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THE CAPITAL CITY
INSURANCE COMPANY
(Georgia)
Tom's note:
I believe the "Mr. Henley" referred to in this story is actually Alonzo
Herndon, a prominent and influential in American business history.
You can learn more about him on the Internet including the
web site for his
home, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The young Negress, who sat at her desk
in the reception room of the Capital City Life Insurance Company's local
office, was industriously thumbing through a sheaf of papers when I
entered. She stood up at once when she saw me, and when I expressed a
desire to talk with the manager of the office, she said, "Just have a
seat, and I'll see if he is busy." As she left me to open a door marked
"PRIVATE" I noticed her straightened hair, combed back from her very black
face and arranged in a smooth coil on the back or her head. Her neatly
fitted frock was made on the tailored lines of appropriate office
costuming for women.
She returned promptly, saying, "Mr. Smith will see you now." She led the
way, and on entering the small private office I saw a young Negro man
dressed in an impeccably tailored and freshly pressed dark blue business
suit. "I'm Sam Smith," he greeted me, standing beside his desk, "What can
I do for you?"
He laughed when I asked him to relate some of his experiences and problems
in his occupation as an insurance man. "We do have a good many problems,"
he admitted, "and our experiences might fill a good many books. But first,
won't you have a seat?" He saw that I was comfortably seated before a
table, then began his story.
"Maybe you'd better start asking me questions, for I don't know just what
it is you want, and then, I'm not very good at telling things anyway," he
suggested.
"Then tell me about your early life," I replied.
"Well," he said, "I was born in a small town in South Georgia, in 1905.
The folks down there may not consider it so small - they even have a daily
paper there - but after spending so many years in Atlanta and Athens, and
visiting other larger cities, I came to realize that I am from a small
town. My father worked at sawmills and consequently was away from home
much of the time, for when one lot of timber was cut the sawmill had to be
moved to another tract.
"One of my earliest recollections is my determination to earn money. I
wanted to have my own money and to be independent. I hardly know just how
old I was when I began work as a bootblack. It's really surprising how
many nickels and dimes a small boy can earn blacking shoes. During my
grammar school days I was on the lookout for any little chore by which I
could earn money between school hours. After finishing grammar school in
Moultrie, I began high school studies at Americus Institute in Americus,
Georgia, but after one school year there I went to Morehouse College, in
Atlanta, where I completed high school studies, and I remained there until
I graduated from college. About twenty percent of the students at
Morehouse did part-time work to earn some of their expenses. I was one of
that group, and I also began the fall term every year with quite a tidy
sum saved from wages and tips paid me at summer resorts during the
vacation period. I waited on tables, did bellboy service, or 'most
anything that came to hand at summer hotels.
"When I finished college my plans were already definite. I wanted to go in
the insurance business, for I could think of no other field that offered
as promising opportunities to a young man of my race.
"I didn't step out of college into a high salaried executive job. My first
work was the humblest that this business has to offer. I was an agent's
helper. That means I made the rounds with the agent to keep up with the
literature that was distributed for advertising and selling insurance. I
wasn't allowed to do any collecting and neither could I try to sell any
insurance until I was promoted to the job of assistant agent. Even then I
was given long and careful training by the agent before I was permitted to
discuss any matter of collection or selling with a policyholder or a sales
prospect. It takes someone who is plenty interested in insurance to stick
through the long training period that begins with the lowest chore of our
work and takes in every detail of our routine just as rapidly as the
learner can attain the degree of efficiency required of our agents.
"I can tell you it was hard on me during my first experience in trying to
keep up the quota required of all agents and their assistants. There were
days when it seemed impossible to make even a small increase in the volume
of sales and collections. I would have given up then but I very well knew
it was only by means of bringing in more business than the other agents
that I could hope for promotion, and I was firmly determined to get it.
The agent with me knew I was doing my very best and that I wanted, more
than anything else in the world, to make good at insurance work, so he did
everything in his power to encourage and assist me. It was his kindness
and understanding that enabled me to successfully pass through the trying
period of training.
"When dark came, the other agents would
call it a day and they would go out for an evening of pleasure and
frolicking around at dances and shows, but I worked right on. That was my
time for contacting those of our people who couldn't be reached in the
daytime because of their jobs. It was this night work that enabled me to
pile up a higher total of insurance sold than the others in my district,
and eight years ago it won me my place as manager.
"Now we have a regular training school for young men of twenty-one and
over who want to enter the insurance business. We take twenty or thirty of
them and start training the group. They don't have to have college
education for this work, for we teach them according to our own ideas. Do
you know that some of the best executives in the insurance business are
men that never finished high school, and some of the top-notchers never
even finished grammar school? Education is a great thing, but that old
school of experience beats 'em all, because that's where you have to work
for yourself. That's one school that will make you put out all there is in
you.
"We start our agents off with small salaries, plus a commission on all
business above a certain quota. That's an incentive to work, for they
realize that the amount of their earnings depends on their own efforts and
resourcefulness, and they usually dig in and get the business. After an
agent is appointed and his territory assigned he becomes responsible for
the business in that definite area; not for just one type of policy but
for all the different kinds of insurance that we write. All the special
problems that arise in that particular territory - and believe me there
are plenty of problems coming up all the time in any territory - the agent
is expected to settle by himself as far as possible. It seems as if a week
never passes that some policyholder doesn't let a policy lapse for one
reason or another. The agent who can keep in sufficiently close touch with
his policyholders to be able to persuade them to let no insurance lapse is
considered exceedingly good and is in sure line for promotion. Sometimes
the lapses will total more than the new business, and that's when we get
discouraged and feel like giving up.
"Of course we investigate every risk as well as we can before we write the
insurance, and then do more investigating before we pay any claim that
appears to be in the least doubtful, but even at that we do get caught
sometimes. Things aren't always as they appear on the surface and its not
possible to accurately judge the physical condition by casual inspection
of outward appearances. People who want to collect on sick benefit claims
will swear to anything that they think they can get by with. When they
want to get a policy written, they'll swear they have never had to see a
doctor, at least not for the last 5 or 10 years, when all the time they're
just planning to cash in on some disease already present in their bodies
and which they may be able to conceal from us long enough to get the
insurance written and in effect. We've learned that there are almost as
many speculators as there are honest people. This is especially so on the
sick and accident policies. Some of our policies carry sick benefits that
run as high as twenty-five dollars a week, and persons have tried to
collect as soon as the policy was in force. Then again we have had some
that have carried these policies for years, and have never put in for the
first claim.
"I'll never forget the time when a woman who held one of our sick and
accident policies, paying $5 a week in the event she was confined to bed,
tried to swindle us. We paid the first week's claim without hesitancy
after I had personally visited the home and found her in bed apparently
very ill. When the claim for a second week came in I made my formal visit
of investigation at an hour when she did not expect me. Suspecting there
there was some reason for the excessive delay in permitting me to enter
the home, and noticing that the cover pulled up closely about her neck on
that sweltering July day was probably to conceal the fact that she had
gotten into bed fully dressed, I remained by the bedside administering
simple remedies and sympathizing with the patient until the limit of her
endurance was reached. That was after I had awkwardly mixed up quantities
of freshly ironed clothes with piles of unironed garments and had
apparently accidently, dropped them on the floor and trampled on them, as
I directed a neighbor woman to apply hot water bottles to the feet of the
patient and mustard plasters to her chest. She rose up out of bed, fully
clothed, even to her shoes, and said she did not want that $5 a week if
she had to go through all that to get it.
"But you know I don't believe she ever did suspect anything other than
that I was just extremely solicitous about her. That story spread through
the district and it gave me a good reputation for looking after the sick
people who hold insurance with me. If anyone else in that district ever
tried to swindle me in a sick benefit claim I never did find it out.
"Now don't get the idea that we're reluctant about paying just claims. We
very readily pay all just and honest claims, but because of the great
number of speculators who are always ready to take any and every advantage
of us, we must at all times be very careful in our investigations of
claims.
"The worst feature of it all is that these speculators sometimes find
doctors low enough to help them in their efforts to swindle life insurance
companies. However, I'm happy to say that this doesn't happen very often.
We always learn when these cases do show up, that the policyholder has
promised to divide the benefits with the doctor when, and if, the claim is
paid. I don't think they ever gain by this practice in the long run, for
if they win once they invariably keep on trying to work the same gag, and
sooner or later it makes a lot of trouble for them, if not a jail term."
"Are all your insrance payments weekly?" I asked.
"In town, yes; or that is, most of it is paid by the week in town. It can
be paid by the month by special arrangement. Out in communities where we
don't keep an agent all the time, we send a representative once a month to
make collections, and those clients are usually very prompt, for they know
that if they don't have the money ready for him, they'll either have to
buy a stamp and money order to mail it in or let the policy lapse before
the agent calls again. It's counted a serious matter to risk loss of money
by letting insurance lapse.
"Perhaps our greatest collection problem in rural communities lies in the
frequency with which our policyholders move from one farm to another, and
we've never been able to make them understand the importance of notifying
us whenever they plan to move. Some of them move about so much. They will
stay probably a year on one farm and then get dissatisfied for some
reason. Usually they think they haven't been treated right, didn't get
enough pay, or the people they rented from didn't advance them enough
during the year to get by with their bills until the crop was sold.
Sometimes it's the illness or death of the main breadwinner in a family
that's the reason for the move, but they scarcely ever stay in one place
over a year or two at the most, for they're always thinking they can do
better at some other place.
"Sometimes they move into a county where they're not known, and it's a
problem to locate them then. I've known it to take several months to
locate one policyholder. They just don't cooperate with the agent. After
all that work in locating them, when we ask, 'Why didn't you let us know
where you had moved?' we got this answer, 'I just never thought about
it.'" He laughed and continued, "But you know that's about the truth of
the matter, they just don't think; that's one great fault of my people -
they don't stop to think.
"I don't know if you know this or not, but one of the greatest mistakes
our people make is when they let a policy lapse, they'll sometimes just
drop that one and take out a new policy with another agent. I've known
this to happen many times, and I've occasionally known them to die before
the new policy is in force. If they had only kept the old policy in effect
by keeping it paid up they would have received its value. It's hard to
make them understand this. Of course, if they just move from one town to
another it's very easy to transfer them to the agent in that town if they
notify us, but the point is, they seldom do this.
"People with high incomes don't need insurance like those who work on
small, uncertain salaries. I really don't know, just what my people would
do in some emergencies without their insurance, for it's one thing on
which they can depend. Take the washwomen, cooks, maids, and all the
others that work for two and three dollars a week. What do they have to
depend on? Their earnings are not even enough for the necessities of
living, and if sickness should come they couldn't get a doctor to come
unless he knew he would get his money, and it's the same in case of death.
They'd have to lay out until enough money was raised to pay burial
expenses. But if they have a good insurance policy they can get the doctor
to come, and if they should pass out the doctor, as well as the
undertaker, would get his money. Yes, a good policy is something they can
depend on, and if they can possibly get the money to keep it in force,
they won't knowingly let it lapse.
"Another feature of insurance which has brought up many questions and
caused some lawsuits is the minor child beneficiary. Of course we can't
turn the money over to a child, and sure as the world when the uncles and
aunts of the beneficiary learn that it has money coming from insurance,
they all fall out about who is to be the guardian. Each one of them will
want the child as long as they expect it to receive money. In most of
these instances we have turned the money over to a court, whose duty it
was to appoint a guardian for the child and its money. Now we refuse to
write policies that name children as beneficiaries unless the policyholder
specifies a guardian in the application for the policy.
"As to the matter of production, we divide the business area into
districts, and in each district we set up a local office in some central
town. A manager is appointed to take charge of the business of the
district and to handle the affairs of the local office. The personnel of
the local office includes manager, assistant manager, cashier, clerk,
inspectors, supervisors, and agents. Each supervisor has from four to six
agents working under him. Each agent has a quota to make, and this quota
must go over and above his lapses.
"For instance, it's worked out this way: if you're collecting on 25¢
policies and you lapse four, that would mean a lapse of $1 a week, and for
every dollar lapsed you have to write $1.25 in new business to keep up
your quota. That makes it very much to the interest of the agent not to
permit policies to lapse, and how they do work to keep up their quotas and
to exceed them! They know that'll count more on their records and will
bring promotion quicker than anything else can.
"Then too, the agents are supposed to make so many calls each day. The
required number of calls is rated according to the size of territory and
the amount of business done in that territory. While we understand that
not every prospect called on will take out insurance, we do expect our
agents to land at least three out of every ten they call on. Each agent
has his prospect book, and in this is kept the names of all the people he
calls on, the date of each call, and a notice of when he expects to see
each prospect again. Sometimes it takes weeks for the agent to make just
one trip to each of his prospects, but whether they want him or not, he
hunts them up and calls regularly, just as a matter of persistence. Do you
know that in the end these regular calls usually win out for the agent?
"Our larger towns are divided into what we call zones, and each agent has
his own zone to work. Their work is so carefully outlined and systematized
that they run on schedule time, just like postmen. That schedule is
important to the prospect as well as to the agent, for they know just what
time the agent is due to arrive for his money.
"From time to time the company puts on contests, and the prizes are, as a
rule, nice trips. For instance, a winner of one of our latest contests got
a trip to California, and another won a trip to the World's Fair in New
York. There were many other smaller prizes in the contest that were well
worth working for. These contests make agents feel like putting out their
best efforts to win those fine prizes, and the efforts of the agent
compose the lifeblood of the organization, not only of our own, but of any
business organization.
"Few people on the outside realize the valuable services we render to
morticians. You know the collection end of their business is bound to be
difficult, for they are compelled to bury the deceased even if they never
get anything for their services and merchandise. As a usual thing people
are inclined to request expensive funerals for their relatives, whether
they can pay the bills or not. We encourage the proprietors of undertaking
establishments to call us as soon as they are notified of a death, so that
we can let them know whether or not the deceased has insurance with us.
Most of the other insurance companies extend the same courtesies.
"When they know in advance how much cash will be available, the morticians
are enabled to make a more sensible deal with the family. They can show
only what they know can be paid for.
"It's an established fact that unless they get at least a substantial part
of the cost before the interment, it will be difficult for them to collect
at all. After they have rendered services to the best of their ability,
furnished burial robes and casket, and used their hearse, automobiles and
other equipment, there is little that they can do toward collection after
the body is under the ground. They had better get a claim on what
insurance exists before they even start to work on the corpse.
"We don't have very much time for recreation, and there's very little in
that way to do here, but our agents usually go in for whatever amusements
are popular in their territories, for it's a good policy to mix with the
local people. That helps business. We don't have any ball teams among our
workers as is customary in many other organizations, but that's because we
don't know all the time where we will be located. We do try to cooperate
with each other in anything that comes up, and in that way we do really
help each other in many ways.
"Personally, I have very little time for recreation. I do enjoy swimming
and billiards, also a good game of tennis in the late afternoons, and I
think we all like a good picture show. I visit all the churches very often
and attend their different entertainments, for, as I told you, I consider
it a good policy to mix with people. Though I'm a Baptist myself, our
policyholders belong to different churches, and it makes them feel better
to know that we want to be with them.
"I married an Alabama girl soon after I came here to work as a manager. I
have no children, and just a short time ago - it really seems ages - I
lost my wife. Since she passed away I'm left without any family. I get
lonesome, for we were so happy, but I know that I'll have to go on some
way and I'm trying to take it as she would have me to. I'm glad I stay so
busy that I don't have time to brood and worry so much.
"There are so many problems of our people, and many have tried to find
their solutions. The white folks are working on these things now, and I
hope and believe that at some time in the near future there will be better
understanding between the races. The South is the home of the Negro, and
our people are beginning to realize it more and more in every way. Of
course some of them, in fact a great many, have gone North and have made a
success of their work at the better salaries paid there, but after all,
that doesn't mean so much, for it takes all they can make to live up
there.
"Housing conditions can be blamed for many of the problems of my race. Our
agents have found that these conditions are worse in small towns and rural
areas than in the more thickly settled sections. Rain comes in through
leaky roofs and they can't keep the cold out. Continued exposure in cold,
wet, and unsanitary living quarters brings a notable increase in pulmonary
disorders. Pneumonia flourishes in areas where these conditions prevail.
In fact, the majority of our sick claims are based on this disease. As a
general thing there is a trend toward improvement of housing conditions
throughout the section of the country that I frequent. Our people are
beginning to take advantage of the plans offered by various Government
bureaux for financing improvement of houses. Marked improvement in rural
areas is coming from the aid and encouragement now given tenant farmers
toward purchase of farms and building of farm homes.
"Our company sponsors lectures and assemblies for teaching improvement of
health by means of diet. We began this several years ago when an amazing
number of sick benefit claims, based on varying degrees of prostration
accompanied by a peculiar roughening of the skin, came in from a section
in South Georgia. We investigated and found this malady to be pellagra.
Our workers in that territory concentrated their efforts on convincing the
sufferers of the benefits to be gained by properly varied diet to such an
extent that we think more cures were effected by the change of food habits
than by medicines. By means of the county agents, nursing projects, and
other facilities the government has done splendid service in teaching the
essentials of proper diet to the people of your race and mine.
"It would probably be hard for you to believe what we found to be the main
obstacle in our efforts to help pellagra victims in the area I've just
mentioned," he remarked.
"Go ahead and tell about it," I urged. "It should be known."
"Well," he continued, apparently unaware that he had lowered his voice
until I had to lean forward to catch the words that followed, "in this
section almost every landlord would forbid the tenant to plant a garden
for his own use saying, 'I want you to put all of your time on your crop,
so I'll plant a garden big enough to feed every family on this plantation.
You plant your crop on every foot of land I've rented you.' So the tenant
had no garden, no potato patch, no watermelon patch, no chickens, and no
hogs or cows. Sure enough the landlord would plant a grand garden, but
everything the tenant, used from it was charged to his account at a price
that enabled the landlord to make an excellent profit and it usually left
the tenant in debt to his landlord at the end of the year if he used
anything from that garden. So the poor tenant learned to do without
vegetables, milk, and fresh meats. He lived chiefly on cornbread, syrup,
and fatback, and consequently became susceptible to pellagra. Some of our
people in certain sections still find themselves hampered by restrictions
like that, and so they keep moving from place to place. They're trying to
get away from such things.
"Most of us can remember the time when people of my race had few
opportunities for higher education. Now we have excellent high schools and
colleges, as well as much improved facilities for grade school education.
If young people of my race want to be educated, there is nothing to
prevent them from going ahead and getting whatever training they desire.
"I'm proud or these educational institutions, for they have been the means
of giving us better preparation for our work. Even the cooks need to know
how to read and write, and the same knowledge enables the maid to answer
your telephone more intelligently and take down the messages that come for
you in your absence. Nursemaids give better service in the care of your
children when they are trained for their work. In fact, there is no line
of work - no matter how humble the service - that cannot be improved by
even a little education.
"The relationship between our people and the white folks in the South is
on a sounder basis than in the North. I know that many thoughtless things
have been done by our people, and some of them have been terrible in their
effects on the harmony of the races. These things have made hardships for
the rest of us. We are working in cooperation with the good white people
to prevent such things from recurring, and it will all be straightened out
eventually. It takes lots of time to solve problems concerning the human
race, and much more time to work out those solutions sufficiently to see
improvement.
"Only the Negroes who have means can make money and progress in the North.
The ones that have nothing can't get along. I know many who couldn't live
in the North. Eventually they'll all want to come back to the South where
the majority of them were born. The South is their home. Here they have
their own friends, relatives, churches, and schools. If they can just
learn to get ahead, then they'll be on the road to greater advantages.
"I know many that sold their farms and moved to the North because they
thought they couldn't make a go of it on the farm. They didn't know how to
do much of anything except to raise cotton and corn. Now there's no excuse
for the farmer not to make a good living if he's willing to work. The
Government has all these farm projects and agents to teach them what to
plant and how to cultivate the ground to the best advantage. They are
learning that cotton is not the reliable money crop they once thought it
was. They know there are many other crops that will bring in more money,
without the work and risk of one-crop farming.
"They are getting along better, having more to eat and wear then ever
before on the farms. The Government has really been a blessing to the
farmers, yet many of them can't, or rather just won't, admit it. It isn't
just teaching them to till the soil that counts. The agents are showing
them how they can make money raising cattle for the market as well as for
their own use. In this way they no longer have to depend on one crop for
cash, and that keeps them from getting discouraged so easily.
"What political party do I belong to?" An honestly puzzled expression came
over his face that was quickly followed by another expansive smile, as he
confessed, "I don't know. I was reared in a family of Republicans without
knowing very much more about that party than the story that President
Lincoln was a member of it and that he become a martyr soon after he
signed the document that sealed our emancipation. It seemed natural to us
that there was no better way for Negroes to pay tribute to the man who
gave us our freedom than to vote his way, and there was no other party
that seemed as much interested in our welfare as the Republicans did.
Since the present Mr. Roosevelt was first elected his remarkable
achievements have made me do some serious thinking. I'm reluctant to vote
against the old party, but I cannot ignore the fact that my people have
had more consideration from the present administration than from any in
the past. Please don't ask how I'll vote in 1940. I really don't know. I
admire our President," he said in conclusion.
"You've probably heard of our Mr. Henley, the remarkable man who founded
our company," he queried, looking up at a large framed photograph.
"Everyone has heard of him, and I can very well remember seeing him for I
passed his barber shop in Atlanta almost every day, about thirty years
ago," I replied, "but I'd like to hear his story from you."
"Well," Smith continued, "he was born a slave, in Monroe County, Georgia.
After freedom came he went to Atlanta and started to work for a barber.
That he made a success of his work in shown by the large business he built
up. His best customers were among his white friends. Before 1900 his
barber shop had more then 20 chairs in it, and that shop is still going
today long after his death. A list of his patrons would sound like a roll
call of Atlanta's most prominent and important business men. It may be
that his daily contact with successful business men had something to do
with his own success. His ambition to do something to enable the members
of our race to prepare for the financial crises so often brought about by
sickness, accidents, and by death, led him to organize his first little
accident and sick benefit company. It's probable that the purity and
unselfishness of his motives in starting his insurance business were
factors that led Providence to permit it to prosper so that in 1905 he was
able to buy out several other companies, organize a great business, and
put up a $5,000 cash bond in accordance with a law enacted that year by
the State Legislature for the protection of insurance beneficiaries. Prior
to that time there had been several small companies doing business in
accident and sick benefit insurance that carried death benefits of from
twenty to thirty dollars, and not one of these little organizations was
able to raise the cash bond. Mr. Henley's purchase of these small
companies and merging them with his original insurance business was the
beginning of the Capital City Insurance Company, and our home offices are
still in Atlanta.
"Our little mutual company, that before the merger in 1905 paid sick
benefits of from two to three dollars a week, has grown and improved until
we have more than 300,000 policyholders, and we're now one of the largest
insurance organizations among our people, we write any kind of insurance
now, from sick, accident, straight life, and paid-up, to endowment. In
fact, this is an industrial as well as an ordinary life insurance company,
and we're more than proud of our business.
"Our records show that in 1939 we paid out more than $800,000 to our
paid-up policyholders and to beneficiaries in general. This, of course,
includes loans on policies, sick and accident benefits, dividends, and
final payments after the death of the insured. After making these payments
totalling considerably more than three-quarters of a million dollars, we
still had a surplus of more than $980,000 on hand. At the beginning of
this year we raised the amount of capital stock from $100,000 to $500,000.
Our one hundred and four employees include our managers, clerks,
inspectors, and field agents. That'll give you some idea of how our
business has grown."
There was a proud and satisfied look on his face when he asked, "How do
you like our new home?" As I looked about me, he continued, "We've just
recently moved into these offices. We'd simply outgrown the old place and
just had to have more room. I'll have to admit we're rather proud of our
new home."
The modern offices were well furnished and equipped. Venetian blinds
shaded the windows facing the street, and the walls and woodwork were
immaculate in their fresh coats of light tan paint. "You have every reason
to be proud of these lovely offices," I assured him, "and they have the
advantage of being centrally located and convenient for your workers and
clients."
"Thank you," he answered, "and now I think I've just about covered
everything of interest about my insurance experience. I don't have to
explain that practically my whole scheme of living is bounded by insurance
now. There is no other business that I know of that brings the worker in
such close contact with the great mass of our race as does insurance, and
through it we are able to have insight into the most personal problems.
While a child is still very young, some insurance man is going to be there
to see about writing a policy on its life, an insurance man will
investigate practically every condition that effects the health and
welfare of his policyholder throughout his life, and when he has died the
insurance man comes around again to make settlement. Everything that the
insurance man does to improve health conditions and to take care of his
policyholder is actually an economy in the narrowest means, for in that
way he is lessening the payments of sickness and death claims, but I still
maintain that our Mr. Henley founded this business for the purpose of
helping the people of his race.
"I'm hoping that you'll find at least a part of the information I've given
you usable. If in the future there are questions that arise in regard to
our race, I hope that you'll let us try to help you compile the
information needed."
Rewritten in accordance
with Mr. Cutter's suggestions
THE CAPITAL CITY INSURANCE COMPANY
Written by: Miss Grace McCune
Area 6 - Athens
Edited by: Mrs. Sarah H. Hall
Area 6 - Athens and
John N. Booth
Field Supervisor
Federal Writers' Project
Areas 6 and 7
Augusta, Georgia
July 10, 1939
April 14, 1939
June 20, 1939
July 7, 1939
J.H. Robertson (Negro)
Samaritan Building
West Washington Street
Athens, Georgia
Manager, Atlanta Life
Insurance Company
G.M.
Text from: Library of
Congress, Manuscript Division, WPA Federal Writers' Project Collection
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