Doris Mack reflects on 100 years of life and change

Saturday, October 1, 2011

FORT SCOTT, Kan. -- Doris Mack has more than a few memories of her century on this Earth.

The Fort Scott resident, who was born and reared in Kansas City and has lived in Fort Scott for more than 50 years, turned 100 on Friday. Mack talked with the Herald-Tribune on her birthday about her memories of how Fort Scott once was years ago, life in a small town compared to life in a big city, her educational background, Gordon Parks, being an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, living to be 100, and other topics.

Mack said she remembers when streetcars ran through portions of Fort Scott on rails set up going down the middle of roads during the early 1900s.

"Streetcars were the only way to get around unless you had a car, and we didn't have a car," she said.

Mack said she was once a substitute teacher at the junior high and high school levels in both Kansas City and Fort Scott. She earned a master's degree in music composition at Pittsburg State University.

"My specialty was music," she said.

Mack said she "traveled a lot" across the United States after completing school, and has visited such cities as Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Memphis, New York City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C.

She prefers life in a small town over life in a big, bustling city crowded with people.

"People are friendlier here than in the city," Mack said. "In Kansas City, everybody was so close together. Here, there is more space. It's like New York City, it (Kansas City) never sleeps."

When Mack and her husband first moved to Fort Scott, they lived in a house built in the 1800s and located on several acres of land near her current home on Native Road, where she has lived for more than 40 years. They never farmed because Mack said they "didn't know anything about farming."

She and her husband were married for 45 years until his death 25 years ago.

Parks, a noted photographer, writer, musician and filmmaker who grew up in Fort Scott, visited her home on several occasions and was one of her late husband's schoolmates.

While active in the NAACP, Mack said she participated in the 1963 March on Washington, a large political rally in support of civil and economic rights for African-Americans.

"We wanted to get them to make legislation to make it a crime to segregate, and we did it, too," she said.

Martin Luther King Jr., delivered his historic "I Have a Dream" speech advocating racial harmony at the Lincoln Memorial during the march.

"I remember that wonderful speech that he gave," Mack said. "It made me cry, and others, too."

Today, Mack lives a contented life and goes to church every Sunday. She said she doesn't have any secrets to her longevity.

"I just asked the Lord to live," she said. "I just want to live."