interviewer: um, Say, um, you had a lot of old worthless things that you were going to throw out you'd say, um, "Oh, that's not good anymore; that's just-" What would you call stuff like that? Just old, worthless, broken-down things. 579: We just called it rubbish or trash. interviewer: uh-huh What- and what about a a little room that's used to store um odds and ends in? Things that you don't know what to do with? 579: We had three of them. {NW} And they had, uh, old disused- disused furniture and old pictures and cracked, uh, china and, uh, old books, old window shades, remnants of wallpaper. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: All sorts of things that eventually were thrown away. interviewer: mm-hmm What- what did you call the- that room? How would you refer to it 579: Oddly enough, we'd call one of them the big room. {NW} It wasn't any bigger than the others, but that's what we called it. #1 The big room. # interviewer: #2 uh-huh # 579: And when we added a room to the house, when one of my brothers married, That was a- we'd just call that a plunder room. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: That had a great deal of space in it compared to the others. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Let's see, there was one on the East side downstairs two on the East side downstairs. There was only two of them. That's right. Two of them. interviewer: mm-hmm um Talking about the daily housework that a woman would have to do say if- if her house was in a big mess, you'd say she had to? 579: There was plenty of colored help in those days, I mean post-slavery days. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: They didn't earn much but it didn't cost them anything like what it costs anybody to live these days. interviewer: mm-hmm You had plenty of- of servants at your #1 house? # 579: #2 Nearly every # household had a cook and a maid. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: The cook did the cooking, and the maid cleaned up and made fires and cat-eyed the ashes and so forth. interviewer: mm-hmm um and the thing that you'd sweep with, you'd call that a? 579: The what? interviewer: The thing that people use to sweep with. 579: Sleep in? interviewer: Sweep with. 579: Oh, sweep w- brooms. interviewer: uh-huh And say if- if the broom was in the corner and- like in that corner there and the door was open so that the door was sort of hiding the broom, you'd say that the broom was where? 579: Behind the door. interviewer: mm-kay 579: Although, there are people that- very few people that careless about it; they'd rather put the broom in a closet where it wouldn't show. interviewer: uh-huh You had a lot of closets in your house or? 579: {NW} In our house we had one. interviewer: uh-huh 579: and a little one under the stairs that- {D: well, that was the name before then we changed it} a little one under the stairs you had to stoop to get under it. {D: mm-hmm} It was very small. It would hold rubber shoes and umbrellas and what not. interviewer: mm-hmm um And to get from the, um- you mentioned the stairs. What would you call it outside, um, from the ground up to the porch. Would you call that the stairs too? 579: Stairs. interviewer: mm-hmm But would- would you use an- um would you call it steps? or stairs? or? #1 Stairway? # 579: #2 Well, usually # to correct myself, the- the steps from the {NW} inside walk in the yard up to the porch were called steps. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Inside, from the first floor to the second, were stairs. interviewer: mm-hmm And um you say years ago, on Monday, women usually did the what? 579: #1 {X} # interviewer: #2 The clothes # were all dirty. You'd say they have to do the? 579: Oh, a washwoman came and got them interviewer: uh-huh 579: Took them to her house and washed them and ironed them and starched them and brought them back. interviewer: Did you ever see anyone wash the clothes? Did you see how that used to be done? 579: Oh, yes. There was a big round tub and they'd- and a washboard #1 Corrugated # interviewer: #2 mm-hmm # 579: surface on it and they'd rub the garments and towels and what not on this corrugated metal washboard. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: And of course they didn't change the water often enough and uh they really were not very clean. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Incidentally, a careful housewife would never bring- never put the wash when it was brought home on a bed because there was a chance that there might be bed bugs in those garments or towels or what have you. interviewer: Really? 579: Yes, indeed. interviewer: From the washwoman's? 579: From the washwoman's house. interviewer: #1 So you # 579: #2 And once you got # those things, interviewer: uh-huh 579: their name was Legion when they got a start. interviewer: {NW} um What would you call a place now where, um, well, maybe where you could send your shirts to be cleaned? 579: Excuse me while I yawn. The laundry. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: They were- they were called steam launderers. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: We had uh Oh, I don't remember more than two Chinese laundries here, everything done by hand. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: I remember only two of them. interviewer: Did people used to use that word laundry to mean washing and ironing? Would they ever say I have to do the laundry? Or would they say- 579: No, they would refer to it was the washing. interviewer: uh-huh 579: and things that were brought- that the washwoman brought back was called wash. interviewer: mm-hmm um and say if um if the door was open and you didn't want it to be you'd tell someone to? 579: Shut the door. interviewer: mm-kay 579: Usually said shut rather than close. interviewer: And, uh, you know, in some houses they have boards that lap over each other, like this. 579: That's what ours had; they call it a weatherboarding. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Ours was weather-boarded with air-cured seasoned hard cypress. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: If you keep it painted, it'll last two hundred years. And, well, we kept ours painted alright but it didn't last that long. eighteen eighty-six to nineteen sixty- uh- eight interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Eighty two years. interviewer: That's a long time. 579: But that cypress, no wood like it in the world, it's just almost eternal. interviewer: mm-hmm um say if- if you were gonna hang up a picture you'd take a nail and a? 579: Hammer. interviewer: and you'd say I- I took the hammer and I what the nail in? 579: The old style nails were pretty substantial. They were what were called cut nails. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Not round ones. Our house had- was built with cut nails. They were just for the name any case they were cut out of metal. interviewer: #1 mm-hmm # 579: #2 So # They were square or slightly oblong interviewer: mm-hmm 579: in shape. Several sizes, of course, and they were the very dickens to get out too, oh my goodness. um The- the- the floors were generally hard pine, almost as hard as oak. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Beautiful grain in them and, in the winter, carpets were put down and, in the summer, most people put down what we call matting, made in China, I think. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Strips about a yard wide. Tacks, no end of tacks in them, that ruined the floors. Once you've discontinued the use of the matting and used rows there were rows and rows of scars in the floor made by these big tacks. interviewer: mm 579: God, it was dreadful. Well these- oh, I forgot to tell you about these, uh, picture nails. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: They were about two and a half inches long. Very sharp point, they were sharpened by a machine. And, the top was threaded and there was a porcelain, uh, Metal-bound cap that screwed on after you got your picture hung. interviewer: mm-hmm um But tell me about, um, putting the nail in- in the wall. What word would you use to describe that? You'd say I what the nail in? 579: A careful person would hammer on the wall lightly and just move across in a straight line and try to estimate where the joist was interviewer: mm-hmm 579: by the difference in the sound. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: It was a bit uncertain but you wanted that in order to get a good surface to support the picture. And some of them were pretty heavy. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Because you y- eh, behi- uh, behind the walls was what we call lath, L-A-T-H. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: They were about four and a half feet long and about, uh, an inch and a quarter wide and about quarter inch thick and once the joists were in place carpenters would nail these little laths on there and then plaster was put on top of that. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: The plaster would go through the cracks in these laths and run down a little bit inside which acted to put it securely. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Then the surface was plaster Paris, smooth and white, and that was usually covered with wallpaper. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Not paint. It wasn't until a good many years after the old houses were built that some people took to painting the {D: plaster Paris} instead of putting on wall paper. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: So if you were hanging a picture and you drove a nail in the space between two laths, you didn't get a good foundation for it. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: It might pull out and fall. interviewer: um What different- Where did you used to keep your stove wood? #1 Did you- # 579: #2 Stove wood? # We had our separate little house out in the yard. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Sometimes it would be divided: stove woo- wood on one side, used in the kitchen interviewer: mm-hmm 579: and coal on the other. Coal was used on our little house and sometimes we used it for cooking. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: But very often oak wood was used for the cooking and coal for the heating. I guess the wood was cheaper. interviewer: mm-hmm What did you call that- that house that you kept the wood in? 579: The coal house or the wood house. interviewer: mm-hmm um What about well, you- you had a bathroom inside your house. 579: #1 {NW} # interviewer: #2 Did # 579: We did, I remember the first one {X} It had a built in tin tub. Ours was one of the early houses in town to have one of them. Up in the attic was a- an iron tank about six feet square. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: A pipe led from that to the cistern. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: And there was a pump with a long handle on it and my two brothers would get on this pump and pump water from the cistern up to that tank. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: It flowed by gravity down to the built in tin tub but there was no way of heating it so in the bathroom we had a little stove which furnished heat and also a great big saucepan or pot of some kind to heat the water to pour into the tub after you had let the cold water in {NW} That's the best we could do. interviewer: {NW} 579: Oh, that was crude. My goodness, that was crude. interviewer: {NW} 579: There were no- there was no electricity. There were no electric fans. There were no screens. And mosquito bars were used in the summer time. You had to keep the mosquitoes off. Heavens, you couldn't sleep if you didn't have some protection from mosquitoes. And some nights were stifling. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: You'd have no electric fan. You would've been burning a gas light which turned out a great deal of heat. {NW} And then when you went to bed you had to get under this mosquito bar. interviewer: Mosquito bar? 579: Bar. B-A-R. interviewer: #1 Wha- wha- what was that? # 579: #2 It was a netting really. # interviewer: uh-huh 579: And there was almost no air circulation under it. Good gracious, it was just dreadful! I don't know how we stood it. interviewer: {NW} You know, I guess most people in town weren't as lucky as y'all to have bathrooms inside. What did they have? What did they call the the building outside? The bathroom outside. 579: There were no window or toilets and there were outdoor privies we called them. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: They called them Chic Sale's Edifices later on. {NW} And uh Oh, that was crude too. Heavens and Earth that was just- I don't know how we lived through it. interviewer: {NW} um 579: One side is for the colored folks and one side for the white folks. interviewer: Mm-hmm Tell me something about the different buildings you'd- you'd have on a farm. Were- were you ever around a farm much? {X} 579: Uh, buildings on farms? interviewer: uh-huh 579: Well, I don't know a thing about that. Never lived on a farm. interviewer: You're- 579: #1 What did-? # interviewer: #2 They would have a corn crib # 579: and a cotton house interviewer: uh-huh 579: and an implement shed to put things like plows- didn't have any tractors in the early days- and, uh, cotton wagons and, uh, {NW} wagons drawn by mules and horses, mostly mules. Ther- there would be, uh, uh, cabins, we call them, all over the plantation. and that's where the colored folks lived. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Very, very crude. Usually there was a pump out in the yard. Up in the delta you can go a certain distance and nearly always find water. But some of it reeks of iron and I don't see anybody stands it. interviewer: um What about the place- the place where the- the animals would stay, the big building? #1 Where you- # 579: #2 Where what? # interviewer: #1 # 579: #2 # interviewer: What about the big building where you could store hay or keep the animals? 579: They were called sheds and barns. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Some of them were just sheds for the, uh, horses and mules. Some were barns with room upstairs for hay and corn. interviewer: What did they call that room upstairs? 579: That was just the loft. interviewer: uh-huh Say if um- if there was too much hay to put up in the loft Oh {X} I'm beyond my depth now. I don't know a thing about that. 579: #1 Well, # interviewer: #2 Well, # 579: I think that they stacked it outside. interviewer: uh-huh 579: And, uh, I do not recall having anything like tarpaulin which is- in the old days was heavy canvas or plastic was unknown, there were no- no plastic covering for haystacks. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: That's comparatively modern. interviewer: mm-hmm Do you know, um, what'd they call it when- when they'd cut the hay and dry it and then rake it up in little piles Did you ever hear a word for those little piles of hay? 579: Don't recall any. #1 No # interviewer: #2 mm-hmm # 579: #1 # interviewer: #2 # What about, um- tell me about the different animals that they had on a farm and- and where they'd be kept. 579: Some of them stayed outdoors, summer and winter. We had mules, which is a habit animal, combination of a horse and a jackass. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Incapable of reducing, uh- reproducing themselves. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Uh, we had hogs and in some cases, uh, sheep and goats interviewer: mm-hmm 579: but mostly horses and mules. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: The mules, did they have a work! And they really did it too. interviewer: What- if you had two of those mules working together what would that be called? 579: A team. interviewer: uh-huh 579: Team of mules. interviewer: um did- now you- did you go out very often to- uh, you said your father owned {X} you said your- 579: He managed the p- the- the- the- he managed the plantations that were owned by my mother's father. interviewer: uh-huh Did- did you visit those plantations very often? 579: No, very seldom. He went right often because he had to keep up with what was going on. I went with him once or twice, not often. interviewer: mm-hmm Where were the cows kept? 579: Well, there was nearly always a- well, there had to be, pastures for them. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Because they didn't acquire a great deal of feed except maybe in a severe winter. And there'd be a cow lot where they were milked but, uh, interviewer: Where would the #1 cow # 579: #2 no # hmm? interviewer: Excuse me. Where would the cow lot be? 579: Generally, right next to the barn. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: But usually, the- the cattle stayed outdoor summer and winter. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: because we don't have very severe winters here, except rarely. interviewer: mm-mm What about a- a small fenced in place out in the pasture where you could leave the cows overnight for milking? 579: Oh, I don't know too much about that but I th- I think that if there were a great many cows they just stayed outdoors, summer and winter. interviewer: mm-hmm Did you ever hear of a milk gap or cow pen? 579: Cowpen? interviewer: uh-huh 579: People who lived in towns had a cow so they had cowpens. interviewer: uh-huh 579: And what is the other one? Milk what? interviewer: Milk gap. 579: Gap? interviewer: uh-huh 579: G-A-P gap? Never heard of it. interviewer: um What about the hogs? Where would you keep them if you were gonna um, fatten them? 579: They were allowed to run in fields but there had to be a mighty good fence to keep them from getting under or through and running away. interviewer: uh-huh 579: Generally, they just stayed outdoors somewhere in winter. That's been my observation. I never lived on a plantation. interviewer: mm-hmm Well, did you ever see them put in a small or fenced in area? or? 579: For feeding maybe. mm-hmm And these pumps could be found in several locations on the plantation because the stock had to have water. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: I don't know how far they have to go to strike water Probably not much more than, uh, thirty feet perhaps. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Sometimes at a more shallow level than that. interviewer: mm-hmm What about, um, the place- where did people used to get their milk and butter? Before they had refrigerators? Or used to keep their milk and butter? 579: I really don't know. My earliest recollection of that is ice refrigerators. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: The ice man would come around and bring in a big block of ice and put it in there. And it gradually melted, you know, and the refrigerator would lose its, uh, efficiency. And generally, there was a funnel beneath the refrigerator and a pipe leading down through the floor interviewer: mm-hmm 579: and the dripping just went through that into the ground which was bad practice because that encouraged termites. interviewer: mm-hmm What about- what would you call a farm now where you had a lot of milk cows and sold the milk #1 and butter? # 579: #2 Dairy. # A Dairy. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Well, there were several of those around here and they would come around in a one horse light wagon with the milk in, uh, large milk cans. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: And they would have a long handled dipper. They might ring a bell when they got to {X} a hand bell. And you go out there and carry your vessel, you take one of these long handled dippers and draw up milk from the, uh, big can and turn it out into your vessel interviewer: {NW} 579: You could never be too sure about how clean it was either. interviewer: {NW} um You mentioned, um, a field. What would you call a smaller area? Where you had uh, maybe just a little bit of tobacco planted or just some 579: #1 No tobacco # interviewer: #2 {X} # 579: in this country. I think the winters would eat it up before it got strong. Uh, or a garden. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Or a patch. interviewer: uh-huh 579: For example, on the plantations All the negroes who were worth anything had a- had a- a garden patch. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: And they would grow greens and, uh, corn and maybe okra and, uh, snap beans and butter beans. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Some of them were not energetic enough or enterprising enough to do that. interviewer: mm-hmm What about, um, what kinds of fences do you remember? 579: They were barbed wire or wire netting with very large {X} probably five and six square but you couldn't use those for pigs because they would get through or dig under. interviewer: mm-hmm Did you ever see a, um, wooden fence that went in and out like this? 579: Very, very few. You don't see those until you get up about Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, up that way. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Not many of them down this way. I have seen a few. interviewer: What are they called? 579: um Zig-zag fence. Maybe called them a zig-zag fence, I don't remember. I never saw many of them. interviewer: Did you ever see, um, a- a fence or a wall that's made out of loose stone or rock? 579: A few. In this particular area, there is what is known as Vicksburg limestone. And it was deposited eons ago when the gulf of Mexico extended as far off as Montana. And the way I happen to know about that is that one time I went to Glacier National Park in Montana- go there some time if you can, beautiful scenery- and the, uh, ranger said eons ago the Gulf of Mexico extended as far up as Montana. But in this particular area along the river Vicksburg limestone was deposited. It's, uh, relatively soft. There's a house on Cherry Street up here, about three block away, the yard is higher than the street and the wall, retaining wall- wall, is that old Vicksburg limestone. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: And on the National Cemetery road going straight out Washington Street to the National Cemetery, interviewer: mm-hmm 579: you can see it in the wall on the right hand side of the road. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: I walked along that one time. There used to be a ledge ab- above the road, about twenty feet. And I found some of the most exquisite little shells. Exact replicas of the large ones you find on seashores. interviewer: mm 579: There's a man at our apartment whose son is an oceanographer and, uh, he visited him one time and I said wait a minute, let me show you something. I went to my apartment, I got these exquisite little dainty shells and he was very much interested in them. I forgotten how many million years old he said they might be. interviewer: uh-huh 579: Pretty fragile too. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: But this limestone is concentrated so much in this particular area that the geologists call it Vicksburg limestone. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: If you get back from the river say, uh, half a mile, you don't see as much as you do close to the river. interviewer: mm-hmm Did you ever say, um, what sort of fences did people used to have around their yards? 579: Eh, wh- what about the yard? interviewer: What kinds of fences did people used to have around their yards? 579: Usually, they had cast iron fences. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Particularly in front. Sometimes out the side and the front both. They didn't rust. They just lasted and lasted. Sometimes they were made of wrought iron which could be bent Cast iron can't be bent. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: And they would have curved designs. Sometimes what we call picket fences, wooden fences and it the- the upright pickets were sharpened like that. they weren't good for boys to play on {NW} interviewer: um 579: The fences- have you ever visited Kentucky? interviewer: No. 579: Ah, that's my second home. Up there they have fences made of wood and the longitudinal pieces- the horizontal pieces are probably uh fifteen feet long and posts another piece and another post, and so on, always white washed. And they just make the place look picturesque behind that are some fine horses. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: But we don't see many of those down this way. interviewer: You never lived up in- well, except for when you went to school up there. 579: That's all. interviewer: You've never 579: Two school terms interviewer: uh-huh um You know, when people raise cotton, um, and they get out there and they thin the cotton out, do you remember what term they use for that? When they-? 579: Thinning the cotton out? interviewer: uh-huh 579: Just that. And the picking was all done by hand and machine picking cannot excel hand picking because when the hand picking is done the cotton is clean, that is to say no trash in it. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: but when these big machines go along and suck it out of the bowls they get pieces of bowls and pieces of leaves and oh, some, uh, oh little twigs and what-not. They can't compare with handpicking for the- picking out clean, high-grade cotton. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: But the handpicking is too expensive now. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: It's pretty hard to get pickers also. They would walk through the fields with a long sack about six feet long trailing behind them, pick cotton, stick it in there, and at the end of the day what they picked was weighed and they were paid so much per 100 pounds for the cotton they picked. That's just out of the question now. You can't get the pickers for one thing. interviewer: mm-hmm Did you ever hear the expression chopped cotton? 579: Yes. At a certain stage, when the crop is growing up you have to chop out the weeds. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Else you would have more weeds than cotton, and that is called, uh, Wha- what? interviewer: Chopping. 579: Chopping, yes. Done with heavy hoes. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Now, they have chemicals that just kill that stuff before it gets a start. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Some of it is put on before the cotton comes up, we call that {D: pre-merge} chemical, that is pre-emergence of the cotton. interviewer: mm-hmm What types of weeds and- and grass would grow up in the cotton? 579: Principle enemy is Johnson grass. Heavens and earth it grows thick and hard and strong and, oh, it's just dreadful. Also, what they call tie vines interviewer: mm-hmm 579: which grow all over the place if you don't stop them. And what else I don't know. Those are the two principle ones. interviewer: mm-hmm and um if you wanted to make a hen start laying, what might you put in her nest to fool her? 579: To make her what? interviewer: If you wanted to make a hen start laying? What could you put in her nest? 579: Oh, that's way over my head, I don't know a thing. interviewer: um A little while ago you mentioned, um, a china dish did, um, did you ever see an egg made out of-? 579: I've seen many of them. Uh, that either induced the hen to lay eggs or you could steal all her eggs and she wouldn't- didn't have no sense to notice it. She saw this white china one left there and it didn't disturb her. interviewer: uh-huh What did- what did you call that, a? 579: A nest egg. interviewer: or the ch-? 579: Made of china. interviewer: uh-huh So you'd call that a- a china? 579: We usually just called it a nest egg. interviewer: uh-huh 579: Well, they'd call it a china nest egg. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Because sometimes we'd leave a real egg as a nest egg. interviewer: mm-hmm um and what did you use to carry water in? 579: Water? interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Big buckets. interviewer: What was that made out of? 579: Tin. Enamelware came later. interviewer: What about wood? Did you ever see-? 579: You mean fire wood? interviewer: Or, um, a bucket? or? 579: Oh, wooden buckets? interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Mostly tin because the wooden buckets were not as durable. interviewer: mm-hmm 579: Little heavier, too, I guess. interviewer: mm-hmm What about something they could use to carry out food for the hogs in? 579: For the hogs? interviewer: mm-hmm 579: That's over my head too. I don't know. interviewer: Okay. um and something you could cook in, maybe fry eggs in? 579: Excuse me while I yawn. Mostly iron skillets. interviewer: mm-hmm Did that have little legs to it? 579: Little what? interviewer: Did you ever see a skillet that had little legs to it? 579: A little what? interviewer: Legs. #1 So you could set the # 579: #2 Now # Yes, uh. {X}