Courtship and marriage
In this excerpt, Hargett briefly describes her courtship and marriage. Hargett met her future husband when she was sixteen, shortly after she went to work in the mills. Her husband was also a mill worker and they were married within a year. Hargett was only seventeen at the time of the marriage and she explains how her father escorted them to Lancaster, South Carolina, where they could be legally wed, despite her young age.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Edna Y. Hargett, July 19, 1979. Interview H-0163. 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
Jim Leloudis:
I'd like to talk a little about the differences in those looms, but first let's talk about your husband a little bit and how you met.
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
He was working in the mill where I was working. We'd see one another going in and out, all going out at the same time and coming in. So I met him; we used to sport and go to church on Wednesday nights and church on Sunday nights. Saturday night we went to a movie. That was our entertainment.
Jim Leloudis:
Which mill did you meet him in?
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
Louise mill.
Jim Leloudis:
You came to North Charlotte when you were sixteen years old?
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
Yes.
Jim Leloudis:
And went to work at Highland Park.
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
That's right.
Jim Leloudis:
What made you decide to go to Louise?
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
I left home then. Daddy had to leave the mill when his health got bad, so he got a job working for the A and P warehouse. So he had to give up the mill house whenever he didn't work for them. So then I went to boarding with some people and went to working in the mill there. So I'd seen him [husband] coming in and out and knew he was single, and we'd walk together and talk to one another sometimes. And
the next thing you know, we started dating, and I married him then.
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[TAPE 1, SIDE B]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
Jim Leloudis:
How old were you when you moved down to the Louise mill?
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
I was about seventeen, because I married just a few months before I was eighteen. I married in December, and I was eighteen in July. And Daddy went with us to Lancaster to get married.
Jim Leloudis:
[Laughter]
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
Daddy used to be on the police force down there, and he wanted to go down there, so we went down there and was married in Lancaster, South Carolina.
Jim Leloudis:
So he approved.
- EDNA YANDELL HARGETT:
-
Yes, he went with us. He approved of it.
