Warren Taylor holds recommendations from a number of prominent people
referring to his excellent character, high morals, unusual intelligence,
wide information, industry, thrift, honesty, and trustworthiness. Some
of the names occur in the interview. The letters and documents proving
his long service and good record were brought out during the interview
and given to me to read.
He has an unusual memory and penetrating insight into conditions.
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Sneed Teague
Brinkley, Arkansas
Age: 68
Occupation: Works on railroad
"My owners was Miss Betsy and Master Teague. Miss Betsy had a sister
lived with them. Her name was Miss Polly. They was French folks from the
old country.
"My ma had belong to the Cox before the Teagues owned her. The Teagues
had three families of servants.
"I remember them--yes mam--they was very saving people. They made
everything that they used. The shettle, the carding machine, the
spinning wheel and all, they made em. They had a carding machine
different to anybodys in the country. It worked by a foot treadle.
Another thing wasn't like nobody elses in the whole country was the bed.
It had four tall post. The head board a little higher than the one at
the foot but instead of using slats across from the railings it was
mortised together and hemp ropes wove bout a inch apart. It was strong
and didn't seem to give (stretch) much.
"They raised sheep and they wove and spun wool altogether. They didn't
fool with cotton. Never did, not even down to my time. That carding
machine I'm telling bout turned out rolls of wool. It was right pretty.
They made all kinds of wool things and sold them. The old man had three
or four boys. Mr. Jim Teague run a wood and blacksmith shop. He sold
plows, wagons, hoes. They made spoons, knives, and forks out of sheets
of some kind of metal. Everything they used they made it and they sold
mighty near every thing folks wanted. The servants stayed on after the
war. My ma stayed till she died. My family had a little dispute when I
was twelve years old and I left. Ma died and I never went back. I
come to Forrest City and got work. I been farmin' and working on the
railroad. I have done track work. I got 10 acres land and a house. I
don't need on the relief. If I need it I would want it. The reason I
ain't got a garden and cow is I work out and not there to see after it.
"Some times I vote. You make enemies cause they all want you to vote
for them and I can't do that. I don't care nothin' bout votin'. I don't
enquire no more bout politics.
"The fellow what raises things to sell is better off with prices high
but if he is working for money, times is hard for him. Cause the money
is hard to get and hard to keep now. The young folks morals ain't like
young folks used to have. Seemed like young folks too smart to be
trained in morals like they was when I was comin' up."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Mary Teel
Holly Grove, Ark.
Age: 74
"Our Masters was Wade and Curls. Miss Fannie was Master Wade's wife.
They was kin somehow. I heard Ma say they wouldn't let their boys work.
We girls growd up together. They called Ma 'Cousin'.
"Ma say she come from Marshal County Tennessee to Holly Springs
Mississippi. She never did see her pa. My papa's papa was _a white
man_. My pa was Lewis Brittman. He was a carriage driver. He made and
mended shoes. My Ma was a fine cook. She had nine children but jes three
living now. One of the girls--Miss Fannie's girls--married bout when
I did. We jes growd up lack that. I left the girls at Mt. Pleasant,
Mississippi. I stayed on their place a while. I wish I had money to go
back to my old home and see all 'em livin'. I never heard 'em say if
they give 'em somepin. Pa lernt us to do all kinds of work. He knowd how
to do nearly everything cause he was brought up by white folks. Measles
broke out, then small pox and the white folks put us in a room all
together at the white house so we could be seen after. We lay on the
same beds. My brother would whistle. I was real little but I member it
well as yesterday. Ma say stop whistlin' in that bed and Miss Fannie say
let him whistle I want to hear him cause I know he better. They say it
bad luck to sing in bed or look in the lookin'-glass (mirror) if you in
the bed. We all got over it.
"Pa made us go clean. He made me comb and wrop my hair every night. I
had prutty hair then. I had tetter and it all come out. I has to wear
this old wig now. When I was young my eye-sight got bad, they said
measles settled in em and to help em Ma had these holes put in em (in
her ears). I been wearin' earbobs purt nigh all my life.
"The Ku Klux never bothered us. They never come nigh our house no time.
Pa died and Ma married a old man. They stayed in the same place a while.
When Pa died he had cattle and stock that why I don't know if he got
somepin at Freedom. He had plenty.
"We lived at Holly Springs (Miss.) when they started the first colored
schools. There was three lady teachers. I think a man. One of the white
teachers boarded at my Ma's. On Saturday the other two eat there. I
recollect Ma cooking and fixing a big dinner Saturday. No white folks
let em stay with em or speak to em. They was sent from up north to teach
the darky chaps. I was one went to school. They wasn't nice like my
white folks then neither. They paid high board and white folks sent em
to Ma so she get the money. I was 14 years old when I married. I lived
wid my husband more an 50 years. We got long what I'ze tellin' you. This
young set ain't got no raisin' reason they cain't stand one nother. I
don't let em come in my yard. I cain't raise no children, I'm too old
and they ain't got no manners and the big ones got no sense. Jes wild.
They way they do. They live together a while and quit. Both them soon
livin' wid somebody else. That what churches fer, to marry in. Heap of
em ain't doin' it. No children don't come here tearin' up what I work
and have. I don't let em come in that gate, I have to work so hard in my
old days. I picked cotton. I can, by pickin' hard, make a dollar a day.
I cooked ten years fore I stopped, I cain't hold up at it. I washed and
ironed till the washing machines ruined that work fer all of us black
folks. Silk finery and washin' machines ruint the black folks.
"Ma named Elsie Langston and Lewis Langston. They took that name somehow
after the old war (Civil War), I recken it was her old master's name.
"After I was married and had children I was hard up. I went to a widow
woman had a farm but no men folks. She say, 'If you live here and leave
your little children in my yard and take my big boys and learn em to
work, I will cook. On Saturday you wash and iron.' She took me in that
way when my color wouldn't help me. I stayed there--between Memphis and
Holly Springs.
"I live hard the way I live. I pick cotton when I can't go hardly. They
did give me a little commodity but I lose half day work if I go up there
and wait round. Don't know what they give me. I don't get a cent of the
penshun."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Wade Thermon,
R.F.D. (PWA Reservation), Des Arc, Arkansas
Age: 67
"I was born in Boswell, Oklahoma. My mother and father was both slaves
some wha in the eastern states. Soon as freedom was declared they kept
going till I was born. They finally come back and farmed round Pine
Bluff. My folks last time I heard from them was at Garland City. There's
wha my mother died. I had three brothers and one sister, but one brother
died long time ago. Oklahoma was pore farmin'. The family could do
pretty good farmin' in Arkansas. I come here from Pine Bluff. I got a
wife, two girls and a little grandchild. When I first come to dis county
I done public work--piece work. I handled cotton and cross ties. I used
to help load and unload the boats and I worked helpin' build railroads.
Then I had to farm about a little fur a living. I worked on Victor
Gates place six years. Then I worked on the widow Thomas place till the
Government bought it. Then the last eighteen months I got work wid the
PWA on the rezer/va/tion. They turned me off now and I ain't got no
place to work.
"I voted the Republican ticket the last time. I don't know nothing 'bout
stricted sufage. I voted in Oklahoma some and here some. No I sho don't
think the women needs to vote. They won't let us vote in the Primary. No
I wouldn't know who would suit in dem high offices. I reckon it is all
right. We is in you might say a foreign country. What I blames 'em fur
is not puttin' us in a country all to our selves and den let us run it
all to our selves. It is gettin' us all mixed up here every year worse
and worse.
"I don't know nuthin' 'bout the Civil War. That was before I was born. I
heard my folks talk some 'bout it, been so long I forgot what they did
say. My folks owned a place in Oklahoma, at least I recken they did. I
never did own no home nor no land. Well, missus, cause I never could get
but berry little ahead ever and it takes all I makes to live on and I
ain't got nuthin' to go on now.
"Times is changin' so much I don't know whut goin' to happen to the next
generation. Prices is mighty high now the reason you have to spend every
cent you makes fore you get paid off. Dats the reason I don't like the
PWA work I done. It cuts you off without a thing to go on. I likes farm
work whole heap the best."
Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Mrs. Dicey Thomas
2500 Center Street, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: About 82
"I was born in Barbour County, Alabama. When I was born, the white folks
kept the children's age, not that of their parents. When the Yankees
came through our white folks' plantation, the white folks was hiding
away things.