Adkins, John (1912- )&Adkins, Harriet (1908-1981) |
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Worcester County Library: Local History and Genealogy Collection, Snow Hill Branch, Snow Hill, MD
|
Interviewee: |
John Adkins (1912- ) & Harriet Adkins (1908-1981) |
| Interviewer: | Katherine Fisher |
| Date of interview: |
1981 February 27 |
| Length of interview: | 1 hr 22 min |
| Transcribed by: | Chelsea West, Worcester County Library |
| Preferred Citation: |
“Name, Oral History Collection, Date of Interview, Worcester County Library, Snow Hill Branch, Snow Hill, Maryland.” |
Topical Terms:
African Americans—History
Domestic Life
Education
Farming
Religious Life
Worcester County (Md.)—African Americans
Worcester County (Md.)—Education
Worcester County (Md.)—History
Worcester County (Md.)—Social life and customs
Worcester County (Md.)—Women's History
Location Terms:
Newark (Md.)
Ocean City (Md.)
Snow Hill (Md.)
Interview Begin
INTERVIEWER: Today is February 27 and I’m at the home of Mr. and Mrs. John Wesley Adkins, and Mr. Adkins how old are you right now?
JOHN: I’m 69.
INTERVIEWER: Alright you’re 69, and Mrs. Adkins what was your maiden name?
HARRIET: Allen.
INTERVIEWER: Allen. Oh, okay. And your age now?
HARRIET: 73.
INTERVIEWER: 73. Okay. Alright. Mr. Adkins where were you born?
JOHN: I was born in Ironshire.
INTERVIEWER: Alright.
JOHN: And then that’s where I was born and then I was moved to Newark when I was younger, I don’t remember, Ironshire.
INTERVIEWER: Okay.
JOHN: I was moved to Newark down what they call Hickman’s Hill.
INTERVIEWER: Alright now which direction if I’m at the crossroads in Newark you know downtown where the bank is now which direction, where’s Hickman’s Hill?
JOHN: Hickman’s Hill is you turn right when you get to Newark and it’s where the old post office used to be, you turn right and you just keep right on going and you go right on down just like you’re going down to the bay.
INTERVIEWER: Alright. Got ya.
JOHN: And that’s where we lived.
INTERVIEWER: What sort of work did your parents do?
JOHN: Well, my father was a farmer.
INTERVIEWER: Okay. Alright. And your mother helped?
JOHN: Well, my mother I can’t remember a whole lot about my mother because my mother passed on when I was about seven but I remember my mother very well but all she did was take care of the fowl and raise.
INTERVIEWER: Alright you raised chickens.
JOHN: Chickens, hogs, ducks and stuff like that and that was her job and she did the cooking.
INTERVIEWER: Did you have a large family?
JOHN: Yes. It was.
HARRIET: Seven.
JOHN: There was seven in the family.
HARRIET and JOHN (together): Seven children.
INTERVIEWER: Plus, your mother and father.
JOHN: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: Alright and she had enough to do then (laughter) just to cook for them I imagine. How long did you stay in Newark?
JOHN: Well I stayed in Newark until 1929 then I left Newark and I moved right over here to a house right across the street from my sister. That’s where my sister lived and I went to work on the state roads.
INTERVIEWER: Oh. You did.
JOHN: Yes.
INTERVIEWER: All right now what year were you born in?
JOHN: Nineteen hundred and eleven.
INTERVIEWER: Eleven, so you came in here 1929 right? So you were twenty. I can’t even subtract today, you were around 20 years old.
JOHN: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: Right, okay. Let’s go back to Newark for a minute since you remember Newark too. What in the world was that Newark then? Probably more than now.
JOHN: Newark was a very family place, both white and colored.
INTERVIEWER: Ok.
JOHN: The whole area. The whole county as far as I knew Newark, Berlin and all the places was nothing compared to what it is today. It was a family affair, both white and colored. There wasn’t no such thing as violence between races and there was the work that was being done was done in groups because the white men always raised bigger crops than the colored. And when the crops get ready to be harvest they all gathered together then they go to one farm and just get him completely harvested and the ladies of the house and from around would come and they all had long porches and they’d cook fried chicken, white potatoes, and dumplings and hot bread and everything and there was no money involved.
INTERVIEWER: Alright that’s what I was wondering.
JOHN: There was no money involved into it.
INTERVIEWER: Okay.
JOHN: And that’s the way it was. There was never any money involved into it. And it was taking up hay, thrashing wheat it was all the same thing now when they went and take up the hay the man that we would be working for he always picked the best spot you know. There’s always a weak spot and a poor spot in to the field and he would always put a stub out there mark that stub and that would be the pay. That each one that come with their horses and wagons that would be their pay. They would get a big load of hay for their team at the end of the day.
HARRIET: Alright, well, that really did work then.
JOHN: It worked. It worked beautifully. If people could work like that now. Well, you see there wouldn’t be no money. The (inaudible speech) fellow would take the potatoes they took the potatoes but we got I would say around 15 maybe 20 cents a barrel for potatoes (inaudible speech) we scratched them out and they would plow them out.
INTERVIEWER: Oh you would, then you’d …
JOHN: And then we’d come along and just lay down on our knees and scratch them out and put four rows together.
INTERVIEWER: Oh alright.
JOHN: There was two rows on the side and two on that side and then that was the row of heaps then you would do the same thing over.
INTERVIEWER: And then you’d go down the heaps.
JOHN: And then when you got ready to pick em up then you just go down and pick up the prime and they never saved the culls they gave the culls to whosoever wanted it and the people that raised hogs they always got the culls and carried them home and put them under the tree and my father always, always had hogs to kill there wasn’t nobody that didn’t raise hogs (inaudible words) for meat and so they just take and cook em part of those potatoes and then mash em up ya know they would get cold and that’s what they fed the hogs on.
INTERVIEWER: Oh for goodness sake.
JOHN: And they let em run loose ya know. They run loose out in the fields and we'd leave them, they knew where home was.
INTERVIEWER: They really did.
JOHN: They didn’t bother to go on other people’s properties. There wasn’t no such thing as electric wires and fences like that.
INTERVIEWER: They knew where home was.
JOHN: They knew where home was and they mostly worked around there you know bounced around home.
INTERVIEWER: Was there a store at Newark?
JOHN: Yes. Mr. Roman Jackson was the first man that I can remember that had a store. And after he, I don’t know whether he died or, but anyhow, Mr. Lev Connor taken over the store. That was a country store. That’s where everybody was at. That was the social gathering.
INTERVIEWER: Okay now where was this?
JOHN: When was this?
INTERVIEWER: Where?
JOHN: Where. Right at the railroad station down in Newark in town.
INTERVIEWER: Okay so it was. (Inaudible speech talking over each other)
INTERVIEWER: Its where Barbely’s …
JOHN: Barbely’s …
INTERVIEWER: That’s okay …
JOHN: Barbley’s store.
INTERVIEWER: That’s the same store. I don’t think it’s changed any.
JOHN: No (laughter). They still hang around there they still hang around there. You go right down there now you can find somebody sitting around there there’s always been on Saturday nights, there was no place no dance hall nothing like that. People just went there and they just talked and they sang. We had a quartet and we used to sing and we would get in the store and sing and everybody just had a great time till about 10:30 until the man got ready to close up then everybody would just go on home.
INTERVIEWER: Now you didn’t have much that you had to buy at the store. You grew and raised and your mother or someone canned and did all that kind of thing?
JOHN: We always canned, and canned everything mostly and all the things that we would have to buy was sugar oil and stuff like that.
INTERVIEWER: Alright, things like that. Was there a mill in Newark that you could have your wheat or flour ground out?
JOHN: Mr. Gordon Adkins he had a mill. But I don’t think it was. I’m trying to think whether it was a mill that you … I don’t think it was a mill that you … It must have been though, it had to be. It wasn’t a timber mill.
INTERVIEWER: Well, he … There was I think from something I talked to a couple of other people about Newark. Mr. um that name was familiar and there was a like a barrel or a timber, not a timber factory but a barrel mill or something.
JOHN: Barrel factory.
INTERVIEWER: Yeah something like that. But there was a flour mill there also. Wasn’t there another mill of some kind well down the road from where you lived by a pond? Let’s see there’s a name that goes with that mill.
JOHN: Oh a water mill.
INTERVIEWER: Yeah a water mill.
JOHN: That’s where we used to carry corn back there.
INTERVIEWER: That was a grist mill.
JOHN: That was a Joe Mitchell, that’s the Joe Mitchell …
INTERVIEWER: Good, I couldn’t think of that name.
JOHN: Mr. Charlie Mitchell, he used to run the gas business right out here. I think its Texaco but he owned that. That’s where we used to carry. The farmers they raised a certain amount of white corn and that’s where we got the meal you don’t make meal out of yellow corn (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Okay, then you make hominy out of that white corn too didn’t you.
JOHN: No, we made hominy. We made hominy, they had hominy meal.
JOHN: It was made from the white corn. But each family, didn’t everybody have one. But we had one. I don’t know whether my father made it. He must have made it, but I don’t remember him making it. But he must have made it, and they have one down to the museum. If you’ve ever been in there and they have a maul you put so much corn in there and you just stand there and beat it and crush it and you have to crush it up just like that and its made out of gum. You can’t use any other kind of wood except gum. See, gum doesn’t have a taste to it.
INTERVIEWER: Alright it doesn’t have a resin.
JOHN: A resin or nothing like that, it has a resin to it, but I mean it has to be thoroughly dry or you can’t taste it.
INTERVIEWER: Well that’s interesting.
JOHN: And then they made their own hominy.
INTERVIEWER: Did you. I’m thinking about the Mitchells and the pond down there. Did you go ice skating down there at all?
JOHN: No. Well some we used to go ice skating but it was always in the woods and like a low spot in the woods. It would freeze up right from our house across from a man name Mr. George Richard which used to catch muskrat. From his house to our house it was a low spot always water there and we used to go there and we skated. But we didn’t have skates though we just slid on the ice with our shoes you know.
INTERVIEWER: Right, you had just as much fun too.
JOHN: Yeah more fun and so that’s the way (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Well it sounds like you really did have. Did you have chores to do? You had responsibilities on the farm?
JOHN: Yes indeed.
INTERVIEWER: You know I think this is something important for children to hear these things today, many of them have no responsibilities.
JOHN: They don’t, they don't have, their family does their chores. But we had chores to do. We had to get the wood out. We had to keep the yard raked and we had to. My father chopped the wood in the summer. He got the wood ready in the summertime and he would do it in the woods. We would go down there and cut the trees down, saw em up and he’d burst the wood up and then in the winter time all we would do is take the mules in the cart and go down there and bring the wood up and dump it up in the yard. But our chores was to see that the we made all the fires. We had to get up and make all the fires in the morning. We had to get the light wood. We had to go in the woods and get what they call laddered knots. You know pine tree, the limbs after the tree decays it puts out a knot and that’s pine. And we used to have to go into the woods and gather them up and then we would take em home and put em on the chopping block split em up and make kindling out of em. In the morning we could take and light a match (Inaudible speech) and start your fire.
INTERVIEWER: Now where did you start school? Where did you go to school?
JOHN: Well I didn’t go to school much. I went to school only to Newark but you see we had work to do on the farm and my father was like most of those old timers, was a little bit funny about school. They thought it was (inaudible speech) for kids to being to school sitting doing nothing when they had work for them to be doing.
INTERVIEWER: Well he had a point then. (Laughter.)
JOHN: So all this time that all the horses had to be taken care of the cows and the horses was all the manure had to be cleaned out. Spread out on the farm and then re-filled up with clean pine shats. We used to rake pine shats in the woods for days and days and haul it and dump it up. That was done every year. That’s where the manure came from it wasn’t much fertilizer, very little fertilizer. (Inaudible speech) is we didn’t raise many potatoes we tried it. I think about one year, and if you use stable manure for white potatoes you get pocky potatoes. You have a pock on them. You have to use fertilizer.
INTERVIEWER: Okay so they bought fertilizer for potatoes?
JOHN: Yes.
INTERVIEWER: Okay when you did go to school was there a black or colored school in Newark or did you go?
JOHN: There was an all-colored school. There was a colored school and a white school but we only went to a colored school.
INTERVIEWER: Where was the colored school?
JOHN: You go right straight after you get to Newark you turn left you go right across (inaudible speech) the store we was talking about you go right across the railroad right down by Masons cannery.
INTERVIEWER: Yes, alright I’m following you.
JOHN: On that street down there the school house was right down there on the left.
INTERVIEWER: Alright. It’s still there, isn’t it?
JOHN: Yes. The old building is still there I think.
INTERVIEWER: Yes. It is, I remember last year seeing that. (Inaudible speech.)
INTERVIEWER: Well now let me ask you. Going to the store and everything, the black people went as well as the white people to the store? You know, on Saturday nights and everything.
JOHN: Oh yes. Yes, mostly the farmers, not the women. The women wouldn’t go, not even the colored women wouldn’t go. It would be, you take like Mr. Hark Townsend and he had a brother. I forget his name. Mr. Hark Townsend and there was another man. They just liked to hear the boys sing and the boys used to go out there. And there was a place up in Ironshire that they made home brew and they’d get a car load of em. Two or three car loads of em and they’d go up there and they’d buy em this brew. I think for about 15 cents a bottle. The man made it himself and then they’d get to singing and then they had a big joyful time. Big joyful time.
INTERVIEWER: Did you all go to church?
JOHN: Oh, yes.
INTERVIEWER: Alright, where was the church?
JOHN: The church was right down by the school.
INTERVIEWER: Alright, right down. Okay, by the school.
JOHN: It was there now but before it was on the curve right up by Mr. Hark Townsend. You know Tom Sturgis?
INTERVIEWER: Yes.
JOHN: Well his wife’s homestead was right up just before you get to the church, right where the cemetery was. They I don’t know. The church, I think whilst we was away. I think they did away with the church. I don’t know whether it burnt down or whether they tore it down or what, but I think they moved it. And they moved it up to Newark across the railroad.
INTERVIEWER: What kind of church was it, a Methodist church?
JOHN: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: Okay. Was it an all-day affair on Sundays? I know a lot of people I’ve talked to, Baptists especially. I think they went in the morning, they stayed all day and then they stayed at night some too on Sundays.
JOHN: No. They went Sunday morning and then they would come home about 11:30, 12:00 and then. But they had class meeting, experience meeting. Every Tuesday night was prayer meeting and then they had class meeting, experience meeting. You’d get up and testify tell them how (inaudible speech) your soul was doing and all that and then they had prayer meeting and my father and all I used to go. But you see I was, I mean we was. We wasn’t. We wasn’t not even what you called a wealthy, that wealthy. I didn’t even have shoes to wear. I used to have to wear my sister’s, my half-sister’s shoes. But I would go. I would go and Mr. Harry Bowen he had a store. And so one day he says, alright everybody called colored old people. So he says bring the kids out, he says I want to clear the attic out with some shoes. So we took us all out there, we went up the stairs and just about everybody picked out what they wanted to wear and I picked out above everything else a pair of women’s sharp-toed (inaudible speech) shoes. But they fitted (laughter) and he said no (inaudible speech). So he says if he wants them let him have them. So I wore em, I took em and carried em home. I was the oldest one out of the family that would go to church with my father. Every time he went to church I would go and I used to sit there and watch them in prayer meeting. I don’t know whether you don’t know what an old-time prayer meeting is?
INTERVIEWER: No I really don’t. I may have read about one but …
JOHN: Well it’s, you see, they sing and they clap their hands and they motion and they throw their heads and I used to say they’re gonna bust their heads you know (laughter) like that but they never did. They never did hit their heads. Then after a while one would pray. They would pray then somebody would start another hymn and they’d sing about three pieces like that and pray and then they’d go around and shake hands with everybody and then they’d have a group time with the Lord. If they took up a collection, I can’t remember because that was very poor collection. It wasn’t a thing of money at the churches in them days. It wasn’t a matter of a whole lot of money. It was matter of spiritual and friendship you know there wasn’t.
INTERVIEWER: Okay was there a minister?
JOHN: Yes, they had a minister.
INTERVIEWER: Do you remember who it was?
JOHN: Well I can remember. I can remember Reverend Stuart. We had a preacher named Reverend Stuart. Had one name Reverend Jolley and I can’t remember.
INTERVIEWER: And as far as did they, did they live in Newark or did they travel around to different churches?
JOHN: No they only tended to …
INTERVIEWER: To Newark.
JOHN: They only the church. You see (inaudible speech) one Cedar Chapel and one would be Williams Chapel. I don’t know the difference yet. I never figured it out. I never tried to really. But they didn’t. They didn’t visit or they didn’t preach, each one preached.
INTERVIEWER: To their own place?
JOHN: To their own place mostly.
INTERVIEWER: Now as far as ministers today get all sorts of salaries. Would they be helped out by their congregation by given things to eat and things from the garden and things like that or did they make their own way?
JOHN: No. They got a salary but the salary that they got it was probably about … I don’t know, it was probably very small.
INTERVIEWER: They had a very strong spiritual commitment then?
JOHN: Yes. Yes, and there were a lot of em. Reverend Jolley he was one preacher that (inaudible words) He would go right in the fields with the rest of the people and scratch potatoes.
INTERVIEWER: Okay so he worked in addition to preaching?
JOHN: Yes. Yes, and then Sunday morning he’d be up in the pulpit you could see mud on his shoes uh dirt where his shoes was dirty.
INTERVIEWER: That’s good too. He wasn’t setting himself above?
JOHN: No. No.
INTERVIEWER: Other people. Did you? The train in Newark is sort of important. Did you go on the train much?
JOHN: No, because if I wanted to come to Snow Hill, we walked. It was only 7 miles.
INTERVIEWER: Only 7 miles he says, only 7 miles. (laughter) I couldn’t make it. (laughter)
JOHN: And it was 27 cents from Newark to Snow Hill.
INTERVIEWER: Alright.
JOHN: That was the fare. And then they used to have excursions.
INTERVIEWER: Yes. I’ve heard of that.
JOHN: I don’t know once or twice a year and then the people would gather up and they’d go up to cities and they load the trains down (inaudible speech). Just as far as going to Newark we never … (inaudible talking over each other)
INTERVIEWER: Snow Hill you just …
JOHN: Snow Hill and all …
INTERVIEWER: Right you just walk.
JOHN: We just got down to the railroad and just walk.
INTERVIEWER: Alright, you walk down the track (inaudible speech).
(Recording cuts out.)
(Inaudible speech.)
INTERVIEWER: Alright now how often would you come to Snow Hill? Cause you had to walk it you didn’t make too many trips.
JOHN: Well I … My sister lived here.
INTERVIEWER: Alright.
JOHN: And I would. I would come here not too often, until when I moved down here. Then I stayed (inaudible speech) then I worked on the highway then when I wanted to go back home I wouldn’t catch no train (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: How long would it take?
JOHN: I haven’t the slightest idea because I didn’t have a watch. I didn’t even know what a watch was really. I mean I knew the word.
INTERVIEWER: You didn’t need one really.
JOHN: I didn’t need watch.
INTERVIEWER: No.
JOHN: No, I didn’t need a watch. I just. I just say. Just like from our house down where we used to go (cough) crabbing.
INTERVIEWER: Alright.
JOHN: That was almost as far as Snow Hill from Newark.
INTERVIEWER: Now where would you go crabbing?
JOHN: We would go down to … You know Vic Townsend in Newark?
INTERVIEWER: Yeah.
JOHN: Well that would be the same bay.
INTERVIEWER: Alright.
JOHN: Now he lived to the same bay but it would be a different. It would be a different place. I mean it would be the same bay but it would be a different angle.
INTERVIEWER: Alright.
JOHN: Now where we lived we could go and just take go to the mailbox and turn a little bit right and just go out on to the woods and go out to what they the call the old Potts Farm and that was the largest farm there is that I know. In Newark the roads from the house to the woods is exactly one mile and when we used to scratch potatoes there they had to cut the roads in half. They had groups of people there that there they would let one group carry one half another group have another half. Then from their house to the bay is where you had to really go catch the crabs was at least I’d say a quarter of a mile because the rest was the marsh.
INTERVIEWER: (Inaudible speech.)
JOHN: But now they’ve got it so the last time I was down there I was deer hunting oh I’d say oh a long time ago about 10 or 12 years ago. I went down there and I just decided that I was (inaudible speech) and I went down there and they’ve got now it’s a beautiful place people go down there they have picnics. And it’s a beautiful place to go swimming, you can wade out there and everything.
INTERVIEWER: Did you go swimming much when you went down?
JOHN: Wading, I really couldn’t swim. We used to. We had a boat my brother and I and they were gonna have a picnic someplace and we kept our boat hidden in the seaweed and we would go get our boat and then we would go in our boat and paddle across where they had the picnic.
INTERVIEWER: Now that’s good.
JOHN: When they had the picnic they would cook fried chicken, make cakes, make muffins they wouldn’t they wouldn’t make a layer cake they’d make muffins and everything (inaudible speech) and then they went in a horse and drove a wagon and the people would load up in horse and wagon so (inaudible speech). My father, he bought a car once. He bought a Oakland.
INTERVIEWER: An Oakland?
JOHN: Oakland.
INTERVIEWER: Alright. I’ve never even heard of that which doesn’t mean a whole lot because I don’t know much about cars (laughter). At all.
JOHN: Well he bought an Oakland and he’d ride in second gear all the time (laughter). You know Robert Lee in Newark? Robert Lee he worked to the state store.
INTERVIEWER: Yes. Yes. Alright. Alright now.
JOHN: His daddy is the one who sold it to him. His name was Will Smith. Now he was in the car business and so my father he used to after my mother died well then he started to after a while he started going around you know and doing his thing and so he got himself a car. And I’ve known (inaudible speech) teach how to run it. And from the mailbox out to the house that’s as far as he let me drive, from the mailbox up to the house. And if I can remember well I think not too many of the other kids even rode in it because they was afraid because I always, I always figured anything my father did was alright.
INTERVIEWER: If it hadn’t hurt him.
JOHN: It didn’t hurt him it wasn’t hurting me. So that’s the way I was brought up. So he finally bought one and. Mr (inaudible speech) owned the store, he bought one. I think they said at that time it was $750 (inaudible speech) and so they were good old days.
INTERVIEWER: Now would you, I know there was something in Public Landing called Forester’s Day or Farmer’s Day so like a big picnic down there. Could colored people go to Public Landing at any time or was there certain times?
JOHN: Well no they had, they had a special day.
INTERVIEWER: (Inaudible speech.)
JOHN: They had special days for that and then. Well I don’t even remember going myself but they had special days at Public Landing. Now like down in Ocean City they used to have Maryland Delaware and Virginia days, in Ocean City. Now at that time I was old enough then I was working in Ocean City.
INTERVIEWER: Alright when did you first start to work in Ocean City? About how old were you when you went there?
JOHN: Let’s see I don’t know I was; I was up in my 20s.
INTERVIEWER: Okay.
JOHN: I was up in my 20s. I was, first I went and got a job at the Hastings Hotel.
INTERVIEWER: Yes, I know where that is.
JOHN: Miss Ludden.
INTERVIEWER: Yes, Miss Lilly Ludden.
JOHN: Which is Paul Jones’ sister.
INTERVIEWER: Right. Right.
JOHN: And I worked a week and everybody else come out and was going in the office and coming back and I seen them with mud in their hand. Like what is this and they said today’s pay day. I says where is the office? Just go right through that door there, she’s in there. So I went in there and (inaudible speech) today’s my pay day. She says you don’t get no pay yet. I say I don’t understand. She says you’re not an experience waiter. I says I waited on all the people that sits at the tables. I have two tables, four people there at the tables and I give them service. So I didn’t argue with her. So I went on back and where I slept down in the, I call it the basement. It was and in there and the sand crabs, you go down there at night and turn the lights on. You know what sand crab looks like?
INTERVIEWER: Those little tiny things with all those little legs.
JOHN: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: All over em. Yeah (laughter).
JOHN: They’d be all over your bed. They’d chase you out. So I said well I’m not gonna. I didn’t, I didn’t say nothing. I just didn’t, I didn’t have no clothes anyway. I just had a few clothes on my back and my shoes. She furnished the white coat and so I took and I went up on the boardwalk to a place we called Rickets. That was Rickets where you get all the nice crabs (inaudible speech) Rickets and I was sittin up there and I said well I’m down here and I don’t know what to do. I ain’t got no job, didn’t get no pay. I heard a man come from the Atlantic Hotel called Pop Taylor, a colored man. He was the one that was always hiring and I heard him holler to a boy. He said hey boy you want a job (inaudible speech) to the Rickets I was sitting up there on the bench and when I heard Pop Taylor ask this boy if he wanted a job and the boy said no. And so I got up and I went over there to him and I said I want a job. He said you do. He said what’s your name? I told him and he said come here, like that. And I went over to him and he said you know anything about running a dishwasher? I can run anything. So he said come on, like that. Over to the Atlantic hotel. And I went over there and I went to work right away.
INTERVIEWER: Did you figure out how to run a dishwasher?
JOHN: Well there wasn’t nothing to it. Put the dishes in there and pull the lever close the door and the steam done the work. And then after so much steam you turn the water on and another one and rinse them off and then the heat from that.
INTERVIEWER: Dried em.
JOHN: Dried em. So all you had to do was stack em up. And then I worked there. And I worked there until they hired a, they had a man from Johns Hopkins Hospital (inaudible speech) out there and then the head waiter came out there and he wanted me to wait. Oh they had people there standing in line night and he said you want come on in he says and make you some extra money. Doing what? He says serving. (inaudible speech) people around 5 o’clock in the afternoon. And then I didn’t have nothing else to do but sit out there on the bench. So I went in there and he says I tell you what I’ll get the order and bring it to you and all you have to do, the tables are numbered. And so I went in there and got their orders and served them and around about 15 people. And out of 15 people I served them and then when they got ready to leave that’s the first thing they do because if you don’t watch you’re out and somebody sees your people leave and put tip on there the other waiter will go over there and get it you know. So I was smart enough for that so I went in there and (inaudible speech) dishes. So I cleaned my table up carried my dishes off. Took my dish cloth and wiped the tables off and he would look up and I said no, no I didn’t get nothing. I didn’t get paid for it. I said I didn’t get (inaudible speech). He said if you’ll serve these it’s (inaudible speech) so he went and (inaudible speech) and gave me $10 you know. And then I says okay so I went and I served them then after that I would go in there and I’d take a chance you know. Sometime you don’t find a bunch of dollars. And sometimes you go in there and you find a bunch of young girls (inaudible speech) and they’d get to talking and I guess probably might have a drink or two and you’d come back and they be gone. (laughter) Food on the table. They wouldn’t come back. They wouldn’t even come back. And I stayed there the summer.
INTERVIEWER: Were the living conditions any better there?
JOHN: Oh yes it was good. I had my own room. But I didn’t wanna sleep with nobody. I didn’t wanna sneak in the room with nobody. So you had a single bed. So it was a bed here and another guy had to share another bed. But I mean it was two beds but you were two in a room, and I didn’t like the idea you know. So I asked Pop Taylor what we called him. I said isn’t there another room around here, new place I can find to sleep. I said I don’t wanna be in no room with nobody else. He said there aint but one room here, he said that’s the room off of the furnace. You gotta go through the furnace room he said it’s just like any other room. He said but it’s in the furnace room. I said well by the time I get in there, I said the furnace was gonna be off anyhow ain it. He said It’ll be cool though because after a certain time they’d cut the furnace.
INTERVIEWER: Alright they used it to heat the water didn’t they?
JOHN: Yes. To heat the water, and so I took that room and I made it alright. And I got another boy, a boy Ken Waters. His dad knew me and I got him a job. I got him a job there. I got him a job and I got Nick Mills a job there. I got Nick a job doing my work, the work that I was doing. Cause I was washing the dishes and I loved spinach (inaudible speech) and some of that spinach was coming back it was all fresh spinach.
INTERVIEWER: Wasn’t no canned stuff.
JOHN: No canned stuff. Was all fresh spinach.
INTERVIEWER: Oh nothing’s better than that.
JOHN: You see a man come up there with trucks loaded with fresh stuff and fowl and I used to help the boy to kill the fowl. Now when we kill turkeys we kill anywhere from 25 to 30 turkeys.
INTERVIEWER: Would you really!
JOHN: Yeah and you know how we killed them (inaudible speech) that wasn’t my idea but it was his so I had to follow through. He had a piece of wire about that long. (inaudible speech) and we took the turkeys out in the fence and I mean in the courtyard. And instead of grabbing the turkeys and fooling with them he’d just get down on his knees and he’d walk around and as he walked the turkeys would walk around he’d just take
that thing just like that and just.
INTERVIEWER: Snap the necks.
JOHN: And knock their heads right off. He’d just break their necks and down they’d go. And then we didn’t have to, we had a steam. Everything was done by steam and we’d put em in the steam pot. We had a steam pot right there. All we had to do, we had a thing that to hook over his leg and stick him down into the steam like that and then (inaudible speech) had a big table and then all we had to do was just take and pick em.
INTERVIEWER: Alright the steam would loosen up its feathers.
JOHN: Yeah clean down to the skin. (inaudible speech) I forget his last name but I knew him well as anything. And I worked there. I liked it. I liked hotel work.
INTERVIEWER: When you were working in Ocean City, did you work more than one summer there? Or did you go back? Or did you just do that one summer?
JOHN: I only did one summer there. Just one summer.
INTERVIEWER: What would you do for entertainment there? I don’t know if you had any time for entertainment.
JOHN: I didn’t do no entertainment. Cause I was a loner. You know I always been a little peculiar. I always been to myself you know. When I got my work done, we had an old a cat there a kitten and she was a (inaudible word) little thing. And when I got through, got my stomach full. We didn’t even have a radio and there wasn’t even, you couldn’t even hear nobody with a radio. Now all you can hear is the radio and tape player and all that. We didn’t even have a radio and I would be tired and I’d just go in and take me a shower. Everybody had a shower. They had shower stalls and you’d go in and take your shower and come on out and get in there. And there was no place to go you know and unless you go in there where they gamble. They gamble and shoot pool and I didn’t do that you know.
INTERVIEWER: They paid you for washing dishes?
JOHN: Oh yes.
INTERVIEWER: Alright and you took your chance on tips from …
JOHN: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: The waiting …
JOHN: Yeah …
INTERVIEWER: Part of it.
JOHN: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: And sometimes you were lucky, sometimes you weren’t.
JOHN: Yeah but I got along with (inaudible speech) that was her name and she was lovely and so was he.
INTERVIEWER: I’ve heard that said.
JOHN: (inaudible speech) Both of em was nice as they could be.
INTERVIEWER: Okay now let’s see. How did you get a job with the state roads or county roads?
JOHN: State road.
INTERVIEWER: State road. Now when did you get a job with them?
JOHN: I got a job with them after, after all this.
INTERVIEWER: Right that’s what I was figuring.
JOHN: I came back home and I can’t remember how it happened but (inaudible speech) my sister worked with Daniel Boone. He was the head of the state road and I said I want a job on the state road. And I said you (inaudible conversation). So she called him and he says tell him to come on down to the barn in the morning at 7:00 (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Is it still where it is now?
JOHN: Still in the same place right down here across from the mill pond. Well I didn’t have no way to get down there but walk. So I walked down there. Walking was just my way of getting around. So I went down there and told me, well he had called Mr. Hugh Pusey. And so he give me a job (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Oh my.
JOHN: The boys down the road today, they have it made, we had to we had to (inaudible word), everything was done on the state road except breaking up the shoulders. We had to do it by hand. Picks and shovels, chipping the roads like they chip the roads now. We had to deduct so much full wheel barrows of gravel just about every, I’ll say about every 30 feet. On this side and then on the other side. And then when we got ready to tar the road, we’d do that for a whole day. Two days. And then when the tar machine would come, the tar machine would come and put down the tar. And then we’d go and each one would I would take a heap and another boy would take a heap. I would throw it towards him and he would throw it towards me. Spreading the gravel on it. But we’d only use half of the heap. You understand what I mean?
INTERVIEWER: Yeah.
JOHN: Then we’d go to more heaps and do the same thing. Then when we did the other side of the road that’s when we do the other side of the road. Then the roller man he’d come along after we got started. He’d come along and he rolled it. And I learned how to run the steam roller. I learned how to run all the equipment out there, and then I worked out there till 1929. And I got sick and I had to go to Baltimore for a couple of years. And then I worked in the kitchen there at the hospital and I did the same thing I did in Ocean City. That’s what I did.
(Inaudible speech.)
JOHN: I went down in the kitchen and got the food cart and brought it up to the dining room. Up in the ward, and not the ward. But then the nurses would come there and then they’d take and tip me. They had that chrome lid to it, stainless steel. And then they’d put the patient’s food on it and I would push the cart as they.
INTERVIEWER: As they worked on it.
JOHN: As they worked on it. And then I’d take the dishes after they got through gather up the dishes and then I’d take and carry them right down to the big kitchen and then I took care of the floors (inaudible speech). I never did sleep on the inside.
INTERVIEWER: You didn’t?
JOHN: Never (inaudible speech). Well that’s the way it was there. The doctors, the doctors. That was a long time ago. And the doctors, the doctors didn’t give you x-ray there you know. They just looked at you and thought what was wrong with you and they said that I believe you need a (inaudible word). I believe you might have the TB. So he made preparations (inaudible speech) and when we got there they give me all these x-rays and (inaudible speech) He said did he take x-rays? I said what’s x-rays? Them things I put up against you to (inaudible speech) your chest (inaudible speech). I said no, no he never did that I said. He said he didn’t do nothing, didn’t tap you on the shoulder. I said no.
INTERVIEWER: He looked at you.
JOHN: Yeah the doctor did (inaudible speech) It didn’t cost me anything because (inaudible speech) I stayed there, I came home on vacation after a year. I come home. I stayed I think around 14 days then I went back (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Okay well I better give you a rest, you’ve talked so long. (Laughter.) You were born right in Snow Hill?
HARRIET: Yes, in Snow Hill. They didn’t have the streets named back then but it’s called, now it’s called Mason Street.
INTERVIEWER: Okay.
(Inaudible speech.)
INTERVIEWER: Okay so you were born in Snow Hill. What sort of work were your parents doing?
HARRIET: Well my father worked (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: What was your mother’s maiden name?
HARRIET: Bennett.
INTERVIEWER: Where did you go to school?
HARRIET: Here in.
INTERVIEWER: Alright was there a colored school here in Snow Hill?
HARRIET: Yes, the colored school used to be over here but they burned it down about 3 years ago.
INTERVIEWER: Over on (inaudible name) street.
HARRIET: No not (inaudible speech) Collins Street (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Alright do you remember any of your teachers’ names?
HARRIET: Mr. Jackson (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: You had men teachers?
HARRIET: Men (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Did you have chores to do since you were in town? Did you have your own garden?
HARRIET: We had chores to do. I always helped cook and the others after school they got the wood in (inaudible speech) get the eggs and shelled the corn to feed the chickens with (inaudible speech). Then they had their dinner. After dinner you got your bath. And then after your lessons you went to bed.
INTERVIEWER: Then it was time to get up the next morning and start all over again. Were your parents very conscientious about seeing that you did your lessons and your homework?
HARRIET: Yes.
INTERVIEWER: How long did you go to school?
HARRIET: (Inaudible speech) that was as far as they went at the time.
INTERVIEWER: Where did you go to church?
HARRIET: Right here (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Okay Ebenezer. Was your family active in church?
HARRIET: Well yes I used to (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Oh you did.
HARRIET: (Inaudible speech) and I used to do a little substitute teaching. Just a little. (Inaudible speech.)
INTERVIEWER: What do you remember about downtown Snow Hill when you were growing up? You know the hotel was there. Was the hotel there?
HARRIET: Yes, hotel (inaudible speech) hotel was what it was called and Dryden’s store (inaudible speech) and (inaudible speech) Miss (inaudible name) had a store before him and Sanford’s Meat store. They don’t have that anymore.
INTERVIEWER: No. Was that where Mr. Herrick was?
HARRIET: Yeah.
INTERVIEWER: Cause didn’t they have a sausage recipe?
HARRIET: Yes, Sanford’s had.
INTERVIEWER: He had the sausage and then Mr. Herrick made some sausage after that.
HARRIET: He did but I don’t know whether he got Sanford’s because he wouldn’t do it anyway. I don’t know whether he got Sanford’s or not.
INTERVIEWER: I don’t know.
HARRIET: But I can remember. I know they used to carry Johnson’s sausage and there used to be that hotel down going across the bridge (inaudible speech). There was a hotel boarding house or something.
INTERVIEWER: Okay. Since you worked in the hotel down here, you’d know the Purnell Hotel from when you were …
HARRIET: That’s where you were.
INTERVIEWER: Right, yeah. Did they have a saloon or anything in there or bar?
JOHN: They had a bar in the pool room.
INTERVIEWER: Okay.
JOHN: It was in the pool room. Then they had a restaurant. Like a restaurant then a counter and you could sit to the counter or you could sit to the restaurant. All they served there was beer because I used to have to be there at 5:00 in the morning cleaning (inaudible word) doors solid brass and sweep the (inaudible word) off. I had a call sheet. Like a traveling salesman would come through, wanna get up early. The first thing I had to do when I went in there was look at the call sheet. See what time he wanted to get up and so that was my job. Then after I did that and got the (inaudible word) doors (inaudible speech) that was brass.
INTERVIEWER: Okay, that was brass.
JOHN: I had to do that and get everything all cleaned up in there. Then I had to go back in the kitchen cause I washed dishes and I did the shopping. Right to the, where the drugstore is now that was the A&P. That was the grocery store. Was it an A&P or … ?
HARRIET: Acme.
JOHN: Acme.
HARRIET: One was Acme, one was A&P.
JOHN: There were two, weren’t there?
HARRIET: Yes, there were. Acme and then A&P.
INTERVIEWER: A&P was where the Health Department used to be?
HARRIET: Yes, that was A&P.
INTERVIEWER: Okay, I remember a postcard. I remember that. (Laughter.)
JOHN: (Inaudible speech.) It got to the point every Thursday where the sheriff was supposed to be off and there wasn’t nobody to take his place. So Mr. Jack. We called him Jack. He says I want to teach you something. I say what. He says come out here and he showed me how to do this and how to do that. And he would do a ham and a leg of lamb and show me how to take the slices and everything and how to (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: You make a sandwich.
(Inaudible speech.)
JOHN: And so every day he used to school me on that until I was able to do it. So one day Mr. (inaudible name) come in there.
INTERVIEWER: Now who was Mr. (inaudible name)?
JOHN: Mr. (inaudible name) was the owner. (Inaudible speech.)
INTERVIEWER: So this Mr. (inaudible speech), was her husband.
JOHN: Yes (inaudible speech). Said you ain’t had no time off. What you gonna do. He said I got somebody to replace you and he says who and he says John. He says John. (inaudible speech) And I had oh I had nerve then. (Laughter.) (Inaudible speech) Cause we had all those you know those caps they wear.
INTERVIEWER: Yeah those white hats and everything.
JOHN: His head’s a little bit bigger than mine (inaudible speech) Miss. (inaudible name) took a couple of them caps home and fixed em up to my size and (inaudible speech) and we got along fine. And it’s just something that you have to learn.
INTERVIEWER: Right, and you have to watch and do.
JOHN: You have to watch. Lots of things people think is hard to do (inaudible speech), but it’s the idea of getting the hang of it. Seeing how it operates. How it’s done.
INTERVIEWER: And be willing to take the chance.
JOHN: That’s right.
INTERVIEWER: Which you were evidently (inaudible). Did you do any work? Let me see. I’m trying to think where you were when you were older. When did you two meet? Can I ask that?
HARRIET: Where did we meet?
INTERVIEWER: Yeah.
HARRIET: (Coughing) Snow Hill.
INTERVIEWER: Oh you did. Okay. Were you married before?
(Inaudible speech.)
JOHN: I had went away and I came home on vacation and one Saturday night I’ll never forget. I had on a blue (inaudible word) suit, a white (inaudible word) hat and black and white slippers.
INTERVIEWER: Oh my goodness. You were dressed.
JOHN: I was standing right down just about in front of (inaudible speech). My wife and her sisters all used to come downtown on a Saturday night. So my sister, she was trying to get us together all the time. So my wife’s a great reader. She reads all kinds of books, magazines and everything. And so my sister wanted me to go up and get her a book. That night, that was on Saturday night and that’s what started it all. Then when I went back to Baltimore, then we started corresponding with one another. But she never did write me a love letter. I mean these was only just friendly letters. (Laughter.) And then when I came home … How long did we go together before we got married?
HARRIET: Oh a couple, three years.
INTERVIEWER: Two or three years.
JOHN: Yes, indeed.
INTERVIEWER: Oh my dear.
JOHN: It was longer than that. I was still working to the hotel (inaudible speech).
HARRIET: We went there right after.
JOHN: Right after. After we was married.
HARRIET: He was making three dollars and a half a week. I made a dollar and a half a load of wash.
INTERVIEWER: Oh my word that’s $5 put together.
JOHN: I paid the preacher two dollars and a half (inaudible speech).
INTERVIEWER: Isn’t that something. Now you said you made a dollar and a half one week?
HARRIET: I was washing. One wash. (inaudible) family, one wash. But see I didn’t have (inaudible) in other words (inaudible) in cooking. I kept out …
INTERVIEWER: You kept out.
HARRIET: And this little washing was all I had.
INTERVIEWER: That was something anyway.
HARRIET: It wasn’t very much.
INTERVIEWER: It wasn’t very much. When you got married did you set up housekeeping?
JOHN: No we went.
INTERVIEWER: That’s when you went.
JOHN: We went to Tommy Johnson’s.
INTERVIEWER: Alright you went right there.
JOHN: And then we worked there until the big snow came and we got snowed in down there.
(Inaudible speech.)
INTERVIEWER: Yes, I know where that is.
JOHN: (Inaudible speech) And he called from Baltimore to tell us he wasn’t coming back until the weather set in and for us to do the best we could and back the tractor up to the house and if we had to go anyplace we could drive the tractor and use the tractor. And I went there and got the tractor and made a snow plow out of 2 by 10s and plowed everybody’s roads there was up there, the neighbors and everything and then after the weather broke (inaudible speech) come back so we came home. So Miss Beulah Pratt her name was Beulah Richardson when she got married. She married (inaudible name) Richardson and she was (inaudible name) Johnson’s secretary. And well I had the key to the office. So he said John can take care of the office. So I did that after she left. I went there to care of the office and everything. So he paid me for about three or four weeks. Then one day I went in there and has a sad story to tell me. That he said he couldn’t pay me any longer but he wasn’t going down to South Point no more until May but he wanted us to be available if possible to go back down there with him. So I said well (inaudible speech). So I took and gave her the key. So after that I said I won’t be coming back. So the very next day. I went home that afternoon and told my wife what had happened. So the next day, I had a 1936 Plymouth car, no money and gas it was about 12 cents a gallon and had about enough gas to get to Wilmington at her brother’s. So I went to Wilmington. We went to Wilmington.
INTERVIEWER: Both of you?
JOHN: Both of us. Got in the car we went to Wilmington. Went to her brother’s and stayed all night. The next morning, we got up and went to the employment agency and we got a job right away.
INTERVIEWER: Did you really!
JOHN: Yep. We got a job right away and all we had to do was come back. So I borrowed $10 from my wife’s brother to see me home and back. And I came home and got our clothes you know (inaudible speech) because I know I wasn’t gonna need em (inaudible speech) And so we went back and but before we went out and was interviewed by the people who we was gonna work for.
INTERVIEWER: Oh you were sure?
JOHN: Yeah we was sure (inaudible speech) We was sure of the job because the employment agent, the lady. She called the woman and told her and then my wife’s brother he knew where it was 11 Berkley Road (inaudible speech) and so we went out there and went to work. And what did, we worked there two years or one year?
HARRIET: One.
(Inaudible speech.)
JOHN: We worked there one year. You worked for a private family if you were a good cook and a good butler. You don’t never have to worry about a job because they always had guests and the guests always wants a good cook and a good butler. So a butler is just like a mummy. He’s not allowed to say anything unless the madam is the only one who can anything. And if she wants to ask anything when she get around to it she’ll press the buzzer sitting right under her foot and then you go in there and (inaudible speech) and she’ll whisper, then you go ahead and do it. And so we worked there. It wasn’t hard. The work wasn’t hard. Well they wanted to go. They went all the time. She was, they was British.
HARRIET: What are you talking about, the Millers?
JOHN: Mrs. Miller.
HARRIET: I was talking about them people we went to first.
JOHN: It was Mrs. Miller.
HARRIET: Uh-uh. It was people from Georgia.
JOHN: (Inaudible speech.)
HARRIET: Yes, you did go out there (inaudible speech).
JOHN: (Inaudible speech) But anyhow.
INTERVIEWER: You’ll settle that later, won’t you? (Laughter.)
JOHN: But anyhow all you were after was money.
INTERVIEWER: Yes, alright.
JOHN: And to do a good job. And that was my profession from the hotel cleaning floors, waxing the floors, dining room floor and steps and all that and everything so that was nothing to me. And serving table that was nothing because I used to serve the hotel when the head waiter was off. There wasn’t but one waiter there (inaudible speech) and when he was off I did his job. I waited so I was experienced in all that work so that didn’t hinder me a bit. So we got along (inaudible speech).
HARRIET: The only thing you know Mrs. Miller was an alcoholic.
INTERVIEWER: Oh that’s sad.
JOHN: Yeah. Yeah.
HARRIET: She was a terrible alcoholic.
JOHN: Oh she …
HARRIET: I remember one thing you were getting ready to go off (inaudible speech). Every time she got on one of these sprees they had to take her somewhere.
(Inaudible speech.)
Recording stops