Church provided mill workers an opportunity for socializing
Faucette discusses the role of the church in a mill town, where almost any denomination could practice their faith. Church served as a social and entertainment avenue for workers.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Ethel Marshall Faucette, November 16, 1978, and January 4, 1979. Interview H-0020. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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What about different kinds of religion. You all had two or three churches right here, didn't you?
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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Didn't have but one.
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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This one that was. . . .
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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This one where it's felled down.
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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There was one up on the hill.
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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Yeah, there is now but there wasn't back then. Let's see, that one has been organized, I forget how long it's been organized, but it's been organized a long time up here.
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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Did a lot of people go to different churches, or did most everybody go to the same one?
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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No, most everybody here on the hill went to this little church down here. It was a union church and any preachers could preach there except the Mormons.
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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I see. It wasn't a particular denomination.
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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No, any preachers. So we had a Baptist church down here and a Methodist church that was in that same building. One had their meeting on the morning and one in the afternoon. And then the Baptists decided that if Bob Holt would give them the land to build on up yonder, why they would build. So he did, he give 'em the land,
give 'em a deed. And the Baptists built up there on the hill. And then the Methodists wanted to buy this little church down here, and the land, and build a Methodist church down there. And Walter Green told 'em he'd love to give 'em the land, but says he can't give 'em no deed for it. So that's why they didn't build down here. They went up in Green Acres and built.
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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And you say that's because the deed is kind of tangled up?
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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Deed is willed back to the old generation-is what they tell me, now I don't know. I never have see'd it, I'd have to see the deed if I know'd, but I don't know. But they say it's willed back to the Holt generation.
- ALLEN TULLOS:
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Did most of the people here go to one of the church services?
- ETHEL MARSHALL FAUCETTE:
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Yeah, some of 'em went to both. (chuckle) Go to one in the morning, one of the evening. Ain't nothing out here but to go to church. And you was reared to go to church.