MILWAUKEE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT The Reminiscences of Sencere
ART START Columbia University 2018
PREFACE The following oral history is the result of a recorded interview with Sencere McDow conducted by David Castillo on May 8, 2018. This interview is part of the Milwaukee Oral History Project. The reader is asked to bear in mind that they are reading a verbatim transcript of the spoken word, rather than written prose.
McDow – Session #1 – 3
ATC Interviewee: David Castillo Interviewer: Sencere McDow
Session #1 Location: Date: May 8, 2018
Q: So the thing’s going. Today’s date is May the 8th of 2018. This is David Emmanuelle Castillo. Work for the Department of Black and Latino Male Achievement, as a Planning Assistant. I’m interviewing student Sencere McDow [phonetic], who attends Washington High School. Sencere, I do have your permission to use this interview for the project we are working on, correct?
Sencere: Yes.
Q: Perfect. So we’ll get started. First question. Just tell me a little bit about yourself, man.
Sencere: I—From what? Just anything?
Q: Anything.
Sencere: [00:00:42] But actually, just like to have all myself into things. I like doing and trying new stuff, putting myself out there to better myself, and meet new people, see new faces. So I’m a pretty much outgoing person. That’s [phonetic] all it is.
Q: Okay. Why do you think that’s important, if you could tell me? Just tell me a little bit—
McDow – Session #1 – 4
Sencere: [00:01:04] I think it’s important because, the type of spirit I have, a lot of people want me around. I’m not a person that just always mad, always pouting. No, I’m skilled [phonetic] vibes.
Q: Okay. Do you think we have a lot of not that, around here?
Sencere: [00:01:24] No, I don’t see too many. I don’t see too many, unless you get to know that person. But you’ll never know.
Q: All right. So real quick, where are you from? Are you born and raised in Milwaukee?
Sencere: [00:01:40] I was raised here but I’m not from here, though. I was actually born in South Carolina, Orange County. But I moved here back when I was like in eighth grade. So pretty much how that happened.
Q: So you lived in South Carolina when you were little, until eighth grade—
Sencere: Yes.
Q: —and then moved here?
Sencere: Yes.
McDow – Session #1 – 5
Q: Tell me a little bit of South Carolina.
Sencere: [00:02:02] Well, I can only remember a few things, nothing really. It wasn’t really a small town. It was small but it was kind of big. Mostly, everybody knew each other. So it was like a family there. Moved here. My mom—I was down there with my dad. So moved here with my mom, my granny. They all in Chicago, right across the street. So the move from here, it wasn’t really no change. It was just kind of warm down there. And it’s cold up here, pretty much.
Q: So me a little bit about—you say it’s not much of a change but if there’s anything you could think of that’s different between South Carolina and Milwaukee, what would it be?
Sencere: [00:02:45] They food better. They got some good food down there—
Q: [Laughs]
Sencere: —the carnivals. Yes. It don’t really get too cold there. When the winter was there, it was like fifty-six, barely—it didn’t even snow. Come here, it’s below forty. [Laughter] And some [phonetic]—you’ve got six foot of snow. So everybody the same. Just they got their own different flaws. That’s pretty much it.
Q: Okay. Share with me a little about Milwaukee. What’s your perspective on the city?
McDow – Session #1 – 6 Sencere: [00:03:21] When I moved here, I went to a good school.
Q: What school was that?
Sencere: [00:03:25] Eighth grade here, it was Hartford. It was right there on campus of the UWM [University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee]. It was a pretty good school. They taught me a lot. I went off to high school. I didn’t start at Washington. I started at [Alexander] Hamilton [High School]. And I moved on to Tosa [Wauwatosa] East [High School]. Then I came here. It was moving around. Well, I adapted to it, like I usually do. And that was pretty much it.
Q: So what caused the moving around a lot, from high school to high school to high school?
Sencere: [00:03:59] When I first got here, I went to Hamilton. And I didn’t too much like it like that. I ended up in Chicago for a few months. It didn’t work out, because they didn’t have my credits right. They didn’t fix my credits. So I had to come back down here, went to Tosa East, stayed there for a little bit. I wanted to play football, so I came here. Pretty much it.
Q: Okay. How was Tosa East?
Sencere: [00:04:27] People all had their groups. You hang out with that type of clique. You hang out with this clique. It wasn’t really how Washington is. It was just chill, chill.
Q: What do you mean how Washington is?
McDow – Session #1 – 7
Sencere: [00:04:44] You come here, the kids everywhere. Hamilton and Tosa, you’re in class, [laughs] you’re out of there—is pretty much how it is. [unclear] get your work done. If you don’t, you get kicked out.
Q: All right. So real quick, your Art Start project, if you could talk about that a little bit. I believe your concept was you being an agent. But what was it that inspired you to want to pick that as a career path?
Sencere: [00:05:18] Growing up, that’s all I was around, sports. I never really watched cartoons. I watched ESPN. I watched the NBA l—30 For 30s. I ain’t really—you could say I lived child life. But I wasn’t really into characters, SpongeBob, nothing like that—was seeing dunks, people getting crossed over. I really didn’t—I’m not the one to play basketball, you know? So why not? I like money. I like athletes. I want to see—you know what I’m saying?—what’s behind and who really taking care—and I might be a sports manager—sports marketing, enter that business, get my name, my face out there. That was pretty much what it was.
Q: How do you think the project really is going to play a role towards you kind of—
Sencere: [00:06:19] It just shows—a lot of people don’t know what I want to do. A lot of people don’t know what I’m going to do. A lot of people just—I don’t speak too much at school. You see me. I’ve got headphones in. If I got to talk, I got to talk. Other than that, I’m really not conversating with nobody, just—
McDow – Session #1 – 8
Q: Okay. So you said people don’t really know that about you. Yes, you’re quiet but do they at least try and make an effort to—?
Sencere: [00:07:01] Yes, they’ll say, “What up?” to me and shake my hand. I say, “What up?” to them. But other than that, I’m to myself. I was a basketball manager, at the varsity, for Washington. I was just having fun. That’s the only time you’ll really see me light up, is outside the school or you just talk to me. But pretty much it. A lot of people don’t know what I’m into. So I feel like Art Start, with this program, it shows people—Magawi’s [phonetic] at the photo— she’s, “I didn’t even know you want to be something like this.” No, I just—people really don’t know what I really am, what I’m trying to do. So I just—
Q: Okay. Something you just said right now, when you’re outside the school, that’s when you really light up, when you’re at these types of events—
Sencere: Yes.
Q: —do you think it’s possible that schools can create that for you?
Sencere: [00:07:57] Yes. It’s all about who the person—I’m involved in so many things, in Washington. A lot of people just don’t know. I had to speak a few HBCU [historically black colleges and universities] colleges, had to make a speak up in like thirty minutes, for this College
McDow – Session #1 – 9 and Career Center here. I do a lot of things. It’s just nobody would never know, because I don’t really tell nobody. Just I stick to myself, most of the time.
Q: Okay. I know you say you stick to yourself most of the time. Is there a reason for that?
Sencere: [00:08:40] I don’t know. It’s just how I am.
Q: Just how you are?
Sencere: [00:08:44] I don’t got nothing against nobody. Just how I am. I’d rather stay to myself.
Q: Okay. So I’m going to ask you what are your plans right now? You’re about to graduate. What are your plans for after Washington?
Sencere: [00:09:02] I’m going to have fun in the summer first, you know what I’m saying? [Laughter] I’ve been working six months in school. It’s stressful, man, trying to keep them grades high.
Q: Just speak up a bit.
Sencere: [00:09:14] It’s just stressful keeping them grades high. So I’ve been working for six months. After I graduate, I look at the summer now. Then after the summer, I’m off to school
McDow – Session #1 – 10 again. Just that’s pretty much what I’m going to get into after I graduate, just having fun in the summer and on off to school.
Q: What school you looking at?
Sencere: [00:09:39] School I’m looking at? I’m really not looking at a school anymore. I made my decision. It was Fisk University, in Memphis, Tennessee. So that’s where I’ll be headed to after I graduate.
Q: All right. Why Memphis? Why Fisk? What were the options, first of all? And then, out of all the options, why Fisk?
Sencere: [00:10:01] The options, I had a few options. I actually got these HBCU colleges off the speech I had talked at the College and Career Center. So after that, most of the schools admitted me on the spot. And I was surprised. So it was Philander Smith [College], Fisk, [University of Wisconsin]–Whitewater, [University of Wisconsin]–Parkside, and two more colleges. But I feel like Fisk was a support system. So why not go there, if I got all the help I need? So I just decided to go there.
Q: So support system. I’m going to guess that’s something that’s kind of important for you?
Sencere: Yes.
McDow – Session #1 – 11 Q: Why do you think that’s needed, not just necessary for you? So I want you to think kind of big-picture with this. Why are support systems important for you and why do you think they’re needed for people in Milwaukee, in particular, our youth of color?
Sencere: [00:11:01] Everybody, no matter what skin you—everybody going to need help. Can’t nobody do something on their own. Everybody going to need a helping hand to lean on. It’s impossible for somebody just to do everything on their own. They got to have some type of assist or somebody got to help him out. If it wasn’t for Shaq [Shaquille R. O’Neal], I don’t think Kobe would have had his rings. I’m just going to keep it like—everybody need help. Everybody needs support. That’s how the world basically goes around. You help this person to help this person to help that person out. Having a support system is always good, for anybody. So—
Q: Okay. What are you going to major in at Fisk? Fisk University, right?
Sencere: Marketing. Yes.
Q: Marketing.
Sencere: Yes.
Q: And what’s—besides—? I kind of know—being an agent. But what do you really ultimately want to do with that?
McDow – Session #1 – 12 Sencere: [00:12:00] I want to take it off. If I can get a few athletes, I may—[unclear], because— how the way I am and how the way I talk. When I see money and I know there’s money to get and I got a career, that’s based in what the things I say, I’m going to get it. I got to go get it. Because I got to eat. I got to live. I’m going to be a man. I got to be a man. I got to start paying bills, in a little while. Is just—right now, I’m just learning right now. I’m just writing notes down and learning everything I need to know for me to be more successful in life. I don’t look at myself—I don’t want to be on the streets. I don’t want to see myself—that’s the motivation, of me not to be on the streets. So I just feel like I got to take off, so—so—is all it is.
Q: Okay. Once you take off, what are your plans to like—I don’t know if it’s South Carolina, if it’s Milwaukee—or like your plans on giving back?
Sencere: [00:13:03] If I really do every—I’m known everywhere, I got at least fifteen clients, yes, of course, I got to give. I’m [unclear] give a person. I’m not a stingy person, just to have it all. I got a family. I got sisters and brothers looking up to me. So they see me doing it, it’s going to run in their bloodline to do the same thing, because it’s—That’s how I was raised, off of just helping everybody else and make sure not myself is good but make sure they’re good too. But if it take off like I want it to, I’m going to get into something else. Like I love fashion. I love to dress people. I think I’m kind of good at it. Because a lot of people ask me for advice. So. It just —brushing off [phonetic] the next one. So if things work out, I’m going to just go ahead, just start dressing people. Yes.
Q: [Laugh] So you say fifteen clients. Why that number? Is that like—?
McDow – Session #1 – 13
Sencere: [00:14:00] That’s the max. I’m bringing in at least a few million—
Q: [Laughs]
Sencere: —probably more than that. It depend on what clients I’ll have. That’s all it is.
Q: Okay. Tell me a little bit more about fashion. What got you into that? How far does that go?
Sencere: [00:14:16] It go far. It go pretty far for me. I don’t know if I want to change my—I was just thinking about that. I don’t know. But I still—because fashion, to me—I could dress anybody. You show me how you dress, we can just go pick out some things. We’ll put it together. We’ll make some magic. That’s just how I am. I don’t like seeing people uncoordinated, you know? I’ll always put my two cents in, to something, especially when it comes down to dressing. That’s just how I am. That just another talent, that was just blessed down upon me. And I thank the man upstairs for doing that. Because I’ll be dripping sauce sometime, as they tell me—I drip sauce.
Q: [Laughs]
Sencere: [00:15:02] So, you know. I don’t mind dressing people. I would love to do that, if somebody gave me the chance to dress them, so to show my skills or...
McDow – Session #1 – 14 Q: All right. So you really—you want to be a businessman, is what I’m hearing.
Sencere: [00:15:15] Yes, yes. It all comes together, is—I get the connect my marketing. I get connects off of that. I know people. So it’d probably branch off. But we’re going to see how this go. That’s all it is.
Q: And aside from the stuff you looked at in sports, growing up, like what really sparked that, where you were like marketing or like being a businessman?
Sencere: [00:15:41] Oh, after I knew I wasn’t going to the league—[laughter] I knew I wasn’t going to the league, so I might as well handle some money. I like counting money and I like the game. So it’s just two combination into one. So I could just—marketing—I’m pretty much to behind the scenes. You see the athlete, I’m behind the scene. I’m handling they money. I’m making sure they’re all right, before they step on the court. So that’s all.
Q: Okay. Real quick. So we’re going to deviate a bit. You’re part of the First Thursday luncheons. I wish you would have been there last Thursday. It was pretty dope. You got your sweater, right?
Sencere: Yes.
Q: Cool. In what ways has that program been beneficial, not necessarily for you but in general?
McDow – Session #1 – 15 Sencere: [00:16:32] I feel like we should just keep doing stuff like that. Because it brings everybody together. It makes everybody want to be a family. You get to meet students that—you never seen them in the hallway. You meet them for the first time. You see what’s they backend of the story and what’s going on with them. It’s like you go to the salon. All you see is females. They gossiping. But we gossip about the right things and how we can do something better and how we can—you know I’m saying?—just make everything go as planned, how it’s supposed to. That’s why I really think we should just keep that going, keep that going, bring us together. That’s all.
Q: Okay. And what you just said, you mentioned how you should do this more. So what would you say to a person who’s like, “That ain’t important. The kids need to be in the classroom more”?
Sencere: [00:17:36] We is in a—it’s only your first day of the month. It’s only a Thursday. We in class but we can also take a break from—a few hours, probably an hour or two, thirty minutes and just have a conversation, catching up with somebody, having a conversation. That’s always needed. Because you don’t know what’s on somebody mind. Maybe they need to get it off but they can’t get it off in the classroom, they need to get it off—and people that already been through it, so they can know—and talk to them about it. You know? So I don’t see nothing wrong with it.
Q: Okay. You say a conversation. What was like a real dope conversation you had, over the course of that program?
McDow – Session #1 – 16
Sencere: [00:18:23] Man, it was a lot. I don’t recall. But I remember when Dray [phonetic] was up. He was talking to some kid about pushing theirself.
Q: Roberson?
Sencere: No, Dray. He got the fro, the tattoos.
Q: Oh, yes, yes. Okay.
Sencere: [00:18:40] Yes. They had a conversation [in] group. I forgot what it was about. It hit me, how he stood up for the freshmen and the freshman look up to him as a role model. I feel like we should have more role models. And that program just making us get to know each other better. And everybody feel like they got a brother here, you know? It’s pretty much a brotherhood. That’s all. It’s building a bond. So—
Q: And tell me a little bit more about that? Why is brotherhood and building a bond really important? Yes. And when I ask that, I want you to think about the community that you come from, the things that you see at your school, and why you think that’s super important.
Sencere: [00:19:27] Because having a bond with somebody—like I said, you don’t know what’s going on with people, outside of school. Anything can be going on. Somebody could—just saying somebody just die in front of them. Can’t nobody express to you just seeing somebody
McDow – Session #1 – 17 die in front of them. And where we come from, it ain’t picket fence. We don’t have white picket fence. We come from where we come from. But we can stick together and make something happen. And this program, it’s bringing us closer but it need to continue. Because a lot of people take it for granted. I feel like the whole—my skin color, your skin color—I feel like everybody should have been down there, every Thursday. A lot of people just don’t know about this. And I think I should just keep this going, so it can build it up and have more people, and come together as one. That’s pretty much it.
Q: Okay. I know you’re aware that Milwaukee’s super segregated.
Sencere: Yes.
Q: What’s your thoughts on that?
Sencere: [00:20:32] I feel like that’s everywhere. A lot of—racism’s going—that’s forever. It ain’t—It’s hard to tell you—That’s forever. That’s never going to stop. Because it’s ignorance. That’s all it is. White people’s not born—they’re not birthed, as babies, to hate black—they don’t even know what’s going on. It’s ignorance. That’s all it is. But as that just being say, I’ll just deal with it. Even when whites or colored, we all can just come together as one. Because everybody’s not racist. Everybody don’t despise my skin color, your skin color. It just ignorance. And it was how they raised upon. It’s just—it could come to a change but, how the world is now, I don’t see —and it’s hard to say that. Because don’t nobody want to walk somewhere and you know a bunch of white people don’t even want you here. I’m not—you know what I’m—slavery, to me,
McDow – Session #1 – 18 and how we’re getting treated—it’s the same when my mom was in high school, when they was growing up. Ain’t too much nothing changed. It’s just the same—just in a modern time. That’s all it is.
Q: What are some examples where you see those connections?
Sencere: [00:22:06] Like I remember seeing a video. I don’t know if it’s N.W.A., who—they made a song about it, when a guy was getting beat up by a cop. We’re still getting beat up. But we’re not even getting beat up. We’re getting killed by cops. It ain’t taking out no tires or nothing like that and beating us. We getting killed. And it’s just—sometimes it’s the reason why— because we shouldn’t be carrying around guns. I’m saying that’s what the cops is on. That’s what type of people they are. We should know better not ride in stolen cars. So I feel like sometime we bring that stuff upon us to happen. A lot of people don’t see that. I ain’t never been in jail. I ain’t never been arrested or nothing like that. A cop never—know I’m saying? He asked me a question but—I don’t be hopping in stolies, going on drug rides, doing all that, carrying around a gun. I don’t do that. I’m not that type of person, and to be involved with that. Because it’s stupid. I don’t need to do that. So I feel like, man, it’s the same as my mom and them growing up. It’s a modern—
Q: Yes, yes.
Sencere: [00:23:17] So that’s all it is. And we seeing it. We got technology now. We can record it now. So it just—
McDow – Session #1 – 19
Q: So for you, that was the difference between now and then, to have that—?
Sencere: [00:23:29] Yes. Yes. It’s basically the same, just you see it more. You’ve got technology to record now. So it’s just—and—[coughs] excuse—I feel like the system is the same. So everything’s the same. It’s not changing at all. I don’t see it changing at all. Probably still getting freed, after they just kill somebody. It doesn’t change.
Q: Hold on, real quick.
[INTERRUPTION]
Q: So just real quick, share with me where your thoughts are on the system, whatever those thoughts are, and how you think we can change that.
Sencere: [00:24:25] With the system? The crazy thing I’m just saying was when—I know you heard about it. It was Meek Mill. I think he got probation. He got two years.
Q: Yes.
Sencere: [00:24:39] Then some guy just killed, I think, fourteen, fifteen people. Meek Mill didn’t get a bond. He did something off his parole. But this guy just killed fifteen people but got a bond. He was white. And I’m not saying it’s race. But I still don’t understand that, like to let somebody
McDow – Session #1 – 20 on bond that’s really a threat to any town. Anywhere he go, he’s wanted. You gave him a bond. But Meek Mill violate his parole, you give him two years—I don’t understand it—without no bond. I don’t get that at all.
Q: Yes. Just don’t make sense.
Sencere: It don’t.
Q: So what do you think can e done to change these systems?
Sencere: I don’t—voting?
Q: And go—?
Sencere: [00:25:30] Vote in the right judge? That’s all I really can say. We take a stand for it, the same thing going to happen. So I don’t know.
Q: [Jayda], we’re going to get close to wrapping this up. I’m going to ask you I guess the last question of the interview. If you had a magic wand and you were able to use that magic wand to make this world a better place, how would you use that?
Sencere: How would I use it?
McDow – Session #1 – 21 Q: Yes. Where would you start first? There’s may areas to start in. Where would you start first?
Sencere: [00:26:11] Taking the evil off the world. It’s a lot of evil here, you know? It’s hatred. And it’s all that in one thing. You take away evil, you got a better world now. Because a lot of people just do stuff because they mad. They want to get something off their chest, so they take it out on other people. So they’re evil. So if I had a magic wand, I would just get rid of all that, make it a better place, make it happy. Because once you happy, everybody else is happy.
Q: I see. Thank you, Sencere.
Sencere: Yes, no problem.
[END OF INTERVIEW]