Stacey Scales: So you said your grandmother had land? Charles Pollard: Yeah. My old great-great grandmother. She lived until 100 and something. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: Did she talk about the slavery times? Charles Pollard: Well, somewhat. You know, I was small, back then. Stacey Scales: I see. Charles Pollard: She was over 100, when I was born, you see. I was born, of course, March the 13th, 1906. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: And she died, in that period of time. But I slept with her, once or twice. And she told my daddy, one day, "You and Lucy is going to have to get this boy out the bed with me. If you don't, he going to kick me to death." I was a bad sleeper. Stacey Scales: Oh. Yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. She died along during the 1900s. Stacey Scales: Did she talk about her times, or anything like that? Charles Pollard: Well, not too much. Stacey Scales: No? Charles Pollard: We always kept teacakes in her pocket. Stacey Scales: Oh. Yeah? Charles Pollard: Where we could nibble off of. Yeah. You see, when I was two years old, I was plowing. Scratching out there in the field. Stacey Scales: Really? Charles Pollard: My daddy had three boys. And Dan was his horse, he'd go to town. He was the boss, you see. And he owned land, then. And then, after—He had done left from over there, where Grandma was. And it's still in the Colored race, but a boy had bought that 60 acres off of the old place. Alderman Pollard, he had his place. Will Pollard had his place. But wind up with his place, White folks got his. Stacey Scales: Where was your grandmother from? Charles Pollard: Oh. Right here. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: She was born right back in there. Yeah. She was born over there. Stacey Scales: And were your parents born here too? Charles Pollard: Yeah. My daddy was born right down there, where it's called the truck stop. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: That's over there— Stacey Scales: This is Macon County, right? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: Okay. Charles Pollard: Yeah. And over here, in the truck stop, you know it's two miles from down here, to Harbor Bridge. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: But up there is the truck stop. We call it the truck stop. See, that's where my Rising Star School is out there. It's a big—I mean, that's where they went to school down there, Rising Star. Stacey Scales: That was the Black school? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah. And we had a teacher taught down there in the early years. I think Ms. Daisy Weston was the first one I went to, Daisy Weston. And another lady come on in after then. But Daisy Weston, she taught up there in the one room schoolhouse. Stacey Scales: Really? Charles Pollard: Yeah. One room. I expect it's as long as this house. Yeah. Stacey Scales: What type of things did you learn in there? Charles Pollard: Huh? Stacey Scales: What type of things did she teach? Charles Pollard: Well, we had regular books. We had them blue back speller books then. And tablets. Had the alphabets, all going from one to twelve. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah. Charles Pollard: See, I learned all that going to school. Set at one table from one to twelve. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. And we started up there and I went to school with two more boys, of course they've been gone a long time ago. But I was just a little kid then. But they was in the community. And the Robertsons. And you had my people been owning land all my life, on my daddy's side. Stacey Scales: So your daddy was a farmer? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Old farmer. That's what he was and that's all I ever did was farm. Stacey Scales: Were there times when people tried to take his land or get jealous because— Charles Pollard: Well, if you didn't have any. See, we were the only one right in here had any land. And you see, my daddy was raised up with old Major Ramsey in the Slavery War. He'd taken care of him kind of up there in Notasulga. See, they was born back over here, but he come out. He wouldn't chop cotton and pick cotton or work in the field for 35 cent or 25 cent a day. You see, he stepped out of town. And when the train—We used to have plenty of trains running through here. But now we ain't got no passenger train, but freight train. Stacey Scales: How was riding the passenger trains back then during— Charles Pollard: Well I come up from Montgomery a time or two. Stacey Scales: Were they segregated? Charles Pollard: Oh yeah. They had the front care up there and Blacks had the back car. Stacey Scales: So how was your section? Charles Pollard: Huh? Stacey Scales: How was it in your section, where you had to sit? Charles Pollard: Both of them were the same. Stacey Scales: Yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. But they was just in front, in the front car. In the first car was the baggage, you see. And yeah, I went to Opelika a time or two on the train. I used to test the freight train go up there. I had a girl up there in Opelika way back years ago. Of course I got on up pretty good then. And that was up in the '30s and '40s. Stacey Scales: Oh, okay. Charles Pollard: But you see, I was raised right over there. I was born right over there. We owned—Well, we sold it to one of the—Loaned it to my brother's part. And he sold his. But he's dead. He died in, was in the 40s. He was a bad boy. And you know you do bad things, you're going to reap bad things. That's the way I always looked at it. And he did everything rotten he can. But anyhow, back to me, can you see—We didn't—Back then, you could buy a nickel worth of cheese and you couldn't eat them all up. Stacey Scales: Yeah. Charles Pollard: Now you can buy five or six dollars worth, you ain't got enough to eat. That's the way prices have changed. Stacey Scales: Now did anybody ever get jealous because your family owned land, like White folk? Did they ever try to— Charles Pollard: Well, I heard talk of it. But they didn't—They wasn't on their place. Stacey Scales: What do you mean by they weren't on— Charles Pollard: They didn't own no property. Stacey Scales: They didn't own your father's land, right? Charles Pollard: No, no. Stacey Scales: Did they ever try to take it? Charles Pollard: Oh no. No. We paid for it and kept it. Of course, you see, over there my grandmother and all raised up back in there, you see, them older peoples is gone on. Used to be houses and the school back in there, between here and the truck stop. If you over front on the freeway, you know where that Big Buck truck stop over there and the other one down on the shoulder, you know. But this is right up—It's two miles from down here to the bridge, big creek at the end, up there to the truck stop. You see, you come on around. We used to go right through here over that truck stop back in an old T model car. We been owning cars all our life, you might say. We had a '23 model Ford. Stacey Scales: How was it traveling through the South? Charles Pollard: Fine, fine. Stacey Scales: Yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: How about— Charles Pollard: You know. Stacey Scales: Jim Crow gas stations. Did you ever run into that? Charles Pollard: No. No. Go up there and fill up my tank, 10 cent a gallon. Stacey Scales: Yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Get some of it for a nickel a gallon. Stacey Scales: So how did your family make it through the Depression? Charles Pollard: Fine. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:08:07] Charles Pollard: We knew that—Yeah, he was. And I tell them they make theirself poor by talking loud. I mean, trying not to do nothing. They can't think. Lot of them can't think good. You know. They come up under the White man. You can't think for yourself trying to think for him too. You know. I know there's hear tell of them and Beasleys used to be up here. They owned 300 or 400 acres of land. The Hughs is back in here. Right through here in Macon County. You know, White folks always fought Tuskegee and Macon County. There's more Negroes down here than anywhere else own their own property. You heard talk of Joe Louis. And he's right there. I got his picture in there. Stacey Scales: Here? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Got his picture in there. When you go out there, when you stand out and look, and the boys—You know you read about JL Robertson, the football player out in California. You heard about him. Stacey Scales: You knew him? Charles Pollard: Yeah, he was raised here on our place. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Born and raised right here on our place. And that's what I tell some of them. I'm proud that he out there with the Los Angeles Rams playing ball. But he live in Minnesota. And when he come down here, come down here last year, spent about 15 or $20,000 right there on his people. His people, White people too. That's where we go to school too. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: But back then, we didn't go to White schools. We went to our own school. But and then, I reckon you might've heard about Ms. Roosevelt. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: You knew her? Charles Pollard: Well she come down here. See White folks didn't want Tuskegee—I mean, VA hospital's here. Stacey Scales: So what happened? Charles Pollard: Huh? Stacey Scales: What happened? Charles Pollard: Well, White folks didn't want it here. Too much for them. Stacey Scales: So what— Charles Pollard: And Ms. Washington come down here and brought all them corn and things, brought a Colored [indistinct 00:10:27] said if they didn't leave there they'd tear this place down. Yeah, they didn't want this Tuskegee Institute. Over there, Tuskegee Institute. The VA hospital. Yeah. And they always fought it. And you see, my old foreparents come from Boston, Massachusetts. My foreparents on my mother's side. But my daddy was raised right over here, truck stop. Stacey Scales: So how did they get the VA started then? Charles Pollard: Well, that was because, during the World War I. Stacey Scales: Did Ku Klux Klan— Charles Pollard: Well, Ku Klux Klan wasn't bad much through here as far as I know of. No. You know they had, I think, a song or story about the Ku Klux Klan, a freight train come through Tuscaloosa I think. They said it was a White woman over there and Black boys was riding on there too, I think it said they killed one of the Black boys or something. Or put them in jail. Put them in prison or something like that. You know all that, I heard that, you see. Because back then Jim Crow and you know. But you know, I had a plan when I come here. You know, when your thinking's good. But a person raised on White—Most of them was raised on the White one. But this was the best city. That's one thing where there's more Negroes in here than anything else. See, because from over there at the truck stop, come on through here into Notasulga, we owned all that land. But all of them left from down here and went north. Of course, some of my uncles went north to all them buildings up there in Chicago. And we bought some of their land. You see the Cummins place over there and the Louie Parker place, we bought it but it was 80 over there. Bought it for $600. And my daddy, when he bought this place down here, he paid $4 a acre for it. Stacey Scales: Really? Charles Pollard: Yeah. $600, 160 acres. Stacey Scales: Who would you sell your crops to? Your family farm. Charles Pollard: Well, we'd gin cotton up to the gin house. Thought it would move. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. All our cottonseed mill over there [indistinct 00:13:13] Yeah. [indistinct 00:13:14] mill and salt mill come in here in 1926 and hired people. And you heard talk of the back water up there, the claim. And two fellows come from down in Georgia. Because down in Georgia it was pretty rough how people were raised over there. They come on through here and stayed until they went to Florida. Flew around there and walked up on the track drunk. On the track. Wind had blown a electric wire on the track, both of them locked up drunk, hit that rail and down they went. That happened right there [indistinct 00:13:55] I started going down there in 1943. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:13:58] Charles Pollard: Go down there on the bus for $15, down there and back. Stacey Scales: Was there a organization or a union that Black farmers had— Charles Pollard: Well, we never did have that in here. Stacey Scales: No? Charles Pollard: Mm-hmm Stacey Scales: Did you ever need [indistinct 00:14:16] Charles Pollard: Well, back up, yeah. That, when you know the riot was. Stacey Scales: What year was that? Charles Pollard: I think it was 1932, they had a riot come out of a [indistinct 00:14:27] out there in the real town. [indistinct 00:14:32] that's Tallapoosa County. And see that wasn't—It was right on the edge of Macon County and Lee County. That one there, they had that little riot out there and it was Ned Cobb and Ned James, I think. James or something. I know Ned Cobb was in it, because I was going out there to see [indistinct 00:15:03] one of his daughters name. All of them gone on. But I was just going to see her, you see. That's my daughter. Yeah. Yeah. Stacey Scales: How old are you? Charles Pollard: Who? Stacey Scales: How old are you? Charles Pollard: Fourth month, the 13th, 1906. Stacey Scales: That's all right. I wouldn't think so. Charles Pollard: How much you make? Fourth month. Fourth month now. 13th day, 1906. Stacey Scales: 1906? Charles Pollard: Yeah. That's it. That's it. And see, from April the 12th up to now, last week, three more months. And I told them I'm 88 and three months. 13th of July, I'll see, and the quarter in there. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: See these people—I've seen so and so and so nine tenths. Some of them ask me, "What is nine tenths." You know. Stacey Scales: Yeah. Charles Pollard: And when the [indistinct 00:16:16] White man [indistinct 00:16:18] all he wants you to do is wait. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: But we right through in here. We didn't know much about that. Wasn't no White people in here. They was up there in Notasulga. Up there. And y'all's church—I knew when they built Shiloh Church way back there in the 1900s. Yeah. Stacey Scales: Did they have hangings, and them things? Charles Pollard: Well, I heard talk of one hanging. And one the old fellow was here, down here in Tuskegee. I just heard of that. They broke his neck. Stacey Scales: How did it happen [indistinct 00:17:01]? Charles Pollard: He had cut a White man neck off about a dog. Stacey Scales: A dog? Charles Pollard: That's what he told the man. The other fellow. He worked there with us 30 days. See, my daddy'd been using hands all of his life. We had three mules and the hands that would go to town and piddle around, [indistinct 00:17:23] bring you something to eat. And Jasper Morris and Pat Young and Joshua Young, Rosie Young and Jed Young. All of them was working on halves. The house right up there on top of the hill right now. But they've remodeled it, you know, since then a little bit. Added another room to it. But the same old—And then over there where I bought that place on top of the hill in 1965. I give $5400 for it. I could've bought it for $4000, but I knew where all the corner was. Stacey Scales: Did you have to get a loan [indistinct 00:18:13] get started? Charles Pollard: Well, no. No. I never did. My daddy died in '57 and I took over in '58. And you see, he dealt with [indistinct 00:18:27] In '58, after Christmas, I went to Tuskegee and bought me a brand new John Deere tractor. And then the man—I was down there, one of my friends, he down there back down there toward [indistinct 00:18:44] towards that bridge down there. That's where the girl takes care of me right there at the creek, between them two creek in that brick house on that side. She there since you come here. She was going [indistinct 00:18:59] Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:18:59] Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah, because you come on in, yeah. And I wasn't there [indistinct 00:19:06] But she has been—She's down there. And then the other one, he worked for Tuskegee [indistinct 00:19:14] You might've seen him over there. Go right into the school, right above the filling station. Going toward the school. You know [indistinct 00:19:26] Stacey Scales: Yeah. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: Mr. Reedy? Charles Pollard: Yeah. But I thought— Stacey Scales: I used to work [indistinct 00:19:37] Charles Pollard: Yeah. That's it. Now the Reedy filling station and the cleaner was a different Reedy. Thomas Reedy, that was who that was. Stacey Scales: Oh, okay. Charles Pollard: That's the one who sent off, you know. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Thomas Reedy. You done seen him and met him. Stacey Scales: Yes, I've seen him. Charles Pollard: Yeah, of course. Been up talking, you see. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: When we had the Democrat meeting, he was there. But they sent him home. You know, when they send you home. And then if he wouldn't have been doing what he was doing [indistinct 00:20:07] about that flag. Wasn't nothing to talk about it. He run it his own self. You know? You can't go over. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: You know, back there then. Sent him off two, three years, but sending you off will do something to you [indistinct 00:20:38] You ain't got no say so over nothing. But I [indistinct 00:20:47] If you can think pretty good. If you can't see nothing—As my daddy used to say, whatever you do, buy you one acre of land. You can go deep as you want to or go high as you want, but if you couldn't think of nothing to feed your own self—You know you can feed your own self. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: —if you get out there and do something. Don't have to ask nobody for nothing. If you want to [indistinct 00:21:26] but if you can't think, that's it. And God built it in you. You see, people that—judgment. Stacey Scales: Did you [indistinct 00:21:43] Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah. Stacey Scales: What kind of man was he? Charles Pollard: That was the—He was the old man, wasn't he? Yeah. Yeah. Stacey Scales: Did he ever help out with the farming and [indistinct 00:21:53]? Charles Pollard: Well, that's what I was fixing to say. Most of the [indistinct 00:21:56] they had all the skeletons down there, different things. And Professor Carver. Because I might've seen him once, but you see, Booker was there. I seen him. Stacey Scales: You seen Booker Washington? Charles Pollard: Yeah. And you see, my foreparents come from Baltimore, Maryland. They come down here, Grandma Brown and Grandpa Felix. Peg Brown and Grandpa Felix. And they come on [indistinct 00:22:39] down here. Grandma Bill and Grandma Grammit. Do you know the girl that dress hair? Stacey Scales: Grandma Bill and Grandma who? Charles Pollard: Well, I'm telling you, I'm talking about the girl that dress hair in there, down there, Clara Grammit now. That's the lady that dress hair. Maybe you ain't heard talk around that, but you know. They run, you see. Now, both of them was up at church last night. They remember my church. Raised up in Notasulga. But one of them married [indistinct 00:23:23] He was first [indistinct 00:23:27] No, I done forgot his name. But anyhow, Zi lost his eyesight and he finally died. And he had one boy. But he died. And she don't have no children now. You know. But no, her first boy died, Mason. [indistinct 00:23:58] And she knows it matters what you got. She got her boy to call her BB, big fat boy. But Clara, [indistinct 00:24:09] first cousin. He stayed right there in [indistinct 00:24:13] right there, before you get up to the—What's the home there? Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:24:25] Charles Pollard: No, right there when the [indistinct 00:24:29] at the cemetery. Where they put up that new building there. Stacey Scales: Oh [indistinct 00:24:32] Charles Pollard: Well that's a—[indistinct 00:24:36] you come around that corner where the old house tore down [indistinct 00:24:39] Stacey Scales: The gas station over there? Charles Pollard: Yeah, gas station comes from there going out to the hospital. And it's then going to the school [indistinct 00:24:50] and you see, from there, back to that other house east from that filling station, over where that old house tore down and all those other in wood. Well that in there, Walter and Clara stay in that brick house right there. Coming on out before you get to Magnolia Homes, go down this hill. But that's where Grandma Hagg, Grandpa Felix, and Grandma Hagg stayed right there. Can you see? Grandma Bill and Grandma Grammit. And Grandma Bill, she married at [indistinct 00:25:34] come from [indistinct 00:25:36]. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:25:38] Charles Pollard: No. We wasn't no kin. But James Pollard over here, we kin on his mother's side. And you see, in my day I was raised right now here. And he married Grandma Grammit's daughter Alma. Had two or three—She had three or four—several children. But anyhow, all of them gone on. But the grandchildren and Walter and Clara's there in the old Hagg—Well they built—and they [indistinct 00:26:16] built the house there. And her son worked in the post office over there to the school. Yeah, and he was a pretty good whisky drinker. Stacey Scales: So Carver was [indistinct 00:26:26] Charles Pollard: No. Carver was gone then. Stacey Scales: Oh. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah. Stacey Scales: Did you get together with the farmers and help them? Charles Pollard: Well that's where it come out. Peanuts, you see. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Peanuts, you know. We did a heap of things with peanuts. Made him a millionaire back there then. Stacey Scales: So other farmers, did you ever see him come out and work with the farmers? Charles Pollard: Well, no. No, I never did see him come out. But we'd go down there. We had the ag teacher then, back then. Stacey Scales: Do you remember any experiences you've had with him that you could tell me about? Charles Pollard: Anyhow, they was teaching me how to read pastures and things. When you come from down there. And you see, I have a grandson, Michael over there. We raised three time [indistinct 00:27:25] that come on up to see in the late years. And I used to raise black Angus cows. I had 150 head of cows once. You see, just wasn't nobody in here like that. A lot of them—Well my uncles and them come from back in there. But we got one of them, my cousin's place, we go back in there and that's going straight towards church [indistinct 00:27:59] Stacey Scales: Right. Is that your father right there? Charles Pollard: That's him right there on that picture, at the top. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: That's my two—Well, the dark one on here, that's my baby sisters. One died a while back. That's Sam Daniel. I thought, see, he was coming in really—But he come in and pick up Sam. Pick up Alma. Stacey Scales: Did folks back then talk about their experience [indistinct 00:28:32] Charles Pollard: Well yeah. Some. I never did. I never did. I used to get up trying to see him. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. But I never could see nothing. And I used to—and they said moonshine and that. I used to go up there and walk all over the cemetery, see my foreparents is buried right up there. And I bought that place up on top of that hill. When Old Man Bowens come down here, going with this Rambler girl, got married to her, he come from Hooker up north. He was a Yankee. White folks didn't like him. So my daddy would start anything down here [indistinct 00:29:12] let me know. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: [indistinct 00:29:15] Major Ramsey raised them up there in Notasulga, see. Stacey Scales: So [indistinct 00:29:21] Charles Pollard: Huh? Say what? Stacey Scales: Your ancestors are buried on the land? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah. Right up there on [indistinct 00:29:29] cemetery. Shiloh Baptist Church. Yeah. I remember when they built that church up there. Stacey Scales: So you go up there trying to see them? You go up there at night? Charles Pollard: Yeah, go up there anytime trying to see something. Well, I ain't never seen nothing. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:29:46] Charles Pollard: Well, that's what they say. That's what I've heard talk about, how it made them run. Stacey Scales: Made them run? Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah, got scared and run. And I tell you, one night we was coming right along out there, the moon was shining bright, and them old—Out in the field, I don't know if you ever seen it, but they come up and got stickers on him. [indistinct 00:30:08] something that tall and it had white blooms on it. But we come down there [indistinct 00:30:13] and one of the fellows [indistinct 00:30:13] and he said, "Look at that little thing [indistinct 00:30:19] when we was down yonder. And we seen it. We got even with him. He's keeping up with us. And then we looked back and seen he was right behind. And it wasn't nothing but that thing bloomed there out there in the field. Yeah. Yeah, I remember a one cent stamp. Stacey Scales: Yeah. Charles Pollard: Two cent stamp. Get a stamp for two cents, get a card for a penny. Yeah. Stacey Scales: Did you know the Lewis Adams family? Adams? That was the guy that helped out [indistinct 00:31:01] school. Charles Pollard: No, I didn't know them. But I was around these other ones, you see. I went to [indistinct 00:31:13] Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:31:15] Charles Pollard: Pocatello. Stacey Scales: How was that? Charles Pollard: Well, anyhow, we used to go to the commencement. They'd fry fish down there and give us some salmon. Stacey Scales: Yeah? Charles Pollard: Right there in the old chapel, see. The old chapel got blowed up. Built a new chapel. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: And you see, something [indistinct 00:31:41] democrat lady in Tuskegee. We went up there where Booker was, you know. We had a meeting right there in the eating place, where the eating place, whatever. I can't pronounce the hall that they called it. You know, you'd go down there— Stacey Scales: Boise Hall? Charles Pollard: Where they eat and have meetings. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:31:45] Charles Pollard: Yeah. Right that way. And look right [indistinct 00:31:45] Booker T. Washington. You could look at Booker, you go right in this building here. That's where—They called it something. Stacey Scales: Tompkins Hall? Charles Pollard: Something like that. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:32:17] Charles Pollard: Yeah. [indistinct 00:32:20] I can't—They told me what it was, but anyhow, we had a democrat meeting there. And you see, there's a bunch of them [indistinct 00:32:33] they was raising money for the Democrat Party. And you see, they had me in the table, you see. We had to pay $15, I think. It was raising money for the Democrat Party. And it was 10 to the table. The [indistinct 00:32:49] up here at the school. Him and his wife, Beasley and his wife, and then David Warren, the chief of police. The head police now. Him and his wife was there. And I knew all of them, you see. We kinfolk, you say. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:33:12] Charles Pollard: Yeah. All of them and I. And it was 10 to the table, see. We paid $15 a piece. We raised money for the Democrat Party. Stacey Scales: Oh, right. Charles Pollard: Yeah, and Fred Gray was there. [indistinct 00:33:23] Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah, and then we had [indistinct 00:33:26] after the talk. Stacey Scales: Do you remember when things started to change here? [indistinct 00:33:38] Charles Pollard: Well, yeah. I knew what he said. [indistinct 00:33:38] Stacey Scales: Yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Later, [indistinct 00:33:50] Lancaster. I tell you, you know—Do you know where old Reed's place was, [indistinct 00:33:56] Stacey Scales: Yeah. Charles Pollard: Right there on that corner. Well that brick house there to the left, that was Mayor Woodall's house back there in the '30s. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: '20s. Yeah. See, I had pneumonia in '21, had it again in '31. And then Doctor Hayes worked on me '21 and '31. He had the double pneumonia in '33. He didn't wake up. He left then. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:34:38] Charles Pollard: Well, that was Charlie Palmer. [indistinct 00:34:42] Stacey Scales: Did you know him? Charles Pollard: Yeah, it broke the store in 1947 too. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah, that's when the store went broke. See, it started in '32. Stacey Scales: So you're the one that— Charles Pollard: Yeah, I'm in both. I was getting something, they put nothing in. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: So how did they get you in there? Charles Pollard: Well, every year when the school started up, everybody would go up. We had the meetings and the [indistinct 00:35:20] the first one thing or another, and everybody would go up and get a blood test. Stacey Scales: Did they tell you [indistinct 00:35:26] Charles Pollard: Yeah. We'd get blood tests every year, you see. And especially school time. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: And you see, plenty of children went to school bare feet. I reckon I went to school bare feet. But I always had shoes. Stacey Scales: Yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. And you see, I been working in the farm all my life. And I told them if I had to run my life over again, I'd do the same thing only I'd try to do it better. From what I learned coming on up. Stacey Scales: So they [indistinct 00:36:05] Charles Pollard: Yeah. That's it. And then— Stacey Scales: And in '42 [indistinct 00:36:08] Charles Pollard: Yeah, in '32. Stacey Scales: '32. Charles Pollard: [indistinct 00:36:08] was broke in '42. Stacey Scales: Oh, I see. So you told the news? Charles Pollard: Huh? Stacey Scales: You told the newspaper? Charles Pollard: Oh yeah. Yeah, my daddy took the newspaper [indistinct 00:36:13] I wasn't asking them out. Stacey Scales: No, you tell [indistinct 00:36:13] Charles Pollard: Well anyhow, Norris [indistinct 00:36:13] you see, he was in. And she'd come out here the next morning. And it first started down there in Montgomery. I was selling cattle at the Hoople Stockyard. The one on the Mobile highway. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: That's where I was. But I had been going through the union stockyard. I've been selling cows all my life. We raised cattle. My dad said when he first married, first thing he did, got him a mule and a cow. Got him a mule and a cow where he could get the milk. Stacey Scales: Right. Charles Pollard: And plant his corn, raise his feed. Bought him a [indistinct 00:37:15] mule to start with. When I was big enough, he had [indistinct 00:37:23] running around with. But Kate and Lula was Jasper [indistinct 00:37:31] and Joshua had Tate. Two mules and a horse. Dan was the horse. But the two mules was female mules, both of them. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:37:42]l Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah. Kate and Lula. We kept them for years. And see all of hem's gone on, been gone on. He got hit—I mean Uncle Alden now, he got some. And Jasper, he married my first cousin [indistinct 00:38:08] all of them gone on. And all the uncles has been gone on now. And old Uncle Majors gone. She got one grand niece and she married Arthur, I think [indistinct 00:38:22] something. But Mayor Lee was, he was first cousin. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:38:30] Charles Pollard: Yeah. He would take care of me. Stacey Scales: Oh, okay. Charles Pollard: I lost my wife in '89. She lost her son. She had a son. I had a daughter. But she lost her son in '88. She come on and passed in '89. And my oldest sister passed in '90. Right down the line. And Barber Reed died in '87. He was the husband that stayed down there in that brick house down there. Times that we used to call that Red Creek, you see. And it's two creeks, that [indistinct 00:39:09] that go together right there back of that house and the first bridge you'll come across, I mean the first one coming up this way, see that water go under on this side the house. And that Mahone, both of them join over there right behind the house and make on going towards— Stacey Scales: Oh, [indistinct 00:39:35] Charles Pollard: Yeah, right there back of they house. Connect there and went on through under the low bridge. Both the bridge—She right between the two bridges, see. But they go together right back of the house, make one, and it goes on down there to [indistinct 00:39:49] and empties into [indistinct 00:39:52] Creek. And going down to the Alabama River down at Shorter. Go in the river there. River go right there, Montgomery Station. And go into Mobile, Selma. Mobile Bay. All the water come from up under that down, come right down here and go in. Stacey Scales: You say you saw Cadillacs? Charles Pollard: Huh? Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:40:16] Charles Pollard: I raised a lot of cattle. Stacey Scales: Oh, cattle. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Auctioned them off. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: And when first started—555 was mine. Crompton, TS Crompton. That's what it used to say on my cows, too. Cow man leave them and wait to sell them, cow man leave them, come on back. They mailed a check to me. Different one would buy them. I turned my to TS Crompton, that's who I started off with. [indistinct 00:40:52] And they had to come down there and consign them. See Ms. Crompton, her husband had died and she run the business on until she died. And then they finally closed up. The union gone and took up nothing but the capital stockyard. Stacey Scales: Did anybody ever [indistinct 00:41:15] Charles Pollard: Well anyhow, they was auctioning them off. Stacey Scales: Oh yeah? Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: Did you get a fair amount? Charles Pollard: Yeah, back there then. Everything else was cheap. I sold plenty of them for 15 cent a pound. Yeah. I bought three calves down there one day for $30. I bought them, auctioned them off. You have to sit there and [indistinct 00:41:47] he's watching you [indistinct 00:41:50] I bought calves down there one day, I paid a dollar for them. They weighed 200 pounds. That same one I was first telling you about. But when I sold him, I sold him for $600. He was a baby calf, weighed 100 pounds. And you see them big Holstein cows, them black dairy cows? Stacey Scales: Yeah. Charles Pollard: That's what it was. Dairy cow, see. And I— Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:42:31] Charles Pollard: And made money myself. You see, it's a heap of them [indistinct 00:42:31] something you have to build in your mind. You know, you got to think for yourself. Whatever you go through in life. And I took it out [indistinct 00:42:44] And you see, a lot of them up there on top of the hill where the cemetery is, I bought that place up there for $50 a acre. And old man Henry Neil Seger, we went down there and I kind of still [indistinct 00:43:03] for them, you see. I knew where all the corners was. And first, I could've bought it for $40 if I'd have went on old man Henry Neil. Stacey Scales: Now you said you bought a car [indistinct 00:43:17] Charles Pollard: [indistinct 00:43:17] Stacey Scales: Oh. Charles Pollard: Section line and the beat line. Beat line run east and went, section line run north and south. Stacey Scales: Oh. Charles Pollard: Yeah. And you see, you get on the corner of the property and that's where you buy. And if you buy 20 in some corner or another, you got 20 acres. Buy 40, buy 60. And now it's cut up in quarters. Yeah. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:43:47] Charles Pollard: Huh? Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:43:49] Charles Pollard: Well, along there. You know, when it was [indistinct 00:43:56] we got the chance to vote. But I hadn't voted none [indistinct 00:44:00] and they finally got a boy in there. Come on in here, Charlie, they've been talking about Wolf Creek, this that and other. Sign here. Tell me your name and your address and everything. Go on about your business. That's [indistinct 00:44:16] He was from down there, truck stop. He was married. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:44:22] Charles Pollard: No, it's a White fellow. Up there. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:44:26] Charles Pollard: Oh yeah. Back there then, yeah. When you come in—But my daddy been voting all the time. Stacey Scales: How did he do that? Charles Pollard: Well he would go [indistinct 00:44:37] and he owned a whole lot of land. He had this land practically when I was born. See, I was born right back there on the old place what he bought after he come from over there at our grandma place. And it wasn't nothing but a big room and a kitchen [indistinct 00:45:01] Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:45:01] Charles Pollard: What? That's where my great-grandmother stayed there. That was my daddy's grandmother. His mother and father was [indistinct 00:45:20] yeah. That was [indistinct 00:45:25] That was they grandma, Grandma Margaret. Yeah. Grandma Grammit, now she was in Notasulga. Yeah. And on my mother's side, they had a place right there in town. And the Johnsons owned it. And the Grammits come from out on the road towards [indistinct 00:45:40] And the Grammits, Johnson, they had a home. You been to Notasulga? Stacey Scales: No I haven't. Charles Pollard: Ain't you? It's right up through there. Stacey Scales: [indistinct 00:45:41] Charles Pollard: Look around. Come out there [indistinct 00:45:41] ride up and down the road with you. Take you around. Stacey Scales: Maybe we can do that. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Maybe some Sunday evening. Stacey Scales: Maybe Sunday [indistinct 00:46:24] I can give you a call. Charles Pollard: Yeah. Stacey Scales: I'd like to know [indistinct 00:46:30] Charles Pollard: Yeah. Yeah. Be around in the area. Yeah. Go from here to the truck stop, go down there to the creek—