Tywanna Whorley: What is your name, sir?
Charles Austin Gratton: Okay. My name is Charles Gratton.
Tywanna Whorley: Where were you born?
Charles Austin Gratton: I was born July the 16th, 1932, Birmingham, Alabama.
Tywanna Whorley: Okay. Where did you live?
Charles Austin Gratton: I was born and raised in Norwood. That's a neighborhood just about eight miles out of downtown Birmingham.
Tywanna Whorley: Was it a predominantly Black neighborhood?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, actually it was a White neighborhood and we were on the back side of the White neighborhood.
Tywanna Whorley: Can you describe it?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes. Norwood was the upper middle class White neighborhood. And like all neighborhoods back in the 30s and 40s, they had Black people living on the out of edge of the White neighborhood. So, that's where I was born and raised.
Tywanna Whorley: How was the area that you lived in, in terms of compared to the White neighborhood?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, it was typical practically of all Black neighborhoods. We had an old saying that goes, "You can tell where the White neighborhood ends and the Black neighborhood began," because usually that's where the pavement run out. No paved roads, no sidewalks. All dirt roads. So basically, that's the way I grew up in Birmingham.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you have street lights?
Charles Austin Gratton: No street lights. Matter of fact, it was in the probably 40s before we even had electric lights. We used lamps. You know what a lamp is? Okay. And somewhere in the early 40s, we were able to get electricity and we had to walk something like a block and a half to pick up our mail. We didn't even get mail delivered to our doors. And that was typical in all Black neighborhoods. It was more or less like a rural route when it came down to us. But right at the edge of the Black neighborhood and the White neighborhood, the Whites would get their mail delivered to their door. But they had one particular area with just a rural mailbox. And the postman would just come by and put all your mail and those boxes. And then you had to go a block and a half to collect your mail.
Tywanna Whorley: Do you remember the house that you lived in?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes, it's still standing now, but it had been remodeled. The old original house was torn down back in '59. Mother and father lived there until they passed. And my brother, I guess about four years before my mother passed, my brother had the old house torn down and built my mother a new house. But that particular site is still there.
Tywanna Whorley: Can you describe the house?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes. It was, again, typical of Black family homes. Had a [indistinct 00:03:28] tight front porch on it and wooden steps come up to the porch. You would enter into the house and into a bedroom. And then it was another room to the left as you enter that we used for a bedroom and living room combined. And there was a little small dining area and a kitchen with a little stove in it. And that was it.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you have any brothers and sisters?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes, I have, what? Well, it was seven boys and three girls. One boy is deceased. They all weren't born in that particular house. Myself and two other brothers were born in this particular house. The rest of my family were born in that vicinity. Norwood vicinity.
Tywanna Whorley: Where are you in the 10?
Charles Austin Gratton: I am the 10th.
Tywanna Whorley: Oh, you the baby?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes.
Tywanna Whorley: Oh, okay. Can you tell me a little bit about your parents?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes. My father's name was Joe Gratton. My mother's name was Charlotte Gratton. They migrated here out of Montgomery, Alabama. And down in Montgomery, it was more or less just farming. And my father came to Birmingham, I'm not sure what year, but he done mostly public work, foundry, pipe shops, until his health started getting bad on him. And then he more or less resulted to farming and gardening. He had hog, cows, chickens, all this right on the backside of Norwood over there. So, he did that up until his death. He died in 1948.
Tywanna Whorley: What did your mom do?
Charles Austin Gratton: She had a full-time job raising 10 children, just a housewife. And she passed in 1968.
Tywanna Whorley: You said that your father grew a garden. Did the kids help out in terms of—
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes, I guess that was one advantage of having so many children. They could help out with the farming chores, and that's basically what we done. Just helped dad out. He had a pretty good plot of land over in Norwood. And he would raise corn, sweet potatoes, peanuts, had a nice sized garden there in the back. Like I say, hogs, cows, chickens. And he done very well.
Tywanna Whorley: Was that typical of the neighborhood?
Charles Austin Gratton: No. And see, that that particular section was real scattered. It wasn't a lot of Blacks. I guess total you could say maybe seven or eight families lived on the backside of Norwood.
Tywanna Whorley: Did they own? I mean, in terms of—
Charles Austin Gratton: No, we were renting. But later on, in '46, my daddy started buying with the help of his sons that they went to Chicago and they were doing very well. So, they, in turn, helped him buy the place back in '46. He was able to buy the house we were living in and 12 additional lots for $1,300. And I know that doesn't sound like much now, but back in the 40s that was a lot of money. And like I say, my brothers, his sons, they helped him by sending money back and help pay for it.
Tywanna Whorley: Do you remember your grandparents?
Charles Austin Gratton: No, I don't know anything about it. But grandparents, no more than what I was told by my parents and my sisters and brothers.
Tywanna Whorley: What'd they tell you about them?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, my granddaddy Jake Gratton, I understand, I don't know exactly if he were born in Atmore, Alabama, which is pretty close to 100 miles outside of Montgomery, south. And he had quite a bit of land in that Atmore. And they were mostly farming. It was all farming land. And I really don't know what actually happened with all the land that he had in Atmore, but for some reason, my daddy, he decided he would come to Birmingham. And this is where he got his start, here at Birmingham.
Tywanna Whorley: I don't know if you remember, but when he came to Birmingham, what did it start off with?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yeah, I think he was working with the railroad. And I don't know if it was Southern Railroad or what the name of it, but he kept that job for a while. And then he left it and went to a steel foundry called American Radiator back in those days. And he worked there for several years. And then he went to American Cast Iron Pipe Company, known as ACIPCO. He worked there for years. And last job I remember, public work that he did, was with a foundry called [indistinct 00:09:27] and Goslin. And they were doing more or less what we called back then in World War II, was a defense plant. And they were making shell casing for these big cannons and all that they were shooting in the army. And basically, that was about it. And from that he went back to the farming over in Norwood.
Tywanna Whorley: Where did the kids go to school at?
Charles Austin Gratton: I went to school at Hudson Elementary School in Cottageville. And that was approximately six miles from where I lived. And yet there were a White school a block and a half from where I lived, but I couldn't go. And I had to walk every day, five days a week, those six miles to school and back. From Cottageville back to Norwood. Wasn't any buses. We had to walk. Rain, sleet, or shine. We went to school.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you have your siblings with you? I mean, did y'all walk together?
Charles Austin Gratton: There were maybe two or three kids that had to make this journey going to school each day.
Tywanna Whorley: Where did you go for high school?
Charles Austin Gratton: I went to H Parker High School after finishing Hudson Elementary. That was in, I'm not sure of the year, but by the time I graduated from Hudson, we were riding the bus from Norwood downtown, get a transfer, and go to Smithfield to Parker High School.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you have to pay for the bus or was it with the schools?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yeah, they had what was known, and you could go to the Alabama Power Company, which was in charge of the buses at that time, street cars. And through the school, they would issue what they call a coupon book. You would've passes. And by the way, the car fare at that time was seven cent. And instead of paying the seven cents, you could get this book of coupons for like, three cents. Half price for school children. And they would last probably a month. And this is the way we had to go to school.
Tywanna Whorley: Could all the children afford to pay to ride the buses?
Charles Austin Gratton: As far as I know, I've never known of any problems. And I guess if they did, I guess the schools would make some type of arrangement if a parent was unable to afford those coupon books. I suppose that the school and the electric company worked out some type agreement.
Tywanna Whorley: How was it going to Parker High?
Charles Austin Gratton: Oh, it was nice. But still, like I described about Hudson School and Norwood Elementary School, there also was school that the bus had to pass by, an all-White school in Norwood. That was Phillip High School. We had to pass that and go probably another three miles to Smithfield in order to get to Parker High School. Of course, in later years during the transition and right now, Norwood is, I say 99% all Black. So, naturally the elementary school, Norwood Elementary School is Black. Same thing with Phillip High School that I had to pass by. It's now I guess 99.5% Black, if not 100%. So, this is the change that have taken place since the 60s, when the school desegregation and all that came out. But the strange part about it, it really didn't solve the problem totally. Because when these schools started integrating, then you had what is known as the White flight. White people started leaving the city. They went to the suburbs, built better schools, and in turn, the schools that they left had a downward trend. And even as now, the better schools are located out in the suburbs. What was the better class of schools here then for Whites, have really declined.
Tywanna Whorley: How was it going to Parker High?
Charles Austin Gratton: It was nice. It was one of the better schools for Blacks in the entire city. They had a school by the name of Erma High School. It only went to the 10th grade, I believe. And you went two years to Erma. The students that were living on the south side of the city, they went two years to Erma and then they were transferred to Parker. Parker was the school, it always have been the top school for Blacks, back in the 30s and 40s and 50s. Then, somewhere during the late 50s or early 60s, they started building new schools for Blacks in different communities. Like, now for instance, they have a high school in Cottageville where I went to the elementary school. They still have Hudson High School, but they have Carver High School out there too. They have Fairfield High. They have an Ensley High. So, now it's just been spreaded out. Back in those days, there were just the one high school, other than Fairfield. Fairfield had a high school, but it really wasn't up to par with Parker. Parker was the top high school in the city of Birmingham.
Tywanna Whorley: In terms of the classrooms, were they all [indistinct 00:15:57]?
Charles Austin Gratton: Not really. They were comfortable. We didn't have to bring in extra seats in any class. It was average, it was pretty much standard.
Tywanna Whorley: Did they have the uniform?
Charles Austin Gratton: At that time they did. The boys were required to wear khaki pants and the girls were in blue and white. Blue skirts with white blouses. Yeah.
Tywanna Whorley: Could everyone afford that?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes, they did. It's a strange thing that when you come up the hard way, you have a tendency of finding out how to do certain things. As far as the boys were concerned, we would go to the Army surplus store and buy the khaki pants, the soldier uniform, and you could get them at a discount price. So, buy your being in uniform, basically all you would've to do was keep them clean. And it wasn't a matter of being in style or out style, because everybody was in the same thing. And I don't know how the girls fared. I guess some of their mothers were talented enough to sew and they bought this blue material and made their blue skirts and all. So, really, actually, it was more economical than it is now. Because that material and what we were wearing, it wasn't expensive. But now you have children with these designer jeans and the $150 sneakers and all this kind of stuff. So it really wasn't a burden. I think it was the best way to go back in those days.
Tywanna Whorley: Did they ever give you a reason why they had the dress code?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yeah, well, that was the reason why. For fear that some of the parents were better off and could dress their kids better than others, and then this kid that couldn't afford expensive clothes or better looking clothes, it would have a bad effect on them. So, if you put them all in uniform, regardless of what your standard was or was income-wise, we all look the same. So, that eliminated that problem.
Tywanna Whorley: So, I guess there were kids who'd come in from different backgrounds.
Charles Austin Gratton: Right. Right. Right, because like I was telling you a minute ago, Parker High School was the central school. So basically, everybody had to go there. I don't care how well off a Black family was, it didn't qualify him to go to a White school. He had to go to the Black school. So, if the family was a little financially better off, naturally they could afford to dress the kids better. But the uniform took into play, it just negated that kind of thing.
Tywanna Whorley: How were the teachers?
Charles Austin Gratton: Pardon?
Tywanna Whorley: The teachers?
Charles Austin Gratton: How were they?
Tywanna Whorley: Yeah. In terms of, I guess, what they were teaching the students.
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, I think the teachers were very efficient. That's about the best—It's almost like a person saying that, "Mama, she cooked the best biscuits, nothing in the world like Mama's cooking." That was simply because I hadn't had nothing else but Mama's cooking. So, when you asked me about the teachers, I would have to say, because they knew more than I did. Now, if there was some teachers better, I didn't know anything about it. So, basically, I think I got a good education.
Tywanna Whorley: How would you describe, I guess, your family's economics? Were they, in terms of middle class or?
Charles Austin Gratton: Mine? I would say they were just barely above the poverty line. Just barely. We had to really make out with a lot of things, especially being a large family, too. And me being the 10th child, naturally I got a lot of hand-me-downs. And my daddy, he was very industrial. He had a lot of get up about him and he knew how to do a lot of things. For instance, he would buy his shoes, and I know this might sound new to you, but the name of those shoes, we call them Brogans. I don't know if you ever heard of that, but when we wear those out, he would have soled them shoes himself. He'd go up in Norwood in some of those alleys and find some automobile tires that the White people have thrown away. And he'd bring them back home and cut out soles for our shoes. And had a little gadget there that he called a shoe last. And he would cut the sole out and nail it to those shoes and they would last you a lifetime. You wouldn't wear out that automobile tie. So, this is the kind of thing that we came up in.
Tywanna Whorley: Did they ever talk about, I guess, the Depression?
Charles Austin Gratton: I was born right at the verge of the Depression, back in '32. I think the Depression was from '29 up to about '31. So, I don't have a lot of memory about the Depression, but I do know that my sisters and brothers, they nicknamed me as being the Red Cross Baby. Had what they called the Red Cross that was helping take care of families, large families, that were in need. They would issue food stamps, something similar to what they got now. And the families could go to this central place and get certain types of foods, like flour, meal, canned meats, and this kind of stuff. So, that's about as much as I can remember about the Depression.
Tywanna Whorley: In terms of, I guess when you were in need, how were your parents able keep your family, I guess, together during difficult times? Like, morale or whatever.
Charles Austin Gratton: State it again, because I may be losing you.
Tywanna Whorley: I'm sorry. Was it a close family?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes, very close. And my father, he was deacon at the church and we were raised up going to Sunday school and church every Sunday. And we'd always have prayer in the home. And most of the times, whenever possible, we would all eat together, have family meals together. That time it wasn't any television or radio. So, we would all sit around the fireplace, and basically the discussion was just about the Bible. That's the way we were brought up.
Tywanna Whorley: Did y'all do anything fun? I mean, the whole family?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yeah, we played with each other and made our own toys. We would make wagons and skateboards and go swimming in the creek. And by the time we got through doing all of the chores around the house, there wasn't a whole lot of time left for playing.
Tywanna Whorley: Did y'all ever travel to downtown or?
Charles Austin Gratton: Probably maybe once a month. And that was a walking experience. We had to walk from Norwood downtown.
Tywanna Whorley: How long would that take?
Charles Austin Gratton: Not too long. You could do that walk in about 20 minutes. Taking shortcuts. Yeah. The closest grocery store was at least a mile, mile and a half. And that was another walking trip for the weekly groceries. We would go and help bring groceries back. And that'd consist of maybe 50-pound sack of flour, meal, and lard to cook with. Just basic things, because by we having this mini-sized farm and big garden, we raised most of the things that we needed to eat. So, we done very well. We never had to go hungry. Yeah.
Tywanna Whorley: Were there families in the area that wasn't as, in terms of [indistinct 00:24:43]?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yeah, there were. And my daddy, he was generous enough to share some of the things he had with the other families. It was a lot different then than they are now. People seemed to really care about one another and if you didn't have something, your neighbors would gladly chip in to help. And that's something I would like to see today. People being more concerned about their fellow man.
Tywanna Whorley: The store that you traveled to when you'd get your groceries, was that White-owned?
Charles Austin Gratton: Oh, yes, yes. That was in the middle of Norwood, on 12th Avenue. And matter of fact, we didn't have any Black grocery store owners. The only thing that we had then were just little small operations, like mom and pop, and a lot of those were operating out of portions of their home. And the story that's almost go untold about 4th Avenue here, which is known, and have been known down through the years, as the Black business district of the city of Birmingham. During the hay days of the late 30s and early 40s, you couldn't hardly pass out there on the street for Black people. This was the only place they had to come shop. They could go in the front door and come in restaurants, have a seat. Didn't have to go on the backside of somebody handing what they wanted, ordering from a little handout window.
Charles Austin Gratton: But the saddest part of that story is although there were a lot of traffic and Black shoppers up and down 4th Avenue, the business itself was owned by Whites, still. And they just had Blacks working in there as waitresses. And sometimes you would find a Black person on the cash register, but the Whites were sitting somewhere close by to watch over the operation. Now, this was the hay days of 4th Avenue that were known as the Black business district, simply because this was the only place that Blacks could come and go in the front door. These establishments were set up specifically for Blacks. It was the only place that they had for a movie theater. I think we had two or three at the time. And no other place in the entire city could you go? Not unless you went to a back door and went up to the balcony. Even some of the big department stores downtown, you couldn't sit at the lunch counter. They had a handout place where they wanted your money, but they didn't want to give you the service. They'd have a little section where they could just hand it to you and you could get it and keep going. But to go in a restaurant to sit down and order your food, this was the only place you could do it. 4th Avenue.
Tywanna Whorley: When did you first become aware of the fact that there was these type of conditions, or actually segregation?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, actually, when I got old enough to know myself, to really know I existed, I mean, I was born into this thing and raised in it. I can remember very close in my mind when my mother would have the occasion to send me to this grocery store I told you about that was approximately a mile away, which was the only grocery store in Norwood. She would give me instructions before I leave home and tell me, say, "Son, now you going up to the store and get this or that for me. Say now, you pass any White people on your way, say you get off the sidewalk, give them the sidewalk. You move forward. Don't challenge White people." And so I was just brought up in that environment. They also had a park, it was about about a block from where I was born and raised, or where I lived.
Charles Austin Gratton: And it was known as the White people park. They had a tennis court there and nice park, trees. And Blacks wasn't allowed in that park. I mean, we just couldn't go there. And it's just one of those things. Coupled with the school thing, like I say, some days that I would be sick and I could hear the school children playing during the lunch hour down at Norwood Elementary School, which was all White. And that's what really stuck in my mind. I say now, "That's a shame that I have to walk so far to school every day," when I hear those schoolchildren playing. And I say, "Here I am, a block and a half from an elementary school and I've got to walk six or seven miles of school every day." And it really, even now, I can almost hear those kids, those White kids, out at this elementary school playing and the noise and laughing and playing. And I'm at home, sick, because I guess, basically, most of it might have been from exposure, walking those six and seven miles of school every day, whether it was raining or not. I had to go. So, those are some of the memories that I have of my childhood, growing up in Norwood.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you ever ask your parents why things were as they were?
Charles Austin Gratton: I don't know if I ever just specifically came out and asked that question, but it was one of those things where you had been programmed all along, from ever since, I guess, maybe you got old enough to know right from wrong and this kind of thing. And to challenge White people just the wrong thing to do. And you just automatically grow up inferior. And you have the feeling that White people were better than you. And it just really wasn't any question to ask them about why. I mean, that was White people thing. That was a White people's school. And I just didn't feel that I had any right to go there. It basically just never entered my mind. And it's not strange for me. I mean, most Blacks in the South felt that way until the late 50s and 60s when Dr. King come along with his philosophy and started giving Black people some hope that the way we were being treated wasn't right, and this thing can change.
Charles Austin Gratton: And it was just some hope that we were waiting on. And the way it affected me is whenever I would hear Dr. King talk, it seemed like he was touching me from the inside. He could touch your feelings from the inside, things that you would want to say, but you just didn't know how. Things that were right and wrong, but you kept it inside of you, because you didn't know how to express it. So, he was really a great leader and a great man. I think he done a wonderful job in what he'd done for our people as a whole.
Tywanna Whorley: When you finished high school, what did you do?
Charles Austin Gratton: I worked for a Coca-Cola Bottling Company for about six years. And—
Tywanna Whorley: In Birmingham?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yes. Birmingham Coca-Cola Bottling Company. And I got married at the age of 17, had my first child at 18, and then I left the Coca-Cola Company and went to American Cast Iron Pipe Company, known as ACIPCO, and I stayed there 28 years. And I retired on disability in 1980. But in 1959 I went into business for myself, Green Acres Cafe. And I was doing two things, working at ACIPCO and operating Green Acres Cafe. And I did them both until 1980 and came off on disability from ACIPCO, and then I were able to put full-time into what I'm doing now.
Tywanna Whorley: How was it working for Coca-Cola back then as a job?
Charles Austin Gratton: Typical of all jobs that were issued out to Black people. You always done the hardest and the deadliest work for less pay. I had the opportunity for a while, during my tenure with Coca-Cola, to work on what they call a route truck. And that's the truck that deliver Coca-Cola, the drink, the pop, to the different stores. And my job was, after the White salesman come in and take the order, he'd come back and tell me how many cases of pop to bring in the store. So, I had to pull them off the truck, load them on a dolly or hand truck, take them in the store. First thing I would've to do when we reach a store was go in and start separating the empty bottles. Get all Coca-Cola product. And I would tell the White salesman how many empties he had and in turn they would get those many full cases to replace. So, that was a job that the helper on the truck, that's what I was at that time, a helper on the pop truck. And the helpers done all the work and the White driver, he just went in and wrote the ticket up and collected the money and stood around. Drank him a coke while the helper was doing all the work. No help from him at all. He was making maybe five times of what his helper was making.
Tywanna Whorley: Do you remember how much you was making?
Charles Austin Gratton: I was making?
Tywanna Whorley: Mm-hmm.
Charles Austin Gratton: I was making 26.50 a week.
Tywanna Whorley: I've heard that, I guess, I don't know if it was just—That Coca-Cola was a White man's drink. Was that—
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, that was the say so. Do you know the rationale why it was called that?
Tywanna Whorley: No.
Charles Austin Gratton: Okay. That was because it was a small drink. It only had, what, six ounces or eight ounces. And that wasn't enough for a Black person. He wanted the 12 ounce drink, same price, but you get more drink. And so, Coca-Cola was more or less a pleasure type drink for White people that really wasn't hungry, not thirsty, they just did it for just entertainment. But I had one of the helpers on the truck and the strange thing about that, Coca-Cola I had a policy that when the driver and the helper were out on trucks and going into these stores, with your own money, you wasn't allowed to buy another product. You had to drink a Coca-Cola. If you went in the store and on your job and say you was hot and thirsty and wanted a cold drink, you couldn't buy a Royal Crown Cola, or RSC as we call it, or a Town Hall. And you had to drink a Coca-Cola or the salesman on the truck would report you and probably get you fired.
Charles Austin Gratton: But that was way back then. But recently, we had a similar situation, somewhere not too far from here about, little suburb. Coca-Cola actually fired one of their helpers for drinking a Pepsi-Cola, I believe. And they made a big issue out of it. So, when they fired him, Pepsi-Cola said, "Well, send him on over here, we'll hire him." (laughs) They made a publicity thing out of it.
Charles Austin Gratton: But back to your other question about the Coca-Cola being called a White person drink. Well, basically that was it. It just wasn't enough for your money. And we were buying it to either help fill us up, when White people were buying it just for pleasure. They wouldn't even drink all of that little six ounce, or maybe eight ounce, whatever it was. But the 12 ounce wasn't enough for us. Because actually, this was part of our survival. This was pleasure for White people. So, that's the rationale behind Coca-Cola's a White men drank and all the other big drinks we used to call the bigger drinks, belly washers. It would actually fit you up, because you could buy you what we call a deck of cinnamon rolls and a 12 ounce drink. And that was your lunch. You full. So, that is the reason that Coca-Cola was labeled as being a White man drinking and this kind of thing.
Tywanna Whorley: What do you remember the year that you got married?
Charles Austin Gratton: 1949.
Tywanna Whorley: So, when you went to work for the steel company, what did you do there?
Charles Austin Gratton: Basically, I was a pipe grinder.
Tywanna Whorley: What's that?
Charles Austin Gratton: See, they have this 18-foot mold that they put this hot metal in. It's maybe 17 to maybe 18,000 degrees Fahrenheit in order to melt this metal. They line this mold with sand and they put it on some rollers that spins, and they pull this hot metal into it and that forms the pipe. Well, after it cooled down and they pulled this pipe out of this mold that's been lining with the sand, then some of the sand would stick to the outside of the pipe. And we had hand grinders with a grinding wheel on one end, electrical outfit. And we had to grind this sand off the outside of those. It wasn't a whole lot, but it was some. See the pipe had to be clean. And then they would take it and dip it in hot tar and coat it, paint it, put the numbers on it and it was ready to be shipped.
Charles Austin Gratton: So, I did that for about six years. And I was transferred out of that unit into the steel foundry. And instead of grinding the outside, I was grinding the inside. I was operating what they call the OD grinder. See that same process of cleaning the outside, the inside. You wouldn't have sand on it, but it would have what they call a flux in it, where they throw this flux up in it while it's still hot and that would help make the inside smooth. So, I worked on that particular job for about another seven, eight years. And then I was moved up to a overhead crane operator, and I stayed in that capacity until I came off on disability.
Tywanna Whorley: And do you remember how much you made?
Charles Austin Gratton: Yeah, I think I started off at ACIPCO back in '56 and I started off making a $1.25 an hour. And that was a long ways from $26.50 a week. And constantly we got raises. And when I retired from ACIPCO on disability, I was making pretty close to $9 an hour.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you belong to a union?
Charles Austin Gratton: No, no Union. It was a fairly good company to work for, because by not being unionized, we never was really bothered with layoffs or strikes. And the company was fairly decent. We had our own medical program, whereas to go to the doctor and your medicine didn't cost you anything. And along with that, we were on a, I guess you might call it an incentive program, whereas every three months, depending on how much profit the company made, they would in turn pay us a bonus. And the percentage they paid us would be determined by how much profit that the company made. So, that was real nice. It helped a lot of people above and beyond their regular salary. Most times the average worker would probably come out with the extra $400, $500, maybe $600 every three months in bonuses, so. It was real good.
Tywanna Whorley: So, in terms of treating Black males that work there, that was [indistinct 00:42:36]?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, when you compare to how Black males were being treated in other industries, plants similar to what we were doing, I would say that we probably had the best treatment, because basically it was all the same. Even the ones that had unions, about all they got above what we were getting out ACIPCO was they had to pay union dues and we didn't. Companies now and back then, they pretty much controlled the unions. The representative that supposed to be representing the men from the union, they would meet with the top executives of the company and they'd cut deals and it's just so much they was going to give you, whether you had a union or not. Because they had the representative in the pocket, you know? They'd pay him so much under the table and he'd be in negotiating, he'd come back out and tell you, say, "Well, it's the best we can get. Y'all going to have to accept this." SO.
Tywanna Whorley: When you went to go get your job for the steel company, how did you get it?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, just went to the employment office and filled out application. See, usually word spreads around when certain place are hiring. And at this particular time I heard that they were doing hiring out at ACIPCO. So, I went out and put my application in and in a couple of days they called me and told me to come out for my physical. And another day or two I went to work.
Tywanna Whorley: Where did you live in Birmingham?
Charles Austin Gratton: Still lived in Norwood.
Tywanna Whorley: Norwood?
Charles Austin Gratton: Uh-huh.
Tywanna Whorley: Did you own your house or would you rent?
Charles Austin Gratton: Well, no. When I first got married I stayed in the house, family home with my mother, for about four or five years. And after getting this job out at ACIPCO, if we back up, you remember I told you my father bought the house and 13 lots? Well, before he passed, he had this property separated. He gave so many to the brothers that were able to send money back and help him pay for it, they had their investment in it. So, some of those got three lots, some of them got two, this kind of thing. But I got one, because I was the baby. So, on that lot that was mine, I think it was about in '57, somewhere along in there, didn't take me too long, but I built me a house on that lot. So, I never actually paid the rent in my life for a home, because I stayed there in the home house until I was able to build mine.
Tywanna Whorley: And did you build it yourself?
Charles Austin Gratton: Partially. I had found me a old carpenter that knew how to frame and advised me what to do, and he more or less just told me how to do certain things and I pretty much built the house myself.
Tywanna Whorley: What, was it a two bedroom, three bedroom?
Charles Austin Gratton: It was two bedrooms. Mm-hmm. Had two bedrooms. It was a real nice house. It's still there now. Of course we've had some additions put on it and I'm not living there. I live out in other side of Irondale now. I've been out there about 20 years. I had me a home built out there. But this particular house, it was the house of Norwood at that time. It was brick, two bedrooms, bath, kitchen, dining room and living room. Real nice house. And now it have three bedrooms to it. Like I say, I don't live there. Back in '67, I suppose, somewhere in there, my wife and I divorced and I gave her the house and she stayed in it for several years and then she moved out and have it rented out now. It's a rental property now.
Tywanna Whorley: Oh, okay. One other question I want to ask you is about business that you started, you—