For ten years or more Anderson has operated a grocery store in the corner of the Mayodan and the Ayresville roads. Customers come more at night, so Anderson has time in the day to work his garden patches of onions, snaps and the like and to stop and rest on the porch of the small store house. Clad in good dark clothes, a low crowned derby hat, he often snoozes as he rests his eighty-two year old frame.
Anderson and many of his children were distinguished by their very large round eyes with much white showing. One of his sons inherited the blackness of his skin. This was "Little Anderson" who once sought a warrant from a local justice to punish by trial some boy at the tobacco warehouse, who had remarked thus: "Boy, charcoal would leave a light mark on your skin!"
Anderson's son, Will Scales, was the first husband of Bertha who had to nurse him through the terrible spells he would have from liquor debauchery. Will was the servant of the Nat Picket family and once Mrs. Pickett herself went down to their home and nursed Will through one of his terrible "cramping spells." After Will Scales' death, Bertha married Cleve Booker, plumber, ex-World War veteran and of surpassing good nature from Washington, Georgia. Their oldest son they named Chilicothe, Ohio, because at that city, Cleve was in war camp and met Bertha who had gone there to go out in service.
Some of Anderson Scales other children still live in Madison in homes marked by good construction, clean well furnished interior, artistic surroundings. Martha married Arthur Cable who also holds an honored place in the church. One daughter married Odell Dyson. Fannie Sue married Thompson. Walter married Morris Carter's daughter. He died in early 1937 of pneumonia in West Virginia. So his widow went to help take care of "Pap Anderson". Nancy Scales married Eler William Wells.
When told that the pioneer graveyard of the Scaleses which is a mile or so west of his store was a thick tangle of growth and no stones to the once wealthy tobacco manufacturer, William Scales, Unka Anderson exclaimed May 19, 1937: "You don't mean to tell me my ole Marse ain't got no tombstone to his grave".
A merchant's wife stated that about 1930, Anderson had more ready cash in the bank of Madison than any white man in town, but Uncle Anderson disclaimed this.
But the Depression of 1930-1934 did not injure this energetic black man who started in a "quarters" cabin a mile or so west of his present home and store, lived all his life in Madison and faces the "one clear call" with comfortable snoozes on his own front porch. Respected by white and colored, Anderson Scales, 82, has guided his life by the gospel preached by his pastor, also an ex-slave, William Scales of Madison.