Janette Chandler interview recording, 1995 June 21
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| Blair Murphy | State your full name, your date of birth, and your place of birth. | 0:02 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Okay. My name is Janette Ragin Chandler. I born in Clarendon County in 1951. I'm the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. General Ragin. | 0:06 |
| Blair Murphy | Okay. So tell me what it was like when you were growing up. | 0:23 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | When I was growing up, it was not, I'd say, real hard. It was easy to me because I was the queen out of 14 little children. | 0:27 |
| Speaker 1 | [indistinct 00:00:38]. | 0:37 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | All my sisters and brothers had to work in the field, but I didn't work in the field because I was the precious one. I washed and I cooked and I cleaned up the house because my mother didn't never allow me to get in the fields because I was the precious one. | 0:40 |
| Blair Murphy | Why are you the precious one? | 0:58 |
| Speaker 1 | No, I said— | 0:58 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Because I was the prettiest one. | 0:58 |
| Speaker 2 | [indistinct 00:01:09]. | 0:58 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | That's why my mother didn't never let me work in the field. | 1:12 |
| Blair Murphy | So what did you do? | 1:16 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I washed. I cooked, and I cleaned up the house and looked after my other little sisters and brother when they finished picking the cotton and picking beans and all that good stuff. I had to make sure they'd get fed. I cooked their dinner. I fixed their food for them, and I made sure they had enough to eat because I was the precious one. | 1:20 |
| Blair Murphy | What number child were you? | 1:38 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I was the sixth child from the oldest. My mother had 14 [indistinct 00:01:50] children. She had 15, but one died at birth. The one died at birth, she had in the hospital, but she had 14 of us at home, and all us living. All us living today, except one. July the 21st will be a year he passed away. My oldest sister is 56. My oldest brother is 52. My next brother is 50. My next brother is 49. Myself, going on 44. Under me, I have other little sisters. That's why I was the precious one. | 1:44 |
| Blair Murphy | Do you remember the midwife coming to your house? | 2:34 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Yes. I remember midwife used to come. My mom used to say, "The little babies will come in the little black bag." So me and my sister, we stole the little black bag because we wanted to see the baby first. My mom in the house, hollering. My daddy around the house, hollering. We had the little black bag. | 2:35 |
| Speaker 1 | Oh, mercy. | 2:50 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I said to myself, "We can see the baby first." Come to find out, they was wanting the little black bag so they could work on my mom. So we peeping in the corner. We want to see where this baby coming from because it wasn't in the little black bag. It was exciting to see a baby come out like that. | 2:55 |
| Blair Murphy | How old were you when you saw that? | 3:13 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I was 14 at that time. | 3:15 |
| Blair Murphy | You didn't know where a baby came from? | 3:17 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I did not know where babies come from. But then I peep in the corner in my father house. We had an old raggedy house, and it still is raggedy, nothing but board because it was only a two-room house. I wondered how a little old baby could get in a little black bag. Today, that's why I say, "You're not to tell your kids lies about babies, where they come from. Let them know where the baby's coming from." I was 14 and didn't know where the baby come from. That come from the vagina, from the stomach, from the vagina. It's just that way back yonder, a lot of people be saying that if you kiss a boy, you get pregnant. | 3:19 |
| Speaker 1 | Uh-oh. | 3:56 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | So it was a lot of tales way back yonder. But I'm 44 now, and I'm grown up. I have five of my own children. Two already finished school, went to college, and still in school and married. I used to be married to a wonderful man, moved to New York, moved back to South Carolina, and now I'm making South Carolina my home, Summerton, South Carolina. | 4:01 |
| Speaker 2 | So why you be getting — | 4:26 |
| Blair Murphy | Do you remember any family stories? | 4:30 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Sure. I remember the time when me and my sister and brother, like I said, I was the oldest one, not the oldest one, but I was the precious one. When we used to go to school and my mother had three plates and there's 14 of us. But all of us used to jump off the bus, run home. Who first get the plate? That's the person gets dinner. That's the person that eat. But see, I didn't worry about jumping off the bus and running home to get the plate because I know I'm going to eat because I was the precious one. I was the first one to eat at all the time. | 4:33 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | But my poor sister, Sheba, she used to grab the plate, and I tried to take it from her. She won't give it to me. So we fight, and I make her jump out the door without touching a step. She going to run with the plate in her hand. But she still was the last one to eat. Like I said, I didn't have no problem of me eating first because I was the precious one and still is the precious one. | 5:05 |
| Speaker 1 | Lord, have mercy. | 5:31 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | But our family's big, but all us get along good together. We fuss at this and say this, but we still love each other, as they grown up now. I know when they interviewed my father, I missed one of my sisters. There's so much of us. That was Joyce, Joyce Ragin. I didn't give y'all her name. But now, everybody's grown up with their own family and everything. It's beautiful now to have a big family. It's very beautiful to have a big family. | 5:34 |
| Blair Murphy | Did you ever meet your grandparents? | 6:08 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | No, I never get to see none of my grandparents. They died before I born or they died before I could get to know them. | 6:09 |
| Blair Murphy | Did you know anything about them? | 6:15 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | No. All I know is their name of [indistinct 00:06:23]. I never know my grandfather name. | 6:18 |
| Speaker 1 | On your mama's side? | 6:27 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Yes. My mama's side. I don't know nothing about that. But on my father's side, I know my mother name. I get to meet her. I mean I remember the time, we have to pick cotton or sweep her yard for a piece of cornbread or for a piece of biscuit. Time was hard for me and my sisters because there was a lot of us. To make end meet, we used to go and sweep yards or cut a piece of wood to get a piece of cornbread or a biscuit. | 6:29 |
| Blair Murphy | What do mean by sweep a yard? | 6:59 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | We used to go to one another house and, "You need your yard sweeped?" You'd get— | 7:00 |
| Speaker 1 | Ain't no [indistinct 00:07:05]— | 7:04 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | — cornbread or biscuit or ice cream. We worked for it. | 7:06 |
| Blair Murphy | You didn't have any grass out in the front? | 7:09 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | No, we had only a yard. | 7:10 |
| Speaker 1 | Clean yard. | 7:12 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Clean yard with chicken doo-doo in that. But we would sweep that yard to get our cornbread or get a piece of biscuit or ice cream. | 7:14 |
| Blair Murphy | So you just make the dirt look real even like? | 7:22 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Yeah. Mm-hmm. We didn't have our grass like we got now. I mean they used to have nice big yards. But now they got grass in the yard. But then me and my sisters, we'd get by. I think on my daddy's side, my aunts never like us. I don't know why. They never like us. But when they'd fall sick, all us went to help them. They own kids turned their back on them. But General Ragin's children helped them. Why I say we love each other. Like I said, we have problems, ups and down, but we care for each other. But that's on my daddy's side. You make it. | 7:25 |
| Blair Murphy | You remember going to elementary school? | 8:10 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Yes. I remember I was going to elementary school, and I was— | 8:12 |
| Blair Murphy | Did you take a bus or did you walk? | 8:16 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | We took a bus. We was so far, we had a bus. | 8:17 |
| Blair Murphy | The kids before you didn't have a bus? | 8:23 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Most, yeah. Before me, they had buses, too. Yeah. They had a bus before I did. When I started school, I was six years old. I finished school in 1969. I graduated in 1969. Went to New York in 1969. Moved back to South Carolina in 1983. | 8:25 |
| Speaker 2 | Why you move back down here in 1960? | 8:44 |
| Speaker 1 | You tell [indistinct 00:08:50]. | 8:46 |
| Blair Murphy | I was going to ask you why you moved back. Why did you move back? | 8:51 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I moved back down for a better environment. In New York, it's just like I had to walk my child to school, pick them up from school, bring them to school, take them back to school, back and forth because the society, it was so bad in New York. This right here, my child can catch a bus. I don't have to worry about no hoodlums or just around the corner waiting on them to knock them off or to rob or get their sneakers or take their lunch money like that. I moved back for the environment. | 8:53 |
| Blair Murphy | So how is this area different than it was when you were growing up? | 9:22 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | More stores now, got more rides. You got cars. You got buses. But now you can just go out the door and catch the RTA bus or you can get in your car and stuff like that. It's just better now. Before, I remember I walked to Summerton, and that was eight miles. I walked to Summerton because we were living out in the country. I know I walked to Summerton because my mom didn't have no car. My dad had a car, but he was in the road all the time. So if we wanted to go to Summerton, we walked eight miles just to get to Summerton. | 9:27 |
| Blair Murphy | How long did it take you to get to Summerton? | 10:02 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | It was like a half a day. Not a half a day, about four hours. I remember my little sister, Carolyn, she was the little skinniest one in the bunch. We'd run her back home. She said, "No, I'm not going back." We had a little bottle of vinegar water, and we let her carry it. She was so skinny. When she get to Summerton, she like to pass out. | 10:04 |
| Speaker 1 | Mercy. [indistinct 00:10:27]. | 10:27 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | We got back home. My mom beat me and my sister that day. She tear us up for walking to Summerton, and we never walked back to Summerton no more. | 10:27 |
| Blair Murphy | You only walked once? | 10:42 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | We only walked once and get a beating for doing that, a beating for doing that. So that learned us a lesson not to walk to Summerton. | 10:44 |
| Blair Murphy | So did you go to town very often? | 10:51 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | No, we didn't used to go to town often. It was like three years before I could get to town. | 10:53 |
| Speaker 1 | Three years? | 10:57 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Three years. We never went to town. The only time we went to town is on the bus to go to school and back home. On the bus to go to school and back home. | 10:59 |
| Blair Murphy | What was the name of your school? | 11:07 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Scott's Branch. | 11:07 |
| Blair Murphy | Scott's Branch? | 11:07 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Mm-hmm. That's the only way. | 11:07 |
| Blair Murphy | Scott's Branch is an all-Black school? | 11:14 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | All-Black school. Scott's Branch always been a all-Black school. | 11:16 |
| Speaker 1 | Some of them the worst places to get along together. | 11:19 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Summerton still is prejudiced. It's not that the society and everything is fine in Summerton. It's not. It's still prejudiced because some places you go now, you're not allowed, like little Summerton Diner. You can go in there, but the people don't like you. | 11:32 |
| Speaker 1 | No, they sure ain't. | 11:43 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | So if you don't feel comfortable in a place you spend your money, you don't go in them places. Some places uptown in East Summerton, you don't go up there neither because they have to deal with you, but— | 11:43 |
| Speaker 1 | They mix them. The Black people running Summerton now need money. If they depend on the White people, they'd close down everything in the summer. | 11:58 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | White people in Summerton take their money out of town to spend. But it's more Black people in Summerton than White. Now they want to combine Summerton and make a bigger population. Now, East Summerton's more Black people, but in the town limit, it's not. It's not. In the town limit, they got more White than Black because they don't want too much Black to mix into town limit because when it time to vote, it be too much Black people voting. So the town [indistinct 00:12:42]— | 12:06 |
| Blair Murphy | Summerton is very small? | 12:42 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | If you're not in the town limit. Now, if you want to run for county council or if you want to run on the town county council or you want to run for mayor or whatever, you cannot run because you're not in the town limit. | 12:43 |
| Blair Murphy | So it's mostly White people in the town limit? So they control the political? | 12:55 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | They control everything. Really, the town council, the mayor, they control everything now. Before we can get anything, we have to go to the town council to get their permission to have a parade in the street or a block party in the street. Or anything to have to do with the town, you got to go through the town council to do that. | 13:02 |
| Blair Murphy | So— | 13:24 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | And all the town council's made up of Whites. | 13:28 |
| Blair Murphy | So you don't— | 13:30 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | We don't have one Black on the board. | 13:30 |
| Blair Murphy | Since the '50s, the persons in control have not changed even with the fight for desegregation? | 13:36 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Haven't changed, it's still there. It's still there in Summerton. We still got the Ku Klux Klans right here in Summerton, South Carolina. | 13:42 |
| Blair Murphy | They still have the Klan? | 13:49 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Yes. They still have the Ku Klux Klan is still here in Summerton, although they don't do like they used to do way back then and there. | 13:54 |
| Blair Murphy | Do you remember them when you were a child? Do you remember seeing them? | 13:58 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | The Ku Klux Klan? It's just that be on the TV a whole lot, and people talk about them, how they're a group of White people get together and do all this and that. But I never was seeing them in any company and don't want to be in any company. Just whatever people said on how it was on TV and stuff like that. But we still have those prejudiced people still. Usually I called them Ku Klux Klan because if they can kill us, they'll kill us. Just like in Connecticut, these boys was going to graduate from school. Five White guys had on their graduation hat, "Kill all niggers." So we thought that thing was old, but it's not. It's coming back. | 14:05 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | So where they want to say the five guys is not going to graduate with the rest of the classes. That's the punishment for them. The Black guy, he never speak to them again because he thought they was their friend, but they wasn't his friend. They want to kill all the niggers. But you know how much niggers they'd have to kill? A gang of them. I mean so many. But it's out there. Back then, that's a little group hate niggers, niggers. That way they believe they can kill them all. That was in Connecticut. So like I said, we all over. People got their own little prejudiced town. Everybody's prejudiced in their own little town. | 14:50 |
| Blair Murphy | So you know how the Scott's Branch became a all-Black school? | 15:24 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Well, Scott's Branch become all-Black, it's not like we was fighting to not let the White to come in. White didn't want to come in because all the Black, and then went to Clarendon Hall as a private school to keep [indistinct 00:15:56] mixing up with the Black. | 15:36 |
| Blair Murphy | Because Brown v. Board of Education? | 15:57 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Right. Since that happened, they take all their kids and went to a private school. Still today, it still is not integrated with the Black. | 16:01 |
| Blair Murphy | Do you know why they still won't come back because it's been— | 16:13 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Because they prejudiced. | 16:14 |
| Blair Murphy | It's been 40 years. | 16:15 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | It could be 50. Not in Summerton, South Carolina, due to that what happened way back in the Briggs v. Brown. But in Summerton, it could always, always be prejudiced, always. We got a lot of prejudiced people around here. We could talk in their face, smile, and [indistinct 00:16:39] with them, but they don't mean us no good. I'm not even talking about White, even Black is prejudiced. You know what I'm saying? But White will not mix with Black, not in Clarendon County. I'm sorry. Not in Clarendon County. | 16:20 |
| Speaker 1 | In East Summerton, Black and White go together— | 17:02 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | I mean East Summerton. | 17:02 |
| Speaker 1 | Yeah. Because Black and White go in Manning. | 17:02 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | [indistinct 00:17:03]. Not in Clarendon County, East Summerton. Manning, they have Black and White, and that's good. But Summerton, always, always was a Black school due to the White don't want to come. | 17:03 |
| Blair Murphy | Do you think that had— | 17:14 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | [indistinct 00:17:15] because it's private. | 17:17 |
| Blair Murphy | Do you think it stems from the fact that the case was originated here in Summerton? | 17:18 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | Yeah. Really, it's the biggest case then and there. | 17:23 |
| Speaker 1 | That's where it started. | 17:26 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | That's where it started at, right here in Summerton, South Carolina. All that, it started right here in Summerton, South Carolina. Due to all that started there, that's why we got so much White people hate— That's why they're still prejudiced here today because we won what Mr. Briggs and the rest of them, Delaney, the rest of them who was fighting on this board won the case, and the White did not like it. So today's day, it's not to say, "Well, everything will go okay," because you have to live here. You know what I'm saying? | 17:28 |
| Janette Ragin Chandler | But since they won the case and stuff like that, they feel like they still don't have to give in to the Black, and that's why they don't send their White kids to our school. We don't have no prejudice against that or not to say that. But they'll take their kids from Summerton and take them to Manning or put them in private school before they send them right there to Summerton. But that's a little piece of Summerton and what I know about. I work in the school system down here since 1989 now as a substitute teacher, and I like working with kids. I hope I don't talk too much. | 18:03 |
| Blair Murphy | Anything else you want to say? | 18:50 |
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