Ruthie Jackson interview recording, 1995 August 10

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Stacey Scales	—Jackson?	0:00
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, I was born in 19 and nine.	0:01
Stacey Scales	19 and nine?	0:02
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm.	0:05
Stacey Scales	Where were you born?	0:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Crystal Springs, Mississippi. Yeah, I have all of that in there. Crystal Springs, Mississippi, that's about 25 miles from Jackson.	0:06
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes.	0:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And it's a vegetable country. Crystal Springs, up here, mostly they raise some little vegetables, but at Crystal Springs, that's all they raise. But when they raise it, when they get through with the—Can we be talking now?	0:15
Stacey Scales	Yes.	0:33
Ruthie Harris Jackson	With the vegetables, all down there is vegetable.	0:36
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	0:40
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And we raised that in the summer. You see the vegetable farm, we raised that in the summer. Carrots and beets and lettuce and beans. The yellow beans and the green beans and the English peas and potatoes and tomatoes. We raised all that kind of stuff down there. And you could just walk, your house would be sitting in a field of cabbage.	0:40
Stacey Scales	Really?	1:08
Ruthie Harris Jackson	It was just a big cabbage field.	1:08
Stacey Scales	Your yard was cabbage?	1:13
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, the whole field. It was just a big field. And then we tied those beets and we tied those carrots. That's where we made our living. And the tomatoes, we stuck the tomatoes. They grow and you prune that tomato between the stalk and the—Right in here. It's a little bloom would come, a little prune. You prune this little thing out.	1:13
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	1:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And that'll make your tomatoes great, big tomatoes when you prune. And we didn't have—The fertilizer that we are using now, you could just put your hand in some fertilizer and just sprinkle it on this stuff. And we—Huh?	1:37
Stacey Scales	Did your people own that?	2:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, they're planters.	2:04
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	2:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They owned it, just like the people in the Delta. Well, everybody had their own crop. You worked with these people and you packed your tomatoes. You had some crates and you packed your tomatoes and then you load them on the train. You put about half right and then you load them on a train and they ship them then from one place to the other. They would ship those tomatoes.	2:07
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And they had a shed made where you go and stand up there and pick out those tomatoes, number one, number two, number three. They was classed, those tomatoes. And then you pick out your tomatoes and pack them in baskets. When you pack them in the baskets, you get them ready for to put on the train. And by the time the tomatoes get where they going, they would be ripe. You pack them about half green.	2:28
Stacey Scales	How much would you get for your work?	2:56
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh well, we did it by—Now, we didn't get too much a day, but we worked by the—Just so many crates. So many crates. And then that there we picked the beans by the bushel. They had a bushel basket and you picked those beans by the bushel. You picked yellow beans, then you had green beans, but you picked so many bushels and they give you so much a bushel.	2:58
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	3:29
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That's where you did that. And you'd tie your carrots and your beets and things by the bunch.	3:30
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	3:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Then they had a pond there that you wash them. You wash them in those ponds. And let me see what else now did we do? We'd do watermelons. They raised watermelons, so plenty of watermelons down there.	3:38
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well now, after we get through with all of this, we'd come to the Delta and pick cotton by the hundred. In the fall, our crops would be over.	3:54
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And those tomatoes, I want to tell you, they had a frame. Called it a hotbed. You put those tomatoes in that hotbed first. Then after you put them in the hotbed, they'd grow up, then you had a long frame. A long frame. A thing made that you put those tomatoes in.	4:03
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	4:25
Ruthie Harris Jackson	When they growed up big enough, you set them out in the field and then it was if a cold wave would come in, they'd blow a whistle, then you'd have to get up. I don't care what time of night it is, you had to get up and cover all those tomatoes to keep them from getting killed. It looked like it was kind of hard but that's what we had to do. Now we didn't own those crops, but the man that we were working with, he owned them.	4:26
Stacey Scales	Were you sharecropping?	5:02
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No.	5:04
Stacey Scales	No?	5:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We lived in our own homes in different places. You see?	5:06
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	5:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now some people were sharecropping, but we never did sharecrop, we just worked for the people. And then they had some pine straw and they had this frame covered. We had a long thing covered over that, then you had some pine straw that covered on top of that to keep the cold from killing the tomatoes. 'Cause they was hard to—	5:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You had to do everything to try to keep them until the cold weather got over. Called it hotbed. Then when the first one was a hotbed, the next was a cold frame.	5:37
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And so that's how we made our living there. But we was just growing up. We growed up there and that's how we made our living. But when they got all the cabbage gone and all the tomatoes are gone and everything, then we come to the Delta and pick cotton by the hundreds.	5:51
Stacey Scales	You were in the hills before?	6:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	In the hills, we were in the hills. Crystal Springs. That's Crystal Springs, Mississippi.	6:12
Stacey Scales	And did your grandparents and parents work? Were they there?	6:20
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yeah, they were there. My parents were there. They worked in that stuff too. Now, they didn't have too much of cotton there. And that little cotton sack, you could just swing it up on your shoulder what we had in the hills. But when we come here, you had this long cotton sack. But up in the hill, the little what they made, you could just let your little sack swing on your shoulder.	6:23
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes. And when you all were living up there, why did you decide to come here?	6:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, now when we was in the hills, they called it the devil. "No, we don't want go to that devil." We called the Delta the devil, 'cause we heard how they treated people.	6:55
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But by us coming up here in the Delta, my stepfather decided he wanted to live here. That was at Isola. I got that in there too for you. That was at Isola. That's the first place that we come to live. We got on the wrong man's plantation down at Isola. Mr. A.G. McDaniel.	7:06
Stacey Scales	Why did you say it's the wrong man's plantation?	7:33
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Because he was mean. He was mean to the people and he didn't clear nothing. And then when you pick cotton by the hundred, they called it a P. They had it loaded. You might have 100 pounds of cotton in your sack, but you would have over 75 pounds when it was that loaded P. They had to load the P and weigh your cotton. And then when they weighed your cotton, if you had 100 pounds in there, you'd lose about 25. That's the way it was on that place.	7:37
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But after we were on this man's place, you made a contract. My daddy made a contract with this man. He didn't furnish you no money, he furnished you food. And when he furnished you this food, he had a contract you going to get maybe meat and molasses and salt pork and maybe a few peas, a little coffee, little sugar, flour and meal.	8:06
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, on this place, this first place we came to, he promised us this flour and we had been without flour for about three weeks. And my stepdaddy, he told a White man. He said, "Look, I ain't never done without flour in my home three weeks in my life. I'm 40 years old." And he said, "I never have done without flour this long."	8:40
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, he cussed him out. He cussed him out. I got that in there too, telling you about—And he cussed him out and told him he was telling a lie and told him that he know he had done without flour. That somebody coming there?	9:08
Stacey Scales	No, ma'am.	9:24
Ruthie Harris Jackson	My stepfather then, he went to Jackson. He come on back home and he told my mother, "Now look, he not going treat me this way. He done broke the contract. He was supposed to let me have flour." Well, they called the store a commissary. The stores was called commissaries. And then when you go to this store and he let somebody else have your sack of flour, but he was supposed to keep your flour until you get there. But now, that's where he broke the contract at. Then my step-daddy, then he went on down to Jackson and sued him.	9:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	He went on down to Jackson. Now, those are some things I was asking you what did you think about that? But now I feel like in the early '20s, if you could sue somebody in the early '20s and make them pay for the way they treat you, look like it already been done somewhere else, if the person had nerve enough to go.	10:07
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But he went on down there and we had 24 hours to be in Jackson. 24 hours. That's when my daddy went on down to Jackson and reported how he was treated and reported about the flour, we wasn't getting the flour and all of that. Then they wrote him a letter back. That was Isola, the first place we lived, and they give us 24 hours to be in Jackson.	10:27
Stacey Scales	Who gave you that?	10:58
Ruthie Harris Jackson	The lawyers and the court. Our daddy went and sued him. And then when he went and reported us and they give us 24 hours to be in Jackson. 24 hours. They said they wasn't afraid of them, but they let us go.	11:01
Stacey Scales	What was going to happen if you stayed there longer than 24 hours?	11:19
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, they were going to do something about it. They were going to hunt him down. They had been sued after my daddy went and made this report, that we had to be in Jackson in 24 hours. Well, we had to be there in 24 hours and they were going have to be—Something was going to happen through the court. And then another thing you would do, just like your house is furnished, people would just run off and leave. They would just run off from the Delta.	11:22
Stacey Scales	People had to run away?	11:57
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Run away. They had to run away. But see, they'd slip off by night and leave their house just furnished. Well, if somebody else come in, they could just go on in that house because it was already for them. All you was trying to do was get away yourself. Now, we didn't never run off, but our daddy, when he went there and put and turned them in, in Jackson, we were just free to go.	11:59
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	12:22
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We were free to go. And Mama just packed two trunks and just left everything else. Just left it and went on. And this man let us have a wagon to put them two trunks in and got them to the bus, where we could get the bus to get the Jackson.	12:23
Stacey Scales	Who was the man that let you use their wagon?	12:48
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That was the boss man, A. G. McDaniel. That's whose plantation we was on.	12:52
Stacey Scales	Did he know you were going to up there to do something about him?	12:56
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yeah, he knew it. He didn't know that my daddy was going to walk on down. My daddy left walking. He left Isola walking and he walked as far as Isola. We was in Isola and he walked as far as Belzoni. And he got a ride right into Jackson, right where the lawyer was. And he went there and he sued those—They didn't know it until they received a letter. And when they received this letter saying that this family had to be in Jackson in 24 hours, see, they was afraid then. And they let us go. And we had to be there in 24 hours, we was in Jackson. Because he had said we weren't going to move. But in 24 hours, we was in Jackson.	13:00
Stacey Scales	Living there?	13:53
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, we lived at Crystal Springs. But he sued them in Jackson. That's where he went and sued him. Well, I thought maybe if he could have nerve enough to go and sue those people, look like somebody else could have done that.	13:54
Stacey Scales	Right. When he sued them, did he ever get his flour?	14:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh no, we didn't stay there no more. We went on back to Crystal Springs.	14:16
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	14:18
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We was through with that plantation. But now after we got back there, we decided to come back in some more places and pick cotton by the hundred. And then after we got there, well, we'd go back home. But then in '24, we came to the Delta to live. In '24. This little girl, she was a baby.	14:21
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes.	14:41
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That was my baby, and her daddy and we come to the Delta and we moved on Mr. Allen Harves. I told you about that.	14:42
Stacey Scales	Yes.	14:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	On his plantation up in Ruby, between Money and Philipp. We stayed there so many years, all through the '27 high water and all that. When you get on these plantations, if you wasn't satisfied, you'd leave and get on move on somebody else's plantation. That's where we'd do that.	14:50
Stacey Scales	And what was the big differences between the hills and the Delta, as far as working conditions?	15:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh well, the people didn't do too much of farming. People didn't do too much of farming in the hills. They would just work out on these farms like I'm telling you. Didn't nobody do—	15:20
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Now, the White man mostly—Now, he might have these tomato farms and these carrots and these beets and things and we worked for him, but as far as us having these farms, we didn't have them. We just worked for the man until the time all this stuff was over with, all the gathering and everything. But we were through making money there then, through the summer and spring. Then when we'd come to the Delta, we'd come to make us some money for the fall and the winter, to take care of us through the winter, through the fall. But now, after we come to the Delta, we found some pretty fair places, but not like this place. I've been working for these people. I worked for these people in the kitchen and in the house just about 50 years. And I—Huh?	15:34
Stacey Scales	Were you able to eat with them?	16:27
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yeah. I cooked—	16:28
Stacey Scales	You could eat at the same table for them?	16:28
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, we could eat at the same table. That happened just a few years ago, we would eat at the table together. But now when I first started long about '44, I come off a farm down on these people's place. Then after we got—And then you had to go around to the back.	16:33
Stacey Scales	You had to go to the back door?	16:54
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. You go all the way around and come in from the back door and work to the front door. You didn't come in their front door. But you see, on long down through times, then things changed. Then you could go through the front door.	16:56
Stacey Scales	How did you feel about having to go through the back door then?	17:17
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We felt all right, 'cause we wasn't used to nothing but that. You didn't go in these White people's front door. You didn't say yes and no to them. That just happened. You said yes, ma'am, and no, ma'am. And when that girl or boy got to be 13 or 14, you began to call them Mr. So and so, and Miss.	17:20
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now it's not like that. You saying yes and no to everybody now. And I think some of them just know they can do it and they just runs out, some of our Black folk. They know they can do it now and they just do it.	17:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now, you and other people that's trying to live, I'd sooner honor you, Mister. You see? You drew that honor. But now, I still—We were raised like that. I still call the White people Mr. and Ms., and I still honor them as, "Yes, ma'am," and "Yes, sir." And they do me the same way now. But it used to didn't be like that. But now I'm Ms. Jackson most anywhere. Here, in Itta Bena, anywhere. Anywhere. You Ms. now.	18:07
Stacey Scales	When you were working in people's houses, did they try to test you and leave money out and different things like that?	18:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, I have had some to do that. I had one family to do that. I had one family used to stack the money up. Now, you know no money ain't going to fall stacked. When it falls, it's going to roll. Well I have seen it, not with these people but with some people I worked for, they stacked their money. Well, then I had to clean and all around that. But I happened to know that the money don't be stacked up when it falls. And then I had them to know that my mother raised me if I wanted anything from anybody, ask for it. And if they didn't give it to me, okay. I said, "But you don't find money stacked. That show you somebody stacked it there."	18:55
Stacey Scales	Right. Did people ever have to confront the man of the house? Sometimes I've heard where the husband will try to make advances toward some of the Black women working in those homes. Did that happen back then?	19:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well I hadn't been where they did that, but I was where the boss man would boss the wife, just like now, I'm working on this farm and I may stop Friday evening to wash. We had to wash, we had to iron to get ready for church. And he'd ride by and say, "Well, you can't kill grass in the rain. You can't pick cotton in the rain. You know you stopped too early." I have been on those type of places. He's letting you know then, just riding by on the horse, we called him the horser or the rider.	20:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	He was working for the boss man that I was working with, but he was the man that was working over the people. And every farmer, every planter had a man you call a rider. He was your boss man. But when that boss man would leave this White man, he would run the plantation 'cause he'd carry everybody with him 'cause he was the one that was being good to you. All of those places wasn't like that. But now some of them, he'll tell you, "Well, you can't kill grass in the rain." That mean you here stopped on a Friday to do your washing and things, but you need to be out there in the field, killing grass.	20:53
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. Did Blacks help each other back then?	21:35
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yes, much more than they do now. Blacks, when we would be farming, if we didn't get through with our crop, when we got somebody, some of our neighbors would come and make a round or two for us in our field.	21:41
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	22:00
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. They would come and help us to get through. And if we were picking cotton and the other fellow got through picking cotton, it was better than it is now. Colored people were better than they is to one another now, and they would come and help us get through. And then sometime a great big boy should come and make a round. Go right straight down, all of them, get them and go make a round for us.	22:02
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now people don't pay you too much attention. They're not like that anymore, because everybody is doing different work now and they don't have time. We don't have no cotton to pick. And you see when they stop the people on the farm, the poor people didn't know what to do, 'cause they hadn't done nothing but pick cotton and chop cotton and that's all they know. But you see, the Lord fixed a way, give everybody a home and then pay them. They'll learn. You see what I'm talking about?	22:27
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	23:02
Ruthie Harris Jackson	He paid them to learn. Women driving their beautiful cars, the men driving their cars, they going to work and they know what they going to get when they get paid off. Well, we worked from one end of the year to the other and Christmas, you didn't clear a dime. I have no grown men to cry because they didn't even have apples for their children for Christmas. You done worked a whole year. And my son-in-law and my daughter, they left from Ruby with this man when I was with this man what's dead now.	23:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And they would try to pick all their cotton. They would pick 16 bales and 18 bales and they would clear over $200. Well then, all of my sisters and brothers left and went to St. Louis and they got jobs and they be causing my family to being in St. Louis. 'Cause they wasn't doing nothing. They wasn't making no money. And my son-in-law, now he's a carpenter and he owns a great big fine home and then he owns two or three extra houses. But you see, he never would've got it down here getting $200 for his crop. He left and he's doing good.	23:42
Stacey Scales	That's good.	24:29
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And all of the brothers is doing good, those that haven't passed away, they're doing good.	24:29
Stacey Scales	Was there ever any storms down here or droughts when you were in the hills or here that ruined crops?	24:35
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Now, when we was in the hills, we didn't have too many storms in the hills. But now this man here, one that just died, the one I'm working for now, down at Pugh City, they had a terrible storm in '71. Blowed, killed all the people down there on that plantation and made it to my mama's house. My sister there was sick. She got her home down there, where she lived on with this man what I was with. But now, that killed all the people. Now he called that Pugh City. You might have heard of Pugh City down at Swiftown.	24:45
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	25:30
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And it blowed all the houses away, just flipping back to forth. Killed all the people and it made it to my mama's home and my sister there. She was working over at the hospital in Greenwood and that storm come right on up to their house and had done destroyed everybody. And when I got out there to my mama's, it come over the radio that the storm had come and tornado had killed everybody. I left out going down to see about my mama and my sister and my brother-in-law. When I got there, they were still alive and the house was still there.	25:34
Stacey Scales	It stopped right where the house was?	26:13
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Right there. Right there.	26:15
Stacey Scales	Do people have ways of making the weather change? I heard a story about using a ax of some sort.	26:16
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They do what?	26:23
Stacey Scales	I've heard since I've been in the Delta, people use a ax and they'll put it in the ground.	26:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, just to the storm.	26:31
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah.	26:31
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, they turn the storm. Now where did you live? Where your home?	26:32
Stacey Scales	My home now is Atlanta, Georgia.	26:38
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh. I have a granddaughter in Atlanta, Georgia.	26:41
Stacey Scales	Okay. I was born in Gary, Indiana.	26:44
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, yeah.	26:46
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	26:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Gary, Indiana. Well, my oldest granddaughter is in Georgia now. She just married a few years ago and she's in Atlanta.	26:46
Stacey Scales	That's great.	26:58
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. But now, I tell you what made it bad in the Delta, we had some people, some certain Colored people, you call them snitchers. Now, I want to try to spell snitcher, but I couldn't spell it. But anyway, they call them snitcher. That's somebody go back and tell the White man.	27:00
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes.	27:25
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You see?	27:26
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	27:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	What the Black man is doing. And if you tried to run off, they had him, if he caught you running off and told your boss man, they might catch you and beat you up. Well, that man was working for the boss man. And then the White man knew everything went on about the Coloreds because they'd have these Colored men working and these Colored men would get out and talk and tell things that done happen last night, done happened yesterday, letting the White man hear. And that's how he kept up with the Colored man business.	27:28
Stacey Scales	Would the Blacks do anything to that person?	28:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, the Blacks wouldn't, but the Whites—	28:13
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah.	28:14
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, the Whites. Now sometimes that Colored man might help on account of he was that snitcher you were calling him.	28:16
Stacey Scales	Right.	28:18
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, he would help. And I tell you another thing, sometime that boss man would have one of the Colored women for his wife and you couldn't do nothing about it. It has been so many times in places that we have lived, the boss man had one of the Colored women on the place.	28:25
Stacey Scales	Would she want to do that or would he ever—	28:51
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, she wanted to.	28:54
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	28:55
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Because you couldn't get no money or nothing more, but when she with the boss man, you know she was going to live. We had those kind of things that happened and that made it kind of bad, but you couldn't do nothing about it.	28:58
Stacey Scales	The Black man couldn't do anything?	29:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	The Black man couldn't do anything.	29:17
Stacey Scales	Could Black men court White women?	29:22
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, Lordy. And he better not look at one. You might have heard of Emmett Till.	29:26
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	29:32
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That was my husband's cousin.	29:34
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes?	29:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And these people lived right here in town, what done it. Right after the first cafe up here in town, coming this way. That's where one of them lived. The Milams. It was three or four brothers of them. Then we had some Colored people that be with them, that helped to do that.	29:37
Stacey Scales	It was Blacks that helped do that?	30:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	From Blacks' help.	30:04
Stacey Scales	Man. And how did the family cope with that death?	30:13
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, it was just hard. And he lived in Chicago.	30:15
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	30:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, and so it wasn't too much was done about that. Wasn't too much about that.	30:24
Stacey Scales	Were there other ways of punishing Blacks for that, other lynchings that you remember?	30:32
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I don't remember. That's the worst case that I have heard of. But now I'll tell you, there have been so many Colored people beat up, you might remember they said, "They got so-and-so out of jail last night." They done put somebody in jail, some Colored person. Maybe some White woman done accused him of saying something to her, they'll put him in jail. Then through the night, the mob crew went and got—How they going to get you unless they had a key?	30:40
Stacey Scales	Yes, sir.	31:17
Ruthie Harris Jackson	How they going to get you? "Oh child, the mob crew come and got so-and-so out of jail last night and killed him." Well, things like that happened. Well, you can't get nobody unless you had a key.	31:20
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am. Did you remember that happening when you were growing up?	31:44
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. That happened in the hills even, before I came here. Some of that happened in the hills. But now you didn't say yes and no, and if the White woman accuse you of saying something to her, they'd believe what she said. They'd believe what that White woman said. But sometimes it would be found out that she wasn't telling the truth and they would free the man. I have known a case like that.	31:47
Stacey Scales	What happened with that?	32:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, they just let him—Just freed him because the woman wasn't telling the truth. Now, she wasn't telling the truth, kind of like in the Bible when Joseph—You heard about Joseph? You read about Joseph?	32:17
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	32:30
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And then we had so many Colored men had to leave home on account of White ladies. When they get in behind them, they love Colored men. And if the Colored man didn't do what she wanted him to do, she said she was going to accuse him and they would have to leave by night. I have some cousins had to leave by night.	32:31
Stacey Scales	For that reason?	32:53
Ruthie Harris Jackson	For that reason, because he couldn't fool these White women. He had to leave home. They would come by and kiss us goodbye at night, and kiss us goodbye and leave and go on way to Chicago or somewhere to keep from getting killed. Because if a White woman saw you and liked you, and if you didn't do what she wanted you to do, she would accuse you, you see?	32:54
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am. And your cousins, what was the process of sneaking away?	33:30
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They just went on and caught the train by night. We had a [indistinct 00:33:47] .	33:35
Stacey Scales	Oh, really?	33:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	In the hills when I was growing up, we had 10 trains a day. We had five trains going north and five trains going south a day. They caught the [indistinct 00:33:55]. It didn't stop at Crystal Springs because it wasn't a large enough town. But they went on where they could get the [indistinct 00:34:05] and left home and went on to Chicago or whatever. Never did come back.	33:46
Stacey Scales	How many went that time?	34:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, just 'cause of how many that was in that case. Just like you, if somebody was bothering you, some White woman was bothering you and you didn't want to fool with her, then you would leave. Well then if there was another one, if it happened with another one, he would leave to keep from getting killed. That's right. Because if they wanted you and you didn't want them and you were afraid, you know not to. That's right. It had been some sad things. It had been so that a Colored person were killed and dragged, hitched to a buggy and dragged through town. That was at my home.	34:13
Stacey Scales	You saw that?	35:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I didn't see it. No, I didn't see it.	35:06
Stacey Scales	You heard about it?	35:08
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I heard about it. I wouldn't want to see it. It was some terrible things had happened, but now it's better.	35:09
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	35:19
Ruthie Harris Jackson	The White man now is afraid to bother you because he figured the other ones will get him. You see?	35:21
Stacey Scales	Right.	35:31
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You don't fool with nobody now. And the young people now, when they hear of what happened back yonder, they get mad. They just don't like White folk too much, 'cause they heard too much about them. But this man here that just passed away, he was the best that I've ever lived with. We farmed with him, he were good. Then I've been working right in the house for just about 50 years.	35:33
Stacey Scales	Man. That's quite some time.	36:06
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Ain't that some time?	36:06
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	36:06
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And we got along good and he was a good man and he asked me, when I came here, I tried to stay with people. I came from Greenwood to live here about three weeks.	36:09
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes?	36:21
Ruthie Harris Jackson	His cook was gone and he knowed me 'cause I lived on his place. And he wanted to know for me, would I come and work three weeks for him? "Now you know me, you know what I do for you." And he said, "I'll be good to you right now. If you don't leave Mr. Pugh," he said, "if you don't leave me, I'll fix you somewhere to stay." He fixed this place here for me. But I had tried to stay. I stayed right over there in that house the second time.	36:22
Stacey Scales	Across the street?	36:54
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Across the street. I stayed there with a lady. She's dead and gone now. Everybody I tried to room with, they would tell me they needed their room. And I tried to help them, I tried to do everything I could to help them, but they just needed their room. And so he told me if I didn't go off and leave him, he would fix me so I wouldn't have to leave, move, long as I live. This is where I've been.	36:55
Stacey Scales	He situated this together?	37:24
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, he asked me to pick me out a place where I would like to live. And I saw, right over the fence there, it was somebody used to live there. They had a brick walk where they had flowers. I thought I could get that but the man didn't want to sell that. Then I come here, he told me to pick me a place and I picked this spot. They were going back to the state. And he went down to Jackson and paid his taxes, whatever little bit it was, and built a house here.	37:25
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	37:55
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I hadn't been put outdoors—And them same people that putting me out, those done stayed right here with me.	37:58
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	38:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I felt sorry for them and I was crying 'cause they was out the door. (laughs)	38:16
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But that's how the Lord will do things for you. If you is a Christian and trust God and wait, he'll open a way for you. Then after he passed away, this was willed to me. It need some work done on it, but if the Lord blessed me, I can do what needs to be done. You see how it was wired up and I got to do some painting and all, and putting up curtains. I got my sister been here sick with me, and that's one reason why that I haven't did it yet. But we're going to have it. And I used to paint. I used to come in about 8:00 and I'd start painting. My husband was a preacher and people would come and talk with him and they'd leave about 8:00 and I'd have a little hour of rest and I'd get up in the chair here and I painted these rooms that's just the colors that I wanted.	38:16
Stacey Scales	That's great.	39:13
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. And I painted it all any color I want. I'd paint this and this room, and go back in the room and go back in the kitchen and go—I just painted. But now I can't. My shoulder and my arms. But just as soon as I can, I'll have somebody to paint it for me. And I know if I have this wire changed, it'll cost way up in the money. You don't have it on the outside.	39:14
Stacey Scales	Oh, no?	39:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Uh-uh. But when I moved in here, the man that built the house, they put it on the outside.	39:37
Stacey Scales	Oh, I see.	39:44
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Now, here was one house I lived in here and I had to move out, my boss man, this boss man, he fixed that house beautiful. It was a old piece of house and he fixed that house up for me and he gave me some beautiful paper for my birthday. Soon as we got there, I was renting. Soon as I got the house fixed, the White woman sold it. And when she sold it and the man she sold it to, he said he wanted it right now. Then my boss man had them to know that I didn't have to move right now. And he said, "I went in and fixed your old piece of house up so my maid would have somewhere to stay, and now you done went and sold it."	39:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Then when I did come out of there, I went back there the second time. And I waited there until they went to Jackson and got this all clear. Then he built this for me and that's why that wire—'Cause he had it took down. He took that wire down from over yonder where I was and that's why it was on the outside. 'Cause he said he wasn't going to leave it there. He wasn't going fix that old piece of house up and she sell it. And she sell it.	40:30
Stacey Scales	Did they have Black businesses around?	41:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yeah, we had right uptown there. It was plenty of Black business. Cafes, some of them up there now. Some of the have people died but it's business up there now. People got their cafe and their liquor stores and their [indistinct 00:41:22] and things.	41:07
Stacey Scales	Were there places that were for Whites only?	41:23
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, yeah. There were plenty places where it was Whites only. That was all up and down, everywhere you went. Everywhere you went, Black had a place where they'd go, White had a place where—And they'd tell you, you didn't mix. I'm sure I enjoy this. You didn't mix with the White people. And when I used to ride the city going to St. Louis and some of these old poor peckerwoods from out in the hills would come and they would catch a Colored man in the restroom and they would run out and want to know, "Do you know where you is at? Do you know where you is at?" Well, he didn't know where he was at because on the city, everybody went the same way. And the conductor asked him, said, "Do he know where he's at?"	41:27
Stacey Scales	He didn't know where he was at.	42:32
Ruthie Harris Jackson	He didn't know where he was at.	42:46
Stacey Scales	And did you ever get a chance to travel up North when you were younger?	42:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yeah, all my—Oh, all the time. Where my baby lived and all my grandchildren are there now. Well, my sister here now is sick is the reason why I haven't been.	42:46
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah.	42:51
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But I go every year and stay two weeks or three weeks with my children. And I have, from that one daughter, she has four sons and four daughters and I have about 20 great-grandsons. Then I have great-great grandchildren. Just a number of them from this one family. That picture that you see right there by that little radio?	42:54
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	43:28
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That's one of my sons and that's his daughter at the top and that's her baby. That's three generations right there.	43:31
Stacey Scales	Right there.	43:34
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Then he have one or two more. One of my daughters, she has seven.	43:36
Stacey Scales	That's beautiful.	43:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Some of them has four. I only have two that don't have children.	43:45
Stacey Scales	When you went up North, was it different than the South with the discrimination?	43:51
Ruthie Harris Jackson	It was different. It was nice. And then the people there didn't pay no attention. It was just Black and White and what it is, got to fighting, whatever happened, they wouldn't like the people down South. And when I would go to St. Louis and go to the different stores and I'd say, "Yes, ma'am," to the people, they wasn't used to that. And they'd say, "Oh, you've come to visit. How long you going to stay?" 'Cause the people didn't say that to them. Yes ma'am and no ma'am, but I was from here and I was used to saying it. I just kept saying it. They knew that I was from down here.	43:59
Stacey Scales	When people went North, the Blacks, and stayed for a while and came back, did people look at them different when they—	44:39
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well no, they didn't pay them too much attention. Now, one or two of them, some of them went up there and come back saying yes and no. And it made these mad. But now you don't change out too quick. If you went up there, they was saying it up there, you knew how it is down here. This Jim Crow stuff.	44:47
Stacey Scales	And did the Whites get upset ever, after those Blacks that came back down and—	45:09
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. They'd tell them, "Now, you don't know who you talking to. You going to get out of my store," or something like that. But I don't think I would've done it, since I know how it is here. And just because I done been up there and visited a while and then come back here saying yes and no, I know that wasn't right. You just wasn't allowed that. But now it's all right.	45:16
Stacey Scales	And how would Blacks and the police get along?	45:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, they would get—Right here, we had a police called Mr. Weber. Now, he was a good man. My husband used to tell me, "If it wasn't for Mr. Weber, we wouldn't be able to live here." Because he was kind of rough but if you treated him right, he would treat you right. I wasn't afraid of him because I know that I wasn't doing nothing. But the place it'd of been or wouldn't have been, it'd been was just afraid of this one man, Mr. Weber, because he meant for you to do what he said. You didn't just do any way here. And people were scared to park their cars here in Itta Bena when Mr. Weber there. But Mr. Weber was taking care of Itta Bena. But everybody was afraid of him because he was rough. He was—	45:48

Ruthie Harris Jackson	—to this Delta. That was his year.	0:01
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	0:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But they tore his end down. And Mr. Foundry bought all in here. Mr. Foundry. And he put a lot of tin houses. Put houses in, and covered them with tin. And my boss manager said, "Now, if that was my corner, I'd have a nice store there." And he would've had it.	0:10
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	0:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But the Foundrys had it. Well, somebody bought it from the Foundrys. I stayed right in this place here 17 years. Nobody but me. Nobody. Nobody on that side. Nobody there. Just somebody right there in front of me.	0:30
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	0:44
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now when they tore down all these Foundry things and these people got it and build, but then that's how I got all this company, right? And all these houses back of me. They wasn't there. All these houses up and down the street here, all these brick houses. They wasn't here.	0:45
Stacey Scales	Huh.	1:01
Ruthie Harris Jackson	All this happened in these years that I've been here. Nice brick home, and people ain't taking care of them.	1:02
Stacey Scales	Did you all have to go to church when you were coming around?	1:13
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, we were born. We been going to church all our days. Mama raised us up in church, just me and my sister. There never had been but just the two of us. And Mama carried us to Sunday school until we were big enough we got a little catechisms. And she carried us as long as we were little small children. And then soon as we got—She didn't feel like going, we went by ourselves. And we were raised up in church. I told you about that in that Christian Spring. Christian Spring, Mississippi. I was converted at a Baptist church.	1:16
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	1:58
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Called it Good Hope Baptist. And my pastor was Reverend Simon Minor. And then when I come here, whatever town I went to, I joined the church.	1:58
Stacey Scales	Do you remember your baptism?	2:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yeah. It was in 1909. 1918 because I was born 1909, and I was baptized, I was born in 1918, when I was converted.	2:23
Stacey Scales	Was it outside?	2:30
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, it was in the church.	2:32
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. They had a pool?	2:34
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They had a pool. But now, most people baptized in these lakes and rivers.	2:36
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	2:43
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now, when I joined the church at Christian Springs, it was a Baptist church. But my mama was Methodist. My sister was baptized, and my mother was Methodist. And my mother couldn't take care of us in two churches. And I waited till I got married because I wanted to do what my mama said do. And I came on up here to Ruby, and I joined the Baptist church up there called St. John's. And were baptized in the river. That's when I was so happy. Course they sprinkled us.	2:45
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	3:21
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You know the Methodist. And I wanted to be buried.	3:26
Stacey Scales	In that water.	3:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I wanted to go in that water. I wanted to go in. Well, you see, Mama, she couldn't take care of us in the Methodist and Baptist. And so I went along with my mama, and when I got married I came to the Delta and joined St. John. And I was buried in the Yazoo River.	3:26
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	3:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. But I had been converted. I was already converted. Just stayed in the Methodist church with my mama.	3:46
Stacey Scales	What was the difference for you between that sprinkle and that—	3:51
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, I don't reckon it might not have been none, but the Lord walked so far—	3:54
Stacey Scales	Right.	3:58
Ruthie Harris Jackson	—to be baptized by John in the River Jordan.	3:59
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	4:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You see? Well, that's where we Baptists get it. Christ walked so far to be baptized in the River Jordan by John the Baptist, you see?	4:13
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	4:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Where we get ours, the Baptists. But now most Methodists, they sprinkle. And they told me if I would go ahead on and join the Methodist church, they would bury me. But they didn't. They didn't. But I had to stay on like I was, until I got grown and come on up here and was baptized. And I've been happy, happy, happy, hey, ever since church. And I want—	4:15
Stacey Scales	Was church—	4:47
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Hm?	4:47
Stacey Scales	Was church different back then than it is now?	4:48
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, well, it wasn't as much going on in our church as it goes on in the church now. People have so many different things going on in church and all that we didn't have. We had church in Sunday School and revival and that was all.	4:52
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	5:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now they has all kind of reunions and guest speakers, and the preacher have to come down out to pulpit. I don't know how that is because he's supposed to stay in the pulpit. But now when we have a guest speaker, the guest speaker gets up there.	5:12
Stacey Scales	Okay.	5:30
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I'm a missionary for the Lord. And I'll stand at the table.	5:32
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	5:43
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I teacher a Sunday school and a missionary, and I'm president of the Missionary Society. And I'm a Worthy Matron of the Eastern Stars.	5:45
Stacey Scales	Is that right?	5:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. A Worthy Matron of the Eastern Stars.	5:49
Stacey Scales	When you were coming along, did Blacks plant by the signs and the almanac?	5:56
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yep. And I think I had an almanac up there in that. But anyway, they planted by signs. They used the signs.	6:05
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	6:10
Stacey Scales	So how does that work?	6:14
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, it works, a lot of them says. So many, they say, "Don't plant now. If you plant now, it's on bug day. Or if you plant now, it's so-and-so." And they would wait until a good time.	6:16
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	6:27
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And then everything would work out all right with them. Then some people use a moon.	6:28
Stacey Scales	Okay.	6:32
Ruthie Harris Jackson	A certain time of a moon that you plant certain things. Some call it the growing moon, which one thing. Or some, if it's a bug day, they'll say. You looking that almanac, and you can tell when the bugs. And don't put plant today because this is bug day. The bugs eat up your stuff. So people would do. They do that now.	6:33
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	6:53
Stacey Scales	And do people back then talk about haints and spirits?	6:53
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. We used to sit around our parents and hear people come in. That's all they talked about. Tell us about the haints and tell us about bears and all kinds of stuff like that. And talk about what that, and the Hainty house. And we listened to all that kind of stuff.	7:01
Stacey Scales	So do you remember any of those stories back from back then?	7:21
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, I done forgot a lot of them. I forgot a lot of those. Because after we got grown and people stopped telling us about those—	7:23
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	7:34
Ruthie Harris Jackson	—stories. So we quit. I done near passed my mind. But they would talk about the hainty houses, what they heard in the house, when they heard something fall. And they did that and the other.	7:34
Stacey Scales	Did they have ways of keeping those things away from them?	7:48
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No. Somebody would hang a horseshoe up.	7:49
Stacey Scales	A horseshoe up?	7:51
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. They would hang a horseshoe. That would keep the haints out. And they would hang a horseshoe up over the door.	7:53
Stacey Scales	Okay.	7:57
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Because that keep the haints out.	7:58
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Now, I have heard noises, I have heard noises. I had a friend that get killed one time, and we were at Ruby. His name was Willie Baker. And somebody killed him, about the second door from me. And I wanted his cap. Or some way they—I reckon he must have went to get up like that, and they shot it through the head.	8:03
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	8:27
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I told him I wanted the cap. I wanted his cap. And do you know, I couldn't keep that cap?	8:30
Stacey Scales	Why did you want the cap?	8:37
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I just wanted to remember him.	8:37
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	8:40
Stacey Scales	What do you mean you couldn't keep it?	8:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Something kept coming. Something coming in the house and going up and down the porch.	8:45
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	8:51
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And keeping up noise. And I just had to get rid of the cap. And after I got rid of the cap, well, I didn't happen to hear it no more. So I just didn't know. I said, "Well, I imagine there was something."	8:53
Stacey Scales	Did people leave things for the dead and things like that? Or ways of remembering people that passed away?	9:07
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, sometime they did. And another thing about it, when anybody died that day and our day coming on, you had to bear them the next day.	9:14
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	9:27
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We didn't have no burials, no undertakers. And the people would go and sit all night and drink coffee and put this person on a cooling board you call it.	9:29
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	9:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Had some planks and put him on there. And put nickel over his eyes, and—	9:42
Stacey Scales	Put nickles over his eyes?	9:45
Ruthie Harris Jackson	—put nickel over his eyes and put a little old dish or something with some sauce in it over the mouth.	9:48
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	9:52
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Then the next morning, we buried. But you set up all night.	9:56
Stacey Scales	And those things were put there to keep the mouth closed and things?	9:59
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, keep the mouth and eyes, and keep it from purging from the mouth.	10:05
Stacey Scales	Okay.	10:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And then my mother used to go, if somebody past the night, they would always get her to come and give this person a bath.	10:07
Stacey Scales	Oh yes?	10:16
Ruthie Harris Jackson	If it was a woman, Mama would always go and give that person a bath and comb their hair and get them ready for the funeral for tomorrow. That was at Crystal Springs.	10:19
Stacey Scales	Do people have different ways, if someone has been buried a long time ago or they had been there for a while, what type of ways do people have of remembering those people?	10:29
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Let's go and carry flowers.	10:42
Stacey Scales	Flowers?	10:43
Ruthie Harris Jackson	On remember certain days.	10:45
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	10:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They go carry flowers and put on it. Like I lost my mother, and she lost her husband and all. On those special days, you go and carry flowers and put on the grave.	10:47
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. Okay.	10:59
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now, in St. Louis, when you put the flowers there, but they move them in the northern states. They moved the flowers after the funeral is over, after bury.	11:00
Stacey Scales	Right.	11:11
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They take the flowers away. But we always would leave the flowers. And with my Eastern Star, we just lost a member. You have a five-pointed star.	11:12
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	11:23
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You order this star's got five points, and then we buy that flower for this person. She was a Eastern Star.	11:25
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	11:32
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Or if a man was an Eastern Star. Sometimes men join the Eastern Star too. And you buy this flower and have it at the funeral.	11:32
Stacey Scales	Okay.	11:41
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now, we leave our flowers. Or we put our flowers, nobody bother them, but in the cities, they move them.	11:44
Stacey Scales	Okay.	11:49
Stacey Scales	Did people use plants and herbs and things to help people when they were sick?	11:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, a lot of people did. But my mother and grandmother hit with stuff that they could get out the woods.	12:01
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	12:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And make teas. And when we have a flu or pneumonia or something like that, they would use tallow. They would save tallow when it killed cows, and they would use this tallow and get a piece of red flannel. You call it red flannel.	12:13
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	12:31
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And you grease it and rub and heat it. We had a fire place. And you heat that flannel and just grease it, and you spread it in the bottom of your feet and all like that. And it would cure, it would heal.	12:35
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	12:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm.	12:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They had so much in the woods they would get and make.	12:49
Stacey Scales	Oh okay.	12:52
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now this flannel, that was for when you kill the cows, when you get that—	12:53
Stacey Scales	The flannel.	13:01
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm.	13:01
Stacey Scales	Was it certain times of the year that they would get these things?	13:08
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No. Well, sometimes it would be certain times of the year. But no, we had another tree, we call it sassafras.	13:08
Stacey Scales	Okay.	13:14
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Where they would make teas. That's for you through the spring. And then they had something called poke salad.	13:15
Stacey Scales	Okay.	13:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	You use poke salad and make you some, eat some poke salad through the spring. And that was to help you. And I think I found some over on that side over there, and I set it out on my side.	13:26
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	13:41
Ruthie Harris Jackson	So I could eat them. And you could mix it with your vegetable, or you could cook it by yourself.	13:43
Stacey Scales	That's right.	13:46
Stacey Scales	And did they teach you how to pick those different plants, your grandmother?	13:52
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, I already knew. Yeah. Because I could know what Mama and them were using. I already know about them and knows what they were going to use for us. And they had another thing you called center leaf.	14:00
Stacey Scales	Okay.	14:14
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We'd make tea. Mama would put that down by the fireplace and pour some hot water on it. And then when we get ready to go to bed at night, well, you'd give us some center leaf tea. Well, that would help you. That was also for you. It would help you for your bowel movement, and then it would help you otherwise.	14:15
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	14:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Called it center leaf.	14:36
Stacey Scales	Who delivered the babies back then?	14:38
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, we had midwives. They called them midwives. The women were trained in the home. The doctor would train them what to do.	14:39
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	14:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And then they would set up a room and show us how it ought to be done. And then when the little baby, if the little baby wouldn't come, then the midwife would call the doctor.	14:49
Stacey Scales	Oh okay.	14:59
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But if she was good, she could deliver the baby.	15:04
Stacey Scales	And were they paid to do that? Or were—	15:09
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, I don't think they paid them. Of course, their family might would pay the midwives maybe 10 or $15, $10, whatever—	15:13
Stacey Scales	Right.	15:21
Ruthie Harris Jackson	—they charged. But we had midwives in that day.	15:22
Stacey Scales	Did the older people, like your grandparents, talk about slavery times?	15:25
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. And I had a auntie. This baby, she helped this baby here, my baby.	15:33
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	15:40
Ruthie Harris Jackson	In the early '20s. She was a slave. She lived to be 115. That was way back. And she had where they beat her, you know, in slavery. It looked like a little old titty or something would be hanging on her back.	15:44
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	15:57
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And she was our auntie, our great-aunt. And we call her Mammy Sue.	15:58
Stacey Scales	Do you remember some of the things she would share with you?	16:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, we never. We were small. Real small. And she would tell my mama, but we couldn't remember all she said. But she would tell us how she was beaten in that time.	16:07
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	16:20
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, that was only auntie that we know. That was my grandmother's auntie. That was our great-auntie.	16:24
Stacey Scales	You said she had a piece of—	16:31
Ruthie Harris Jackson	It looked like little titty where they—	16:32
Stacey Scales	On the back.	16:35
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Uh-huh. On her back where she was beating when she was in slavery time.	16:35
Stacey Scales	Did she say why they had beat her?	16:44
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, they just did it. She didn't. That's because it was slavery time, and they were just there on the place. And they were just mean to them. Just mean to them. But I'm so thankful that our fore-parents prayed that we wouldn't have to go through with what they went through with. See, my mother didn't go through with that. My grandmother didn't. That was our auntie that was much—She was in it, but we wasn't. My mother, my grandmother, we weren't in the slavery time.	16:46
Stacey Scales	What'd you all do on holidays?	17:24
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, well, on holiday, calling what day it was. Maybe Christmas. Easter. We just celebrate. For Easter, now that thing was, I got all your reading in.	17:27
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	17:40
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That's a Easter seals.	17:41
Stacey Scales	Okay.	17:45
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I took the Easter seals out because the Easter's a pretty good place off, and put your writing in there.	17:45
Stacey Scales	Okay.	17:50
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That's so. Put your writing in there.	17:54
Stacey Scales	And do you remember voting?	17:57
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Not until these years back.	18:02
Stacey Scales	Oh yes. Could Blacks vote back then on the people's land?	18:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, no, no, no. This started since I've been here, and I got mine somewhere now where I kept it for the first time that we were able to vote.	18:08
Stacey Scales	How old were you?	18:18
Ruthie Harris Jackson	How were me?	18:21
Stacey Scales	How old were you when you were first able to vote?	18:22
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, that's been—I don't know. I was in my 40s. I guess 40s.	18:25
Stacey Scales	Oh yes?	18:33
Ruthie Harris Jackson	40. Around 40 something.	18:34
Stacey Scales	Okay.	18:34
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That we were allowed to go and vote. But now, they tried to keep us from it because they wanted us to come to the courthouse, and they asked you so many questions you couldn't answer them. So we went to the post office and went down in the basement. Because I told my boss man. He said, "I hate to see you go down there in that old post office."	18:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I said, "Well, that's where I'm going because that's where my own opportunity." And I went down in the basement, and the man already asked us, well, what our name was. I said what our name.	18:58
Stacey Scales	That's it?	19:07
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That was it. And we come on out and come on back home. But in the courthouse, they'd ask you so many things you wouldn't pass. You wouldn't be able to vote because you wouldn't pass because you couldn't answer all those questions.	19:11
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But this man, I believe it was around '42 or somewhere like that. But anyway, that's all we had to do. Give it our name and where we live. And we've been voting ever since. Some people don't vote so much. They going to do what they going to do anyhow.	19:26
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	19:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But now, that ain't right. If your one vote would stop something.	19:46
Stacey Scales	Man.	19:53
Stacey Scales	And did they have the NAACP around when you were growing up?	19:53
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, they just started that since I've been here.	19:56
Stacey Scales	Okay.	19:59
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But it had got too far away before anybody could do anything about it.	19:59
Stacey Scales	Oh.	20:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	It was done spreaded too far. Because they was turning their cooks off and all that stuff. They found out that you was a member of it, you didn't have no job. But now, you see you can have a job, and it's everywhere. But I know we had our first preacher was killed down the Belladonna, Mississippi. Reverend Lee.	20:05
Stacey Scales	Oh yes? Why'd he get killed?	20:27
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Because he joined the NAACP. They found out that he was a member of it. They were killing people because they were members of it. But they found out it was done got too far.	20:34
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	20:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	It had got too far. Now they can't handle it.	20:45
Stacey Scales	Did organizations like the Masons and the Eastern Stars, did they help people get out of town or different things like that?	20:49
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Uh-uh. Uh-uh.	20:59
Stacey Scales	No.	21:00
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No. No, the Eastern Stars, we always take just like we are.	21:02
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	21:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We didn't have anything to do with it. But now, it had got so much better.	21:05
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	21:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They quit killing people about it. They let you alone about it because those NAACP people had gone to handling folks about messing with people. So now, they don't pay no attention now.	21:12
Stacey Scales	Man.	21:26
Stacey Scales	So when did you first start realizing things were changing?	21:31
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, I know. That's go way back a long time ago. Way back since I been here.	21:35
Stacey Scales	Did you go to school when you were younger?	21:44
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, I didn't go to school too much. The reason I'm telling you I got my dictionary and everything. But I went to school some. And all my jobs, my people would help me. I worked all the time. Nurse babies and things like that.	21:48
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	22:02
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And then my mama would teach me, and my people that I worked for, nursing for, they would help me.	22:03
Stacey Scales	Did you have to nurse the Whites?	22:09
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Uh-huh. I worked for nurse for White people when I was growing up.	22:11
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	22:16
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. That's why I make my living. You may not give it about $2 a week or two and a half per week. But that was good money then. The groceries was cheap then.	22:19
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	22:28
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, take just a little money and get a lot of food and stuff for a little or nothing. But now you can't. Yeah, you just make about $2 a week, maybe two and a half, for nursing.	22:33
Stacey Scales	You mostly worked with people in their homes?	22:52
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I mostly nursed when I was growing up.	22:53
Stacey Scales	Oh.	22:53
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But after I was grown, I worked for these people longer than I ever worked for anybody. Not in the home. I was on the farm.	22:58
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	23:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But I was in the home here these years. Right in the home. Just cooking.	23:07
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	23:16
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And fixing dinners. And they all thought I was a good cook. Yes, sir. They'd have parties called stag parties. The boss man would have a lot of men to come, and they would have parties .they eat together. So I would always do the cooking. Then I would do the cleaning. I would do the washing. And I started over $10 a week. And you know'd when you were going to work, but you didn't have no special time to get off for a while till the thing began to get better.	23:19
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, I started off at, I'd be at work at 7:30.	23:57
Stacey Scales	Yes.	23:59
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And I'd get off, maybe I was supposed to be ironing up the clothes, but I'd get off—So if I didn't get through ironing this evening, I'd finish up tomorrow evening.	24:03
Stacey Scales	Were there times where they treated you unfair?	24:14
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No.	24:17
Stacey Scales	Working with people?	24:18
Ruthie Harris Jackson	These people were real nice. But the other people that we were farming with was unfair because we never declare nothing on these different plantations.	24:21
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	24:31
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We know they was unfair, and they'd work you a whole year for nothing. See, what you working on halvings.	24:31
Stacey Scales	Right.	24:35
Ruthie Harris Jackson	If you made 12 bails of cotton, the White man got six, and you got six. And then you had to pay your indebtments out of your six.	24:40
Stacey Scales	Man.	24:55
Stacey Scales	So how was the family able to survive those depressions and hard times if you—	24:55
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They just made it the best we can. We raised stuff. We raised and canned.	25:00
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	25:03
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We raised struck patches. We raised chicken and raised cows. I didn't have no cows but we had people on the place raise cows, and they had milk and butter. And we canned stuff. Berries and make jellies and canned vegetables and had all that to take us through the winter, sweet potatoes, ice potatoes, onions, whatever. We raised it. We didn't have to suffer for that kind of stuff. All the winter, we had our winter food.	25:04
Stacey Scales	So you were able to maintain your own-	25:29
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Chickens.	25:37
Stacey Scales	Did any Blacks back then steal from the boss man?	25:40
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, not too much. Because if they did, they would get punished. They didn't do too much of stealing.	25:45
Stacey Scales	No?	25:56
Ruthie Harris Jackson	If they stole anything, mostly be from their own color. They didn't bother the White man.	25:56
Stacey Scales	Oh yes?	26:00
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm.	26:01
Stacey Scales	When you all would kill your own hogs and things like that, would you share the meat?	26:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, no. The neighbors, sometimes if you give them, if they wasn't killing hogs, you share some of yours—	26:11
Stacey Scales	Okay.	26:18
Ruthie Harris Jackson	—with them. Then you put it down in salt, and you have your meat and your sausage. And you hang them up over the stove there. You had a smokehouse, you call it. Carry your meat and stuff and put that there. And then people would make lye hominy, you call it. Take corn, make lye harmony. And they shared better. People were better than they are now with each other.	26:24
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, we raised our stuff. We raised it on the farm.	26:53
Stacey Scales	Oh yes.	26:57
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Uh-huh. So that's how we did so much. We didn't clear too much, but we raised it.	26:57
Stacey Scales	Oh, earlier, I was going to ask about that ax. I think I forgot to go back—	27:05
Ruthie Harris Jackson	About that ax? About what you put this—	27:11
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	27:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Some people, and we never did do it, but it is people that do it. They said they changed the storm, but we never did. But it was some people did it.	27:19
Stacey Scales	And how would they do it? What would they—	27:22
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Just stick it some kind of way. I don't know. But they would stick it at some. They said way the way storm was coming.	27:25
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	27:30
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And they would stick it in that direction. But we never did. Our family never did do it. But it was other people doing it.	27:31
Stacey Scales	Yes.	27:37
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But boy, when that storm, when the Lord says storm, it was a storm. And you stick that ax any way you wanted to.	27:41
Stacey Scales	Right. [indistinct 00:27:55].	27:54
Stacey Scales	So were there other ways that people talked about doing that?	27:54
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, nobody talked about it too much.	28:00
Stacey Scales	No?	28:03
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Not too much. Just a few people.	28:04
Stacey Scales	Just a few people. Was that practice in the hills and in—	28:10
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, in the hills. Oh, a little bit in the Delta. And some people did it in the hills.	28:13
Stacey Scales	Oh okay.	28:15
Stacey Scales	And you were saying earlier that people called the Delta—	28:15
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, the devil.	28:25
Stacey Scales	—the devil.	28:26
Ruthie Harris Jackson	The devil. Because they heard so much about it, but all places wasn't the same.	28:32
Stacey Scales	Right.	28:34
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Some places you moved on, they were good. But you never did clear no money. Not too much.	28:35
Stacey Scales	Did a lot of Blacks own land back then?	28:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No. We had just one or two owned some land. We had one Colored man by the name of Mr. Terry. And he owned a long old car. I forget the name of the car. And he was only, about the only. It might have been one or two others owned some land. People mostly owned their little houses and their lots.	28:44
Stacey Scales	Oh yes?	29:07
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But he was one of the big renters. He owned a lot.	29:15
Stacey Scales	Were there ever any rich Black people back then?	29:18
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, I don't know what you call them rich or not, but they were wealthy.	29:21
Stacey Scales	How did they get their money?	29:25
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, they raised their own. They had their own crops like the White man.	29:26
Stacey Scales	Oh.	29:29
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And see, they raised their own stuff. And they sold it like the White man.	29:30
Stacey Scales	Did Whites ever get jealous of them?	29:36
Ruthie Harris Jackson	No, they didn't. Not in the hills. But in the Delta, they take the advantage. They didn't want the Blacks to have nothing. Because it hadn't been all that long. I don't know when, but when I was a girl, Colored woman couldn't drive a car.	29:47
Stacey Scales	No?	29:57
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-mm. And sometimes, you know—and then in a long time—	29:59
Stacey Scales	Why couldn't they drive?	30:04
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They didn't want them to. That was too good.	30:05
Stacey Scales	Could the Black man drive a car?	30:11
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. He could drive, and he had to get his boss man car. He never hard to find anybody to buy a brand new car. But the boss man would sell them his car, and he'd get him another one. Yeah, the boss man, he'd get him a car. But now, everybody got cars if they want. And if they got a good car, they'd go around the trade and get them another one.	30:13
Stacey Scales	So what would happen if they caught a Black woman driving a car?	30:39
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But they still wasn't going to catch her because she wasn't going to be driving. They wasn't going to catch her because she wasn't going be driving. It was against the law. But now, you can. Anybody can drive a car if they wants to. People driving them now.	30:48
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	31:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, they driving, and they pretty too.	31:12
Stacey Scales	How long ago was that, that those women couldn't drive?	31:12
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh, that was back when I was a girl.	31:12
Stacey Scales	Oh yes?	31:14
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Way back.	31:16
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But since now, since they stopped the people from farming, that's when the people had to get cars. Because they had to have jobs.	31:16
Stacey Scales	Right.	31:25
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And they had to go to that job, and they had to be paid to go to that job. And that made them have to get a car to go to their job.	31:27
Stacey Scales	Right. Do Blacks, women, have organizations back then where they meet?	31:40
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. Yeah, we always had church and missionary societies and conventions.	31:47
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	31:52
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Congresses.	31:52
Stacey Scales	Well, Mrs. Jackson, is there anything about your experiences back then that you think is a lesson that people could learn from?	32:00
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Oh yes. There's plenty. Right now, the thing that the people learn when I was coming on, they are better now. And people learn how to do by going to these different meetings and things. They take up different trades, do different things. And we got a lot of young. Our church is loaded with young people, and they learning a lot. And a lot of them was out there where you are.	32:12
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	32:35
Ruthie Harris Jackson	They finishing up out there.	32:37
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We got, our church, we got a number of young people, and when they finish up they go on somewhere and get them a good job.	32:39
Stacey Scales	Upper Valley.	32:46
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah.	32:51
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	32:54
Ruthie Harris Jackson	That's right.	32:54
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. We done raised up a many young persons. And when they finish, they go out there and finish, and they get them a job. And they leave. Next thing you know, they're married. And then gone somewhere.	32:54
Stacey Scales	That's all right.	32:59
Ruthie Harris Jackson	And we training young people how to do church work now. Right now. And when they come back home from there, different places, they come right to the church because that's where they were raised and trained how to do church work.	33:06
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah. We have a number of them. We got a number of people out there now, out to the college.	33:27
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	33:32
Ruthie Harris Jackson	We have a lot of them have retired.	33:37
Stacey Scales	Do you have any more things that you would like to add about those times?	33:42
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Well, I guess not. Because I wrote a lot of stuff. You would see it in there by some different things.	33:48
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	34:02
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I tried to tell you some things that happened on the different plantations that I was on. And so you can take time out when you have time and read them and pick out what you want to talk about.	34:02
Stacey Scales	I'll read them today. Yes, ma'am.	34:09
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Whenever you have time. And I appreciate this.	34:18
Stacey Scales	Okay.	34:20
Stacey Scales	So I really enjoyed talking to you.	34:20
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Yeah, I enjoyed talking to you. And that reason I said I tried to think of some things. I said, "Because I'm liable to forget something."	34:22
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am. I understand.	34:24
Ruthie Harris Jackson	But I've been in the church all my days. My sister been in there all her day. Our parents, we know nothing but Christians. And I love the Lord. Yeah. And I work, I work, work, work. I just work in the Congress, in the conventions and in the churches, in the missionary. I represent in the conventions and things like that.	34:33
Stacey Scales	Okay.	34:58
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I'll mention in a third Sunday in March, I make a little talk. And then my church will give me a offering. And then I think I reported $105 this time from our mission work.	34:58
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah?	35:17
Ruthie Harris Jackson	Mm-hmm. And my subject was footprints. And what kind are yours?	35:25
Stacey Scales	Excuse me?	35:28
Ruthie Harris Jackson	I said my subject was footprints. And what kind are yours?	35:28
Stacey Scales	That's all right.	35:32

Item Info

Title:

Ruthie Jackson interview recording, 1995 August 10

Date:

August 10, 1995

Creator:

Jackson, Ruthie Lee

Contributor:

Scales, Mausiki Stacey

Description:

Name: Ruthie Harris Jackson; Date of birth: 1909-06-08; Place of birth: Chrystal Springs, MS; Occupation(s): agriculture; farmer; domestic; Residence: Itta Bena ,MS
Informant ID: 1140; Interviewed by: Stacey Scales.

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Language:

English

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Behind the Veil

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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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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.

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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.

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Interview number: 472
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Ruthie Jackson interview recording, 1995 August 10

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1. Ruthie Jackson administrative file, 1995

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Ruthie Jackson interview recording, 1995 August 10

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John Hope Franklin Research Center

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