"De river got so low dat we would be tied up for 3 or 4 days before we could unload it. And we never made it to de port where we could unload it to send it to California. From dese ports you went by land with a covered wagon and oxen or mules. It would sometimes take 6 months to get to California from de time we left de river. My way would have been free because I could drive a team out to California. But I never got to go 'cause de river got so low. I quit de river work and done some farming for first one den another down in Ste. Genevieve County for a couple of years.
"Dey was just startin' up at Crystal City. Dere was lots in de paper about it. Now and den William Kimer, who was livin' in Jefferson County, wrote me to work for him. I would work for him from May to December durin' de wheat cuttin', thrashing, corn pullin' and wheat sowin'. Den dere was no more summer work, so Crystal City was just startin' up and dere was no railroad and dey got everything by boat and teams hauled de things from de river up to de plant. Sometimes there was from 50 to 60 farm teams down at de river haulin' de coal, brick, etc. for de company. Sometimes we would make $15 a day for de farmer man and he would pay me $10 a month and board. Den I went to Crystal City and worked 13 straight years. De most dat ever I got dere was five or six dollars a day. Dis would be about every three months w'en we tore down de furnace and built it back. At other times I would get about $4.50 a day. I done everything. Made mortar, carried de hod and brick and when quittin' time come you was tired. After I quit Crystal City I went down in Ste. Genevieve County and farmed and got married and had two children. My wife and one child, a little girl, is dead. I live here with my son and his wife. My son has been workin' for de St. Joe here for 12 or 13 years. I had to quit work when I lost my eye-sight.
"I was grubbin' hazel-nut bushes in dem rich bottoms in Ste. Genevieve County; and one day I was runnin' and fell down on a stob and it went through my left eye. Dis happened about 40 years ago. De other eye was good till I was 45 and den I had de loss of both eyes and been blind ever since. I'se been gettin' a blind pension for 22 years. It is $75 every three months.
"Dere is only one colored family here dat owns their house. All de others rent from the company. I vote at every presidential election, but dat's about all I ever do vote. I been votin' for every president election since I was 21 years old. From de beginning to de end it's always the same, the Republican ticket. Dey joke me a good deal around here 'bout voting one way.
"As I look back on it, people ought never to have been slaves. Dat was the low downest thing dat ever was. De first startin' of slavery was when a white man would go over to Africa and de people over dere was ignorant and de white man would hold up a pretty red handkerchief and trade it for one of de Negro women's children. De Negroes in Africa was too ignorant to know better and dis is de way slavery started. I always said like dis, when de older ones that knowed de things, dey ought have learned de slaves their names as dey was in Africa. Lots of us don't know what our grandparents was in Africa. Slavery didn't teach you nothin' but how to work and if you didn't work your back would tell it. Slavery taught you how to lie, too. Just like your master would tell you to go over and steal dat hog. Den de other master from who I stole de hog would say, 'Peter, why I've lost a hog; did you ever see him anywhere?' I would say, 'No, suh'. Of course if I did not lie I would get a whippin'.
"De white people did not want to put us in a state to ourselves after de freedom 'cause dey couldn't do without us. De colored people done come up too high now to back 'em and dey got a better chance. De conditions now of de colored people is of course better now 'cause dey is somebody. But every day dey is tryin' to starve us out and give de white man a job on de state road. Dey do dat to keep us down. Dat's done more now dan ever before. It's been worse since Roosevelt got in dere. When Highway 61 was put in from St. Louis down to Festus de colored man had a part to do. Since Roosevelt got in dey won't even let a colored man walk down de highway."
[Ed Craddock]
Interview with Ed Craddock,
Janitor, Saline County Court House,
Marshall, Missouri.
Veteran Janitor
Marshall, Missouri has a life-long negro citizen who was born in slavery, but was too young to remember actual slave conditions. He is Ed Craddock, born a few years before the Civil War, the son of slaves owned by leading pioneer families. Craddock lived through the hard days of reconstruction. His own father was a school building janitor in Marshall in the 1870's, and Ed Craddock was apprenticed under his sire, finally, upon death of the latter, succeeding to the job, which he has held for forty-seven years. Years ago he married and reared a large family. Craddock belongs to the Methodist Church, serving as "second minute-man", which he explains is something like a secretary, and also belongs to the Colored Masonic Lodge. Craddock's brother is a practicing physician in St. Louis.
"Stories told me by my father are vivid," Craddock said in an interview. "One especially, because of its cruelty. A slave right here in Marshall angered his master, was chained to a hemp-brake on a cold night and left to freeze to death, which he did. My father said slaves had to have a pass to go places. 'Patrollers' usually went in groups of three. If they caught a slave off his plantation without a pass the patrollers often would flog them."