"Never went to school over two months in all my goin's. We always lived in a place kinda unhandy to go to school. First teacher I had was named Mr. Bell. I think he was a northern man.
"All my life I been farmin'—still do. Been many a day since I sold a bale a cotton myself. White man does the ginnin' and packin'. All I do is raise it. I'm farmin' on the shares and I think if I raise four bales I ought to have two bales to sell and boss man two bales, but it ain't that way.
"I voted ever since I got to be a man grown. That is—as long as I could vote. You know—got so now they won't let you vote. I don't think a person is free unless he can vote, do you? The way this thing is goin', I don't think the white man wants the colored man to have as much as the white man.
"When I could vote, I jus' voted what they told me to vote. Oh Lord, yes, I voted for Garfield. I'se quainted with him—I knowed his name. Let's see—Powell Clayton—was he one of the presidents? I voted for him. And I voted for McKinley. I think he was the last one I voted for.
"I been farmin' all my life and what have I got? Nothin'. Old age pension? I may be in glory time I get it and then what would become of my wife?"
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Kato Benton
Creed Taylor Place, Tamo Pike
Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 78
"I was born in South Carolina before the War. I ain't no baby. I wasn't raised here. No ma'am.
"My daddy's name was Chance Ayers and my mammy's name was Mary Ayers. So I guess the white folks was named Ayers.