"I signed up three years ago. I don't get nuthin' now. What I scrape round and make is all I has.
"I was born in June 1861. I don't recollect what day they said. Pear lack it been so long. When it come to work I recken I is had a hard time all my life. I never minded nuthin' till I got so slow and no count."
Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Saint Johnson
Izard Street, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: —
Occupation: Drayman
"As far as slavery is concerned I know nothing about it except as the white people told me. My mother would ask me what they told me and I would tell her that Miss Annie said I didn't have to call her father 'Master' any more. And she would say, 'No, you don't.'
"My father's name was Wiley Johnson. He was ninety years old when he died. He was born in Cave Spring, Georgia, in Floyd County. My mother was born in the same place. Both of them were Johnsons. They were married during slavery times. I don't know what her name was before she married.
"Anyway, I've told you enough. I've told you too much. How come they want all this stuff from the colored people anyway? Do you take any stories from the white people? They know all about it. They know more about it than I do. They don't need me to tell it to them.
"I don't tell my age. I just say I was born after slavery. Then I can't be bothered about all this stuff about records. Colored people didn't keep any records. How they goin' to know when they were born or anything? I don't believe in all that stuff.
"You know these young people as well as I do. They ain't nothin'.