Rosa Gramtham interview recording, 1993 August 05
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
Sonya Ramsey | The neighborhood where you grew up as a child? | 0:01 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. I grew up in this same neighborhood. I was born in this very house. | 0:04 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Okay. And this neighborhood, was it a segregated neighborhood when you growing up? | 0:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, it was. It was segregated. And there was quite a few kids in this block and we were just all good neighbors. We were in and out each other's homes. The kids played together very well. It was really nice. | 0:19 |
Sonya Ramsey | What did most of the adults in your neighborhood do for a living? | 0:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, my father was a railroad man. He worked on the railroad. There was a mill. A lot of people worked at the mill. | 0:46 |
Sonya Ramsey | What kind of mill was it? | 0:56 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | A saw mill. In the later years, that's where he worked. Some of them worked on farms. People would come in town and get them, take them out of town to work in tobacco, cotton or whatever they had. Tell you the truth, I'd never seen any cotton until I was grown. I wasn't around cotton or tobacco. | 0:57 |
Sonya Ramsey | Really? | 1:31 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Really. Mm-mm. No. I stayed in the neighborhood. | 1:32 |
Sonya Ramsey | When you were a little girl, what did you and your friends do for fun around your neighborhood? | 1:37 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | We made mud pies, played hopscotch, jump rope, jump board and things like that. | 1:42 |
Sonya Ramsey | [indistinct 00:01:52]. | 1:51 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | You put a board across the stone, I'd say a stone, but it could be some wood underneath. One on one end, one on the other. You jump one jump up, which would be very dangerous now. But then, we did it. | 1:52 |
Sonya Ramsey | How many brothers and sisters did you have? | 2:10 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I didn't have a brother until I was 19 years old. Yeah. I was the only child, but I grew up with some children that was raised here in this house that I really thought was my brothers and sisters. | 2:12 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | It was a girl and a boy, but their mother also was here in this house. You see, my mother—I had two mothers and two daddies. When I was born, my mother was 13 going into her 14. Right away, the people that reared her took me and I went in—that's where I got the name of Hopkins from. They just took me over and reared me and I— | 2:28 |
Sonya Ramsey | Were they your grandparents? | 3:07 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. I could tell you how my mother came to town. She was reared in Williamson, North Carolina. Her mother, when she was about 9 or 10, sent her on the train to New Bern. She was supposed to go to James City, but my grandmother did not meet the train that morning. These people here and a lot of other people, would always go down to the train station mornings to see who was coming in. | 3:11 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | The policemans knew these people real well. This little girl was on the train and didn't know where she was going, didn't know much of anything. And so the policeman asked this lady if she would keep her until he could find her people. This is how my mother got to be connected with these people. | 3:56 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did they continue in raising— | 4:22 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, yes. They kept her for a while and then after a while, her mother did show up. But the little girl wanted to stay here. See, these people didn't have any children. And I must say they were the best people I have ever known. | 4:25 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | They really loved children and they were so good to—she asked her mother if she could stay. Her mother let her stay for a while thinking she'd come back and get her. But this went on and on and on. And she always remained here. She didn't ever go to James City to live with her mother. Her mother was satisfied because these people didn't have any children and they were doing all right with her. She was in church and just being a real good little girl and they let her stay. | 4:42 |
Sonya Ramsey | What was their occupation? This was their house? | 5:19 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. As I say, he worked on the railroad. She took in washings. | 5:23 |
Sonya Ramsey | That's your mother or— | 5:30 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | That was the other mother. | 5:34 |
Sonya Ramsey | The other one. Okay. Okay. So you've gone more as the other mother rather than as a grandmother? | 5:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, right. Okay. So I could say my grandmother, but I always thought of her as my mother. I loved her to death. I loved my mother. It was a funny thing, but I didn't really recognize my mother as mother until I was in my teens. | 5:42 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Then I accepted her as my real mother. But I never put aside this other lady because my mother was young. She would go up north, come back, you know how young people—she was trying to find her way in life and I was always left in this good home. So I stayed. | 6:01 |
Sonya Ramsey | What type of values did your mother and your other mother and father and other father try to instill in you when you were growing up? | 6:20 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, my mother, not my real mother, the other lady, her education wasn't real good but she could count real good now. My father, he would always depend on me to do the business part of this house, like pay the taxes. When he got ready to pay the taxes when I was large enough and that was real early because at 12 I remember cooking. | 6:33 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | So he would let me go downtown and pay his taxes. I did that all my life. And any bills that were to be paid that you could just really go and pay, I did it. I would go and give in his taxes and things like that. He helped me with my lessons when I'd come home, what little bit of reading he knew how to do, he would help me to get me started. | 7:03 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | In the meantime, they took in another lady and her two children. Okay, now these are those that I grew up with thinking they were my brothers and sisters and he always wanted me to go to college and just do something great. | 7:34 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | He just had his mindset on that I would do such because I was, I guess, patient with them, very obedient. I was very obedient. That's one thing I can't say for the other girl and the other boy, he was nice, but he always wanted me to just be somebody. | 8:01 |
Sonya Ramsey | Who punished you growing up in your family or punished the children? | 8:25 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | You know the mothers, they get you first. But Daddy was in with that too. He was in with the punishment also. I'd say they both did it. | 8:33 |
Sonya Ramsey | When you were growing up, did you have to do any chores growing up? | 8:45 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Oh yeah. | 8:47 |
Sonya Ramsey | What kind of chores did you have to do? | 8:48 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I always wanted to cook like I would see her cooking. So at an early age, I began to learn how to cook. When in school, when I started taking home economics, nobody could beat me home that afternoon. If we made biscuits in school, I wanted to come home and make some and that's how I got started. I started real early cooking the meals, because like I said, she took in washings. | 8:51 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | So I would hurry home from school to cook supper. In the morning, Daddy went to work, say—when he was going to work at 7:00, I would get up and fix his breakfast while she got her rest. Then when he started working nights to the meal, I would get up in the morning and have his breakfast on the table when he got home. Then I would go to school, hurry home and cook. I'd love to keep house. It just really worked out good. It really worked out good. | 9:23 |
Sonya Ramsey | I wanted to ask, in your neighborhood, outside of your home, were there any other people that you looked up to that you thought were important in your neighborhood? | 9:58 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mm-hmm. There was a family that lived on the end of the street, Mr. And Mrs. Foreman. He was a railroad man also, his wife was sick. And I used to go down there when I was real young and do little chores for them in the afternoons. When she got real sick, I'd go in the morning before I went to school just to do little chores. | 10:10 |
Sonya Ramsey | Why were they special to you? | 10:44 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Because I feel like they helped raise me too. They were concerned about me. | 10:44 |
Sonya Ramsey | I wanted to ask, in your family, did your parents ever tell you about segregation or how to act around White people when you were growing up? | 10:48 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, they didn't. That's a funny thing. But they didn't. But yet, my mother would send us down to pick up the White people's clothes, bring them here. They would wash them, iron them, send them back by us. | 11:00 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | One thing that I guess anybody could tell that the Blacks had a lot of respect for the White. It was same things you just didn't do in front of them. But as far as them telling us. | 11:19 |
Sonya Ramsey | How did you learn how to act and what to do and things like that? | 11:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I guess it just came natural. I didn't have anybody to sit down—they didn't sit down and discuss that with us. See, we had respect for even our own kind and that meant a lot. We knew that the White people were different from us. So I guess it was in us to start with. You don't go too far over there if that's White. I feel like that's the way it was. | 11:44 |
Sonya Ramsey | When in your neighborhood, were there any White families in your neighborhood or— | 12:16 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. | 12:26 |
Sonya Ramsey | No. So you didn't play with White children? | 12:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. | 12:26 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. In your neighborhood, I guess, where did your family go to shop and— | 12:27 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Downtown to Kris' and Charles Store. By the time I got up, that's what was down there. The grocery stores, they had one out here, D.P Tenders and then they had one called Mr. Hawkins that was over this way. | 12:30 |
Sonya Ramsey | How did they treat—were they White-owned stores? | 12:53 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. | 12:55 |
Sonya Ramsey | How did they treat the Black customers? | 12:55 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | As far as I knew, they treated him all right. Now, I won't say they didn't try to cheat him in the background but it was all right. One thing about this man and this woman here, they were well known among White people that I've been around and they seem to think a lot of them or something. | 13:02 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. I wanted to ask, I guess ask some questions about school. What was your elementary school like? | 13:32 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I enjoyed it. I'll say that much. I enjoyed it. | 13:40 |
Sonya Ramsey | What did the school look like? What type of school was it? | 13:45 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I went to West Street. It was a large building, just like a graded school at that time. To me, it had upstairs and downstairs. It even had a basement in it, a large building. | 13:48 |
Sonya Ramsey | The high school, was it grades 1 to 11 then or? | 14:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah. | 14:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 14:17 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And then on the side, they had another building that was known as your high school right beside that tall building. | 14:19 |
Sonya Ramsey | Do you remember any of your teachers going to your school? | 14:28 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mm-hmm. Yeah. | 14:31 |
Sonya Ramsey | What were they like in general? | 14:34 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | If you were good, they were good and if you weren't, they knew how to use the paddle. And so I never had any problems. The only problem I had, which it was my fault, not the teacher's fault, when I got in high school, one year, I did not pass in the book I was supposed to pass in. She held me back until I wrote up that book in the summertime. | 14:38 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I gave her the book. She gave me my grade. I thought that was terrible but I didn't have to stay back for one thing. I just went from grade to grade. | 15:13 |
Sonya Ramsey | What was your high school years like? Did you participate in the activities aside from academics? Like in the choir or the band? | 15:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I was in the choir. I was in that. They used to have a lady to come and teach us music. | 15:45 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. | 15:56 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And so I would always find time to do that. | 15:56 |
Sonya Ramsey | What instrument did you play? | 16:00 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I did not. I was in a Glee Club. I did not play an instrument and I'm still trying to learn how to play. | 16:02 |
Sonya Ramsey | You were in the Glee Club. Did the Glee Club travel to different places? | 16:12 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. | 16:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | Where did they perform? | 16:17 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Just here. Just here in New Bern. | 16:19 |
Sonya Ramsey | What was the social life and the dating life during your high school years? | 16:23 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Now, that was exciting. We had a place called a Red Cross Hall and most likely on weekends, the school children would have a 10-cent party there. | 16:28 |
Sonya Ramsey | It cost 10 cents to get in there? | 16:44 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | 10-cent party, yes. | 16:46 |
Sonya Ramsey | What did they do during the party? | 16:49 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | They'd just dance. Just dance. | 16:51 |
Sonya Ramsey | What were some of the popular dances? | 16:54 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | You could do the Charleston. You could do the—let me see. Well, I can't get the names together. | 16:57 |
Sonya Ramsey | That's fine. That's fine. Were there other special activities and things? | 17:12 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Every now and then, yes. Yeah. | 17:20 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did churches have things for young people? | 17:24 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, they did. They did. I participated in the programs. At that time, I was in the Baptist Church, Free Will Baptist, because that's where this lady belonged, called St. Stephen's Free Will Baptist. | 17:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | They had different programs that included the children. I can't remember any exciting ones other than saying speeches or singing a song or something like that. | 17:44 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you have to do that— | 18:03 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I'm not that good on speeches. No, no. Mm-mm. I would say a speech or sing a song. But that's it about as far as it went. They would have little parties for the children sometimes and we'd go bobbing for apples and things like that. | 18:04 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Let's see. I wanted to ask, what year did you finish high school? | 18:30 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I came out one year before I was supposed to graduate, so I still—1939 is when I got out. | 18:39 |
Sonya Ramsey | Do you remember how the Depression—Did the Depression affect your family? | 18:49 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, it—very much. | 18:53 |
Sonya Ramsey | How? In what way? | 18:55 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I remember daddy was out digging up iron and different little things to sell in order to make ends meet. We do not remember actually missing a meal, but I remember it was tough on them because at that time, you could really buy fish, a penny of piece. | 18:58 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did the other lady with her children live with you then too? | 19:27 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Oh, yes. All through life. We grew up together as one big family. One big family. That's why I say the people that took us in, they were the nicest people I've ever known. Not to be related and to raise us as good as they did, as nice as they did, they did us better than the people do their children now, the mamas and the daddies. | 19:29 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I just don't get it. I just love it. I love that my mama stayed over here because we couldn't have made it that well, being over in James City with my grandmother, that's where my grandmother's from, James City, she's buried over there. And to be here, it was much better lovable people. When they died, they willed me this home. See, I was just so close to them. Yeah. | 19:59 |
Sonya Ramsey | What did you do after you finished or when you left high school? | 20:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I left high school to be married. | 20:39 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Okay. | 20:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And I have been married 54 years. | 20:42 |
Sonya Ramsey | My goodness! How did you meet your husband? | 20:46 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | In school. I met him four years before we've been married. So that mean we've been together 58 years. | 20:49 |
Sonya Ramsey | Wow! You were sweethearts for that long? | 20:56 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. And then I went straight to New York. I got married, went to New York. I stayed there four years. In that four years, I had three children born. | 20:58 |
Sonya Ramsey | I wanted to ask you, what was your impression of New York coming from New Bern? | 21:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, Sir, I was so excited. I really was. When I got there, I had the address of where I was supposed to go but my people were supposed to meet me at the bus station. | 21:21 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I'm only used to one bus station. When I got there, I called up and I told them, "Come pick me up. I'm at the bus station." And I hung up. They couldn't find me. They could not find me. And a girl that was at the bus station, I sat there so long, she said, "Are you lost?" I said, "No, my people are coming to get me." | 21:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And I told her what I had done, and she said, "Well, they might not know where to pick you up." She said, "I've got go to work later. Say, but I tell you what now, I could—" I told her where I was going. She said, "I could take you there if you want to go." So I had been there so long. I said, "Yes, I'll go." And she took me straight to my sister-in-law's house. | 22:04 |
Sonya Ramsey | That was nice. | 22:28 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | But my sister-in-law liked to have a fit, because she said a lady could have carried me anywhere. But see, I wasn't used to that kind of thing. But I thought New York was the greatest place. | 22:29 |
Sonya Ramsey | Where did you all live in New York? | 22:44 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | We were in Harlem. We were in Harlem. Like I say, two of my children were born in New York. The next one, I had moved to Allentown, Pennsylvania. She was born there. I didn't stay long. | 22:47 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you have a chance to get a job in New York or you just raised your family? | 23:07 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I mostly raised my family, what little bit of time I was there. I couldn't do too much because see, they were still small, but my sister-in-law would, and when times she wanted to stay off the job, I'd go in her place, make me some money. | 23:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Then I tried on my own at one time. But what happened was the lady here, I was in Pennsylvania then, getting ready to go into my own apartment and I got a telegram that this lady here had lost her eyesight. Nothing to do but I grabbed the [indistinct 00:23:58] bus and came on home. I couldn't even wait for my husband to come home. I just called him up on his job. I'm telling you, I got so excited. | 23:29 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I called him up and told him what happened and I came on down here. So then after that, he made arrangements to come here, and we've been here ever since. | 24:07 |
Sonya Ramsey | [indistinct 00:24:22], was the World War II going on by that time? | 24:22 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Was War II going on? | 24:22 |
Sonya Ramsey | World War II going on? | 24:22 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. Mm-hmm. | 24:27 |
Sonya Ramsey | How did that affect your family or people? Did you know anybody that had to go fight? | 24:28 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I had a uncle. My uncle was in C.C. Camp. They had a C.C. Camp around here during that time. I didn't have anybody going into the war in active duty. Mm-mm. | 24:32 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. When you moved back here, had they started building Cherry Point? They had Cherry Point at that time. | 24:50 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. Mm-hmm. | 24:58 |
Sonya Ramsey | What do you think of Cherry Point? How do you think it affected the Black community here? | 24:58 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I think it helped them very much. It really did. That's right. | 25:03 |
Sonya Ramsey | So after you came back and your husband moved back here, what did you all do then? | 25:11 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, he went to Cherry Point to get a job. Me, what did I do then? I had all these little small children around so I did a little something, but my main goal was to become a beautician. | 25:15 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Okay. | 25:37 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | So that's what I really went into. | 25:39 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Did you go to beauty school? | 25:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mm-hmm. | 25:41 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. What beauty school did you go to? | 25:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mary Harris's. Let me see. What was the name of that beauty parlor? Well, anyway, Mary Harris's. | 25:48 |
Sonya Ramsey | I wanted to ask, why did you want to become a beautician? | 26:02 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Always did. When I was a teenager growing up around here, the settle people used to get me to comb the hair, plait the hair. I don't care if they had teenagers in the home, they just wanted me to do it. And I just loved to do it. I would always keep mine so pretty. | 26:02 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And they admired it and they would get me to do their. I don't know, I just wanted to do it. And when I did take the course, I was going to take it up north but by her losing her sight, that made me come here. This beauty school opened up after I got here and I was one of the first students. | 26:19 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. What kind of things did they teach then [indistinct 00:26:50]. | 26:48 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, they was teaching compressing, water waving. | 26:50 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. | 26:54 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah. Marceline, I mean. | 26:54 |
Sonya Ramsey | How do you do that, marceline? | 26:55 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | With the gel, they do it now a lot. | 26:57 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay, okay. | 27:00 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | They was doing a little crimping then too. But you had to do so much for a little bit of money. You wash the hair, you compress it, then you hard press it. If the person wanted it, then you curl it. | 27:03 |
Sonya Ramsey | What's the difference between comb pressing and hard pressing? | 27:17 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, when you pull it with the curls, you go down it with the curls and so it was a lot of work for the money. | 27:21 |
Sonya Ramsey | For a typical hairdo, how much did you all charge? | 27:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | In my size, hair would be $2. Now, I pay 50-something for it. | 27:39 |
Sonya Ramsey | How many customers did you have a day? | 27:44 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I had quite a few people. I can't say how many I would have in a day. | 27:52 |
Sonya Ramsey | I didn't finish. After your beauty school, where did you go to work? | 28:02 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | With New Bern City schools. | 28:08 |
Sonya Ramsey | You were a beautician with the schools? | 28:11 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, I was a dietician. | 28:13 |
Sonya Ramsey | Wait. | 28:16 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I went from cosmetology to a dietician. | 28:18 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Let's go back. I wanted to ask, where did you do hair when you first— | 28:21 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, when I first started, I was in my instructor's beauty parlor. | 28:28 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Okay. What was your instructor's—what was the name of that beauty parlor? | 28:33 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mary Harris's. | 28:37 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. I wanted to ask about working in the beauty shop. What did the ladies talk about when they came there? | 28:38 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | The ladies? | 28:49 |
Sonya Ramsey | Mm-hmm. | 28:50 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, if you wanted to read a book, just wait, go to the beauty parlor. You heard everything in a beautiful, you hear everything in a beauty parlor and a barbershop. Now, I really wanted to cut men hair but I didn't wind up doing that because I thought it was less problems. | 28:51 |
Sonya Ramsey | Well, did you have to get a separate license if you wanted to be a barber or could you do both? | 29:21 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I think you could do both but you would have to get the practice for it. | 29:23 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you just have women coming in shop? Did you ever have men come in? | 29:28 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, I had a man customer. I had two during my time doing that. | 29:31 |
Sonya Ramsey | What would they have done? | 29:36 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Curl all over like the women. Pretty hair. They had whole up better than the women. | 29:38 |
Sonya Ramsey | Really? | 29:45 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah. They were real nice. | 29:46 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did any people with [indistinct 00:29:53] or I guess people who had straight hair come in and things like that and stuff like that? | 29:51 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mm-hmm. I went to Jacksonville to work to help a girl to get her license. She was working her apprentice out under me. Down there, you find all grades of hair because the service mens and their wives, it was kind of rough. They would come in with the hair down here and want all that hair brought up on their heads. | 29:58 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I thought that looked terrible. I had to find a way to put it up there too. It wasn't much you could do, but just roll it to [indistinct 00:30:36] and pin it down. That's what they wanted to have up on their heads. We had a time with that. | 30:25 |
Sonya Ramsey | What type of women came into your shop? | 30:44 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | All types. All types. | 30:50 |
Mr. Gramtham | [indistinct 00:30:52]. | 30:52 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | That's my husband. | 30:52 |
Sonya Ramsey | Hi. How are you. | 30:53 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | That's my husband. | 30:54 |
Mr. Gramtham | [indistinct 00:30:58]. | 30:54 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Okay. | 30:54 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Did you work at Ms. Harris's shop while you were doing there or did you ever go anywhere else to work? | 30:58 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah, I worked in her shop for a length of time. Then I opened me one myself. | 31:07 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Why did you want to open your own shop? | 31:17 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, because then I could keep all my money. | 31:23 |
Sonya Ramsey | You had to give a percentage? | 31:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah. 60/40. Yeah. And to open your own shop, you keep your money. Although, don't do you that much good but you keep some of it. | 31:28 |
Sonya Ramsey | Where did you open your shop? | 31:40 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | In Paver Town. Okay. | 31:41 |
Sonya Ramsey | How far is that— | 31:43 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Paver Avenue. That's not too far. | 31:45 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you rent the property or did you buy it? | 31:50 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, I rented it. I rented a shop from Miss Annie Simmons. | 31:53 |
Sonya Ramsey | You already had your customers though? | 32:00 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah, I had my customers. By that time, I had bought me—excuse me—a couple of chairs and a shampoo bowl and things like that. | 32:02 |
Sonya Ramsey | Do they have hair shows then and people doing things like that. | 32:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | We belong to a club and the beautician club and they would have shows at times. | 32:18 |
Sonya Ramsey | Were you known for any special hairstyle or any special service and things like that? | 32:30 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, it's not one thing I was known for. The girls would always tease me, at least before I took the examination. They said they did not want my head to be the last head left. | 32:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | It was so large. My hair would stick. And so it was a joke and it wound up that I was the last head left, but there was two girls. So what they did, they put one girl on one side and one on the other side. | 32:54 |
Sonya Ramsey | So you had to practice on each other? | 33:16 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. That was hard to live down. | 33:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | I'm trying to think. Okay. Well, so then you opened your own shop. How did you learn how to manage your money and all that stuff? Did you have to take a course or did they teach or you just learned on your own? | 33:22 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, I just learned that on my own. | 33:35 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever have any problems with the operators that worked for you? Not doing what they were supposed to do? | 33:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I didn't know because I only had one and I didn't have her for a long time, no way. Just for a short while. | 33:40 |
Sonya Ramsey | How many days a week did you work? | 33:49 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | All six of them. I really did. Yeah. | 33:54 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever do any work outside in your home too? | 33:57 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, yes I did. But that was strictly against the grain. Strictly against the grain. | 34:01 |
Sonya Ramsey | Is that before you had your own child? | 34:11 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | It was in between. It was while I was working for my instructor. | 34:14 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Did you ever have people come in that wanted weird styles that their hair couldn't do? | 34:24 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. | 34:26 |
Sonya Ramsey | How did you manage that? | 34:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | You go and try to do it anyway because it's funny. If a lady wants to look a certain way, she wants that. I guess if you tell her that you just can't do that, you just lost a customer. You're going to try to satisfy and try to give it to her the best you can. In fact, I always managed to satisfy my customers. Always managed to do it. | 34:31 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. How long were you a beautician? | 35:02 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I was a beautician for about 20 years. | 35:06 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. How did the hair care change during that time? | 35:08 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | To me, it didn't change. | 35:20 |
Sonya Ramsey | Then had they started doing the relaxers then? | 35:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. | 35:27 |
Sonya Ramsey | No. | 35:27 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | They had not started this. Then I guess I would've still been in it because the money that the people get now, all I'd have to do would be three customers a day. Because it took me a long time to make any kind of money at a dollar and a half because people ran page boys. They were dollar and half. All over curls was $2. So however you went over that, you had to do some heads to make that kind of money. | 35:28 |
Sonya Ramsey | Are those the usual hairstyles? What were some of the other hairstyles? | 36:02 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | That was the usual, the all over curls and the page boy. Oh yeah, the up sweep. Yeah, the up sweep. And then there was cluster curls in the back. | 36:07 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever talk about things like voting or political issues or anything like that? | 36:24 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mm-mm. | 36:32 |
Sonya Ramsey | As a business owner, did you ever have people come and ask you from the work to the chair for charity things and things like that? | 36:37 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I didn't hear much of that. I really didn't. Now, when I started working at schools, then that's when that came out into the open. | 36:46 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever have people come in and try to sell? Vendors and things, come try to sell things [to you and customers on Saturdays. | 37:00 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Like what? | 37:07 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever have salesman come in and try to sell things to you and your customers? | 37:10 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. No more than—I didn't have but one salesman that come along and that was the product man. | 37:15 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. What type of were some of the—it's okay, ma'am. You said— | 37:24 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I do not remember the names of the people selling the products now. | 37:34 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did they have—some of the products, did [indistinct 00:37:47] Madame C.J Walkers products? | 37:44 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, they did. Yes, they did. Yeah. | 37:49 |
Sonya Ramsey | Like Coral? Was that familiar, Coral Products or no? | 37:53 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I have seen have that in stores, but— | 37:59 |
Sonya Ramsey | Mostly Madam C.J Walker? | 38:04 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Mm-hmm. Madam C.J Walker, I remember that name now. | 38:06 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Okay. Is there anything else I should have asked you about you being a beautician? | 38:10 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, because that's so far behind me and I just—the job that—well, I loved that job and I also did love working in the lunchroom. I really did. And working with those people, I loved it. | 38:18 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Well, let's go on then. Why did you decide to leave the— | 38:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | The lunchroom? | 38:44 |
Sonya Ramsey | And go work in the lunchroom? | 38:45 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, as I say, the beauty culture was not paying enough money and you had to work so hard to get the money. | 38:48 |
Sonya Ramsey | How did you manage childcare while you were working? Because sometimes beauticians took long hours. | 39:00 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | See, I was in this good house. This lady loved children, so I didn't have no problem. | 39:06 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did she gain her sight back? Did she— | 39:15 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, she had an operation. She had cataracts. That's what caused it. But to me, it was like different when I got the telegram. Her husband stayed sick 12 years upstairs. 12 years. And all of his doctors died before he died. | 39:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | Good. | 39:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Isn't that something? But they were good people. But anyway, so my baby girl, who was just beginning school at that time, she was about 3rd grade, came running home one day and I was doing a lady's hair's. So she came by the shop. She said, "Mama," she said, "they need somebody to work in the lunchroom at school." Said, "And I brought you an application to fill out." Said, "Fill it out for me." | 39:41 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I told that lady that was sitting in my chair. I said, "Now what does she think I am? I don't want to go to no school and cook." So the lady said, "Fill it out for the child." Said, "You might not even get it." So I filled it out. She carried it back and I was the first one they called. And so then I went on. I took the job and I stayed there 31 years. | 40:12 |
Sonya Ramsey | Wow! Did you sell your shop? | 40:47 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I finally, eventually came out of the business. I did hair and worked at the lunchroom. | 40:48 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh goodness! | 40:54 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I would come home and some days I would do maybe one or two. And on weekends I'd just do all I could. | 40:55 |
Sonya Ramsey | Wow! | 41:04 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | But it got so much, too much for me and I finally gave it up and settled in just the school business. | 41:06 |
Sonya Ramsey | You said you loved working home in the lunchroom. What did you love about it? | 41:14 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, I was the manager of the lunchroom. I just loved everything about it. I loved serving the children. I love working and showing the people how to make certain dishes. But I just liked everything about it. | 41:18 |
Sonya Ramsey | How would you learn how—I guess you had your home economics and you liked to cook and— | 41:46 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, yeah. I had my home economics, but I've always been that type of person that if I see you doing something, I can do it too. I don't know. It's just— | 41:50 |
Sonya Ramsey | You just pick up on it? | 42:07 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I don't say no and I just walked right into it without—I didn't have any experience because see, you're talking about 200 and 300 children that you have to buy for and feed. But I don't know. I just went right on into it. | 42:09 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And after I was there for a week, everything came on just as nice. I told my supervisor that—she kept telling me I was doing a good job. I said, "Yeah, but I think there's more to it than just this. I think I'm missing something." | 42:31 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | She said, "No, you keep on like you going." She said, "You've got it." I just wouldn't take that for an answer. So finally, she made arrangements for me to go to Greensboro. Is that where A&T is? Okay. I went to Greensboro for two weeks during the summer and that's where I picked up on her lot. I did that for a long time. Every summer, I would go there and stay those two weeks and I picked up—but it just came to me. It just came natural to me. | 42:50 |
Sonya Ramsey | What were some of the typical lunches you would pick? | 43:26 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | My favorite lunch was spaghetti, tall salad, a dessert. They had fabulous meals while I was there. When I left, one of the teachers came—I went back there to visit. | 43:32 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | She came to me. She said, "Are you coming back?" I said, "No way." And she said, "But I'm going to tell you the truth." She said, "This food, just don't taste the same." And I was hunting and telling her hush because there were the other people were there in there. I didn't want to do that. But then I meet them on the street and they tell me the same thing because okay, when I was there when you said baked beans, we had baked beans and it takes baked beans one or two hours to cook. | 43:51 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | What they do now is they open a can of pork and beans, pour them in the steam table. They might put a little sugar or something in them, but that's baked beans. But see, we didn't have nothing like that. Our string beans were not dumped from a can in the table with a little bit of seasoning in them. | 44:21 |
Sonya Ramsey | Mrs. Gramtham, can I turn that TV down because I think it might— | 44:42 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. Okay. You can turn it off. | 44:47 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. [indistinct 00:44:52]. Okay. | 45:12 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Oh, where was I? | 45:14 |
Sonya Ramsey | You were talking about them, now they poured the cans into— | 45:15 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Oh yes. It was different food and we really cooked. I really liked it. They made all sorts of desserts. All sorts of desserts. I could make a roll that looked like the hotdog roja. | 45:18 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I could make a hotdog roll, it would look just like you bought it. | 45:36 |
Sonya Ramsey | That's great. Wow. | 45:39 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Now, that's right. I was good on rolls and baking was my job before I took manager's job. I learned to do it real well. But I didn't cook. I didn't cook. I just managed the business. | 45:40 |
Sonya Ramsey | What would be a typical work day for you here? | 45:58 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Here at home? | 46:02 |
Sonya Ramsey | No, when you worked in the lunchroom? | 46:03 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | If my baker was out and for years, I would hire somebody in her place. But I'd hire a person in a place and I would do the baking. And that just didn't work out for me because that was just about—that was a little too much. | 46:05 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | So then later on, I'd just stop hiring anybody in her place. I'd just go ahead on and bake myself. If I was a little late in the morning and we were having donuts, I wouldn't change that menu for breakfast. We still had our donuts. Yeah. | 46:22 |
Sonya Ramsey | So you could bake— | 46:43 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I know how to do things like that. | 46:44 |
Sonya Ramsey | — and they had breakfast and lunch or just— | 0:01 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Later down the years, they started giving them breakfast, breakfast and lunch. | 0:04 |
Sonya Ramsey | So did the children, they paid for their lunches? | 0:08 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, they paid for their lunches. Some got free lunches, breakfast the same way. | 0:12 |
Sonya Ramsey | What did the kids say about your lunches? | 0:19 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | You should see them when I meet them in the street now, the ones that was there, some of the kids, I don't even know them when I see them and they'll remind me of the rolls. They love to talk about the rolls. They make me know them by knowing about the good food in the lunchroom. | 0:22 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever cook for outside of the lunchroom for other things like a caterer or a catering event? | 0:43 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I have. | 0:52 |
Sonya Ramsey | What would type of events would you cook for? | 0:54 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, my church, whenever they would have something, they would put me in charge and I'd cook for them. And if my friend was having something in her church, I'd help her out too, like that. | 0:57 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did you ever do things for weddings and things like that? | 1:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I have, yeah. | 1:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | When you, I guess back in Denver, were you involved in any organizations or any clubs and things? | 1:20 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes, I am a member of the Eastern Star. | 1:25 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. What kind of activities do the Eastern Star do in the community? | 1:34 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I'm thinking now because I have been out sick for two years. | 1:40 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, when did you join them? | 1:47 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | In 1964. | 1:48 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. | 1:55 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | '64. I think it's '64. Anyway, it's around that. | 1:55 |
Sonya Ramsey | So back then, what did they— Well you [indistinct 00:01:59] back then, what did they do when you first joined? | 1:56 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | What did they do for the community? | 2:02 |
Sonya Ramsey | Or social activities? | 2:02 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Social activities. Well, they give dinners and they didn't have too many social functions. We'd go off to different meetings, something like that. | 2:09 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Have you ever talked about the Eastern style? | 2:23 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Oh yeah. And we go off to different meetings at certain times. They had certain Sundays they turn out with my church or some other member's church and have a feast after that. Something like that. | 2:27 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Were you involved in any other organizations? | 2:48 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | The Golden Circle. | 2:48 |
Sonya Ramsey | What was The Golden Circle? | 2:49 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | The Golden Circle is a branch coming from the Eastern Star. | 2:53 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. | 2:57 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And they have banquets and things like that. | 3:01 |
Sonya Ramsey | Was your— | 3:07 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | When I was a Loyal Lady Ruler of— | 3:07 |
Sonya Ramsey | Sorry? Loyal? | 3:13 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Loyal Lady Ruler— | 3:14 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 3:15 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | — of the Golden Circle. I organized singing group. | 3:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. You still sing? Okay. | 3:24 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And we went on different occasions to different churches if need be. | 3:25 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 3:32 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I went even down to Morehead City. We had a member down there. We had been down there to her church. Yeah. | 3:32 |
Sonya Ramsey | How does one become a member of the Eastern Star? | 3:39 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | How does one? Your father, your brother, or your mother has to be a member. | 3:42 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 3:49 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Now, one time here lately, so I learned since I've been out, they had open house. They wanted members. So you did not have to have that connection. | 3:50 |
Sonya Ramsey | Who was the member in your family? | 4:08 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Daddy. | 4:08 |
Sonya Ramsey | Daddy. Okay. Is he a Mason or [indistinct 00:04:09]? | 4:08 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | He was a Mason. | 4:09 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. Okay. | 4:09 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah. The man has to be a Mason. And of course, the woman is Eastern Star. | 4:12 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 4:16 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Then I was a member of the Isis. | 4:18 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. What's the difference between, if you can tell me, I don't know if you can speak on that, difference between Isis and Eastern Star? | 4:22 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | They're all practically come from— You should be an Eastern Star to become a Golden Circle, a Loyal Lady rather. And you have to be both of those to become an Isis. | 4:29 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 4:47 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | So I went to the top in that and we had a good time because they had parties. You see, the Eastern Stars is not a party club. | 4:50 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 5:03 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | The Golden Circle is not either, but the Isis, they do have parties. | 5:03 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 5:11 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah. It's a different organization altogether. And I enjoyed all of those. We travel a lot. | 5:11 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, what kind of places you travel? | 5:20 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Each year. Like Ohio, where's Bourbon Street? In— | 5:23 |
Sonya Ramsey | New Orleans. | 5:30 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | — New Orleans and Detroit, Michigan. That's how I did my traveling because other than that, I doubt if I would've gone anywhere really. So yeah. | 5:31 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Were you ever involved with the NAACP or any organizations like that? | 5:49 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | I had a brother-in-law who was kind of up there in the NAACP up north, and he lived in Northtown, Pennsylvania. He died while he was making a speech. | 5:56 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh my goodness. | 6:15 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | He made a speech, sat down, I think they say he lit a cigarette or was going to or something, and just died right out. Isn't that something? | 6:17 |
Sonya Ramsey | And your husband, he worked, worked at Cherrypoint. Is that where he— | 6:34 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | He worked at Cherrypoint for a while and then he became a brick mason. | 6:34 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. | 6:36 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yeah, he always regretted leaving Cherrypoint. | 6:38 |
Sonya Ramsey | Why did he regret leaving? | 6:43 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, you know how it is. You have friends and they kind of help encourage you, I guess. But he don't know how that even happened himself. But he laid bricks for quite a while, so he's not doing anything now and neither am I. | 6:45 |
Sonya Ramsey | So then your children went, did they go to the same school where you worked in the lunchroom? | 7:11 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Yes. | 7:14 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did they ever feel, you think, maybe extra pressure to behave and things like that? | 7:16 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, the one that got me the job, she was just so proud when she come in and she was kind of chubby anyway, her face would be lit up, smiling. I'd tell everybody she thought she was going to get free lunches. That's why she tried to get me the job because she thought she was going to be able to eat free or get extra food or something. | 7:20 |
Sonya Ramsey | She wasn't able to eat free? | 7:45 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. | 7:45 |
Sonya Ramsey | No? | 7:45 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No. I tell you, I had to pay for her lunch. | 7:49 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh no. Okay. Did you ever have any neighborhood kids that tried to come eat at your house? | 7:54 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Well, by that time, all our neighborhood kids had gone. My children were the last ones to leave this block. Of course, now we have a few more that have come in, but all these people up here now, except for the lady next door, they're strangers to me. Yeah, because this house was the first house on this street. | 8:00 |
Sonya Ramsey | Really? | 8:30 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And daddy sold those people that land. | 8:32 |
Sonya Ramsey | Really? | 8:36 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | And that tree out there is about 75 years old. | 8:37 |
Sonya Ramsey | Did he ever tell you how he came to own land? | 8:38 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, I'm sure because they used to save up their money and I'm sure when he got married and he wanted to come down here where his job was, he just came down here and bought this land. | 8:46 |
Sonya Ramsey | Where was he from? | 9:03 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | He was from Hobgood. | 9:04 |
Sonya Ramsey | Oh, okay. Okay. | 9:05 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | She was from some parts of Virginia and if I'm not mistaken, she was working, cooking on a boat. That's what I understood. She was cooking on a boat. | 9:07 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Well, I think have asked all of my questions. Is there any other questions that I might have left out? | 9:27 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | No, I doubt it. I doubt it. | 9:35 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. | 9:35 |
Rosa Hopkins Gramtham | Just to say that I was born in this house, reared in this house, and it just doesn't even seem like it for the house to stand that long because the house has to be over 75 years old. | 9:38 |
Sonya Ramsey | Okay. Okay. | 9:55 |
Item Info
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