DALLAS — With one look, time gives way to a reunion of old friends.

“Hey, my sugar,” said Willie Mae Coleman as she greeted her childhood friend, Don Johnson. “I’d spank him and say you get back in here and sit down.”

Coleman, 91, and Johnson, 88, both grew up in South Dallas and share a lifetime of memories.

“I was breaking laws and today I’m making laws,” said Johnson.

“Don, you’re a mess,” responded Coleman as she laughed.

Many of those childhood memories, good and bad, took place at Fair Park during the State Fair of Texas . During the segregated 1940s, Johnson worked on the Midway.

“Place called the ‘African Dip.’ They threw baseballs at me, called ‘Hit the trigger, dunk the n****r,’” said Johnson.

Credit: San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library

The fair

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