Cecil A. Partee Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

A: We had a fairly good basketball team. We went to the state tournament
two or three years. We never won, but we got very close to third place once.
We played for third place once and got beaten. Most of the teams that won
were teams that had available to them gymnasiums. We played outdoors.
Q: Oh?
A: In my, I guess maybe, junior or senior year, they permitted us to use the
armory hall there for basketball. Our fortunes improved a great deal after
that because we were getting accustomed, you know, to playing on the floor.
So, I played basketball all the way through high school.
Q: Where did they hold the state tournaments?
A: In Pine Bluff, Arkansas, at the Arkansas State College. It was a black
college. State supported school. It's now a part of the University of Arkansas,
a division now of the University of Arkansas, but at that time it was
strictly an all-black school.
Q: Do you recall anything about the trips over there?
A: Yes, we would always drive and, in those days, you never went very far
without somebody having a flat and putting boots in and the old kind of
patches. I remember when the hot patch came along, we thought that was
really an improvement. You probably remember that.
Q: Yes, sir.
A: Yes. But we would normally have a couple of cars and we would drive over,
stay at the college in the dormitories.
Q: Was that as much fun as the playing?
A: Oh, yes. Sure. It was a lot of fun to get away over to Pine Bluff which
is about, probably, two hundred and twenty-five miles from my hometown.
My hometown is in the extreme northeastern part of the state. We're right
under the Missouri boot heel, just six miles from the Missouri line. That,
too, was an experience, living that close to another state because, when I
got to the legislature, T remembered the differential between what various
states had in terms of taxation. (takes paper and pen and draws map) Now,
here is the baot heel of Missouri and here is Arkansas here, and we were
right up here, six miles from Missouri. So on Sundays, we would drive up to
Missouri to fill our gas tank.
Q: Oh?
A: Yes, because the gas was about five cents a gallm cheaper, because the
taxes were less. Of course, you know it was a matter of mathematics whether
you really saved. The tanks only held ten gallons at that time and you would
probably have a few gallons when you went up there and you would buy your gas.