Roy Dawson

Roy Dawson moved to South Phoenix as a 9-year-old boy and worked his way up to being a successful personnel director for a variety of engineering enterprises.

Roy Dawson was born on October 19, 1942, in Texarkana, Texas. Roy’s father moved the family to Arizona in 1952 for a job opportunity. All eleven family members loaded into one vehicle and made their way through the desert. Their first home in Phoenix was a modest 700 square foot, 3-room house on Broadway and 40th Street. The rustic community was called Okemah, a small, primarily African American homesteading community. At the time, City of Phoenix officials simply called it “southeast Phoenix,” or more frequently, “the county,” because it was not yet incorporated by the city. Either way, Okemah was the place Dawson began his journey upwards into the world.

Dawson was a devoted student from a young age. One of his first and most significant memories of school was when he won an award and attended a ceremony at Percy L. Julian School. He was nervous to get up on the stage and later felt like all of the other kids were laughing at him because of his modest, dusty clothing. Roy knew then that his abilities to excel in school would take him farther than any of those other kids might have guessed. He remained in the top 4% of his class throughout his school years.

Future Clip:   [Insert clip: 9:50, The 1st Award]

At the time, Roy Dawson was growing up in one of the poorest, socio-economically communities in South Phoenix. Okemah was a small-knit community where neighbors saw each other as family. Over the years, family farms were sold off to developers or lost to imminent domain. Today, much of the land that was once Okemah is buried under industrial warehouses and the I-10 Interstate near the Broadway exit.

Future Clip: [Insert clip: 51:37, Greatest Strength]

One day as Dawson was finishing up high school football practice, he received the news that his family was moving to California. This small town, rural family relocated to the Los Angeles area, and Roy’s life was forever changed. In the 1950s and 1960s, he was living his formative years in an urban, racially charged city, when just years earlier he had lived a quiet country life. While in LA, Dawson met a mentor, Mr. Leon Everette Whaley, who helped find Dawson his first job.

Later, Dawson moved back to South Phoenix and began working for the Honeywell Corporation, a significant company in the Phoenix area during the late twentieth century. He was one of the first Black supervisors in his role, and he faced racial discrimination and the envy of others, but he persevered. A few years later, Dawson started his own Human Relations business, curating it brick by brick.

Though he lived for a while in Los Angeles, Dawson still sees South Phoenix as his home. And he still marvels at the grand expansion of this once-rural town. Sometimes the growth is exciting; other times it concerns him.

Future Clips: [Insert clip: 10:47, The Auditorium], [Insert clip: 11:26, The Harsh Reality]

Roy Dawson spent his life, as a child, as a young professional, and now as a wise sage, striving to be a waymaker for others, no matter the obstacles that lay in his path. Through his diligence, he managed to seek brighter opportunities for the underserved in South Phoenix.

Narrator	Roy Dawson
Birthdate	October 19, 1942
Place of Origin	Texarkana, TX
Place of Residence	South Phoenix, AZ
Role	Engineering Enterprise Personnel Director
Years active in South Phoenix	1980-
Interview Date	October 2, 2023
Location	Roy Dawson Residence
Duration	1:52:14
Interviewed by	Faculty Researcher: Summer Cherland, PhD
Story Written by	Student Researchers: Juliene Pilar