“I too old, I don’t fool wid no votin’. I never did take a big stock in sich foolishness.
“I live wid my daughter and white folks. The Welfare give me $8 a month. We got a garden. No cow. No hog. No chickens.
“The present conditions seem pretty bad. Some do work and some don’t work. Nobody savin’ that I sees. Takes it all to live on. I haben’t give the present generation a thought.”
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: John Goodson (Goodrum)
Des Arc, Arkansas
Age: Born in 1865
“My master was Bill Goodrum. I was born at Des Arc out in the country close by here. My mother was a house woman and my father was overseer. I was so little I don’t remember the war. I do remember Doc Rayburn. I seed him and remember him all right. He was a bushwacker and a Ku Klux they said. I don’t remember the Ku Klux. Never seed them.
“I heard my parents say they expected the government to divide up the land and give them a start—a home and some land. They got just turned out like you turn a hog out the pen and say go on I’m through wid you.
“I heard them set till midnight talking ’bout whut all took place during the Civil War. The country was wild and it was a long ways between the houses. There wasn’t many colored folks in this country till closin’ of the war. They started bringing ’em here. Men whut needed help on the farms.
“All my life I been cooking. I cooked at hotels and on boats. I cooked some in restaurants. They say it was the heat caused me to go blind. I cooked up till 1927. The last folks I cooked for was on a boat for Heckles and Wade Sales up at Augusta, Arkansas. I done carpentry work some when I was off of a cooking job. I never liked farmin’ much. I have done a little of that along between times too. My main job is cooking.
“I voted along when I could see. I ain’t voted lately. I sho lacks this President.