Interviewer: {X} Okay that's on mm-hmm mm-hmm. This is the manual we use 412: Alright Interviewer: It has a lot of questions in it 412: Mm-hmm Interviewer: {NW} {D: What now} Now since we're not gonna do a complete interview Maybe skip around a little bit now 412: Alright Interviewer: Items and {NW} Basically What we're interested here is pronunciation You know 412: Mm-hmm Interviewer: For the dialect study and there are a few items that uh I, uh, I, uh usually try to, uh, to get you to say, in other words I won't uh Say them for you for you say I because sometimes when someone else says something it influences the way you say it 412: mm-hmm Interviewer: So sometimes I might say, uh You know I might point to something and you would tell me the what you call it or any alternates, uh any alternate ways a person would talk around you uh I think what I might do first is uh we use uh it sometimes helps us get started You built this house, didn't you? 412: yeah, yeah #1 # Interviewer: #2 # 412: #1 Well I didn't # Interviewer: #2 There's uh... # 412: do it myself of course but Interviewer: Well I mean 412: #1 I helped # Interviewer: #2 you laid it out # 412: #1 Okay I thought this # Interviewer: #2 # 412: Well actually I built this house out of thirty-six hundred dollars believe it or not These walls are eighteen inches thick Interviewer: This all stone? What kind of stone is this? 412: {D:Oh it's uh an old {X} from over here in the creek} it's granite and uh Weathered and stones of other types Little field stones not too much of that flint uh Interviewer: okay 412: #1 {X} five # Interviewer: #2 I'm just # 412: five or six times Interviewer: Okay, this community is uh, what do you call this community? 412: Loachapoka Interviewer: And uh, uh you're uh full answer? uh, What you would 412: Well {B} Well I've Not using {D:at all} but accepting official documents Interviewer: Okay 412: {X} Interviewer: And you just use Loachapoka as your address? 412: yeah, yeah We all had to have box numbers now Interviewer: Is that P-O-L-K-A? 412: mm-mm Interviewer: #1 P-O-K-A # 412: #2 P-O # Interviewer: #1 Not Polka it's Poka # 412: #2 yeah, uh # Interviewer: #1 # 412: #2 # {X} you showed up now {X} Interviewer: {NW} 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 Well I # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 Yeah, I noticed how {D: Polka-ing or something} # 412: #1 Yeah, that's what they use, it's P-O-L-K-A. # Interviewer: #2 # Yeah that's what, I think that's where I got the idea 412: yeah Interviewer: And you were born in {D: Lake} county? 412: Yeah Interviewer: Was it close to {NS} here? 412: {NS} Yeah down behind Interviewer: Down here with next to mr Ward? 412: No, behind, you know what Beyond that triangle and you turn right and go down that wire road oh about a half a mile Interviewer: {D: Hmm, here} Uh, do you, what do you consider your occupation to be right now? I mean, are you just 412: Well, I'm simply retired because I'll always as long as my health holds I'll be alright and columnist and my chief ambition if my health holds on is to write a history on the progress of southern agriculture in the last fifty years I'll make it sixty then if I get into it uh making, making it something like the Magnum Opus of my career I think I showed you that family history the other day Interviewer: yes 412: Did one on agricultural classics this was the last one I did uh before I left the company retired then we had done three hours take 'em in to hand wrote oh {NS} Bunch of printed {D:and or in} thirty six We sold about fifty thousand copies of that They {X} into handbooks and and our section in those days we spoke with someone {D: opportunity} then I've added to and aided in writing a lot of other books This is a South was one in which I collaborated in ran {D:magnetic book} Interviewer: {X} 412: mm-hmm Interviewer: Were you involved with this now you were involved with uh you said a, a publisher or a foundation that helped with this 412: No, this is company, this is a company publication Interviewer: Which, now, which company is this sir? 412: Progressive farmer company Interviewer: Progressive farming 412: Uh We had invested millions in this just to get it started Interviewer: As a matter of fact the reason I, the reason I, that book looked familiar to me is that this again I saw it in, uh, Illinois 412: Yeah, uh I'm not surprised Yeah Interviewer: As a matter I might've even bought it, uh I often buy them, especially if it had James Dickey's name on 'em #1 Yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 I might've done it just for that purpose originally # uh 412: Yeah his book, "Deliverance," um, brought him a lot of attention, uh Good and bad {NS} I guess Interviewer: Well I've been, uh studying mr Dickey since he's been doing his poetry 412: yeah Interviewer: Um, back a bit before Deliverance but he did some lectures at our university for 412: uh-huh, He elected, you know, at this humanities conference There was held here I'm on this advising council for the humanities in universities and this was a project of, uh group, the humanities group and school of arts and sciences {NW} {NW} Interviewer: What's, what's your age sir? Your age, sir? 412: Going on seventy-one. Be seventy-one in September Interviewer: Okay 412: {NW} Interviewer: And your religion is Methodist? 412: Methodist. {NW} Still have a little {D:primitive} Baptist in me from my grandma {X} Interviewer: Got some Baptist on that side It, now this community basically, I is it, uh kinda, divided along religious lines 412: #1 or is it, uh, together # Interviewer: #2 No, no, we're no longer divided # 412: There are some communities where there still seems to be divided but in this {D: area} We don't attend each other's preaching services as we ought to but uh we all work together Interviewer: Alright 412: uh, as far as Baptists and Methodists go, you know they separate over communion and immersion and sprinkling Interviewer: And, what was the second term? 412: Uh, sprinkling Interviewer: No, you said "mushing?" 412: Immersion Interviewer: Oh, immersion Yeah, or sprinkling. 412: Well, that still goes on, but uh the communion, we unite, join with each other in communion Interviewer: You know my family, my uh grandmothers on my mother's side have all been Methodist and I was raised Baptist because my 412: #1 {X}, yeah # Interviewer: #2 father's side was, I mean his parents were all Baptist # and uh, it goes along the family lines uh in our family 412: well I was brought up and lived, until recent years, believing that uh any nun would be a Methodist and a Democrat Well, as I'm begin to get into this history I discovered that we had a lot of Baptists and uh Then I discovered in the last very few years we got Presbyterians Interviewer: uh-huh 412: Which surprised me because I don't think any of our people came from Scotland so, I think we just got in maybe like you did, and, and {D: Your kids} Interviewer: Right okay Uh, um, what's uh your educational level, so how far did you go in education? 412: Well I simply finished a B.S. formerly then I did, um night school working in Birmingham after I'd gone to work with progressive farmer company in journalism, and um then in fifty-nine the university here university conferred on me the honorary doctor science degree {NW} Interviewer: okay and uh, uh I know that, well you're obviously in um, active in the historic society but you you remembered various other community uh, organizations or social groups? 412: Yeah {NW} too many I think belonged to the in the historical field American State Association or What is that exact title? A-A-S-L-H? I wish I... Well anyways, it's uh Association of State Historical Societies and relating groups headquarter's national and then of course, I belonged to the Heritage Association which is an Albany based group the State Historical Association and Southern Historical Association haven't gone farther than that, really I been invited into a number of- I do belong to the Newcomen Society of North America Interviewer: Newcomen? 412: Mm-hmm. Interviewer: okay uh any um, local civic 412: #1 I'm {D: relying} # Interviewer: #2 organizations? # 412: #1 {D:overlined} # Interviewer: #2 reliant? # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 okay # 412: and then I really attend club here locally It was in a field, such as I served in all these years you come to have membership in a lot of other things soil conservation societies and numerous others Interviewer: You have like a, do you have the equivalent up north we have granges do you have the equivalent of like a grange, here? 412: uh, the farm bureau of course has been the dominant organization all through this area. When I was just beginning to grow up there were farmers alliances, it was just dying out and the farmer's union had preceded that I suppose a farmer's alliance and this area, perhaps most of the Southeast, or was it most of rapidly spreading and uh most, yeah most loyal group that uh, ever got into any uh, real society that was still, well, only one I guess to my knowledge there was still one alliance warehouse alliance building, as we called it still standing when I was a boy uh the movement swept the South so rapidly in {D: populist} days you recalled, the Populist movement Interviewer: Now that's the same {NW} Excuse me, the same Populist movement that made the impression on the eighteen nineties 412: #1 yeah, oh yeah # Interviewer: #2 the election # 412: Williams Jennings Bryan and {NW} all the others Interviewer: okay uh how about, uh, uh uh, in your parent's name your mother's side of the family are your parents' birthplace, maybe your mother {X} 412: Well, uh, momma and papa both were born in this era, in that momma was born down to in Armstrong, which is about two miles south of the home place and papa was born there on the home place and that's this one on the wire road about four miles, four and a half miles Interviewer: Down by bee hive? 412: yeah yeah on, this is it part of the land Bill's now operating Interviewer: Are, are you uh, would you consider yourself, uh, associated with farming here? 412: #1 oh yeah # Interviewer: #2 I mean would you consider yourself # sort of a farmer 412: And they would get dissociated from it, even if they'll quit farming himself I, uh Oh, I don't know, I get all the {D: SDM} material and I get the Mississippi material and the Florida material and the Georgia material and get a little North Carolina then from time to time I'll order special things right now, for example, I'm going to order this new book from {D: Iowa} on the the history of agriculture going back to the seventeen hundreds I believe, comes forward to well, maybe nineteen hundred anyway, it's just been announced and I believe that {NS} motion, piece or side to order it Interviewer: okay, uh, how about your parents' education? 412: Papa, uh, went what was through what was called the eighth grade in his day, but it must've amounted to a a co- not a college education, a high school education Now momma never did get any farther than uh I think about what was called the fifth grade in, in her day Interviewer: okay 412: Schooling was hard to come by uh, seventy-five years ago, uh Interviewer: yes 412: uh When Papa, he, he quit after the eighth grade he had gone to Dublin, Georgia and lived a year with his oldest brother but in that eighth grade, he was taking subjects that I think we get until eleventh, twelfth grade so it hadn't been too many years, well it's been a long time for the average youngster but in in my thinking it hadn't been too many years since we only had eleven grades for high school sometimes I'm not sure that it wouldn't be just as well off if we didn't have eleven now I hear a lot of these twelfth {D: racking} and complaining about the nothing to do the last year this is sorta, a feeling that {D: my daughters} down at Enterprise have now Interviewer: You mean that they may feel there's nothing being taught or 412: Well for example, uh there, there are two children one boy and one girl Bill is the younger of the two and he finished, uh last year, and Sidney's already in college and Bill seems to feel that uh what he's getting now just saw him, as he said to me the other day is kind of a review of what they've done and I, {D: i mean} I get it the state high schools and the colleges have worked out a plan whereby if a youngster can pass {D: a certain} uh test he no longer has to get a high school certificate Interviewer: You mean to go to college? 412: yeah Interviewer: You mean like a general education development well they have one in Illinois called the GED 412: #1 Well I mean, you made that, uh-huh # Interviewer: #2 General education, and development # 412: #1 Well # Interviewer: #2 Well # 412: Apparently this is a trend that I hadn't known much about until the last year or two but apparently it is a trend now actually in high school I went a one full year this was um last year, the senior year and the two middle years were the two flu years and I remember that we were out of school two months and all of a sudden just closed down and then the next year, I don't, I don't remember how long it was closed down but I know the first year I quit school in March to help Papa farm. So I got about two years of high school, no no it'd be near two and a half, really of high school and then my first year in college, uh, we were on the quarter system and uh I didn't attend a single class the last quarter, I Dr. {D:Dow, Dows, bright dows} simply let me take the examination Interviewer: Now, when you were younger though you didn't, you didn't, you lived and worked on the farm 412: uh, no Well, I worked on the farm, worked uh, with Papa We were living in old {X} when I was in grammar school And I got a good foundation in grammar school {D: No, no other sub} had a good this was a new school new principal I'm sure uh, we had teaching and training above average Now my brother, he um, he started out bee-hiving he didn't get nearly as good a background as I did Interviewer: hmm You think the like, the educational systems uh, you sort of indicated earlier that you thought maybe the educational systems uh, grammar schools, high school systems were kind of coming down from where they were uh, years ago 412: #1 In qual- in quality # Interviewer: #2 You mean, in number of years? # 412: Well, we, we had a we had a lot of poor schools and uh I guess I'd have to say that a lot of kids before busing days and we didn't really have a busing system until the thirties, even for some of the whites it was hard for a lot of youngsters to get a high school education unless they'd come into town and live with Aunt Sally uh, uh, spend the week with Uncle Jim uh, somebody else in the family, or some close friend the number of our people right through here got their high school training that way and that's probably what I did even when I was an old {X} spent boarding with a cousin but, as we gradually got, uh busing uh and better roads, we didn't have any roads {X} thirty-five which was just forty years ago Interviewer: What kind of roads did you have when you were a 412: #1 Well # Interviewer: #2 {D:young one around here} # 412: In this area I used to say we got stuck in the sand when it was dry and stuck in the mud when it was wet and that's not far from the truth Interviewer: Yeah 412: but up in the Red Hills uh they were in pretty good shape when it was dry except, that ol' red dust but when it was raining, well they had a problem Interviewer: The first roads that came through were they like a black top, or concrete, or what 412: No no, no at first roads were gravel top Interviewer: Gravel top... 412: {X} gravel surface and actually I think if we looked into the records I've got piles on it upstairs see Old Senator Bankhead and the father the second Bankhead he was given credit, given credit for the building or the initiation and helping to establish that decent road system that we began to build on I guess around nine- between nineteen hundred and nineteen ten Well, uh, sort of a sand clay was what they started with and then they well and I'm sure there were spots where they built gravel roads {X} then, uh sort of a gravel, uh type of, the, the clays and sands in here better than others for road, uh I coulda shown you down at the museum this morning. We using a type of sand and clay off of that hill out there that just packs down and becomes almost as hard as a floor, well listen they learn where there were deposits of that sort of sort and so that's what they'd use to surface a road and then came along with gravel, and uh uh {X}, maybe and then uh, actually except for limited errors in a town, larger towns and cities we didn't have any roads about thirty-five Interviewer: hmm Even the towns, the towns that developed, uh streets and roads 412: #1 Yeah, well # Interviewer: #2 fairly early on, you mean that # 412: I'd say right here that uh Auburn and Opelika they had any number of just plain dirt streets dirt surface streets uh in, in fairly modern times goodness alive, uh You shoulda seen Auburn uh fifty fifty-five years ago when our class entered {D: four twenty} You wouldn't believe it how bad it was compared to today {NW} You, did you look at that picture on the bulletin board on #1 Auburn in nineteen hundred? # Interviewer: #2 yeah # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 I looked uh, well it, it # 412: #1 {NW} # Interviewer: #2 it, uh # Well, I didn't get a good uh, picture, uh view, a feel of the streets but 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 but, uh you know # 412: #1 I guess, yeah, yeah if you # Interviewer: #2 it looks a lot different # 412: If I'd been there, if I'd thought about it, I'd have pointed it out to you See Auburn didn't even have a bank till nineteen seven Interviewer: Wow 412: And then they had one telephone, two telephones, I believe In nineteen two or nineteen three Interviewer: Was, uh, Opelika the main commercial center all all the way through, or 412: Uh, since seventy about seventy-two And assumed that it was evidence that there was gonna be a railroad junction there it, it continued to {X} Opelika, actually it wasn't in Opelika at the time, {X} Loachapoka no {X} It was a {X} little community Known as Lebanon, this was Interviewer: Lebanon? 412: Lebanon, this was uh Sort of the heart of the a Methodist church known as Lebanon was a sort of the pivot, or And I'm told this was one of my friends that told me the other day I tried to help him with his family genealogy he's uh been associated with this TV tape development apparently importantly he was telling me that his guest house there on Opelika, on the South side {NS} is supposed to have been the exact spot of the {NS} tradings No, that was the exact spot for the Post office, I believe, uh one of the Post Offices is just sort of a staged {X} and then at the trading center, I believe or the no, it wouldn't have been the trading center Oh the trading post! was out where his guest house is and this is out just on the edge of that uh industrial complex on the South, um yeah the trading post was um by his guest house and then if you go straight through the woods and uh uh Charles' property You'd come to Lebanon in about a half a mile, there's a marker there and this is where the post stop was Interviewer: I'm just curious, uh since we're doing sort of a language study and one thing we usually ask is {NW} Do, do you think that that the language has uh drastically changed much I mean, you know that the type of language people tend to speak now though the proper language, you know the language that people, uh, consider proper at a at a time, or even the, the what you might call, the average, uh language, or the common language 412: Well, I think in this area this has been probably a continuous process I've seen a lot of change since I was interested see one of my fortes was English and I've always liked it and of course as I got into this field of journalism and writing it became more and more important but there, there's been a lot of change uh there's been a great change among our negro people they speak much more good in this {X} and, uh in days gone by there are more negro enunciations, or pronunciations if you please uh among the whites than there is today you know whites and blacks don't rub elbows as much as they once did Interviewer: hmm So there is somewhat of a change? 412: Oh yeah, there's been a big change Interviewer: What do you think about the language that you hear, like on TV, or something like is that, is that very much different than uh 412: Oh, I'm I think I'm biased against TV and I get irritated with TV English every time I listen to a program over a night's period For example, {NS} I think it's just stupidity every script writer apparently for TV has the phrase "I understand" to talk back, or answer back to certain types of uh questions that might come up regardless of whether it's a shooting or a a marriage, or whatever "I understand" Well that's asinine to me I don't believe any of our folks would have that sort of a stock phrase uh they'd say, maybe if it was within a family, "Mm-hmm" or, uh #1 uh # Interviewer: #2 You, you mean an, as an affirmative someone said # 412: #1 yeah, mm-hmm # Interviewer: #2 and, they said "well I understand" # 412: No, this TV saying, #1 "I understand" # Interviewer: #2 Oh, oh # 412: And I'd say, if it's within the family and among people you knew you'd say "Mm-hmm" something like that as affirmative uh, if it is a person maybe on business and he wanted your opinion, you'd say, "Well, I think so" That's probably right Phrase I usually use is usually includes "right" in "that's about right" "I think you are right" something like, but this idea of every person, uh No matter what his state in life say "I understand" they about all the niggers, you know Interviewer: Yeah 412: Well that, they just didn't make any sense Interviewer: you ever heard anybody say something like, uh "Well that's right" and then after they'd say something like after they'd say, after well let's say a person's trying to convince someone else 412: #1 yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 of an argument or point, and you would say # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 "Now you agree with that # 412: #1 yeah, yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 don't you," or, or, "That's right, ain't it" or something like that # Yeah? 412: Yeah Interviewer: Now that's, that's more of the like good questions in a book 412: Uh You might not I think, saying it today, you wouldn't use "ain't" much as often uh uh You, you might say it this way "Doesn't that about sound like you think?" or isn't that about what you think Interviewer: Someone, uh, some people might say, uh, "That's right" uh, or, or "I'm right, am I not?" or 412: yeah #1 yeah, yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 You might've heard that... yeah # Okay, back to this questionnaire Uh, what was the occupation of your parents? 412: Uh Well, Mama was always a homemaker and Papa was always a farmer and Papa, Papa was a good civic leader too He had a strong temper And a strong sense of justice and injustice and uh this led him, I think, to make some decisions, that uh maybe if he'd have thought 'em over a little bit more he wouldn't have done but if he thought I don't care if it was a blackish nigger or the um wealthiest white man if he thought he was being wrongly treated uh that was his opinion and I inherited a lot of that myself and I find it in the family pretty much in all of our close family, I hadn't rubbed elbows enough with distant cousins to find out how far it's reached there uh I think I made some decisions over my lifetime simply by inheriting that same trait I'm not bragging on myself it just just the way your mind runs uh, for example, um Papa been leading a sun- a superintendent Sunday school and leading the lodge We had a Woodmen of the World I think it's still organized {X} {D: dead after this air} Interviewer: What was the name of that again? 412: Woodmen of the World Interviewer: Woodmen? 412: Mm-hmm. Interviewer: Is that like a- a Now is that, is that a professional group? uh 412: #1 mm, well it was a secret order # Interviewer: #2 or was it # oh, oh, okay. 412: We've got one or two tombstones out here in the cemetery Woodmen of the World markers Well he was, uh, I've forgotten what they taught me in {X} he was a head the lodge But things came up, that, uh he thought weren't fair and uh, weren't right and uh he resigned as Sunday School superintendent he got out of the lodge eventually And I can look back on my own career and I I can see some things happening, also was a something of a warning to me to be careful, uh, uh think, think it over twice {NW} {NS} Interviewer: I think we all have, I know I have traits like that I 412: yeah Interviewer: there's some parts of my uh, I respect my grandfather on my mother's side 412: #1 Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm # Interviewer: #2 a great deal. He's from Kentucky and he's backwoods # But there are aspects about him that I have to be very careful about because, uh I can see 'em in me and they're not pretty 412: yeah #1 yeah {NW} # Interviewer: #2 yeah {NW}, okay, uh # How about the uh, your maternal grandparents, do you uh, uh, where were they, they born, you know, education, just 412: #1 Uh, well # Interviewer: #2 general background # 412: On grandma Finch's side the family has been in here well, since anybody ever got here these were the tailors over {D: Todo-amnesa} Well little bit north of {D: Nelson} {X} and north of Baron's crossroads they were members of that {X} from the Baptist church, but The Finches, we haven't been able to find much about Grandpa yet uh his daughters ain't very particular and always said he was nice I mean he probably was he had something of a appearance of an Irishman uh That's about all I ever knew, he didn't have but one sister and she didn't have but one daughter and she had no children so the only lineage left of Grandpa's family is is his immediate descendants Interviewer: hmm 412: {NW} Interviewer: And, and you think they might've been originally, uh Irish 412: I think grandpa Finch was, not grandma, uh Tailor's you know, could be most anything, that, they could be Scots or Interviewer: yeah 412: Could be English I don't think they could be Welsh But there's so many Tailors You you find it hard to separate them out I haven't even tried to get back at my great-great-grandfather Interviewer: Hmm You ever heard of the, uh people in the South they have a name "Tailor" and they change it to Sitaris 412: #1 No... no # Interviewer: #2 The Latin word for Tailor? # I ran across that once, I thought it was kind of strange to have a name like Sitaris, which is Latin 412: #1 Uh-huh, uh-huh # Interviewer: #2 For tailor, you know # 412: #1 No, I, I know that # Interviewer: #2 No? # 412: #1 changed # Interviewer: #2 {NS} # 412: #1 {NS} # Interviewer: #2 # Uh, um, how old is your, uh how old is your wife, sir? Or would you mind I ask? 412: No, she doesn't mind, uh Sally'd be uh Seventy... I- seventy-one. Sally'll be sixty-nine in January Interviewer: And she's also Methodist? 412: #1 Yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 Both of you # 412: #1 Now she comes from # Interviewer: #2 And um # 412: An old-time Scots Presbyterian family on her father's side Interviewer: okay 412: {D: what's all believe} what is to be will be And I got to {D: kid 'em} one day and I said um "So if you believe that, why aren't you willing to fly, to ride a plane?" He didn't like plane flying at all I said "If, if you going to die where from a plane flight you're going to die anyway." He said, "Yeah but the Lord just didn't intend for me to get up in the plane to start with!" {NW} #1 {NW} # Interviewer: #2 That was, that was on a # Who was it that said that, now? 412: This is Sally's father Interviewer: oh 412: That's, that's where the Scots Presbyterian #1 Side, yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 All the predestination, yeah # 412: #1 Ordination # Interviewer: #2 or # 412: #1 and predestination # Interviewer: #2 right # 412: #1 {NW} # Interviewer: #2 I didn't, I just now caught the connection {NW} # {NW} uh, is, uh her family from this area too? Are they from Mount Si- 412: No, uh Mister old Stanley was from North Georgia but we found him in the Revolution We just hadn't gone back far enough yet to get the uh, lines, this is the next job I set for myself now mm, uh Sally's mother's people were German {B} And we don't know when they came to this country at least I don't think any of Sally's immediate family ever knew they, they were in the Talladega area for a good many years You know what Talladega is? Interviewer: No I don't, sir 412: Well it's due north of here, it's a part of the old creek session Talladega itself is a county seat off Talladega county it's about, uh about seventy miles southeast of Birmingham Interviewer: okay What about, now, how, how much education how high did your wife go? 412: uh, she finished her first year of college Interviewer: Okay {NS} And she has uh, uh {NS} social contacts or clubs the {X} 412: Yes, uh I guess She and one or two other ladies are the only members of several of the Auburn clubs Sally belongs to the D-A-R she belongs to the uh Daughters of the Confederacy she was eighteen years a member of the county school board Interviewer: okay the school board that's on tape.. so I guess I'll write it down too Alright, uh basically, now you said you built this house, or at least you helped design it, I guess did you design it? 412: Well one of my classmates drew it and of course we worked with him we trust in him he gave us a fine design he did originally designed a French provincial it was to be so much more expensive than this type that we took well we really sorta condensed a French provincial you are familiar with that style, the wings you know well actually we just kinda squeezed in uh Interviewer: Well, um now what we sometimes do here, show you uh, do it {X} is uh perhaps maybe a wrong one um 412: okay okay Interviewer: Here's a good, uh, a real brief sketch of the 412: #1 yeah, yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 place in the back of the picture here so # Uh, I can get you, what you call the Truman 412: Alright, well this is very simple It's um, it's a ten room {NS} well the sun, ten-room house with a sun porch knew, I'm sure you recognized the sun porch is over here sun porch then the kitchen then we make it kitchen dining room except for when we're having formal meals Interviewer: Okay, now this is an upstairs-downstairs, this is two-story, right? 412: yeah Interviewer: Does it have a basement? 412: No, we wish we'd put a basement in but those were rough days and we were trying to save everything we could Interviewer: Okay, uh The room that we're sitting in right now, what, what do you call this 412: #1 Well this is a # Interviewer: #2 room? # 412: customary den uh, what we'd kinda call a den, you know Interviewer: Okay 412: This was a bedroom for us at one time Interviewer: okay Would you have called this a den, or would, uh your parents have called it a den? 412: I don't know what we would've called this, you see when I was growing up the family the bedroom may have been your sitting room, usually the parlor was a guest bedroom and, uh then your sitting room might be anywhere uh I don't Interviewer: might've- 412: I'm trying to think how many homes I could think of that had what we would call a parlor which woulda been without a, without better accommodations but, the old home place we considered the the guest bedroom the parlor but when neighbors and friends came to see us we usually would sit in, in, Mama and Papa's bedroom which of course a great big room, eighteen by eighteen high ceilings, that sort of thing Interviewer: I wonder, wonder if you'd have a a two uh, a great many relatives visit you in an older place like that, you didn't have enough beds or rooms or couches for everybody to sleep on Did you ever lay something on the floor for 'em'? 412: oh, yeah Interviewer: What, what'd you call that? 412: Well, we called it a pallet, usually uh Course they were trundle beds too we never had one but it wasn't uncommon uh, just rolled 'em under the bed uh and then you might just put a mattress down on the floor! and in the summertime, you just maybe give a youngster a pillow and a sheet or something over the floor and that was it but I also have vivid memories still of going to visit cousins and when we were small we'd sleep feet to feet and I guess I've slept with as many as four in a bed Interviewer: huh that's quite a few 412: Two at the #1 head, you know and two at the feet # Interviewer: #2 Two, {X}, yeah # 412: at the foot of the bed and then you'd have two with the heads at the foot board and two at the headboard {NW} Interviewer: Incredible 412: {NW} Interviewer: Alright now, we've got the den here and the kitchen and that's, the you, the sun porch 412: #1 yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 beyond the kitchen that's over here # 412: yeah Interviewer: Does it take up the um, uh, whole side with the dining room too? 412: Yeah, the dining room wall uh, is a wall also for the sun porch Interviewer: okay 412: Now You'll have to keep in mind that that's an offset Interviewer: right 412: and that wall let's see Interviewer: This is the basic sketch, anyway, I'm thinking of something like this 412: Well, wait a minute, I think I show it better here and then you decide how you want it Interviewer: oh, okay 412: {X} Interviewer: {NS} Or if you wanna just sketch it here, yourself 412: Well, uh-oh Interviewer: Oh, that's alright {NW} 412: See here's your, here's your south wall {NS} and that comes all the way across now Come in! Interviewer: Oh, that's okay 412: Hey, David, how are you doing? auxilliary: Fine, that's that's my brother 412: Good to see you! {B} David {B} #1 Hey, how are you? # auxilliary: #2 {X} # 412: #1 Listen # auxilliary: #2 It's fine # 412: {B} Here auxilliary: oh It started sprinkling, I thought I'd 412: #1 Thank you, {X}, well you gotta letter! # auxilliary: #2 come over # 412: #1 # auxilliary: #2 # 412: #1 What, did you want another, more? # auxilliary: #2 We got a lot of {X} # 412: #1 # auxilliary: #2 # 412: #1 Well I, # auxilliary: #2 We might get more, if it doesn't stop raining # 412: #1 Is it? # auxilliary: #2 It's just sprinkling now, I'm not thinking of the rain much # 412: #1 Well, take a long {X}, if you want to Thomas # auxilliary: #2 okay # 412: #1 # auxilliary: #2 {NW} # 412: #1 Winding to go # auxilliary: #2 {X} {NW} # 412: #1 {X} # auxilliary: #2 It'd sure help # 412: #1 # auxilliary: #2 # 412: Uh, y'all have a seat, unless you're getting ready to leave auxilliary: {X} 412: Alright {NW} You can just go ahead in the- there's nothing in it truck- Tommy! auxilliary: yes? 412: Are those peaches- apples all, and the corn all out? auxilliary: Uh, Alex's apples are still in there and then the squash is in there 412: Well, oughta take the squash out, and the peaches out auxilliary: I think so 412: Well, how about in the cab? auxilliary: Oh I don't know about the cab, I'll check and get it 412: Alright Interviewer: okay 412: #1 Oh yeah # Interviewer: #2 Now this is your son? # 412: #1 We do our cemetery on contract # Interviewer: #2 oh # 412: What David and Tommy been working with me for a long time together And they been taking the contract jointly but right now Tommy sorta has by itself by himself and uh I don't think he likes it too much {NW} working out there by himself Interviewer: Right, while I was when, {NW} when I was out there earlier 412: #1 {NW} # Interviewer: #2 he was # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 cutting # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 'Course now there was someone else # 412: #1 Mm-hmm # Interviewer: #2 over on the other side, {X} I guess it was just a family plot # 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 they were cutting # trimming up uh uh That's quite an area. 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 I mean that's.. plus you have to, a lot of um # 412: #1 yeah # Interviewer: #2 close and you have to be careful not to run into # 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 some of the older stones # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 # 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 So # 412: Yeah we've got about three acres in that cemetery proper hmm Interviewer: I can empathize with that because I used to have to cut two acres in place we lived in 412: yeah Interviewer: And that was just square, you know 412: Yeah #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 Maybe a few trees and no stones # Gets to be quite a job 412: Yeah {NW} {NW} Um, well and he {NS} Yeah, I'm {X} show you this thing Now Now up here on the front side the wall is also straight, like that but here's your offset for you porch your front porch entrance Interviewer: okay 412: and really this would be open here then you see here's about the way this works Let's see now, this should be there and then See now {NW} {X} Well this is divided half and half I think I got my proportions a little off Interviewer: That's okay. 412: But that's about right cuz it only space we got here is the door and here's your here's your kitchen And this is the den, this is the bedroom, I've got this too short again {X} And then over here you see we've got the bedroom wall here matching that but we've also got the bathroom, you see, built in here uh Well let's see We've got to come off a little bit each one this is your little Annie room or hall and here'd be your bathroom I've got this too long, this is these are fifteen by thirteen as I remember, both of these are bedroom and then this is a bathroom here and this is a little Annie room right there and then this is this one here is a twenty-two by fifteen plus the stay away here it goes upstairs and here's your fireplace This was originally designed for a three-way fireplace We never used it, we closed this one up this would've been in the kitchen and this is, we always use this one when having our Christmas Eve party and family gathering and that sort of thing and then uh We use this fireplace, we got the heat pump system but we use this fireplace just because we like it and also it's cost-saving, money saving. We got plenty of old hickory, and pine, and everything else This is too long too much elongated here and Interviewer: okay 412: But this is twenty-two by fifteen and I've forgotten what the proportions here are I wish you would look Interviewer: Yeah, it's starting to rain 412: Blow me down This, this I think is about between ten and eleven feet there and I think it says the same thing here Let's see, thirty-five thirty this number's about thirty The span of the house is thirty-five and a half the beams in the front room are span the entire house Now thirty-five and a half feet and the walls thirty-six Um That'd be thirty The net the net space in here counting inside walls would be about thirty-two five Recognizing that your outside walls are eighteen inches Interviewer: okay And this is uh, like a bathroom 412: Yeah Yeah, and then there the upstairs bathroom and was built of course, right over this same design but the rest of it is rather different Interviewer: Okay, now, what, what would you call this room here, sir? 412: What is it? #1 We call it # Interviewer: #2 This room, this twenty-two by # 412: the living room Interviewer: Okay Would you call it that, uh old, uh, the older 412: Well #1 No # Interviewer: #2 The, that you would call # 412: With us, that time is just virtually just a pin Some people have parlors but we don't think of that in the old sense of "parlor" Interviewer: Okay And this is, uh What room is this? 412: That's our bedroom family bedroom Interviewer: And this room over here? 412: That's a guest bedroom. Right now it's a my second study got so much material piled up in there for the museum and personal material Interviewer: Okay and the upstairs is, uh 412: Well, the upstairs is um just a think of it as the same basically, you got your opening, you see here only a porch So you got your same thing {NS} And you got that {NS} bathroom immediately sitting on this bathroom Interviewer: okay 412: Except there also is another factor in here now I'll just draw this in, this should be open here but here's your bathroom and then here is a storage closet, right in here and then under under this then this would be a sort of a low attic here Well, here's your trend thing but we've got this battery, uh closets now run down to here and then the whole heat pump cooling and heating system is right in Well I shouldn't have shown it to you just Well it's gonna be too many right in here that's right over yonder over there sun porch, sun then on this, here's my this really is my study now, right here uh the one that's right in the center and this just about centers the study And this is set up as a library type study and then over here is a storage room for books and magazines and records and so on Interviewer: okay 412: Then if you remember the, keep the chimney in mind now here's a bedroom here's a bedroom and then, this is a little bit well it's not that much larger either this is When the children are all at home, this is Bill's room this was Peggy's and Ruthanne's room And this was Patricia's room She was our youngest child fourth child Interviewer: So you got three bedrooms, this 412: Mm-hmm Interviewer: okay 412: #1 Yeah, and this is # Interviewer: #2 I just need a basic, uh # 412: Your stair, here, of course that I've shown here open Interviewer: Okay, stairway 412: yeah And there wouldn't be enough offset here of course, I've drawn the bathroom a little too long be an offset here so, uh, so you got a door right there And that's counter balanced over here, we've got another closet actually right in here and then you walk away to get at this closet you come in from this side Interviewer: okay, that's fine Alright uh, now Get down here, just Start off and see how far we get now A lot of the things, in the discussion we've talked about You've already mentioned many of the items 412: #1 Mm-hmm, mm-hmm # Interviewer: #2 So that's one reason I've asked you certain questions # Now I'm trying to, uh 412: #1 Mm-hmm # Interviewer: #2 Expedite things, just a little bit # Um, and uh You, you I think you said, uh you were talking about the chimney 412: Yeah Interviewer: Yeah Would you, uh just out of curiosity, would you call a, you know, like a fa- on a factory, where maybe like a brick yard or something where they have ovens 412: #1 Mm-hmm # Interviewer: #2 And the tall brick # Uh chimney, they have a, would you call that a chimney too? 412: Well Interviewer: Okay Uh 412: Now there, there is a distinction in a home chimney we still use 'em to the extent that you're gonna You'd speak of a stack chimney which would be a multiple-opening chimney #1 Which this is # Interviewer: #2 Is that a # Like, now this one has three openings? 412: Yeah it has two, now, we close up one Interviewer: The one in the kitchen? 412: Yeah Interviewer: Oh 412: Uh That would be a stack chimney well, just a single chimney would be that is, for a single room or a single outlet you call that a single chimney, maybe #1 Or just say chimney # Interviewer: #2 Now # Right On, on, now on this one was it originally open all the way through to three 412: #1 No, no # Interviewer: #2 three rooms? # 412: #1 No, no # Interviewer: #2 Or you use # I've seen some, you know, that you they just have open space to two rooms built one fire for two, but that seems 412: I don't believe we have that type down here You'd always separate, you'd have a wall here as we have a fire- firebrick wall Interviewer: Alright I noticed that it's that way Uh, uh what, what do you call the, uh, the open place in the that brick place in front of that fireplace, there, the open place in the floor 412: You mean the hearth? Interviewer: Yes, sir 412: Yeah Interviewer: Okay How about in the, in the fireplace the things that you lay the wood across? What do you call those? 412: Well you call them andirons or fire-dogs or something else, depending on what they were Interviewer: You, uh have any, uh, ever heard of any uh older pronunciations or any other names for those things? 412: Mm Not off hand Interviewer: Okay Uh, uh how about the the piece above your fireplace, there what your clock's sitting on 412: Well that's always been the mantle Interviewer: Okay Okay, now the, again I'm, these are the questions that are said 412: Yeah #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 If you ever, if you want to elaborate on any # 412: #1 Alright # Interviewer: #2 one of these, just stop and start # 412: #1 Alright # Interviewer: #2 Any in cut dialog you want # 412: #1 {NW} # Interviewer: #2 {NW} # Alright, uh, how about uh when you uh bring a, a piece of wood in to put in your fireplace? piece of wood about that long maybe that big around, what would you call that? 412: Well, likely if it was any size at all, as you say here, that'd be a stick of wood #1 Piece of wood, maybe would be smaller # Interviewer: #2 A stick of wood? # Okay What about, uh, uh 412: #1 A log, if a log got big enough, you might say, # Interviewer: #2 Uh # 412: "They'll put the log on, put that log on the fire." Interviewer: How, how big would a piece of would have to be to be a log? 412: Well, if it were cut from a whole tree you'd be inclined to call it a log even if it said wasn't any bigger than that Interviewer: Well, what is that, six, seven, eight inches? 412: Yeah uh Ordinarily, if you had split wood even if it was heavy You, you might not call it a log Interviewer: Just a piece of wood, or 412: Yeah #1 Now let's # Interviewer: #2 Now I've # 412: put that big piece on the fire Interviewer: Uh, um, the reason I'm curious about this is Mis- both mr Warret and mr Gallette, uh uh would not I couldn't get them to elicit, "log" 412: #1 Mm-hmm. Well, I # Interviewer: #2 Like, any large, even a large piece, they always said "piece of wood" # 412: have to say that in our family, I believe we thought of logs more often uh, because they were round and then just cut from the whole piece but if it were a tremendous thing, you might say "Well, put that log on" just because of it's size Interviewer: Ah hmm That's interesting What about, uh, what do you use to start a fire with, kinda what do you use to start a fire? 412: Well {NW} That's an interesting thought uh uh #1 You wanna take time to allow me # Interviewer: #2 Sure! # 412: Well When we were growing up my brother and I when we moved back from {D: Northern suburbs to} beehive, to the home place There were old lightwood and that's about the way we'd say it you, if you wanna be exact, you'd say "lightwood" Interviewer: Lightwood 412: Stumps These were the old dead stumps from the long leaf heart pine, and they were just as fat as could be still just as sound as a dollar Interviewer: What, excuse me, what do you mean by, uh fat, when you're talking about, you're talking about the sap in them? 412: Not sap #1 The very opposite of sap # Interviewer: #2 Oh the.. the # 412: #1 would be the rosin. Yeah, yeah # Interviewer: #2 the ro- yeah, the hardened # 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 Yeah, I'm sorry # 412: And it didn't take much you see, of that sort of kindling to start a fire Well, for fifty years I've been expecting all this to play out and that gets sort of comical to me, that and we still got a lot of lightwood and we keep some, here I'll show you, great big stump right out here we haven't even split it yet but we get so much third-class mail #1 That today I can take # Interviewer: #2 {NW} # 412: the limbs, if, that's another oddity never thought of it as a boy I said to Sally here last winter wonder if a man had any size pecan grow All he had to do, to uh be ready for his fire in the morning was just save all his dead limbs which just fall off plus the paper waste paper that comes down through the mail every day and that that's about the way we built a fire Interviewer: {NW} 412: #1 And we'll save scrap # Interviewer: #2 So you # 412: #1 wood and half rotten wood # Interviewer: #2 Right # 412: No good for anything else, wanna get rid of it Alright, I never thought about, I guess there's probably enough paper around to #1 Oh, Lord # Interviewer: #2 Start any fire you need # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 # 412: It, it's amazing now of course we probably get more I know we get more than the average family but we don't get any more than I've {NS} seen a number of families in this community Interviewer: Hmm What now, now, if you've earned uh, say some oak or hickory some real good, hard 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 Wood # Uh, uh What, what would you uh what would be the residue that would be left in the bottom, you know, after the fire went dead 412: Well it'd be ashes, whether it was pine, or oak or anything else Interviewer: Would there be any color differences in the ashes? 412: uh, yeah, I think you could distinguish it if you've lived around it there's a difference in the auxilliary: They got the tractor, I need to get the keys, said it's gonna work 412: Oh, yeah, that is Tommy, I believe, right in there It's uh you know it's that sort of, aluminum like I think that's it, isn't it? {NS} auxilliary: Think so 412: It's, it's a little short key auxilliary: I think this is it {NS} I don't know where you're gonna keep them {X} cuz you have after 412: Yeah, sure would, Billy, he didn't wait, did he? auxilliary: I'm gonna tell him to try, to fit, uh That's your lawn mower 412: Yeah auxilliary: #1 I think {NS} {X} # auxilliary: #2 I did get you {X} # auxilliary: #1 Of course I {X}, that's your size belt # auxilliary: #2 I didn't get it in # and this is your length 412: #1 Mm-hmm, {X} # auxilliary: #2 This one is, four {X} # Course that's That's a gates built 412: #1 Mm-hmm, mm-hmm # auxilliary: #2 they number them differently # Just got, see it takes two of them and one of these 412: Mm-hmm auxilliary: Just got them numbered if you, well you can get that belt cross {X} back to 412: Alright How much I owe you, Bill? auxilliary: Don't owe me nothing 412: Well, you had to pay for it! auxilliary: {X} {X} 412: {NW} {NS} auxilliary: {X} three twenty-nine 412: Yeah auxilliary: {X} four twenty-nine Want me to give you a discount up there? Letting me do your buying 412: I don't know whether it did not {D: Die} does but I, I'm not sure they do auxilliary: That's the best price, four twenty-nine cause {X} 412: Yeah auxilliary: about twenty-five percent {X} {X} {X} to {X} wood {NS} 412: {X} {B} This morning, she been trying to find somebody to let her have vegetables each week, she's been accustomed apparently, for a number of years, to have a regular person from whom she'd get vegetables {D: French is} ninety-seven worked with her closely together she and I were classmates Interviewer: Hmm 412: High school days We weren't going to sell her any vegetables, and I still don't intend to keep it up but she can't find a supplier so We finally agreed that after we'd sent her two weeks of vegetables that We'd let her pay something so she wouldn't feel too bad about it and that's what she paid us today She put in a dollar too much, Sally auxilliary: Well I bet she did! 412: Did, she put five dollars and forty-five cents auxilliary: She, she told me on the phone she says, I'm not gonna come and get them unless she let me pay 412: #1 then # auxilliary: #2 Yeah # I said, "Well, Frances, we just don't want you to," she said, "Well I won't get them then." 412: Well I, I tried to price them about half what they are at retail, but I said to Sally when she left this morning, I suspect that think she got would be, uh twelve to fifteen dollars, and I priced these two at four forty-five but she put in a dollar extra {NW} {NW} auxilliary: {X} 412: {NW} auxilliary: And everything is packaged in little cartons, you know, and covered with cellophane and the average person, like they're retired, and they're ill they don't want that many things at one time, they just want one or two and they won't sell them like that Interviewer: Yeah auxilliary: And a lot of people in Auburn that are elderly people, that are retired it seems to me like somebody would've thought of that and catered to those people 412: It does auxilliary: #1 Yeah, or something # Interviewer: #2 Like a fruit stand or something # 412: #1 Yeah # auxilliary: #2 Yeah, and you know, and and # 412: #1 Mm-hmm # auxilliary: #2 They could buy just the quantity they wanted # Instead of having to buy a prepackaged little carton Interviewer: Well, I get, I guess it's another way to charge a little more, you know it's 412: Yeah, I think it is Well you see for example this morning, trying to get ready, knew she was coming, of course and I finally concluded that the best way to give her some tomatoes was get three nice ones, give her one full ripe one half ripe, and one just tiny So that maybe this will last {X} next Saturday when she comes back again Interviewer: Ah yeah 412: And corn, of course, you got a dozen ears, well they'll eat one or two a day probably two if #1 they eat one a piece. Yeah # auxilliary: #2 And Amanda, {X} freezer # 412: #1 {D: Anna Banks} # auxilliary: #2 # Her husband has recently had heart surgery and other surgery too, and He was, he's real bad fixing to, now {X} can't eat anything but fresh vegetables cooked dinner uh Pyrex double boiler without any grooves in it #1 Mm # Interviewer: #2 And so that's why she likes these # auxilliary: special kind of vegetables, it's chicken {X} especially Interviewer: Huh That's uh uh, my uh, Grandmother had a gallbladder operation, she had to eat just totally bland food cooked like that for well she still got to 412: Mm-hmm Interviewer: And that could be very uh unpleasant, I guess 412: yeah yeah Interviewer: I don't mind this, at all, because 412: #1 {NW}, Alright, alright # Interviewer: #2 Because I'm gonna, this and running out here anyway, just gonna turn it over, yeah # Matter of fact, I think I might I don't know how much time we got, oh we got a little bit left uh see okay Uh, what do you call, what do you call this, uh, item over here the 412: You mean the chair? Interviewer: yes I'm just eliciting certain pronunciations 412: Well What'd you think I say, "chair?" Interviewer: Well I don't know Uh 412: Now this I may, I remember give you some uh dialect pronunciation from our Red Hill people as we go along if I think but {NS} mr Delaware {NS} would've said "chair" I believe, Sally Interviewer: Chair? 412: Chair Interviewer: chair {C: pronunciation} With kind of an A sound on it? 412: No, a double E Interviewer: Chair {C: pronunciation} auxilliary: #1 Like, chee # Interviewer: #2 Oh, chee # 412: #1 Chair # Interviewer: #2 Chair # 412: #1 chair # Interviewer: #2 chair # 412: #1 # Interviewer: #2 # Oh What do you call, uh, this thing here? 412: #1 Oh I call it # Interviewer: #2 that I'm {X} # 412: Call it all sorts of things {NW} sofa, and sateen lounge {NW} Interviewer: What, uh 412: #1 When you see me stretched out, taking a nap, now that's a good lounge. # Interviewer: #2 What do... lounge # That's why I was about when, when we were at the museum, that that, uh, what you call a 412: #1 Yeah # Interviewer: #2 sled, uh cow # 412: Sleigh bed Interviewer: Sleigh bed 412: Uh-huh auxilliary: Well the reason that's called a sleigh bed is {X} Interviewer: It's made to look like a sleigh auxilliary: {X} Interviewer: Wh- Would, would the older Would the older people call them anything else, the call this type of furniture, that type of furniture, anything else that you ever heard of? Yeah, there, there was a auxilliary: Called them {D: steptinis} or something 412: yeah #1 I believe it's still # auxilliary: #2 {X} # 412: #1 # auxilliary: #2 # 412: Yeah, uh, the couch That usually was an upholstered, like this is if it was a wicker I don't believe they call it couch Interviewer: What might it be called if it was a wicker? 412: They call it a settee perhaps And oh I think