd hit. And we'd run from here to there, have our own little game of baseball. We played things like ring a-leaveio,' we called it. Hide your eyes and count to 8:00ten, then try to find everybody, they all hide. And your job was to go look and see where they were hiding. Behind the car, behind the tree or underneath something. You'd tag them, then you'd run back to the home base, and you win, or they win, and then they have to play 'ring-a-leavio.' You know, these are things you make up.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: You have no toys! I don't remember toys in the household. It didn't bother me because I didn't know that there were toys, I guess. And that's the same with everyone else. Everyone was poor. You know. We didn't have anything to play with. And there was no TV, we went to a movie for a nickel, you could go to a movie, and I used to go to the movie. And when you went to the movie, wow. You always got something. A prize, like a Baby Ruth candy bar, or a highlight paddle ball, if you went to a movie. It was a dime, maybe. And then you'd see two movies, a cartoon or a comedy, and a news broadcast or something. I forget what 9:00they call it, but anyway. So there was a news and a comedy and two movies. All day in a movie for ten cents. That was really something. That was big entertainment, that was Saturday. And then among ourselves, kids, we played in the street, and I remember for lunch, we were six stories up, mama used to yell out, "Howvahd! Howvahd!" you know, in her accent. "Howvahd! Howvahd! Come here! You've got a sandvich!" You know a sandwich. And she'd throw down, in a paper bag, I'd get two pieces of rye bread with butter. That was it. That was lunch. And throw it down to me from up there, I'd catch it, and all the kids did the same in there houses, you know. And I would eat, that was my lunch, bread and butter. [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: But it was fine, we were running around. So that's the upbringing I 10:00had. There was not much education involved, or learning experiences, or anything. [?] go to school. Worked around the house. My job, everybody had a job in my house. I had to polish the furniture. We were very very plain. All the neighborhood, everybody we had, we were spotless. Mama was so careful about laundry, laundry, laundry, everything. But we had furniture polish, I used to polish the furniture. That was my job and I was very good at it. I'd get underneath the table here and get polish with a rag and I'd polish the wooden stand that held the tables up. I went to every room and polished, everything, we always had neat and clean. That was the thing. Clothes, boy, washed right away. Get out and play, bring them back, in the laundry. Constant washing in that household, always. And in those days, there's no washing, you know, what you 11:00did, is you had a washboard in the bathtub. You put the clothes in there, and the soap, and then you'd rub everything on the washboard. I don't know if you've ever seen that.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And, then you rinse it out, and then you put it on the line. We had a clothesline that goes from the fire escape, we had the fire escape, and it goes right out to the telephone pole on a pulley, with clothespins, you ever see that?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: You see pictures sometimes in Brooklyn, New York. You'd see that sometimes, in the old time. Everybody had that. And all the laundry got out on the line, and got dried up. If it rained, you didn't do it, but it would dry, you'd bring it in, you'd fold it up, and that was it. And it was like, every day there was something. With everybody in the family. There was always something. So, that was the early childhood reflections, I think. One of the things I remember that affected me over the years, it didn't bother me, it just affected me, was when I travel now and go out with friends, or we share a room, I have 12:00the TV on all the time. And I have a friend that travels also from marketing, and it's got to be dark. Completely dark, and quiet. And me, no. I need to have noise and I need to have a light. And what this goes back to, I remember this very well. That my pop used to have friends over to play poker at the house, and smoke cigars, you know, drink beer, and they played poker. And I'm back in the bedroom, and they're all yelling and laughing, and making fun and making noise, you know, that's their time. It didn't bother me one bit, I slept through all that. There was light coming in from the other room, it wasn't completely dark. So, as a kid, that's the way I slept, and it's stayed with me throughout the years. Whenever I'm out, even at home now, I live alone, so in my house I have the TV on. Those days, no TV, but there were card games and there was light 13:00coming in, so I heard the noise, and I had the light. You understand?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: So now, I go to bed, I can go to sleep in the dark. Sometimes I go somewhere that's a resort and there's no TV, you know, nothing there, I have no problem sleeping, but it's just a habit-type thing to have the TV on and I fall asleep like that [snaps fingers]. Bingo, I'm out. If I had to sleep in a dark room without any noise and no lights, I don't think I'd fall asleep right away. [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter] So what neighborhood in Brooklyn?

FEIERTAG: It was called Williamsburg.

GOGAN: Williamsburg, okay.

FEIERTAG: Ah, you know about that. There are different neighborhoods, right?

GOGAN: Yes [laughter]

FEIERTAG: Ah, good. You do know.

GOGAN: And then, what did people do for work when you were growing up, generally speaking, in your neighborhood?

FEIERTAG: One of my brothers worked in a fruit stand. Produce. Fruit market.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Stocking up—you go to Kroger now and you watch people in the fruit department, produce—stacking up things. In Brooklyn, the shopping center, the streets in Brooklyn, where you had—you didn't have a supermarket—they didn't have a Kroger. You were at one place for bread, you went to a bake shop. Bread, and baking, and bagels and that was it. And then, you went to a dairy store. They had dairy. They had milk, and eggs, and cheeses. And you had an appetizing store, it was called an appetizing store. I used to work there when I was a kid, I helped them out. And that's where you were bought the big, brown barrels of pickles and sauerkraut, and fish, pickled herring. You know, all that stuff. It stunk like heaven, but oh, we loved the smell. You had all those different types of fish and that was the appetizing store. So you had fruit, then you had a 15:00chicken market, which is different than a meat market. Sometimes the meat market started to do chickens, but in the early days, there were strictly chickens, you know. And they had live chicken. My mother used to go to the marketplace, where—we were Orthodox, we were kosher—you have to remember that—and she would get—go to this place where they had a rabbi slaughtering chickens. Fresh chickens, they'd come in, and he'd be there, and he'd say a prayer, you know, and cut it, and my mother had to buy, it had to be kosher. How different is it, who knows, but it had to be kosher chicken. So he would slit the throat and say a prayer, my mother was happy, she'd buy the chicken. So there was a market for everything. Now, of course, you've got supermarkets. Then, you want grocery, there's a grocery store. The grocery store was all canned items. You know, you'd buy cans of different things. We used very, very little canned. My mother just 16:00didn't like the idea of opening up cans, she wanted to buy fresh fruit, everything. That's why she had to shop every day. And we had a little ice box, you know, how much can you hold? And we had a little stove. The stove was, like, from here to here to there [gesturing] with four burners and that was it. And a little oven. She did all her baking. How she did it, I don't know. Today, nobody could do it. She baked a lot of stuff. And cooked all the time, really.

GOGAN: With ten kids, too.

FEIERTAG: Yeah. I never remember her eating. It was just coming and go. There was always somebody in there eating and I don't believe we ever all sat together. I don't remember any time that we all sat together, except on Passover, where my father would conduct the Passover service, religious service, and we had the whole family there. They went through it with the whole family. But you just kind of came and went. You ate, you didn't eat, and she just made food, kept it going. But Brooklyn has changed a lot, the schools have changed a 17:00lot. PS 234 was my public school. Everything in New York is a PS. PS 234. There was a college nearby called Brooklyn College.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Which came up every once in a while, but none of us went to college, so it never came up. And even after high school when I graduated, the subject never came up with college. I went in the army right away, this was 1945, the war wasn't over yet. I got out of school, I was 17, and you couldn't really get in before you were 18, and I was 17, but the army took me anyway, and they sent me to army specialized training. ASTP, Army Specialized Training Program. They sent me down to Clemson. Here I am in Brooklyn, and going to Clemson.

GOGAN: Must have been a big change.

FEIERTAG: Like, if I went to Manhattan, it was a big trip, to go to Manhattan. That was a big thing, it was like going—like now—somebody going to a big city. And because Brooklyn and our neighborhood was very close. But anyway, I got to tell you about some of the employment, too. I didn't mention that in my early days, in high school, I worked all the time, too, because as a kid, nine years old, I was delivering packages for the appetizing store and the dairy, you know, delivering stuff for them, and working, cleaning up. Nine, ten years old, just helping out. You know everybody had to work, this was the work ethic. So, all through high school, I worked. I worked in a candy store first, selling newspapers out front at six o'clock in the morning. We had a subway in King's Highway and people would pick up a newspaper and run. Two cents, went for about two cents, they'd pick up a newspaper, Daily News or the Daily Mirror. And I was 19:00out there selling the papers. We had the World Telegram, it was like two cents. So that was my first, I guess I was twelve years old maybe, and doing that. It was before I went to High School, that was while I was still in grade school. Early in the morning, six o'clock, out there selling newspapers. Then, they brought me inside, after a little while, I don't know what age, maybe thirteen. And I started to make Coca-cola drinks. You know, for people to buy drinks. Cup of coffee or something before they went on the train. It was just a small, a little luncheonette, it had a big counter. You ever been to a luncheonette with a counter, where you could sit on the counter and be served, and that's all they had, the counter?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And people would go in there for breakfast. So, I was first at the counter with the soda and people would buy cigarettes. People would buy cigarettes a cigarette at a time. It was a penny a cigarette. You could buy a package of Camels or whatever it was for fourteen cents I think, and there were 20:00twenty cigarettes in a package. But we'd have it opened up and they could buy two or three cigarettes for two cents or three cents. People didn't have much money in that neighborhood. You know, you bought, pennies meant a lot. I used to sell cigarettes to them and make soft drinks. Then they moved me in the back. That's where I started getting my food experience. So, I'd go in there at night after school, and I would squeeze oranges, you know, hand-machine orange juice for the next morning, put them in a gallon jug. And the next morning, they would pour juice out of the jug, fresh orange juice for breakfast. So I was doing that and coffee. Then I learned to make eggs, I learned to make toast, and I really got experience there. So that happened all before I got to high school.

GOGAN: Okay. And then when you were growing up, did you know anybody who was gay, lesbian, or bisexual?

FEIERTAG: No.

GOGAN: No, you didn't.

FEIERTAG: Well, I shouldn't say that. No, no that wasn't true. Because my first 21:00experience, homosexual experience, was at probably ten or eleven. No, I'm sorry, I'll go back a little earlier than that. I'll tell you—yeah, you should have gotten around to that, how come I missed that? That's what this is all about.

GOGAN: [laughter]

FEIERTAG: At age 9, I was playing out in the yard with all the kids, and we were cleaning, I don't know what we were doing, but we had a yard, we didn't have a yard, it was a lot. There were businesses, stores, there was this vacant lot. And so we'd go there, we'd steal potatoes from the house, and we'd build a fire and we'd bake our own potatoes. In a hole in the ground. At home, we wouldn't eat it, but here we'd make it, oh boy they were good, so yeah, we did that. So we were playing in this lot, the sandlot, you know dirt and trees and shrubs, 22:00whatnot. And I was bending down to pick up something, I don't know why and one of the kids picked up a rock, a boulder, to move it, not on purpose, but it slipped and hit me in the head. So I was bleeding, blah blah, so, took me to the hospital. So, that's my hospital experience. But, -BUT- this is where I learned something about being gay, though I didn't know that expression, the word, really no words. But there was another fella in the bed next to me. Also, I don't know why he was there, I don't know who it was. But I took a liking to him, [pause] and I don't know why, nothing happened. It was just a liking and I just liked him, his looks, something. I don't know what it was. And I knew at that time, I remember very well, I knew at that time that it wasn't right to 23:00like another boy. No one ever told me, I never heard anything about gay, I never met anybody that was gay, I just had no idea what's what. But I knew that feeling that I had was not right. Isn't that funny?

GOGAN: So you knew that you were different.

FEIERTAG: Yes, yes. I don't think everybody—I knew it wasn't right, I wasn't supposed to be like that. It never came up in any subject in the family or in school or with other kids, the subject never, just inside of me I liked him. You know it was a funny feeling. It didn't really bother me, I was just concerned, what's happening? why is that?—so then it got away from me. But in the next few days, I still thought about him. I wanted to see him and be with him. I never did, but disappeared. So that was my first experience. Okay?

GOGAN: Okay. And you were nine at that time?

FEIERTAG: I was nine. My next experience was a couple years—then of course it went away and I never looked at anybody else that I liked. I never saw anybody I liked, I don't know. But I guess I was about twelve, maybe. I'm trying to think. I was playing around with a couple other kids and I was on the top floor, and then there was a little alcove and you walk up steps to go on the roof. Lots of times, we went on the roof, you had pigeons up there, we'd play on the roof, you know. But, there was one guy, and I remember his name. His name was Bumpy. I don't know why, Bumpy. He was a little bit older and he was also a kid, maybe a few years, maybe he was fifteen or fourteen, I don't know. And that's where I got my first exposure in homosexuality with another person.

GOGAN: Okay.

FEIERTAG: So, he was sitting up there and he had all the kids, he was playing around with everybody. So I wanted to play around, too. So I hung around, just 25:00being there, maybe he'd invite me over or something, which he did, so we fooled around a little bit. With the private parts. And I thought that was pretty cool. [Laughter]

GOGAN: Mmm hmm [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Some of the other kids would have ran away, and the other kids stayed and played, and I stayed and played, and then we all left. You know, nothing really happened except a little play-thing between people. You know, between all boys. So that was my first exposure. I was about twelve I guess. You know, but nothing drastic, nothing big came out of it, it was just fooling around with each other.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And it was exciting. It felt pretty good. I liked that. Why not? What's wrong with that? [laughs] So, but I never talked about it to anyone, never spoke about it, and it didn't bother me that I did playing around like 26:00that. Then nothing for the next few years. You know, not much happened I guess. I can't remember. But those were two instances I remember at an early age. And one more time it happened on a train going to New York, on a subway. With an older man. I was sitting down, and he started fooling around. And I was getting a little nervous. There were people around, and it wasn't the right thing, you know. I didn't mind him doing it, but, you know, I was a little nervous about the people. [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: So I [laughter] I'll show you how smart I am. So I get up, and I don't know if you're familiar with subways in New York. Are you, subways?

GOGAN: I am

FEIERTAG: Oh, you're from New York?

GOGAN: My mom is, yeah

FEIERTAGou: So, all the subways, there's different cars, but they're all connected, they're all tied together, right? But in each car, there's a little 27:00closed off space where the conductor, or whoever's driving the locomotive would sit. It's just a two seats, like this, and a wall here and a wall here and a little doorway going in here. And everybody used to go in there and sit, and read the paper while they're going wherever they're going. No motormen was ever in there, but they were built that way. So I was nervous about people looking, so I get up and I go to the—I'm a kid, right? [Laughter] and he followed me in there. So, that was another experience. Nothing really happened except fooling around a little bit, so. That took care of that. So that was another experience at an early age.

GOGAN: And how old here you then?

FEIERTAG: Probably twelve or thirteen

GOGAN: Twelve or thirteen

FEIERTAG: All right, and then as I got older, and I don't know if I was in high 28:00school then or not, but I'll give you another homosexual experience. [Laughter] I used to ride the subway. [Laughter] it's terrible

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Riding the subways was a fun thing for me. Sometimes rode the subways and I didn't have to go anywhere. I used to go during busy hours—right. And in the subways, during busy hours, in the morning and the evening, people going to work and coming, everybody was jammed up. Whoever was sitting was sitting, but everybody was standing. It was very—you really, in Brooklyn, or really any place in New York, during business hours, you push. And some of the stations, they have motormen, people who worked for the subway, that would push the people in so they could close the doors. That's how tight it got. And everybody was like this, holding onto the strap or holding on to the pole, you know. So you can 29:00imagine. So here I am, I'm working my way around, trying to get up to someone that I can get in very close proximity, that I couldn't help— but brush up against.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: [Laughter] Can you believe this stuff? Isn't it wild?

GOGAN: So, when was that? How old were you when you were doing this?

FEIERTAG: I was in the early teens. Thirteen, fourteen maybe.

GOGAN: Alright

FEIERTAG: Maybe I'd started high school, probably in between junior high and high school, maybe. Got into that. Yeah, so that was part of my experience, getting excited about going on so I could, you know. And it worked. I mean, it happened.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: [Laughter]

GOGAN: So is that what made riding the subway fun, or were there other things?

FEIERTAG: Is that what?

GOGAN: Is that what made riding the subway fun for you or were—

FEIERTAG: Yeah, yeah

GOGAN: That was it, that was it [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Yeah, that was the thing. As long as we're on the subject, which is the subject. As a kid we went to Coney Island. We used to go to a place called Hahn's Baths in Coney Island. The whole family went there, and we would have a family locker. We played handball a lot, all my brothers went there, sisters. We hung out there a lot during the summer time, go to take the train, the subway to Coney Island and go to Hahn's Bath. So, Hahn's Bath had a—this was my first experience in the steam room. [Laughter] a steam room and showers, and you had a locker where you'd put your clothes, and you'd put your suit on, and take your suit off and you'd go into the men's, this was the men's. The women's were here 31:00and the men's were here. Right? And there was a wall in between. You can imagine how many holes there were in the wall.

GOGAN: Right [Laughter]

Jordan Laney: [Laughter]

Howard FEIERTAG: I'm serious. So anyway, my brothers, we all went, and my brothers were very big on massages. Everybody—you went in nude. Everybody went nude. You didn't need a bathing suit. Nobody was trying to hide anything. Nobody cared what anybody looked like. Men went in. The old guys, the young guys, everybody went in the steam room. Well, my brothers were big on massages. Everybody had to get a massage. Broke my back, they were massaging me and each other, and everybody was having a good time in the steam room, you get all soaked up, you know. That was all right. That was fun, it was with the family, right? But sometimes I would go alone. During the day when they were on the beach or something, I would just go into the steam room just to get some steam, and once in a while there would be somebody else there also looking to get some 32:00steam or get steamed up, whatever you want.

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: And there was a little action going on there. And then we'd meet somebody and go back to the locker room. And go into a locker, only two people could fit into a locker, it's a door like this. And a little place to sit and a place to hang your clothes, so we'd go into the locker room and fool around a little bit. So, that was some more experiences at high school age.

GOGAN: High school age

FEIERTAG: So, time to go to high school now, out of junior high, and so now I got this little restaurant where I was—luncheonette, selling papers and selling cigarettes, and chocolate egg creams. You ever hear about a chocolate egg cream?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: All right. So, I made egg creams, and lunch and started working. But I got to work after school, early in the morning, before school, before school 33:00started at a quarter til nine I think it was. I got in about six o'clock. From there I went to a place called Silver's Luncheonette, it was just a block from where I lived, in the apartment. And by the way, in the meantime we moved from that ghetto that I was raised in to Flatbush.

GOGAN: To Flatbush

FEIERTAG: From Williamsburg, we moved to Flatbush. You heard of Flatbush?

GOGAN: Yes

FEIERTAG: So that was a little more upscale from where we were. It was more American than it was European with all the different races and religions mixed up. So that was upscale a little bit. Yeah. So then I went to high school while I was living there on Dekalb Avenue and I got a job in Silver's. Which was a luncheonette, larger than where I was before. And in the morning I'd work breakfast with the other guys that were working there, and they were busy, with 34:00all kinds of stuff. And I'd work after school, and I'd be there for sodas, and everybody came in for ice cream sodas and cones and ice cream sundaes, so I did all that. And then I stayed through dinner. And then people'd come in for the grill. We had—they had chairs, very very nice comfortable chairs and tables. They had a counter, a luncheonette counter but they also had tables in the back. So in the evening, we served back there, we had one guy that was the waiter for the tables and I worked the counter, but I also was a short order cook. So I was making sandwiches, whatever we had to cook, and I was already getting my experience—ice creams and sandwiches and breakfast and meals, you know. Throughout high school, I worked there. So, until I was seventeen. So about fourteen to seventeen I guess, three or four years. I worked there. And learned the business. [Plastic crinkling sound] the homosexual activity kind of died 35:00down [plastic crinkling sound] other than the subway rides, you know. I had friends in high school, but there was no homosexuality that I was aware of, anyway. Very active with the girls, went to a lot of parties, did a lot of dancing. I didn't have one special girlfriend. I had a lot of girlfriends. And all my family used to tease me a lot about my girlfriends, and say "oh boy, you're gonna get married early, I can see it already" because I was always out dancing, partying, and we always went out with the girls, the guys, and the girls. We went places and did things. We always had some place to go. Someone's house. One of the girls parents we went to, I remember, used to love to have everybody come over there, because they felt safer I guess if everybody came to the house rather than go out. So, she'd, they'd always have parties for us. So 36:00that was my big thing during most of high school, was more heterosexual activity. Not real activity, I mean fun running around, but no sexual activity.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: I was having a good time. Kissing, necking, you know. But that's all, that's where it ended. Except in the meantime, riding the subways back and forth. But there was no—there was one friend, there was one guy in high school, who I suspected of being gay, even at that time, never heard the term. Never had any discussion with anyone about homosexuality, it never came up, there was nothing in the papers, you didn't even know that it was going on. I wouldn't even—but it never bothered me, I was never—what's interesting about it, I see kids nowadays, or adults now, they had a troubled childhood because of it, and I 37:00never did. I never had a problem [laughter].

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: I didn't have to announce it. That's one of the issues I have now when I go to some of our gay programs here with the 'Out at Work.' You know, the Out at Work program that I went to? You know Out at Work?

GOGAN: No, can you tell us about it?

FEIERTAG: Oh yeah, Out at Work here, we have it every year

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: We had a big reception at the Smith building, the career center. And the university, people are pretty big on Out at Work for diversity. And there are about four homosexual groups in town. Are you familiar with them? Four different, uh, homo societies here? [Laughter]

Laney: No

FEIERTAG: Four different groups, and I belong to the Caucus, which is a faculty and staff, and then we have a graduate, it's called, I forget, OPS Queers or something like that, they call themselves, and then there's another one, I'm 38:00trying to think. There were four different groups. A graduate student group, an undergraduate, a Caucus, and then the science group. Science and engineering or something like that, alright?

But anyway, so where was I? So we didn't know, there were no discussions about it, no one ever mentioned, or ever heard the word 'diversity.' We were already diverse in Brooklyn with all the other nationalities and religions and groups, except for homosexuals, but it never came up! There were no stories about it, no jokes even, every once in a while you'd talk about somebody being a fag, you know, a kid who acts like a girl.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: So we'd call him, you'd call him a sissy. And we'd call him a fag. But we never did that—it wasn't very nice—I never did. But one kid I met that was in our class, I kind of figured he was... a fag. You know. That's the term. You're a fag.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: That's the only term we ever used! I can't think of any other use. 39:00Didn't know any other lesbians, didn't even know there was a lesbian. I never heard of such a thing. Never heard the word. I'm sure that was going on, but who knew?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: I didn't know. So that was—nothing happened with that guy until later on [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: After school ended. I ran into him. Anyway

GOGAN: Like, after you graduated from high school, you ran into him? Or after...

FEIERTAG: Yes, it was after graduation

GOGAN: Okay, okay

FEIERTAG: Uh huh. His name was Marty. Nice kid, but he was—so. And then a couple other friends that I was not aware of and didn't find out until after high school. After when I was in the military and came home on leave. I was like, boy, why didn't you tell me before? You know, three years ago, five years ago?

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Oh you know [Laughter]. So we found that out.

GOGAN: So, you said that right after you graduated from high school, you went 40:00into the military.

FEIERTAG: So, yeah. So I worked in the luncheonette, and then after graduation, I went into the military. I went to Clemson. And nothing happened down there. I was there for about a year, until I was old enough to be officially a soldier, you know?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: I was in specialized training, which is good, like college, maybe. There were courses and military stuff. I wore a uniform. But it was strictly not real military, but pre-military. And then I became active in the army. So I had three years in the military— Nothing comes to mind— of any real homosexual activity during that period in the army. And we didn't even hear about it. I 41:00mean, I knew it wasn't something you wanted to do, or maybe I wanted to do something, maybe I was afraid, you know, but it never came to mind that I had to do or wanted to do, or found somebody that was going to do something with, nothing. It wasn't that strong a desire. It was there, you know, but there was no real strong desire to get active in it. So I did my tour of duty. At an early age, I ended up with a lot of responsibility. I got into military police, they put me in military police school. And, we did security, we had a security and intelligence group they moved me into. We did criminal investigations. Security 42:00came next. The first move from military police school was into a CID criminal investigation department, where we did investigation for small stuff, crimes. And then from there I went into the security and intelligence division—SID. I was in Fort Monmouth, New Jersey where we had a top secret cryptographic laboratory, and we had a lot of scientists working on codes, right. And so I was involved with that department doing background investigations on the people who were employed by the government in that area. I did cryptographic clearances, you had to have a top secret clearance before you could do cryptography, ever hear that word? No? [Laughter] Cryptography was codes. But before you could get 43:00into it, you had to be background, make sure you're clear. So that's what I did, I did background investigations. Then they got me into a situation with my boss, who was a civilian, a retired colonel, and he had me doing special investigations on the people that worked in that lab in New Jersey. They were suspicious of communists.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: There was a big senate hearing back in those days about what was going on, in that Fort Monmouth, was a secret, and they had all kinds of new stuff going on there. The physicists and who knows what, coming up with programs. Other than cryptographic, there were other things going on, which I knew nothing about. But there were other things going on, they were very suspicious of some 44:00of the people working there being communists, so I had a special detail. I was working with this guy to investigate these people so, I'd be attending, I'd be wearing civilian clothes and attending meetings that went on and I would go out and write down people's—people parked their cars, and I would write down all the license numbers [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: And through checking the registration, you would find out who was attending the meetings.

GOGAN: Oh. Wow.

FEIERTAG: And I never really came up with anything. [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: But I did my job, I did the investigations. So anyway, I got promoted, became a sergeant, and that stuff. But I was a young kid, I was 18. Already had responsibility, had couple of guys working for me. But I didn't have any [plastic crinkling sound] experiences—homosexual involvements or experiences 45:00that I can remember. Nothing comes to mind.

GOGAN: Did you know anybody who was gay when you were in the military?

FEIERTAG: Hm?

GOGAN: Did you know anybody who was gay?

FEIERTAG: No

GOGAN: No

FEIERTAG: I'm sure they were there, but one day when I got home, on furlough, two of my friends, we all used to hang out together. One was driving a car, we were going to go to a movie or go out or something. So I'm in the back seat with one friend, Al, a big, tall, tall guy. And another one who was driving. Elliot. I can't believe I remember these names [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: And he started to fool around with me! And I said, "Come on! Get out of here!" [laughter]

GOGAN: [laughter]

FEIERTAG: I didn't know why, I didn't want to do anything. And he was all, come 46:00one! He was trying to get into my pants, and he did. He told the guy up front, "Howard"—I forget the expression. He said, "Elliot, Howard's letting me do it." Elliott, "oh, really?" He was looking back there, driving.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: So, that was my exposure with my two close friends that I used to hang out with, not knowing who was what. So, nothing really went on other than that, you know? I used to hang around, when I'd come home on furlough, in the neighborhood, and walk up and down the blocks just to see if I could find anything or anybody [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter] Was this in your neighborhood?

FEIERTAG: My old neighborhood, yeah

GOGAN: Flatbush, then

FEIERTAG: Flatbush

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: I'd walk down the dark streets and look around, maybe somebody just hanging around there waiting. Sometimes there were just people hanging around, I 47:00guess. So there wasn't really much there.

GOGAN: So how could you tell if someone was hanging around waiting?

FEIERTAG: Well, you know, you play it by ear, pardon the expression [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter] okay

FEIERTAG: "Oh hi, how you doing?" "Alright." You know— you just try to make conversation, depending on whether they're willing to make conversation, and someone's got to take the lead to make a pass. You don't use words, you use actions. You can't use words. I had a friend [laughter] I have a friend, today, over the years I've had different friends. But—this is just cute. He's a professor at another university. I won't mention where or what.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: But, we visit from time to time, and he's about 58 or so, but he's 48:00homosexual, but he's had very very limited experiences because he's very religious, raised as a Baptist and the religious thing is all over him. So, he's scared to death, and it's just not his thing. But he wants to, but he can't, this is the thing. So, his big thing is talking with people. That's how he gets his kicks. Meeting a nice young man, where are you from, he's a very good conversationalist. He can really talk to anybody on any subject. Sports, or anything you want, he's good at it. And he was trying to figure out how he could maneuver himself into doing something. I said, well, doing all the talking you're doing, you ain't going to do nothing. I said, now take me for example [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Actions speak louder than words. I said, if I start talking to 49:00someone, it goes away, I can't do anything. It's just—the idea is that you can talk afterwards, but not before [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: If you want to pick up somebody, you know, you want to make out. You don't get into conversations. That goes somewhere else, that's just not what you want, right? So, you got to, and sometimes you waste a lot of time, too. There's always somebody else [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Actions speak louder than words. So, how you act [laughter] anyways, but, I have to get back to the background

GOGAN: But you grew up in a religious family, too, though, right?

FEIERTAG: Well, yeah, but it's a different religion. You've got—the Jewish religion is so different than Christians, and different religions within Christians. We don't preach the Bible, and you will be damned and you're going to go to hell if you do this or do that, and no you can't do this, you can't do 50:00that. There's nothing in the religion except, in our religion, anyway, Jewish, and I'm not religious to the point of reading the Bible and knowing what's going on.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: But there's nothing in there that—that's in the Bible, but you find most of the bad stuff is in the New Testament and some in the Old Testament as well, about being bad, but nobody seems to pay much attention to it. Having kosher food, now, that's important! [Laughter]

GOGAN: Right [laughter]

FEIERTAG: Or going to synagogue on the holidays, or Saturday, you know. But I was brought up, I went to Hebrew school for four years, also. Between my high school and my work I had to go to Hebrew school. My mother insisted I went every afternoon for a couple hours. Every other afternoon, maybe. So I did that and worked and did everything in high school. But, there was nothing there that stopped us from doing anything—

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Some religions, you can't do this, you can't do that. The only thing is, you don't eat ham, you don't eat pork, but I do, but in those days I didn't.

GOGAN: Right

FEIERTAG: Until I worked in a restaurant, I learned about what bacon was. Boy, was it delicious.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: I loved the bacon. I used to make sandwiches with bacon, lettuce and tomato, BLT. I said, "I'm going to try one of those!" I wouldn't tell my mama that, but I will.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: So I got to learn to eat bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwiches, and that was delicious. And I learned about ham, I didn't even know there was ham.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: You know. We never had it in the house, I said oh, this is ham, oooh boy. It's good, you know. I learned that when I was working, but never told mama, you know. [Laughter] Anyway, where was I. And so, I got out of the army, isn't that what I did?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm—oh, we hadn't gotten to you getting out of the army yet.

FEIERTAG: We haven't gotten there yet

GOGAN: No, but—

FEIERTAG: Yeah, so I did that investigation stuff, and that was— many years later, it came up again, about these communists. The issue came up because my 52:00name was on all these investigations, I was part of the investigating team. And some years later, it came up in the senate, and they had a big—I'm trying to think of the congressman that made a big stink about communists—

Laney: McCarthy?

FEIERTAG: Who?

Laney: McCarthy?

FEIERTAG: McCarthy. You remember! You remember the story. That's history, boy, eh? Yeah, I got called, but later on I'll tell you, later on, I'll tell you my next experience in the army. So that was my one experience. So now, my boss, the civilian guy, Andy. What are you going to do? You're getting ready to go out. I said, "I don't know." "You're going to go away, you got to go to college." I said, "I never thought about going to college." He said, "what do you mean, you got to go to college! Everybody goes to college." I said, "well, you know, nobody in my family went to college, we can't afford it, you know, you got to pay for it." "No! The GI Bill!"

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: "The government's going to pay for it, going pay for everything, 53:00they'll give your mother an allotment, they'll pay for the whole thing." I said, "I don't think I'm smart enough." He said, "what do you mean? Look at all the work you've been doing here... blah blah blah. He said we're going to get you to college. So he went ahead and he researched it, he says you've got a lot of police experience here with your military police, and investigation, all the work you did for me. He said we're going to get you a degree in police work, police administration. I said I guess that'd be a good idea. What do I know? You know. So he researched where to go to school. He found Michigan State was one, somewhere out in California was another, there were only about three schools that had a program in police administration. So he wrote letters and he got me into Michigan State, with a degree in police administration, the school of business and public service. So, okay, GI Bill paid for the whole thing, and it 54:00worked. So, it was great. So here I go, I'm off to college [laughter]. Went to Michigan. Anyway, that was right after the war, because I got out in '48, I was in the service for three years. Went in in '45, I got out in '48, and I went—in '49 I started, in February I started. Lived in a Quonset hut.

GOGAN: What's that?

FEIERTAG: Quonset hut. They built these metal buildings all around the country. Airports had them, it was a circular-type building like this, it's all metal, that's what they called it, a Quonset hut. And it had beds and bathrooms and everything in it, but they were portable, and they were made real easy to make. Quonset huts. They had heating, and they had lights, and they had bathrooms, and they'd have, I forget how many in each hut. Maybe twenty students, you know.

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: And they had a little cubicles, like two to a cubicle. You know, two beds, and a separate wall. No rooms, but there were just walls, had two beds, and that was it. That was the dormitory. Before they were building buildings then. So, while I was there, they were building a place called Shaw Hall, which was on the water. On the Red Cedar river. But anyway. So that's where I met my roommates, you know. Bob Kirkse, very good friend for many many years. He ended up being an admiral in the Navy, and while he was in the service and I was in my second tour of duty, we used to visit, and his wife, Vy, she went to school with us, they were boyfriend and girlfriend from the same neighborhood. But still 56:00[laughter] that was another story she didn't know about.

Claire: Ohhh [laughter]

FEIERTAG: [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: And another guy. So, we buddied up, and that was fine. The first year, there was nothing going on, not any activity at all that I can remember. So anyway, I went in there and I [plastic crinkling sound], since I had military service I didn't have to go to ROTC. They had one if I wanted, but I went to ROTC the last two years so I could get my commission. That was part of the goal, this guy told me, my boss told me what I want to do.

GOGAN: Okay

Laney: One hour

FEIERTAG: So... [long pause, eating sounds] I worked as a dormitory counselor, 57:00when they finally built this building. We all moved in the first year, and the government was already paying the way for everything. They paid me cash because they didn't have to give me free housing or free food, the government's paying for it. So they paid me, so I got a job being a counselor, I got paid for it. So that's money. I bought a car. Had a girlfriend. We went out dancing, parties, and whatnot. Nothing sexual, but, you know, a friend. And there was nothing really going on except with a couple... guys that I liked. And Kirkse was one of them, and he was a roommate, and we all moved in together, to the new dormitory. 58:00And I knew Vy, I knew they were running around together, but I liked him. We did a few minor playing around things, nothing serious. Just fooling around, but nothing, nobody got mad or anything, we were just cutting up. So that was all right, and we stayed friends for a long time afterwards. Older at the time, he was in the military and I was, too. Then there was this other little fella [laughter]

GOGAN: [laughter]

FEIERTAG: He was a short, nice looking young guy, who was also in the dormitory, not where I was, but got very friendly with him. But nothing ever happened. We never happened. And he had a friend of the family, an older older man who used to come visit him. He used to stay at a hotel, and he used to stay with him, so really I became suspicious. You know, of what, but nothing every transpired 59:00there. But I got good feelings about it. But I used to go out running around a little bit myself, in the town, looking, going to a bar or two, but nothing really happened, nothing big. Nothing memorable, I'll put it that way. Right?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: So, anyway, I graduated, got my degree, graduated with honors, got an offer to join the regular army as a commissioned officer, and I said well I don't know, I'll just stay in the reserves. I graduated in 1952. 1953, Korean War, I got called back into service...[pause] I left out a piece.

I was trying to think, what did I do when I graduated? Between that time and when I got called back, right? That's an important part of my life. Graduation was coming and one of my professors said, "What are you going to do?" I said I don't know, all these guys were going to Detroit working for Dearborn and one went into secret, all the other guys got their degrees and went to work for Secret Service, or went into officer Naval Intelligence, and some went to Ford Motor Company, and I said, I don't know what I was going to do. He says, well I got a job for you. He says, the state prison of Southern Michigan and Jackson, Mississippi is looking for a counselor. They have ten counselors working with the prisoners, he says I think you'd be ideal. I said, a counselor in a prison camp? I mean, not prisoner of war, prison. I said, I'm not a psychologist, I think that's what you'd want to be. He says, "no, you'd fit in. You're very 61:00good, you're good at that, you know how to talk to people." He's like, "go on down and talk to them." I went down and bingo [snaps fingers] they hired me. Just like that. This is, I'll mention it now, I don't know how much time we've got. All through my career, this is interesting. I've really never applied for a job. I've been recruited. Every job I've had, people came to me and wanted me to move to go to work. Same with the University, even. I never applied, never thought I'd be teaching. It's not my field, but they recruited me to come teach because they want somebody from the industry to teach. So I never made an application, I never had a resume.

GOGAN: Hmm

FEIERTAG: So this was how it started.

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: I got the interview, I never applied for the job, they gave me the job. So now I've become a prison counselor. Now, the interesting part about it, 62:00I was given a special element of the prisoners. In Michigan, they have a CSP law, called Criminal Sexual Psychopath. If you're convicted three times of a sexual offense, you go in for life. Mandatory life— alright? So we had ten counselors there. Ten of us, right? And they were all psychologists, or had Master's degrees, whatever they got, a lot more education than I had. I get the CSP group, they had 400 CSPs in the State Prison of Southern Michigan at the time. That was my group to counsel as a counselor. Why me?

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Maybe they know something I don't know! But—[laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: I never figured that out! I didn't ask, but that was my group. And of course, I had a secretary who was a gay prisoner. We all had secretaries, they were all male, but mine happened to be one of the CSPs. So it was a lot of fun. I never said anything, they never asked me anything, I never opened up, you know? But that was interesting, to be the counselor for that group, and I was counseling with them about their job, their life in prison, and how they got along. That was all I did. Just to keep them happy while they're in prison, I mean, not completely happy I guess, I don't know what they would do on their own. But they would come talk to me, the families would come and talk to me, visiting them. I'd talk with the families and they would—it was really a pretty easy job, just a question of counseling. You know, was I making them more comfortable in what they're doing, help them move—they had a lot of jobs, you 64:00know, at the prison. They had 6,000 inmates, the largest maximum security prison in the country. 6,000 inmates. So they were, you know, all over all kinds of jobs. They had farms, they had metal factories. They had, you know, places to work. So I helped them get acclimated to their jobs. So that was part of it.

Well, I wasn't there long until the war broke out. And here I am in the reserves. So I get my orders to report for duty. And I was assigned—my paperwork, my title. Commanding officer of the 56th military police prisoner of war camp. In Korea. That was what my job title was. I was to report to Fort 65:00Gordon, Georgia, to this battalion, on a certain date. I was like, all right, they already told me what I was going to do, how'd they figure that out? So, when I got in I talked to the personnel guy, when I got down there. I said, why, how did they? He says, well, they have—in the military there's what they call M.O.S.: Military Occupational Specialty. They didn't have the computers like we have now. You remember those IBM cards that were like this, you'd punch holes in them and put them in the machine?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Brrrrrrrrrrr! And it'd kick something out. So they put in, and they were looking for someone for this job. Criminal, you know, for a prisoner of war camp. Well [coughs] when they had all my information and file from my early days, I was in the military police, I was in investigation, I was in security and intelligence, I got my degree in police administration from Michigan State, then I went to work in a prison camp, in a prison, in Michigan. Hey, I was the 66:00most qualified guy they could find!

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Because I'm sure they read those cards and I was the only one that spit out. You know, we got one!

GOGAN: Yeah

FEIERTAG: This is what we're going to do with you. I guess that's how it worked. Works fine, those computers, whatever they were called in those days, IBM cards. So that's what happened. So now I go to Fort Gordon, Georgia. Still there's no real homosexual activity in all this that I can remember. There were little things here and there probably, but nothing serious and nothing big going on. Nothing big [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter] So did you have like a coming out experience at some point?

FEIERTAG: Now that's a good question. [Plastic crinkling sound] Actually, that's one of my arguments, not my argument, this is one of the issues that I bring up with the other guys and ladies in our program

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: About coming out. I addressed a class in Human Sexuality several months ago. I forgot whose class it was. It had like 200 students. At 67:00Litton-Reeves. I was on a panel. And they talked about coming out. I never came out. I mean, what is this coming out? I said, you try to go tell your parents, they're probably going to tell you they knew you were gay. They know! They worry about it. One of the kids on the panel, how worried he was for such a long time, he wanted to tell his parents, didn't want to, wanted to, he was a nervous wreck. And finally he told her, and she said, I was wondering when you were going to tell me. That's what the mother said.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm [laughter]

FEIERTAG: There was no coming out. I never—I mean, I did what I wanted to do, it didn't worry me, I never got in trouble by it, I don't need a psychiatrist, you know.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: I did what I wanted to do. Or didn't do, you know. And who was I going 68:00to tell? Tell my family? What for? What do they care? I mean, what were they going to do about it, you know? Why worry them? Why give them something that—hey, I got a brother that's queer, my son is queer. What are they going—you know. Why bother them? Do what you want to do, don't get anybody else involved. But today, these days, they have to come out. Or coming out at work. I never came out at work. Believe me, everybody in our faculty knows about me, in the college, the dean, they all know. The provost knows. I mean, they know me. We never talk about it, but they know. My friends do, in the faculty, we have a lot of fun. They try to fix me up with a date, hey look at that guy. You know, they do that kind of stuff. But it's the same in all the companies I worked with. I was out. I didn't wear a sign.

GOGAN: Right

FEIERTAG: But if the subject ever came up, I wouldn't deny it. People come to me and say, people I run into at a social event, for example. They'll say, do you 69:00have any grandchildren? I say, grandchildren, I'm not even married! Oh, you're not married! I say no, I'm not married. Had a partner I lived with for 41 years, you know, and he and I...but he and I decided not to have any children. You know, I make a joke of it.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: And then it goes by and people tell each other, finally they know I'm gay. I don't have to make an announcement. I live what I want to do. I'm not obvious, I don't think. I don't go out with a sign, I don't pat people on the butt, you know

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: So, but this coming out business, people always say about coming out, why do you have to come out? Just do it. And the kids, it drives them nuts. So many of them go crazy about, they're gonna tell their parents—why do you have to tell them?!

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: They'll know soon enough. I have a cute story to tell you about that.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: My mother from the old country. When I was in college, one of my 70:00friends. Straight friends. Wanted to come to New York, come home with me to Brooklyn, and he stayed with me at the house— remember, my mother was from the old country, didn't know much about America, didn't know about English, to speak it. But where we lived at the time, there were three bedrooms in the back of the house. We always doubled up all the brothers. And one bathroom. One bathroom for the whole house. My mother and father had a separate room with a bed on the other side of the apartment. I said house, but it was an apartment. It was a living room and a dining room and a kitchen, and then the three bedrooms. So it was the other end. Right? When I brought my friend home, one of my friends, not 71:00gay, we were going to sleep in one of these bedrooms, you know. And my mother said, no no no no, you come over here, private, you go back in my room. She gave me her room, her bed. She went to sleep in my bed, my old bed— Did she have anything in mind? I don't know.

GOGAN: Hmm

FEIERTAG: But, nothing happened. But, in Brooklyn, you have steps, what do you call them

GOGAN: A stoop?

FEIERTAG: You all sit down there, in front of the apartment

GOGAN: On a stoop?

FEIERTAG: Yeah, the stoop, the stoop. I forget. The stoop. Right. So I'll be coming down there with my friend, my mother would introduce my friend to the neighbors. "Oh, this is, this is Hahvahd's boyfriend!" She called him my 72:00boyfriend. [Laughter] What does she know? My boyfriend?

GOGAN: [Laugther]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: A boyfriend? Like a girlfriend? A friend. You know. She had no—my friend was looking at me like, what's she saying, Howard? [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: [Laughter] that was so cute. Howard's boyfriend. I was like what are you talking—but that's just a cute little story. But anyway, so, now I'm in the army, I've got my lieutenant, I'm working on it, and I go to the commanding officer and I said, "where do I go?" You know, the colonel or the battalion commander he said, "you got to put your company together." I say [?] so he showed me, "this is the barracks here, this is the motor pool, there is the kitchen, this is where supplies are," nobody there, no people. He says "no, you've got to find them, got to put it all together, we're forming this. It's 73:00your baby, you got to put it all together." He says, "we'll go to personnel, they have a sheet already of what you're supposed to have." It was a very very specialized unit in the prisoner of war. I had to have interpreters, I had to have interrogators, had to have photographers and fingerprint experts, then security people. So, they know all that, and they're doing those M.O.S.s for those people, too. And they came from all over the country, little by little, started coming in, over a period of time, being transferred from wherever they were. Really an interesting concept

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: The military, putting it all together. Finally, I got a chef, I got a kitchen crew, I got a supply sergeant, I got a first sergeant, got a company clerk. Had to have my photographers and fingerprint experts. And I had really an upscale group of guys. All college kids, with all these different experiences that they had. It was really great, you know. This is something, good. And this 74:00was my company, I had to train them. I had manuals and whatnot, and who, what, play acting and all that jazz, doing all that. So in the meantime, I had this girlfriend in town, too, in North Augusta, in Georgia. In Augusta, Georgia we had North Augusta. I wonder where that was—North Augusta? I'm trying to think if that was in Georgia—it was in Georgia. It doesn't matter, but anyway, I had a girlfriend there, who had a kid, had a daughter. So, I don't know how I hooked up with her somehow or another. So, we got into the thing, we were having sex. It wasn't so great, but you're supposed to do it, you know, and keep her happy, I guess. But I also had my other eyes on other things going on. And there was a gay bar in Augusta, Georgia that I used to go to and hang out with some of the 75:00guys, and this one guy I was telling you about, the little guy that was in the college, he was also in the army, he got called in, too. And he also was a lieutenant. And I ran into him up there, and he happened to be there, too, so we used to go to the gay bar together. Nothing ever happened between us, I would have liked to, but it didn't hit, you know, he had other ideas. So, nothing worked.

Anyway, that was the, hanging out, nothing extraordinary happened there. I used to go to the USO officers, we had dances on Saturday night, Friday night. And I'd go into the restroom and it was unbelievable what was going on— [laughter]

GOGAN: Can you tell us a little about that?

FEIERTAG: You want me to talk about that?

GOGAN: Yeah! If you want to.

FEIERTAG: Um, you know what a glory hole is? Oh, you do?

GOGAN: You can explain it, though, for—for posterity

FEIERTAG: For posterity! [Laughter] when you go into the bathroom, to close the door and sit down, right? You're in the little cabinet there, you got walls. Well, there are holes in the wall. That's a glory hole. Because you could put things into [laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: And someone on the other side, yeah. So, there was a lot of that going on. I was a little surprised, I used to go there, yeah, quite often. [Laughter] back in those days. And that was interesting. Never really hooked up with anybody because I never knew who was who.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Yeah, so that was fine with me, too, because I was an officer, there were a lot of enlisted men, you had to be very careful. So, I didn't go in uniform, I went in civilian clothes, so they shouldn't know I was an officer. Anyway, uh

GOGAN: This was still in Augusta, Georgia?... Was this still Augusta, Georgia?

FEIERTAG: Yeah, uh huh. This was still Augusta, Georgia. Okay, so I got my whole team together, we got into sports, we played with the intramural basketball and volleyball, and we had a small company. Most of the military companies had four or five hundred soldiers in them, we had ninety. That was the whole program, our whole company, it was ninety specialists. That was our company, and we won tournaments. Intramural tournaments. We had college kids, tall guys that were playing basketball, they were playing for the college team! You know, they're coming in the army now, they loved playing basketball, so we won tournaments. And volleyball, you know, I was the coach. I didn't play, told them how to play, you know. So, nothing every happened with these guys, not at all. So, I'm trying to go on maneuvers, going to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and there was a war going on. In the military, you had the Americans Against the Enemy, and the Fort 78:00Bragg paratroopers, special service teams, they dressed up like the enemy. Uniforms and hocus pocus. And there wasn't really fighting going on, you know, make believe shooting cannons and whatnot. We had a prisoner of war camp, with guards. When we arrived with that, all of our vehicles and all of the troops in my company with the vehicles and trucks and equipment, and we pulled into where we were supposed to go, and it was interesting. Here was a prisoner of war camp, the engineers built us a camp. With barbed wire, and fences, and barracks. Amazing, and I said, wow. This is our camp, you know? So we made, we made do. We got in there. One of the situations came up, but we were in tents. So it was, it was tents, not barracks. Everybody had tents. And I had a first sergeant, great 79:00guy, tough guy. And he—I don't know, he knew something was going on. He never said anything, but I knew he knew—something, I don't know. I don't know why he would know it, I just had that feeling. But he was right. But when I got into where I was going to be assigned, he was assigning everybody where they're going to—this is the officer's tent, okay? So, I was the only officer, commanding officer, I didn't have any officers working with me. I had ninety guys, right? So in this tent, he also put the company clerk. Now, I had my eye on this company clerk. His name is David Vaughan. Imagine how far back this goes. And I remember that name? David Vaughan. I have a story about that, too. So I will have to tell you.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Anyway, so David Vaughan—because you don't mix officers with enlisted, 80:00though I loved the idea that he was going to bunk with me. So I asked the sergeant, I said "well, this is a mistake here, you've got David," he's said "well, I thought it would be a good idea if we had the company clerk bunking with you. Of course you've got a lot of business going on, and you can talk to him." The guy knew something was going on! Nothing was going on, but he assumed, maybe, I don't know. So, but nothing went on at all, with David. Just I liked him, but that was it.

FEIERTAG: I am going to jump now to after I get discharged.

GOGAN: that's fine

FEIERTAG: that was a whole two year thing, at that time. And now I'm in Atlanta and working for an insurance investigation firm, another company that got me because somebody told me about it and they hired me like that [snaps fingers]. 81:00Anyway, so I'm out one night, going into a gay bar and who do I run into— David Vaughn [laughter] I said hoohoo and he looked at me and [laughter] says, "Lt., I whahhh..." anyways. So, come to find out, he was surprised, I was surprised, that was it. Nothing went on now because he was doing something else with somebody, and nothing went on, that was just curious how you know you don't know Bingo. I have another surprise for you [laughter] I'm thinking this was in Charlotte, or this was Atlanta, a few years later, I ran into a another— well, I'll tell it to you now I forgot just when it was but

GOGAN: we don't have to be totally linear so that's fine

FEIERTAG: Well the story is this. I went to a party one night and it was in Charlotte, when I finally moved to Charlotte after a few years and went to the party, it was a gay party there was a drag show going on somewhere's in town, and everybody was dressed up so I went to the party, and I'm in this room talking and I hear this guy in another room talking [growls] rough voice you know, and I go "oh my god— my colonel." Colonel with ribbons from here to here [motions with hand on chest], full Colonel [Bert?] colonel that I knew that was in the military, of his post. He was all over the wars and all this and real real rough tough guy and he's off in this other room, camping like a queen, like everybody else. And he recognized me, yeah yeah, and he was like "What the hell are you..." [laughter] So that was a big surprise. A colonel, a big shot 83:00colonel, a big husky guy and he's acting like a queen like everybody else, you know [laughter]. Amazing how you run into people you don't know anything about.

So, in the military, in Augusta, Georgia I had a girlfriend. I was invited to another time, I went to a party where there was this lady, invited me over to her house for another thing, and uh, I really felt guilty about this but anyway, I went over and I knew what was gonna go on, what she wanted or what was supposed to go on. And I saw a picture of a sailor in her bedroom, a picture of a guy in uniform and I go "oh, that's interesting, that's your brother" and she goes, "no, that's my husband." [whistles]. Whew. I felt bad. I really felt- I 84:00left... I said I don't feel good— made some excuse. I really really felt like crap, I mean, that— here I am going to go to bed with this guys wife and he's in the navy fighting off in the war, the Korean war and I'm here going to bed with his wife and I couldn't take it, I couldn't handle it. That bothered me so much, you know. I remember that thing very well, and I'm a big believer in supporting and things...

GOGAN: So is that how, did you come down south because of the military and then stay in the South or did you do some moving around before you came to Tech?

FEIERTAG: I got out of service in, 55, right? Yeah 53 to 55 and the war was 85:00over, and we disbanded, we never went to Korea, we were supposed to, but then, after the manuevers, where they screwed around so long training and building and getting together, the war was over. 2 years, that's all it was, really, 55. So they disbanded the company and everybody went home. I went home too. I mean, I didn't go home. But, David, at that time, David was getting married, the company clerk— no not yet he got married later. So I didn't know where I was going to go to work. David worked for Delta Airlines, so he got his job back when he was discharged he was going to go to Delta, he says, "C'mon stay with me at my house" with his parents where he lived in Atlanta because I didn't know where to go after discharge from Fort Gordon, from Augusta Georgia, Fort Gordon, Georgia, he was leaving from Augusta also, he said, "Come to Atlanta, you'll find a job 86:00there." I said alright, so I said okay, I moved in with him, into his bedroom, you know separate beds, that's it. This is before I ran into him at the bar, the bar came later.[laughter]

GOGAN: OK

FEIERTAG: Because that was in Charlotte. So I moved in with David and then he got me, through his father or somebody, with this company about insurance investigations, you'd be good at it, blah, blah, blah— I said okay. They went on and called, and bingo [snaps fingers] they hired me like that. I got the job just like that in Atlanta. Then I moved into my own apartment. And then he got married, he was going with a girl there, and then he got married. And then, and didn't hear much and I was going my way he was going his way and not until a couple years later that I ran into him at a bar. It was after I had moved to Charlotte, it wasn't Atlanta, it was in Charlotte. That surprised me, he divorced, and he knew he was gay. But he know he was gay when he was in the 87:00army, he told me— I said "well, we should a done something." [Laughter] Anyway, maybe I wasn't his type. Everybody's got a type, you know. So, anyway. So I went to work with that company and then went to the gay bars in Atlanta, and nothing really happened, no affairs or anything, just fooling around stuff. And then from Atlanta I got transferred, I became assistant manager of this [?] insurance investigation firm, and then they transferred me to Savannah. We had a small office in Savannah to take care of the southern part of Georgia. And northern Florida, for investigations there, through insurance companies. Insurance companies hired our agency there to investigate claims. Right? So, that's what I was there.

Savannah was a great, great town. Really loved it. Really nice, friendly, just 88:00really a nice place to live. And the beach was there, nice. And I was active there, there were a couple of gay bars, you know, but nothing—there was a lady that I was very friendly with, she always used to like having the gay boys over her house. So we used to hang out at her house, not far from where I lived. We always had parties together with all these other gay guys and every once in a while, you'd run into someone you like and you do things, but nothing serious going on. Julie, her name was. Nice lady. She liked to have the gay boys there. That was it. So we had parties there. And then, after a while, I got promoted to a larger office in Charlotte, North Carolina. And that was in 1958. That was three years after I got out, yeah. 55 and I was in Atlanta, Savannah, and then moved to Charlotte. That was the regional office of our company. That was a 89:00larger area, larger office. I was very active in the chamber of commerce, the junior chamber of commerce, Jaycees. Once you're 35, you're kicked out of the Jaycees. So, I wasn't quite 35. So I was president of the Jaycees, active in community affairs, and did programs with the community, with the chamber of commerce, I was very active there. And did a good job running that office. And had a few excursions with some of the boys around there, nothing— exciting. So now here comes the story.

GOGAN: Okay!

FEIERTAG: I know you're waiting for it. So, one of the fund drives we had was to raise money washing cars. All over the place. So this place on South Tryon 90:00street, washing cars, and then after we're all through, I was in shorts and wet and dirty, I think I'll just go have a beer. So I go into the Berringer hotel, one of the nice hotels in town, and I went into the bar to get a beer, and I didn't want to sit up front where everybody could see me, people wouldn't come in, because it was a nice bar, so I went and got a seat in the back, you know, where no one could see what I look like. You know? Because I looked crummy. And I had my beer there. And this was a straight bar, wasn't a gay bar, straight bar. So I'm drinking a beer there and I see this guy sitting at the bar. Very nice man, dressed up, tie, coat, very quiet. All by himself, and people all around. So anyway, he looks at me, I look at him, my thing is to act, not talk, 91:00remember I told you?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: I wasn't going to have a conversation with somebody, you lose them that way! [Laughter]

GOGAN: It's like the Elvis song, 'A Little Less Conversation'

FEIERTAG: Yeah, uh huh. So, time to close, it gets to close, people starting to leave, and very few people left, so I figured I'll get my beer and get ready to go, but I'll go up to the bar... and go up and order another beer at the bar, sit next—one seat behind, one seat between, I wouldn't dare sit next to him, it's too obvious. One seat over. No conversation yet, nothing talking, nothing going on. Finish the beer, they're closing up, they've got to get out, I walk out, he walked out. We're both standing in front— what do you do? So I say, both standing there [laughter] ridiculous, I say, "Where do we go from here? Is there another bar?" you know? That's logical, right? Where do we go from here? And he 92:00says, well, come to my place [laughter].

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: I said, "Oh, I'm glad you asked" [laughter]. I said, "I'll follow you." I had a car, he had a car to drive. So here we're going through town and going out in the woods and further out and further out, and oh boy, I'm in for it. I know what this is all about. We're going to get off here in the woods somewheres and park, and a bunch of guys are going to come out and hit me over the head and steal my car and my money and everything, and beat me up. I really thought that. I said, well, I'll just keep my distance. If he parks somewheres where I don't like, I'm on my way, you know. Because I didn't know him or where we were going, it was like into the woods, I mean the road's going like this up all over the place. Very funny. He didn't live in town, you know? Finally he goes into a beautiful residential section. Beautiful homes. Big home, pulls into 93:00the driveway, I said, well this has got to be okay and I pulled in behind him. What a beautiful home, up there. "Have a drink" I'm "Oh yeah, sure." Have a drink. He's sitting there and I'm sitting here, and having a drink. Now what do you do? Now words! We're not talking!— You ready? Can you handle it? So I walk over and I kiss him right on the lips. And he returns the kiss. Still no conversation. And we go to bed— All right? We go to bed. And the next morning, I'm sleeping, just like in the movies. You wake up and nobody's there! [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: [sniffing sound] Oh, I smell bacon and toast, hmmm what's going on? You get up, he's cooking in the kitchen, got breakfast ready. Eggs and bacon and toast and who knows what else. Coffee, I could smell coffee. Orange juice, 94:00breakfast was ready! So, all right! So now we're friendly. So we just talked a little bit. Very little, we still talk. So, after a while, I get an invitation to move in. "Come help me pack." Got in my car, then I had a convertible. Got in my car, went to—I was sharing an apartment there with two other guys, and they were straight. So I packed up my reasonable clothing that I had, that—when I got 95:00out of the military, I didn't really buy that many more clothes, I didn't have much, put everything in the car, moved in with him. So the question I ask the students at this—200 students there when I had the—I say, "Anybody here believe in love at first sight?!" [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Some hands went up. I said, well, I can tell you a story about love at first sight. And it was love at first sight.

GOGAN: And this was in—Savannah? Or—Charlotte.

FEIERTAG: Charlotte, yes. So that was 1960.

GOGAN: Charlotte 1960, okay.

FEIERTAG: August 20, 1960.

GOGAN: All right. Good memory.

FEIERTAG: So that was a long 41 years that we were together. During our history together, we lived in sixteen different locations, sixteen different houses. We 96:00bought a farm and we, first of all, we moved out to the river, sold his house, moved out, got a place on the river outside of Charlotte, where we could go swimming, and got a pontoon boat, and had friends come over, a couple lesbian friends I met that lived out somewheres else, I forget how we met them. But they used to come over and we'd all go swimming and go boating. We just have a good time, the four of us, you know, running around a lot. So, that was a lot of fun. Met some other couples and went with them, and visited with them. So that was the relationship. After that, that was it. No other relations, no other fooling around, nothing, you know. I was very content with that. And then, getting ready to get transferred to New York, with the company, to the New York office three years later, in 1962, I think it was. At that time, I was president of the Jaycees and a notice came out in the paper that—Charlotte was a very small town, 97:00you have to understand. Charlotte was like Blacksburg. There were like two hotels.

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: A couple motels, motor courts. So, I was going to be leaving, I'm moving to New York, I'm resigning from the Jaycees. The Jaycees were a big organization, you know. And at that time, I was also doing work with the chamber of commerce, where the chamber decided they wanted to have a convention bureau like some of the big cities. Most of the convention bureaus around the country were started by chambers of commerce, [the bureaus had?] offices there. And then it developed into a city operation, so, Charlotte's a small town, they decide they are going to organize a convention bureau. So, working for the chamber, I was in charge of the search committee. I was the one, they asked me if I would just review the applications and try to find someone that would be appropriate for the job. That was the job. But anyway, so when it came out in the paper, I 98:00got a phone call from one of the city leaders, and said that "We'd like, we have a group of us together, we'd like for you to come and have lunch with us at the City Car." I thought it had to do with the job. So, all right, I went. I said, so, John Belk was there. John Belk at the time—Belk stores? He was the son. So he was there, then other lawyers, doctors, indian chiefs, whoever, you know, on this big civic committee. "We decided we don't want you to leave Charlotte. You do a lot of work here, we all like you, you get along with all the people so wonderful." And they knew I had a partner. I mean, word gets out, you know. Because he worked in a hotel.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And during the time that I was there with the insurance company, you know, I was still doing investigations for them, I was active around there and 99:00had a lot of friends in that industry. But he was working in a hotel and I used to go and visit him at the hotel, so people at the hotel knew. Anyway, so don't leave town, they all offered me jobs doing all different things. They all wanted me to be security, and I went ahh, someone else wanted me to do a finance company, the other one was an insurance company. I said, no, I don't know any of that stuff, insurance investigation. They said, "well, what about this job that you're looking for the chamber?" I said, "well that sounds really interesting but I don't know anything about it. That's not my field." "Yeah, but you'd be good at that. Why don't you take that job? You're looking for someone." I said, "well, I don't know, maybe that would be good." So, they called up Charlie Croffitt, I know that guy's name, he's the head of the Chamber of Commerce. And you'd never thought of, they told him they wanted me to get that job. And he said "wonderful, if he would, would he take it?" So I agreed. I discussed it 100:00with Thad, my partner, and he didn't want to go to New York. He likes the country and he's from the mountains of North Carolina. Spruce Pine, North Carolina is where he's from. And sometime I'll tell a story about him, too, from being up there. Illegitimate, he was troubled being gay when he was a kid, the kids made fun of him because he was a bastard, they called him a bastard because his mother was not married

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And his father was married to somebody else. So, uh, you know they made—he had a bad time. Anyway, I got that job and resigned from the other company. So now I became the, I was the first convention bureau manager in Charlotte, North Carolina, again not having applied for the job and not making up a resume, right? So, we did that. So I did that for, ...[pause] about two 101:00years. I got a call from Orlando. Chamber of Commerce in Orlando. They're looking to hire a convention bureau manager. They want to set up a convention bureau. I never heard of Orlando. Nobody ever heard of Orlando... So, I told my boss, I said "they want me to come," and he says, "Oh, go! It's a free trip. They're going to pay for your way, ah, you'll have a good time." So,I said oh yeah. But, I said, "You know, I'm happy here. I like everybody, and I know everybody, I know the hotel people," blah blah blah. He said "eh, go ahead, get a trip."

Oh before that, I wanted to tell you, so then now I was with the chamber, now I got very active with the chamber and I started an advisory board. Forty two members, advisory board from all the industries, not just hotel and restaurant. Lawyers, doctors, and indian chiefs, you know. I said, what we're going to do is we're going to expand the horizon here, and everybody's going to benefit from it. The whole tourism industry, it's not only hotels and restaurants, but, you 102:00know, all the other, gas stations, department stores, restaurants, they're all going to make money off the tourists, I want more of you people involved, not just the hotels and restaurants. So that's what happened. I put them all to work. That's another story, but. Orlando. So I went down there and it was nothing. What a town. I mean the cattle driven through town like you see in the movies

GOGAN: Oh wow

FEIERTAG: I mean it was a cattle town then, and Florida still is big cattle country, but it was all cattle and oranges. That's all. They had a motel and a hotel, and not enough space for a convention anywheres. A lot of motor courts. Remember the old time motor courts? Motels? I thought, oh my god. So, they offered me a job and I accepted it. Again no interview, no paperwork, no application.

GOGAN: No resume?

FEIERTAG: They heard about Charlotte, and what I had done. In just two years, I did a lot. Really. And no budget. We had a $19,000 budget. I mean, my salary was also $12,000, whatever it was. But we had no money for anything. Any time I went to a convention to bid on something, I'd get a, go around the hotels and beg for money, and they all kicked in $25, $50, you know, so you'd get money to go on a trip to... that's the way it was. But we did build it up, we did get a lot of business. Now, one other thing I left out, about the gay bars. I knew the chief of police. He became a very good friend. And he was, uh, active in the chamber. That's how I met him, through the chamber. And while I was there, together we built on the association of chief, the International Association of Chiefs of Police to get their convention.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And it was very exciting. I got to tell you that story. It has nothing 104:00to do with being gay, but

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: I think it was in Orlando—I'm trying to think where it was. Jacksonville? I forget where it was. I forgot where I went to the convention. But he got the other police chiefs in the other cities around to help bid on this. We were a dry, Charlotte was dry, there were no bars in the hotel, you could buy liquor store, but there were no bars. And there weren't too many places to be entertained, it was still a small town. But I said let's go after this, so he helped. He went to the other chiefs of police, detectives, got it together, they were going to go down and we were going to bid on it. So we went a bid on it. So, how are you going to complete with Miami? And Jacksonville? I guess we were in Atlanta then, because they were bidding on it, and in those days, they were big. And they had money. And they entertained, and they spent, and they had money under the table to get people to bid, you know. To want to go 105:00to their city, they were competing. Then here we come in, Charlotte. Who ever heard of Charlotte, you know? So, it was a tough one to get. We didn't have bars, we didn't have entertainment, you know, transportation, it was nothing compared to Jacksonville or Miami. So, they had a women's group having a meeting. So, the day that I was supposed to go in and make a pitch, to the membership, my proposal, we all did, the day before. The day before the women's, the women were meeting, so I went to the lady in charge and said, "I'd like to talk to the ladies chapter. Nobody's talking to you, but I want to talk to you about Charlotte. I said, I'll buy coffee for everyone. Coffee and doughnuts. When you take a break, we'll have the hotel bring it into the room, then I'll talk to you while you have your break." So, they loved that. But I came and she introduced me. So I told about Charlotte, and that we don't have bars to go to, 106:00we don't have [?]. I said when you guys, when your husbands and the crowd get together, I bet you they're all running out to the bar and getting drunk, and they said "yeah, yeah, yeah, they're all getting out, we can't hold"—I said "here in Charlotte, you'll all be together because there's no place for them to go."

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: "We'll have all the parties at the hotel, you know? The big hotel that we had there, I was with the bureau. And we'll go get the liquor from the ABC stores, you know? And you all can have your own liquor party if you want liquor. And dancing, we get entertainment, and they'll be with you all the time because there's no place for them to go!" And they all loved it, they cheered, said aaaaahhhh [claps hands]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: The next day, we go in to make the proposal, I didn't have to make a proposal. [Snaps fingers] we won it. [Laughter] we won the convention! And that was the only way to get it, I think. Otherwise, we had nothing to offer them.

GOGAN: Right [laughter]. Come to our city, we have no bars!

FEIERTAG: Uh huh. So that was one thing. I told you about that. But, anyway, 107:00talk about the chief of police. So this was before I met Thad, this was—let me see. I met him in '60? I was there from '58, yeah.

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: Because this was before I met him. '58. So some ways there were two years, I knew Jim Ste—I can remember, it was Jim Stegal, isn't that funny? I remembered his name. Ah, that was the chief of police. Anyway, going—you need?

[1:47:26 through 1:48:06, Jordan Laney closes the door because there is loud 108:00vacuuming in the hallway outside of the conference room]

FEIERTAG: So, we used to hang out at the gay bars.

GOGAN: Okay.

FEIERTAG: Small town, but they had gay bars. And it was fun, a lot of fun... so, there used to be a lot of kids hanging out in front of the gay bars, and when the gay bars closed, they were hustling, wanted to get the gay guys, take them home, they'd pay them... So, some of them commented they were afraid, they saw police cars cruising around the gay bars. And that made them very nervous about—cars were around, said are they checking up on us? Are they taking pictures? They want to know who's here? Are they going to lock us up? What are they doing? Of course, it was an open gay bar, everybody knew it was gay, nobody 109:00cared. You know? But, the cops were there. [Plastic crinkling sound] So, when someone approached me, it didn't bother me, but someone approached me, I said oh, I'll find out. Go to see Jim Stegal, invite him over for coffee. He comes over to the hotel for lunch. You know. I said, what's going on, police cars around, I forget the name of the bar. He said, we always have them out there. I said, I never paid any attention. He says, oh yeah, I have them cruising there all the time, he says. He says, we're not looking to arrest anybody. That's for protection. We want to scare off these kids that are hustling, that want to pick up the boys to make some money. We chase them away. We're protecting your guys, you know, he said, tell them. We're not there to cause any trouble, we want to protect them, we want to keep things quiet, we don't want anybody getting in 110:00trouble, we don't want any kids hanging out there trying to make money. I said, oh, thank you very much [laughter].

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: But back in those days, in the '60's, you'd think, gay, hoo boy, lock 'em up. It's like with the blacks, you'd think something, too. You know, the black people didn't have a chance down there. But you'd expect the gay people—but it was open. You know? Fine with him, fine with everybody [laughter]. After when I was with the chamber, and with Thad, we used to have parties over the house. You know, moved the house, went to the river, had a big, big place there for parties, and invite all the hotel managers over there. And they all knew that we were partners, you know? Nobody had a problem with it except one girl, a sales manager. I'll think of her name too. Anyway, she was with one of the hotels. She came over with her husband and Thad and I were there 111:00entertaining, and he was in—he was preparing the food and doing something there, so she knew him from the hotel. And, at the hotel where she worked. That's where he worked. He was the desk clerk. But he was in the—you know, [?]. And she came up to me and she says, "Oh! Did you hire Thad to come up here to serve food?" [Laughter] I said, that's my partner. "Oh! Oh! Oh oh!" She was so embarrassed.

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Everybody else knew, I don't know why you don't know. [Laughter]

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Imagine that.

GOGAN: Can we jump ahead for just a couple minutes and talk a little bit about Virginia Tech and what brought you here?

FEIERTAG: Yeah. It's interesting. So this was another job I had, of course, this was in 1988, I was doing a program at the Homestead. I used to go out and do it 112:00all over the country, I was doing sales workshops for people all the time, you know, it was for ideas. And I'm doing it at the homestead, and Mike Olsen, who was chairman of the hospitality HTM department at the time knew me. I was on his advisory board. That's another story, why. We're not doing a book, so... I called him up, Mike I'm on the program, I noticed you're on the program. I've got to fly into Roanoke. You want to pick me up at the airport? We'll ride in together to the hotel. "Oh yeah!" Okay, fine. So over that weekend, he talked me into going to work here, to teach. I told him I'm not a teacher, but he said, "ah, you come, you do another workshop, you can do the job." At that time, I was 113:00senior vice president of operations for 60 hotels, management company in West Palm Beach, Florida.

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: 60 hotels, we operated. And I was running it. So I'm already into six figures. So he says, "Well we only have a half time job and $20,000..." I said, well, I got to ask my partner. I wanted to make sure he knew I had a partner, you understand?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: I said, because I don't know. If he says okay, okay, I said, but it didn't faze him one bit. Maybe he knew, or didn't know, I don't know. But he knew then. You understand, I wanted to make it known.

GOGAN: Right, right

FEIERTAG: And I knew Thad was unhappy in Florida. He wanted to get back to the mountains, because we had left. He wanted mountains and country, and get back in the farm business. We had a farm before, you know, in Rocky Mount when I moved 114:00into this company in Roanoke. Then I went to work after that—a lot of in between stuff I'm leaving out.

GOGAN: Yeah, yeah

FEIERTAG: So, to get into Virginia Tech. So, I went home and he went and got all excited about going back to Blacksburg. He said, "oh my god, yeah, let's do it, right now." I said it's only—he said don't worry about it, we'll go to work. He'll work, I'll work, we never had a problem before with money and we always manage. Because when we first started out, I didn't have that much saved and he didn't either, but we went into the farm business and we started to accumulate. Him working, me working, we managed very well. So, I agreed to go, that's how I got recruited. Without an application

GOGAN: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: Or a resume, and personnel did it, you know. But all I signed was a W2 form and I'm on the payroll. So, that's got me over here.

GOGAN: Okay, okay

FEIERTAG: So Thad and I, we found a place, rented, then we bought a farm in Christiansburg, and we had a farm operation. We had cattle, and we had 86 head of black angus, and we ended up with 100 sheep, we had a big operation. Sizable, I should say. Anyway, uh, then there was no involvement with the gay community for a while.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Everybody knew I had a partner

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And we went out together with some of the people, and so, the faculty knew, and how far it went from there, you never know. People talk.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: You know. Students never knew, I'd never bring it up in class. I'd never reference it or anything. But word gets out, yeah. I guess. So, that was it. There was very very little other than ourselves and some of the friends we 116:00had. That was it, our involvement here, until... I don't know who I met first that invited me to attend the caucus. I just don't remember who it was. I didn't even know there was a caucus. I didn't know what a caucus was. And, uh, that was 1989 when I came here. So this is my 25th year here.

Laney: Congratulations

GOGAN: Really, congratulations

FEIERTAG: Yeah. So, we lived in several places, had two farms here. Thad got very ill, he had a heart bypass 14 years prior. Uh, earlier days when we lived in Roanoke. We lived in Roanoke at the time. I was working for a company called American Motor Inns Hotel Management Company... I'm trying to think when, anyway. 117:00Whatever it was, he couldn't, we had to sell the farm because his legs wouldn't move. He finally had to walk on a cane, he had very very bad legs, with the blood flow, whatever it was, it was a heart, bad heart condition that he—he used to smoke a lot.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Then after we got together, after a while he quit smoking. No no, when he got his first heart attack in Roanoke, the doctor told him to quit, he quit [snaps fingers] just like that. But anyway, so in 2000, in February, 2001. February 1st. One o'clock in the morning, woke up, chest pain, neck pains, heart attack. You could tell right away. I took him to the hospital. They wanted me to call the emergency, they wanted to call an ambulance, I said let me take him. So 118:00I took him to the hospital and emergency bing bing, 1-2-3, they knew right away, upstairs with intensive care, he was a nervous wreck. He really wanted to get out, said, "I want to get out, I want to go home, I want to go home," there were like four nurses on him doing different things, so finally they knocked him out, and he never recovered. And, uh, on February 8, seven days later, he died. [coughs] No, they had him on life support and asked me for permission to take him off life support, which I did, which is what he wanted. So, that was the end of our time. So that was, after that [coughs] that I got invited, somehow met somebody from the caucus.

GOGAN: Okay, okay.

FEIERTAG: So that was the end. My activities [coughs] have been nil since then. No other person in my life, didn't have any interest in, fall in love, or meet 119:00anybody that I'd want to fall in love with. And I couldn't or have anybody else live with that, don't think I could do it. After 41 years, that's a lifetime, and we loved each other, and had great respect for each other. I did things, that I tell people about, they don't understand it. And they don't believe it. But it was love, it was, I mean, it was really, you know, first time we met. Love at first sight, that thing, but it was really love. We cared for each other and looked after each other. Every night, before going to bed, we would kiss and say goodnight. And when we got up in the morning, we'd kiss and say good morning. Kiss. Two guys kissing, forty years, and that was a habit. We did that every day just to remind each other. When I was out of town, I was out of town a lot, I called twice a day, talked to him, how you doing blah blah blah, you 120:00know. All through those years. All those years I'd been on the road doing workshop training, blah blah. And always, and sometimes he'd go with me, but most of the time he'd stay and take care of the farm, run the farm. But I called him every day, twice a day, to tell him how much I loved him, and he loved me. We always used that love expression to remind each other that we, you know, love each other. Never any case of cheating or, not that I'm aware of and I never asked questions or something, but, you know, there could be. But, that's not important. Just love and respect. And we had some friends, couples, other couples, didn't do any running around. So it was a very quiet existence for us. Just us. Not running around to bars and gay parties and the hoopla, you know, like they do.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And then, when he passed away, then some of the people invited me to 121:00go to the caucus. But the caucus doesn't do anything. Not much. They have the lavender graduation alumni awards program, for the lavender awards, but other than that, they meet for lunch once a month someplace. They talk about issues now with the diversity thing, with the new dean who is into diversity, the president's into diversity, and then we have the college, other groups are in. So, that's the gay life. This is the—

GOGAN: So are you involved in the gay community in the New River Valley, you know, other than what you do with Tech, or is Tech—

FEIERTAG: No, just with Tech. I don't have any other connections. It would be 122:00nice if they had a gay bar, there's a big gay community here at Tech, and a bar would be good.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: For everyone, for them, just to have a place to socialize, to go and meet other people, which is what they want to do.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm. Mmm hmm.

FEIERTAG: So, there's a lot of stuff in between, but I got with Thad, that was a solid relationship, there was nothing else really going on. Except our own home life and friends and travel, we did a lot of cruises, went on a lot, saved a lot of money, we had a lot of money and saved it. Did lots of things with it. The farms were good experiences, we had three farms, they were good experiences. Did what, made money on the farms and cattle. We had a good life together. Went out—oh, the family, the family. We've got to bring the family in. It's 123:00unbelievable how they took to him. Still didn't come out to the family, I didn't have to say anything, and they met him. And when we had the farm in Rocky Mount, invited the family to come visit the farm, that's where they all really met him for the first time. And they all came, they were curious, you know. With their kids and brothers and sisters, they all came at different times, and they all loved him. And he was in love with them. And he wrote to, he stayed in touch with family more than I did. He called them and he wrote to them, wrote them letters, and they got back to him, and they still talk about him now. All my brothers are passed away, but the in-laws, you know. My sister in law would hang out with him in Florida, I go visit her and stay with her. But all the other sister-in-laws in a home, up in Long Island and another one in Sarasota, sister-in-laws, because all my brothers died. But they all talk about Thad, you know. Over the years. They all loved him and he loved them. That was his family. 124:00I mean, he took them on like it was his family. More than the respect he got from his family. He didn't get anything. His grandmother was the only one that was close to him, and other than that, the whole community where he lived, and his relatives, cousins and whatnot, they—he didn't get any respect from them. He got more respect from my family than from his own family, so he adopted them, you know. They adopted him, I don't know. So it was a very very good relationship that way, too. Never had to make an announcement about what's what, they knew what's what [laughter].

Lane: We're at two, Claire

GOGAN: Okay. Okay.

[Plastic crinkling sound]

GOGAN: So who have been some—this is going to be our, like, third to last question. Who have some of your allies been at Virginia Tech?

FEIERTAG: Some of—?

GOGAN: Who has really been there for you at Virginia Tech, or kind of a friend 125:00to you or a friend to the gay community?

FEIERTAG: Oh, I have a lot of friends. But, then you say for me, I don't go for counseling, I just have good friends. And we know it. And we cut up a little bit and make jokes. All the people who work at the Inn here know me, and they know I'm gay. For a long time, since I've been at [Brown?], and they tell each other, you know. I don't have to walk around and say, you know I'm gay! They know. All the faculty know. Most of the people in the college of business know. Some of the restaurants you go to—[laughter] something cute I've got to tell you about. Red Lobster. You been there?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: That thing was opened up eighteen years ago, nineteen years ago. One of our graduate students in my class ultimately ends up being manager of the Red Lobster in Roanoke, when they decided to build one here, they brought him in as 126:00the manager. He won many awards, he did a wonderful business. He was in the kitchen, he was outside, he was here, he was there. Thad and I used to go there a lot, and he met Thad, he knew I was gay, he met Thad. And we had a special table we liked to sit at because it was in the corner, it was nice, it was cozy, you could see everything going on, blah blah blah. Thad liked it. I said, okay, that—so every time we came, the hostesses, the waitresses, him, right away, that's Howard's table, you know. You sit there. This was like eighteen years ago. So, in the meantime he got married, he got kids, and he moved away, but we stay in touch. He's on our advisory board now, as a matter of fact.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: So anyway, So Candy Clemons, you know Candy? In the College of Business? She's the assistant dean in the undergraduate department. She's a good 127:00friend. She's one of our PhD graduates, and then left and went to teach somewheres else, and then came back and went to work in the dean's office. So she does a very very good job in undergraduate. So, we go out a lot together, and she's divorced. I knew her husband, was a friend of mine. But she knows about what's going on. So, one day, we'd been going over there every now and then, and we'd get together about once or twice a month and maybe just go out for dinner, and, one day I'm in the bar waiting on her, and this lady comes up, "Howard! How are you?!" You know, I'm so and so. I recognized her a little bit, she used to work there in the early days when Thad was alive and we used to go there. So we yakked a bit there, then Candy came in and we had a class of wine, I said okay, we're going to go sit down. So she runs around the other side and 128:00then comes up and she said, we have your table waiting for you. What does she mean by that? Said no, no, and all the sudden sure enough, we go to that table. She remembered the table.

GOGAN: Wow

FEIERTAG: And I had to tell Candy the story. Do you know now we go over there, and everybody else now knows that's my table?

Laney: Wow

FEIERTAG: I mean, come on, it's ridiculous, isn't it? When we go there, they've got the table for us. This goes back a long time, you know. Isn't that funny? So Candy and the people in the college of business, went out with the women that worked there, in that department. I wouldn't say the whole college of business, but my department knows, college of business knows, who else knows? I'm active in Hillel. Hillel, the new Hillel center that was built, I'm on the board with them, and they know I'm gay, you know. Or they know I had a partner.

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: So, do the students know? I don't know. They know someone else, told 129:00them. But—

GOGAN: But do you feel, for the most part, that people accept you at Virginia Tech? Like—

FEIERTAG: Oh yeah, oh yeah. They respect me, and they accept me. I do good work for Virginia Tech, so why not? Never had an occasion to feel that someone would ignore me or say anything behind my back that was negative, you know?

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Or avoid me. And a couple of the staff from the university administration have seen me at some of the events that I've got to attend. The 130:00lavender event for graduation and the Out at Work event we had just recently, you know. And some of the administrative staff kind of. Frank Shushok? You know Frank?

GOGAN: Mmm mm

FEIERTAG: So they're aware, and I make—I always have an opportunity to say something. At Out at Work, they say, say something, so I make jokes and I cut up about my relationships and, you know. So, whoever's there knows, you know. But I have no other—never heard anything negative, didn't know that—that the university under any situations were biased... some of the, uh, I don't think I'll, I don't want to say it over public. Shut that off for a sec.

GOGAN: We can turn it off, yeah

[Tape is shut off]

GOGAN: Um, I have one last question, and it's what did I not ask you that you were expecting me to ask you?

FEIERTAG: Oh, I had no idea what you were, I didn't anticipate

GOGAN: You didn't have any expectations [laughter]

FEIERTAG: I didn't, uh, I didn't anticipate what it would be all about, but no, there are no questions I would have expected you to ask me

GOGAN: Okay

FEIERTAG: I don't know what it would be.

GOGAN: I guess, um, before we close the interview, is there anything else you want to say?

FEIERTAG: Oh, probably a lot.

GOGAN: [Laughter]

Laney: [Laughter]

FEIERTAG: I use up more of your time here

GOGAN: We could do a second interview, also. I mean, that's a possibility.

FEIERTAG: Well, if you want some more, I'll be happy to give you this. I don't mind talking about myself.

Laney: I think a biography should be in the works

FEIERTAG: What now?

Laney: I said, I think a biography should be in the works

GOGAN: Yeah

FEIERTAG: Oh, a biography should be in the works. Yeah, there's a lot more if I 132:00ever get around to it, but I mean I'm not a writer. I write a column for a magazine, I think I told you.

GOGAN: Uh huh

FEIERTAG: This is my 35th year of writing that column for Hotel Management, but it's like 500 words, you know? And they pay me for it, so it's nice. But writing a book is not my thing, but talking is, I don't mind talking [laughter]

GOGAN: Yeah, I feel like, even though we have been talking for over two hours, I feel like we still haven't begun to cover [laughter] your life.

FEIERTAG: Yeah, there's a lot in between there we didn't get to.

GOGAN: So—

FEIERTAG: And it's part of the history. But I've never been involved in any movement, any great movement for gay, they wave the flag, I don't go to the parades, and go to out week, or whatever they call it. Out at Work is one thing I go to—I don't go to Roanoke for their parades and their activities, I don't believe in that, that's fine and let them do that, but that's not me. If you 133:00want to know about me, I'd be happy to tell you, if you ask me, I'll tell you, I'm not going to hide anything, but most of the time, if the question comes up, like how come you're not married, or you should be married, or kids or something, I tell them. But I don't say, "oh I want you to know I'm gay," you know. I mean, it's not a thing you're proud of, you want to wave the flag, you know, it's me. But I drop the hint about my partner, you know. So they know, that takes care of that. But I'm not trying to sell, you know, it's good to be gay, or we're very proud to be gay. I mean, that's the thing here, you know. You are, you are, that's all. And you act accordingly, and so, don't put yourself in the position to embarrass other people, don't make other people feel bad about it, so you won't see me in a parade, I wouldn't participate in a parade. It 134:00doesn't make sense to me, but that's fine, people want to do it, you know, to promote something, you do it. But people are always going to disagree with the system, I mean not the system but the issue that there are gay people, but there are probably a lot more than we know about, because there's so many here at the university, and I'm sure, that will never tell you, and they'll hide it, and they feel so guilty about it. You know what I mean? So, why they feel guilty, because somewheres in the past, they've been accosted by someone because they were gay, and they didn't want to have that occasion to occur again. So, they don't push and they hide, and there are a lot of couples, I'm sure, here. Now we have two congressmen came out in the paper yesterday about that they're gay, and they're a couple, and speaker of the house is voting, going for them, did you see that? He's endorsing them, so that's interesting. I don't know if they're 135:00both in the senate, or one's a governor, or I don't—little by little, they're coming out. But you see an awful lot, a high percentage I guess, in hiding. We had... some interesting stories we don't have time for about friends of mine, couples that I knew over the years, how they got along and what happened with them, it's amazing. Anyway, uh.

GOGAN: Thank you very much.

FEIERTAG: Sorry to take up all your time.

GOGAN: Oh no, this is great, this is the best possible thing to go for over two hours, so thank you very much for sharing your stories with us.

FEIERTAG: Well, I hope it does something for you, at least adds to the program

Lane: It adds a very special story to the history of Tech

FEIERTAG: It does? I didn't even know that it did. See I didn't see much of it—what had I said was related to Tech, that's all. See—I wasn't active in any 136:00big movements or trying to get people to understand or do lectures on it. I appear before a panel if I get requested to, I'd be happy to, and I talk about it.

GOGAN: But your experience is also part of—part of the whole picture, you know, because not everybody is out doing activism and things like that, you know.

FEIERTAG: Yeah

GOGAN: So your story is an important part, too

FEIERTAG: Yeah

Laney: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: Things like this go on and a lot of people don't know about it, you know, for many years. Some people here probably have 50 year anniversaries. If Thad was alive today, this would be 52 years, 53 years of living together.

Laney: Wow

FEIERTAG: So, there are people out there, that are couples, that nobody knows about

GOGAN: Mmm hmm

FEIERTAG: And maybe at the university, too, and you don't know about it, because they don't want to come out and do anything or acknowledge it.

Laney: Mmm hmm. Yup. Thank you.

GOGAN: Yes, thank you very much.

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