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AOHP #73
Page 1
This is an interview with Mrs. Elizabeth Hartley^ and
her son, William, by Karen Weaver for the Appalachian Oral
History Project in Triplett on June 11, 1973.
(in this transcript Mr. Hartley and "son" are the same person)
Q:
First I'd like for you to give me your name and age
please.
A:
Lizzie Hartley, Elizabeth Hartley and I'm 73.
Q:
Where were you born?
A:
ABout
Q:
Did it have a name?
a mile over up this holler.
Did it have a certain name for the
area?
A:
Arnold's Branch.
Q:
Arnold's Branch?
A:
Yeah, Arnold's Branch.
Q:
How many children were in your family?
A:
Seven.
Q:
How many brothers and sisters did you have?
A:
I had four sisters and two brothers.
Q:
What did your father do for an occupation?
A:
He farmed and worked the sawmill.
I've never heard of that.
�Q:
The sawmill?
Was it around this area?
A:
Yeah,rail around this area.
Q:
Did your mother-was your mother just a housewife?
A:
Yeah, my father was a carpenter.
Q:
Was he?
A:
Built houses.
Q:
So you had a farm?
A:
Yeah, yeah we had a farm.
Q:
Did the children have to help with the work around the farm?
A:
Yeah, the children helped with the work.
Q:
What did you have to do?
A:
Oh, we hoed corn, made a garden, and all such things as that,
What did he make?
Building, he worked at a carpenter's trade.
Is that where you get most of your food from?
raised cattle, chickens and hogs.
Q:
Was it hard work?
A:
Yeah, it was hard work.
Q:
How long did you have to work everyday?
A:
'Bout twelve hours every day.
People worked form sixvo1clock
till six o'clock for 60£ a day0
�Q:
So you rteally felt like you'd earned that, didif'^. you?
A:
Yeah and most everybody lived in a one roomed house.
Q:
The vtiole family?
A:
Yeah, amd we were raised right here in a little ol' log cabin
with-it had three little rooms.
One big one and two little ones.
There wasn't hardly anybody that even had a stove to cook on.
They cooked on fire.
Q:
You had to cook all your food on fire?
A:
Yes.
There wasn't anybody, only just- I bet there wasn't half
a doxon in our community that owned cookstoves.
Q:
Really?
Who were some of the families that had stoves?
A:
My grandmother had one and Mary Carroll had one.
That's the only
two I know of in the whole community at that time.
Q:
I bet living in a small house, did you have alot of fights with
your brothers and sisters?
A:
No, no.
I's the oldest girl in a family of seven and I took care
of the other young'uns.
Q:
Oh, so that's mainly what you had to do?
A:
Yeah.
�Q:
Did your brothers have to help around the house with the housework?
A:
No, they didn't do no housework.
Q:
They just farmed.
A:
Yeah and fixed wood and things like that.
Q:
Have you had any jobs?
A:
Nol
Q:
lfc>u just lived around here on the farm all
A:
Yeah, and people used to gather all kinds of herbs and dig roots
your life?
and all for a livin1.
Q:
Did you all used to do that?
A:
Yeah.
Q:
How much would you make?
A:
Oh you couldn,'t make nothing hardly.
You could a lots a kinds
of roots you could dig 'em and dry them and sell 'em for 2$ a
pound, and people would dry fruit and sell it for 2C a pound,
corn 50£ a bushel and coffee IOC a pound and sugar about 4C a
pound, cloth about If a yard.
Q:
Really?
Some of that cloth now is two and three dollars a yardl
�A:
Yeah.
Q:
What kind of roots and gerbs did you gather?
A:
There way May Apple, Blood Root, Black Cohosh, Blue and Stone
Root, and Quill Root.
Q:
Quill Weed?
A:
Quil Weed, yeah.
Hydrangeas, something that is on the root
list, hydrangeas was then.
Gather pine tips to make Christmas
roping and skin white pine bark.
Q:
What were some of these used for?
A:
Oh, it was all used for medicine.
Q:
Can you still sell them today?
A:
Oh, yeah.
It was 2C a pound.
(Mrs. Greer's neighbor) Beadwood leaves are 15C
a pound green now, 30C for dry.
Q?
What are they used for?
A:
Medicine
Q:
Any particular type of medicine?
A:
(Mrs. Greer) No, don't know what kind.
(Mrs. Hartley)
It's
Oxblood that they use for heart medicine, they sell it up here
at Boone, that medicine for heart trouble made o : of oxblood.
u|
It had a little purple bloom on it.
Star root and Gensang and
�lady's slipper, wild cherry bark, "sassyfat" root bark, that's a
tree.
Q:
What is lady's slipper used for, do you know?
A:
Some kind of medicine, I don't know what.
And Beth Root and
Indian Turnip, sprigmint and angelico.
Q:
I've heard some of these, but some I've never heard of before.
Like I have heard of ginsang and things like that.
They pay
a pretty good price for tinat, don't they?
A:
Dollar an ounce.
(Mrs. Greer)
get hardly nothing.
(son)
Pepper drinks that you but.
Q:
A:
It wasn't back then, you didn't
You take now, you know these Dr.
That's wild cherry flavor.
It is?
Yeah and this here root beer drinks that you buy?
That's sassafras
flavor.
Q:
It is?
I didn't know that.
So they use some of these herbs
for those drinks too?v>
A:
(Son) I think so.
(Mrs. Hartley)
Sassafras and you never see
no drink made with Beadwood do you?
Q:
Is that a herb or root or something?
A:
A little branch.
(Mrs. Greer) just pull the leaves off.
That's
�what we's telling you was 15C a pound, green now.
we are talking about spicewood..
(Mrs. Hartley) Mo,
Them there are beadwood leaves, they
are called witch hazel on the list.
Q:
Yeah, I have heard of that.
Did your family used to use any of
these for medicine, like when you could'nt get hold of a doctor?
A:
Oh, yeah.
Make tea out of them and catnip, catnip tea.
TMey
used to make catnip tea and boneset and lemon balm and another
kind we gathered, bugle weed, and wild horse mint.
What people
hepatitis 'now, wild cherry- tea from wild cherry bark will
cure that in two or -three days.
(Mrs. Greer)-
Lord a mercy, yeah.
I took my, one of my young'uns had it one time, had that for I
don't know how long and I took her to the doctor time after time
and she didn't get no better, just laid there like she's dead
or something.
Little girl came up and she was-well her and
Mizelle was A'sout the same age I reckon and she said, "I had that
stuff and Momma made me some wild cherry bark tea," and said,
"It cured me".
So I said wouldn't j^t, no harm in trying.
ANd
I went down here and got me some and fixed her some and in three
days she's well.
Q:
Did you tell the doctor what you had done?
A:
No, they wouldn^tbelieve you.
it.
He'd say some of his medicine done
�8
Q:
Wild cherry bark, is that what it is?
A:
Yeah (Mrs. Hartley)'
and Balm of Gilead buds you pick them.
I picked eleven pounds one time and took them to Boone and
got eleven dollars for it.
Q:
Really?
Do they fix. them in town or do they send them off
somewhere?
A:
They ship them.
Q:
Did you mother or grandmother used to have any home remedies,
like for Wtan4lvLkids were sick?
A:
Oh yeah, Catnip tea and wild cherry tea, boneset.
If I had to
die or drink boneset , I'd have to die because I couldn't swallow
that.
Q:
A:
That is a bitter thing, oh nasty.
(Mrs. Greer) Corn silk tea's
good for your kidney's if you can get it ciown, but getting it
down.
(Son)
Have you ever tasted any Quinine?
Q:
I have heard of it, but I have never tasted of it I don't think.
A:
(Mrs. Greer)
Well they used to give us quinine when we was little
for a high fever.
Q:
Really?
Did it cut it down?
�A:
Yeah, but it would run you crazy.
(Mrs. Hartley)
was assifidity, you buy it at the drugstore.
That there
You can put that
in a- put that in some kind ofaicokol, it is awful good medicine
for your stomach.
(Mrs. Greer) Yeah, for babies for the cholic.
(Mrs. Hartley) Now you can tell her what you make.
Q:
(To Sofl) What do you make?
A:
Well, few dancing dolls,-and churns, buckets, and lamps.
Things
of that nature.
Q:
How did you get started in doing these things?
Making these
things.
A:
Making them?
Q:
How did you get started making them?
A:
How did I get started?
Q:
Why did you get started making them?
A:
I picked it up myself.
Q:
You just wanted to start making them?
A:
Yeah, well in fact I think I must have been gifted to work
like that because that is what I like.
Q:
You sell these to craft shops?
�10
A:
Yeah to different places.
There's not alot to be made at it
because there is to many in it. Ocaasionally I build a little
machinery once in a while for woodwork as the drill, lathes,
grip saws, ^B^rfLuS. a"d things like that.
Q:
What kind of instruments do you have, do you own that you play?
A:
I have three right now, two guitars and a harmonica.
Q:
You have a dulcimer, don't you?
A:
(Mrs. Greer)
Yeah, he's gonna build him one.
one to build him one.
(Mr. Hartley))
not mine, I borrowed ri.t.
He borrowed that
The dulcimer , that's
I got it and I'm gonna get the pattern
off of it to build one for myself.
Q:
Oh, how long do you think it'll take to build one?
A:
Weil, now I wouldn't have the least idea, because I ha^re never
built one of those.
Q:
Well that makes sense.
A:
Well, no, I just work around home.
craft work.
Do you have a certain job you work at?
I do garden work, I do some
Well, occasionally I'll work away from home <X livrl^j
help somebody finish a house of something like that, but not very
often.
Q:
Oh, so you just stay around home and work mainly and carve all this
�11
stuff?
A:
Well, I have been playing the guitar and other instruments
like that.
I reckon I been where I could play an organ ever
since I coiald walk because they was an organ in the home when
I was born wasn't there?
Q:
Who played it?
A:
The whole family.
Q:
Where did you get it?
A:
(Mrs. Hartley)
(Mrs. Hartley) Yeah.
Roebuck then.
Ordered it fro'm Roebuck, Sears.
(Mr. Hartley)
I am gonna show you.
It was Sears
I have something in a few minutes
It is a 1908 Sears catalog.
Q:
Really?
Is it an original one?
A:
(Mrs. Hartley) Yeah.
Q:
Is it one that you all had?
A:
(Mr. Hartley) I found it advertland and I bought it.
In a few
minutes I'll get that out and we will go through it.
Q:
Okay.
What can you remember about the Depression?
A:
(Mrs. Hartley)
Well, I don't remember anything unusual that happened,
Alot of people suffered for something to live on and you would
see people- we lived in Tennessee part of the time at that time
and you would see whole wagon trains going down there and stop
�12
everywhere a wanting potatoes or something to live on.
We made
it pretty good through the Depression, but a lot of people suffered.
Q:
So it didn't affect you all as far as food?
A:
No, as far as food was concerned it didn't bother us.
Q:
Did any of the children leave home during the Depression to
find work?
A:
No.
Through the last Depression, now we went through two- one
±>out 1916 and one about 1930 and the first on I believe was the
worse than the last one.
We skinned pine bark and gathered
stuff and bought food we had to have and o£ course we always
put up a lot of food at home.
(Mr. Hartley) Well the way it
was, I remember just a little bit about it because I was very
young, but the pBople that owned right much property and owned
their own home where they could farm it, they made fairly wellthey growed allftheir own foor, but the people that rented or
depended on jobs- they suffered.
Q:
Were neighbors helpful to each other during this time?
Did
they help each other out a lot during the depression?
A:
Oh yes.
Some did- them that had anything divided with them that
didn't.
(Mr. Hartley)
Well it was about the same way then I
think it is now, there as some people that wouldn't work regardless,
(Mrs. Hartley) and we helped Virgil folks down here out.
had a big family.
They
�13
They didn't have - they owned their own home, but they didn't make
much.
We helped them out a lot.
We always kept hogs , we killed
hogs every fall, had plenty of meat, kept cows and had plenty of milk
and butter and things like that.
And then we growed a lot of corn
and potatoes and beans and all kinds of stuff like that.
Q:
What about -this first depression?
in 1916.
A:
I had never heard about it-
What can you remember about it?
I don't remember to much about that.
remember that at all can you Vear?
But these people- you can't
It was hitting pretty hard on
them, at that time, them that didn't have nothing to live on.
And we gathered pine bark and all such things as that in order
to buy the the things you can't raise like sugar and coffee,
salt and stuff like that.
(Mr. Hartley)
Made no difference
what you took to the store when they ran out of herbs at regular
how much, you never got no money for it.
If you get enough you
get it all up in groceries or whatever you needed.
They wrote
out what they called a due bill.
Q:
A what?
A:
(Mrs. Hartley) A due bill.
not a penny.
Wouldn't never give you no money,
People couldn't hardly get enough money to pay
their taxes at all.
Q:
What did they do when they couldn't pay their taxes?
A:
They just let them go until they could pay them.
�14
Q:
Just let it pile up kind of?
A:
Yeah, our tax never did.
We never did have our property advertised
for tax, but the last paper we got there's two whole pages people's
land advertised for tax.
Q:
They advertised it for sell for their tax.
A:
So they could pay their tax they were gonna sell their li'.nd—
A:
Mo they had to pay it with that.
Now a lot of people owns enough
that they pay their tax and never miss it, but they don't want to
you see.
(Mr. Hartley) What's the matter with times now they're
taxing people so high and they're getting sick of it.
(Mrs. Hartley)
They will tax them so high that they CQiA't pay it hardly.
Q:
You said that your father had a farm.
Did he ever take any of
his products into towns to sell?
A:
No not much, well they used to.
Used to take a yoke of oxsns and
a load of Irish potatoes to Lenoir.
Take them about three days to
go «Iown there and back and they would take them a load of Irish
potatoes down there to town and sell them and bring back a load of
flour.
Q:
How would he get it?
Would he get his flour like in
A:
Iibags just like it's bought now, cloth bags.
back a thousand ppund6 at one tirae.
I have seen him bring
�15
Q:
A thousand?
How long would it take you all to run through a
thousand pounds of flour?
A:
Oh, we didn't use it all.
He let other people have alot of it.
I would ruin before we could use a thousand pounds.
Q:
What else could he get besides flour?
When he took his produce
in what else could he bring hack?
A:
Well he never did bring anything , but flour.
Q:
Is that all?
A: .Yeah.
You see they had a little grocery store round here just
below the church and there's one down on the creek and you could
get all things like that, well we could have got flour, but I
remember Wivius_ 4iu/ju. wasn't no flour in the stores, nor no meal either,
Q:
Why not?
A:
They just didn't sell it then.
the flour mills to but flour.
They'd have to go to Lenoir to the
(Mr. Hartley) We raised wheat, lot
of wheat, had to take it to the mill and have it ground.
Q:
Did you have a lot of wheat?
A:
No, not too much.
Q:
Just enough to live off of?
A:
Yeah, we raised wheat and rye, cut it by hand.
�16
Cut it with an old-fashioned cradle.
I bet you've never seen one
one of them.
Q:
A:
I don't know whether I have or not.
Oh they had a blade that long and then a little bitty fingers
on it about- they's little bigger round than your finger and I
guess they was about 40 inches long.
You'd just take that
cradle, swing it around, get you a bundle and just pour it off
of it.
You'd get about a bundle ever lick.
and rye both.
I've bound wheat
Go along behind the cradle and tie it up in shocks
and let it dry and then stack it or thrash it- stack it and then
the thrashing machine come and thrashed it, after there got to
be any thrashing machines.
A lot of people thrashed it out by
hand.
Q:
How would you do that?
A:
Fixed them a thrasing floor and spread that our on it and just
beat that grain out of it.
Q:
Oh, I ' l l bet that was hard work, wasn't
A:
Yeah.
it?
Then you could hold it up and the wind was blowing it'd
blow every bit of the chaff and trash out of it and you just had
clean wheat.
Q:
Isn't there something in the "Bible about the wind blowing the chaff
away.
�17
A:
Yeah
Q:
With all the work around the farm, when did you all find time
to play?
A:
When you were children?
Oh we didn't play none.
I was having to tend to the young'uns
till I got too big to play.
Q:
So you never got to play?
A:
No, No.
Q:
Did your brothers and sisters ever have any little games that
I didn't play none.
No.
they used to play?
A:
Oh yeah.
Played ball and once in a while I could get time to
jump rope or something.
(Mr. Hartly)
Q:
What would you do?
A:
Veil, we'd get out and maybe we'd go somewhere there's a big
a big whole of water- go swimming, or we'd get out in a good
cool place in the voods, set around and talk, find us a good
grapevine to swing on and played with that.
Then after we ' <'
learned to play music we'd get together some of us over the
weekends, get back where it was cool at.
Maybe a whole crowd
of us gather around, play sing, and dance.
sometimes keep as many as four cows
(Mrs. Hartley) We'd
and it's whole lot of trouble
to take care of youTmilk and keep it clean.
�18
Q:
How would you go about doing it?
A:
Well, you'd just milk the cows and then strained your milk and
diurn, make butter.
And we kept four or five old hogs all the
time and we'd feed the hogs milk and now give $1.;35 a gallon
for milk.
Q:
Did you have any kind of ice box or something to keep your milk
and stuff in?
A:
No, but it kept in the spring.
Kept a race below the spring
water ran in it all ihe time.
Q:
Oh, I bet it kept a lot colder, too, didn't it?
A:
Yeah, it kept it good and cold.
We had a spring box down here
when we lived here and we kept our milk in the water.
(Mr.
Hartley) The way we'd do-that we'd get some kind of good wide
board, make a box*
Make it waterproof.
Go right down below
the spring, we'd dig out a space in that branch there that
would fi>^ it so the water would stand about eight inches deep
in the box -and the W^W- hjojld, flow through that box all the time
and that's what kept the milk and butter cold.
Q:
Looks like after a while the water would start to rot the box
or something.
A:
Oh, it won't run under the water at all.
�19
Q:
What the box. wouldn't be under water?
A:
No, not under water, no.
Q:
How long did you have to use it like this before you got an icebox1
A:
I guess about my whole lifetime up until about thirty years ago.
Q:
Really?
A:
About thirty of thirty-five years old.
I guess I was thirty-five,
maybe forty before we ever got refrigerator.
our first refrigerator in '55.
five years old then.
(Mr. Hartley) We got
(Mrs. Hartley) Well,X was fifty-
(Mr. Hartley)) Well, you see we didn't get
ttie electricity until '54, then '55 we got the refrigerator.
(Mrs. Hartley) We didn't have no electricity till about '54.
Q:
Iteally?
A:
(Mr. Hartley)
They didn't nobody around down in here have no
electric til right up around '53.
(Mrs. Hartley)
Electric wasn't
down in here til that time.
Q:
Wasn't that hard not having electricity?
A:
Well you never was used to it, you wouldn't miss it, if you never
knew nothing about it. But now if you were to go back and didn't
have electricity it would be rough.
It would be bad now.
never was a car down here til about '22, 1922.
down here.
There
Not even one car
�20
Q;
Really?
Do you remember if that is that the first time you had
ever seen a car?
A:
Oh, no.
I had rode in a car before that time.
Q:
Wiat did you think about the car when you first saw it?
A:
Oh, I didn't think much about it.
First car I was ever in was
Charlie Watson's, when Roxy and Deity, my two sisters went to
Boone to lave their tonsils out.
and I rode in that car.
taken out.
That was nineteen and eighteen
I went with them to KuVt- their tonsils
But the first car that was ever down in here was
Seymore Carroll's car and they never was a car down in here til
'22.
Q:
Why not?
Just nobody down here had one?
At
No they couldn't get in and out of here.
There wasn't no road.
Couldn't get in and out, no there wasn't no road they could drive on.
Q:
So that's how you traveled before you had a car?
A:
Yeah, walked.
I walSed.
I could walk then.
First time I ever went to Boone
I was eighteen years old before I ever went to Boone.
Q:
How long would it take you getting there wilking?
A:
Oh not long, not too long, no.
Deerfield, that way.
Went up to Jake's mountain through
�21
And the first time I ever went to Boone I went up there to my mothers
sisters, walked up there.
We got back home about two o'clock.
Q:
Did you?
And that is the first time that you had been to Boone?
A:
First time I ever went to Boone I was eighteen years old.
Q:
What did you think about it?
What did it look like when you were
eighteen, what did the town look like?
A:
I don't remember. cThere wasn't too many buildings there.
I remember
Roby Blackburn's, went into see him, she-her son had died and
she went up there to, have , be appointed administrator.
Roby Blackburn up there and he asked me how old I was.
And I saw
I told him
I was ei ghteen and he said I was old enough to begin to court
just a little bit but I wasn't old enough to get married yet.
Now most all the buildings that was up there at town, I would say
fourteen years ago, was torn down.
Q:
Really?
What kind of buildings were up there?
A:
Well, there's some of them was dwellings and some of them was
for business purposes.
Now up at the place where I bought my
first Gibson guitar I ever owned was tore down.
the theater is at?
You know that parking lot just above it?
Right there.
Q:
You know where
That is where it was?
The store?
�22
A:
Yeah, it belonged to Richard Greene.
Q:
Richard Greene?
A:
Yeah he owned it.
He owned the store?
He had his music store in the basement of
his house.'
Q:
And it/s torn down?
A:
He is dead now.
Did he go into another business or what?
I have got the guitar now yet, the one I bought
from him.
Q:
The very first one you bought?
A:
No, it is just the third one but it is the first Gibson.
Q:
Oh, -that is the kind that my brother has.
I think it is a Gibson.
When'did you get your first guitar?
A:
The first guitar I got was in, the first one that I ever owned
I got it in 1936.
Q:
Who did you get it from?
A:
Sears and Roebuck.
Q:
Did you?
A:
Uh huh.
Do you still have it?
I wished I had kept it. A guitar like it today costs
$32.00 and that one costs four dollars and thirty-nine cents.
�23
Q:
What kind was it.
A:
Silverstone.
Q:
Prices have certainly changed.
A:
(Mrs. Hartley) You could get a good cow for $15.00 but you had
to work thirty days to get that $15.00.
Q:
WMit, just doing any kind of work?
A:
Any kind of woirk that you done you just got 50C a day and you had
to go to work at 6:00 of the morning and work till 6:00 of the
evening, for 50C.
Q:
That is the most you could make was 50£?
A:
50C, 50C a day, and people got so they could get a dollar a day
for work and they thought they's going to town.
Women, when they
worked they got 25C a day and the woman would do just as much a«
the man, they got, a man got, 50C a day and that wasn't fair.
Q:
What kind of jobidid the women have to do?
A:
Oh, they would get and work in the fields hoeing corn and working
out like tbat.
Q:
What about the men, what did they do?
A:
They would do things like that too.
Worked in timber and the saw-
�24
mill, cut timber and logs, and I worked in the sawmill. They wasn't
no way to get lumber out of here only haul it out with,* team.
Couldn't
get in here with a truck.
Q:
Either oxen or horses?
A:
Oxens or horses.
Q:
Didn't you say that your father worked wi-fk the sawmill?
A:
Yes
Q:
Would he just cut up the lumber?
A:
He usually logged.
Q:
Logged?
A:
Pull logs into the sawmill out of the mountains.
What would he do, what do you mean by logging?
He'd pull them
with teams and he done a lot of carpenter work, too.
(Mr. Hartley)
He helped build every house that was built in the neighborhood,
until he died.
Q:
He was probably a pretty \\&rd worker then, pulling all that stuff.
A:
Yeah
Q:
How long has it been since you have made a quilt?
A:
I ain't been too long.
four years.
(Mrs. Greer-neighbor)
It's been about
(Mrs. Hartley) I guess it has since we made one.
But I've got some more to make cause I have got some to quilt.
�25
I ain't got nowhere to put them up to quilt.
Ain't got room in here
and it is too hot upstairs in the summer time and too cold in the
winter time.
Q:
Where did you used to quilt them?
A:
We'd quilt them right here but we didn't have as many things in
this room,
(Mrs. Hartley left the room to get a quilt to show me so I talked
to Mr. Hartley about school until she got back.)
Q:
How much schooling did you have?
A:
I went to the fourth grade and then I got sick end had to quit.
Q:
Do you remember your first year of school, the Very first day of
of school?
A:
Yeah, I didn't like it.
Q:
You didn't like it?
A:
Well, I didn't like my teacher awfully good.
Q:
Where did you go to school?
Ai
It was down here.
Why not?
I tell you, you know down yonder where come
down, you know where the church is around there?
Well, you know
where you come on down to that road you turn left to come straight
on down
this way?
Well you remember after you got on down, you
�26
remember that house that's setting over that creek?
Right there
was where the school house was at.
Q:
Really?
How long has it been since they have torn it down?
A:
They te.d the last school house there at the '40 flood.
(Mrs. Hartley returned with her quilt)
Q:
Oh, this is beautiful!
When did you make this one?
A:
It ain?.t been too long since we quilted this one.
Q:
Is this a certain pattern?
A:
Star. (Mr. Hartley)
If she wants to make a certain design in
her quilting, I help her figure her patterns out.
Q:
Do you make up the patterns?
A:
Yeah
Q:
I knew that there were some certain patterns to go by but I
didn't know that you all had made these up.
pretty.
A:
Oh, these are
Now, do you do these by machine or hand or what?
(Mrs. Hartley) I can do it by hand or by machine or either one,
It is quilted by hand.
Q:
Are you ging to go back to quilting?
A:
I don't know.
I don't know whether I could or not.
I've got
�27
I ain't hardly able to do nothing.
A:
(Hr. Hartley)
People used to talk about seeing such hard times
back then, I don't wonder at it.
Took everything they could
rake and scrape to buy buttons with to go on the clothes aad
they was made of brass, and brass never was cheap.
(Mrs. Hartley)
Well, people back then didn't know how to have nothing.
The land
vas worth three times as much as it is now and -they planted about
four hill of corn to the acre.
(Mr. Hartley)
They would plant
•the corn four foot apart each way.
Q:
They just didn't know?
A:
(Mrs. Hartley) Didn't know hosr to do it.
take you right now and show you a farm.
(A\r. Hartley) I can
It is in Ashe County
and it is a beautiful farm too and way back, it is a great big
farm about 300 acres was sold for one old hog rifle.
Swapped
for one rifle.
Q:
Really?
Whose farm'-is it?
A:
Cooper's, Cooper's farm.
(Mrs. Hartley) People used to buy all
all the land the land they wanted for $4.00 an-acre.
(Mrs. Hartley)
Sell any kind of old bluff for $2.00 an acre.
Q'i
Why do you think their has been such a drastic change in the prices
of land and everything>else?
A:
Well I don't know.
People has just got to be bigger dogs than
�28
they used to be I reckon.
(Mr. Hartley) and what's run the prices of
land up here in the mountains so much is the people from Florida and
also from the North coming back here, and what I think has really
happened is people has made so much money they either have a farm
or a lot that costs just so they got it.
See they could buy that
land cheaper than they could pay their income tax.
Q:
What do you all think about all these people coming from Florida
aid like from the North coming in and building houses and all these
condominiums and things on top of mountains?
A:
(Hrs. Hartley) Well, I don't exactly approve of that, do you?
(Mr. Hartley) Well, I will tell you what I think about that.
I think we should hold that more or less for the people in our
own state.
a home.
Now say for instance,say you wanted to go buy you
How much more would that home cost you on that account?
A 30, a $25.000 and a $30.000 home now ain't worth over $45.000.
And they will burn you. up building it.
And'the labor costs on
a home now is more than the material to build it.
people wfisn^t work like they used to did.
Because
And most of the contractors
when you build now, they build you a house at costs plus 10%.
Well they don't try to save nothing on that building material.
They don't try to save nothing on the lot.
Now they don't care
how long it takes them to build it, why the more they are going
to make.
self.
(Mrs. Hartley}
Well, built our house practically his
He cut every piece of framing in it but three.
it his self.
He built
�29
Q:
How long did it take you to build it?
A:
Well, in getting my^timber out and having it sawed, it took me a
little over a year.
See, I cut my own logs and had them sawed.
I built this houee for a little less thafa $22.00.
I am thinking
about, I don't know whether I will or not, I been thinking a little
bit about building me another one.
Me and a friend of mine are
going to buy a sawmill, in fact we are going to build us one
a piece.
Yeah, we are going to cut our own timber.
Q: Where would you build it?
A:
I would probably build right around here somewhere and my friends
gonna build one about a quarter of a mile on up above here.
Right
there's where I was born and raised.
Q:
You said awhile ago when I was talking to
you about school.
Do
you remember any experiences that you had in grade school?
A:
Well, not but a very few of them, Matter of fact, what I liked
about school, only it was different than it is now.
We run up with
a problem then in school that you didn't know what to do with, your
teacher, she would come to your seat and sit with you and explain
dt to you and help you, or my teachers would.
She would work with
the whole class like that as long as we had her for a teacher.
learned in school and learned and learned fast.
And my favorite
subject was arithmetic, but today we call it math.
Q:
How much schooling did you have Mrs. Hartley?
We
�30
A:
They just, when I was growing up they was just three months school.
Maybe I would get to go two or three days during the whole term.
never went to school none to amount to
nothing.
I
(Mrs. Greer) She
can out read any body you ever seen.
Q:
Did you teach yourself to read?
A:
Yeah.
Q:
You did?
A:
Well, •-! just got to reading every little thing I could come across.
How did you know how to teach yourself?
(Mrs. Greer)
there?
Q:
You see all them books and things stacked up across
She reads everything in the world.
That is really good.
What about your brothers and sisters, did
they get to go to school?
A:
Oh yeah, they went to school.
Q:
Did your parents go to school?
A:
Yeah, both of them could read and write.
Q:
How many years did £hey go?
A:
I don't know.
They didn't have no school much.
Back then children
didn't get to go to school, they had to work, and their wasn't
no compulsion school laws then.
Q:
I never went to school none hardly.
Do you know what they used'to do Hor discipline in the schools?
�31
A:
Used to whip them.
stand up.
Sometimes make them slay in.
Sometimes make them
I was going to school in an old log cabin, and one
boy, they made him stand up and he fainted.
He was a grown man
just about, Granville Tripplett.
Q:
Who was it?
A:
Qranvilfc Tripplett.
Q:
Do you say you went to school in a log cabin?
A:
Yeah.
Q:
Was it one room?
A:
fust one room and they didn't have no glass in them, just open
He is dead now.
windows and a big old fireplace, they kept a fire in it, big old
chimney, kept a fire in.
Q:
Who would keep the chimney supplied with wood?
A:
Well, the students would.
Yeah, they was woods all around it and
and they would cut the wood.
Q:, About how many students would be in the classroom?
A:
They would be about.
I've got a group here of pictures taken,
maybe I can find it.
Q:
What did they used to do for discdpLine when you went to school?
A:
(Mr. Hartley) Well, sometimes they would use a switch on them,
�32
sometimes a paddle or they'd rnark a ring out in the center of the
floor and make them stand on one foot for a certain length of time.
Q:
What if they would fall?
What would the teacher do if they lost
their balance?
A:
Send them back to their seat.
Then alot of times they would make
them mark a ring on the floor and make them hold their arm up
like that for a certain length of time, ot again go up and put a
dot on the board and make them stand on their tiptoes with their
nose in that dot on the chalkboard.
Q:
Just anything they could think of to do.
A:
Yeah.
But I will tell you though, the teacher I had was good to
them but she kept them under control.
Q:
Was she a strict teacher?
A:
Well, the same teacher I went to was my first grade teacher, second,
third and fourth grade as the grades come up for me, why she got up,
she come up and started teaching higher grades.,
Q:
Who was she?
A:
It was Ollie Triplett at that time, it is Ollie Thompson now.
Q:
So she would just move up with you all in the grades?
As you
would move up to another grade, she would move up?
A:
Well, see she would go to school herself when school was out.
She
�33
would build herself up to it,.
She'd teach around here and -then when
school was out she would go to college.
Q:
Well how would the teacher go about teaching if you were all
different ages?
A:
Would he teach you all at one time?
No, they had certain classes for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and
7th grades.
Q:
Would they all be in the same room?
A:
Yeah.
Q:
What would the other ages be doing when he was teaching another
age group?
A:
They was, they'd just call them up to class and have them recite
one class at a time.
Q:
What would the others be doing though?
A:
Be studying.
(Mr. Hartley)
I believe folks back then days too
Wis alot stricter with their younguns than they are now.
Back
then it is a possibility that they were too strict with their
family andnow it is a possibility that some of them are not strict
enough.
Don't you believe that a lot of this doping that has got
dnto the college and many different places, don't it start at the
students homes?
Q:
I couldn't really say.
�34
A:
(Mrs. Hartley) No, I don't really believe parents, if they know
that, I don'tAtheir parents would allow it. Of course alot of the
parents are dopes too.
(Mr. Hartley) Yeah, what I mean, I think
alot of times I believe these things begins at home.
Q:
Probably so.
Probably has the roots of it at home.
A:
Or at least in the hometown.
You see, the students that go to
college up there are from all over.
some cases their from other nations.
All over the nation and
I don't know you might not
agree but I think in America, I don't think they should allow
anybody in Boone to have schools but for theJAmerican students.
And you know that as messing up our nations too much and that is
giving other nations the chance to learn too much about our affairs,
Q:
You think they should stay in.their own nations and country and
go to their own schools?
A:
I think that we'd be better off.
Q:
That is interesting.
A:
This United Nations"4Keu have got I don't think too much of fchat.
Because we are paying for all of it and the other nations are
paying for none of it.
Q:
We are paying all the expenses.
You don't think that it is helping keep peace or something with
other countries or anything?
A:
There^ is no way to keep peace with other countries because we have
�35
done found, looks to me we've done found that out.
All they are
doing now, just trying to get everything out of us
that they can
and we are giving it to them.
Now I have had people that stayed in
i
Germany for three or four years andhow I had a cousin, her and her
husband stayed ovet there for four years and she told me that the
German people had any love for Americans they did not.
they hated our guts.
fact.
(Mrs. Hartley)
She said that
And I wouldn't doubt it that ain't about the
Now I think that our government authorities is
just doing the American people awful wrong.
They are taxing them out
of all reason in the world and then sending it to them people over seas
now that is not fair.
I don't think they should do that.
(Mr. Hartley)
Well, now you know when they settled this here peace treaty there in
Vietnam, whenithey went- and signed that peace treaty and they wanted to
i
give North Vietnam so many million dollars, two and and a half million,
I think, and South Vietnam two and a half million , I agree with you
that isn't fair, it isn't fair.
Q:
What, to give them the money?
A:
To give thm the money to build back with.
They was the ones that
started the war and they were the ones tho^" tore up everything.
Vfty not let them fix it back themselves.
Q:
Where would they get the money to fix :it back?
A:
(Mrs. Hartley)
Where did they get all the money to buy all that
equipment for the war?
�36
Q:
Well, that is right.
A:
(Mr. Hartley)
I think to let them whup theirselves, that would
teach them a leason.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Appalachian Oral History Project Interviews
Description
An account of the resource
In 1973, representatives from Appalachian State University (ASU) began the process of collecting interviews from Watauga, Avery, Ashe, and Caldwell county citizens to learn about their respective lives and gather stories. From the outset of the project, the interviewers knew that they were reaching out to the “last generation of Appalachian residents to reach maturity before the advent of radio, the last generation to maintain an oral tradition.” The goal was to create a wealth of data for historians, folklorists, musicians, sociologists, and anthropologists interested in the Appalachian Region.
The project was known as the “Appalachian Oral History Project” (AOHP), and developed in a consortium with Alice Lloyd College and Lees Junior College (now Hazard County Community College) both in Kentucky, Emory and Henry College in Virginia, and ASU. Predominately funded through the National Endowment for the Humanities, the four schools by 1977 had amassed approximately 3,000 interviews. Each institution had its own director and staff. Most of the interviewers were students.
Outgrowths of the project included the Mountain Memories newsletter that shared the stories collected, an advisory council, a Union Catalog, photographs collected, transcripts on microfilm, and the book Our Appalachia. Out of the 3,000 interviews between the three schools, only 663 transcripts were selected to be microfilmed. In 1978, two reels of microfilm were made available with 96 transcripts contributed by ASU.
An annotated index referred to as The Appalachian Oral History Project Union Catalog was created to accompany the microfilm. The catalog is broken down into five sections starting with a subject topic index such as Civilian Conservation Corps, Coal Camps, Churches, etc. The next four sections introduced the interviewees by respective school. There was an attempt to include basic biographic information such as date of birth, location, interviewer name, length of interview, and subjects discussed. However, this information was not always consistent per school.
This online project features clips from the interviews, complete transcripts, and photographs. The quality and consistency of the interviews vary due to the fact that they were done largely by students. Most of the photos are missing dates and identifying information.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Collection 111. Appalachian Oral History Project Records, 1965-1989
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1965-1989
Document
A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text.
Scanned by
Wetmore, Dana
Equipment
Hp Scanjet 8200
Scan date
2014-02-25
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with William and Elizabeth Hartley, June 11, 1973
Description
An account of the resource
Elizabeth Hartley was born in Arnold's Branch, North Carolina in 1900 and lived on a farm where her only job was to collect herbs and dig roots. William Hartley is the son of Elizabeth Hartley.
Mr. and Mrs. Hartley both talk about growing up and childhood activities such as picking herbs, but they both agreed their childhoods were mostly hard. Mr. Harley talks about playing instruments like the organ and his interest in music, while Mrs. Hartley discusses her hobby of quilting. They both reminisce about what it was like living through the Great Depression and such as using electricity for the first time in 1953 and seeing their first car in 1922.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Weaver, Karen
Hartle, William and Elizabeth
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a title="Appalachian Oral History Project Interviews, 1965-1989" href="https://appstate-speccoll.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/195" target="_blank">Appalachian Oral History Project Interviews, 1965-1989</a>
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
6/11/1973
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
Copyright for the interviews on the Appalachian State University Oral History Collection site is held by Appalachian State University. The interviews are available for free personal, non-commercial, and educational use, provided that proper citation is used (e.g. Appalachian State Collection 111. Appalachian Oral History Project Records, 1965-1989, W.L. Eury Appalachian Collection, Special Collections, Appalachian State University, Boone, NC). Any commercial use of the materials, without the written permission of the Appalachian State University, is strictly prohibited.
Extent
The size or duration of the resource.
36 pages
Language
A language of the resource
English
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
document
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
111_tape73_William&ElizabethHartley_1973_06_11M001
Spatial Coverage
Spatial characteristics of the resource.
Triplett, NC
Subject
The topic of the resource
Farm life--North Carolina--Watauga County--20th century
Watauga County (N.C.)--Social life and customs--20th century
Depression--1929--North Carolina--Watauga County
Elizabeth Hartley
farming
Great Depression
herbs
homemade remedies
instruments
Quill Weed
quilt making
quilts
roots
sawmill
schoolhouse
Triplett
William Hartley
-
https://omeka.library.appstate.edu/files/original/bfdcde28375a3728f55e2a2522b3adf3.mp3
a7181a389c8b26b4fa24fbbfdd87830c
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Appalachian Oral History Project Interviews
Description
An account of the resource
In 1973, representatives from Appalachian State University (ASU) began the process of collecting interviews from Watauga, Avery, Ashe, and Caldwell county citizens to learn about their respective lives and gather stories. From the outset of the project, the interviewers knew that they were reaching out to the “last generation of Appalachian residents to reach maturity before the advent of radio, the last generation to maintain an oral tradition.” The goal was to create a wealth of data for historians, folklorists, musicians, sociologists, and anthropologists interested in the Appalachian Region.
The project was known as the “Appalachian Oral History Project” (AOHP), and developed in a consortium with Alice Lloyd College and Lees Junior College (now Hazard County Community College) both in Kentucky, Emory and Henry College in Virginia, and ASU. Predominately funded through the National Endowment for the Humanities, the four schools by 1977 had amassed approximately 3,000 interviews. Each institution had its own director and staff. Most of the interviewers were students.
Outgrowths of the project included the Mountain Memories newsletter that shared the stories collected, an advisory council, a Union Catalog, photographs collected, transcripts on microfilm, and the book Our Appalachia. Out of the 3,000 interviews between the three schools, only 663 transcripts were selected to be microfilmed. In 1978, two reels of microfilm were made available with 96 transcripts contributed by ASU.
An annotated index referred to as The Appalachian Oral History Project Union Catalog was created to accompany the microfilm. The catalog is broken down into five sections starting with a subject topic index such as Civilian Conservation Corps, Coal Camps, Churches, etc. The next four sections introduced the interviewees by respective school. There was an attempt to include basic biographic information such as date of birth, location, interviewer name, length of interview, and subjects discussed. However, this information was not always consistent per school.
This online project features clips from the interviews, complete transcripts, and photographs. The quality and consistency of the interviews vary due to the fact that they were done largely by students. Most of the photos are missing dates and identifying information.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Collection 111. Appalachian Oral History Project Records, 1965-1989
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1965-1989
Sound
A resource whose content is primarily intended to be rendered as audio.
Artist
Critcher, Josie (interviewee)
Ward, Karen (interviewer)
Duration
Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.)
00:53, Making soap
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Interview with Josie Critcher, August 8, 1973
Description
An account of the resource
Josie Mae McGuire Critcher was born on May 10, 1876 to Paul McGuire and Laura Martinee Lewis from Ashe County. She married Gaither Critcher on April 27, 1898 and they had seven children that included Thelma, Lena, Willie, Jessie, Paul, Robert, and Hubert.
Gaither was a farmer and carpenter, and also pruned trees and shrubbery. The entire family helped on the farm and mother Josie did the cooking, canned food for the winter, spun cloth to make clothes, made quilts, embroidered pillow cases, made scarves, and crocheted lace and fringe. She also taught weaving at Watauga Handicrafts in Boone. During the interview she talked about her parents, siblings, making soap, quilting, education, using lamps before electricity, and raising children.
She died in June 17, 1977 at the age of 101.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a title="Appalachian Oral History Project Interviews, 1965-1989" href="https://appstate-speccoll.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/195" target="_blank">Appalachian Oral History Project Interviews, 1965-1989</a>
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
8-Aug-73
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
Copyright for the interviews on the Appalachian State University Oral History Collection site is held by Appalachian State University. The interviews are available for free personal, non-commercial, and educational use, provided that proper citation is used (e.g. Appalachian State Collection 111. Appalachian Oral History Project Records, 1965-1989, W.L. Eury Appalachian Collection, Special Collections, Appalachian State University, Boone, NC). Any commercial use of the materials, without the written permission of the Appalachian State University, is strictly prohibited.
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
MP3
Language
A language of the resource
English
English
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
<kml xmlns="http://earth.google.com/kml/2.0"><Folder><name>OpenLayers export</name><description>Exported on Thu Oct 24 2013 14:16:58 GMT-0400 (Eastern Standard Time)</description></Folder></kml>||||osm
Boone (N.C.)
Watauga County (N.C.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Critcher, Josie Mae McGuire--Interviews
Ashe County (N.C.)--Social life and customs--19th century
Ashe County (N.C.)--Social life and customs--20th century
Watauga Handicrafts Center
Ashe County
cooking
crafts
Education
farming
quilt making
Watauga Handicrafts