Mitchell Family

Willie Mitchell and his wife Willie (Frank) Mitchell were born in the South in the 1920s. Willie came to Arizona by train with his parents in the 1930s. Willie worked in the cotton fields, and then, entered the service during World War II.  He remembers that during his time in the Army, he was sent to a little island that was one-mile wide and a half-mile long. He says jokingly that he was told to “dig a hole and shoot at everybody.” When he returned from the war, he and Willie Frank moved to New Orleans. Willie Frank preferred Arizona, so they came back to Chandler. Willie worked as a clerk at the Rexall Drug Store, where he enjoyed dressing in a tie.

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The Mitchells moved to a home in Southside. In 2007, he described how he got his first home:                 

            “Somebody came by where we were staying and said there was a plot of ground down there for sale by a lady … So, she took my money and I was leaving, riding a bicycle at the time for deliveries. I went down this last street in Chandler, going south, and this guy was making bricks to build houses, and I said, ‘You selling out?’ and he said, ‘Yeah I am getting tired. How many bricks do you need? Well, I will sell you all those for half,’ and I gave him my address, and he did later that evening. Me and another person living behind me, we had been working on the church down there, and we had been laying some bricks; he and the assistant pastor got into it, and the (assistant) pastor just walked off. I asked him if he wanted to lay bricks for me, and he said he would be down there in the morning. That was my first house, one room, and then, we built it up two rooms, and now it is almost ten rooms.”

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Walter, one of the eleven Mitchell children, was born in Mesa on July 1, 1953. There was not a hospital in Chandler yet. He attended the Winn School in 1958, and then, went to Denver Elementary School (now San Marcos Elementary), Chandler Junior High School and graduated from Chandler High School in 1970. Walter went to Arizona State University and received his teaching certification and a degree in sociology. He taught Special Education in various places, such as Yuma, Flagstaff, and Phoenix, Arizona, and Las Vegas, Nevada, before returning to Chandler. He remembers that his family was very active in their church, Mt. Olive Missionary Baptist Church.

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