StoryCorps - Annie Watkins and Barbara Davis

By Gillian Ferris Kohl

Flagstaff, AZ – A StoryCorps mobile booth has been parked at Wheeler Park in Flagstaff for the last several weeks archiving the stories of northern Arizonans. Here, Barbara Davis interviewed her longtime friend, Annie Watkins, the first black teacher to be hired in the Flagstaff Unified School District after desegregation in 1956. Their conversation went from Annie's own school days in French-speaking Louisiana, to the beginning of her more than thirty year teaching career in Flagstaff. This installment of StoryCorps was locally produced by Gillian Ferris Kohl for KNAU, Arizona Public Radio.