Jessie Chassion interview recording, 1994 August 02

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Jessie Lee Chassion	Neat.	0:01
Michele Mitchell	Okay. This is on August 3rd, 1994. And this is an interview with Ms. Lee Chassion? Yes. You could spell your first name and your last name—	0:04
Jessie Lee Chassion	J-E-S-S-I-E L-E-E C-H-A-S-S-I-O-N.	0:11
Michele Mitchell	Ms. Lee Chassion, if you could tell me where you were born and when you were born?	0:22
Jessie Lee Chassion	I was born in Freetown, it's out in the rural area, August 15th, 1926.	0:28
Michele Mitchell	Now, what was it like growing up in Freetown?	0:37
Jessie Lee Chassion	It was—You see our—We were surrounded with White neighbors. Okay. Now, it wasn't really—You had to get permission to pass to use that road. My grandmother that raised me being a midwife, she—My uncles would send her to ask, could they go come to town? You see, it was nothing out there but country. They would tell her, yes. Okay? Because the other way, too many holes, you couldn't go that way in an old car. But when we would get there, there would be a tree or something in the road where you couldn't pass.	0:40
Michele Mitchell	And this would always happen?	1:39
Jessie Lee Chassion	They would, you know—If you couldn't, you had to come back because you—Like it's raining. It has been raining. It was no way you could go the other way because the roads were too bad. So she would go ask by—She was the midwife and she would go for the White babies and the Black babies, for every baby. She would go, "Oh yes, y'all could pass." But when you would get there to pass, you couldn't pass because they had already blocked the road, put a tree or something across the road.	1:42
Michele Mitchell	So who would she go ask?	2:16
Jessie Lee Chassion	Huh? She would go ask Joe Norris. That was—The road went in front of his house.	2:18
Michele Mitchell	How do you spell his name?	2:22
Jessie Lee Chassion	His name was Joe Norris.	2:23
Michele Mitchell	Okay.	2:25
Jessie Lee Chassion	So whether it was his road or not, I don't know, but the road did pass in front of his house, so you had to get his permission.	2:29
Michele Mitchell	Now see, I thought that Freetown had mostly Blacks in it. So it's—	2:38
Jessie Lee Chassion	Now.	2:41
Michele Mitchell	Now.	2:42
Jessie Lee Chassion	But when I grew up—You see Freetown is Freetown, but where I grew up was out from Freetown. And Mr. Joe's road was—it passed in front of his house, so we had to get his permission to use that road. If he wanted you to do it—But you see, my uncles, they were farmers and he did make pretty good crops and that was, it was like a no-no. You wasn't supposed to do that because it was his father's land. It was really my grandmother's land. Then they had a mortgage on the land and she paid it, but then by her not reading or writing my uncle had to pay it again. So he saved the land. The land is still back there but it's jammed in a corner. So you had no way to come out unless you would go, you'd go on his road.	2:43
Michele Mitchell	That's—	3:58
Jessie Lee Chassion	This land was handed down from my great-grandfather, Tom, Tom Simon. It fell—Well then my grandfather, who was Morris Simon, so the land was just from one generation to the other. My grandmother said they didn't believe in Black people having land. That's why they did us that.	4:01
Michele Mitchell	But that's just—I mean, putting a tree in the road?	4:37
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah. You see. But he had people working for him and they would haul a tree and put it across the road where you couldn't cross that tree with your car. Car was already old to start off with.	4:40
Michele Mitchell	What sort of things did your uncle raise on the farm?	4:55
Jessie Lee Chassion	He raised, he had okra, he had cotton, cane, and he raised vegetables. Because they had big gardens and all the food that we ate, like cabbage and beets and whatever, was raised in that garden. He even had, they would plant peanuts. They tried to plant as much food as they could because there was—You couldn't say you would come to town and buy something because you didn't know how you would get there. So they tried to—and they raised cattle, and in the summer they would kill calf. In the wintertime they would do hogs, so you had your meat. They had chickens, they had things like that that you would have—But they didn't raise rice.	4:57
Michele Mitchell	They didn't?	5:53
Jessie Lee Chassion	They did not raise rice. But we had corn to grind to make corn meal. Cows to milk. So they couldn't starve us out. We couldn't starve. But if you had to come to buy, if somebody needed something or a pair of shoes or something, you had to get their permission to do it. To come. We lived through it, but there was no other way.	5:54
Michele Mitchell	How long did this go on?	6:24
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, that went on till that old man died. When that old man died, I think I was about 12. Then it got better. Now it's not like that out there now, because now—I don't know, the Whites have just about all moved away. So it's not like—Then now this day and time, they would have problems doing that. You know? So—then I went to school here.	6:27
Michele Mitchell	In New Iberia?	7:09
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah. Okay. Everything was labeled. It was White only. You follow me? We used to have a ice house here and it had faucets, drinking fountains, White only. But there was a faucet with a hose connected and if you wanted to drink, you could drink from that hose.	7:11
Michele Mitchell	It was just a hose?	7:42
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, you know, could turn the water on and drink from the hose. The bathrooms at filling stations and whatever, White only.	7:43
Michele Mitchell	So there was not even just one Colored restroom? Nothing at all—	7:55
Jessie Lee Chassion	No. Not at no filling station. It was White only. If you wanted a sandwich or something from a White place, you went to the back door. You knocked and they'd come and see what you wanted and they'd go fix it and hand it to you. And all the help was Black.	8:00
Michele Mitchell	All of it?	8:30
Jessie Lee Chassion	All of kitchen help, they were Black but that's the way they did things. Even if you went in a store like a shop and say I'd walk in first and the White woman was behind me, they look over your head and say, "May I help you?" You waited.	8:31
Michele Mitchell	This always happened?	8:58
Jessie Lee Chassion	It always happened. It always just happened and nothing could be done about it.	8:59
Michele Mitchell	Did anyone try to do something about it?	9:11
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	9:12
Michele Mitchell	No?	9:13
Jessie Lee Chassion	No. I finished school on the second day of June, 1944. In May, that's when you start with your commencement exercises. So we had our graduation, but we didn't have a class night. Because that's when—had a Black man, Black guy came here and he was going to teach welding to Black people. And the doctors, we had a Dr. Dorsey who had his own private clinic. We had Dr. Schoolings who was a dentist. We had—no, Dr. Pearson was the dentist. Dr. Schoolings was in internal medicine. And we had Herman Faulk, he was the agriculture teacher at school. And they were getting together to teach these Black guys to weld so they could, in time, better their condition.	9:14
Jessie Lee Chassion	But it didn't work because that's when they got together, these White folk, and ran these doctors out of town overnight. They had to leave. One guy, Leo Hardy, they took him out in the woods and they beat him, but he died. This other man, Gus Barone, they beat him but he didn't die, but he played dead and he lived. But all the Black doctors and Herman Faulk, they had to leave town like—just right now.	10:19
Michele Mitchell	They just left?	10:59
Jessie Lee Chassion	They had to to save their lives and their family's life. They left and that was the end of the welding school. They didn't want Black people to know nothing or be nothing but just work for them for whatever they decided to pay you.	10:59
Michele Mitchell	What did they pay people?	11:13
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, if a woman worked and she made two and a half or $3 a day, she was making big money. And you know what else they had? You see these oil field companies, these people would move here from out of state, these White people. They had a newcomers club. These White women had a newcomers club and these new women that would come, they'd have this meeting and that was to tell them how much they were supposed to pay.	11:17
Michele Mitchell	Really?	11:51
Jessie Lee Chassion	I'm telling you babe.	11:52
Michele Mitchell	See, no one's told me that.	11:53
Jessie Lee Chassion	Because no, they ain't going to tell you, but I'm going to tell it like it is. The limit—And when they paid you $3 a day, you went there in the morning, you did everything. You cooked, you washed, you ironed, you mind the children, you stayed all day for those $3.	11:54
Michele Mitchell	Watching children—	12:12
Jessie Lee Chassion	Everything was included. Everything was included. That's why they had the newcomers club. Because, you see these people that were coming from out of state, they had been used to paying more so they would want to do it. But these women would get them together and tell them not to give them too much. But now some of these women didn't buy that. They paid whatever they wanted to pay. They didn't go along with it because they didn't feel like it was right.	12:13
Michele Mitchell	But to organize a club to tell people what to pay—	12:51
Jessie Lee Chassion	They did it. It was called the Newcomers Club. It was for newcomers, new women that's come into town. So they had this and they'd go and have the meeting, and so that's what it was all about. "So you don't pay them too more than we—Because all we pay is just $3, so you stay on that level."	12:57
Michele Mitchell	Would this be five days a week to the women that left—	13:20
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh no, it wasn't no such a thing as five days a week. It was six, seven days a week, whatever they wanted to do. Whatever. It was no five day week work. This is all new. It was whatever amount of days and they could tell you what time to come to work, but they never told you what time to leave. What you were going to leave. If they say, "Be here for 7:00." Okay, you be there. But you never think you going to leave at 3:00. You were going to stay until.	13:22
Michele Mitchell	Until—	14:05
Jessie Lee Chassion	If it was somebody sick, you took care of them too. You did it all. You did everything.	14:05
Michele Mitchell	So folks would never get extra money if there more was more to do?	14:15
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh no, you wouldn't get no more money. You'd get that same amount. That's the way it was.	14:18
Michele Mitchell	So what would Black women do with their own children?	14:30
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, they leave them with the next person. Sometime they had—Some of them had a mother or somebody or the next neighbor. They help each other out. That's how they do it.	14:34
Michele Mitchell	In the neighborhood?	14:50
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah, you'd try to see if could get somebody see if they'd try to help you out.	14:51
Michele Mitchell	So how many Black women would live with White women that they worked with?	14:55
Jessie Lee Chassion	Huh?	14:58
Michele Mitchell	Would there be any women, Black women, who would live at the White people's house?	14:59
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, there a few, but not too many. Because you see, they didn't want you to live in there with them. They didn't have, very few of them had a outside, a room outside or something where you could live. If they did—But you see people didn't want to do that because then you'd never be off.	15:02
Michele Mitchell	Oh, yes.	15:29
Jessie Lee Chassion	Because, okay, you see if company came in the middle of the night and they decided they wanted you to come make coffee, they'd call you. So it wasn't very popular.	15:30
Michele Mitchell	I can see why.	15:40
Jessie Lee Chassion	Nobody didn't want to do it. Nobody didn't want to do it.	15:41
Michele Mitchell	Now did you work for any families?	15:46
Jessie Lee Chassion	No. When I went to school I did, but I worked for a lady and she had two boys. But she was not Creole and her husband wasn't either. So I stayed in the house and now she treated me good and she taught me a lot about life itself. She would explain things to me. She was a pretty nice person, but she was born rich and I don't know I guess that made the difference.	15:48
Michele Mitchell	How so?	16:40
Jessie Lee Chassion	Because she wasn't like the rest of them. Because I went to school and she always stressed how important it was for me to go to school. But a lot of them didn't want you to go to school. Because I have a son that—I did restaurant after I grew up all my life and my son and I let him work with me after school washing dishes because he needed a little extra money. One day he—He didn't like to go to school to start off with. And one day he told me that the man said if he wasn't going to school, he would give him a full-time job. Believe it or not, I made him quit. I didn't quit, and I needed for him to work, but he didn't want to go and this wasn't going to help me none.	16:41
Jessie Lee Chassion	I wanted him to finish school so I said, "Well as of today, you don't come back." I told the man, I said, "Don't put that in his head. He don't want to go as it is." He did finish. He got a paper route. He cut yards and he did finish and he went in the service and stayed 24 years. But that was me. Because I couldn't see him telling my child that to keep him down the rest of his life. He's 40 some years old, he'd still be washing dishes. But we were just absolutely nothing. They had a way they would drive by and if you were outside—"Do you want to come babysit?" And if you say no, they wanted to know why.	17:45
Michele Mitchell	They'd ask you why?	18:47
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well why you don't want to come here? I'm going to pay you. You couldn't use for an excuse, "Well I don't have nobody to stay with my children." They might just tell you, you could leave them alone to come mind they—	18:48
Michele Mitchell	Watch theirs.	19:00
Jessie Lee Chassion	That's the way it was. Nobody know unless you been there. It's better, but it still have some far to go. It's not right. It's better now, but we still have a long way to go. We have a long way to go because it's like even today, wherever you are, wherever go it look like they'd have two sets of rules. You follow me? They have a set for the White and another set for the Black. But you have to be strong and you don't have to get violent, but you have to let them know you're not crazy. But this has been going on for so long. It's like, especially in this part of the country in this—It's like this fear is still—	19:02
Michele Mitchell	Still there?	20:11
Jessie Lee Chassion	Uh-huh.	20:11
Michele Mitchell	Why do you think the fear is there?	20:15
Jessie Lee Chassion	I guess it come from they think they going to lose out or something. If we—We could make it better if we would learn to hold together. But you know what? You see what I mean? But we haven't come that far yet.	20:16
Michele Mitchell	So even back in the 50's and 40's, people didn't hold together?	20:39
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	20:42
Michele Mitchell	Is that what you're saying?	20:43
Jessie Lee Chassion	And yes. And you see they would—Like if you fixing to do something or we going to do such and such. Well, somebody in the crowd would go tell. So they know what you're planning to do. You see that's what happened with these doctors. They had somebody that was in the crowd with them and they took all the information and then brought it to these people. They knew about the welding school before it even got off the ground, so they just went on and stopped it because they had the information. They didn't even let it get started. But somebody went and told them.	20:46
Michele Mitchell	Now, why would somebody do that?	21:32
Jessie Lee Chassion	I don't know. I don't know why they would do it. The person that went and told, they were a principal of a school. I don't know if it was to hole their job. I don't know what it was for. But they the one that told and that's how I just—flat up. No. So they never could start it, they never could get it where they could teach these Black guys how to weld. Because this man wasn't from here who was going to, and he always felt like in time they would be accepted in these positions. And they are now. Huh?	21:37
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	22:34
Jessie Lee Chassion	But at that time, only White went offshore. Only White.	22:36
Michele Mitchell	Only Whites went offshore?	22:42
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh yes ma'am. Black didn't go offshore, and Blacks didn't do nothing but common labor.	22:43
Michele Mitchell	Now when you say common labor, you mean like digging ditches?	22:56
Jessie Lee Chassion	Or sweeping or being the Johnny chore. You didn't see Blacks in the post start working like they do now. They carry mail and they work in the post office and in the banks, they all over the place. But that wasn't that way. If you were there, you would've made or you would've done it to. That's what you were.	22:59
Michele Mitchell	Now did those jobs pay better than cutting cane or doing something like that?	23:21
Jessie Lee Chassion	They would pay maybe like $5 a day, six, something like that.	23:28
Michele Mitchell	So did you stay out in Freetown or—	23:38
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	23:39
Michele Mitchell	—did you move to town?	23:40
Jessie Lee Chassion	No, I left Freetown. I was about 12 years old. No.	23:41
Michele Mitchell	Because I wanted to ask you earlier, you said that you went to school in New Iberia?	23:47
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yes.	23:50
Michele Mitchell	You always came to school in New Iberia. They would block the road so that your grandmother couldn't get to town, how did you get to school?	23:50
Jessie Lee Chassion	I didn't live—I wasn't living there, I was living here. I could walk to school. You see, you couldn't send your children to—They had a little school out there, a little country school. But if it rained too much, the children couldn't go to school because it was too much water. So I came to school here and I lived here. I had family here so I could go to school.	23:56
Michele Mitchell	So what was it like, I mean, were the White people in Freetown the same as the White people here? I mean—	24:21
Jessie Lee Chassion	Now the only thing, sometime you run into a mean bunch like the children. Well children I guess would be children. If you were walking the sidewalk and they were coming, and if they wanted you to get off the sidewalk and get in the streets, you just had better do it.	24:27
Michele Mitchell	Even with children?	24:46
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah. But the grown people, they wouldn't bother you too much. They wouldn't. But you see it's—But the children and there was nobody to tell, you were always wrong regardless. So you just went on and tried to make it.	24:47
Michele Mitchell	So there was never a point that you would play with White children or—	25:09
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh, no.	25:11
Michele Mitchell	No?	25:12
Jessie Lee Chassion	No, no—No. You didn't play with them, you didn't.	25:13
Michele Mitchell	Now did any Whites live around you once you moved to town?	25:24
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	25:27
Michele Mitchell	Where did you live?	25:28
Jessie Lee Chassion	Huh?	25:28
Michele Mitchell	Where did you live?	25:29
Jessie Lee Chassion	You see, it was like I lived on Walton Street. Now there was a White store and Mr. Deltham lived next door, but he had his store. If it was a White business, they would live either in the business or next door. But they would have stores in the Black neighborhoods, and they knew they were making their money off of Black people so they would be a little nicer. But if you couldn't read and write—Cause you see they used to sell the grocery, you could buy the grocery and pay credit. But you had to know, or you had to have somebody that knew how to keep up with for you because they might charge you for this week and last week too. You see? That's how they did it.	25:30
Michele Mitchell	You would be wrong if you said, "Wait a minute, you know, you can't charge me because, you know—"	26:48
Jessie Lee Chassion	I paid. Well they knew you didn't—Like some of these people didn't read, so they just took their word for it. They did things in a way where you would—It's no way you could get ahead. It's no way.	26:52
Jessie Lee Chassion	So, you don't understand me now.	27:28
Michele Mitchell	I understand it, but it doesn't make sense in terms of doing everything you can to make sure that people can't get ahead.	27:39
Jessie Lee Chassion	But that's—See, that was the policy at that time. You see even like the Greyhound bus, they had a sign on the Greyhound bus. You know that long seat in the back?	27:45
Michele Mitchell	Oh, yeah.	28:01
Jessie Lee Chassion	That's where we had to sit. Because they had two little signs, Colored. Now if the bus wasn't crowded, those next two seats, you could sit there. They wouldn't tell you nothing. But if the bus started to fill up and you was sitting there and you were holding a baby, you got up. Sometimes it just wasn't enough room on that back seat for everybody.	28:02
Michele Mitchell	Well yeah. I mean it's long, but it's not that long.	28:34
Jessie Lee Chassion	But that's the way it was.	28:37
Michele Mitchell	Were there things that would happen in town, like incidents between Blacks and Whites that—where someone would end up being killed, or anything rough like that happen?	28:38
Jessie Lee Chassion	No, because the Blacks just stayed away. I mean, they knew and they just—	28:52
Michele Mitchell	So basically then Black folks knew what to do when—	29:05
Jessie Lee Chassion	They did know. That's right. They knew and they didn't get into trouble. Now I remember when they integrated the schools here. My kids were out of school and my grandkids were too young. Henderson High was right there on Henderson Street. One week, only one week they had problems. But I do believe they felt—I don't know if they thought it was like the old generation, it didn't work like that. Those children stood their ground. They stood their ground and right at the corner over there, those children were turning over—They turned over police cars, they burned books, they did all kind of things. Those boys were tied, bound their hands like this and they would fight. And in one week's time, it was just as peaceful as ever. Because, you see, it's like the children—the parents—	29:07
Jessie Lee Chassion	I was working with a lady and her daughter got into something and she had to leave. And when she came back, she said how her daughter got beat up. I said, "But Ada, you wrong. You should have told her to mind her own business and don't get involved in this." But it didn't last. In one week it was all straightened out and everybody just went to school and no more incidents. But they had to fight and at first we did fight. They fought honey. Because a boy, he's a man now, was living in the back and me and his grandmother were talking and he was coming from school. He told her, he said, "Mommy, just soon whip me enough today for tomorrow, because I'm fighting again tomorrow." She just put the belt up. But it's straight now and they still having problems. Well, all the children not doing what's right, the White or the Black. You know? But that went down much better than they thought it would.	30:31
Michele Mitchell	Do you think a lot of parents would punish their kids if they were burning books and that one week that things were happening?	31:38
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	31:47
Michele Mitchell	No?	31:48
Jessie Lee Chassion	Uh-huh. I don't think they punished because those children said they were getting the raw end of the deal. It's like they wanted them to have the old books and they just wasn't going to stand for it. Nope, they didn't do their children nothing. But it didn't last long, and the peace came and it just went peaceful.	31:48
Michele Mitchell	Now what was it like when you were in school?	32:14
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, you see our school was all Black.	32:14
Michele Mitchell	Now, which school did you go to?	32:21
Jessie Lee Chassion	It was IPTS. But we were all Black.	32:23
Jessie Lee Chassion	So we didn't have incidents because we were all Black and they didn't come around us and we couldn't go around—No.	32:37
Michele Mitchell	Yeah.	32:55
Jessie Lee Chassion	So we just had no problems with them.	32:55
Michele Mitchell	But you finished high school right around during the war?	33:00
Jessie Lee Chassion	I finished school in '44.	33:02
Michele Mitchell	In '44? Did the war take away a lot of Black men—	33:06
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah.	33:08
Michele Mitchell	—in this area.	33:08
Jessie Lee Chassion	Did.	33:09
Michele Mitchell	So who was doing all these jobs that Black men were doing beforehand?	33:10
Jessie Lee Chassion	The women and the younger men. Young men—	33:13
Michele Mitchell	When the men would return, could they get their job back?	33:24
Jessie Lee Chassion	If they wanted to they would get work. But so many didn't come back here.	33:29
Michele Mitchell	Huh.	33:39
Jessie Lee Chassion	They didn't come back. I see more people coming back home now. Because you see, this was the thing, "If I ever get away I'm not coming back." So many just, they just didn't—	33:39
Michele Mitchell	Didn't come back.	34:03
Jessie Lee Chassion	—didn't come back. They just didn't come back.	34:04
Michele Mitchell	But for young women like yourself, who were you going to marry if a lot of these men didn't come back?	34:10
Jessie Lee Chassion	Huh?	34:14
Michele Mitchell	Who did you marry if a lot of men didn't come back?	34:14
Jessie Lee Chassion	Take a old man. Well, that's the truth. But they didn't come back. But it's better. It's better. But we still could stand some improvement. We could stand some improvement.	34:18
Michele Mitchell	Yeah. In terms of jobs, in terms of—	34:47
Jessie Lee Chassion	Uh-huh. We could you know. But yet it's open. This is the thing, these kids, they have to understand that it's very important to get an education because that's the way they'll block you. That's the way that they'll block you. So you have to try to get as much as you can so you will be able to stand up. Just like with all this drugs and whatever. I see a lot. These boys, these Black boys, sure they pushing and all of that. They're not—They're doing it for the White man. You see them. A car drive, beautiful, hand in the pack. Why let them destroy you that way? You follow me?	34:53
Jessie Lee Chassion	But well, I guess it's fast money or whatever. But they only destroying you. They want you down there. They want to keep you down.	36:02
Michele Mitchell	Even now?	36:18
Jessie Lee Chassion	Sure! They want to keep you down there. But I do believe, I don't know why they hate us. We didn't do them anything. What was done, the wrong that was done, was done to us. When I was talking at church, I was talking to an old Reverend and he said, "Sister, I'm going to just tell you I need this fear." He said, "They might be afraid that the table would turn." But they look like they're afraid to really and truly give you a fair chance. They're afraid. If you talk to them and like, to me, I feel like if you talk to them with good sense and let them know you have good understanding, they'll respect you. They going listen. But that's why I say we've got to—We came a long way, but we still have a long way to go. We do.	36:22
Michele Mitchell	Do you think thing's are better for you than they were for your grandmother?	37:36
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh, yes.	37:39
Michele Mitchell	What did your—I mean you said your uncle did the farm. Did your grandmother farm too?	37:43
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah before her husband died. But you see, my grandmother was the only midwife around that area. And she was very seldom home.	37:48
Michele Mitchell	So she was busy?	37:58
Jessie Lee Chassion	She was very seldom home.	38:00
Michele Mitchell	Now, so when you got sick, did she take care of you or did you go to a doctor?	38:01
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well she—What you mean if I got—	38:07
Michele Mitchell	If you got sick. Once when you were a child, if she was a midwife, did she do other medicines and things like that?	38:12
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	38:17
Michele Mitchell	No?	38:18
Jessie Lee Chassion	No. We had to go to the doctor. But you see, they didn't let us get sick because they'd give us medicine all the time. So we were never sick. In the wintertime they put some olive oil and honey together and in a little jar. Soon as it started getting cold, everybody had to take some of that. That was, she said that was to oil your insides so you wouldn't catch a cold. So we didn't catch cold.	38:18
Michele Mitchell	That's olive oil and what?	38:54
Jessie Lee Chassion	And honey.	38:55
Michele Mitchell	And you just take a spoonful?	38:58
Jessie Lee Chassion	You'd stir it up in a little jar and you squeeze a little lemon in it and you mix it up in a jar. You kept that and you take some of that. I don't know if it kept the colds away, but I know we didn't have any. And I did it for my children.	38:59
Michele Mitchell	And it works?	39:20
Jessie Lee Chassion	Maybe it's in my mind, but it works.	39:21
Michele Mitchell	No, not—No, that works.	39:26
Jessie Lee Chassion	I still do it because that's the way they did with us and we were never sick. You see, and then in summer, all right it's summer and school would open. Then just before school opened, they would give you a purgative and then they would make soup and you would take that purgative and you would eat soup all day. They said that was getting the summer fever out of you. I don't know if it's true or not, but that's all they did for us and we didn't get sick.	39:27
Michele Mitchell	Now what was in the purgative?	40:08
Jessie Lee Chassion	Huh?	40:09
Michele Mitchell	What was the purgative? What was it? Was it just some herbs or something?	40:10
Jessie Lee Chassion	It was tasting like Epsom salt to me.	40:15
Michele Mitchell	Taste like Epsom salts?	40:16
Jessie Lee Chassion	Uh-huh. That's probably what it was.	40:18
Michele Mitchell	To get rid of the summer fever?	40:22
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yes. She said all up. She would call it biliousness.	40:28
Michele Mitchell	Now would you, I mean I heard somebody else say that if you got a cut, they used salt pork?	40:45
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah.	40:50
Michele Mitchell	Have you heard about that?	40:50
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah.	40:51
Michele Mitchell	So would your grandmother do that too?	40:52
Jessie Lee Chassion	She didn't do it to me because she used to do it to—I used to see them do that to the older ones. Because they would always get cut, cut feet, walking on something and they would put salt. You always had salt pork because that's the way you preserved your meat, with salt. They would put that on there until it would take the infection out. I bet you try that today you'd die.	40:54
Michele Mitchell	You think so?	41:22
Jessie Lee Chassion	I don't know. I don't know if I'd want to put no salt pork on no cut. But that's how they did it. And if you bled too, if you cut and you bled a lot, spiderweb.	41:28
Michele Mitchell	You just put the spiderweb on?	41:43
Jessie Lee Chassion	Get the spider it put a—and that would stop the bleeding.	41:43
Michele Mitchell	So there wasn't really any need to go to a doctor because folks knew how to take care of—	41:54
Jessie Lee Chassion	They took care of themselves. They took care of themselves. If they had—I even saw them, if a child had whooping cough and the horse, the mare had a colt, they'd run chase the mare around the pasture, then catch the mare and milk 'em and give that milk to that child for the whooping cough. But I never saw doctors too much. They didn't—too much. Now when my grandmother got older, she lived to be 89 and she went to her daughter in Galveston, I did too and stayed there a while. She said, bring her home. She didn't want to die over there. She want to come die at her house. We brought her home and she went to bed and she never got up. They got the doctor. I saw the doctor come. I was grown then. He said it was nothing with her but she was just old, because he couldn't find nothing. She didn't live but two weeks after that.	41:58
Jessie Lee Chassion	But I never, other than that, she never saw the doctor. Because whenever my cousins had babies, she'd do it. So you just didn't see it. With all they did to us and those White people would come to her, she'd go.	43:33
Jessie Lee Chassion	And sometime it was pouring down rain they'd come walking. She'd go. She had a old coat on. She put her old coat on and her little hat on her head and tie it. She'd go. No raincoat and no umbrellas, but she'd go. Sometimes they'd come on the old horse. She sits sideways on the horse and the man would lead the horse. And she went as much for White as she did Black.	44:00
Michele Mitchell	And they still did her that way?	44:23
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well they didn't call themselves doing it to her. They called themselves doing it to her son. Because you see, they knew she didn't have no car, she didn't drive. But yet they would do it.	44:28
Michele Mitchell	Now did your uncle sell his—	44:41
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	44:42
Michele Mitchell	No? So he was just doing well, but he was doing well for his family.	44:43
Jessie Lee Chassion	He farmed that land until that—He farmed it and he bought some more in another spot further away from that. Now where they was blocking us out, it's still there. His grandson lives there and he has a son that lives out there. They built and they lease the farm land.	44:53
Michele Mitchell	So they lease it now?	45:26
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah, they don't farm anymore.	45:27
Michele Mitchell	I see.	45:29
Jessie Lee Chassion	But it's still there.	45:29

Michele Mitchell	—has been done to people.	0:05
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh, yes.	0:06
Michele Mitchell	So much wrong that has been done and done to their children and just done to their parents.	0:06
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah. Yes. Not nice, but maybe it wasn't harder than my grandmother because she had been slaved.	0:13
Michele Mitchell	Your grandmother had been a slave?	0:25
Jessie Lee Chassion	Mm-hmm. Okay. So I guess she could cope with it. She had been a slave because she had—See, but it was worse with her because she had marks across her back where they had whipped her. She had a finger that was bent like this where a little boy had chopped it with a hatchet. But she had been slaved.	0:26
Michele Mitchell	Why did he chop it off?	1:04
Jessie Lee Chassion	I don't know. She said she was supposed to be taking care of the little boy. She was trying to make him do something that he didn't want to do. When she put her hand down and he chopped it, chopped it with a hatchet. And they tied it up some kind of way and it grew back, but it stayed crooked. Now my grandmother was dark because her father was dark. And you see, the war had freed the slaves, so he went. But she don't know if he got killed or what because she just don't know. Because you see the master took care of all that. The White man took care of all of that. And my grandmother had a sister that was fair and she had soft hair and I never did like to get my hair combed because I would just scream murder. I used to ask her why didn't I have hair like in Sally's children? And that's when I grew up and she told me about her daddy and her mama.	1:07
Jessie Lee Chassion	See, but Aunt Sally was for the master. She said if the master went in the little shack and decided to be with their mama, it was nothing nobody could do and they would be all right then. That's how he said it. Why Aunt Sally was bright and she wasn't? Now how could people do that with their children? But that's the way it was when she grew up because she was a slave. And she said it was so cold in the little shack where they had to live. Tell her her mama had to burn wood in the fireplace all night to try to keep our children warm because they had so many cracks in the walls and all that. Because if we'd complain, she'd tell us to stop complaining and to pray because we had it a whole lot better than her. And that's how she would be telling us that. That's right. It's bad, honey.	2:16
Speaker 3	[indistinct 00:03:34] here?	3:34
Jessie Lee Chassion	No, baby. Yes. It's been something. It's been something. And even here, every now and then, you have to call them down. Every now and then you have to call them down. Because like I tell them, I'm getting old and ain't nobody going to dog me no more because I ain't taking it. I'm not going to take it, baby. And every now and then, because sometime in here and I'll call them down. It's like they can't forget what you're supposed to do. They just can't forget it. And don't let nobody fool you. Even in here, see, I believe in telling the truth. Even in here, every now and then things like they forget and they do things that sometimes you have to see. But don't you think that's not right, even here. Because you see, our boss, she's very, very prejudice.	3:34
Michele Mitchell	Is she?	5:07
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh, Lord, yes. She's good in her way. But it's like sometimes they forget and then you have to see, well that's not quite right. You know, it's not quite right. But as long as you let them do it and think they're right, they going to keep doing. But you got to let them know that some things just not the way. That's not the way. You got to do what's right. Right?	5:08
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	5:47
Jessie Lee Chassion	And everybody got feelings. Well, I don't know. But we Black people, we come from a long way. We have come from a long, long, long way. But we still have a long way to go. And sometimes we just talk too much. And some of these women, look, I tell them, I say, "You know what burn you up? When I'll creep up on y'all talking about each other to them." See, why can't you sit down and discuss it among yourself?	5:47
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	6:36
Jessie Lee Chassion	And don't let them know if one having problem with something. Don't need to tell them that. Because look like when a person having a hardship or problem, that's when they really want to treat you bad. You know that? That's why things like that and you've got to learn not to do that. That's not the way. If you can't help or you can't say nothing good, just shut up. Just shut up. Say, "I don't know."	6:40
Jessie Lee Chassion	Because one thing about her, she always feel like, I can't make her understand that, yeah, people need each other. Maybe I need your money, but you need my labor, so we need each other. Right? And that's the way it's got to start working I think. And that's how it go. What good do you have anything if you can't do it all yourself and you ain't got nobody to do it for you? So people need each other. And that's the one thing we should strive for. Respect. I'm not always supposed to respect you you don't never respect me. We supposed to respect each other. I can't walk up to you and say, "Oh, I can tell her anything because she young." No, I can't do that. I got to respect you. So in return you'll respect me too. Right?	7:17
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	8:24
Jessie Lee Chassion	So that's the way life is. And that's what all of this commotion, to me, I feel like a lot of this, that's what it is. That's what it has always been. They always thought we always were nothing. We just were nothing. They were everything. And yet they couldn't make it without us, but they just didn't treat us right. And I know people who had stuff and they just borrowed, borrowed and then eventually the White man took it because he said he owed it all to me. So they took land just because they couldn't keep records, no receipts, so they just signed it away. And at one time, like the older people, I knew some old ladies here that didn't believe in, they still go try to put their little money in the bank or something. They let Mr. so and so, Ms. so and so hold it. Yes, ma'am.	8:25
Michele Mitchell	For real?	9:57
Jessie Lee Chassion	Yeah-huh. Mm-hmm. And they held it. They held it because I knew a lady that and when she died, she was living with my sister-in-law. So she went to these people because she know she, and I believe what they gave her what? $150? She said that's all she had. She said, "Well I know she had more that because you been holding money for her for years." But she couldn't prove it because the old lady didn't have no receipt. But that's how they did things. That's the way they did it and they let them. Because you see these older people, they still got that faith and confidence in these people, even now. And that's how a lot of these White people got what they got. They stole it from Blacks. They just took it signed and loaned there. Well, if you ain't keeping no record, they ain't keeping nothing. So eventually it's theirs.	9:58
Jessie Lee Chassion	All these things, it just happened. All these things just happened. It did just happen. A whole lot of things that nobody just don't have the slightest idea how it goes.	11:19
Michele Mitchell	But these things, you're telling me they're outrageous.	12:04
Jessie Lee Chassion	I know. I know that. But that's the way it was. That's just the way it was. And tell who? Who would you tell?	12:13
Michele Mitchell	This is true.	12:39
Jessie Lee Chassion	Who would you go to? Who could you go to? They had control so there was nowhere to go. There's nowhere to go. So just let it be. But now you see the generations are smarter and they wouldn't let these things go on with their old people, not now. But think about the ones that don't have nobody. Huh?	12:40
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	13:33
Jessie Lee Chassion	That don't have nobody. Now people that have people to look after them and take care of these things, fine. But how about the ones that just don't have anybody?	13:37
Michele Mitchell	I hadn't thought about it that way.	13:50
Jessie Lee Chassion	Huh?	13:51
Michele Mitchell	I hadn't thought about it that way.	13:52
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, that's the way it is.	13:53
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	13:54
Jessie Lee Chassion	That's the way it is. And now just like, all right, I think about this all the time. It's like when nursing homes, their patients get $38 a month. And if you don't but never buy nothing or do nothing, $38 a month save. Eventually you can pile up. You don't have nobody at your desk to claim it. Then what happens to that? You see. What happens? Even if they hold it a certain many years waiting for somebody to come. But suppose nobody don't come, then what happens?	13:58
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	14:48
Jessie Lee Chassion	So I don't know what happens because everybody don't have somebody to look after them.	14:48
Michele Mitchell	That's true.	14:51
Jessie Lee Chassion	I don't know what happens. I know and it's property here in town that people didn't have nobody. The husband would die and then the wife might live. And then after that she died, they had no children. I wonder what's going to happen? What, it goes back to the city? I guess. They live on them if nobody don't come forward. They not going to waste no time looking for cousins and all these people not. No, they ain't going to do that. Somebody's going to claim it eventually.	14:55
Michele Mitchell	And it won't be be somebody Black?	15:49
Jessie Lee Chassion	No. No, it won't. So you see they always had things going their way. Everything was in is in that favor. And the majority of the Black people didn't read. A man was buying a little building, you know those little metal buildings?	15:52
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm.	16:35
Jessie Lee Chassion	And the building was $300 and he was standing at the window counting money. And I was standing there waiting to get to this window. And when he bypassed the amount and he kept on going. And I said, "You giving too much." You know what that White man told me, "What are you? His lawyer?" But I knew the man and I knew he couldn't read. And he, "Huh?" "That's enough. That's enough. That's enough." He had already bypassed the amount. So I just put there. I said, "[indistinct 00:17:13]," I said, "that's enough." "What are you? His lawyer?"	16:35
Michele Mitchell	When did this happen? Was this recently?	17:18
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh, this happened about 10 years ago. But I knew the man couldn't count and I knew him. So I just, I said, "Hey, that's enough. You giving too much." The man, "Hey, what are you? His lawyer?"	17:20
Michele Mitchell	And he took the money?	17:38
Jessie Lee Chassion	No. He had bypassed the amount the man wanted, but he was going to take it. You see, but people, they do things like this and some of people they don't know and you can't tell them and they won't trust you to go with them. But because they going to believe what they tell them.	17:39
Michele Mitchell	Mm-hmm. So that hasn't changed?	18:06
Jessie Lee Chassion	Oh, no. That that'll never change. They believe what they tell them, especially people that don't have anybody to look out for. They believe what they tell them. It's an old store on the corner of, let's see, this is Washington and Hopkins, this is Old Georgia, that store been there since I was a real small child. And it's still there and it's all dirty and dusty, but she sell everything. People used to go there and people still go buy with this woman and whatever my check is, it's not much though. And then she got the store, then she got some shacks, some houses that just need to be torn down. So you do that and you rent and everything is all together. But they need repairs and everything and people still let her do that to them. But it's people that they don't really have nobody. They don't know and they believe what she say and they just believe it with all their heart.	18:15
Jessie Lee Chassion	But it still goes on. It's not as open as it was because people know better and it's different. And because now most people have somebody or child or a grandchild or something that kind of look at for them. But it's still bad. If they can get over, they will. They're not going to try to help you find a real answer. But it's not as bad as it was. But it has room for improvement.	19:57
Michele Mitchell	Oh, yes.	20:53
Jessie Lee Chassion	A whole lot of room. And if you're not stupid and you can kind of fend for yourself what they call you? A smart nigger. It's not that you want to be smart, but it's just that you don't want to take advantage of nobody and you don't want nobody to take advantage of you. Huh?	20:54
Michele Mitchell	Oh, yes.	21:22
Jessie Lee Chassion	Because you've lived through that already. You don't want to just forever live the same way. Because it was time when even if they knew they could, like my grandmother, she went to her grace end. But I know I paid that mortgage. She said, "I know I did." But she had no receipt. She couldn't prove it. And it was her word against his. And my uncle said, "Mom, I'm just going to pay it again." And he paid it over. So they paid it twice because she didn't read. And how far was her word going to go? But you see, when my uncle did it, my uncle could read. So it's proven that he did it.	21:22
Michele Mitchell	What about voting around here?	22:32
Jessie Lee Chassion	Well, yes. And now we can vote now. But they had just as many not voting because there never is.	22:35
Michele Mitchell	So when did people start voting?	22:46
Jessie Lee Chassion	They started voting in the 60 what? '65', '66. And the old man, Abraham Roy was the first Black man to register to vote.	22:47
Michele Mitchell	Abraham, what's his name?	23:07
Jessie Lee Chassion	Roy. They didn't want the Black people to vote. But he broke the ice because he went and registered. He was the first person, first Black person. And Mr. Roy, like he said, he was alone, he said, "Well, if they kill me, I'm old anyway." but he went and then gradually people would go.	23:08
Michele Mitchell	Did people try to go before him?	23:38
Jessie Lee Chassion	No.	23:40
Michele Mitchell	No?	23:40
Jessie Lee Chassion	Hmm-mm. Everybody was scared to go. Because you see at that time, the White man is the one who had the guns. And then you would fear for your own life, you feared for your family's life. So he just wouldn't do it. But Mr. Roy went and gradually the people started going to vote. It started. And even now, there's so many of us that just didn't register. And to me it's wrong. They had to fight and die for it and now you don't want to go? You see, sometimes we keep our wounds [indistinct 00:24:44] down, huh? Right? We got to stop living in the past and try. You see that's what I'm saying, we still have a long way to go. We have a long way. And you hear him say, "Well, they do what they want anyway." Well, maybe we all do something. Maybe we could stop them from doing what they want. Right? Well, how we going to ever stop them?	23:41
Michele Mitchell	Thank you so much for your honesty.	25:17
Jessie Lee Chassion	And honey, everything I told you is true. Because me lying never did anything. I never could, but that's the way it was.	25:18
Michele Mitchell	I appreciate it.	25:30
Jessie Lee Chassion	And it's better. I'm telling you it's better, but it's not as good as it should be. We have a long way to go. Yeah.	25:34

Item Info

Title:

Jessie Chassion interview recording, 1994 August 02

Date:

August 2, 1994

Creator:

Chassion, Jessie Lee

Contributor:

Mitchell, Michele

Description:

Name: Jessie Lee Chassion; Date of birth: 1926-08-15; Place of birth: Freetown, LA; Occupation(s): domestic; food services; managerial; Residence: New Iberia, LA
Informant ID: 614; Interviewed by: Michelle Mitchell.

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English

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Behind the Veil

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

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

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

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Interview number: 742
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Jessie Chassion interview recording, 1994 August 02

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1. Jessie Chassion administrative file, 1994

John Hope Franklin Research Center

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Jessie Chassion interview recording, 1994 August 02

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John Hope Franklin Research Center

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