>> As a high school student, Vel entered a national
speaking contest and won.
Her performance got her a scholarship to the university
of her choice.
She chose Howard University, the historically black college
in Washington, D.C.
>> We had always lived in neighborhoods where there
weren't many blacks and I was kind of proud
of my heritage and I figured that
they would all be blacks and all these wonderful,
outstanding people.
Well, I was just enamored with everything about college.
I felt like I owned the world.
>> But in 1943, Washington D.C.
was still racially segregated.
>> A friend of mine said, let's go to the Cherry Blossoms.
So we went on this Sunday and it's just, oh, if you never
been there, there's nothing to compare.
And you just feel ethereal, just magical, and close to God.
And so we said, "Well, let's go to church."
The two of us went into this church and I'll never
forget the minister stopped mid-sentence
and asked the ushers to usher us out of the church.
>> And then they're escorted out,
which is crushing to her.
That's a white church.
Here in the nation's capital?
The betrayal of those core American values that every kid
gets instilled in them growing up in America,
black or white.
>> I just thought, this is not as it should be.
And that just sort of lit a fire, you know?
>> After graduating from Howard, Vel returned home to Milwaukee
and began volunteering at the local branch
of the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People, the NAACP.
One night at a party, she met a World War II veteran
named Dale Phillips.
>> I was very attracted to him, because he seemed to be
a little streetwise, and I didn't know much.
>> My daddy was a runaround guy.
He had a lot of buddies and they loved to party.
>> And he came up to me and said, "Gee, what's your name?"
I told him right away.
And so he brought out a big thing of liquor.
>> Vel remembered her mother's three rules.
>> And I thought right then, uh oh!
What should I do?
I don't want to be naive and stuff.
I just said no thank you.
Then he took out his cigarettes.
I thought, oh God!
I had to refuse again.
He'll never see me.
When I refused the liquor and the cigarettes,
I guess he decided, "This is it; this is the woman
who I'm going to marry."
>> I think when he saw my mom he saw "the one."
So he reigned in all of his rascalness.
>> When I came home after just seeing him for the first time
and said, "I met a young man, Mom, at the party,
and I was just drawn to him.
If I got to know him, and he asked me to marry him,
I'd marry him."
She sat right up, she was fanning, "What do you mean?
You just saw him one time!
Oh, Lord Jesus help me."
>> They had a very brief courtship.
I think after three or four dates that he popped
the question.
>> On September 12, 1948, Dale and Vel were married
at St. Mark's AME church in Milwaukee.