WEBVTT 00:00:02.000 --> 00:00:34.000 Peter Gottlieb: This is an interview with Mr. Matthew J. of 2201 Crestas Avenue, North Versailles Township, Pennsylvania. Recorded on May 28th, 1976, in Matthew J.'s office at 411 Porter Road, North Versailles Township. [recording paused] Were you able to get very much education? 00:00:34.000 --> 00:01:41.000 Matthew J.: Well, I went to the-- tenth-- ninth grade. I think it was ninth grade and then, uh. Had 14 kids in the family. Of course, the boys always had to work. The girls went to school. They went to-- The two sisters finished high school, the one went to college and some teaching school. All that high school, the boys got, we had to work. We had to help the old man to keep bread on the table for the rest of them. But-- so I didn't finish high school there. And after I left home, I would further my education in Washington, D.C., I went to night school there. And since I've been here, I went to school and had some schooling here in Pennsylvania and I took a course in economics and sociology and so forth. 00:01:41.000 --> 00:01:50.000 Matthew J.: And that's-- that size of the family, I couldn't concentrate on studying too much. 00:01:50.000 --> 00:01:52.000 Gottlieb: Were you the oldest in the family? 00:01:52.000 --> 00:02:04.000 Matthew J.: No. I have one sister, two-- two sisters and one brother older than I am. For about the third-- [unintelligible]. 00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:14.000 Gottlieb: To my knowledge, nine years of education at that time in South Carolina was more than most Black people were getting. Is that right? According to your-- 00:02:14.000 --> 00:02:15.000 Matthew J.: What subject _______[??]-- 00:02:15.000 --> 00:02:21.000 Gottlieb: Was nine years of education was-- was more than most Black people were getting in the South at that time? 00:02:21.000 --> 00:03:53.000 Matthew J.: Well, they, those didn't have a large family. They went on, they were-- But one of the handicaps that had them in my part in what's called Kershaw County, in Lancaster County, they had this high school, was about seven miles from where we were living, and they had buses running to high school and all that went to high school, they had to go in town and board there, they couldn't come that had no transportation. So those were the able to send their children there and pay the board. They went on to high school and they had not a-- Joke about that was the, the Jim Crow system. They had buses running through from this same community to the high school in Lancaster where they went to high school, but the Black kids couldn't ride that bus. Only the s went to high school on the bus. So those Blacks that wasn't able to pay the board, they tried to go to high school. They couldn't go there. When I went on to my sister, two sisters went with but 14 kids, they couldn't afford that expense. Too expensive. So that's what's happening now. Those large families, they had the same-- come in the same category with the small families, was able to send a kid to school. They got 2 or 3 kids, they sent one to high school. 00:03:53.000 --> 00:03:57.000 Gottlieb: Was the elementary school just as far away as the high school or was it-- 00:03:57.000 --> 00:05:05.000 Matthew J.: No, the elementary school was about a mile and a half from where we lived. So we walked to schools and we walked and-- We were down there and we had to go down-- when the school was down near the church was. And the system it had there was the White schools was on the main highways. The Black schools were back, you know, on the treacherous [??] roads. And of course, some of the Whites had a long way to go, too, to get to the school. Some have transportation, some of 'em had to walk. Poor White folks, there were some poor, just like the Blacks were, in on the same category. And those richer people, they had transportation to take the kids to school and bring them back long distance. And others had to walk and many of them didn't finish. They weren't able to go to high school because the parents weren't able to pay. That had to get out of high school. Someone had to pay. And some of them, they just-- they dropped out, too. Just like the Black kids. 00:05:05.000 --> 00:05:12.000 Gottlieb: Was your father one of the few Black men who owned land at that-- in that part of the-- Matthew J.: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:05:12.000 --> 00:05:37.000 Matthew J.: There are quite a few Blacks owned land there. Plantations. 40, 50 acres. Some had much as 100 acres and they still own the land. The old folks died and they willed it to the children and they kept the tax. They come up north and worked and kept the tax up on and went back down there and build homes on it. Still own it, Black still own it, and still buying land. 00:05:37.000 --> 00:05:40.000 Gottlieb: And does your family still own the land that your father farmed? 00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:53.000 Matthew J.: No, he sold it to one of my-- my sister and my brother, one brother and sister. They owned some of the parts. They sold part of it, but they kept the rest of it. 00:05:53.000 --> 00:05:57.000 Gottlieb: Were there also a lot of Black families there that rented land and sharecropped land? 00:05:57.000 --> 00:08:15.000 Matthew J.: Yeah, they had poor, poor White and Black had sharecrops. And those sharecroppers, you know, I saw this myself. The White family, they were joining our farm and he was renting. 'Course, sharecropping was, the sharecropping system was the land owner, furnished the land and the-- I think he furnished the land and the-- Yeah, you worked the land. And go 50-50 on the fertilizers. He furnished what you call a mule, to plow it, and he got half of the crop. Then they changed that system down there, on the late years, and back in the late 40s-- 40s. They had what's called a fertilizer plan. Now you own the land and don't see-- I'm written off. I'm a sharecropper, you. Okay? You furnish all the fertilize. All the fertilize I want put on the ground. And I furnish the mule and the labor and he got half of the property, so he buy that fertilize by the carload. And I figured it out. I had a friend of mine working down there. I went down in 1945. I go down every year. My mother's living there and I checked him out. He was a good farmer. He made cotton and corn. He's a good farmer and we figured that out. Now he made around 20, 15 or 20 bales of cotton. So we figured out this fertilize plan, this fella paid about $800 worth of fertilize. Now, this fella had to feed the mule, work the crop and gather the crop. 00:08:15.000 --> 00:09:54.000 Matthew J.: And sometimes he had to hire help to get the cotton. And he got half of-- the half of the crops, half of the corn, half of the cotton. And we figured out this man, he paid about-- and the guy made 20 bales of cotton plus the corn. Now he got to feed that mule out of that corn. The other fella got to have-- he sitting on his porch and he got-- I figured it by the carload. He got that fertilizer, about two dollars, 100-- Well, we figured that he paid about $800 worth of fertilizer. Now, 20 bales of cotton. That's ten bales of cotton they got there. And this poor fella, when he got through his crop, now, he didn't have nothing going-- was all during the summer. You know, he had to everything-- He had a big. So anything he wanted to eat-- go to the store and get it. He'd put that on his bill. They'll come to settle up. This fella just broke even. See, he just made-- and he paid all his debts. You know, all he got during the summer. He come out, just broke even. Well, he'd say. Now, Mr. Matthew J., you did pretty good this year if you come out of the-- out of debt. He said, Yeah, but I don't have nothing for Christmas for the kids. Don't worry about that. Any amount you want, you go down there and get it 6 or $700 worth of stuff. 00:09:54.000 --> 00:11:16.000 Matthew J.: You tie 'em up again for the next year. See, like that. That's the game. He's like, You need a car, you buy you a car, anything you want, all the clothes you want for the kids, this year, you up by seven, $800 in debt again. See, the next year comes in. He paid it up. He-- he's just about breaking even again. That's the way and that's the way they kept him on the farm, kept him away. Now he was nice to you, as nice as he could be. Don't worry about you-- Anything you want, you can get it. So that's way he kept a lot of those fellas. And I told him, I said, Man, you ain't doing nothing. Yes, that guy getting rich off of you. I said, you know. So finally he gave up the farm, said that guy didn't want to leave. He livin' off. He sittin' on his porch, I'm doing all the work, all the labor. And I said, Now this is-- that's the way they took advantage of folks. And a lot of people they-- I went down, I went back South. I used to work, I used to sawmill down there. See, I had a job cutting logs, you know, I was logging the mill. We was getting a dollar-- back in 1918, 1917. I was getting a dollar a day. That's all they paying me. So went on to stay at school [??]. 00:11:16.000 --> 00:11:20.000 Gottlieb: Did your family raise all their own meat and vegetables on a farm too? 00:11:20.000 --> 00:11:21.000 Matthew J.: Well-- Yeah. 00:11:21.000 --> 00:11:24.000 Gottlieb: So you didn't have to rely on store bought things too much. 00:11:24.000 --> 00:12:28.000 Matthew J.: Not food. No, no. We raised our own hogs and cows. And we raised-- my dad, he had, he used to train horses. He had a racehorse. And that's how I got here [??]. I used to be a jockey and raised horses. And he'd buy his studs and get 'em out and his coach and train 'em. And he was a good farmer. He was much of a man to call him. His name is Richard Matthew J., they call him Bully Matthew J. because he didn't-- He didn't take no stuff off the White folks. You fight down there, he fight back. They say you ain't got good sense. He said so-- So he see, he had a-- we had a farm. We had this-- I was about 14, 15 years old. And we was joining the farm by the name of-- the old man name was Frida McGill [ph], the White fella. So we had what's called a fence law. 00:12:28.000 --> 00:12:30.000 Unidentified speaker: You can go. 00:12:30.000 --> 00:14:15.000 Matthew J.: We had what's called a fence law. And that means if our cows got over on his farm, he'd lock them up. His cows got on our farm, we'd lock his cows up and have to pay a dollar a head to get them out. So, then, McGill's cows ended up on our farm then. Then we had Brooks [??] come over the fence and then Dad said, Get them cows and take them and drive them back over there and fix that place where they broke in. Okay. Three of his cows. So about a week or two later, our cows got on his farm. And so he locked him up in his barn. He'd come over to the house, and dad's out there in the shop sharpen his plows. And I said, the old man walked up there and I was out there helpin' dad out. And-- Hey. He called him Bully. Hey, Bully, I got four of your cows in my farm, in my lot. And I-- I locked 'em up. Say, give me a dollar a piece. You can get them back. Dad said, what you say? You got my cows in your barn. Say confound you and say, I just made my boy take your cows over. Drove your cows back to your lot. _____________[??] Then he start toward the old man, the old man took off with Dad right behind him. Ran all the way to the woods and went on back home. He brought the-- brought the cows back. So that's like that. See, he just wouldn't take it now. He was right, the old man was right' cause-- He said-- Neighbor, the farmer, they was good neighbors. Said you take them cows back with you, fix up the place. 00:14:15.000 --> 00:15:37.000 Matthew J.: Our cows got into his lot. He locked him up and went to get some money. My dad wouldn't buy that. Ran him off the farm and he never had no more trouble. So now this and many incidents we had down there. Well, wasn't no racial trouble. I know when I was a little boy about-- I never forget that, too. In Heat Spring, a little town called Heat Spring, we was out there pitching horseshoes and the kids like, I was the only Black boy in the crowd. So kids played together like anything. So I was a good-- I was a left hand. I thought, I was gonna to play that and slide that shoe on the peg that had a five. On the peg, this boy, White boy kicked it off. I said, Why do you kick that shoe off that peg? I had a five. No, I didn't. You didn't have no five as, you kick-- I didn't. I say you did so. I'm looking at you. You lie. I didn't. I said you know you lie. You did. And I got him and I tied up that, see. And then I jumped. He jumped me. And I was getting the best, and another couple-- Two more White fellows. I-- they jumped on, the three of them. About 3 or 4 of them got on me and I had good teeth and I pulled one down and bite him and turn him loose. He'd go out, he'd go out there and leave me. So at that time, the police in the town there named Jason Clark, he-- people out there standing in front of us all looking at the fights and nobody wouldn't interfere, a crowd of kids gather around there. 00:15:37.000 --> 00:17:07.000 Matthew J.: And I had 2 or 3 of them fellas beating on there and saw that blood. I'm alright. I'm standing there ready for another one. See, no police come up there and say, what are you-- Say, you gonna lock me up? See, had a little jail back there by the side of the outside house and outhouse. So, create-- by the police get me, creatin' excitement. People was coming to gather around and see what's going to happen, you see. So they back there wanted to load the cart that on the platform. I had to go up on that platform to go around to, sent to jail. So when Bridges, he's the head of the town, he's the boss of the town. My dad-- he and my dad was up tight in politics together, see, so he come out on the platform. What's the matter back here? Says, this boy here and bloodies these boys' nose and he bite them and cut them up like that, and they bleeding. And said, What are you gonna do with that boy. Gonna lock him up! Whose boy is that? Someone said, that's Bully Matthew J. boy. Bully Matthew J., your daddy? Yes, sir. Turn that boy loose, go home to your dad, boy. That's all there was to it. Boss of town had spoke, see. And things like that, now you got to make a big issue out of that. And the guys jumped me, see? So that's all it was then-- things like that. But other than that racial trouble we got along pretty good. I-- we had little fights, but old-- fathers would get together and separate us. 00:17:07.000 --> 00:17:12.000 Gottlieb: Mhm. What times-- did you use to go to school as long as children today go to school? 00:17:12.000 --> 00:17:19.000 Matthew J.: No. We had nine months school. No, nine-- nine months. Was it nine months? [unintelligible] 00:17:19.000 --> 00:17:23.000 Gottlieb: They go-- they go to school about nine months now. 00:17:23.000 --> 00:17:34.000 Matthew J.: Now? Yeah, no we went-- I tell you when we were at school, from December, January, February, March. 00:17:34.000 --> 00:17:38.000 Matthew J.: April. Like five months. 00:17:38.000 --> 00:19:52.000 Matthew J.: April was time for farmers. That's all that we had. Ain't no nine months school. And in the schools down there now, they had two class of books. Either you buy your own books there at that time. You didn't-- landowner don't pay no school taxes. Everybody buy their own books, but anyways [??]. And they publish the books. Okay. Now you got to buy the books for your, you know, your White kids in the second grade, first grade had a different book from the Black kids. Wasn't the same story in the books. And that's how they indoctrinated us this here, Jim Crow is in school. And we go to the show. Black sit upstairs, the Whites downstairs. And all those pictures there, that's why they planted this thing, indoctrinated us so deep. We go upstairs and they have a-- what they-- I don't know how they get those pictures. They get the picture and go out in the field of kids-- Well, they had pictures, what of those Black kids on that field raggedy and they all happy and all and White man come along on his horse, you know, and pop his [??]-- put that in and hit him and he run like that. And White kids looked at that and we looking at it and what that, what that done put in that kid he's-- he's superior you know and I'm inferior see and-- and so when he come out on the street he see me, he look down on me and I got to look up to him. That's-- and the story was different than the books. Gottlieb: Yeah. Matthew J.: That's why some of them is indoctrinated them so deep. They can't-- they can't get rid of it. Can't get rid of it. Unidentified speaker 2: Good morning. Matthew J.: Good morning. So that's what-- one of the hang ups they had. That's why they so-- some old folks down there, it was so hard to get that out of the system. You think that's a way of life, and then we-- the shows were done Jim Crow. You get on the buses and all of the trains. Yeah, they had on the trains, had a colored coach and a Black coach, you know, and the streetcars, you ride in the back and they in the front and all that kind of stuff. 00:19:52.000 --> 00:19:58.000 Gottlieb: I've-- I've been told even in some places in the South that there was one side of the street and Black people walked down the other side of the street. 00:19:58.000 --> 00:20:28.000 Matthew J.: [simultaneous talking] That's right. Some of the towns were like that, you still then, and still here, you know, stuff like that. And it is bad. It is a rough system. But we come up with that stuff, see, and that's why a lot of Negroes left and went North. They want some freedom. You know, we just tired of that yoke around the neck. When they got old enough, they couldn't-- He had to say that they had to fight, so rather than fight, you just leave-- Just leave home. Go away to get some freedom. From that Jim Crow system. 00:20:28.000 --> 00:20:31.000 Gottlieb: Well, if they were going to fight, they wouldn't have had a very fair chance either. 00:20:31.000 --> 00:21:38.000 Matthew J.: No, we wouldn't have had a chance. You-- you been hurt, or kill somebody. A mob will get that lynched, that's all. And it's a bad system down there now. And this is-- these-- now the kids got along together as long as they were small. They played together, but then got up certain age, you ain't supposed to associate with any of us, you know. Mr. So-and-so's son-- And I had another innocent with a guy when I was-- I was-- I was-- we used to fish, not on our farm and I had a sister was afraid of a horse, you know. So this man, Bill Williams, he had a big-- he had to join our plantation too. Said to J. Williams [??], he had 4 or 5 boys and a boy named Olan. Olan, him and I was about the same age. So he come down on a big gray horse, come running down, down the road, down. My sister saw the horse and she ran up to the tree, see. She, she saw it running. He got the horse to chase-- chase her around the tree on the horse. I say, Hey, only don't-- stop that. He laughing and she running and hollering, you know. And I took a rock and hit him and hit him right upside the head. 00:21:38.000 --> 00:21:41.000 Matthew J.: Knocked him off the horse. 00:21:41.000 --> 00:22:10.000 Matthew J.: And he fell off the horse. Horse went on back home and we all run. And we went home, see. He went-- Horse went. So the horse came home with the boy not on him. Then they backtracked the horse down to that-- dirt road, backtracked the horse, the boy lay down on the street, bleeding. We went home. I didn't say a word nobody, didn't tell my dad nothing. So where-- when I had the one, when we were had went on, when Olan's dad come and __________[??] 'cause I saw him comin'. And went over my dad was, said hey. Said my dad caught me out then. 00:22:10.000 --> 00:22:15.000 Matthew J.: Says, What happened down in the creek? 00:22:15.000 --> 00:23:07.000 Matthew J.: I said, Olan was chasing sister around the tree with the horse and I told him to stop. He wouldn't stop. And I hit him and deal with him. He said, You only hit him. You damn near killed him. He said, Boy's in the hospital. Said, so-- So I told them how it happened. He said, Boy always chasing kids on that horse. So my dad had to do pay his hospital bills. That's all. And that was all, was that. So I went home in 19-- that happened back in 1916, I guess, and we got to be friends again and played together. After I left home, and I came up here and I went home in 1948. My brother said to me and say, you know, we got to talk about all the boys we used to play with. Said, Olan work down here in Kershaw [??]. I said, he's still-- Olan's still livin'? Yeah. You ought to go down and see him. I don't want to see Olan. Said, he don't want to see me. You still got his head, still got the mark on his head there. 00:23:07.000 --> 00:24:10.000 Matthew J.: I said no, I ain't going down there. So the joke of it, he said, he insisted I go, see. Oh, no, we asked him about it. So it goes on. And I thought he going in to get his coffee. The guy went to the garage down there. He drove in there and stopped his car and got out. And here Olan was there up on the car, you know, Hey, Olan, you know this fella here? He looked. Say, yeah-- yeah, that's one of the-- they call me Mask. Ain't that old Mask Matthew J.? Say, yeah, this is me, Olan. God-- he got off there, hands all greedy, grabbed me around the neck and just hugged me, I said-- And all the people in the office, they're lookin' at us and said, Boy, why don't you-- Where you been? Goddamn, you look good. Where the hell you been? I said, Oh. And he said, Now any time you're down here, come back to see me. I'm looking that mark on his head. I-- I thought he had that old grudge against me. Altogether different. So every time I go down, I go down to see Olan, see. 00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:11.000 Gottlieb: He's still living now? 00:24:11.000 --> 00:25:27.000 Matthew J.: Still living. He's about 77 years old. Gottlieb: Yeah. Matthew J.: Yeah. See, that good relationship there, see? Then another time I went down in 19-- I bought a Oldsmobile in 1938. I went down South and it was bad down there in 38. See, it was bad down there. They had the Ku Klux-- Town, they had a big sign on the highway, Ku Klux welcome, welcome you to this town. Was rough. Was rough there. So I drove my car down there and on the main street you got business park, you drive in on the parking lot. And I pulled my car in and my brother said, You can't park there. I said, Why not? Ford, T-Model Ford got-- I had a nice looking car. Say, you can't park this here. Says, Come back up, back up, get outta here. They'll give you a ticket for parkin'. I said. We went around that way to look the horses out, you know, that's why we parkin', 'cause we park in the back. I said, Well, okay, that's a law. I got to abide by the law. He would give me a ticket and I have to paid for it. See, that's the law. Okay. So I go there the store there, a big old store there. You buy a harness and plow hose and harnesses and tools, all kind of farming tools, food and everything. Combination store, everything. So my brother is up buying something. I went back in the back to see all the shoes back there. 00:25:27.000 --> 00:26:43.000 Matthew J.: I want, I saw a pair of them those-- thin shoes with the holes on the top on the bottom. I sit on a leather seat there and sit down. The girl went back-- She got to wait on the White. Nobody __________________[??] I sat down. My brother saw me sitting there. He come in, what do you want? I said, I'm trying to buy a pair shoes, if I ever get waited on. So he said, Come on, man, they won't sell you no shoes here. Go back around here, round behind the bend, they had a wooden box for the Black folk sit on tryin' shoes. He said, you try to put your foot in a shoe here, if it don't fit, you got to buy it anyhow. Stuff like-- Back then, I saw the box, said, I walk on out. I didn't buy no shoes. I said, How do you feel? Said, that's what-- that's way we do. That's the way they do here. So I didn't buy no shoe. So-- and every year I went down, I'd go down there where my brother traded at. And they know. They know I'm a stranger there, they know I ain't-- You ain't round here. You ain't-- You live around here? No. You one-- You some relation to Reverend Matthew J.? That's my-- that's my brother. All right, then. You know. Gottlieb: Mhm. Matthew J.: So in 1951, I drove a Lincoln down there, see. 00:26:43.000 --> 00:26:46.000 Matthew J. Big Lincoln down there. 00:26:46.000 --> 00:27:58.000 Matthew J.: And my mother lived back-- around, she livin' with her sisters, live out on the farm there. And so we joined them back to the house. I had-- that was during 1950 and had that air raid thing. I was an air raid warden and I had this sign on-- on your seat, on the front of your car. Better, better schools. It was 1950-- 50-- 54. That's what it was. 54. Better schools, better communities. Put it on the front of your car, where your license plate. You know, I go through town, I notice people looking at the front of the car, look at the back of the car and I had some papers back in there on this one back seat of my car where this air raid stuff, they had a lot of papers. They gave 'em out all the time. So we drove over that Lincoln over the house. Then we got over there, my brothers and I said, Let's go to one of them watermelon place, get some watermelon. Say you leave your car here, I'll drive my car. We got to come get the watermelon, come back. And got back to the house. About 3 or 4 White fellows all around my car look at me. I said, What them guys around? So we go up in the yard. They say, Hey, Roy says, my wife plant some flowers and we want to get some manure. 00:27:58.000 --> 00:29:17.000 Matthew J.: That wasn't what they have, that's an alibi. I said, All right, go out down the barn, and get it. You get all you want. So 3 or 4 went out the barn and I was sitting on the porch where my mother was. Say, How you, Aunt Minny [??]? I mean, how are you, Mr. So-and-so. Says, this one of your boys? Yes, this one, not the oldest-- Not the oldest one. Says, Where you from? That was me now. I says, I'm from up on Pennsylvania. How you like up there, sir? I like it alright up there. You got to work for a living, like you do here. Just--Just--Just got to work. You got a pretty good job? A fair job. Making a living at it. Think you'd ever farm again? I said, Well, I don't know. I know how to farm. I don't say I'm going to farm again. If I ain't got to farm again. I farm til I was 20 years old. I know all about the farm, so I may come back down here someday and farm, I don't know. Yeah, you can get along all right down here, doin' the right thing. Just like that. So-- But what they was after, they thought I was, since they passed-- The Supreme Court passed that law in '54, desegregating the school. I had on my front of my car. 00:29:17.000 --> 00:30:12.000 Matthew J.: "Better schools, better"-- Now he thought I was down there advocating that, see. That's what he suspicious was. Gottlieb: Yeah. Matthew J.: So I tell my brother in law, I say, my brother said, I better take that sign off my car. That guy's pretty suspicious about something. My other brother-- You bought it, didn't you? I said, Yeah, I bought it. Well, it's yours. Keep on the car. After I saw that, I went and took that sign off my car and put them, put them on the seats. 'Cause they were gettin' suspicious. And when we go in there the fella sat on the porch, at his porch, we go right by his house. He watch every strange car coming out that road that, gotta strange car, they get you, you know, get your license. They watch every move you make. And some of them down there in northern car they follow-- The police will follow you all the way through town. You-- all like that. And the preacher went down, Reverend Nelson McKeesport. They followed him all the way to-- police car, followed him all the way through the town. They going to come out and come back. They want to see where you're staying. What's your business down there. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:30:12.000 --> 00:30:15.000 Gottlieb: This man Nelson was from the same part of the state as you from? 00:30:15.000 --> 00:30:17.000 Matthew J.: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:30:17.000 --> 00:30:26.000 Gottlieb: Um, what was I gonna-- You-- Your, uh, brothers and sisters stayed in South Carolina? None of them came up here? 00:30:26.000 --> 00:30:52.000 Matthew J.: I have one brother here and uncle, they live down the hill, but other brother, one of them-- one of them, he went to Buffalo and-- I had three brothers. I-- yeah, they got their own place there, see. Where they-- after they quit farming, they went, they went-- they got a job in the oil mill, a big oil mill there. They worked there til they retire, both of retired and one was a big-- he worked, a big contractor and they was both all retired now. 00:30:52.000 --> 00:30:54.000 Gottlieb: Did any of your sisters come up North? 00:30:54.000 --> 00:31:09.000 Matthew J.: Not to live. See, they still both-- both my sisters' husbands, they died and they still didn't know, they got their own-- another sister married. He-- he got his own place and they got their own place down there. And I-- 00:31:09.000 --> 00:31:14.000 Gottlieb: [simultaneous talking] What-- was it hard for you to go back to the South after you'd been living up here for a while? 00:31:14.000 --> 00:33:08.000 Matthew J.: No, I like down there. I like the climate. I'm going down next week. I was down there for Christmas. I was down there 2 or 3, 2 or 3 times a year. In fact, after my kids got grown. We and my wife gon' move back down there. I like it. And down there, them same stores where I had that trouble, the same store that-- you go there now, they done made a big-- what do you call these serve yourself, see-- like, uh-- made a shopping center, see. Great big grocery store there, you go in there and get your bags and go around and get you-- load up your bags and come to the counter and you pay for it. And I grab a bag and say, Wait a minute, hey boy, the White feller would pick that out of the cart and stood there. I put-- put it up in the corner of the trunk. Thank you. Come back again. I said, hey, I don't give kind of service in Pittsburgh. You got to get it. Nobody can-- with groceries, with groceries cart on there, they got courtesy there. Gottlieb: That's right. Matthew J.: Everybody, White and Black, they take that-- they take that bag, have you-- Take it and tell you, come back. She said, my sister said, what's different there now. It's beautiful down there now. And all those restaurants, you can go in there and eat, anywhere you want to eat. And motels. I was driving down there one year and going through North Carolina. I had the kids in the car and I wanted to get some milk. You know, stop in there, run in the ______[??] and get some cold milk, there were the kids, went to the door and started in, girl next to me said, Nigger, ain't no niggers allowed in here. I said-- What am I going to do? Walk on out. And-- and the motel on the highway, you couldn't-- You couldn't stop. You just had to-- it was rough, you know, back. After they pass that law and put the fool out that everything would level off. 00:33:08.000 --> 00:33:13.000 Gottlieb: Did it used to bother you before 1954 when you went back home? Matthew J.: Yeah. 00:33:13.000 --> 00:34:26.000 Matthew J.: That's when I had that trouble, that's when I drove that Oldsmobile down, you see, they didn't-- I didn't get no trouble, 'course, I just abide by the law. See, it says 50 mile an hour or whatever. I just stayed within the speed limit going through them towns. And I never had no, never was stopped. Nothing like that. But I-- just forget. I know I went down on the bus one year and they had the Jim Crow in Charleston, West Virginia. And so we ride together. They got to Charleston and they had the restroom all the same. But the eating counter was different. Blacks eat downstairs and White eat upstairs. Well, I just got off the bus with the same restroom together. I go to it and sit on the counter where they-- with the White folks, see. I didn't know, you know. And I sit down and the man there, his White apron and say, White-- hot coffee downstairs, hot coffee downstairs looking right at me. Say, told me, you get your hot coffee downstairs. I come on, there was one colored porter, I said, Man, you won't serve you here, you have to go downstairs to get the coffee. Say-- Well, I go any other place to buy a coffee, I'm going across, these are the [??] restaurant across the street and I ain't bought no coffee. I didn't go downstairs. 00:34:26.000 --> 00:35:37.000 Matthew J.: So got on the bus. And the Whites-- Blacks had to go in the back seat. And that's how-- Jim Crow, in Charleston. And-- Well, I got back to. I didn't want no tro-- I went to the last seat in the bus and sit down, big long seat. Nobody back there but me. I got me a pillow, lay down and went to sleep. So then after that, we stop there somewhere and found out some more colored folks got on there. Well, they took my bed, so I had to sit up, get a seat up there sitting there and got way down in North Carolina in daytime, a whole bunch of picnics and a whole crowd of White folk. And I'm sitting about middle of the bus now and the only seat was vacant was the one back there, the one back seat in the back of me, see, the bus driver got up and looked back there and he saw I'd been through. He just got up and look back and sit down. I was looking for him to come back to ask me to move back, but he didn't. And this girl-- her boyfriend, he said she sitting back with me and said, I'm sitting here smoking a cigar, and then she back there, Givin' him hell. This is what I got to put up with. This is what I got to put up with. 00:35:37.000 --> 00:36:45.000 Matthew J.: You know, this is 'cause she's ridin' back there in the back of me. I'm supposed to be behind her. Oh, what the hell are you doing? Said you ridin'. She said, Yeah, but look where. I ain't say a word. She forced all the way into Winston-Salem. But, uh. Stuff like that. The boy didn't say, he didn't care, but the girl, she the one that raises hands, and she had to sit back there where the colored folks sit. But some of them bus drivers-- usually, I said-- seats them back. He would grab them and move them back. So it's altogether different now. And in the station there, great big things like this. The ticket office there and Blacks over there and the Whites over there. Now I got-- I got a little ticket, run right up to the office. I go there and buy my tickets and Whites go there and buy their tickets. As long as the Whites are there, I think the colored people miss trained on it. As long as the Whites there, they won't wait on you till all the Whites took place. And that kind of stuff. They just won't come and give you a ticket and all that stuff. So I go in, and we go in when it ain't crowded and get your ticket. People gettin' it in a hassle. 00:36:45.000 --> 00:38:11.000 Matthew J.: Yeah, all that kind of stuff now. And they got a-- I was going out on the bus, same bus I was going on, I got out of the station, now I'm asleep. I woke up, the bus say, you got 15 minute rest period. I jumped up and woke up and went in and went right into the white station. See, where the white boy, I wasn't thinking. I went over the counter and said, I want to-- bought a couple cigars. She got that counter, said, The colored waiting room right around there. I say, Give me some cough drops. She got the cough drops-- I said, the colored waiting room right around-- [laughs] I couldn't wake up-- I went to drinking fountain, drink water. You know, I wasn't thinking. She come and walk me, come up and I went around there and cut a little, little hole back there. And you had to-- to get waited on, you had to-- The waiting room, the service-- They hand it to you, through the window. I, I just waited. I looked-- box to sit on, and boxes, boxes sit on it. [unintelligible] So we had to put up with something. But it's beautiful down there now, anyway, the Negroes got good jobs down there. They got government jobs down there now. They making more money there than it is here, some. It's altogether-- This is New South. 00:38:11.000 --> 00:38:21.000 Gottlieb: Tell me about the circumstances-- You said that you farmed for 20 years with your family. Matthew J.: Yeah. Gottlieb: Tell me about the circumstances under which you decided to leave. 00:38:21.000 --> 00:39:43.000 Matthew J.: Well, as I said, my father gave me a choice, see. Say you've been here on the farm, now if you want to go out in the world, that is a normal [??] It was the fall of the year, we-- all the crop together. A lot of the fellows go up and come up North and work and come back in the spring and farm, see. Gottlieb: Uh huh. Matthew J.: So he said, You can try it for yourself and if you like it, don't like it, come back. So I went on-- I went to Winston-Salem and Rock Hill, South Carolina, where I got my first job and now to Winston-Salem, Winston-Salem to Washington, D.C. And I got a job working tobacco factory there. And I had a job wherever-- I got a job, never without a job. And so I stayed in Washington, D.C. for five years in the-- 1920 to 1924, I had-- Then other job that I got done, a small job. I've been a dollar-- dollar, $2 a day was the pay up and Winston-Salem was payin' two dollars and a half in the tobacco factory. And then Washington DC, a construction worker, I gettin' $4 a day. That was a big money back then. So I went-- After I left there, I decided to leave Washington, DC. I was going to Buffalo where my brother was. I had a brother in Buffalo and I had-- I had an uncle living here. So I stopped to see him and he said, Stick around here. Says, You might get some job. If you get a job here, you can't use going somewhere else. 00:39:43.000 --> 00:41:12.000 Matthew J.: So I stop here and borderline [??] in Braddock, stayed down there. Went all the steel mills and I got hired over steel, and they wouldn't hire nobody else. There was a bunch of guys in the employment office, filled up there. I sit down around 12:00, everybody come in's going out. Fellow in the office, he started to put his coat on to go out. Said, look, man, a big place like that ain't got room for one more man, just like that. Say, yeah, I got jobs here but-- It's outside. It's cold here through the winter, in February. It's snowing every day. I got a job here, it was outside. I said, Ain't nobody else out there. Yeah, I got that-- Anybody else out there, I can go-- I can go out there, too. Just like that. Said, alright. Come in Monday morning. I come in on Monday morning. I got my overalls on, man, I got my heavy socks. And I'm ready for that cold weather. Guy done had me on that with a fella, white fella. He's had one loading the big gondola cars. Now he-- he-- he was eating all that coal dust till I got there. He put me down there, say now, buddy. He's a foreign fella. He says, you work for me now. I tell you what you do, you-- I go up on top of the car. When I-- When I holler, you pull lever. You got to go on top to a big car, load up coke. And loadin' up the car. Okay, buddy, pull lever. Oh, and that dust-- I couldn't go nowhere. That dust. All that black dust go right over your face. [laughs] 00:41:12.000 --> 00:42:30.000 Matthew J.: And now you couldn't tell him-- All you could tell by his eyes. He-- his face was this dirty black. You know, he-- He put me there to eat that dust. Okay. He's smart. He got up there in the car. Okay, buddy, pull lever. He was going down the, holdin' down the track there. Okay. I see. So about 2 or 3 days the boss come out there and this fella said to me, he said, The boss is a good man. He's a good man. Good man. Okay. He didn't give me a good recommendation. So I'm getting tired of eatin' that dust too, now. So. So about next week, the boss come in and says, Hey, Matthew J.y. He says, I got another fella who got a good job inside down there. He won't work steady. Say, you said you workin' steady. I want to put you inside on that job, I'll let him go. Okay. Went down there, had a good job inside there and put the next sand for the dinghy. All he had to do is stand up in there and let it dry and then dinghy come along and pull a lever and it shoot up in the dinghy. And, you know, the dry days, I didn't have nothing to do, just sit there and read, sleep. Man, says, was warm in there, gave me-- I got that good job. So, worked there about two weeks, he come out there one morning when Friday, say, Hey, Matthew J.y, says, you stay home Saturday and come out Sunday. I said, What? I said, I said, I don't work on Sundays. 00:42:30.000 --> 00:43:40.000 Matthew J.: Oh, yeah, you work Sunday on this job? No, I said, I go to church on Sunday. I don't-- I don't. Well, you ought to keep this job now, it's a big temptation there. Good job here now. So I come home and told my landlord, I said, Look, you know what that man told me? He told me to stay home tomorrow and come out Sunday. Oh, yeah, that's another day here. I said, don't you work on-- No I ain't going to work on Sunday. I said, I'm going to leave here. I'm going, I'm going on to Buffalo. Well, I hate to see you go, says, uh. Says, why don't you go up to Westinghouse? They work five days and a half. I said, Where's that place at? Said, he said, Go up there to Sixth Street and get the 55 car running on East Sixth Street. I go to walk up there. I says, Snow is that deep. Then the car done stop running. Street cars wasn't running. I saw a fella come along walking. I said, How far are you headed to Westinghouse? He says, That's where I'm going. The street cars don't stop in Homestead. I walk from Homestead, I'm going to Westing--. I mean, I walk from Braddock to the Westinghouse, East Pittsburgh. Out there-- Man-- People all out in the street there, employment was crowded. The man, one of these big men came. I don't know. We're all sitting. 00:43:40.000 --> 00:43:42.000 Matthew J.: He says-- 00:43:42.000 --> 00:45:06.000 Matthew J.: After he-- Come out then. Look at me and says, Hey, fella, come here. Want to work? Say yeah, go upstairs. Man hired me Saturday morning. And I went to work Monday morning. So-- and up then, and I had a good job there, painting and painting. And so payday come. I goes back to Homestead to get my pay. Man asked, Why you-- why you quitting? The reason for quitting. I said I don't work Sunday work, so he write down in the book. He give me pay and I come on back and work in the Westinghouse. And they had me back there in that paint. They didn't have no other corner, like that room, that painting, no, that-- didn't have no fan in there. Nothing-- that paint got-- that blooming paint got on. Go home and take a bath. I can still smell it. So I went to superintendent. I said, look, says, I can't stand that paint. Says, like I go home and take a bath. I still is-- in my skin. I can't get rid of it and I can't stand it. I'm gonna-- If I can't get nothing else, I have to-- I'm gonna to quit. So no, we-- we can find something else for you to do. How would you like to get on the trucks? Say, anything to get me out of that paint. So the next day, he put me on a truck. Way up on the truck around there. Well, I like that. I get out in the fresh air and [unintelligible]. So I stayed on that truck for 41 years. In the transportation department, see. 00:45:06.000 --> 00:45:07.000 Gottlieb: Driving or? 00:45:07.000 --> 00:46:07.000 Matthew J.: Driving a truck. Yeah. Transportation. I stayed there-- then I got-- well in 1932. I was 24 when I went there. 1932, the Depression hits. They laid off everybody up to ten years service and I like, in about 3 or 4 months. I was 24. I had about 7 or 8 years in. So anyhow, I was the highest. I had to-- go up to get who they wanted out of there. They had to go to ten years. The second [??] fellow they wanted out of there, nobody was back. So boy--
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