James Eaves interview recording, 1995 August 04
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
Alex Byrd | All right, we're on. Thank you, Mr. Eaves, for agreeing to let me interview you today, and thank you for taking me around over the past two weeks. If we can, I just want to start by, you saying your name and where you were born and your date of birth. | 0:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Okay. My name is Jim Eaves, E-A-V-E-S. I was born in White Plains, Kentucky, fourth month, fifth day, 20th year. | 0:17 |
Alex Byrd | All right, I'm just going to rewind it. Well, Ms. Eaves, can you describe for me the White Plains of your boyhood? Where'd you grow up, what it looked like around here? | 0:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, White Plains was a little farming community plus a little mining community. | 0:47 |
Alex Byrd | And did your people farm or mine or both? | 1:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | They did both. | 1:06 |
Alex Byrd | Was your father from here as well? | 1:11 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yes. | 1:13 |
Alex Byrd | He was from White Plains? | 1:13 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yes. | 1:15 |
Alex Byrd | What was his name? | 1:15 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Elmer Eaves. | 1:17 |
Alex Byrd | And what was your mother's name? | 1:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Mary Weir Eaves. | 1:20 |
Alex Byrd | Was your mother from Kentucky? | 1:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yes. | 1:25 |
Alex Byrd | And born in White Plains? | 1:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, she was born in this vicinity. | 1:27 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. Well, tell me what kind of work your folks did when you were coming up. | 1:36 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, when I was coming up, my dad worked in the mines, and he'd have little truck patches. We raised tobacco, sometime corn, and he always managed to have a very large garden. And we had one cow, we raised hogs. | 1:39 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Then he would work in mine maybe one day a week or two days a week. And some days he'd work in the mine, wouldn't even make anything. They had what they called "working by the tonnage", and you would go in there and wait until you get something to load coal in. If the man didn't come in there with a mule to pull your coal out, you wouldn't get paid. You wouldn't do nothing, just lay around in there all day, and then they'd probably call you back to work Sunday. So that's what he went through in those days. | 2:11 |
Alex Byrd | So sometimes, if the man didn't pull your coal out, you'd just go home, would you call it? | 3:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, you couldn't go home. | 3:06 |
Alex Byrd | Okay, you just waited? | 3:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. See in other words, you had what you call a mule driver, and he might be pulling off 10 or 15 people. When they load a car, he come in there and get it. Well, back in those days, there wasn't no big demand for coal, and they would had a whistle that they would blow. If the whistle blow three times, you'd work that day, but if it blow one time, you wouldn't work. | 3:08 |
Alex Byrd | So would miners usually go to work in the morning? | 3:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 4:02 |
Alex Byrd | So the whistle blew in the morning? | 4:02 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, the whistle blow the evening before. | 4:03 |
Alex Byrd | Okay, okay. So you get off work knowing whether you working tomorrow or not. | 4:08 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, that's right. Well see, if you working at the mines today, well you would find out at the mine whether they going to work the next day. But if you was at home, that's when they blow the whistle. Three times, you would work. One time, you wouldn't work. | 4:14 |
Alex Byrd | Was it possible back then for people your father's age to make their whole living in the mines? | 4:37 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I guess you could because a lot of guys lived in what they call company houses, and they depend entirely on the mine. They didn't raise no garden, nothing. But my daddy inherited this land from his grandmother. | 4:43 |
Alex Byrd | You know about what mines your daddy worked around here? | 5:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | White City. | 5:21 |
Alex Byrd | White City? | 5:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Mm-hmm. | 5:22 |
Alex Byrd | Is that still close? | 5:23 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 5:24 |
Alex Byrd | Real close? But it's all tore down now? | 5:24 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 5:28 |
Alex Byrd | Well, how'd your grandparents come into White Plains and come into this land and be able to pass it down? | 5:32 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | My grandmother came in here out of slavery. She had two kids, I believe, a boy and a girl because I never did know her husband. But anyway, my daddy's daddy, let me see. My daddy's daddy was named Jim Eaves also, and he worked on the railroad. And his sister married a guy that worked at White City where my daddy worked, and she had about, oh, I guess, six or seven kids. And anyway, they settled here in White Plains, one big family known as the Dobbins. And my daddy's mother were the Dobbins, but she married the Eaves, you see? | 5:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, they was all hooked in together, and the family just spreaded out because my daddy's mother had about, I believe, six sisters and two brothers. So they just come as accumulating. Now I don't remember when this church over year was built, when I know them thing. | 7:13 |
Alex Byrd | Barnes Chapel? | 7:49 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Barnes Chapel, yeah. But they had a one-room school, little bit, old, small schoolhouse. And when we got out of grade school, we had to go to the county seat in Madisonville, and the superintendent of the school would give us examination to pass to the ninth grade. But we didn't have no bus back then. I had a sister and she wanted to go to high school, so she went and stayed with my grandmother on my mother's side, to Greenville. And she went up there and went to high school. | 7:50 |
Alex Byrd | Do you remember what your grandmother's name in Greenville? | 8:48 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, Neely Weir. | 8:50 |
Alex Byrd | Neely Weir? | 8:52 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Uh-huh. | 8:52 |
Alex Byrd | W-E-I-R? | 8:56 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | W-E-I-R. | 9:00 |
Alex Byrd | You know, I've seen a lot of them. I probably seen her. I've seen some Weirs out at the Reynolds Family graveyard out on Cave Springs Road. You know out in Rhodes Chapel, there's some Weirs out there? And I saw some Weirs today out at the West End Cemetery in Greenville. | 9:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | My grandmother, she was buried in White Plains. And her husband, he was also buried in White Plains, Tom Weir. As a matter of fact, I've been named after both my granddaddies. One was named Jim and one was named Tom, so they named me Jim Tom. And my grandmother, she had three sets of twin. | 9:22 |
Alex Byrd | We still talking about Neely Weir? | 9:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Neely Weir, three sets of twins, and I think she had 16 or 17 children. | 9:55 |
Alex Byrd | And this the one who come here out of slavery? | 10:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, that was on my daddy's side. | 10:09 |
Alex Byrd | Okay, so Neely's on— | 10:11 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | My mother's side, yeah. | 10:14 |
Alex Byrd | You know what your grandmother on your daddy's side name was? | 10:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Rebecca. | 10:22 |
Alex Byrd | Rebecca. You remember her family name? | 10:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, I don't. Only thing I can remember about my grandmother on my daddy's side, she lived in a log house next to us. | 10:26 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. Right over there? | 10:42 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right. Well, our house was built on Turner log house. And she was an old woman then because she had a Barker stick about four foot long, I guess, where she'd walk with. And she would follow you upside the head with that stick. | 10:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I had a little old wheel I rolled around the house. She was sitting out in the yard, had a pipe in her mouth, smoking. She told me, said, "Boy, you get on out there if you want to roll that wheel. Don't roll that around here near me." I got out there. A few minutes later, I got back close to her. Next thing I know, that stick went upside in my head. The wheel went one way and I went the other. But she didn't play now. When she told you something, she meant business. | 11:08 |
Alex Byrd | She meant business. | 11:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, and she died during the flood. | 11:46 |
Alex Byrd | '37? | 11:48 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Uh-huh, '37 flood. I was in CCCs, and I didn't know it until I come home because during that flood, everything stopped, you see? | 11:52 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. Did she take dinner with y'all? | 12:02 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, she stayed with herself in that house, and she cooked her own meals and everything. Of course, my dad would always check on her, and I don't ever known her to ever be sick. | 12:07 |
Alex Byrd | She lived a long time? | 12:23 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, she did. I don't know exactly how old she was, but she was up in years. | 12:27 |
Alex Byrd | Did you get to see your other grandmother much over in Greenville? | 12:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah, yeah. No, the one in Greenville, I used to go to Greenville a whole lot, and I'd pick up odd jobs and I'd stay with her. And she would come down and visit us. She'd have to ride the bus. Bus come down in the morning from Louisville, then the bus from Paducah would go back to Louisville in the evening. But I was real fond of her, and I was around her a whole lot. She had a daughter, was a twin, and well, she was kind of a runt. And well, I know she had a hot temper. But anyway, my mother told me that they were sitting at the table eating, I don't know, dinner or whatever. And she got mad about something and grabbed a biscuit and throwed it and hit my granddad in the face with it. | 12:43 |
Alex Byrd | Your granddaddy Jimmy? | 14:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, Tom. Tom Weir, Neely's husband. | 14:21 |
Alex Byrd | Tom Weir? | 14:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. And say they just knowed he was going to kill him, but he just looked at it, didn't say a word. Yeah, she was kind of the runt in the family, but said she really had a temper. | 14:26 |
Alex Byrd | She must have had to be tough then because being so small. | 14:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, I guess. I guess they spoiled her too, you see, because— | 14:49 |
Alex Byrd | Well, what kind of work did your mother do when y'all was coming up? | 14:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, my mother did a little domestic work around these White people here in White Plains, but she didn't work too much. She had so many kids. Let's see. Well, we had one cousin stayed with us, and my mother had seven kids. | 14:58 |
Alex Byrd | Seven kids? | 15:20 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Seven kids. | 15:20 |
Alex Byrd | What were your brothers and sisters' names? | 15:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh, okay, yeah. Old Dale, he was the oldest. | 15:25 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 15:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Novella. | 15:30 |
Alex Byrd | She was next? | 15:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right. Beatrice, A.W. Jim Eaves, that's me. Milbert Eaves and Allene. | 15:38 |
Alex Byrd | Erlene? | 15:49 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Allene. A-L-L-E-N-E. And we had a first cousin that lived with him. | 15:52 |
Alex Byrd | It was a boy? | 15:57 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | A boy. | 15:58 |
Alex Byrd | What's his name? | 16:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Charlie. | 16:05 |
Alex Byrd | What was his last name? | 16:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Anderson. | 16:06 |
Alex Byrd | Anderson. How'd he come to stay with y'all? | 16:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, my granddaddy, he— | 16:14 |
Alex Byrd | On your mama's side? | 16:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, my daddy's dad. He worked on a railroad and he go from one place to another, and that's how these other kids come into the picture. But now that's just what I hear, but he never did talk about it. I think he had some kids in Beaver Dam, Kentucky, and I think he had one or two around here. He must have got around quite a bit. Of course, I never did even know him, never did even see him. | 16:18 |
Alex Byrd | He was always moving around? | 17:06 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, moving around. And tell you the truth, I think he was dead before I born because I never did see him. But some of the old peoples, you know- | 17:08 |
Alex Byrd | They'd tell you about him? | 17:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, and he used to run around up in Crofton, some say. | 17:19 |
Alex Byrd | That's where your wife's from, right? | 17:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right, yeah. | 17:23 |
Alex Byrd | So your mother, she did a little domestic work, mostly because there's so many of y'all. | 17:28 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, that's right, so many of us. But my sisters, they done very well because they would do most of the housework when she worked out. But she didn't work all that much. And then again, my mother, she stayed kind of poorly a whole lot. Of course, you take a woman that have that many kids, she had seven kids and wasn't none of them over two years apart because my brother, younger than I am, I think he ain't hardly two years different between our age. | 17:37 |
Alex Byrd | He was like born in '22 or something around there? | 18:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, he was born in, well, you might as well say '22 because I was born in 1920, but it wasn't hardly two years, because his birthday is in March and mine's in April, you see? | 18:21 |
Alex Byrd | So not quite two years. | 18:38 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, not quite two years. | 18:39 |
Alex Byrd | So you think having those children was kind of hard on her? | 18:42 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah. | 18:45 |
Alex Byrd | Having them so close? | 18:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. And you know, you take back there, when women did domestic work, working with those White people, they had to wash once a week plus cook, clean up the house. They had kids, they had to take care of them. And so, it was pretty well a day's work. | 18:47 |
Alex Byrd | And then you got to come home. | 19:11 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's right. You got to come home and take care of your family. I know we had a fireplace, and my mother had a big kettle. Well, it wasn't no kettle, it was a big pot, I'd say. And she'd put those peas in that pot and she'd leave just a little fire on them. And sometimes she'd tell us to make sure it didn't go out, and a piece of fat meat or something like that in there. And that would be our supper. Of course, cornbread, she had a big skillet, she'd come out and make some cornbread, and that's what we'd eat. Of course, we had plenty of milk and butter. | 19:14 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And there used to be a guy down there making molasses. And every evening, he would give us the skimmings. That's the foam on molasses when you cook them. See, when you first start cooking it, it would be green, and when your molasses gets just about done, they would turn red, brownish. And he would take that skimming off and get the molasses, and he'd give us the skimming. But see, after that skimming set overnight, they would be molasses too, you see? | 20:07 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 20:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And they had a little old, it wasn't nothing but just a—It had a top on it and it had trays in there. Be about five or six trays where that molasses would go up and down, up and down, up and down. And when it got into the last one, it would be molasses. | 20:54 |
Alex Byrd | So it was like some kind of filters? | 21:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, no, uh-uh. It was just a flat piece of metal and just say this. You have it in here, move this over here, it would go over here. They had a little old plate, something about along there. They'd raise it up and let the molasses go from one area to the other. But it would go up and down, up and down. When it got to the last one, well, it's pretty well molasses. | 21:23 |
Alex Byrd | It's ready then. | 21:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Yeah, that's right. | 21:56 |
Alex Byrd | So did y'all made all y'all own butter and milk? | 21:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah. See, we had a cow and we used to churn our own butter. We raised our own hogs, and we used to hunt rabbits. And in the winter months, we'd kill so many rabbits. We'd hang them up on the outside, on the smokehouse. My mother getting ready to cook one, she'd go out there and get one off on the side of the building. | 22:02 |
Alex Byrd | It'd already be smoked up? | 22:38 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, just leave them hanging on and do them up there. See, it was cold back in those days. | 22:42 |
Alex Byrd | Oh, okay. In the wintertime, you'd just keep out? | 22:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, just keep, yeah. And sometimes she'd have to cook two, there's so many of us. And man, that meat would just slip off on the bone. | 22:48 |
Alex Byrd | It'd be that tender? | 23:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah, it'd be that tender. If it was old rabbit, she'd pump on it. But a half grown or grown rabbit first year, she could tell. And rabbits, mashed potatoes, biscuits, gravy. Man, that was awful good eating too. | 23:03 |
Alex Byrd | What did your mother cook best? What was some of the best things she made? | 23:27 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | My mother could cook anything, and my daddy was a good cook. He would make hominy. I don't know if you know what hominy is or not. | 23:36 |
Alex Byrd | Yeah, there's hominy grits and there's like— | 23:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, but they made this out of corn. Yeah, okay. He put them in a kettle, and it would swell up. And then it would take the hull out of it, and I liked hominy too. But my daddy, on the end though, after my mother passed, my sister and him stayed up there in the house. And a lot of times he'd get up and cook his own breakfast because he liked to get out early. | 23:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But when my mother died, I just thought the world was supposed to come to an end, and he'd talking about what he was going to do or something around the house. And well, it just hurt me so bad. When you go through something like that, you never get over it. And I think about her now time because see, when she was sick, the last days, I wasn't at home and somebody else got her to the hospital. And I had a little wall back then too. | 24:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, she laid in that bed. We was all around her bed because a doctor told us she had a infected kidney, and he gave her some medicine. Said, if the medicine was effective, she'd be all right, and if it wasn't, you know. And she got to talking, we couldn't understand nothing she was saying. But anyway, while she was talking, looked like to me she was looking right at me, and she would always, "Son, y'all do this and do that." You know how mother is, I guess. But it worried me because I never could understand nothing she was saying. Then I guess maybe month and a half or two months later, I don't know, might have been three months, I had a dream about her and she was laying in that bed just like it was the day she died. And she just kept repeating it, "Son, go to church. Son, go to church." And I remember waking up, jumping up in bed. But long as I live, that stayed with me. Yeah, "Son, go to church." | 25:12 |
Alex Byrd | Did that slow you down some? | 26:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah, it did. Yes, it did. Yes, it did. Yes, it did. | 26:35 |
Alex Byrd | So how old were you when she passed? | 26:42 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Let's see. My mother died in '50—I want to think it was in '56. | 26:51 |
Alex Byrd | About '56? | 26:51 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | '56. | 26:51 |
Alex Byrd | How did you change, or how did you try to change? | 27:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I'll tell you what. See, during that time, me and my old lady's having problems and then kind of domestic problems. See, she was from Crofton, but I'm an outsider. And it was all her big family of them, of her people. It was a big family. But anyway, I was working at the mines and a lot of us at the mines, coming in from work, we'd stop at saloon up there in Mannington, drank a few beers. | 27:08 |
Alex Byrd | In Madisonville? | 27:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, in Mannington. | 28:00 |
Alex Byrd | Oh, Mannington. | 28:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | It's a Christian County, you see. And we drank a few beers. Sometimes it was a little late in the night when I got home. I don't know. We get out around about, I don't know, about 3:30 or something like that. And we'd go over there at this place and drank beer till around 5:30, 6:00, something like that. And I don't know, things just kind of are getting a little worse, and we stayed separated, let's see, I guess about three years. | 28:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | This house wasn't hardly—Well, the house here still needed some work on it. I wasn't finished with it. And she stayed in Texas. She had a cousin that lived in Texas, and she come in here for the 8th of August. And while she was here, she went back to Texas. We didn't have no kids then. Yeah, we did. We had the little girl. | 28:45 |
Alex Byrd | [indistinct 00:29:25]. | 29:23 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | We had the little girl. We adopted the little girl, and anyway, that was during the time, I believe, when Kennedy got killed. She was down there then. But anyway, let me see, I want to believe she was here when my mother died. I believe she was. Yeah, I'm pretty sure she was. She here when my mother died. | 29:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, now her mother, I would go by and talk to her mother, and her mother told me that she was sending her money down there. And when somebody else sending you money, things ain't going on too well. You know what I mean? And finally hearing the girl come back on a visit, and we got together. Me and my daddy carried her back to Texas and she had some furniture down there. But anyway, we rented a U-Haul and brought her back to Kentucky. | 30:04 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And so, I give and she give. Then things begin to work out because, tell you what, I just quit fooling with the whiskey period. I'll drink a beer every once in a while. But see, I got sense enough to know if something is destroying me, I'm going to leave it alone. Only thing that I can't leave alone is cigarettes, and in a small community, if you stump your toe, everybody in community knows it. "Blah, blah, blah, this," and everybody in Crofton just about was kin to her. And I had a friend, his name of Joe Holmes, and we always have been pretty close. But he lived at Crofton. I think my wife's mother had about, I don't know, 10 or 12 sisters, and they all lived up here and all of them was kin folks, you see? | 31:07 |
Alex Byrd | There was plenty of them. | 32:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. And man, if they see me, they'd watch me so they could tell her something. And then my old lady started working for the social service center. They brought a little kid up here, told her to keep the kid until they adopted out. Well, she kept his little old kid, its eyes wasn't even open. | 32:35 |
Alex Byrd | It's that small. | 33:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | It was that small. But anyway, when the kid got ready to leave, she done got attached to him. And then she said she was going to adopt a boy. That's when she adopted Mike, and I believe I was 52 or 54 when we adopted Mike. And kids will bring you closer together too. They will. They'll bring you closer together. | 33:06 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | We adopted Mike, and then all my attention went towards him, you see, you know. And all through school, whatever he did, I was right there. Any kind of sports or wherever he would go, I'd go. We played basketball, whatever game he'd played, I would be there, and most of the time when they go to schools out of town, I'd go. | 33:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So then, let me see, I don't remember now who the pastor was. I don't know. But see, I didn't go to church like I should, but anything I could do for the church, I would do it because it had got so hot, we'd have homecoming at the church. And it was so hot, it's just like walking into a furnace, that hot. So the women got together and said we going to get air in here next year. | 34:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But now before that, we wanted to put a building onto the church. And a lot of the guys know me at the mines, and I would tell some of them, ask them for a donation. A lot of them would offer me cash, and I said, "No, if you want to help me, write a check made out to Barnes Chapel." And I got all kinds of carpenter tools, and Willie Lovins, he's a good carpenter. And we built this addition onto the church. | 35:10 |
Alex Byrd | That thing on the back of it? | 36:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right. We built that, and then we didn't have no air in there and buddy, I mean, it was hot in there. So the women wrote several people who used to live here, and they sent them some money. But it wouldn't hardly buy one unit, and I was in pretty fresh shape. I bought a unit myself, hardly got to install them and then put them in, and Al said we didn't need them. | 36:04 |
Alex Byrd | Didn't need the air conditioner? | 36:48 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | You know what I told him? I said, "Al, me and you been friends a long time, but I don't want to knock your ass off." He said, "But you wouldn't hit an old man." I said, "Yeah, if you got out of your place, I would." I said, "We going to get those air conditioners." And we put them in the church, but see, Al can't stand there. He can't stand it. | 36:51 |
Alex Byrd | Because that's why he'd be over at your house. | 37:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | He can't stand it, see? Well I told him, I said, "If you can't stand that air, just get in the back and we'll turn it down low." But see, just because I can't do something, I'm not going to stop the majority. And one while, him and Willie wouldn't turn the air on. We'd go to church over there and turn the air on. | 37:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So then I started going to church regularly and look forward and was going church every other Sunday. And I don't know, I just, when you get an interest in something, anything going on, you want to know about it. And I make it my business to find out, and whoever the pastor is, I try to work with him. Now this Negro, see, when you live in a small community, a lot of people think they can't be community and just rub you any way they want to. So this guy Wade, I don't know if you know him or not, live in Drakesboro. | 37:51 |
Alex Byrd | What's his name? | 38:42 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Wade. He's a preacher. | 38:43 |
Alex Byrd | Did he preach at St. Paul's first? | 38:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, he lives up there. I think he drived a white Cadillac. Great big dark-complected guy. | 38:48 |
Alex Byrd | And he still lives there? | 38:58 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, he's still there, yeah. | 38:59 |
Alex Byrd | I must have seen him when we went. | 39:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I'm pretty sure. Wait a minute. No. Well anyway, they gave him this church, and he came down to visit me one day. And when he come in, said, "I'm going to write a book not related to Christianity." It puzzled me. "No, I'm going to write a book related to Christianity, but not to Jesus Christ," on that order, some kind, but I know Christianity and Christ is together. And I thought about it, thought about it, then it slipped my mind, and I thought about it some more later on. But if he wrote a book, I'd never hear no more about it. Why would a man come into a man's home and tell him something like that? That's what I couldn't publish about him. | 39:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And then my wife was a trade secretary. And he got to the place, he just took over everything. Come out of the pulpit, write the names down. I mean, he just took over everything. Well, I told Doug Lamb, "Well, if we ain't going to take over everything, he don't need us." So when coffers come, I'd give a certain amount of money. But he didn't have enough money for coffers. | 40:18 |
Alex Byrd | Why he didn't? Okay. | 41:10 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And when you faced that bishop, you better come up with that money. And I wasn't at the church that Sunday, but he told Al and Willie that they owed him some money. Right after that he resigned. At the next assignment, he resigned. Well now, here's the thing about it. I'll treat you right if you treat me right. But see, if you don't treat me right, I just get on away from you because I'll find out. If you don't care too much about a person's ways, just get away from him. It's your ways what affects you. Now you can like a person, but you just don't have to like his ways. | 41:13 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, he went on back direct where he'd been down a time or two since that our pastor been here. But see, he was a first sergeant, some of them said, during Army. Said he can't hardly help himself. He wants to take over everything. I done said, "My guns of war have been old 40 or 50 years ago." | 42:08 |
Alex Byrd | Was he different [indistinct 00:42:42] where these pastors—You came up in the church over there? Was there a difference in how the church was when you came up in the church as compared to when you were grown and in the church? | 42:40 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | My daddy was a preacher steward. | 42:58 |
Alex Byrd | A steward? | 43:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, preacher steward. | 43:02 |
Alex Byrd | What's that? | 43:04 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | He's the guy next to the preacher. And ever since I could remember, we lived next to the church. Preacher would always come to our house first, and my daddy would go up there and make a four in the church every Sunday morning or whenever we going to have church. And when that door opened, he would be right there. And Willie and I, of course they was young, but they would be there too. And we had some more people, they would all come to church. | 43:04 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, my daddy was a will in that church, and he know where everybody lived, everybody was buried in that cemetery. And back then, people didn't have the money to give in church. I seen the time that my daddy didn't have him a nickel or a dime or nothing to give in church. But still he would be there every Sunday. Well, after the war, I mean, he began to make a little more money, and he would give in church. But always how contribute to that church because I always felt this way. That church is in my community and this is where I live. | 43:50 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And I remember when they panel that church, they owed about $300. And I told Al Lovin one day, I said, "Let's pay this bill off." He said, "Okay." So we paid it off because I was concerned about putting a commode in that church. When you got a bill over you, you want to get rid of it. And so, we got rid of that. Then we set out the bill at distant part on the church, and we got it built. That stove in the den, I used to have it over here, and I carried it over to the church. | 44:45 |
Alex Byrd | This stove right here? | 45:40 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, the ones in the church. | 45:40 |
Alex Byrd | Oh, the one, okay. | 45:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, yeah. And I thought something was wrong with it. When a guy come in the house with it, the line was bent flat. | 45:43 |
Alex Byrd | That's why it couldn't get no gas. | 45:57 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Couldn't get no gas. And I bought this stove, and when the guy come up and hooked it up, he said, "No wonder you couldn't get no gas." Then I went back to the guy that sent the guy up here to do the stove, and I think he wanted to give me $50 on the stove. I had used it maybe one winter. But they sent that man up here, he'd been up here four or five times working on that stove. I don't know what he was doing. | 45:59 |
Alex Byrd | But he just wasn't getting it right. | 46:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No. | 46:34 |
Alex Byrd | Wasn't looking at the line. | 46:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, he wasn't looking at the line. So I told him, I said, "Well, you know what? You don't appreciate my trade." He said, "Yes, I do." I said, "No." See, I bought a furnace from him. | 46:35 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And an oven and my furnace went bad one winter and I had a guarantee on it. Then I was out about a thousand dollars for labor, see? And I told him, I said no. I said, "You don't appreciate." That's been oh a year. I guess it's been about a couple years ago. I haven't been back in the place of business. | 0:02 |
Alex Byrd | But can you tell me something about when you started in the coal mines, Mr. Eaves? | 0:33 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. I went in the mine, I guess, let me think a minute. I don't—wait a minute. I guess I was around 18. | 0:54 |
Alex Byrd | Around 18. | 1:08 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | 19 or 18, and they hired me and my brother and my first cousin. | 1:12 |
Alex Byrd | Which brother, the younger brother? | 1:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oldest. | 1:23 |
Alex Byrd | The oldest child. | 1:23 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And his first cousin. | 1:27 |
Alex Byrd | Well, how'd you get that job? | 1:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, the job was down here at White City. Now, the other day when we went to Madisonville, remember I took this back road? And when I hit, well, in other words, I went to back road and over to my right when I turned down there around that truck stop. You remember my truck stop down there around Mortons Gap? | 1:31 |
Alex Byrd | I think so. | 2:04 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well anyway, that road goes on back another way to White City, see, and we'd walk down there. That's the only way you had to go was walking, and there was dirt road. We walked down there. Well, the superintendent needs some extra coal, so he hired all three of us, and we went to work on a night shift. | 2:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | They had cars, I mean, they were monsters too, and you shovel, time you go in there until you come out and had a guy come in there and pull a car out and put your new one in there, you see. | 2:40 |
Alex Byrd | So did you take a shovel with you or they give you a shovel? | 2:57 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, they give us a shovel. I believe they did. Now, I don't know, it's been a long time ago. But anyway, I'm pretty sure they must give it us or sold to it us and take us out of pay, because I didn't have no money nohow. | 2:59 |
Alex Byrd | You's going down there to make some money. | 3:15 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's right, and we worked about, I don't know, maybe three or four months, something like that, and then he laid us off. | 3:18 |
Alex Byrd | Why he do that? | 3:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, there wasn't no demand for coal. | 3:30 |
Alex Byrd | There wasn't no demand. | 3:32 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I stayed around there while, and then I went to Louisville. I come, it's working up there for a construction company. | 3:36 |
Alex Byrd | How'd you find that job? | 3:47 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, they had a union hall where you'd go low. Somebody wanted somebody to work, they'd call in there, see. | 3:48 |
Alex Byrd | Louisville had one of those, or they had one here? | 3:56 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Louisville, in Louisville. See I lived in Louisville then, see. | 3:59 |
Alex Byrd | Did you go up to Louisville to find work? [indistinct 00:04:06] | 4:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, went up there to find work. I hoboed a train up there. | 4:07 |
Alex Byrd | By yourself? | 4:10 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. But see, I had a brother over there. My youngest, Bill, was already living in Louisville, see, Melbourne. | 4:14 |
Alex Byrd | You think. | 4:24 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I had an auntie living up there, and so I went up there. I never will forget the first day, I washed cars all day long up there, 50 cents a car. | 4:26 |
Alex Byrd | At a car wash or? | 4:42 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, just around a garage, wasn't no car wash, just a garage, area where you could wash cars. I believe it was on the outside, you see? | 4:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Then I went out to this local union hall, and Quentin Burkes sitting there and got, I don't remember how many people. We went out there and went to work, and they was building government barracks. I worked for them, clean on up until October in '41. Then I went in service. And after service, I come back through Louisville. But I couldn't make enough money. I was money crazy. Didn't have no money, and the mines were paying more than anybody else there. | 4:56 |
Alex Byrd | You went in the service in '41, came out, and when did you come out? | 5:50 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I come out in last of '45 or first of '46. | 5:53 |
Alex Byrd | When were you in CCCs? | 6:02 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That was before then. | 6:03 |
Alex Byrd | So you was in CCCs even before you, was that after your first coal mine job or before? | 6:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That was before. | 6:11 |
Alex Byrd | Well, what'd you do in CCCs? | 6:12 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, in CCCs, it was Civilian Conservation Corps. | 6:18 |
Alex Byrd | Conservation Corps. | 6:24 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Ok. Down in Russellville, they had this limestone rock. Lot of time we would work on those big rich people's farm down there. We had a little old hammer where we'd break rocks and sometimes we would work on land, trenches and stuff like that, where the water would go year and yonder, you see, and that's what we did in the CCCs then. | 6:26 |
Alex Byrd | Did you work with other guys from around here? | 7:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, because my brother, he come in there later on as I was coming out. See, the pass some kind of law that he couldn't stand there over three years or something like, over 24 months, I believe it was. | 7:04 |
Alex Byrd | That's how long you stayed in? | 7:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, I stayed in 29 months because that law come into effect when I was in there, so they discharged us and took some more. But see right after that, the war broke out, see? | 7:21 |
Alex Byrd | So that's when went to the army. | 7:35 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. But see in the meantime, I come out of CCCs and my brother went, and I believe he come out too, I believe. So you must remember that was in '39. | 7:39 |
Alex Byrd | '39. | 7:52 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | '39. Yeah, '39. | 7:52 |
Alex Byrd | Was there Blacks and Whites in CCCs? | 7:58 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, no, they was segregated. You just had Black, White officers. | 8:03 |
Alex Byrd | So y'all didn't work with Whites at all then, did you? | 8:12 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No. My most dealing with Whites was when I went in the coal mine. Of course, when I went in the mines up there where I work, all your bosses was White, see, and you work with Black. It might be some White guys in there, see, but that was hard work up there. The White man dodged it. | 8:16 |
Alex Byrd | He didn't want a load coal. | 8:46 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, he didn't want a load, and the coal was low, see, about 36 inches high. You'd have some of them in there. But most of them in there, they had the easiest job among, of course, all the work in there was hard. But some of the work was harder than others, you see, but anyway. | 8:47 |
Alex Byrd | Would've been the harder jobs, and what jobs did Blacks not get to do so much? | 9:08 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, bossing, mostly bossing, and belts, see, they have guys walking belts, you see. | 9:15 |
Alex Byrd | They check on the belts. | 9:23 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, and have a little shovel, clean up little spills on the belts, you see, and all the mechanics, they was White, see. | 9:24 |
Alex Byrd | Mechanics kept the belt in order and— | 9:37 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, mechanics, they would work on equipment when it break down, see. And let's see, and they have some guys in there, they didn't have no education, White guys, and they called him a gang leader. He carried several Blacks off and work them, because he was White. Well, he didn't have mine forming paper, so they called him a gang leader, see. | 9:40 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | They'd give this guy a note what they want done. Well, he'd give it to Willie Lovens because he couldn't even read, see. Well anyway, when they swapped superintendents up there, he went to a bigger mines and they put another guy. | 10:23 |
Alex Byrd | This still at White City? | 10:49 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, this is Mannington. After I got out the army, you see, and me and him worked together for a long time. But anyway, when he becomes superintendent, me and him always got along pretty good. So he told me, he said, I told him, I said no. I said, "When you get that position, you be like the rest of them." He said, "No, only thing I'm looking for is [indistinct 00:11:18]." | 10:50 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I said, "I'm going to treat you right." I said, "Time will tell." So when he got to be superintendent, he began to put me on different job. You see? | 11:18 |
Alex Byrd | So until this point, you'd always been loading coal. | 11:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right, at the face of the coal. And he putting me on a, well, first I start working in the fire boss's place when he was off. | 11:34 |
Alex Byrd | That's the safe [indistinct 00:11:51]? | 11:48 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, that was the mine and guy that inspected the mine every morning before we go in, see. He going around about 4:30 or 4:00, inspect the working place. | 11:52 |
Alex Byrd | And he's called the fore boss? | 12:04 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | F-I-R-E, fire boss. He would examine the working places and come outside before the regular shift went in, see, make his report. Well, when he would go on vacation or was off, I was working his place, you see, and so— | 12:05 |
Alex Byrd | [indistinct 00:12:27] at about 30 now. | 12:26 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So uh, they come to getting shorter bosses, guys were leaving there, going somewhere else. Then I began to work extra as a unit foreman. | 12:35 |
Alex Byrd | What's a unit foreman? | 12:54 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's a boss who works on a unit. Each unit in the mines got a number, number five unit, number four unit, whatnot, you see. | 12:55 |
Alex Byrd | So that's a area of? | 13:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right, a certain area. | 13:05 |
Alex Byrd | That's off the main like you was talking. | 13:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right, and so this superintendent, one that put me on that job. | 13:13 |
Alex Byrd | What was his name? | 13:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Whitfield. | 13:22 |
Alex Byrd | Whitfield. | 13:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Wes Whitfield. Then he brought me to the bottom. That's where you dump coal. The guy that was working down there, he quit. | 13:25 |
Alex Byrd | And that's the bottom is really at the top? | 13:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, the bottom. You see, when you go down the slope, when it level off. | 13:46 |
Alex Byrd | That's the bottom. | 13:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's the bottom, and we had a big pit, about big as this house, with a track over it, and the locomotive would come over there and dump cars that they would trip the bottom, the door swing open, the coal fall down the pit. Then they had a belt up under the pit, would carry it outside, see. So I started knowing that and Whitfield left there, and this other superintendent come back. Well, he didn't know I had mine foreman papers. | 13:53 |
Alex Byrd | You already had mine foreman papers then? | 14:37 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 14:40 |
Alex Byrd | Oh well, I missed when you got the papers. | 14:41 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I told you that other day because— | 14:43 |
Alex Byrd | You told it to me, though we didn't get it on tape. | 14:47 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I'll tell you about it now. | 14:50 |
Alex Byrd | These are my notes from the other day. Here you go. | 14:54 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Huh? | 15:10 |
Alex Byrd | I see where you tell me when you started working on the bottom right here. | 15:13 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | You want me to go through that now? | 15:24 |
Alex Byrd | Yeah, tell me how you got to be a foreman. | 15:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I inspected this, worked in this guy's place— | 15:30 |
Alex Byrd | The fire— | 15:36 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | The fire boss, so I came out one morning, the Black boys raised Cain, and some Whites, mostly Black, said he don't have a fire boss papers to inspect this mine. So Whitfield asked me would I go to school and make fire boss appointments. I told him yeah. But in the meantime, why I go to school for one thing when you could go to school for the whole deal, fire boss, [indistinct 00:16:11] foreman, anything found in that category. So I went, made first place papers. | 15:37 |
Alex Byrd | About what year was this? This in the '60s? | 16:20 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Let's see, it might have been in the first part of '70s. Might have been, I think it was, so then I worked back there as a boss. He wanted to hire me as a face boss, but I didn't want to get out the union. I had my miner's pension made, you see. Well, I don't like to put all my eggs in one basket, because one basket, they all break. Then you gone, see. | 16:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I was pretty active in the union, and before that, during that time, now a little bit before that, they brought me out of the mines as a district worker for district 23, UMWA. Well, all that was political, because Ball was running for president, see. So, got one Black, four Whites out of the largest locals union in West Kentucky. So when he got back in office, we went back to the mine, you see. | 17:08 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, after that, they inspected, job becomes circulating around in this area. Wasn't no Black coal miner inspectors, period, see, and they was working for the government. So I took a civil service test, me and another guy, and they said we didn't pass. We just got a little old note from the government saying, "not pass," or I don't know, it's been so long. I didn't pay no attention. | 17:57 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Then about a month, month and a half later, a guy from Washington named Rick Harris. He stopped over here in Madisonville at the Holiday Inn and called me and said, "Eaves," said, "I'm Rick Harris, I'm out of Washington DC," said, "I hear you want to become a federal mine inspector." | 18:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I said, "Well, I was interested in one time." And I said, "I didn't pass the test." He said, "Come over here, let me talk to you." I didn't know him from Adam's apple, and he told me, he says, "Reason you didn't get in, they didn't have no Black inspectors." | 19:06 |
Alex Byrd | They just weren't hiring no Black inspectors? | 19:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, they weren't hiring none. | 19:27 |
Alex Byrd | And this was the '70s? | 19:28 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 19:30 |
Alex Byrd | Goodness. | 19:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Wait a minute. | 19:30 |
Alex Byrd | Or the '60s? | 19:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Wait a minute. Well, let's see now. I believe late part of the '60s, late part of the '60s. But anyway, he said, "Well," he said, "they wasn't hiring no Black inspectors, but if you're interested in it, I'll see that you get in." I said, "Well," I said, "I'm not going to give up my miner's pension." I said, "I'm going to write Tony Ball a letter, and see if it affects my miner's pension." | 19:35 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I wrote him a letter and he, Tony Ball, answered right back and said it wasn't affecting my pension. See I know Tony Ball personally, because when he'd come down here on a visit, I would be on the committee. You see? | 20:09 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I went on in and, well, let me back up just a little bit. When I started working for the district, I had been working about two weeks. I went over there one Monday morning, and district manager told me, he said, "Jimmy, I'm going to have to let you go. The men's can't get nothing out of you. You didn't mess up the barrel fund money." | 20:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Asked me three questions and didn't give me time to answer. Mines on vacation, you see, said when the mines go back off vacation, you can go on back to the mine. | 21:11 |
Alex Byrd | And what's the barrel fund? | 21:26 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, no. Well, I'm going to get to that. And I wanted to ask him a question and he walked out the door. So I was talking to him, a local president, the president of the local union told him about it, and he said there's something else behind him. | 21:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, one Black, two or three Whites got to some of the field workers out the office, told them I had took all the barrel fund money and messed it up. They couldn't get nothing out of me, see, and told them a whole lot of junk. They told this guy about it, Austin, district president, see. So that's the reason he fired me, he said, see, because I think he was getting pressure from a lot of these White guys, because they put a Black over at the work, see. | 21:55 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I wrote Tony Ball a letter, told them that it was supposed to be organized labor. I said, "The man fired me and I don't believe a scab." That's what they call a non-union, a scab but foreman, like that. Well, they sent two international board members in here to investigate it. I went over there, my president committees went with me. | 22:41 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | They didn't make no decision, then Ball had to make the decision, so I left. Out at the mine, one evening I got a call. This guy that was the president over there, they removed him, put another guy in there, see, and I went on back to work over there, see, and that really hurted me. I didn't think a guy would do something like that before you would investigate something. | 23:20 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | See, if somebody tell you something, if you going to act on it, you'd get the details before you act on it. But he didn't, see, and I asked him at that meeting, I said, "How come you didn't act on him?" And he didn't say a word. I said, "I guess you did it because I was a Black." He still didn't say a word. | 23:51 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, they moved him out office and put this other boy. But after Tony Ball got in to be president, we all went back to the mine except one guy and they made him president of a district, 23, you see. But anyway, now I'll get back to the, well, now what did I drop off? | 24:17 |
Alex Byrd | You was talking about how you got to be a miner. | 24:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah, that's right, and Rick Harris is the one called me to be a federal mine inspector, because he said he was going from Washington to Denver recruiting minority mine inspectors. But anyway, I got a letter from Barbersville, Kentucky, said I'd be stationed up there and I told my wife, I said, "I ain't going to no Barbersville," up in eastern part of Kentucky, close to Virginia line. | 24:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That same, must have been the next evening, Rick called me, said, "Jimmy," he said, "I hear you got your assignment," said, "there's a problem?" I said, "No, it ain't no problem because I'm not going. He said, "Well, I'll tell you what," he said, "go ahead and accept it. Let me see what I can do on this end." | 25:32 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So Childers was a district president. Rick told me that he saw him in Washington. See he asked him, said, "How about station Eaves in Madisonville?" Childers told him he couldn't do it. So Rick told him all right. He saw Childers's boss, I don't know, they must have been in the same office or something. | 25:50 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Said he asked him, and said, "Yeah, I'll put him in Madisonville," said, "I'll call Childers now." He picked up the phone, called Childers and said, "Rick got his friend down there in White Plains. I want you to put him in Madisonville district." Childers told him that, "Yeah, I'll be glad to do that." | 26:20 |
Alex Byrd | You think they were trying to keep you out Madisonville? | 26:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 26:45 |
Alex Byrd | Why you think they didn't want you in Madisonville? | 26:47 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, they didn't have none in Evansville, in Indiana, you see. | 26:49 |
Alex Byrd | No Black? | 26:51 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, didn't have none, see, but anyway, Rick said he saw Childers about two weeks later in Washington. So he walked up to him, told him, said, "I was going to put Eaves in Madisonville for a long time." But see, he wasn't going put me down there. | 26:51 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I worked in Madisonville office. Of course, I know the guy that was acting district manager, because he used to inspect our mines, see. He was a guy, had a big belly on the man. He had a hard time in that little old [indistinct 00:27:35], see, and he was from Indiana too. | 27:16 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But I went on and inspect the mines, and see, when you inspecting mine, you don't deal with the little man. You deal with people's got authority. They appreciate they job, and they know if they give you any trouble, you can make it hard on them. | 27:39 |
Alex Byrd | Then was there a difference in working with Whites in the mines before you became a mine inspector and after you became a mine inspector, what was it like? | 28:06 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, those guys up at Mannington, where I worked, when one of them come into mines—most of them are new guys, never worked in the mine before in their lives—they depend on Blacks to learn them. Now, a guy that's been working in the mine, he wouldn't hardly come up at Mannington. He wouldn't do that kind of hard work, see. So if a man depending on you, he ain't get no static from him, see. Now, I'm sure some of them had that in them, but they didn't show it because— | 28:10 |
Alex Byrd | Because the work was hard and dangerous. | 28:57 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Now, that's right, see, and you depend on one another, you see, and one guy in particular, I like the guy. | 29:00 |
Alex Byrd | And it's still over at Mannington? | 29:06 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, and he was bolting the roof. See, your rock is in layers, like that, see. Layer here like that, see. When you bolt them together, it makes it thicker, you see. That keeps them from falling, see. | 29:12 |
Alex Byrd | Keeps the top from coming down. | 29:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Especially miner [indistinct 00:29:28], see, but now you take a place [indistinct 00:29:31] than my garage, maybe 8 or 10 feet thick. Ain't nothing you can do about it but listen for it, because it's going make noise before it falls. Sound just like thunder, you see, and you know it's way up, you see. But anyway, this guy, he was running this bolt machine and got careless. We would put the boats on four foot centers, see, one pinned to another be four feet. Anywhere you go, you see, be four feet. | 29:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, he's running about six feet apart. And I said some to him, I said, "Now, you getting these pins too far apart." See, he was going in the place and pining. We come in behind there with the cutting machine. We cut the place and after we get out, the guy go there and shoot it. Then you loading machine go in behind him. | 30:06 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | In other words, it's a rotation. You go in there and do your thing. A guy behind you going in and do his thing, you see, and the last man in there is a loader, and he cleans up the place. He's just, he's circling all times. And he got hostile with me, and he was a White guy. | 30:36 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I told him, I said, "Well," I said, "Now, if you don't pin to suit me when we go in there, we'll put a timber." That's just a straight leg with a head and [indistinct 00:31:10], and you wedge it up to the roof, you see. But anyway, about two or three months later, piece of rock fell on him was as big as this couch and paralyzed him from waist down. | 30:58 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | He went to the hospital and stayed in there for a good while. Every time I go to the hospital to see him, he comes crying, see. He know he did that on his self, you see. But he want to hurry up, get in a place and get out and sit and wait on somebody else to go in there, do their thing, you see. But I mean I felt sorry for the guy, but I don't know whether he did it intentionally or just ignorant. Then again, you find some guys, they don't want a Black man tell them nothing, you see. | 31:22 |
Alex Byrd | Was there ever trouble in the mines you worked in between Blacks and Whites? | 32:02 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I guess once, about, let me see, shit, I guess it's been 30 years ago along. We were riding in cars, going into work and this motor jumped off in the track, see. And this guy was sitting in the car, in other words, always was sat down flat, where if something happened you could brace yourself. A lot of guy would just sit up right. | 32:10 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But anyway, the motor jumped off in the track, and this guy fell over and here hit the car and commenced the bleeding, see. This guy told a guy operating the motor said, "You was going too damn fast." And a guy said, "I wasn't." And he said, "You was," and this White guy said, "You feel the other way, do something about it." | 33:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Then the [indistinct 00:33:33] from him, I believe it was, said, "Hold it right there," said, "I don't want to hear no more." Told them, "Stop right there." But the guy that got his ear hurt, he told the foreman that he wanted to go out and go to the doctor. That's the only incident that, to my knowledge. | 33:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Now, we had one face boss. Nobody at the mines didn't like him. The superintendent didn't like him, and well, he didn't come up through rank, see. What it was, his daddy, a big shot in Crofton, and just took him off of the belt, put him over mens, you see. And I didn't like him and the superintendent didn't like him. He didn't like the superintendent. They get into it all the time. So he come down on the bottom where I was and— | 34:03 |
Alex Byrd | This was back when you was working— | 35:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | At Mannington. | 35:00 |
Alex Byrd | At Mannington. | 35:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Find something on the bottom, and he had me doing, see I had a whole lot of leisure time sitting around, see. He didn't like that, see. So he told me one evening, said, "In the morning, before coal begin to come into the bottom, I want you to go out there and clean up on that slope belt." | 35:12 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I couldn't even see the slope belt from where I was working, see, so the superintendent had to go to the big office that morning to a meeting. I asked him, I said, "This slope belt's pretty dirty." I said, "You reckon I can come out shovel on a little bit?" He said, "No, man, no way. Don't ever leave that pit." Said, "Something hang up down there," said, "mess up the whole run." And he was right. | 35:38 |
Alex Byrd | That's what the superintendent tells you. | 36:11 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But this mine foreman want me to go out there and shovel on a belt. So we got walkie talkers in the mines, and so when he got up in the works, I was on the bottom. He called me over the loudspeaker. I know the superintendent was going to Madisonville and he said, "Eaves, you been on that slow belt yet?" | 36:13 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I didn't say nothing. Said, "Do you hear what I said?" I said, "Yeah, I heared you." He asked me again. I said, "Well, I got news for you." He said, "What is it?" I said, "The superintendent told me you didn't have a damn thing to do with me. Your job was to get that coal down here to me." Everybody in the mines heared it. People on the outside heared it, see. | 36:35 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And to cap it off, when I started inspecting mines, I'd go to his unit. Well, we had about five or six inspectors knowed him and didn't like him. We go to his unit and burn his butt. District manager asked me, he said, "Jimmy," he said, "how did you and Johnny make it when he was at Mannington?" I said, "Not worth a damn." He never sent none of us back out to that mine where this guy worked, and the guy finally died. | 37:03 |
Alex Byrd | In the coal mines? | 37:49 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, he didn't die in mine. He died after got laid off, because the mine closed up. But better, I stuck it into him rough, see, now see, he was denied that. He told me to go out there and shovel on that belt, see. | 37:55 |
Alex Byrd | Did he act like he hadn't told you? | 38:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, he would've done. He was that type of fellow, see. See, here's something, but nobody don't like you in the mine. See something badly wrong with you, you see, nobody. I told superintendent one day, I said, "Well," I said, "I don't know what you going to do." I said, "Johnny ain't speaking to you." He said, "Well, I'll tell you one thing, if that coal quit coming out of that mine, I'll speak to him." And he meant it too. | 38:09 |
Alex Byrd | [indistinct 00:38:37]. | 38:36 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, he meant it. | 38:36 |
Alex Byrd | Why do you think in the mines there was so a little trouble between Blacks and Whites? | 38:38 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I'll tell you what, when you in the mine, you got your own thing to do, you see. In other words, say if you were drilling, see, drilling the coal, you go in there and drill. All right, well, when dinnertime come, you all sit down and eat dinner together. But see, you working, and where you have trouble when people ain't working. They got time to shoot the bull, you see? | 38:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But them guys over, as I tell you, most of them is the first time they've been underground was at that mine, you see. And most all of them was farms, come off from farms, you see, and they was hardworking guys. In there, you go in there and you would do your work. See now, that was on the bottom. I guess I worked about, I guess if you put all my work together, I didn't work two hours a day. | 39:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Uh-uh. I didn't work two hours a day. I had a seat just like this, and I would reach up and press the button just like that. That's right. Then I was getting time and half a half an hour every day, because see I wouldn't stop for dinner. Because if I stopped for dinner, the pit might get full, so he told me, "Well, we just give you time and half, see." But my goodness, and I'd press a button, tell the guy on the outside, "Start my belt, bins full of coal." See, then on the end, they had another belt was dumping into that pit. See, all I do was sit there. | 39:56 |
Alex Byrd | You had a good job. | 40:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Sure, I had a good job, and there was a ceiling was high as this was. I couldn't even reach the ceiling. | 40:47 |
Alex Byrd | So it wasn't one that was low. | 40:52 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Nah-uh. See, what to do to shoot out. See they shoot out several areas in the mine you see. | 40:55 |
Alex Byrd | Down at the bottom, it's the highest ceiling then [indistinct 00:41:03]. | 40:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | See in other words, just like they going to, well, see, if they going to work on equipment, see, big equipment, they would go in the mine and shoot out area room and put a overhead hanger, where they could take stuff out of machinery, you see. | 41:09 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | See, they would make those areas in the coal mine, you see, and that's where it was on the bottom. All your cold come in there, you see, and I had chairs. See when I went down there, it was just as filthy as it could be, loose coal, coal dust everywhere. I went in there, I told the superintendent, I said, "I've been getting me some rough lumber, because people come down there when I'm working, they just in my way. | 41:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I fixed these seats where they would be back out of my way. You see, and I guess to tuck a lot of month and a half. I fixed seats up there and [indistinct 00:42:16] dust it. It was just as white and clean, back in there, for the guy to go back in there. When they waiting on the man trip, they go back in there, sit down, you see. | 42:03 |
Alex Byrd | To rest. | 42:24 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yes. Had a lawn chair. It was where you could—You see these yard chairs with high backs to them? | 42:28 |
Alex Byrd | You can sit back on them. | 42:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. I fix one down there, and the general manager come in mine one day. I hear the master superintendent say, "What you doing with a chair like this in here?" He said, "That fellow over there built all these chairs." | 42:37 |
Alex Byrd | You got to make the [indistinct 00:42:55]. | 42:47 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, and every time he come in the mine, he'd grab that chair too. | 42:56 |
Alex Byrd | One of those big ones? | 42:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 43:00 |
Alex Byrd | Was it different between Whites and Blacks out of the mines? | 43:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh yeah. You see some of the guys that you've been working with, and if they by their self, or they speak to you in the count, have a little conversation. But if their wife was with them, they looked the other way, they wouldn't see you. But now if you had your wife with you, he's all up in your face, you see? | 43:06 |
Alex Byrd | In White Plains itself and in around White Plains, was all of it mostly segregated? Where could Black folks go to eat and stuff like that? | 43:40 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, it was segregated to the T. Well see, let me see. They had one or two restaurants, you could go in there and buy something, but you didn't sit in there and drink. Of course, I was so small and I think they had a little beer or something, maybe under the counter that they—But see White Plains, I don't think they ever sold whiskey in White Plains. Nothing but bootleg whiskey, you see. | 43:51 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | We had a little incident here once though. Used to be a swimming hole down this way about, well, it was on that road we went to Madisonville, back here somewhere. I don't know if you remember or not, but it's a creek down in there. | 44:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And I learned how to swim with a gallon bucket. A gallon bucket that had a lid on it so it wouldn't sink, you see. We learn how to swim in the pond. But anyway, you go down that creek, when you get in it, it's about 10 feet deep, you see, and you'd jump off it and go back into it, see. That's where we'd swim. The White boys would swim down there, you see. | 44:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And sometimes wouldn't be over two or three of us, but then it'd be 10 or 12 of them, maybe more, they'd be down there swimming. This particular time we was coming away, and they was fixing to go in, and they ganged up, was going run us away from down there. And a guy by name of Lewis Drake, he picked up a stone and throwed in the bunch and broke this guy's wrist. Well, his daddy was a big wheel here in White Plains. | 45:15 |
Alex Byrd | The White boy that got his arm broken? | 45:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. His daddy was a big wheel, see. Well, his daddy know my daddy. My daddy had been trading with him for years. Well, just about all the people here in White Plain trade with him, see, and he know all these Black people, and he know his son, see. They thought he was going to do something. | 45:55 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | He told him, said, "Well, I know those Black boys out there," and said, "They wouldn't bothering none these White boys." Because where we played ball, it used to be a little big ditch down there, water in there about a foot deep. We used to play in that water, see. I was real small then, see, wasn't another word said about it, and then had a cow pasture out there. | 46:27 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Now, this boy was a little older than I am, but he had a brother around my age. And we played ball together— | 46:59 |
Alex Byrd | And you was talking about being out on the cow pasture where you used to play ball. | 0:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, we'd play ball. We drank out of the same—Somebody would go get a bucket of water. We all drank out of it. And then used to be a lot of springs around here. Well, water coming out the ground, you know? | 0:06 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 0:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And people just had these old—I don't know if you ever know that. It was something they called a gourd. | 0:23 |
Alex Byrd | Yeah, I know a gourd is. | 0:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh, you do know what that is. | 0:32 |
Alex Byrd | Think it's a dipper, right? | 0:33 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, that's right. Yeah. | 0:33 |
Alex Byrd | Yeah. | 0:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's right. (laughs) You tell your age after a while. (laughs) | 0:35 |
Alex Byrd | I've been talking to people older than me. | 0:38 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Around these springs, they'd have several of them hung up around there, and the people would get them and look at them and see which one looked the best. Then they'd drink out of it. Yeah, I used to drink water out of a stream, running through the woods. But man, and I wouldn't even think about it now. Yeah. And all of this out front it was woods. | 0:45 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 1:08 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | All of this was. And then this guy live across the street, me and him growed up together, now. | 1:09 |
Alex Byrd | Is it a White guy? | 1:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | White guy? | 1:19 |
Alex Byrd | What's his name? | 1:20 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Russell Moore. | 1:21 |
Alex Byrd | Russell, okay. | 1:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Mm-hmm. | 1:21 |
Alex Byrd | He's what's named that street named after him. | 1:23 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right. | 1:25 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 1:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And he would treat you right, if he knowed you. See? And me and him growed up together. He knowed me. But a Black guy that he didn't know, he'd burn his ass. And he worked at a strip. He was a superintendent at a stripping outfit, see. He had a boy driving a truck for him. This was on the side. It was his truck, see. He had this boy hauling coal for him. Well, he got rid of his trucks, but he never did put this Black boy to work in that pit, see. And the boy left here and went to Detroit. | 1:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | It was in '50, I believe it was, '48, or '49, or '51. I went over there trying to buy me a truck, and I need $100. He come in there, and I told him, I said, "Loan me $100 for a few days." He said, "What are you going to do?" Said, "I'm going to buy me a truck." And he wrote me a check for $100, and I bought the truck. In a few days, I paid him back. | 2:28 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But now, another Black guy run into his fence up there one day, and he was drinking. And he called the law. And they come up there and arrested this guy. I told him, I said, "That guy was one of my friends." He said, "Well, son, if I had any idea that you knowed him," said, "I never would've called on the law." | 3:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I went to his mine one day, on surface. And they was hauling dynamite on a little old Jeep, see. He wasn't there, but he come there before I left. And he asked me, said, "Is it anything that I should know," if somebody had told him, "that I don't know?" I said, "Yeah." I said, "Now, you know what's going on." I said, "But I'll let you go ahead and correct it because you're here," because I was fixing to burn his ass, you see. | 3:32 |
Alex Byrd | That's when you was inspecting? | 4:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right. | 4:17 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 4:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. But he got to the place he's just crazy about money. He bought a tiller, which tilled up, a little old garden tiller. I think he give 12, 13 hundred dollars for it, and didn't raise nothing but it's about a five or six hills of tomato. So I said to him one day, I said, "You know what, Russell?" I said, "That's kind of stupid." I said, "You spent 12 or 13 hundred dollars for some damn tomatoes, and all you had to do is stick them in the ground." You know he got rid of that tiller the next week? (Byrd laughs) But that was stupid! He didn't raise nothing but tomatoes, you see. | 4:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And then, one day, he come by and told me, said, "I just come from the doctor, and the doctor give me a clean bill of health." It's just six months later, he was dead with a cancer. Yeah. | 5:03 |
Alex Byrd | Well, how did Black folks who came through here from other places, how did they get treated by the Whites here? | 5:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, didn't too many peoples come here, see. But number one, I remember guys working on railroad, I mean, working on the highways, building roads. Now, they would come in here, but most all of them would be out of deeper out of the South, see. | 5:24 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 5:53 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Like Mississippi and Alabama, see. Well, they know the score, you see. | 5:54 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 5:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | See? And they'd come in here, and they'd get acquainted with some of these women. Then they'd jump up and marry one, you see. | 6:00 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-mm. | 6:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, same way about Greenville, see. I know two or three guys was heavy operator equipments. They come in here and start working, and they married some girl up there in Greenville, see. | 6:06 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-mm. | 6:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And all them guy that would come in here, seemed like they was gifted with talent because most all of them could do anything, you see. But as far as come in contact with the White, they never got no call because the man they're working for, he would be White, you see. | 6:23 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 6:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But other than that, see, I tell you, most trouble they have had was over there in Madisonville. See, them people over there, a lot of them are big shots, and they'd get these Black boys to take care of their yard. What like that, see. Then next thing you know, they be going with the man's wife, see. Now she'd have to make the first move. See a man know that if he going to get hung, or shot, or killed, he ain't going to make no first move, see. | 6:46 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 7:28 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And one guy in particular, he was going with this woman. And every time they'd get together, it would be in her car. And when he wipe hisself, he sticks the hanky down under the seat. And they got him one day, and she hollered rape, you know? And he told them that he had been fooling with her and where he had put the hankies under the seat. They went and pulled out all those hankies. But still he had to leave town, see. | 7:29 |
Alex Byrd | But they ain't kill him. | 8:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, they didn't kill him, see. | 8:05 |
Alex Byrd | Was this back in the '40s or '50s? | 8:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No. Let's see. I guess it was in the '30s, I guess. Yeah, that's been a long, long, because I was real small. That seemed like, back in those days, now, I don't know exactly, but it was fresh, they hung two guys over at Madisonville. I used to hear my daddy talk about it. Said peoples come from everywheres to see that hanging. | 8:12 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And one of these guys had a wife. She was pretty as a speckled pup. And the judge said, "Anytime a man got a wife looks as good as that, he ought to be hung, to fool with a tramp." He called this White woman a tramp, see. And she hollered rape. And the guy had been going with her the whole time. | 8:44 |
Alex Byrd | This was two guys, right? | 9:06 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, two of them. Mm-hmm. Both of them been going with her. And seemed like, to me, there was some White, I mean some light-complected Negro girls, yeah. I can't remember. I remember the White guy that done the shooting. And this Black guy was going with this girl too. She was a Black girl. And this guy said they got into a fight, and some guy said, "He just took his pistol out and shot this guy," because he'd gone out with Black girl, see. And this guy was a foreman on the railroad, see. And he didn't want this Black guy going with her, see. | 9:08 |
Alex Byrd | Why? Because he liked her? | 10:00 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Mm-hmm. | 10:02 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 10:02 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Now see, I don't even, I remember the woman, and I remember the man done the shooting, but I don't remember the Black guy he killed, see. Now see, I guess that was in the '20s, I guess, because I used to hear older peoples talk about him. | 10:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And one Black woman, she had church. We had church over here. Man, and she come out there and shout from now on. She come in the church shouting. And there she was living out there with a White man. And, well, I didn't know what was going on. She had a little, old building there. | 10:27 |
Alex Byrd | When you were a little kid? | 10:55 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. She had little, old building out to the back, and that's where she's supposed to have stayed, see, because he was single. But her daughter built a house down here. Oh, I guess it was about a half a mile from here, on down the road. And he lost that house out there, where he did live, see. And he built this house for her daughter and him, all the way up, sometime, hell, he'd go down there and spend the night. Yeah. And hell, I was— | 10:55 |
Alex Byrd | And everybody knew about that? | 11:36 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, everybody know'd about it, but me, till I asked Brother about it, my oldest brother, see. | 11:37 |
Alex Byrd | Uh-huh. | 11:42 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Her name was Aunt Nanes. I never will forget that. One day, she come in the church and just a shouting. She was a heavyset woman too. She'd jump up and down. The church get to shaken a little bit. | 11:43 |
Alex Byrd | When you was coming up, were there Blacks who lived around here, and some who thought themselves, you know how folks get a little bit of money, or they get a little bit of something, and they start to separate themselves, or think of themselves as—Were there ever classes? | 12:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Mm-mm. | 12:17 |
Alex Byrd | Like folks who thought of themselves as an upper class? Or— | 12:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Mm-mm. | 12:21 |
Alex Byrd | Not around here, in White Plains? | 12:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No. I'll tell you what. All the guys made pretty good money, and one guy in particular. Well, he called himself a Eaves. He went in his mother's name. He was supposed to have been a Littlepage, see. | 12:23 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 12:47 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But he was born in wedlock, so he went in his mother's name. We always called him Uncle James. Well, he cut coal in the mine, see. Well, he would work every day. See, the kind of work he was doing, he was making territory, making the mine larger, you know. | 12:48 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 13:10 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's why he had to cut coal. So he works about every day, and I think he had pretty good money. But the bank, I'm going to mess it up. See, back in those days, they didn't have no— | 13:11 |
Alex Byrd | Insurance? | 13:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Insurance. | 13:24 |
Alex Byrd | I see. | 13:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Nothing, see. And my dad said he lost pretty good money at that bank. Some of them seemed to think, after that, he was burying his money. See? But now, he was a regular guy and carried a big .38 on him, most of the time. | 13:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | You had little old place down here, called Crossroads. And they went down there, got some whiskey. I think he was driving a Model A or Model T. I don't know. Was back in those day. Some guys were going run him out of there. He put this .38 on them. Man, they fell away like fly. And before they could get home, the police stopped them in Nortonville. They done called them. | 13:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, the police knowed him, know that he doesn't never bother nobody, unless somebody trying to bother him. So they stopped him and talked to him. I think that even police was drinking with him. And then he come on home. | 14:16 |
Alex Byrd | Was these Black guys who was trying to run him out? | 14:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, they were the White guys trying to run him out from down at the Crossroads. | 14:39 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 14:41 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | See, they went down there and got some whiskey, you see. | 14:42 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. And they was trying to run him out— | 14:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 14:44 |
Alex Byrd | —and he pulled that gun on them. | 14:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | He pulled that gun out on them. Yeah. I remember is he had a son about my age. We used to take the bullets out of that gun to fool with him. Had one of them long barrels on it. | 14:46 |
Alex Byrd | Was it any different in, say, like Earlington or Madisonville? Were there classes of Black folks? Or you think it was about the same as it was here? | 15:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No. In Earlington, see, you had school teachers and preachers, see. | 15:16 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 15:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | They rated theirself over the Black level. But see, they couldn't go too high because they had to deal with the Black. Do you see what I'm talking about, see? | 15:21 |
Alex Byrd | Yeah. | 15:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But on ordinarily, they would want to look down on you, see. And the principal of the Black school, his name was Mims. I guess he was principal down there for years and years and years. They got one of the nicest church it is around there, in Earlington. They still take up good money. | 15:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Because I belong to Shriners, and one of my friends died down there. Well, when somebody died down there I know and pretty well, I always go down there to the funeral. And see, I got a lot of people down there, see. | 16:00 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 16:27 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Now, my grandmother daughter had a daughter, and see, she married a guy living down that a way, and see. Shit, I guess she had six or seven kids. And she had one boy. I know he got about eight or nine. And shit, they got kids scattered all over Earlington. Some of them, one or two of them around my boy's age. And Earlington was kind of a knitted town too, see. | 16:30 |
Alex Byrd | What kind of town? | 17:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Knitted. | 17:07 |
Alex Byrd | What's knitted? | 17:08 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Close together. | 17:10 |
Alex Byrd | Oh, okay. | 17:11 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. The White guy wasn't going there and starting no stuff. Yeah. And they paid the police there. | 17:11 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 17:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Police come by, he'd get his cut. Everybody down there want to sell a brand of whiskey. They're selling. So when the police come around, you give him his cut, see. Yeah. Yeah. | 17:19 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Coal mining camp. That coal cutting man, most of the time, they didn't have no money, but anything else you wanted, you could get it down there. And them Black boy really dress, man. They looked dressed just like guys in the big city. Didn't have a penny in their pocket. | 17:32 |
Alex Byrd | And still be dressed sharp. | 17:59 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Yeah, they got anything you want, furniture, clothes. | 17:59 |
Alex Byrd | That's at that big company store— | 18:05 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Right. | 18:06 |
Alex Byrd | Western Kentucky. | 18:07 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | West Kentucky. Back in those days it was called St. Bernard, Bernard Coal Company. | 18:08 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 18:13 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But now, it called West Kentucky. And see, West Kentucky sold out to Island Creek. | 18:13 |
Alex Byrd | Island Creek. | 18:21 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. And Island Creek finally sold it to [indistinct 00:18:26] Clinic. | 18:22 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 18:28 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's who owns it now. Of course they tore a part of it down. | 18:28 |
Alex Byrd | I remember when we was at the bank, you shown me where the store is. | 18:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, okay. Yeah. Okay, yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. | 18:35 |
Alex Byrd | Well, Mr. Eaves, I don't want—I could keep you here all evening. | 18:39 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh, yeah, man. | 18:42 |
Alex Byrd | But I don't want to keep you here all evening. | 18:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I ain't got nothing to do. No, I don't have nothing but go to bed. So— | 18:43 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. Because I got lots of tapes. We'd be here all day. | 18:50 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 18:53 |
Alex Byrd | But what I usually do when I stop, or toward the end. Well, you've seen me stop toward the end, so you know what I usually ask folks. | 18:56 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Yeah. | 19:02 |
Alex Byrd | About just looking back over those days, what advice or words of wisdom you could leave with people? | 19:03 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, when I was growing up, things was pretty rough. I always thought that, well, when you a kid, you acted as a kid, see. | 19:13 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 19:38 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And I'd eat, and I would stay hungry most of the time. And— | 19:40 |
Alex Byrd | You'd stay hungry? | 19:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, I would stay hungry, see. And I always felt I'd starve to death, when I was real small, see. And the house we lived in, in bad shape, and I always felt this way. I said, "Now, if I ever live to be grown," I said, "I'm going to make it my business to live in a decent house." I always said that, see. | 19:44 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But see, my daddy was a good guy. He was well respected in this area, and people liked him. But see, my daddy was a type of fella, he never would venture out. He'd always wait until things come to him, see. | 20:10 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 20:33 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I'm always a little different. I'd ask the guy, you see. "How about letting me do it? How about this and this," see. And when I first went on a job in Louisville, I worked for this contractor, Whittenberg Construction Company. Well, I don't know if you know what a Georgia buggy is. | 20:35 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 21:01 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Got two wheels on the side. And they hired me, and I pushed this Georgia buggy up to the cement mix. Well, I didn't know, see. I didn't take it out. I thought he going to shut the concrete off. Pour it in there. Well, he filled it up. I couldn't even move it, man. When I backed it up, but I did back it up, it lifted me up off from the ground, see. | 21:02 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And then that guy put me with a—I think I cried that day. He said, "I ain't going fire you." He put me with a carpenter helper. And well, I was eager to work. And the carpenter, well, carpenter told the boss, said, "You know what?" Said, "He's a good guy, but he's just a little bit too eager for me." He said, "I can't even relax." He said, "I didn't want to come back to White Plains, man." So he put me with a concrete finisher, and I got to the place, man, I could finish concrete good, you know. | 21:33 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 22:18 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So I getting [indistinct 00:22:22]. And then made a concrete finisher or foreman on the job. Then he let me finish concrete with him. We were working on theater, these Army theater. We putting in floor, you know. | 22:20 |
Alex Byrd | Okay, that's local? | 22:36 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, uh-huh. Yeah, back there. I was working there when I went in the Army. And now, my pay got up a dollar and quarter an hour, man. | 22:37 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 22:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Shit, I said, "Lord, have mercy." Then the Army started fooling with me. And didn't nobody tell me. I just figured we was going to Fort Knox, which is only 30 miles from Louisville. That morning, went to the post office. They examined us in the post office. Got out of the post office, went right straight down Sims Street to the Station, got on a train, crossed the Ohio River into Indiana. I said, "That's funny. We going to Fort Knox. Fort Knox the other way." Now, nobody hadn't told me nothing. Okay. | 22:46 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 23:26 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And they don't just draft them for a year, see. We stayed around there two or three days, and one evening around four or five o'clock, they said, "Pack your bags. Getting ready to move out." Now, I know I'm going to Fort Knox now. We got on the train. I was setting up there comfortable, and I says, "Something's wrong." And I went to sleep. When I woke up, the train was parked. No, yeah. But we rode three or four days, see. and I know wasn't going to Fort Knox. I woke up one day. Hell, we was in Texas, one morning. | 23:27 |
Alex Byrd | He's older now, Mrs. Eaves. | 24:11 |
Elcie Eaves | Have we got— | 24:11 |
Alex Byrd | I think he's about— | 24:11 |
Elcie Eaves | Have we got to seventy? | 24:11 |
Alex Byrd | —20-something right now. | 24:12 |
Elcie Eaves | I'm a— | 24:18 |
Alex Byrd | He was in his 50s. | 24:20 |
Elcie Eaves | Oh, wonderful. | 24:22 |
Alex Byrd | So we almost, we almost there. He went back. We in the Army. | 24:22 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 24:25 |
Elcie Eaves | Yeah. Oh. | 24:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 24:25 |
Elcie Eaves | Have you finished? | 24:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | We said we called you, didn't we? Didn't we say we'd call you? | 24:26 |
Alex Byrd | [indistinct 00:24:34]. | 24:34 |
Elcie Eaves | I never knowed you said you'd call me. | 24:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 24:34 |
Alex Byrd | It's almost, we closing out. | 24:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 24:34 |
Elcie Eaves | Okay. | 24:34 |
Alex Byrd | So we've got to get you to the 50s. | 24:34 |
Elcie Eaves | Because I won't be that long, because of my life hadn't been that long. | 24:45 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Now, I look back at my life. It could have been worse. | 24:55 |
Alex Byrd | Well, you didn't tell me what you did in the Army, though, Mr. Eaves. | 24:57 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Oh. When I was in the Army, we was in a chemical well, we was in a chemical well fire. And we wore those impregnated clothing, and it was grease, you know. | 24:58 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 25:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | [indistinct 00:25:29] related to gas. That's— | 25:29 |
Alex Byrd | Did you have to go overseas? | 25:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No. Uh-uh. | 25:29 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 25:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | No, we was on maneuvers in Tennessee and was on a night problem, and the guy run off the road, over a cliff. That's what they said, because, see, I was knocked out. I got a compound fraction in this leg and a lick over this eye. And when I come too, some guy had my leg held up high. They was taking a picture of it. And I'm got a compound fracture. See? But anyway, three guys got killed. | 25:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | So they sent me to Nashville, to their general hospital that was out there at [indistinct 00:26:16]. I stayed out there, I don't know, pretty good while, because every time I'd see that doctor, I'd have my stick, see. And they would send sawdust with little screws out there. You saw them out, see. I done forgot what they paying us a hour, see. But I'd buy two or three carton of cigarettes and take them in town and sell them for $10, see. | 26:11 |
Alex Byrd | That's when you was in the Army? | 26:46 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 26:47 |
Alex Byrd | Oh. | 26:47 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. And man, I was popping in Nashville too. They had three clubs up there. Oh, Dr. Summer. One day, I went to a dance one night, and some joker stole my stick, see. And Dr. Summer, the next day, I was without that stick. He said, "You look like you in pretty good shape." | 26:51 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Man, next, I was in there, now. Man, next thing I know, I got on a train that I went to Camp Lee, Virginia. Man, those guys soldiered up there. Yeah, they soldiered man. I was exempted from doing that [indistinct 00:27:36] and leggings all time, big old helmet and, oh, all. | 27:15 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And next thing I knowed, I was on a train going to Florida, Camp Gordon Johnston, Florida. And they put me in Amphibian Force down there. And that outfit was fixing to go overseas. I had been in the Army a pretty good while, then. And they began to let them out on points. So I talked to the company clerk. I said, "Don't look like I'd have to go overseas. The time I get over there, they'd have to ship me right back. I'd have my points over there." So he— | 27:42 |
Alex Byrd | The war was over? | 28:15 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Just about, see. | 28:15 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. | 28:15 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Mm-hmm. So he said, "Well, I'll check into it for you." So, oh, First Sergeant called me. He said, "No, you won't have to go overseas." Because he had been overseas, you see. | 28:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But I never forget. See, peoples is people. Old dentist had been in the Army I don't know how long. And I got some teeth broke, you see. And he asked me what theater was I in, see. I told him, I said, "I haven't been overseas." Man, he said, jumped back and said, "What?" I think that booger tried to hurt me too. And I was surprised, see. He was a commissioned officer too, see. | 28:32 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 29:09 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | And he asked me, he said, "How come you didn't go oversea?" I said, "I'd just go where they sent me." Well, I think that made him madder. | 29:11 |
Alex Byrd | So you managed—How long was you in there, man? About four? | 29:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | I was in about four years and two months. Yeah. | 29:25 |
Alex Byrd | Well, you did all right. Yeah, brother. | 29:34 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, I done about four years and two months, and yeah. No, I never will forget that old dentist. He practiced just out at Peckerwood too. When I was in that hospital, a lot of those, I seen two or three pilots that was in that hospital, from Tuskegee, you know? | 29:35 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. Those Black [indistinct 00:29:56]? | 29:54 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. Mm-hmm, yeah. I talked to one of them and seemed like, to me, he was from Owensboro. But he seemed like he was a friendly guy, though. But you know how it is when you're a officer. We probably come in contact there, maybe we sitting down beside the side on a bus, going into Nashville, or coming back, something like that. You sit down the side of them, you know, you could talk to them. But— | 29:56 |
Alex Byrd | Mmm. | 30:26 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | —meet them out in the streets, you just let them go ahead on, you see. | 30:27 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 30:30 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, mm-hmm. When I come out of the Army, I had one gentleman. And see, I got a first cousin. Her daddy and my mother was brothers and sisters. And her husband, he was the one-star general when he was in the Army. He been out, now, about—Well, he's in Texas. Yeah, he's in Texas. I don't know what he doing. And I saw him once, that's when his wife's mother died. Because he had on his uniform down at the funeral. And when I was in the Army, they just had one Negro there, and that was Davis. | 30:34 |
Alex Byrd | Yep, Benjamin O. Davis. | 31:17 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. But man, they got a bunch of them in there now. | 31:19 |
Alex Byrd | Oh, yeah. | 31:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 31:25 |
Alex Byrd | You know, they had Colin Powell. | 31:27 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 31:27 |
Alex Byrd | And he had four stars. | 31:27 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, see, well, I done forgot about him. Yeah. | 31:28 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. He's a big man. I saw him once. | 31:29 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | You saw him in person. | 31:32 |
Alex Byrd | Did you see? | 31:32 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | You did? Yeah. | 31:32 |
Alex Byrd | Oh Mr. Eaves, he's big. I didn't want to like him, either, because I didn't like old George Bush. | 31:32 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 31:43 |
Alex Byrd | And I knew that Reagan had appointed. So I didn't want to like him. And it was at some, it was a Jefferson Award ceremony. And he walked in the room, and he's about 6'3". And he's broad, and he's lean and tall, just a big man. And he gave a little speech. And you couldn't help but like him, by the end of it. And you know, someone come into the room and they just become the center of the room? He was like that, just everyone just deferred to him. | 31:43 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I'll tell you one reason, see. I know that he had to be outstanding, see very outstanding. Because see, you got a whole lot of White Jones, and he picked him. | 32:15 |
Alex Byrd | Right. | 32:28 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | See. And he had to be outstanding, you see. And before I even saw him on the TV, I hear some White guys talking about him. I was down there drinking coffee, down at Nortonville. They wasn't even talking to me, and they said they got a Black Jones. Said, "He's sharp as a tack." Yeah. And then I got to [indistinct 00:32:56]. Then I saw him on TV several times. And then, again, he seemed like he was a friendly type guy. But I knowed he had to be outstanding because I know Bush and Reagan. See, I didn't like Reagan and didn't like Bush, you see. | 32:29 |
Alex Byrd | Mm-hmm. | 33:15 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | But I know for them to go down through the rank like that and get a Black man, see, he had to be great, see. Yeah, he had to be great. | 33:16 |
Alex Byrd | And he is. | 33:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah. | 33:25 |
Alex Byrd | Okay. Well, I better finish up before Mrs. Eaves— | 33:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well— | 33:25 |
Alex Byrd | —would make you leave. | 33:25 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Okay, then. Well— | 33:31 |
Alex Byrd | But wait a minute. Let me unhook you. | 33:31 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Okay. | 33:32 |
Alex Byrd | You forgot to say your closing thing. You know how I usually ask you to, you just got to say your closing piece of advice to folks who could be listening to this tape a long time from now. | 33:32 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Well, I'll tell you what. To make it in this world as things are today, keep your mouth closed and your eyes open. Whether we like it or not, it's a White man's world. He control everything. You couldn't even eat breakfast in the morning, wasn't for him. But I always believed this motto. And Christ told each peoples, "Why do you want to be first? Because the first shall be last." So that's it. | 33:47 |
Alex Byrd | That's good words to live by. | 34:35 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | That's right. | 34:35 |
Alex Byrd | Thank you, Mr. Eaves. | 34:35 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yep. | 34:35 |
Alex Byrd | I really appreciate it, not just this interview, but everything you have done since I've been here. | 34:39 |
James T. "Red" Eaves | Yeah, okey-doke. | 34:45 |
Item Info
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