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Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview H-0133, in
the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical
Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill”
Flake and Nellie Workman Meyers were both born around the turn of the twentieth century. Born into a family of farmers and furniture makers, Flake first began to work at the age of sixteen, around 1913, in High Point, North Carolina, in order to help support his family. Flake worked at several furniture manufacturing companies during his career, spending most of his time at the Southern Desk Company. After working several years learning different jobs in the furniture factories, Flake became a foreman in the early 1920s. He describes in vivid detail what it was like to work in the furniture industry, paying special attention to techniques used to make furniture, the role of machinery in the workplace, and relationships between employees and employers. Nellie Workman also grew up in rural North Carolina in a large family. As the oldest daughter, Nellie spent a great deal of time helping her mother raise her nine siblings and tend house. Before her marriage to Flake Meyers in 1922, Nellie worked briefly in the cotton mills in Vale, North Carolina. Flake Meyers's job as foreman in the Southern Desk Company in Conover, North Carolina, where the couple eventually settled, provided sufficient economic means for Nellie to stay home and raise their children without having to work outside of the home. Together, the stories they tell reveal the nature of living and working in a southern working community during the early twentieth century.
Flake and Nellie Meyers describe what it was like to live and work in and around Conover, North Carolina, during the early to mid-twentieth century. As a worker in various furniture companies and as the foreman at the Southern Desk Company, Flake Meyers describes in vivid detail the various kinds of skills involved in furniture making, the role of machinery in the industry, and workplace relationships. Nellie Meyers similarly describes the kinds of family labor systems and social customs that shaped their lives.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
. . .where you were born?
I was born in Rowan County, Salisbury. We lived there until I was three years old, and then we moved up to Iredell County near Mooresville. Then from there we moved up here in Catawba County. Been living here ever since. Lived over in Vale section till 1961 we came over here, wasn't it?
We have three homes. Just out there are the homes we built.
Decided to sell out and move closer to town. I drove back and forth to work for years. It was in the . . .
Country?
Yes, we did. I'm a country boy.
It was two or three miles you walked through the snow every winter to meet your relatives.
Couldn't get gas, you know, way back in there much, and we'd pool rides.
You would go through the snow about three miles to get to the ride.
Were your parents farmers?
Yes, they was farmers. And he made furniture; there's where I got into it. He had a little furniture shop out in the country. He made all kinds of furniture, chairs and what they called kitchen safes back then. Those cupboards; there was tin up the doors with those little holes punched in.
Pie safes.
Called kitchen cupboards. He made lots of them, and then he made a few coffins. They didn't call them caskets back then; coffins, you know, back in them days.
Where did he learn how to do that?
That's the reason I learned how to make furniture; my father trained me up. We'd go in the woods and cut our timber and haul it in and dry it and make it into furniture. That was when I was at High Point.
How did he learn how to do that?
From his father. His father made old wooden clocks. They was interesting.
This was a family skill handed down?
Yes, that's right.
I hadn't talked to anybody before that was like that.
My grandfather was a clockmaker.
Was he from Germany, perhaps?
Yes, his folks were German, but he was born and raised here in the United States. His father was from Germany, and his grandmothers were Dutch.
Why did you decide to leave home and go to High Point?
We was kind of poor folks, and we couldn't kind of make ends meet. My
grandfather lived at High Point, and so I stayed with them and worked
over there. And I worked there for several years, and I came back to
Hickory and worked at Hickory and boarded over there at Hickory. My
folks lived out there in the Vale section, and I'd go home about every
month [unclear]
When you first went to High Point, what plant did you work in there?
The Alma Furniture Company. Then I left there and went to the Columbia Furniture Company.
What was your first job?
My first job was running a tenon machine.
Can you describe that to me?
Like this here, if this post is mortised out, you know, holes cut in
there, and then you cut a tenon to fit it in there and put glue on it
So a tenon machine would drill a hole in it?
The post had a mortise in it. Then you'd cut a tenon on it to put in that mortise there, and that'd hold it together, you see. I've got a little shop down yonder I make furniture. I ought to bring that table in here and show it to you, but. . .
We can go out and look at it then after.
I don't have much down there.
He don't have many tools to work with.
Then I went to Hickory Chair Company. I run a shaper over there, shape up that post. Throw them out like this. Then from that I run a cutoff saw. Then when I went to Conover, I done a little of everything all over the shop. I was kind of the main man around there. And we made school desks, and we made kitchen safes there. They made them by the hundreds there. And hickory sticks for cotton mills, and all kinds of cotton mill supplies. And chicken coops.
Yes, I had heard all that.
I done a little of everything. Then the plant growed; it got a lot of big machinery in there, and they put me as assistant foreman there for quite a while. Then finally they sold out and went to Hickory. Worked there at Conover for years.
Yes, they had sold out to Broyhill.
Yes, that's right.
When you were working at High Point, how did you learn to do that first job?
Well, it wasn't hard for me to do it. The foremanwent in and showed me
how, and I went ahead and done it. I couldn't set it up too good
So you didn't have any kind of training period.
No, I just learnt the hard way.
Just while you were working.
He worked with a lot of machinery, but didn't get hurt on it.
That's amazing.
Yes, that's right. I've got all of my fingers. How much do you think I made a day there, ten hours?
I don't know.
A dollar and a thin dime a day.
What year was this when you first went to High Point?
1913.
How old were you then?
Sixteen.
Did you go with anybody over there to High Point?
No, I just stayed with my grandfather and grandmother.
Walked to work.
Did they work at the furniture plants there?
No. He was kind of a wealthy fellow. He had lots of houses he rented out. Of course, he didn't get too much out of it, but he didn't work for them.
This isn't the grandfather that was the clockmaker.
Yes, he made the clocks.
He made the baskets, too, didn't he?
Yes, I worked in a basket factory over there, tobacco warehouse baskets, and I nailed them together.
Was this while you were in High Point?
Yes. A lot of times on Saturday I wouldn't be working at the furniture plant, and I went with him to make these basket things.
Would your father sell the furniture he made just to local people?
Oh, yes, he would have to write his orders down, he had so many come in.
Were most of the people from around that area?
All around in the country, neighbors, good friends. They'd come from a distance when they found out he made furniture. He sold quite a lot of it.
So you didn't have any trouble finding a job when you got to High Point?
No. My grandfather went with me, and I remember he said, "Could you give my son-in-law [grandson] a job? He's a young boy, and he's trying to start out and would like to have a job." "Yes, we'll try him. Bring him in." So the next day I went in and went to work. A dollar and a dime a day.
Gosh. How long did you stay there in High Point?
About two years and a half.
And then you came to Hickory?
I come to Hickory.
Why did you decide to come to Hickory?
I got tired of High Point. I wanted to come home and be at home with my folks.
Was there a difference in the towns?
Yes, a lot. That's a large town, High Point is, but Hickory back in . . .
Hickory wasn't very big then.
No, not at first. And I knew quite a few people in Hickory, and I decided
to come on home.
So you first went to Hickory Manufacturing?
Hickory Chair.
Why did you go to that particular plant?
I just don't know. I was out job hunting and happened to start there first, and they give me the job.
Do you remember a man there, Ralph Bowman?
Oh, yes, sure. He was the superintendent there a while, wasn't he?
Yes.
That was after I quit there. Bratt [unclear]
I don't know Bratt Hall, but I've talked to Mr. Bowman.
Bowman was the assistant, I think, when I was there.
Were they good bosses?
Oh, law, yes. They were real good. But you didn't get no breaks like you do now. I worked ten hours a day and had to work right on through. They didn't want you to even have a sandwich or anything with you.
You had to really work hard.
Yes, you bet you did.
You had to work all ten hours you were there.
Yes. Get an hour for lunch, but go right back. You had to
You had to punch out for lunch.
Yes, when you'd go back in. Ten hours. It seemed I got two dollars and a
half there a day.
What were you doing then?
I run the shaper, band saw, boring machine to bore holes. Like for a pin to. . . .
Like for a dowel.
Yes, like for dowel pins. They'd drive dowel pins, and that'd hold a dowel together. If you didn't have this mortised, you see, you'd drill holes in there. Drill holes in this rail, and put about two dowels in there, and the dowels would go into the post there. And that's the way we'd put it together with the chairs.
Rather than nailing them together.
After I quit there, I went to the table factory before I went to Conover. It was called Highland Furniture then. I run a big planer down there. Then I kind of got mad at the foreman there, this Henry Clay, so I went down to Conover and worked there.
Why did you go from Hickory Chair over to the table place?
They offered me more money. I knew the superintendent. I was getting two and a half up there at Hickory Chair, and they started me in at three dollars a day at the table factory.
How many years had you been working for Hickory Chair?
Three. I worked at the table factory about a year and a half.
You worked a little at the Century [unclear]
Yes, I went over had helped them start up, but I didn't like the place.
They had a big automatic shaper, a double head, and I run it for six
weeks. They offered me a good price if I'd take it up, and Southern Desk
down there
What was it about that one machine that you didn't like, the big shapers?
That automatic?
What would be the difference between a boss like that and somebody that you did like to work for?
Well, when you go in, and it seems like you can't please him, and you just think, "I'm not going to stay here; I'm going where they'll treat me better."
They appreciate you.
Yes. Where they appreciate you. Well, they would let me stay on there.
told them I was going back to Southern Desk, which they gave me more
money to come back. [Interruption]
So you went from the table place, where you were running that big shaper?
No, that was the big planer at the table factory. I run that about a year and a half. And then I heard about Conover, and so I went down there and stayed a couple of years.
How did you hear?
Different ones were telling me about it. I knew some sanders
What would they say about it?
They'd say, "Meyers, why don't you go down to Conover? They have mighty good foremen down there, and I think you'd enjoy working for them. They pay pretty good. Why don't you try it?"
So there were people living in Hickory working in Conover?
Yes, quite a few of us. And she had a brother who worked down there, and
we was living out in the Vale section at that time. That was too far to
drive back and forth
What was your brother's name?
Logan Workman.
So you were a Workman.
Yes. Did you know Scott Workman?
I've interviewed him, too.
He worked up in High Point [unclear]
He was my baby brother. There was ten children of us.
I've talked to most of your brothers then, because I've talked to Lee Workman and Scott Workman and Memory Workman.
Memory died here a few months ago.
Yes. This was two years ago.
I got all them brothers jobs. I started first and got all them brothers jobs. Let's see, Lee and Memory and Scott and Zeb and Jake. In fact, there were five who got jobs there.
Gosh, that little place. If you'd gotten rid of the Workmans, they would have had to close the place down.
We moved over to Conover eventually.
How did you all meet? Were you from Vale?
They moved up there about two miles from where I lived. We'd see one
another back and forth, and so we got acquainted, and it was from then
on.
When you all first got married, did you have your own house or did you move in with parents?
He'd bought an old log house.
It was on a little old farm, a twelve-acre farm.
And it had a little log house on it, and it was plastered all inside. And
we'd take newspapers and decorate it all inside with it, and then we'd
put the pictures out of magazines around to make it pretty. And so when
it would rain, we'd have to get up of a night and move our bed around
and around out of the rain.
A cook stove.
Then he went to the store and got some little pots and pans, and we started that way. We didn't have nothing. I did have a bed and some bedding.
That you got from home.
No, I made myself. . . . I had about eight or ten quilts made when I was twelve years old. I love to do that.
I made the dining table and
This was an old tobacco barn?
No, it was an old. . . . It weren't used for anything. I
Okay, we'll see it.
In fact, we lived with her folks for awhile.
You did?
Yes, we was all real close.
And then we did have to move around the house.
So you all lived out there until you moved into Conover?
Yes. Moved to Conover. I don't know just how many years ago, though.
About forty years at the least.
And we lived up above the hardware store.
You were boarding in town during the school years?
Yes.
So you didn't have to catch a ride.
That's right.
Well, the money went a lot further then, I guess.
Yeah, four and a half a week.
When you were working for Conover, how many hours a day would you work?
Ten. I got to be assistant foreman there. I had to put in a lot more
hours, though.
He had mentioned that you were some kind of foreman.
And I run a lot of the machines there; I run a tenon machine and a ripsaw
and
As assistant foreman, what would you do then, extra?
Had to do a lot of machine setting up. Set up the machines and see that the stuff went through right. The right amount and all that.
But during all of this time, you
That's right. Go in and set it up and see that the men had a job they were working on. That's nerve-racking.
If you didn't get your stuff out right or get it on time. The superintendent would come around: "Why is this behind here? Meyers, you'd better get busy and get it on out." That was about the hardest thing.
To get the people to get going.
"Get this man on it over here.. He's standing there. I would get him to
work."
Who was the superintendent at that time?
Bill Roberts. He's passed away a couple years ago, I think. If you didn't happen to know, Ralph Simmons was the one in Conover.
Yes, as a matter of fact, I have interviewed Ralph Simmons.
Ralph Simmons was my foreman when I first went down there. We made school desks.
Yes, and Frank Gilbert.
He's dead. Ralph is living, isn't he?
He was last year when I talked to him.
He's in bad shape, heart.
I knew that Mr. Simmons knew a lot about machines. Did he teach you some of your jobs?
Oh, he sure did. He was a real good saw filer. He kept all the saws sharpened up. He'd sharpen saws and band saws, and he was real good at it. He learnt me a lot. But they quit the school desks and put me up as a foreman. And then the new superintendents come in there, and we finally went to Newton Furniture Company. I left Conover and went to Newton. And the new management over there put me in as as assistant foreman.
What was the management change? Did Mr. Brady die or what?
No, it got so it wasn't making very much money. It kind of went in the
hole, and they had gotten way in debt, and they sold out to Broyhill.
So Mr. Brady was still living during that time?
Oh, yes.
But he wasn't in charge of it.
No. His son-in-law had taken over, and he really wasn't too good at it.
That's what I heard. His name is Bill Barker?
Yes, but that's what ruined the place. If he hadn't come there, probably the place would be running yet. Mr. Brady ran a sharp outfit.
What kinds of things did Mr. Barker do? Did he just not know that much about the furniture industry, or what?
He had a good college education, but he didn't know beans about furniture. He tried to change everything from what Mr. Brady did.
I believe Mr. Brady had a partner, one of the Shufords in town?
Yes, Maynard Shuford. Maynard run the glove will down there, Warlong
Glove,
What was the name of that glove mill? Was it Warlong?
Yes, Warlong.
Did a lot of the wives of the people that worked here at the plant work at the glove mill?
Yes, they did. Lots of them. She never did get to go up there.
Did you ever do any public work?
I worked in the cotton mill.
When was this?
That was in 1919, right after World War I.
Were you married then?
No.
Where did you work?
At the Clyde Mill in Newton. Knitting all these socks. They've got
something else over there now; it's not
Were you still living up in Vale?
Yes. Mr. Will Stanley was the boss there at this mill. Back then hands was scarce. A lot of them was in service. So he found out that Dad had a big family, and he came over and got us to move over there.
Did your whole family move?
Yes. We was there three years. Then Dad got tired of it,
What kind of job did you do?
I run a spooler. You wouldn't know what it was.
I sort of know. I've been in a mill a couple of times.
You had a cone thing, you know. You'd hold a spool down, and there's your thread and you held your hand like that and tied the threads. From a bobbin to the spool.
And it rewound it?
On a spool about that tall. And I enjoyed it, because I like working. It was very good pay; it was very hard.
When your whole family went there, did your father go to work, too?
Oh, yes.
And your mother?
No, she had to cook for all of us. And do all the washing for us. She had it hard.
How many kids did you have in your family?
There were three girls and seven boys.
You could almost run one shift with that crew.
Yes.
But your father didn't like the work too much.
Mr. Stanley gave him an easy job. He was getting pretty old. It was 1919.
He used to run a blacksmith's shop.
Oh, yes, my dad did. He made wheat cradles. It had six fingers to it in
the side, built all together, and them six fingers would come around and
catch the wheat straw and throw it all in bundles, and then
Would your father make these himself?
Oh, yes. And then he'd run a blacksmith's shop, too, and make wagons and all different things like that. And he would always call on me to run the bellows, a little fire to heat things. Had a big bellows. It was fun.
Did you like helping him?
Oh, yes.
It was better than working out in the fields.
Yes. Oh, that was real hard.
Yes.
That's the way it is
Yes, that's right. They have more to do than the rest of them. Then I worked some in Lincolnton. Had to to help feed the rest of the family. Dad didn't make much in the blacksmith's shop.
Would you board in Lincolnton, or ride?
Yes, with my aunt. There wasn't but just a few cars then.
I'm trying to keep track of everything. I want to get both of you all's stories. How old were you when you first went to work?
About fifteen years old I quit schooling. I had to to help the family. I
just quit school and went to work and give him my wages to help raise up
the children.
The oldest girl.
Did your older brothers go out and find any jobs, too?
The second brother did.
Where did he work?
With me.
Gastonia? And you all went to Gastonia?
We boarded down there.
How old were you all when you all got married?
I was twenty-two, and he was twenty-three.
Was that old back then to get married?
No.
Back then they didn't get married quite as young as they do now. Isn't that right, Nellie?
Well, I just didn't see nobody that I thought I'd love enough.
Have you worked since you've been married?
No. I've done the housework. Tend the farm.
So you didn't ever work after you were married.
Let me get back to your work over there in Conover. What year did you leave to go up to Hickory?
Was that when the plant set up?
Yes.
Did you have any people that you knew at Southern Desk?
No, I didn't, but I had some friends who worked there.
A lot of your friends were going?
Not a lot, but some.
Did you just go up to the plant and ask for a job?
Yes. I went there on Friday afternoon, and the foreman said, "Come in on
Monday morning." "I'm from over in Conover," I told him. And I told him
what-all I could do, and He says, "I've got a tenon machine sitting over
here waiting on someone. It'll be a few days before it can be fixed, but
I'll give you a job around here before I get it started." [unclear]
Did you work with a tenon machine the whole time you were there at Southern Desk?
No, I looked after it. I run it for about two or three years. Then he put
me as a setup man with an automatic shaper, getting things around there
set up for the men. They had a panel sizer, and that was about the
biggest job I had, keeping it set up, and keep the stuff moving in and
out and stacked.
Did any of the men that ran the machines set up their own machines?
Yes, they could set up. Nothing very particular about it. I'd have to
okay most of it. Just the ordinary stuff I would, but anything
particular, I had to do it. [unclear]
I guess the setup man would be a pretty skilled job.
Yes, it was.
What is involved in setting up a machine?
You've got to know just what to do to it. A paper would spell it out,
tell exactly what to do to each piece, and how to cut it on a forty-five
angle. Cut tenons on it or whatnot. Or maybe a tenon
Then you was making most of the church pews.
Stuff for classrooms and dormitory stuff, I guess.
Church furniture, pews and pulpits and . . .
So they made institutional furniture rather than stuff for home use.
That's right.
Did that plant ever change hands at Southern Desk?
Yes, Drexel taken it over.
What year was that?
1959, I believe.
Was there a difference when a big corporation like Drexel took over?
Drexel owns several plants. There's one big Drexel in Lenoir, and then in Drexel.
What kind of changes would they bring in?
Very few. They were generally making the same furniture.
Would they bring in their own supervisors?
No, they left the ones there. It was the same supervisors, the same president.
The same president in?
Yes, that's right.
So I guess just the ownership changed.
That's right.
Who owned Southern Desk?
The Iveys. Mr. George Ivey and Leon and Elbert, his two sons. There was three sons. Mr. George Ivey was the founder of it. He had a big sawmill there. That's where it started out in. People would bring hickory logs in, and they'd saw them. They'd start sawing in the fall of the year about September and saw till way up in the summer, say in June.
They'd haul it in carloads and truckloads and things. They made picker sticks for the cotton mill. Dowel pins. You know what a dowel pin is; I was showing you a while ago. They run a dowel pin factory up there yet.
So he started out doing that.
That's right.
And then built the Southern Desk.
Yes, built the church furniture. All kinds of college and school
supplies, school desks. Like I say, he didn't make any household
Do you remember during the times of the Depression and what happened?
I sure do. I was at Conover then.
How long would you go without work at times?
I was really fortunate. They was making samples, and the bossman and I
and one or two more men got to work. We worked the whole time, making
samples, trying to get something started. Maybe the men would work two
or three days a week, then maybe'd be off a couple weeks, or even
months, at a time.
What did the other people do, who weren't as lucky as that and could only come in and work for a couple of days?
They'd run the whole plant when they'd come in there like that.
When they'd get an order?
Yes. They'd have a few orders and work it out. Maybe one man would bring
in the lumber, and another would cut it up in the cutoff saw, and then a
couple would rip it up and band-saw it and run
Right. Was it a drum sander?
No, that's a
You don't even have to use any muscle.
Yes. A drum sander, you've got to hold it on the drum.
A machine sander and drum sander.
I believe you know a lot about . . .
I know a little bit. But I'm out here talking to a lot of people. I learn it round-about. I feel like I ought to know enough to go in there and just turn the switch on.
Do a little bit.
Have you ever visited one of the plants?
I've been through the Bassett plant over in Newton. I know Hoyt Lewis over there; he's the superintendent. He took me through two years ago. They've made a lot of changes there since.
Pretty interesting to anybody that cares anything about looking at it.
Yes, it is.
We'd have lots of people visiting, like the schoolteachers would bring the children in from the schools, take them all around and show them everything, how they worked.
Was this at Southern Desk?
Yes. Mr. Ivey would come in
What was Mr. Ivey like as a person to work for?
Oh, he was real good. If he'd see you make a mistake, he'd say, "Hee!
Yah! I want you to do that right now." And he'd show you how. He'd
really call you down. If you were maybe running one piece, "Can't you
run two pieces?"
Did he know a lot about the stuff?
Oh, law, you don't know. He really did know. If he'd see you doing
something wrong, he'd tell you in a minute.
Oh, goodness.
Well, when he was coming through,
Speaking of making church pews and all, we made opera chairs, too, theater furniture. And folding chairs. A lot of them little plain chairs, and some of them would be padded. They'd really look nice.
So you did a little upholstering there, too, at Southern Desk.
Yes. And then we made all kinds of. . . . During the War, a plant like that had to make a lot of material for the War, and we made a lot of stakes. And I just can't think of what-all we did make. Something about a boat. I forget what they call them now, to fasten the ropes. I know I done it on the automatic shaper, cut out just little blocks and shape them out by hand. We made a lot of them things. We made tables to fold parachutes on. Made hundreds of them. They'd go to camps where soldiers trained. I'll show you one of the opera chairs I made. Now, that was a long time ago.
He'd been away from home right much. And I'd have to control the children. We had five.
So you were kind of in charge of . . .
The home when he was a-working. I always had supper ready when he'd get there, before quitting times.
Did you ever take his meals up to him at the plant?
No, that would be way ten miles back over there, when
This is one of the cheapest ones. [He shows the opera chair.]
Would they make the metal frame for the chair there, too?
No, they didn't. They ordered the pipe, and then they'd cut it off and maybe put it together.
How would they give the piece in there a bend like that?
They got forms and pressed a press down. They'd glue this together; that's just thin stuff there.
Oh, it's several layers glued together?
Yes, it is. They'd put it down and put glue on each piece, and they'd clamp about six seats down together and form. . . . This is like your seat Underneath and on top, and then there's a big leg comes down and holds it down for about three hours. When the glue dries, it's ready to take out and saw up.
So it's all in the right shape and everything.
And then before we got that automatic shaper, we shaped it out. You'd have to put it on the trim saws; the panel sizer would just shape it all around here.
So that would take out some of the skills that the other
Before we got the shaper, they'd have to take it and run it on the panel sizer, and then they'd take it over to the band saw and have to have a markout boy to mark it out. And then the bandsaw man would have to . . .
Would cut along the line.
Yes. And then we'd have to take it to the router and smooth it
That's an old yard chair he made that we use outside.
We made lots and lots of them.
What are some of the changes that you've seen in the plants since World War II?
I know one thing: we didn't get to work much, only war supplies. When we
wasn't doing that, they made lots of little old toys. In fact, Mr. Ivey
got up a thing to make wooden tires. You know, you couldn't get tires
back then a lot of times, and we made wooden tires and put on a car, but
it didn't prove out too good.
It's kind of a rough ride.
This was when they had dirt roads.
In between doing the war supplies?
Yes. Didn't run out of no church pews back then. We'd make five million things. Like I said, anything that the government would need, we'd try to make it there.
What kinds of things did you like to make the most?
Church pews.
Were they easy to make, or fun to make?
Well, they wasn't too hard. They wasn't as much work as some other kind
of furniture. Wasn't so much different pieces. Let's see, you
Did they ever do any fancy carving?
Oh, yes. Like church pews and pulpit furniture, that was all carved by
hand. They'd have nice scroll-things on it. We made lots of them. There
was several churches here in Hickory got our furniture. There's a big
Baptist church in Lynchburg, Virginia. Once in a while we
Have you gone out in churches and seen work that you've done?
Yes, I have. That's right. When we got our pews, that Clapp fellow got me to go with him. He knew I knowed a lot about the church furniture, and so I went and helped him pick out what he wanted. When they decided on that, taken the order to Mr. Ivey, and you know, he give us a big discount on it, by me working over there.
What church did you belong to, or what church did you grow up in?
The Methodist. You know where Rhodhiss is? We go over there.
Is it called Rhodhiss Methodist Church?
Yes. Rhodhiss United Methodist Church. [Points to photograph.]
Were you brought up in the Lutheran Church?
Oh, yes, ever since I was three weeks old.
Did you switch over when you were married?
Yes, after we had the children. Their schoolmates was going to his church, and they wanted to go to his church, so I told him, "Well, I'll just go with you." So we've been going to the Methodist Church ever since.
You can't hardly [have] the wife go to one church and the man the other. It's best they all go to one church, I think.
What's the difference between the Lutheran and the Methodist church?
It's a right smart difference.
What are some of the differences?
Well. . . . What are the mostly difference between the two churches?
I don't see that much difference.
The Lutherans has closed communion, and the Methodists has open.
We've got Catholics; we've got Baptists; we've got Methodists and Lutherans, all in our family. If they're happy in their church, we're happy with them.
The Lutherans don't believe in a lot of things that the Methodists do,
and the Methodists don't believe a lot of things they do. The Methodists
has
You all have five children?
Five; four boys and one girl. The girl lives next to us over here. One boy lives in Oklahoma City and one is living down in Lexington, Kentucky, and one in Lexington, North Carolina, and one in Gastonia.
What did they end up doing for a living?
The boy in Oklahoma City is an accountant for a big oil company. They
drill oil wells. They drilled about ninety-some wells last year, he
said. The boy in Kentucky is a Tom's Peanuts distributor. He's got a big
territory; he has thirteen trucks there. He's got a real good
business.
They turn metal parts?
That's right.
Did he get any of that from you, learning how to work with machines?
He worked with Southern Desk. I'd learn him how to run that panel sizer. He kind of fell out with their foreman and went to Cramerton, North Carolina, near Gastonia, and worked in that Burlington Mill. He was there about twenty years. They sold out and went to the bad, and so he went to the machine shop then. In the meantime he was a foreman down there all the time in the slasher room. I don't know what that is; maybe you do.
I sort of know. I've heard the job mentioned a lot.
Anyway, he was the foreman in there for about twenty-some years. When they closed the mill down, he got the job at the machine shop.
Did any of your other sons ever go to work with you at any of the places that you worked at?
They all did. Every one.
What kind of jobs would they get?
Marking for the band saw and then tailing the ripsaw. Harold, the one at Gastonia, run the panel sizer. And then I believe the oldest boy, the band saw. They all didn't stay too long.
Did they want to look towards better things, or what? Why didn't they want to stay?
They didn't like it. They wanted to change.
It was too confining for them there, and they wanted to be out.
Three of them went in the service. So when they came back, they went to
school. All of them finished high school, and two or three
Did your daughter ever do any public work before she was married?
Yes, she worked in the hosiery mill a while.
And then she worked in Sally's store.
Doing sales work?
Yes.
She went over to Sears a while. She don't like that much. Her husband's a
mail carrier. He don't want her to work, says, "If you work, I have to
pay so much more income tax."
Does she like to work?
Yes. She's got a little job over here at the market. She just works
part-time. Says she gets tired of loafing around all the time, but she
went over there. I'm working twelve hours a week.
Over across the street? [At the crossroads store]
Yes. I enjoy it. I've got so many friends I know over there. They're so nice to us. They've been nice people to work for.
He told the boss that we wanted to go spend some time in Florida this past winter. His wife baked him a nice cake and gave it to him when he left from over there and said, "Now we want you when you come back, for sure.".
Sent us a nice Christmas card.
They're so good to him.
Do you all think you raised your kids different than your parents raised you?
They didn't have to work like we did in the farm. You see, nowadays they
don't farm like they used to. Dad would have us hoeing the corn when it
was in silk and tassel [unclear]
Just wasting time.
Just something to keep you working.
Yes, to keep us busy.
So you didn't make your children do that.
No, but we wasn't farming much. Well, when ours was littler, we tended
This was while you all were married?
Oh, yes.
So you did a little bit of farming.
I had to take the children and go to the field. I didn't have to, but we did, and he worked over there. We had to kind
of kind of ends meet like that, for he didn't make much.
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
Take any woman the age of two and eighty years old, forgets. I can't remember things like I used to.
A lot of times, I find people remember more about the things I ask them about than they do what happened last year.
Yes, that's right. I can think of way back yonder better than I can yesterday.
That's the way with me.
I still, I think, forget a lot of things.
Do you think that because you all didn't do a whole lot of farming, that your kids were able to go through school and finish school?
Oh, yes. Before, way back there, I don't
There was a few, but most of them . . .
There might have been a few, but I don't remember of any.
Did your parents kind of encourage you, as soon as you got a good enough education, to go to work?
They just wasn't able to send us to school. My dad made our shoes, and Mother knit our stockings. And we wore aprons with long sleeves and buttoned plumb to the back, down to the bottom. That's what kind of dresses we wore, and just with nothing but a sweater, and had freezing cold and snow knee deep. We had to wade through it. That's what we wore.
Did you like school?
No, I didn't.
You were more interested in helping the family.
Yes. It seemed like we'd have to have that to help out.
How many years did you go through?
I quit when I was fifteen years old. Way back there then, they just had four hours a day in that school.
And this was just during the winter?
Yes. November and December and January and February. Dad had a big patch
of woods, and we cleared that. When we come home from school, they'd
say, "Now you children get your mattocks and get down there and drill
[unclear]
You would light pine knots?
And you couldn't half see, and my eyes wasn't too good at that. I didn't
learn much, for I couldn't see how to study.
How far did you get through school, Mr. Meyers?
I went to the seventh grade.
Did you like school?
Not too good. I was kind of like her. I had to go to work to help my daddy support the children. But I liked it pretty good.
Before we moved up here in Catawba County I went to Mooresville School, a
nice school there, and I went more there than I did up here.
When you moved up here, didn't they put you way back?
No, that was when we went to Mooresville. Went to a Rowan County school
down there, and they had me up to seventh grade there, and they put me
back to the high first one.
Why were there those differences in the schools?
They wasn't much teachers out there in the country. But that town school, they really was strict.
Did your family move from in the country to town anytime?
Yes. I was born and raised in Salisbury, and I was three years old when we moved up to Mount Olive; that was close to Mooresville. And we were there several years. Then we did move into town, in Mooresville.
His mother died when he was three years old. Had two stepmothers then.
How were your stepmothers?
My first one was real nice to me, just the same as my mother had been. I couldn't say that about the last one too good.
Yes, he did.
He liked the women, didn't he?
He had four children and he couldn't support them, so I just had to quit, and that's when I went to High Point and went to work in Hickory Chair. I give him most all of my money till after we got married, which I didn't after we got married.
When you all moved into town, what did your father do for a living?
He run a furniture shop. He was a schoolteacher a long time, but with that he didn't make much money back then, four months out of the year. He started making furniture. I helped him some.
So he had a little cabinet shop, I guess?
Yes, he did. He had machinery, and
So you boarded in High Point and sent money back.
Sent the money to him. Grandpa come to find out I was giving him money, he'd send a check. I didn't have no bank account.
So you didn't ever see it, really, in your hands.
That's right, except maybe I'd keep a dollar out, maybe every three or four weeks for what I'd need. Ten or fifteen cents went a way back then. That's about all I got to spend.
All the time we was in Newton and working, I never seen a penny that I
made. It all went in Daddy's check, and he'd take it and put it in the
savings and loan.
Her mammy didn't work, and about four or five of them drew seventy-five dollars.
It was Dad and myself and Jake and Marge, and Lee part of the time.
That was during World War I, and I was about packed to go.
The day I was to reexamine, the Armistice was signed and I didn't have to
go. I went to Camp Abraham Eustis, Virginia, and worked as a carpenter
out there. I was just a young fellow then. And I made seventy-five
dollars a week just myself, and they all just got seventy-five.
And I thought I was doing well making twenty dollars a week.
I was able to help my daddy out then. I started in in June and worked till October. I took the flu up there and like to died. You know, back then flu was really. . . . It was influenza; they'd call it "flu." And I had it bad.
You had it when you were out in Fort Eustis?
Virginia, yes. I did make good out there.
Did you send him the money home?
Yes. It was about five dollars a week. I had to pay board out there. That was five dollars a week, and I kept five out for spending, and sent the rest to him.
How did you find out about that?
I had a friend out there in the Navy.
And he wrote him and had him to come out there.
He got me a job.
Gosh, I bet they were paid. The Army, I guess, pays pretty good for stuff like that.
Did you have two other brothers that were full brothers?
No, just one.
Two; I had two brothers.
Oh, yes, one died when he was a baby.
He died when he was only a few months old.
Was this when your mother died, too?
Yes. I was four years old when she passed away.
Did your father immediately get married after that?
No. I don't know how long after my mother died, thirteen years, I guess.
Do you know how he took care of you all?
My brother stayed with his Grandfather Meyers, that fellow I mentioned. He lived up in Iredell County. I stayed with my aunt. She lived close by there. That was my dad's sister. They kept us till he got married. No, I don't think it was that long. It must have been two and a half or. . . . It wasn't too long that I lived with my aunt, and him was his grandfather. About a year and a half. And then the next time, after she passed away, it was a couple years before he found his last wife.
Was this brother of yours older than you?
Yes, four years older.
What did he end up doing as a job?
Drinking. He got run over and died of pneumonia. He was a good mechanic, but he messed it up too bad.
How old was he when he died?
About '78.
It was in 1978?
Yes. I figure it was then.
He was drinking and got out in the road, and somebody run over him.
Did he ever do any work in furniture?
Not too much. In fact, he came over there to Hickory Chair when I was
working there, and he stayed two or three weeks. And they were telling a
fellow to go out west. [He] came in
He married out there.
What didn't he like about working in the furniture plant?
I don't think he liked it too well. He liked to be a mechanic more than
furniture work or millwright work. But he was really good on cars,
gasoline engines, stuff. He didn't like furniture too well.
So I guess he didn't ever help any in your father's shop.
No, he hadn't.
Had he run out west?
Yes, he did. He left real early and come back.
I wonder why he got this calling for the West.
I don't know. He thought that was wonderful, to go out west.
You did'nt ever feel that?
That was him and his wife. (She shows a photograph.)
He's a nice-looking man.
That was our fiftieth wedding anniversary. And we celebrated our fifty-seventh wedding anniversary in April. There's Daddy Workman there. That's Flake when he was. . .
Oh, this is a neat picture.
See that boy, and that's. . .
My first stepmother. Now she was a good woman.
She's really pretty.
That's how they dressed away back there.
He's got that big moustache. Were those in style back then?
Oh, yes.
Got your Little Lord Fauntleroy suit. Big bow tie and brass buttons. Where would you all go to get pictures like this taken?
To Mooresville. They had a man who'd take pictures cheap.
You all were living in town then?
No, we was living out from town. Then after she died we moved to town.
Did he have any sons or daughters by her?
No, he didn't.
Did you ever have any stepbrothers or stepsisters?
I've got three. My brother got killed in service in France in World War II. One sister lives in Newton, and the other out from Lenoir. You know where Persian Mountain's at? Between Valdese and Lenoir, near Pine Mountain.
What did your sister in Newton do?
She is an old maid. She stays with Mrs. Jeter Abernethy. Would you happen to know them? He was a big cotton mill man in Newton there.
He died here a while back.
It was about a year ago. She's been staying with her since.
She's kind of a live-in housemaid, I guess?
Yes, that's right.
What did she do before that?
Before her mother passed away, she stayed with her. Raised cows and cats and dogs.
This was her mother. That's his last stepmother.
She looks awful ornery to me.
Oh, she was stubborn.
Me and her didn't. . . .
When we got married and went to the house. . . . We stayed overnight out at Dad's. We went down there on Sunday evening. You know, she wouldn't even speak to me when I went in? He said, "I'll put up the car and feed the mule, and you go on to the house," and I did, and she never even looked at me or spoke to me. I've wished a thousand times, and I almost turned around and went back.
Oh, yes, he always did like her. Thought a lot of that.
That's probably why his wife didn't.
You'd think she was jealous. She didn't have anything to be jealous of.
She knew if I'd get married, the money would quit coming in.
Did her daughter ever do any public work?
Going to stay at Mrs. Abernethy's, but the other daughter worked at the hosiery mill, didn't she?
Worked in the hosiery mill.
Her husband was a contractor, and she don't have to work now. She gets
out and has a big garden and flowers and all.
But she did work in the hosiery mill.
Yes, she worked up in the hosiery mill until she got married.
What were the best jobs to have back then? If you wanted a good-paying job, was furniture the place to go?
I imagine so. That paid a little better than the cotton mill. It did. That was about the best-paying job.
What was the comparison between hosiery and furniture?
I believe a hosiery mill was as good paying as a furniture factory. I've worked at a hosiery mill. In fact, the boarder, they make good pay.
The boarders
Yes, boarder machine. Paul has worked a while in the hosiery mill. He made good money. After he worked a while with me in the furniture factory, he decided to go to the hosiery mill.
(She shows another photograph, of her son.) I still think he looks like myself, don't you?
Yes, I think so, too. The hair is a little different, but. . . .
When we was married, you couldn't tell which end was fastened to his head. His hair was pretty.
There it looks kind of light brown.
He's got a little old cap or something on, Maybe not.
Or it might be just the light from the film that made it look lighter.
I've always wore my hair
Yes, there's not too much difference. They're really more similar in the way they look. I guess a lot of jobs in the hosiery mill were women, so there wasn't a way that a lot of men could get jobs.
Not too many. In the dye house they'd have to have men, but mostly women working.
Were there any women working in the furniture plants at all back in those days?
Way back then when I was working with Mr. Barker [Conover Furniture]. We worked a lot of women there at the Southern Desk Company.
What kinds of jobs would they have?
Tailing
Maybe women came in during the War and after the War?
Yes. That's really when women got started working in furniture, during the War, when there were so many that had to go in service. That's the reason they put them on the jobs.
When your kids were still living at home and they were making money, would you do the same thing that your parents did? Would you all get the money?
No, ma'am, we never took a penny of our children's money.
No, sir. If they made it, they kept it.
And you wouldn't charge them any room and board.
Oh, law, no.
I'd take the children and I'd send them on to the field,
It kept the boys out of meanness.
This was in the summertime, when they'd be off from school?
In the summertime, when they was off from school.
They wasn't mean.
No, but they could have been mean. And they drove the school busses.
So they made a little extra pocket money?
Yes, they made some pocket money, and we didn't keep that.
So that was a lot different than you and your parents.
Yes, when I was raised up.
When you all were working, did you ever resent that you never got
Oh, I cried more than one time. When we lived in Newton, the girls would come by and "Come on, let's go to the show." I said, "I can't. I don't have a penny." I just come out and told them that I didn't have a penny to go. They said, "Well, come on, I'll pay your way." I let them a couple of times, but I wouldn't all the time. That was too much. So I never seen the money.
He kept it, and then when he passed away we used it to put him away. They both lived till they was eighty-six years old.
That's so
Oh, yes. A year or two before she died, she'd get up and be out in
somebody's field walking at two o'clock in the morning. Just didn't know
that she was in the world.
Yes, she was real old.
She landed up up here in Morganton [Broughten Hospital], and law, every
time I'd go to see her once a week, I'd go a-crying and come back
a-crying, because you could see the difference in her every time you'd
go. It'd be worse. And they said she pulled at the door and just knocked
and kicked, a-trying to get out. Well, that [unclear]
You must have hated to do that.
But it was better, I reckon, then that she was in the home [Broughten]
Did most people try to keep their older parents at home with them? I know a lot of times now they put them in a rest home or something like that.
They would mostly try to keep them. They really didn't have too many rest homes back then.
No, along back then. They didn't have but one hospital as I know of; that was Crowell's at Lincolnton.
I didn't know nothing about that.
They had two, I think, Richard Baker
That's something I can't. . . . Gosh, the state home, I . . .
A lot of people went to Stokesdale.
Yes, Broughten Hospital.
Where did you all go when you all were sick?
We had an old country doctor there in Vale. Of course, when we lived in Mooresville, we'd go to a doctor there. Dr. Bell was his name.
He came out several times to see us.
Did you ever use home remedies?
Oh, plenty of them.
What kinds of things would you . . .
She'll have to tell you that.
Take epsom salts and castor oil.
And Watkins' Liniment.
Yes, all those liniments and salves and everything.
Do you know anything about Watkins?
I sure don't.
We'd get a cold, and I'd take Vicks and breathe. And I'd fry onions and
make onion poultices and put them on their chests.
How did you learn how to do those things?
My mother learned us how. I guess from on back and on and on, way back there.
Did your mother have her kids at home?
Yes. Now we did, too.
Did you have a doctor?
Oh, yes.
Were there any midwives around?
No.
So you just had a doctor come to the house.
Yes. And I'd always have one of my close neighbors with me.
When the daughter was born—she was the oldest—old Doc Ford came over
there and spent the night with her.
And it just rained so hard and so long the creek was up, and he couldn't get back to the office.
I bet the roads were muddy.
Flake went to walk it, and they come back through the woods a-walking, him and Ford.
The next morning he called up her father and said, "You've got a
granddaughter down here, Tail." His name was Scat.
We was on out by his daddy's house; that's where we lived.
So that was your firstborn?
Yes. She lives next door.
What year was she born in?
In '23. And we was married in '22.
So you had her right after you were married.
March the sixth. We had the boys in March, too.
Fourteenth and one the twenty-second.
Did you have them a year apart?
Two years.
Did you just decide to do it that way?
No, I didn't know it.
That's neat, that they were all born in March. I'm a March girl myself.
Oh, are you? What day?
Eleventh. I had a lot of people in my family born in March.
I've got three grandchildren born in March.
One in June, almost on her birthday, the third. Was born on the fourth.
One granddaughter. . .
Greatgranddaughter.
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
[START OF TAPE 2, SIDE A]
Do you remember when Roosevelt was in office?
Oh, yes.
And all these changes were made, the eight-hour law?
A lot of changes then.
What did you think about the eight-hour-a-day law and the minimum wage?
I really thought they was better. I think it's better. And then they passed the Social Security law, and that was real good. It helps us out now. Of course, it's hard on you young people working.
Yes. Our boys pays out so much in Social Security and texes. I wonder whether they'll ever get anything back; maybe they'll do away with it by the time they get old enough to draw it. But that was really good, that Social Security law. I don't know how you think about it.
I think it's a good . . .
I think it was. And the eight-hour law was good.
Did that cut down the hours that you worked at the plant?
Yes. If you worked anything over eight hours, you got time and a half.
Did it actually cut down any hours, or did you still work the same ten hours but you got time-and-a-half? Did they actually cut down on your hours?
Yes, they did. A lot of times we was busy, they'd run ten hours, for which they'd have to pay time-and-a-half. And if you went in Saturday morning, you'd get time-and-a-half. If you worked anything over forty hours, you got time-and-a-half.
When you were working those ten hours, did you work every hour you were in there, or were they a little bit more lenient about letting you take a break?
We didn't get a break till . . .
Till the eight-hour law.
That's right. I don't know when that break started in. It hasn't been too many years ago. At Southern Desk they started that in '55, I reckon.
So nobody got any breaks until 1955?
Well, no, you had to work right on.
Not even a break for lunch?
Oh, yes, you'd take off an hour, but you had to punch out. And you'd lose that hour; they didn't pay you for that.
Gosh. I had talked to some people that had worked in a cotton mill, and
they said that when they had the ten-hour law they had to be in the
plant all that time, but if they didn't have anything to do, like if
their job was running by itself, they could take off.
Yes. I don't think they work as hard nowadays as we did back then. And there are just lots of drifters who come in and work a week or two and quit and go somewhere else and get a job. They don't want to work like we used to.
Where do these drifters come from?
Boys who don't go to school. They're think they're going to get out and make them some money, and they never have worked any. And they try a job. "No, that's too hard. I'm going somewhere else."
Do they come from around here?
Yes, from around the country and the town. More so city boys than. . . . Well, country boys are almost the same. I guess you find drifters everywhere you go. They'll try one job, then they think that work's too hard, and then they'll go to stealing, a lot of them do. Get through and have some money. And steal. Too good to work. I saw it myself.
When the minimum wage law came in, how much were you making then?
Forty cents an hour.
So that's when you were still working at Conover.
Yes. That stepped me up right smart. I've forgot just how much I made.
[unclear]
During the Depression time, did they cut back on the wages?
No, they didn't cut the wages at all.
Do you remember your first raise after the times got better?
Yes, I remember. First we got
What were the headaches, just in trying to get people to . . .
That's right, get the stuff done. Like I said, the superintendent may be
standing over there watching you, and these men'd be standing here idle,
not doing nothing. him on that job. Get over yonder, and get that
other man a-going."
So that was the bad thing about it.
Yes, I know it. They'd stand over there and watch, and I'd just run
around. . . . They were like a, what do you call it?
Yo-yo?
Yo-yo.
So when he started doing that, you knew you had to look around: all right, who's sitting where?
So you didn't really like that part of the foreman's job.
No. I wished a lot of times I was back on my old job.
But it did pay more, I guess.
Yes.
What were the highest-paying jobs in the plant?
You mean just the labor, or the foremen?
I guess the highest-paying would be to be a foreman.
Really, I don't know exactly. I'd say sixty dollars a week, probably.
Back when I was working at Southern Desk. That would be about '55.
What were the best jobs to have in the plant besides the foreman jobs, just the workers?
Running a machine's the best-paying job.
So anybody who knew how to run those machines had a good job?
Yes. They made good on the shapers; that was a good-paying job, about the best-paying job there was. It was dangerous, too; you'd get your fingers cut. You know what a shaper is.
I don't think I know what one looks like.
It's a big table. I suppose it'd be wider than this [motions the span of his arms]
So with an automatic shaper you didn't have to use forms.
Yes, you had a form, but you'd just screw them in there, then they
clamped down and run around. You had four forms. There was two forms
that cut the inside out and two that cut the back out. One form would
cut this side and it would go around, then
And that would be the automatic shaper?
Yes.
And then on the other shaper, you had to lift it out to put it in the different forms.
That's right. But it had a clamp. It'd screw down to hold them on the
rubber shapers. But this automatic had clamps about four inches wide run
by air, and at certain times they'd drop down and hold it. They'd get
around there
And then they'd spew it out.
Yes. And once in a while it'd throw them out.
So a man that was running an automatic shaper had to watch out.
Yes, that's right.
I guess the automatic shaper made the job a little less skilled, because you didn't have to change those things.
That's right. It was a lot of work setting it up, but after you got it set up you could run lots of them out in a day.
You would be the one that set up this machine.
Yes, that's right. And we made toilet seats there for a long time.
Wooden toilet seats?
Outside and inside. I've shaped a many a one of them. That was on the automatic shaper.
What would put the rounded edge on it?
It had big cutters.
The shaper would do that?
Yes. Had a form just the shape of the toilet seat.
Are a lot of things happening like that in the furniture plants now, like they'll have bigger machines that would do a lot of things that ordinarily men would have done on the older machines?
They have quite a few of them. There's the automatic shaper and that machine sander. It's got a big drum, and you just stick it in and take it on there, carries it out, and you take another one, stick it in there. That's so much faster than putting it on a drum sander.
And having to turn it around.
Of course, anything crooked, you have to run it on the
So they still have to keep some of the old hand shapers.
Oh, yes, the automatic wouldn't do this.
And a lathe would do all the round stuff, like table legs.
Yes. That Queen Anne is cut on a lathe.
So a lathe was more for things that were rounded all the way around.
But they can put that on a form on a lathe. We made a lot of them at Conover. Lots and lots and lots and lots of them. They're called Queen Anne. Band saw cuts all this out here. Shaper rounds it out, and then they finish on a carving machine.
What would a carving machine do?
Here's what it would do here, cut all these little places.
For fancy cuts.
I'll show you this. It's a long spindle, about that long, and it's got a
little machine
Cutters the shape of what you want cut.
That's right. Put them on there. Put little old bits of fine cutters to cut this here. Then he carves this all out and put it through after you run it on a lathe. And if you don't round it real good, we've got to finish it on a carving spindle. It's a long spindle with screws to screw your little cutters on. And many a person got his fingers cut off on that.
How did you manage through all those years not to get anything?
I was just careful. I've had it brush mine lots of times. I was running a
hand joiner one day, and going across there it'd kick that little
finger, just kind of shaved it. The knives could have just cut the whole
ends off. Yes, I've had a big roll of luckies.
I've heard that at Southern Desk they had a union trying to get in there one time?
Yes.
Were there any before, like at Conover Furniture, or back in the early days?
No. Back then, the union never tried to get in while I was at Conover. At Southern Desk they tried it several times, but it never did make it.
What do you think of unions?
I didn't want it. I really worked hard to keep it out.
Did they have any kind of plant committee, people that said don't vote for the union?
Like the foremen and all couldn't [vote], just the working men and women.
What is your opinion of unions? What's bad about it, and what's good about it?
I just think when you're working at a big plant like we had at Southern Desk, if you'd bring a union in there they'd come in and tell you what to do, like when we'd go out on strike, maybe go out for thirteen months. Where you had a good job that was paying you pretty good, why get a union in there to tell you what to do?
You didn't want anybody else telling you.
That's all I had against it. I just didn't want it, and I really worked and a lot of other good people did. They voted it down three or four times after I left there. We had worked so, several times since they voted it down.
What were the people who were trying to get it in like?
They was mostly drifters, people
They weren't some of the people that had been there a real long time.
Wasn't like me and lots and lots of others, had been there a long time, and we knowed that it was a good place to work and all, and weren't at all for the union in there. Them people that maybe hadn't been working there but a few months, they'd think it would be the thing to do. It'd be a big price to work there. We'd vote it down.
I know you all kind of live out in the country, but how has the town of Hickory changed over the years?
I think that they have made a lot of improvement, but I don't [unclear]
The downtown?
Yes. But there's a lot of vacant buildings there.
And there's a lot of walking there to do, too.
Do you like the malls better?
No, I don't go.
You don't go shopping anywhere.
No, not much.
Where did you used to go to buy stuff?
Over here at Talbert's.
And Dudley's?
Yes.
Yes, we rarely go uptown. If I get in a crowd, I get nervous.
Unless you have broad
My legs gives me a lot of trouble, my feet.
But I think they've made a lot of improvement there. They're getting the railroad crossings better, some of them that are up here.
Yes, they moved the main switching station from downtown out to Oyama.
That was really rough way back yonder. They used to shift and shift them cars. You had to sit there and wait. [Now] you don't have to wait. Them long trains comes through, you can't wait to get them across.
What do you think about Carter?
I'm the
one asking the questions. What do you all think about him?
You'll laugh when you hear this played. I was trying to tell you.
I just don't like him.
Oh. Don't talk like that.
Do you like him? You don't like him, either? [To Mr. Meyers]
I don't think he's doing what he should.
He promised a lot, and I'm afraid he hasn't done as much as he could. She and I, we talk about it a lot some.
I don't mean to talk about him, but I just don't like him. I don't think he's doing what he should.
Who would you all like to see as President today?
I'd like to see Ford get back in.
I think Kennedy. I always liked his brother. I'm a Republican, but I also liked President John Kennedy. I thought a lot of him. I always vote for the man I think will be the best, regardless of the party.
Is your family traditionally Republican?
Yes. Hers is Democrat.
That's funny. You'd like to see Kennedy; she'd like to see Ford.
Yes [unclear]
No, I don't go and vote.
Well, you have some.
Yes, I have some, but I just don't. . . .
You didn't the last time.
I don't know whether I'm voting for the right person, and I'm just going to stay at home.
She don't stay away just because I'm a Republican.
Why, no, not that.
She voted several times.
Who did you vote for when you did vote?
Ford.
Yes. I always like him.
What about Ronald Reagan, is he going to run?
I think he is going to run for the Republican nomination.
And Ford, probably. And Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, and who-all.
All this gas. Look like he'd do something about it.
It has gotten high. I heat by oil, and I don't even want to see what the bill is when I get my tank filled up this fall, because it's going to go sky-high.
It's high now.
Fuel oil is seventy-five or eighty cents now. They filled our tank up a while back, and it was 65.9 cents, way on up yonder.
Do you all heat by oil here?
Yes. I think we
I'm not going back in them storms. Now I'm staying here; I don't care how cold it gets.
Do you rent a little place down there?
Our son, the boy in Kentucky, has a trailer down [at] Leesburg.
A three-bed room home; it's real nice. It's a big trailer camp. It's nice.
Got a nice clubhouse there, and we go and have parties there.
Suppers every Monday night. Seventy-five or eighty people.
And then on Thursday nights. The women's got something to do there every night.
Our son has that thing and just wanted us to go down and stay all winter.
Where is it at?
At Leesburg. That's near Orlando.
My grand parents live in Pinellas Park. It's near Tampa.
That's not too far from Leesburg.
My grandpa's real bad sick, and that's the best weather for them.
Even St. Petersburg is full of retired people, all those towns.
Oh, it is, of most anywhere in the world, I bet.
We spent a couple winters in Lake Wales and a couple in Homestead.
Homestead, now that's a Marine Corps base.
Yes, I like Homestead. It's warmer down there, and all them good fruit to eat.
We'd just go out to the fields, and the people would just give us whatever they had; they'd give us what we wanted. They'd grown it theirselves.
Oranges the same way. With 35,000 acres of oranges, there had been a bad
freeze.
I'm looking forward to going down and seeing my grandparents.
They're so nice to you down there. They'll come and visit you and bring their work and bring their cup of coffee and come sit down and talk with you. So friendly.
Have you ever been down thataway?
I've just been as far as Tampa and St. Petersburg.
We went to Key West—that was nice to see-and Cape Kennedy.
Yes, and then we went to Disney World when we was down there last winter and enjoyed that.
I bet those were crowds.
Oh, you couldn't walk for it. And my feet just ached.
To get on the monorails, you'd have to stand in line to get to ride around. Rode on that old steam engine train, go through the Indian reservations. It was really nice.
END OF INTERVIEW