"He don't believe in dreams but some dreams like when you dream of the dead there's sho' goner be falling weather." He "don't dream much" he says.
He has a birthmark on his leg. It looks like a bunch of berries. He never heard what caused it. It has always been there.
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Sally Nealy
105 Mulberry Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 91
"Yes mam, I was a slave! I was sixteen years old when the war begun. I was born in Texas.
"My old master was John Hall and my young master was Marse Dick. Marse John went to war the 5th day of May in 1861 and he was killed in June. They wasn't nothin' left to bring home but his right leg and his left arm. They knowed it was him cause his name was tattooed on his leg.
"He was a mean rascal. He brought us up from the plantation and pat us on the head and give us a little whisky and say 'Your name is Sally or Mary or Mose' just like we was dogs.
"My old mistress, Miss Caroline, was a mean one too. She was the mother of eight children—five girls and three boys. When she combed her hair down low on her neck she was all right but when she come down with it done up on the top of her head—look out.
"It was my job to scrub the big cedar churns with brick dust and Irish potato and polish the knives and forks the same way. Then every other day I had to mold twelve dozen candles and sweep the yard with a dogwood bresh broom.