Dallas leader Levi Davis introduces Dallas multicultural oral history collection

By Norma Adams-Wade
Correspondent
Texas Metro News

It’s pretty well-known that history never quite fully tells the whole story. So, for more than a decade and a half former Dallas city leader Levi Davis has been collecting his own archive of oral history interviews with Dallas leaders that he now is presenting to the public.

Davis – himself a history maker – publicly introduced his collection of more than 100 multicultural oral history interviews with fellow Dallas leaders and change agents at a reception and program at the Fair Park Hall of State Thursday March 5.

 “Capturing these oral histories has been really, really exciting for me,” Davis said in a Texas Metro News interview at the event. “There’s so much to know that we just don’t know about a leader’s life until you sit down and just begin to talk with them.”

A bevy of dignitaries and community people attended the gathering in Dallas hosted by the University of North Texas Libraries from Denton, Texas, about 40 miles north of Dallas.

“Today we celebrate him as a keeper of stories,” said Dr. Sian Brannon, program mistress of ceremony and University of North Texas vice provost and library executive. “This is not just an archive, it’s a gift.”

The collection of oral history interviews will be available online to researchers, students, educators, and the general public through the Portal to Texas History at the University of North Texas.

The history chronicler is no stranger to prominence. Davis made history himself as Dallas’ first African American assistant city manager from 1978 to 1986, then again from 1990 to 1998. He served under six mayors, from Robert Folsom to Ron Kirk and five city managers from George Schrader to John Ware.

At the Hall of State public reception and archive introduction program, Davis said he started collecting oral history interviews 16 years ago after chatting with civic, business and education colleagues about the impact of the lives of people they knew. He began his interviews and now is publicly releasing the archives.

Various people in the audience said they were impressed with the obvious amount of work that went into collecting the volume of oral history interviews presented.

Golf instructor Ricky Parker said a family member suggested he come and he did not know what to expect.

“The legacy of these great historic people is what resonated with me,” Parker said. “At a time when we are losing much of our history, it’s good to have something like this to lean on for the present and future. We all come in contact with history. We have to wonder where we are today, where we’ve been, and where we’re headed tomorrow.”

Officials and citizens attend collection’s opening at Fair Park Hall of State

Travel coordinator Carolyn Coleman said she has a young relative who attends the University of North Texas and was impressed that the university officials had the sensitivity to support the archive effort and host the reception and program.

“Our young people need to know what these people have contributed to us all,” she said.

A billboard chart at the reception and program listed the first 100 individuals interviewed, including some oral recording that Davis said were donated to his collection. The 100 interviews  feature individuals from careers that include civil servants, philanthropists, artists, politicians, and business leaders. Among the more than 100 persons are Louis A. Bedford Jr., Dallas’ first African American judge; Adelfa Callejo, Latinx activist and attorney; Ed Cloutman, civil rights attorney; Betty Culbreath, former Dallas County Health director and outspoken community leader; Lucy McDonald Davis, Black Women’s Hall of Fame honoree and wife of the late Black newspaper owner Tony Davis; Robert Decherd, former A. H. Belo Corp. CEO; Dr. Wright Lassiter Jr., former Dallas County Community College chancellor; Stanley Marcus, board chairman and former president of his family’s luxury retail store Neiman Marcus; Pancho Medrano, Latinx civil rights activist; Don Payton, historian of Dallas Black history; Rufus Shaw Jr., late former media commentator and blogger;  Dr. Rosie Sorrells, educator; Cleophas Steele Jr., late judge and justice of the peace; Annette Strauss, former Dallas Mayor; James Washington, The Dallas Weekly newspaper’s late publisher emeritus; Ann Williams, Dallas Black Dance Theatre founder; Nolan Estes, former DISD superintendent; and Kay Bailey Hutchison, attorney and former U. S. Senator.

To learn more about the Portal to Texas History, visit texashistory.unt.edu.

Dallasite Norma Adams-Wade is a Texas Metro News senior correspondent, The Dallas Morning News retired writer, and a National Association of Black Journalists founder.