WEBVTT 1 00:00.000 --> 00:00.000 The end of the Colored people's line is right back there. 2 00:00.000 --> 00:12.000 In this field? 3 00:12.000 --> 00:17.000 Yeah. Slow down [indistinct 00:00:10]. So all this is old John's place, 420 acres, each side. Railroad and— 4 00:17.000 --> 00:18.000 I want to put this microphone on you because— 5 00:18.000 --> 00:33.000 Yeah. The railroad over there, and he got 420 acres in here. He promised to—I could work it as long as he didn't sell it for $400, but I made so much cotton on there, he took it from me. 6 00:33.000 --> 00:33.000 Who took it from you? 7 00:33.000 --> 00:33.000 White man. 8 00:33.000 --> 00:37.000 What? 9 00:37.000 --> 01:01.000 Because it belonged to White. All this belonged to White. I used to work all of it. I had six acres. I picked 13 bales off it, before I stopped picking. Now this here, this belongs to somebody else now. That's the block school. That was school for Notasulga. 10 01:01.000 --> 01:03.000 Oh, yeah? What about this lake over here? 11 01:03.000 --> 01:49.000 Well it belonged to Whites, and they were burning it off. Burning it off over there now, cleaning it off. Part of it is, we used to work all this land in here, back 50 years ago. We worked clear on up here to this bridge. But White folks owned that from back down there, on this side of the church. White folks owned that. Yeah. You all went all in there. That's the propane and mill yard out there. Colored fellow bought it and selling it. He bought that place. And that's been there for—That's the end of that now. Now we're in the city limits. 12 01:49.000 --> 01:51.000 So the bridge ends the line? 13 01:51.000 --> 01:51.000 Yeah. 14 01:51.000 --> 01:53.000 Okay. 15 01:53.000 --> 02:09.000 Yeah. See, we're in the city limits now. From right there at that store. There's a little store back there. This is the overhead bridge. This been here. We used to didn't have a bridge here to cross the railroads back in the '30s. We crossed on the railroads. 16 02:09.000 --> 02:09.000 Oh, yeah? 17 02:09.000 --> 02:15.000 Yeah. We had to stop for the train. Want to go through North Salem? 18 02:15.000 --> 02:15.000 Oh, you want to go and look through the town? 19 02:15.000 --> 02:15.000 Yeah. 20 02:15.000 --> 02:15.000 Okay. 21 02:15.000 --> 02:15.000 Yeah. 22 02:15.000 --> 02:17.000 Sorry. 23 02:17.000 --> 02:51.000 Yeah. I thought—And I'll keep check on it. Yeah, we're going—You ain't got to go so fast. They ain't behind you. All of these White in here. Ain't no Colored people. Well it is, one or two. Well, we've got some Coloreds up in here now, but the older heads died out, and you know White people, they don't like a gang of children. They don't have a gang of children. Some of them don't want any. But you see, the older heads gone. There's a Colored fellow stay right there. 24 02:51.000 --> 02:59.000 And that was one of Paul Ray's old house. Him and his wife stay there. These houses are empty— 25 02:59.000 --> 03:00.000 How long has this been White? 26 03:00.000 --> 03:03.000 It seems to been all my life. 27 03:03.000 --> 03:04.000 Really? 28 03:04.000 --> 03:20.000 Yeah. When I was a little boy, I came to notice that. When cheese was a nickel a pound, you'd get more than you could eat then. Now, you can get about $5 worth, and you don't have enough to eat. That's strange, ain't it? 29 03:20.000 --> 03:20.000 Mm-hmm. 30 03:20.000 --> 03:39.000 See, when it was a nickel a pound, Prince Albert, 10 cents, [indistinct 00:03:26] nickel bond, that—I never did smoke. I never did smoke. I never did drink no whiskey. I used to bootleg some whiskey. Bootleg, but you got sealed whiskey everywhere. 31 03:39.000 --> 03:50.000 I used to live right back there, me and my wife, when I married her. That was a little store there. All this White in here. Used to farm cotton right out there. 32 03:50.000 --> 03:50.000 You did? 33 03:50.000 --> 03:50.000 No. 34 03:50.000 --> 03:50.000 Okay. 35 03:50.000 --> 03:51.000 Other people. 36 03:51.000 --> 03:55.000 Do you know- 37 03:55.000 --> 03:58.000 Just hold to the—Gone around to the right of the light. 38 03:58.000 --> 03:59.000 Okay. 39 03:59.000 --> 03:59.000 To the right of the light. 40 03:59.000 --> 04:00.000 Okay. 41 04:00.000 --> 04:35.000 Yeah, don't go so fast, so we can look while we're looking. Well you've got the [indistinct 00:04:08] now, I see. That's the wash house. That's the bank right over there. We used to have two banks. That's a—It was a shirt factory, but they moved it from there and got something else. Now that used to be a post office over there, but it's something now. Just ride on across the bridge here, to the old school where integration took place. 42 04:35.000 --> 04:40.000 Did this area here have a place where Black folks would shop? Like Black- 43 04:40.000 --> 04:40.000 Oh, yeah. 44 04:40.000 --> 04:42.000 —owned places. 45 04:42.000 --> 04:50.000 Oh, no. They didn't have no stores they owned. Some of them had a little rusty ranch around, an eating place, but all the stores, White folks owned all the stores. That's the old cemetery out there. Some out there were buried in the 1600s. 46 04:50.000 --> 05:31.000 Yeah, that old fellow stay there, Edward Brown. That's the White folks cemetery. This is all White folks in here. That's the old Hottington house. I don't think nobody—All of them are dead and gone. I don't think nobody even live in the house. This house here, old fellow Bentley stay in this house here. Now he's the grass man. Down there below my house, all that grass from down there by the big bridge? 47 05:31.000 --> 05:32.000 Yeah. 48 05:32.000 --> 05:38.000 Well that's his farm. Bentley. He stays right back there. He got some boys running it for him. One of his sons runs it. 49 05:38.000 --> 05:40.000 Okay. 50 05:40.000 --> 06:28.000 This is the high school here. We might—Drive around it, if you want to. Yeah, that's where we go to—That's where the integration come up, and police led them through up here and they—One of them, when they came through, got over here and unloaded. One of the White fellows here in Tuskegee kicked the driver. All of them were White, you know? 51 06:28.000 --> 06:29.000 Mm-hmm. 52 06:29.000 --> 06:42.000 But he kicked it. Now go in a little square, that way. The teachers and them, they had classes in all those trailers, and that's the school. That brick part been there. My wife played football and basketball down there. I would have been—play basketball in one of these buildings here. That's the football field down there. 53 06:42.000 --> 06:45.000 So what year did that take place? Do you remember when that took place? 54 06:45.000 --> 06:46.000 When the integration came on. 55 06:46.000 --> 06:52.000 Okay, '60s? 56 06:52.000 --> 06:57.000 And they been had Coloreds every since. That was when, in '63? I think it was '63. This a new building over here they built then. 57 06:57.000 --> 07:27.000 We'll ride out this way, just a little piece. Right off to the right. That used to be the old Tom Livingston place. Judge Livingston. 58 07:27.000 --> 07:32.000 And that's who? 59 07:32.000 --> 08:32.000 Gunner's old house back there, of course he's dead and gone. And that was the old judge's place. We can go out [indistinct 00:07:43]. This one of the gunnery houses here. One of them stay there. And the little fellow that runs that, he went to Auburn, but Butch came back down here. They own that land in here, and I know when he bought it. Been cutting hay all day. That's where they run the hardware, called Butch knife. But what—And that's the other brother's place there. He works around Auburn, I think. But they own all that land down there, for hay grass. Most of them places pasture grass now. Some coming over to my house. I got a field of hay they're going to cut. Get me a little money out it. I done raised—I used to have 150 heifers. 60 08:32.000 --> 08:33.000 150 what? 61 08:33.000 --> 08:55.000 Cows. 150 head of cattle. They done started to cutting that. Look like it's been cut in the last day. Well I probably—I'm supposed to start on mine next week. 62 08:55.000 --> 08:58.000 Did you have White neighbors when you stayed here? 63 08:58.000 --> 09:16.000 Oh, yeah. Yeah, they were White and Coloreds all around in here. And on back there was an old White man. He had a whole lot of White children my color. Two sisters had children by one White man, way back. 64 09:16.000 --> 09:16.000 Really? 65 09:16.000 --> 09:32.000 Way back, long when I was born. Of course they—One of them is still in Florida. Let's turn around up here on the top of this hill. 66 09:32.000 --> 09:37.000 Okay. 67 09:37.000 --> 09:44.000 That's where one of my neighbors live, there. John. That's where one of our deacons live, right here. We'll pull up in here in John—Pull around and turn around here, top of this hill. Gone out there further. Don't go so fast to make a turn right in here. We can see it pretty good. 68 09:44.000 --> 09:53.000 Cool. 69 09:53.000 --> 10:46.000 Don't get on the grass. Go to the road, this clay. Ms. Poet stays there. Her husband died. James Willie stays out there. He worked with that man on the grass mower. Roy Gridhouse stays out there, one of our deacons. He got a son live right there. They own those houses. John, me and him go out to the site together, he stays in that house. That's the old Apple Grove schoolhouse. The old church used to be in there, we called Apple Grove. 70 10:46.000 --> 10:47.000 Apple Row? 71 10:47.000 --> 10:48.000 Apple. 72 10:48.000 --> 10:50.000 Apple. Okay. 73 10:50.000 --> 11:29.000 Oak Grove. Way back years ago. It ain't nothing there now. Everything done rotten down. You've only got one, take it easy here now. This road here, this is the main one. I thought that was him. It is. He is out there cutting. Yeah. 74 11:29.000 --> 11:46.000 What did you do? 75 11:46.000 --> 12:14.000 Nobody. I don't have no machines. See I was going to cut mine, unless I give it to him and tell him to cut it. He has some cattle, one of my neighbors. Told him to give me something if he wanted. He didn't take it. He drove that far out there. Yeah, they're cutting that hay today. That's old Butch out there. Watch for these cars now, coming out here. You don't want to hit none of them. Yeah. 76 12:14.000 --> 12:22.000 And that's the high school. Mike, my grandson there at the trailer, he went to school there right—Way back in the '60s. 77 12:22.000 --> 12:24.000 Okay. 78 12:24.000 --> 12:46.000 And they're all mixed up now. That's when the integration started. That's the old Judge Livingston house. 79 12:46.000 --> 12:46.000 He's a judge in Notasulga? 80 12:46.000 --> 12:51.000 Well that's back 50 years ago. Then they got a mayor up here. He runs the whiskey store and runs the store. It ain't but one store up here now. 81 12:51.000 --> 12:52.000 Really? 82 12:52.000 --> 13:17.000 One grocery store, and he runs—His wife and son runs it. We'll go by there, but he runs the whiskey store up the road. That's the old White people's cemetery. That's the old rental loft, where my wife—She used to work for them folks right there. 83 13:17.000 --> 13:22.000 Where did attorney Gray live back then? 84 13:22.000 --> 13:22.000 Who? 85 13:22.000 --> 13:50.000 Gray. 86 13:50.000 --> 13:50.000 He lived in Tuskegee. 87 13:50.000 --> 13:50.000 Right. 88 13:50.000 --> 13:50.000 Yeah. 89 13:50.000 --> 13:51.000 Did he near you? 90 13:51.000 --> 13:51.000 Take it easy now. Let's go down this way. Kind of stop and go down this way. Be sure you're clear. 91 13:51.000 --> 14:18.000 That was the old Hope house. The back of it, but he's gone. And he lived to 102. He died. That's the old depot man. He used to have a depot here, a train stop. Don't nothing stop here now. Tullis is that way, Auburn straight up, 13 miles. We're going up towards the county line and turn around. We're in Macon County, but when we get up here and where we'll turn around, we'll be in Lee County. 92 14:18.000 --> 14:32.000 That's the fellow work on cars, there. Trucks, everything. This what you call the town brain. Used to baptize in there. You know, it don't rain like it used to be. 93 14:32.000 --> 14:34.000 They used to baptize where? 94 14:34.000 --> 14:41.000 Don't go so fast. Right there. But you see grass done grew up in there now. 95 14:41.000 --> 14:42.000 Do you know anybody that got baptized in there? 96 14:42.000 --> 15:20.000 Yeah, I knew plenty of them baptized there. This was my wife's church. We stayed together 54 years. Now there were some houses bought and put up there, some double wide trailers. This Macedonia here. That was my wife's church. She died in '89. These are all Coloreds over here on this side. They bought those places and built those houses here, just a few years ago. These been over here a little while. Yeah, they've been there. That boy work at the VA Hospital. They've been there a long time. 97 15:20.000 --> 15:55.000 And some of my friends stay there, over here. I don't think nobody—That boy died in there. The boy didn't have much judgment. He went to—Bennington sent him to the penitentiary. 98 15:55.000 --> 15:58.000 What's the name of the place where they were baptizing people again? 99 15:58.000 --> 16:02.000 Macedonia there, that church we had passed. 100 16:02.000 --> 16:04.000 And then people from that church were baptized down in that water? 101 16:04.000 --> 16:24.000 Yeah. Back years ago. They ain't had no baptizing this year, I don't think. Told you here. Put your lights on. We wanted to turn here. 102 16:24.000 --> 16:24.000 Turn left? 103 16:24.000 --> 16:34.000 Yeah. Don't go so fast. Pull up in there. 104 16:34.000 --> 17:02.000 You want to go down there and come back up? 105 17:02.000 --> 17:02.000 Just turn around. We're at the line now. 106 17:02.000 --> 17:44.000 Someone's on a motorcycle. We used to go up to Opelika, because they had one of them. You could take your whole family on it, and a trailer behind it, and a rig look like a motorcycle. And had the trailer behind, carry his whole family on it. It was $17,000. That boy work at the VA Hospital, there. Yeah, that was Lee County we turned around in. All of this is Macon County. That girl that cooks for me, that's her mother's house. That's their house right back there to the right. 107 17:44.000 --> 17:46.000 What was the biggest crop in this area? 108 17:46.000 --> 17:48.000 Well ain't no crops now. It done- 109 17:48.000 --> 17:51.000 No, you said, "50 years ago." 110 17:51.000 --> 17:53.000 Oh, yeah. We used to farm cotton and corn. 111 17:53.000 --> 17:55.000 Cotton and corn were the biggest? 112 17:55.000 --> 18:12.000 Yeah. Peanuts. We raised a few peanuts one year, but cotton and corn were the main thing. Raised a lot of sugarcane. I used to make syrup. I made syrup from it. 113 18:12.000 --> 18:17.000 How did people feel when Carver said to grow peanuts? 114 18:17.000 --> 18:51.000 They—All right. Those that had their own land, they raised them. And the other ones raised them for the White folks. Didn't many Coloreds—We're going to cut to the right here now. To the right. See, we came from that way, we're going back here. This the old depot place. That's the gas place there. That's the FHA Co-Op Farm. Co-Op done bought everything in there. That's where I used to buy a lot of fertilizer from. 115 18:51.000 --> 19:01.000 We're going on out here where I eat damn near every day. There's Colored people there, and Colored people, they own this here. This is some of my people here, the Grimmetts. The Grimmetts stayed there. 116 19:01.000 --> 19:02.000 Oh, yeah? 117 19:02.000 --> 19:16.000 Yeah. White right there. That's where Grimes stayed at. Used to run the filling station down there, next to the inn, but he stays down there. He stopped running it and bought that place there. 118 19:16.000 --> 19:17.000 The Grimmetts, that's your mother's side, right? 119 19:17.000 --> 19:43.000 Yeah, on my mother's side, the Grimmetts. These are all White in here. Old. Done got old, most of them. And the young ones, gone. Some of them—That may be empty there. Well he died, but I reckon why—I think the fellows that built them over, they done sold them. They couldn't keep them. Yeah, White on both sides. 120 19:43.000 --> 20:06.000 That's the road. We come right through there now, when we're going to get something to eat, we'll go back through there. That's where my nephew stays, there. One of my old friends, White lady, stays over here. 121 20:06.000 --> 20:06.000 You know every house. 122 20:06.000 --> 20:10.000 Yeah. I got a grape pauper there. We eat the grapes. 123 20:10.000 --> 20:15.000 What used to be right here? 124 20:15.000 --> 20:30.000 That's just an old pasture over there. They started that store back there, 50 years ago, but you know the—I don't know why that fellow died, what started it, I think. All of them are Whites right here now. A little old store there. 125 20:30.000 --> 20:41.000 We used to work that land all out there, where that hay bale is up there. They done baled that hay out. Looks like they just baled it. I stop at that store here, about every day. 126 20:41.000 --> 21:17.000 Oh, she's cutting her grass. They got a pretty—Some cattle in there off over here. We're going to turn up here at this post to the left. That's where we eat, out there. 127 21:17.000 --> 21:17.000 Right here? 128 21:17.000 --> 21:38.000 Yeah. You're going to go down in there and turn around. Straight on down in there. 129 21:38.000 --> 21:39.000 So you come out here to eat every day? 130 21:39.000 --> 22:34.000 Yeah. And put them—And back. Right back. [indistinct 00:21:44] in there. Now bag back. Straight back. Down a little. Don't hit the fence now. Because the fence belong to somebody else. Somebody hit it up there on the corner now. They've been hitting it. Yeah, we hit down there every day. That's Bubba Langford. He's the mayor. He built that for the senior citizens. He gets paid from the government I reckon, for that. Imagine he does. Behind the covered building. Old pole cat, I believe. You can smell those skunks, ain't you? Skunks, we call them pole cats. 131 22:34.000 --> 22:35.000 Pole cats? 132 22:35.000 --> 23:07.000 Yeah. That's the old cemetery. That's the old cemetery there. They bury one out there every once in a while. And then they got a new one right there, next to the slight, on the South side of that place where we eat. Where them—They got some pretty houses out there. That's what I used to raise at. I had some red Angus. I got them from out in Wisconsin. They came from out there. 133 23:07.000 --> 23:12.000 Yeah, we used to work all that land out there. Those guys, they're cutting that hay, ain't they? 134 23:12.000 --> 23:15.000 Mm-hmm. 135 23:15.000 --> 23:36.000 I believe they are packing it and baling it now. We'll cut through right there, where that car came out from. 136 23:36.000 --> 23:37.000 Okay. 137 23:37.000 --> 23:54.000 Yeah, my niece stay—One of my cousins stays there, Nadine. Her husband died 10 or 12 ago. They lived in Chicago but they came back home and bought that place there. He died. 138 23:54.000 --> 23:54.000 You have missed seven calls. 139 23:54.000 --> 23:54.000 Huh? 140 23:54.000 --> 23:54.000 Somebody called you. 141 23:54.000 --> 23:58.000 Seven calls. 142 23:58.000 --> 24:38.000 And we had some corn groves in there. Old fellow stay right back there. When he come out to eat crumpets, his wife is on the—Well that's the one run the senior citizen's place. Yeah, they come out there to eat. That boy runs the cattle. Here comes one from over this way. That's going out towards Montgomery. We'll go back this way. This is the way we come to the site. Yeah, we're turning right here, to the right. 143 24:38.000 --> 24:41.000 Right here? 144 24:41.000 --> 25:12.000 Yeah. That just carries us back up into town. But that's the Baptist church there. That's the church over yonder, by the depot. One of my friend's, Bob, stays there. He came from Chicago and bought that house. A White lady had it. Yeah, and he stays out there. He has him one of those—What you call those— 145 25:12.000 --> 25:14.000 A two car garage? 146 25:14.000 --> 25:16.000 —Got him a short, new trucks. It's a van now. 147 25:16.000 --> 25:16.000 Minivan? 148 25:16.000 --> 25:19.000 Huh? 149 25:19.000 --> 25:21.000 You can get melons for a dollar. 150 25:21.000 --> 25:22.000 Y'all want to stop and get one? 151 25:22.000 --> 25:25.000 I don't know where we're going to put it. 152 25:25.000 --> 25:25.000 Put it in the car. 153 25:25.000 --> 25:26.000 In the car. In the thing. 154 25:26.000 --> 25:27.000 We buys them there. 155 25:27.000 --> 25:27.000 Oh, really? They're just a dollar. 156 25:27.000 --> 25:37.000 Yeah. I'll buy one for you. I'll buy one myself. Didn't you say a dollar? 157 25:37.000 --> 25:39.000 Yeah, that's what I saw. I guess that's the— 158 25:39.000 --> 25:42.000 Pull on up there. I know him. If we can get up. 159 25:42.000 --> 25:42.000 Yeah, he got that sign. 160 25:42.000 --> 25:42.000 Is they—Yeah, pull up in there. 161 25:42.000 --> 25:42.000 Melons for a dollar. 162 25:42.000 --> 25:42.000 Huh? 163 25:42.000 --> 25:53.000 Do you know him? 164 25:53.000 --> 25:55.000 Yeah, I know him. That's all right. 165 25:55.000 --> 26:01.000 Okay? 166 26:01.000 --> 26:13.000 Yeah. Well we can keep on. Yeah, that way, all these people around here, they're friendly people. Been knowing them all my life. And he just married this girl here. 167 26:13.000 --> 26:14.000 Oh, yeah? 168 26:14.000 --> 26:57.000 Yeah. He just married her. She married one of the Reynolds' boys. And I had an uncle stayed back in there in an old shack. That was old Dr. Samuels' old home there. He have an old shack back there, and my uncle stayed in it. He stayed drunk all the time. He had a shack back there. He stayed in it, look out and the see the moon shine. Shining at night, in the old house. That's old [indistinct 00:26:46] house. Right there, that's John Candler's house. He has 220 acres there, adjoining me. I'll go back down there under the hill, below the service station. 169 26:57.000 --> 26:57.000 This way? 170 26:57.000 --> 27:03.000 Yeah. Yeah, there. You know where you are now. You can come to the old circle anytime you want now. You done made a circle around. 171 27:03.000 --> 27:10.000 All right. 172 27:10.000 --> 27:24.000 Yeah. Yeah. And you know you're around in town, looking, and don't go too fast. And just ride it [indistinct 00:27:17]. It's just playing on different people. I never did have no trouble out of people and I've been around here all my life. 173 27:24.000 --> 27:29.000 How did you manage to survive? Like— 174 27:29.000 --> 27:31.000 Nothing. Just going on working. 175 27:31.000 --> 27:32.000 Oh, okay. 176 27:32.000 --> 27:49.000 Yeah, and they were all the time talking about the integration and things. I ain't never seen no difference in nothing since I been coming up here. These White folks go everywhere, fishing, but didn't go to church together. Well, we still don't go to church together. 177 27:49.000 --> 27:49.000 Right. 178 27:49.000 --> 27:54.000 No. 179 27:54.000 --> 27:55.000 Did anyone ever get jealous of you because you had a lot of land? 180 27:55.000 --> 27:58.000 No. No. Always did— 181 27:58.000 --> 27:58.000 You said they took your land once. 182 27:58.000 --> 28:15.000 Yeah. We had plenty of land. Well we're going to drive by the place. And you see, we used to work all this land. And what people's going to hire you? What if they didn't have nowhere to stay and nowhere else? They had to work on halves. And my daddy was working people on halves. When I was big enough— 183 28:15.000 --> 28:16.000 What's half mean? 184 28:16.000 --> 28:16.000 Huh? 185 28:16.000 --> 28:17.000 What do you mean, "on half"? 186 28:17.000 --> 28:21.000 Got them working on halves. Cotton and corn, and he'd take it over. 187 28:21.000 --> 28:23.000 Was he good to you? 188 28:23.000 --> 29:12.000 Well he had his half, and if it ain't pay enough out, he'd take all of it. But my daddy didn't do that. It was White folks had plenty of them on it. But you see, I ain't never worked on half. My old great-grandmother had a home when I was born. She had 20 acres they gave her. This was still back in slavery time. Yeah, we used to work this land right here, back down to my house. And I worked for the grass farm down there, going towards Tuskegee. That grass farm, I worked that one year. Made so much cotton on it, that man wouldn't rent it to me the next winter. Wanted me to work it on half. I said, "Hell no. That's slavery time stuff." And I said, "In other words, y'all don't like Black folks no ways. I ain't studying about you. If you don't want to rent it, I could—I had more land than I could use." 189 29:12.000 --> 29:51.000 That's where that old planter mill—Those are Coloreds all out there, but the Whites run the store. Well a Colored lady be in there sometimes, they say. I think she got a Colored lady behind the—That's one of those good old White folks right there. She made that out there. She got a grandchildren a pool right behind that fence. That's her house right there on the—That's her son there, and she's in the other house. That's her whole family there, and she built that pond. She has a lot of grandchildren. 190 29:51.000 --> 30:08.000 That's one of our boys out there. Now that, he bought that place. He call himself buying it, I don't think he do it that much. That's a block school. That's where the headstart went. Now the place there, from here on back, down on right where we used to work— 191 30:08.000 --> 30:17.000 We've got to stop at the school and church. 192 30:17.000 --> 30:51.000 Yeah, that's where we were—Go up under there. That way. You can pick up some, just take it easy. I used to work on both sides of the road. I made 30 bales of cotton from right there, down to the line yonder. Back where that shed in the road done got off the slab, that's where it crosses, right there. Right there where the car is now. That's where they go across the road. Another belonged to Colored people, on down below me. Yeah, from right on—The first house over there, out the sink. 193 30:51.000 --> 31:30.000 Well Colored people used to live along in here, but they were working on halves, and some of them were renting. Don't nobody stay there. All the older heads gone, and him that got it, he's getting old and they ain't got no children. Nobody got land no how, because when they're dead, they're gone. Ain't nobody still out. This Colored all right here. That boy now, he got a pretty good—We sold him some land. At least we didn't sell it to him. Boy that had it got mixed up with the—We'll turn in here now. We'll turn in. 194 31:30.000 --> 31:40.000 Oh, yeah? 195 31:40.000 --> 31:41.000 Yeah. Look. Watch. There you go. Come on over where you won't hit your door. See, now we're moving too slow, huh? 196 31:41.000 --> 31:45.000 Mm-hmm. 197 31:45.000 --> 32:13.000 You know you got—You've still got to wait yet. Got to get him up here with some dirt here on this road. I didn't know it was in this kind of shape. They all had to—Go right up in the front there, if you want to. 198 32:13.000 --> 32:13.000 Right here? 199 32:13.000 --> 32:19.000 Yeah. Yeah. See where it's marked off here, where you—if you want to take—Just don't hit it. 200 32:19.000 --> 32:30.000 [indistinct 00:32:29]. 201 32:30.000 --> 32:32.000 Want to make some pictures and [indistinct 00:32:32] one thing or another? 202 32:32.000 --> 32:36.000 Yeah. I just need to—We're going to reconnect this when you get out. 203 32:36.000 --> 32:36.000 —I been tending all my life. All of my life. 204 32:36.000 --> 32:51.000 And it was organized in 1870? Wow. 205 32:51.000 --> 32:52.000 Yeah. That's a stone up there where— 206 32:52.000 --> 32:52.000 In 1870. 207 32:52.000 --> 32:52.000 Yeah. 208 32:52.000 --> 33:00.000 That's a long time. 209 33:00.000 --> 33:03.000 Yeah. My daddy was born in 1881. He left us in '77. 210 33:03.000 --> 33:08.000 Oh wow. 211 33:08.000 --> 33:16.000 He left on. Of course all us done outlived him now. But my mother died young. She was on the Grimmett side. 212 33:16.000 --> 33:23.000 What's the—Who is the earliest minister you remember listening to? 213 33:23.000 --> 33:23.000 Was he a Woods? Is it on there? 214 33:23.000 --> 33:23.000 The earliest one? 215 33:23.000 --> 33:28.000 Woods? 216 33:28.000 --> 33:32.000 Woods or Young. Caleb Young, I think. Was some of the first ones. 217 33:32.000 --> 33:33.000 Okay. 218 33:33.000 --> 33:42.000 First ones for me, was W.M. Burton. Burton Funeral Home, here in Tuskegee, right on Arbor Road. Well Burton runs all the undertakers now, you know. 219 33:42.000 --> 33:42.000 Okay. 220 33:42.000 --> 34:08.000 Yeah. When I was big enough, it was Poe and another one. Day and Poe. Now my mother and wife, they came up, the horses brought them up to the cemetery. That's what we had back there then, didn't have no vaults and things. Just had a wooden. 221 34:08.000 --> 34:08.000 Right. 222 34:08.000 --> 34:11.000 Yeah. I married when I was 18 years old. 223 34:11.000 --> 34:12.000 Really? 224 34:12.000 --> 34:16.000 Yeah, I married too early. But anyhow. 225 34:16.000 --> 34:17.000 You said, "too early"? 226 34:17.000 --> 34:22.000 Yeah. That daughter there, you see there? That's my daughter. 227 34:22.000 --> 34:22.000 Oh, really? 228 34:22.000 --> 34:24.000 Yeah. And she's 69. She was born in the '20s too, 1925. 229 34:24.000 --> 34:28.000 For real? 230 34:28.000 --> 34:28.000 She doesn't look it. 231 34:28.000 --> 34:28.000 Yeah, she doesn't. 232 34:28.000 --> 34:30.000 She looks young. 233 34:30.000 --> 35:00.000 Well she's—That's when she was born, '25. 1925, March the 22nd. And I lost my wife in '25, second day of July. And her aunt raised her, but all of them gone on. And then her husband and brothers, all of them gone on. 234 35:00.000 --> 35:01.000 Going to walk down to the school? 235 35:01.000 --> 35:01.000 Huh? 236 35:01.000 --> 35:01.000 Going to walk down to the school? 237 35:01.000 --> 35:01.000 Oh, yes. If you want to walk down there, you— 238 35:01.000 --> 35:02.000 Okay. 239 35:02.000 --> 35:08.000 Yeah, we'll walk down there. And talk and make some pictures, if you want. And talk. Yeah, this is my place. 240 35:08.000 --> 35:08.000 Do they still hold meetings in the church? 241 35:08.000 --> 35:08.000 Yeah. 242 35:08.000 --> 35:22.000 I mean, in the school. 243 35:22.000 --> 35:33.000 They don't—They just have different little meetings down there, and sometimes they have picnics. On a Saturday, raise a little money. Some of them want to raise a little money for something, put on a fish fry. 244 35:33.000 --> 35:35.000 Oh, a fish fry? 245 35:35.000 --> 35:58.000 Fish fry. Top of that, where we're going up there, that's where I used—I bought a place up there, $5500. I bought it from the old White folks up here in those—Bought it from a Yankee, and he was from [indistinct 00:35:52], Illinois. Old man Boeing. I bought that place down on top of the hill where our cemetery is. 246 35:58.000 --> 36:00.000 Did the people from the church make the school? 247 36:00.000 --> 36:00.000 Yeah. 248 36:00.000 --> 36:09.000 Or they put the [indistinct 00:36:02]— 249 36:09.000 --> 36:15.000 Yeah, they put up that school. That school was put up—When that school was put up? I reckon, '45. 250 36:15.000 --> 36:16.000 1945? 251 36:16.000 --> 36:28.000 Yeah. I imagine that, back then they put it there because when I was little—because I didn't go to school there any. 252 36:28.000 --> 36:28.000 Okay. 253 36:28.000 --> 36:54.000 Because I had got—You know I wasn't married. Wait a minute, I wasn't married at that time, but I had got married during the time that school—Anyhow, it was built along there, in there. It was built in the '30s. Yeah. 254 36:54.000 --> 36:57.000 So it was a one room? 255 36:57.000 --> 37:01.000 Oh, no. That's just like up here. It was—Now in the old school, where I went to, it was sitting right out there, about those pines there. 256 37:01.000 --> 37:07.000 Okay. 257 37:07.000 --> 37:22.000 And it was just a one room, and it had a little house on each side for our jackets. And it had a little—had something you could put your lunch in there. We'd bring a lunch to school. Sometimes I'd just put mine in my pocket. 258 37:22.000 --> 37:22.000 In your pocket? 259 37:22.000 --> 37:41.000 Yeah. But had me a butter biscuit or something. Have a sausage patty in there, a slice of meat, and wrap it up in paper and just put it in my pocket. Just to the schoolhouse. And we had to pull off our jacket. We'd just let our lunch stay in our jacket. 260 37:41.000 --> 37:46.000 What happened to the school? 261 37:46.000 --> 37:48.000 Where the other one, the old school, they tore it down. 262 37:48.000 --> 37:50.000 Oh, they tore it down? 263 37:50.000 --> 37:52.000 Yeah. And built that [indistinct 00:37:52]. 264 37:52.000 --> 37:59.000 So did the money for this school come from donations from the church? 265 37:59.000 --> 38:25.000 Yeah. People built around Shiloh here. Built that school. Oh, they got a little help from the—Ms. Roosevelt was the first one came down here. Ms. Roosevelt, she came down here with those coons and things. You know Tuskegee didn't want that John Andrews Hospital. I mean, VA— 266 38:25.000 --> 38:28.000 VA Hospital. 267 38:28.000 --> 38:33.000 —VA Hospital, down here. Ms. Roosevelt came down here and got with those coons, and all of them out of Washington. Told them that if they didn't let those boys in there, they would blow it up. Yeah. 268 38:33.000 --> 38:33.000 How would you all get to school? 269 38:33.000 --> 38:42.000 Huh? 270 38:42.000 --> 38:43.000 How would you all get here? 271 38:43.000 --> 38:45.000 Walk up here. 272 38:45.000 --> 38:46.000 How far was that? 273 38:46.000 --> 38:54.000 Back down to the house, a mile and a quarter. You better not be late. 274 38:54.000 --> 38:54.000 Really? 275 38:54.000 --> 38:56.000 What would happen? 276 38:56.000 --> 39:46.000 Children now, you can't get them up on time to catch the bus. Catch the bus, can't get them up on time to catch the bus. You know children, most of them out there in the country, they stay in the bed too late. And then the—See, TV's running these young children. Of course, that's all—I've got three there. Yeah, three there. Willie, Bubba, and Carla. They've got their eyes set on that TV, and I say, "Y'all children, y'all sitting down there looking at the—looking in your book and you're seeing the TV. Can't learn like that. Need to cut it off." But you see, all of them looking. And that's it. 277 39:46.000 --> 39:49.000 This where we were when that Tuskegee study was going on. 278 39:49.000 --> 39:49.000 Oh, really? 279 39:49.000 --> 39:49.000 Yeah. 280 39:49.000 --> 39:52.000 Hm. 281 39:52.000 --> 40:11.000 Right up here on top of this hill. Got a bunch of us up here. Nurse Rivers, Dr. Smith, [indistinct 00:40:02] Long. 282 40:11.000 --> 40:12.000 Did they—How long did they hold school here? I mean, was it year round or like six months, or [indistinct 00:40:13]? 283 40:12.000 --> 40:20.000 That's what I was telling you, that we didn't have nothing but seven months school. 284 40:20.000 --> 40:20.000 Seven? 285 40:20.000 --> 40:41.000 Yeah. Seven months, that's all I had. You left there and—Well later on, and we went to [indistinct 00:40:30]. Yeah, I went up and down those steps many of time, but I didn't go to school there. But you know, in and out. 286 40:41.000 --> 40:41.000 Yeah. 287 40:41.000 --> 40:42.000 Yeah. 288 40:42.000 --> 40:45.000 So is it like two rooms in there now? 289 40:45.000 --> 40:47.000 Oh, yeah. That whole—See, you go in either one of these doors, and— 290 40:47.000 --> 40:47.000 Can we go in it? 291 40:47.000 --> 40:55.000 It's probably locked. 292 40:55.000 --> 41:10.000 It's locked, ain't it? This here—Yeah, it's locked. I don't know, it's just benches sitting around in there. Nothing but benches I don't— 293 41:10.000 --> 41:10.000 [indistinct 00:41:12]? 294 41:10.000 --> 41:10.000 Huh? 295 41:10.000 --> 41:19.000 The benches? 296 41:19.000 --> 41:38.000 You see, they been stopped school there. See, all the schools you see—Reverend Padgett, y'all heard me talk about Reverend Padgett, he's the first one started the—all of the children—He bought a bus himself and hauled the children to Tuskegee. For two years. 297 41:38.000 --> 41:47.000 Two years? 298 41:47.000 --> 42:00.000 Before the county took it over. He was 63, I think, when they—These children were already riding the bus. They made them buy those yellow buses. What, some horses up there? 299 42:00.000 --> 42:00.000 Yep. 300 42:00.000 --> 42:00.000 Yeah, plenty of those things around here. 301 42:00.000 --> 42:01.000 So why did they build a school up here? 302 42:01.000 --> 42:02.000 Well that's where—It was built along in the '30s, during that study. 303 42:02.000 --> 42:02.000 Okay. 304 42:02.000 --> 42:12.000 Because that's where we were, at the church. And— 305 42:12.000 --> 42:12.000 So they built it specifically for the study, or they just built it because [indistinct 00:42:15]— 306 42:12.000 --> 42:12.000 No, this was a school. 307 42:12.000 --> 42:12.000 Okay. So they just built a school for the kids? 308 42:12.000 --> 42:15.000 Yeah. 309 42:15.000 --> 42:15.000 Okay. 310 42:15.000 --> 42:16.000 Yeah. That's where our school was at. 311 42:16.000 --> 42:30.000 So did everyone who belonged to the church, did their children come here, or did you have other children from the other community able to play? 312 42:30.000 --> 42:30.000 Just in this community. 313 42:30.000 --> 42:31.000 Okay. 314 42:31.000 --> 42:45.000 It was another—Now we're talking truck stop over yonder, on the freeway. Well people on that—Between here and down there, it was school back in there, Clemonsdale. That's where they went to. My daddy was born down there, by the truck stop. 315 42:45.000 --> 42:45.000 Who built this school? 316 42:45.000 --> 42:45.000 Huh? 317 42:45.000 --> 42:52.000 Did—I mean, who built it? Did— 318 42:52.000 --> 43:07.000 You know, county. County and the Tuskegee Institute. 319 43:07.000 --> 43:08.000 Oh, wow. Looks pretty sturdy. 320 43:08.000 --> 43:08.000 What was the name of it? 321 43:08.000 --> 43:10.000 Huh? 322 43:10.000 --> 43:11.000 What's the name of the school? 323 43:11.000 --> 43:12.000 Shiloh School. 324 43:12.000 --> 43:15.000 Shiloh School? 325 43:15.000 --> 43:17.000 Yeah. Yeah. 326 43:17.000 --> 43:19.000 Did you have kindergarten all the way up to sixth grade, or— 327 43:19.000 --> 43:19.000 Yeah. 328 43:19.000 --> 43:21.000 Really? 329 43:21.000 --> 43:23.000 Yeah. Well at kindergarten, you know it started out here way—Just a few years back. 330 43:23.000 --> 43:23.000 Let me get a shot. 331 43:23.000 --> 43:36.000 From the first grade. 332 43:36.000 --> 43:39.000 Uh-huh. Did—The teachers, did y'all hire the teachers, or did the county hire them? 333 43:39.000 --> 43:39.000 County hired them. 334 43:39.000 --> 43:39.000 Oh, really? 335 43:39.000 --> 43:39.000 Yeah, county paid them. 336 43:39.000 --> 43:39.000 Black teachers? 337 43:39.000 --> 43:55.000 Yeah. Yeah, the county paid them. 338 43:55.000 --> 44:03.000 What? It's been lasting a long time. 339 44:03.000 --> 44:41.000 Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's been there a heap of years. Because you see, '63, they cut—All them in Tuskegee. And you see, all—because the children up here, they all went to school here, because they didn't go down below to Tuskegee, to that school. That's the reason I'm telling you to go over to North Salem. Wasn't no point in leaving North Salem, just to get any grades down there. Below Tuskegee. All the other counties went in though, but this one up here didn't go. We stayed here at this school. And then they were going up there anyway, because you see, they ain't had no schools here in 30 years. Just had them little—You know how people have kindergarten— 340 44:41.000 --> 44:44.000 Can we get a picture of you in front of the school? 341 44:44.000 --> 44:45.000 Yeah. 342 44:45.000 --> 44:46.000 Well we've got to walk over— 343 44:46.000 --> 44:46.000 If you could stand right here, I could just kind of— 344 44:46.000 --> 44:46.000 Turn around. 345 44:46.000 --> 44:46.000 —do a background. 346 44:46.000 --> 44:46.000 Yeah. 347 44:46.000 --> 44:55.000 You can turn around. I— 348 44:55.000 --> 45:06.000 You want to get further? That's good? That's good. Okay. You're ready? 349 45:06.000 --> 45:14.000 Ready to say something, so tell me. Cheese. Cheese. Yeah. 350 45:14.000 --> 45:29.000 Yeah, and Nurse Rivers, she made a heap of trips up here. She finally died. Lost her mind up there in Opelika. I had to go up there and get here. 351 45:29.000 --> 45:31.000 So where would you all eat in here? 352 45:31.000 --> 45:32.000 Huh? 353 45:32.000 --> 45:33.000 Where would you all eat in the school? 354 45:33.000 --> 45:33.000 We'd bring our lunch. 355 45:33.000 --> 45:38.000 Oh, yeah? 356 45:38.000 --> 46:27.000 Yeah, bring a lunch from home. And some of them back there then, you know it just depends on whether—who raised them for you to—Because I'll tell them, "I don't like somebody said 'poor.' I ain't been poor in my life." I've been working all my life. I had pneumonia in '21. I had it again in '31. And the same doctor, doctored on me both times, he died in '33. He was gone the next November. He had double pneumonia. He went in. But he had one child, and he was in the post office, but he retired from the post office. I've been on this ground all my life, church and school. 357 46:27.000 --> 46:29.000 So the church owns all this land right here? 358 46:29.000 --> 46:33.000 Yeah. Yeah, they own this. 359 46:33.000 --> 46:43.000 Right. And you better not be late getting to school too.