THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL HILL SOUTHERN ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM. Piedmont Social History Project. Interview with FLOSSIE MOORE DURHAM

Transcription

1 H-M THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL HILL SOUTHERN ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM Piedmont Social History Project Interview with FLOSSIE MOORE DURHAM September 2, 1976 Bynum, North Carolina By Mary Frederickson and Brent Glass Transcribed, by Jean Houston Original transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection Louis Round Wilson Library SOUTHERN HISTORICAL COLLECTION C8# 3926, Wilson Library The University of North Carolina at Chapel HM Chapel HIH, NC 27599J926

2 FLOSSIE DURHAMt All I know is I just have to go back to, you might say, when we first moved, to Bynum. I was ten years old at that time. MARY FREDERICKSONi Where did your family come from? Where had they been living before? DURHAMt In 1894 we moved to Bynum. MFt You were born in 1884? DURHAM i I was bom in MFt Where were you born? DURHAMi I was homed down in the country here, down the river here, about ten miles from here, right down the river in the country. MFt Did your family have a farm? DURHAMi We was on the farm all the time up till.... Well, in the first place, there was a crowd of us. There was eight of the children. And I was one of the along-toward-the-middle ones, I say. [Laughter] But anyway, we was on the farm till my father died., and. after he died then we moved to Bynum. That was when the Bynum part started, for me. But it was quite different then, of course, from what it is now. MFt Back to talk about when your family lived on a farm just a little bit? Did. your father own the land that he worked? DURHAMt No, he rented a farm then. Worked mules then. MFt What did he plant? DURHAM t He planted cotton and. corn and wheat, too, and really had a good farm. So after he died, it looked like we couldn't keep a-going on the farm. MFt Was he a pretty young man when he died? DURHAMt He died almost sudden. He wasn't but forty-three when he died.

3 DURHAM 2 And it left us, and it left my mother in a bad shape. Along them days there wasn't any money coming in much. We lived; we never went hungry; we hever went cold. But I've often wondered how she kept us all a-going. MFt How long did she stay on the farm after he died? DURHAMt We didn't stay but a few months after he died, just gathered that crop and then we moved to Bynum. MFt How did she decide to come to Bynum? DURHAMt There were several of the men that come out and met first, trying to decide what to do because there was a big family of us, and all of it like it was,didn*t know hardly what to do. They knew about Bynum, and it was a good little place to live. It's always been a real quiet, nice place to live, almost just in the country. And of course the cotton mill was running here then. And the ones that was old enough.... Well, I went to work at ten years old. MFt So you went to work right when your family came into Bynum. DURHAMt Yes, went to work when I was ten years old. And so the mill run on then. The mill was owned by the Odells in Concord. But the houses all back over there then were in good shape; now they're really bad.. They've been getting bad. MFt Did your family move into one of the houses over on the hill? DURHAMt Yes, sure did. Moved, into one of the houses over there on the hill. And. we lived there till I was grown and married. come? MFt Who lived there with you? Did all of your brothers and sisters DURHAMt All of them lived [there] till my oldest brother married while

4 DURHAM 3 I was there. He was gone. And then the next brother was off at school. So that's the way it went all the way down the line till they was all grown. Now they've all gone but I've got one sister and myself a-living; that's all. There were four boys and four girls. BRENT GLASSt Mrs. Durham, did you do any work on the farm when you were a little girl? DURHAMt Nothing more than just pick a little cotton or a little something like that. I wasn't but ten years old. Wasn't quite ten even. So just like any child would now. MFt Did your brothers help your father work the farm? DURHAMt Yes, they did. and. the plows. You know, They worked with mules then, mules and a wagon, There weren't no such thing as a tractor then. No. Not in this country. MFt Did he have anyone else working on the farm with him? Did he have any hired help? DURHAMt Just the family. There was two boys old enough to work on the farm, plowing, things like that. And, like I said, they sowed wheat, made plenty of flour with the wheat. MFt Would he grind his own wheat? Did he have a little mill to grind his own wheat? DURHAMt It was right here at Bynum, a real good grist mill, a big, nice grist mill, and. they'd grind the wheat and the corn for anybody that'd bring it here. I've seen it, right down there where now there's trees grown, and that's where the grist mill was at. And there was two men run it, and usually the yard, all around, there in front of the mill was full of

5 DURHAM 4 horses and. wagons and different carts and different things, bringing in the stuff here. They kept the mill a-going; sometimes they couldn't even keep up in the daytime, MFt Did they run the mill at night sometimes? DURHAMi Sometimes they would, MFt Did you used to come in with your father to bring the wheat in? DURHAMi No, I never come in with him. No, I never come in like that, but the boys would. BGt Would, he bring his cotton here, also? Was there a cotton gin? DURHAMi Yes, there was a cotton gin here, too. There really was a cotton gin then, and they'd gin all the cotton anybody'd bring in. There was a lot more manufacturing here then than there are now. Because they had a blacksmith's shop that done a lot of work, because then there was a lot of mules and horses that had. to be looked after. And. they had. a good blacksmith's shop right down there in the bottom, like. On down a little farther was the cotton gin, and on down a little farther then was the grist mill. Well, they done good work, all of them did. And then the cotton mill was right down below where it's at now, but the one at that time burnt down. And there's been a new one built since then. But most of the houses that's over there on that hill was here then, but a lot of them was practically new. But oh, they look bad now. BGt Did you help your mother at home when you lived on the farm? DURHAMt Well, yes, of course, just like a young'un will do. What I was told to do, that was all I knowed to do. MFt What kinds of things did. your mother do? Did she ever have to

6 DURHAM 5 help your dad out in the fields? Did she work in the fields at all? DURHAMi No, she just worked, in the home. She didn't work in the field. She never done any public work. No, I had a mighty good mother, though, really good. She was a good clean Christian woman. So were my father. So I'm proud, of my father and mother, of a generation from way back yonder. And my grandfather was a preacher, and. my other grandfather was a real good man. So I'm really proud of my descendants way back yonder, what I know of them I had. MFt Did you get to know both sets of your grandparents? Did you know much about where they came from or how they happened, to come to this area? DURHAMt I've been told that my great-grand father Moore I was a Moore before I was married. come to this country, and when he got into this country he didn't have anything in the world, only what he had tied up in a little bundle. He didn't even have a suitcase. But he stayed, here in North Carolina till he married, and he raised, a family here. Well, then one of his boys was my grandfather. And. then that's about as far back as I go. BGt Where did he come from? DURHAMt I couldn't tell you. I couldn't remember to save my life. So maybe I've heard, it, but it's one of the old countries across the ocean. I've heard them speak about him. he was a Moore, and that's all. I don't even know his given name; I know But anyway, the whole Moore family me and all the rest sprang from him, you might say, that young man that come here from this country. MFt What about your Grandfather Moore? Where did he live when you

7 DURHAM 6 were growing up? DURHAMt He lived right there in the country, down here about five miles right down the river. And. he was a Baptist preacher, and he preached at several of the churches around here. Over here at Rock Spring I don't know whether you've heard of that or not in a little church across the river. And several like that. Anywhere that they to call him, he'd preach. MFt Did. he have a regular circuit? DURHAMt Yes, he had a regular circuit. MFt Did he travel on a horse, or did he have a wagon? DURHAMt Well, it was a horse and buggy. That's all he had to travel with. Maybe miles; he'd go as many as ten or fifteen miles at a stretch. Some of them not that far. MFt Did you hear him preach when you were a little girl? DURHAMt Yes, I remember hearing him preach, I surely did. MFt Was he a good preacher? DURHAMt Yes, I remember hearing him preach. MFt Did your family always go to the Baptist church? DURHAM t They did until we moved to Bynum, We would, have gone to the Baptist church, too, if my father had lived, because he was a strong Baptist. But after he died and we moved, to Bynum, the church here was a Methodist church. So finally we all become Methodists. MFt What about your mother's family? What did her parents do? DURHAMt She was a Bland before she married. And she remembered during the Civil War her father weren't in the war, but he would search for what thpy call a deserter, hunt deserters. And they said that was

8 DURHAM 7 so dangerous, too, but anyway that was his work. I reckon he was too old to go to war; I don't know. Anyway, they said he'd, be out a lot at night hunting deserters. There was a lot of them would leave the War, you know. Then they'd try to get them back. But that was the Civil War. And she remembered a lot about that. MFt Where did she grow up? DURHAMt She growed up about twenty miles, I reckon, right down the river here. We're all country people. MFt Was her father a farmer? DURHAM t Yes, they farmed.. Now my Grandmother Bland at that time owned a good, many niggers. That was before they were freed. And. a good lot of land, down the river there, but of course it's all gone. MFt Did he lose his land and his people after the War? DURHAMt He kept it. He still lived on the same farm. But of course the colored was all freed, but you know a lot of those men women, too had good, homes, and they didn't want to leave. Because in the first place you all know more about it through history than I could know, though a lot of them did have good homes, and they didn't want to leave. And. a lot of them didn't have, so they was.... You know, that was bad on them, though, when I think about it. They were freed, but a lot of them didn't have nowhere to go. What to do? Them colored people. Oh, it's so different now with colored people. Bat I'm glad they've come to the top. I'm glad things is like they is with them. They deserve it. I'm glad. they do. MFt Do you remember visiting your Grandfather Bland's farm when you were small?

9 DURHAM 8 DURHAMt Yes, I remember both of them. And. my Grandfather Moore died, suddenly. He had preached at Rock Spring, they said, there on Saturday. Well, I knew about it. meeting on Saturday. Along in them days, they'd have their business Well, on Sunday morning he was going back over there to preach, and he fed his horse. Of course, there weren't nothing but horses then. But he fed. his horse and bent down to put his bucket back in the crib, and when he went to open the crib up he fell dead, right there of heart trouble. So that was the end of him; he died, suddenly. MFt Was he an old man at that time? DURHAMt Yes. He died, and in about three months then my father died. MFt Let me ask you one other question about when you used to visit on your Grandfather Bland's farm. Do you remember seeing the black people? DURHAMt I just remember something about them. much now about them. I don't; no, I don't. I don't remember too BGt Do you remember out in the country corn-shuckings and... DURHAMt Oh, yes. BSt Did they grind sorghum cane and things like that? DURHAMt All them days, you see, I remember that so well. As long as we was in the country, when they'd bring up all the corn and. pile it up in front of their barn, you might say, and then they'd have a big shucking. Invite a whole lot of the men around, and they'd have supper for them then. They'd all just have a good time, men laughing and. talking and joking around that corn pile till they'd get it all shucked. BGt Did. people sing songs? DURHAMt Oh, yes. It was just like a crowd of men'll do when they get together. But I don't think they ever done anything wrong. I don't

10 DURHAM 9 think they was doing things, drinking and cutting up. And. the same thing when they went to thrash the wheat. The thrasher would go from one farm to another and. thrash the wheat. Well, they'd, always have a lot of hands there and have a big dinner. Now that's all I cared, about, that big dinner. MFt [Laughter] If men got together and. shucked the corn and thrashed the wheat, did women get together like that, too? DURHAMt No, not much. They didn't get together in the cooking much. Maybe some of the neighbors right next to them would come in and help out, but not like the men, MFt Did they all just bring their separate food? DURHAMt No, they didn't bring anything, I remember my mother cooking chicken stew, and. she'd cook it in a wash pot. You know, used to we had. to have a big old wash pot out to wash clothes in. Well, she'd put about two or three chickens in there and make a big stew there in that wash pot. BGt Cook for all the men? DURHAMt For all of them, yes. Well, it would take about that much to feed all those men. That was one of the things that they'd always usually have, and I remember seeing her cook that so much. But that's a long time ago. I'd have been about eight years old along then. BGt How about quilting? Did your mother do any quilting with other women in the neighborhood? MFt Did they ever get together and make quilts or sew? DURHAMt Oh, yes, they. All the I have around, here is the quilts I made. Oh, I've made many a quilt myself. I made many a quilt and quilted, them, too. MFt Would, women work on them together? Would you and. your mother

11 DURHAM 10 ever make a quilt together? DURHAMt No, She made some that I had.. She was in her sixties when she died. So I've made many a quilt since then and quilted them, right here in this house. We've been in this house fifty-seven years, I mean we bought it then. My husband and I had a little house back up here on the road. built with him. We lived, there ten years, and the boys began to get grown, like it weren't big enough. So we traded, that house then for this. My son owns this house now, and he's done a lot of work on it. It's the same rooms, same place, all like that, but he's done a whole lot of work on it. But it was a good house at the time we moved, here. A good house. MFt When your mother and. your brothers and sisters and you moved to Bynum, what do you remember about that move? Did you take all your belongings and. bring them into town? DURHAMt Oh, yes. We brought them all to Bynum, what they had. Yes, they had. some pigs, different things that they'd done on the farm, brought down over here to. MFt So you could keep pigs, and. did you have any cows or chickens that you brought with you? DURHAMt Any what? MFt You brought pigs and. kept them here in town when you lived, here? DURHAMt Oh, yes. We lived, up there on the very top of that hill over there, a little three-room house. MFt How many of you were living there then? DURHAMt There was eight of us and my mother. But my oldest brother didn't stay very long before he was somewhere else. Edgar Moore was his

12 DURHAM 11 name. He lived to be ninety-six years old. He become a mighty nice man, and he was superintendent of the mill down here for a long time. MFt When you first went to work in the mill, what was it like? Were you afraid, to go, or were you excited about going? DURHAMt Well, I tell you, when I first went to work, it changed at one o'clock. At one o'clock in the day that morning shift would go off, and. the evening shift come on, and each one had to work twelve hours. MFt So when did the morning shift go to work, at one in the morning? DURHAMt Monday morning they went to work at four o'clock. Now I've worked on every one of them shifts when I was a girl. And then Monday morning the morning shift would go to work at four o'clock, and they'd work till one in the day. The evening shift come in at one in the day, and they worked till one that night. And. then the morning shift come in at one that night and worked till one the next day, and they done that all week. MFt When you were ten years old» y u did that? You would work that long? DURHAMt Yes. And they didn't make anything, neither, a little along them days. MFt Do you remember what you first made when you went to work? DURHAMt About twenty-five cents a day. And that was a day; that weren't an hour. That was a day. BGt Mrs. Durham, were you going to school at the same time you were working in the mill? DURHAMt No, I didn't get to go to school anymore. Sure didn't. MFt Had. you gone to school when you lived on the farm?

13 DURHAM 12 DURHAMt Yes, we went to school when they'd have any school. We went to school when we were all living on the farm. But no, I never got to go to school anymore. I always regretted that, but I had to work to make a living. And what I picked up, I picked, up for myself the best I could. But all the children finished high school, and some of them went to college. BGt All of your children. DURHAMt And. that was one thingt I wanted the children to go to school. See, we had, Manly and myself....there's five of the children living now. We've got four boys and one girl. And I'd love for you to see them. Of course, you know Louis, Well, he's the youngest boy. And the oldest boy had a strike here. I mean a.... BGt Stroke? DURHAMt Yeah, oh. Anyway he fell, and it took him a long.... He hasn't quite got over it yet. It was a stroke. That's what I was trying to say. He has never tried to do any work much since; that's been nearly two years. BGt Do you remember your first day at work and what your job was? DURHAM t At the mill? BGt Yes. DURHAMt Yes, it was spinning. BGt At ten years old? DURHAMt Yes. That's all I could have done. I weren't but ten years old. All the little ones, they'd put them to spinning, you see, or something like that. But now that weren't a bad life. We had a real good, life over there on the hill. Every house was filled., and. the people was all friendly and. they was all nice. And Mr. Luther Bynum was looking

14 DURHAM 13 after it, and he wouldn't have anybody over there that drank. Anybody got drinking, they left there right now. Didn't have no drinking and. cutting up over there. Things was kept quiet and. nice. And it was a good place over there to live. MFt Did almost everyone on the hill go to the Methodist church? DURHAMt Yes, all of them. That was all the church there was here, was the Methodist church. In other words, we'd been here five or six years..,. Well, there was a church. We had that old schoolhouse down there; we always called it the old schoolhouse, down there in the bottom like. Well, they had school there in the week, and on Sunday they had preaching there. preaching and anything in that line, and. when they taught school there'd be school there for the children. So that went on that way till the church, I think, was built about 1898, I think it was just about eight years that the little church over there was built then. About 1898, just a little before I was married., and I was married in 1901, BGt Was it a brick church? DURHAMt No, Well, it's brick-veneered now. Yes, it is. And. it's in good shape, but the place it's at is still bad because it's there on that hillside. MFt Was there a preacher there all the time? DURHAMt It's there every Sunday. MFt Did he live in the town? DURHAM 1 Yes, they live right up here in the parsonage. MFt But I mean when the church first started, was there a preacher in Bynum all the time? DURHAM 1 Yes. The preacher always lived here, at first. There's

15 DURHAM 14 always been a parsonage here. And. a long time the preacher had six churches. But for a long time now he just has one church. MFt I see. DURHAM tit's a young man.and. they live right up there. And now they have a new parsonage, but they've been trying to get shut of the old, one ever since the new one was built. And nobody don't want to fool with it, it's going to cost so much to move it. But it was built in I knew when that old parsonage was built, and. it's a good old building. It's a pity to see it go down like that, but they say it would cost so much to move it, nobody won't take it. One time they tried, to give it away, if anybody'd take it and get it away from there. They said, "Unh-uh." They said it would cost three or four thousand at least to get it away, and so they didn't do it. BGt Did you play games with the little children when you lived over here in Bynum? DURHAM 1 Oh, yes, all the children's games and. all like that, yes. BGt Do you remember any of those games? DURHAM 1 No. [laughter] No, I just remember that we did. The children used to get together and play games just like they would now. But there weren't nothing then.... Of course, there weren't no automobiles around here; there weren't no such thing as an automobile. And it was a rare thing if you ever seen a child, with a bicycle or anything like that, but they'd, have little wagons. MFt Did you have much time to play, or were you really tired after you came out of the mill? DURHAMt Oh, well, like I say again, didn't nobody make anything

16 DURHAM 15 hardly then. Of course, everything you bought was cheap. And they had a pretty big country store over here that the company run. And. then there was another little store around, or two. But the main store belonged, to the company at that time, for a good long while. And they kept most anything you'd want. MFt Did they pay you in cash, or did they have some kind of scrip? Did they have any kind of company money, or did they pay you in regular money? DURHAMi No, because they was just ordinary, plain people. That's all I would know. I never known anything bad to happen here, especially in them days. No, I didn't, no. MFt When you worked inside the mill, what was it like? Did you have a lot of friends who worked in the mill, too? DURHAMt Oh, yes, they was all.... one big family. A lot of people'd say, "Aw, it's just about like one big family," There weren't so many houses over here then. No, This house was here, and them over there, of course, and the parsonage. But there's a lot of these other houses was not here, MFt Did you have time when you were working to talk to the people around you and sort of joke around? DURHAMt With most of them you could. Yes, they had pretty good overseers. No, they weren't bad, no. MFt If you got tired and wanted to sit down and rest or something, could you do that? DURHAMt Oh, yes, if you had your work up, you could sit down any time you wanted to. What water we had was drawed. out of a well and brought in there in the bucket.

17 DURHAM 16 MFt So could you always stop and get a drink of water when you needed it? DURHAMt Whenever you wanted to. And there was always that bucket sitting up on the big post place, and. a dipper in it. I can almost see anybody go there now, take that dipper and knock the lint back off of it, and. get them a drink of water. And a lot of the time, when they'd first bring in the bucket of water, that's when a lot of them would get their water. MFt [Laughter] Before it got lint on it, huh? DURHAMi Before it got lint on it. [Laughter] In my imagination I can almost see anybody take the dipper and then kind of push that lint back and get them a drink of water. And we didn't think nothing about it. MFt Did the lint ever bother you? Did you ever have trouble? DURHAM; Oh, not enough to know any difference, no. MFt You didn't catch colds from it or have asthma or anything. DURHAMt [Laughter] Anyway I've lived through it till I'm ninety-three years old. [Laughter] And so I'm the oldest one here in Bynum. MFt Mmmm. Do you ever remember anyone who couldn't work in the mill, like they were allergic to the dust or something like that? DURHAMt No, I don't know as I do. Right now I don't remember anybody. Most of the people were healthy enough that they could, work. There's one or two that went to work a little younger than I did, but the majority of them didn't go to work till twelve or thirteen, along in there. MFt I see. Once you started working, how long did you keep working in the mill? DURHAMt I worked till I married, about eight years. Yes, we married at eighteen, and I was ten when I moved here.

18 DURHAM 17 MFt How did you meet your husband? DURHAMi I met him when he was a little boy, thirteen or fourteen years old. MFt Did he live up on the hill, too? DURHAMt No, he didn't at that time. He had an uncle back up here, a doctor. In other words, his mother was dead and his father was dead, too, so he stayed up there with this doctor, his uncle, a lot. And you know, the first time I seen that boy, I was going on up the hill with another girl from the mill. She was older than I was, but she was a-talking and a-going on about this, that, and the other boy, one thing and the other. But I looked across the street then and saw a boy tying a horse to the tree. I said, "Well, my fellow's right out yonder, but," I says, "I don't know who it is." Says, "Oh, I know him." Well, it happened to be the same one that I finally married. MFt What made you think he was so good-looking over there, tying that horse up? [Laughter] DURHAMt I had just said that, just like [laughter] a careless word, in a way, but I've thought of it many times. Didn't think nothing about it then. MFt Did you meet him soon after that? DURHAMt It weren't long before he come up here. Just children like. MFt Were you sweethearts for a long time? DURHAM t I was with him to amount to anything. But I can say that the first time I began to be with him I liked him, and it never failed. MFt Did he start actively courting you? Did you call it courting?

19 DURHAM 18 DURHAMt No, not for a long time. [Laughter] Just like playing games and one thing and another and being together, all like that. No, I never thought about nothing like that. Too young for that. MFt Right before you married, did you used to go to church together? How would you spend time together? DURHAMt No, we didn't sit together, but usually when I'd leave he'd go home with me. But I can say and tell the truth that I never.... I thought a lot of him all them days down till he died. And I don't feel like I've got a thing in the world to regret, that I didn't do the best I could for him all the time. All the time. And he'd been sick a lot. He hadn't been able to work a day's work in thirty-three years when he died. Been thirty-three years. In i960 was when they brought him from the mill with a spell, and I fell out. Oh, he was sick in the hospital so much. But he'd get able to come back. MFt What seemed to be wrong? DURHAM 1 Well, they used to say it was his heart, but I don't think his heart killed him. I couldn't tell you to save my life, but he was sick a lot and in the hospital a lot. First one thing and then the other. But I think finally his blood, killed him. He got to losing so much blood. BGt What would happen when you were a little girl here in Bynum, if someone got sick? DURHAM 1 Yes. Was there a doctor nearby? A lot of times we had a doctor here, and always a doctor at Plttsboro. There's always been doctors there. MFt Would they come out to Bynum if somebody was sick? DURHAMt They'd come to Bynum anytime you called them. Dr. Tisch(?) would come anytime you'd call, his nurse said. They will now. He's getting along in years, too, but used to there was at least one doctor over there

20 DURHAM 19 and sometimes two. And there was a country doctor back up here for a long time, about three or four miles from here, and he'd come anytime you called him. And part of the time there'd be a doctor living here, not all the time. BGt Were there any midwives living in Bynum or people who weren't doctors but who you could call on if you were sick? DURHAMt No, there wasn't anybody. no nurse or anything like that. BGt Louis told me about a Mrs. Smith. Did you know a Mrs. Smith who... DURHAMt I wish you could see her daughter right now, Ida Smith. Well, it was her daughter that married my son, and they own this house. Yes, she was a woman that would just go anywhere anybody.... She didn't claim herself a doctor or nothing like that, but she'd help anybody she could if she could do anything for them, especially little children. If she could do anything for them, she did. She had two children of her own. there on the hill. And they lived right up there in that house over I mean up on the road, not over there. BGt What kinds of things would she do as a nurse? She wasn't a doctor. DURHAMt No, she wasn't a doctor, and she wasn't a nurse. She had just been one of the kind that visit people that are sick and do anything for them This doctor up here, like I was talking about, this doctor in the country, she was a real good friend to him, and he was they mingled with other right smart in that medicine business. But she never counted herself anything like a nurse; she was just a good woman to do what she could. That was her life. MFt Did she ever help any of your family or take care of any of your children? DURHAMt No. My children was all.... They'd got large enough then

21 DURHAM 20 that.... But I've got two children dead, a baby and a girl that was sixteen years old. I miss them both so bad. BEGIN TAPE I SIDE II DURHAMt... nowadays. Had a bed in here. And he breathed so hard, all the time. And his flesh was warm. But he didn't know anything in the world. Anything anybody goes off in a coma. It's bad. They don't know anything any more than if they was dead, it looked like. But yet his flesh stayed warm. began And when he died, he went off just as easy as anything you ever saw. MFt Well, that's good. BGt Do you remember what would happen when someone died here back when you were a child, how they would treat the... DURHAM t How people died then? BGt Well, if people died, what happened to them? DURHAMt Well, typhoid fever was one thing that killed several a long time ago. I'm sure you don't remember when typhoid fever went through here. No. BGt What would happen when the person died? Was there an undertaker, or would they... DURHAMi The man from Pittsboro would come over here and take the body. There's a place in Pittsboro, of course, all that's done. Nothing here. The body was always carried to Pittsboro. MFt When you had your children, who helped you have your children? Did the doctor come or would, your mother help you deliver your children? DURHAMt There was always a doctor.

22 DURHAM 21 MFt The doctor would, always come? DURHAMt Yes. There was always the doctor when anything like that. MFt Did you have all your children at home? DURHAMt Every one of them. No, I never went to the hospital with a one of them. MFt Did you ever have any trouble? DURHAMt Not anything special, no. All of them was horned all right, and five of them's living. MF t You said you had one baby who dled. DURHAMj Yes, I did. Our first baby died. MFt What did the baby die of? Was it real young when it died? DURHAMt Yes, it was six months old. It wasn't right from the start. It never was right. And I don't reckon he'd have been right if he'd a-lived. But my daughter now was, and she had pneumonia. And she was the youngest... MFt Did the doctor come when your daughter had pneumonia? DURHAM t BGt Mrs. Durham, was that usual? Did most families have at least one baby who died in the family? DURHAMt There were a lot of families here had a little baby to die. I don't know why, how. right from the first. But this baby of ours weren't right. It weren't He had screaming spells. He had about two spells a week could get him quiet. MFt Was your mother with you most of the time when you were raising your children? DURHAMt Yes, she lived close by, and she'd help me. Oh, she helped

23 DURHAM 22 me a lot of times with the children, as long as she lived.. But she was sixty-five when she died. Well, all the children was here then, all but one. MFt Had. your mother gone to work in the mill when she first came to Bynum? DURHAMi No, she never did work in the mill. MFt Did she keep the house and. cook the food and... DURHAMt She kept house, but she had several children. No, she never did work in the mill. MFt When your older brothers started leaving home to go away and get married, did anyone else come to live in your house? Did. you ever take anyone else in? DURHAMt No. Well, he was nineteen years old when my father died, and he taken hold to help out the family all he could. I feel like he done the very best he could. And then later on he helped some of the boys through school, and I feel like he taken the place as well as he could. He married a real nice girl, and they just had one child. And she lived, to be.... Hasn't been dead long. Right over here at Pittsboro, Elizabeth Moore. MFt When your brother became superintendent of the mill, how long had he been working in the mill before they promoted him to be superintendent? DURHAMt Oh, not long. MFt He was still a real young man then? DURHAM;Well, it was when he was grown. He was grown, but he wasn't married. But the man that was superintendent here was one of the Bynums, Henry Bynum. Well, they told my brother Edgar, "Now if you'll come down there and work through the mill, start at the first, just learn the

24 DURHAM 23 machinery, when you get through with it, I'll put you overseer." Well, that's what he did. They put him overseer down there, and he was overseer then for several years before he become the superintendent. MFt Was that when you were still working in the mill? DURHAM; Yes, when he went to work in the mill I was. BGt Were there any rules in the mill that you had to obey? DURHAM; Well, of course they had some rules, but not bad. BGt What if you were late for work? What would happen? DURHAMt Of course, they had. long hours, and you had to go through them long hours, and all the time. MFt Was there any kind of whistle that blew when the shift changed? DURHAMt Yes, there was. They had a bell down there. It would ring if they was leaving or coming or changing or anything. And they had a whistle...of course, it was steam het up. Down below there was a boiler room, they called it. And the mill was het up by that for a long time. MFt Could, you hear the whistle if you were in your house? DURHAMt Oh, yes. We could hear the whistle or the bell either. MFt And that's how you knew when it was time to go to work? DURHAMt. They'd usually ring the bell or something like that about ten minutes before changing time. Everyone knew all those things then. And the mill run regular then, night and day, all the time. But that mill burnt down. It was a real nice wooden mill, though; it weren't brick. MFt When did it burn down? DURHAMt About 1918 or somewhere along there. I'd been married, some years.

25 DURHAM 24 BGt Do you remember the day it burned down? DURHAMt It burnt down on Sunday; I don't remember the date. BGt I mean do you remember when it happened? DURHAM t There was a storm on that evening in the summertime, and lightning struck it. And a bolt of lightning went right through that mill, just setting fires cotton. It sure did, that was. And the mill burnt down that evening. MFt No one was working in the mill on Sunday. DURHAMt No, the mill wasn't running. There wasn't anything going on. A watchman was down there. There was a watchman always looking after things, day and night. MFt Did they ever run a shift on Sunday? DURHAMi No, never did work you on Sunday. MFt When would you quit on Saturday? DURHAMt The evening shift would quit ten o'clock Saturday night. I've worked every shift they had. MFt When did they start putting on three shifts? DURHAMt They never did have three shifts here then, just two shifts. But each shift worked twelve hours and kept the mill running. They kept the mill running at that time, unless something stopped it. They started up Monday morning, and they run till ten o'clock Saturday night. They'd stay up thirty minutes at breakfast and thirty minutes at supper. MFt Did. you go home and eat breakfast and go home and eat supper? DURHAMt Yes, we'd go home and eat breakfast and go home and eat supper. And. that's all it stood, unless it had to. MFt Did you work all of the time except the thirty minutes? Did you get any other kind of rest time?

26 DURHAM 25 DURHAMt No. That's all. Like I say, when we moved to Bynum I was on what they called the morning shift. And at twelve-thirty at night, the watchman would come around, knock on the door and wake you up. put on your skillet pan and. get ready and get down there about one o'clock at night. And you worked till one the next day. And that's the way it went a long, long time. MFt Then when you came home, would you go to sleep? DURHAMi We'd, usually sleep in the evening some then and then go to sleep again after.(?) Sleep weren't like it is, all night, of course. Yes, I remember all them days. MFt Did your brothers and sisters all work different shifts? DURHAMt Yes. MFt So some of you were home at some time... DURHAMi Yes, some of them was different. MFt Did you all eat dinner together? DURHAMt When they was boys, they did. Could, you all come together for dinner? You see, there'd maybe be one shift eating before the others did. And. the one that was doing the cooking and looking after that, why, they knowed they couldn't all eat at once. MFt Were there any boarding houses up on the hill? Did anyone run a boarding house? DURHAMt Yes, they did. There was a right smart of boarders here along then, because if the mill was running a lot was over there. Now they're scattered around. They come from the country and Pittsboro and all around, that work down there. But at that time, everybody that worked, come off the hill up there. And. of course it was in good shape, and the houses were in good fix, and most of them was big families. MFt Do you remember anyone who ran a boarding house, or did boarders

27 DURHAM 26 tend to live with families? DURHAMt There weren't no special boarding house; it was just anybody that could take another one, why, they'd take them. mother boarded several of them, her last days anyway. Girls or boys. My Not when we was all at home, no. But before she died, she had several boarders. MFt Where would the boarders usually come from? Did they come from the country? DURHAMt Anywhere, if they didn't have a family here. MFt Were some of them young girls? DURHAMt Yes, the majority was young. Didn't any old. people work here then. No. BGt Were they men or women boarders? DURHAMt Some of the women kept cooks, much less worked at public work, at that time. You could, get a nigger to work for you a month for five dollars. My mother never hired any of them. She done her own work. But some of them did. MFt If some of them had to work in the mill, would they have a black woman at home to cook? DURHAMt Or if they didn't even work in the mill. MFt Oh, they just would have someone to cook. [Laughter] DURHAMt Yes, they just had a big family and had somebody to help them. I know several families done that. They had a big family, and like I say, they could get help for almost nothing and felt like they was able to do it and they did it. MFt How did people do their washing when you lived on the hill?

28 DURHAM 27 DURHAM t Oh, it was washed by hand for many years. Even after I moved down here, we didn't have no electricity nor any washing machines. We'd been down here in this house some little bit before there was any electric power that you could get. Didn't even have electric power at the mill for a long time. They made their own power. MFt How did your mother do her washing? DURHAMt She washed herself with tubs and board and wash pot. That's the way everybody washed then; there weren't no other way to wash. And they was used to it and didn't think anything about it. MFt Were there any women in town who took in washing? Was there a washerwoman in town? DURHAM t Yes, a lot of colored women would come in here and wash. You could get a woman to wash for twenty-five cents. MFt But they'd come to your house and do the washing? DURHAMt Yes, they'd come to your house and wash and hang the clothes out. But Lord [laughter], any of them now. Because most of those colored, people is oh, so different now. Never see one now. MFt When women had a small baby, would they nurse it? How long would they nurse it? DURHAMt Oh, yes, they'd nurse the baby as long as they thought it was necessary. And some women, of course, couldn't; they'd have to use a bottle. And we had doctors; see a doctor anytime you wanted a doctor, for a baby or anybody else. And some babies was raised on a bottle, but.... MFt About how long would they usually nurse a baby? DURHAMt Oh, anywhere from a year to two years. they

29 DURHAM 28 wanted to. That was their business. MFt When you first got married, where did you and your husband live? DURHAMt We'd been married about a month when we went to keeping house. And the house right back up here now, the house standing there now, at that time there was two rooms. Well, he had a brother a little younger than him, and his mother was dead, and his father was dead, so when we went to keeping house he went with us, and stayed with us then till he got grown, just as one of the family, and married. MFt You said you got married in 1901? DURHAM 1 Yes, I did. MFt Did you have a wedding? DURHAM 1 No, just married at home. There was a man there who lived, across up close to us, a Mr. Atwater, so he was thn magistrate, and he come out there and married us one Sunday morning. Our house was full. MFt Did all the relatives come? DURHAM 1 There weren't many relatives, just friends come in. So, after we were married, went to ride. Got a horse and buggy from Pittsboro. Now that was another thing. Mr. Nat Hill over there at Pittsboro run a livery stable. And anybody here at Bynum, anytime they wanted a horse and buggy or maybe several wanted a hack, he'd send it over here. And of course you paid him; he'd come back after it. Well, that was real nice all them years. I've been in a buggy like that, and I've been in with several going together. And they'd get anywhere from four to six in a hack that would carry that many. And spend a day anywhere you wanted to. MFt So on your wedding day, you went out and rode? DURHAM 1 Just went out to ride, that's all.

30 DURHAM 29 MFt Did you ride all day? DURHAMt No. [Laughter] No, I didn't. Come back then and et down at his aunts*. sisters lived over there. Two of his mother's We stayed there for about a month and went to keeping house. I tell the children here sometimes, I've got one chair here that we went to keeping house with, and [laughter] that's the only thing in the house that... MFt Which one is it? DURHAMt And it's all right. It's in there now. It's all right. He give two dollars for it. MFt [Laughter] DURHAM t A good., strong little rocking chair. But I told them I said, "That's what I rocked all the babies in." At that time we used cradles. I don't know whether you've ever seen a cradle or not, either one of you. [Laughter] But I wouldn't have taken anything for my cradle. At that time, the man who ran the store down there they kept furniture here, even to a casket if you wanted it. MFt Did someone in town make furniture? DURHAM i And so we went to the store and bought a cradle and a high chair. MFt How long after you were married did you have your first baby? DURHAMt Well, it was about twelve months. And then most all of them, wasn't more than two years between them. I had four little boys at one time, and the oldest one couldn't go to school. MFt Whew! DURHAM t [Laughter] Lacked a few months of being old. enough to go to school. MFt Boy, that must have kept you busy.

31 DURHAM 30 DURHAMt kept anybody home. MFt [Laughter] Did. your husband work in the mill at that time? DURHAMt He was overseer at that time. He never was superintendent, but he was overseer of the spinning a long time. And then I had. two boys that done the same thing. The one that lives here now was superintendent of the mill a long time. BGt What is his name? DURHAMt Frank. MFt Did your husband and your brother Edgar work together a lot in the mill? DURHAMt Part of the time they did, but most of the time, though, my husband quit was sick and wasn't able to work a lot of the time that Frank was superintendent. BGt Mrs. Durham, when the mill burned down, did you think about leaving Bynum? What did. your husband think about that? Were you afraid or... DURHAMt When the mill burnt down, that was a shock to the place, now that's true. Some of them moved away from here. Several families left here; most of them went to Durham from here that left. And pretty quick they began to clean away from down there, getting ready for another one. Any of the men that wanted to could work down there. And. things like that. So it was just about twelve months that they had. another mill ready to run. The mill that's running now. BGt Did your husband talk about maybe leaving Bynum? DURHAMt No. didn't ever want to leave. [Laughter] He had a job offered to him two or three times, only you'd had to have moved.

32 DURHAM 31 Well, we then owned our little house up here at that time, and we had several children. We stayed on here, made it all right. He wanted to have some money when he died, wanted to have some money I say when he needed it. And oh, my, he was in the hospital so much. It had been so long since he'd made any money, except they had a little land, and he sold several lots off of that. So there's still money in the bank now that he had put in there. My oldest boy lives out here. He would have, but he had that stroke that affected him a lot. Then the next boy, Frank, is a mighty sturdy, good man, [even] if he is my boy. So he looks after all the business. And Louis'11 tell you that. BGt Right. DURHAMt I think all four of the boys are good. BGt You didn't have a favorite? DURHAMi They don't drink; they don't run around; they don't gamble; they don't do none of those bad things. BGt Did you have a favorite? DURHAMt I wouldn't say so, no, because I love them all. And they've all been mighty nice men through Manly'ssickness and his death and all. I've got one boy who's Vernon that lives right down here. Carey's the oldest, then Frank, then Vernon, then Louis is the youngest. Then there's one girl, and she works in the... BGt She still does? DURHAMt She still does. She and her husband separated a long time ago, and left her with three children. And now she has ten grandchildren. MFt Does she live in Bynum? DURHAMt Yes, she lives right down here in this house, right below this one. She owns that house down there. MFt What does she do in the mill?

33 DURHAM 32 DURHAMt She winds. And you wouldn't know anything about that, I don't reckon, but anyway, that's what she... MFt Is the mill running now? DURHAMt Yes, it's running. It's running today. It didn't yesterday on account of their taking inventory, but it's running right now. And she's at work right now. BGt What is her name? DURHAMt Florence Cooper. She never married anymore. He lives at Burlington. But she had one boy and two girls, and she lives with one of her girls and her family. All the grandchildren are of school age. BGt Louis told me that a little bit after the new mill was built, a lot of new families came in here from all over. They brought in a lot of new people. Do you remember that? DURHAM t Yes. More people come in, yes, as they needed them at the mill. And of course they started up the mill with just a little, and then they kept accumulating, getting on. As far as I know, they run a good business down there now. But the people that's got it now have just got it leased. the company. BGt When a new person would come into town, would the company tell them where to live? DURHAMt If they had a house vacant. If they knowed that there was a vacant house that they could move in, and they changed houses a lot over there, anything. Just like almost.... It used to be, especially. I don't know much about it personally now, because I'm not over there now never, or hardly ever. But it was a good place to live when I was a girl. I enjoyed it, and I worked. Didn't get to go around like they do

34 DURHAM 33 now. Didn't get to dress like they do now. But I had new dresses [laughter], new hats. Along back in the time that girls wore hats to church. They don't do it now. BGt What did you wear to work? DURHAM; We just wore dresses. We didn't wear slacks like they do now, no. No. No. MFt What did you usually do with the money that you made? DURHAMt Well, I done most everything down there. I first started off spinning, and then all my last work down there was what they call spooling. BGt What do you do when you spool? DURHAMt The bobbins would be attached onto the spinning frame there. It was run onto a big spool about so high, and it had ends about like that, too, on it, and it filled up them spools. And at that time they were going up to what they called the warp mill. That downstairs. And. the warp mill was a pretty big thing, and there were so many of them spools running together. Had big frames up there. It was pretty a-running, that warp mill was. And then they'd be run all down into be as as my arm, this thread. And that was baled then into big bales. That's the way they sold it. BGt Did they have a weave mill there? DURHAMt No, they never did have any looms here. No, I never did know anything about weaving. BGt Was it mostly women working there? DURHAMt The spinning was run mostly by women and girls. Didn't many women along then; the young girls would work,but now, for a good, long bit, they finish high school.... They go to school in Pittsboro now. We used to have a real good school building here, but it got to where there