HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Old Days Panel Group 01/ - --N � --� .r.J
Signature of Interviewer
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Place of Interview
I hereby give and grant to the HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE, City of College
Station, Texas, for whatever purposes may be determined, the tape recordings, transcriptions, and
contents of this oral history interview. Also, permission is hereby given for any duplications of
original photos, documents, maps, etc. useful to the history project to be returned unharmed.
Interviewee releases, relinquishes and discharges CITY, its officers, agents and employees, from all
claims, demands, and causes of action of every kind and character, including the cost of defense
thereof, for any injury to, including the cost of defense thereof for any injury to, including death of,
any person, whether that person be a third person, Interviewee, or an employee of either of the
parties hereto, and any loss of or damage to property, whether the same be that either of the parties
hereto or of third parties, caused by or alleged to be caused by, arising out of, or in connection with
Interviewee provision of historical information, whether or not said claims, demands and causes of
action in whole or in part are covered by insurance.
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Interviewee (Please print)
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Signature of Interviewee
List of photos. documents. mans. etc.
HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE
City of College Station, Texas 77840
ORAL HISTORY DATA SHEET
Name
Address
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Telephone Lin 6 t Co 3 1 7 4 D
Date of Birth q / / 9
Place of Birth n
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Interviewer (Please Print)
INTERVIEW STATUS: Completed
Interviewee agrees to and shall indemnify and hold harmless CITY, its officers, agents and
employees, from and against any and all claims, losses, damages, causes of action, suits and liability
of every kind, attorney's fees, for injury to or death of any person, or for damage to any property,
arising out of or in connection with the use of the items and information referenced aboved by
CITY, its agents, representatives, assigns, invitees, and participants under this grant. Such
indemnity shall apply where the claims, losses damages, causes of action, suits or liability arise in
whole or in part from the negligence of city.
Date
Initial
In progress
I hereby give and grant to the HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE, City of College
Station, Texas, for whatever purposes may be determined, the tape recordings, transcriptions, and
contents of this oral history interview. Also, permission is hereby given for any duplications of
original photos, documents, maps, etc. useful to the history project to be returned unharmed.
Interviewee releases, relinquishes and discharges CITY, its officers, agents and employees, from all
claims, demands, and causes of action of every kind and character, including the cost of defense
thereof, for any injury to, including the cost of defense thereof for any injury to, including death of,
any person, whether that person be a third person, Interviewee, or an employee of either of the
parties hereto, and any loss of or damage to property, whether the same be that either of the parties
hereto or of third parties, caused by or alleged to be caused by, arising out of, or in connection with
Interviewee provision of historical information, whether or not said claims, demands and causes of
action in whole or in part are covered by insurance.
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Interviewee (Please print)
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Interviewer (Please Print)
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Signature er
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Place of Interview
List of photos. documents. mans. etc.
HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE
City of College Station, Texas 77840
ORAL HISTORY DATA SHEET
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Ad res s
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Telephone
Date of Birth 7 — '
Place of Birth i ■ / 77, " (Pi
INTERVIEW STATUS: Completed
Date
Initial
In progress
Interviewee agrees to and shall indemnify and hold harmless CITY, its officers, agents and
employees, from and against any and all claims, losses, damages, causes of action, suits and liability
of every kind, attorney's fees, for injury to or death of any person, or for damage to any property,
arising out of or in connection with the use of the items and information referenced aboved by
CITY, its agents, representatives, assigns, invitees, and participants under this grant. Such
indemnity shall apply where the claims, losses damages, causes of action, suits or liability arise in
whole or in part from the negligence of city.
HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE
City of College Station, Texas 77840
ORAL HISTORY DATA SHEET
I hereby give and grant to the HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE, City of College
Station, Texas, for whatever purposes may be determined, the tape recordings, transcriptions, and
contents of this oral history interview. Also, permission is hereby given for any duplications of
original photos, documents, maps, etc. useful to the history project to be returned unharmed.
Interviewee releases, relinquishes and discharges CITY, its officers, agents and employees, from all
claims, demands, and causes of action of every kind and character, including the cost of defense
thereof, for any injury to, including the cost of defense thereof for any injury to, including death of,
any person, whether that person be a third person, Interviewee, or an employee of either of the
parties hereto, and any loss of or damage to property, whether the same be that either of the parties
hereto or of third parties, caused by or alleged to be caused by, arising out of, or in connection with
Interviewee provision of historical information, whether or not said claims, demands and causes of
action in whole or in part are covered by insurance.
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Interviewer (Please Print)
Signature of Interviewer
Place of Interview
List of nhotos. documents. mans. etc.
Interviewee (Please print)
Signature of Interviewee
Name 0/4XX I r I 5 TO AZ
Address � I
Telephone ) 1
Date of Birth a , 1 ; / 7 / 6
Place of Birth Afi-etykd C `.
INTERVIEW STATUS: Completed
Date
Initial
In progress
Interviewee agrees to and shall indemnify and hold harmless CITY, its officers, agents and
employees, from and against any and all claims, losses, damages, causes of action, suits and liability
of every kind, attorney's fees, for injury to or death of any person, or for damage to any property,
arising out of or in connection with the use of the items and information referenced aboved by
CITY, its agents, representatives, assigns, invitees, and participants under this grant. Such
indemnity shall apply where the claims, losses damages, causes of action, suits or liability arise in
whole or in part from the negligence of city.
Signature of In eer
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Place of Interview
List of photos. documents. mans. etc.
HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE
City of College Station, Texas 77840
ORAL HISTORY DATA SHEET
I hereby give and grant to the HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE, City of College
Station, Texas, for whatever purposes may be determined, the tape recordings, transcriptions, and
contents of this oral history interview. Also, permission is hereby given for any duplications of
original photos, documents, maps, etc. useful to the history project to be returned unharmed.
Interviewee releases, relinquishes and discharges CITY, its officers, agents and employees, from all
claims, demands, and causes of action of every kind and character, including the cost of defense
thereof, for any injury to, including the cost of defense thereof for any injury to, including death of,
any person, whether that person be a third person, Interviewee, or an employee of either of the
parties hereto, and any loss of or damage to property, whether the same be that either of the parties
hereto or of third parties, caused by or alleged to be caused by, arising out of, or in connection with
Interviewee provision of historical information, whether or not said claims, demands and causes of
action in whole or in part are covered by insurance.
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Interviewee (Please print)
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Signature of Interviewee
Interviewer (Please Print)
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Address
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Telephone
Date of Birth /-? - - - 5 �
Place of Birth G 4"/1- .'w't
INTERVIEW STATUS: Completed V
In progress
Interviewee agrees to and shall indemnify and hold harmless CITY, its officers, agents and
employees, from and against any and all claims, losses, damages, causes of action, suits and liability
of every kind, attorney's fees, for injury to or death of any person, or for damage to any property,
arising out of or in connection with the use of the items and information referenced aboved by
CITY, its agents., representatives, assigns, invitees, and participants under this grant. Such
indemnity shall apply where the claims, losses damages, causes of action, suits or liability arise in
whole or in part from the negligence of city.
/- 3o
Date
Initial
Place of Interview
List of photos. documents, mans. etc.
HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE
City of College Station, Texas 77840
ORAL HISTORY DATA SHEET
I hereby give and grant to the HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE, City of College
Station, Texas, for whatever purposes may be determined, the tape recordings, transcriptions, and
contents of this oral history interview. Also, permission is hereby given for any duplications of
original photos, documents, maps, etc. useful to the history project to be returned unharmed.
Interviewee releases, relinquishes and discharges CITY, its officers, agents and employees, from all
claims, demands, and causes of action of every kind and character, including the cost of defense
thereof, for any injury to, including the cost of defense thereof for any injury to, including death of,
any person, whether that person be a third person, Interviewee, or an employee of either of the
parties hereto, and any loss of or damage to property, whether the same be that either of the parties
hereto or of third parties, caused by or alleged to be caused by, arising out of, or in connection with
Interviewee provision of historical information, whether or not said claims, demands and causes of
action in whole or in part are covered by insurance. . A/ 4/ { 6, Tft' d/fefl '
Interviewee (Please print)
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Interviewer (Please Print)
Signature of (interviewer
Signature of Interviewee
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Name k
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Address `
Telephone
Date of Birth
Place of Birth r'0 N ( fivi4/9 d
INTERVIEW STATUS: Completed
Interviewee agrees to and shall indemnify and hold harmless CITY, its officers, agents and
employees, from and against any and all claims, losses, damages, causes of action, suits and liability
of every kind, attorney's fees, for injury to or death of any person, or for damage to any property,
arising out of or in connection with the use of the items and information referenced aboved by
CITY, its agents, representatives, assigns, invitees, and participants under this grant. Such
indemnity shall apply where the claims, losses damages, causes of action, suits or liability arise in
whole or in part from the negligence of city.
Date
Initial
In progress
Moderator: Sarah Holmgreen
Transciptionist: Chelsi Conway
Camcorder: Channel Lamb
Interviewees: Robbie Clark
Emma V. Henderson
Eleanor Richmond
Tommie Preston
"THE OLD DAYS"
July 30, 1996
Lincoln Center
0, Mat Tr0 11e k-4 9eXVI
SH: What we'd like to do is for each of you to say your name, tell a little bit
about yourself so that there will be a recognizable voice print on the tape, so that
when the people transcribe the tape they can recognize your voice. And we'll
start with Mr. Thompson if you would please.
CT: Yes, ma'am. What's my name and everything?
SH: Tell your name and maybe a little bit about yourself.
CT: I'm Connie Thompson Jr. I was born right here in Brazos county, out there
78 years ago, and I went to school in Betsy Grove. My first school I went was
Betsy Grove. My first teacher was named Ms. Otta Keys. My second teacher
was named Ms. Lorna Davidson, Washington County 1928. In 1931, my third
grade teacher was Ms. Boone at Sanclair.
SH: O.K. Next up Ms. Henderson, would you tell something about yourself?
EH: My name is Emma V. Henderson. I was born September 9th, 1925 in
Bryan, Texas. My first teacher was Mrs. Martinez. I started to school at Bryan
Elementary School and at the age of six, I started to school when I was four. At
the age of six, we moved to Wellborn, Texas. My step - grandfather, Booker
White, died and we moved to Wellborn, Texas. I went to school in Wellborn,
Texas all my elementary life. My teachers was Ms. Kate Tolder and Ms. Julia
Muckleroy. And then I started to Kemp High School. I attended Kemp High
three years and after three years in 1941, the latter part of 1941, they built
Lincoln High out here. I stopped going to Kemp High School. I started to
Lincoln High. I was one of the first graduates to graduate from Lincoln High
School in 1942 at the age of sixteen. Almost sixteen, I was fifteen.
SH: And Mrs. Richmond.
1
ER: I'm Eleanor Richmond. I moved here two years ago from Arizona. I was
born in Griffith, Indiana 12/28/1915 and I graduated from the Griffith High
School. And that's just about all.
SH: All right, Mrs. Clark. Tell your name and something about yourself.
RC: Well now, I am Robbie Clark. I was born in Brazos County, Wellborn,
Texas on September 15, 1919. Ms. Kate Tolder and Ms. Julia Muckleroy was
my first teachers.
SH: Well that's good now we have a voice print that everyone will be able to
recognize. What we'd like to do next, we can just turn the tape off for this.
TAPE OFF
SH: Well, I'II start over here with Ms. Clark. Ms. Clark would you like to tell us
some more things about, for example, growing up here and that sort of thing.
RC: Well, here in College Station? Moved here in 1944 from Wellborn, Texas,
August the 25th. That's when I moved here. You don't want to go back from
Wellborn do you?
SH: You can tell about growing up in Wellborn.
RC: I was born in 1919, September 15 and my Grandparents was a Alice
Malone and Ed Malone and they raised me. My mother and daddy was Will
Malone and William Malone. And we had our own farm, bought it, the land, and
we was never sharecroppers. We had our own land in Wellborn. We were real
up on everything you know. You had your own land. We were not
sharecroppers. She wasn't and I wasn't. We wasn't sharecroppers. No.
SH: That's wonderful.
RC: And I never lived in a rent house in my life. I joined church when I was
nine.
SH: Could you tell us the name of the church?
RC: Pleasant Grove Baptist Church. We are celebrating our ... anniversary... I
joined church the second Sunday in July, 1929. That's when I joined Pleasant
Grove in Wellborn, Texas. I baptized in a tank by Reverend G.W. Williams.
Went to school, they had no schools down in Wellborn. We had to walked four
or five miles to school. On the other side of us. First school I went to. It was
school in a old church. Remember had a school close to Ms. Vander's place
and we walked over there. And my mother died while we was going back and
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forth to school. My grandparents raised me. Then we had to be bused. It was a
man named Cannie Burrell drove the bus. And we rode that bus, Cannie Burrell.
We went to school two years in Bryan. It was eleventh grade then it wasn't
twelfth. Tenth and eleventh grade we graduated. And we rode Cannie Burrell's
bus to Kemp High.
SH: How do you spell his name? Do you know how?
RC: Cannie Burrell.
SH: Thank You.
RC: Burrell.
EH: Yeah, that's what they called him then. I didn't know nothing about him.
RC: We called him Burrell.
EH: We called him Burrell.
RC: But we rode the bus and we had a bus that had strings one on each end,
one on each end and one in the middle. My brother would rode it up when it
would rain and make us stay mad.
EH: It really wasn't a old truck but a wagon.
RC: That's right. We rode that up and rode that from Wellborn to Kemp High.
SH: How did you get to church when you went to church?
RC: Well, I lived close to church. We walked.
EH: Well, I lived five miles from church.
RC: Sure did.
EH: And I walked.
RC: Well, lived about a mile, about a mile and I walked to Pleasant Grove.
SH: What sort of farming did you do on your land?
RC: All of it, everything we ate nearly. We had cotton. We had hogs. We had
chickens. We had turkeys. I'm talking too fast for her. I'm sorry.
3
CC: No, that's O.K. I'm just taking notes. Just summarizing what your saying.
RC: Anything you can raise we had. And my grandfather died. My mother died
in 1929. My grandfather died in 1931, February 5th. And back then times were
hard but that old man was an industrious old man. He worked at Duncan Hall,
no Sbisa. And boy, he washed them pots and he took pneumonia and died.
Every pay day he would take his money. He had a box. He hid his money.
When he died we found about two hundred dollars in it. Back there was the
Depression, 1931. Then he took out insurance. Well, he had nine hundred
dollars and that was some money. My grandmother hired somebody to plant the
cotton and do all the farming and all that. So everything we had. We had
potatoes, onions, just everything you raise in the garden we had at that time.
SH: When did you move into College Station?
RC: I moved to College Station August 25, 1944.
SH: Right there in World War II.
RC: Yeah, and when I moved to College Station, it was three houses right
where I lived. There weren't no apartments here on Harvey and George had all
these lots right in front of me. Weren't a house there...wasn't a house on the
street. And school, school was built here in 1941. I mean school started cause
they had two churches, I happen to have the history right here.
EH: I graduated from here in elementary school and they had a march in
Washington Chapel.
RC: That's right. I have this history here.
SH: If you would let us have a copy, maybe later. Would you mind if...
RC: And this is a history my daughter made up.
SH: That would be good.
RC: When she was here at the Lincoln Center.
SH: Do you mind if...
RC: You can have it.
SH: Would you like them back?
RC: I want this one back, but I don't want this one back. You can have it.
4
CC: I think we have this yellow program at the office.
RC: You've got that one.
CC: Yes, ma'am.
RC: OK.
SH: But may I keep this?
RC: Yes ma'am. That's all I can say about it.
SH: Ms. Richmond, would you like to tell us, I know you said you have not lived
here long but if you would like to tell about when you moved here, and the things
that you found different.
ER: There's a lot. It's very, very different from where I came from. I came here
because of my daughter. My husband passed away in 1979, and I was living
alone and she didn't want me to. So I moved out here. I'm sorry.
SH: That's all right.
ER: And I like here but I don't like the humidity. Of course it was very hot in
Arizona but it was dry, and you didn't notice it. I've been outside when it was
129 degrees and I didn't mind it.
SH: Would you tell us your daughter's name?
ER: Julie Paprock. Her husband is a professor over here at the university.
SH: Would you spell that last name?
ER: P- a- p- r- o -c -k. My daughter works at Desert Hills. That's a rehabilitation
place and my granddaughter is going to college this year. I have an older
daughter and granddaughter who just had her second baby, and they're
adorable. A typical grandmother, right. I was almost tempted to move back
because I knew no one here and then I joined the senior center and I love it. I've
met so many nice people so I decided to say. That's just about all.
SH: We are very glad that you are here.
ER: Well, thank you.
RC: Where do you live?
5
ER: On Dallas Drive. Bought a nice little house. My daughter found it for me. I
came out in August 1st and I moved in August 19th. I had to do an awful lot of
work on it.
SH: That was part of that prairie that Ms. Clark was telling about. Ms.
Henderson, would you like to tell about your growing up?
EH: Until I was six years old I lived in Bryan, Texas. My father was a Baptist
minister. And at that time, he pastored a small church that they called Sunrise
on west side of Bryan. When my step - grandfather died, they thought my
grandmother didn't want to move to Bryan. But they thought they could make a
better living. By moving to Wellborn, we had 54 acres of land in Wellborn,
Texas. And we moved to Wellborn and I started attending the Pleasant Grove
Baptist Church. But I was baptized in Jerusalem by my father at a very early
age. I don't know how old I was when I was baptized but he was baptizing my
older sister. And my older sister was about nine or eleven years older than me.
When he dipped her in the water, I just run down in the water behind him and
they baptized me too. And my cousin, Thelma Lee, she run down there, and
they baptized her too. So they all us was baptized that day. I came on back
home to Wellborn and my grandmother was a doctor lady. She made a whole
lot of money. She was a doctor lady. She doctored from roots and herbs and
she done midwifing and she knew about medicine and prescriptions.
SH: Would you tell her name please?
EH: Her name was Emmeline Michelle Chisom White.
CC: Would you spell that first name?
EH: Emmeline. E- m- m- e- l- i -n -e. Cause she spelled it like a French.
CC: Emmeline Michelle, what?
EH: Emmeline Michelle Chisom White.
RC: Did you know she married my uncle?
EH: Chisom Nelson White. That's right.
RC: She married my uncle.
EH: Horace Nelson.
RC: No.
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EH: Well, whoever he was.
RC: Terrell Nelson.
EH: Terrell Nelson. I know Uncle Horace Nelson.
RC: That's it. He sure married my mama.
EH: Uncle Horace Nelson and Aunt Mariah and Aunt Alice. And that's how they
got to be my aunts. They was a whole lot of them. He raised my mother until
she got to be in her teens. Then he died. When he died, she married Booker
White but Gil Chisom died first when my mother was eight years old. Then that's
when she married Horace Nelson. And he lived with them a good while.
RC: Terrell Nelson.
EH: Terrell Nelson. And he lived with them.
RC: Horace was his son.
EH: He lived with her a good while and he died. My grandmother had a habit of
losing husbands. Then he died and she married Reverend Booker White. Who
was a pastor I believe at Salem Baptist Church at Wellborn.
SH: From Salem?
EH: Salem Baptist Church in Wellborn. After so many years when I was about
six years old, he died. Then that's when I started living in Wellborn. My mother
and father did church work. My mother sung and she sewed and she done hair.
She sold cosmetics and she done just a little of everything. And my daddy, to
make up for the living, he dug trees and things and came and he sold them all
over College Station. We was an industrious family.
RC: Your mother was one of the best soloist.
EH: That's right. My mother was a songster. She was a gospel songster.
RC: Sounded like Haley Jackson.
EH: She sang just like Haley Jackson. But she never made a record because
she didn't go into the blues world. But she could have because she was just that
good. And we lived in Wellborn, until I was eighteen years old. And we lived in
a five room house. It was a great big white house. We had two bedrooms, a
dining room, a kitchen, and a little back shed room. I guess you could call it a
7
bedroom too, which made it three bedrooms. We had double fire places and we
lived well. We lived well. We didn't have no whole lot. We wasn't rich, but we
thought we was, because we had everything that we needed and wanted. And
we cut wood for those fireplaces in the morning. And I would get up in the
morning, and I'd tote in the wood for the cook stove. And then in the evening I'd
tote in fireplace wood. And we would wash in a tin tub. We had a big iron pot.
We'd throw them clothes in that big iron pot, and boil them. We'd go down to the
creek. We lived right by a creek. It ran right through our place. And we'd go
right down on that creek and we'd wash on that creek. We'd set that pot up on
the bank and put wood under it, and boil those clothes out. And wash them first
and put them in there and boil them out. And then we'd wash them in two more
wash. Then we'd hang them on the line. And then we you got ready to iron, you
made another big fire in the yard, and you set your ironing board out there in the
yard in the summer time. And you ironed your clothes. You starched them, and
you ironed them. And you wore them. Now I didn't have no whole lot of clothes,
but I had at least three dresses I wore to school. And two I wore to church on
Sunday. And we lived off the land, because my father dug up trees, and sold
them at the college. We dug up grapes and sold them. And made fruit and sold
them. And in the later years when he was down there he went somewhere and
learned how to burn charcoal, and he would burn this charcoal, and bring it to
Bryan on a wagon. And he would sell this charcoal. In between the two of them,
what he made and my grandmother made, we made a good living. But we lived
like cheapies, but we lived off the land.
SH: When you said you dug up trees...
EH: Little sprouts of trees, you know like wild cherry trees, wild plum trees and
he let the folks plant them, so he sold them all over the college. Folks said he
bring to college on a wagon, and he sold them all over the college, because my
daddy was an industrious man. He sold them all over the college. And then
when I was about eighteen when it got to a place where I couldn't make nothing,
we raised hogs. We didn't kill our hogs and eat them like everybody else did.
We sold our hogs and ate one. We milked our cows, we had about six or seven
cows. I milked those cows every morning before I went to school. I had to get up
four in the morning to get up and milk them cows. He was there finally at one,
the calves didn't get into one. I got a whipping that next morning. I had to
remember to do what mama said.
SH: How did you sell your hogs?
EH: Well, dad would throw them in the wagon or kill them and sell them, butcher
the meat and sell them, or either he would bring them here to college and sell on
the hoof, sell them on the market place, wherever they sold them at. But that's
how we had to live and that's what we done. We dried some of our meat and we
made sausage out of the hog and we put them up in a smokehouse. You know,
8
they had a place where they hung the meat up on in the smokehouse. And we
raised potatoes and we put them in a keel in the ground, sweet potatoes in a
keel in the ground. They throwed the ... potatoes in the barn, isn't that right, they
throw them down on the ground in a dry place.
RC: With the onions on top.
EH: With the onions on top. That's how they stored it.
SH: What was the roads like back in those days?
EH: Where I lived the roads were terrible. Like them roads they got in
Wellborn, they didn't have them out there then. We had rock, the roads were
loaded with rock. When it rained and mud, we would get out in that water you
couldn't get out from down there where my grandmother lived in a car or wagon.
You had to walk and they were rough roads. My Uncle Mitchem had a buggy
and he would go to church, he was an old preacher but when he decided to go
to church, he didn't go to church a lot, but whenever he decided to go church, he
would go in this buggy and all of us would jump up behind it. Sometimes, if
was lucky to get on the wagon but my daddy always kept an old piece of car
cause he was a preacher and have to go places in his car, which wasn't much of
a car cause it didn't have any air conditioning, it didn't have no heater in it, it
barely had a top on it. We still went in that Model T Ford. We didn't have a
whole lot like I tell you. To us we were rich cause we were happy. Like I told the
lady one time that I worked for, she said, "Emma, you act like you was raised
rich, you like you was used to everything." I said, "I ain't been used to nothing."
But it's one thing about it I was poor but I didn't know it. I was real poor but
sure didn't know it.
SH: When did you move into College Station?
EH: I didn't never move into College Station, I moved back to Bryan. After I was
grown and finished schooling and came out of school. But we traveled from
Wellborn to Lincoln up here on this same Cannie Burrell bus that she tell you
about. I walked two miles to get to that bus to ride it every morning and I had to
get up real early to walk to catch that bus. Cause he didn't come around to the
house to pick you up. If you were not there on that highway...
RC: He gonna leave you.
EH: He go off and leave you, you had to make it to the highway yourself.
RC: And the best you could.
SH: There in Wellborn?
9
EH: There in Wellborn.
SH: Where did you live in Wellborn? Out west or, what direction?
EH: I think I lived northwest in Wellborn. Was it northwest or east?
RC: I might have been the east.
EH: It was northeast cause I lived on this side of this side of the railroad track
and she lived on the other side.
RC: I lived on the west side.
EH: On the west side, the other side from the railroad track. And I walked five
and a half miles to the same church she telling you about she walked a mile. My
grandmother would get us up on Sunday morning and .... and we would go on to
that church. When we got there, we would always be late getting to church
cause we never did get up early enough to walk all them miles on time, but when
we would get about a half a mile from Pleasant Grove, you could hear folks
singing, just singing and hollering. Boy, we would just start running to get there.
We would spread our dinner out in an old church what they had off from the
other church and everybody would sit down and eat together in fellowship and in
love. They don't have church like those no more.
SH: Do you remember, either of you remember anything about College Station
itself back in those days?
EH: Yes ma'am. I remember when they didn't have a school at College Station
and the children from Wellborn would come together with the children from
College Station at graduation time and we would have our graduation exercise
from the seventh grade. We'd either have it in Washington Chapel or St.
Matthew. Our last one was in St. Matthew, the last graduation I went to. Our
high school graduation was in St. Matthew.
SH: Where is St. Matthew?
EH: It's the church right down the road here.
SH: Do you know the address?
RC: Right here on Holleman.
EH: Right here on Holleman. I told you earlier that our elementary graduation
was in Washington Chapel, the one on the highway. Our high school
10
graduation, they didn't have no...march, but we marched in caps and gowns in
St. Matthew Baptist Church. Rev. C.L. Simpson, my last husband's first cousin
preached our graduation bacularate sermon, and his subject was "The Roads of
Life ". I never will forget it.
SH: Did you graduate at the same time?
RC: No, I'm older than she is. She's ... than my baby brother. I think ya'II were
born in the same year. He was born was born in 1925 maybe...
EH: Yeah, he was born in May and I was born September.
RC: But now my grandfather used to load cotton seed.
EH: Mine did too.
RC: He load the whole box cart. He would start about this time of day and load
all night long. Fifteen dollars a whole cart load. He'd load all night long and the
next day until about eleven and come home, take a bath in the tub and go to
sleep and go back that night and finish that cart load. Fifteen dollars a cart load.
EH: Really and truly, I don't see how those people lived...
RC: I know.
EH: ...as long as they did. Cause my grandmother did all the doctoring, going
out in the wind, and in Wellborn, and helped milk those cows and cook that
cornbread and stuff. And she lived to be in her eighties, cause she didn't die
until 1950.
SH: Now how did she go, how did she get around?
EH: Well, they had a wagon at first as I told you. They traveled by wagon. And
when a woman was going to have a baby, they'd come pick her up. And she'd
stay at the home three or four days til that baby was three or four days old. I
betcha there was a bed, that her grandmother was a midwife too.
RC: Mine was.
EH: I betcha there ain't a white child in Wellborn hardly that my grandmother
didn't bring into the world, the white and the black. And the white and the black
went to her for medicine.
SH: You said her name.
11
EH: Emmeline Michelle Chisom Nelson White, cause she had three husbands,
all three of them died.
RC: My grandmother had to make that lye soap.
EH: Yeah, you sure did have to make it.
RC: We'd put that soap in that pot out there in that tank and we ... we didn't take
them to ... then we'd go to the house and my sister, my sister is older than me,
her name is Metty, and me and my grandmother we washed three washings for
different people in the summer. Take our rub boards, I got my grandmother's
now.
EH: You have.
RC: Yeah. Wash those clothes, wash them at 7 o'clock we'd put a load of
clothes on, around about 10, then at 12, then you'd go back the next day and
iron all three of them Toads. Then my grandmother didn't have much money.
See but my mother died and my grandfather. She had three, us all.
EH: It didn't take no money.
RC: Grandma, some of them bring her sack of flour, sugar, coffee, crackers ,and
cheese, and give her the other milk. Whatever, milk you got it wasn't much.
EH: When I was growing up...
RC: She asked them to bring what we couldn't raise.
EH: When I was growing up, Mr. Guy Neely run the county store.
RC: That's right.
EH: And you didn't have to have no money to go in Mr. Neely's and get nothing.
All you have to do is downright need it, and he would let you have it from one
crop til the next crop, and when we left Wellborn owing Mr. Guy, cause nobody
ever paid him anything what they owed him. But everybody ate. It didn't make
no difference, I didn't know what a store bought dress was at least I didn't.
RC: Hand me downs.
EH: My ma'am, hand me downs, and my mama made them all what I wore. I
didn't have but five cause I had three to wear to school and two to wear to
church on Sunday. And you got a new dress maybe Easter, you might not get
12
one on Easter and you might not get any on Christmas cause they would but you
toys. You got as you needed.
RC: I wore all of Metty's clothes.
SH: You were talking about your parent's loading cotton seed. Was there a gin
there at Wellborn?
RC: No, I didn't know about a gin there. You had to take it to Bryan.
SH: Where did you load the cart?
RC: Right there on the railroad. Took a cart off the railroad there in Wellborn,
that's where he'd load the cart.
SH: Where did the cotton seed come from?
RC: I don't know. They brought it there somewhere. I don't know, I sure don't.
EH: Cause she was child.
RC: I know they load them, just the two of them, fifteen dollars a cart.
EH: ....She was a servant. Wasn't nobody else.
RC: She had us working every day, ....milk half of the milk, and then they'd go
and help pick peas and all this, kill hogs, and hang them up in the smokehouse.
EH: We'd pick peaches anything that had to be done.
RC: We canned, kill a calf and can it, we canned roast muse, all that.
EH: In the thirties they put a 4 -H Club down there, and everybody met in the
club and everybody ate together but you lived off of the land. Lived off of what
you had. And electric light, I didn't know what electric light was, hardly, til I was
good and grown. We didn't have no lights, we had kerosene lamps. We would
burn them. We read and learned our lesson by them. Electric light didn't even
bother me. When I come to town and my cousin had electric light I thought that
was wonderful she had something pop on with a button and pop it off. I had
been married to my first husband, went to Atlanta, Georgia. Came by to Bryan,
Texas, and when I got to Bryan, mama's house was all lit up. I said, "What's the
matter with mama's house lit up like that? It ain't on fire cause it ain't shining
bright ". When I went in she said, "baby, we got electric lights ". And I said, "well
ain't that good ". And electric light was a mystery to me. In Wellborn we didn't
know what electric light was. Now I imagine that some of the richer people had
13
lights. But we didn't have none, I didn't have none. They didn't bother me, we
had kerosene lamps.
RC: We had a furnace. You know, my grandmother used to iron. We would
iron on, we would iron to make fifty or seventy -five cents. Shirts for doctors and
all them and ....
SH: Tell us about it.
RC: She had a furnace with clay on the inside and put coals up right on top of it,
like you do a barbecue grill.
EH: Now that's the kind of coal my dad made.
RC: And then you put the irons on the outside. Then we got electric.
SIDE A ENDS
RC: ...furnace would hold six irons.
SH: Tell us about the irons.
RC: The iron that you have, iron the top, bottom, and sleeve. The bottom was
nice. Don't none of ya'll have those old irons?
EH: I got one, I got two.
Jay Henderson: I've seen those irons. They just solid iron.
EH: I got two at home.
JH: They had a smooth bottle.
RC: You didn't have one?
SH: I just wanted you to tell about it so it would be on the tape. I'd tell the
reason for the furnace because a lot of people won't know about that.
EH: They sure won't.
SH: Tell them how you used the furnace.
RC: Put your coal on the top, and light it and after the blaze goes down you put
the iron on top of that. You could use those same coals all day.
14
EH: That's right.
RC: All day long.
EH: And the irons didn't get dirty.
RC: Sure didn't. My grandmother kept some wax paper and some other stuff
you know to rub down there.
EH: You go out and get cedar.
RC: Cedar.
EH: You go out there and get a piece of cedar off the tree and you put that
down and rub your iron with that cedar, and your iron stayed clean.
RC: We never had to worry about no iron getting clean. We ironed doctors,
you don't know nothing about Dr. Lee Bailey.
EH: Well in the late forties, a man came to Wellborn , I forget his name, and he
put up a whole line of laundry and everybody went to his house and did .... and
he came up here and collected those sailor suits from the college. My mother
ironed them and different folks in Wellborn ironed from that laundry he had.
They ironed and he paid them so much a suit. That's when I found that sailor
suits was creased backwards, you have to crease them backwards. Of course
learned how from ironing in that little home laundry that he had. That lasted two
or three years and then we moved to Bryan. I don't know where he went. The
folks had a hard time but they lived off the land and like I tell you, wasn't nobody
poor cause everybody was happy.
JH: Everybody was in the same state.
EH: Yeah, everybody was in the same state. And it's different being poor and
hungry and being poor and well fed cause we was well fed, we ate.
RC: In the summer, we made preserves, jelly, peaches.
EH: I still make...
RC: Pear preserves, grapes off the vine.
EH: That's right, off the vine.
RC: She'd make me so mad but I couldn't say nothing cause I'd get a whipping.
Mama was dead and she raised us, my mama died when I was ten. She would
15
mash that inside, had us take our hand, we didn't have no glove, wash your
hands good, and mash the inside of the grape cause it was light in one pan, and
the dark outside, we had a light jelly and that other jelly. Made two kinds of jelly.
EH: That's right.
RC: That was the first year we made it.
EH: Then they made dewberry jelly, and they made the jam and left the seeds in
it.
RC: Sure did.
SH: Where would you harvest the grapes?
RC: Well, they would be in our pasture, wild grapes. Then my grandmother had
a grape orchard, and she plum, pear. My grandfather who was an industrious
old man, like I told you, he had rows of berries just as long as this building, you
could go down each side of it and pick all of the blueberries. First it was
blackberries, I mean dewberries and then blackberries. He kept it cultivated.
EH: Ours wasn't cultivated, they were wild.
RC: He fixed that, he propped them up like tomatoes, my grandfather done that.
Now we had the ice man to come once a week and bring ice. He'd bring fifty or
one hundred pounds ice in a solid block. He dug a hole in the ground and he'd
go to Wellborn, the guy here in the store and they'd save him papers. He put
into the bottom of that...
EH: He drop that ice into the hole.
RC: ...and other stuff to wrap that ice up in the ground. We never was without
ice.
EH: We never was without ice.
RC: And then my, we wasn't able to buy tea. My grandmother go out there and
get the wild sage tea and dry it.
EH: That's right.
RC: And we'd make tea out of that. It was the folks out back...
16
SH: You were speaking about the uniforms, could you tell us something more
about that? I know that was during World War II.
RC: That was during World War II. And he would get the uniforms and bring
them back there to Wellborn. There were five or six different women at different
times that worked for him and the sailor uniforms those blue uniforms with the
white trim on them they ironed them and they'd put the crease in them and them
sailor uniforms they creased backwards cause they ain't creased like anything
else cause they would put the backwards crease in them and he would pay them
25 cents a piece for them ironing those uniforms. And you had to iron so many
uniforms and so many shirts a day cause if you couldn't , "I couldn't make the
bucks," if you couldn't make the money you lost your job. And that's the way
they ran like that . And that's how they lived like that. And I had an uncle,
George White, he made his living selling bootleg whiskey cause he made that
too now.
SH: We have someone new now that has just joined us.
TP: I'm Tommy Preston.
SH: Oh, well Mr. Preston will you tell us just a little about yourself, please.
TP: I moved into the city of College about 1946, I believe, '45 or `46, and on
construction work and started working for the city about '47 and I worked for
them about 15 years and I lived over on Northside or Eastside what is now
called Prairie View Heights.
Tape off for release form.
SH: If you could think of anything else you'd like to tell us before you leave...
EH: Tell her about Pleasant Grove and those pretty Delco lights they had up
there.
RC: In Wellborn, when the church burned down.
EH: Yeah, with those pretty Delco lights they had.
RC: She says they didn't have no merchant lights they had pump door lights.
That church burned down in 1920.
SH: And that Pleasant Grove was in Wellborn?
RC: Yes.
17
SH: Do you think it caught fire from the lights?
RC: It did. I got that history and I'll give it to you.
SH: They might like to have that.
EH: Well, I'II give the whole history. It was the prettiest church I'd ever saw in
my whole life. It was a big church and I guess it looked huge to me cause I was
a kid and I didn't know nothing about these big brick churches they had and it
was a great big pretty white church and it had these big double bell towers on it.
RC: Sure did.
EH: Sure did, and in the spring they used what they called a spring opening and
everybody came to the spring opening to see the children say they parts and
sing they songs. We got there in the woods and picked all the wild flowers and
have them all the way around and just sit there.
RC: And just sit in wild flowers, that was in April. The fourth Sunday.
TP: Do you have some coffee or juice or something there?
JH: Sugar or cream?
TP: No.
RC: It's a dollar a cup.
SH: Mr. Preston would you like to tell us some things that you remember?
TP: About the city?
SH: Well about, well did you grow up here or did you come from somewhere
else?
TP: I came from Amarillo.
SH: Could you tell us where you grew up then?
TP: Out at Harvey.
SH: And when you came to town.
TP: I came to town in '46.
18
SH: Would you like to tell us something about your growing up out in Harvey
and then ...
TP: I was sad to tell you some of that, in fact I was just out there this morning
talking to some friends over there. I grew up on a farm out there well I grew up
on two farms, two farms really, one to the other. The Dasbitf's farm was where I
was born. Later my mother passed and my grandmother took me and my
brother in.
SH: Could you tell us your grandmother's name?
TP: Ida McGee, she was called Aunt Ida at that time by all the people and my
mother's name was Sally. She got married to my dad and I never did see my
dad so they taught me. He passed before I was born and my mother later
married another man, Mr. Cleve Sparks and they were together when my mother
passed . I was 5 years old at this time and of course my grandmother took me
and my brother in and cared for us until she passed. She passed when I was
13. She passed when I was 13 and of course we were on our own from then on.
At this time we lived out there on a farm called the Weedon farm. I visit with the
son of the Weedon's out there this morning. It was Jimmy Weedon, you probably
heard of him.
RC: I know him.
TP: He has donated property for a ball park and he was going to show me all of
this and his wife, but on this farm we grew up there together and when I was
grown at 15 I got married. I lived there then for the rest of the time, which
amounted to 21 years all together and as the farm grew I become farming over
there on this farm. We had about 13 young boys and 7 sharecroppers. I had
the pleasure at looking at some of the work I did out there back in the early 30's
and 40's. We built things then around the fields to keep the land from washing
away. We did this with mules not by machine and we used a tool to do this.
Later I moved from there and moved out to another farm out west of Bryan and
lived there for two years and then moved into the city of College, this was
somewhere near, near as I could remember in `45 or '46. I moved in the city
cause I started construction work. I believe the name of it was Becky Davis. I
worked there for a time and then I went to Texas City and worked for about 8
months with C. Richardson Refinery Company and then I came back to the city
of College, started work for the city of College, and I worked there for 15 years
when Lincoln School here, we built roads and street around the city and City Hall
of course was right up here on Southgate up stairs in a little room not hardly this
large. The City Manager, a Public Works man, I can't remember his name,
before that was Raymond Royges.
CC: Raymond who?
19
TP: Raymond Royges. I started work here for the city of College as a garbage
collector and I collected some of the first garbage. It is really amazing to think
how we did that. We had an open bed truck . No dump. One other man and
myself collected all the garbage the city had. We would carry it to the dump
which is over here where the shopping center and the Golden Corral is now.
This is where the dump ground was. This property belonged to the Putz ` at that
time and it worked out real well. It is amazing to know how that worked out .
We had a big gully that we backed up to and it had a little slope to it and we
could back the truck down with a little slope and push the garbage off into the
ditch and of course with hogs around to take care of the food or garbage or
whatever they could eat. After the hogs were done we'd push all the other to the
bottom of the gully to burn. So we dumped there for a long time. We moved
from City Hall from up here at Southgate to a little location on Wellborn Road.
We were there until they built the big City Hall over here on Texas. There was a
lot going on in that period of time, in 15 years that I won't be able to remember.
SH: Where did you go to school?
TP: I went to school out at Harvey. It was a school out there that was called
Mount Enterprise School.
CC: What was it called?
TP: Mount Enterprise. I think I went through the sixth grade in this school.
Then of course the war started and the government had a plan where you could
attend night school.
SH: Now that was World War II, correct?
TP: That was World War II, and I attended that class until just about time to get
my GED and the government stopped that program, so as you can see I don't
even have a GED degree. Skipping now on to here when or after I moved into
College they started the same kind of program here at Lincoln. The building and
all was getting in pretty bad shape, but I attended that class for some time and of
course the government stopped that program, so I didn't get my GED for that
reason. I could have finished over here at Lincoln I mean at the Community
house, but age began to tell me you don't need it now. I still regret it so later on
in the night when the school burned and we were in class here and someone
came in and said, "The buildings on fire, the buildings on fire!" we all ran out,
but it had gone to far to do anything about it, but that was when the Lincoln
School burned.
SH: Do you remember what year that was?
20
TP: I was trying to think so I'd be able to tell you, but I really can't remember
right now.
SH: I believe Ms. Clark said she had given us a report if you could tell us about
that.
RC: I had.
TP: O.K. I think the first little league park that was built here was built out here
on Luther Street, as I was working here for the city we didn't have enough
ground here for a baseball park and someone let us use some land back out
here for a baseball park and the city furnished us with a cultivator to come in and
do whatever work we needed to do to do that.
RC: That was our property...the Clarks.
SH: Tell us, please mention that Ms. Henderson.
EH: I was the first Homecoming Queen at Lincoln High School and it was in the
late sixties. I think it was in '67, I was Miss Homecoming.
SH: That's an interesting thing.
RC: I'll tell you another thing, but didn't have no water here. And my husband,
imagine Mr. Preston you might have been there digging, but up there...George
Bush Drive, they dug the city wouldn't run it. They wouldn't give us no water
line. Did you ever dig that?
TP: Do what?
RC: Did you help dig that water line?
TP: Oh, yes.
RC: We didn't have no water, you remember that?
TP: I dug all the water lines in here...
RC: He brought those lines so we could have water here at the Lincoln Center.
Didn't have no water.
SH: You didn't have water at the school?
RC: No. My husband, Philip Steen, Sylvester Steen, and oh I could name so
many that's dead and gone. You too, helped dig. You take the shovels and
21
everything, dug the water lines right up on through here, so we could have
water. We didn't have no water.
EH: And I know how they got it but you see the City of College Station didn't
furnish it. The parents paid for it.
RC: Sure did. We paid for that. The men dug it and we had paid for it.
EH: We paid for it.
RC: When I bought my home here, I had to, my husband had to dig it and pay to
get on it. They wouldn't let us hook on here. He had to dig almost to Montclair.
That's the way the city is. ...cut this strip in here they made the street wider, the
alley.
TP: I was working for the county then.
RC: I had three driveways, my husband and me, beat it there, the land, to make
the street wider. They cut out my driveways, one of them, cause see I had three,
and I went to the county, I went to the highway department and they wouldn't
give me my driveway back. So after my husband died, I went to dreaming cause
that's what he wanted, three. So W. C. Daniel, my cousin, he told me, "Robbie,
don't you get no attorney, cause they gonna fight you, " He said, " Your gonna
have to pay out for an attorney more than you would to pay for it yourself." He
said, "Go on and pay for it and pay for it and put your driveway back if that were
you." So they poured concrete on it over here on Lincoln Center, so I saw them
out there and I went out there and I asking them if they'd pour my driveway back.
They'd do it for two hundred dollars and I called W.C. and said, "Thank You."
He said, "By you fighting them you got the city, you got the highway
department..." I called them all and they wouldn't hear me so I had to pay for
that...to get the driveway back.
EH: You'd pay for it one way or another.
RC: Huh?
EH: Everything you got you paid for one way or another.
RC: Yeah, they didn't let us have nothing, but we should have gotten it.
EH: God is so good and merciful, that he gave us that.
RC: That's right.
RC: So, I had to pay for that driveway. Highway department said no.
22
EH: Now I don't know how they got water, but I know it was good by local
citizens.
RC: My husband would get off work and get that shovel, pick and go on down
there and dig and run that water line cause the city would not give it to him.
SH: I imagine Mr. Preston knows a lot about the streets that were put in around
here too.
RC: That's right.
TP: Yes, there weren't many streets in this area. Most of the streets built had
been torn up by a road grader just a bed of dirt, you know. No gravel or anything
and some of the best soil we had in this area was right over here on Luther
Street. We'd haul that soil there, hauled some of it over here on the school
campus when I was working for the city. We had to take that out to build the
street so we put in gravel, such as it was, and over on the northeast side where I
lived we had the same problem with water. The city would let you tie on, at a
certain fee, and you could run your line where ever you wanted it to go if you
stayed on the street, according to city specifications. When you get to your
property, then the next man that wanted water on down, he'd tie on and on
down. If there is anyone in between you and where you tied on with the city then
they was to help bare the expense for your line on down. We did the same thing
over here on Tyler Street. The street was named after the principal here, Mr.
W.A. Tyler, and we did the same thing over there for water. They wasn't any
water anywhere in this area. In fact, they wasn't any city limits. When we
managed to get the water we still didn't have sewage we didn't have gas. We
used butane and propane for gas and we didn't have sewage, but it wasn't
noticed too much because there wasn't too many houses out in this area. They
began to build later. I remember when we bought this area, I don't remember
about this area in the picture, but I know at one time about the only business
was out there on Wellborn Road and that was the main road to Houston at that
time. A little two way road with not a solid stripe, but little dots to keep you on
the side. It went in to Navasota, the same little old narrow road, it carried you on
into Houston.
SH: About what time was that? In the 1930's or...
TP: Well, that's about the time that they start building these roads, anyway this
was in the late 40's before they changed these roads.
EH: That's right in the late 40's.
23
TP: Late 40's. This place up here is one of the oldest streets I think, that is that
goes all the way through. Park Place it goes all the way through paved top right
in the center and that was gravel shoulders and that was the city's job to keep
this gravel pulled up to the shoulder and smoothed off where I could be
collecting the weeds. I did that with a little farm Ford tractor with a little blade
behind it. It had one of these little drop blades you put on there and drag them
through. And even there on George Bush it was the same way going over there
by the school. The streets were so narrow that there was hardly room for a car
to pass. So, I started doing that kind of work. Then they got an Austin - Westin
road grader and we were growing then, the city. Then I still helped build the
road and streets and on the northeast side I helped build and most of the water
lines. We didn't have any certain position with the city then you was just hired
in. I worked in the electrical department, water department, sewer department,
street department, and all this. And I got good pay I got 65 cents an hour.
EH: That was a whole lot of money then.
TP: Made a decent living then. Bought a little house, built the little house, paid
for it. $13.00 a month. I was fortunate, I went by there yesterday, what we used
to call the Bryan Building & Loan. One of the ladies that assisted me in making a
loan for $900 to build this little house was retiring and I had a chance to meet
her and a bunch of old friends that were there. We had a good visit, but I think
of those things now and for history it ought to be known more because of the
way things is going now people think they can't live unless they've got a hand
full.
EH: A handful of money.
BEGIN TAPE 2
RC: Integrated means at the store. Mavis Thompson, Lynn Robinson, my
daughter, and Tyler Thompson's children integrated Maye's. They went up
there and they wasn't aloud to eat at the counter. So that Tyler's daughters said,
"Let's go get us an ice cream cone," and my daughter said, "all right." They went
up there and sit on the counter, and they tried to make them leave up there at
Maye's Pharmacy. So my daughter started to get on them and they said, "No,
no, no, we eat in Ohio at the counter with them. So Tom Brown, he is an old
delivery man, he tried to make them leave and he is black, and they wouldn't go.
And he got up in church telling it and said these people are not raising their
children and they had business here and they wouldn't get up well we not
suppose to let them eat, it's not integrated yet. So ya'II stop it here and make
them obey. So they's another musician goes to church was there. She said,
"Honey, somebody got to do it if they got the grits let 'em do it." She stood up
and told them. Said, "Now it's integrated, ya'll can go." So that's what made it
24
integrated, my daughter and Tyler Thompson's two daughters. They got up
there at the counter.
EH: Well, did they serve them?
RC: They served them.
EH: Sure, they'd served all of them if they had of went there.
RC: That's right. They'd served them, but that other black man, tall and brown,
delivered the medicine said, "Get out! I'm gonna tell your momma and daddy
your disobeying. They weren't ready for that yet. My daughter was gonna get
up, but they said, "No, no, no you sit down there."
SH: When was that, do you remember?
RC: Oh, I sure don't remember..
EH: It was in the 50's . Wasn't it?
RC: Yes, cause they integrated Maye's Pharmacy and nobody mess with them
but the man that delivered.
EH: But, my daddy integrated Bryan cause Mr. Shay had a place where he sat
on the outside and let negros eat and my daddy bought gas from him and he
told him, "Mr. Shay I'm never going to buy another gallon of gas from you, I'm
going to church and going to church and I'm going to tell it all over Bryan. Folks
don't suppose to eat out doors like dogs. He said, " You build something for me
and I'II buy gas from you and he went from church to church and asked the
people not to eat in it and they closed it down. His name was Garfield
Alexander.
RC: And Reverend Flowers, integrated the schools, we went to every meeting.
EH: Pastor for 56 years.
RC: And ya'II know Mr. Ray Oden, he used to own this store up here, he talked
about us like dogs.
EH: They talked about us...
RC: I was there. "We nice to you black folks, what more do you want ?" He did
this. Then Flowers told W.C. Davis, we had a meeting he was at, "Listen, "
Flower's told him, said, "Listen, I'm tired of paying tax, I got a problem," and
paying taxes, he stood up, " I'm tired of paying taxes, I paid taxes from the top of
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the court house to the bottom." Saying, " You got here color water, color water,
and then white and all this water in this building is clear, it's not colored no way
and you got color restrooms and white, I want those signs moved in 30 days and
if it's not I'm gonna take it to the Supreme Court. W.C. Davis told them, he said,
"You don't have to do it, but give me 30 days and it will be moved 30 days."
Now that's how the courthouse and the school house got hit cause the come
after these books, the books were outdated here at Lincoln. We had people
come to A &M from other states and came and got with us. We went to the
school and found out that we wasn't getting but consolidated books.
EH: And they still trying to integrate Prairie View cause you see...
RC: They was not have the same books...
EH: Wait, it's not integrated yet, because they say it's equal, but it's not equal.
It's not equal, Prairie View is not equal to A &M . It says separate, but equal, but
it is not equal, it is still not equal.
RC: We really had a time get there, we had to go to a meeting each week
sometimes twice a week, but Shane Gross, Reverend Gross, got up and talked.
Some student in a white suit walked out crying, "Why don't you want to
integrate." Shane Gross said, "I don't think nobody need to get mad." Mr.
Odem we bought groceries from you and patronized your store and we just want
something equal, something we suppose to have. He told them. We just want
something what we have fought for, lived to see, and we want it to be the same
we want it to change.
SH: You don't remember what time this was, or what period of time?
RC: I sure don't.
EH: That was in the late 50's, cause Shane Gross was my cousin and he went
to school with me and that was in the 50's or 60's. It had to be.
TP: Late 50's or early 60's.
SH: Well, we are really getting out of our time frame with that cause...
RC: We can't tell everything in three hours cause so much happened, so much
happened. So much is still happening.
SH: That's true.
RC: Cause this is a living thing it ain't dead yet.
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TP: I don't remember the years of that myself, but I and a Mr. Henry Williams
would call in his name as Joseph Williams, we served on the City Advisory
Board between the schools and during the time of the getting together and it is
true that Reverend Flowers and several others had a big hand in working this
out, so we all worked out this business to the extent that it worked. I myself have
been taught that you don't win by force, you win by faith and I believe that. It
was the Lord's plan that it worked.
RC: That's right.
EH: It was God's plan that it worked.
TP: And I liked to give him credit for whatever he did or whatever he will do. All
of these things that you will read in the Bible teaches you these things will
happen at a certain time and will tell you if it don't happen Heaven and Earth will
pass away.
EH: It will.
TP: Because it says my words you will obey. Heaven and Earth will pass away.
I find in our life, black and white, that we are so far divided in most cases. I have
been blessed myself. I don't have any serious complaints. I've been called
"nigger" and talked to as "your nigger friends" and all of this and I tell them all
that "everybody that know me will like me ". Then I finished that statement... "if
they got good sense ". I think that's a pretty good way to put it. We all remember
the old antic about the only way to have a friend is to be one. There is no reason
for he black man to be crushed or the white man to be talked about. There's no
reason for that. Israel had a great hard time if you remember, but the Lord told
Moses tell my people that they will humble themselves. You see this pigheaded
stuff will get anybody into trouble. If they will humble thyselves and pray I will
hear from Heaven and I will heal the land. So we might be able to do better if we
would just follow that Bible a little closer. Remember it don't tell you to fight
back.
EH: I'm just like him about that. If you get a changed heart, you get a changed
man.
TP: That's right . That's about all I have to say at this time, I guess. They is a
lot more I know that's gone on in the City of College. The first police was Mr.
Leonard Wood, the only one, and I believe the second was Mr. Bullets, I don't
remember his first name, and about the third was Mr. Melvin Ludeke.
SH: Who was after Ludeke?
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TP: The water superintendent was Benny Ludeke. The street superintendent
got to be Alfred Miller. I was starting to work there with those guys and when Mr.
Ludeke, that was Benny Ludeke, started to work here he didn't know a T from an
L if you know what I am talking about. That is pipe fitting. He didn't know a T
from an L. We started working here at the same time and we worked right on
together. I worked as a laborer and a friend of mine Walter McGrueger he
worked as a laborer. We did know a little about this pipe fitting and water and
laying lines and so forth. So, he was for us and later they made him water
superintendent. We had to teach him, but you can't go back and fight about this.
I was there to make a living, he was there to make a living. They didn't do me
right. No! They didn't do him right, but they didn't keep me from living. This is
the point. As I said I made a decent living. It wasn't fair for it to be this way. I
don't think the Lord intended to be that way, that's the way it was.
EH: What is fair in life really?
TP: I hope that we will all learn that white and black, you don't win by force.
You win by faith.
RC: I was on the advisory board when they did this, the Lincoln Center opened.
and Mrs. Mackleroy was on the city council. Do you know they voted not to air
condition that building. We begged them. This big gym, big window air
conditioner. I told her one day when she came up for collection. She verbally
spoke against it. Our mayor, she's the worst. I was in there.
EH: Did you vote against her when they had that?
RC: That's my business how I vote. But anyway it 's not air conditioned and it's
hot and that summer Lincoln, and the farmers to be why did ya'll get on that
board. And there was this man, I met him, he was at the board, he got so mad,
he got up and walked out. He said, "What a disgrace. You build this great big
gym and no air conditioning." They still wouldn't do it . It's still not air
conditioned. She was the first one who spoke against it.
EH: Well, I guess, I had my kitchen fixed and I needed a new sewage line and
had asked the city to help me with the sewage line, the city wouldn't help me.
But the minute I started redoing my kitchen they came out and he started digging
the sewage line and called to thank him for it. I asked her, "Why did you finally
decide to give me a sewage line ?" She said, "Cause you helped yourself and
people help people when you help yourself. " I live in Bryan now, but if we would
make a program or plan ourselves to put air condition and raise some money for
it they would help us put air condition in, but we have to help, cause folks help
you if you help yourself.
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RC: We had lights up and we asked them not to take them down, but they took
them down from there and put them on another park down here on Southwood
Valley. I was only advisory board when they done it and I begged them to
please don't take them lights down. They said, "Robbie, you wasn't there
because you got all them lights shining in your house. " I said, " Children play
ball out there and they can't play out there at night," but it still don't happened.
No lights at the ball park.
SH: Well, we are kinda getting away from history and getting into current affairs.
RC: Sure is. I better go now.
SH: We sure appreciate you being here Mrs. Clark.
RC: Thank ya'll.
EH: Well, I guess I'd better go too.
SH: Well, we appreciate your being here.
EH: And I appreciate being here and enjoyed myself very much.
TP: I know Ms. Clark, but I don't guess I remember you.
EH: I'm Emma Henderson. Emma Alexander Henderson from Bryan.
was raised here in College Station.
TP: Is that right?
EH: I was raised in Wellborn, Texas.
SH: Is there anything you would like to add about the old days? Where did you
go to church?
TP: I go to church at the College Hills Missionary Baptist Church on Church Hill
Street which leads off of Lincoln just before you get to College Street and ...
SH: Where did you go to church, out in the country, when you were a boy?
TP: I went to church...I went to church at the same place I went to school. It
was called Mount Enterprise Trinity Baptist. This wasn't a Missionary Baptist,
this was Trinity Baptist. This church was where we wash one another's feet and
so forth. They don't do that anymore, you know. I went to church there until I
moved down here that was in the mid 40's. I was very young out there, I was the
youngest and trained as superintendent and I moved from there over here and
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was going to College Hills Church. I've been a member there since maybe the
very early 50's.
SH: When you were going to school out in the country, how did you get to
school?
TP: Walk. I remember walking three and four miles and somedays there would
be snow or ice, ice on the roads, but we walked to school.
SH: Did you come into town to buy groceries and things like that? And how did
you do that?
TP: Oh, yes. Once a month we, if you was on a farm or plantation the owner
would furnish you a wagon and team. If it take two, he would furnish you two.
Everybody would load on these wagons and go into town once a month and buy
groceries. This supply was for a whole month. The funny part about that, it's so
much about it people wouldn't believe now. When I first got married if you was
on a farm on a place you farmed on half as they called it. The man would
furnish you a certain method of time or grocery for you to work your crop and at
the giving of the crop they would, whatever you made he would get first, if he
furnished you a $100.00 but he'd get his all at once and you in debt until you
paid that. I remember when I first got married I used $5.00 a month for me and
my wife to live on in a month. $5.00 a month. But we did, the school years was
pretty rough. My grandmother had four girls, she had taken in me and my
brother and that made six children . She was a widow lady and she cared for us.
Somehow she'd go to this place and wash, clean house today and she'd go to
the next tomorrow. She'd carry two of the girls today and carry two tomorrow and
she clean house and rake the yard and everything, wash. This is the way she
supported us other than the farming we could do and that wasn't much at that
time. When the family and me were able to gather three bales of cotton, this
was a big crop.
SH: How much land did you usually farm?
TP: It would take quite a bit out here to grow that much. About 25 Or 30 acres.
The Brazos part of it was different. They was gathering about a bale an acre
down there even then, but out on the post oak as we called it, it would take
about 20 or 25 acres to even gather three bales of cotton and the land owner
would even let you grow a little patch of corn. He would furnish your team to
work it. We would grow this corn and then we'd carry it to the mill. They had
rich mills as they called it then as they'd grind this corn for us and make it into
corn meal. We didn't have any to pay the man for grinding the corn, so he
would take out enough meal to pay for his grinding and this was the way, and
the meal he'd take he'd sell it. I remember a lot of times we'd take 40 or 50
pounds of corn in there and that would do us for the month. So, this is the way
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the living part was, it was rough it looked like, but we made it so easy it didn't
seem rough then.
SH: Well, when you came in to buy supplies, did you come into College Station
or did you go into Bryan?
TP: I went into Bryan. It was a old grocery store owned by an old man by the
name of Mr. D. Mikes and I forget, Lawrence's Wholesale, Lawrence's
Wholesale, he furnished the stores in that neighborhood. Most of the stores
were a grocery supply, but they'd buy it from him and as the need it, he'd deliver
it to them.
SH: When you moved into town did you have a car or, how did you get...?
TP: College Station?
SH: Yes.
TP: I didn't own a car when I first moved in. It was a long time before I owned a
car.
SH: How did you get around then?
TP: 1 walked.
SH: In town?
TP: I walked. Now there was a bus running from College Station to Bryan if you
needed to go, but you seldom needed to go because you didn't have the money
to spend anyway. If you were going in you would go on in get what you want
get on a bus and come back. It was a bus going from Bryan to College Station I
believe it cost you 15 cents a round trip.
SH: Did you ever ride the interurban?
TP: No, I didn't. They had the interurbans and the had one that's called the
street car or trolley car that run from Bryan out to what is known as the Academy,
you know they got a school now that is further into Bryan, but they had a school
out there that is called the Academy out on Booneville Road a ways and this
trolley would run from this school down to Bryan. This was for the students to
ride. This was an electric deal and that was history. It ran right in the middle,
see there was a street here, one going this way and this trolley would be right in
the center and this electric wheel on top with sparks would be flying and I
remember going in and driving the team and they'd see all of this and they'd get
so excited they'd almost run away with you. Now that old line hadn't been to
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long to move, the old trolley line. I guess they must have moved that about
twenty years ago, something like that . That's the old Boones Road. I
understand that they had one coming into College Station. I don't really
remember it too well. It was gone before I moved here to the city of College.
We had editions at that time. There was an little edition over here that was
called Boyd Flat. There was one down here that was called McCollough Edition.
All this property around in here this is McCollough. It was sold to the different
people. This is where the city started growing. You would buy a lot from him
and people could get them a little house started and on the, up here on George
Bush that was industry. There was the Doublanders that owned that property
on the right side lines of Texas. They had a big dairy there right in there around
where Lincoln School is now.
SH: That's the other school, not Lincoln. Isn't it?
TP: I don't mean Lincoln, I mean Consolidated...
SH: Willow, whatever, Willow Brook.
TP: I forget what the name that was.
SH: The new school. Willow Branch.
TP: Willow Branch? O.K. Well, this is where he had his dairy and having this
property there he couldn't do anything with it much but to build a few little
houses and that was called the and before I moved over there Mr. Pasley
owned some property and he sold some of the lots, foot by foot, some of them
and they called it the Pasley Edition until the city took it in and they named it the
Prairie View Heights. He owned Wellborn Road and I'm trying to remember the
man's name that ran the barbecue pit so long over there.
SH: Hrdlicka.
TP: Hrdlicka, that's right. That was the busiest place there was in this area.
SH: It's twelve o'clock, just about. Is there anything else you'd like to add to
your...
TP: I don't remember anything right now. I had planned on writing this stuff
down when I got this little letter and I got so busy that I never did. That's about
all I can remember now. I hope that I've been some help.
SH: We really appreciate you being here and thank you for your contribution to
it.
Tape Off
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