Irene Monroe interview recording, 1994 July 11
Loading the media player...
Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
Irene Monroe | Keep breaking the chain and the snake running out. Fredrick Douglass is on there. Booker T. Washington. | 0:02 |
Tywanna Whorley | Really? | 0:07 |
Irene Monroe | Mm-hmm. | 0:07 |
Tywanna Whorley | Hold on. I'm just going to test this tape right here. It's a mic. Okay. And we just going to ask you questions about living here in Bessemer back in the '20s, '30s, and '40s and '50s. | 0:13 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, I think I came here in 1940. That's when I started in business in 1940. | 0:27 |
Tywanna Whorley | Where'd you live prior to Bessemer? | 0:49 |
Irene Monroe | I was living here but I was working, I used to teach down in Lamar County. And I bought this house for tax and then when school was out when I was teaching, I come home here to my brother. He stayed here and so he built that upstairs garage. He stayed up there and I stayed down here. | 0:50 |
Stacey Scales | What business did you start here? | 1:11 |
Irene Monroe | I started the Madison Nite Spot. | 1:14 |
Stacey Scales | Really? | 1:14 |
Irene Monroe | In 1940. He had it built, so when I came from school he said, "You won't have to go back down in the country and teach this time because I got a job for you." So I got a relief of absence to go back and get my degree. I just had finished two years college at Alabama State. Well the branch office was in Parker then for Alabama State. You could go each summer, go three summers and that was a year. That's the way I got my college diploma. | 1:18 |
Irene Monroe | But I finished high school, I started the miles in the fifth grade. They had primary grade then. Because we had a preacher, Reverend Yarber, GH Yarber, was our pastor and he lived right across in front of the campus. And he told brother to send me there to school because it'd be private. I went to Dunbar one day and I didn't like it. | 1:48 |
Tywanna Whorley | One day? | 2:17 |
Irene Monroe | One day I went down there. So in English a girl said we had to write a essay and she said, "I don't know what to say, writing in English if it's a letter writing to my nigger, I could write one." That's what she said. I told my sister when I came home about it. She said, "Well that's no place for you to go to school." | 2:18 |
Irene Monroe | So Reverend Yarber told him to take up, she can live at my house and go to school up at my house. So I started miles. They had down in the grades then. | 2:43 |
Tywanna Whorley | How old were you when you— | 2:56 |
Irene Monroe | Ladies dormitory. Oh, when I finished high school I was 18. | 2:56 |
Tywanna Whorley | When you started running the business? | 3:12 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah, no, I taught. I taught nine years. | 3:16 |
Tywanna Whorley | Really? | 3:20 |
Irene Monroe | I taught nine years. | 3:21 |
Tywanna Whorley | What grades did you teach? | 3:26 |
Irene Monroe | Oh, first through sixth. In the country you have to teach all first through sixth grades. And I started then. But I'd go to summer school every summer, that's where I working on my college. Go Parker High. | 3:27 |
Tywanna Whorley | How was the school set up in the rural area that you— | 3:43 |
Irene Monroe | Had benches. And first grade here, second grade. Or had a group in third grade and another group in fourth and fifth on like that. | 3:48 |
Tywanna Whorley | How were you able to teach all of them? | 4:01 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah, you go to this group right here, the big old school hall, and you have this class, you get through with it. You go on to the other class and they'd be getting out their work. | 4:02 |
Tywanna Whorley | So the other kids would sit by quietly while you're teaching the others? | 4:17 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. Each class at a time. One through sixth grade. | 4:24 |
Tywanna Whorley | Nine years. | 4:26 |
Irene Monroe | But I didn't teach at that school for nine years. I was at Sergeant when we had four teachers there. We had a lot. I had first grade there. We had four teachers up there. | 4:31 |
Tywanna Whorley | How was that? Did you live alone when you taught out there? | 4:42 |
Irene Monroe | No, I had the board with some of the parents, but I mostly cooked for myself. I rented a room and cook for myself. I'd go in the kitchen and fix my food because that lady, the first year I didn't cook for myself, and they didn't roll out no biscuits and cut them. They'd take some watered dough and squeeze it like that and do it like this and put it in the pan. It'd be great big old biscuits. | 4:51 |
Irene Monroe | And so I need that mostly, I did it for a week or two. But then my brother let me carry my car down in. I always go to the store and she was rolling out biscuit. I said, "Give me that little piece of dough right there." And I rolled it thin and cut it and cut me a biscuit. Because I'd throw way through the woods. I wouldn't carry it back because I was afraid she'd get mad with me. Because supervisor told us, "You better be careful what you say." | 5:15 |
Irene Monroe | You know people in the rural, they think you making fun of them or something other. And supervisor stayed with my daddy and she had told me a lot, how to do ground rural people. | 5:45 |
Tywanna Whorley | Do you remember any of them? Any of the suggestions she made to you? | 6:00 |
Irene Monroe | Oh, Miss Todd? | 6:01 |
Tywanna Whorley | Mm-hmm. | 6:01 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. She told me not to say anything about, see they dip snuff. Her lady dip snuff and she'd do like this and just spit right on the floor. They have sand on the floor. | 6:06 |
Stacey Scales | Inside? | 6:19 |
Irene Monroe | Inside. You'd be sitting up at the table eating and she wanted to spit. She put her mouth right there and spit, right in there. So you're kind of hard to eat. But after the first year, I didn't really have any that first year. But the next year I told her I just go in the room, I cook for myself. And I'd go in the kitchen and make my breakfast and cook. Then I said I didn't want to make them angry like that. I said if she's not going in there while she's in there. And I said, "Give me that little piece of dough right there." She'd be the made it up and I'd take it, roll it out thin, and cut it. | 6:20 |
Irene Monroe | And I said I'm more hip to this morning. You know like that. Like you wasn't making fun of them or something like that. And some of the chairs didn't have no bottom. They was made with, you make these baskets and that duff was down in the bottom of the chair. You make cotton baskets and they ride them boards and make them little strips and it's threaded, it go through. And the chairs was like that. | 6:56 |
Irene Monroe | I taught. But they were nice to you. They were nice to you. They invite you to the house for dinner and the children bring cans of pickled peaches and pears. And everyone came to school and everything. I wasn't weighing about 124 when I went down there. But I think when I left I weighed about 132. I liked to pick peaches and all that stuff and can. | 7:38 |
Irene Monroe | Now some of the families were real nice but where I stayed where they had me, was an old lady. And so the supervisor told me I'd have to just kind of not say nothing because she dips snuff and she just really "Ptchoo!" They have sand on the floor. | 8:08 |
Tywanna Whorley | You said you had a car? | 8:31 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. My brother had a Hudson Terraplane and he let me take it down there. And I carried, see I played ball at school at miles before I finished high school. | 8:32 |
Tywanna Whorley | Basketball? | 8:44 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. And softball. | 8:44 |
Tywanna Whorley | Oh yeah? | 8:44 |
Irene Monroe | Mm-hmm. We had softball. We had basketball. Many family was teaching in Ensley. You ever heard of her? She was a agriculture, I mean she was a physical ed teacher. And we at Miles had a basketball team and I was a guard. Then they had different rules. You have a center line halfway and you couldn't cross. See everybody crosses the line now. | 8:48 |
Irene Monroe | But then guards didn't cross the line. Ball would just be on that side and the guards have to get you the ball. I was a guard, I'd get them the ball, and I had two little girls from Ensley, long-winded. They were sisters and they could pass that ball until they not get the ball to them I thought. And they could run folks down until they tongue was hanging out. They was tired and then they just go there and throw it in there. | 9:21 |
Stacey Scales | That's all right. | 9:50 |
Tywanna Whorley | How was it going to Miles High School? | 9:53 |
Irene Monroe | Oh it was nice. See I was over in the elementary part where I went. I finished 12th grade there. In the elementary part meant they had domestic science. We had to go to cooking. They taught everything. They had cooking, sewing. I took sewing and making, they start you out on the apron, something like that. Something simple. | 9:59 |
Irene Monroe | And we would cook. And then a lot of times we'd cook and then we invite the teachers to our 12th grade class. We'd invite the teachers too. We had a good class because then Virgil Harris was protective life insurance undertaker. He made undertaker, that was my classmate, he made undertaker. I went into business. And Dr. Fudge Bradford, he made a doctor that was my classmate. Yeah, Dr. Fudge Bradford. And he made a doctor and Virgil went into undertaker and I went into the Nite Spot. I opened up a business out there. | 10:21 |
Stacey Scales | How was your Nite Spot? Could you describe? | 11:12 |
Irene Monroe | It was a long, oh I can show you the frame of it now, where it burned. It burned in '67. See I stopped teaching in 1940. I finished high school in 1931. My ring said 30, yeah, 31. I taught nine years. But I did have, she started off in a little country school. But then she moved me to a four teachers up at Sulligent, Alabama for that school. | 11:14 |
Irene Monroe | But in the meantime, when I was at this other school, I had been playing basketball and softball at Miles. Because we had one teacher from TCI schools and they have all athletics. They have TCI when I went to Woodward in the fourth grade. And we had this toothbrush drill, you'd have to have toothbrushes and carry them to school and leave them. Had all those grills. | 11:48 |
Irene Monroe | But after I finished, when Miles I was taught sewing. I would start us on a apron and we cooked and we'd invite some of the teachers to dinner and they gave Latin and everything. And Dr. Nun, one arm Nun went there too. He had been to the service and come back, grown people up go there too. | 12:16 |
Stacey Scales | Did the basketball team ever travel? | 12:43 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. Now see on basketball when I got my little school, I taught my children, organize a team, and we practiced. And so children would had grown, almost grown, that stopped school because they had been finished in sixth grade. They wanted to start back to school because see it was interesting. They wanted to play ball and they wanted to come back to school. | 12:46 |
Irene Monroe | So the supervisor asked the superintendent could they come back? Some of the grown ones. See I wasn't, I was real young, just 18. So he said if they willing to abide by the rules and regulations and not do things in front of the little children. And you see the grown, they was older than them, and not do things and said things in front of the little ones, they could come to school. But if they came there and they said things in front of those little children and all like that, they couldn't come. | 13:13 |
Irene Monroe | So they had a supervisor, she'd come out there and check. She was from Selma. She called her jean teacher. She was over all school. She'd go over the county. So I organized me a team there and old boys came back to play ball. But I told them they'd have to get their lesson too. Their English work. They didn't want to write no workout. But they learning how to do work and then play ball. | 13:48 |
Irene Monroe | And after I got a team, then we didn't have nobody to play. And then Mr. Todd asked me, well after school would I go to these other schools and organize a team? So we'd have somebody to play. So after school I would go to these other schools and organize a basketball team, so we'd have somebody to play. And then that way different schools go certain places to play ball. | 14:13 |
Irene Monroe | Like Fridays, Saturdays. And people coming out to see children play ball. And they had quit school but they came back to school. And it was hard to get the boys to get their English. They don't like to write, they don't like to get the workouts. | 14:39 |
Stacey Scales | How would you travel around from one school to the next? | 15:00 |
Irene Monroe | I had a Hudson Terraplane. I had a car down there. | 15:04 |
Stacey Scales | Oh yeah. Was it far? | 15:06 |
Irene Monroe | I tended to go from here down there. But they put up the board. They made the board, the country, the fathers and things, made the boards up there and put a ring, bought the rings and everything. And I carried off from here. | 15:09 |
Stacey Scales | Did you have any troubles with White folks ever on the highway like the Jim Crow at gas stations? Or? | 15:21 |
Irene Monroe | Millport was a little Jim Crow town. Millport, Alabama, down there, railroad track down there. Now those White men would try to go with the Colored girls. They had one trial down there that one girl went and killed a fella. She was going with this White man and he'd come to the house and he told her she better get rid of him. And she did kill one of my patron's sons. But he wasn't going to school. He was just in the community. | 15:27 |
Irene Monroe | And no, they didn't bother much. My daddy, he was born in slavery and he was half White. And so they was born in Alabama. They didn't pick at you. Didn't nobody bother him or bother me or something like that. Mr. Perry Monroe's daughter. And so they would come out to different things. | 16:11 |
Irene Monroe | So Millport, they called it Jim Crow. When the White men would go with the Colored girls and things like that. They was bad about that down there. So our supervisor, I would ride with her a lot of times over the place, the county to show her because she from Selma, Alabama. And I would carry her to places especially to take census. Now we had never turned in that many children in Lamar County until she got there. | 16:44 |
Irene Monroe | She took the census and them people would hide them. When the White folk come around, they would hide their children. Thought they was going send them to the wall. They'd hide them up under the bed when they come. I ain't got but two children. Sometimes they had about seven and they be peeping around. So Miss Todd, when she got there, when the Colored lady got there, and I went around with them. And so everybody knew my daddy, Uncle Perry, everybody called him Uncle Perry. Even little White boys downtown. "Uncle Perry." Papa said, "I ain't know your damn uncle." Uncle Perry give me a nickel and you know all that. He'd be downtown. | 17:14 |
Irene Monroe | So I would ride with her to take census. I knew where all the people live in. And so Miss Todd told them what we'd get. You say you don't have but just five months school and say you ought to get nine months if you have more children. You got to turn these children in. Some of them was 12, 15 years old, had never been counted. | 17:59 |
Irene Monroe | And we went around and got all the names and they wouldn't know when they were born. I said, "When was he born?" She'd asked and she said, "Now look at it, we was picking cotton." That's what she said. And Miss Todd put down picking cotton. And then she'd go home and ask my daddy, when did the cotton open? What month did you pick cotton in? He told her August and September you start in then. So that's the way she'd give them a date for their birth. | 18:23 |
Tywanna Whorley | Oh. | 18:56 |
Irene Monroe | She didn't know what, because they didn't know when they were born. And sometime they say we were hoeing or we was planting, that's April or May. April when they plant. And my daddy would tell them those things and that's what she would put down when she took the census. And she had all them children, found all them children what they hadn't been reporting. | 18:57 |
Irene Monroe | And then Lamar County began to get money to match their money and the school got a nine months school. Before then you wasn't getting but six months. Okay. That old fella ain't, he done gone? | 19:24 |
Stacey Scales | He's going back there. | 19:42 |
Irene Monroe | Oh. | 19:42 |
Stacey Scales | [indistinct 00:19:47]. | 19:42 |
Irene Monroe | But that's the way they would come then. They would get a nine-month schooling. But because they had found all them children. And she said, "That's all they're doing." Said, "Yeah." They said, "Well I thought they going send them to the army." See he called them, huh? | 19:47 |
Stacey Scales | They came in to let you know. | 20:06 |
Irene Monroe | He got it, he got it. And so that's the way they would find out all those people, the population of Lamar County, by her taking the census. Because them White people, they wouldn't give them to them. They'd hide the children. Tell them we ain't got none. Nobody but us too, like that. | 20:08 |
Irene Monroe | So when the Colored supervisor got in there and they gave them, then he had a lot of, then we started getting a nine-month school. She built a county training school down there for them to go to high school. | 20:29 |
Tywanna Whorley | Oh, what was the name? Was that the name of it? | 20:47 |
Irene Monroe | Was Lamar County Training School. | 20:48 |
Tywanna Whorley | Did it get a lot of turnout? | 20:51 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah, she see all the rest of the children after the sixth grade, they were bused to the county training school and she had a lot of teachers down there. It's a big school. There was a heap of children down in Lamar County had never been counted until she took census and turned them all in. They didn't know they had that many children in the school. | 20:52 |
Irene Monroe | Oh they was hiding. They was behind the door, under the house, and peeping us. Said, "Who is that upon there?" "Come on out of there." I said, "We ain't going to bother you. We trying to get more money for your county." She explained that she's trying to get money for the county so the state could match their money, you see. | 21:16 |
Tywanna Whorley | Did they run into roadblocks in terms of building that training school for Blacks? Did they get the money they needed to build it? | 21:36 |
Irene Monroe | Uh huh. We built the county training school in agriculture. They had taught from people from out Tuskegee came and they picked a whole lot of stuff for exhibits. Some of them made wagons and they had a workshop and whatnot down at the county training school. | 21:44 |
Tywanna Whorley | They teach them how to read? | 22:11 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. That's all we were doing before then. But then we had song fest, we'd have a festival. On a Saturday all the schools would come to the county training school and each teacher would have like a May festival. They got to having those then. After the supervisor got there and found out all them children were there, he had something other to work with. | 22:13 |
Irene Monroe | And I had now Sergeant, where I was, in Millport and Kennedy, and the county training school, they was the big schools. And I'd go in the evening and organize those teams and start them to playing. So we'd have something to play. And then she'd have a day to have, call it a May festival. She'd invite teachers from Walker County and other counties. | 22:41 |
Tywanna Whorley | Do you remember any of the names of the kids? I mean of the teams that you put together? | 23:20 |
Irene Monroe | Oh they were just named after the school. | 23:21 |
Tywanna Whorley | Oh, okay. | 23:23 |
Irene Monroe | That was Sergeant. Well we had, see they just go to Southern, went to the sixth grade. Lamar County Training School went to 12th grade. They had buses to bus the children from these different. She got buses. Then after you finished your sixth grade, you was transported to the county training school as a high school. | 23:25 |
Tywanna Whorley | Did they build a gym for the kids to play basketball in? Or? | 23:51 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, they had on the outside. They had goals and things on the outside. | 23:55 |
Tywanna Whorley | You said you— | 24:03 |
Irene Monroe | But they had a workshop too. They had a fellow from Tuskegee, Mr. Lucas. And they had a workshop over there for boys. They would make wagon beds and different articles and things they put on exhibit. | 24:03 |
Tywanna Whorley | You said your father was a slave. Did he ever talk about it? | 24:22 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. He used to go to church in his shirt tail. [indistinct 00:24:29]. They make it long, make shirts long, and it dipped down in front and behind. He went to church. His mother was real dark. I remember Grandma Gracie, she was then a slave. I remember her. | 24:25 |
Tywanna Whorley | What do you remember about her? | 24:45 |
Irene Monroe | I was just little but I just remember I used to go to her house. She lived in a little log house down from our house. She was in a little log hut. | 24:50 |
Stacey Scales | What type of stories would they tell about slavery and things? | 25:02 |
Irene Monroe | Well see they really didn't know about slavery before then. But nobody but my grand mama and I was very little when she died. He didn't tell me. But papa used to tell me that he went to school, went to church in the shirt tail. Make the shirts long enough, didn't have on no pants to make the shirt long enough to go there. They go to church in his shirt tail. | 25:08 |
Stacey Scales | Did he ever talk about being treated unfair? | 25:43 |
Irene Monroe | Well yeah they would. Now in this trial they had, but my daddy, no he didn't have. We was the first one who had a T-model car, bought a T-model car that you have to mash them pedals until you get all the way up the hill. And my brother worked for Mr. Gaiden, which is a White man. Oh he's in knee pants would come to your knees, knickers. But thing like here, yeah. | 25:47 |
Irene Monroe | He worked down at that store. That's where he got his learning from. Working in that White man's store where you put the chain in there and mash something or other. You go on a cart way back to the office. | 26:26 |
Stacey Scales | Oh yeah. | 26:38 |
Irene Monroe | And this old White man had a lot of Blacks on his plantation and they would make cotton. And they'd bring it there to the store and he'd sell the cotton, weigh it and sell it and pay them. And then— | 26:39 |
Stacey Scales | How much was— | 26:57 |
Irene Monroe | Sometime they'd be done taking up charge a lot. During the summer he had to feed them and they come down there and get bread or coffee or whatnot. Mostly we raised all our hogs and chickens. You see we didn't buy nothing but coffee and sugar. We raised everything here. We just— | 26:58 |
Stacey Scales | How much did he get paid for doing that? | 27:23 |
Irene Monroe | Well cotton the, cotton was really just 20 cent a pound. You have a bale weighing 500. My daddy could figure it up in his head quicker than I can do it with a pencil. He used to count by quarter. So four quarters in a dollar he said. And he'd tell you what his cotton was going to bring and bales of cotton weighing 500 pounds. And he'd tell you what he's going to bring. | 27:26 |
Stacey Scales | Was he educated? | 27:58 |
Irene Monroe | No, he couldn't read nor write. He didn't know his name when he saw it, my daddy didn't. But they didn't mess with him. White folks didn't mess with him. | 28:00 |
Stacey Scales | Why not? | 28:09 |
Irene Monroe | They killed the beef, and it's like they didn't have no ice box in then. They had boxes, which you put the block ice in, the wooden box. Or either We let it down in the well. We had the well where you draw the water and you let your stuff down in the well. It's cool down in there to keep it if you didn't cook it that day. | 28:15 |
Irene Monroe | And if somebody going to kill a beef, you'd engage it all out. And you take it how many pounds you want and how many pounds you want? And how many pound like that. He'd engage it before he kill it. And then when he killed it, he would deliver it around and they'd pay. | 28:34 |
Irene Monroe | And so this old White man had something left and Papa told him, he said, "Well this is a nice roast, you can care Hilly with that." That was his wife's name. He said, "Well don't care if I do." And he bought it and carried it up there to Mama Hilly. And it wasn't fresh. She had done carried it on his wagon all day around delivering meat and it had done got kind of slick. | 28:52 |
Irene Monroe | And so Mama Hilly wouldn't take it. She told him it was spoiled and he carried it back down there and the man didn't want to give him his money back. So he checked him all. He said, "You're going to pay one way or the other." He said, "You're going to pay one way or the other." He checked him down off his book, his wagon, he had it on a wagon or springs. Papa pulled him out in the middle of town, put it down there. | 29:17 |
Irene Monroe | He said, "I'll whoop it out of you." He cussed. He cussed loud. Everything he said were cussing words. And so he was down in town and the sheriff come and he said, "Perry, you shouldn't use that language. Too many White women you know around there." So the sheriff gave him a ticket and charged him. He said, "I ain't charging you for whooping him and getting your money." He made him give Papa money back. | 29:43 |
Stacey Scales | Oh yeah. | 30:10 |
Irene Monroe | And he said, "I'm charging you for cursing down here in this lot of White women thing." And Papa told us he wasn't going to pay it. I was up here and brother was too. And my stepmom sent me a letter and told me Papa's trial was coming up the next morning at 8:00o'clock. And I wasn't here. I way up in Tuscumbia, Alabama. Up at Lou Armstrong, or Lou Jordan up there. | 30:11 |
Irene Monroe | And I came here and the letter was here. I just, I said, "Well I have to keep on home." It's 110 miles from home. I got me a coffee and made me a sandwich and whatnot. Sister and we live out to go to Vernon, Alabama. We got there about daylight to wake up Papa. And I told him, "Papa," I said. See I'm the baby. He had 11 children. I'm the baby of them all. | 30:43 |
Irene Monroe | And I told him, I said, "Come on, let's go downtown here." "And I don't want to go." I call the judge name. I said, "I'm going down to his office." Like that. He would do what I said do. He would mind me just as good. And he went on with me. And so I went into the judge's office and I told him I'm going to plead guilty on that charge of [indistinct 00:31:31] and pay it before the trial started. | 31:11 |
Irene Monroe | And he let me pay it and I just paid his fine out of my own back pocket. Papa said he wasn't going to give him nothing. "He just put me in jail and I'll sit it out. That's what he stole." He's a hard head. He said, "I'll just sit it out." And so I told him I wanted to pay it and I brought Papa on back home. | 31:32 |
Stacey Scales | How much was it? | 31:55 |
Irene Monroe | I done forgot now. | 31:56 |
Stacey Scales | Was it a whole lot? | 31:58 |
Irene Monroe | No, it wasn't much. It wasn't much. It was about 15 or $20 something. He said he wasn't charging him for whooping the man. He charging him for cussing down in town. A lot of White women was around there. He told Papa that. Sheriff department good. | 31:59 |
Irene Monroe | I used to get them before I had a car. I used to hire taxis when I bought this house. I know it was going for sale for tax. Brother that went down there and called, told me I'd be here when it was on for sale. And so I got a White cab. There were a number of White taxes then. I got them to drive me up here, pay on this house. I bought it in 1940 for tax. See it was selling for tax. | 32:21 |
Tywanna Whorley | How much? Do you remember? | 32:50 |
Irene Monroe | I don't remember. It wasn't that much. So I just don't remember that. But I know that I came on up here and gave him a check for it. | 32:50 |
Tywanna Whorley | What made you decide to live here? | 33:04 |
Irene Monroe | Well brother had, he used to work on the, deliver grocery for TCI, for the commissary right there in Westfield. That was his job. He delivered groceries. And see, after I finished school, we decided he had a job so we would stay up here. So we found us a house for sale. And he called me because see we didn't make much, about eight or $10 a week. But what you going to do, you have to take it. | 33:13 |
Irene Monroe | But they gave a lot of food out of the kitchen. When he delivered groceries like man sending roasts and things to his house. He said, "Where mine for my little sister?" He said, "Carry this to Irene." He'd send me a big roast. That's when they used to have them big picnics for them, for the employees. And he'd have, I don't know, Boston butts. Brother bring home two, three dish pans full. | 33:47 |
Irene Monroe | And I'd go to summer school, I'd catch some of them at summer school. And give her folks at a cafe across the PD Davis, across from Parker High. I'd give her a roast and they'd sell it like that. And I could drink pops and eat ice cream and whatever I wanted out of the today, because I carry a big old roast. It's already barbecued. | 34:22 |
Irene Monroe | But after I taught nine years, I asked them for relief of absence. I told them I was going to come and finish my college. I had two years in college. But I came and I started and I got out of school in April. And I started out here in May with a barbecue pit and oil stove. | 34:43 |
Irene Monroe | And I made barbecue, hamburgers. Coca-Cola was six cent bottle then. Beer wasn't but 11 cent. | 35:13 |
Tywanna Whorley | 11 cent? | 35:33 |
Irene Monroe | Back then them beer. And like Budweiser or Schlitz was 13 cents. But all this other, 92, Cooks, and they had Keeley's Half-and-Half then, was 13. | 35:33 |
Tywanna Whorley | So Black folks would drink Coca-Cola? | 35:40 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. I had, anybody would stop out there. I didn't care what color they was. I had a lot of White customers. I had them come in convertibles and back up to the door. And they would sit there and eat about two three barbecue pork sandwiches and then bring them beer. And I served them. | 35:42 |
Irene Monroe | And then Mr. Jesse Edward, he was a mayor of Brighton over there. And his mother, she didn't care nothing about it. She come on in there and sit down on one of them stools just as big and tell me, "Irene, fix me a slab." She'd bring her basket. "Fix me a slab of ribs and cut them all apart." But let it be whole, but just slice it down where she wouldn't have to do nothing but pull it off. | 36:09 |
Irene Monroe | And I fix her barbecue sauce in a jar, a marinade jar, and wrap her bread separate. And she would say, "I want to eat about two three pork sandwiches." She'd sit there and eat but two or three pork sandwiches. And then she carried the ribs with her and would drink her beer. And I didn't have no trouble. | 36:34 |
Irene Monroe | And I served beer on the curb out in the front. They park out in the front, man and his girlfriend, it was twins. I couldn't tell them twins apart unless they had the girlfriend with them because they looked so much alike. I couldn't tell one from the other. They back up to the door with the top back and they sit right there and eat pork sandwiches as fast as I could make them. They was making pork sandwiches and they eat those. | 36:53 |
Tywanna Whorley | Did the Blacks and White eat in the same area? | 37:20 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. They come, the White would come in. I didn't turn nobody down. The Blacks ain't pay them no attention. And some of them would come in a truck. Gang of boys. And you know what, they'd sit around that truck on this side in the bed and that side, the ridge of it. And put the beer, put they all by the case. They put a case of beer down the center of it and they sit out there and drink it. You could drink it on the curb and they didn't bother you. | 37:25 |
Tywanna Whorley | Never any conflict? | 37:53 |
Irene Monroe | I ain't got no trouble. | 37:56 |
Tywanna Whorley | How much did you used to sell your sandwiches for? | 37:57 |
Irene Monroe | They were 15 cents back then. Hamburgers was like a dime or something. Pork sandwich 15 or 25 cent, I think. And rib sandwich was a quarter. Oh, you could have a whole lot of stuff. You could buy a whole lot for a dollar. Buy ribs and sandwich and whatnot all for— | 38:05 |
Tywanna Whorley | So when you went to the store, did you just buy bulk of ribs? | 38:22 |
Irene Monroe | Oh yeah. We bought from Zeigler, we bought boxes of ribs. And we'd go down there and buy. The meat, be hanging, swinging on them things. And buy ground beef in the 10, 20 pound packages like that. | 38:26 |
Tywanna Whorley | So this was in the '40s when you started going there? | 38:42 |
Irene Monroe | And then the little houses out there, that 10 that was the barn where I was stored my beer. They didn't have no petitions in them then. And we would buy, Billy Smith what used to run the Bluebird up there. He and brother bought a car bill. Box cars would come on the railroad track. They'd buy a car and they have a truck up there and unload it. Keylee's Half-and-Half and put it out here. | 38:46 |
Irene Monroe | And so when you get ready for a case of beer, I furnished several houses with bootlegging. They come in, I sell them a case. | 39:13 |
Stacey Scales | Yeah? | 39:23 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. I sell them a case of beer. Especially on weekend. They'd run out on Friday night and they come down here on Sunday. I'd put one in their trunk. Go on about their business. Go and run houses. Lady named Naomi Belsamont. I had several houses in Inez, over there in Titusville, I had two, three houses that I furnished beer by the case. | 39:26 |
Tywanna Whorley | How would you charge by the case? | 39:52 |
Irene Monroe | Well there wasn't much because you could buy a case for $2 or something. Because the beer wasn't but 10, 11 cent a bottle. $1.80 something. | 39:57 |
Tywanna Whorley | When did you start working for your brother in the [indistinct 00:40:15]? | 40:02 |
Irene Monroe | It burned in 1967. He died in 1967. I had in that hallway, after brother got kind of ill, then I had mostly catered to clubs and fraternities out there in the Nite Spot. Then I'd have every weekend, like a Friday or Saturday, I'd have balls out there. You'd have to dress, they'd have formal dances. | 40:15 |
Irene Monroe | See I quit on paying. When I had BB and Ray Charles. That's the reason I got the little old building out there, the motel. I had to fix a place for them to stay because you couldn't stay in the White motel. And they had to stay in there and they stayed out there and play out here. And then I'd buy about, you'd have to buy four or five dates on them. I went to Montgomery. I had a place, I had three places in Montgomery. I played Captain's Club and the Sawmill Quarters, and another one place. | 40:50 |
Irene Monroe | I paid BB down there and Louis Armstrong. And I played Nat King Cole down there the first time. I lost money on him. First band I paid past. That was his home. Montgomery. | 41:26 |
Stacey Scales | Really? | 41:44 |
Irene Monroe | Mm-hmm. | 41:45 |
Tywanna Whorley | And you lost money on him? | 41:45 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, I lost money on him because see they're supposed to advertise for you. See I carry them plaques and give them tickets, advance sale tickets to sell, and put them up and everything. But see, the people had never got used to going, they didn't know about them. You know about then you promoting them, things like that you see. | 41:49 |
Irene Monroe | And after then, why I didn't have no trouble. I'd go to Selma to the Elks. I carried them to Selma and another little old place in Tuscaloosa that them people had beer. I don't know how it was fixed, but they had it in the wall. And you go there and they'd put the cup up under there and they'd run it out there. They had the whiskey like that too. They didn't have no bottle in the place like that. | 42:08 |
Irene Monroe | They had it fixed in the wall and they just selling it, all kinds of whiskey and stuff. See they would give me the door to get the sale to the people. They wouldn't charging me no rent. | 42:43 |
Tywanna Whorley | No? | 43:03 |
Irene Monroe | They just get to bring a big crowd to their place to get to sell to them. That's where they made their money. Selling food and drinks. | 43:03 |
Stacey Scales | How about Fourth Avenue here in Birmingham? Did you— | 43:09 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, I was there 29 years. Right there in Monroe Steakhouse, right there. Second there was a cab stand there and the Masonic Temple and Nancy's is a cafe right there beside me. She sold, now see I wasn't open in the morning, she'd sell breakfast and things like that. And I didn't open until 8:00 o'clock. And she'd be there and she'd open about 5:00 o'clock. | 43:10 |
Irene Monroe | And so that was a one stop place. I had beer, whiskey, and foods and I have all kind of vegetables. See my brother, we got a farm down in Shade Valley and we raised everything. We had chickens, hogs, geese, ducks, everything. Cows, we had everything. We killed all. And raised all kind of vegetables, corn, potatoes, peas. Preston up at the Masonic Temple in there, put in that drug store there. People come around and buy bowls of peas and a slice onion. I sold soul food. | 43:35 |
Tywanna Whorley | Whoa. Who managed the farm while you? | 44:24 |
Irene Monroe | My brother. He stayed, he got a house. We had a house. We had two houses down there and barn, cow. We had milk. We'd milk cows and bring the milk here and sister churn it with the dasher like that. She'd sell all the buttermilk she could get. My sister would do that. She came from Detroit and stayed with me. She'd do all the cooking here at the house. I didn't cook, I just come in. | 44:25 |
Irene Monroe | It kept me, we had two, three places one time. So it just kept me on the road. Every night I'd have somewhere to go to play the band. I'd get a little shut-eye, strike out that evening about 5:00 o'clock. I always leave early to get in town to let them now that the band is there and show their bus what they be traveling in. | 44:51 |
Tywanna Whorley | So when you went to Montgomery, did you stay in the Memorial Town? | 45:15 |
Irene Monroe | Uh-uh, I didn't stay in no place. I'd come back at night when it's over. Yeah, we'd get back home. Yeah. Really the band would come back here and they'd stay out there because they didn't have nowhere to stay out there. | 45:22 |
Tywanna Whorley | How much did the people that played for you— | 45:34 |
Irene Monroe | Chare a band? | 45:36 |
Tywanna Whorley | Like BB King, how did they charge? | 45:36 |
Irene Monroe | When I first, I got some contracts was $300, some 350. Ray Charles, I played Ray Charles. I would get little Junior Parker and like that. They just started playing what I'd ask them for when I paid BB. See you run in percentage after. He cost 350. All right. After he make 350 and we take the tax, you had to pay this 10%, take tax off. And then when he run in the percentage, it's been so many people out there, running the percentage about $500 after you got that guarantee. Ray Charles too. Little Junior Parker, James Brown, Ira Joe Hunter, he's from Louisiana. And— | 45:43 |
Irene Monroe | —them. I don't know how many bands I had, but I'd book them from New York and from Houston, Texas. Houston, Texas had B.B., man. That was my sure bit when I wanted to make some money. | 0:00 |
Tywanna Whorley | Yeah? | 0:19 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, he'd been there a lot of times. Yeah, he'd been there and James Brown, too and 5 Royales, and Ivory Joe Hunter. She had a lady here, a lady playing the piano, Anita Howard and she'd sit sideways on the piano and look to the people and get up and twist and they'd holler. I had reserved seats down at the front and a fence around it, where the other people sat in the booth. And outside, come out to dance. And up in the front was the café, if you wanted a sandwich or whatnot. I had a barbecue pit up there. They'd sell barbecue, chick heads. | 0:20 |
Irene Monroe | And then when a brother got sick, kind of where he didn't feel like sitting out there, I mostly catered to club dances and sororities where you could just formally put decoration. I put tablecloths on all the tables, put some stuff on the floor, make it easy to dance on. And they'd come with their bow ties and things, black and white or whatever it was. They'd be the one giving the people invitation. The club would pay me for the hall and then I'd get to sell to them. And if they wanted to eat, they'd have to come up in the front there on them stools and buy our food, but they'd buy ice and lemons and all that stuff. Waiters carry that down in the hallway. They'd drink down in there and dance. | 1:03 |
Stacey Scales | So who would be in the audience? Was it a lot of Black folks or White folks? | 1:56 |
Irene Monroe | Mostly Black. | 2:02 |
Irene Monroe | I had the Sweethearts of Rhythm. Now they were White girls and I didn't know it, but I'd have policemen here. I had seen them two policemen from Brighton, always come and work. | 2:03 |
Irene Monroe | So them girls came here and I didn't know these White—New York folks send me a post, they don't tell you whether they're White or Black. They just say they're artists and they want to come, why, they'll just come. They send them on. | 2:17 |
Irene Monroe | When they got here and they was White, I had them out there in the motel. So I said "I didn't know you all were White." I said "You're different." I said "Would y'all mind putting on a little pancake makeup?" And they said "No." I got some pancake makeup and made them brown skinned, light brown, put it all over them. But they had on little white blouses and little bow tie, right around here. And that girl blowing the horn, she got hot. She turned it loose, she opened it up and one of the fellas saying, "She White, she White, she White!" (laughs) | 2:34 |
Irene Monroe | I said '"Shut your mouth, nigger," just like that (laughs). I said "What you care about what she is?" She was blowing, man, she was blowing that horn, they was dancing. He come up there to her, pointed to the— | 3:14 |
Irene Monroe | See, the stage was up kind of high. They couldn't get up there. He went up to her and he was standing up there and looking at her blowing. She just blowing that horn up and she unloosened her little blouse. She had a little round collar and a little bow tie, a little tie. She took it loose, she got hot, and he could see that white there and she was brown up here. (laughs) | 3:31 |
Irene Monroe | He said "She White, she White!" I went to him, I stand around. I just walked the floor, you know. I said "You shut your mouth, nigger. I don't want to hear you say that no more. What difference does it make?" I said "Ain't you enjoying it?" "Yes, ma'am, I'm having a good time." I said "You go on have a good time, don't you be out here—" (laughs) | 3:53 |
Irene Monroe | They stayed out there till they—I mean they played their dates. They had a big crowd. | 4:13 |
Irene Monroe | Them girls could blow them horns. Yeah, they could blow horn. But B.B. had a lady, a Black girl from Memphis, the first time he came here. Evelyn, her name was Evelyn. Evelyn was good. She could blow. She'd take that solo and she could blow that horn. | 4:26 |
Irene Monroe | But the best blowing I ever seen was I believe, I don't know if it was The 5 Royales or not. That fellow was kind of crippled and he couldn't sit down in a chair. He had to have a stool because he couldn't bend. He was on that stool up there and he's taking that solo. Them people, they stopped dancing and just get around and look at him. Whoo, he played that horn. He done make it talk. Some of them was, whoo. | 4:44 |
Irene Monroe | I didn't have no trouble. All these people down here. "Irene, they can park in front of my house. I ain't going to let them steal nothing." They'd be here just watching the cars for me. No stealing no tires off. I had that lot. I had them parked on it and then they'd be parked all up the street. | 5:10 |
Irene Monroe | They said "Just open that window, that way, we can hear that man play that guitar." (laughs) I had a big old window on this side and I open that window. It had a pull-out thing and so they said open that window. That man remind me when I was down in the country trying to get my rollout. He said let him play that horn and B.B. get on in the song with a guitar, Lucille, and had a little girl, one girl and boy. He a frail that thing and they just jumping. | 5:30 |
Irene Monroe | Brother said "Lord, don't let nobody else here." Or they'd be out there in line trying to get in with Louis Armstrong. I said I can't get nobody else in there. I said "Standing room— " "I don't want to sit down. I just want to get in there, I just wanted to—" And that's all up in the [indistinct 00:06:23] part dancing. And then you had your ham sandwich over like this and get your money like that. Same with the Coca Cola. They had the bottle in their pocket and their cup in their hand and their Coca Cola in there just dancing. Just like that. | 6:06 |
Stacey Scales | Were you— | 6:38 |
Irene Monroe | They had a good time. | 6:39 |
Stacey Scales | —familiar with a club called the Owls? | 6:40 |
Irene Monroe | I visit [indistinct 00:06:45]. Yeah, he was undertaker. I used to go to the Owls Club when it's upstairs [indistinct 00:06:53] here. Sure did. | 6:42 |
Tywanna Whorley | Now where exactly was the club, was it back here? | 6:56 |
Irene Monroe | Let me show you from this door here. | 7:00 |
Tywanna Whorley | Okay. You go ahead. | 7:03 |
Stacey Scales | It's right here? | 7:03 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. | 7:04 |
Tywanna Whorley | You walk, you can walk. | 7:04 |
Irene Monroe | See, now when it burned, it could take my house because see, how close I am to it? I had this put on there, since the club burned, since it burned. But it could've taken all that I got. See, that's the frame of it. See this, see them blocks right there? That was the latest toilet in the kitchen right there. The kitchen was on this side and that back yonder, all them blocks back yonder. | 7:06 |
Tywanna Whorley | He's going to take a picture of it. | 7:36 |
Irene Monroe | Okay. See, this frame? See that out where that grass stop back there, where that road come in, that's the foundation over yonder. They were going to let me build it back but after Brother passed, I was afraid to try. It come to the first to that rock out here in the front. | 7:41 |
Tywanna Whorley | Was it also right here with the doors on there? | 8:01 |
Irene Monroe | Mm-hmm. That's the building right there. I put up a—Them the rocks, but I put up a fence there in that fence back yonder where you see some of the blocks up back there now. | 8:05 |
Stacey Scales | Yeah. | 8:19 |
Irene Monroe | That dark spot there. I had a back door back there, you could go in the side door on that side. I have one this way and one in the front. | 8:19 |
Stacey Scales | So the people that lived around you didn't mind the loud noise and cars or something? | 8:30 |
Irene Monroe | No, they'd tell me they watch the cars. They just park all in front of their houses, they sit there and watch them. Told me to open the window where they could hear, they could go—They told me to open the window where they could hear. They were all good. They didn't care. | 8:34 |
Tywanna Whorley | Okay. | 8:55 |
Irene Monroe | Some of them, and when I had the club dances, they would come, they would come to the—They would rent, the club would rent the band and pay for all of that. They just rent the club from me and I get to sell to the people and I let the clubs have them, have the hall for $25. | 8:59 |
Tywanna Whorley | $25? | 9:21 |
Irene Monroe | Mm-hmm. $25. What this man—The little girl who got burned up in the school which blowed up and his daughter got killed. What his name? | 9:22 |
Stacey Scales | In church or the school? | 9:41 |
Irene Monroe | No, in the church. | 9:41 |
Stacey Scales | 16th street? | 9:42 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. | 9:45 |
Stacey Scales | This church? | 9:46 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. | 9:47 |
Stacey Scales | One of the daughters? | 9:47 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. Her club have her dances. They'd be running the clubs and sororities. I had some doctors' fraternities, too. Dr. Denby. | 9:49 |
Tywanna Whorley | So who managed the money? | 10:02 |
Irene Monroe | Me. I check up with all of them. I have a cash register, I have one girl on cash register. She's in California now. I bring my worker from the steak house. They loved to make them double. They wanted to see the bands, too, you know. All the waitresses all want to wait tables, they come down to the steak house and come with me when I come back home in the evening, they'd be here. Gladys is in California. Bertha's in California. They worked on the register up there. My cook, I'd bring her to work in the kitchen down here. She'd double up. She'll cook, we cooked soul food. We make us a number of sandwiches out here. But up there, I had all kind of vegetables. | 10:06 |
Stacey Scales | Did you have pictures of— | 10:54 |
Irene Monroe | Fried corn. I'd have corn about three times a day. | 10:54 |
Stacey Scales | Did you have pictures of the people before they came? Like pictures of the—Promotional pictures? | 11:04 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. I gave the old, carried them up to the Jazz Hall of Fame. | 11:06 |
Stacey Scales | Yeah? | 11:13 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. | 11:13 |
Stacey Scales | Did you have any ice skaters and people like that? | 11:14 |
Irene Monroe | No, I never. I didn't have any. | 11:17 |
Stacey Scales | Because I saw some pictures from the Jazz Hall of Fame, I didn't know if they were yours. | 11:20 |
Irene Monroe | I have some old contracts. They want them old contracts where I used to buy B.B. for $300. That's what I paid for him the first time he came. $300. And Ray Charles, too, and T-Bone Walker. T-Bone was the first one I played out there. | 11:25 |
Tywanna Whorley | What was the name of your club? | 11:48 |
Irene Monroe | Madison Nite Spot. | 11:49 |
Tywanna Whorley | Madison Nite Spot. | 11:51 |
Irene Monroe | It was the station over on the car line, you called it Madison. And so I named it Madison Nite Spot from the car line. | 11:52 |
Tywanna Whorley | Did you open every night or just on the weekends? | 12:07 |
Irene Monroe | We'd be open every night. I had eight waitresses on the floor. Beer wasn't but 10, 11 cents a bottle. They made $8 a week in tips. Yeah, they were there. The man who worked the club, I think I didn't pay them but $5. | 12:10 |
Tywanna Whorley | Because they made enough— | 12:32 |
Irene Monroe | They made in tips. They made it in tips. They were hot on the tips, they make good money out there on tips. | 12:34 |
Tywanna Whorley | So some nights, you didn't have like someone performing, people just came in anyway to sit around and talk? | 12:44 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, they just come to the Nite Spot. They could dance by the rock hall because I had a dance hall and they had—Yeah, they sit around and drank. They bring these bottles. I charge them cover charge. Some come there. They go back in the hall and they dance. I had a group from Miles. I let them have their pep rally dance out there from Miles [indistinct 00:13:21] was teaching these. | 12:51 |
Irene Monroe | And I know some of them things Gaston told. Boy, he ain't got started selling no damn peanuts. Now, he ought to quit that lie. I know him. I know where he started. He sold peanuts, he married Smith daughter and Smith one what had the undertaker. It said Smith and Gaston and when Dad Smith died, see, he was coroner, he married his daughter. Remember when he asked how he got that business, talking about he sold peanuts. He don't sell no peanuts and start nothing. Shoot, he sell, those cost peanut wasn't a nickel a bag. Yeah, quit that shit. I know a whole lot about him. He learn me good when he buried my daddy but I told him all that stuff. I said "Man, you ought to quit, I'll tell about you." | 13:24 |
Tywanna Whorley | That's how he says he started out by selling peanuts? | 14:27 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, but he married Dad Smith and he used to have Smith and Gaston and you ain't ever seen Smith. Smith died. And he married Smith's daughter and he was helping him and then he turned it over to him, I get, that's how it was done. | 14:30 |
Tywanna Whorley | —watching out for you? | 14:45 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, they be watching out for us. I'd pull my back door, turn on that light at night and they know I'm sick and they come out here and see about I'm still here by myself. | 14:48 |
Tywanna Whorley | How would you describe Mr. Gaston? | 15:06 |
Irene Monroe | I know, see, that's how he come in possession of it. See, it was Smith and Gaston and then Smith died and he married Smith's daughter and that left it to him. But he didn't buy that thing. Doctor used to tell me he sold peanuts. Gosh. | 15:06 |
Tywanna Whorley | He's saying he bought it? | 15:21 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah. You know when he started in business, said he sold peanuts and all that stuff. That thing was there because at that time, Mary Strong was one undertaker, too. She was just like I'm sick, somebody was sick, they would go down, come to your house to see how you were and all that. They try to talk to the people you know to get a body, figuring you're going to die. And Gaston, he buried folks and but he's tall. He had so many caskets. He had a casket that he cut the leg off (laughs) to fit the casket. [indistinct 00:16:18] tell a lie. | 15:26 |
Irene Monroe | I don't know what he's talking about, talking about he sold peanuts. He buried my dad and my dad and mama was down in Lamar County, Vernon, Alabama. And Smith and Gaston, they had them burials and folk come from closer place, Walker County, Jasper, up there. And my step mama and my daddy had a burial with him. Okay. Papa got sick and mama—He got sick but his water stopped and so I took Dr. Denby down there. Doctor helped me, got out at 11:00 and he stopped papa's— | 16:18 |
Irene Monroe | He started on and I get papa down there. See, there were a number of White doctors in Vernon, Alabama and I got Dr. Denby down there after he come out of the office about 11:00. I had a boy to drive me, Chatma, he dead now. And we went down there and papa was swolled up. His feet was swollen, he's swollen, couldn't make water, he was hurting. I carried him down there. So I said "Papa, I brought a doctor down here and he going to work on you." He looked up at him and he looked up and said "I ain't never had no nigger doctor. " (laughs) He said "I ain't never had no nigger doctor." Dr. Denby said "Haha, you got one now. "(laughs) I had told the doctor to pay no attention to what he said. Whatever come up, come out, you know. | 16:56 |
Irene Monroe | He couldn't read nor write but he could figure a bale of cotton, 500 at 20 cent a pound, he could do it with a pencil. In his head, he'd count them quarters like that. See, he was born in slavery and he said—See, it's just White doctors down there in Lamar County. | 17:54 |
Irene Monroe | And they had all White taxis. I had a taxi to bring me up here when I closed the deal on this house. Papa told him and said—Dr. Denby laughed. I told him to pay him no attention, he's old. So he got on now and he worked with the man [indistinct 00:18:36]. He said "How you feel now?" He says "I believe you are a cracker jack." That's what he said. He felt good that he got that water out of his stomach. [indistinct 00:18:47] So next time, I went down there, I brought him on back up here with me so he could be here near the doctor, he wouldn't be so far for me to take him down there. So Dr. Denby was doctoring on him, on papa. He said "I ain't never had no nigger doctor." You have White cabs and White doctors down there. But Dr. Denby, he loved Dr. Denby. | 18:14 |
Irene Monroe | See, he died up here with me. And when he died up here with me, I called Smith and Gaston because they had to bury. So he told me, I said I want to take him back down home, called my mama. My step mama had died. So we take him back down to the cemetery, we got a space. So he told me, you're going to have to add something to the burial, we're going to have to charge you more. I said what more? We ain't got more mileage. I said I don't have as much mileage, he's dead. That's when he luring me. I said we don't have as much mileage. I ain't never carried no body to Vernon, Alabama. I said if you want to make a big impression, I said you advertise on your own, not on me. Because he got a wife left here and he was—And I says I'm not going to take all his money and give it to you and make a big name. And then his wife won't have nothing. | 19:19 |
Irene Monroe | Sometimes, they catch people bereaved and they just say yeah, brother and sister, brother be sniffing out and sister, she's sniffing. But I don't know, I'm the baby and I kept a level head, I said no, I ain't going to pay you no more. I ain't never carried no body down there. I said if you want to make a big impression on the people on the people you advertise, you do it on your own, not on mine. Not me [indistinct 00:20:54] because you got less mileage. I said look, it's 60 miles from my house to Jasper. That's the closest place. They have to come down there 60 miles and pick the body up and bring it up there and embalm it and then carry it back. That's 120. | 20:27 |
Irene Monroe | Okay, I said then their boys have to come back up there to get where they stay. And I counted up that mile. I said now, it's not but three miles from here to this branch office. He'll go down here and be embalmed. See, you then go down home and then they come back and that's it. I said I counted up the mileage and I told him he's making less mileage. | 21:15 |
Irene Monroe | He think people when you're bereaved, you tell them anything and they just say go on and do that and they'd be crying and sniffing and going on. But I knew I did all I could do for my dad and I wouldn't want them [indistinct 00:22:03]. Said "I won't give you a penny more." That's when [indistinct 00:22:11]. They did it. They picked the body up and carried it down here and embalmed it. And we got ready to go, he carried on home and come down here and we lined up and went on down to Lamar County and buried him. I didn't give him no more. But that's when he luring me, he didn't know me. That's when he lured me. | 21:47 |
Tywanna Whorley | How did you know about the peanuts? I mean in terms of him telling that story about the peanuts but you knew that he got married. | 22:36 |
Irene Monroe | I heard. I heard him telling them. Somebody was interviewing him on the radio and he talking about he sold peanuts. He got started he'd sell it and saved that little money and all that. He saved that money. You know he couldn't stselling peanuts out there. Because peanuts was about a nickel [indistinct 00:23:06] was cheap. Coca Cola was 6 cents. Barbecue pork sandwich, 15 cent. I started off selling, beer was 10-11 cent a bottle. And that was 92 and Cook's, all that, but Budweiser and Schlitz was 15 cent. They're a little more. But you could buy a beer for 10-11 cent a bottle. They wouldn't come in and ask for a bottle of beer. They come in and order a case. If it was just four or five of them, they come in and order a case. So put half a case on the table now, and the other stay and be cold and then bring the other half. That's the way they would buy it. And they drink it all. | 22:47 |
Irene Monroe | And same thing, I'd serve it on the curb. We could serve it on the curb. They be [indistinct 00:23:57] White people coming in and sit on them trucks around that thing and tell me to put the case of beer—I had a boy, Henry, he used to help me. He went to the Navy but he didn't come back. I don't know what happened to him. And he called me and told me he was on his way back, but he never did get here. I don't know what happened to him. He didn't have no cousins and uncle, he didn't have no people. But he now used to do, he would serve the box. I had eight waitresses on the floor and he would fill every one of thems order, they didn't come behind the bar. He would order it and fix it up and then carry it on up to the cash register and that girl would get her money. I'd give him change and they'd pay for it and then carry it out and get their money. That's the way it would happen. | 23:52 |
Tywanna Whorley | So when did everybody get paid? Like every Friday or once or twice a week? | 24:44 |
Irene Monroe | Once a week. | 24:52 |
Tywanna Whorley | Once a week? | 24:53 |
Irene Monroe | But they made good tips. Them folks, they made good tips. Shoot, they made—Most of them, when I would get ready to have a band, I could have more extra waitresses than I need. They was all at them clubs and things. Them boys would be down there, ready to come down here to work, they want to see the band. They work for $3 because see, they made tips. I had a girl behind the bar fill your order. You come up and order and you didn't come behind the bar. She just filled all your order, put it all on down to the cash register. She'd tell them what they owe and they pay that and he go down there each and get their money out of them. People would check them. | 24:57 |
Tywanna Whorley | And Mr. Gaston never come down and check out your place? | 25:52 |
Irene Monroe | Yeah, I don't tell that. I won't say that. I set it off real quickly. | 25:55 |
Tywanna Whorley | That's okay. | 26:07 |
Irene Monroe | I can't say that. Yeah, he like my waitresses. | 26:10 |
Tywanna Whorley | Okay. | 26:14 |
Irene Monroe | He like one. | 26:17 |
Tywanna Whorley | Thank you. | 26:19 |
Item Info
The preservation of the Duke University Libraries Digital Collections and the Duke Digital Repository programs are supported in part by the Lowell and Eileen Aptman Digital Preservation Fund