[TAPE 1, SIDE A]

BEN BULLA:

Doc, let's talk about Everett Jordan for a while.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

You asked me if I had ever seen him in overalls? I've seen him with overalls on twice. When he was working on the dam up there he had on overalls, and when they were pouring the foundation for that old diesel engine he had overalls on. And just as soon as he got the foundation poured he took all the colored people up to the store and they all sat down and ate. I worked for him for 35 years, and he was a fine fellow to work for.

BEN BULLA:

What did you do all that time Doc?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I went in there as a doffer and doffed spinning; me and Grief Smith. I went from that to fixing and I continued as fixer in the spinning room the rest of the time—then when they put the spooler in I went out on the spooler—Barber -Coleman Spooler—and I learned to spool, and I kept it in my head what I had learned. It broke down one day with Cephas and they came after me. I told him to start it up and he said, "it ain't no need, it's out of time." I started it up and I seen what was wrong with it and I fixed it. Joe Neel said I'd have it fixed in 5 minutes time, and I did."

One time Mr. Jordan called me in the office and was talking to me about when I was going to buy that old house over there, and he asked me about the spooler, and I told him that the spooler wasn't getting the proper attention that it should, and so he wanted to know why and I told him, "Mr. Jordan, there ain't no one man that can look after 48 spinning frames, look after the help and keep the laps on and work on the spooler." I said, "all he can do is run out there and put a drop or two of oil here and yonder on it and switch it off a little bit."

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He says, "all right." About that time Mr. Altman came walking in the office and Mr. Jordan wanted me to tell him, so I told Altman. Altman said, "Aw, you're hurting yourself." I said, "No I'm not, I'm just telling the honest-to-god's—truth; ain't no one man that can do all of that." So Altman asked me about taking a shift of 4 hours in the morning and 4 hours in the evening, and I told him, "Awshucks! I couldn't even work four hours and go down on the river and catch a decent fish in four hours!" Mr. Jordan busts out in a big laugh and said, "You know Altman, He's right about that; they couldn't. And besides, one man can't look after 48 spinning frames, oiling and sewing on tape, cutting off laps and look after a Barber-Coleman Spooler."

BEN BULLA:

Is that what you were doing?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah. So I told Altman I wouldn't do no split shift; four hours in the morning and four hours in the evening. I went down to the mill and told Cephas about the split shift and he said, "Well if you don't take it, I won't." Next morning I went in at 11:00 o'clock and met Cephas coming out. I asked him, "Where you going?" He said, "I'm going home and come back in at 3:00 o'clock and work four more hours." So he took the split shift. The Spooler broke down with him and he didn't know how to fix it—it's out of time. He told me it was out of time, and I told him to start it up. He started it up and it went about 10 feet down the side and I seen what the trouble was. I went over there to the work bench, got the other knotter out and fixed it. Helen Thomas walked up and said, "He'll have it going in 5 minutes." So I changed the knotters—Cephas was walking along holding it, about half way down he turned loose and came back up there and told Ralph Richie and Lynch that it was out of time. I said, "Well time it—it ain't out of time." So I set the other knotter where it would tie

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and put it on, started it up and it went to tying. Lynch came around there and said, Well I see you got it fixed. Ralph Ritchie said, "Cephas, old boy, I knew you could fix it, but I just didn't know long it was going to take you." I says to myself, "I wish a ten-ton truck would come here and knock me clean through that brick wall." They called me back down here several times on that spooler—I knowed it by heart. They put Frank Hanks on it—he kept it tore up, and he'd come to town after me. I'd come down and fix it; so one day Joe Neel came out through the spinning room and I was standing there and he said, "If plumber don't get it fixed in 5 minutes, ain't no need sending after a Barber-Coleman man." Tisdale come walking around the end of the spooler, and said if he can't fix it send and get Cephas Knighten. Joe Neel said, "Go-to-hell!" I pushed the thing on and started it up and it went to tying. Mr. Jordan told me that if he had two or three more like me in there he could run the whole mill. And he also told me one time that he could take me and Walt Lingerfelt and two more like me and run the whole mill.

BEN BULLA:

What did Walt do?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

He come there as a fixer in the spinning then they put him as overseer of the spinning.

BEN BULLA:

Where did you come from Doc?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I come from Carrboro. I doffed in a spinning mill.

BEN BULLA:

How old were you when you came to Saxapahaw?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

About 21 or 22 years old.

BEN BULLA:

How come you to come up here?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Well that mill down there was closing down. Mattie came up here and got a job, then Ada, my sister came up here to work, and my daddy

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said, "Well we'll just all move up there."

BEN BULLA:

What year was this?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I don't know, now you can count back, I was 22 years old when I come up here.

BEN BULLA:

How old are you now?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

39—77. That's how old I am, 77.

BEN BULLA:

You sure don't look it. You were here before the depression then.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah I was up here during the depression. I come here working for $9.60 a week; twelve hours a night, six days a week.

BEN BULLA:

That would be 72 hours a week wouldn't it?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

In fact I have worked three and four double shifts during the week.

BEN BULLA:

How many sides did you doff at a time?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Me and Grief Smith were doffing 48 frames—96 sides. We'd doff em then go down on the river and fish.

BEN BULLA:

You'd get them doffed and you'd have time to do that?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah. We'd go down on the river and fish or go play ball, or get out on the back side of the mill and cup-up and frolic and go on.

BEN BULLA:

What yarn counts were you running then, about 30's and 36's?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

We'us running 60's and 30's and 40's. One time—Joe Neel would buy Coca-Colas and set them in the windows up stairs— and one day John Smith came out there with a ball of warp rolled up, and he said, "You see that Coke up yonder, I'm going to hit it and knock it out and you catch it." I was standing there and he throwed that ball and busted the window light out and hit Joe Neel right back of the head with that ball of waste. Here come Joe down there and I was sitting there on the platform and Joe said, "Did you ever see this?" I said, "Let me see what number yarn it is—that's 60's 2 ply." He said, "That ain't what I said. You seen it when it went through that window up

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right up there and hit me in back of the head." I said, "Yeah, I did." About that time John come out the door laughing—one of those big laughs he puts on—Joe told him, "That's all right you ‘cotton-head’ so-and-so, you needn't laugh, it's going to cost you a dollar and a half for that windowlight and 50¢ for putting it in. Sure enough, when payday came they charged him for that window light.

We used to doff frames and tote the yarn up the steps instead of going to the elevator. Mr. Jordan came in there one time when I had started up the steps with a box of yarn on my shoulder. He says, "What're you doin'" I said, "Carrying this yarn upstairs." He said, "set it down and put it on a box and roll it down to the elevator and take it up with the elevator." I took that box to the elevator, but the next one I took it up the steps.

When they brought those last frames from up north and put them in, Tisdale went to Apple's Tin Shop and had twelve small pans made and twelve big pans made to put up under the head to catch the oil. Tisdale had me putting them down when Mr. Jordan came by. He says, "What you doin'" I said, "puttin' these pans down here to catch this oil." He told me to not put another one down and to go get Tisdale. I went down to the office and I told him, "Tisdale, Mr. Jordan wants to see you out yonder in the spinning room right now!" He come out there and Mr. JOrdan told him, "Tisdale, where is your oiler at?" Tisdale said to me, "Doc, where's the oiler at?" I said, "There he is over yonder." Tisdale said, "Go get him." So I went and brought him over there and Mr. Jordan took the oil can and says, "Now look, you see this hole right there, one drop of oil in that one hole there would do a whole lot more good than all that oil that's running downstairs on them warps. From now on, you put one or two drops in them holes. Doc,

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you take up them pans." He turned around to Tisdale and said, "Tisdale, you take these pans back to Apple's Tin Shop and tell them we don't need them." Tisdale said, "Can I send them up there Mr. Jordan?" Jordan says, "No, you take them up there yourself." So Tisdale had me to put them in his car and he took them.

Another time Tisdale went up to his house and got a turkey tail and put it on a long reed pole and gave it to Rob Collins. Rob was fanning it down—fanning lint every which a way. Jordan came in and seen Rob and ask him, "Rob, what're you doing." He said, "M-M-Mr. Tisdale told me to brush down with this turkey tail." Mr. Jordan said, "You take that turkey tail off that pole and take it down to Tisdale and tell him to take it back home. We don't need no turkey tail down here. There's enough slubs running in this yarn without fanning lint off the top the building down on it." Tisdale took the turkey tail and lit out to the house. At times I would go down there and try to explain things to Tisdale—he'd be sitting there writing and didn't look like he'd be paying a bit more attention to me—sitting there writing.

He was having me to put two ounces and two tenths of yarn to the bobbin of 60's. I took ten empty bobbins and laid them on the scales, then take full bobbins and lay them on the scales. One day I asked him, "Tisdale, let's make this a little interesting, will you allow me one-half of three ounces each way on building these bobbins? If it's over 3 ounces I'll buy you a Coca-Cola, and if it's just 2 ounces you buy me a Coca-Cola." He says, "That's a deal." I went up to building bobbins—putting yarn on the bobbins and would bring them down for him to weigh them. He said, "Here, go get you a Coca-Cola." I drank so many Coca-Colas off of Tisdale I didn't know what to do.

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Mr. Jordan came down one day, walking along picking up bolts, and taps and things off the floor. He said, "There ain't no telling how much money's been throwed away—bolts, etc just swept out the door into the trash can." I said, "You're right Mr. Jordan."

He'd call me into the office every once in a while and talk to me about the mill down there.

When Lingerfelt died he gave me the keys to his car and told me to take Mrs. Lingerfelt and them to Gastonia. He gave me $5 to buy oil. That old Dodge really drank the oil. I carried them up there and came back.

Then one time, when Ida Williams died, it had started snowing and Mrs. Jordan wanted me to take the pall bearers up to the funeral. I had the pall bearers in her car and a woman from Albany, N. Y. ran into me—or skidded into me. Later I was telling Mr. Jordan what happened and Mrs. Jordan came running in saying, "What did you say?" I told her that a woman had skidded into me and tore up the left front fender. "How bad?" she said. Mr. Jordan said, "That's all right we got insurance on it." So that was the last I heard of it . . . the old oil burning Dodge—he got rid of it.

He was a good fellow. I had an awful habit of borrowing money—I could walk up to him anytime—I was setting in front of the barber shop when he came out of the house. I told him I wanted to talk to him. He said, "All right, Plumber, come on." I said, "I want to borrow $50." "Alice, come in here and give the Plumber $50. How do you want to pay it back." I told him I would give it back to him payday. He said, "Oh no, a dollar a week will be all right."

BEN BULLA:

You say he called you "Plumber?" Did you do plumbing?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Oh yeah I used to do plumbing work down there in the mill and the village too.

One time the valve stuck on the old straight eight diesel engine and I went down there with Mr. Jordan. Alse Davis was up on top of it. Mr. Jordan said, "Davis, how long before you going to have it working?" "Just a minute," Alse said. He threw that crowbar down without looking to see if anybody was standing there, it bounced up and hit Mr. Jordan on the shin and skinned it a little bit—he come by me hopping and said, "Come on Plumber, this ain't no place for me," and out the door he went with me following.

He was awful good to me, Mr. Jordan was. I could borrow money from him anytime, anywhere. First time, me and five of the boys went to Virginia Beach. Sunday morning we got up, I had all the pocketbooks, and I had all their watches on my wrist. Walked up the beach and there stood Mr. Jordan, Dr. Carrington and Shannonhouse, the yarn salesman. I walked up over there and I says, "GOOD MORNING!" He turned around and he says, "Huh! I thought I left Saxapahaw at Saxapahaw." I said, "No, there's five more of them out there somewhere or another. Mr. Jordan, how about loaning me $50." "You don't need no $50," he said, "you're getting ready to be back to that mill Monday morning to go to work." I said, "O. K., if you'll let me have $50, I'll guarantee I'll have all five of them others there at 7:00 o'clock to work." So he let me have the $50. We got back in Saxapahaw at 20 minutes to seven the next morning. I jerked the keys out of the car and went to work. Mr. Jordan came down there and asked what we were doing there dressed up. I told him we had just got back about 15 minutes 'til seven and didn't have time to go home and change. He told us to all get out

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of there and go home and put on our working clothes and come back."

BEN BULLA:

Who were the other four—five?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Marion Glosson,

[audio missing]

Dorsett Johnson, Wayne Woody, myself and—

BEN BULLA:

Why were you carring all their watches—were they in the water?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yes. I would take the cramp every time I went in so I just kept up with their pocketbooks and watches.

BEN BULLA:

When they bought the new diesel did you help install it?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

No, I guarded it one night though. They were bringing it in and had pulled it off on the side of the road and they wanted somebody to watch it. Alson Davis come and got me to go over there that night. I had a piece of pitchfork handle about 4 feet long, and somebody came by in a car and stopped, "I wonder what that thing is?" they said, an pulled out a knife to cut a hole—I popped that board with that old stick I had and when I did they threw the knife down and flew—got in their car and took off. Mr. Jordan came over the next morning and they hooked up to it and started pulling it in. They had the old "Big Bess" caterpillar pulling it. The back end of that thing was down in the road just like that—down in the hard road.

BEN BULLA:

How many days did it take to pull it down there?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

They unloaded it at Graham depot and it took them two days to pull it down there. Armon Davis was flagging traffic. They pulled off of 54 at the worm ranch. It set there two nights and then they went to Chapel Hill and got that old "B Bess" to come up and pull it. Harvey Foust come over there and told the fellow driving it, "Drop it down into sawmill gear and you won't mire down." Jordan said, "Do you know how to drive that thing? Harvey said, "Yes sir!" "Well get up there then." Harvey got up there and thowed that thing in sawmill

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gear and just kept walking with it. Came on over here to the mill and they all told him he would have to pull it down to the foot of the hill then pull it back up the hill before he could swing and go in there. Harvey says, "No. Mr. Jordan, you got any straight pine trees about 10 inches through and about 10 or 15 feet long?" Jordan said he did and he sent them colored people over there to cut them. Harvey put that pine down there right in the middle of the road and turned that diesel engine around and started down the hill with it. One of the [unknown] had a Kodak taking pictures of it and it looked like it was going into the ditch and turn over and the fellow kept snapping pictures and saying, "it's going, it's going!" Harvey pulled that thing on out of that ditch on around there, backed that thing up and skidded it off. Harvey told them, "That was right easy." Mr. Jordan wrote him a check for something, I don't know how much it was— he wrote him out a check and gave it to him—then he turned around and hired him to run the bulldozer to push coal and work around there with it.

One time Sid Lloyd was driving a company truck and I was going across the bridge. He was heading for Tennessee taking a double decker load of yarn up and was going to move a fellow back. I said, "Where you going?" He said he was going to town and for me to come on.

[audio resumes]

He slowed down and I stepped up on the running board on the drivers side and he held me—Mr. Jordan was standing up there on the walkway hollering— we got on around the curve and he stopped and I got in and we went on toward town. Just about the time we got into the edge of Graham here come Mr. Jordan and he said, "Hey, where you going to, a fire?" Lloyd said, "No I ain't going to no fire, what's wrong?" He was that close to the post office and he handed him a package about 12 inches square

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and told him to take it to the post office and mail it, and he got in the car and turned around and come on back. Lloyd said, "That's a heck of a note, come all the way up here right at the post office and hand me a box to mail." So we went on and delivered the yarn and brought Chapman back to run the Mercerizing plant.

They'd send me out to ride the telephone line . . .

BEN BULLA:

Dock, tell me this, did you ever see Mr. Jordan get really mad?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

No, I never did.

BEN BULLA:

Loose his temper?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

No, I never did see him lose his temper.

One time when Mr. Jordan was in New York, Tisdale and Lynch were overseers—no Lynch and Ralph Ritchie. They had gotten an old grease-gun from Richard Stanford. One person would have to stand down and pump it and another person up greasing the motors. So one day I was pumping and Alse Davis was up there greasing the motors and Ralph Ritchie and Lynch came in there and wanted to know what I was doing. Davis stuck his head out of a hole up there and said, "I don't know that it's any of your business, but he's pumping grease up here to me." So we got through and started on back in the mill and Lynch and Ralph Ritchie came up. Old Mrs Cole was sitting out there eating and they said, "That's got to be stopped and stopped right now!" They said I was to go over and tell her. I said, "No, you go tell her if you want it stopped, they have been eating there ever since I've been in Saxapahaw." So I went on in the mill and Lynch sent for me to come on down to the office. He was sitting there all reared back with his thumbs stuck in his vest, and I said, "What do you want?" He said, "SIT DOWN!!" I said, "Listen, I can hear what you got to say standing

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up—I had a piece of machinery in my hip pocket. He said, "Why is it that every time you go to speak to anybody you blow up like a bullfrog?" I said, "Now I'll tell you Mr. Lynch, if anybody looks like a bullfrog you do, the way you sitting there." So I walked out and the more I got to studying about it the madder I got. They were holding a section man meeting and I was out in the spinning room and Lee Durham come up behind me and I wheeled around and struck at him with that bald-faced machinist hammer. I went down there and told Ralph Ritchie, "Put somebody out there on my job, for I ain't got no business being in here; I'll hurt somebody." I asked Bunk Vickers to work the rest of the night in my place and he said he was sick. Well I started out the door crying and I told Boyd Stacy that if anybody wanted to know where I was, that I had gone home. I never did get home. Harley Anderson picked me up and brought me back over to the store to get some Alka-Seltzer. Joe Neel came up there and asked me what was wrong, and I told him just like it was; how I was out helping Davis grease the motors and what they done and then they called me down in the office and bawled me out there and wanted to know how come I would blow up like a bullfrog when I spoke to somebody, and I got mad enough to cry, and when I get that mad I'd have killed him if he'd a come around. Joe said, "Let's ride." So I got in the car with Joe and we rode up to Richard Stanfords old place. I told Joe I would go back down there and start that mill up for him—they had done stopped the whole spinning room off, spoolers were all standing, and said they weren't going back to work until I came back.

BEN BULLA:

Were you a section hand then?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah. I told him I would start that mill for him or Mr. Jordan

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but I just be damned I would start it up for Ritchie or Lynch either one. Joe said, "Well come on." We went by Cephas KNighten's to see if he would go and he wasn't at home. Joe carried me on over to the mill and stopped down at the lower gate and was going to let me out at the cotton shed. There stood Ritchie and Lynch down there all reared back and Joe told me not to get out there. He carried me on up to the silk room to get out. He told me to go on just like nothing had ever happened and walk over my job and do like I would do every morning or evening when I came in. "I'll be in there he said". I went in and when I came down the steps Hazel Roberson said, "Lord-God yonder's Doc." and when she did they all came in there. They wouldn't let me put up a end, wouldn't let me start a spinning frame. Joe came in there and threw his arms around my shoulders and he said, "Now you got it—you're as good a hand as ever walked in here—you've got it and you can run it if they'll let you alone." I told Joe that if either one of them two came in there and said anything to me I'se going to bust them in the head with a hammer, so help me God. I said, "I'm going to do it!" I went to start the old big motor up on the spooler and when I did, here came Ralph Ritchie and Lynch around the end of the spooler. Joe went up and grabbed them by the arm, turned them around and took them on out. He told them that if they went in there and he kills you, he'll pay for it, and he'll do it. Joe took them on out. I went in and those fellers wouldn't let me put up an end nor start a spinning frame up—they all got them all straightened out themselves.

I didn't know it at that time but Jake Miller was up there in the office talking to Mr. Jordan in New York over the telephone. Joe told me about it. The next evening, Lynch came walking in there and asked me, "What the hell was wrong with you yesterday?" I didn't say

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anything—I saw a Pepsi-Cola bottle sitting over on the end of the spinning frame and I walked over there and picked it up by the neck of it—Dee Herring walked up and told him, "If you don't get out of here and leave him alone, I'm going to bust your head wide open, and she made a swing at him with one of them big Chavis rollers, and Lynch went out the door. He didn't come back and bother me. I didn't know it at the time, but Jake was talking to Mr. Jordan and they fired Lynch and let him go. I worked on. Joe Neel came in there and told me that Lynch wouldn't be bothering me any more.

Another time I was doffing and I carried a box of yarn up to the winder room. Grady Foster was there and he told me to clean up this row and that row of frames and that three old Mason frames. I cleaned them up, and mopped under them—after I got them mopped, Hoagie Steel came up laughing and said, "Thank you for cleaning up my frames." I said, "No, I didn't clean your frames up, I cleaned Sellers Manufacturing Company's frames." Grady came by there and called me a damned liar about it, I made a dive after him and he grabbed me by the overall galluses and was going to drag me up the steps. He had his knife up in his shirt pocket, and I jerked his knife out and I said, "Grady, I have never cut a man in my life—I've been cut, I know it hurts—but if you don't take your hands off me I'm going to empty your entrals right here on top of me." "Oh, you won't" he said. I made a swish across there and just cut his shirt, and I said, "Now the next one is going to go deeper." He took his hands off me, and I walked on up where Mr. Bailey was sitting at the desk at the door. Grady says, "I fired him." I says, "Mr. Bailey, I quit at 5 minutes 'til eleven o'clock." He says, "do you want your time now?" I says, "No, I'll

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be around payday." I went up and sat down in front of the company store. Here came Mr. Jordan and he said, "Huh, what're you doing up here." I told him I wanted to talk it over, so we went into his office and I told him how it happened. He said for me to go down to the mill and tell Grady Foster to get up here on the double. I said that I'd be back and he said, "No. You get on that doffing box and go to doffing. Get back to work." So I went down and told Grady that Mr. Jordan wanted to see him on the double. He said, "Well, I'll go up there terrectly." I told him that he meant now, not tomorrow or this evening, that he wanted him right now! I was watching when he came out of Jordan's office—instead of coming to the mill he went to his house and went to packing. I says to myself, "Uh-oh, he's done fired him."

As I said earlier, they had me to ride the telephone line from Saxapahaw to Sweps. One day I was riding it and I went up a pole where the line crossed the road and Mr. Frank Love came by in his car. I had my belt hooked to the wire trying to pull it back. He stopped and I asked him for his belt. He gave it to me and I got to pulling on it and pulled it half in two. Finally I went and borrowed a rope and pulled the wire up there and fastened it. Frank went back to Saxapahaw without a belt.

[audio missing]

I would ride over to Sweps then call back to Miss Alice to see if it was all right.

One day I came in with the truck—Joe Neel—the reason I call him Joe is that one day I called him Mr. Neel and he said, "Don't you never call me Mr. Neel no more, call me plain old Joe. But that day he sent Dace Thompson down to tell me to ride the telephone line.

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Homer Duncan said that I wasn't going. Dace said, "What do you want me to do?" I said go tell Joe just exactly what he said and he did. I looked out the door and here come Joe down the hill slinging them arms walking as fast as he could and he walked up to Homer Duncan and told him, "Let me tell you one thing! that telephone is just as important as this mill running. That's where we get our orders, and you tell me he can't go on that telephone line? If this whole spinning room has to stop off he's going on that telephone line." So I went out there and threw a ladder on the truck and struck off towards Sweps. I fixed the telephone line and come on back. I was looking for Duncan to be fired when I came back but Joe had talked pretty rough to him about it. When Mr. Jordan came in he got on him about it; told him just how important a telephone line was. So from then on I rode that telephone line anytime they asked me.

BEN BULLA:

What would break the lines?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Somebody would shoot the insulators off them.

BEN BULLA:

Just to be mischevious?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah. I rode the telephone line until Southern Bell went to work on it. Homer didn't have much use for me after that. One day he was reaching to pull some cotton off the rollers and his thumb went clean back up through the rolls and he was a hollering, I was on the other side of the machine, but I thought he was just hollering and cutting-up. He finally jerked his hand out and when he did he jerked all the hide off his thumb. He says, "How come you didn't stop that spinning frame off?" I said, "You ought not to have been hollering, I don't holler." He went in and had it fixed and was walking around there with it wrapped up. Mr. Jordan came in there a day or two later and said, "Duncan don't you know them rollers will grab your thumb?"

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He said, "I do now." Mr. Jordan said, "Keep your thumbs out from up in there then." Mr. Jordan walked on down through the mill. He came in every Sunday walking around. I'd be blowing off the spooler—he could see more things undone, or hadn't been fixed than the man that supposed to be fixing things. He'd walk along—he showed me, he said, "You see that bolt laying right yonder? That bolt cost me a quarter, and there it is going in the sweepings. That man that buys the sweeps is getting rich off my nuts and bolts." He gave me down in the country about not picking them up and so I got so I picked them up.

Do you remember when the water got up over that bridge down there? Well, Joe Neel would come out on the end of the bridge and holler over at us standing on the other side. He'd say, "What about coming over here and helping us sweep some of this mud out of here. Grady Quakenbush was standing there and he said, "All right, I'll be right over." He jumped in that water, thought he could swim across, but when he came out he was down at the first creek. Joe sent John Smith over for a load of us. We swept that water and cleaned up there. Old Alson Davis—he was always whining through his nose—he said, " 'I God, durned if somebody ain't turned some water loose up the river."

Do you remember that?

BEN BULLA:

Yes the water was up over the railings on the bridge.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

We lived right across from the Methodist Chruch and they went in that church and put one bench on top of another and another one on top of that and put the piano on top to keep it from getting wet. I thought several times it was going to come up into the house, but we kept dry. But I had said one time that I would love to see hank clocks on them spinning frames—then whenever Mr. Taylor came there

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building that bridge, I said, "I'd like to see that water over that bridge. I was over at the house and couldn't get across and I said, "Water did get clean over that bridge and the bannister—just running level across." So whenever we went over there to help clean up, Mr. Jordan came down by there and says, "Ain't they wasting them brooms?" And I said, "They sure god are." They would walk down there with two brooms and out the door they'd go; brooms and all—stole them. They put me out on the spooler and I'd try my best to make the other man some money if I was going to try to get some myself. Before they sold I went to—I was talking to Miss Alice McLean and I told her they were throwing away stuff on that spooler down there that is a whole lot better than the stuff they are buying and putting in there now. Them little bearings in each end of the cheese cores—they would knock them out and put new ones in there, and they were just as rough as they could be. I was working with Cannon in Graham. I came down there one day and Frank Hanks was knocking them bearings out throwing them in the trash can; putting new ones in. I picked up two where he had just throwed in there and washed them off with varsol, put a little grease back in them—take your finger and roll them around and they were just as smooth. You take the new ones and put grease on them and they were rough. I told Miss Alice, "They are throwing away more money over there at Sellers Manufacturing Co.; the old stuff is wayyonder better than the new stuff they're putting in. And they went over the whole spooler now, and done that—knocked them all out and put new ones in.

BEN BULLA:

What was the trouble: Did they just need oiling up?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

No—what they'd do, they'd take them out—see they got nine

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spaces inside that cheese core and there is a bearing in each end. A little bearing just about as big as a half-dollar; the ball bearings in them are just about as big as BB shot or a little bigger. If one of them was running rough—you put your finger in there and if it was running rough, put a new one in, but if it was running around there smooth, it was just as good, if not better than the new ones that they were putting in there. They were rough. They stripped that whole spooler—and I told Harold Phillips what they were doing. They's send for me to come down there and fix the spooler—I'd go down and fix it—but they were taking and knocking these bearings out and throwing them away.

BEN BULLA:

Doc, let me ask you this. Did the employees in the mill criticize Mr. Jordan?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

No, people in that mill really loved Mr. Jordan. I never heard anybody at all criticize him.

BEN BULLA:

When you bought your house, did he help you finance it in any way?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

When I bought the house from him, he told Miss Alice to let me pay for it any way I wanted to—$5 a week. And that's the way I paid for it.

BEN BULLA:

Which house was that Doc?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

It was the house that Harley Anderson build over there across from Mot Lindleys. They sold it to J. B. Kemp, and he left and went to Siler City. Mr. Jordan seen me out there one morning and said, "I heard you wanted to buy that house over yonder." I said, "Yeah, I'd like to have it, but I ain't got no money to pay you down on it." He said, "I didn't say anything about paying anything down on it." He took me in the office and told Miss Alice, "The Plumber is buying that

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house over yonder. He can pay for it like he wants to." Paid $5 a week—I had a stack of check stubs that high. Then I turned around and sold it—or gave it away. That's when I left and went to Thomasville.

BEN BULLA:

How come you to leave Sellers?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Well I was offered more money. I worked over 35 years for Mr. Jordan and me and Mr. Tisdale didn't get along any too good. I would go in there and try to explain something to him—that's always been my motto; if I'm working on something or other and it's important then I'd explain it to either the overseer or the superintendent what I'm doing, and he wouldn't listen to me so I had a chance to take a job up in Thomasville with two spoolers and I took it.

BEN BULLA:

What year did you leave?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I don't know. And Tisdale kept writing for me to come back down here and I come back and stayed one year. I lived in the old Methodist parsonage one year. Doyle Deaton was over the first shift on the spoolers up there and I went up there and Sherman Laws was general manager of the mill and he wanted me to come up there. They had 92 spinning frames in one section. Mr. Laws told Mr. Edwards, "Take Ellington across the spinning room, the spoolers, the twisters and winders. He's good on any one you put him on . . . [tape runs out]

BEN BULLA:

[audio resumes]

Jackson asked you to build a wedge shaped bobbin?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah, big at the bottom and little at the top, and I told him I had never seen one built before in my life. I was tearing down a frame and putting new studs in; new bearings, so I built a bobbin—made the prettiest bobbin he said he had ever seen. When I got it done he told me to stay right there with that frame and when it

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doffs off you take it down there and lock it up in the office. So that's what I did. I didn't think about Mr. Jackson coming back to me and wanting me to do all the frames that way—so after they put that yarn on the spooler it run off as pretty as you ever seen—never broke nothing much. When I got all the frames set up the spooler would have to stand 4 hours twice a day. Four hours the first shift, full shift on second and stand another 4 hours on third on account of yarn. They'd run out. After I got all the frames set up the other section men on the other shifts would go to messin' with them. Anytime they would put another pick in or take a pick out of it, it would change the size of the bobbin. So I told Mr. Jackson I couldn't do it with all the others messing with them. They kept on until they had about a half-dozen frames back just exactly like they were before. Henderson was working on one of them and he put the chain on backwards and instead of the traverse going up it was going down; I just told Mr. Jackson—Woodall was over the spinning and he would write out a note and hand it to them—"take a little off the top and put it on the bottom," or "take a little off the bottom and put it on the top." First thing you know they had that spinning room messed up to where all the yarn messed up—wouldn't half run. I got it straightened out, and Mr. Jackson said, "Ellington I want you to go with me to Cedar Falls." I said, "all right." He carried me over there and he went in the office and talked to the overseers over there and he told them, "I've brought him over here to show y'all how he had built the bobbins over at Sellers and the yarn is running good over there. I didn't bring him over to take nobody's job, he's got a job over there. I want you all to watch him, he'll explain it to you." Well a fellow Chillroy was the first one over

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there that I seen. I knew him, and they told him to watch me and see what I was doing. Well I took the top bobbin [unclear] and went out to the shop, took the [unknown] wheel and went to grinding that hump out. Chilroy turned around and said, "Hunh! I know how to fix them frames like 'at." I didn't say nothing. He got up, went over there, stopped the frame off; half full of yarn, moving a sweep arm up and down them. He had one of the biggest messes you've ever seen over there. Jackson came over there and he seen what he had done, he went and got the superintendent, got him out there and showed it to him, and says, "Kilroy, are you fixing them frames over there?" He says, "Yes, it's easy to fix them like that. All you got to do is move your [unknown] arm up a little or down a little bit." Jackson told the superintendent that he had asked him to sit down and let Ellington explain it to him and he wouldn't do it, now he's got about twelve frames all messed up—yarn tangling, won't run off— well he got his tool box and got gone, so they sent a young boy over there. The boy sat down there and I explained it to him. Showed him how to take em out to the shop and grind them out and put it back. He fixed them and the yarn was running better over there. So when I left and went to Thomasville, KILROY WAS THE FIRST PERSON I SEEN!. He was in the spinning room. I walked down there where he was and got to talking to him, and I noticed him reaching in his mouth and dropping something or other down in there, and putting the spindle in there and taking a hammer and tapping it on there. I says, "Kilroy, what you doing?" He said he was plumbing spindles. He was putting B B shot in there. Now you can take a B B shot, if a spindle is wobbling, you can drop a B B shot down in that sharp point on the end of that spindle and tap that spindle on top and it will spread it out

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around the tip and it'll straighten up there just as pretty as you please and run—oh probably it'll run a month like that before it wears that lead out—then there they are again.

I told Mr. [unknown], if he's plumbing spindles, I'm making them. Mr. Moore says, "Why?" I says, "Well I tell you what you do—not that I would advise you to fire him or nothing—just talk to him. You stand right yonder at that frame and watch him." Mr. Laws saw what he was doing and he went over there and patted him on the back, and he swallowed all the shot he had in his mouth. Mr. Laws just talked to him about it—what it would do you know, and then he went up to the hardware store and bought these little biddy washers that go down in there—put them down in there and tap it and it would sink it right in that round part of the spindle. I caught up with him about that and I told Mr. Laws about it. Mr. Laws got rid of him right then. You know they had to go hire a crew of men that was spindle plumbers there in Gastonia to come down there and knock them shot and washers out of there and put new bolsters in and plumb them spindles.

. . . he was just as plain talking as he could be. I never heard him tell a dirty joke . . . he said he went into the mill there as a sweeper and worked his way up.

BEN BULLA:

Did he tell you how long he was a sweeper?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

No he didn't say how long.

BEN BULLA:

He didn't sweep very long.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

You take John. He was down in the shop one day and I was talking to him and he said that his daddy wanted him to work through the mill, but he said he had rather be out on the farm. I told him that he was doing him a favor—letting him work his way through. I told I had been in one ever since 1918 and I had learned a lot. When John was

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up in the blend, he had us all over there; Shine Collins, myself, Cicero and this other fellow, all over there showing us how to sew a tape on. Had Shine sew a tape on—John says, "Shine, that's crookeder than my dog's hind leg when it got broke." Well that was true. If you get a tape and you get it sort of crooked, it's going to run crooked-wobble and wear out the spindle a heap quicker. So he had us all sew a tape on. You have to take your time; you go down this edge and across, back down here then across here then you go up and down about twice through the center—hold the tape as straight as you can. If it puckers a little bit it'll do the same thing, but if you sew one on there straight, that tape will outlast three of the crooked ones.

BEN BULLA:

Could John sew a straight tape?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah, John could sew one—he'd take his time sewing it. It's like I told John, "You can't sit down there and just fly with it—got to sew it"—then they went to bonding them then.

BEN BULLA:

What did the folks in the mill think about John?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Well John was all right. I've heard a few of them say that they thought he was lazy and didn't want to work in the mill, but John was different from that. John was all right.

BEN BULLA:

I never thought John was lazy.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I always got along all right with John. My wife cooked an applenut cake one time, and John would come up there where we were all eating. He'd come up there with a pack of crackers and a glass of water or a drink and sit down and eat. I had this piece of cake over there and John took his knife out and cut it half in two and ate it, he says, "You know that's good. I'll tell you; I'm going to eat this other piece 'cause you got some at home." And he ate it. He was

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all time picking at me—John was—but he would sit down and eat with us up there. Sometime we'd have some ham biscuits and he'd eat them, but everytime he'd come up there with a pack of crackers and a glass of water or something or other. Me and John always got along all right.

BEN BULLA:

Did John learn the mill business pretty well down there?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah he did.

One Sunday when he was just a young 'un he had on some knee pants—I lived across the river there and I was coming across and John was down there on the island in a mudhole knee deep, catching tadpoles. Mrs. JOrdan had done dressed him to go to church. I had done gone on over to the end of the bridge and here comes Mrs. Jordan. She says, "Doc, have you seen John?" I started not to tell on him, but I told her where he was. She went over there and John was catching them tadpoles to carry up to the fishpond they had up there behind their house. Well when she got over there she tadpoled him! She gave him a whuppin' and here he come across that bridge and her right after him. When she got him home she changed his clothes and back to that church he went. John never did know that I told on him.

BEN BULLA:

What did you think of Mr. Jordan as a Senator?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

He was all right, he was a good one. I figure he made good at it.

BEN BULLA:

Did you ever work on the dam with him any?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah. Me and Bill Bynum was sitting up there on Sunday morning at that old head gate. We had been to the beach and Alson Davis . . . [tape runs out]

BEN BULLA:

. . . Doc, you were saying about Mr. Jordan?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I asked him if he was going to put flood gates in that dam and he said, "Hunh! flood gates ain't no good in a dam." Mrs. Jordan spoke up and says, "Everett if you don't put flood gates in there

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you'll just have a nice little lake of water." And shore enough it filled up. It filled up to where Peewee Crawford, as little as he is, could walk from that wheelhouse side out to that island out there. He'd be in water up to here and in mud knee deep he said.

And they were going to take the old wooden dam out—tear it out. They put dynamite under it and it just riz up and came right back down in the same place. The old dam is still in there right in front of the other one. The pond is full of mud now. They could have had a lot of water there if they had put flood gates in it, because when that river gets up and they'd a raised them flood gates it would have cut a channel. He had oh ten or twelve holes left in there and I thought he was going to put flood gates in them, but he had them filled up with concrete. If he had just put them gates in there and when that flood came, opened them up it would have washed that mud out of there all the way up to no telling how far it would have cut it and pulled it out of there.

BEN BULLA:

Yes, that was a mistake.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

You were talking about me doing plumbing work down there? Yeah I used to do a lot of plumbing down there.

BEN BULLA:

Did Mr. Jordan want you to do a good job, or just patch it up?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Oh I'd do a good job. He didn't want no patch ups.

Dad Baber's wife came out there to the store and said, "Dad, the oil's out of my stove, ain't no oil going in it." I was standing there and he asked me to go check it for him. I went out there to check it. I opened the door and stuck my hand down in there and oil was about that deep in the thing. Mrs. Baber said, "You're going to dip that out aren't you?" And I said, "Yes mam." I looked around and I seen a kleenex and I took a match, lit it and throwed it down

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in the stove and that old stove said, "Whooof! WHOOOOF" jumping up and down in there. She come in there and said, "I thought you were going to dip it out." I says, "I'm dipping it out now!" Here come Mr. Jordan running in the door and said, "Doc, you know you're going to burn this house up, the blaze is more than two feet above the chimney." I said, "Aw Mr. JOrdan, I'm just burning the chimney out." So he turned around and went on back out to the office and I just let it burn down and turned it on.

BEN BULLA:

That was Dad Baber's house?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yes. I did go out there and sure enough the blaze was two feet out of the chimney. At that time I lived in one of them six room houses, the second house were you turn to go to Woody's. I was living in one side and [unknown] Petty was living in the other. I went up in the attic, I thought it was awfully sooty up there, and I got to looking around and there was a hole about that big where the brick masons had left in the chimney right above the joists. I told Mr. Jordan about it and he said, "Hunh! I've got insurance on the house, have you got any insurance on your furniture?" I said, "Naw, but just as soon as I can get to town I'll have some on it." He never did have it fixed. Naw sir he never would have it fixed.

Ben, in all the time I worked down at that mill, I've never known it to stand because of lack of orders but three days. He went on three days for about a week or two weeks and then he went out and came back and started up on full blast.

BEN BULLA:

Was that dur ing the depression?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah, during the depression.

BEN BULLA:

How long did you stay on three days?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Two days one week and three days the next then the next week

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week they started it up full blast and run from then on. They didn't stand the whole two weeks.

BEN BULLA:

Right in the middle of the depression?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah.

He would have these suppers. Adrian Jobe was over there, and Mrs. Jordan—a bunch of old timers—and he got up and made his talk and asked Mr. Jobe if he had something he wanted to say. Well they had just been discussing how so many people came and went so much. Move in and then move on. In and out; in and out—and so when Adrian got up there Mrs. Jordan asked him—she said, "why are the people going and coming so, then they'd stop all at once—not leaving." So Jobe said, "Well they got so poor thay can't leave." Mrs. Jordan made him get back up there and apologize to the whole bunch.

BEN BULLA:

Did he apologize?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah he apologized.

During that depression he paid off with ducats—pasteboard money. We'd go to town and go to the show on it, buy gas on it—Old man Williams over here in the country sold liquor. Hugh Allen and a bunch of them was down there—Harley and his daddy and a bunch drinking all the time. They would come to the store and get some ducats and go over there. He had a #2 tin tub sitting in the floor and he told them to just throw their pasteboard money in that tub and he would get the liquor for them. He brought that whole tub of ducats over here and wanted Mrs. Williams to cash them in. She told him he would have to trade them out. He told her it would take him his lifetime to trade them out. I had one of them ducats and I gave it to Hal Dean.

When I'd borrow money they'd take it out of my time there in the office. One time Wallace Bowman saw me and he said, "Doc, do you know

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you've got some money here in the office?" I told him no I didn't. He said I had some in there that had done cankered. He came out there and gave me this silver and an envelope that had a ten dollar bill in it. Miss Alice says, "You just don't care anything about your money do you." I told her that if I had had $10 of hers as long as she had had that of mine I would have done spent it for something or other.

BEN BULLA:

How come you to have money in the office?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

I guess I had signed enough ducats to take care of it. Money left over at the store.

Ben, I'll tell you—a bunch of us—Raymond Hall, J. W. Petty and Lee Petty, Wayne Woody—we'd come down there on Saturdays, I'd fill up my gas tank and we'd start out. I was furnishing it all. I'd go in there and borrown money from Miss Connie or Dad one or I'd sign ducats and they'd give me cash for them; and so I just blowed it in.

BEN BULLA:

Was that before you were married?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yes. I just blowed it in—I just had a habit—a bad habit—every time I'd see Mr. Jordan I would ask him to loan me some money, and he'd pull it out and hand it to me, or if he was down there he'd go and say, "Miss Alice, let the plumber have some money." I was fixing to go to Washington, D. C. with my wife and her sister. I was sitting out there on the steps and Mr. Jordan came out of the house and I asked him to loan me $50. "Hunh! what do you want with $50." I told him I wanted to go to Washington. He said I didn't have any business in Washington. I said, "I want to go up there and see the President." "Or I may get married while I'm up there." He said I didn't need no $50 then. I stood there a few minutes and he went into his office then he stuck his head out and said, "Come here Plumber." He told Alice to let me have $50. Said I could pay it back a dollar a week. I could borrow

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money from him anywhere, anytime. He was always good to me. He was good to his help. He run that mill all during the depression and he looked after his help. I heard him tell old man Tom Bailey—he was an overseer-"you know one thing, I can get . . . [tape runs out]

BEN BULLA:

But he was a hard worker himself, as you know.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Yeah he was good to the help. He had good help down there. One time, Harley Anderson and his daddy, Rack Robinson and two or three others would always get drunk over the weekend and wouldn't be able to work on Monday. Sherman Laws was the overseer and he talked to Mr. Jordan about it, and Mr. Jordan told him to clean it up. Well when next Monday morning came there was about five of them out—wouldn't work. When they came in, Mr. Laws fired them. They went up there and sat down in front of the store. Mr. Jordan came out of his house, came by there and saw them all sitting there. Then, just like he told me, "Hunh! what you all doing sitting up here?" They told him that Mr. Laws had fired them. He told them to get back down there on the job and go to work.

BEN BULLA:

Did he ask why they had been fired?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

He knew why they had been fired because Laws had told him about them being out on weekend drunks and he had told him to clean it up, but Mr. Jordan just decided he was getting rid of some of his good help you know. Part of them had come here right after he did. He wasn't going to stand for it.

BEN BULLA:

I never knew Harley drank; he must have quit before I came around.

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Oh good night alive! Harley used to get drunk—he was drinking one time and my brother-in law and my sister Ada came to see us and they had a Ford Roadster and my brother-in-law was riding around in it and Harley seen him and didn't know who he was and Harley came up

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there raising sand and he was going to "whup 'im" and he was going to do this and he was going to do that. I told him the best thing he could do would be to shut his mouth and go down through these woods and go home, that he' us my brother-in-law.

BEN BULLA:

Doc you mentioned that people came and went so much in Saxapahaw; why did they come and go so much?

THOMAS R. ELLINGTON:

Well, I'll tell you; they wouldn't work nowhere else, there's a grade of people that just won't work. They'd come down there and think they ought to be making a way yonder more than what they were making—wouldn't work half the time, and they got to going on about not making enough money to live off of—make more elsewhere, and they'd pick up and go somehwere else.

Just like me—Now I started to working down there for $9.60 a week and when I went to running a section I got up to $2.90 something an hour. When I left Saxapahaw and went to Thomasville I went on second shift on two spoolers. All I had to do was just small things because Doyle Deaton was over the whole works and he was supposed to do all the fixing and everything. I was making anywhere from nine, ten to fifteen thousand dollars a year; but I was running two jobs. I'd run the spooler 8 hours the first shift then go over in the spinning room and plumb spindles—two jobs, and that's the reason I made so much—then I'd pull double shifts and so forth. The reason I came back down here for one year was that Tisdale just kept a writing and writing wanting me to come back.

Well my wife was in bad health and Dave Nolf was boss man in the winding. He came up there to me and wanted to send my wife home to rest on account of her health. I says, "Dave, she's working for

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you, and if she's not a working satisfactorily for you, send her home; but if you do I'll get the blame for it." Dave went down and told her that I said to send her home. Well when I got home, lord-god I got bawled out for fair about it— [Laughter] "you ain't got that on there have you?"

BEN BULLA:

turns off recorder.