Audio File
Transcript
My name is Devin Igles. I am 17 years old.
My name is Robert John Taylor the Third. I’m 14.
My name is Raymond Johnson. I’m 12 years old.
We interviewed JaQuay Edward Carter on June 13th, 2018.
I’m from Glen Hazel and Hazelwood, born and raised here. From growing up here from a young age, it certainly has been a place that has been warm and welcoming, loving. It’s really a close knit community here where many members of the community are like aunts and uncles and cousins to me. Even if they’re not blood related, we just have such a closeness there. I was able to turn to a lot of individuals for help who have molded me and helped and shaped me growing up here and going to church here. All my family still live in this area.
I was a six year old kid in church. That’s like one of my first memories is being in church. I grew up in the church. I was in the choir of the church. I got money to go to college from the church. The church was just everything to me. I did have a mixture of growing up in a lot of different facets. I was a popular kid and I had all these sort of parties and things, you know, at adult clubs and everything, but being raised in the church and always being able to go back to that, it just kept me grounded and-and very humbled, you know, which I still am, especially now doing this work, I’m even more humbled.
Hazelwood is alive, which I grew up with and-and the hope for Hazelwood that we’re starting to say now, those are basically linked. The time periods was the early 90s. We were saying, “Hazelwood is alive” at a time when there have been about 10 years of depression in the area after the steel mill closed, and then now, looking ahead of the future, presenting like hope for Hazelwood, so that has to do a lot with the buildings that really mean a lot to this community and-and making sure that they’re preserved and utilized in some way and not just sitting there rotting away as they’ve been doing. So we do have a lot of hope for Hazelwood and what’s going to happen on Hazelwood Green and you know, if Amazon does choose Pittsburgh as a location and just being a part of the development of Hazelwood in that regard, just being a small young kid, you know, from the projects here and now, I’m actually in multimillion dollar meetings with the community about development and just being a part of that is just absolutely like a full circle moment for me. And I’m just like, so proud and excited to be like a leader in this movement that’s going on now. And so all I really see is a bright future. I really do see that hope being manifested through all the work that’s going on here.
Right now, I’m the founder and president of the greater Hazelwood Historical Society that was founded earlier this year, and it’s actually bringing pride back to Hazelwood and restoring hope, which is something that I look to do in my work here. I’ve been doing a lot of different things before that, such as computer networking, and I’ve been doing my undergraduate studies. I’ve doing some writing for a book that I’m going to be publishing. There have been a number of things that I have attempted to do, such as I was in law school. I went for computer networking. I’ve been a DJ ever since I was 10 years old, believe it or not. So I actually have been throwing parties and things like that when I was a kid as well. Ever since I was 13, I was like, very popular at party promoting and having parties annually for my birthday here in Hazelwood that are, like, legendary from that time. But I’ve tried so many different things just to sort of see what was best for me, and I guess I could have looked at those as failures, but they certainly weren’t. I mean, they prepped me and led me to this. I mean, if it wasn’t for all those things that I went through and them not working out, then I wouldn’t be available to be doing the work I’m doing right now. But you know, there have certainly been things that I wish that I could have done better or even just with the military, I mean, I wish that I didn’t have the-the heart condition that I have that made me had to get out of the service because I would still probably be there. But again, God has a different plan for you. I mean, if he doesn’t want that for you, then he will allow another door to open for you, you know, so that’s just what happened with me. I can’t take it as a faliure. It’s just a part of my journey.
My job in the military was Illegal Services Supervisor, so I would have never been one of the people that would have went on the main line with guns. I actually was really close to doing that, but I received the medical discharge, which was like right at the time when other people that I was in platoon with were actually being deployed, but because I had a medical issue, I was able to be released, but some of those people never made it back home. Some of those people are paralyzed now or lost limbs and things like that. So I feel fortunate that that wasn’t what God had for me, but I was there, and I was prepared to do it if I had to.
I had always wanted to be a teacher in some capacity, but I do feel that I don’t have to be a teacher in the classroom. I could also be a teacher in the streets, and, you know, everywhere that I am, I can still teach and inspire people by the way that I live my life. Just remain focused. Try to be the best that you can be. College is really not for everybody there. There are trades. There are skills that you can learn that you can make almost just as much money by being a bricklayer or working in iron, or there’s just tons of different things that you could learn, carpentry and-and different skills. There’s the military, which is a great option. That was something that I did straight out of high school instead of going straight to college. And then I was able to get my education afterwards. So, your path is really, you know, dependent on what you want to do. No matter how dark times get, just believe in yourself and-and really believe that somebody is really looking over you and watching over you, and they will see you through.