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A FARMING
PREACHER-PROPHET
(Georgia)
Tom's note:
Again, as is common in the Life Histories, especially from Georgia, there
is extensive handwritten editing in this article. Much of it was
difficult to make out. The editing to put the words into the
vernacular appears to be common when the subject is African-American.
Editing also appears to be common when the life history was authored by
Grace McCune. Some of this editing is to correct Ms. McCune's
grammar and sentence structure, and some seems to be simply the style
preference of the editor.
Tom Gosden is a well known figure about
town, and coming across him on one of the main streets, I asked if he
would give me the story of his life. He readily agreed to meet me in about
two hours at a local tailor shop where we could talk but in the meantime
he had to "tend to some business."
Tom is famous for his remarks about the Bible, as he understands it, also
for his [?] power or gift of seeing things and predicting future events. I
arrived at the shop ahead of the time appointed for I did not want to miss
him. Several people were there, and they were having a friendly but
spirited argument. Just as a young man was told that he was "just
impossible," Tom came in.
The young man said, "Tom, did you hear what they called me? What do you
think about it?
"That they is wrong," Tom solemnly replied, "for with God, nothing is
impossible. He's the only one that's impossible.
"I knew Tom would take up for me," the youth boasted, "and I guess you all
will let me alone after this." The argument dwindled and they left.
As they went out, Tom said, "Mistess just what is it that old Tom can tell
you, for you knows I'se just a plain old ignorant stick man, that was
borned and raised in the country. Yessum, I was borned right down yonder
in Oglethorpe County, and that's still home to me.
"I worked in the fields when I was too little to last out all day. When I
went to school it was in just a plain old country school. The school house
was made out of logs and the cracks was daubed with red mud to keep the
cold wind out for us really had winters then.
"Along in them times schools wasn't no ways lak they is now. Our only book
was that old Blue Back Speller. Yes, Mistess, that's what us larnt, and
too, us stayed all day, and us started out to school soon as it was good
daylight. Wasn't no going then at eight and nine o'clock in the mornin'
lak chilluns do so now. I didn't git to go to school, 'cepting just two or
three years, 'cause I had to work in the fields.
When I was big enough to work all day, I was paid 15¢ a day. Yessum, 15¢ a
day was good pay for us chillun in them days. My home was just like all
the other houses then on the farms 'specially for the colored folks, just
a plain old log cabin, and they called 'em notched houses, don't 'spect
you knows what a notched house is?
"But you know us didn't have saw mills
back then, so us couldn't make planks, and nails wasn't plentiful neither,
so they just notched the logs to make 'em fit and the cracks was all
daubed with red clay and them old chimblies, they was made with sticks and
red clay too but us was happy and contented 'cause that was all us knowed.
"I tell you them old black molasses and ash cakes sho' tasted good
'specially after a day in the fields and us only had a biscuit on Sunday
mornin', but that one biscuit made us feel rich, or as you say now lak
millionaires, only us didn't know nothin' 'bout that then. When us had
biled victuals it was most times just plain poke berry sallet, but us
enjoyed it.
"I remember too that good old eatin' when my mother fixed ash cakes in
biled sweet milk and many a day that is what us et, and us was happy to
git it. Yessum them was happy days, more so than they is now.
"Us wasn't up to dressin' then lak us is now and most all us wore was just
one garment. That's right! And that garment was just a long shirt. I'se
worked many a day in the field in nothin' but one of them long shirts.
They was made right at home too. Mother would weave the cloth on her old
loom at nights, and plenty times when us didn't have candles, she worked
by the light from lighted knots and us chillun would play 'round on the
floor.
"The very day I was big enough to plow, what you 'spose I plowed with?
Well it was old Mike, our old ox. He was just as good as mule any day and
when us got out of bread, then one of us just put a sack of corn on Mike's
back and away us went, and it was eight or ten miles to the mill. While
the corn was being ground, Mike had his dinner of corn shucks. If it won't
too late when us got back home, us went right on to the field 'cause,
Mistess, us was raised to work.
"'Long at that time, us thought twenty-five or thirty five cents a day was
fine wages. Then us had plenty of corn and 'taters, and a meat box full of
good meat. That was some good meat 'cause we raised our own hogs and cured
the meat by smokin' it with hickory wood. Back then, I don't know if you
has done heered about this, but soda was mighty skerce. Even that didn't
'mount to so powerful much 'cause corn cob soda would sho make that bread
rise. Yessum, us just burnt the corn cobs til they was just a fine powder.
That was good as anybody's soda.
"That old persimmon beer was half of our living. Us chillun would gather
persimmons by the bucketfulls. Mother would cook 'em with wheat bran and
make it out into the big pones that she used to make the beer mash and she
put lots of locusts in it. That beer was really good and so refreshin'
after a hard day's work.
"We wasn't sickly ' long in that time, but when we did get a little sick,
mother would go into the woods and git herbs and grass. There was one
kinda grass 'specially that she used. Just let me call Sally Anne, that's
my wife, and bless her soul, she'll know."
Tom went to the telephone and was back in a few minutes. He said, "I told
you Sally Ann would know. She always knows and I can 'pend on her. She
stays right at home in her field of duty, just right on the job all the
time.
"Sally Anne said it was just plain old scurvy grass, and you find it
mostly in pine woods. It has long yellow roots and the roots is what they
made the tea with. It was, and still is, 'cause us uses it now. It's the
finest medicine anybody can git to cure colds, and then when folks git the
measles, if they would just drink old scurvy grass root tea, they would
soon be well and wouldn't have to worry 'bout gittin' wet even.
"Another good tonic is this very simple one. It'll make you eat your head
off and lessen you wants to gain in weight you had better not try it.
That's just the plain old turnip. Yes, that's right. You just bile turnips
in clear water 'til you have 'bout a quart of the juice and drink that
juice two and three times a day, but I 'spects you would have to put some
sugar in it 'cause it's mighty bitter. Along in them days us used the old
black mo'-lasses to sweeten most everything; even used it in our coffee."
Tom laughed and said, "Why even our coffee wasn't what it is today. Most
all us had was corn meal, parched right brown, but to us, that corn meal
coffee sweetened with mo-lasses was really good, and us was thankful for
it.
"Another good medicine that the women folks used lots of times was what is
known these days as black hall root. They made tea out of that 'cause it
won't easy to git out and buy medicine back then, for us didn't have drug
stores lak us does now. A doctor was seldomed called. Folks just made
their own medicine. Yet there won't many folks sick in them days.
"Long back in them days when us got in distress, trying to make a living
us used to set lots of nights, burning lighted knots to make tar. That was
sold by the quart or gallon. You know that blessed old mother of mine has
even used that old homemade tar as a medicine. We had to drink the water
off of the tar for colds and it was a good tonic also for any one that
didn't have no appetite.
"Still and too, that wasn't just prezactly what us made it for, 'cause you
knows back then us didn't have no such stuff as wagon grease. That old tar
answered the same purpose and it was used on wheels and harness too, and
just 'bout everything they needed to grease.
"Another thing, Mistess, us didn't git no shoes 'ceptin' one time a year,
and that was on Christmas, that was our Santa Claus. Us would go to bed
and try to see when they come, but it wasn't long 'fore us would be sound
asleep. Next morning our brogan shoes with the bright shiny brass toes
would be there, and how happy us was! Just thankful for everything.
They said I was always a very peculiar sort of a chap even when I was just
a little tike. I was always asking questions. I was gifted with some kind
of a strange power, but it was sometime before I could really understand
this strange and wonderful power. Fact is, I don't understand it now.
"But things just comes to me. I can see them and tell folks for it is just
like a vision. Back then some folks would laugh at me about them visions.
But, Mistess, they is all glad now when old Tom can help them out
sometimes. Sometimes I can't help them a-tall for the vision just will not
come and that is all I tells, is just what the Lord shows me and tells me
to help folks, and I has been trying to help for fifty years or more.
"Along then us had confidence in each other. Us was taught to live right
and serve God. Never to take nothin' that didn't belong to us and never to
do anything that would hurt anyone. Us just lived in the bonds of the law.
Nobody broke the laws, and when night come, us could lay down and sleep
with a good clear conscience.
"I still 'members the first time I ever heerd 'bout any one breakin' the
law. It was just outrageous. People for miles around were upset, skeered,
and shocked. A man killed his wife. It was just terrible. Us couldn't
understand it. When they tried him in court lots of folks couldn't git
nigh the place 'cause everybody tried to go. He was sentenced and hung for
murder.
"From that time-on folks begun to grow weaker and wiser, and how wicked
they are now! Murder is a very common thing now and folks just will take
things that don't no ways belong to 'em. Folks just don't live right. And
God is going to show us one these days. Oh, how wonderful and grateful it
was that I could hear my mother pray." Here Tom broke down and cried.
After a few minutes, he said: "You couldn't go wrong on her prayers."
At this moment someone called and asked if Tom was there. The proprietor
of the shop called Tom to the telephone. He came back to me and said "That
was two men wanted to see Tom, but I told them that I was busy," he added.
They didn't accept that excuse and before Tom could get back to his story,
the men were at the shop for him.
Calling Tom to the door, they said, "We have just got to see you for a few
minutes, but we won't keep you long." Excusing himself, Tom said, "I'll be
back in a few minutes." The men were dressed in overalls and heavy shoes.
They seemed to be farmers. They escorted Tom out to their car. I waited
over an hour and still Tom didn't get back. Finally he came in and said,
"It is so late and I just can't git 'way from them men. What is I gwine to
do?"
I asked him if I could come to his home the next morning and finish our
interview.
Tom thanked me and said, I'm sho sorry 'bout this, but; one of these men
is in trouble and wants to see if I can help him."
He told me how to find his house but asked if I would prefer to have him
come back to town and talk to me "cause he lived way cross town." I wanted
to see his home and said, "I will be there if you are going to be at home.
Yes'um I'll be there lessen someone dies 'cause that happens very
occasionally. I'll call you if that happens." He went back to the car
where the men were waiting for him.
Reaching Tom's house early the next morning, I found that even then he had
already been to town and returned home. He asked me to have a seat, in the
livingroom and apologetically said: "Excuse me while I eat breakfast, for
I went to town early so I could git back by the time you got here." As he
went out of the room to eat his breakfast, I looked around. The house was
a new four-room cottage, painted white and trimmed in green on the
outside.
The walls of the livingroom were papered with comic sheets from the Sunday
papers, and the border around the top was of pictures cut from magazines.
The room was ceiled overhead. A brightly figured linoleum square covered
the floor. Rolls of music were neatly stacked on a player piano, which was
flanked by large ferns in white-painted homemade boxes. A crocheted cover
adorned the cushion on the piano bench. I noticed a cabinet-style victrola
and three large plain rocking chairs that were painted a bright shade of
green. Fancy lace curtains were draped at the windows and crocheted
squares covered the glass panes in the front door.
Tom returned in a short time and asked me if I would like to go through
the house. He said that he wanted me to see Sally Anne and his daughter. I
followed him through a bedroom, where I saw a walnut colored iron bed,
which was covered with a red silk spread, A telephone rested on a stand
near the bed. There was a dressing table and several chairs, a heater, and
a faded wool rug. The two windows were draped with clean scrim curtains,
and the walls were covered with newspapers.
The next room was also a bedroom and a fire was burning in the grate. A
brown iron bed in this room was covered with a green silk spread. A
dressing table, a small table and several rocking chairs completed its
furniture. The walls were papered with newspapers, and the floor was
covered with a linoleum square. In front of the fire was a box of baby
chickens. Cream colored scrim curtains were hung at its only window.
As we passed to the next room which was the kitchen, I saw that it too was
papered with newspapers. It was warm and comfortable from the fire in the
large wood-burning range. A small dining table was covered with a clean
white cloth. A side table held some dishes, and a very large cabinet was
in one side of the room. A shelf just inside of the door held several very
brightly polished water buckets. Plain white curtains draped the two large
windows.
When we passed out of the kitchen door, we were in the yard and directly
before the door was a well. Tom said, "This is one of the best wells of
water that you will find any where these days. It is cold and pure too,
but yonder is Sally Ann and Sister at the washhouse. They are a little put
out cause they is washing today, and, ain't had time to git fixed up. I
told them that was all right cause you knowed us had to work."
As we reached the washhouse I was greeted by Sally Anne, who is a very
dark skinned Negress, and in spite of the fact that they were at work,
their house dresses were very clean and neat. As Sally Anne smiled she
showed a mouthful of gold teeth. She is rather inclined to be fat, but
Sister, as they called her, is thin and tall, not as dark as her mother
and father, and her hair was combed back close against her head.
We looked around the large clean yards as we chatted. Showing me the
hedges and different kinds of flowers, that they had just recently put
out, Tom said, "If us can ever git fixed up lak us wants this will be a
right nice little place, but you know it takes money to do that. I have
seen the time when I wouldn't have to stop for that, but lak most
everything else, it is all gone now.
"I has had my day, and I has been wonderfully blest by a gracious and
understanding God, and I wouldn't call back them days if I could cause
I'se done had my day. I tried to make good use of the days past and I hope
the good Lord can say "well done," when I goes home, but us will go back
to the fire to talk. This sunshine is mighty warm and pleasant, but if you
stay out too long you can feel the chill."
As we were seated in comfortable chairs in the room, where the fire was
burning so bright, Tom removed his large white felt hat, and asked if he
might smoke his pipe, "'cause I could think better if I can smoke," he
said. Assuring him that it would be all right for him to smoke, I watched
him as he very carefully filled his old pipe. He was dressed in a white
shirt, gray wool trousers and a blue coat, not new, but clean and neat.
Black shoes and a very bright red and blue tie completed his costume. He
does not look so old, as he is tall and very straight. I judged that he
was between sixty and seventy.
Getting the pipe going good he looked around and smiled. "Pride done ruint
this old world, Mistess. Pride just done took the day. Back long in them
times, us won't 'fraid to work. Didn't know what it was to go to the store
when us went to cook a meal, 'cause all the victuals were raised at home
and all the cooking was done on the fireplaces. Clothes was made at home.
Why, when us went to church, it was in old home-made clothes, that our
mothers made.
"But bless the Lord that she didn't stop us from having meeting. Folks had
'ligion then and from the time the pastor read out the song and the
brother over the corner started it off, every-body, would 'gin to git
happy, and when that old song, Amazing Grace How Sweet The Sound , was
sung the shouting could be heard for a mighty long ways off cause didn't
nobody stay home 'cause they didn't have no clothes to wear. Everybody was
there shouting.
"All of us worked hard in the fields, and as dutifully as the sun rose in
the morning it found us in our fields at labor for that was the way we
made our living and I did work. I wanted to have something and from
daylight 'til dark us was at our work. At night us was tired out, that us
was, and ready for the bed. Warn't no running 'round at nights for us on
the farms, but us did learn new things to grow and how to grow 'em better.
As we 'vanced 'long we could raise more things to eat and us learnt how to
grow sorghum cane to make [?] syrup. That was a change from the old black
mo-lasses but I'se frank to say, them black mo-lasses is still my
favorite. There was just nothing lak them gingerbread cakes that my mother
made with mo-lasses and baked in them old ovens in the fireplace.
"I'se farmed all my life and I'se made money in farming and then and too
I'se lost money the same way, but mostly after farmers started to raising
cotton as the money crop. For a while us made money that way then prices
of cotton would go up and then [?] to the bottom. When the price started
up, everybody would hold all they possibily could just wasn't goin' to
sell, just waitin' 'til it got a little bit higher and fust thing us
knowed it had done hit the bottom.
"I was just lak everybody else. I knowed I was goin' to git rich that way,
but one thing I didn't do, I didn't quit raising plenty of foodstuff for
us as well as plenty for the stock. I done pretty good.
"I took care of what I had. I didn't throw it away and from my old ox,
Mike, that I learned to plough with, I traded until had good mules and
some fine horses. I loved good horses and I raised only the best, and if I
does say it there wasn't no finer horses in that county than mine. I sold
one to a man here in town for a thousand dollars. Yes, mam that is right I
had 'vanced from that little notched log house until I had a good farm and
a comfortable house for those times. When I married in 1894, I had besides
my farm and horses, a sawmill, shingle mill, grist mill, and a gin, and I
run them by myself.
"Course now you understand there was different times to run 'em. I
couldn't do it all at one time, but I got it all by hard work and saving
what I made." The insurance man came to collect. Tom went to a nail at one
side of the fireplace, and took down an envelope with the book and money
in it. The collector chatted a few minutes with Tom and asked him if he
was going to farm again this year. "I guess I will try," Tom replied, "but
all this rain us has been having will sho bake this old earth later on."
As the man left, Tom said, "How does you write that way and me just
talking my head off? I just can't see how you does it."
"It was hard at first," I replied, "but you know, when you have to work,
you have to learn how to do the work."
"That's right," he said. "I'se been watching you as I talked and I'se had
a vision. See if I am right."
"Well, I hope it is a good one," I said.
"I'se seed that you is the only one of your family left, and the last
went, less than a year ago. Is I right?
"You are," I replied. He started to say something else when someone called
to him to come out in the yard for a minute.
As I waited for him to return, I picked up one of the small chickens out
of the box. Sally Anne came in. Seeing the baby chick in my hand, she
laughed and said, "Does you lak little things too? Bet you laks dogs."
"I really do," I answered. "I think they are one of the most faithful
animals that we have, and I always had a dog when I was at home and the
little girl where I board has one, that I am very fond of."
Tom came back in the room and said, "It was about them same men that
wanted to see me yistidday. I done said that I wasn't gwine nowhere 'til
us got through talking 'cause they can just wait. Wasn't us talking 'bout
cotton? I remember back in 1920 when things was sky high and I had forty
bales of cotton here in the warehouse.
"Cotton was sellin' for forty cents a pound, but lak everybody else I helt
on to that cotton, just knowed it would go higher, and I 'vested heavily
in land also, bought every bit I could git a holt of. Everybody was just
money mad. But it wasn't right. And I lost everything I had 'long with the
rest of the folks. I'se learnt that the best way to make anything out of
cotton is sell it, just as quick as it gits out of the ginhouse.
"I never plowed up one stalk of cotton, cause I 'bided by the laws and
didn't plant only what I was 'sposed to plant. Yessum I has stayed right
in the bonds of the law. I'se got some money on my land and it was a
blessing to me. Why, last year the farmers didn't make anything. It was
the worst year I ever 'members for farmin'. Course most folks wouldn't do
lak the great President done asked 'em too. They just went ahead and
planted their cotton and then when it was ruint, they plowed it under so
they could git their checks.
"I think our President is the grandest man that has ever set in the
President's seat. He is a blessing to humanity. He has done more for the
farmers, than anyone else has ever done. He is just lak Moses, leaden' the
chillun of Israel, just trying lead us out of struction, but he don't git
much help. He feeds the poor, and fixes jobs so that people can work. He
is a blessin' sent by God."
Picking up a worn Bible from the table, Tom said, "Does you believe in
this Good Book? Cause if it is wrong then there ain't nothin' else left
for us. Does you believe in it?
"Yes, indeed! I replied. "I was taught to believe in that by my mother."
"Do you ever read your Bible?" he asked.
"I do," I answered.
"But did you just read it or did you really study it? I'll find out later,
cause I am goin' to ask you some questions.
"I ain't never had much education. But when I married, I decided that I
was going to larn and make a man out of myself. I has sho tried to do
that. I'se worked hard and I can read and write a little, specially can I
read this book of Life. God lets me understand its meanings.
"But tell me about your wedding." I said.
"Well, along then times won't lak they are now. Us had a big weddin', big
for Negroes. Crowds of people was at our weddin' and there was plenty of
white folks too. All Sally Anne's white folks was right there 'cause they
sho did lak that gal and I'll tell you, she is one of the best of women
and if I had a million dollars today, I would lay it all in her lap. She
has never failed me. I always know that she is right here in her field of
duty. She has worked right side of me in everything.
"Us has farmed together and raised our things to eat. I didn't never try
no 'bacco, just corn, peas, 'taters, rye, and wheat. Yes, I has made money
farming and I has also lost money on the farm. It is hard work, out any
kind of work is that way if you stays at it. My check from the Government
for thirty dollars came just before Christmas. It sho did come in a good
time. I took that money and bought us all something to eat and some
clothes.
"We has just got two chillun: a girl, Sister, and a boy. Sister is a good
and smart girl, but my son is just no 'count." At this time someone called
him again and he went out to see who it was.
Coming back in a few minutes he said "I has been wonderfully blest for God
gives me these visions so that I can help folks and I has been so
thankful, but Mistess war is comin'. I know it is, 'cause I has had the
same visions I had before the World War. I has seed the people gatherin'
together and marchin' in crowds, and then the Bible is fulfilling its
teachin's, for it says: 'there shall be wars and rumors of wars,' and the
war thats comin' and comin' fast, is goin' to be bad 'cause folks is wiser
in wicked ways than they was in the last war.
"I has had visions and predicted for our Govenors. Yessum I has had
letters from more than one of 'em, askin' me to help 'em. But lessen I
gits the vision I can't help a'tall. But when God lets me see these things
I think it is my bounden duty to tell 'em.
"I'se been a licensed preacher for more than nineteen years, but I'se
never been ordained. They has wanted to ordain me, but I just don't feel
right yet in that way 'cause I is just plain and ignorant, but I takes my
stand on my Bible, if it is wrong then I am wrong. But if this Blessed
Book is right, then I am right, for as the Lord said to Nicodemus, 'Ye
must be born again.'
"Churches ain't lak they used to be, just too much high polutin' preachin'
now. I don't lak that. I laks to hear 'em preach from the Bible, and the
heart, not just read off a sermon that somebody done purpared and writ
down for 'em. Why they don't study the Bible no more. They reads it, but
not with understanding. Some of our greatest preachers today, can't
explain what the soul of man is.
"Now my Bible says this, and I takes my stand on the Bible. See right here
in the second chapter of Genesis in the seventh verse." Tom slowly read
with some difficulty, "'and the Lord God formed man of the dust of the
ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man
became a living soul.' Now that is plain for anyone to read. The soul is
the breath of life. My white folks comes to me lots of times and ask me
questions about the Bible.
"I 'member one time. Us had up a question about the Sabbath Day. Has you
always been taught that God made the earth in six days and rested on the
seventh day?
"Yes I have always been taught that." I replied, wondering just what he
would say about that.
But he was ready, as he said, "Well then Mistess just let me read the
second verse of the second chapter of Genesis to you."
And again he slowly read, "And on the seventh day God ended his work which
he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he
had made."
Handing the Bible to me, he said, "There read it for yourself, and you can
see where it says He ended his work on the seventh day." He has this place
as well as the seventh verse which he had just read marked with a cross.
As I handed the Bible back to him, he said, "Don't you think that is plain
for anyone to understand? For he says he ended his work on the seventh
day. I is just a plain old Missionary Baptist preacher, but that is plain
to me, and if all people would read with understandin' and belief it would
be plain to them.
"A little more than a month ago, I was called to preach at my old church
where I still keeps my membership 'cause I never has moved it in all these
years. Everybody was upset and distressed 'bout these hard times. I just
tore up that church. God just told me what to say. I told them that us
didn't have no panic now, and I took 'em back to the days of Moses and
Aaron and when Elisha led the people into Samaria and there was a great
famine in that land.
"People was so hungry that they et they own chillun. Some of them didn't
lak it and said won't no sich thing in the Bible. I asked them to read
Second Kings, 6th chapter, 28th and 29th verses. They came to me and told
me I was right. I had took my stand on my Bible and now it proved me
right. Now I want to read them verses to you." When he found the place
which was marked with crosses, he read:
"'And the King said unto her, What aileth thee? and she answered, This
woman said unto me, Give thy son that we may eat him today, and we will
eat my son tomorrow.
"So we boiled my son and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day:
give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son.'
"See I was right Mistess. This Blessed Book has never failed me yet. I
always tried to preach just what I see, 'cause I don't lak this high
polutin' preachin' and God don't lak it neither. He wants his disciples to
preach the truth and nothin' but the truth, but Oh, just for some more of
them old meetin's when people got happy and wasn't 'fraid to show it, that
is what I calls real 'ligion.
"But I'se had my day and I 'spects I'se gittin' old. I don't know how old
I is 'cause my folks didn't know how to count. I still tries to farm and I
sells face creams, powder, and sich things as that and piddles 'round on
odd jobs all the time."
"What did you do back in those days for pastime?" I asked.
"Well, 'bout the biggest times was them old corn shuckin's. Now Mistess
they was really enjoyable. Sometimes they lasted for two and three days
'cause folks sho raised corn then. We had a general that led the singin',
and there was big suppers. I has shucked corn by the light of the moon and
by bonfires. After the work was done, there was games and I tells you
playin' marbles was a great sport.
"When us just wanted a get together supper and party, us had hominy
feasts. It was the real old lye hominy. Big pots full of it was cooked,
and that was something to enjoy and be happy and thankful for.
I was afraid to ask about dancing and I just asked if they continue to
have cornshuckings in the present era.
"Why, yes, lots of times, when the corn is all gathered in 'specially 'mong
the colored folks. They 'vites crowds to help git the corn shucked cause
they don't change much as the white folks and many of them is still lak
they used to be but our folks is gitting in better shape just 'vancing'
right along."
As the same men came back for Tom again, I prepared to leave. He walked
out to the sidewalk with me and said, "This sun is delicious today and
makes me feel good. I'se glad I'se not in the trouble dem folks is.
"Come back again when our flowers gits to bloomin' out, and our place will
look better."
As Sally Anne came around the house to tell me good-bye, Tom said, "Mistess,
I'se gwine to come and tell you 'bout that vision. It ain't right clear
yit, but I has seen enough to know that you is gwine right on to success.
I can tell you more about it soon.
On my long walk back to the city I pondered Tom's parting remarks, and I
hope that he is right.
******
The End
March 6, 1939
March 7, 1939
Nick Waller (Negro)
290 Tabernacle St.
Athens, Ga.
Farmer and Preacher
Grace McCune
Text from: Library of
Congress, Manuscript Division, WPA Federal Writers' Project Collection
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