Harriette Brinkley (primary interviewee), Henderson McCullers, and Patricia McCullers interview recording, 1994 June 09
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
Patricia Ann McCullers | I'm Patricia A. McCullers. | 0:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | I'm Harriette McCullers Brinkley. Patricia's my sister. | 0:05 |
Henderson McCullers | And I'm Henderson McCullers. The father of the two. | 0:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | All right. | 0:14 |
Sally Graham | Henson, what is it? | 0:21 |
Henderson McCullers | Henderson. | 0:23 |
Sally Graham | Henderson. Henderson McCullers. Okay. And it's Sally Graham. | 0:30 |
Tunga White | Tunga White. | 0:33 |
Sally Graham | Okay. And it's June 9th, 1994. Well, let's just— | 0:35 |
Tunga White | I don't know where to start because I don't know what Leslie said about those photos, but if you like, we could by talking about the photos and then we can get into some family history while, okay? | 0:46 |
Sally Graham | How about that? | 0:59 |
Harriette Brinkley | All right. You want to start with the ones that Leslie did already? | 1:00 |
Sally Graham | Let's do that. | 1:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. All right. These pictures here were, let me see. She was wanted to know why I put them in certain order that I did. I don't even know if I had anything in mind when I put them in order. But the majority of the ones here on this first page are of my older brother, my father, daddy did you take most of the pictures when Cleveland was a baby? My father took most of these pictures. This is a picture of my mother holding me. | 1:05 |
Sally Graham | Okay. And your mother's name is? | 1:39 |
Harriette Brinkley | Her name. My mother is deceased now, but her name is Annie Eliza Tyson-McCullers. | 1:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | T-Y-S-O-N. | 1:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | And I have two brothers who are living the oldest one's name is Clesiastes. | 1:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | C-L-E-S— | 2:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | See how much you went to church? Spell that. C-L-E-S-I-A-S-T-E-S. And my next brother his name is Allen, A-L-L-E-N, Leon. And then I'm next in line and my sister, Pat is after me. And then we have one brother who's deceased. I think we have some pictures of him in here too. And then I have another sister who was stillborn and also a part of, we got, I call an extended family and he's just like a brother to me. When my youngest brother was seven when he died. And my mother said she always prayed and asked God to send her another son. And somehow my brother got the preacher's daughter pregnant and it was a boy and we ended up with the baby. We brought him home from the hospital. So he grew up in our home also. So to me, he's just like a third brother. | 2:03 |
Tunga White | The brother that died when he was seven, what was the cause of death? | 3:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | What happened? He and another little boy, they were the same age, were playing around an irrigation hole. And the irrigation hole was like 25 feet deep and the irrigation hole was used when people barn tobacco. You know what I mean when I use that word? | 3:05 |
Sally Graham | No. | 3:19 |
Tunga White | No, I don't. | 3:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh Lord. | 3:19 |
Tunga White | I know about cotton, I don't know anything about tobacco. | 3:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. Barn tobacco means that, you know when, well, Daddy, you want to explain barn tobacco? | 3:26 |
Henderson McCullers | Well, getting back to irrigation now as she was saying that this pond or this pool, where my baby boy got drowned in, this White fella, he had dug out a big hole to get clay to make a dam at another place for his pool where he going to use his irrigation system. | 3:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | To water the tobacco plants. That's why we call it irrigation hole. | 3:57 |
Henderson McCullers | And they were playing out there in this little, it was very smooth level where they were playing at and all at once he just fell right down in this hole. | 4:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | But you could see where the footprints is from what I can recall, the footprints where they like pushing one another at the edge of the water and then his prints just slid right on into the water, but they didn't know how to swim. And so— | 4:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He drowned. | 4:27 |
Sally Graham | About what year was that? | 4:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | 1965. August 5, 1965. The first child is interesting. The first born was Patricia A McCullers also. So I'm really a Patricia A. McCullers the second. | 4:30 |
Sally Graham | And that was the stillborn child? | 4:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. Yeah. | 4:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | She was born in 1943. | 4:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | But back to the phrase of barning tobacco, when you had so many men in the field who would pull the leaves from the field that were ripe or yellow and they would put them on a wagon type thing, a drag, and that person would direct the mule and then later drive the tractor and bring the wagon with the leaves in it to the barn. And there were two people on each side of a long bench, I think. And you would put the leaves from the wagon onto the bench and then you have what you call handers and you would put say three leaves together and you would hand it back to the person who would string the tobacco onto the stick. | 4:51 |
Harriette Brinkley | And once the stick was completed, matter of like what, two, three minutes, then you would take the finish stick and you would put it in a certain area until 12 o'clock you would try to do two barns of tobacco a day. And at 12 o'clock the men from the field would come in and take all the sticks that were prepared and put them in the barn. And then they would, at night the owner of the barn would come back and light the fire and go ahead and cure the leaves. And then that procedure would go on to the processing plant where they make cigarettes. | 5:32 |
Tunga White | So was your family involved in tobacco farming? | 6:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | Very much so. | 6:06 |
Tunga White | Very much so? | 6:07 |
Sally Graham | And where? Here in— | 6:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | Wake County. Wake County. | 6:11 |
Tunga White | So you all lived in obviously a rural area. Tell me about the area that you grew up in. | 6:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Well, go ahead, Daddy. | 6:24 |
Henderson McCullers | It was practically the same thing until we married and left home. But my daddy, he had a pretty good sized farm. He had 40 to 48 acres. And we were born in the back. We had the back cotton. And that's something you say you familiar with? | 6:28 |
Tunga White | I'm from Mississippi, have to be. | 6:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | These are pictures of his mother and father and all of his sisters and brothers. | 6:51 |
Sally Graham | And Mr. McCullers is that you had, your father had the 48 acres in Wade County also? | 6:56 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes. | 7:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | Wake. | 7:03 |
Sally Graham | Wake County. | 7:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now throwing some, before I forget about my aunt, one aunt, this one lives in, her name is Ruth and she lives in Richmond. And I would say in the past five years or so, we have become very, very close. And up until that time we were sort of estranged. But that was on my part. But we are really close now and she has shared some things with me that I was not aware of, for example, there, daddy how many sisters you have? About 12? | 7:07 |
Henderson McCullers | Right now? | 7:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | How many were living? | 7:33 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh, living now? | 7:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, did you have? | 7:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Here they are. | 7:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now, okay, say, so the mother bought say two bulks of material pink for example, and a blue. So maybe five dresses were made in blue and then four were made in pink. So this week, five wore the blue and four the pink. And then next week they would switch up. | 7:39 |
Tunga White | Alternate. Okay, let me see. | 8:03 |
Harriette Brinkley | But there were total, daddy how many brothers and sisters you have total? About 15? How many? | 8:03 |
Henderson McCullers | 15. | 8:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | There were 15 in the family. Good kids. Could we stop the tape a minute? | 8:06 |
Sally Graham | Sure. | 8:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | All right. Okay. Hold this one just a minute. All right. My father was a military man and so they doted a whole lot. There were lots of pictures of my older brother. And so, oh, here's a picture of a tobacco field. Can you see that? This is my mother and this is my older brother. And at that time they had an adopted girl in the home. This is Mary Helen. She just stayed in the home at that time. | 8:14 |
Sally Graham | And how long was Mary Helen in the family? | 8:43 |
Henderson McCullers | She was with us during the school term by approximately two years. | 8:48 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. See this is Mary Helen again. Mary Helen here. And this is Mary Helen, and my oldest brother and Mary Helen | 8:56 |
Sally Graham | Did Mary—[crosstalk 00:09:02], oh, sorry, sorry. | 9:02 |
Tunga White | What age did Mary Helen come to the home and live with you all? | 9:04 |
Henderson McCullers | How old was she then? Mary Helen, she was about six or seven because she was just entering school. | 9:09 |
Tunga White | Was she the daughter of a relative then? | 9:10 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, but her mother was working see, and was she mostly staying with different ones we were taking care of for her mother while she was working. | 9:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Was she a relative? | 9:34 |
Henderson McCullers | No. No, she wasn't a relative. | 9:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | She was not a relative. | 9:38 |
Henderson McCullers | No. | 9:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. Correct. Okay, because I was going to say that's the first time I've ever heard that. (phone rings) (all laugh) | 9:41 |
Tunga White | You learned something too. | 9:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah, I knew that Mary Helen was there, but I was not aware that she was a relative. | 9:48 |
Henderson McCullers | No. | 9:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So she's not a relative. | 9:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | We can in the, well we'll talk about that later. Okay, bye. | 9:54 |
Tunga White | So, Mr. McCullers. | 10:04 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes ma'am. | 10:04 |
Tunga White | Your parents, what were their names? | 10:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Sam McCullers. | 10:07 |
Tunga White | Sam. | 10:09 |
Henderson McCullers | And Carrie. Carrie Lilly McCullers. | 10:10 |
Tunga White | Carrie. And were they from Wake County? | 10:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes. | 10:21 |
Tunga White | Too—okay and they had been there all their lives? | 10:21 |
Henderson McCullers | No, my father, he was born in Wilson. What is it, Wilson County? Wilson. | 10:24 |
Sally Graham | Wilson County. | 10:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know. | 10:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Wilson County. | 10:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | And tell you something that I found out recently was that, my aunt told me that my grandmother was 13 when they got married. And grandpa was how old? | 10:35 |
Henderson McCullers | He was 11 years. | 10:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | 11 years older? | 10:48 |
Henderson McCullers | 11 years older than she was. | 10:48 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 10:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And they had 15 children. | 10:53 |
Tunga White | So did your mother do any type of work besides farm work or did you only farm work? | 11:02 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, she worked. She worked at the cafeteria at the school for I don't know how many years. Maybe eight, nine years. | 11:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Cafeteria worker. | 11:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | See I didn't know that. | 11:16 |
Tunga White | Now what school was this? | 11:18 |
Henderson McCullers | Lockhart. | 11:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | L-O-C-K-H A-R-T High. | 11:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | And Lockhart— | 11:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Lockhart. Just Lockhart. | 11:26 |
Harriette Brinkley | —remained predominant, well remained a Black school up until— | 11:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | 1968. | 11:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, yeah. | 11:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Lockhart High in Knightdale. | 11:36 |
Sally Graham | Night? | 11:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | K-N-I-G-H-T-D-A-L-E. | 11:41 |
Tunga White | So your father, was his only profession, farming and agriculture? | 11:49 |
Henderson McCullers | Well really, excuse me. My father, we children, as far as I can recall back, we children tend the crop. And he was hired out to, he were working at a saw mill or even the gin. He worked at Saw Mill during the summer months and ginned cotton in the winter months. | 11:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It's interesting that you say that because that is a question that I just asked him in 1993. Because the way you see how grandfather dressed is the way he was dressed every day. | 12:23 |
Tunga White | Really? | 12:34 |
Harriette Brinkley | Most of the time it was like suspenders, a white shirt and a hat and— | 12:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Dress pants. And I asked daddy, I said Daddy. And I was born in 1953 and I said, daddy, I don't ever recall granddaddy doing anything. I said daddy—And that's, and just listening to the older family members, granddaddy didn't do anything. And I said, did granddaddy ever work? And he stated, yes, he once worked at a mill, but that was a long time ago. I don't think he really did much of anything once he moved to Wake County because he had the children and this is where he went every day. | 12:38 |
Sally Graham | How did he acquire the 48 acres? | 13:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Well, it's a long story and the best I can recall, my daddy was working for a White fella. He was a sharecropper for White man. And this man, he was the sheriff of Wake County and he found out that this Black man who owned the land that my daddy bought a portion of it was—name was Major Slade and he was about to lose it due to— | 13:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | Taxes or something. | 13:52 |
Henderson McCullers | —Tax. | 13:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Non-payment of taxes. | 13:53 |
Sally Graham | And he, in turn, got my daddy with a dollar which a dollar back there was a dollar. And I don't know how much daddy paid for the land whatsoever. This White fella, hooked my daddy, what little money he had. He might have loan him some money, I don't know. But he stood for papa to buy this crack of land. That's how he got it. | 13:55 |
Harriette Brinkley | So, but am I right to say that this man, that backed granddaddy was grandmama's daddy? | 14:21 |
Henderson McCullers | That's what they said. | 14:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | His mother was the daughter of the sheriff of Wake County. | 14:30 |
Harriette Brinkley | See, 'cause supposed—I was told that— | 14:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You can see from her complexion you know there was— | 14:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | —He and his wife. I was told that he and his wife could not have children or did not have children. And when he got my great-grandmother pregnant and my grandmother was the result that until the day he died, he saw to it that she was taken care of. | 14:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And all of the children, my father, everybody was very well taken care of. So we were not treated as, for lack of a, excuse me? | 14:55 |
Henderson McCullers | Underdog. | 15:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, underdog. | 15:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. And this was the norm during that time. And we were fortunate. We were fortunate. | 15:09 |
Harriette Brinkley | But my aunt in Richmond told me that the Sheriff and his wife would often babysit. And it was that type of relationship that they had. | 15:21 |
Tunga White | So it wasn't that private, it was more— | 15:37 |
Sally Graham | It was open? | 15:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | Right, that he acknowledged her. | 15:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He acknowledged and his wife also acknowledged the fact, as a matter of fact— | 15:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | None of the descendants did, but he did. He always saw to it that she was taken care of. | 15:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And that is interesting because his side of the family were a staunch Klansmen. But back during the sixties when and fifties when a lot of people were getting fire bombed or crosses burned in the yards, there were never any burned in our yards. When the schools integrated and when the schools integrated, say if there was a child from this particular house that went to the new school or wanted to go before they fully integrated, there would be a cross burned. But that was never the case in any of our family members' yards. So it was quite interesting. | 15:52 |
Sally Graham | What did the other Blacks in your community, how did they perceive you? | 16:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Meaning? | 16:35 |
Sally Graham | If they— | 16:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | It was like— | 16:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | We were looked up to because our grandfather was— | 16:41 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, it really was because it's like you were McCullers and Sam McCullers was your grandfather type thing. It wasn't— | 16:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It was a respect. A great admiration. Great respect for you being a McCullers. So much so that when I built my home in '85, I went to some of the stores in the city near us, Wendell. And because my name was McCullers, no problem. If you want credit, no problem, no down payment was required. You pay when you get ready. That to say that, that lets you know that he had, people had a lot of respect and a lot of admiration for him. And that still stands. | 16:50 |
Tunga White | You mentioned that the sheriff's family was involved in Klan activity. Can you elaborate on that a little bit more? | 17:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Well, as I recall back in the sixties when the Klan would have marches and there was a house not too far from us that would have nightly Klan meetings. Everybody in the neighborhood, Black and White knew that that was a Klan house. And as we grew older, that is when we found out that they were our relatives. So much so that my father had the same characteristics. | 17:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | If you were to see them, they're, some of them are named the Broadwells. Most of them are living in the area. You see my father's white platinum hair, all of them have the same type hair. They're tall, slender, just like my father. My father I think can probably get in his military uniform and all the guys, if you were to come to the area and see the Broadwells and they still hang at one of the stores. They have a store and they still hang up there every night and you pass by and they all look the same. They all have the same statue and the same hair, the white platinum hair. Our family is known for having the solid white hair. Our grandmother, daddy's mother, I understand that she was completely platinum by the age of 30. | 18:10 |
Tunga White | Really? | 19:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | All I ever remember was that, her hair like that. That's all I— | 19:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So we are known for having the gorgeous white hair, not just yellow but white, white hair. | 19:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is back then, well this shows in '57. My father was, I guess I hate to say a lot of people, but were involved in 4-H work back then too. And my father had, this is my oldest brother and this is his prize cow. So they participated in a lot of the shows and things that they have. I think some of them were at Central. Is that right? Am I right? I got pictures in here of that. | 19:13 |
Sally Graham | What Central? | 19:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | North Carolina— | 19:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | North Carolina Central. St. Augustine's College in Raleigh. | 19:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. This is my mother when she was in high school. | 19:45 |
Tunga White | Yeah, we saw that. | 19:48 |
Sally Graham | We saw that. | 19:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is my mother and this is my father's sister here. | 19:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | One of the ones— | 19:53 |
Sally Graham | Now, who took that photograph? | 19:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, who took this one with aunt Carol? | 19:55 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know about this one. | 19:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | This one. | 19:59 |
Henderson McCullers | I know I had taken that one. | 20:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | Which one? This one. | 20:02 |
Henderson McCullers | No, that one. And this one here too. | 20:03 |
Sally Graham | This one too? | 20:07 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 20:07 |
Sally Graham | Of the cows and— | 20:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You took which one? This one and which one, that one? | 20:09 |
Henderson McCullers | That one, yeah. | 20:11 |
Sally Graham | Okay. | 20:11 |
Henderson McCullers | This one. I don't, I know I didn't take that one. | 20:11 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is a school picture, looks like a school picture. | 20:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Dad was sort of an amateur photographer. It was rare for, now, it was not rare for us because we were always around cameras. But when we talked to other people our age who may drop by the house and they see the family album and they go, oh gosh, we don't have any pictures of ourselves. And we were accustomed to having a camera because our father always had a camera. | 20:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, I meant Derek Tyson. | 20:40 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, that's who I was talking about. | 20:44 |
Sally Graham | How did he get into photography? | 20:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Ask him. | 20:46 |
Sally Graham | How did you learn how to be a photographer? | 20:46 |
Henderson McCullers | Well, just by looking and listening. (all laugh) | 20:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let me just share a few things about our father. Our father is a what you would call a jack of all trades. That is a rarity now to hear of a man being capable of doing a lot of things. Our father is by trade, a master carpenter. He is a plumber, electrician as you can see, a photographer, a mechanic. | 20:55 |
Harriette Brinkley | And back then he had all the farm equipment like tractors— | 21:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Discs. | 21:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, all that stuff. All that stuff was we had. | 21:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And that was a rarity. | 21:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | And like for a swimming pool, we didn't have a swimming pool, okay, daddy how big were those barrels? Okay, when you watered, sometimes if you didn't have an irrigation hole— | 21:34 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, it'll hold about 50 gallons of water. | 21:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | You had these great big barrels that would hold say 50 gallons of water. And then that's what we would use. They were steel. Were they made out of steel? | 21:43 |
Henderson McCullers | They were metal. | 21:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Metal. And then we'd use them in the backyard for swimming pool. | 21:49 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Swimming pool. And we grew up with animals as pets. We had pet goats, dogs, chickens. | 21:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | When they first— | 22:00 |
Tunga White | That you all named, right? | 22:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh (affirmative). | 22:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | —When they first married, I guess did grandpa have the house built for y'all as a wedding present or what? | 22:04 |
Henderson McCullers | No, no. | 22:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | How long after? | 22:12 |
Henderson McCullers | Joe, not Joe, not [indistinct 00:22:17] had that house built. We all was working on the experiment farm at that time when they built that house for us. | 22:14 |
Harriette Brinkley | What's an experiment farm? | 22:21 |
Henderson McCullers | You talking about— | 22:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | The house. | 22:23 |
Henderson McCullers | My daddy? | 22:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Queen and Rudolph's house. The house where we were living in. | 22:25 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh yeah, yeah. Had that built, but that was way back, way on down the road after we left the treatment farm. | 22:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 22:33 |
Henderson McCullers | 'Cause we left the experiment farm and went and stayed there for a couple years and then he built it. That's when he turned his farm over to me and Anderson. | 22:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 22:40 |
Sally Graham | About what year was that? | 22:47 |
Henderson McCullers | Wait a minute now. | 22:49 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. Well you married in '42— | 22:51 |
Henderson McCullers | I came out of service in '66. No, '50— | 22:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '40. | 22:56 |
Henderson McCullers | '46. | 22:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '46. | 22:56 |
Henderson McCullers | That was in somewhere in '50— | 22:59 |
Harriette Brinkley | Who was the first one born at the house? | 23:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Allen? No. | 23:07 |
Henderson McCullers | Huh? | 23:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Was it me? | 23:09 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, you. | 23:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. So that was '53. | 23:10 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '53. How about that? I didn't know that. No wonder I cut that grass every week. | 23:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. The house is still standing. | 23:19 |
Sally Graham | Oh, okay. | 23:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | And it's four, I guess they added a bathroom on now, but it was just four rooms. It was four rooms and it didn't have a bathroom then. | 23:24 |
Henderson McCullers | And didn't have no electric heating. | 23:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 23:35 |
Henderson McCullers | No electric, we used a lamp at that time. | 23:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 23:36 |
Sally Graham | Is it still in the family? | 23:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. | 23:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yes. | 23:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. 'Cause when my grandfather died, all the land was divided amongst the children or their descendants. And the house that my father and mother once owned went to— | 23:42 |
Henderson McCullers | My oldest brother. | 23:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | His oldest brother. But my father still lives in his house, which is right across the street from there now. Everybody down there stay together. Okay. This is more of my older brother. My other brother was basketball player, but all of them, both of them really played basketball and they were really big in basketball. | 23:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Our mother was a basketball player also. | 24:17 |
Tunga White | She was? | 24:19 |
Henderson McCullers | She was the only figure. (all laugh) | 24:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So we come from an athletic family. | 24:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is the one that died when he was born. Okay. This is the one that took his place, well, for lack of a better term, took his place. This is the other one that grew up in our home. His name is Anthony. | 24:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Our nephew. As you can see, this is the older brother. They dressed him very well. It's ironic because I waited late in life to have a son and I named my son after the brother who drowned. My son's name is John Derek and he's named after his father, who is a John. My grandfather who is also a John and his great, my great grandfather who is a John. | 24:40 |
Henderson McCullers | Who is those two guys? | 25:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | Where? Here? | 25:06 |
Henderson McCullers | It's interesting. | 25:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | Allen. | 25:06 |
Henderson McCullers | No, I mean right here in the middle. | 25:06 |
Henderson McCullers | And Quigley, somebody, one of his friends. | 25:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It's interesting that some of the same clothes that I have bought for my son who was born in 1990, it appears that they very same thing that Cle was wearing back in the forties. | 25:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. This is my mother. We used to always have, we still do have family reunions and stuff, but this was one in March 1959. So in this one I was seven, six. I was soon to be seven. So she was five. | 25:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What is that? | 25:44 |
Harriette Brinkley | 1959. | 25:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, Okay. Okay. | 25:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | So this is grandkids. Grandkids, yeah. | 25:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, this picture is a picture of my mother and Phyllis. Our cousin. | 25:54 |
Harriette Brinkley | Cousin. | 25:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mother had just lost Patricia and while she was pregnant she had bought up a lot of clothes and bassinet everything that the baby would need. And my father's sister was pregnant right after that. So my mother gave her all of Patricia's things. So daddy's sister allowed mama to name Phyllis. | 25:59 |
Tunga White | Who delivered all the family's babies? | 26:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. Patricia was born at the military hospital in Columbia, South Carolina at Fort Jackson. I believe it was called Fort Jackson, Columbia, South Carolina. She was born in the military hospital and buried there. Cle, the oldest one was born at home by midwife. And— | 26:23 |
Tunga White | Do you know the name of that midwife? | 26:42 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy who was the midwife? | 26:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Did you say Sadie. | 26:49 |
Henderson McCullers | Huh? | 26:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Did you say Sadie? | 26:49 |
Henderson McCullers | No. No. Aunt Molly. Cousin Molly Hinton. | 26:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Molly Hinton. | 26:54 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's what they used to say when somebody was a relative. What they say, cousin Molly. (all laughing) | 26:55 |
Henderson McCullers | Well she was one of my cousins. | 26:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Cousin Haley. | 26:57 |
Tunga White | My family's like that too. | 26:57 |
Sally Graham | So y'all were related to Molly? | 27:02 |
Henderson McCullers | Where are you from? | 27:04 |
Tunga White | I'm from Prentice Mississippi. | 27:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. | 27:04 |
Henderson McCullers | Who? | 27:04 |
Tunga White | Prentice Mississippi. | 27:06 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh yeah? That's a nice place to be from. | 27:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now you, don't get him riled up here. (all laughing) | 27:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. This is a picture of my brother who died. | 27:16 |
Tunga White | How old was he? | 27:19 |
Sally Graham | His name was John? | 27:20 |
Tunga White | No. His name was— | 27:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | His name was Derek Tyson. | 27:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | Derek Tyson. | 27:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | D-E-R-E-K. | 27:24 |
Tunga White | How old was he in this picture? | 27:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's probably like six. 'Cause he had to have been in school. | 27:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The year is there. | 27:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, it's not, 88. | 27:34 |
Henderson McCullers | It's not on the back? | 27:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | 8 31 something 4. '64. | 27:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '64, yeah he was six. | 27:39 |
Harriette Brinkley | So six. Six years old. | 27:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He was six when that was taken. | 27:43 |
Henderson McCullers | Before we were saying about drowning in that pool. | 27:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. Okay. Did you ever see people baptized like this? | 27:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Baptized in a lake? | 27:50 |
Sally Graham | Oh my goodness. | 27:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | In the river, or see before they had baptismals like they have in churches now. Okay. This person would take a tall stick, you see the stick, the rod in his hand? And that person would go out first and test to see how deep the water was or if there were pockets of water. And then he would walk back to the edge and the preacher would walk out with him and then he would walk back to the shore and bring the person out that was going to be baptized to the preacher. And then he'd baptize and then he'd take them back and bring the next one out. | 27:52 |
Sally Graham | And what kind of church was that? | 28:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | Baptist. | 28:22 |
Sally Graham | Baptist. | 28:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Missionary Baptist. And this, the old Negro spiritual, Take—What is it Daddy? "Take me to the water." (singing) And this was it. "Take me to the water to be bap—" (singing) | 28:23 |
Tunga White | Now, what Minister was this? | 28:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | His name was C.R. Trotter. | 28:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | T-R-O-T-T-E-R. Doctor. | 28:37 |
Sally Graham | Doctor? | 28:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Doctor. | 28:42 |
Tunga White | Was that your church's minister? | 28:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. He had a doctorate in divinity. | 28:47 |
Sally Graham | Did you remember where? | 28:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Excuse me? | 28:52 |
Sally Graham | Do you remember where from? | 28:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Wasn't it from, was it from Shaw? | 28:54 |
Henderson McCullers | Who? | 28:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Trotter. | 28:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Reverend Trotter? | 28:58 |
Henderson McCullers | No, Trotter was from Graham? | 28:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. Where he got his degree. | 29:01 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh, Shaw. | 29:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Shaw. Shaw University in Raleigh. | 29:05 |
Tunga White | Did the family attend church services regularly? | 29:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | Every time the doors opened. (laughs) | 29:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. The church is like, our church. | 29:22 |
Sally Graham | Is this still standing? | 29:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yes. There are pictures here. | 29:22 |
Henderson McCullers | That was only entertainment that we had during that time. Wasn't radio, no telephone. We just go to church and laugh and talk about each other. | 29:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The first church, Good Hope, derived from Hephzibah, which was a White church in Wendell. Well, basically— | 29:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Eagle Rock. | 29:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Eagle Rock. And when the Blacks wanted their own church, the church was built on our family estate. | 29:39 |
Sally Graham | And what's the name of the church? | 29:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It is now called Good Hope Baptist Church. | 29:52 |
Sally Graham | Was it, was there a different name before that? | 29:55 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, used to call it something. One time we had it—Chitlin Switch. (all laugh) | 29:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Chitlin Switch? | 29:59 |
Henderson McCullers | Chitlin Switch and then— | 29:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I have the book in my car. I have the church history book in my car. And also— | 30:10 |
Henderson McCullers | And they called that other place where the preacher's daughter's from— | 30:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | —Pictures of mom and daddy. Daddy put in the cornerstone of the church. So when I say the church, it is family church. | 30:14 |
Henderson McCullers | —and they left his wife's church, it was Bush Holler. What you call that? | 30:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | Bush Holler. | 30:21 |
Henderson McCullers | Bush Holler. Okay. And that's what it was called. | 30:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 30:24 |
Henderson McCullers | They met on a bush on a— | 30:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | Brush arbor. | 30:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Brush. | 30:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. Brush Arbor. Okay. All Right. | 30:31 |
Henderson McCullers | We call it Bush. | 30:34 |
Tunga White | Since you attended church, so regular, were y'all actively involved by being members of the deacon board or a choir or things like that? | 30:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | All that stuff. All of that. My father was a deacon. My mother deaconess. My mother was very involved in some of the pictures in here would show she was in very involved, have always been very involved in first-aid life support. | 30:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "As a matter of fact, when our brother drowned, we were there. My mother attempted to resuscitate him and she did get all the water out except for half a teaspoon. | 30:57 |
Sally Graham | Oh my gosh. | 31:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And once we carried him to Wake Medical Center, the doctor said Mrs. McCullers, you did an excellent job. But the little water that did drown him, you could not have gotten, even if you—" They said we could not have gotten that because that was say a half a teaspoon between his lungs. | 31:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So we have pictures of her. She was very involved in the first-aid. We were all involved in choir, Sunday school. Just daddy was very involved in, he was what? President of the PTA. Very involved in civic church activities, involved in the NAACP, bunches of things. | 31:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | This picture here is one that was one of the demonstrations with the, I don't know where this school is. I don't know if that's— | 31:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I think that's at St. Aug isn't it Daddy? | 31:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | St. Aug Or Central? | 31:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let daddy see that. | 32:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | Because these pic— buildings don't look familiar. | 32:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy took the picture. Sure, he would know. Was that at Central or at St. Aug? I think that's St. Aug. | 32:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Maybe in Greensboro. Could be, was it A&T? Did y'all ever go to Greensboro? | 32:18 |
Henderson McCullers | I believe I made that picture in Durham. | 32:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That was over at Central then. | 32:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Wait a minute. No, no. This is St. Augustine's, 'cause there are cleats down there with these cows. | 32:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 32:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You see. So as you can see this little outfit right here, this is what I was talking about. My son— | 32:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | That one's got one. | 32:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | —Just like that. Just like that. | 32:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. But this is my parents. | 32:38 |
Sally Graham | And about what year is that photograph? | 32:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, you remember about what year this was or where you were? | 32:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Were you and Mama married then when you took that picture? | 32:45 |
Tunga White | That's a nice— | 32:48 |
Henderson McCullers | No we didn't. We was in Richmond then. | 32:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. So that was about '42. | 32:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, did y'all— | 32:53 |
Henderson McCullers | '41. | 32:54 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '41, '40. | 32:54 |
Sally Graham | Y'all were close. | 33:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, I asked that questions and the answer was, no. | 33:08 |
Sally Graham | I'm trying to. | 33:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | I'm going to ask that roof. Listen to Daddy talking about trying to. | 33:15 |
Sally Graham | How did you meet your wife? | 33:15 |
Henderson McCullers | My wife, we lived in adjoining counties. She was living in Johnston County. I was living in, you could be kind of funny in answers too. She was living in Johnston County and I was living in Wake County. This particular time when I first met her, we was having children day at Good Hope Baptist church. | 33:15 |
Henderson McCullers | So I was dating another girl and they were selling ice cream and lemonade and whatever out on the yard. So me, my girlfriend were going across over to the shade over there and get her some ice cream. So then I met my wife, the one, to be, I say, I met her and she was coming back to towards the church. She walking along look like she was so lonely and I asked her, I said, "wouldn't you like to go with us and get a cola cream?" She said, "well I don't mind." So she turned around and go with me and this girl back over where they was selling ice cream and we got some ice cream. Coming on back, well my friend, she had to go to the bathroom or somewhere. During that time— (all laugh) | 33:33 |
Sally Graham | I'm going to remember this, don't ever go to the bathroom. | 34:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | You move you lose. | 34:24 |
Henderson McCullers | During that time I asked my wife about me coming to see her. She said yes, come on. I said, well where do you live? She told me what road to take. Come on over there, come behind the white church over there, and she live in that blue shanty thing over there behind the church. And then I began to go over there and date Eliza, which was my wife, and dating this girl back here too in Wake County. | 34:34 |
Sally Graham | Oh, do y'all know that? | 35:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh! (negative) | 35:06 |
Sally Graham | Oh, you don't know. | 35:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Only because I live next to them and I was able to see them every day. So there are some things that I know that maybe some of the other children don't know. 'Cause I was there every day and was nosing ask questions. | 35:07 |
Henderson McCullers | So the girl, she was living in the county, near the county line and she was attending school in Clayton. And my wife was driving a school bus that she had to ride up. | 35:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh no. | 35:35 |
Tunga White | That's too hard to handle for me. | 35:38 |
Henderson McCullers | But before they started riding, before the Black got school buses, they had a little country school, about two room school house. And this girl going there too. And they got in an argument one day while they was on their lunch period. And well I ain't going to tell you what happened. But something happened. They got almost got the fighting. From then on, somehow or another, I just put this girl that I met before I met Annie, I stopped dating her. Then I began to, dating Eliza. In '31 I bought me a car. | 35:47 |
Sally Graham | Wow. | 36:23 |
Henderson McCullers | And then they give me a chance to not have to hire somebody to take me over there to Johnson County to visit her. And from then on we just started to going to different places. I was the first one to carry her to Raleigh, brought in Raleigh. And then when she got married on down the road on down further, that's when they start to, they consolidate two teaching schools. Then they started going to Cleveland over at, what's the name? | 36:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | Cooper. | 37:03 |
Henderson McCullers | Cooper in Clayton. And she went on through high school. And I'd always tell her, I said "You ain't learning nothing in school you might as well come on and go home." | 37:03 |
Tunga White | Why'd you say that? | 37:13 |
Henderson McCullers | She didn't appear to me, she wasn't proving to me what she had—(all laugh) | 37:31 |
Henderson McCullers | And along the latter in when she went to graduate— | 37:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | But then they only had graduated at 11th grade. They didn't have the next year after she graduated, that's when they added on the 12th grade. | 37:34 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, after. I've always had been kind of stoic, and maybe I was hard to understand or something, but everybody got a way of their own, you know? So, just before the graduation night that she asked me to bring her to Raleigh, which was about 12 miles from where I was living and I brought up there, she picked out an evening gown. I think she rented it, I believe she did. And went on back. We were sitting up there laughing and talking while we riding along. | 37:41 |
Henderson McCullers | She never did say, well I'm graduating Saturday night or whatever night it was. She said, I want you to come be with me. She never did say anything like that to me. She never come round up for the last minute. She didn't never send me no invitation to come. So I said there's something wrong somewhere. So I wouldn't go. And she couldn't go 'cause I didn't come over there to pick up and carry her. Then she got at me the next day or two after that. Why didn't you come get me? You know I want you to be, I said, you didn't ask me. I said, and I stayed over there from time about halfway of the service. | 38:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Prom. | 39:04 |
Henderson McCullers | All the way to the end of the last person left the school. I said, I still didn't see you. I said now I wonder what happened. She said, well I was sitting over here crying, waiting for you. And from then on we got going on pretty good. And that same year she left and went to stay in Richmond with some of my relatives up there. Two or three years thereafter. Well I went up to Richmond, start staying with my sister. So we were still close together. And '42, that's when I was called to service. | 39:06 |
Sally Graham | Were you in the army? | 39:42 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes ma'am. Army, yes. | 39:42 |
Tunga White | So how long did you all court before you were married? | 39:42 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know whether we ever— (all laugh). But I would say about three years. Maybe—yeah, maybe about three years. | 39:42 |
Tunga White | So where did you get married at? | 40:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Columbus, South Carolina. | 40:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And did you have a church wedding? Were you at the Preacher's house? | 40:14 |
Henderson McCullers | No, we had a private wedding. We went up there to the courthouse and the Magistrate married us. | 40:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Was a female? | 40:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 40:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I have a copy of that. | 40:19 |
Sally Graham | Female judge? | 40:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah, I have a copy of the marriage license in the car. A female, she was a notary public. A female notary public. | 40:25 |
Sally Graham | What year was that? | 40:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '42. November 9th, 1942. | 40:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | So she died seven days before they would've celebrated— | 40:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The 51st anniversary. | 40:51 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, 51st anniversary. | 40:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So, mom was 21 when you all got married. So she must've been what? 16, 17 years old. | 40:55 |
Henderson McCullers | Now don't talk about how old I was. I was older than her. | 41:01 |
Sally Graham | Well we know that you were first dating one of the students that she was carrying to school. | 41:06 |
Tunga White | So, how old were you? | 41:11 |
Henderson McCullers | When now? Or then? | 41:16 |
Tunga White | When you got married? | 41:17 |
Henderson McCullers | I was in the, I was about, when was that '42? | 41:24 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let me see '42 from, was it 15? 27? | 41:26 |
Henderson McCullers | Maybe 15. | 41:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. One from three, yeah. 27. | 41:30 |
Sally Graham | Oh, she was 21 and you were 27? | 41:31 |
Tunga White | It's not bad. | 41:34 |
Sally Graham | No. | 41:34 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. Here are pictures, early pictures of his farming equipment. Here's a picture of the church back in '57. It's still much the same today I think it's got reels and stuff there. | 41:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Two wings. | 41:48 |
Sally Graham | That's huge. | 41:48 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. And here these two ladies are nurse, what they call nurse's aides, I guess— | 41:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | First-aid. | 41:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | First-aiders. | 41:57 |
Tunga White | For the church? | 41:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, for the church. | 41:59 |
Tunga White | Like if people— | 42:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | Funerals and stuff like that. | 42:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And if, you know, anything happens, I'm now a first-aider also. A first-aid member of our church. When you were required to take CPR, advanced life support courses and get recertified every year. And my mother inspired me to do that because she was one. | 42:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | Here's a picture of them. I don't know. | 42:24 |
Henderson McCullers | We were in Columbia then. | 42:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | Were you in Columbia then? Looks like she's pregnant. | 42:28 |
Sally Graham | Who are they? I know this is your father. | 42:30 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. That's my father. That's my oldest brother, and that's the next one. This is Allen. | 42:33 |
Sally Graham | Allen and Cle? | 42:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | Cle. He hated—he didn't like you to call him by his full name. | 42:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's our mother. | 42:46 |
Sally Graham | Ecclesiastes. Y'all call him Cle. Okay. And is this your mother? | 42:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. Here she is again. | 42:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | Here she is. | 42:50 |
Sally Graham | Wonderful photographs, now— | 42:52 |
Tunga White | Beautiful clothes. | 42:55 |
Sally Graham | Mr. McCullers. Were these backgrounds that you had when you'd set up to take a photograph? | 42:57 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes. | 43:04 |
Sally Graham | Okay. Did people come to you and— | 43:05 |
Henderson McCullers | No, I think this, when we had this one made right here. We was at the state fair. | 43:10 |
Sally Graham | Okay, so, but this is, okay. This is your wife? | 43:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Did you take that picture, Daddy? | 43:15 |
Henderson McCullers | No, I didn't take that one. | 43:15 |
Sally Graham | No, you didn't take that one. Okay. | 43:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That one was probably at the studio. | 43:21 |
Sally Graham | Okay. But did people come to you to have their photographs taken? | 43:29 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes. | 43:33 |
Sally Graham | They did? | 43:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | How did you get them developed then? What'd you had to do? Send them off or what? | 43:38 |
Henderson McCullers | No, they had, during that time they had them, you know what you call it camera now that you? | 43:41 |
Harriette Brinkley | Kodak? | 43:47 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 43:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He had an instant. | 43:49 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 43:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | An instant type camera. This right here was an instant. | 43:51 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh, where the pictures come right out? | 43:52 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 43:54 |
Sally Graham | Oh, really? | 43:54 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah all of these are instants. | 43:55 |
Henderson McCullers | Now this, this one here, now that one you had to send them off. | 43:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That one? | 43:59 |
Sally Graham | He's in that one. | 43:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | My mother took that one. | 43:59 |
Sally Graham | Oh okay. | 43:59 |
Henderson McCullers | All the pictures that you see in there that I made, the camera that I had on the pan, there was a little bit thing by the two by two pan. And then they had to have it turn it off and blow it up that thing. | 44:06 |
Sally Graham | Is that the kind of camera that you'd look down into? | 44:20 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 44:22 |
Sally Graham | What kind of camera is that? | 44:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | As a matter of fact, his sister still has one and it works. | 44:25 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know. I've forgotten the name of that camera. | 44:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Isn't it a Kodak? | 44:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | The one that Mike had? That that was a Kodak. | 44:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. Aunt—that's not a face camera, Kodak. | 44:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Because they didn't have graduation like a matching— | 44:39 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Caps and gowns. | 44:42 |
Harriette Brinkley | —Caps and gowns. My mother always had a desire to wear one. So I don't know who's cap and gown did she, no it wasn't mine 'cause I had already graduated. So it had to have been yours. | 44:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I think it was mine. | 44:51 |
Harriette Brinkley | So this is in the back of our house. | 44:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And this is Harriet as a baby. There are no baby pictures of me. I'm the only child that there are no baby pictures of. | 44:56 |
Tunga White | Now, why is that? | 45:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I guess I was that ugly. | 45:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, there when she was maybe four or five or something like that. But this is— | 45:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And see— | 45:12 |
Sally Graham | But where is this? This looks like the ocean? | 45:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is me at the prom. No. | 45:12 |
Sally Graham | Oh, okay. This was the— | 45:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | Here's a picture of my sister. No, that's me. The other half was up front. This is when we were going to church and the other half was up front. | 45:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And soon as I said this— | 45:21 |
Henderson McCullers | Down over there, that's the beginning of it. | 45:21 |
Harriette Brinkley | Of the church? | 45:21 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 45:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. | 45:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. See they put the cornerstone in there. | 45:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | See daddy and mama put the cornerstone in. And when our cousin did the history, what do we call it? Revise the history and did a book a couple years ago, I had her to include in there what is in the cornerstone because mom had a little match box in there and she put several little things in the match box. And I wanted everyone to know what was in there. | 45:32 |
Sally Graham | What did she put in there? | 45:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | We'll talk about that and I'll go out and get the book and let you see that. | 46:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | These are high school pictures of my mother. Daddy, where were y'all at when? This is 1943. August 1943. | 46:06 |
Henderson McCullers | '43 we were in Columbia. | 46:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Columbia. | 46:14 |
Harriette Brinkley | Columbia, okay. | 46:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Here is he in the military? | 46:18 |
Sally Graham | Now, what year would that have been? | 46:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know. | 46:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Don't know that. | 46:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Don't let me see. So she was about 17. What was I doing here? 21 from, let me see, 21 plus 17 is what? 38? 1938 probably. | 46:22 |
Sally Graham | 1938. | 46:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '30 somewhere between 36 and 38. | 46:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | These are our relatives on my mother's side, family. Oh, this is part of barning tobacco. See here, this person right here is what you call the stringer. You see this wood here, this is called the horse. And the stick, here are the sticks. You put the stick going this way on the horse. The horse has to be like this at each end and stick lays in the will go in the groove here. | 46:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And that's our mother stringing the tobacco. | 46:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | And now these. | 46:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They tended tobacco together three days a week or two days a week. They would come and work with daddy and the other two, mom and dad, would go and help them. So we've always had that interaction and closeness. | 0:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | Dad, what was being built here? Was this the utility house that was out behind the house? | 0:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Hm? | 0:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | When you took this picture? | 0:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. Uh-uh, they were sitting on the porch there. | 0:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, here. That's a building that's being built. | 0:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I don't know. | 0:35 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know. | 0:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | You remember that little shed that was built out behind the house there where you had the tools and stuff in? | 0:37 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. | 0:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | I was wondering if that's what you were building there. | 0:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh. | 0:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Might be. I didn't know. I forgot now. | 0:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 0:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I'll go and get that. | 0:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is a picture of my mother's mother. | 0:54 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 0:55 |
Harriette Brinkley | You can't see her that good there, but— | 0:55 |
Tunga White | And your mother's mother's name— | 0:59 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh here she is. This is my— | 1:00 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Gertrude. G-E-R-T-R-U-D-E. | 1:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. This is a field of tobacco here. This is— | 1:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Gertrude Richardson Tyson. | 1:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | The mule with the drag. The wagon was called a drag when it was behind the mule because it didn't have wheels on it. It would dragged in the dirt. | 1:10 |
Sally Graham | Now, who took that photograph? | 1:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, do you know? | 1:20 |
Henderson McCullers | No. I think it was taken by some of those guys from the agricultural department. | 1:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. See, they worked on—Right down from my house is what was called an experimental farm. The experimental farm was administered by North Carolina State University. | 1:25 |
Henderson McCullers | How much do you think we were making during that time per hour? | 1:46 |
Tunga White | I couldn't tell you. | 1:46 |
Henderson McCullers | Just make a guess. | 1:46 |
Sally Graham | 50 cents? | 1:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | I would think. | 1:46 |
Sally Graham | Less? | 1:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | Around 30 cents an hour? | 1:48 |
Henderson McCullers | You all getting close. 25 cents. | 1:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. So a lot of the people in the area worked at the experimental farm. They called it experiment farm. | 1:54 |
Henderson McCullers | Then, they were taking social security out of that 25 cents. | 2:00 |
Tunga White | Out of 25 cents? | 2:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | The thing is, even when we started working in tobacco, because for eight years, my mother and father were separated. So when my mother had to go to work in the fields, and we had to go too because she didn't have babysitters then. The man would pay her 25 cents a day for us. Our jobs when it was barning tobacco time, for example, my sister May would have to tote the sticks, carry the sticks to the— | 2:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Stringer. | 2:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | Stringer when she needed it. Maybe I would pick up the loose leaves that fell down or vice versa. Supposedly, he was supposed to be paying social security on us then. I have no records of—And I have checked. There had no records where it was ever paid. | 2:41 |
Tunga White | Around what year was this? | 2:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This was in the sixties. Early sixties. | 2:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Early sixties. | 2:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 3:00 |
Sally Graham | And about what year was the experiment farm? When was that started? | 3:01 |
Henderson McCullers | That was in 40—Wait a minute. That was in the '60. I came out in '46. So I started working at the experiment farm in '46 through '48. | 3:06 |
Sally Graham | How long, is it still there? | 3:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. | 3:21 |
Sally Graham | Okay. Because of the experimental farm, did y'all have more, was it better to be next to an experimental farm? | 3:21 |
Henderson McCullers | Well, that was about the tip. I'm going to say the limit on farmer, tenant or whatever was, hired person, that what they were paying. | 3:33 |
Sally Graham | Okay. | 3:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is a picture of, I guess my mother's graduation class, I guess. Yeah. This is her brother. This is— | 3:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Grandma Carrie. | 3:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is my grandmother. | 3:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:04:00] center. | 3:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | Then they don't have, and even today in some of the rural churches, the cemeteries are not cared for like you see around the city. They would have what they call burning. I guess you call them burning day or cleaning day where everybody would come together and then they would go out and clean off the cemeteries. | 4:00 |
Sally Graham | What time of year would that be? | 4:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | In fall or winter, well, with the coats on it was probably in the winter. | 4:21 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. Had to be. Yeah. | 4:25 |
Sally Graham | Now who was this? | 4:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Grandpa. My mother's grandfather. We— | 4:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Great-grandfather. | 4:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Her great-grandfather. Grandpa Bell. | 4:31 |
Sally Graham | Great-grandfather. So that would be your great-great-grandfather? | 4:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Correct. Uh-huh. | 4:36 |
Sally Graham | And where was his family from? | 4:38 |
Henderson McCullers | Who? | 4:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Grandpa Bell. Lee? Sanford? | 4:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | Johnson? | 4:48 |
Henderson McCullers | No, Spring [indistinct 00:04:53]. | 4:49 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Spring Lake? | 4:52 |
Henderson McCullers | No. | 4:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, Fuquay. | 4:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Fuquay. | 4:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. | 4:54 |
Henderson McCullers | Fuquay [indistinct 00:04:57]. | 4:55 |
Sally Graham | He's got a very respectable suit on and everything. What do y'all know about his? | 4:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy can probably tell you. Do you know what kind of work he did or what they did? | 5:03 |
Henderson McCullers | No because I didn't know him too long after we got married. He soon passed when we got married. | 5:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | See, this was his dad and his grandpa. | 5:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 5:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. [indistinct 00:05:20]. | 5:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is what he was like just about every day. | 5:20 |
Sally Graham | Vest, coat. | 5:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And this was Mama's dog— | 5:26 |
Sally Graham | Dog named Bob. | 5:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Bob. Uh-huh. She had another in there called Pony. | 5:29 |
Henderson McCullers | Getting back to this tobacco, we were still working in tobacco here and see that log barn there? That's what they cured the tobacco in, that log barn there. | 5:32 |
Sally Graham | How long is tobacco cured? How long? | 5:43 |
Henderson McCullers | It took four days. | 5:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | Then? It was different. Then and now. | 5:50 |
Henderson McCullers | Four days. | 5:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now— | 5:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | But now, it's barned, it is cured totally different. Nothing like what we grew up doing. | 5:52 |
Henderson McCullers | When they were using that barn there, you had to sit up with it all night and just about all day. | 5:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Keep the fire. | 6:01 |
Sally Graham | Keep it stoked—oh. | 6:01 |
Henderson McCullers | But now they just go in and set the fire to it and go on fishing. | 6:01 |
Sally Graham | Going fishing (all laughing). | 6:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | One of the tobacco farms that my father built is still on the family estate. Or is that the one that Mike bought? But it's still standing. | 6:09 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm. | 6:15 |
Harriette Brinkley | Mm-hmm. Okay. That's another one of Mary Helen probably going to Sunday school. I took a picture of my girlfriend. I remember this picture from my mother. I took my girlfriend's picture a couple weeks ago with her mouth open, sleeping like that. And then I handed it to her husband, her new husband. | 6:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Where's the picture of Mom and Dad that I had the obituary taken from? I haven't seen that. Or the other small one that is in my house in the living room. I don't see either of those pictures. | 6:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh. They weren't in here. | 6:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Huh? | 6:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh. Maybe it was in yours. | 6:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, they came out of here. | 6:49 |
Henderson McCullers | You talking about this one here? | 6:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. Uh-uh. | 6:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | It couldn't have come out of here because this one was always with me. | 6:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-uh. | 6:55 |
Harriette Brinkley | [indistinct 00:07:03]. | 6:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, uh-uh because this was at my house when I had the pictures made back in '89. Uh-huh. | 7:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh. [indistinct 00:07:13]. | 7:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I just bought this over here when I was staying here. We've had this one at the house. | 7:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | I thought I got— | 7:21 |
Henderson McCullers | Where that picture was. | 7:21 |
Harriette Brinkley | No I didn't. Because I was the one that put the albums together. | 7:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah, you put it together. But you bought it home. I bought— | 7:26 |
Harriette Brinkley | When Mama moved from the house up to your house. | 7:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-uh. I bought it up here in the brown bag and put it behind the bookshelf. | 7:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't remember. I don't remember. But I don't remember seeing that picture. | 7:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay, well, that's the one we got to find. | 7:40 |
Sally Graham | I see some that are colored and some that are black and white and they look like they're different times. What— | 7:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. That's Cle and daddy. That's their firstborn son. He was born in what, '47? | 7:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | See, there's another picture. You remember Mama sitting in front of these flowers here in a chair? | 7:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. Daddy. | 8:02 |
Sally Graham | Is he holding a doll? | 8:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's his baby doll. | 8:06 |
Sally Graham | Wow. Did you see this photograph? | 8:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You may want to skim through it, just that. | 8:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, I'm going to, she sent some sleeves the proper way to store pictures now too. So all these will come out. | 8:19 |
Sally Graham | And did you take that photograph? | 8:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let me go ahead and get [indistinct 00:08:30]. | 8:29 |
Henderson McCullers | More than likely I did. | 8:30 |
Sally Graham | That's just intriguing to me. Did you just come about a camera and just start— | 8:34 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. A fellow came through and he was broke and I had, I think I had about $15 and I asked him, "What do you want for it?" And he said, "Give $10." And I gave it to him. And I seen other people make pictures and I come looking through them and I poke them in there. Then I started buying film. And he showed me how to work it and everything. | 8:39 |
Sally Graham | About what year was it when you first met the guy that needed money? | 9:00 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh, let's see. That would've been about— | 9:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '40. | 9:07 |
Henderson McCullers | Huh? | 9:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '40 something. '40? | 9:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, it was in the '40s. | 9:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, here's some. | 9:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | It had to have been because you have pictures from— | 9:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This is an invoice of dad, a car that he bought in 1938. | 9:22 |
Sally Graham | That needs to be photographed. | 9:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It's a 1930 Chevrolet sedan. | 9:29 |
Tunga White | That is something. And it's preserved so well. | 9:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mm-hmm. | 9:35 |
Sally Graham | $75. | 9:35 |
Tunga White | I wish I could get a car at $75. (all laughing) I'd have a fleet of them outside. | 9:35 |
Henderson McCullers | And it wasn't, I bought it in '70, I'm going to say '31. | 9:35 |
Sally Graham | 1930. | 9:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, 38. | 9:35 |
Sally Graham | Oh, oh. | 9:35 |
Henderson McCullers | Huh? | 9:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | See? | 9:35 |
Sally Graham | 1938. | 9:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '38. | 9:35 |
Henderson McCullers | '38. Was that the Chevrolet [indistinct 00:10:02]? | 9:36 |
Sally Graham | Yes. | 9:48 |
Henderson McCullers | Okay. It wasn't one year old. [indistinct 00:10:10]. | 9:48 |
Sally Graham | Who did you buy it from? | 10:09 |
Henderson McCullers | Sanders Motor Company. | 10:10 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Sanders. | 10:11 |
Sally Graham | Straight from the Sanders Motor Company. | 10:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They're still in Raleigh. They have another name now, I think. | 10:14 |
Tunga White | How far away did you live from your closest neighbor? | 10:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | As far as from here to the corner. | 10:26 |
Tunga White | Was that a relative or? | 10:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Relatives, uh-huh. And then the— | 10:33 |
Henderson McCullers | White. | 10:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. The guy, John [indistinct 00:10:40], the White couple, they lived maybe as far from here up to [indistinct 00:10:44]. About a block and a half. | 10:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | Block and a half away. | 10:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. So the neighborhood that we live in is Black and White all right there. It's no— | 10:50 |
Tunga White | Everybody played together? | 10:54 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 10:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And did everything together. | 10:56 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now I remember, I don't know the boy's name, but I don't know how long, what was that little White boy name that stayed with for a while? | 10:57 |
Henderson McCullers | Hm? | 11:03 |
Harriette Brinkley | You know. | 11:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I can't think of his name. Matter of fact Cle and I were talking about him— | 11:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | Where'd he come from? | 11:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Not too long ago. Do you remember the young White boy who used to stay with us? | 11:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | That came out funny, didn't it? (laughs) | 11:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Just forgive us. We're not a present group. | 11:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | My mother's home, my mother was like the neighborhood bus stop. And even until the day she died, all the kids gathered at our house. All the kids when they had a problem, they could come and talk to my mother when they couldn't talk to anybody else. She would be there waiting for them when they got out of school, take them all to the store to buy them a penny piece of candy or whatever. So it was like regardless of what the color was, our house was like the stopping off point. And it was so much so that I used to wish that they'd just get up and go home, go somewhere. Because it was always somebody else's kids at our house. But I was thinking, you're talking about the Black and White issue. And it was never for us. | 11:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Never. Uh-uh. No, uh-uh. | 12:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | Any issue. | 12:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. Never. | 12:13 |
Henderson McCullers | No. Harriette was kind of jealous. Like you saying, Anna had all them children there and Harriette was thinking that her mama was taking more of them other children. | 12:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Now, that was me. That was me. That was me. Yeah. | 12:22 |
Tunga White | So what did you as children do for fun? | 12:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. That's very interesting. We would make playhouses. | 12:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | In the woods. | 12:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | In the woods. | 12:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | We'd take sticks that had fallen off of trees in the woods and you level off your rooms, make off your rooms [indistinct 00:12:42]. | 12:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Make your kitchen, living room, bedroom. | 12:41 |
Harriette Brinkley | And you take these tow sacks. You know what a tow sack is? It's like a burlap sack. | 12:44 |
Tunga White | Uh-huh. | 12:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. You take the tow sack and so this is your bed— | 12:48 |
Henderson McCullers | Play church. She'd be the preacher. | 12:51 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. | 12:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 12:52 |
Sally Graham | You'd be the preacher? | 12:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 12:54 |
Harriette Brinkley | Play church. Yeah, baptize. Okay. My mother would rake the leaves in the fall and then before she would burn them, she would let—that was when burning was legal. We could play jumping in the leaves and then we play baptizing one another in the leaves and stuff. | 12:55 |
Sally Graham | In the leaves. | 13:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 13:11 |
Harriette Brinkley | And then when they set up the irrigation pipes in the field, in the tobacco fields in the summertime, the water, okay, they got these long metal pipes going this way and then every so many feet apart, you'd have them going up like this, like sprinklers coming up. And so then when they turned the water on, just so you didn't tear down the tobacco plants, you'd run up under the water and stuff. | 13:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | But we would play house, we would play doctor. And it's interesting because our niece and nephew several years ago were visiting and I said, "Well, why don't you all go outside and play?" My niece looked at me and said, "Do what?" I said, "Be creative, use your brain." It was nothing for us to go outside with no toys and find something to do. It was more common to see junk piles laying beside the road. And we would go to the junk piles and get us some old dishes [indistinct 00:14:02] and we'd have dishes and we'd have little furniture and our brothers would get old car tires— | 13:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, roll the tires. | 14:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And they would be driving their car. We would get tobacco stick and that would be our pony. But we had horses and animals, as I said. Which was a rarity. | 14:10 |
Sally Graham | Would y'all get inside the tires and roll around like that? Did you ever do that? | 14:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. I don't think Harriette and I were brave enough to do that. But one of the things we laugh about now— | 14:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | No. Your dad want to know, my daddy probably had barbed wire up and then my brother would tell the other ones. I'm like, "Go on up on that. Come on. You cleared [indistinct 00:14:40]." | 14:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And that was another trade. Our daddy was also a barber. | 14:39 |
Harriette Brinkley | Throw rocks at people cars. | 14:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He cut all the boys' hair in the neighborhood. Uh-huh. | 14:48 |
Sally Graham | Was that a nighttime thing? Would you do that— | 14:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh no, that was just— | 14:53 |
Sally Graham | That was just— | 14:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Just was anytime. | 14:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Jack of all trades. | 14:53 |
Sally Graham | Okay. | 14:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | But I remember Saturday night was, the routine was because at one point I remember when we were little, when Daddy was like we were all, Daddy was really strong in church and that we didn't have television and stuff. And the only thing you could listen to on the radio was religious music. And so we didn't have that television, stuff like that for a long time. But then when we got television on Saturday night, the routine was my mother would watch wrestling, Ed Sullivan— | 14:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Lawrence Welk. | 15:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | Jackie Gleason and Lawrence Welk. But she would do her ironing. She would iron up the clothes, the weekly clothes during that time. And then you had to polish your shoes and set your shoes over by the heater ready for Sunday morning. | 15:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | We all grew up basically, I guess you would say like military brats or military—We would be awakened by military time. All of us now get up real early. 4:30, 5 o'clock. We all read the paper. Education was an absolute must. Reading. I guess we could read before we went to school. And these are some of the things that we indicated in our mother's obituary. We would read and she would have us to read the comic strips out of the newspaper aloud to her while she was cooking. And that's how we got better at it. She'd say, "Read aloud." And if you got to a word that you could not pronounce, she'd say, "Spell it. Now break it down." | 15:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | You ever heard the words called slop in the hogs? You ever heard that phrase? Now here's where they slop in the hogs. These are my mother's parents. And this is what you carried the slop out in. This was the hall trough. | 16:33 |
Tunga White | Yeah, that's the slop bucket, right? | 16:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yep. [indistinct 00:16:50]. | 16:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. | 16:49 |
Tunga White | I know. So the chores, how were the chores broke down? Who was doing what chore around the house. Did y'all have certain chores [indistinct 00:17:01]? | 16:53 |
Sally Graham | Did y'all have chores? (laughs) | 17:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | No. Well, my mother was really strong on getting your schoolwork and stuff. And she did most of the work. And when we got home from school, we had—Okay. No, when you got up in the morning you had to turn right around and make your bed up. And when you ate, everybody was responsible for washing your own plate and your own silverware and stuff. And then she did the pots. | 17:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Before we would get up. | 17:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | And then when we got home from school, we would have to, she and I would have to take the clothes in off the line, fold them up and stuff. And then sometimes, because at one point all she had was a scrub board. You know what a scrub board is? | 17:26 |
Tunga White | Mm-hmm (affirmative). | 17:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, you—I wish I had a picture of one. | 17:39 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:17:41] (all laugh) | 17:41 |
Sally Graham | A scrub board, is that a washboard? | 17:44 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. A washboard. | 17:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Washboard. | 17:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | And then she'd hang the clothes out. But then sometime in the wintertime it would be so cold the clothes would freeze on the line. So you bring them in and just leave them like that until they dry. But that was our job. And then the boys' job get the wood in and the kindling. | 17:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | But she did not trust us to iron the clothes. And see, our mother used to work in a laundromat. So she was very particular about how we dressed, how we looked. The boys, all the neighborhood boys knew that they could always come to our home and get a nicely starched shirt. Something that the average guy does not—Probably most of them don't even have it in their closet now. But mom would just hang all the boys' shirts on the mantle piece. She'd starch them up and they'd have a weak supply shirts. | 18:02 |
Sally Graham | And that was your brothers or the people in the neighborhood too? | 18:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. People in the neighborhood. All the young guys would come out, "Miss Annie, can I have a shirt?" "Yes, Earl. Yes, Howard. There's some in there." And they'd go in and they'd pick out what color they wanted. | 18:36 |
Sally Graham | Did she make extra money to do that or— | 18:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, uh-uh. | 18:50 |
Sally Graham | She just did that? | 18:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-uh, no. No, no, no. No money. No, no, no, no, no. We were taught to do things, that you always feel better when you share. [indistinct 00:19:02]. And we have found through life that it is very, very true. You always feel better that you share and that you receive by giving. These are all terms coming from the Bible. And we grew up in a very religious environment where we had Bible quotes on the walls. I remember them being, say on little plaques like, and they'd say, "Thou not steal. Thou shall not lie. Thou shall not do this." And so we were taught that you basically, you always feel better when you share. | 18:52 |
Sally Graham | Is the family bible still in the family? | 19:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. Oh yeah. | 19:37 |
Sally Graham | Who has that? | 19:39 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Our dad. And I hope to—(Graham laughs) why did you bring that up? | 19:40 |
Sally Graham | Family rivalry, uh-oh! (laughing) | 19:45 |
Henderson McCullers | Harriette was speaking about Annie used to wash. I recall the first washing machine she ever owned, it had a wringer washer on the top of it. All run by electric though. I went to Wendell unbeknown to her and I bought one. I think it was secondhand though. But anyway, I bought it, carried it home, I had it sent home. And the man got back there before I did with the washing machine. She said, "What you bringing that thing here for?" He said, "This is the washing machine your husband bought." She said, "No, I know [indistinct 00:20:29] my husband ain't bought no washer." (all laugh). They said, "Yes, he did, ain't your husband named Henderson McCullers?" She said, "Yes." "So this is the right place then." So he told me to sit out there on the back porch. We had a back porch. He told me to sit on the back porch and he was moved whenever he got here. By that time I drove up, she said, "Did you tell this man to bring his mess here?" | 19:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | Sounds just like her. | 20:54 |
Henderson McCullers | I said, "Yeah." And ever since then, after she got familiar or used to washing with that machine, she won't to do without a washing machine since. | 20:59 |
Sally Graham | About what year was it when you bought the machine? | 21:08 |
Henderson McCullers | I bought that machine in '40—About '49. | 21:10 |
Sally Graham | '49. | 21:10 |
Henderson McCullers | And after that, well, a couple years [indistinct 00:21:26]. | 21:15 |
Harriette Brinkley | (Door opens) Hi. Come on in. Can you come in? Wait a minute. Pat's coming in the back door. Pat. | 21:25 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 21:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | Let brother Steve in. | 21:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. Hi. [indistinct 00:21:43]. | 21:41 |
Henderson McCullers | And she really enjoyed whenever I got her a dryer. All you had to do was take it out of that washer and dump it into the dryer. | 21:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | Hi, how you doing? | 21:51 |
Steve | Pretty good, doing alright. Thanks for having a party and not inviting— | 21:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Not inviting, huh? [INTERRUPTION 00:21:57] | 21:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. The church—are you— | 21:58 |
Tunga White | I just turned it back on. | 21:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. As I said, you want me to start back over? | 22:01 |
Tunga White | Yeah, please. | 22:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. As I indicated the Good Hope was start from Hepsibah Baptist Church, which was an integrated church in Eagle Rock. Hepsibah Baptist Church still exists. The edifice that you see here in the picture is still there, yet they have a new brick structure. There's some history about our church that I found noteworthy. As I say to my cousin, I wrote up a history. We were celebrating 121 years and our church bell was donated by Clyde's Chapel Baptist Church. "Clyde Chapel Baptist Church is located in Johnson County approximately four miles from Good Hope Baptist. Clyde Chapel is a White, predominantly White church. This bell was delivered by Deacon Anson McCullers and son, Henderson McCullers on a two horse drawn wagon. Scaffolds were built to install the 1000 pound bell." | 22:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "First electric light. The first electric lights for Good Hope Baptist Church were powered by a 12 battery generator, which was operated by gasoline. The gasoline started the generator and the generator kept the 12 batteries charged. It was suggested by Deacon Anson McCullers that a gooseneck light be placed at the front entrance door. A great discussion was held concerning the possibility of this entrance light being blown out by the wind during a storm. As one can see, it was very hard for many adults to realize the difference in an electric bulb versus kerosene light. Good Hope Baptist Church was the first rural Black church in Wake County to have electrical lights." | 22:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "Church pews, the pews for the sanctuary used prior to our present ones were donated by Mount Moriah Church, which is also a White church located on [indistinct 00:23:40] Road and delivered by Deacon Anson McCullers and Elliot Heinz by Mule and Wagon. Noteworthy, several White churches, Hepsibah Baptist, Clyde's Chapel Baptist and Mount Moriah Church donated items to our church." And these were some things that—Go ahead. | 23:28 |
Sally Graham | Was your grandmother's father—He was the sheriff? | 23:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 24:03 |
Sally Graham | Was he a member of one of those White churches? | 24:04 |
Henderson McCullers | No. He was at [indistinct 00:24:06] church. | 24:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. Okay. There was some other things in here that I—Oh yeah, here's something about the baptismal. But, um, what was that—oh! One of the things that was interesting that I had thought I had included in here was the greatest, the largest donator of our church was the community alcoholic. When our church was built and when they nailed the last nail, the church was paid for. Blacks at one time could not go out and borrow money. So we had sellings and different things like that in order to raise funds. | 24:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And the different members were asked to go ask people if they would donate trees, sand, or whatever. And our mother went to this man who was a large landowner in the neighborhood, but he was the community drunk. And he said, "Take whatever you want." So the majority of the timber for our church came from someone who a lot of people would shun. But what I wanted the young people to understand was basically a couple of things, that you don't have to go out and borrow money for everything that you want. And secondly, don't look down your nose at anybody because the one that you think can least help you is the one who may be able to help you the most. | 24:52 |
Sally Graham | That's true. Was that a Black landowner? | 25:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. Yes. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. So those were some of the interesting things. | 25:40 |
Sally Graham | Do you remember his name? | 25:49 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh gosh. Yeah. Mommy told me that. Let me see. What was his name, Daddy? | 25:53 |
Henderson McCullers | He was a Jones. [indistinct 00:26:01]. | 25:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What was his name? | 26:06 |
Henderson McCullers | He was a gentleman. | 26:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | What did he do for a living? [indistinct 00:26:13]. He was a farmer? | 26:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. Here it is. The edifice. These are some of the other things I had included. Just by sitting and talking with Mom and Daddy. | 26:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "When planning to construct our present edifice, the church was divided into five groups. Shotwell, Knightdale, Eagle Rock, Auburn, and Raleigh. These groups were challenged to raise funds any way they could. Some tenants and farmers donated bundles of tobacco and groups had different projects like gardens, acres of corn, sellings, raffles, weight rallies, shoe size rallies and programs as ways of raising funds. Many landowners donated trees and tenants were asked to request a tree from their landlords. Most of the lumber donated for the erection of our edifice was given by Mr. Paul Jones, a non-member of Good Hope Baptist Church. A portion of the sales was donated from the farms of Deacon Fred Dedham and Deacon Henry Coffee. Men gave free labor. Ladies prepared meals and delivered lunches on a daily basis." | 26:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And I remember walking through the woods with our grandmother carrying daily lunch baskets to the men working on the church. | 27:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "The Good Hope members and community aided in the construction under the auspices of Reverend Claude Trotter, Senior. " | 27:10 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He was also a contractor. | 27:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "And the fellowship hall, our first fellowship hall was constructed at the rear of our new edifice by Mr. Walsh Randall and Mr. Henderson McCullers from the materials of the old church. This structure was utilized until our present hall was built." | 27:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And all of that's in here. Pictures of that and see. | 27:33 |
Tunga White | Before you turn, I thought you said something about a shoe size— | 27:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. Uh-huh. Shoe size rallies. | 27:39 |
Tunga White | What is that? | 27:39 |
Sally Graham | What's that? | 27:39 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let Daddy explain that. What is a shoe size rally? | 27:39 |
Henderson McCullers | Like they ask to pay maybe 10 cent, maybe a dollar, 50 cent per number of the size of your shoe. | 27:43 |
Sally Graham | Oh. (all laughing) | 27:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. So whoever had a big foot wound up paying a whole lot. | 27:43 |
Sally Graham | A whole lot of money. | 27:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. | 27:43 |
Sally Graham | Now, what you just read about the timber being donated by the—Okay, was that the original structure that was built a hundred and twenty years ago? | 27:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh no, that's this one. | 28:15 |
Sally Graham | This one. | 28:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This one. I'll show you this picture. | 28:17 |
Sally Graham | But this is brick. | 28:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Of course. | 28:20 |
Sally Graham | [indistinct 00:28:22]. | 28:20 |
Henderson McCullers | Woodworking [indistinct 00:28:23]. | 28:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So you have to have wood. This is it. [indistinct 00:28:26] Before any house, it's just like my house, and I'll share that with you. Any structure that is brick has to have wood first. You have to have a wood frame. | 28:23 |
Sally Graham | Okay. | 28:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. As a matter of fact, I think I have some here. You can look through here. There may be some, you need to go by a construction site and just see. But before they put the wood up, they have to have frame. And the frame is always wood. | 28:35 |
Sally Graham | Okay. I just didn't know if the original structure was brick or the original structure was a wooden structure. And then [indistinct 00:29:02]. | 28:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | They had wood first. | 29:02 |
Sally Graham | Okay. | 29:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. Let me see. [indistinct 00:29:02]. Let me see. There's something else here. "In the fellowship hall, our first fellowship"—Oh yeah, I read that. Okay. | 29:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "Now the northwest cornerstone," where that picture's in there— | 29:05 |
Sally Graham | This one should be right there. | 29:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. And the other picture you saw where Mom and Dad were putting the picture in. "The Faithful Workers Lodge number 255 had a cornerstone ceremonial service on Sunday. On a Sunday in 1955. It rained all day this Sunday. Therefore Mr. Henderson McCullers who was the master of Faithful Workers Lodge number 255 Shotwell, North Carolina was given the authority by the district deputy of the Grand Lodge to seal the cornerstone on a more favorable day. On the more favorable day Deacon Henderson McCullers, Deacon Marion Gustin Sr, Deaconess Annie T. McCullers sealed the cornerstone." | 29:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Excuse me. Where's my tissue? | 29:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | "A time capsule is included in this cornerstone revealing the names of the past and present ministers and deacons and names of the three who sealed the cornerstone. These three names are inserted in a small 1 cent matchbox." And I'm so glad I got this information from my mother before she died. | 29:49 |
Tunga White | [indistinct 00:30:07]. Now, what use did your fellowship hall have? What did you all do with your fellowship hall? Did you have— | 30:07 |
Henderson McCullers | Hm? | 30:16 |
Tunga White | Your fellowship hall. | 30:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | What did you do in the fellowship hall? [indistinct 00:30:28]. | 30:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay, there's a picture of it in the back. [indistinct 00:30:28]. | 30:27 |
Henderson McCullers | That's what they call them now with the dining halls. | 30:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. That was a dining hall. Uh-huh. | 30:27 |
Henderson McCullers | But now they called it a fellowship hall. | 30:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | There are pictures in one of these— | 30:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, here's the generator building that I was talking about in there. Uh-huh. | 30:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Was this the first church? | 30:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It's standing beside the old church. | 30:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | Old church. [indistinct 00:30:46]. | 30:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That was one of the old churches. | 30:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | And this is the [indistinct 00:30:48] cemetery. I think we have pictures of that. | 30:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. Cleaning the church cemetery. Deacon Anson McCullers standing beside the generator used for electric lights in old church. | 30:49 |
Sally Graham | Was the church, when it went from the wooden structure to the newer structure, did the size increase? | 30:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. Uh-huh. [indistinct 00:31:07]. | 31:04 |
Sally Graham | The same location. | 31:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yes. There are pictures in there. | 31:07 |
Sally Graham | You mentioned—Oh, sorry. | 31:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | There are pictures in there of it in there. Some in here of it. I get it [indistinct 00:31:17]. Excuse me. | 31:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | How'd you do this, Dad? This is double. How was that done? | 31:17 |
Henderson McCullers | What? | 31:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Could have been mistake. | 31:21 |
Henderson McCullers | It wasn't double [indistinct 00:31:28]. | 31:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And one of those—Tell me it's not in here. It's in one of our family pictures. The old, the fellowship hall. You know the building in the back of the church? | 31:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | [indistinct 00:31:38] the side of the church. | 31:38 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 31:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's a double exposure. | 31:40 |
Henderson McCullers | Something went wrong with the camera or something. Because you see, you see right here? | 31:42 |
Harriette Brinkley | Right here? | 31:46 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. Look on this side. Now, that's where that bell is up top over here. | 31:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh, the bell is in there. | 31:49 |
Henderson McCullers | See? Yeah. And something cut the other part off the other side [indistinct 00:31:59] it's right here. But something shattered. | 31:53 |
Sally Graham | You mentioned a grand lodge. What was— | 32:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy was a Mason. Uh-huh. Mother was an Eastern Star. You hear of the Mason, the Shriners? | 32:03 |
Sally Graham | Mm-hmm. When did you become a mason? | 32:12 |
Henderson McCullers | '46. | 32:16 |
Sally Graham | And when did Mrs. McCullers become an Eastern Star? | 32:17 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:32:22]. | 32:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Probably '46 also. | 32:24 |
Tunga White | Are you all involved in Eastern Star? | 32:25 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. I want to be. I was blackballed. | 32:27 |
Tunga White | Oh. | 32:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So my mother told me to try again. Okay. This is a— | 32:34 |
Sally Graham | How is that? How did you get blackballed? What— | 32:37 |
Henderson McCullers | That's a secret. | 32:41 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. You can't say. | 32:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. | 32:44 |
Sally Graham | Oh, is that a thing that happens and you just can't say? | 32:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | If you're blackballed, that means that— | 32:49 |
Henderson McCullers | You're rejected. | 32:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You're rejected. And it only takes one person to drop that black ball. | 32:52 |
Henderson McCullers | Could be a hundred and then one can blackball you— | 32:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And the sad part about it is I told my mother, I want to know who— | 32:59 |
Henderson McCullers | They don't tell you. | 33:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Blackballed me. | 33:04 |
Sally Graham | Were the Masons interracial when you were part of them? | 33:06 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 33:09 |
Sally Graham | They were. | 33:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | They were Black and White in your—? | 33:11 |
Henderson McCullers | No no no. | 33:14 |
Harriette Brinkley | Just all Black. | 33:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. Some church leaders back in 1945. And that was a picture of the inside church. And as you can see, there is our grandfather holding his head and my son holds his head just like that. Uh-huh. | 33:16 |
Sally Graham | That's wonderful that you have all this. | 33:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | There's a picture of the fellowship hall in the family album. I don't know whether y'all would be in interested in that, because it's— | 33:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is a picture of the baptize— | 33:35 |
Sally Graham | Another one. | 33:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-huh. | 33:35 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And there's our brother with his pet goat. | 33:42 |
Tunga White | So do y'all sell these? | 33:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. Yes. Uh-huh. Yeah. Uh-huh. | 33:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. These are some of the nurses' aides. | 33:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | First aid. | 33:56 |
Harriette Brinkley | First aids there. These are later pictures of my brother and them in school. | 33:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. That's not during the era that you would be interested in. | 34:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is my grandfather's— | 34:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy's— | 34:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | House. | 34:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 34:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | House that he grew up in. His mother. | 34:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And his sister. | 34:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | It was a washing machine. That's the washing machine. You could see it better in the other photo album, that wringer wash machine he was talking about. That's the wringer part sticking up right there. But I saw it better in one of, in that one back there. This must have been before y'all put the screened in porch. The screen part on, Daddy. That's her second grade. | 34:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And this is our mother's— | 34:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Report card. | 34:39 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Report card. This is the era that you're interested in. | 34:40 |
Sally Graham | 1939. '38-'39. | 34:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '38-'39. Oh, there it is. There it is. There's a fellowship hall in the back. See, this is a picture of it before the wing— | 34:49 |
Tunga White | So her father had to sign it every month when they get the grades? | 34:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 35:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | Even when I was in school you bring your report card home [crosstalk 00:35:05]. | 35:01 |
Sally Graham | I didn't know it goes back all that far. Now where's the bell tower? | 35:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | In here. | 35:09 |
Sally Graham | On the— | 35:09 |
Harriette Brinkley | It's in there. | 35:10 |
Sally Graham | On the right side when you go in. | 35:11 |
Harriette Brinkley | Right. It is a room. | 35:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, no, no. It's a room. You have to go inside the sanctuary and then into another room. | 35:15 |
Sally Graham | And is it still rung? Do you— | 35:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yes. When that's [indistinct 00:35:24]. | 35:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | I think Daddy said they need to get up there and put a rope on it? | 35:24 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm. New rope. They deteriorate. It rots out. | 35:25 |
Sally Graham | Now, who's this? | 35:30 |
Harriette Brinkley | Me. That was when I was [indistinct 00:35:36]. | 35:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | These are pictures that they would be interested in this era. Well, oh, okay. Well, that's Molly and some other one. | 35:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | My mother's brother. | 35:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Ponto is the dog. | 35:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | He eventually became a preacher. | 35:47 |
Sally Graham | Ponto the dog? | 35:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know who these people were. Daddy, you remember? There were several people because she [indistinct 00:35:58]. Oh, this is how they killed hogs back then. They cut them open like that. Then they hang up. | 35:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is during Hurricane Hazel. Did you ever hear about that hurricane when it came through North Carolina? | 36:02 |
Sally Graham | I heard of that name with the hurricane. | 36:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh, look at this picture. Now that is tough. To me, that is— | 36:10 |
Sally Graham | Now, who are the— | 36:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know. | 36:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | We don't know who they were. | 36:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, do you know who they are? | 36:16 |
Henderson McCullers | Uh-uh. [indistinct 00:36:23]. | 36:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | To me that's a really nice picture. | 36:16 |
Tunga White | Back to this killing hogs. I know you all said y'all shared a lot. Did you share with the families in the community when you killed hogs? | 36:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Well, see, the children were never around so you have to ask him. | 36:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | [indistinct 00:36:41] somebody came to help kill the hogs. | 36:41 |
Henderson McCullers | You killed them today, all of us get together and come help you today. | 36:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | And you may get some sausage [crosstalk 00:36:49] or something when you're ready to go home. | 36:47 |
Sally Graham | Oh, okay. Was that an all day, all night type thing? | 36:50 |
Henderson McCullers | No, no, no. | 36:54 |
Sally Graham | No. | 36:54 |
Henderson McCullers | But, you know, along in that day in time, the old folks, they would have to eat. Then they'd go to the fellowship hall, I reckon, and talk and we had to go play. | 36:54 |
Sally Graham | And this is another album that you put together? | 37:09 |
Harriette Brinkley | Mm-hmm. | 37:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They had several pictures of mama. | 37:13 |
Sally Graham | There's Bob again. Bob's gotten in there again. | 37:15 |
Tunga White | You mentioned that the older people would go to the fellowship hall and talk. Were there any other places that they would get together when they wanted to relax and talk and— | 37:17 |
Henderson McCullers | I said fellowship hall, but what I mean they would go in the other room or in the living room or some place like that. That's what I mean. | 37:26 |
Tunga White | But did they go to other places when they wanted to just socialize and talk and, I don't know, listen? | 37:34 |
Henderson McCullers | Nowhere to go. | 37:41 |
Tunga White | There was nowhere to go at all? | 37:41 |
Henderson McCullers | Nothing but the movies. | 37:41 |
Sally Graham | Where would y'all go to the movies? | 37:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Hm? | 37:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | The drive-in. | 37:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Friday night or Saturday night. 25 cent. | 37:53 |
Sally Graham | And was that in Wake County? | 37:53 |
Henderson McCullers | In Raleigh. | 37:53 |
Sally Graham | Raleigh. | 37:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm. | 37:53 |
Tunga White | And what was your favorite movie? | 37:57 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know. I just loved to hear the music. | 37:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And me and the dog. | 37:57 |
Henderson McCullers | Most of all to be away from home, I reckon I was mostly—(all laugh) | 38:06 |
Sally Graham | So you got your first car in 1931? | 38:10 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 38:12 |
Sally Graham | Right? | 38:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 38:13 |
Sally Graham | So did you start going to movies then? | 38:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 38:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Outdoor movies? The drive in theater or indoor? | 38:20 |
Henderson McCullers | No, wasn't no such thing as that then. | 38:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | Indoor movies? | 38:22 |
Henderson McCullers | The Lincoln Theater up there on Hargett Street. | 38:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | Was this Black and White went there and Black upstairs? | 38:27 |
Henderson McCullers | No, no, no. | 38:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | Just Black. | 38:27 |
Henderson McCullers | Now there was one up on Wilmington Street. No, not Wilmington. | 38:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | Hargett. | 38:40 |
Henderson McCullers | Salisbury Street. Now White would be down here. Black would go outside and go upstairs. Well, they had one in Wendell similar to that one on Salisbury Street. The White was down here and then the Black was sitting upstairs and you barely stand up, upright. | 38:40 |
Sally Graham | What kind of movies would you see there? | 39:02 |
Henderson McCullers | You see some, most anytime. But there was no movies like you have here now. | 39:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | No x-rated movies or nothing like that? | 39:14 |
Henderson McCullers | Not one certain thing, outdoor theater. Nothing like that. | 39:18 |
Sally Graham | Did they ever have a special day for Blacks to go and see movies? | 39:21 |
Henderson McCullers | No. You could go in any day you had a quarter. | 39:24 |
Sally Graham | Okay. Any day (laughs). | 39:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now then, back then they had a habit of when a person died, you would bring the person to the home. Now you go to the funeral home for the wake. And I would imagine this is them bringing the body out of the house. | 39:30 |
Sally Graham | Do you know who that would have been? | 39:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh. Daddy, do you know whose body that was? | 39:44 |
Henderson McCullers | Uh-uh. | 39:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What was that? | 39:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | Talking about bringing the body to the home. | 39:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, that was Grandpa Bell. Mama told me. | 39:53 |
Tunga White | Now how long would they keep the body in the home? | 39:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That was Grandpa Bell or Grandma Bell. [indistinct 00:40:00]. | 39:57 |
Tunga White | And then they'd take it to the funeral home the next day? | 39:59 |
Henderson McCullers | No, they'd take it to church. | 40:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | To church [indistinct 00:40:05]. Uh-huh. To the church. | 40:03 |
Henderson McCullers | What they would do when you pass, then they'd take it to the funeral home and embalm you and then bring you back home. | 40:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Then they'd take you to church and then have the ceremony. Then you're buried. | 40:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm. | 40:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 40:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now Daddy, this must have been in, was that in Japan or where was that? | 40:17 |
Sally Graham | Wow. | 40:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Was that in the Philippines? He can't see like that. Turn around so he can see. | 40:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. You got some pictures in here I want to ask you about too. This is picking cotton. That's tow sack. [indistinct 00:40:39]. Okay, these are later pictures. This is when they uncovered the statue over at probably North Carolina Central. | 40:25 |
Tunga White | Yep. Right there. That's Shepard. | 40:44 |
Henderson McCullers | I was there when the ceremony was given when they put him up, when they unveiled it. | 40:50 |
Tunga White | What year was that? Do you remember? | 40:55 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know. | 40:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It's written on there. | 40:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | 1957. June '57. | 40:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | June 19— I don't know whether that was the— | 41:00 |
Sally Graham | Now, who was this? Snazzy. | 41:03 |
Harriette Brinkley | A friend. Her name was Phyllis. | 41:05 |
Sally Graham | Phyllis. | 41:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 41:09 |
Sally Graham | Wait, is this the one that someone was able to name? | 41:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, no, no, no, no. | 41:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, no, no. | 41:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-uh. | 41:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh. That Phyllis is a relative. | 41:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. And saying these are the first aides again and the child is me. They were pretending to be resuscitating me. | 41:15 |
Sally Graham | Is your mother in that photograph? | 41:24 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. Uh-huh. | 41:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | Right there. The tall one. | 41:26 |
Sally Graham | Oh, the tall one. How tall is your mother? | 41:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Five nine. | 41:29 |
Sally Graham | How tall are you? You're pretty tall. | 41:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Five eight and a half. | 41:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. See, here's another picture like the fellowship hall back there beside it. See? | 41:35 |
Sally Graham | Compared to the other churches in your area, how was your church seen? | 41:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The top one. | 41:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Good Hope was number one. | 41:49 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The number one. Uh-huh. Number one. | 41:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | It was number one. | 41:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | As I stated in here, it was the first Black rural church to have lights. And it still is considered top, fine in the country. | 41:54 |
Harriette Brinkley | This must have been at Lockhart. I don't know what the celebration was there, but that says November 1956. It looks like y'all are drinking something. | 42:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Might be coffee. | 42:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, it ain't no coffee in no bottle look like that. (Henderson laughing) | 42:14 |
Sally Graham | Is that you? | 42:15 |
Harriette Brinkley | —Must be drinking. No, that's a cousin— | 42:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's a cousin. [indistinct 00:42:20]. | 42:18 |
Henderson McCullers | Where? | 42:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Right there. That one. See, I know it's Lockhart because there's a stage right there. Up there. You don't know? | 42:22 |
Henderson McCullers | No. | 42:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's Miss Corena Dunn right there. That big mama right there. | 42:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Well, they wouldn't know that. | 42:38 |
Henderson McCullers | That was a, what you call a thing? Scout meeting. | 42:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. | 42:38 |
Henderson McCullers | A scout celebration. | 42:39 |
Sally Graham | You were part of the Boy Scouts, that kind of scout? | 42:41 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 42:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 42:44 |
Sally Graham | Wow. | 42:44 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is his sister. | 42:45 |
Henderson McCullers | I been something, everything but a preacher. | 42:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's one of his sisters. | 42:52 |
Sally Graham | What was your sister's name? | 42:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Lucille. | 42:54 |
Harriette Brinkley | Her name is Lucille. | 42:56 |
Sally Graham | Lucille. | 42:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 42:58 |
Sally Graham | Hurricane Hazel again. | 42:59 |
Henderson McCullers | You remember Hazel? | 43:03 |
Sally Graham | I've heard of the name, with Hurricane—what year was that? | 43:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | '59 it says there. | 43:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. Uh-uh. That was earlier than that. | 43:09 |
Harriette Brinkley | Well, this had to have been another storm then. | 43:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah, that was another storm. | 43:15 |
Henderson McCullers | Maybe '49. It was '57. | 43:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It was '52, '53, I thought. Hazel. | 43:21 |
Tunga White | Did it destroy a lot of homes? | 43:23 |
Henderson McCullers | No. | 43:24 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I think Mama said that Harriette was a baby when it came through. So that would been '52. | 43:24 |
Henderson McCullers | Hazel came through in '40—'40— | 43:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | No. '52, dad. | 43:32 |
Henderson McCullers | Hm? | 43:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | '52. | 43:32 |
Henderson McCullers | Maybe so. Maybe so. Yeah. But I lived here in '59. | 43:37 |
Sally Graham | And it got this far inland? | 43:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yes. | 43:43 |
Sally Graham | Wake County and city of Raleigh? | 43:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 43:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's my husband on the wall. And during that he was driving for roadway, and he inadvertently killed a man because a tree the storm blew a huge tree down out on Highway 98 going was Wake Forest. You know anything about Wake Forest? | 43:47 |
Sally Graham | That's a school, right? | 44:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | No. Yeah, Wake Forest, well, Wake Forest. No, that's another way now. The seminary is in Wake Forest. But Wake Forest is probably 20 miles from here, maybe. | 44:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | And he was driving, it was coming down the hill and the storm had blown the huge tree over the road and the tree was so big and people were out just taking pictures of the damage from the storm. And people were standing up on the tree. And when he came down the hill and he applied the brakes and he couldn't stop before he got there. So he said it was like, here's the long part of the tree here and here's the top of the tree part up here. So it was lots of people standing here on the long part of the tree. And he said that it was either hit 20 people in here or either cut this way and he cut this way. And it was one man standing there in there and it just got him. | 44:14 |
Tunga White | Was your husband hurt in that? | 44:55 |
Harriette Brinkley | Uh-uh. No. No. Because roadway tractor truck, 18 wheeler, you know. It ain't too much damage you can do to that. | 44:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Here are the pictures. | 45:03 |
Harriette Brinkley | But the one that you— | 45:04 |
Tunga White | This is in front of the car. | 45:10 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 45:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh, there are the ages on the back. | 45:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Harriette as a baby. Here's daddy. As you can see, this family, he was in the military. He's the same size. | 45:21 |
Sally Graham | Oh my gosh. | 45:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | Look at this picture. | 45:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Here he is. This is the color picture Harriette was talking about. | 45:36 |
Sally Graham | That is [indistinct 00:45:39]. | 45:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | Which one? Oh yeah. | 45:38 |
Tunga White | Yeah, we saw this one. | 45:39 |
Harriette Brinkley | That she copied. [indistinct 00:45:43]. | 45:42 |
Sally Graham | Did y'all sweep your yards? No. Did you sweep the yards? | 45:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 45:45 |
Sally Graham | You did. | 45:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | You made brush brooms, you know what a brush broom is? | 45:46 |
Sally Graham | Mm-hmm. | 45:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay, so she made copies of these. | 45:52 |
Tunga White | I know she made a copy of this particular one. I haven't seen the other ones. | 45:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh. | 45:59 |
Tunga White | So where were some of the places you were stationed when you were in the military? | 46:03 |
Henderson McCullers | I was taking my basic in Columbia, South Carolina. And then I went to Jacksonville, Florida. And from Florida I went to— | 46:08 |
Sally Graham | And that was— | 46:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | —45. | 46:17 |
Sally Graham | And that was your grandfather— | 46:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | When he was in the military. | 46:17 |
Henderson McCullers | Seattle, Washington. Seattle, Washington I went right in after Pearl Harbor was bombed. And I was there from Hawaii— | 46:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's when he was overseas. | 46:28 |
Sally Graham | That's, they look Japanese. | 46:28 |
Henderson McCullers | I went down and under, they call it. I went down to Okinawa. And that's where I finished up at, in Okinawa. | 46:28 |
Tunga White | Now, how was it for a Black man to be in the military at that time? | 46:39 |
Henderson McCullers | Child, they were rough. | 46:40 |
Tunga White | What, tell me about it. | 46:41 |
Henderson McCullers | I can't tell you. | 46:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's what they're here for, Daddy. | 46:45 |
Henderson McCullers | It was terrible. I'm telling you. But as a whole, you might say we did pretty good. We thought we was doing good. | 46:46 |
Tunga White | Mm-hmm. | 46:56 |
Tunga White | You had your own integrated camp? | 0:00 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, we had our home commanding officers and then our commanding officers were White and we had some commission officers, which was Black. [indistinct 00:00:22] was the only White that was in our company and as we would travel, it was that way all the way through Army life. From '42 to '46. The years that I spent in [indistinct 00:00:40]. | 0:05 |
Sally Graham | '42 to '46? | 0:38 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm (affirmative). | 0:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I never saw that. | 0:38 |
Tunga White | Did you ever keep in contact with some of the men that— | 0:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You don't have the stuff in a file [indistinct 00:00:52]. | 0:49 |
Tunga White | —You were in the military with? | 0:49 |
Henderson McCullers | Galileo, yeah. | 0:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Send the things to properly store them. | 0:49 |
Henderson McCullers | But [indistinct 00:01:00], no. | 0:49 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's nice. That's nice how they did that. | 0:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, [indistinct 00:01:08]. Daddy, where was this picture taken right here? Do you remember that? | 1:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He said in the Philippines. That's what you told me the other Sunday that was in the Philippines. See what else you got around here. | 1:16 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. That was in the Philippines. | 1:21 |
Sally Graham | Where were you during Pearl Harbor? | 1:35 |
Henderson McCullers | Pardon me? | 1:38 |
Sally Graham | Where were you during Pearl Harbor? | 1:38 |
Henderson McCullers | Where were you? | 1:41 |
Sally Graham | Where were you? | 1:41 |
Henderson McCullers | When Pearl was bombed? I was in Richmond, Virginia. | 1:43 |
Sally Graham | Richmond Virginia. | 1:46 |
Henderson McCullers | I think December 7th when they hit Pearl Harbor. February 2nd, I was on my way to the Army. | 1:48 |
Sally Graham | Oh. | 1:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He was telling me some interesting things last Sunday of how they went from here to what Seattle and then you all caught a boat from there and went to Hawaii. He went to Pearl Harbor, but they had already bombed it. | 1:59 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh, yeah. | 2:15 |
Harriette Brinkley | In the fellowship hall, when they would have homecoming or special occasions, everybody would bring baskets of food and then they would set it out like this [indistinct 00:02:24]. | 2:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Fellowship Hall, the food and everything. | 2:25 |
Tunga White | Was this like a revival kind of thing right here at this picture? | 2:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, that was like children's day homecoming. | 2:30 |
Sally Graham | Where is this? | 2:35 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, where is that? | 2:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's in the Philippines. | 2:37 |
Sally Graham | The Philippines. | 2:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | Do you know where that is? | 2:40 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, that's Philippines. | 2:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's probably down there at Lake Myra. | 2:40 |
Sally Graham | That's unveiling of Dr. Shepard again? Right there. | 2:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:02:53]. | 2:50 |
Sally Graham | Central would like to have some— | 2:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And from the pictures that had of my dad's family [indistinct 00:03:01]. Daddy's family are a big socializers. | 2:54 |
Tunga White | They had some beautiful dresses. | 3:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's true. | 3:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, yeah. | 3:01 |
Henderson McCullers | That's before they unveiled that though. What's his name? | 3:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Shepard. | 3:01 |
Sally Graham | Shepard. | 3:01 |
Henderson McCullers | Shepard. That was him veiled up right there. | 3:01 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh. | 3:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, here's a better picture of it. Another one. | 3:01 |
Sally Graham | Oh, and you took those too? | 3:01 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, I had taking that one. | 3:01 |
Sally Graham | That's wonderful. | 3:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Here's one of the people at the ceremony. Where were these? Did the girls take these? | 3:20 |
Sally Graham | Uh-oh, now, what's this story? | 3:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | All those. | 3:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, okay. | 3:29 |
Sally Graham | Who is this? | 3:29 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, that's, uh-huh, who is this? | 3:30 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, I don't know. (all laugh) | 3:30 |
Sally Graham | Oh, now we have it (laughing) She made it into the album. [indistinct 00:03:40]. | 3:30 |
Tunga White | Answer all questions except that one. (laughing) | 3:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This is baptismal ceremony at the [indistinct 00:03:45]. | 3:41 |
Sally Graham | Some pigs too—I don't know who laid the album, so I better not say— | 3:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's right down below my house. | 3:42 |
Tunga White | Lake, what now? | 3:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Lake Myra. | 3:48 |
Tunga White | Myra. | 3:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | M-Y-R-A. | 3:50 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is coming up from the baptism. | 3:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Lake Myra. Then it is still been right down the street from the house. | 3:54 |
Sally Graham | This is another photo of the baptism. | 3:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yes, right. | 3:58 |
Sally Graham | This is coming up from it. | 3:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | Leaving it, yes. | 3:58 |
Sally Graham | Is the preacher in that photo? | 3:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, he would still have on—Let see this may him right here. Let see. | 3:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This is one of the pictures of Cle and his cow. | 3:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, that's not him. This— | 4:02 |
Sally Graham | You have about six or seven photographs of the baptism. | 4:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Also, you didn't any of these? Here I'll just let you— | 4:11 |
Tunga White | No, I don't think we saw any of them. | 4:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, here. | 4:11 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay Daddy, where was this? | 4:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I thought you had already seen these. | 4:18 |
Henderson McCullers | What is this? | 4:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's in the Philippines. | 4:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | Look in the Philippines like the family's marching or something. | 4:21 |
Sally Graham | You took this photograph also? | 4:24 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 4:26 |
Sally Graham | You really documented— | 4:27 |
Harriette Brinkley | You took your camera with you to the Army. | 4:29 |
Tunga White | This is the minister, right? | 4:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 4:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Look at all these. [indistinct 00:04:35]. | 4:34 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Reverend C.R. Trotter. | 4:34 |
Sally Graham | This is just wonderful. Is this your grandfather's? | 4:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | September '57. I don't know who that was. | 4:40 |
Tunga White | Was this a 4-H? | 4:41 |
Henderson McCullers | That's a [indistinct 00:04:45] there. | 4:41 |
Tunga White | Something going on. | 4:41 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know where it was [indistinct 00:04:47] in September 1957. | 4:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy? When Cle had his horses, I mea his cows that was 4-H, right? Was that 4-H? | 4:48 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 4:56 |
Sally Graham | Now, is this the preacher or this is a candidate? | 4:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's the preacher. | 4:57 |
Sally Graham | This is the preacher coming up. | 4:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | He'd always wear that black robe like that. | 4:59 |
Sally Graham | Wow. | 5:00 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | All these are recent pictures. | 5:05 |
Sally Graham | Doctor Trotter? [indistinct 00:05:11]. This is the [indistinct 00:05:12]. | 5:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, that's not the one because it has a '50— | 5:12 |
Henderson McCullers | No, that's not— | 5:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's says— | 5:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | May '58. | 5:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No. | 5:13 |
Sally Graham | It says '58. | 5:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Maybe not. | 5:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Maybe you didn't have it developed until '58. | 5:20 |
Henderson McCullers | No, I bought this picture. It was a picture about that long. | 5:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I recall seeing that picture. I think that's in that group that was stolen for that Harry had at school. | 5:27 |
Tunga White | Is this a picture of them cleaning off the cemetery? | 5:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. Yes. | 5:36 |
Henderson McCullers | 2,800 men on it. | 5:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | On the boat? | 5:38 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 5:38 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Plus equipment. | 5:38 |
Henderson McCullers | That's not even counting the crew members. That's how many was on the boat that I came back on down to San Diego. | 5:40 |
Sally Graham | What day did you come back on? | 5:49 |
Tunga White | Now, what was going on in this picture? | 5:50 |
Henderson McCullers | I came back [indistinct 00:05:54]. | 5:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Those may have been Eastern Stars at some program that they were having. | 5:54 |
Henderson McCullers | '46, November the [indistinct 00:06:06]. | 5:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | She said she was unable to do the ones that are rolled up. She tried to unroll them to straighten them back out and she said they too far gone. | 6:05 |
Sally Graham | That was after VJ Day, is that right? | 6:18 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh yeah. | 6:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, I never knew you had a picture of Uncle Buddy. Somebody's been real busy. | 6:24 |
Henderson McCullers | Don't you know who it was? | 6:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 6:32 |
Henderson McCullers | Don't try to [indistinct 00:06:38] me. | 6:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Real, real busy. | 6:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | You got to be. | 6:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I see. | 6:39 |
Sally Graham | Wow. | 6:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Taking family heirlooms. Yeah, it's fine. | 6:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | As I was talking to dad last Sunday, I did not know that Patricia was born in military hospital on the base and that she was buried in the military cemetery there. I made some calls this week and hopefully we will be able to locate her burial site. [indistinct 00:07:11]. | 6:51 |
Henderson McCullers | It's going to be very hard to do because we went down there in '47 or '48, went to Columbia and went out to the base. Onliest way I could tell where it was, was when we first buried her, it was a little cedar tree about that big around. When we went down there in '48, I think it was '48 or '49. Tree that I thought was a little thing when I buried the baby. It was something like that there. You couldn't tell where the grave ever been there. | 7:10 |
Sally Graham | Is it an unmarked grave? | 7:47 |
Henderson McCullers | Unmarked, yeah. | 7:49 |
Henderson McCullers | When we first got in Japan, down in Okinawa was where we was at, these Japs had just came into surrender. It was American soldiers, Japanese soldiers. Where we had to set up our camps at we had to move some of them bodies in order to put down our tents and things. | 8:01 |
Henderson McCullers | They immediately, after we moved in there, they immediately got bulldozers. Built long trenches and you talking about over most especially when it rains, it took a long time for that tent to leave. All them soldier things was dead out there. They built a long trench with a bulldozer and then they went back after they got it deep as they wanted it. | 8:30 |
Henderson McCullers | They went back and just took them bodies and pushed them right over in that trench. Got the dog tag off. Soldiers missing in action. Sent the dog tag back home and buried them folks right out there no headstone or no nothing. Just pile them up in that [crosstalk 00:09:17]. | 9:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | When they showed on television last Sunday about [indistinct 00:09:22] in the paper about how many thousands of soldiers were sent back to the United States and they were really not sent back. | 9:17 |
Henderson McCullers | No they didn't [crosstalk 00:09:29]. | 9:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And the families will never know. | 9:28 |
Henderson McCullers | They didn't send no bodies back here. They might have sent General MacArthur back here. (all laugh) | 9:32 |
Sally Graham | Oh, no. | 9:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That was an interesting— Daddy shared with me last Sunday that when George Patton was killed he was as close to him as from here to Main Street. | 9:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | Really? | 9:48 |
Henderson McCullers | That's right. Sitting up on the back end of a jeep going down the street. At least we called it a street, but just going down a little old runway. | 9:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You say it was at European Theater? | 10:01 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 10:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's what the area was called then in the Philippines. Was it Philippines or Japan? Philippines? | 10:03 |
Henderson McCullers | Japan. | 10:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Japan, okay. | 10:11 |
Sally Graham | Another thing— | 10:12 |
Henderson McCullers | Well, Japan and the Philippines is the same thing. | 10:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh okay. | 10:12 |
Henderson McCullers | About the same thing. | 10:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You said he was sitting on the back of his jeep. Going down a little path and then it says some Japanese jumped out there and shot them all. | 10:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Some snipers. | 10:25 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Snipers. | 10:25 |
Henderson McCullers | We was driving a transportation truck called Amphibious transporting goods from shovel to ship and from ship to shovel. There was truck where you could run on water or you either run on land. Depending how you want to do it. | 10:29 |
Henderson McCullers | That was when MacArthur back when we were driving that thing. That's when they started dropping bombs over there. They had that ship we was trying to finish unloading. I was over eight trucks. No it was over four trucks and eight men and we was unloading that truck. | 10:55 |
Henderson McCullers | We started unloading that ship one morning, one Sunday morning about 7:00 and we started running them trucks, running 12 trucks round o'clock for eight days. That's how long it took to unload that ship. | 11:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You hear that here, Harriette? | 11:32 |
Harriette Brinkley | What now? | 11:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He said it took them eight days to unload the ship that he went on. | 11:35 |
Henderson McCullers | Not the one I went on. | 11:39 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, another one. | 11:41 |
Henderson McCullers | No, it was the one that had brought cargo and stuff in. | 11:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, okay. | 11:44 |
Henderson McCullers | Food and ammunition. What have you. | 11:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What would be interesting is that I've heard you tell the girls about when MacArthur said, "I'll be back." | 11:48 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh, well we was in Okinawa then and the snipers and things were still over there and you asked how was about the Black and White and all that. We had Whites hauling on trucks just run on land and we would bringing stuff from ship to carry on land. They would take it then and carry it to the dump. | 12:02 |
Henderson McCullers | We look it was going to take us longer than a week to unload that ship. Instead of unloading it twice, we ended started going to the dump driving this truck. Like I said our Amphibious truck. We had to go up a big old long hill, winding hill up there and it was snipers all around there. It wasn't nothing for you to be driving down behind a truck and all— | 12:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What's that noise, is that? | 13:04 |
Henderson McCullers | —going off in the ditch. | 13:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Calvin's generator. | 13:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's the next neighbor. | 13:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | Nextdoor generator. That's what you trying figure out what that— | 13:07 |
Sally Graham | I was trying to figure out. | 13:10 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:13:13] interfering. | 13:10 |
Henderson McCullers | Go off in front of you and run in a ditch and you stop. | 13:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | I'll close the back door. | 13:10 |
Henderson McCullers | It'd be a sniper done shot one them White guys, but to my knowing, I ain't know nothing of them to shoot or injured, none of we Black boys. We was going to the dump and coming back. | 13:18 |
Henderson McCullers | I was driving one time, I'm coming back up on the mountain and I was standing up on the back of my truck behind the driver. A bunch of little trees didn't grow up no more about like that. About five of them little Japs come sliding down the hill right in front of us. I said, "Lord we in trouble now." | 13:32 |
Henderson McCullers | As each one of them was sliding down there, they came down behind each other, one right behind another. They got down. All them slid right down the hill and every time they hit the bottom down in there in that little old road, they throw their rifle up above head and hold up both hands. | 13:53 |
Henderson McCullers | They would be saying something and I'd be saying something. I didn't know what they was saying and I knew they didn't know what I was saying. (all laugh) Five of them came down sliding down that hill and they maybe begging saying they want a ride. I was begging for them come on and get up on there. I get 'em onto the [indistinct 00:14:38]. They didn't bother us. | 14:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Now what was that you had always stated to us about MacArthur said— | 14:39 |
Henderson McCullers | They was giving the Whites such a hard time over there before we got there and they killing them. MacArthur told them said, "Well I'm going back to America. I'm going, but I will return." Said, "When I return," he said, "You all are going." | 14:45 |
Henderson McCullers | When MacArthur carried all us back down over there and them Japanese said, "Well them Black ain't did nothing to us and I wonder why you bring all them in here and we don't want to bother them." They come to us to giving up. | 15:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The history books never mentioned this. | 15:36 |
Tunga White | They never told you that. | 15:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Never ever. Never mentioned it in any [indistinct 00:15:42]. | 15:38 |
Henderson McCullers | MacArthur brought the Black pilots in there driving those bombers, P38s. They would carry two bombs at a time. Had a bomb on each side of them and the way the plane was built, it was built like a bomb, but it had the bomb fastened underneath it. The pilot was one man. | 15:43 |
Henderson McCullers | He was sitting in a seat right like I am now and he was operating that plane with them two bombs on there plus guns. He says, "uh-oh." [indistinct 00:16:23] he ended up back them Black Crows and brought them over here. They got them well trained too. Said, "You know good and well we going to have to give up. Brought them damn niggers over here and they so smart, got one man driving two planes at one time." (laughs) | 16:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I guess that was the way that the plane was built though. | 16:44 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, that's the way it was built. | 16:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The way it was built it looked like someone who had never seen one that it was two planes. | 16:46 |
Henderson McCullers | It looked just like two planes. A plane on each side of that man. [indistinct 00:16:56] one over here and one over there. | 16:51 |
Tunga White | They thought that they was something else [indistinct 00:17:01]. | 16:56 |
Henderson McCullers | Before I left Columbia, they had one Black captain, Captain Turin. He was Black. I don't know where he got his plane from, but he came in that first time I [indistinct 00:17:19] a piece that they had been landed on the airstrip down there in Columbia. | 17:04 |
Henderson McCullers | He come in there and he was about to give out of gas. He just kept circling around, and circling around, and circling around trying to get bird to them on the ground. Begging for him come on in or just open up the airstrip so he could come on in. He was just doing all them numbers up and down like that. | 17:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Showing off. | 17:45 |
Sally Graham | Flipping I guess. | 17:48 |
Henderson McCullers | He was mostly showing off, but when he did land that plane the island commander, post commander, everybody was up and up in command they would run to the airport, riding to airport, to see who was flying that plane. [indistinct 00:18:12] flying that plane like that. They went over there in that big old [indistinct 00:18:16] in that plane. | 17:50 |
Henderson McCullers | He was up in rank. Our post commander ordered him said, "What's your business here for?" He told him where he was headed to, but he was running low in gas and he wanted to get some gas. He told him said, "Well you came up there and get some gas and I'll give you three hours to get that plane out of South Carolina." | 18:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Evidently that was the first time a Black pilot had ever come in. | 18:46 |
Henderson McCullers | They had never seen nothing like that. | 18:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He wanted him out of there. | 18:51 |
Sally Graham | You were saying that the Japanese wanted to end it because they were Black [indistinct 00:19:03]. | 18:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They had no alt against the Black man. See because as daddy was telling me that when America first went, I guess they sent the White soldiers. The Black soldiers did not go. | 19:02 |
Henderson McCullers | No, we didn't have a chance because the Whites, they wanted the Whites to get the credit for winning the war. After they got over there and found out that so many of them were getting killed and they weren't doing nothing. Hadn't been trained. | 19:13 |
Henderson McCullers | They sent him over there and then they found out they weren't trained or nothing like that. Then he come back and got the Blacks due to the fact that like I said, that they wanted the White to get recognition for winning the war. | 19:32 |
Sally Graham | Where were the Black pilots trained? | 19:52 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know whether it was Kitty Hawk or somewhere. | 19:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Now, I've read about that. As a matter of fact, they recently had a reunion of sorts. Ebony Magazine has featured them. You could probably get that information from the Air Force or something because I've recently read seems like within the past month of some recognition for they had a particular name. It was— | 19:59 |
Sally Graham | I guess it wasn't the Black Crows. (all laughing) | 20:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Something funny though they had a funny name. Something like the Eagle something real funny, real corny name that they had. | 20:24 |
Harriette Brinkley | Are you afraid of a dog? You afraid of a dog? | 20:33 |
Sally Graham | No. | 20:34 |
Sally Graham | Besides the Black pilots and I guess the jobs that you were doing, what other jobs did the Blacks have in the Army? | 20:40 |
Henderson McCullers | We had all the dirty jobs to date. All the dirty jobs. | 20:50 |
Sally Graham | Were you in supply or what exactly area were you in? | 20:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What branch were you in, daddy? | 21:03 |
Henderson McCullers | I was in the Army. | 21:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, no, no. I'm sorry. What infantry, what division? Were you in infantry— | 21:06 |
Sally Graham | What were your duties I guess? | 21:12 |
Henderson McCullers | I was in the 488 Transportation Corps. | 21:13 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Responsible for what? | 21:18 |
Henderson McCullers | I was responsible for four trucks, and eight men, and I was squad leader. | 21:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy was stating that you've heard the Vietnam vets come back and say, "Well we came back and we are treated like crap." Daddy, I've heard him state that they felt the same way because the Blacks had gone to fight for the country— | 21:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Fight for our country and when we got back here we still didn't have no country. | 21:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It was still segregated. | 21:52 |
Henderson McCullers | We still had to go through that same routine that we was before we went over there. | 21:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | There was some good things that came about because as a result of them fighting in that war and after you all got out that we talked about that last Sunday, them opening up having the vocational schools. The training schools that you all able to go to and be trained. | 21:58 |
Henderson McCullers | Oh, yeah. That was benefits. | 22:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The veterans. | 22:17 |
Henderson McCullers | Veterans benefits. They had training schools. If you hadn't gone to school and you wanted to further your education, you could go to a school or college or whatever and further your education as many years that you served in the military. | 22:17 |
Henderson McCullers | Now, I was in there three years eight months and 11 days, but I got credit for four years. When I came back and when they started they school, training school, I went in as agriculture. I was studying agriculture plus doing a little carpentry work and that's as far as I went. They had mechanic schools and you name it and they— | 22:41 |
Sally Graham | Were all those schools for Blacks? | 23:14 |
Henderson McCullers | They was for all. | 23:15 |
Sally Graham | Oh, for all. | 23:15 |
Henderson McCullers | For everybody that served in service. | 23:16 |
Sally Graham | What about the GI Bill was that eligible to Blacks? | 23:19 |
Henderson McCullers | That was under the GI Bill of Rights. | 23:23 |
Harriette Brinkley | Come on. (dog panting) | 23:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I built my house on the family estate so [indistinct 00:23:37] have a general idea. | 23:33 |
Henderson McCullers | Come here. | 23:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Look, now he's going from one to the other. | 23:38 |
Henderson McCullers | Don't you hear me calling you? | 23:40 |
Tunga White | Love that attention. | 23:40 |
Sally Graham | What's your dog's name, Shay? | 23:45 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oreo. | 23:47 |
Sally Graham | Oreo. | 23:47 |
Tunga White | Oreo. | 23:47 |
Henderson McCullers | Oreo looks like he just come out the pond. Ain't you just come out the pond? | 23:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Say, "No, I didn't." | 23:53 |
Sally Graham | Oh, now I have a question about this. Is this NC Central? | 23:54 |
Harriette Brinkley | Let me see. | 24:00 |
Henderson McCullers | I think that's our old church. | 24:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | No. | 24:02 |
Sally Graham | It looks like the dorm that we're in right now. (laughs). | 24:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | Or something. It looks like a dorm or apartment building or something. | 24:09 |
Sally Graham | It looks like— | 24:11 |
Tunga White | It looks our dorm that we're staying in [indistinct 00:24:15]. | 24:11 |
Sally Graham | Rush, the dormitory. | 24:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It probably is. | 24:11 |
Harriette Brinkley | May 1958. | 24:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It probably is. | 24:11 |
Tunga White | Because Rush is one of the oldest— | 24:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It is. | 24:18 |
Sally Graham | Is it? | 24:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Rush. I think it is. [indistinct 00:24:21]. | 24:19 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:24:25] in Durham. | 24:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Now where are you from? What school do you go to? | 24:26 |
Sally Graham | I grew up in Chattanooga, but I went to the University of Mississippi. | 24:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, okay. | 24:33 |
Sally Graham | Got my master's there last summer. | 24:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Where are you now? You at Central or Duke? | 24:36 |
Sally Graham | No, I'm— | 24:41 |
Harriette Brinkley | You just up at Documentary Studies? | 24:41 |
Tunga White | Yeah, we're all just coming in from different schools for the summer working on this project and then we'll go back to our different schools in the fall. | 24:42 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now when is she supposed to start? She told me that she's going to start copying some more pictures. I need for her to call me. | 24:48 |
Sally Graham | Okay, we'll let her know. | 25:03 |
Tunga White | Yeah, we don't know because we're leaving out tomorrow. | 25:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Tomorrow, okay. | 25:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh you are? Going where? You all leaving the area? | 25:09 |
Sally Graham | We're going to our research, different research sites. Last summer the project was all in North Carolina and this summer it's spanning the south and going to—Tunga and I are on the same team and we're all going to be in Georgia and South Carolina. | 25:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Where are you going to school at? | 25:28 |
Tunga White | I'm at Jackson State University. | 25:28 |
Sally Graham | Then another team is going to New Iberia and New Orleans and then another team is going to Tuskegee, Birmingham— | 25:34 |
Henderson McCullers | How many— | 25:36 |
Sally Graham | —and Tallahassee. | 25:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | All right. You all are going to Georgia and South Carolina leaving out tomorrow. | 25:38 |
Tunga White | It's the ten of us. We have people from University Maryland, from Michigan. | 25:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I'm sorry, these right here are just some of the— | 25:43 |
Tunga White | From all schools all across the state, White and Black. | 25:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let me see, just to give you—Excuse me, I keep reference of everything, but these are some of the pictures of the family estate. | 25:51 |
Tunga White | We've been here for two weeks and then we'll be out in the different states for nine weeks— | 26:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The church is right around the corner from us. | 26:06 |
Tunga White | And then we'll come back, and we'll be given another week and then we all go back in August. | 26:09 |
Sally Graham | This is your house? Was that the original home site? | 26:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, the original home site is right next door. | 26:15 |
Henderson McCullers | Was this part of your plan? | 26:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It's right next door. | 26:18 |
Sally Graham | And that's where your father lives now? | 26:19 |
Tunga White | No, it's not part of our— | 26:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, he doesn't live on the home site. | 26:21 |
Tunga White | —it's just a project— | 26:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He lives on my grandfather's land, but no, my aunt lives on the home site. [indistinct 00:26:29] | 26:23 |
Tunga White | We can use it towards going to school, for credit hours, but most people just want to do for the experience of doing it. Getting a chance to go into people's homes and talk to them about it. | 26:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Right, right. | 26:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | These are some of the family heirlooms and all. | 26:39 |
Tunga White | The experience. So most people don't need for the credit we just do it because we want to do it— | 26:44 |
Sally Graham | So you saw an article in the paper? | 26:44 |
Sally Graham | That's amazing and you just called Duke to talk to them? | 26:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | It was a picture of a Black couple and they were both had on a military uniform. They looked like they were lovers and it said that studies were going to be done and they were interested in talking to individuals who had old Black photos and seemed during the period and stuff. | 26:51 |
Harriette Brinkley | I forgot what was going on during that time because I didn't call right then, but then after my mother died seemed like it was November. Maybe it was right after my husband died. Then I saw the article and then I was going through all of that and then about the time when I decided to, it came back, I thought about it again. I went to the library and I couldn't find the article. I have a very good friend who's a librarian and so she helped me research. She called me one day. She said, "I got it." | 27:12 |
Sally Graham | Oh that's wonderful. | 27:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Did you see the detail church 1894? | 27:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | I called the number and then Leslie called me back and she came out and we started talking. It was— | 27:54 |
Sally Graham | 25— | 28:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I thought I had a picture in there of my house where we grew up. | 28:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | My mother had all the pictures at one point just in dresser drawers. They were just in a dresser drawer and that was it. I don't know exactly when it was, but one day I got all the photos out because my mother had a very rare form of multiple sclerosis and multiple sclerosis or muscular dystrophy? | 28:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Polymyositis which falls under muscular dystrophy. | 28:39 |
Harriette Brinkley | Muscular dystrophy. | 28:43 |
Harriette Brinkley | At the end, she was totally bedridden, but I thought it would be a good diversion for her to be able to thumb through the photo albums and then when people come by and talk. Then she could talk about the pictures. That's why it was with that in mind that I— | 28:44 |
Tunga White | Got started. | 29:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | Got started on putting the albums together. They stayed in her room, in her bedroom on this little table right by her bed until we later moved her up to my sister's house. Then it was at that point that maybe you had both of them and then when she came over or something, then I managed to get one of them back. Then she ended [indistinct 00:29:32]. With Leslie's help— | 29:03 |
Tunga White | Two historians. Two family historians. That's amazing. | 29:30 |
Harriette Brinkley | Now with Leslie's help we'll be able to swap pictures. Otherwise, I'd have to go to Kinko's and that's very expensive doing it that way. Then Leslie was able to pass on information about things I've been doing wrong as far as keeping [indistinct 00:29:58]. | 29:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What's her name? | 29:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Leslie Brown. | 29:59 |
Tunga White | Her number you can get in contact with her. It's in that brochure. | 30:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | She had told me that she would be interested because at the church that I go to now there are some older Black ladies. She said that she'd be interested in coming and talking to them about what it was like working as they were coming up and so forth. | 30:05 |
Tunga White | Hopefully get them interested in preserving their history too through their photos and conversations with members of the community. | 30:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I think there were a lot of pictures that were stolen from the area. | 30:31 |
Sally Graham | What kinds of pictures were stolen? | 30:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | There were family pictures. Daddy took a lot more pictures when he was in the military. A lot of them, what you have seen is not half of the ones that he had. What are some of the other ones? | 30:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know what happened. I don't know. All I know is that they were just gone. | 30:53 |
Henderson McCullers | Harriett, you had a picture of that boat that I came home on? | 30:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I have seen that. | 31:03 |
Harriette Brinkley | I have never seen that. | 31:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I think that was in that group. They were all in that drawer. | 31:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | I have some other pictures but when I put these together I just picked say stuff in that people I knew something about basically. I knew with the lady, with the kids in front of that car, I didn't know who the people were, but I thought I remembered that car as being ours. That was why I put that picture in there, but I have other pictures. There may be some in there. | 31:14 |
Sally Graham | When you were making the albums, did you have all the pictures there together or did you kind of— | 31:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Then I just went through and picked out and stuff, but I didn't have anything in mind particularly as far as format and so forth. | 31:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This looks good right here? | 32:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, there's a whole—Yep. | 32:06 |
Henderson McCullers | What happened to all my medals that I had won when I was overseas? | 32:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | I don't know. | 32:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They were all in that door too. | 32:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | They may still be in the drawer. | 32:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They still may be in there. | 32:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | Down in there at your house. | 32:08 |
Henderson McCullers | Didn't you and Cle and Peck go up in there— | 32:08 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, now we didn't clean out no bedrooms. No. I didn't go in any bedrooms. | 32:13 |
Henderson McCullers | They not there. | 32:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:32:20] and practices | 32:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | In Allen's bedroom? | 32:20 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know about Allen's bedroom. | 32:20 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's where they [indistinct 00:32:25]. | 32:24 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | If you all could talk to the Delaney sisters have you read that book? | 32:27 |
Sally Graham | Yes. | 32:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Isn't that good? | 32:30 |
Sally Graham | It's amazing. | 32:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It was really good. The South, the laws, and practices of segregation and limited job and educational opportunities. | 32:34 |
Harriette Brinkley | See I have a tape it's maybe—Come to think of where is my tape with his sister, the one who lives in Richmond that I was telling you about. I visited her maybe a year and a half ago. | 32:42 |
Tunga White | This is Aunt Ruth, right? | 32:56 |
Harriette Brinkley | Ruth. | 32:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | As we were talking that night and I told her, I said, "Hold up wait a minute," just like you did. I said, "Let me go get a tape." At first, she was hesitant, but my cousin told her said, "No mama." She said, "Because if people continue to die off," and she said, "There's no way to continue passing the information on." | 32:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | She was the one that told me about how the mother would buy the pink boating material and the blue boat and then they'd switch off. Then she told me about this little room you all had that was separate from the house. Had this bed and stuff in. | 33:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | So when you had company and she's got a picture now of her outside posed all like this in just her bra and some real short, shorts. I said, "Aunt Ruth." She talking about, "Oh it was very hot." | 33:30 |
Sally Graham | Now who took a picture of Aunt Ruth? | 33:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, right. | 33:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | I didn't even think to ask her that, but she has a lot of pictures and we were just going through and I had to tape on and we were laughing and talking. | 33:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | Then she was the one that told me about the age difference. [indistinct 00:34:14]. She told me what happened when grandma was 13 and her daddy was a sheriff and he knew that he wanted her to have a husband. Someone who would always take care of her, and treat her right, and someone that he respected too. Basically he chose my grandfather for her. | 34:07 |
Sally Graham | Was it ever thought that— | 34:42 |
Harriette Brinkley | Love or something? | 34:44 |
Sally Graham | Did the sheriff rape your grandmother? | 34:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, no. I don't think it was a matter of raping. It was— | 35:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | What she told me was that his wife could not have children. | 35:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | They had a long going relationship. | 35:01 |
Sally Graham | They did have a long going relationship. | 35:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | It wasn't just one time and then that was it. | 35:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Well, see, what happened this was the norm where it was normal for the White man to have a Black mistress. Normally the wife knew about it and they had long relationships. Relationships that extended through years. | 35:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That is why you have so many Black people—You could line 20 Black people, I'll say 10 to be more realistic. You would find not one of them on the very same complexion and that is why. That is why. | 35:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | Why you got to go somewhere? | 35:37 |
Henderson McCullers | I was getting up to take me a little walk. | 35:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | We're almost through. | 35:37 |
Tunga White | Yeah, we're almost through. | 35:46 |
Tunga White | Our family [indistinct 00:35:46] have some file, some little paperwork to fill out like a little family history. | 35:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay, go ahead, Daddy. | 35:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Sure. | 35:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You can go ahead daddy because we can handle that. Yeah, because I want a cigarette too. | 35:53 |
Henderson McCullers | What going out to dinner? | 35:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You can. You can go to smoke. | 35:59 |
Harriette Brinkley | We'll be all right. | 36:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The girls have some things that they want to fill out. | 36:02 |
Harriette Brinkley | She was telling me that see grandpa had two children before his first—He was married twice. His first wife died. Then there were two children by that marriage. | 36:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | When he came along and the sheriff wanted him for grandma, he and his wife, the sheriff and his wife, babysat. That's what I was saying earlier about babysitting. They babysit the two children— | 36:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So that he could court. | 36:31 |
Harriette Brinkley | So he could court her. | 36:34 |
Sally Graham | What do you think played a part of the sheriff picking your grandpa? | 36:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | I think he just loved his child enough to just want the best for her. Is that you're asking me? | 36:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Is that what you're talking about? | 36:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, you're talking about his— | 36:45 |
Sally Graham | Why specifically— | 36:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This woman? | 36:49 |
Sally Graham | No. | 36:50 |
Sally Graham | Who would then become your grandfather. | 36:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | What? I don't understand what you're asking? | 36:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, as Harriette say that he had respect. | 36:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Stop now. | 36:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | See Granddaddy was something like the one in the area who went around and took the census. He was a census taker. He was a very respected man. He was educated as far as he could go. He was extremely educated for those in comparison in the area. | 36:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Obviously he was—How can I say? I guess that's where daddy got some of his traits being a jack of all trades. He was multi-talented. | 37:19 |
Harriette Brinkley | Aunt Ruth told me that she never remembered him working. She said that she never remembered my grandfather working. She said the only thing that she ever remembered as far as work that he did was the building of their house and she said that she and her sister [indistinct 00:37:49] would walk with him— | 37:33 |
Sally Graham | And this is? | 37:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | This was the wedding of the baby. This was her wedding day. | 37:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | They would walk with him to build, to work on the house. | 37:57 |
Sally Graham | Are these people that we're talking about? | 38:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's his mom and dad. These are all their children. | 38:08 |
Sally Graham | Wow. The census taker? | 38:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 38:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He was very active in church. He was also a Mason. He was just involved in a whole bunch of things. | 38:21 |
Sally Graham | Tunga. | 38:27 |
Tunga White | I saw that when he first [indistinct 00:38:31]. | 38:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | As I stated to Tunga, I don't know whether you heard or not, but when the new ministers would come to the church, they always stayed at their home. When the teachers for the school came to the community, they would always stay at their home. It was interesting Daddy tell about— | 38:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | He was in the bathroom | 38:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy stated my mother lived as close from Raleigh as say a maximum of 15 miles. Our father was the first one to ever carry her to Raleigh. | 38:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | It was quite interesting. It was quite interesting, but daddy's family were not considered poor Black. That's the bottom line. They were not considered the average Black and they were considered what some might call you know in the Black community maybe something that you're not familiar with. You have what do you call it? The well to do, but you've heard that term? The well to do. | 39:10 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oh, okay I think I'm about time to wind it down so I can get something to eat. | 39:37 |
Tunga White | Well if you don't mind, since we have three people, I'm going to let you fill this out. | 39:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Let me [indistinct 00:39:54]. | 39:50 |
Sally Graham | Oh yeah so we can just [indistinct 00:40:06] would be same. | 39:56 |
Tunga White | I guess she can fill hers out we can— | 40:06 |
Sally Graham | How about that? I should— | 40:06 |
Tunga White | Let her fill out [indistinct 00:40:09] have one a set of questions. I just started on. | 40:07 |
Sally Graham | So I don't need that one do I because I got that one? | 40:14 |
Tunga White | I started with that one. | 40:17 |
Harriette Brinkley | Come here leave Tunga alone. Come here. You like Tunga. Come here. | 40:18 |
Henderson McCullers | Come here. Come here. | 40:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Come over here. Puppy. | 40:32 |
Tunga White | We did that last time. | 40:32 |
Sally Graham | There we go. | 40:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Did a person [indistinct 00:40:33]. | 40:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Current information, this is mine, right? | 40:32 |
Sally Graham | Yes. | 40:34 |
Sally Graham | Do you have an extra—Oh you do? | 40:37 |
Tunga White | I have one pen. | 40:59 |
Tunga White | Do I have any [indistinct 00:41:00]. | 40:59 |
Harriette Brinkley | Daddy, do you got and ink pen on you? | 40:59 |
Henderson McCullers | You all got to fill mine out. Stay away [indistinct 00:41:00]. | 40:59 |
Henderson McCullers | Go on. Stay over here with me. | 40:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I named our road after—Our road, the road we live on his named Major Slade Road and I named it after the man that our grandfather purchased the land from. | 40:59 |
Tunga White | Oh, okay. | 41:08 |
Sally Graham | Major Slave—? | 41:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Slade. | 41:10 |
Tunga White | S-L-A-D-E. | 41:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Major Slade. | 41:13 |
Sally Graham | Actually, can I get that little notebook out from underneath? How about that? | 41:23 |
Tunga White | Yes, [indistinct 00:41:28]. | 41:26 |
Tunga White | Just a couple of more questions. | 41:33 |
Sally Graham | I might've written them down somewhere [indistinct 00:41:40]. | 41:36 |
Tunga White | The information [indistinct 00:41:40]. | 41:36 |
Tunga White | Do you have some of it? | 41:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:41:42]. | 41:36 |
Tunga White | Your current address, what's your address now? | 41:45 |
Henderson McCullers | Route one Wendell, Major Slade Road. | 41:48 |
Tunga White | Is that Wendell with E or an I? | 41:53 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Down here. | 41:53 |
Henderson McCullers | W-E-N-D-E-L-L. | 41:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | Oreo, come over here. | 41:53 |
Harriette Brinkley | Come on. | 41:53 |
Tunga White | That's in what city? | 42:00 |
Henderson McCullers | Wake—Wendell. | 42:00 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Maybe I'll say Pat McCullers. | 42:01 |
Tunga White | You said this is Major Slade. | 42:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, Road. | 42:15 |
Henderson McCullers | About 12:20. | 42:15 |
Henderson McCullers | Get away. | 42:15 |
Harriette Brinkley | If he gets in the way I can put him back in the back. | 42:15 |
Tunga White | Your zip code? | 42:17 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know. What is it, Daddy? | 42:21 |
Harriette Brinkley | Here sit down. | 42:22 |
Harriette Brinkley | I'm going to put you in the back. | 42:22 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What you say Daddy? | 42:22 |
Henderson McCullers | The zip code? | 42:25 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, 27591. | 42:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | Come on, Oreo. | 42:28 |
Tunga White | Your home telephone number there? | 42:30 |
Henderson McCullers | 266-956 [indistinct 00:42:37]. | 42:36 |
Harriette Brinkley | Go in the back. | 42:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Place of birth. | 42:38 |
Tunga White | Did you ever have a nickname? | 42:38 |
Henderson McCullers | No. | 42:38 |
Tunga White | No nickname. | 42:38 |
Harriette Brinkley | Hank. Yes he do. | 42:38 |
Tunga White | Oh, just doesn't want to say. | 42:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Hank, Uncle Ned, Matt, but no, those are only by relatives, specific relatives. | 42:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | One set of his nieces and nephews call him Uncle Ned and they're the only ones in the entire family who call him Uncle Ned. | 42:51 |
Sally Graham | Ned? | 42:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Ned. | 42:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I asked them myself I said, how do you getting Ned out of— | 42:57 |
Sally Graham | Henderson. | 43:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 43:03 |
Tunga White | What's your middle name? You got a middle name? | 43:05 |
Tunga White | Now, your date of birth is what? | 43:05 |
Henderson McCullers | 8/15/16. | 43:14 |
Tunga White | What place were you born? What city? | 43:19 |
Henderson McCullers | Wade County. | 43:21 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mother's name. | 43:27 |
Tunga White | Your wife's full name? What was her full name? | 43:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Annie Eliza. | 43:30 |
Henderson McCullers | Her maiden name? Her name? | 43:30 |
Henderson McCullers | Annie Eliza Tyson McCullers. [indistinct 00:43:40] Eliza Tyson. | 43:32 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mothers name, Annie. | 43:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, Lord have mercy look what I've done. | 43:46 |
Sally Graham | That's okay. Just mark it out. That's fine. | 43:46 |
Tunga White | Now, do you know her birthday? | 43:46 |
Henderson McCullers | What is June— | 43:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | June 26, 21. | 43:46 |
Tunga White | June 26th. | 43:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '21. | 43:59 |
Tunga White | And her date of death? | 44:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | November 2, 93. | 44:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Annie E. | 44:06 |
Tunga White | What city was she born in? | 44:08 |
Sally Graham | Like about 73? | 44:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Johnson County. | 44:13 |
Henderson McCullers | Johnson County. | 44:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | 72. | 44:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mothers date of birth, what is this? | 44:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, 11/2/93. Oh, I can catch up with you. 6/26/21. | 44:22 |
Tunga White | Now, I need to know your mother's name. Her full name. | 44:32 |
Henderson McCullers | Carrie what? | 44:41 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Carrie Lillie. L-I-L-L-I. | 44:42 |
Tunga White | Carrie with a C? | 44:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. | 44:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | C-A-R-R-I-E, Lillie, L-I-L-L-I-E Smith. | 44:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh this says city. | 44:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mother's place of birth. What did you put down there? County, is Johnson County. | 45:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | I just put Johnson County. | 45:04 |
Henderson McCullers | Smith. | 45:04 |
Tunga White | Smith is her maiden name. | 45:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | Mother's occupation. What was she? Agriculture agent? | 45:07 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Agriculture. | 45:10 |
Tunga White | Her date of birth? Do you know that? | 45:12 |
Henderson McCullers | No, I do not. | 45:15 |
Tunga White | You don't know it? | 45:15 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh gosh. | 45:16 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:45:17]. I've forgotten that. | 45:16 |
Henderson McCullers | What day was mama's birthday? | 45:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | October—Oh gosh, I can't recall. | 45:21 |
Tunga White | What about the year? | 45:26 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Born? I can't recall that either. | 45:29 |
Tunga White | Do you know her— | 45:30 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Aunt Ruth would. | 45:30 |
Tunga White | Do her date of death? | 45:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That was in '61. | 45:36 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | We can get that for you. Go ahead. We can make a phone call and get that for you. | 45:39 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Father's— | 45:42 |
Tunga White | Do you know where she was born? | 45:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Wake County. | 45:43 |
Henderson McCullers | Wake County. | 45:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Father's name, Sim. | 45:47 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No middle name, McCullers. | 45:51 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Are you doing the same page I am? | 45:52 |
Harriette Brinkley | Who? | 45:53 |
Sally Graham | Four, but I think it's different. | 45:56 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, I'm doing his mother. | 45:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, okay. | 45:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | You doing your mother. | 46:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | I did one of these for, Leslie Brown— | 46:02 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh my goodness. | 46:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Do you know what I'm doing? | 46:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | What? | 46:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I'm up here listening to you and doing his. [indistinct 00:46:10]. | 46:07 |
Sally Graham | Oh no. | 46:09 |
Tunga White | Give her another one and I just [indistinct 00:46:17]. | 46:09 |
Sally Graham | I have one. | 46:09 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, me. | 46:19 |
Sally Graham | Do you need another one? | 46:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes I do. Yes. | 46:25 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That's what I get for trying to listen to two things. I do have a habit of doing that. | 46:25 |
Tunga White | Well, I'm trying to make you do two things at one time. | 46:28 |
Sally Graham | Do you need this page again or I just give you the whole packet? | 46:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, I have that one. | 46:35 |
Tunga White | Did she have jobs outside of the home? | 46:35 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, she was the cooker for Lockhart Food [indistinct 00:46:40] a few years. | 46:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | When was Cle born? | 46:43 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Cle? | 46:44 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | February 5, 47. [indistinct 00:46:48] | 46:46 |
Sally Graham | Something else she did too. | 46:48 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Grandmother? | 46:51 |
Sally Graham | Your mother? | 46:52 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh, she worked in tobacco and all that, but that was—No, [indistinct 00:46:57] she was an agricultural extension agent. | 46:54 |
Tunga White | That's a town or a county? | 47:03 |
Henderson McCullers | Town. | 47:03 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Place of birth, Raleigh. | 47:07 |
Tunga White | You know what county that's in? | 47:08 |
Henderson McCullers | That's Johnston County [indistinct 00:47:11]. | 47:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Johnston, yes. | 47:12 |
Tunga White | And his job was what? | 47:16 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:47:22]. | 47:18 |
Tunga White | Maybe their birth dates, the place they were born, or would y'all have that information somewhere? | 0:01 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, not birthdays and all that. But we can get their names. | 0:07 |
Harriette Brinkley | We can get that for you. | 0:09 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 0:11 |
Harriette Brinkley | If you just give us that, we can get it for you. | 0:11 |
Tunga White | All right. Okay. | 0:14 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy, you can give him the names, can't you? | 0:15 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 0:17 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Give her the names. | 0:17 |
Henderson McCullers | Rufus McCullers. | 0:19 |
Tunga White | My dad's name is Rufus. | 0:20 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | How about that. | 0:21 |
Tunga White | And my grandfather's name is Rufus too. | 0:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | He died [indistinct 00:00:26]. | 0:25 |
Tunga White | My mother's father's name is Rufus and my dad's name is Rufus. | 0:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | 65. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Okay, and who else? | 0:28 |
Harriette Brinkley | When was Patricia born? | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | And Edith. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | '43. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:00:39]. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Mother's place over— | 0:28 |
Tunga White | What now? | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | [indistinct 00:00:44]. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What am I doing? Wait a minute, let catch up with you. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Can you give me both of them? | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Well, Edith Evan-McCullers. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Where was she born? | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Who? | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | No, Edith— | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Patricia. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | In Columbia, South Carolina. I don't know the— | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | And then Annie McCullers-Jones. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Roberta, and Roberta McCullers's dead now. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | August [indistinct 00:01:16]. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | How do you spell [indistinct 00:01:16]? | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Did you put down Daddy's birthday? '15 or '16? | 0:28 |
Harriette Brinkley | '16. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | And Hattie McCullers-Bryan. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy's born Wendell, did you put Wendell? | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Brown? | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Bryan. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Bryan. Okay. All right. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy's retired. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Wendell McCullers-John. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Last name? | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | McCullers-John. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | [indistinct 00:01:41]. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | Ruth McCullers-Curry. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Did she spell that with a U or R? | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | C. C-U-R-Y. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | R-R. | 0:28 |
Tunga White | Y. Okay, I got it. | 0:28 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:01:59] | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I'm listing you and Harriette. | 0:28 |
Harriette Brinkley | That might be it. | 0:28 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Sisters and brothers. Okay. Full name. | 2:07 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:02:10]? | 2:08 |
Tunga White | Okay. We got them with Ruth. | 2:09 |
Henderson McCullers | Okay. Then Lucille McCullers-William. | 2:11 |
Tunga White | I understand Lucille's got photos in here, right? | 2:19 |
Henderson McCullers | And you got mine. | 2:24 |
Tunga White | Uh-huh. | 2:25 |
Henderson McCullers | And Romual McCullers. | 2:27 |
Tunga White | How do you spell that? | 2:29 |
Henderson McCullers | R-O-M-U-A-L. | 2:31 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 2:34 |
Henderson McCullers | Carrie Lillie Robinson. McCullers-Robinson. Mildred McCullers-Bell. | 2:36 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 2:55 |
Henderson McCullers | And you want [indistinct 00:02:58]? Well, my will then, Samuel McCullers. | 2:56 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Birth and date. Daddy, excuse me, do you remember what month Patricia was born? | 3:00 |
Henderson McCullers | Who? | 3:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The baby, Patricia, in Columbia— | 3:07 |
Henderson McCullers | What year? | 3:10 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What month? We know it was 1943. | 3:10 |
Henderson McCullers | We married on November the ninth. Might be in January. | 3:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | No, that she was born? | 3:25 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 3:27 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. So. Okay. | 3:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | A few months later. | 3:46 |
Henderson McCullers | No. It was longer than that though. But she did, it was a year and something. | 3:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | A little over a year? | 3:48 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 3:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 3:50 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Are you talking about, was it '44? | 3:52 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 3:54 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | She was born in January of '44? | 3:55 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah, I think it was, yeah. Wait a minute? '44? No. | 4:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Y'all married November. | 4:04 |
Henderson McCullers | It must've been '43. | 4:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. She was born in '43. | 4:06 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 4:08 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So I just say 19— | 4:09 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:04:11]. | 4:10 |
Tunga White | Okay, we just got [indistinct 00:04:12]. | 4:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I just say 1943, don't know. | 4:12 |
Henderson McCullers | Sammy and Laura. Lara, wait a minute. No, that one my sister. That my brother, too. That's old. | 4:14 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 4:20 |
Henderson McCullers | Don't you have 15? | 4:23 |
Tunga White | One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, and you. That's 13. | 4:25 |
Henderson McCullers | 13. | 4:30 |
Tunga White | Let me tell you what I got. I got Rufus, Edith, Annie, Roberta, Hattie, Zelma, Ruth, Lucille, Romual, Carrie, Samuel, and Mildred and you. | 4:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You got Faye. | 4:46 |
Henderson McCullers | Faye. | 4:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Roberta. | 4:46 |
Harriette Brinkley | Carrie Lily. | 4:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Roberta. | 4:46 |
Tunga White | Carrie Lily's there. | 4:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You got Roberta? | 4:53 |
Tunga White | Don't have Faye, though. Does Faye have a E or just— | 4:55 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | E. | 4:56 |
Tunga White | Okay. And what was her last name? | 4:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Tucker. | 4:58 |
Henderson McCullers | Tucker. | 4:58 |
Harriette Brinkley | Lucille, you got Lucille? | 5:03 |
Tunga White | Uh-huh. | 5:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | Roberta, you don't have. | 5:04 |
Tunga White | Yeah, I got Roberta. | 5:04 |
Harriette Brinkley | You got Roberta. | 5:04 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You should have 15. How many you have? | 5:05 |
Harriette Brinkley | Hattie. Hattie. | 5:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Zelma. | 5:05 |
Tunga White | I got Hattie. | 5:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Zelma? | 5:05 |
Tunga White | Mm-hmm. | 5:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Buddy? | 5:05 |
Tunga White | No, I have Willie. | 5:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Willie. | 5:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Willie. | 5:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Willie McCullers. | 5:05 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 5:05 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Is it 15? | 5:05 |
Tunga White | 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. | 5:06 |
Harriette Brinkley | That's it. | 5:45 |
Tunga White | That's it. | 5:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh yeah. McCullers's June 12, '19. | 5:45 |
Tunga White | I need to know how many grandchildren you have. You know how many grandchildren you have? | 5:45 |
Henderson McCullers | No ma'am. | 5:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Easy three. | 5:45 |
Tunga White | Oh, that's an easy number. | 5:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Wait a minute. Yeah, three. | 5:45 |
Tunga White | Only three out of— | 5:45 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Two girls, one boy. No, four, now John Derek. Two girls and two boys. Four. Real easy. | 5:46 |
Tunga White | John Derek, he's yours. | 5:52 |
Henderson McCullers | How many children's Alan got? | 5:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Alan's got— | 5:57 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Who? | 5:57 |
Henderson McCullers | Alan. How many children Alan got? | 5:57 |
Harriette Brinkley | Three. | 5:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Anthony, Cledra, Makayla, John Derek. Four, two boys and two girls. And you have one great-grandson. | 6:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | You ain't going to count the other girl? | 6:10 |
Sally Graham | Uh-oh. | 6:11 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Well she asked that we not— | 6:13 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. Let me tell you about this other girl right here. I told you earlier that I had one brother, when my brother died when he was seven, my mother prayed that God send her another son. My brother got the preacher's daughter pregnant twice. The first one was a little boy, which we raised. The next year she was pregnant again, she had a girl. So my mother asked her, begged her to let us take the girl so they could come up knowing one another and together. But instead she let her cousin adopt the little girl, and the agreement was that we would never know where the little girl was. So my mother spent all her days looking for this little girl. She would call me and she'd say, "Well, I heard they live in Apex." So I would go to Apex, go to the schools, look in the yearbooks and try to find somebody that looked like us. | 6:16 |
Harriette Brinkley | And I never could. So finally a couple of years ago, their mother, the two kids' mother, because we were always close to her because finally her father accepted the fact that she got pregnant and stuff and he would let her keep the baby on the weekends and stuff like that. So she was always in Anthony's life and she knew where the little girl was, but she would never tell us. So one day she went to my mother's house and she told my mother, she said, "Well did you see on TV or read in the newspaper about the girl in Apex, or Holly Springs, Apex, who was pushing her baby in the stroller along the highway and a friend of theirs came around the curve and hit both of them and it killed the baby?" Mama said yes. She said, "That was your grandchild." Oh, so that was my mother's granddaughter and her great-granddaughter, the great-grand baby died. | 7:03 |
Harriette Brinkley | So that was how we finally found her. When she was in the hospital, she stayed for months in the hospital over at Chapel Hill because she had a huge hole in her pelvis and stuff. And so from the hospital she went to a rest home in Wake County, and so I went to see her and I took pictures of everybody and showed her who everybody was and stuff. And the lady who raised her was in the room and her grandmother, the one that she call her grandmother, was in the room. So the mother left out of the room but the grandmother stayed in the room. And so I just talked, she just listened and stuff. So finally Anthony would go, her brother would go to the hospital and see her so finally she told him one day that she wished that it was okay for him to come. | 7:55 |
Harriette Brinkley | But she wished that we would leave her alone because she had a family. But I told him, I said, "We'll respect her wishes." I said, "But it still does not erase the fact that she has our blood in her." So I just imagine all the hurt and everything because we didn't want to take, those people who reared her, we didn't want to take their place but still we wanted her to know that we loved her enough that we hunted for her. Not many days went by that we did not think about her or look for her. So I figure in time, hopefully she'll come on around. But there is another grandchild. | 8:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | So— | 9:17 |
Tunga White | Maybe that relationship with Anthony might develop into relationship with the whole family. | 9:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Based upon that information, what are you going to do? | 9:25 |
Harriette Brinkley | Let's not miss on his paper, how many grandchildren he got? | 9:31 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh. | 9:34 |
Sally Graham | Well it is a grandchild. | 9:36 |
Henderson McCullers | Now you're talking about how many grandchildren you got, [indistinct 00:09:39]. | 9:37 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Excuse me. | 9:37 |
Harriette Brinkley | He has. | 9:37 |
Tunga White | How far away is Apex? | 9:47 |
Harriette Brinkley | 18 miles. Because at one point we were living here in Durham and when I was teaching school when she would have been— | 9:49 |
Tunga White | They hid her very well. | 9:58 |
Henderson McCullers | We got more grandchildren than that, ain't— | 9:59 |
Harriette Brinkley | No, you got Makayla, Cledra, Anthony, you have her, and John Derek. That's five. | 10:00 |
Tunga White | Can I please use your restroom? | 10:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah, uh-huh, the light is right up—Let me [indistinct 00:10:18]. | 10:14 |
Tunga White | Excuse me. | 10:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Can you take this? | 10:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yeah. | 10:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 10:18 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 10:18 |
Harriette Brinkley | Or you can pull it, it'll pull, too. | 10:18 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Interview is right here. This interview is current and was recorded [indistinct 00:10:39]. | 10:35 |
Tunga White | And then your children. Full names. | 10:40 |
Henderson McCullers | I had six, four or six. | 10:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Here you go. | 10:46 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 10:46 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | And then mine is the same as the first one. | 10:52 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 10:58 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I'm fifth in order. | 10:58 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 11:00 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | See where I put me? | 11:00 |
Tunga White | I can copy that out. | 11:00 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | That page doesn't look very well. | 11:08 |
Tunga White | That's okay. | 11:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Daddy, I think I need a cigarette too. I can't even see or think over here. | 11:29 |
Henderson McCullers | Ain't no ashtrays in here, you can't smoke. | 11:29 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I know my sister had one ashtray and she has hid or thrown it away. | 11:30 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't believe I have eaten enough today. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Oh. Dates. | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | We're still working here but you can go on [indistinct 00:11:56]. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Okay. | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | This is a nice porch out here. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Yes. Has the interviewee ever received any awards or—Oh, yeah. | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Paper. Durham, Durham, Durham. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Has the interviewee ever received any awards— | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | [indistinct 00:12:34]. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I was living in Shotwell. 1952 through 1970. | 11:33 |
Henderson McCullers | What you going to do with that shit down there? | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Probably left the back door open. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | You need to close that because it would come out over the recorder. | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Okay. | 11:33 |
Tunga White | Okay. Do we have a residential history or should we go through that? Do you think so? Or do you think that we can get the information another time? | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | I think we've got it. I think, yeah. | 11:33 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | All right, what's the difference of these two? | 11:33 |
Tunga White | [indistinct 00:13:45] county and then farming, right? | 11:33 |
Harriette Brinkley | Right. | 11:33 |
Tunga White | Okay. What about Mr. McCullers's—The school did you go to? | 13:49 |
Henderson McCullers | Shotwell School. | 13:54 |
Tunga White | Was that— | 14:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | The name of your church? | 14:01 |
Tunga White | The first school that you went to? | 14:02 |
Henderson McCullers | That's the only one. | 14:04 |
Tunga White | The only one. Shot, what is it? | 14:05 |
Henderson McCullers | Shotwell. | 14:06 |
Tunga White | Shotwell. | 14:06 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Right here on number two. | 14:09 |
Tunga White | Is that in Wake County? | 14:11 |
Henderson McCullers | Yes. | 14:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | The church you are affiliated with now. | 14:12 |
Tunga White | And— | 14:14 |
Henderson McCullers | I don't know if you want training school, I also went— | 14:17 |
Tunga White | Okay. | 14:18 |
Henderson McCullers | What? | 14:23 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Is it Shepard? James E Shepard High School. Zebulon, North Carolina. | 14:24 |
Tunga White | And about what were the dates that you were at the Shepard School, the training school? | 14:36 |
Henderson McCullers | '46 through '70. | 14:42 |
Tunga White | Through '70? | 14:50 |
Henderson McCullers | No, '50. | 14:50 |
Tunga White | '50. | 14:50 |
Henderson McCullers | '50, yeah. | 14:51 |
Tunga White | And there you were doing carpentry and? | 14:52 |
Henderson McCullers | And then— | 14:59 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Agriculture. | 14:59 |
Henderson McCullers | Agriculture, yeah. | 14:59 |
Tunga White | Agriculture. Boy, previous jobs, everything. | 15:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | Yeah. He was jack of all trades, remember? | 15:18 |
Tunga White | Gee, photographer, barber— | 15:20 |
Henderson McCullers | Handyman. | 15:20 |
Tunga White | Photographer, barber, electrician— | 15:21 |
Harriette Brinkley | Carpenter. | 15:32 |
Tunga White | Carpenter. Is there farmer somewhere in there? | 15:33 |
Henderson McCullers | Farmer, yeah. Plumber. | 15:37 |
Tunga White | Plumber. | 15:41 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:15:49]. | 15:41 |
Tunga White | I ran out of the lines, but I can make some more, don't worry about that. [indistinct 00:16:01] church in here. Deacon? Good Hope? | 15:52 |
Henderson McCullers | Mm-hmm. | 16:10 |
Tunga White | Good Hope Baptist? Good Hope Missionary— | 16:17 |
Henderson McCullers | Right. | 16:19 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Correct. Good Hope Baptist. I need my resume. I can't think of all these things because I cut out so many things I [indistinct 00:16:28] to after I had John Derek. | 16:19 |
Tunga White | And that's in Wake County. | 16:24 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Uh-huh. | 16:24 |
Tunga White | So what kind of medals did you get when you were in the Army? | 16:47 |
Henderson McCullers | I got bronze star, and overseas strike, conduct medal. And what else? [indistinct 00:17:23] those. | 16:51 |
Tunga White | Bronze star, overseas strike, conduct medal. | 17:02 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:17:25]. | 17:02 |
Tunga White | Okay, and those are all from the US Army? | 17:24 |
Henderson McCullers | Yeah. | 17:40 |
Tunga White | Between 1943 and '46. Was that right? | 17:40 |
Harriette Brinkley | I think so. | 17:40 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What was that? | 17:40 |
Tunga White | Between 1943 and '46? | 17:42 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | What was that? What are we talking about now? | 17:48 |
Henderson McCullers | '42. | 17:48 |
Tunga White | '42 and '46. | 17:48 |
Henderson McCullers | '42. | 17:48 |
Tunga White | '42. Okay. | 17:49 |
Harriette Brinkley | Something interesting, this is outside of this, not related to this, but I went to Germany last September and I stayed for the month and I went to this concentration camp. And we were walking, okay, it was sunshine outside. So you drive back up in the woods to the parking lot, maybe a half a mile or so, and the closer you got back to where the crematoriums were, fog came in so thick that I was standing here, my girlfriend was standing across the street and we could not see one another. And I had my granddaughter with me and Crystal was sick so she kept saying, "Memaw, let's get out of here. Let's go." That's how eerie it was. | 18:00 |
Harriette Brinkley | And I was thinking that it was just the storm was coming in so I said, "Libby," I said, "We better go." I said, "Because we are going to have a hard time seeing." Because we had a two-hour drive back, and by the time we got back out to the main road, the sun was shining again. By the time we got back to where we lived, she talked to a lady the next day and the lady said she had been there on two other occasions and every time it was like that, it's the same thing. And this is the neat part, as we were walking back into the crematoriums and where the bunks were, I looked over in the weeds over there and I said, "Look, that looks like a walking stick." I said, "Crystal, go over there and get that. Let me see what it is." | 18:44 |
Harriette Brinkley | So she brought it back and it looks like a piece of a tree limb. And it's looks like a cane, it's tapered, it was tapered down at one end. And so I said, "Oh God, I wish I could take this back to America with me." And so Donna said, "Well, they won't let you take it on the plane." Said, "Leave it and then I'll have it shipped back when we ship our furniture back." I brought it all the way back and we got to Raleigh-Durham and I handed it to Crystal to hold and she handed it to her mother who was there to get us. And she leaned it up against the pole and left it. We didn't realize it was gone until we got home, so we called back and so they had a Delta official to meet us and he delivered it here and I'll show it to you. | 19:24 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Can I have that? | 20:12 |
Tunga White | When did you get into the Masons? About what— | 20:12 |
Henderson McCullers | You said why? | 20:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | When. What year? | 20:12 |
Tunga White | What year? | 20:12 |
Henderson McCullers | I went in '46. | 20:12 |
Tunga White | '46. | 20:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | I need to see [indistinct 00:20:33] crazy. I can't even think, girlfriend. | 20:12 |
Tunga White | I know what you mean. I'll wait till I get back to that dorm. | 20:12 |
Patricia Ann McCullers | Do you smoke? Let's go out on the porch. | 20:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | He told me, he said, "I'm surprised they let you bring it back." I said, "Why do you say that?" He said, "Because that was a weapon." Really? | 20:12 |
Sally Graham | Oh my God. | 20:12 |
Henderson McCullers | I reckon they did. | 20:12 |
Tunga White | It looks like could do some damage. Yeah. | 20:12 |
Henderson McCullers | Stick that thing clean through somebody. | 20:12 |
Sally Graham | Yep. | 20:12 |
Harriette Brinkley | Isn't that awesome? | 20:12 |
Sally Graham | Gosh. Look at the way it's made, and the bark is off of that section. | 20:12 |
Henderson McCullers | [indistinct 00:21:11]— | 20:12 |
Item Info
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