"No'em, no huntin' no mo. Useto hunt rabbit until las yeah. They ain't wuth the price ob a license no mo." No'em, ah ain't evah fished in Ohio."
"No'em, nevah wuz no singer, no time. Not on steamboats, nor nowheres. Don't member any songs, except maybe the holler we useto set up when dey wuz late wid de dinner when we wuked on de steamboat;—Dey sing-song lak dis:"
'Ol hen, she flew
Ovah de ga-rden gate,
Fo' she wuz dat hungrey
She jes' couldn't wait.'
—but den dat ain't no real song."
"Kentucky river is place to fish—big cat fish. Cat fish an greens is good eatin. Ah seen a cat fish cum outa de Kentucky river 'lon as a man is tall; an them ol' fins slap mah laig when ah carries him ovah mah shoulder, an he tail draggin' on mah feet.—Sho nuf!"
"No'em, ah jes cain't tell you all no cryin sad story 'bout beatin' an a slave drivin, an ah don' know no ghost stories, ner nuthin'—ah is jes dumb dat way—ah's sorry 'bout it, but ah Jes—is."
Samuel Sutton lives in north lane Lebanon, just back of the French Creamery. He has one acre of land, a little unpainted, poorly furnished and poorly kept. His daughter is a huge fleshy colored woman wears a turban on her head. She has a fixed smile; says not a word. Samuel talks easily; answers questions directly; is quick in his movements. He is stooped and may 5'7" or 8" if standing straight. He wears an old fashioned "Walrus" mustache, and has a grey wooley fringe of hair about his smooth chocolate colored bald head. He is very dark in color, but his son is darker yet. His hearing is good. His sight very poor. Being so young when the Civil War was over, he remembers little or nothing about what the colored people thought or expected from freedom. He just remembers what a big time there was on that first "Free Fourth of July."