United States. Work Projects Administration

“ In slavery white folks put you together. Just tell you to go on and go to bed with her or him. You had to stay with them whether you wanted them or not.
"After freedom old master called all us slaves and told us we was free, opened a big gate and drove us all out. We didn't know what to do—not a penny, nowhere to go—so we went out there and set down. In about thirty minutes master came back and told us if we wanted to finish the crop for food and clothes we could, so we all went back and finished the crop and the next year they gave us half. So ever' since then we people been working for half. ”

“ Most of the slaves left the white folks where I was raised. It took a long time to ever get fixed. Some of them died, some went to the cities, some up North, some come to new country. I married and come to Fredonia, Arkansas in 1889. I had been married since I was a young girl. But as I was saying the slaves was still hunting a better place and more freedom. The young folks is still hunting a better place and more freedom. Grandma learnt me to set down and be content. We have done better out here than we could done in North Carolina but I don't believe in so much rambling. ”

“ Clinton, on ex-Mississippi slave, lives on a small farm that he owns a few miles north of Marvell, Arkansas. His wife has been dead for a number of years and he has only one living child, if indeed his boy, Joe, who left home fifteen years ago for Chicago and from whom no word has been received since, is still alive. Due to the infirmities of age "Uncle Joe" is unable to work and obtains his support from the income received off the small acreage he rents each year to the Negro family with whom he lives. ”

“ When my brothers got growed they learned shoemakers trade and had right good business in Little Rock. But when pappy died, them boys give up that good business and tuck a farm—the old Lawson place—so to make a home for mammy and the little chilluns.
I married Freeman. Onliest husban ever I had. He died last summer. He was a slave too. We used to talk over them days before we met. The K.K.K. never bothered us. They was gathered together to bother niggers and whites what made trouble. If you tended to your own business, they's let you alone.
No ma'am, I never voted. ”

“ No ma'am, didn't nobody think of raising watermelons to ship way off like they does in Hempstead county now. Cotton was our cash crop. We rented thirds and fourths. Didn't move but three times. One place I stayed 15 years.
I been a widow 40 years. Yes, ma'am. I farmed myself, and my children helped me. Me and the owners got along well. Made good crops, me and the children. I managed to take good care of them. Made out to raise 15 out of the 17 to be grown. There's only 5 of them alive now.
Hard on a woman to run a farm by herself. ”

“ After the Civil War ended, Ed Cotton walked out and told papa: 'Rob, you are free.' We worked on till 1866 and we moved to Joe Lambert's place. He had a brother named Tom Lambert. Father never got no land at freedom. He got to own 160 acres, a house on it, and some stock. We all worked and helped him to make it. He was a hard worker and a fast hand.
"I farmed all my life till fifteen years ago I started trucking here in Helena. I gets six dollars assistance from the Sociable Welfare and some little helpouts as I calls it—rice and potatoes and apples. ”

“ Not a one ever went to the War or the Yankees. Jep Davis had been to get his mail on his horse. A Yankee come up at the gate walking and took it. He asked for the bridle and saddle but the Yankee laughed in his face. We never seen our horse no more. 'Babe' we called her. She was a pretty horse and so gentle we could ride her bare back.
"Jep Davis was religious. They had preaching at his church, the Baptist church at Nuna, for white folks in the morning and a white preacher preach for the niggers at the same church in the evening. ”

“ I ain't never had a chile. I ain't got nobody kin to me livin dat I knows bout. When I gets sick a neighbor woman comes over and looks after me.
I thinks if de present generation don't get killed they die cause they too lazy to work. No mum dey don't know nuthin bout work. They ain't got no religion. They so smart they don't pay no tention to what you advise em. I never tries to find out what folks doin and the young generation is killin time. ”

“ We hoboed on freights and walked to Chattanooga, Tennessee. We stayed there awhile. Then a white man came along getting laborers. I never kept the year nor nothin'. He brought us to Lonoke County, and I got work on The Bood Bar Plantation. Squirrels, wild things, cotton and corn, plenty of it. So you see, the man told the truth when he said money grew on bushes.
"I taught and farmed all my life. Farming is the greatest occupation. It supports the teacher, the preacher, the lawyer, the doctor. None of them can live without it. ”

“ Biscoe was heard of in this country. I'm for the world like my daddy. He was light as I is. I'm jus' his size and make. There was three of us boys. Dan was the oldest; he was my own brother, and Ed was my half-brother. My daddy was a fellar of few words and long betwix' 'em. He was in the Old War (Civil War) . He was shot in his right ankle and never would let it be took out. Mother had been a cook. She and my grandmother was sold in South Carolina and brought out here. ”

“ She was raised in Arkansas. Papa was married twice. I was raised around Holly Grove, Arkansas. That is where my folks lived in the last of slavery—that is mama's folks. Papa come to Arkansas at a later time.
"I think times is queer. I work and makes the best of 'em. (Ten dollars a month house rent.) I work all the time washing and ironing. (She has washed for the same families years and years. She is a light mulatto—ed.)
"Young folks is lost respect for the truth. Not dependable. That is their very worst fault, I think. ”

“ My mother said her sister had two yellow children; they were her master's. I know of plenty of light people who were living at that time.
"My mother had two light children that belonged to her sister. They were taken from her after freedom, and were made to cook and work for their sister and brother (white) . All the orphans were taken and given back to the people what owned them when freedom came. My mother's sister was refugeed back to Charlottesville, North Carolina before the end of the war so that she wouldn't get free. After the war they were set free out there and never came back. ”

“ I come back to Arkansas where I could farm. The land was better here than in Mississippi. I walked part of the way and rode part of the way when I come here from Mississippi. I vote a Republican ticket. Bout all I owns is two little pigs and a few chickens. I did have a spring garden. We work in the field and make a little to eat and wear.
"I find the present times is hard for old folks. Some young folks is doing well I guess. They look like it. I made application twice for help but I ain't never got on. I don't know what to think bout the young folks. ”

“ Passing the porch where the aged negro man and the young white woman sat talking she paused and gave what was suspiciously like a sniff. Fitzhugh grinned. "She's sanctified," he explained.
"Did you ever hear of Tucky-Nubby? He was an Indian. Bob Hurley used to bring him to Hot Springs every year. What medicine shows they used to have here. Ain't seen nothing like it lately, everybody knowed Tucky-Nubby. Lots of those medicine shows—free shows, used to come here. But Bob Hurley and Tucky-Nubby was the most liked.
Yes, ma'am, I'm all alone now. My sister married a man a long, long time ago. ”

“ They built nigger pens like you see cow pens and hog pens. They drove niggers in there by the hundred and auctioned them off to the highest bidder. The white folks kept up with our age so when they got ready to sell us they could tell how old we were. They had a 'penetenture' for the white folks when they did wrong. When we done wrong we was tied to that whipping post and our hide busted open with that cow hide.
"We stayed out in the field in a log house and old master would allowance our week's rations out to us and Sunday morning we got one biscuit each. ”

“ Some say Rainey. But he must have been a Dortch; he called himself Dortch, and we go in the name of Dortch. Rainey was a white man employed on Dortch's plantation. Rainey's name was Wilson Rainey. My name has always been Dortch.
"My mother was named Martha Dortch. I am trying to think what her maiden name was. My sister can tell you all the details of it. She is five years older than I am. She can tell you all the old man's folks and my mother's too more easily than I can.
"My father had, as nearly as I can remember—lemme see—Cordelia, Adrianna, Mary, Jennie, Emma, and Dortch. ”

“ I was born in Mississippi. Grandma cooked all the time. Mama and papa both worked in the field. I heard grandma say every one of her children was born in South Carolina. Mr. Jefferies, one of the younger set, lived in Clarendon, Arkansas. Since I come to this country I seen him. I lived over there pretty close by.
"I got no 'pinion worth telling about our young folks. They want to have a big time when they are young. All young folks is swift on foot that way. Times is funny. Funniest times ever been in my life. Is times right now? Ain't no credit no more. ”

“ When he would git through, she would give us the rest. Sometimes, she wouldn't put the paper on it because she would be mad. He would ask, 'No paper today?' She would say, 'No.' And he wouldn't say nothin' more.
"There is some of the meanest white people in the United States in Mississippi up there on the Yellow Dog River. That's where the Devil makes meanness.
"There's some pretty mean colored folks too. There is some of them right here in Little Rock. Them boys from Dunbar give me a lot of trouble. They ride by on their bicycles and holler at us. ”

“ A little white boy said, 'I tell you something if you give me a watermelon.' The black man give the boy a big watermelon. He had a big patch. The boy said, 'My papa coming take all your money away from you some night.' He fixed and sure 'nough he come dressed like a Ku Klux. He had some money but they didn't find it. One of the Ku Kluxes run off and left his spurs. The colored folks killed some and they run off and leave their horses. They come around and say they could drink three hundred fifteen buckets of water. They throw turpentine balls in the houses to make a light. ”