She never did have any complaint about them.
"For amusement the slaves used to dance and go to balls. Fiddle and
dance! I never heard my father speak of any other type of amusement.
"I don't remember what the old man said about freedom coming. Right
after the War, he farmed. He stayed right on with his master. He left
there before I was born and moved up near Pine Bluff where I was born.
The place my father was brought up on was near Pine Bluff too. It was
about twenty miles from Pine Bluff.
"I remember hearing him say that the Ku Klux Klan used to come to see us
at night. But father was always orderly and they never had no clue
against him. He never was whipped by the Ku Klux.
"My father never got any schooling. He never could read or write. He
said that they treated him pretty fair though on the farms where he
worked after freedom. As far as he could figure, they didn't cheat him.
I never had any personal experience with the Ku Klux. I never did do any
sharecropping. I am a shoemaker. I learned my trade from my father. My
father was a shoemaker as well as a farmer. He used to tell me that he
made shoes for the Negroes and for the old master too in slavery times.
"I have lived in Little Rock thirty years. I was born right down here in
Pine Bluff like I told you. This is the biggest town--a little bigger
than Pine Bluff. I run around on the railroad a great deal.
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