Sephus Neal (primary interviewee) and Margaret Neal interview recording, 1993 June 05
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
Margaret Johnson Neil | You want my names also, don't you? | 0:03 |
Kara Miles | Yeah. Yes. | 0:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Margaret Johnson Neil. I grew up in the Greenville area. I moved to Greenville. I'm really what you'd call a city girl off North Church Street to the Greenville area. At that time it was called Graham Extension, right there at Three Ward. And that's where we lived a many year. | 0:08 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And what I was trying to get — What I wanted to state was about the Greenville area, that as they had, I wanted to set the record straight more or less about the Greenville area. It was always an integrated area with Neils and white people at one end of practically every street. And where we lived just above us was a great big house. And the George Suttons lived there and down the street we lived in a big house and the postman at that time stopped on Snowball Street. It didn't go through the Greenville area at that time. And that was called Graham Extension. | 0:45 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | In later years, of course, it was changed to North McCall Street and on the upper end of North McCall Street there were white families there. And it was more or less what you call an industrial area. There was the Buckeye Oil Mill that made socks, and sold linseed by the bags. There were two silos, great big huge silos there. There was also the flour mill. And of course the flour mill is still there in the Greenville area. The highway goes right up by the side of the old Greenville and the ice house and the coal yard. Also, the yarn mill was out there and it worked a lot of people from different areas. | 1:50 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | The Alvester, that's what it was called. And the Buckeye Oil Mill where the silos were there. Of course, now my grandmother reared me, and I stayed mostly in the Greenville area all the time with her. And sometimes I would get a chance to come over to the Greenville Church that I mentioned the other night about the tent and the food and that sort of thing. But Greenville was strictly an industrial area and they also was the Charlotte, the Standard Bonded Cotton warehouse was built on the spot where we first lived. Then my uncles built a home at 1208 Forest Street and that's it. | 2:59 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Upper end of Forest Street there was white people who lived up there. They had a grocery store. And the Ramseys, they owned most of that block because their dad had a grocery store and a house. Then his son — Well, one of the sons, Boyd, was a city policeman. And the other one, Calvin, I can't remember what Calvin did, but he was— | 4:18 |
Sephus Neil | Policeman too. | 4:52 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, they both were policemen? | 4:54 |
Sephus Neil | Both were policeman. | 4:54 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, anyway. That street, Forest Street was also integrated. And they had a grocery store also up there. We used to go in and out of there. And my grandmother's name was Ellen Harris Hargrave Cochran Johnson, because she was born at Surrender. And her dad sent her to Scotia Seminary, to school. She attended Scotia Seminary and she was a wonderful musician, played the organ and signed beautifully. | 4:56 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Now what other — I was trying to think. How many businesses did I leave off? | 5:58 |
Sephus Neil | She might have some more questions to ask you. | 6:05 |
Kara Miles | Oh, I have lots of questions. | 6:08 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Okay. | 6:08 |
Sephus Neil | And then you respond. | 6:08 |
Kara Miles | You said that you lived in a big house. Describe it for me. What was the house like? | 6:18 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, great big kitchen with a table, long table. Now they call it the deacon bench, where on Sunday morning everybody that was at home on Sunday we had to have what they call a Sunday morning prayer. We all got around this big table and big kitchen for prayer because my grandmother was strictly religious. You see all the Bibles all torn up through the years. | 6:24 |
Kara Miles | How many rooms did it have? | 7:02 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Five. I mean, it was — No, six. | 7:04 |
Kara Miles | How many bedrooms? | 7:09 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They're all bedrooms except that big, huge kitchen. | 7:12 |
Kara Miles | Who lived there with you? | 7:17 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | My grandmother and my mother. And my sister would be in and out of there part of the time, but they didn't stay there all time because they had their own place in First Ward. | 7:19 |
Kara Miles | This was a whole sister or was this — Why didn't she live — | 7:32 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, I was the first child, I guess. And I was more or less pampered, I guess. I stayed with grandmother most of the time. And then she had a brother—in—law that had a room there also. | 7:36 |
Kara Miles | So where did your sister stay in First Ward? Who did she live— | 7:53 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Her mother. | 7:56 |
Kara Miles | Okay. So you all had the same father, is that? | 7:59 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. | 8:01 |
Kara Miles | Okay. And when you were talking about that your neighborhood was integrated, but whites lived at one end and Blacks at the other? | 8:02 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Mm—hmm. Because we were on the corner right at the [indistinct 00:08:16]. | 8:12 |
Kara Miles | Okay. Did you have contact with your white neighbors? | 8:19 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes, we used to play through the fence. | 8:23 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 8:26 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | We weren't allowed to go into anybody's house and go visit like children do now. Played through the fence. | 8:27 |
Kara Miles | Was that because they were white that you— | 8:36 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. | 8:38 |
Kara Miles | Okay, that was just with anybody? | 8:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I didn't even know what Mrs. Brown had in her house. And the Houstons, they had a big house on Snowball Street, but that was down the street. | 8:41 |
Kara Miles | So you just didn't, it was just— | 8:51 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | A customary to — | 8:54 |
Karen Ferguson | You just didn't go in people's houses. | 8:57 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 8:57 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | You didn't go, you didn't run in and out of people's houses. | 8:57 |
Kara Miles | So what did you all used to play? | 9:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Mud cakes. We made mud cakes and mud pies and then if we got a chance, we went swimming in the creek down below us. And the Houstons have a store and that way we got chewing gum and candy and different things. And you know how children are, they all wanted to do something, so they tried to chew tobacco and that sort of thing. And some of them tried to dip snuffs. | 9:03 |
Kara Miles | Is this boys and girls? | 9:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Mostly girls, but sometimes it'd be a few boys in there. | 9:41 |
Kara Miles | Dipping snuff? | 9:45 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. | 9:47 |
Kara Miles | When you were talking about the mill or the mills, did Blacks and whites work at the mills? | 9:53 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes. Yes. | 10:00 |
Kara Miles | Side by side, like doing the same jobs? Or were the jobs— | 10:00 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I don't know what — I never did get to go into the mill. Only time I would get to go up there was sometimes. My aunt had a cafe, a real cafe, and she prepared dinner for the group at the Buckeye. And sometimes we carry trays up by. And then sometimes they'd line up and gets their own dinner and then go back on the grounds to eat it. | 10:05 |
Kara Miles | Okay. Your aunt, this is your mother's sister or your fathers? | 10:31 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, mother's. | 10:33 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 10:34 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Her picture, that is her picture. | 10:34 |
Kara Miles | Right there? | 10:34 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Mm—hmm. | 10:34 |
Kara Miles | Okay. Did your grandmother work? | 10:43 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes. She was more or less at that time she helped Dr. JT Williams as a midwife. | 10:45 |
Kara Miles | Did your grandmother ever tell you any stories of her childhood, of her life? Do you know anything about her history? | 11:00 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Not too much. I don't know too much about it. Once we were asking about — But she didn't tell us this, a Ms. Pfeiffer, who was much older than she was, was the one that told us about them coming to the field and saying that the darkies will freeze. | 11:07 |
Kara Miles | So how old was she when? | 11:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Now, I don't know how old my grandmother was. She was born at Surrender, they said. | 11:42 |
Kara Miles | Oh, okay. | 11:45 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | But now Ms. Pfeiffer was older. | 11:48 |
Kara Miles | Okay. So, you knew Ms. Pfeiffer? | 11:51 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, I saw her. She lived on Snowball Street. | 11:53 |
Kara Miles | Were there any other older people in the community who you were close to? Or whose stories you, whose history you might have known or who told you things about their childhood? | 11:57 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Very little. Ms. — Aaron Grant's mother. What was — Ms. Bessie Grant. She was a school teacher and she would talk a lot of times. And then after I — Oh, but that's been these late years when she — After I had started school, she decided to go back to school to further her education. She borrowed one of my science notebooks. | 12:08 |
Kara Miles | Where did you go to school? | 12:43 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Fairview School. Fairview School to Second Ward. | 12:44 |
Kara Miles | So how many, what grades were in Fairview School? | 12:52 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | One through six. | 12:55 |
Kara Miles | Okay. And then the Second Ward was? | 12:57 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Seven through 11. And I was last class of sweet girl graduates. | 13:01 |
Kara Miles | Of what? | 13:09 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Last class. The class of 1929, was the last class that wore white. You had to make your dresses. | 13:10 |
Kara Miles | Okay. For graduation? | 13:19 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Mm—hmm. | 13:21 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 13:21 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And then you had to carry them downtown and had a picot. And what is that other thing? Hem stitched. | 13:22 |
Kara Miles | What's picot? What does that mean? | 13:31 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | It's a trimming on a [indistinct 00:13:38] white dress that made it real pretty. One of my classmates still has her dress. | 13:34 |
Kara Miles | Interesting. | 13:43 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | She lives in McCrorey Heights. | 13:44 |
Kara Miles | Why did they stop that? | 13:48 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They want caps and gowns. The time had changed. They have yearbooks. We didn't have yearbooks. I've torn up my high school graduation edition of the class paper, giving our clippings and things to different people. Reverend Burke has a slide from my high school class paper, the football team, the basketball team, girls and boys. And he wrote a book. Okay. Come back Bernie. I certainly will. And so glad you take the time out to come. | 13:50 |
Kara Miles | So tell me about Fairview School. | 14:42 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, I did have some pictures. But I didn't go to this last pretty brick school. I went to the old plank school house with the high steps. You may have seen those on display somewhere. Anyway, I believe TD Elder had a snapshot of somewhere she was able to get that the high steps and the pot belly stove and the different classroom. Ms. Marie G. Davis was the principal. | 14:46 |
Kara Miles | How many rooms were there in the school? | 15:32 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I don't really know. There were two first grades, I'm sure. Seem like there were two second grades, but there were only one third. There were two fourth grades and one fifth grade. And one sixth grade. | 15:37 |
Kara Miles | That sounds like a kind of big school. | 15:57 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes. And I remember one thing that I missed because my teacher was young and she got married during the time when I was in fourth grade. Ms. Cassie Benson, she lived in Washington. | 15:59 |
Kara Miles | What were your teachers like? | 16:23 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They were real strict, most of them, but I don't know. I liked all my teachers a lot. | 16:26 |
Kara Miles | How did teachers discipline students? | 16:39 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Whipped them. They got spankings. Most of the teachers used a switch, but these later years they got so they started hitting them in the hands, which was wrong, I thought. | 16:42 |
Kara Miles | You thought it was better to whip them? | 17:05 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes, with the switch that would sting your legs and not bruise your body. | 17:07 |
Kara Miles | And was that only for elementary school or how did teachers discipline high school students? | 17:15 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, they may have spanked them in high school back then. I don't know that. | 17:23 |
Sephus Neil | I don't think so. | 17:27 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I don't know that, but I definitely know that they did in elementary school. | 17:30 |
Kara Miles | Tell me what was Second Ward like? | 17:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, it was real nice because we had — Oh, I had three or four real elderly teachers, Ms. Austin and Ms. Hellen Stewart. And they were more or less friends of my grandmother. And Ms. Minnie Ballor, she was an English teacher and she was very strict. | 17:44 |
Kara Miles | Did teachers play favorites? Were there certain students that they gave special attention or let get away with things? | 18:24 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, now I wouldn't notice that. I mean, because I was such a talkative, outgoing kind of a person. I didn't notice that part because I was always wanting to do something and being into what was going on. | 18:34 |
Kara Miles | Were there any organizations or what activities did you do in high school? | 18:57 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I started off going to play basketball and take a part in the glee club and all of the activities in the school, of the school functions, the plays and different things. But at that time we didn't have a car and I didn't get to, a lot of times, take part and go back for the plays and different things. Unless they were held in the afternoon early, because my grandmother said I could not be out late at night. And we only had the street car, the trolley had turned to go back to town at 11th Street. | 19:01 |
Kara Miles | So you played basketball and you— | 19:49 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh yeah, until I got tired. And I said I was too short. I wasn't wide enough to knock nobody down, you know. You know how they elbow you? And so then I quit trying to play basketball. | 19:51 |
Kara Miles | Did the basketball team used to travel to other schools to play against other schools? | 20:07 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, they have team. | 20:12 |
Kara Miles | What other schools were there to play against? Did they play against? | 20:14 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I can't — What is it? The school right over here, which — No, it wasn't West Charlotte. Lord have mercy. It was either Belmont or Gastonia or Mary Potter or something like that. They used to go. | 20:20 |
Kara Miles | Did you ever learn any Black history in school? | 20:52 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. | 20:55 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 20:55 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | We weren't in the history books. | 20:56 |
Kara Miles | No, that's true. So did you ever learn anything from your grandmother or from other people in the community about Black history? Like about famous Black people? Or— | 21:02 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, yes. We would read about them, that particular way and talk about them Tulane, McLeod Bethune, and — Oh — Oh, the woman Spelman? | 21:18 |
Sephus Neil | Was related to right there in Spelman College? What was her name? | 21:43 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I can't call recall that one. But there was another one that — Well, the program's in there. When I miss here, finished Spelman. But Ms. Nellie told me about the conditions and how they used to stay up at night and they had some kind of a straightening comb. | 21:48 |
Sephus Neil | She talking about 50 years ago now. We used to have a neighbor went to Spelman College. | 22:23 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And she would tell — Sue Young, she would tell me about things that went on at Spelman. And some of those traditions have not changed yet there. And about going and coming at a certain hour to be back on campus. | 22:40 |
Kara Miles | What was this about the straightening combs? | 22:53 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. They used to stay up at night and burn — What kind? Some kind of torch, a light they had. I don't know whether it was a camper's lantern. A what? But something they used to see. | 22:56 |
Sephus Neil | They used to make a light out, make the lights out of something else, I think. | 23:14 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Candles or what? | 23:15 |
Sephus Neil | It wasn't a candle. | 23:15 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | In a can. It was something in a can so that they could heat those irons and press their hair to look nice. | 23:21 |
Kara Miles | I had a question about your teachers. Did you have a favorite teacher or ones that really stood out in your mind? Maybe you — | 23:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. | 23:47 |
Kara Miles | — emulated? | 23:47 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Ms. Geraldine. Well, she was a Johnson. Yasses, she married Dr. Yasses that ran the drug store in Brooklyn. And she was one of my favorites. She's my second grade teacher. | 23:49 |
Kara Miles | Why was that? Why was she so favorite? | 24:05 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, we had the same last name, I guess. And she was pretty and I liked her. | 24:08 |
Kara Miles | And one other question, where would you read about somebody like Mary McLeod Bethune or where would you find out about her? | 24:18 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well you see, my grandmother was a reading and writing woman. | 24:26 |
Kara Miles | Right. | 24:30 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And at that time there was so many of the children's parents who did not read or write. I go to school, so she would get the paper. | 24:31 |
Kara Miles | Right. Was there a Black newspaper that you subscribed to? | 24:40 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | There has been a Black newspaper for years and years that used to come in from the Afro Americans. From what? | 24:45 |
Sephus Neil | Baltimore. | 24:54 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Baltimore. | 24:54 |
Kara Miles | Right. Mm—hmm. | 25:00 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And we had salesmens that got them a certain day and delivered them. So we knew what was going on across the — What is it? The South. | 25:02 |
Kara Miles | Right. | 25:16 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Southeastern part, all the way to Baltimore, all around. | 25:16 |
Kara Miles | I thought of another question I wanted to ask you. What kind of values did your grandmother instill in you? | 25:27 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | To work and if you made a dime or quarter, try to save a nickel off it. | 25:34 |
Kara Miles | And did she or anyone else, any other adult ever tell you, were there certain ways that you had to act around whites that you met up with? Did they ever tell you? | 25:47 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, because we'd always lived among white people until we had to move when we lost our lease from when we lived on Graham Extension and they changed the name to McCall Street. Then they built the warehouse, the Standard Bonded Warehouse. So we had to move twice then. We moved once back to our old neighborhood at Ladale Street. And the Longs ran a store three doors from us and they were white. And I used to go down there and — Well, I was real small too at that time, but I was just ambitious. And this lady was kind of sick and Mr. Long's wife was bedfast. She had a nurse come in and out and wash dishes. | 26:01 |
Kara Miles | Were there ever any conflicts between the whites and Blacks living in these neighborhoods together? | 27:15 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. No. | 27:24 |
Kara Miles | Well, Mr. Neil? | 27:28 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, yeah. | 27:29 |
Kara Miles | Where did you grow up? | 27:31 |
Sephus Neil | I grew up in Third Ward in front of our only Black hospital at that time. And that was back at — Well, I was born 1912. So the question you asked concerning Black and white? | 27:32 |
Kara Miles | Mm—hmm. | 27:51 |
Sephus Neil | They didn't live direct in the neighborhood, but we came in contact with a lots of white people. And to me, to them, they were just like anybody else. But my most experience in dealing with the white, when I got large enough to go to work and start working, you can see a lots of prejudice and things like that on jobs. And I'll repeat this before you ask the next question while it's on my mind. | 27:58 |
Sephus Neil | I worked on one job 40 years and I was a supervisor. So one day we hired the white boy and when we hired the boy, I knew my next job was telling him what to do. The boss would be sitting in the office. When he wasn't sitting in the office, he really didn't know what was next. First thing, always first. But most of the time I would know. So I would call the strikes. And I'd say, "You do this. You do that. You do this." So this new fellow, I'd tell him two or three times, "Do this," and I'd tell somebody else to, "Do that." | 28:31 |
Sephus Neil | Finally, you know what the fellow says to him? He says, "You can't tell me what to do." I said, "If I can't tell you what to do, I'll let that man there tell you what to do." That was the boss. The boss says, "What's wrong, Sepher?" I says, "You come talk to him." And he says, "What's wrong?" He says, "He can't tell me what to do." He says, "I can't keep up with you. He know more what going on here than I do." You know what? And 20 minutes later he gets on this fellow's back, on this white boy's back here. Here's my hand until, so I left the job. | 29:13 |
Sephus Neil | I used ask the lady that take to — She was the clerk. What you call? The cashier. "Did the boy ever come back and get his money?" We made a joke out of it. And anyway, the next morning when the fool enters the door, the boss gets right on his back. And before noon I saw the fellow go out the back door. And I didn't tell nobody. I didn't know, he might been going to his car, he might have — You know, it is anything. I'm busy doing something there. | 29:51 |
Sephus Neil | So sooner or later somebody asked about him. I said, "He went out the back door a few minutes ago." And somebody went out the back door looking for him. He wouldn't let me tell him what to do. He quit the job. He quit, he never did come back to pick up his money. He never come back to get his money. He never came back get his — | 30:23 |
Sephus Neil | So that's the most experience I've had, as I say. Oh, you can see it here and there, everywhere, you can be in China. I believe I have moved around a lot in my life. And I'm sure you read the newspapers about Denny's restaurant. It's a article in the newspaper about it. And I was going to New York — No, I wasn't. I was going to Washington DC when Mel Watt was inducted into Senator. I went to Washington and we stopped in a restaurant. | 30:45 |
Sephus Neil | I don't think it was Denny's, but it was a chain. And it could have been about five, 10 minutes after six o'clock. It was two, three people in the place. And the driver goes in and so that's the driver, I'm right behind the driver. And he says, "Do you have a group of people for breakfast?" And the guy said, "Yes." He said, "Well, you wait a few minutes." And the driver said, "Yes." I says, "Can I use the bathroom?" He said, "Yeah." So, I goes on in and used the bathroom. In about five, 10 minutes we entered the building, we were served. | 31:28 |
Sephus Neil | So, it makes me think a little bit about that at that particular time. Was it too many of us? Now, if this had would've happened to those folks up at Denny's, I might have would never given us another thought. But it's still lots of it around, and it's sad to say. | 32:06 |
Sephus Neil | And we're going to have to get back to book. And the book is the Bible. And I believe that would be the only solution. Now, history that y'all are looking for right now, I don't have the book. I had to carry the book back to the library. I read more about integration in one book as old as I am in my life. And that's a book put out about Colin Powell. You get that book— | 32:32 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Colin Powell. | 33:09 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, Colin Powell. You get that book and read it. From the day he entered the army to where he is at right now. He sits right next to the man up there in the White House. Him and the man don't get along. When I say, "the man," you know who the man is. Well, he going to be one of those ones. Ford was one. Mr. Carter's one. Clinton's going to be one. And this — It wasn't Bush. One time president. | 33:09 |
Sephus Neil | That's what I'm saying when I say, "one." Mr. Clinton, he going to be another one too. Him and Colin Powell, they don't see eye and eye together. They say they're together, but they don't see eye and eye together. He wants to dictate. Well, he didn't want to dictate, he said about two words of Powell and that hit the news. And when it hit the news, boy you ain't heard it no more. But they're not together. They're not together. | 33:38 |
Sephus Neil | So I said all I said, it's everywhere. But during his days in the army, when he entered the army up until where he's at now, you should read it. Now, you talking about some history, you'll have some history. You get the book, you get the book. I guess I should buy the book. You can pick it up at the library, can keep it four or five days. When I come home at night, I'd have other things to do. And first thing I know it's 11 o'clock and I can't read but a few minutes. And in a few days you got to take it back to the library, they just start charging. One of those things. Now, go ahead. Go for the next one. | 34:07 |
Kara Miles | What job was this? That you had the experience with the— | 34:48 |
Sephus Neil | I was working for Wholesale Florist. We sold flowers to retail shops. And the place is still, they're still in business. They're still in business. | 34:52 |
Kara Miles | And what was your job? What did you do? | 35:08 |
Sephus Neil | My job was, they had me on piece of paper, for money—wise they called me a shipping clerk. But I was actually a supervisor. I was called — In other words, I take words from the boss and pass it down. The boss used to tell me, "If so—and—so don't do so—and—so," he said, "Tell them to go home." And you wouldn't want to tell the fellows, "We've got nothing for you to do," and make them feel bad. You say, "Well, get them off. Get the broom." And some of them wouldn't want you telling things like that. I say, "Now, if you don't get the broom," I say, "The boss is going to send you home because he's already talked to me." But that's not — They stopped moving. I said, "He going to send you home." | 35:10 |
Sephus Neil | In other words, in the mornings you'd be real busy with orders. Well, after maybe 12 or one o'clock, you wouldn't have a lots of business. The business would be over with. But if the fellows could find something to do, the man would let him stay on the clock. But if he'd catch them standing up talking and one of those things, he said, "Sepher, tell so— and—so," when the car — He wouldn't send them home at 2:15. Say, "It's 2:30. Tell so—and—so he can go home. Tell so—and—so he can go home at three o'clock," and one of those things. But that was my position. But as I say, they wouldn't say supervisor, they would say shipping clerk. For what? Money. | 35:51 |
Kara Miles | When did you get that job? | 36:35 |
Sephus Neil | Oh, I started working that job 19 — What? Was after we married. Let me see, I was working for WBT when we married. And that's when we married in 19 — I tell you when I went to work there. | 36:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Probably [indistinct 00:37:01]. | 37:00 |
Sephus Neil | 1940 — Let's say — Yeah, about '41 or '42. I'd say maybe about 1942. | 37:01 |
Kara Miles | Okay. And how much did you make when you started off there? | 37:15 |
Sephus Neil | Maybe about $30 to $35 a week. But I worked before I went to work there. I worked for WBT once, and I think on Saturday then I was taking home $13.86 a week. $13.86. And at that time I was paying about $3 a week for a house. | 37:24 |
Kara Miles | What was this you did? | 37:46 |
Sephus Neil | At WBT? I was custodial. I was custodial. | 37:47 |
Kara Miles | What's WBT? | 37:50 |
Sephus Neil | That's a radio station. | 37:52 |
Kara Miles | Oh, okay. | 37:53 |
Sephus Neil | Uh—huh. We the largest in the South. | 37:55 |
Kara Miles | Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm not from the South. | 37:55 |
Sephus Neil | You from the South? | 38:00 |
Kara Miles | No. | 38:01 |
Sephus Neil | Where your home? Change the conversation. | 38:05 |
Kara Miles | Well, I'm from Canada. | 38:07 |
Sephus Neil | Oh, Canada. Okay. I'll backtrack then if you from Canada. I'll backtrack. I was going say from Richmond to Atlanta. That's what I was going to say. Something like that, see? See Charlotte is in the middle between Richmond and Atlanta. When you get to Atlanta, you got your second New York City, one of those things. So Charlotte sits in between, Charlotte — Yeah, WBT. I don't know what's now, it was once 50,000. I can't tell you now. That's been a long time ago because I still remember — Well, I listened to radio out in the yard, but I don't think about things like that. | 38:09 |
Kara Miles | Now, was that your first job at WBT? | 38:52 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. Mm—hmm. Yeah, that was the first job I started making money on, WBT. | 38:54 |
Kara Miles | So, you were right out of high school. Was that right out or — | 39:00 |
Sephus Neil | No, elementary school. | 39:03 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 39:04 |
Sephus Neil | Elementary school. | 39:04 |
Kara Miles | So what was the last grade you completed? | 39:07 |
Sephus Neil | Eighth. Eighth grade. | 39:10 |
Kara Miles | And why did you stop then? | 39:12 |
Sephus Neil | Well, I wanted to — | 39:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Be a man. | 39:19 |
Sephus Neil | No, no, no. You ask me a question, now if I say, "Yeah," then it, that's going to give her a break. | 39:21 |
Sephus Neil | I've always been in love of clothes. I like clothes. When I went to work, I started buying clothes. And — | 39:31 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, you give me a break. You can't get in his closets for the clothes. And there's two boxes. You give me a break. He had two camel's hair overcoats, brand spank new, and you don't get them for a few pennies. | 39:41 |
Sephus Neil | Well, anyway, that's why I started— | 40:07 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | That's why he was hung up on— | 40:11 |
Sephus Neil | I worked. I'm working on this job. I missed one, I ran the elevator maybe for few months in the same building with WBT before I went to work for WBT. And at that second time, I think I must have had about as many clothes as I got today. I must have had about 10 suits of clothes. And the man told me, "Well, don't come to work dressed up." | 40:14 |
Kara Miles | Why was that? | 40:36 |
Sephus Neil | Why? | 40:38 |
Kara Miles | Yeah. | 40:39 |
Sephus Neil | Inhibition. Yeah. He said, "Don't come to work dressed up." And one of those things, I'll never will forget the fellow. Sooner or later, the guy wanted to make you say that you were working overtime to bribe your money. In other words, if he put you down for — If were supposed to be working 40 hours and he put you down for 45 hours a week, and you going to get that money, he would come to you and say, "Give me that extra money because I'll put you down to so—and—so." You know what I said the same for? I say, "I'll give you half of it. I won't give it all to you." | 40:40 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well. | 41:21 |
Sephus Neil | I wasn't doing anything crooked. He was the guy doing the work crooked. I was getting the money. I wasn't working. Look, I wasn't working. See, I had extra money to put in my pocket. So the company finally, they caught up with him and they fired him. But I think I answered that question. You want to know why I go to work? I tell you I went to work to buy clothes. | 41:22 |
Kara Miles | What was fashionable and what were you wearing in 1940 or when you started working there at WBT? What would a young man? | 41:48 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | '30s. | 41:57 |
Kara Miles | '30s? Okay. What would be a fashionable costume or outfit then? | 41:58 |
Sephus Neil | Well — What? Yeah — | 42:04 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | It's like they dress now even. | 42:06 |
Sephus Neil | Something like a derby hat. You know what a derby hat looks like? | 42:12 |
Kara Miles | Yeah. | 42:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I got a picture of you in that. | 42:14 |
Sephus Neil | A derby hat. And I got a hard straw hat. It's been trying to come back for about five, six years. | 42:16 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Clothes crazy. | 42:26 |
Sephus Neil | And it didn't get back. A hard straw, you know what a hard — Shell. They call them shell. | 42:30 |
Kara Miles | Right. Right. | 42:35 |
Sephus Neil | They won't make it. They'll get about halfway back. And if for some reason, if they won't get popular enough, one of those things. I got one in my closet in there right now. I probably haven't worn the hat in 10 years. I won't give it away. And I won't throw it away. | 42:36 |
Kara Miles | And what about the rest of your clothes? What kind of things would you— | 42:57 |
Sephus Neil | Oh. Well, let me see. Overcoats. I think I gave away maybe the last real, real old. No, I got a coat in there now, maybe over 20 years old. They call them black Chesterfield with a felt collar on it. | 42:59 |
Kara Miles | Right. | 43:15 |
Sephus Neil | You know, you following there? And other than that — | 43:17 |
Kara Miles | What school did you go to? | 43:33 |
Sephus Neil | I went to Fairview School. The same school that she were referring to a few minutes ago. I went to that school in the Greenville area. It has been two elementary schools in that area out there. | 43:39 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, yeah. I didn't— | 43:51 |
Sephus Neil | In fact, it's been three. You didn't tell about the Lutheran school you went to out there. I didn't ever go— | 43:52 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I didn't go to the Lutheran school. I used to visit the girls that went to the Lutheran school, the Moores, Eunice and Eienir. E—I—E—N—I—R, Eienirbelle Moore. And their oldest sister was named Eva, but she never did go to that school. I was trying to— | 43:58 |
Sephus Neil | Canada. Oh, what part? | 44:31 |
Kara Miles | Toronto. | 44:31 |
Sephus Neil | Toronto? | 44:31 |
Kara Miles | Yeah. | 44:31 |
Sephus Neil | Okay. I used to follow baseball. And y'all were in there. When? About two years ago. They were in there two years ago. | 44:40 |
Kara Miles | Did you follow Negro League baseball? | 44:56 |
Sephus Neil | What? | 45:00 |
Kara Miles | The Negro League? Did you— | 45:00 |
Sephus Neil | No, no, no, no. Actually, I've always been professional. I used to ride the train from Charlotte to Washington DC to see a baseball game. That's when I was making $13.86. You could ride the train from Charlotte to Washington to see a ball game. You come back for $10. That was back maybe 1938. | 45:02 |
Kara Miles | Right. That was the Senators? | 45:20 |
Sephus Neil | Washington Senators, that's right. Washington Senators. What? They went out to Minnesota, Milwaukee. Where did they go? They went to Minnesota. That's where, Minnesota. | 45:29 |
Kara Miles | Were there any Negro Leagues in this area that you know of? | 45:42 |
Sephus Neil | No. No, I can't — Actually, I don't think so. I can't remember. Oh, yes, it's one. It's some down south. Oh, boy. Alabama? No. Oh, man. Well, you got me there. All right, you got me there. You got me there. So, you go to the next one. | 45:57 |
Kara Miles | Okay. Fairview, was that the closest school to where you were living? | 46:18 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. Mm—hmm. After we moved from Third Ward where I was born, I moved to the Greenville area. | 46:23 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 46:27 |
Sephus Neil | And I was there— | 46:27 |
Kara Miles | Okay. Did you all know each other at Fairview? | 0:01 |
Sephus Neil | No. | 0:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. | 0:03 |
Sephus Neil | No, we didn't know each other. I met her, she used to come to visit some girls at the church that we're talking about tomorrow. We used to have Sunday school at four o'clock in the afternoon because— | 0:10 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I didn't ever tell them anything about the church. | 0:19 |
Kara Miles | We'll get back. We can go back. | 0:20 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, I was looking— | 0:20 |
Sephus Neil | We had Sunday school at four o'clock. Some people had to work and at four o'clock the people, especially the men and some of the ladies too, they would be off from work. They could go to church at night, but they wouldn't be at that 11 o'clock service because they had to work. So we had a very big Sunday school because people be off from work. So she used to come over there to visit some of her friends at my church. And that's where we met. | 0:28 |
Kara Miles | When did you meet, how old were you when you met? | 0:58 |
Sephus Neil | How old was I when we married? | 1:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I don't know. | 1:02 |
Sephus Neil | I can tell you I was 20— See I have a problem with that right now because my driver license is saying one thing and my age is saying no. Because I moved my age up because I didn't want to have no problem. I think I moved my age up two years. Actually, I must have been 20 years old when I married. But I put down 21. But I was actually 19. | 1:08 |
Kara Miles | Is there a reason why you did that? | 1:45 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, yeah. I didn't want them to question me about my license. In other words, here they would question you about your license. But if you go 15, 20 miles from here, a little town they call York, South Carolina, you could go down there and spend a night. If you spend a night, you could say that you live there. You would have to be there 24 hours and you could marry there. Where here in Charlotte, you had to be of age. And I think it was 21. So that's the difference between my age and my driver license today. | 1:50 |
Kara Miles | So you were 19 when you got married? | 2:25 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, about 19 when I got married. | 2:26 |
Kara Miles | How long had you all been dating before you got married? | 2:28 |
Sephus Neil | Well, I have to ask her that question again. How long? She's still looking for that derby. That's a— We done left the clothes now, so you can let the derby go. She wants to know how many years we've been married. That'll take care of that. | 2:31 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | 58 or nine. | 2:54 |
Kara Miles | How long did you all court before you got married? | 3:00 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I don't know. A year or so, I guess. | 3:03 |
Kara Miles | Were you still living at your grandmother's house then, Ms. Neal? | 3:11 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, I was rooming. | 3:14 |
Sephus Neil | That's where I met her. She was living at her grandmother's house when I met her, if that's her. | 3:21 |
Kara Miles | Did your grandmother have any rules about courting? | 3:29 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. You had to be home. You better not be out there at that time it was the Ford plant. And you had to be inside that house at 10 o'clock, unless you were— She knew where I was coming from most of the time. And I'd be running to get Sam from church. I didn't live but three or four houses from the church. | 3:33 |
Kara Miles | So is that what you did for recreation, was things at the church? | 4:06 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, and I went to parties and dances and— Well, we did get to stay a little bit later sometimes when it would be a real big crowd. I would go, what they call serenading, at Christmas time singing Christmas Carols going from house to house. | 4:11 |
Kara Miles | What kind of things did you used to do for fun? | 4:35 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Dancing. I loved to dance. | 4:37 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. | 4:40 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | A lot of dances and a lot of clubs. | 4:41 |
Sephus Neil | We danced. We went to dance about three weeks ago. We still got it. | 4:46 |
Kara Miles | What clubs were there to go to? | 4:51 |
Sephus Neil | Well, believe it or not, back then— | 4:54 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | White Rose Club. | 4:56 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, yeah. [indistinct 00:05:00] had clubs wait listed way back just as far as I can remember. | 4:58 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And we'd go to Goffins. | 5:08 |
Sephus Neil | There was clubs to go to. You know what I mean? It didn't operate 24 hours a day. They called it a club, you just go in there and have a good time. And the man locked the door. The man might work to waste himself, the next day, he'd be going to work. But there was places to go to have good time. It always had been a place to go to have a good time. And we went in a place, the Civic Center here downtown, cost about as much as a football stadium is going to cost here in Charlotte. I said all that, to say this here. And I think it cost by $5,000 to rent the Civic Center per night to have a dance there. And they moved the dance from downtown. | 5:08 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | It was at Oasis Temple. | 5:56 |
Sephus Neil | To another place by the name of Oasis Temple. Well, North Tryon Street. You might— | 5:56 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, it's gorgeous up there. | 6:01 |
Sephus Neil | But anyway— | 6:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | But it's a white though. | 6:04 |
Sephus Neil | It's on and operated by something like a fraternity. Fraternity, Shriners, rotary, something like that. But nevertheless, we moving around. We settled here. She traveled a lot. Traveled more than I traveled. | 6:07 |
Kara Miles | What kind of places did you all used to travel to back during this period? Back when you were like the thirties, and forties, and fifties? | 6:31 |
Sephus Neil | Well, I've gone to New York as long as I can remember. | 6:41 |
Kara Miles | What did you used to do in New York? | 6:42 |
Sephus Neil | Well, I used to go to places like the club. Yeah, same thing. Cotton Club. You heard of the Cotton Club? And when Jackie Robinson got famous, he built a hotel there by the name of Jackie Robinson Hotel. I used to live in that hotel. That's way by. And I said, I can remember my daddy used to— I'd ride the train before that time because he put a tag on me, who I were one them things. So I've always moved. I say when I moved, I like travel. I like travel, I like to go out to Chicago. | 6:47 |
Kara Miles | What was different about say, New York as opposed to the south? | 7:35 |
Sephus Neil | What's the difference? Well, number one, at that time when we were going in and out of New York City, hotels like we had here, you could couldn't go in a in Hotel Charlotte and rent a room. When you get to New York City, I could go on the walk off that store. I had had that, that was the difference. That's why we would go. That's why he would go. | 7:39 |
Kara Miles | So how long would you stay there when you went? | 8:07 |
Sephus Neil | Maybe no more than, never over a week. A week, for maybe a weekend to the following weekend. | 8:19 |
Kara Miles | What other cities? Did you go to any other cities outside the south? | 8:29 |
Sephus Neil | North Atlanta. I've been going to Atlanta— I used to go to Atlanta to have a good time because it was like a New York City. So you can ride a train down to the Atlanta, have a good time. So you go down to Atlanta and get on the train, and catch the train back at midnight, and be back home. See Atlanta is only— At that time, I guess it probably took between five or six hours. But the today, you going to be in Atlanta around about three hours, forty—five minutes, something like that. And a plane, I think about 50 minutes or something like that. I rode a plane down there. I think it's about 50 minutes. | 8:34 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | To where? | 9:23 |
Sephus Neil | Atlanta. | 9:23 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | It's not that far. You just sit down. It's not all but 30, 35 minutes from Charlotte to Atlanta. | 9:28 |
Sephus Neil | I can't remember. I said, I thought about 50 minutes. | 9:28 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, it's not but 35 minutes. | 9:28 |
Kara Miles | And what were the differences between Atlanta and Charlotte? | 9:32 |
Sephus Neil | What's the difference? It's more wide open spaces. It's more to see, it's more activities. I don't know whether I can come up with the right terminology or not. But I'd rather go to Atlanta and spend the day in Atlanta, than spend a day in here because you can see more, more places to go. They offer more. I don't know whether I come up the right word or not. | 9:36 |
Kara Miles | So where did you used to go in Atlanta? | 10:05 |
Sephus Neil | Well, the first place you want to go is what I just got through talking about a few minutes ago, baseball park. Yeah, you go to baseball park. | 10:08 |
Karen Ferguson | So did you ever see the Black Crackers there or did you— | 10:19 |
Sephus Neil | No, no, that's what that was before— | 10:21 |
Karen Ferguson | Your time? | 10:24 |
Sephus Neil | When they were playing baseball there, Mill Walker hadn't come in to Atlanta yet. See the Braves came out of Milwaukee. | 10:25 |
Karen Ferguson | Oh, I see. | 10:39 |
Sephus Neil | If you follow baseball, the Braves came out of Milwaukee. That's where they're from. | 10:39 |
Karen Ferguson | So you went to professional baseball games there, too? | 10:43 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. Yeah. I never did. I don't think I've been to a local baseball game here in 20 something years. I like first base. | 10:47 |
Karen Ferguson | When you went before— When you went to places like Washington or Atlanta and watched professional baseball games, were the stadiums integrated or did you have to sit in a certain area? | 10:58 |
Sephus Neil | No. No. You could buy your ticket on the telephone. | 11:23 |
Karen Ferguson | Oh yeah. | 11:23 |
Sephus Neil | You could buy your ticket on the telephone. And when you go to the Yankee Stadium, you can sit anywhere you'd like to sit. | 11:23 |
Karen Ferguson | And but in Atlanta you could do that as well? | 11:23 |
Sephus Neil | That's right. Yeah. You can sit anywhere your ticket calls from. | 11:24 |
Karen Ferguson | Right. | 11:24 |
Sephus Neil | Sit anywhere your ticket calls from. | 11:24 |
Kara Miles | What about travel to New York? In the cars, you were segregated until you reached— | 11:34 |
Sephus Neil | In the train years ago used to be, but today you sit anywhere. | 11:43 |
Kara Miles | Yeah. Tell me about what used to be. | 11:48 |
Sephus Neil | What it used to be? Well, I can tell you exactly what it was at 1938, because I served the party. Can you find a picture of Russ Hodges? This, this— | 11:50 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, we had a few dozen people. | 12:03 |
Sephus Neil | I served a party on the train from Charlotte to Washington and this was a baseball special. And this fella knew— | 12:06 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | New York ballet. | 12:14 |
Sephus Neil | Some public people was on the car. And he says to me, when you get through serving some of these people back here, take a bottle or two of whiskey up there and give them some whiskey. He knew they couldn't come back there where they were. So when I go up through there, I see one or two people I know, I say, "Here's a bottle of booze." One of them saying, here's a bottle of booze. I say, "This is coming from the man that's booking this excursion." But they couldn't get back in the back. They had a big bar set up, but they couldn't come back there in the back. So I gave them two bottles of whiskey. I said that's what it was like 1938. | 12:17 |
Karen Ferguson | Okay. But even back in like 1938 in Atlanta, when you went to the baseball stadium you could— | 12:56 |
Sephus Neil | Let me see, the Braves wasn't there in 1938. The Braves hadn't been there that long. | 13:02 |
Karen Ferguson | How about the Senators when you went to Washington in the— When you went in 1938, up there, would you be able to sit anywhere in the stadium in Washington? | 13:08 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, you could sit anywhere. | 13:17 |
Karen Ferguson | Okay. | 13:28 |
Sephus Neil | You sit anywhere there, or either you go to Philadelphia, you can sit. But on the train— Once you got in the stadium, you could sit anywhere you buy your ticket. You could sit anywhere in the stadium. But on the train you were separated on the train. | 13:29 |
Karen Ferguson | Right. | 13:47 |
Kara Miles | Well, let me get back to some other things. | 13:47 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | The church, is that? | 13:47 |
Kara Miles | Well, yes, go ahead. We can talk about the church now. What do you want to tell us about the church? | 13:49 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, our church was built by the Reverend Charles Newton Jenkins and his son Dr. Thomas A. Jenkins. That's his picture, bottom back. | 13:57 |
Sephus Neil | In other words, what's she's saying— | 14:14 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Father and son. | 14:16 |
Sephus Neil | I'm going to explain it to you. | 14:19 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Now, let me talk. | 14:21 |
Sephus Neil | Okay, go ahead. Go ahead, go ahead. Go ahead. Just try to make it move. | 14:23 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | You let me talk. | 14:25 |
Sephus Neil | Okay. You talk. | 14:28 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And the reason we have the church, this white family, the Osmonds. Mr. Osmond Binder's family gave us this double lot. That's why we had this church. It's been remodeled. They gave us the ground and we named it Brandon for their oldest son. It was named in memory of the Binder family's oldest son Brandon. And that's why we were called Brandon Presbyterian church until recently, 12 years ago. 15 now. Well, 1977, when we completed the new structure, Reverend Thomas A. Jenkins wanted the new church named for his dad. And that's why it's called CN Jenkins Presbyterian Church. | 14:30 |
Kara Miles | Did you both, this is the church you attended as a child. | 15:46 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, partly. | 15:51 |
Kara Miles | Where else did you go? | 15:53 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I went to all of them because I used to go with my aunt to the Methodist church. I like that. There're certain parts about the Methodist church now that I like. I especially, like their hymn book. And then I went to the Sanctified church, which is that church. My grandmother was a member of that particular faith. | 15:55 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And I was on the building committee. I was chairman of the finance department that collected the money from the members that made pledges to build our church that we have now. I went to the bank, the session selected me as chairman. I went to the bank, and got the cards, and brought them back, and signed them. And I signed it, and carried the money, and deposited it with a helper, one of the elders. And until the board finally decided to give us a grant. At first they said we could not bill a church. We did not have enough members. We didn't have enough men and enough paying people. And at one time we were told to find— They wondered if they could find five real true Christians within the church. So we had meetings, and meetings, and meetings until that particular minister, Reverend— Oh what was his name? | 16:30 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Newberry. He resigned and then Reverend Jenkins came out of retirement and took over. And I remember making notes. I got a scrapbook in there in that drawer there somewhere now, when Reverend Jenkins met with us the first time back in 76 or 75. He prayed because I wrote it down because we hadn't been praying when we had our meetings. And that we were going to build a church. | 17:46 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Then, when we had the next meeting with the missions division, which was over our group and was supposed to give us a grant and loaned us some money, they wrote us a note. On the note, it was a real letter and brought in an executive from the board of National Missions. What was his name? Preston? I can't think right. Anyway, he was a Preston. The last part of his name was Preston. And he said that he felt like that the missions division should tell us that we were wanting too much church and we couldn't afford it, unless we would were able to raise the $35,000 cash to put a deposit on the loan. | 18:16 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | So then we had several meetings. And finally, after I had been selected chairperson, he gets up in one of the meetings and Dr. Henderson was there and told him that we would make a sacrifice. And we had at least 25 or 30 people that would make a sacrifice, and pay a thousand dollars, and raise that money. And he said we couldn't do it. And so it boiled down to, I've got that book hit somewhere too with the list of the ones that paid the first 10 or 12 that paid the thousand dollars spot cash. Then we dribbled on, and dribbled on, and different ones paid 500, 600, 700. And before you knew it, we had raised over the $35,000 and we got the grant. But we went through a terrible hassle. There was even curse words said at some of those meetings in those offices, on Smith's campus of doctor Dr— Oh, what's his name? | 19:16 |
Sephus Neil | One of the executives on this board, he called the shots for the Presbyterian churches out of Johnson C. Smith. And to get back to the history she's missing. She didn't say. If you come to the church tomorrow, the church you're looking at right there, this was the first church. And the church you're going attend tomorrow will be the second church. His daddy built that church. And this one here, he built the church that you'll see tomorrow if you get there. It's two different buildings. That's the history. | 20:37 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | What is that? | 21:13 |
Sephus Neil | It's two churches. The father built one church and the son— | 21:14 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Heres the new church, but it does not have the educational space in it. | 21:22 |
Sephus Neil | Well, we ain't going by church. You're going by buildings. | 21:37 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | But the sanctuary is pretty. | 21:37 |
Sephus Neil | That's the point. A father and a son built both. | 21:37 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Both churches. | 21:39 |
Sephus Neil | Built a church that we attend. A father and a son. | 21:40 |
Kara Miles | Now, did you attend that church when you were growing up? | 21:44 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. Yeah. I attend that old church there. | 21:46 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | And we had cement walkway and everybody learned to skate. And we had a tennis court also, at this old church. | 21:53 |
Karen Ferguson | You learned to roller skate? | 22:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. Yeah. | 22:03 |
Sephus Neil | I don't know whether this would be history or not, but we had the first cement sidewalks in the Greenville area at our church. And that's another reason why we got lots of people in that area over that venture. The rest of the places, they didn't have no cement because they couldn't skate. So they would have to come to our church where there was cement in the walks to skate. So we got the people there, like I get you to [indistinct 00:22:48] I'm just kidding. You make it convenient. I'm just making a joke out of it. You make it convenient. You do what you're comfortable with. That's what life's all about. Do what's comfortable. | 22:05 |
Kara Miles | Now, Mrs. Neil, is this the church that you were telling us last night about the tents? Is that that church? | 22:48 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, no, no. That's a different church. | 22:51 |
Kara Miles | Tell me about that church. | 22:53 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | That's the Church of God. | 22:55 |
Kara Miles | Okay. | 23:02 |
Sephus Neil | Who's oldest? I'm sure you're know that lady that was in here a few minutes ago. Now, she was a member of that church. The lady that was sitting here that you're talking about. Now, she could bring you up to date on that church. She was a member of that Church of God that she was talking about with the tent. | 23:02 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Her mom and daddy were members. | 23:11 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. One of those things. That's where she was raised and brought up with. She spent lots of her mileage up north somewhere. I don't know. | 23:14 |
Kara Miles | But tell me about those tents that you were telling us about last night. | 23:24 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They put up a tent, and tables, and they cooked. Well, they cooked three meals a day, but not three. And dinner was maybe, they cooked two big meals a day. But it was in the afternoon when they fed all the children in the Greenville area, Black and White. They'd swarm up and line up to get that dinner. | 23:27 |
Karen Ferguson | Why did they do this? When did they do it in the year? | 23:56 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They just did it at a certain time when they were running what they call the annual— And more or less like a revival. | 23:59 |
Sephus Neil | It's like a revival now. But they're different. | 24:11 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They didn't call it— What did they call that? It was their annual— But it was their annual church gathering and they held it for two weeks. And ministers would come of that faith from all over this area. | 24:13 |
Sephus Neil | Like soup lines today. Soup line feed people coming from everywhere. And this church, when they'd fix those dinners, they'd feed everybody come from everywhere. Certain times a year they'd have this meeting. | 24:37 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Two weeks. It was two weeks. | 24:51 |
Kara Miles | So for every day, for two weeks they fed everyone? | 24:56 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, everybody. | 24:59 |
Kara Miles | You mentioned white people coming. Was this just White children or were White adults come, too? | 24:59 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes, White and Black. | 25:03 |
Sephus Neil | Because they knew each other. | 25:03 |
Kara Miles | And would they come to the church service, too? | 25:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They would come to the services. Oh, the church would be overflowing. | 25:03 |
Kara Miles | And is that the only time in the year that White people would come to the church? | 25:14 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, I don't guess— Not necessarily. So if there's a funeral or something, somebody they would all come from all over. | 25:19 |
Kara Miles | Okay. Did you used to go to that church sometimes? | 25:33 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. Yeah. | 25:35 |
Kara Miles | What was different from that church and the Presbyterian church? | 25:36 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, the fellowship. | 25:41 |
Kara Miles | What do you mean? | 25:48 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, the way you are treated. | 25:50 |
Kara Miles | What was different? How were you treated differently? | 25:55 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, the explaining of the scripture and the word of God was just brought to you in a different, interpreted to you. You got a different view of your own sins and your own self there. Because what in turn— It was more like Christ like, Christ washed the disciple feet. At a certain time, and during the time they were having these services, they washed each other's feet. | 25:59 |
Kara Miles | Every Sunday that was part of it? | 26:43 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. Just a certain time. It's like we take communion a certain time. | 26:48 |
Kara Miles | Did you enjoy going to that church? | 26:52 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, I enjoyed it. And I enjoyed going to the other one because I go up there and watch the teenagers and things played tennis. I couldn't swing the racket as well as the older ones. Reverend Jenkins. Oh, he was a real tennis player. And then the young men from Smith would come to the Presbyterian church. That was before they built the university church. | 26:54 |
Kara Miles | Did you ever go to the House of Prayer, to Daddy Grace's church? | 27:30 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, I went there once out of curiosity and said, "Oh, I'm so afraid." I said once I was going to carry some aspirin, or carry some ammonia, or something because they holler and sing. But after I got there and they have improved, they have changed. Their music is, well, it's on an upbeat, it's just— Well, they have advanced just like everybody else. So it was beautiful. And you had your meal, you stayed all day. And they had a gorgeous dining room. And I've been to that new one up there and it is gorgeous because they only go upstairs when the bishop's there. | 27:35 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They worship downstairs, and the dining room, and all that is downstairs. Unless, the bishop's there, then they go up where the gorgeous chandeliers and fine plush pulpit. The altar and everything is just, it's elaborate. | 28:29 |
Kara Miles | When did you go there? | 28:54 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I was there about, maybe it's been 12 years ago. | 28:57 |
Kara Miles | Did you ever hear about Daddy Grace Window? I mean back when this church was first. | 29:06 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, I went to that baptizing. I found myself on that great big picture when I was in high school when he first came to Shaw. And those people jumped in. | 29:10 |
Kara Miles | Tell me about that. I don't know about this. | 29:26 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, it was just— Well, same as a camp meeting or circles. There were just so many people there. And he was baptizing them and after he finished those that were robed for baptism, then he held up his hands and people were just jumping in. | 29:30 |
Kara Miles | And you went to that? You were there? | 29:51 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah, I was standing there watching. Yeah. And found myself on that great big picture with all those thousands of people that were out there at Clinton Beach. | 29:53 |
Sephus Neil | Those people were just like the man down there in Texas. The fellow was up there in New York. His name was Coo's? You know they had all those people. | 30:05 |
Kara Miles | Koresh? | 30:21 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, yeah. No, that's a guy in Texas. Yeah, it was another one in New York City. Oh yeah, it's one up in New York City. Oh, man. He hypnotized the people. He hypnotized the people. He hypnotized people. And Bishop raised, back in those days, the people— It was just like those people out there in Texas. They believe he was the man. They believe he was the man back in those days. So today, as she said a few minutes ago, sometimes— I don't know, in reading, I guess. It helps to enlighten people that he can't be the man. He can't, it is not for one book, you know what I mean? And everybody read out the same book. But some people interpret. | 30:21 |
Kara Miles | People back then they believed that he was— | 31:22 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, sure. I have a man that— He's my shoe fixer. He's my shoe fixer at the shoe shop. He'll tell you that was his daddy. I said, you can't have but one. I kid him. I talked to him Turkey Town. He said, but then he's my daddy. One of those things. And he believed it. | 31:25 |
Kara Miles | Did you ever go to that church? | 31:46 |
Sephus Neil | No, I just— What she said, for curiosity, you go for curiosity. See what the people are doing. | 31:48 |
Karen Ferguson | So were the people who went there, they were less educated? Is that what you're saying? | 31:56 |
Sephus Neil | Oh, no, no? I would wouldn't think so. | 32:01 |
Karen Ferguson | No, but what kind of person would go to that church? | 32:03 |
Sephus Neil | Well, this is just like people had with this guy down in Texas. | 32:11 |
Karen Ferguson | So all kinds of people? | 32:14 |
Sephus Neil | All kinds. All kinds. All kinds. They just get hung up on it like people get hung up on drugs. Did some of those people he get hung up on drugs? Oh, wait a minute. I was trying to call the president a few minutes ago. Ford's wife was a what? She was an alcoholic. She got hung up on it. And there's a lot of them. There's lots in the movie stars, get hung up on that stuff. Well, they're human. Their body won't do it so much. They're human. But nevertheless you're talking about, what's the difference between that church and this church? What's the difference between a Baptist and Presbyterian? She said fellowship. One of those things— | 32:16 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Confessing your sins. | 33:04 |
Sephus Neil | Did you not tell me you were a Baptist? In your church and in my church too, because we got lots of Baptist people in my church. You hear lot of amen. But you can go in some Presbyterian in church, you will hear it all day and all night. Why? | 33:08 |
Kara Miles | You tell me. | 33:22 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, yeah. Why? We all going the same way? Well, and the ministers be coming from the same book. But— | 33:26 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | There is a difference in the way I see it in confessing your sins. That's what makes a difference with me because part of my people are Catholics, Presbyterians, Baptist. They're everything. And that's the way I look at it. It's going to confession. See, when you don't confess your sins, you really are not being forgiven them. That's the way I see it because I have— | 33:39 |
Sephus Neil | What are you saying right now? When you don't say amen, you're not confessing sin? Is that what you're saying? | 34:25 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, I'm not. No, no, no. Go for confession from your hearts. | 34:26 |
Sephus Neil | You didn't get the question. You didn't get my question. | 34:37 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I ain't answering your question. I'm trying to tell her. | 34:53 |
Kara Miles | There's someone knocking at your door. | 34:53 |
Sephus Neil | I don't know. Let me see. | 34:53 |
Kara Miles | Did the Black Presbyterian church and the White Presbyterian church ever have any contact back in these days? | 35:02 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. We just merged back. We fell out over the northern and the southern. See we Blacks went with the northern church, but since 83 we merged. I got a newsletter of the day. It's back there somewhere. What did I do with that newsletter? | 35:12 |
Kara Miles | Mrs. Neil, I want to go back to your education. After you finished Second Ward, what did you do after that? | 35:50 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I went to work. I did take a— Oh, what do you call it? More or less, a six weeks or something. First course was on tutoring children under Nancy Campbell. I got a six weeks certificate on, it was what more or less, an illiteracy program. Where people can't read and they were ashamed to let it be known, but still they wanted help. So I took a six weeks course on that and worked— I didn't go but once after I had got my certificate because I was going to have to walk and I was beginning to get kind of nervous and tired of it. So I didn't follow through on it. | 36:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | But I did take that literacy course. | 37:07 |
Kara Miles | Where did you take that? | 37:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Central Piedmont College. | 37:14 |
Kara Miles | Where did you work after you finished high school? | 37:17 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I worked downtown on elevator. And worked for Ivy's. I worked in several departments. And then at one time, between my children, I was in the millinery department. I loved hats. I used to go and check the stock, unpack, and write up the sales and deliver the hats down to the call desk. Because Ivy's at that time had a lot of out of town customers. And I would pack the hats, and write them up, and take them down to be picked up. So the customer would get the delivery more or less. And dust and help with the stock, check off the hats. | 37:20 |
Karen Ferguson | Did you have any other jobs? | 38:15 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | There in the store? | 38:17 |
Karen Ferguson | Or other places, too? | 38:19 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, in these late years I worked for a private family. I was more or less helping with a sick lady because she had a nurse, but her day off I'd be there extra. All day. | 38:22 |
Karen Ferguson | Did they ever have any Black sales people in Ivy's? | 39:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes. | 39:04 |
Karen Ferguson | They did? All the time that you were working there? | 39:05 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, not all the time. | 39:08 |
Karen Ferguson | When did that happen? | 39:10 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | That happened though, back in what? | 39:11 |
Sephus Neil | Who was the first person there? Was it a minister? | 39:14 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, Dorothea had worked there before. | 39:27 |
Sephus Neil | Dorothea Davis? | 39:28 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Had worked there before. | 39:29 |
Sephus Neil | Dorothea? | 39:35 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. She had been a saleswoman there before she went to Lucile's, grants. She had worked. Dorothea had worked all around. | 39:35 |
Kara Miles | So Blacks and Whites went to Ivy's? | 39:45 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. To work. | 39:47 |
Kara Miles | To shop there? Did Blacks and Whites shop there? | 39:49 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes. I used to be on the elevator there. I was one of the first Blacks on the elevator because they were on the more or less. And then I worked in the dining room there. That's when they took those jobs from us. | 39:53 |
Kara Miles | They took what jobs from you? | 40:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Waitresses. | 40:13 |
Kara Miles | And when was that? When did they— | 40:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Back in the— What was it? | 40:13 |
Sephus Neil | It's been going on maybe 20, 20 years. | 40:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | It was over 20 years. This is 90. | 40:13 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah. Yeah. 90. | 40:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They took jobs away from us. | 40:13 |
Sephus Neil | It wasn't anything but the Black people. All waiters an all porters, pulling porters on trains and everything. Today you go in any restaurant downtown— | 40:13 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | They took those jobs from us way back then. | 40:14 |
Sephus Neil | You find all white waiters. | 41:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, I know— | 41:04 |
Sephus Neil | On the sanitary trucks. The people that pick up your garbage the same way. When they escalated the salaries, that was the beginning of it. They found out it was lots of money in it. It's like the man picked my garbage up. Oh, I say 34 years ago, he wouldn't come in my backyard and pick up my garbage. But today he'll come in there and go just say paying them an affordable salary. That's all over the world anywhere you go. Anywhere you go. | 41:05 |
Karen Ferguson | So Mrs. Neil, they fired you then, all the Black waitresses? | 41:36 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No, they just shifted you around. | 41:39 |
Sephus Neil | No, they put you on something else. Sometimes they let you break you own neck. | 41:42 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. And then the elevators. And then the machine nearly took that over. | 41:50 |
Karen Ferguson | So when did you begin working there at Ivy's? | 42:00 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | When I finished high school. | 42:01 |
Karen Ferguson | Okay. So that was around? | 42:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | 1929. | 42:04 |
Karen Ferguson | 1929. | 42:04 |
Kara Miles | And how long did you stay there? How long did you work at Ivy's? | 42:09 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Over 20 years. I helped— I got a service pin there somewhere. | 42:12 |
Karen Ferguson | I wanted to go back to something you said, you said your grandmother was a midwife? | 42:24 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yeah. | 42:27 |
Karen Ferguson | And she worked for a doctor, is that right? | 42:28 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes. Dr— | 42:31 |
Sephus Neil | Did you say Hogan's? | 42:34 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | No. | 42:34 |
Sephus Neil | Williams? | 42:34 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | JT the school that his daughter gave all that property to. JT Williams. | 42:37 |
Karen Ferguson | Was he a Black doctor? | 42:46 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes, Black doctor. | 42:48 |
Karen Ferguson | And did she deliver all the babies for him? | 42:50 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, a lot of them. | 42:52 |
Karen Ferguson | Where did she learn to be a midwife? | 42:59 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | At school, I assume. She was smart. She was just smart. | 43:01 |
Karen Ferguson | Right. Did Black people have their babies at home at the time or did they go to the hospital? | 43:08 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, not all the time they did, but they did have some at home. | 43:17 |
Karen Ferguson | Right. When you had your babies, did you have them in the hospital? | 43:23 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Two of them. My oldest child was born at home. | 43:29 |
Karen Ferguson | Right. Did— | 43:33 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | But Iris and Jimmy were both born in the hospital. | 43:37 |
Karen Ferguson | And were the hospitals segregated when you went in to have them delivered? | 43:42 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | I guess so, yeah. Because there was a bunch of us in a room. | 43:48 |
Kara Miles | Wasn't but one. When you had— | 43:52 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | When my last child was born, I had a private room. | 43:57 |
Sephus Neil | No, no. She said the hospital, but it wasn't for one hospital is what I'm thinking. | 44:00 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Oh, we didn't have— | 44:02 |
Sephus Neil | We didn't have but one hospital. | 44:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Yes, we were segregated. | 44:17 |
Sephus Neil | Yeah, we were segregated. We didn't have but one hospital. | 44:19 |
Kara Miles | What hospital was that? | 44:19 |
Sephus Neil | Good Samaritan. That's the name of it. That's where I was born. Right there. Good Samaritan hospital. | 44:19 |
Karen Ferguson | That was a Black hospital, right? | 44:21 |
Sephus Neil | That's right. | 44:22 |
Karen Ferguson | Okay. | 44:22 |
Kara Miles | So then there was another hospital that was the White hospital? | 44:27 |
Sephus Neil | Oh, yes. | 44:31 |
Kara Miles | Had lots of them then? | 44:32 |
Sephus Neil | They had them all over. | 44:39 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Presbyterian, st. Peter's. A lot. | 44:39 |
Sephus Neil | Mercy. | 44:39 |
Margaret Johnson Neil | Well, a bunch of them. But we weren't allowed in there. | 44:49 |
Sephus Neil | B? Where are we? Have we got a B yet? And I know we don't got an A. If you don't hurry up, we might get a C. Hurry up, we might get a C. | 44:58 |
Kara Miles | Well, we want to go back to your childhood. Can you tell me anything about your parents and your family? | 45:16 |
Sephus Neil | Oh, my parents? Okay. My daddy, he worked for a dealer, he was an automobile dealer. His name was Origen Bander. The same man that give us the property for that first church you see over there. My daddy worked for that man, right there. And he was automobile dealer. And what can I say? I think I repeated this last night, maybe not to you, but there was seven in my family. And my daddy would give us most things with most people would want. He ran a grocery bill. He ran a meat bill. When we used to go to school, we just stopped at a grocery store and buy lunch from— | 45:23 |
Sephus Neal | We went downtown to one of the best shoe stores was located downtown. All we had to do was tell the people who we were, and it would give us what we want. We'd go in the clothing store where you probably wouldn't go but once a year, one of those things, we could get what we want in the clothes in the store. My mother never worked. She always stayed at home. So go for the next one. | 0:01 |
Kara Miles | Well, it sounds like your father was making good money. | 0:29 |
Sephus Neal | Well, he worked for two rich people, two rich men. One was a banker, and the other was a automobile dealer. Way back, automobile dealer. Well, this automobile dealer, he done lost the property downtown. They got a hotel named after him right now downtown. The Barringer. Well, no, they closed the hotel. But the hotel used to be, it was named Barringer Hotel, but it's closed now. This man that owned all this property, he give away lots of property to the church that my daddy works for. You know what happened to him? He committed suicide. | 0:31 |
Sephus Neal | Depression came along, he lost everything he had, and he ended up, he committed suicide. He jumped in a pool, a little larger than this room right here in his backyard. He was living downtown. When he ended up, he was living in the colored neighborhood. That's where he had a house built, in the colored neighborhood. Right out on West Boulevard they called. And he had a pool in his backyard there. I don't know whether it for ducks or what, but that's where they found him. His name was Oslen Barringer. My daddy worked for Oslen Barringer. And the next man he worked for was a man by the name of RA Dunn. RA Dunn was president of a bank downtown. This bank went busted too. This bank went busted. | 1:10 |
Kara Miles | During the Depression. | 2:02 |
Sephus Neal | During the Depression, this bank went bust. And the next job he worked after he worked for those two jobs, he went to work for something like— He worked for, it wasn't the state. What do they call it? Something similar to social service. Something similar to social service. And this company is in the same building that this hospital used to be at 7th and Triad Street. It used to be some government operation in there. He worked there until he retired. So I might have missed something where down the line, so if you got note, pop it. | 2:03 |
Kara Miles | What did he do at these places? | 2:54 |
Sephus Neal | Well, he's custodial. At the bank and for the automobile dealer, he was a chauffeur. He was a chauffeur. And I can [indistinct 00:03:10], he used to go out. He used to take these people, especially the banker, out to [indistinct 00:03:16] club a lot. He'd take them out to the club. My daddy would have to sit there in the car 11:00, 12:00. So sometimes he would come home and stay home an hour or two and go back and pick them up. Finally, I heard him tell my momma, said, "Next time we going to the club," he says, "I'm not going." So the next time they were supposed to go out to the club, one day he come home. That was it. He quit the job. He quit the job. And people tried to get him back. He went back at times to do a little work for him, but he finally found a job, went to work somewhere else. | 2:56 |
Kara Miles | And where was that? | 3:52 |
Sephus Neal | That was the place, I can't call the name of. Something like social service, but wherever he worked at, you have a lots of sick leaves and sick day and something else. But anyway, when he left the job, he had lots of retirement. So when he got old enough to retire, he retired. | 3:54 |
Kara Miles | You talked about this man Barringer. Why was his house— You said he lived in the colored neighborhood? Why? | 4:18 |
Sephus Neal | Well, property was cheap there. He lived about three blocks from the square downtown. All that property he owned down there was worth thousands and thousands of dollars. When he bought some property down there— I'm just giving you a rough estimate. I mean, the house out there probably would cost him what, $30 or $40,000. Downtown, it might cost him $200,000. | 4:26 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | 'Cause it was a big house. | 4:52 |
Sephus Neal | It wasn't a very big house. I looked at the house every day. The house sits right there on that corner where you go up into Gethsemane Church there. [indistinct 00:05:08]. That brick house on the left where Oslen Barringer committed suicide. | 4:55 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | [indistinct 00:05:13] It was a big house. | 5:11 |
Sephus Neal | No, it wasn't a big house. No, I'm the one who moved there. See, just wondering why I know a lots about this [indistinct 00:05:20] sooner or later. When the man's wife died, he was a lover of flowers and the man I worked for, he was a racketeer once upon a time, and a racketeer touched bases with lots of people. | 5:12 |
Sephus Neal | So this automobile dealer used to come to a place where I work at, and he'd always buy flowers wholesale. But he didn't have no wholesale license, but he was a big man. So the man would let him have it, you know what I mean, see? That's the name of the game. I mean, some people like that today. They don't want to go in the [indistinct 00:06:03] store and buy nothing. They want to buy everything wholesale, go to a wholesaler. Borrow somebody's tax number. | 5:41 |
Sephus Neal | I went to buy something the other day, and the man asked me did I have a tax number. I said, "No, I don't have a tax number." But I could get one. I could call one of my friends that operate a business and say, "I'm getting ready to buy so—and—so." Said, "What about letting me use you your tax number?" What would $15 or $20 mean to him? No more than interrupted. It wasn't that important. So I said to the person is, "Forget it." One of those things. So I didn't buy what I actually would have bought, but I wanted to buy a wholesale. Wholesale license cost you $23 for a florist. Wholesale license for operate a florist. I have owner license. Why? Why, I can walk in any place of business and buy anything wholesale I want. | 6:09 |
Sephus Neal | There's food shows that way. It's a company is in City of Charlotte by the name of Pace. Pace sells everything, but to get into Pace, you got to buy something like a credit card. That credit card costs you $25. But you can go in there and buy what they have at a wholesale price. So if I had a great, great big family and bought lots of food and this and that and the other— I had a Pace card once. I didn't need it. I didn't need it. I got some things back there in the kitchen right now. And everything you buy, you got to buy it in a large quantity. You can't buy one. You got buy half a dozen or two or one of those things, see. | 6:56 |
Kara Miles | The man that you said you worked for who was into racketeering? Who was he? What was his name? | 7:42 |
Sephus Neal | Well, what did [indistinct 00:07:50] tell you last night? | 7:48 |
Kara Miles | Oh, okay. Don't want to be sued. Okay. What kind of things was he into? | 7:51 |
Sephus Neal | Well, when I said racketeer, actually the word was bootlegger. He was a bootlegger. That was before they had whiskey stores legal here in the city. He used to sell illegal whiskey. | 8:00 |
Kara Miles | So what did you do for him? | 8:15 |
Sephus Neal | In later years he got out of the business and went in the wholesale florist business. | 8:18 |
Kara Miles | Okay, okay. So this is the— | 8:24 |
Sephus Neal | Yeah. | 8:28 |
Kara Miles | When we were talking about the Depression and the man who committed suicide, how did the Depression affect your family? | 8:28 |
Sephus Neal | To me, I can't tell. I don't think I ever missed a meal or one of those things. | 8:37 |
Kara Miles | How about the Second World War? | 8:54 |
Sephus Neal | The Second World War? Well, that was a gold mine. The Second War, in fact, you don't see nobody die. But when the Gulf War came along here the other year, you know what I was thinking? We going to get out of this economical stretch. But it didn't last long enough. It didn't last. If it had lasted two or three years, one of those things, Mr. Clinton wouldn't have been up against a wall like today. | 8:57 |
Kara Miles | But in what way was it a gold mine for you? | 9:26 |
Sephus Neal | Well, your salary escalated. Everybody's salary. It was more money out there. It's no money out there now. I mean, there's some money. The people out there now got lots of money. When I say that they got lot of money, they doing lots of gambling. Boy, if the stock market would crash tomorrow like it did in 1928 or 1929, you talking about jumping out the windows? You see some people out jumping out the windows. | 9:29 |
Kara Miles | So did you work in any war industries or did you change jobs during the Second World War? | 9:56 |
Sephus Neal | Yeah. Yeah. | 10:02 |
Kara Miles | Where did you work? | 10:03 |
Sephus Neal | I worked for quartermaster where they distributed, what, clothes. | 10:03 |
Kara Miles | Right. And how about you, Mrs. Neal, did you work anywhere during the Second World War? | 10:10 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I worked all my life. My only son that's left has worked since he was big enough to sit on a wood truck. | 10:14 |
Sephus Neal | You haven't answered her question. | 10:24 |
Kara Miles | Where did you work during the second World War? Did you work in any war industry? | 10:27 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | No. I stayed with Linus. | 10:31 |
Kara Miles | Right, right. Did your salary increase during that time? Was this a gold mine period? | 10:36 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | No, no, no. Very little. No. I left there— Yes, I did leave there and start working for Sears, because it was more money. Yeah, I did leave. | 10:40 |
Sephus Neal | Sure, sure. Just like [indistinct 00:11:03]. | 11:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I did leave there. And didn't go back, 'cause they kept writing me letters and phoning and then I told them I wasn't coming back, because there was too much difference in the pay. | 11:03 |
Kara Miles | Who took care of your children when you were at work? | 11:19 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I had a great aunt who passed away. She used to keep them. And then at one time, my mother—in—law, his mother kept them. And Iris was born late, so she kept her a while till she decided that she wasn't going to stay over there anymore. She was going to stay with my neighbor that lived next door to me on Forest Street. I think I showed you that house. And she lived up on Rachel Street, just a couple of blocks from here. So she started staying with her. | 11:22 |
Kara Miles | I have some more questions on your childhood. | 12:09 |
Sephus Neal | Go, go. | 12:12 |
Kara Miles | Keep getting off that. | 12:12 |
Sephus Neal | Go, go, go. | 12:13 |
Kara Miles | What was your house like? The house you grew up in? | 12:17 |
Sephus Neal | Well, the house I grew up in? Well, when I got ready to take a bath at night, I had to go out and get the tin tub. And most times, if something's going on in the house, you'd have to go in the bathroom on the back porch to take your bath. When winter time come, you take an oil heater out there and put in there, you get warm or something going on in the kitchen, in the house. You follow me? And if not, if there's nobody in the bedroom, you take that same tub, pick it up, take it in the bedroom and take a bath. | 12:25 |
Kara Miles | So how many rooms were there in your house? | 13:02 |
Sephus Neal | Let me see. One, two— Let me see. Let me see. One, two, three, four— One, two— Five. | 13:10 |
Kara Miles | And how many were bedrooms? | 13:23 |
Sephus Neal | They all were bedrooms except the kitchen. No, one was living room. Okay. Three bedrooms. Yeah, that's right. | 13:27 |
Kara Miles | And you said was seven of you? Seven children? | 13:35 |
Sephus Neal | Yeah. There was seven. | 13:37 |
Kara Miles | Were you all living there at one time, or were some of you old enough to be— | 13:38 |
Sephus Neal | Some of them were. I had a brother left home real early in life. And the second one left. I can imagine, I can't remember any of us being there any length of time over three or four years. One of those things. One of the houses that we lived at. Well, no, you [indistinct 00:14:06] about that at the beginning. Let me back up a little bit. Let me see now. We lived on Hill Street. This is before we moved into Greenville area. | 13:42 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | How many rooms you have there? | 14:17 |
Sephus Neal | Three. One, two, three. Let me see. One, two— We didn't have but three. We didn't have but three. | 14:20 |
Kara Miles | A kitchen and two bedrooms, or a kitchen and a living room and a bedroom? House, how was it set up? | 14:31 |
Sephus Neal | You want to know the truth, I can't remember. But I can remember how the house was made. The house was made one, two, three, just like I said. Anyway. Most of them were like that [indistinct 00:14:54] back in those days. I don't know, you don't know. But most of the houses back in those days, it was just one, two, three. | 14:39 |
Kara Miles | So it was a shotgun house. | 15:02 |
Sephus Neal | Yes, that's right. One, two, three. That's reason why I said "One, two, three." | 15:03 |
Kara Miles | So did anyone else ever live there other than your— | 15:08 |
Sephus Neal | Nobody else lived with my family. | 15:15 |
Kara Miles | Yeah. That's what I was asking. | 15:17 |
Sephus Neal | That was your question. Nobody else. Nobody. | 15:19 |
Kara Miles | Okay. And I wanted to ask you about the stores where your father had credit. Were they Black stores or white owned stores? | 15:24 |
Sephus Neal | White owned stores. The best. He said to me once, if I used alcohol, I wouldn't use anything but the best. He didn't use alcohol, but I've heard him use that terminology. He see people out there [indistinct 00:15:51]. In fact, I know he used to give him booze. He'd bring the booze home and he had a neighbor that he used to give all the booze to us [indistinct 00:16:00] at Christmas time. [indistinct 00:16:03] He be glad Christmas coming. I got what I wanted when I was able to buy what I wanted. | 15:33 |
Kara Miles | What was Christmas time like at your house? | 16:15 |
Sephus Neal | Well, believe it or not, I'm not exaggerating and I'm not unique and I don't have a ego, but there's always a good feeling with me at my house, the way I was brought up. As I say, we always got what we want. Plenty of food, plenty clothes. My daddy, he believed in the best. He believed in the best, see. | 16:21 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Blessings. | 16:50 |
Kara Miles | [indistinct 00:17:01]. What was Christmas like at your house, Mrs. Neal? | 17:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Oh, we had a big, big dinner and big get together. | 17:04 |
Kara Miles | With all your family? | 17:11 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Uh—huh. My uncles and their wives. I had one favorite cousin who has passed away. Now, he's just like my brother. And his mother was real sweet. She was an aunt in—law. Real sweet. | 17:12 |
Kara Miles | What kind of presents did you used to get? | 17:38 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Oh, all kinds. I liked doll babies and had a little carriage that you could roll your doll around in. Then we liked to beat the drum and dance. My grandmother played [indistinct 00:18:05] and we put on shows. We just had a good time. | 17:41 |
Kara Miles | And what about you? | 18:11 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I'm ready. A big dinner, because I loved to cook, and we raised ducks. | 18:16 |
Kara Miles | So you used to have duck? | 18:21 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Duck or geese or turkey. | 18:23 |
Kara Miles | So you could keep animals right in the city? | 18:26 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Yeah. They could go to the branch, but we had more or less a kind of a pond for them that had rock and cement, and we didn't have to chase them home as often. | 18:30 |
Sephus Neal | [indistinct 00:18:50] City now. | 18:49 |
Kara Miles | Oh yeah? | 18:52 |
Sephus Neal | The man I used to work for, he owned eight horses where he lived at. He lived at one of the most expensive clubs in the city of Charlotte. Charlotte Country Club on [indistinct 00:19:04] Avenue. He owned eight horses. You can keep [indistinct 00:19:09] in the city. | 18:53 |
Kara Miles | I just have one final question for you. And that was— | 19:13 |
Sephus Neal | Oh, well, this is final here? | 19:16 |
Kara Miles | I'm final too. | 19:17 |
Sephus Neal | I'm going to sit up straight here. Wait a minute. I'm getting ready to get you some refreshment. I [indistinct 00:19:28] refreshment right now. You going to let me get the refreshment. | 19:22 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | [indistinct 00:19:34]. | 19:33 |
Kara Miles | I don't know if this is the final one. | 19:33 |
Sephus Neal | No, that's all right. | 19:33 |
Kara Miles | You said your brothers left home early, early on. Where did they go when they left? | 19:38 |
Sephus Neal | One went to New York, and one went to Washington. I talked about one last night. One was in, he was at the First World Fair. First World Fair was held in out in Chicago. 1935 or '6, right along there. But he was living in Washington DC. But he went to Chicago out there for the First World Fair. | 19:45 |
Kara Miles | Why did they move up north? The two of them? | 20:11 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Big timing. | 20:15 |
Sephus Neal | Well, I guess so. Well, more money. And more jobs. | 20:16 |
Kara Miles | Did you ever think of doing that yourself? | 20:27 |
Sephus Neal | No. No. As I say, I was always contented with what I had. | 20:29 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I was going show you a Christmas tree, and I can't find it. | 20:39 |
Sephus Neal | You better you hurry her up while I'm sitting straight. | 20:42 |
Kara Miles | Well, I wanted to ask you about organizations. Did you ever belong to any kind of organizations, any clubs or anything? | 20:50 |
Sephus Neal | Not too much. In fact, I never cared too much about lots of clubs. I mean, club because there's a group of people. See, I can't answer you direct. I have to wait till I get to my point, see. And when you get a group of people, you going to have three say, "Let's do it this way." And four say, "Let's do it this way." And I might be in that three, see? And that makes me— I'm not lonely, don't get it wrong. I'm not lonely. One of those things. But I'm kind of, I don't know why. I don't think I'm selfish, but some people might say I'm selfish. [indistinct 00:21:56]. One of those things, see, but that's me. I never have. In fact, it's like I say, I don't know whether— | 20:59 |
Sephus Neal | I went to choir rehearsal this morning in [indistinct 00:22:04], and they beat at the bushes too much for me, so I walked out on them before was over with. Yeah, I walked out of them. One of those things, see? I said to them what the way I felt about certain things, and I stayed a few more minutes, and I walked out. I said, "This is not necessary." Well, I think the man wanted to get paid, see, 'cause every time you rehearse, the organist gets more money. Every time we rehearse. He don't get a flat salary. He get a salary for a rehearse and he get a salary for a play. If he rehearse three times a week, that means when his paychecks come, he going have four paychecks, see. One for playing and three for rehearsing, see? Sometimes, I think sometimes they want to make that money. They want to consume that time. He wants to stand there. He got to stay there longer than 10 or 15 minutes, one of those. He get paid. | 22:02 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Here's the Christmas tree. This is Christmas dinner. Friends. | 23:04 |
Sephus Neal | That's as close as I can get to this organization. Yeah, I'm involved in where we were at last night. I'm involved there. | 23:06 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | That's my daughter in the center. | 23:12 |
Sephus Neal | You couldn't tell where you were at. But I've been in that organization there for two or three years. | 23:19 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | That's Christmas tree for relatives. [indistinct 00:23:32] Christmas dinner. | 23:25 |
Sephus Neal | I said about two words [indistinct 00:23:35] last night. Who's supposed to cut the grass? I cut the grass where y'all were at last night. I missed it once in two years. That's organizations. | 23:33 |
Kara Miles | And what about you Ms. Neal? What organizations or clubs? | 23:48 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Oh, I'm overloaded. I belong to church women. | 23:53 |
Sephus Neal | She spread it too thin. | 23:57 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I done spreaded myself too thin. | 24:00 |
Sephus Neal | She ain't overloaded, she's too thin. | 24:01 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I spreaded myself too thin. I belong to Church Women United, which is an integrated group. I got a check in the mail this morning from that organization that they call me the Money Raiser. And I received an invitation to the National Christian and Jews banquet for the seven schools that are in the Green Circle that where they honored the students and where they honored [indistinct 00:24:42] the banker and Big John Thompson. | 24:04 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I received an invitation to that through raising money through the Church Women United for the Leprosy Fund and the leprosy group that received the money wrote the chairman a letter and sent her a picture of the children that had been healed from the money that I sent in. I'd raised more money the whole 20 years that they've had the Leprosy Fund. I brought in a thousand dollars, which is more than anybody had ever brought in. That's why they sent me that invitation and I was invited to that fabulous affair. | 24:48 |
Kara Miles | What organizations like back in the '30s and '40s and '50s? What kind of organizations? | 25:36 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Church. Church. Presbyterian. I've been president of my home local church. President of the Women's Organization, Chairman of the Circle Number Three. And also on the Presbyterian level, I served as district leader. And they sent me to Purdue as a delegate for the national meeting in 1970. It was such a fabulous college, and we had such a wonderful time. 5,000 women yeah. 5,000 registered and 490—something. Were there for the meeting. | 25:42 |
Kara Miles | What is— I see the Alpha Pi Chi Sorority? | 26:36 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Sorority. Yeah. Well, I'm a life member of that. That's a civic organization. You get into it, it's supposed to be a service organization. We help. We give scholarships and we work toward the NAACP, the Martin Luther King Foundation. We gave $6,000 toward the building of that building, and they gave us a plaque with our name on it to go in that building. And I've seen that in Atlanta. I'm due for a prize in that now. So I'm hoping my health's going to hold up so I can go and get it, because I'm a life member and I've been in it over 30 years. | 26:40 |
Kara Miles | Is that your Alpha Kappa Alpha? | 27:43 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | No, that's my daughter. | 27:45 |
Sephus Neal | I got the refreshments ready if you can find something to serve them on. I can't find anything serve him on. | 27:49 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | What happened to my tray? | 27:54 |
Sephus Neal | I don't know. I've opened two or three cabinets in here. | 27:59 |
Kara Miles | So Mr. Neal, is there anything else that you think we should know about you? Do you have any more? I don't have any more questions. | 28:02 |
Sephus Neal | No. | 28:08 |
Kara Miles | Do you have anything else you want to tell us? | 28:09 |
Sephus Neal | Oh, I can say I enjoyed the interview. It makes us feel very fortunate to have someone to come around when you get to this stage in the game. For some reason— I'm not saying we don't have friends, but you don't have— | 28:11 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | I don't know [indistinct 00:28:36] table is. That little old— | 28:35 |
Sephus Neal | Let's go ahead and get it fixed. | 28:46 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Get it fixed? It's our those that need [indistinct 00:28:52]. | 28:49 |
Sephus Neal | Oh, oh, you need this table. I didn't know what you're talking about. But anyway, I enjoyed having you this afternoon. | 28:52 |
Kara Miles | Well, we enjoyed being here. Thank you very much. | 28:59 |
Sephus Neal | I enjoyed having you over. | 28:59 |
Kara Miles | Thank you very much. | 28:59 |
Sephus Neal | I enjoyed having you over. | 29:02 |
Kara Miles | Thank you. | 29:02 |
Sephus Neal | And I always said, do we had something else to give you? | 29:03 |
Margaret Johnson Neal | Would you like some cookies? | 29:08 |
Sephus Neal | What you looking for? | 29:10 |
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