Betty Artis interview recording, 1993 July 01
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Transcript
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Leslie Brown | You told me that—You were saying that your sister went to New York. | 0:02 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 0:06 |
Leslie Brown | And you decided that you loved to live in the country. | 0:07 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 0:09 |
Leslie Brown | What did you love about it? | 0:10 |
Betty Artis | I just like it. I still love it, because all them down on me now to leave. But uh-uh. I'd rather stay right here. Right here. I'm satisfied and I'm happy under certain conditions, and I don't feel like it's going to be for so long before I'll be gone on, too. Then they'll put me out right out there in the lot. | 0:12 |
Leslie Brown | You were telling me earlier that your father came down here to Tillery, and he found land, and then he told you and your husband about it, and you came down here. | 0:43 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah. | 0:54 |
Leslie Brown | What was it like when you got here? | 0:56 |
Betty Artis | Well, I didn't like the start of it. I just didn't like the looks of it, but when I got here and come on down here and looked at the house and all, followed my husband, I decided I'd take a trial, make a trial of it. That year after we have our crop and paid off our bills and had money left, I felt better, so I decided I would try, so we did, and he worked until he got to the place where he couldn't take care of his finance. Then he rented it out, and after he rented it out, then Richard Grant wanted to buy it, so he sold it to him. They said they didn't have it, because he didn't never finish. But anyway, we got— | 1:03 |
Leslie Brown | You saying he never finished paying for it? No? | 2:00 |
Leslie Brown | Now, when you were telling me before that, when you moved here, you signed, you filled out an application. | 2:07 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 2:14 |
Leslie Brown | Where did you go to fill out the application? | 2:15 |
Betty Artis | Right up there, where in house next to where they— | 2:16 |
Leslie Brown | The courthouse? | 2:17 |
Betty Artis | What do they call it there? I call it the clinic, but it's not a clinic. I can't recall the name of that building. | 2:42 |
Leslie Brown | That's all right. | 2:52 |
Betty Artis | But anyhow, it was right there in-house back then. Then, later on, they moved up here where PMA office is. | 2:58 |
Leslie Brown | In that brick building with the red trim around it in— | 3:10 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. | 3:12 |
Leslie Brown | In Tillery? | 3:16 |
Betty Artis | No. Up here at the end of 301 when you turn on 561. | 3:17 |
Leslie Brown | Oh, yes. | 3:18 |
Betty Artis | So the building to your right. | 3:18 |
Leslie Brown | Yes. | 3:22 |
Betty Artis | That building. | 3:23 |
Leslie Brown | Uh-huh. | 3:23 |
Betty Artis | But they have added a lot to it since then. Then they got a PCA office. No. That was production. What is it? Credit? Anyway, that was in [indistinct 00:03:52] but it's right there now as you're going in Halifax. It's the service station on one side and the building's right across from the service station. That's where the same building is at now. We didn't never have no business dealing with them after they built that building. We dealt with them when they was in [indistinct 00:04:17] and Halifax. Mr I. H. Swain was our supervisor. | 3:25 |
Leslie Brown | Isaac Swain? | 4:26 |
Betty Artis | Uh-huh. Isaac Swain. Then Mr.— | 4:29 |
Leslie Brown | Do you mind if I write that down? | 4:30 |
Betty Artis | Huh? | 4:31 |
Leslie Brown | Mind if I write his name down? | 4:32 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 4:34 |
Leslie Brown | What did the supervisor do? | 4:44 |
Betty Artis | He just come out and what you might say he talk with the people that were farming and instruct them what they thought were best to do and what not to do. | 4:46 |
Leslie Brown | Did they give good advice? | 4:59 |
Betty Artis | Well, yeah, sometimes they did, and well, maybe all of it was good advice, but maybe I didn't understand them and they didn't understand me. Because I had one came here when my little girl was born, and he told me—I had on my husband shirt—and he spoke to me, and the next word he said to me, "Ain't you something? Your husband is in the field working and you got on his starched and ironed shirt." And I told him, I said, "Ain't you somebody here coming nosing in my business and don't even know me." | 5:02 |
Betty Artis | My husband and him got along fine, but I just didn't bother, because I thought it was insulting. It had nothing to do with what I had on. It was my husband's shirt, but it was mine for the wear, because we always, after children were born, mama always made us clothes out of the arms of—It was daddy's shirt. She was born in August. Nine days old. The first day I went outside. You know what he said. Drove right to that door around there. I was going to hang the baby clothes up. I didn't have no problem. | 5:40 |
Leslie Brown | So you didn't get along with him? | 6:19 |
Betty Artis | I didn't bother him. | 6:21 |
Leslie Brown | You didn't bother him. | 6:21 |
Betty Artis | I didn't bother him. He come up and wanted to see my husband. He asked me speak to me and asked me where was he. I'd tell him if I know, and that was it. I never exchanged no words with him. He tried to talk, but I just didn't bother, because I didn't know what the next thing he would say, so I wouldn't ask for it. I learned if I can't get along with you, I love you and let you go head on but just don't bother you. Because if I started bothering you, that would give you a chance to bother me, so I didn't bother. [indistinct 00:06:59] But Mr. Buffalo, he was our supervisor, too, and he didn't—I don't know who else had any problem with him ,but we didn't. He come to say what he had to say, and he was gone. I didn't have no problem with him. | 6:24 |
Leslie Brown | What kind of advice did they give? | 7:19 |
Betty Artis | Well, like you made crop last year, and it didn't come out so good. They would advise you to increase whatever, a certain way you could do your land. You see, we had come off of the sandy land and needed more counseling to get acquainted with the stiff land than the ones who was already used to it. You see what I'm saying? | 7:26 |
Leslie Brown | Mm-hmm. | 7:49 |
Betty Artis | And they used just keep check to see. That's all the advice I know of, whenever you got ready for your loan, we had to make a loan. When you'd make a loan, they would give us advice, how to and the things that—They would suggest things that they thought that we needed. We didn't have to get it, but they would suggest if it would help you, and that was it. | 7:50 |
Leslie Brown | What did they suggest that you take loans for? | 8:13 |
Betty Artis | For the farm? You see, when we came here, we didn't have no money, and we had to borrow a loan every year to do the crops. We borrowed a loan to buy your gas and pay for your fertilizer, your seeds if you had to buy any, your food. Just make a loan for so much, and you could use it for certain things, but once you put it down said you want the amount of money for, then you use that amount of money. You weren't supposed to take from your fertilizer and buy food or clothing. You know? You said what you want, you thought you would want to use for whatever, and when they totaled it together then, they would make it your loan for the amount you said. | 8:17 |
Leslie Brown | Did you pay them back out of the profit at the end of the year? | 9:09 |
Betty Artis | You pay them first. You pay them first. Your first crop you sell, it was yours, but you save enough until you could pay. If you didn't have enough, you still take what you had and take it up there to them. If they could see you [indistinct 00:09:31] and that you had took all of the money from your sales and this is all you had, you didn't have no problem. You didn't have no problem. We didn't. I don't know about nobody else, but we didn't. I here someone said they really had a tough time, but I ain't going to tell no lie on nobody. I don't want nobody tell one on me, which they do sometimes. But we didn't have no problems with the government. We sure didn't. | 9:12 |
Leslie Brown | You say that when you came here that the land was hard. | 10:10 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. It still is. It's suppled up some, because they have put grain on it and different things to open it up. We had to sew grain when we were farming it, too. | 10:14 |
Leslie Brown | How much was the property when you bought it? | 10:28 |
Betty Artis | It was 30-some hundred dollars, 38, I believe it was, hundred dollars that we had to pay for it. | 10:31 |
Leslie Brown | Did you think that was a good price? | 10:46 |
Betty Artis | Yeah, I thought it was a good price, and since I've looked at it now, I said I know, because they are selling land now by the acres for so much. We had 42 acres of crop land. Then they had some wood land to go to it, and I thought—But it didn't seem like the way the crops was being made and everything, so I don't know. | 10:49 |
Leslie Brown | So you have 42 acres and you got the house. | 11:21 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 11:23 |
Leslie Brown | Did you get any other buildings with the house? | 11:24 |
Betty Artis | No, we had smokers here and a big barn down there. When we moved here, it looked like new, but my smokers got burned up. Caught a fire one day we was up in the field, and when we put it out, all the top was burnt. I was smoking my meat, and it was sitting right in that area from that window there, right over there. So we didn't be able to—Had a chicken house. That was real good. Outdoor toilet. That was good at that time. | 11:27 |
Leslie Brown | You said the house was in good shape, too? | 12:05 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah. The house was in good shape, all of it. Tell you the truth, we didn't have no broken nothing when we moved here. | 12:09 |
Leslie Brown | Your father had already bought, and had he moved here, too? | 12:17 |
Betty Artis | No. His wife wouldn't agree to come with him. See, when my mother died and he remarried, she said she didn't want to come to North Carolina. She didn't come, so that's how Ms. Manley and them got their unit, because Daddy had the first offer. My brother, he moved in the house where it's up there on the other end now. Not this road, the next road, you make a right. It's a white house setting over. But it used to sit right up on the other side of that trailer in the front of that house over there. He bought it and moved it over there, and that's where my brother was living. He didn't like it. He stayed to two years and he left. | 12:20 |
Leslie Brown | Why didn't he like it? | 13:04 |
Betty Artis | Just like the rest of them. They kept on that—I told you they was after me about coming to New York, and they got him, and he went on up there. That's where he died at. | 13:07 |
Leslie Brown | Are you the only one of your brothers and sisters who stayed in North Carolina or who stayed in the South, and everybody else went north? | 13:20 |
Betty Artis | I got one sister live in Halifax. She never lived in New York. My brother, he was in New York, the oldest one and the only one now. He is in Virginia. He moved from North Carolina, but nine years ago, and now he's sick and his wife, too, because I've been going back and forth with them. I plan on going back this week and stay with. They told me Miss Hatch funeral would be sometime soon. I don't know when, and I didn't want to be away, because she was the oldest member of our church. Then she was a long time friend that I had known, and I thought a lot of her. I wouldn't like to be away, so I just keep right on packing, putting a piece in. I say, "Maybe here after a while, when I'm feeling upbeat, then I can make arrangements for going down there." | 13:26 |
Leslie Brown | Yeah, we talked to Doc White Cannon last night. Talked to her last night. I met her over at the community center. | 14:29 |
Betty Artis | Yeah, we raised chickens and hogs while we were farming. Cows. | 14:39 |
Leslie Brown | You had cows. | 14:53 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah. | 14:53 |
Leslie Brown | What kind of crops did you raise? | 15:05 |
Betty Artis | Peanuts, corn, and cotton, and soybean, | 15:08 |
Leslie Brown | Peanuts, corn, cotton, and soybean. | 15:10 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 15:14 |
Leslie Brown | On 42 acres. | 15:14 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 15:14 |
Leslie Brown | How much cotton did you get out of a good crop? | 15:16 |
Betty Artis | Well, I don't even know how many acres Frank would have, but I know one year he made 13 bales, and peanuts, he'd make anywhere from 100 to 250. I think once or twice he did make 300. Then he started to dropping back, and sometime he just didn't make enough peanuts, cotton, and corn. If the cotton was good, looked like the peanuts was weak. It looked like it rotated around, and he just kept right on. He just kept allowancing up, trying to get machinery and stuff and getting in debt. He just kept on until he couldn't move. If he would've listened to me, it wouldn't have been that way, because I got a stopping point. I know when enough is enough. But he would just take a chance with maybe if I do this this time. | 15:20 |
Leslie Brown | Here comes your son. | 16:20 |
Speaker 1 | See you again. [indistinct 00:16:43] | 16:30 |
Leslie Brown | You were telling me about— | 17:06 |
Betty Artis | Huh? | 17:07 |
Leslie Brown | You were telling me about what crops you grew. | 17:10 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. The peanuts, cotton, and corn, and soybeans. I don't think we ever grew any cane, where you make molasses. But people used to do it, but we didn't. | 17:12 |
Leslie Brown | Down here? | 17:29 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 17:30 |
Leslie Brown | [indistinct 00:17:31] | 17:30 |
Betty Artis | Because they had the cane mill right down on the end where them bushes is now when we moved here. That's where they had the machine where they make it or cook it, device or what you call it? All that's gone, destroyed. | 17:31 |
Leslie Brown | Who were your neighbors and what were your neighbors like when you moved here? Did people welcome you to the community when you moved in? | 17:49 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. You ain't going to believe it, I know already, because it do sound strange, because I talked to a lady the other day. She said she wish she could've said it. I haven't had a problem with anybody that I know that were here when I came here and the ones that come here moved here since I've been here. They haven't bothered me, and I haven't bothered them. My next door neighbor was my brother, and that house over there was not there then. This trailer wasn't there. The trailer had been moved here. | 17:55 |
Betty Artis | It's been here a good while now, because when I moved here, that girl wanted the old—The one who is in the trailer, she and my oldest son sure on grew up as schoolmates and everything, and Mr. and Mrs. Midget, they was the next house down there from my house. They were just as lovely as they could be. Mr. And Ms. Terry the same way. Mr. And Ms. Manley, although I stayed away from Mrs. Manley two years, but she'd come and try to be just as friendly a neighbor, but I did not go right to Ms. Mary's, and I just didn't never visit her or nothing. | 18:48 |
Betty Artis | And all of a sudden, when that boy there was born, she came up, and we just stuck with one another from then on up until that. So now we claim sisters to one another, not just these late years but way back. Ms. Pete and I are sisters, we claim, and we have got along just like sisters. I'm going to tell you the truth. I've had no trouble. Sure haven't. Ms. Branch was living in where that trailer, when you turn to go down, she was just as neighbor—She wasn't that much older than me, but I just took her for my next mama. That's how good she were to me. | 19:35 |
Betty Artis | Ms. Eastland was living in the house with the where this clubhouse is. I couldn't ask for no better neighbor. The Wilkins, I didn't visit them, but whenever I called on them for anything or Frank, my husband, needed anything, we never was denied as far as we know. We always got along as a family. All of my neighbors around here, we were just like that. And still— | 20:20 |
Leslie Brown | [indistinct 00:20:54] | 20:53 |
Betty Artis | Yes, ma'am. That's what I'm talking about now. Work together. We just didn't sleep together. When your trouble come, we shared one another's trouble. That was right around—Which we expanded out further, but I'm talking about this was these right near me. | 20:54 |
Leslie Brown | These right around in this area. | 21:09 |
Betty Artis | I didn't have no problem with not the first one. They haven't had no problem with me. Our children grew up together, no problems. We just got along fine. A lot of people called me Mama Betty. They said because of they don't know nothing else but Mama Betty. Because I always treated her as if everybody was my children. I look out for other folk children. They looked out for mine. If they needed a spanking and the parents weren't around, if I didn't spank them, I'd make them think I was going to spank them, and I would spank them if they didn't listen. And we never had no problem. Now, I just love people, and I can get along with anybody. Even if you mistreat me, I ain't got no better sense to love you that much more. I don't know why. It's just in me. | 21:12 |
Leslie Brown | Where did you learn it? | 22:19 |
Betty Artis | Huh? | 22:19 |
Leslie Brown | Did you learn that from somebody else? | 22:19 |
Betty Artis | I don't know. I don't know. Because my sisters and all of them, they always—They say, "You just—" Well, all I'm saying I am different from the 16 head of us. My mother had 16 children. Ten lived to get grown. They said I'm just the odd one, and I was the third child. | 22:20 |
Leslie Brown | All the people who lived around in here that you've mentioned, the Manleys and the Petes and the Branches and the Eastlands and the Wilkins. Did they all move here to buy government land also? | 22:41 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. The Manleys and us moved the same year. The Pete moved the same year. Ms. Harden moved the same year. Now, I make the distinction. Ms. Manley is from North Hampton. These are the ones from Virginia, Ms. Pete, Ms. Harden, and myself, and it was Eddie Johnson. But he is deceased. He used to live down there in the bottom going on to Ms. Grant in that gray house. That's where Irene was living. Rolling, Joe Lewis Rolling, he lived up there on 561. Which house is it? It's the house where Ms—right there at the casket factory, that little red house in that curve. | 22:53 |
Betty Artis | That was Joe Lewis's house, but it was farther down the road this way. But they moved it from there to there. Ms. Harley. Ms. Harley got that house. Where Joe Lewis Rolling lived, he was buying that unit, and Eddie Johnson was buying the one back there between Mr. Grant in this curve that you make. Ms. Pete, she is on the other end. Ms. Harden is on the other end. Ms. Hardin's house was the last house joining [indistinct 00:24:14] down this road. All of us came from Virginia. | 23:43 |
Leslie Brown | You all heard about the government land down here? | 24:19 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 24:23 |
Leslie Brown | How did you [indistinct 00:24:24] | 24:24 |
Betty Artis | My daddy. He just believe in getting out, seeking, but he said he really got tired of sharecropping. I mean, I don't know who told him about it, but he came over here, and then when he came back home, he asked Frank and I to get up early one morning and come with him over here. When we got over here, Mr. Swain, he asked him who was us, and he told him, so he told me he had some more units, did we want to—And I hunched with him, and just like that, I hadn't even seen down here. So Frank's out there. I try. | 24:24 |
Betty Artis | So we come on down. He didn't tell them then, but we come on down here and looked at the units and went back, so when Daddy went back and told Mr. [indistinct 00:25:20] that he was going to buy a home over here. She didn't want to come, so then he had to come back and give up his unit, so then my brother, Clifton, and Frank, which is my husband, they kept theirs. So that's how we—See, we was trying to get joint, because Cliff's unit was right there where Tut's trailer is, and we was on this side, but it didn't work. | 25:09 |
Leslie Brown | So your brother left and you stayed. | 25:57 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 25:58 |
Leslie Brown | You said you made a good crop the first year. | 25:58 |
Betty Artis | No, no, not only the first year. The first five or six years, we made good crops. Good crops. Good crops. | 26:03 |
Leslie Brown | This was the first time you'd owned land? | 26:11 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah. | 26:12 |
Leslie Brown | Did you and your husband sharecrop before? | 26:12 |
Betty Artis | Had been sharecropping all our lives. My dad was sharecropping. He had sharecropped all of his life. | 26:16 |
Leslie Brown | What was that like? What's sharecropping? | 26:23 |
Betty Artis | Well, we did all of the work, but the crop money would be divided, the seeds, the cost of what it took to make this crop. You pay for one half and the owner the other half, and then they halving the money. | 26:25 |
Leslie Brown | Was it fair? | 26:44 |
Betty Artis | I got a duck now since I got on my own, but we were pleased. We were really pleased, but we did live with some good men. Some looked like did—We live at one, he had told my daddy years ago to go ahead on and see couldn't he buy him some land, and daddy ignored it. At last one day, he just made in his mind he would, because we was sharecropping. The last one was the cashier's Meherrin Valley Bank in Boykins, Virginia. He was almost a millionaire himself. But he was good to us, and Mr. Thornton in Southampton County, if he mistreated us, I don't want to believe it. | 26:45 |
Betty Artis | It got to be proven for me to know. Well, that man was just like a daddy to us. I mean, to my daddy's family. We didn't have to want for nothing. Didn't care what time of year it was or what. He was just like a real father. He would always come and try to meet his needs. Sure did. So I can't say I know Mr. Call. I was growing up then, and I can't say. Daddy was working just a one-horse crop farm with him, but when he moved with Mr. Thornton, he was working a two-horse crop. | 27:42 |
Leslie Brown | Mr. Who? | 28:24 |
Betty Artis | H.V. Thornton. That's in Southampton County, Virginia. He left there. Mr. Thornton had got in touch with Mr. Henlin Smith in Boykins, so he contact him, and daddy moved from Southampton County to Boykins, Virginia. Still he was in Southampton County, but then we was in Courtland. That's where I stayed until I moved here. | 28:26 |
Leslie Brown | So when you got married, you stayed on your father's— | 29:08 |
Betty Artis | Share crop from. That's right. | 29:12 |
Leslie Brown | You continued with family [indistinct 00:29:15] | 29:14 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. And these peoples are furnished houses for the tenants to live in, and me and my husband went right on farming with the same name my daddy did. We farmed with him two years, and then we farmed with another White man named Josh Turner. Then we left there and we moved here. | 29:15 |
Leslie Brown | Were you proud to own your own land the first time? | 29:38 |
Betty Artis | Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed. I sure was. | 29:42 |
Leslie Brown | Did you ever think you'd own your own land? | 29:49 |
Betty Artis | I had hoped someday, but my husband was kind of hard to make agreement on things. He wanted, but he was the type of person he was afraid to allowance—He didn't have a little of that confidence in his self I can do this, but I always had, if you can do it, I can, too. That's the way I always looked. I may not do it when you do it, but if I try and try hard enough and do the right thing, I believe I can, too, and I still believe. I'm 75 years old, and I know I can't do what I used to do, but I thank God for what I can do. I can still do some of the things that I did years back. I just can't do as much and can't work as long on account of my heart and diabetes. I sure as well can. I can get up and wash on a rubbing board just like I did way back. | 29:52 |
Leslie Brown | Did you work harder on your own land than you did when you were sharecropping? | 30:56 |
Betty Artis | No. | 30:58 |
Leslie Brown | No? | 30:58 |
Betty Artis | No, no. If I didn't want to go to field today, I didn't have to go. I didn't go. When I was sharecropping, I would wait. If I didn't want to go in the midday, I could stay here at this house long as I wanted to, and when it get cool, then work until the dark. I would get up morning time, you could see how to [indistinct 00:31:21] and stuff. Go as early as I wanted, work as late as I please, but we always say, "Seven o'clock, you're supposed to be on your job." That's the way it was when I was a sharecropper. You knock off at 6:00. But we took from 12:00 until 2:00 for lunch hour. I didn't have no hours. If the day clouded like today and I was chopping, I'd go right on out there and chop right on through, come down and get my dinner and turn around and go on back in the field, because I know it's hot. But the day cool, now I'm going do what I want to do. Then if tomorrow be real hot, I didn't care whether I went or not. So I— | 31:01 |
Leslie Brown | [indistinct 00:32:06] | 32:05 |
Betty Artis | What I'm saying, I worked like I wanted to work. Yeah. But my husband, he worked real hard. I've seen him make long hours out there at times I know he ought not to have been in the field, but he'd be out there. Worked up in the night after he got his tractor, his lights. Worked late hours in the night plowing the crop and doing. I enjoyed it. I really did. It just didn't make me feel good after I done worked all the year, when time coming then there nary a dollar coming back to me on account of I already owed it out, and that's it. But thank God he fixed us over that. | 32:06 |
Leslie Brown | How did you end up owing so much out? | 32:58 |
Betty Artis | Huh? | 33:00 |
Leslie Brown | How did you end up owing so much out? | 33:00 |
Betty Artis | I told you when they were try to get machinery and stuff. | 33:00 |
Leslie Brown | And you wanted machinery to make more crops. | 33:06 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. That's what— | 33:06 |
Leslie Brown | [indistinct 00:33:09] | 33:06 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. When it did that, the crops was coming in shorter, so we just kept right on, and then that interest on it, you see, just kept building up, building up. | 33:13 |
Leslie Brown | When you borrowed for machinery, where did you borrow from? | 33:24 |
Betty Artis | Well, after we got—They could go out and—If I want go to [indistinct 00:33:33] and I would, say, buy a car, I could go on out there, if me and the dealer could make a deal, we could do it. That's the way he done, because he had a guy that do it by FHA. It would've been a stopping point there somewhere, because when they looked at the book and see how much you owe, now here come three or four more thousand dollars, and your crop come in like this. No, no, no. That's what I tried to get my husband and see, but he couldn't see it. You don't keep on loading up when you already loaded. | 33:29 |
Leslie Brown | Sounds like you're very smart about money. | 34:06 |
Betty Artis | Well, I never had any, but I know one thing, I don't believe in wasting no dollars. It come in too slow for me. | 34:08 |
Leslie Brown | When you came to Tillery, you had one baby, eight months old. | 34:20 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. His name was Frank Junior. | 34:23 |
Leslie Brown | Mm-hmm. And then when were the others born? | 34:27 |
Betty Artis | Had another born 1950. Sonny Boy born. Frank Junior was born '47. | 34:34 |
Leslie Brown | That's Fred. | 34:43 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. And then Calvin was born '52. My girl was born '54. | 34:44 |
Leslie Brown | What's her name? | 34:47 |
Betty Artis | Emily. | 34:47 |
Leslie Brown | Emily. Pretty | 34:47 |
Betty Artis | And then Joseph was born '61. | 34:53 |
Leslie Brown | They were all, other than Frank, they were all born here? | 34:59 |
Betty Artis | Every one of them were born right here in this house. | 35:03 |
Leslie Brown | Right here in the house. | 35:03 |
Betty Artis | All but the first one. | 35:06 |
Leslie Brown | Who delivered them? | 35:07 |
Betty Artis | Dr. Wynn delivered—Wait a minute. Wait, wait, wait, before you started writing. Let me see now. Dr. Wynn delivered Fred. He delivered all of them, but Mrs. Cozy Edmonds midwifed. Fred, cut that down. | 35:09 |
Leslie Brown | Now, you were telling me about who delivered your babies. | 35:40 |
Betty Artis | Mrs. Cozy Edmonds with the baby boy, the last one. | 35:44 |
Leslie Brown | Mrs. Cozy Edmonds. | 35:49 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 35:49 |
Leslie Brown | She was the midwife. | 35:51 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 35:53 |
Leslie Brown | Yeah. People told me that. | 35:53 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. Yeah, she delivered him. | 35:55 |
Leslie Brown | And Dr. Wynn. | 36:02 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. His name was L.H. Wynn. He's dead now. He was [indistinct 00:36:09] His office was in [indistinct 00:36:11] at that time. | 36:03 |
Leslie Brown | Was he a Black doctor or a White doctor? | 36:11 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah, he was a Black doctor. But he was a good doctor to me. Yeah. Yeah. | 36:18 |
Leslie Brown | Did you go to church when you moved here? | 36:29 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah. | 36:31 |
Leslie Brown | How did you join? What church did you join? | 36:32 |
Betty Artis | Tillery Chapel. | 36:34 |
Leslie Brown | Tillery Chapel? | 36:34 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. I stayed over here I think about three or four years, though, before I joined. I was a member of Shiloh Baptist in Boykins, Virginia. After I started having those babies, a lot of times I wanted to go to church, and they would be sick or something and I couldn't go, so I just went on joined Tillery Chapel, and I've been there ever since. | 36:36 |
Leslie Brown | That's how you decided to join? | 37:02 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yep. | 37:04 |
Leslie Brown | Did you have friends who were members of Tillery Chapel? | 37:04 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. Wait a minute. Up here, where you just left, where you say you saw Fred at, that the girl's mother, not the woman were there. Never. Her mother was a member, and there was a member in the house, in all those houses, though some of them been torn down. Now, Brother Ben Williams, he was a deacon, and they was right down the road from me. But Ms. Manley, she was a member of North Hampton, but joined Tillery Chapel, too. She and her husband. So me and all of my children joined Tillery Chapel. Ms. Pete still she haven't moved. [indistinct 00:38:12] never joined Tillery Chapel. Them the ones who was in Virginia. Joe Lewis and Lena, when they were living here, they joined Tillery Chapel, but after they moved back, they went back to their former church. Yeah. | 37:11 |
Leslie Brown | Did you like going to church when you could? | 38:32 |
Betty Artis | Yeah, I love it. I love it. I tell you, I love going to church. I just love serving the Lord. I love it. Sometimes it look like things don't go right, but I just say I can't help what nobody else do. I am really concerned with me, getting me right. Can't help what you do, because God going to punish you for what you do, not me. Not me. He going to punish me for what I do. After I got that thought and see it that way, I said, "Let the minister, anybody else, do whatever they want to do, but if it ain't right, God going to punish them for they're doing." I just pray and ask him just to please let me do what he want me to do, and I try to follow the Word as the best knowledge that I got. That's the only thing keep me, I'm going to tell you the truth, because sometimes it's mighty, mighty, mighty rough, but when I realize God is there, I feel all right. | 38:34 |
Leslie Brown | So you tried to go to church as often as you could? | 39:54 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. Yeah. | 39:58 |
Leslie Brown | You worked hard. | 40:00 |
Betty Artis | Huh? | 40:00 |
Leslie Brown | You worked hard. | 40:00 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. I go to church. I don't go now like I did when my husband, when he was living. When Sunday come, we was going from one month to another to somebody's church, unless we was sick and couldn't go. But if we was then going anywhere, to church, and he would go to Sunday school. He loved Sunday school. I went to Sunday school, but I didn't go every Sunday, but he didn't miss. | 40:01 |
Betty Artis | The last Sunday before he died, he got up that morning—I mean, before he got sick and died, he got up and put on his clothes, and all of them sit down in a chair, and he kept sitting there, and I looked at him, I said, "You don't feel good this morning." He said, "No, sir. I wanted to go to Sunday school." He said, "But my legs ain't right." So he missed it, and he didn't go no more, but he laid on that bed and spoke a million times, "I wish I could go to Sunday school." You make sure now this was a Sunday morning. But he didn't get back. But he been to Sunday school, I think, clean on up until September, was the last time he went to church. He died in November. Yep. | 40:28 |
Leslie Brown | Now, when you used to go to church, when you first moved here and when you joined Tillery Chapel, how did you go? Did you have a car? Did you have a truck? | 41:24 |
Betty Artis | No. Only had but a mule and a wagon. | 41:36 |
Leslie Brown | Had a mule and wagon. | 41:36 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. | 41:36 |
Leslie Brown | Did you have just one mule? | 41:36 |
Betty Artis | We had two mules. [indistinct 00:41:40] | 41:38 |
Leslie Brown | Did they have names? Did you name them? | 41:39 |
Betty Artis | One of them was named Mary, and I don't know what Frank named the other mule. But I know Mary, we brought her from Virginia when we came. We owned that mule. He bought one after he moved over here. Bought a mule from Mr. Wilbur or Major. I think it was Wilbur Hawkins he bought that mule from. If it weren't Wilbur, it was Major, but it was Wilbur. I walked from here out there to that casket factory more than once. Got a baby in my arms, and then all of my children were big, fat, healthy babies, every one of them. The smallest one was 10 pound, 11 ounces. Ten pounds and eleven. That was the girl. | 41:44 |
Leslie Brown | So you used to take them over to church with you. | 43:01 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. | 43:01 |
Leslie Brown | And Tillery Chapel was behind where the casket factory is. | 43:01 |
Betty Artis | That's right. | 43:01 |
Leslie Brown | That's been burned down? | 43:01 |
Betty Artis | That's right. That's right. That was old Tillery Chapel. There was mulberry trees that used to be there. [indistinct 00:43:01] more than one time came to church when he set up in there going to act up. I would get right on up and walk on up there and get that mulberry switch and tear his meat up. I look at him sometimes now say, "Those whoopings look like they didn't do a bit of good." | 43:01 |
Leslie Brown | Did you have electricity in this house when you moved here? | 43:16 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. Yeah. | 43:23 |
Leslie Brown | You had electricity when you moved here? | 43:23 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. When I moved here. | 43:23 |
Leslie Brown | Did you have electricity in Virginia where you moved from? | 43:24 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. We had just got it but two or three years before I moved in the house that I was living in. It was down there, but a lot of the tenants' houses didn't have it. Yeah. | 43:24 |
Leslie Brown | How did getting electricity change your life— | 43:38 |
Betty Artis | Huh? | 43:44 |
Leslie Brown | When you were in Virginia and you got electricity, how did it change your life? | 43:45 |
Betty Artis | Well, I was proud of it. My mother died. They turned the lights on after she died in Daddy's house. We was hoping—We know they were going to be turned on, and we was hoping before she passed that she'd have a chance to, but she didn't. The lights were turned on during her layout. I think Mama died on Monday, and we put lights in there Tuesday, because they had done run the wires and all, but they hadn't cut | 43:49 |
Betty Artis | it on. They cut it on that Tuesday, and she was buried that Wednesday. I enjoyed it. I really did. Got me a refrigerator, and I thought that was the best of all to make my own ice, because we used to buy all the ice in those big blocks. We would take it and put it in a—I don't even know if you know what I'm talking about, but we called them grass bags, but it was just like these other bags, but these are plastic now or paper one. But it used to be a weave like—The bag looks something like this, but it was closed. | 44:29 |
Leslie Brown | Like burlap. | 45:17 |
Betty Artis | That's it, burlap bag. That's what it was, made out of burlap. We'd take one of those and put this block of ice in it and had a whole dug just like for a grave, and we would put our ice, that big block, down in the ground and put sawdust over it, and then put a piece of tin on top of that, and then put dirt on it. We would keep ice from Wednesday until Sunday. We always had to get ice Monday, Monday and Wednesdays. | 45:20 |
Leslie Brown | When you put the ice in the ground, did you put what you wanted to keep cold there with it? | 45:57 |
Betty Artis | Yeah, sometimes. But most time we would, like my milk and stuff, we had a rope. We would put it in a big jug container, top it up, and put it down the well. That's the way Mama used to do her baby's milk. We used to do the same thing. Well, they had a well with one of these— | 46:02 |
Leslie Brown | —He told me that your husband, that you owned your own land here, but that your husband also share cropped. | 0:00 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. With Mr B Earkin. And he worked through like that for I don't know how many years. But after he stopped share cropping with Mr. Earkin, that is when he started getting behind showing up. See, when his crop he had home was short, he could pick it up and make it up, keep his payments going, whatever. So that's the way I know it went. | 0:10 |
Leslie Brown | And you said that he shared crop with several other men here, Mr. Whitaker and Mr. Grant. | 0:50 |
Betty Artis | No, they were working the same with the same man that Frank was working with share cropping. Now they were share cropping with him. They were, but all of them was working the same lane. Yeah, at the same farm, what I mean. But he had section there. This is Moses'. This is Frank's. And this is Mr. Grant's. And this is Mr. McEttes. They know where their little block or lane. When they get ready to plant, they would know where their lane were. And all of us would work over there together and house there together and everything. And that's where they kept it. | 1:05 |
Leslie Brown | Did your husband ever have anybody work for him? | 1:37 |
Betty Artis | For housing the crop, we used to get some people from Garysburg. And whenever we pick up anybody around here, like I said, maybe my family was bigger than yours, and I get through my crop chopping or picking cotton or whatever the other part of the family could do, they would go over and help somebody else. And we would pay them just like—Well, I say we hired them. I worked for Mr. Grant on the farm, and I worked for Ms. Manley on the farm. She was the lady of somebody because I think Russell was the last one that I worked on the farm for about a day. He used to pick cotton and help him get up his peanuts and do his chopping. Sure did. | 1:51 |
Betty Artis | Ms Branch and them, we used to get her children to help us chop our crop because, see, my children were young. See, I was 39 years old before I had that child, and stopped at the age of 42. And so my children was little, but these other people's children was older than mine. And we would get them to help us. | 2:50 |
Leslie Brown | Did the children go to school? | 3:27 |
Betty Artis | Everyone of them. They all finished high school. The girl, she started college, and she was a daddy baby. She couldn't take being away from her daddy that long. She come back and went on Richmond, got her job, and she been there ever since. She got married and done divorced. | 3:33 |
Leslie Brown | When your children went to school, were they able to go every day? | 3:57 |
Betty Artis | No. No, we kept our children out. We even took them out of school to help other people house their crops and things. Sure did. And I think about it sometime now. We have kept our children out, and their children's in school. People kept their children out, and my children's in school. And that's just the way it was. | 4:09 |
Betty Artis | Yeah, I kept them at a lot of days, a lot of days, child. But every one of them didn't never had to be put back or set back in their grades. And all of my children was a good student in school. And the conducts was good. They had a little minor trouble, but not no serious trouble. That boy up there, I think— | 4:20 |
Betty Artis | Get this door closed. | 4:46 |
Betty Artis | I believe that's when he really got out of hand. His teacher whooped him at school for something he didn't do, and whooped him so bad he had spots on him, not in checks but in whips all down on his seeds and everything. And they act as if it was nothing. So he speaks about it right now. He said it seemed like nobody never wanted justice on him. He said he just don't care. And I questioned him and asked him why. And then he'd go back to this one. He go back. | 4:58 |
Leslie Brown | Did they have a Black teacher? | 5:49 |
Betty Artis | Mm-hmm. It was Miss Hawkins over here, daughter-in-law. But he had some money, was saving it. We would let them pick cotton on Saturdays to get their fair money to go to the fair, and he could pick cotton. And he picked more than the other children. So therefore he had more money than the other children. And we would tell them to save that money. So when he go to the fair he wouldn't need to ask us for money. | 5:50 |
Betty Artis | And he had saved his. They had stayed home, like today. And the rain that night. When we got there next morning, it was raining. So Frank called him and told him, said, "Y'all go to school this morning." And I got up to fix the breakfast. And I said, "I ain't got nothing to give no lunch." | 6:16 |
Betty Artis | And so Fred said, "Mama." He said, "I can buy the lunch." And I said okay. So he went on, and he carried the money on school, bought lunch. And the teacher asked him that day to take up the milk money, and he took up the milk money and gave it to him. Then sitting in the school, somehow I imagine he just felt good to have his money. He was showing his money, and the teacher ain't paid no attention to the money, whether it was bells on. When they come to check, she didn't never turn it to the main office. They come and ask her about it, and she said she thought she did send that money. And I did know the person who told the teachers that, "Fred Artis got that money." And Fred was the one took up the money. | 6:34 |
Betty Artis | And when they searched Fred, Fred had this money. And they whopped that child terrible. But it was his money. He carried it from home. It was his money, and they found the money after then. But they had done whooped the child. Sure did. Sure did. | 7:30 |
Betty Artis | But there one time, I rang in there for my husband, I don't know where I'd have been today. You talk about me, and say what you want to say anyhow. But I know I'd been mood, I'd been all mood. But I know if I started talking and told them just like it was, someone wouldn't have liked it. But number one, I would've told them, "First, before you go and pass sentence on a person, you ought to get the true evidence. Whether be a teacher, doctor, lawyer or who." You got this right here now, and I know I got it hooked on me. You get up and walk out of the house and forget such a thing, you didn't carry it with you. And when you come back looking for it, and you find it here in the chair, how could you say I stole it? Do you see what I'm saying? And he just believed that's what it—And he often speak about it. | 7:54 |
Betty Artis | And they have told me so many more things happened at the school where I didn't know about it. But anyway, I gave it to God because I know he's going work it out. He going to pay everybody according to what they owe. He ain't going to cheat for me, and he ain't going to cheat for you. And that's how I live it. | 8:59 |
Betty Artis | But Dr. White, when I carried him to the doctor, he told me if I ever, if I ever know of anybody else for their child, not mine, theirs, and he found out, he said, "You the one going to get the punishment." My husband kept saying don't press charges. And I went along with it. | 9:24 |
Leslie Brown | Let me ask you one more question. Do you have any dealings with White people? | 9:46 |
Betty Artis | Do I? | 9:46 |
Leslie Brown | Did you when you move here, or when you were in Virginia? | 9:46 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. Yeah. I had a lot of White friends, well, I don't want to say White friends, but communication. And over here, just to store people. And like I said, the peoples where my husband would buy things for the farm. I met them, got to know them, and the bank peoples. And Mr. Charles Terry, when he was living that field over there in the front of our house, he stayed and talked to me at that road. But I haven't never had no dealing with no, what said, no real business White people much. | 10:14 |
Betty Artis | And Dr. White told me he was a White doctor. But he told me that. He said that woman ought not to. Her license ought to be took from her. So she would never be able to teach nobody else's a child if she didn't have no better sense than the whoop a child like that. And Fred was broke. He was 12 or 14 years old. Sure did. | 11:02 |
Leslie Brown | Do you remember Colored and White signs? | 11:38 |
Betty Artis | Who? | 11:43 |
Leslie Brown | Do you remember ever seeing signs that said Colored and White? | 11:43 |
Betty Artis | Yeah. | 11:47 |
Leslie Brown | Where did you see them? | 11:47 |
Betty Artis | When I was in Virginia, at the cafes and in the theater, in the train station. White on one side. And that's what they'd have. White. White only. | 11:49 |
Leslie Brown | Were they the same? | 12:09 |
Betty Artis | What do you mean? | 12:11 |
Leslie Brown | The Colored side and the White side. Were they the same? | 12:12 |
Betty Artis | Well, I don't even know. I can't. I want to tell the truth, but I know the it would be a partition between. And the Black on one side and the White on the other. | 12:19 |
Leslie Brown | Did you see any of them here? | 12:27 |
Betty Artis | No, when I moved here I didn't never. I used to go down there to—Well, no. Because I didn't never go to no White places. The place I used to go to in Scotland Neck, it was a Black girl. They were right beside the funeral home in Scotland Neck, Mutts Funeral Home. It was Marie's name. I can't think of that name. But anyhow. | 12:39 |
Betty Artis | And I used to go enter that place where they called Mike. So he sell good ice cream, but I don't remember seeing no signs in there in his little cafe. But in [indistinct 00:13:30] sure enough had. They sure did. | 13:04 |
Leslie Brown | Where? | 13:30 |
Betty Artis | Down there at, I can't call the name, but the little cafe is tiny across the railroad. And it was right on that corner. | 13:31 |
Leslie Brown | Is that Meyer? No. | 13:45 |
Betty Artis | No, no. No, it wasn't Mayer. Meyer Street go like this, and you go down across the next crosser and turn. And that cafe was right on that end. And when you wore anything you had to go to a window. You didn't go in the store and get it. I do remember that. But I didn't bother with it. | 13:55 |
Leslie Brown | You didn't bother with it at all? You didn't go to the cafe? | 14:05 |
Betty Artis | Anywhere I used to see if it said White only from a child on up. My daddy was like that. He just didn't bother with it. And he taught us not to bother, and we didn't. But I seen the signs. | 14:06 |
Betty Artis | But when we went in the train station to catch the train or anything like that, we would go in on the Black side. The White view over there like that. And I remember one time, that was in the 40s, I was going from Boykins to Orlando to go to Greenwood, Maryland. That's where my brother was in there service there. And we was going in there to see him, me and his wife. And when we got to the station to get on, all of the Blacks had to stand back and let the Whites get on first as we were going in there. | 14:32 |
Betty Artis | And I told Larena then, I said, "This is my last time." I said, "My ticket cost me just as much as, it might cost me more than, theirs did." Sure did. You got in the line to get on there. The Whites got in the front. And when the Blacks, the Blacks and the White were mixed up, and they get that reach for them White tickets. Every one of them got all the White tickets, and then the Black, started taking up the Blacks. | 15:28 |
Betty Artis | Yes sir. Sure did. And we got in there to the base where my brother was, everybody was together. And I wanted to know how come it couldn't been like that back here? They was in service. IT didn't work that way. | 16:02 |
Leslie Brown | And when was that? That was in the 1940s. | 16:19 |
Betty Artis | It was in the 40s. I think it was between, let's see, Widener went in service 44 or 45, somewhere longer in there. Because he had come in the service when Mama died, and he stayed in three years. Mama died in 47. So three from seven will leave four, wouldn't it? So about 44, 44 or 45 come when he went in service. And he had took his boot training, and I don't know whether he had been there a year or no. But I know he wrote and told his wife he wanted to come see me? She didn't want go by herself. So she asked me to go, and I went on with her. | 16:19 |
Leslie Brown | Did you ever work for anybody White? | 17:29 |
Betty Artis | I worked for Dr. Quinlan in Courtland, Virginia. And I worked for Mr. Hugh Beal in Courtland, Virginia. I was just a babysitter for Dr. Quinlan, and I've worked in the house for Mr. Hugh Beal. And I've worked for them two White people in the house. And Mr. Earkin, he used to get me to come over there to the club, hunting club, and fix breakfast and clean up for them. And he was living, where I told you Frank rented that land, he asked me to come over there. I didn't like that because it was too many White men, and me one. | 17:35 |
Betty Artis | Frank would be over there with me. I just didn't like the idea of all them White men. Frank, he'd be out there sometimes cleaning up around the club, and I'd be on the inside cooking breakfast. And they all in there. I didn't like that. | 18:27 |
Leslie Brown | No? | 18:40 |
Betty Artis | No, I didn't. I did it for them one fall. The next fall, I didn't feel up to it, but that was the reason I didn't. And they were drinking and doing. And a person get to drink, and they'll do things a lot of times they wouldn't do if they were sober. And I got things about that. I said, "Uh-huh. I ain't even going over there." And I didn't go. | 18:42 |
Leslie Brown | You didn't like the way they acted? | 18:56 |
Betty Artis | I was treated all right, but I didn't want to get to a place that I would begin to feel like that I was going to get in trouble in some way over there with them. Because I said Frank could be gone somewhere, and they know he gone. And I'm on the inside thinking he is there. And as many of them as it was, with him being there, they could have killed both of us and went on about their business. And Mr. Earkin, he open the club, and sometimes he'd go clean around the mountain, just leave it open for them. No sooner they eat their breakfast, and I washed up the dishes and things, I'd be ready to leave. | 18:56 |
Leslie Brown | Is that something that you were ever afraid of? | 19:43 |
Betty Artis | No, I wasn't afraid of it, but I began to think about what could have, if it had have been like I can here tell the same, he done never got me over there the first time. Because I'm going to tell you, men drinking and doing, they'll do anything. And with this mess these got on in there is worse than the world right back there then. | 19:48 |
Betty Artis | Thank God I've been blessed. Like I say, I'm 75 years old, and I have never had no trouble of being upset or getting frightened or whatever. I want to walk the road now. But everybody tell me to stay out of that road. And I hate to be hardheaded, but I get in the road and walk from here to that store and back anytime. I did when my husband was living. Take my exercise. But I don't now. I walked from here up to Miss Peach and back. Now, I don't say I could do it as often as I used to. I used do it every day unless it was the weather stopped me from being. | 20:12 |
Leslie Brown | Well, when you were younger, what did you do for fun? | 21:06 |
Betty Artis | Hmm? | 21:07 |
Leslie Brown | What did you do for fun? | 21:07 |
Betty Artis | Excuse me for [indistinct 00:21:19] I'm going to say, but work my tail off. That's all. It was always something to do. I used to like to play ball, but that was the biggest game. And that was right in the yard at home. But we all, my mama, I don't know, she just draws people. And people's children would come there all day long. And this time of year, she was going to make a batch of cookers and lemonade, and when they get hot and tired, she'd tell them come and rest. She'd serve them. And then go back and play like that. | 21:19 |
Betty Artis | But most time I was just, what you say, they handy girl around the house to do the chores that she couldn't. See, my mama wanted children real fast too. And a lot of times things that she couldn't do, she would always call me to do it. And I just stayed around home. And I started singing when I was seven years old, and I enjoyed going to church and Sunday school. And that's just me. I never took no trips or nothing for after I got married. I went to one movie, went to the fair twice before I got married. I was 19 when I got married. That's the reason I got married, so I could be grown enough to do something. That's what I thought. | 21:50 |
Betty Artis | I did do a lot of more things that I had always wanted to do after I got married because my husband wanted to do these things. But he never was a person to go. | 22:35 |
Betty Artis | Since he been dead, I'm going to tell you truth. He done drugged me from left to right, and still think they ought to drag. I told him, "I got to slow down. I can't go every time they said, 'Come on. Go.'" But I'm thankful that they want to keep me going, but I can't go every time. And I always liked my flowers, and I worked my flowers. And I always would have a garden, my little child's garden. Little roll sometime on the lawns but two or three hills. And Mama get that off of that and lawn in. You didn't freeze and do like you do now. She used to can and jar. Get them little paint jars up there and put them up there and put the seal label on that daddy. | 22:50 |
Betty Artis | I'd look at that. I thought I had done something. Around there, 8, 9, 10 years old, man. I always liked to do things like that, but I think that was one of my best harvest that I had, was always trying to have some mix some. But my flowers and my garden. Yes ma'am. And if you want to make me mad, let me have my flowers and some child come along and trample them down or just tear them up. It hurts me so bad. | 23:44 |
Leslie Brown | Is there anything about your history that I didn't ask you that you think I should, you think we should know? | 24:13 |
Betty Artis | No. | 24:27 |
Leslie Brown | Do you have any advice for young people? | 24:27 |
Betty Artis | I just wish parents would stop using the word, "I don't want my child brought up I was," as in my age group, and tell them the reason why. But stop using that word, "I don't want you to be like I was." And get the children to understand that one day they have to step out on their own, and they need to start at a young age, not wait until they get way up. And people be more caution of what their children are involved in because a lot of times our children can get involved in things, and we don't even know about it. | 24:46 |
Betty Artis | I feel like that the parents should be more, feel like they know about, which direction. Then when they can see this change come, that's the time for them to put pressure, more pressure, on them. I believe we would have better girls and boys, but our mothers and fathers have got to see to this, not just tell them and turn them loose. It's not, you don't trust. But you be sure of what I'm telling you, are you getting the message? | 25:36 |
Betty Artis | Because you see, in my day my older sister, ain't nothing but legs. But we used to wear these long cotton, like the peoples called the thigh highs now. Them now, old, heavy stocking for the winter. And we had underwear, like the men got these one-piece underwear. And we had to wear where them. Well, we had to walk six miles to school, and they was trying to protect our legs. She put them on just as good as anything in this world. She got her [indistinct 00:26:53], and she'll put them in her book bag. And then she get it at school, she go right straight to that toilet, and she'd take them off. | 26:10 |
Betty Artis | She didn't want to have them White roll down through her stocking. She didn't want, she was ashamed for anybody to see her wearing. You see these things. And mom and dad thought she left home with it. She come back with it. You see they just felt like that she was doing it. But if they had a checked in at the school unexpected to her and took notice, you see, they would've known. And we told them about it after we got grown. They should have whooped her now. But I also, so I was, yeah, I had to wear mine. But if I had of told it, that girl would've kept me, and I know it. So therefore, I kept it in me. | 26:57 |
Betty Artis | My mama. I what I'm saying, just like she got by with that, kids today get by with different things. You see what I'm saying? So parents need to not pinpoint because it look like you don't have no confidence in the child. It's not that. But if you want to be sure what's going on, you better pay more attention. Do you understand what I'm saying? And I believe we would have better girls and boys. But as parents, I think we as parents, need to really get ourself together and let the children know. Even though if we have did these things, we didn't have sense enough to know what it was going to do to us later on. | 27:52 |
Betty Artis | Don't hide what you have done from your child. Let your child know. If that child is doing the same thing, let that child know I did it. And the reason I did it, I really didn't listen to what was taught to me, or I didn't know no better. Now, I'm telling you because I know it is a better way. | 28:44 |
Leslie Brown | How was your life? How was your life— | 29:09 |
Betty Artis | Well— | 29:09 |
Leslie Brown | —different from your mother's life? | 29:09 |
Betty Artis | I don't know. That might be hard for me to explain, in a way, because my mother was fatherless from seven years old, and my father lived until I was 50 some years old. And my father never left us. He was always there, and she was here, there, and everywhere. She was with her older sister and her older brother and running [indistinct 00:30:14]. And she ended up with one of her aunt on her mama's side when she got married. But her mother was still living. | 29:27 |
Betty Artis | Because she say that she called it real hard not having a father. And she never known, really, what her father was. And when she married my father, then she took his father as her father, and she said he felt like a father because she knew him. But she never got to know her father, and she said she was seven, going on seven years old, when he died. Her baby was going on seven years old when she died. And she said it seemed like a dream. Once in a while she can remember. Then again she can't, her father, things that he did or whatever. But she said she was taught that she had a real good father, but he didn't live long enough for her to really know, have a father's love or whatever. | 30:23 |
Betty Artis | But I would say I had a good life, and I had some ups and downs in that life, which I reckon is something for all of us. But I think I've had a blessed life. I feel happy about it anyway. I was mistreated some with my older sister-in-law. But I reckon this due to sisters-in-law. I reckon it is. But she was the only one. The rest of us, we always got along all right. | 31:23 |
Betty Artis | And my daddy did look like he put her higher than he did me. Because if I needed shoes, and she needed shoes, she was going to get them first. I take the ones that she's getting rid of until I could get me some. But anyway, I don't think I had a bad life. To look at the way the world is today, I think I had a blessed life. I never was hungry. I never was naked. I might was shoeless at the time, but I had the sign of the shoe. If it was all busted over my toe. We never had to be—We lived in some [indistinct 00:33:02] house, but we never got cold. | 32:07 |
Betty Artis | My daddy was a good provider. He believed in his children having plenty to eat, keeping them warm, and giving them the little things that he could give them. He did that, and no education at all. I myself learned him how, I taught him how to write his name. In the fifth grade. And told him, "Daddy, come on. Let's write your name." | 33:05 |
Betty Artis | "Yeah, I can't write my name." | 33:35 |
Betty Artis | "Yes, you can Dad." I took his hand and took the pencil. Before he died, he could write Lewis. But he couldn't read or tap. But you better not put that figure before him. The labor keep on sitting. | 33:35 |
Betty Artis | And the ringer stopped her. | 34:03 |
Leslie Brown | Yes, you did. | 34:04 |
Betty Artis | And the other 10 children live to get grown. I'm still able to fix my breakfast. I don't clean up no more. I was thinking yesterday, I said, "If [indistinct 00:34:28] could get back in, walk in this room, she would stop and look at me, ask me whatever happened." I'd had to tell her, "Mama, it's here. But I can't." Whenever it's cool, I can do pretty good. When it get hot like it is now, it ain't much I can do. So I think I am a blessed child. The oldest girl, she died. The baby boy, he is dead. The next boy, he is dead. That's it. | 34:14 |
Betty Artis | So I am the next oldest one, and my brothers is next to me. And then the other three sisters. So the 10 of us that live to get grown, there's six of us living. So I think, I just think I'm truly blessed. Tell you the truth. I sure do. I think I'm truly. I know I am. I was telling the girl just now. I said I got up this morning. I was thinking by myself. I said, "Lord, you blessed me once. You blessed me twice." When I think about it, he's been blessing me all of my life. And he has. He's good to me. So good. So good. So good. | 35:00 |
Betty Artis | I wanted that place out there more. Then once we got the thing to do it with, promised it was. Nobody did. I walked to there Friday. I stood there. I said, "Lord, looked like to me," I said, "the bushes was coming to my door." And I worked in the garden a while. And then I come in the house. And when I got in here, I was hot. So put the fan on. I got over on the chair and laid down. I went to sleep. | 35:49 |
Betty Artis | When I got up. No, I said, "Lord," I said, "I've asked." I said, "I don't want to do it for nothing." I said, "I'm leaving it in your hand." That was Friday last week. And Monday, when I laid down in that chair and went to sleep, woke up, folks, they done cut. The state had come through. I said, "Thank you, Lord." I said, "I ain't got to pay nobody. Got to pay nobody." I said, "And it's done, too. I just wish it could have went all the way on down." But I'm thankful for that. | 36:23 |
Betty Artis | And that's when I was telling the girl, I say, I'm going to tell you. I say, I said, "Lord, you blessed me once. You blessed me twice." I said, "But when I think about, I know he's blessed me all of my life." And she said, "What you mean, Ms. Betty?" I said, "I mean what I said." She was saying, "Look at you. Look like it's hard." It ain't that hard to me. Things I want done, I can't do myself, why worry about it? Worry is not getting it done, is what I'm saying. So I just asked him. I said, "I'm leaving it in your hands, Lord." And that was Friday. And Monday, them folks coming on there and hewed that place there. | 37:04 |
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