Hettie Love interview recording, 1995 August 02

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Doris Dixon	Mrs. Love, could you state your full name and date of birth please?	0:01
Hettie Bailey Love	My name is Hettie Love. My birthday is May the 3rd, I was born in 1931.	0:04
Doris Dixon	And where were you born?	0:14
Hettie Bailey Love	Here about five miles from Itta Bena, Mississippi.	0:19
Doris Dixon	And what are some of your earliest memories of having grown up in Itta Bena?	0:27
Hettie Bailey Love	My earliest memories, the first day of school I entered the first grade and Mrs. Allen was my first grade teacher.	0:31
Doris Dixon	Mm-hmm.	0:41
Hettie Bailey Love	And there were several of us, and some of them are still here in the community, and she was a very good teacher. She was the story reading type, first graders, and she introduced you to all kinds of things like outside, watching a worm, we call them baits. She would tell you to talk about your parents, and Christmas, and things like that. I thoroughly enjoyed first grade and my friends.	0:42
Doris Dixon	Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Go ahead.	1:23
Hettie Bailey Love	And the next is, I guess it's growing up in Itta Bena. Everybody in this community, especially the older people, was the person that kept you in line in Sunday school, if you misbehave, they either straightened you there, or told you, "I'm going to tell your mom." And so therefore you were raised in a way by the community, because everybody was your friend or disciplinarian. And that's about it for experiences of growing up, the church and the community.	1:33
Doris Dixon	Can you recall the greatest joy or sadness of your childhood?	2:19
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah. There was a little boy in my first grade class I never shared, they walked about, I guess five miles here to LCT, and we were running and playing one Friday evening. And at that time, pneumonia, I done forgotten what they called it, a five day, eight day pneumonia.	2:24
Doris Dixon	Mm-hmm.	2:44
Hettie Bailey Love	That day we played, and played, and I always thought, how you have boyfriends, playmates. And he went home, and he died with pneumonia before the next Monday for him to return to school. And I think that was the saddest day of my life to lose a classmate, or at that time I thought my little boyfriend.	2:44
Doris Dixon	Mm-hmm.	3:10
Hettie Bailey Love	He just died, like someone just left and I was sad. I think that was the saddest day.	3:10
Doris Dixon	Now what would they do for people when they got sick in those days?	3:20
Hettie Bailey Love	Most time your grandparents worked on you with certain salves, and hog hoof teas made from the hoof of the hog. And they did have some doctors in the community, but it was home remedies mostly, and they did have doctors. I don't know whether they carried him to the doctor, it was too late or what. But that's how most medical problems was handled.	3:24
Doris Dixon	Do you remember some of the remedies? You mentioned.	3:53
Hettie Bailey Love	Yes, I had the chicken pox, and there was an old gentleman and I know you noticed the little scar here on my forehead, I think he burned some eggs, and hog fat or something and put on there. That was one of the remedies for chicken pox.	3:55
Doris Dixon	Did it help it?	4:16
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, I guess because I got well so far. And she would use what they call Vicks salves a lot if you had a cold to rub your chest, and warm flannel clothes to wrap your throat up, and you drank tea. I don't know exactly, I know corn, they used the corn husk off of the corn to make tea for different complaints that you have.	4:21
Doris Dixon	And you mentioned the greatest sadness. Do you remember the greatest joy of your childhood?	4:55
Hettie Bailey Love	I had quite a few, but the greatest joy I think was participating in the first operetta that we had. And I think I played a daffodil or something. I remember having long black stockings, and being so frightened when you'd walk out on the stage and all the people were looking at you. But yet it was the best thing that had ever happened to me. I think that was my greatest joy.	5:01
Doris Dixon	You were a daffodil?	5:35
Hettie Bailey Love	In the operetta.	5:38
Doris Dixon	At school?	5:41
Hettie Bailey Love	School play.	5:41
Doris Dixon	Did they have school plays regularly?	5:42
Hettie Bailey Love	Usually it was at the end of school, around some holidays, but most of them were at the end of school.	5:46
Doris Dixon	And did you participate in any other ones?	5:53
Hettie Bailey Love	Yes. Each grade for instance, you had the primary.	5:58
Doris Dixon	Oh right.	6:02
Hettie Bailey Love	And as you got older you participated more and more, singing and what have you.	6:04
Doris Dixon	How were your parents or grandparents involved in your education?	6:11
Hettie Bailey Love	I think my grandmother was the first teacher, because I had my mama and father. But I stayed with her most of the time. I was how you just grow up. And so she started out, she would make biscuits, and she gave me the dough to pat, or make crackers off of the biscuits. I think she was the greatest influence in my life, even though I loved my mom. But I was a grandmother's kid. And she was a person that she could take very little and make it appear to be great, the best thing ever happened to you. The joy of knowing her, and she taught me how to be creative, watch things. She even taught me how she would have her own garden, and she allowed me to have a garden. She would give me the seed.	6:16
Doris Dixon	As a young girl.	7:14
Hettie Bailey Love	A little girl, and she started, I was five or six years old, and everywhere that we lived, each house that we moved in, she always planted fruit trees and gardens. And she was one of those kind of neighbors, if I had it, you can have it too. She was always conscious of those in need about her, didn't care how small amount she had. She shared it. And it was just a great feeling. She made you feel like you was worth $1 Million, you might have tears and wanted something. She'd always tell you, "I'll get it for you, one of these days." And, "Oh, shut up and don't cry for that. You can't need that." She wasn't that type of person. Little things meant a lot to you.	7:23
Doris Dixon	You mentioned that she could do a lot with a little?	8:10
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah.	8:11
Doris Dixon	Do you remember some examples?	8:11
Hettie Bailey Love	For instance, if we were living out in the rural area on a farm where groceries were scarce at time, she could go in the kitchen if she had just a small amount of lard and flour, maybe meat, salt pork or something, she could cook the meat and get the, we call it grease, out of it. And she would take the grease and brown the flour, make a gravy, cook some rice, and she's got biscuits, fried pork or meat and gravy for the rice, and you had a whole meal. That was it.	8:17
Doris Dixon	Did she ever tell you— This is your mother's or your father's mother?	9:15
Hettie Bailey Love	This is my mother's mother.	9:18
Doris Dixon	Did she ever tell you about some of her experiences, or share any stories with you about her life?	9:25
Hettie Bailey Love	You mean with her parents?	9:34
Doris Dixon	Mm-hmm, or in general.	9:36
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, she did. I never shall forget, her father was named Elliot Mallard, and he was born I reckon right after the Civil War. And she would always tell us about how he told stories to them about what happened when the Yankees came, and she related she had several sisters and one brother, and she looked at her father as a very cruel man. That is the time that he would use a whip, what you whip the cows and things to discipline them. And this hurt them very much. He was real mean. But I think her mother was the person who carried and kept the family together. He loved them too, but he just didn't have the feeling that of love for small children. He thought he should just discipline. "I'll beat you for everything or ever wrong." That he thought was wrong.	9:37
Hettie Bailey Love	Yes, and I knew all of her sisters ,and they were kind and made you a warm family. You could spend the night, and I never shall forget, I had one named Hattie, and we all called her Aunt Coo. Aunt Coo was a disciplined person in that family, "And if you done something wrong, I'm going to tell your mama to whoop your behind." But she didn't mean to be mean, she just wanted you to be the very best that you could be. And so I never shall forget, one day my younger sisters, and they always liked to lean on my grandmother's lap, and Coo thought you, well you weren't somebody, because she didn't have children like my grandmother there. My sister Bonnie, they didn't like her. But I loved her because I like for people to be straightforward, and tell the truth and if you needed it, you got it.	10:48
Hettie Bailey Love	And she said, "I just can't stand Aunt Coo, because she never wants me to lean on my grandmother, and she shouldn't have the say so. If we want to lean on and she want us to hang around her neck, then we can do it. Mama I said want us to do this, but Aunt Coo wants, "Get over there and sit down." She wanted the attention. I think that's what it was. Yes. And all of them are buried out at the Wright Cemetery in Attala County, Mississippi. And when you walk through the cemetery families, related family, cousins who's buried there. She was from a big family.	11:52
Doris Dixon	What about your father?	12:38
Hettie Bailey Love	My father was James Bailey from Montgomery County, which is Winona and Kilmichael, and he was a loving daddy. We lived the Delta at first where I was born, and they moved to Berclair, which is down the road. He was the dad if he went to the store and he would buy me something, it had to be a piece of candy, or a delicious apple or some kind of treat. And he had real long legs, he was tall, and he would always put me on, I could sit on his lap, and he'd pull out whatever he brought me, and it was a joy. He was a very quiet, gentle person. He had a lot of sisters and brothers too. And I'm named after his youngest sister. Her name was Hettie. Yes, and after, during I guess the migration from the south, we moved to Memphis, and that's where my mother and sisters live now. He passed away. He's deceased.	12:39
Doris Dixon	What year did you move to Memphis?	13:59
Hettie Bailey Love	I couldn't tell you but it ought to been, was it '41 when the war was? I would say it must have been about '41 or '42.	14:03
Doris Dixon	Did you go to school there?	14:14
Hettie Bailey Love	Yes, I went to elementary school in LaRose. And high school at Booker Washington.	14:15
Doris Dixon	But you had started down here?	14:30
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, that's at LCT. I think I was about six or seventh grade.	14:32
Doris Dixon	When you went up there?	14:40
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah.	14:40
Doris Dixon	Do you remember any differences between the two schools?	14:40
Hettie Bailey Love	Yes. Because down here you see they weren't on the same level. For instance, we had two grades. You usually had first grade, second grade, and beginners in one classroom. And by being I say in what you call it, considered seventh through ninth is junior high. That's where I ended up at LaRose. I can remember that I was promoted because they always thought I was somewhat, they call them smart kids. And so I covered all the material they had for the first and second grade, and he promoted me to third grade in which I was where the other children were, a little bit smarter. The difference was when I got to LaRose, it was a two or three-story building, classes was more like what we had in high school or junior high after you finished the eighth grade.	14:50
Hettie Bailey Love	I never shall forget the English teacher was Miss Elizabeth, and Ms. Golan was my social study teacher. And we had to memorize certain things in social studies for instance, I can't recall but it was the, oh, what was it? The Bill of Rights. And each time you accomplished a certain goal or objective that you got to sit on the other side of the class, and the one who had not completed what she wanted you to do was in one group. And as you completed it, then she'd move you over with the other group. That was the difference. Whereas everybody that was here, you more now just went one way. It wasn't challenging like the schools in Memphis, and that was the difference.	15:56
Doris Dixon	And you mentioned memorizing things for social studies. Did you have any Black history in those days?	16:51
Hettie Bailey Love	Yes, because most of it I think was centered around Booker T Washington, Tuskegee, because I think that was the learning center within the south. They had accomplished a lot back in the forties. And we did have some of the older boys that went from here to Tuskegee. And so when they came back into the community, naturally everybody wanted to say, "Oh they been off to school." And we thought it was the other side of the world. We didn't know what it was, but they were big shots. Yeah, it was something to look forward to, or to motivate you for learning.	16:57
Doris Dixon	How many years did you spend in Memphis?	17:42
Hettie Bailey Love	Let's see, I was about nine or 10, and I married Ray when I was 15, so that was about six years. Let me see, I completed the what, the seventh, eighth, because I graduated up there, and went to Booker Washington ninth, 10th. And I married when I was in the 10th grade, so about five, or 6, 7, 5 years, six years, somewhere in that. And I came back and completed high school.	17:46
Doris Dixon	Here?	18:22
Hettie Bailey Love	In Itta Bena, Valley was just starting. I went back to school at LCT, and then father about two years after I went back to school, then Valley started, because it started in LCT. And I've always wandered into things to see what summer school, at that time they had summer school, and I went up and took the GED test. And Mr. Ford who was the over director said, "You know what? You made one of the highest scores on the test that it was." And that encouraged me to go on to Valley, take night classes, and just start teaching. We had [indistinct 00:19:13] supervisor at that time, night classes, teaching in the day, babies. Sometimes I'd get up at three o'clock in the morning to complete my assignment while the babies and Ray was all asleep. And I continued until I got my BS degree, I was teaching full-time.	18:23
Hettie Bailey Love	Then after I finished that, the supervisor of Special Education in Greenwood, I happened to end up in a speech correction class in her class, and she said I had taught at Parkland City for 17 years. She said, "Would you like to try special education?" She said, "I tell you what. If you come and work a year and you don't like it, I'll let you go back to your original job." And I stayed over there 23 years in Special Ed. I also got my master's degree from Delta State University during that time, and I retired teaching. I have really had an exciting time.	19:32
Doris Dixon	Now in the six years or so that you were away from Itta Bena, had it changed much?	20:19
Hettie Bailey Love	No, not really, because see I was 15 when I came back, and no more than we weren't in war or anything. Some of the older people had passed away, but we still had the same churches. Most of the people were still right living in the same houses. Cotton picking was still going on, farming area. Everything was almost just like it was before I left. We didn't have TV. But when I came back, I think I saw one television in Memphis riding the bus, but it hadn't reached down this, well because they were just in the beginning. It hadn't changed. And it hasn't changed really no more than everything is modernized with TVs and Valley, and they travel a lot, and it has changed somewhat. But some of the older here, we are descendants of the ones that lived here before.	20:29
Doris Dixon	And now when you came back, what neighborhood, what community did you live at first?	21:46
Hettie Bailey Love	I lived with my grandmother, which is, I was on Al Thomas. Ray and I met when we got married, our first home was this little house right here on the corner. And so—	21:52
Doris Dixon	Of what corner.	22:06
Hettie Bailey Love	Of Douglas and I believe it's College, that is the house that three of our kids were born in. The churches all have been, I'd say renovated, or toned down, and new churches are built. But basically it's still the same community, same ideas, but more modern, because we built this house and we're still on the same land within sight of the house that we lived in when we first got married. And we've been here oh, 40 years, because my my youngest son is 39.	22:07
Doris Dixon	You've been at this site for 40 years?	22:53
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, he was born in this house right after we finished, Randy was born.	22:56
Doris Dixon	Same house?	23:03
Hettie Bailey Love	This same house. We added something to it, but it's basically the same house.	23:04
Doris Dixon	And was it brick when you lived here?	23:11
Hettie Bailey Love	No, after Ray and I retired, then we had it renovated and put the brick. It was just a four room, I call it a little veteran housing. The first part, the part down, it was just four rooms, two bedrooms, what you call a living room and a kitchen. And we added this part, and we renovated the whole thing when we retired, within the 40 years. What was your first job? My first job was cotton picking. Wait, that was the only thing in this area. Cotton chopping and cotton picking. I'm one of those that when you hear about when Ray and I first married at 15 or 16, I could pick 200 pounds. And my grandmother never required me to chop a whole day. But after Ray and I married, I earned my first money by chopping the whole day. And I think that was a dollar a day.	23:13
Hettie Bailey Love	And the next job I had was teaching, after Jimmy, Ray wouldn't let me teach the first year, because I had to be away from, I had two babies close together. Jimmy and Albert, I think they're a year and three months apart. And then I would have to transfer way down as I said the boondocks, which is way away from home, I guess about 12 or 15 miles out in the country at a church school. But my first school, it wasn't a church school but it was as far I could go and come at the regular time. Say we'd go in the morning about eight o'clock, and get out about three. And most time here in Itta Bena they had several people that transferred teachers to the rural areas and the different schools, therefore you could come home and I could be with my babies.	24:19
Doris Dixon	And what school was that you worked at??	25:13
Hettie Bailey Love	Pittman Chapel.	25:16
Doris Dixon	And how did you get there?	25:19
Hettie Bailey Love	Mr. Welton transferred teachers in his car, we had very few cars in town, and he would take us to school and he probably would drop me off at Pittman Chapel. And then we had another one right across, I'd say about five miles in another church. I can't think of another church now, that we all could ride together. And he just delivered us like people do, to the different sites. He had one room school houses, and I taught with another lady, Mrs. Marie Marcus. We were in a little church, that was Pittman Chapel. She was the principal and I was just the teacher to help her. And we sat on benches, and had heaters that you had to go out and get wood for, and make fires. A lot of the children had to walk to school, and some days it'd be raining and when they get there they'd be soaking wet.	25:22
Hettie Bailey Love	And so we had to warm them, and dry them, and then teach them. And the White kids was riding on the nice school buses, they might want to spit on you, or say, "Nigger, nigger, nigger." They had to cope with that.	26:19
Doris Dixon	This was in the fifties you're saying?	26:38
Hettie Bailey Love	Mm-hmm. You see they had everything, and we only had a building, and my first salary there, I made $100 for one months work. And then it gradually got better, the salaries and the conditions, and then they built new schools. And then a lot of them was transferred from the little church schools to LCT because this was the center in this community for Black schools. And they had one in Morgan City, they used to call them Rosenwald. That was the next best school, and it was about three rooms and then everybody could be on their own.	26:43
Hettie Bailey Love	You had the older children in one room, and maybe the intermediates, say fourth through sixth grade in another room. Which was better than having everybody sitting on a bench, and everybody doing everything. The Rosenwald was next, and then they Consolidated, which they call LCT. Consolidated meaning they brought all the children in to this center. And then you had your first grade, your second grade departmentalized that way.	27:26
Doris Dixon	Now how many years were you at Pitman Chapel?	27:59
Hettie Bailey Love	Let's see, I guess it was about two or three years. And then I moved to Lake Henry, which was a Rosenwald school, and that's where they had the classroom and a separator. There were three of us there. And the next the [indistinct 00:28:04] supervisor who was the Director of Education here, walked in and said, "Well you going to Itta Bena?" And that's when I cried, because I thought about everybody had a degree up here, I was almost getting mines from Valley. And she said, "Well you've done such a nice job, I want you to go."	28:04
Hettie Bailey Love	And I told my husband, I said, "I don't want to go, I want to stay out at Lake Henry and boohoo." But the next morning I was ready to go, and Mr. Ford was the principal, and I walked up in there and I stayed there until I guess about two or three years, they had built LS Rogers on the campus, and they moved all of these children to LS Rogers and they moved to high school students to Amanda Elzy. And I went to Morgan City, which was Ray's, and it was a large consolidated school, and that's where I spent 17 years teaching first and second grade there. And I moved from there to Greenwood for 23 years.	28:39
Doris Dixon	After Morgan City. You went to Greenwood?	29:21
Hettie Bailey Love	Greenwood, yeah.	29:22
Doris Dixon	For 23.	29:22
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, that's when the Director of Special Ed had asked me to come over and if I didn't like it, I could go back to Morgan City.	29:23
Doris Dixon	Now you mentioned that the teachers in Itta Bena all had degrees.	29:32
Hettie Bailey Love	They came from Alabama. See Mississippi was very slow on certifying, I imagine the White teachers had them. By building a laboratory school out there here, the [indistinct 00:29:36] supervisor was in search of people with degrees certified in teaching. Then they made surveys, I guess all the higher learning institutions like Alabama, and Arkansas, Arkansas was lower than we were. And they brought those teachers in from Tuskegee, and different colleges and things and that's what they had here at LCT. Most of them was degreed, Alcorn, you see you had all Alcorn and Jackson State, and they were in teacher education too. And so they did it exactly like they're doing now, trying to find educators with degrees and certification, and that's why they brought them in.	29:36
Doris Dixon	Now what lessons or what values that you had picked up from your teachers did you try to get carried over to the way you operated the classroom?	30:34
Hettie Bailey Love	One value I picked up, I don't know whether I picked it up from them, but that the children was the most important part of teaching, and how you touch them, or they responded to you as another human being. That's the first quality of teaching anybody I think. I think my grandmother did more for me and how you deal with other human beings than any teacher in college level and things. I like the way they approach academic or subject matter on the college level, because I've always been a person to search and look for things that help me to be a better person for communicating.	30:51
Hettie Bailey Love	I think you have to feel another human being, or a child or you're a teacher, I don't care where you are. When you get not Black, not White, not gray, whatever, you need to be a human being first. A person who can touch another person, or soothe another person when they are so upset they just don't know what to do. And then you become a teacher, just like Christ. The same skills that you are taught in the Bible in other great leaders, are the same tools to be a great teacher.	31:49
Hettie Bailey Love	If you put I'd say criticism, hostile feeling towards another human being, you can't be his teacher, because first place you're going to turn him off because you don't respond. But like you and I are sitting here now, you are a teacher for me, and I'm a teacher for you because both of us like each other. You see what I'm saying? And not I'm going slap you on the face or say something, "Well how come you didn't comb your hair?" You have to approach people from different backgrounds with different feelings. I don't think it's something that you learn from another teacher but from another person to be a great teacher. That's the way I see it now.	32:29
Doris Dixon	Did you often come across children who were from a variety of backgrounds?	33:21
Hettie Bailey Love	Always. Anytime you open a classroom or play a game, you're going have a variety of all kinds of humans. Those who have been loved and feel worthy of themselves, those who've been beat or denied. Mothers didn't love them. Live with the cruel grandmother. They bring all their fears, and all their feelings that they have with them. And so first you got to be a person who looks at the person, or they look at you to be an accepting person. You know what I'm saying? And you can't be a teacher and not have a sensitivity to the individual you're trying to instruct, and you can't have preconceived ideas either.	33:26
Hettie Bailey Love	What he's going to be, what his mama wasn't nothing, and his daddy wasn't nothing and he's not going to be. And especially if you White, ain't going to deal with us. Because you've taken everything away from whatever you going to try to do. That's just my feeling about it, and I haven't had a kid yet that I couldn't find the very best within that child to make him feel great. I don't care if it's nothing but a scribble on the line. If that's his best, you brag on him and you become a good teacher.	34:21
Doris Dixon	Now you said that when you first started you were making $100 a month. Were there jobs you paid better at that time?	35:00
Hettie Bailey Love	Not for Black. It was the top. And school teaching in this area was, everybody thought the teachers were the very best people.	35:11
Doris Dixon	How were teachers expected to conduct themselves outside of the classroom?	35:20
Hettie Bailey Love	Well, you had to be proper. What the community expected of you, you didn't dance and you didn't have a good time. You was just like at the old western, how they always thought that she had to be locked up behind doors, and she could never love anybody. She had to just be proper, whatever the custom was within their community.	35:28
Doris Dixon	And was this the reality of how most teachers [indistinct 00:36:02]?	35:57
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, they put them on the top. Well yeah, unless it was done in the dark and nobody knew about it. But during those times you had specific rules you didn't break.	36:02
Doris Dixon	Were there any cafes?	36:17
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, child.	36:17
Doris Dixon	Were there taverns in Itta Bena?	36:17
Hettie Bailey Love	Honey, yes, Saturday night we had Mr. Mayard Burn, the best fish fry, and tavern, they called them jukeboxes, Seabirds at that time, and they danced, and they had parties and yes. And my granddaddies had them breakdowns. Yes.	36:24
Doris Dixon	What's a breakdown?	36:40
Hettie Bailey Love	Dancing, and gambling, and doing the trucking, I guess just the same way we are now on a different level. We didn't know what the titles and things. Yeah.	36:47
Doris Dixon	Now did you ever participate in any of those things?	36:59
Hettie Bailey Love	No. My grandmother was always, "You go to Sunday school, you go to church." We had hot birthday house parties and things like that. No, but see I was still a little kid when I married Ray.	37:04
Doris Dixon	Even as a young adult, you didn't too much go to?	37:19
Hettie Bailey Love	To house party? No, I never what they call it cafes and things. No more than if you stopped in there, your cousin was cooking at that cafe, and they was cooking hamburgers or something in there. But yeah, I would go in for that, but not dancing like most people did. But if you was a teacher, you had rules and regulations, and they had trustees that watched to see who was going in and out your house. Unless he was going in and out and didn't tell anybody. But yes.	37:23
Doris Dixon	Now who were the trustees?	37:57
Hettie Bailey Love	People in the community, I remember Mr. Jenkins was a trustee. I guess they were appointed by the White superintendent of people who had property, or worked in the church and things like that of the school. And they decided who the principal or the teachers, they would hire them. Just community people.	37:59
Doris Dixon	They I guess took on upon themselves to monitor what teacher did?	38:27
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, well when you in churches and in community, you just got some leaders affairs. It was a Sunday school. I had more education within the community that would be appointed to these different, because a lot of times they would be trustees at the school, and trustees in the church, the deacon board and things like that. They were just the learned people in the community.	38:32
Doris Dixon	And what kinds of things did your mother, grandmother, or even your father teach you about how a young lady was supposed to act?	38:56
Hettie Bailey Love	I think going back to my grandmother, there were certain things that was unheard of, and your grandmother just told you, "Well ladies don't do that." Or you look at the people who was thought so well of and pattern yourself within the community. You wore your dress a certain way, a certain length, you wore your hair a certain way, and if the party lady used to frequency the parties and juking they call it, she had a certain style. And you just didn't imitate those people that they had been selected. She likes to dance, and she smokes, and she drinks.	39:10
Hettie Bailey Love	But the church people didn't believe that, so you patterned yourself after what they thought was best in the church. And not at Susan's doing the trucking, and the dancing, and the jitty bugging, and the hanging out and the boyfriends and things like that. They had the standard in the church that you went by, because she was a Christian or whatever, and they knew Ms. Suzy over there that loved to go juking, and dancing, and gambling, and boyfriends and things. They were the one that set your standards with them.	39:54
Doris Dixon	You couldn't dance, or drink?	40:33
Hettie Bailey Love	If you did it would be just in a house party, you wouldn't go to the cafés, and hangouts, with juke joints and things like.	40:36
Doris Dixon	But you could dance?	40:43
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, you could dance in my church. Now some churches didn't allow to dance.	40:44
Doris Dixon	Were you Baptist?	40:47
Hettie Bailey Love	I am Baptist, we shout.	40:48
Doris Dixon	When you were a young girl, could you dance?	40:52
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah.	40:54
Doris Dixon	That wasn't ever?	40:56
Hettie Bailey Love	No. Uh-huh. I belonged to the Scouts in Memphis. I won a dancing contest, child. You did the dance that was stylish and stuff, didn't do the splits and you could dance with boys, but you just had a certain way, certain things you just didn't do.	40:59
Doris Dixon	Like what?	41:17
Hettie Bailey Love	Well I guess it's, what could I say it was? You wouldn't just be hanging around a man's neck, just all yes, your boyfriend would kiss you the proper way, hold you and whatever. Sex was thought of as something degrading. Yet it's the basis for all human life, and you just didn't get sexually involved before a certain age, you're going to get married. Or you didn't have children out of, what you call it?	41:18
Doris Dixon	Wedlock?	41:58
Hettie Bailey Love	Out of wedlock was thought of, a lot of them was born and they turned out to be their sisters. They go off and had their babies and come back home, and the mother said, "Well this is my sister's baby." They wouldn't say that, "This is my daughter, this is my grandchild, this is her little sister." It was unheard of. They hid it, but it was still a fact just like it is now. A lot of custom that we fought [indistinct 00:42:27], that was a tradition.	42:01
Doris Dixon	I guess I was interested in what things specifically they told you, or your grandmother might've said about behavior, and what you talk, how you dressed, and those kinds of things.	42:35
Hettie Bailey Love	She did. I'm trying to see, in those days and time, we do principal about the same things as other youngsters did. I can remember what they call, what you call it? It was a holiday, but everybody said Mayday back in those days, you could wear shorts, you had a lot of fun with games and things, but ordinarily you didn't go to school with short pants on. You might wore overalls or something that covered your whole body. But that particular day, Mayday, you could wear shorts, and your blouses and play games. But other than that you didn't wear shorts to school and things. That was a difference then and now, and now they wear short shorts any place they want to for young girls and things.	42:48
Doris Dixon	What were you told about being a wife? What did it meant to be a wife and a mother?	43:53
Hettie Bailey Love	You didn't have a baby one day until, you weren't involved in sex until after marriage, and you didn't do that was one of those things. You waited to have sexual relationship until after marriage. They stressed that even though nature says it's not true all the time, you can say what you're not going to do, but when nature takes over, you forget all of it. You see what I'm saying? And that's what I tell them now. We can say, "No, you're not supposed to do that." But it's even stronger. I don't care what you say. If you are in a certain position, you're going to give in. The main thing is teach you how to protect yourself. That's one of the things.	44:00
Doris Dixon	What were you told about being a good wife? What it meant to be a good wife?	44:48
Hettie Bailey Love	What it meant to be a good wife, that you love your husband, that you could sit down and when you have problems, talk it out, and not cut him to death or runaway or go home. I have never left Ray, not a single night, because I think we are the two people that really, if you get angry, you can separate for a while and we can come back and discuss it. And you have to give in a lot of times you think you are right, so that you can think sensible and plan what you can do. And not, "I'll go, I'll leave. We'll get a divorce." In 48 years of marriage, there's a lot of give and take. But basically we have always loved each other from nine years on, to my age of ninety years old. And we've been together, what is it? 48 years.	44:52
Hettie Bailey Love	But it's a lot of give and take, and marriage is a lot of giving and a lot of taking, and not anger and destroy. It's better to separate, but I've never been away from him. That's about marriage. It's to really looking at what is important, what's right now, or the confusion, or the things that hurt each other, or whether you can stretch enough to encompass life. But I think the success is the giving and the taking, and the going when you're really in tough times of something that hurts, that you need to be together, then you need to be together to solve the problem. And loving your children and let them see this in you. And then when they are having a bad time, don't put the—	45:53

Hettie Bailey Love	I'll tell you and I'll tell you can't take sides with that.	0:01
Doris Dixon	What kind of change a little bit—Can you tell me something about the kind of leisure activities—	0:08
Hettie Bailey Love	That I like?	0:14
Doris Dixon	Well that you like, but that were available in this area?	0:15
Hettie Bailey Love	Leisure activities.	0:19
Doris Dixon	Let's say before the sixties back in—	0:21
Hettie Bailey Love	Okay. Leisure activities. Let's see. Club work is one of the things. Church activities is another. We have a beautiful lake and it's a lot of fishing. That's leisure. Valley has provided us with a lot of leisure activities like Christmas, musicals, bringing in talent. I mean people who's involved in theater, having art exhibits, involvement of the summer program for youngsters when they're out of school. Feeding programs, park activities, shopping, boys' clubs in Greenwood. What else did we do? Class activities from Leflore going to Washington. Trips, going on tours. Let's see what else? Greenville, it's not too far and it's the next largest, Indianola When they have something they let this area know and a lot of students by going to Valley and just this whole community is involved in almost any activity that you would like to go to be in or provided for. So travel, we just have everything that culturize you, I call it.	0:23
Doris Dixon	Now, during segregation were the activities available were they different? Was there a difference back in those days?	2:21
Hettie Bailey Love	Days, sure. Because the difference is segregation separated people. A fence in the schoolhouse. You had Black school, White schools. Now the only thing that you really see that you can't really say that everything is segregated yet you know it's there. You see what I'm saying? Because you are free to participate in almost every activity that's offered for leisure. You going to be right there. There's going to be somebody there.	2:31
Doris Dixon	And that wasn't always true?	3:06
Hettie Bailey Love	True, no. Because you had your own and they had theirs. But now almost every activity is integrated.	3:07
Doris Dixon	Now you mentioned the cafés and you mentioned club work and the church. Were there separate gathering places for men and women?	3:18
Hettie Bailey Love	In the church?	3:29
Doris Dixon	No. No, no. In the community. I mean, I guess I'm just trying to figure out who did what. Were there separate things that men did versus what women did?	3:32
Hettie Bailey Love	Baseball. We used to have it here in this community. Yep. Men only was on the baseball team. But now you see you have softball and women that want to play baseball. So I don't think it is, they're probably still doing it on the college level that it's segregated. But we used to have a lot of fun playing. In church, no, we right there together. We have lady ministers, men—	3:40
Doris Dixon	I mean not now back in the—	4:14
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, well see. Women wouldn't allowed in the pulpit in those days only to be a speaker or something and that was one way of being segregated, separate. Club work. We had men club. I belonged to a principal, a women club now. In the classroom, we all be together so far as instructors and stuff. I can't just—But back then, yeah, most things was separated into men and women, I guess. Even on the side of the church. I could remember the ladies had their corner and the men had theirs. And you definitely go up in the pulpit unless you belong to maybe Church of God in Christ. I don't recall the lady, but I guess she read the Bible while the man "Amen" to it or chanted back, but they weren't allowed to get a message like we are now. Because in the Baptist church now we beginning to get—they don't particularly want us up there, but we are. We're there.	4:14
Doris Dixon	So at one point, there was a lady's side and a men's side?	5:30
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, the deacon—	5:36
Doris Dixon	The deacons and the deaconesses or the whole church?	5:36
Hettie Bailey Love	Well, the deacons was only men and the mothers you remember was the ladies over in the corner and they were separated.	5:39
Doris Dixon	Okay. Okay. But usually, did the family sit together?	5:49
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, most time. Yeah. They didn't take the husband and put over. No, they were integrated so far as the audience. But when it came to holding offices in the church then you had your deacons and your mothers and whatever and your choir, they sang together. As long as I can remember.	5:50
Doris Dixon	Did you ever feel like you were treated like a second-class citizen?	6:16
Hettie Bailey Love	Sure, because when we were a second class citizen, especially when I went in the post office during the year and I'd be standing in line with my money in my hand to buy my stamp and Mr. Jones can walk in the door and come all the way around the line and put his money in the window and she waited out here. That's when I felt secondhand or second-class. If I was in a store and the clerk was, I'm getting ready to hand her my money for whatever I selected. And Ms. Jones could walk up there and she would, "Can I help you?" Then I was a second-class citizen. Sure. Many times.	6:19
Doris Dixon	Just in the post office?	7:05
Hettie Bailey Love	Well, no, almost before—When was integration?	7:09
Doris Dixon	Sixties.	7:13
Hettie Bailey Love	Okay. Well, the forties and the fifties. Second-class citizen. Sure.	7:14
Doris Dixon	So you were treated like a second-class—	7:20
Hettie Bailey Love	All the way.	7:22
Doris Dixon	Did you feel like a second-class citizen?	7:23
Hettie Bailey Love	I think when you know your place and the custom of the people, you kind of, I don't know what you exactly feel, I don't know how you feel, but you are conscious of it. Yet within me, look like my grandmother had put that, I don't care what people say. You know what's right, just do what's right and the good Lord will take care of you. So I had a certain pride, but yet I knew that I wasn't above them. They always, so I don't know maybe, and maybe not.	7:27
Doris Dixon	Who were the people, say for instance in your class or just in the community large who tried to buck the system?	8:08
Hettie Bailey Love	They would be the people that started the fight for equal rights during the, well, the sixties.	8:20
Doris Dixon	Before that time?	8:27
Hettie Bailey Love	Before that time, I can't think, but we used to have an insurance man. The United Methodist Church have always had leadership because they were the learneded people mostly in the community. They were far more educated than we were in the Baptist Church and the Church of God and Christ because we was following after the master. But most of them had been to school. They had their own church-related schools. So I would think that most of them was the teachers within the school system came out of the United Methodist Episcopal Church because they were the first to read and have unity and they could teach everybody to follow along.	8:28
Hettie Bailey Love	They saw things, what education could do for the Black man. So I think they were the most educated, they were the most influential on us. We looked up to them. They had the music teachers, they had everything seemed like came from them because they could read and write and they were very educated too. I look at some of the old minis from the old churches where we learning how to read and write. They had it then back in 18 something say 1870s in the first of the 1900s or whatever. They were really educated. It just thrilled me to see and could write beautiful and they said things, they recorded things and I am found in my Baptist. Whereas we have records, but it's not reflected like theirs on what they knew and how it was recorded. You see the difference?	9:21
Doris Dixon	So there was a difference in education between—	10:35
Hettie Bailey Love	Between the Methodist, I say the Episcopal or whatever. African Methodist they were up-to-date too. You go back to the Black leaders who started them out when they broke away from whatever, or from slavery, somebody was a leader who taught them to read and write and the man who could read and write and interpret the scripture, write down documents that who was what and where was the best leaders in the community. I'll just say that just from my viewpoint.	10:41
Doris Dixon	Sure. Yeah. Well, going back to the previous question about segregation. From your experience, do you remember a point where you were conscious of there being a White society and a Black society? Do you remember something that made you realize that?	11:15
Hettie Bailey Love	The difference in the people? I told you the other day that I always wanted to marry a White man and the reason was because in looking when I was a child, I noticed all of the big houses they live in, the best food, who drove the one or two cars that I've ever known they had them. They had Black people working in the kitchen and washing and hanging up their clothes. So as a child I could look and see who had the best, who had the easiest time, and that form my opinion about the lighter you are, the whiter you are, the more power, and the more things you had, the easier time. I looked at my own people, they were the one who was doing what? Plowing the mules or get up before a day to go catch the mule that was down to this White man house.	11:36
Hettie Bailey Love	They was the one, the Black man was driving him in whatever, 1930 or whatever and you were riding in a wagon with your mom and dad. Either he was riding a mule. So that made me grasp the idea that it must have been something right with what the White guy. And not that it was so much wrong, but we didn't have what he had. So my conclusion was I'm going to marry me a White guy so I can have an easy time and somebody cook and wash and do all these other things from a child. So I did, didn't one? But no, but really did. I think it's how bright you are to look around you and see what's happening.	12:29
Doris Dixon	Now, so you spent your first nine years or so on a plantation?	13:16
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, well I guess I was about six or seven.	13:19
Doris Dixon	So you don't really have any memories of that?	13:22
Hettie Bailey Love	I think my mama said when I was three years old, I was walking across the bridge living on a plantation. I was one of the I guess you call it gifted little kid. I watched everything, tell the difference in what was good, what I thought was good or what happened to people. So it must have been that. I don't know. But I always could observe who had the best and who had less. I guess that's what it was. But I was going because they had such an easy time. They didn't have to go and pump water. They had a Black person pumping it for them, bringing it to them. They sat on the veranda, the breeze. They had some fans running but we did. My grandmother had mosquito bars and the swing, she'd swing me in the swing on the porch. That's where we got our breeze from.	13:27
Doris Dixon	What were mosquito bars?	14:30
Hettie Bailey Love	What kind of material? Real thin cotton material that you use behind paper, what you hang paper. I don't know what the name of it my husband does. But they took that and you had a bed. Sometime it took wire and went over around it and they hung these pieces just like this piece of the material all the way around. The breeze could come through it, but it kept the mosquitoes from biting you. So that's the mosquito bar. It kept the mosquitoes out, but you could sleep under it and it kept, you stay cool. Mosquito bar, that's what they called and I imagine a lot of material you'll find one day. See we such a creative person, kind of like the tents that they use in Africa. It was protection, yet it did its job and didn't cost a lot. They call it cheesecloth you know the outing when you see the—But I forgot what you call it. It's got a real name but it was mosquito—	14:31
Doris Dixon	Probably a mosquito net.	15:32
Hettie Bailey Love	Net and a cool breeze could because they didn't have very few screens in those days. That's why they had those slats on the window. They could open them and close them.	15:33
Doris Dixon	And on the plantation, it was your grandmother's house?	15:45
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah.	15:50
Doris Dixon	And what was the house like?	15:51
Hettie Bailey Love	I think we had three room. You've seen the pictures of these little houses? Let see. Obviously, I can tell and see what I can draw one. But they had about three rooms to them and they called the shotgun was the long one that you had three rooms in a row. But the other one that I was born in had two rooms and usually, the kitchen was attached behind the last room. I don't know what you call what the name of them, but it was a three-room house. But where my grandmother lived, it was the two-room house. But the room was attached on the side instead of behind it. So that was the architect of back in the either the 29s and the thirties or whatever.	15:56
Doris Dixon	Okay. Other than the Emmett Till case do you remember any major controversies before the segregation?	16:56
Hettie Bailey Love	I had a cousin and her father, I can't recall their names, worked for a White gentleman here in Itta Bena I mean down out of the country. He was a lower-house boy and I can't tell you what his name, but I remember my grandfather, my grandmother telling me. But anyway, something came up and they was going to lynch him and they went to him and got him from his boss man's place. I can't tell you and in the process of, I guess whatever they were doing to him on Roebuck—I don't know what it's on Roebuck or the river over there, he was heard screaming, "I know that Mr. Ave knew y'all what y'all was doing to me. He would come and stop you." A group of White men had him. So I don't know whether they was castrating him or hanging him in a tree on the river.	17:05
Hettie Bailey Love	Not so far. The Yazoo River, you know where the river coming from Greenwood and said he kept screaming and screaming and screaming and they lynched him and left his body there and this was my cousin. But that was before when they were lynching Black people. And the only incident I know of in Itta Bena there was a reverend, I can't recall his name, but his daughter we were always classmate. He had bought some [indistinct 00:18:49] at that time you could buy it on time what they called, he took it up or had it charged. And he had not paid his bill and White people in those days were just like a pack of dogs. If something happened to one, then all of them gathered around that one. So he had not paid his bill and I recall that about three cars of White men went down to this reverend's house to get him out.	18:13
Hettie Bailey Love	To take him out, I reckon to lynch him or kill him but some way he got his shotgun and stood on his front porch waiting on them. And when they got down near, they could see him standing there. They went down, but they didn't bother him and he left in the night and I mean you read cases and disappeared. But that's the only lynch mob that I've ever seen that attempted to and he saved himself and his family and they moved to California. He has a daughter out there now and that's been since Ray and I have been married. But that's the only two incidents that I know of that was related that were dealing with Itta Bena. And I remember the guy who owned the 5 & 10 Cent Store before he died. He could stand in the window and always looked like he would be looking in that direction.	19:19
Hettie Bailey Love	And they said that he was one of the participants in the lynching of this cousin's father. And he did, I guess he was sick. I don't know whether he was just staring, but they always said that he was involved in it. And also the boss man that he called for Mr. Lynn Mahoney. I knew him personally, but I was very small I don't recall. My grandmother just always know more than the preacher that they went down to get before integration. Before the sixties, this must have been in the thirties or 29s or whatever.	20:14
Doris Dixon	Do you remember any disputes among Black people?	20:52
Hettie Bailey Love	Black people and White people? Oh, just among themselves. Well, I tell you those that were active in before integration of civil rights, the only incident, I mean I can recall this I read is when Martin Luther King, I mean Tougaloo, they had an almost all White faculty. When my kids first started going to Tougaloo, mostly rich retired people taught them and it's known as the best school in the South. I think they got more professionals than any. And during the time all of my kids was going to Tougaloo, it has lost all of those White faculty members. They even had their children there on campus and they was quite active during the civil rights. And I can recall when Martin Luther King, we had carried Jimmy, or Albert back to Tougaloo. Martin Luther King then passed through Itta Bena.	20:59
Hettie Bailey Love	They were marching to Jackson and we met them on the highway between Belzoni and what? Louise? Louise, no, it's on this side of Belzoni. There's a little church Martin Luther King there was marching down was it 49? Number seven because they went out this way. And every porch, see the White people had told them there was this farm White owner told them they better not give them a drink of water or nothing and they had put these signs out. What the sign usually say when you can't stop or anything? Was lining on all these little shacks. Only this little Black church that's where they was going to eat.	22:06
Hettie Bailey Love	And they were they couldn't give them a drink of water even though they were Black and helping us, they still couldn't. You want to give them a drink of water marching. They weren't allowed because of these signs and things. It was all posted, posted, posted, posted, posted, posted—	22:57
Doris Dixon	Do you remember seeing the signs down there?	23:14
Hettie Bailey Love	Down the highway. But this was near Belzoni because it's big Black, not a big Black, but a Black rich farmer lived down in that area. And see Belzoni was racist. We had a leader named Reverend Lee and he was shot to death for voter registration and things like that. And they hated the day that Martin Luther King marched through Itta Bena and Greenwood and all. He was on his way to Jackson. They closed. All much them closed their stores.	23:17
Hettie Bailey Love	Ray was going to a dentist at an appointment for the same time they was marching and he closed his door. He wouldn't wait on Ray. They closed up everything because they knew he was going through. And Ray said, "Well I tell you what, I know another dentist." He lived up in Louisville. He said, "I'll go there and close up if you want to." They was afraid he was going to cause a riot and all that kind of stuff but that's an incident that I never should have began. Your own people couldn't give your leader a drink of water because you lived on a White man's place and he had it posted against anybody that pass. So vivid.	23:54
Doris Dixon	Now, who do you remember as leaders of the community?	24:45
Hettie Bailey Love	Of this community? Let me see. Reverend Hollands, this church Hopewell over here.	24:53
Doris Dixon	Hollis?	24:57
Hettie Bailey Love	Hollands.	24:58
Doris Dixon	Hollands.	24:58
Hettie Bailey Love	I don't know what Reverend might be. It was his church. It was his personal church. He built that church. That's where they had their meetings. Everybody that was for civil rights. And Mr. Bill Bailey, he's dead now used to be the mayor of Itta Bena had a little store right across from there. So all of the doctors, White doctors, and leaders of Itta Bena would come to Mr. Bill Bailey's store to watch the Black church where they were having the civil rights meeting. And one night my brother-in-law, he was a youngster then somebody threw out, I don't know what kind of bomb in the church and rid all of them out of Hopewell. Then they marched from the church all the way uptown because our policeman was named Mr. Weber lived uptown.	25:04
Hettie Bailey Love	He parked old cars down on the lakefront. So they marched down and they went towards those old cars. He said they tore them up, the civil rights worker. And out of this, they put a lot of them in jail and sent them to Parchman. They was breaking their law, but they were doing it in their own—They were Black they went out of our own church, they marched. They didn't bother anybody. They sang "We Shall Overcome". That's where they held the meeting but after that incident and the marching, they packed them up in buses, get them to Parchman for just simply participating. So that's the only, but I still haven't given you any leaders other than the ministers—	25:57
Doris Dixon	And not necessarily during the Civil Rights Movement, but just when you were coming up and people who were respected who was with—	26:48
Hettie Bailey Love	Oh, in this community?	26:53
Doris Dixon	Yes ma'am.	26:53
Hettie Bailey Love	Okay. Well most of the ministers in this community that pastored the churches, there was a Reverend Jed E. Viterel in my church, which is New Bethel. Okay. He was respected. Ray and them had a minister. Oh, I can't think of—See they changed ministers ever so often. Let me see who was in there in the beginning.	26:56
Doris Dixon	[indistinct 00:27:23].	27:22
Hettie Bailey Love	Okay, okay. At Tabernacle, they had a minister. They had so many though. Oh, I can't think of one but I tell you how you can get them. They got the cornerstones on each one of church and so you go to the cornerstone and look at each corner. Cornerstone over here. This is Tabernacle over here. The cornerstone is down to my church. You can go there and look at that. The cornerstone is on Ray's church and you can tell those leaders, say during that period of time, who the leaders were. And they were the most looked up. And Mister—School principal, he was another one.	27:23
Doris Dixon	Mr. Brazil?	28:07
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah. Mr. Brazil. He was the leader.	28:08
Doris Dixon	Do you remember Dorothy Street?	28:10
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah. She has a daughter over there. Ms. Ruth Sims. She was a midwife and she was the biggest landowner. So she was—Well, I and a church leader. I don't know whether they particular held her up as a leader, but when you're a midwife, like some people, you have leaders we think that speaks for the community most time. And she was kind of quiet, even though the folks call her the baby catcher. She owned more land, but she wasn't outspoken like I'd let somebody know that I'm here. She was a quiet one.	28:12
Doris Dixon	Was she the type of person or were there other type of people who did not necessarily speak out, but who helped other people?	29:01
Hettie Bailey Love	Well, she did. She helped other people. Although I probably gave most of the money from building and keeping this church over here. Her daughter, Ruth Sims' mother was a teacher roadie and you had several women. At that time we had a Mr. Thorpes who was a barber and you know how people collect and talk and we had a Reverend Hills who was the Baptist minister in this town. His family lives right there. I mean Memphis because his granddaughters and things was along there. He was a spokesman. But just really having one person that everybody mostly is the people that was involved in school was the one how they held them up as teachers and teachers and preachers. Principal was the same way.	29:09
Hettie Bailey Love	Mr. Brazil. Because I think he was a people person, but his wife was mean. Everybody disliked Mrs. Brazil in a way because she just sooner hit you across the head with a board, make you stick your tongue out, and put soap on it. That kind of person and people didn't like her very much but Festo we all loved him. He was the one whether you were passing and pass you right there before everybody to make you a better person.	30:08
Hettie Bailey Love	He wasn't a mean person. So I think he was the best leader in this area if you had to have because he belonged to the Methodist church. But Ms. Brazil, everybody despised her. Not really despised. She was the home economics teacher. She taught me how to make biscuits. If they weren't right, she'd pitch them out and make you do it over, you stunk you go home and take a bath or—	30:37
Doris Dixon	[indistinct 00:31:07].	31:05
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah. Either bathe you want.	31:07
Doris Dixon	Were there particular people that she picked on?	31:08
Hettie Bailey Love	Well, I think if she got up in the morning and say you going to be a devil today, she would be it. But she taught by being negative and making you frighten of her.	31:15
Doris Dixon	Was she more negative to certain like people who cotton pickers per se versus town people, that kind of thing?	31:25
Hettie Bailey Love	No, I think she picked you just she looked at you and said if you kept—She'd lay out the rules, you going to come clean. We have specific days that you're going to do certain things. You're going to cook. She'd lay out her rules and regulation. But just suppose you couldn't meet her rules and regulation. So and so you didn't take a bath today I smell your—So and so you didn't change your pan. She was a degrading, good demonstrator. You see what I'm saying? You go home and you get you some soap and water and wash your so and so right out before everybody which was embarrassing. If you go use the discreet, you coulda called her and said, "I have warned you several times." I would have. But she wasn't. She make you look small then everybody looking. You see what I'm saying? And that's why they couldn't really take her.	31:36
Hettie Bailey Love	They love Festo. Festo could whip you or whatever but he was the kind of personality you knew that he was to make you better, but she was the kind of person that you was almost afraid of. I remember James Ira Lee, he lives here now. We were in class and James Ira's mother was a teacher too and so he was kind of bragger, he was a little boy and he just talked and talked and talked. He walked in there one day and made him stick his tongue out and whipped him on his tongue. She was that kind of person. But she was. "You didn't do what I say, you didn't change your clothes, did you? Come back and get this soda and stand you up in front, you go wash under your arm, come back and put this soda under in your arms before the class." Mrs. Brazil was. Now she treated her children just like she did it. But Festo didn't. Festo Brazil. He was the most kindest, firmest, molding type of individual. He was a leader, I'll tell you.	32:27
Hettie Bailey Love	But that was the history and that's why we liked Mr. Brazil. He's got a picture up in there. Smiling. Festo was okay. He started us out, he'd feed you. They was given commodities and he'd put a big pot out there and he knew the children that walked way near Bird Claire cold and wet and cooked pots of grits and tomato sauce. And he feed you. Powdered milk made up because he knew everybody around here in the wintertime food was scarce. You made it to school. He had a big old coal house out behind they which had these tall heaters made fires so you'd be warm if you were wet. Mrs. Brazil, she was a home economics teacher.	33:34
Doris Dixon	Times were really hard back then.	34:29
Hettie Bailey Love	Woo. Hard. That's right. Some had something and some didn't. Yep.	34:29
Doris Dixon	How do you think you made—How do you think people made it through those who did make it through? How would—	34:43
Hettie Bailey Love	It was because of the coming together and the caring for each other. Because my grandmother, she had something and somebody down the block or in the next house or whatever, didn't have, they shared. If she had a lot of eggs and you had some flour, she needed your flour or if she had needed your flour, she shared her eggs with you. If you had a milk I see a lot of times we had people in this town with cows. Ms. Dunlap was the cow lady. She had milk and butter and milk you could do a lot of the cornbread and milk, the butter and flour, whatever you cook some sweet breads they call it cake.	34:49
Hettie Bailey Love	So everybody had something that they could give to somebody else and if you had wood, they cut wood and haul wood into town and you had a fireplace or a heater, you probably, if you had a nickel or dime, you paid them that for a block of wood or whatever and the money helped him and the wood helped you to keep warm. It was the sharing of most Black people had to do. If you farm and you got your settlement, which was the end of the year money, then you bought a bale of flour instead of five pounds like they do now. You bought a can of large, which might've had 25 pounds in. You bought a bale of meal or either you had your corn to take to the gristmill to make—You see what I'm saying? You killed three or four hogs. You had a smokehouse outside that you cured the meat in and you had enough meat to last you all.	35:40
Hettie Bailey Love	And when she got ready to cook the canned goods that she had canned during the summer when she had her meat from the hog that they had raised, she had her flour, her meal, they bought sugar in large amount. So you had all your basic and these other things that you bought from the store. If you are shared with your neighbor, and that's the way they made it. You had the butter from the cow, you fed the cow the hay or whatever you could gather for the winter or the corn. And so it was just kind of a cycle and you stuck together and you stayed close to each other when you were cold, it them kept warm. You bought coal from the coal house. You see, we didn't have gas like you have now and it was much, much cheaper. You could buy a ton of coal for about $15. It last you almost all the winter in your five plates are you eating?	36:44
Hettie Bailey Love	So being close together and your grandmother quilted the quilt that you kept warm under and the sheets. Oh, you didn't have to pay but $2 or two and a half to buy you a blanket. And I remember the council people bringing in a lot of stuff from the North. They used to have centers and you could buy things, real cheap. Shoes I got some you call them vase or vases that my children bought for 25 cents. They're thing of collectors now and they bring, oh, clothing, food, things like that. There's always a way.	37:40
Doris Dixon	But there were a lot of people who didn't make it.	38:24
Hettie Bailey Love	Well some of them didn't because of the weakened state and I guess the cold wind and everybody, so what would happen? If you die with influenza, they would bury you and have your funeral in the spring for memorial service. You couldn't have it because church was too cold, and the road was too muddy to get there. They just have to bury the body. But in the spring, they always had memorials to remember they may have five on one Sunday.	38:27
Doris Dixon	So in the winter you were pretty much stuck on the plantation?	39:01
Hettie Bailey Love	Yeah, and the roads were bad. They didn't have as many automobiles, the horses, and the mules, and things. So they just waited. Couldn't have your funeral that day. Have it in the spring. That's the way we made it. I bet your mom knows about it. Oh, now, okay. Huh?	39:05
Doris Dixon	I'm going to stop.	39:28

Item Info

Title:

Hettie Love interview recording, 1995 August 02

Date:

June 17, 1995

Creator:

Love, Hettie Bailey

Contributor:

Dixon, Doris

Description:

Name: Hettie Bailey Love; Date of birth: 1931-05-03; Place of birth: Itta Bena, MS; Occupation(s): educator; teacher; Residence: Itta Bena, MS
Informant ID: 1149; Interviewed by: Doris Dixon.

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Language:

English

Digital Collection:

Behind the Veil

Source Collection:

Behind the Veil: Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South interviews, photographs, and project records, circa 1864-2011, bulk 1990-2004

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Related Resources:

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Provenance:

The David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library acquired the Records of the Behind the Veil Oral History Project from the Duke University Center for Documentary Studies in 1997, 1998, 2000, and 2002.

Rights:

Limited Re-Use

CC BY-NC 4.0

Rights Note:

Copyright for content created by the Behind the Veil project is held by Duke University and made available to the public using a Creative Commons Attribution / Non-commercial (CC-BY-NC) license.

Identifier:

RL00170-CS-0761
967bbb28-d686-42b3-adea-cf33f50574d0
behindtheveil
248cfca8-7818-45e6-bd44-b6ceee710345
ark:/87924/r4rx9fn8c
248cfca8-7818-45e6-bd44-b6ceee710345

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Hettie Love interview recording, 1995 August 02

Transcript

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1. Hettie Love administrative file, 1995

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Hettie Love interview recording, 1995 August 02

Transcript

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John Hope Franklin Research Center

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