Elizabeth Turnage interview recording, 1995 July 10

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Stacey Scales	Okay.	0:01
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I'm Elizabeth Turnage. I was born in Fargo. I was born February the 25th, 1932, at the place I now reside. I have been here most of my life. My parents, they were here before I was born. My grandmother was a midwife here. And I was raised up here.	0:02
Stacey Scales	What are your earliest memories from growing up?	0:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, it may sound funny, but I can remember back at the age of about three, three and a half.	0:34
Stacey Scales	And do you remember anything particular?	0:42
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Specific?	0:45
Stacey Scales	Yes.	0:45
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, my father, he was a man that always wanted me to learn and to do things he wanted. And he was a great man in poetry. And he started me out when I was between three and four, saying long readings and thing. Matter of fact, I can remember part of the first one I did. And I was about four years old. And it went so, "An old man and a young man chance to meet one day. The young man said to the elder, in his usual braggart way, 'Why don't you walk up straight like me? That's no way to grow old. It's all a form of habit, at least that's what I'm told.'" And I have forgotten the rest of it, but I remember that part. And Mrs. Mayhan, she was teaching school, and she'd taken an interest in me and she carried me down to her school, and that's where I did this little poem.	0:46
Stacey Scales	Did you ever learn any Black history in school?	1:54
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Very little.	1:57
Stacey Scales	Very little.	1:58
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Along about '39, the system gave us some Black history books we had for about a year. And something happened, I don't know what, and those books disappeared. And we haven't had any Black history taught in our community. What I have picked up, I've picked it up from reading. I'm not educated, but I do do a lot of reading. I look at a lot of news. I listen at a lot of news. And I'm into things that is going on and being a part of us today.	2:01
Stacey Scales	What did your grandparents do?	2:51
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	My grandmother, she was a midwife.	2:54
Stacey Scales	Oh, that's nice.	2:57
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And I didn't know her husband, neither did I know my mother's mother or father. They passed when she was a baby.	2:59
Stacey Scales	Now, did she deliver many babies in the local area?	3:11
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I have heard people say that she did. And most of those people, in fact, as well as I can remember, all of those have passed on.	3:15
Stacey Scales	Did she learn from anyone in particular?	3:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I have no idea.	3:32
Stacey Scales	Did your family ever have stories about the slavery times or anything like that, passed down to your generation?	3:35
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. I was unfortunate to have any of that passed down. It was only things that I seen, I was a part of, that I can relate to, of the injustice to the Blacks.	3:43
Stacey Scales	Could you share some of the early memories of that?	3:54
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, we used to have a passenger train run through here. And they had a section that was Black and a section that was White. Near town, which was, Franklin, we had our Black cafes and those type of things. Our train station, it was Black, and the White had a side. And those things went on for years.	4:01
Stacey Scales	Did you ever ride the train?	4:40
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes, I did, because that was our only form of transportation, other than a wagon or walking. And I did quite a bit of that.	4:41
Stacey Scales	How do you feel sitting in the section designated for the Blacks?	4:49
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, at the time it didn't really bother me, because I guess it was something that I was raised up in. But when I first become aware of it, I was 11 years old and I had moved to Kansas City to live with my uncle, my mother and I and her husband, which wasn't my dad. Was my stepdad. And I went to this store. And as we Southerners speak, I was, "Yes, sir, Mr. So-and-so." And he stopped me. He says, "I am not your master." He said, "My name is," whatever it was, I've forgotten. He said, "And that's what you called me." He says, "And 'Yessa,'" he said, "Don't give me that. I don't want to hear it." And that was one thing that kind of brought it to my remembrance. And also, it was a White lady here that ran a train station, and she would have to come right by my house. And she carried me out there in a garden with her. She had a little truck patch and she asked me one day, she said, "Elizabeth, do you know what a nigger is?"	4:54
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Hey, what was I told? Black folk. She says, "No, don't ever let anybody tell you that you are a nigger." She says, "A nigger can be as white as snow." She says, "A nigger is a low down person that'll do anything, everything." She said, "You're a Colored person." At that time, they were still using the word '"Colored." And hey, I remember that now. "Hey, it doesn't matter about the color of my skin. I am a person. I'm not a nigger." So, people like that has helped me. And really and truly, I didn't have no whole lot of segregation in this community myself, because I was raised up with some White kids. And if I wasn't at their house, they were at mine. I'd sit at their table and eat and they'd sit at mine and eat. I could see more of the prejudiceness out from around this community than I could in this community.	6:29
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. When did you first realize that there was racism?	7:48
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	That's kind of hard for me to say, because I just never did. I guess it was more or less after I'd gotten grown.	8:04
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	8:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	That I realized that it was so much hate, so much evil going on.	8:18
Stacey Scales	Did your parents ever give you advice as to why you couldn't go here or there? Did they give you something to work with as a young lady?	8:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, not really, because as I say, I associated with this community of children and we were from each other's house. So, I didn't. And I don't guess we seen any color barrier.	8:43
Stacey Scales	Okay.	9:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	It was just when we'd get on the train or we'd go to town. And I guess being raised up in an environment like that, you think, "Okay, that comes natural."	9:05
Stacey Scales	Okay .Did your perception change after you left? Did your relationship change with those people after you found out that there was that type of treatment going on elsewhere?	9:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I'm a type of person I gave everybody the benefit of the doubt. Maybe their parents taught them hatred, but I was taught love. And that's what I have tried to give, is love.	9:36
Stacey Scales	Could you describe your neighborhood when you were growing up? Did people help each other and things?	9:58
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes. If I had some greens and you didn't have any, if it meant I had to pick some and bring to you, I'd see to you getting some. You had a cow and I didn't have one, come on over and get some butter, come on over and get some milk. If I needed some help, I had somebody sick, they'd come over. If somebody else had somebody sick, they'd come over. I recall when I had my first child, she's now 46. The first people to visit me was one of my nextdoor neighbors, which was the Dobbersons. And they were White, and she came over and her niece came with her, and they wanted to know how was I doing? And they asked Mama, "Eletha, is it anything we can do? If it's anything we can do, you tell us now."	10:05
Stacey Scales	Were the midwives still giving birth then?	11:09
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	My grandmother died before I was born.	11:11
Stacey Scales	Were there other midwives?	11:15
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh. The midwives that I can remember was Ms. Anne Macomb. She was a midwife. Ms. Jefferson, she was a midwife. Who else in this community was a midwife? Those were about the only ones. In the latter 40s, we had a practical nurse that came in and was a midwife. And she delivered my oldest girl. And she delivered quite a few babies around here. Those that she seen was having a problem, she'd call a doctor in.	11:21
Stacey Scales	And were there Black doctors around?	12:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	The only Black doctor that has ever been in this community, and he wasn't a doctor. He was a dentist.	12:21
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	12:30
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Was Dr. Cowins. And I don't even remember him. He passed on before I was born or when I was too small to remember. And his wife, she was a school teacher, and they had a nice home here. But other than that—	12:31
Stacey Scales	Did people own cars and their homes?	12:55
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	There Were a few that owned cars.	12:59
Stacey Scales	How about houses?	13:01
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mostly. As I grew up, mostly everybody owned their home, if it wasn't but a couple of lots. And I guess that's some of what made us such a little independent community. And this community was founded, was established, I'll say, because they say that it was some here before them, by two Black mens. And that was Mr. LH Mayhan and Mr. Briggs. They had it planned out. I think the year was 1906. And those are some of the things that I try to keep up with.	13:07
Stacey Scales	So, how did they start it? I don't understand—	14:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They came into this, it was just a rural community, just a settlement, more or less.	14:06
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah.	14:13
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And they decided, "Hey, we are going to make a town. And Mr Mayhan donated 40 acres, planned it out into lots. And that was the original Fargo.	14:13
Stacey Scales	Just 40 acres.	14:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And they had street names and all of this good stuff. And all of this was done way before my time. But my mother, she told me about some of the things that went on in this community.	14:30
Stacey Scales	Like what?	14:52
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, at one time, you can believe it or not, they had a hotel here.	14:53
Stacey Scales	Yeah?	14:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They had a gym here. And something happened that it didn't continue. And after that, they had a place built right next to it that was called a canning kitchen. And this was back during the 30s.	15:01
Stacey Scales	Canning kitchen?	15:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And they were canning all kinds of foods and meats and different things. They actually had the cans there that they put the stuff in. It wasn't just in jars, it was in cans.	15:23
Stacey Scales	Steel cans.	15:40
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And they taught them mattress making. They taught them other different things.	15:42
Stacey Scales	And who was '"they"? When you say "they" were teaching?	15:49
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I don't remember. I was so small.	15:53
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes.	15:57
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't remember who was in charge of this, but I remember going there. And this was still in the 30s.	15:57
Stacey Scales	What do you remember about the place that stands out?	16:08
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	That all of those people was rounding there, just fixing this thing and that thing. And I remember seeing somebody putting on tags, putting this big needle down through the mattress with a little piece on top of one side and one under the bottom, and tying it all. Just such things as that.	16:13
Stacey Scales	Did you feel proud to see Blacks doing that?	16:39
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I didn't have the wisdom of being proud. I was just a child seeing something being done.	16:41
Stacey Scales	Okay.	16:47
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And Dr. Brown, he was one of the greatest influences on this community. When he came in here, he started doing things. And I don't know anything about the 1919 up until I say about 1935. I don't remember a lot, but I've heard of a lot of things that happened. But I know when I was growing up, every spring he'd come out to church and he'd talk to the people and telling them that they had to have pride in themselves and they had to do things for themselves. And he would furnish whitewash every family, if you had a picket fence, rail fence, or whatever, he wanted you to paint that thing. And really, I'm ashamed of our community now for what it looks like, to when he was here. He was just a great leader.	16:52
Stacey Scales	How did the people in that church respond to him when he would come?	17:58
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Everybody loved him and they believed that they could do anything. "If Dr. Brown said we can do it, we can do it." And he'd tell us, "You've got to believe in yourself."	18:01
Stacey Scales	Did you come to the school here?	18:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes, I did. For a year.	18:20
Stacey Scales	What did you learn?	18:24
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I had one teacher that stands out in my mind more than anybody else, and that was Professor Alexander. And he was teaching us, I just remember now what had brought it on, but he was telling us, "Even if somebody give you something and it's not any good, say thank you, act like you appreciate it." He said, "Even if you take it and carry it down in the woods and stick it in a stump." He said, "Never tell nobody, 'I don't want your junk.'" He says, "Always take whatever somebody give you whether you want it or not." And he was telling us about an incident, he was telling the class, but I remembered it.	18:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	He said these White people that he had worked for, he said every time he turned around they was giving him some old stuff that wasn't fit for nothing. He said if you'd go back in the community that he came out of he said you'd find old rotten stuff that they'd given him. He said but when he got ready to graduate, that same bunch that had been giving him that junk went and bought him a brand new suit, shoes, and everything for graduation. He said, "Now if I had been, 'I don't want that mess.'" He said, "I didn't have no way to buy that stuff." He said, "I probably wouldn't have gotten it." And that kind of stuck with me. If somebody give you something, appreciate it.	19:27
Speaker 3	Excuse me, I'm sorry. How you doing?	20:19
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Even if you don't want it, just go on with it. You don't know what you're missing. Sometime we can turn away our own blessing by being so mighty. That's the way I feel about it. And I think that's what have happened to us. We have lost our morals. If it's not the best of everything—Oh yeah, I'd like the best. But if you're giving me something, I'm going to take what you give me and, "Thank you very much." Oh, that's just my way of being, that I was brought up.	20:22
Stacey Scales	Was church mandatory when you were growing up?	21:00
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes.	21:03
Stacey Scales	So you had to go every Sunday?	21:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I won't say I had to go every Sunday, but if you start doing something, you'll get to the place that you'll enjoy doing it and you'll go without even being told. So, it was kind of a place for us to meet up and have fun. A lot of times we didn't see our friends until we'd meet up at church.	21:08
Stacey Scales	Okay. Now, what other type of things would you do to entertain yourself while you were growing up?	21:34
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Okay. Back during the 40s, people had such things as box suppers, and they would sell these boxes. Guys, they'd want to buy these boxes from certain girls, because they figured they had something good in it. And then they'd so sat down and they'd eat it together and all of this good stuff. And it was the young—	21:42
Stacey Scales	So, was that a way of courting?	22:12
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, it was a way of friendship. I think it was more of a way of friendship than of trying to court. It may have been a way of courting, but I considered it as a way of friendship. We had ice cream parties. Some of those old women's freeze up ice cream and they'd sell it. Nickel a cone. We just had a big time. And some of the guys, they would barbecue. We'd have picnics. Just get together and have a good time. Baseball games.	22:14
Stacey Scales	Did they have local teams? Baseball teams?	22:53
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yeah, they played boys from Wheatley, the boys from Brinkley, and the boys from Cotton Plant.	22:57
Stacey Scales	Did Whites ever play Blacks?	23:05
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. No.	23:07
Stacey Scales	Why?	23:11
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Hey, as I say, we never thought anything of it, I guess. It was just our way of living. And I've never known anybody to be beat, as I've read about, heard about in some states. Well, matter of fact, in some parts of Arkansas, but those things had never happened here.	23:11
Stacey Scales	Were there places that your parents suggested that you shouldn't go? Or places that were taboo that they suggested that maybe you shouldn't go around there? Bad places or anything like that?	23:37
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes. If there was a place where they were gambling or dancing and going on, you know those old people said, "Uh-uh. That's a no-no."	23:52
Stacey Scales	Were there any of those places here?	24:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. We had one.	24:05
Stacey Scales	Okay.	24:06
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But I was reared up with the boy. His father that was running the place. At the time, he was an only child and I was an only child. Hey, so he and I just grew up almost like sisters and brothers. And I was at his house and he was at mine.	24:09
Stacey Scales	Okay. So it never became a problem for your family?	24:30
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, it was just a place, "Hey, after night you don't have any business there." And I knew I didn't have no business there.	24:32
Stacey Scales	Right.	24:45
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But during the day when he and I was playing and going on, hey, we played and went on just like all other kids.	24:48
Stacey Scales	What was the first school that you went to?	25:04
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Zent School. Zent Public School.	25:07
Stacey Scales	Zent Public School. And do you remember your teachers from Zent?	25:10
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. How could I forget it when we didn't have but a two-room school and two teachers? A primary to third grade teacher, and fourth through an eighth grade teacher. So, how could I forget?	25:14
Stacey Scales	How long did you stay in school for the year?	25:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, we went to school around six months in the winter. Now, that was the only thing that was really kind of aggravating and I couldn't understand, the White kids would start the school in September and go until May. We didn't start school until sometime about the last of October or about the middle of November, somewhere along in there. And we went until it was time to start in the fields in the spring. And then we would go to the fields and things.	25:41
Stacey Scales	The little, smaller children?	26:35
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, those that were big enough to do anything. But at that time, it was a lot of bigger kids was storing the school. And in summer, after we were finished chopping cotton or putting in whatever, then we'd have to go to school two months in the summer. while the White kids was out being cool, we had to go to school that summer. And that's what the public school was about.	26:39
Stacey Scales	So, that got you upset?	27:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I never did understand why I couldn't go to school, I never questioned anybody why I couldn't go school year round. And another thing, we walked to school. And I thought that was maybe because we didn't have far to go, the reason we were walking.	27:20
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah.	27:38
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Because it was something like a mile, mile and a half, for most of us that went to school.	27:39
Stacey Scales	Yeah. Did you have to walk to church too?	27:48
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. Well, I was almost born on the church doorstep. It was a church right next to me, which was a Presbyterian church. And then it was a church about a block and a half, two blocks from where I lived. So, it was no problem for me.	27:55
Stacey Scales	Was there a cemetery? Is there a Black cemetery there now?	28:17
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes. Macedonia Cemetery.	28:22
Stacey Scales	Macedonia.	28:24
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And it's mile and a half south of here. Some may say it's a mile, but I'm saying a mile and a half.	28:25
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. Did Blacks have any type of burial practices that were different back then than they do now or that the Whites would do?	28:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't know about the Whites. I know about the Blacks. I know that friends and families dug the graves all down through the years until just a few years ago.	28:49
Stacey Scales	So, that was a special responsibility?	29:06
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	That was what was did in this community.	29:09
Stacey Scales	So, people have stopped practicing that somewhat?	29:16
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Somewhat. Yes. They've gone to mechanically digging them now. And for some people it can be a problem. Everybody, most of the people here in this community now, is senior citizens. They're in their 60s and up. I would say that at least 75% of the people that live here, or 65 anyway, are senior citizens. We have very few young people here. And I guess that's because we don't have anything to offer them.	29:19
Stacey Scales	So, do you feel as if the young people have just taken off?	30:16
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yeah, because I'm the mother of nine. And only one of my nine is in this community. There is other parents who had large families. Some of them, they don't have any of their family still in this community.	30:20
Stacey Scales	Why do you think that is so?	30:46
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	It's nothing here for them. It's no jobs. It's nothing to entice them. And so, they're going where better jobs, better way of living, and everything.	30:50
Stacey Scales	Was there a lot of opportunity here when you were growing up? Were there Black businesses and places that you could work?	31:17
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, when I was growing up, most of them was farmers. And we had a Black store here. Matter of fact, we had a couple of Black stores here.	31:25
Stacey Scales	Do you remember the names of people that owned them and the names of the businesses?	31:43
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. Ms. Moody, Bueller Moody. She had a business. And—	31:44
Stacey Scales	What was her business?	31:56
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	A little grocery store.	31:58
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. Grocery.	31:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And then Mr. Parte moved in here and he opened up a store in the late 30s. And somewhere down the line, they became a pair. So, it didn't leave but one store then.	32:00
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	32:25
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And we've had Blacks that that had—one fella had a blacksmith, Mr. Mitchell. He had a blacksmith. Albert Mitchell.	32:34
Stacey Scales	Okay.	32:57
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mr. Aman Mayhan. He had a little dairy deal here. And you already know about Dr. Brown.	32:58
Stacey Scales	Yeah. Was there a funeral home?	33:09
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. No. We had to go to Brinkley for that.	33:13
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	33:16
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And N.G. Branscumb was our funeral home operator.	33:17
Stacey Scales	Okay.	33:25
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Let me see. What else did we have here? Dr. Collins was here for a while until he passed.	33:25
Stacey Scales	Was there a hospital here?	33:34
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No.	33:36
Stacey Scales	Okay.	33:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But we did have that hotel. And I don't know who ran that hotel. I don't remember. But my mother, it's a lot of things that my mother told me about, and they're so vague until—I can still remember them.	33:40
Stacey Scales	What did your mother do for a living?	33:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	My mother was, I guess you would call her more or less the salesperson. Because she would go walk all over this country selling Blair product.	34:01
Stacey Scales	And what's Blair product?	34:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	That was a company that sold—you've never heard of Blair?	34:20
Stacey Scales	I don't think so. Was it like Avon?	34:26
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes.	34:27
Stacey Scales	Okay.	34:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And she'd walk all over this country selling Blair product? Oh, yes. Also, she and her husband, they also sold fish. They were like the little fish market. And what else? Mr. Mayhan was a farmer and a realty fella. And Mr. Briggs, he was a farmer and a realty person. And his wife, she was a school teacher. And Mr. Mayhan's wife was also a school teacher. Those were the things that was happening back in the mid-40s, and back to where I can remember of the 30s.	34:29
Stacey Scales	What did your father do?	35:28
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	My father was disabled.	35:30
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	35:30
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	So, he was more of the house husband.	35:33
Stacey Scales	Okay. Did they have any women's groups that organized back then to help people do things in the community?	35:39
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. Back about, may have been '39 or '40, they started the Home Demonstration Club.	35:47
Stacey Scales	And that was Black women putting that together?	35:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm.	36:01
Stacey Scales	Home Demonstration Club. And what would they do?	36:06
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, they taught them how to embroidery. They taught them sewing techniques, and just a lot of good things to help them in surviving at home and having home comfortable.	36:08
Stacey Scales	Okay. Who were the leaders in putting that together?	36:35
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	A Ms. Davis, I think it was. She was out of Brinkley. It was someone from Brinkley started it, and then the women of Fargo joined in and became a part of the club. They made different things. And when they would have these fairs or exhibitions, whatever, something that they had fixed or something, they'd sent it to this exhibition. I remember my mother, we were getting a lot of government stuff, like fruits and things, oranges, grapefruits, raisins, things like that. And my mother'd taken some of those oranges and canned them.	36:41
Stacey Scales	Whole?	37:35
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, she had them sectioned. She peeled them, sectioned them all, some way or another she had a syrup on them. And I remember the lady saying, "Well, we sure going to carry this." And then this boy that I was telling you about that I was raised up with like a brother, we were a part of it. They learned us how to embroidery and he brought embroidery, a bear, and I embroidered some birds. And they carry our little work with them.	37:35
Stacey Scales	That's great. And where would it be on exhibition?	38:14
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	In Hot Springs.	38:19
Stacey Scales	Would you win awards or anything?	38:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't remember now. All I remember she was getting all this good stuff together and taking it over there. But as well as I can remember, I think my mother did get a ribbon or something for her orange whatever. Well, I think later years they had something called marmalade. And I said, "I wonder, did they get that from my mother?"	38:24
Stacey Scales	They probably did.	38:52
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But anyway, that was what it was something like it was in syrup.	38:55
Stacey Scales	How many women were in that Home Demonstration Club?	39:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I'd say 15 or 20.	39:13
Stacey Scales	And did the club last for a while?	39:17
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	It lasted for a while and then people started drifting away to other things. And then they started up another one that was called the Busy Bee Club.	39:20
Stacey Scales	That was in the 50s?	39:32
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	That was in the 50s when the Busy Bee Club started. And something happened and it just dwindled away until about four or five years ago, and they started another one.	39:33
Stacey Scales	Called?	39:48
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They don't call it Home Demonstration Club anymore. They've got a new name for it. And they have most of the meetings over here at Ms. Swanigan's.	39:53
Stacey Scales	And what's the name of it?	40:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	What is the name of that club? I can't say the Elite, because that's one of the Brinkley clubs. Oh, I can't remember. But Ms. Swanigan can tell you.	40:08
Stacey Scales	Okay, I'll make sure I ask Ms. Swanigan. Now, was the Busy Bee just like the Home Demonstration Club?	40:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	40:28
Stacey Scales	They do some of the same thing?	40:28
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm.	40:29
Stacey Scales	And was Ms. Davis over that one too?	40:31
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't remember who was the outsider that was over it. But Ms. Oma Harris, the lady I was telling you was a midwife, she was one of the heads of that one.	40:35
Stacey Scales	Okay. Back during those times, would people use herbs and plants to help you?	40:51
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes.	40:56
Stacey Scales	Could you share some of the—	40:56
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, my mother was an herbalist. I don't remember where she got her training for this particular thing, but she made salves for pals and she used to make it for around here in the community. And then some people around Brinkley would go to Cotton Plant would come to her and want some of that salve.	41:05
Stacey Scales	Mm-hmm.	41:34
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And then we had some that was just natural herbalist. They'd hang up and dry different types of weeds, we'd call them. And mostly everybody used sassafras. They'd go out and gather that sassafras. And in the spring, they made sure that everybody in the family drank some of it, because it was a tradition or something that it would purify you, clean your system and everything. And if you had a fever, they'd go out and get certain weeds and things and wet them and bind you up.	41:39
Stacey Scales	What do you mean by binding you up?	42:26
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They'd put them in a cloth and—	42:28
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	42:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And this would take the fever down. And I remember something that happened with me, with my oldest. She was having pneumonia. I was running her back and forth to the doctor. And she's 46 years old now. And a friend of mine told me, said, "Stop taking that girl to the doctor." She said, "Come on and go down to the house." She said, "I got something down there." It may be sound funny to you—	42:29
Stacey Scales	No, it sounds great.	43:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And she gave me some coon grease that she had cooked off. She always kept her some for her kids. And she gave me a small potion of it. She said, "Now you get you a dirt dauber nest, put it in a white rag," she said, "And get you a spoon of this oil. And dust that dirt dauber next in it."	43:09
Stacey Scales	Dirt what?	43:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Dirt dauber.	43:29
Stacey Scales	What's that?	43:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Have you ever seen one of these little dirt molds on buildings and things?	43:33
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes.	43:39
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And the little, look like wasps is flying in and out of it?	43:40
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes. Yeah. Yeah. It's grayish-brown?	43:43
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	43:46
Stacey Scales	Yes, the little wasp nest things.	43:46
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	43:50
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	43:50
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, no, no. Not the wasp's nest. The dirt dauber. I don't know what it would be called otherwise, but it's out of dirt. The dirt daubers builds this. This is their little, whatever. And it'd be upside of buildings.	43:51
Stacey Scales	I think I know what you're talking about. Right.	44:10
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And I'd taken that and put it in the cloth, like she said, and dusted it in there, got me a little stick and stir it up, and gave it to her. Give it to her about two or three times.	44:13
Stacey Scales	She drinks it?	44:23
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, you take it like you were taking castor oil.	44:24
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	44:31
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Do you know anything about that?	44:31
Stacey Scales	Yes. I know about that.	44:31
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, that was the way that you'd give it to them. And you could sprinkle the sugar in it, give it a little sweet taste and take that. And she stopped having pneumonia.	44:33
Stacey Scales	So, that did it for her.	44:47
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. Well, see, I didn't know anything about that. But it was on a remedy that she had gotten from some older person. Laryngitis, we'd get some sugar in a spoon and put a drop or two of [indistinct 00:45:06] oil in there, and a drop of turpentine. Set it afire, let it burn, take your straw, something, stir it up where it'd be all through there, then turn around after it cooled off, as if you were doing a sucker of some kind. It would clear up your laryngitis. So it was just, yeah, a lot of things that people used at home, because they couldn't afford to go to the doctor every time you turned around. And some of those things that they were brought up with, some stayed so far back until they probably couldn't get out, and they just passed it down from one generation to the other.	44:50
Stacey Scales	So, how far back do you think that that went?	45:51
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I have no idea. And I will not tell you of the other tea.	45:54
Stacey Scales	I'd like to know.	46:00
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, I will not tell you of the other tea (laughs) that they use for—	46:01
Stacey Scales	Was that from manure? Oh, okay. I've heard of that before.	46:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	With pneumonia.	46:12
Stacey Scales	So, how would they do it? I mean, I've heard a similar story.	46:15
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. Well, back then, the cows were eating pure food.	46:18
Stacey Scales	Right.	46:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And you got a dry part, tied it up in a rag good. And boil it—	46:28

Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	You just gave them some tea. Next thing they know, they were up and going about the business. (laughs)	0:00
Stacey Scales	So you wouldn't let them know?	0:06
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I only did it once. (laughs) But I know that it has been done.	0:09
Stacey Scales	Right. So you think if you would've told the child, that they would have—	0:15
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, God, you know they wouldn't address that. Because I don't know—I might not have myself. But they were so sick with that. They had gone to the doctor. The doctor wasn't doing them any good. And I knew of a friend that had some chips, and I got it, and made them a tea. And in about a day, they were up and going. And they said, "What was that you give me?" I said, "Just some tea." They said, "I don't care what it was, it did better than all of the doctor's medicine that we had been taking."	0:18
Stacey Scales	So who gave you that recipe?	1:01
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Some old person. Probably my mother. Probably some other old person because I was always one of those that liked to be around old people, listening at what was going on and everything. If we got cut real bad, sprinkle sugar on it, bind it up, little turpentine.	1:05
Stacey Scales	Sugar and turpentine?	1:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. And that would stop the bleeding.	1:30
Stacey Scales	So would people from the neighborhood come to you or your mother for advice on those type of things?	1:34
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	There was people that they would go to that they thought knew what to do for certain things, and they'd ask them.	1:40
Stacey Scales	Did people then talk about spirits, the older people?	1:52
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes. I guess that's—	1:58
Stacey Scales	That's a part of it.	2:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And I don't know whether they was lies or truth. But you could sit down some nights, they'd be sitting there by the lamplight, and they could tell some of the weirdest things. And sometime as a child, you'd probably end up getting just as close as you could. Some of them was telling it for the truth. I don't know. I've never seen one.	2:07
Stacey Scales	Right.	2:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	So who am I to say that they were lying? But they have told some very scary things. And I guess that's a part of amusement, was a part of our amusement.	2:34
Stacey Scales	Okay. Who would be the storyteller?	2:48
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Different moms.	2:51
Stacey Scales	Do you remember any of the stories?	2:54
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm.	2:59
Stacey Scales	Would you share them with me?	2:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, it used to be a guy around here, and his face was flat on one side. And I've heard old folks tell the lie, or the truth, or whatever, say that a ghost slapped his face one-sided.	3:01
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	3:20
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Now that I'm older, I don't believe it, but it could be true.	3:24
Stacey Scales	Okay.	3:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	It used to be a place over here that they said that you drive down through there at night and a woman and a long white gown would run up and get on your running board. Cars used to have running boards on the side of them like they're putting on—some people have put on the side of their trucks now. Well, they were on side of cars. They said she'd get on side of the car, riding until she passed the cemetery, and then she'd get off. And then some of them has told these things, and then they said that they found out that it wasn't really anything.	3:31
Stacey Scales	Oh yeah.	4:05
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Because it was a friend of mine, oh, he was a great storyteller. And he said that he had been to town one night, and he said he was on his way home. He says and every time he'd move he could hear this "Skirtch, skirtch, skirtch." He said, and he'd walk faster, and he could hear this scrunching. He said the faster he walked, the louder the scratch becomes. He said he broke out running. He said he ran all the way home and just fell on the porch because he knew it was somebody in behind him. And when he fell on the porch, he didn't hear it no more. And he got up to do something and it did it again. And he found out that it was the corduroy pants that he had on that day. (laughs)	4:06
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But corduroy will—	4:55
Stacey Scales	Yeah, yeah.	4:57
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But he say he ran for about three or four miles trying to get away from whoever it was behind him, and nobody was behind him. And I think that that's a lot of what—	4:59
Stacey Scales	Yeah. Would people talk about signs and different things like that?	5:11
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh well, it's—Now, my mother wouldn't plant unless she seen where the sign was. Is that what you're talking about, Zodiac?	5:16
Stacey Scales	You're talking about the Almanac?	5:28
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Zodiac signs?	5:30
Stacey Scales	That one, yes.	5:31
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, she wouldn't plant anything, do any trimming or anything, unless she looked at the sign, see where was the sign.	5:33
Stacey Scales	So she planted according to the sign?	5:41
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	5:43
Stacey Scales	And who taught her how to do that? Or did she read it in the almanac?	5:47
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	My mother couldn't read or write. And I guess you are wondering how in the world did she do these things. I don't know. I have no idea. But she did those things. She'd taken orders for Blair, then she did some for Lucky Heart, and she couldn't read or write. But now, you couldn't beat her out of a penny. She could count as fast in her head as somebody else could with a pencil. It was just a gift. And she would go all over the country. In the fall, they'd come and get her to cook off their lard and make their sausage and stuff.	5:52
Stacey Scales	Where would she be working?	6:55
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Just first one family and then another would come and get her, and then they'd bring her home, or sometimes she'd walk.	6:57
Stacey Scales	Did she talk about her experiences working?	7:08
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Sure. She enjoyed it because it was always meat on the table.	7:11
Stacey Scales	So they would give her food for the family?	7:22
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes, along with what they would pay her. They'd give her backbone, spare ribs, sausage, the lights, the livers. Well, hey, she knew something to do with it. That's one thing about the Blacks, they always know, or they did back in those days, they knew something to do with everything. They didn't let stuff go to a waste like we do. When they made that kill their hogs and ground their sausage, I don't think it was anything but the hair and the squeak was what they threw away.	7:24
Stacey Scales	Yes.	8:09
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Because they would take those small intestines and stuff them with sausage, hang them up in the smokehouse, and cure them, their meats, hang them up and cure them. You could go out this time of year and cut. Might be dry around the outside, but the inside was just as pretty and red as it could be. And not spoiled, either.	8:12
Stacey Scales	And how would they kill the pig?	8:41
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	You really don't know? You don't know anything about killing a hog?	8:44
Stacey Scales	I've never seen it done.	8:49
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, to begin with, they'd put them on what they call a fattening floor. They'd put them in a little small pen, very small, where they didn't have no activity room. And they'd feed them corn, and chops, and things like that until they get them as fat as they wanted. Then on that killing day, most of the time they looked at the moon, at their almanac, to see where was the sign.	8:51
Stacey Scales	To kill the hog?	9:22
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They'd kill the hog.	9:23
Stacey Scales	They'd get the sign to kill the hog?	9:25
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	9:26
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	9:27
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yeah, because some signs you can do things in, it'll be because of waste.	9:28
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	9:35
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And they'd kill that hog, salt him down. Then they'd take him and they'd smoke him, and they'd take that meat and have these smoke houses. And practically everyone had a smokehouse. And they'd hang that meat in there. And talking about good, that was some good meat.	9:35
Stacey Scales	What if they didn't look at this sign? What would—	9:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I really don't know. Some of them may didn't look at signs, but I know that my mother, in her processing, she would always check with the signs.	10:01
Stacey Scales	Would they use signs for revivals or church—	10:15
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No.	10:20
Stacey Scales	—or other things?	10:20
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, no, not like that. But for preserving, they'd use the signs for preserving their food.	10:21
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. So did most families have an almanac?	10:30
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, yes. Ladies Birthday was their number one Almanac.	10:36
Stacey Scales	Ladies Birthday?	10:41
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. That's what it was called.	10:42
Stacey Scales	And how would they get that? They would just be in the local store?	10:46
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, mostly, I guess. And sometime in the drug stores. That's where they'd go and pick them up.	10:50
Stacey Scales	Did people make any significance of signs, like the eye twitching or hand itching?	11:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, yes. Certain eye twitching was bad luck. The other one was good luck.	11:11
Stacey Scales	What else?	11:22
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Hand itching, you're going to get some money. The other one itching, you're going to get a letter.	11:22
Stacey Scales	Do you remember any other one?	11:28
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, let me see. Sneeze before, seven it'll the rain before 11. Thunder before seven, it'll rain before 11. And what else was it? If it was—the sun was shining, and you know how sometime it'll come up a little shower and the sun's still shining?	11:34
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah.	12:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They'd say the devil was whooping his wife. And let me see, what were some of the other weird things that they would say? Don't break a mirror, don't walk under ladders. They'd throw salt over the shoulders, and just things that now we don't pay any attention to.	12:04
Stacey Scales	Right.	12:31
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, I guess there's still a few that might.	12:32
Stacey Scales	I think so.	12:37
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	If you sneeze with a mouthful, somebody close to you is going to die.	12:38
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah? What would Blacks during the thirties, forties and fifties do for holidays?	12:43
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	For recreation?	12:53
Stacey Scales	For holidays. And recreation. That would be a good—	12:55
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, for recreation, they would go from one family to another's house, and they'd have card parties.	12:56
Stacey Scales	Oh, yeah?	13:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And they'd play five-up.	13:07
Stacey Scales	Five-up?	13:11
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And they do it, drink or smell. If you lost, all you'd get to do is to smell it. If my partner and I won, we'd get to drink. And they'd have dance parties at different houses and things like that. Oh, they had their way of—Then they'd get together and have picnics, have fish fries. The last one that I went to was about '52 or '53. We loaded up on wagons and things and went down in the bottoms on the 4th of July. And the mens put out trout lines and caught fish, and we cooked right there on the lake. We had carried a wash pot. All our other little goodies. We spent the day down there.	13:12
Stacey Scales	That sounds like a good time.	14:19
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, we thought we were having a good time. And they'd go out hogging.	14:20
Stacey Scales	What's that?	14:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	A whole bunch would get together. And the water had run down low on a little place.	14:31
Stacey Scales	Yes.	14:38
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They'd get in there and they'd feel around the logs and things and catch the fish. Oh, they'd have gigs and gigs of fish.	14:38
Stacey Scales	They would catch fishing by their hands?	14:50
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. Yeah. (laughs)	14:52
Stacey Scales	I've never seen that.	15:00
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Since my husband and I been married, it's been, I guess 25, 30 years ago, right across over here, a whole bunch of us decided we'd go down there one day. And some of them got in the water, and some of them standing on the bank. And there was one boy. He looked like he enjoyed it. And he was down under this big cypress, and he thought he had a cat there. And he was charm—called his self charming this cat, and when it came up, it was a water moccasin. (laughs) And everybody was ready to go then. But hey, that was all part of the sport.	15:04
Stacey Scales	How would you charm a fish?	15:42
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, he would just get—he'd get down on—rub him like that, and he'd be still. And he'd get the handhold on him and throw him out there on the bank.	15:45
Stacey Scales	If you rub a fish slowly, it'll just stay in your hands?	15:54
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	15:58
Stacey Scales	And then you just throw it up?	16:00
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	16:06
Stacey Scales	I need to learn that. (Turnage laughs) Did the moccasin bite him?	16:09
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, uh-huh.	16:10
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	16:12
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	When he realized what he had, some of the rest of them taken a gig and gigged him, threw him out there on the bank and killed him.	16:12
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. Who taught you how to do that?	16:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I guess it's instinct, because I can't say that nobody—that I know of anybody teaching them. Or they just followed it down from the older generation, seeing the older generation doing it and they did it.	16:30
Stacey Scales	Would people, when you were coming up, ever talk about Africa?	16:44
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Some.	16:51
Stacey Scales	What would they say?	16:52
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, they told us that's where we came from.	16:55
Stacey Scales	The older people?	16:56
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, the older people say that that's where they had been taught, that we came from Africa. And that is one of the reasons that I am wanting to see a library because—	17:00
Stacey Scales	A library here in Fargo?	17:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. Because we are so far off on our understanding, our knowledge about our heritage. And it really doesn't make sense for people to tell us, "Go back home," because this is my home, and I'm as much a part of the United States as my red brother. So how can he tell me to go home? He needs to go home because this is not his native land. He came in here and taken from somebody else what belonged to them. And that is one of the main reason that I'm wanting us to learn these things. Hey, I have as much right as you have. I am a person. You are a person. Don't ever think that I'm nobody because I am somebody.	17:23
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And as I have grown older, that's my philosophy. Don't let nobody put you down. No matter what has been, don't let that keep you down. You've got to go forward. And I'm trying to instill it into the two boys that I'm raising now. You can be whatever you want to be. If you want to be president, you can be. If you want to be the worst thing in the country, you can be. But I want you to be the best that you can be at whatever you do. Is that all you want to know about?	18:50
Stacey Scales	What would you like to see young people learn that you feel that you didn't learn in the thirties, forties, and fifties, or even after then? What do you think is an important part of history that should be put in the books, in history books?	20:00
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I feel that it should be not—Our kids go to school now. They have history. But most of what they're talking about, what Columbus did, what General Lee did. Okay. There's nothing wrong with that. But see, I know some Black men that did great things. When Columbus came here, it was a Black guy came here. It was Black people that wrote up the first things that was written up. But somehow or another, they let the White man overpower them in their thinking, and stole a lot of that away from them. I want our children to know that they can do anything. If Whitney made that gin, hey, I've got some grandsons up there, they can do it, too. If, what was his name from Tuskegee?	20:21
Stacey Scales	Booker T. Washington.	21:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yeah. If Booker T. Washington, could you find out all of these things from potatoes, and—I mean from peanuts, and—	22:00
Stacey Scales	Oh, George Washington Carver.	22:08
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes. If he could do all of these things, I've got some boys, why can't they do it? But if they don't know about—See, we don't push our Blacks up and try to let them focus on that instead of focusing on these games and things. Because these games and things, it's not doing anything but destroying our children. I think we need to just really get involved in our communities and things, about these type of things, because that's what Dr. Brown was about, for us, standing up for our rights, for us doing the right thing.	22:08
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And you know what? He was a humble man when he wanted to be. But he could always get what he wanted because he was a man that knew how to do these things. Nowadays, young people go on a job and they don't like what people say to them. But you know what? If you be smart enough, you can take that very man's job and become your job. You can put up a business. If you just take it, take all of his little techniques and stick it up back there, and add your own, you can come up and put a business right there side of his, and he wonder what happened to him. We're smart people, but we don't use it, a lot of us.	23:04
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	So it just makes me so proud when I see anybody doing anything for us to understand ourselves better. I don't think we understand ourselves. We really don't know what we can do. We know what they told us we could do. But when it comes to us knowing what we can do, I don't think we even know what we can do. But you know what? I didn't get the education, but I believe I can do anything, a little bit of anything that somebody else can do a whole lot of. I believe I'm that smart.	24:04
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And that is what we are going to have to in store into our generation, our younger generation. Don't take it out like you're taking it out. I just think we are just—And we are losing our children because we don't sit down, and talk to them, and tell them these things, and give them the real morals of life. Because somebody said something nasty to you, you going turn around and get even. That's not what it's about. It's about using your head to get ahead.	24:55
Stacey Scales	Do you remember your very first job?	25:39
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I guess you'd call it chopping cotton.	25:47
Stacey Scales	Chopping cotton? When was this first started, chopping cotton?	25:54
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't know. I guess I was about 11 or 12. I was kind of a spoiled brat.	25:58
Stacey Scales	Yes? Why would you say that?	26:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	My mother always wanted me to learn as much as I could learn. And she started me out to doing things when I was 10 years old, taking care of the business that had to be with writing or something. Back during the forties when we had to have coupons to get shoes, sugar, lard, and stuff like that, they was giving us what they wanted us to have. And as good as she felt, she said that, "Hey, ain't this an address on the back of here?" I said, "Yes ma'am." She said, "You write me a letter. You write it like I tell you." She said, "I'm not going to put it in the post office." She say, "I'm going to carry it over there and put it on the train." She said, "You back it to this place here." She had me to back it to Washington DC, to this office that was on there. In two or three weeks' time, she got this little envelope with extra stamps and things in it. So she started me to taking care of those kind of things when I was 10 years old.	26:12
Stacey Scales	So that was like having extra money?	27:33
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, that was giving me a chance—If I needed a pair of shoes, I had some extra stamps instead of getting me a pair of shoes. Because you were just allowed so many. And you know they were going to give—We have always gotten lesser than anybody else, I think. Now, that's my thinking.	27:36
Stacey Scales	Yes.	27:53
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And hey, I think she was only getting about one book. And this book had to last us on the sugar, the lard, the fat meat, shoes, stuff. It had to last us until they gave us some more. But mama wanted some extra. And she had me to write this letter, and I did. And she got a response. And she was one of these people, if she felt that she was being misused, she'd go directly to you. They weren't giving her what she thought they should have given her in '38 or '39 when they were giving out commodities. Honey, and she went down there and she told that woman, she said, "What you think I am? I got to feed my family. And I'm not working, my husband is disabled." And I don't know what all she didn't say. But I know one thing. She got more than the others around her.	27:54
Stacey Scales	Did people ever try to pull the wool over her eyes?	29:05
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't think they did because she was one that had mother wit. She didn't have the book knowledge, but she was gifted with mother wit. And you couldn't hardly put nothing over on her. So I consider her an intelligent woman in that.	29:10
Stacey Scales	How does one get mother wit?	29:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	It's a gift of God.	29:40
Stacey Scales	So she could just feel when something was going wrong or right?	29:46
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, she would feel when she was did in just, and she'd see around her some—She would go to these people's house, wash for them or something, and see them getting these things, and she wasn't getting it. "Why am I not getting this? I'm a human, too. I need this for my family." And she'd go to the people, and she'd tell them, "Hey." And she'd tell them in a minute, "Well, if y'all don't want to do nothing for me, I know somebody will." And she always had this idea that she could get in touch with Washington and they would do something about it. Now that was—	29:51
Stacey Scales	Right.	30:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And we lived pretty good. Because some of the kids that I went to school with, as I've often told, they came from big families. Some of them, like if they had greens, or beans, or peas, or something like that, they'd have these big molasses bucket, and they'd have this in there, and they may have some whole cake of cornbread, whole cake of biscuit bread, or whatever. And they'd have this stuff in there, and that's what they had for lunch.	30:41
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But see, she'd get up every morning, she'd fry me some salt meat, or she'd fry me a chicken, some chicken. And I always had the little knickknacks, the little specialty. And I would swap off mine, part of mine, to get ahold of some of what they had because she'd always, like I say, people give her meat after killing hogs and things. She might have me some ham sandwiches in there. She might have me some sausage sandwiches in there. But she always had me something in my pocket. That's the reason I said I was a spoiled brat.	31:14
Stacey Scales	When you went to chop cotton, how much were you getting paid?	32:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I think when we first started we were getting about $2 a day, then it went up to about $4 a day. And by the fifties, they was giving us around $5 a day.	32:09
Stacey Scales	Did you feel as if you were being paid fairly?	32:25
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	We didn't know what fair was. We thought it was a good price. Then we finds out that the—We began to ride trucks and things. We find out that the guy that was driving the truck, he was getting a larger amount of that, and he was taking from a dollar to $2 off of it, and we was getting what was left. So our own people was putting a stick to us. And as far as cotton picking, I never was a cotton picker.	32:29
Stacey Scales	No?	33:11
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I just couldn't pick cotton.	33:11
Stacey Scales	Would you still get your $2?	33:19
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. If I went out there to pick cotton, I didn't get no more than what I picked cotton for. If I got 50 pounds, that's what I got paid for. Now, on the picking cotton, you got paid by the hundred, and they'd pay you a dollar and a half a hundred.	33:23
Stacey Scales	A hundred pounds of cotton, a dollar and a half?	33:39
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	$2 a hundred. I think about the highest it got up to, to my recollection, before I just quit and let it alone, was about $3 a hundred.	33:40
Stacey Scales	Where did you work after you picked cotton?	33:59
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Oh, as I got older, I worked at restaurants and places like that.	34:02
Stacey Scales	Oh, you worked as a waitress?	34:13
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, as a cook, or dishwasher, or something.	34:15
Stacey Scales	Okay. Were the places segregated that you worked?	34:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. Matter of fact, in '49 I worked for some people that I had known all my life. And they called it, the Black people called it, I don't know whether that was the name of it or not, The Black and White. It was a partition between, and it's Blacks on one side and White was on the other.	34:23
Stacey Scales	And that's the nickname for it, The Black and White?	34:49
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	34:56
Stacey Scales	Were the White—	34:56
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And I was the cook and the waitress for the Black.	34:57
Stacey Scales	Yeah?	35:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And—	35:02
Stacey Scales	So you were the cook and waitress?	35:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yeah.	35:05
Stacey Scales	Would you cook and wait tables at the same time?	35:06
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm.	35:08
Stacey Scales	Okay.	35:08
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Because we didn't serve nothing but hamburgers and hot dogs, chili and stew.	35:11
Stacey Scales	Okay.	35:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	The chili and the stew was something that I made as soon as I got there, and kept it where it would stay warm. And the hamburgers—	35:19
Stacey Scales	So The Black and White, was that here in—	35:33
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Brinkley.	35:36
Stacey Scales	In Brinkley.	35:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And would you go there to eat, ever, as a—Would you ever go there for lunch one day when you were off or something?	35:40
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-uh. Because the day I would be off, it would be closed.	35:48
Stacey Scales	So in other words, you worked every day.	35:55
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Six days a week.	35:57
Stacey Scales	Black and White. And where was this located?	35:58
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	In Brinkley on East Cypress there. This was in '49.	36:05
Stacey Scales	In '49. Would people stop from traveling long distances to eat?	36:14
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Most of it was locals.	36:20
Stacey Scales	Okay. How'd you feel working in a place where you were working on only half of the business, and the other half was—	36:21
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	At that time, it didn't bother me because, as I say, when you're brought up under a system, you're brought up under something, you think it's just a way of life. And it was along about '55, '54, '55, that really myself, I guess, and the rest of the Blacks really came into the reality of what was being done.	36:37
Stacey Scales	Who handled the money? Who would they pay when it was time for them to pay for their meal?	37:10
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They'd pay me.	37:17
Stacey Scales	So the Blacks would pay you?	37:19
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh. And then I'd carry it and give it to them.	37:20
Stacey Scales	And on the White side, they would pay the White cashier?	37:22
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.	37:30
Stacey Scales	Did any anyone ever try to bring about a change in that restaurant to sit on the other side?	37:37
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. Like I said, it wasn't until about '50 something.	37:42
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	37:50
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And when they started boycotting places.	37:53
Stacey Scales	I'm wondering, did you cook for both sides?	37:58
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	38:01
Stacey Scales	So you cooked for both sides, and you were the waitress for the Black side?	38:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Uh-huh.	38:06
Stacey Scales	Okay. So everyone was eating your cooking.	38:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, the pot, the stew that I fixed, it was served both Black and White. The same one. The White was eating the same thing that the Blacks was eating. If they were getting a hamburger, it was coming out of the same pile. If they was getting chili, it was coming out of the same pot.	38:10
Stacey Scales	Did they know that?	38:32
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I don't know whether they did or not. If they didn't, I'm sorry for them.	38:33
Stacey Scales	Okay.	38:37
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	But then, during the—about '54, '55, they started going up there to the hotel. They had a grill up there, bar and grill up there. And they started going in there, sitting down, and wanting to be served. Well, a time or two, they wanted to act off on. But it didn't take long for Brinkley to give in. And they seen they could do it there, and they went to other places. And some of them, if they felt like they couldn't do it, they shut the business down rather than to do it.	38:46
Stacey Scales	Did they have Black policeman here?	39:26
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No. We had a—called a door shaker, that was all he was.	39:28
Stacey Scales	A door shaker?	39:34
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	He'd walk the street and check the doors.	39:36
Stacey Scales	And that's it. That's all they did?	39:39
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	He never arrested nobody.	39:42
Stacey Scales	In the Black community—	39:47
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Right.	39:52
Stacey Scales	How would the White police treat the people here in the area?	39:53
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	The same way they do them many other place.	39:58
Stacey Scales	Which is?	40:02
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	"Boy." "Girl." And they did work them with balls and chains, cleaning the streets.	40:02
Stacey Scales	They would have people with the balls and chains?	40:19
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	They'd have chains around them, chain gang, whatever you want to call it. Sweeping the streets.	40:20
Stacey Scales	Most of those would be Black men?	40:29
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Most of them. But this was all down Brink. Now back to the getting along with us. Now, these that are right here in the community, they used to come to the Black church, Union Baptist, all the time.	40:31
Stacey Scales	The police?	40:58
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, I'm talking about here in Fargo.	41:00
Stacey Scales	Oh, yes.	41:03
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And the church that was right by me, the Presbyterian?	41:04
Stacey Scales	Yeah.	41:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	The Blacks let them have service there. The White, let the White have service there. And they'd come down there and have service.	41:08
Stacey Scales	With the Blacks?	41:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	In this Black church. They let them have services there when they weren't using it.	41:19
Stacey Scales	Okay. I'm trying to understand. It would be Whites having church at a Black church?	41:26
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Yes.	41:31
Stacey Scales	Would there be Blacks in there?	41:33
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	If they wanted to go. I've never known them to turn nobody away. But very seldom there would be a Black go over there when they was having service.	41:34
Stacey Scales	And then on the next Sunday, would it be a Black church again?	41:44
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, it was a Black church. It was a Black Presbyterian church. But it was only—The membership started dwindling. And then these Whites ask them about having service there, and they let them have service there.	41:48
Stacey Scales	So when would the Blacks get to have their service if they let the Whites have theirs?	42:07
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	The Black had their service when they—Mostly the Whites would be having night service.	42:13
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay. And it'd be a Black church in the daytime.	42:18
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, if that's what you want to call it.	42:23
Stacey Scales	I'm just wondering when they were having service.	42:26
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Well, everybody was always welcome.	42:29
Stacey Scales	Oh, okay.	42:33
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	See, that's the reason that I couldn't—I never could get a great sense of what was happening because the community was a community that really stood behind each other.	42:33
Stacey Scales	Okay.	42:46
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	And up there where we was this evening?	42:50
Stacey Scales	Yes, ma'am.	42:52
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	Now, the lady, that girl just married into the family. But the lady that was reared up there, she and her niece used to come to our church all the time. You seen that other White lady there?	42:53
Stacey Scales	Yes.	43:11
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	She put on a benefit program for our mayor there. She sponsored it. So do you see where I'm coming from?	43:13
Stacey Scales	Right, right. I understand.	43:25
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	We were just never any really enemies to each other.	43:26
Stacey Scales	Right. I think I understand. Do you have anything else you would like to—	43:36
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	No, I guess not.	43:44
Stacey Scales	Well, I've enjoyed talking to you. It's been really insightful.	43:47
Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage	I mainly didn't tell everything, but I was just—some of the things.	43:51
Stacey Scales	Okay, thank you.	43:56

Item Info

Title:

Elizabeth Turnage interview recording, 1995 July 10

Date:

July 10, 1995

Creator:

Turnage, Elizabeth Pendleton

Contributor:

Scales, Mausiki Stacey

Description:

Name: Elizabeth Pendleton Turnage; Date of birth: 1932-02-25; Place of birth: Fargo, AR; Occupation(s): unknown; Residence: Brinkley, AR
Informant ID: 1095; Interviewed by: Stacey Scales.

Location:

Format:

Language:

English

Digital Collection:

Behind the Veil

Source Collection:

Behind the Veil: Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South interviews, photographs, and project records, circa 1864-2011, bulk 1990-1999

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Provenance:

The David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library acquired the Records of the Behind the Veil Oral History Project from the Duke University Center for Documentary Studies in 1997, 1998, 2000, and 2002.

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Limited Re-Use

CC BY-NC 4.0

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Copyright for content created by the Behind the Veil project is held by Duke University and made available to the public using a Creative Commons Attribution / Non-commercial (CC-BY-NC) license.

Identifier:

Interview number: 131
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Elizabeth Turnage interview recording, 1995 July 10

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Item Info

1. Elizabeth Turnage administrative file, 1995

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Elizabeth Turnage interview recording, 1995 July 10

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