WEBVTT 00:00:02.000 --> 00:00:33.000 Benjamin Blake: Trying to offer like that, but I didn't want the job sellin, you know? Gottlieb: Wouldn't it have paid you pretty good money? Blake: Oh, yeah. I'm going to tell you facts now. With nothing for me to come home at ten days. You know, every time we get paid, was ten days, you know, $250, $300 and sometimes $350, if a holiday and I come home with little over $400. Ten days. Yeah. Paying job. Good paying job. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: That's the second helper. First helper pay more than that. Yeah. 00:00:33.000 --> 00:00:38.000 Peter Gottlieb: Uh, wasn't the mill starting to hire quite a few men at that time? Because the war starting up? 00:00:38.000 --> 00:01:13.000 Blake: That's why they were down there. Well, it just started. Yeah, it just started. See, that's why they were crowded in that particular. They didn't hire nobody. Yeah. Didn't hire nobody. No. That particular day when I went, when I was the only one got hired. Yeah. The World War Two was on then and were taking them out of the mill. Send them to the army. That's how I was. We were just lucky. Anyhow, we were. We were older. I think I was, you know, 40 then. Yeah, 40 then. Yeah. We were just lucky. Other than that, we weren't-- at age 40. They weren't hiring the mill. But during the war time they had. An alternative. 00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:21.000 Gottlieb: Uh, so you stayed on the labor gang during the 1920s? The whole time you weren't able to move up? Blake: No. 00:01:21.000 --> 00:01:48.000 Blake: I didn't stay there long enough. But we caught turn on the furnace, You know, it's like somebody lay off, right? Because sometimes send the picker [??] is on the furnace the whole lot about twice as much and making it live again. But that's only so often. The oldest man in the labor gang said, Well, it's a job up on the floor, on the furnace, the gators [??] or so on. And so to go up on the furnace, the boss up there give you a turn, you know, somebody lay off, you know, something like that. That's the only way we got it. Yeah. 00:01:48.000 --> 00:01:51.000 Gottlieb: Well, they-- did they only have Black men working in the labor gang? 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:56.000 Blake: No, no, no. Mix up. Yeah, mix up. 00:01:56.000 --> 00:02:02.000 Gottlieb: Do you remember any of the white men you used to work with? How you, how you got along with them? Did you have any trouble with them, or-- 00:02:02.000 --> 00:02:30.000 Blake: Not whatsoever? None. We just, fact about it wasn't no pressure on it, workin then. And then you sit down and get ready to run our mouth and get ready. You know what I mean? Especially nighttime during the big, big old, as they call him, the big boss on the round. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: And then the pushing and all of us sitting down sometimes get a little job. Almost done. You going to hold it until quitting time? Just talk and carry on. So no trouble at all. No. 00:02:30.000 --> 00:02:32.000 Gottlieb: Never had any trouble from any white foremen or anything? 00:02:32.000 --> 00:04:01.000 Blake: No. On the later years, when I was about to come out, me, my boss, I was in the furnace then and I was fired. I got three weeks before I could, time to come out of mill and he. Foreman said, we can send you home right now. I don't care. And we had it pretty rough. Yeah, pretty rough. And. We meet up and I agree to come out and I went to sign up. This is what happened. Well, I was the only one they ever know. Something happened like that. This was on a Tuesday. Well, after 12:00. After Monday, 12:00. It's Tuesday anyhow. I became-- I turned 65 that Tuesday. Payday was that Tuesday. They turn to pay us that Tuesday. And they said and don't come back for Friday. You know, I said now look here on the two more days to work in this week and I'm 65. And I said sure. In my mind, I left this job right down the way five. And my boss, he, when I tell you had a run-in, the office. Right. So I met. I went and I signed up, I said, ___[??] is what you want? And I explained to him, he said, I don't blame you because I'll quit too. I don't blame-- I said, I won't be back after, the day, after I get my money this morning. I won't be back. He said, I don't blame you and told my boss about me. 00:04:01.000 --> 00:05:14.000 Blake: I told him, being the summertime, kids playing ball, you know. You know, I saw him several times. I said, Well, I'm finished. What? I'm finished. What do you you mean? I'm 65 now. He said, What are you going to do? I said, I got sign off. He said, you got two more days to work this week, I think the company can have them. I'm gone. He's not here to listen. Sit down and let's talk. Listen, I mean, you have that. You know, the last time you had a little run, you was pretty tough. Now, listen, I'm serious. Now we don't want to see you go. We don't want you to go now. We like, every man in this shop like you. I said, Well, now I'm an old man now. His daddy died [??]. You can wait two more years. That's all right. I ain't going to do it. No. He said, Are you going? I said yep. He said, this is what I want you to do. This around 2:00 in the morning. Then he said, Go to the other end of that shop and shake it. And Lord knows I'm telling you the truth. Shake every man's hand you see from first shelf or pull or what? And just take your time. Because everyone on this floor know and they like you, your personalities and whatnot. I'm telling like it is now. And he said, Shake every man hand you see and take your time to get down the other end of the mill. 00:05:14.000 --> 00:06:19.000 Blake: And when you get through, come on back to me. Says, I want you to do that. And don't hurry. I was just about 3:30 when I got through, you know, walk and talking. You know, I know how happy I am, you know? And I can-- say, you finished? Yep. Sit right on that bench there. And don't do nothing until 7:00 in the morning. Go down to the washroom and change your-- get your clothes and clean your locker out and take you down to the labor camp. I got a man working the place right now and you don't lose a quarter and say sit right on. If you go sleep here tomorrow, if you deserve a catch, you catch your sleep. Tell him I tell you to sleep because I like you, Gatiss [??]. Then buried. I'd run in. We had that that finish. Well that was very nice. Yeah. And I said okay. Well I couldn't sleep. I just sit there and rest. Then when I'm finished work for life and 7:00 come, I got my stuff together and went on down to the wash room and changed my clothes, taking you down to laborer stand and went to the office. He said, Be sure to stop by the field office after you go home. I go, Yeah, right there. 00:06:19.000 --> 00:07:38.000 Blake: I told the man, explain to the man, he said. I'm 65. He said, You don't look like you. 65. Oh, boy. You know, you can sign up to work a few more years if you want. Say, why don't you do that? I say, What would you do if you were me? Say, I'l come out too. I say, All right. Well, until when? The clerk says, Get the record down to see it. You got that record there right or you ain't going to get nothing. You mean you cut, you know, and you got my record and what's your name? I said, Yeah. He said, This is a man here. I'm reading it right here. And you're going to see it telling the big boss, You know what? Ten years he lost one day in ten years. He said, what? Said, one day in ten years. I see. I remember that day. Was on a Saturday. She say yep, on a Saturday. I said, my daughter got married and I took off that day. He said, Let me see you. He said, How did you do it? He said, I ain't never seen a record like this ten years. I said, I said, Well, the record. He said, That's what I'm talking about. He said, Going home, get out of here. You deserve it. Yeah, I lost one day in ten years. And after that, that was it. 00:07:38.000 --> 00:07:40.000 Gottlieb: So they're paying you pension now? Blake: Well, yeah. 00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:41.000 Blake: Yeah. Yeah. 00:07:41.000 --> 00:07:52.000 Gottlieb: Do they just-- Something I'm curious about doesn't have much to do with what other questions I've been asking you. But do you get a cost of living increase in that pension, or is it just a steady sum of money? 00:07:52.000 --> 00:08:11.000 Blake: Well, every so often you get a little. The last one, I think, was twenty percent, or. Fifty some. Between ten and five. That's about two years I been out. 00:08:11.000 --> 00:08:21.000 Gottlieb: Is it a company pension or a union pension? Blake: Company pension, company. Gottlieb: Does union give you a pension too? 00:08:21.000 --> 00:08:36.000 Blake: Union don't give no pension. Not that I know of, wasn't when I came out. Gottlieb: Uh, let me just. 00:08:36.000 --> 00:08:42.000 Gottlieb: Did you stay at Mrs. Carpenter's house all during those years? 00:08:42.000 --> 00:08:43.000 Blake: No. 00:08:43.000 --> 00:08:45.000 Gottlieb: Can you tell me some of the other places that you moved? 00:08:45.000 --> 00:09:25.000 Blake: I want to say two places. After in 1924, when I came back, they quit-- 1925. When I came back, they quit running transportation. I came on my own and I stayed-- Wasn't, that time, there was no boarders, you know, go in the mill and go whatever you want to, you know because I think the repression somewhat coming on or something, I don't know. But anyhow I stayed with Miss Carpenter about two months and I find out that I had a cousin here down in West Homestead. Yeah. And talking around and I moved down there, West Homestead, and that's where I stayed. 00:09:25.000 --> 00:09:26.000 Gottlieb: And you stayed there until you got married? 00:09:26.000 --> 00:09:45.000 Blake: Yep. Stayed with her because I got married. Cousin Esmerelda [??] would move out of West Homestead and move up in Homestead around Seventh Avenue. And that's where I got married. Right out of her house. Gottlieb: I see. Blake: 'Cause to me, I was just like her son and older brother. We get along just that good. Yeah. 00:09:45.000 --> 00:09:49.000 Gottlieb: Did you-- did you begin renting a house after you were married? 00:09:49.000 --> 00:10:14.000 Blake: After I got married. About-- we stayed with her about a year and after that our house got burned down and I move on Anne Street, stay there six months and move up around Glen Hazel. They were building the projects then. And they move up there. That's when we got house on Ann Street. And then after we went up in Glen Hazel. 00:10:14.000 --> 00:10:20.000 Gottlieb: So it was just, uh, you were just Mrs. Carpenter and then with your cousin. Blake: Yeah. 00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:22.000 Blake: That's the only two places I ever live. 00:10:22.000 --> 00:10:35.000 Gottlieb: Uh huh. Uh, what did you think of Homestead when you first came here? Just your general impressions of-- Of a town. What did you-- What kind of-- How did it strike you? What did you think of the place? 00:10:35.000 --> 00:10:46.000 Blake: To me, it is hard to explain. To me it seemed never been nowhere in my life. You know, the mountains, anything. And to me, it was just. It. Yeah. I had a good time. Gottlieb: Uh huh. Blake: Yeah. 00:10:46.000 --> 00:10:51.000 Gottlieb: Could you tell me about the kind of things you would do in your spare time just when you weren't working? 00:10:51.000 --> 00:12:34.000 Blake: Well, Imma tell you. Back there. You know, I hadn't gone back to the church then, you know, fade away from the church after I left home, you know, and payday, we'd go out and have our little drink, dance and carry on and whatnot. Go to jail. No, that wasn't no fighting at any point. This all in the street, doin' the hootin' and hollerin' and carryin' the rest of, you know what I mean, we was young, you know and like that. I've never hurt of nobody in my life. And I was arrested many times. I told one time I had a room ready in that police station down every Saturday night. It seemed like I had to go, but just wasn't fighting, just getting a little whiskey and got hollerin' in the street, you know, gettin' in with the wrong gang. You know what I mean? But there was no fighting. Nothing like, no such a thing. No. And I was there so much every week that the desk sergeant, every week, I never forget him, he said Joe Gates in that bunch. Yep. Said, don't put him in there in the cell. Let's put him in the big hall by his cousin in front. I see up there she going to come and get him anyhow. She always do. And somebody lock the rest of up in the cell but put me in the big eye down there you know. But, but, but when she think I ought to be home. She had roomers then. Yeah. I don't know where to call me boy. I don't know where. Boy At Clayton, go to the police. They see your boy up there. Say, Joe Gates up there? Yeah, he's back there. I want him. And so you know what I mean, it wasn't no. You know, ______[??] nothin' like that. I guess. And so after come-- to come to my soul, I went on back to the church, went on back to the church. I was single then you know. I went back to the church. Yeah. 00:12:34.000 --> 00:12:42.000 Gottlieb: Were there a certain places that you would go in Homestead that you liked better than other places? Clubs or dance halls or something like that that you remember? 00:12:42.000 --> 00:12:58.000 Blake: No. We ever one out. That's where I go with no respect. What I mean it wasn't no particular place. No, it wasn't no fighting. You can. You know what I mean? No, no. Not like it is these day and time. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: So you go any place you want. You know, you are right. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: Yeah. 00:12:58.000 --> 00:13:01.000 Gottlieb: Do you remember a place called the Club Mirador? 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:02.000 Blake: Yep. 00:13:02.000 --> 00:13:03.000 Gottlieb: Did you used to go there much? 00:13:03.000 --> 00:13:07.000 Blake: Not much. Not much, no. 00:13:07.000 --> 00:13:14.000 Gottlieb: Do you remember-- Did you enjoy listening to music at that time? Live bands and things like that. 00:13:14.000 --> 00:13:29.000 Blake: So we have-- that's on Fifth Avenue, yeah. Soco Hall [??] and Merchant Hall and. Oh, my goodness. Danced all night sometimes. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:13:29.000 --> 00:13:38.000 Gottlieb: So you did-- Were there certain bands that were-- that were more popular than others? Blake: Yes. Gottlieb: Do you remember? Blake: Yeah. Yeah. Gottlieb: Do you remember the names? 00:13:38.000 --> 00:13:42.000 Blake: Call the name now. No, no. Too far back. Yeah. 00:13:42.000 --> 00:13:48.000 Gottlieb: Do you remember a woman by the name of Maxine Sullivan? Blake: Yep. Gottlieb: Do you remember hearing her name? Blake: Yep. 00:13:48.000 --> 00:13:49.000 Blake: Yep. 00:13:49.000 --> 00:13:50.000 Gottlieb: Do people like her? 00:13:50.000 --> 00:14:00.000 Blake: Yes, indeed. Me? Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: Yep. Yep. That's right. How would you remember that? You wouldn't even have been born. You read about it, though? Gottlieb: I have read about it. Blake: Yeah. 00:14:00.000 --> 00:14:03.000 Gottlieb: That's the reason I know the name. 00:14:03.000 --> 00:14:04.000 Blake: Yeah, I know her. 00:14:04.000 --> 00:14:09.000 Gottlieb: Uh huh. Did you us-- Did you usually stay at Homestead or did you go different places? 00:14:09.000 --> 00:14:30.000 Blake: Different places, yeah. Rankin, Braddock and East Liberty. And, you know, just traveling, you know, different places. Yeah. It wasn't a fare. Had to go like that. Pay on the streetcar, Braddock was a nickel. $0.10 you go to town. So he didn't see it. 00:14:30.000 --> 00:14:38.000 Gottlieb: Did you-- Did you say you usually go out in the evenings just after payday, or did you do this regularly? Every evening? Blake: When you're off. 00:14:38.000 --> 00:14:45.000 Blake: You know, when you're off at a mill or you got certain days off. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:14:45.000 --> 00:14:53.000 Gottlieb: Uh, can you-- Did you-- Did you join the Second Baptist Church when you-- when you first-- 00:14:53.000 --> 00:14:59.000 Blake: 1928. I joined Second Baptist Church around about the last 1928. Yeah. 00:14:59.000 --> 00:15:04.000 Gottlieb: Yeah. Can you tell me about how you made up your mind to go back to the church? 00:15:04.000 --> 00:16:34.000 Blake: My cousin. And I tell you what happened. What helped, too. I'm telling you a whole lot about my life too, this particular time would wake me up too, she was after me. It was kind of hard to care for her, you know, I went out one night, I got drunk. She bought me a brand new 1934. She loved me, brand new, so to speak. Wrote out a showcase, so to speak. She said, Boy, now listen, I don't have chick nor child, say but you to me, just like my younger brother. And every time I get a letter from your mother, she used to tell me to take care of her boy, that means for me to take care of you, now to buy you a car. And you behave yourself and take care of it. Oh, my God. I thought I was a millionaire then. When she said that, I said, okay, I'll take it. You bought me a brand new 1934. Well, I learned how to drive it. And going around, I had good, then. You should have seen me with this car. Oh, my. I was just it. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: And one thing, I never practice,driving when I'm drinking, I never practiced that. No. This particular night was on a Saturday night. I came in on Seventh Avenue, a car parked and got out the door, and some Italian boys had a printing-- printing, a printing shop right up above us, see? And sometime they parked their car right in the back of ours or in front of our door because we all were friends of their mother. 00:16:34.000 --> 00:18:00.000 Blake: And my cousin used to come and sit on the step and talk, you know, and we just friends. All right. This particular night, they-- and they live right across McClure street. We live near the corner of Seventh and McClure, and they live right across McClure Street. Sometimes they can't get in front of their door at Saturday night. At night. They just parked in front our door. You mean in front of our car or behind our car? You know, this particular night I came in, you didn't have to lock no car then. People won't steal an automobile. No, no. And I came in drunk. couldn't get my key in the lock to get in the house. I said, oh, well, I just sit in our car and I get so, staggered the car and open and went on him and happened to get in the boys car. Gottlieb: Oh. Blake: Yeah. Miss mine and, and got in theirs. Yeah. And that Sunday morning around about 7:00. Them boys. I'm other work. They saw me in there. And got in the car and pulled their car across the street back out of my house and put it across McClure Street. And they got to open in front of it and put it in front of their door and left me in there. And it went on, went on the bed and went on to sleep, left me in their car. And I said, Now where am I? I look, I said, oh my goodness, said this ain't my-- our car. I forgot the boy's name now. And you see me jumping out of that car coming around about 7:00 Sunday morning and got in that house and went to bed. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:18:00.000 --> 00:19:24.000 Blake: And you know what come to me? I went to bed, and my cousin, she-- She didn't know when I got to bed, you know, because. Cause she knew I wasn't going to drive. Wasn't driving it. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: But come, I said, now talk to you. And she asked me again, says, I can't do it boy, they are our friends. But now there's a lot of people, boy like that, who see me in that car that time of morning. They could have just driving. Went on down South Side and dropped me in the river and go on and nobody gon ever knew it. It was two of them. Never knew it. I said, this thing that happened-- I say to my cousin, I'm going to get. And you know, them boys haven't said one word to my cousin about it. Hadn't said one word to me. Nothing. Nobody heard it. But my cousin broke it to their mother one time. I said, Now I'm talking. She said she couldn't talk to them. She said they knew it. They knew it was him. They bought nobody. They knew it was him. But the boys hadn't said that to me. Now, Lord, I'm telling you the truth. And I said, Now I could have been gone, forgotten. Nobody never know it. That's-- this is it. I come to my senses, I went on back to church and I stayed then, and I think that's in 1928. Yep. From then on that moving up in the church then. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: Now I'm a deacon. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:40.000 Gottlieb: Um, was-- Now, that was the Second Baptist Church that you joined? Blake: Right. Gottlieb: Were the people who were coming moving in to Homestead from the South about the same time you were-- was the Second Baptist Church the church that they would usually join in Homestead? 00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:47.000 Blake: Not all of them. Gottlieb: Not all? Blake: Different. Different churches. Baptist. Clark Memorial. 00:19:47.000 --> 00:20:08.000 Gottlieb: The churches didn't make any uh, any, uh, uh, it didn't make any difference to them where you might be from if, uh, because, Mrs. Lee-- The reason I ask is because Mrs. Lee told me that some of the people, Black people who were born and raised in Homestead used to look down on-- Blake: Right. Gottlieb: [simultaneous talking] --people from the South. 00:20:08.000 --> 00:20:15.000 Blake: Some of them did. She was right. Some of them did, because, till they come to their senses. I'll go further on that later. Gottlieb: Okay. 00:20:15.000 --> 00:20:17.000 Gottlieb: Well, you can tell me about that now, because that's really what I was getting at. 00:20:17.000 --> 00:21:31.000 Blake: When they would come to their senses to find out, especially men, the girls, when they come to their senses, they find out the boys from the South treat them better they ones that was born up here. They found out because my wife was one. She told me. She told me, said yes, we used to look at y'all and said, Y'all from the South didn't know nothin'. But I'm telling you the truth. That was a mistake. After we come to our senses and courting around, we found out that the men from the South, boys in the South was a whole lot better than these were born up here. And meanwhile, sit down before we got married. And after we got married. Yes, sir. Now, that's the truth. The best one. And tell me when they got married, Said, I'm glad I got one from the South. Yeah, sure am glad. Because then after, you know, I've been up here so long, I learned these boys, that's all. A lot of them wouldn't have a work. But when we come, we worked. Yeah, that's what we used to floating around nobody, depending on nobody. No. And these girls find that out? Yeah, that would tell you too. Yeah. 00:21:31.000 --> 00:21:41.000 Gottlieb: Do you remember any-- any incidents, any run-ins you might have had with-- with Black people who had grown up in Homestead? Anybody? Anybody being snotty with you? 00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:49.000 Blake: No, no, no. You mind if I take a smoke? 00:21:49.000 --> 00:21:59.000 Gottlieb: No, not at all. Of course not. Did you belong to any organization in Homestead besides the church? Any clubs or fraternal orders or anything like that? 00:21:59.000 --> 00:22:03.000 Blake: [simultaneous talking] No. No. I'll tell you why. 00:22:03.000 --> 00:23:10.000 Blake: I'm going back. Back again now. My father, he was a big man. And. Preacher, go down, him, go down him to join in the preaching. I thought it over. Say, well, I think I ______[??]. He join the ministry. Stayed there one month, I came right out. He said, Well, he lied out to me. I see that organizations based on the Bible. Well, it is if you because it is based on the Bible because it's sacred. This order, cover up. And he found out the preacher was a gambler. Gottlieb: A gambler. Blake: A gambler. And he-- And he was the president. The preacher. Pop come right on out of it. My name ain't goin nothing like that and never joined another. And I find that out. And I say I'll never join one. That's right. That's why I'm not belonging. I say I belong to one. That's the organization I belong to. Jesus Christ, He's the president. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: Yeah. Talking to people, you know, he's the president. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: Yeah. 00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:11.000 Gottlieb: Uh, were you ever asked to join? 00:23:11.000 --> 00:23:15.000 Blake: Yeah. Being asked now. Yeah. 00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:22.000 Gottlieb: What-- what kind of club were the big, important clubs back in the years when you were first living here? 00:23:22.000 --> 00:23:34.000 Blake: Mason. Oh, is this what you mean? Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: Mason. Masons and Oddfellows. Were two biggest ones. You know. 00:23:34.000 --> 00:23:36.000 Gottlieb: But you were never interested in belonging? 00:23:36.000 --> 00:25:03.000 Blake: Pop told me that. I said, I said, live right. Treat people right wherever you go, somebody gonna-- if you happen get in a lurch, somebody come to your rescue anyhow. Don't have to be a Mason. And I find that out in my career. I found it out, yes sir, on the road traveling. Something might happen and the one time what it was. One South driving back up North, I was lost. I got to the, the roads, and the roads weren't near like they is now. Now wheel a fella down, Black fella too, I wheel him down. We get to talk, we talk. So he was coming, I was going and he direct me. He said, you about 50 miles out of your way. So you go back and you follow me. I'm going back to where you came. You follow me and I'll put you on the right way. Got to that destination. If you take this road and keep going right, watch the sign, keep going. Well, now, a Mason couldn't do no better than that. No, no, no, no, no. Personality goes further than dollar. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: You gettin' me? Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: You're a youngster. I'm telling you, personality goes further than a dollar. Personality first, first and a dollar next. So that's. That's where I came. 00:25:03.000 --> 00:25:08.000 Gottlieb: Did you do a lot of church work after you were first-- After you first joined Second Baptist? 00:25:08.000 --> 00:25:10.000 Blake: Yes, indeed. 00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:15.000 Gottlieb: Can you tell me some, some of the kind of activity that you were involved in? 00:25:15.000 --> 00:25:57.000 Blake: First I'm a choir singer. First we had-- We had something like. Glee Club and somebody joined Glee Club. Women Workers Club, I joined that. Were all in the church working that. And I went to sing, I had big news, they had big news, when they learned they met a new person in choir, but now it's different. I went through that. School, I went to school, had teacher training inside the school. Some schools, I went through that. The kids were for that. And up, up, up, up. That's what I did. 00:25:57.000 --> 00:26:03.000 Gottlieb: Did-- did that use-- did that take up a lot of your spare time after you joined? Blake: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:26:03.000 --> 00:26:05.000 Blake: Once a week. 00:26:05.000 --> 00:26:09.000 Blake: Went to different one once a week. A different one. Once a week. 00:26:09.000 --> 00:26:11.000 Gottlieb: Did you start going to dance halls and things like that? 00:26:11.000 --> 00:26:16.000 Blake: Yes, indeed. Quit. Give it up. Give it the bottle. Yep. 00:26:16.000 --> 00:26:18.000 Gottlieb: Did your friends ask you anything about that? 00:26:18.000 --> 00:26:33.000 Blake: Yes, indeed. I said, Well, I had my days and I said, Yours should have yours, too. We all come together. Come up together. Well, I will sometime. I said, Well, I'm going. That's truth. Yeah, I'm going. Quit it. Give it up. Did they ever. 00:26:33.000 --> 00:26:34.000 Gottlieb: Did they ever try to talk you back in? 00:26:34.000 --> 00:26:56.000 Blake: Yeah. Didn't do no good. No good. I had my day. And the next thing now, I'm a married man. I good to my house, my home. The more I was younger, no more. 00:26:56.000 --> 00:27:06.000 Gottlieb: Did you say that your wife's family were native Homesteaders or Pittsburghers? Blake: Oh, from the beginning. 00:27:06.000 --> 00:27:09.000 Blake: My wife was born in Virginia. But she was raised up here. 00:27:09.000 --> 00:27:12.000 Gottlieb: Oh I see. At what time did they come up from Virginia? 00:27:12.000 --> 00:27:21.000 Blake: Oh, no, I can't tell you that. No. We've been around. Gottlieb: We have been for a long time. 00:27:21.000 --> 00:27:25.000 Blake: Yeah. Gottlieb: What kind of work did your father-in-law do? 00:27:25.000 --> 00:27:47.000 Blake: Father-in-law, he worked for the company by the name of Scott. Scott's company. He working here, I don't know. Just a little while. This guy driving the horses. Scott hauling coal and stuff like that back then. You know, that's all. You know, like coal. That's what he did. 00:27:47.000 --> 00:27:56.000 Gottlieb: Do you remember when you first came up here? Were you-- did you miss South Carolina a lot? Did you-- were you homesick at all? Blake: No. 00:27:56.000 --> 00:28:05.000 Blake: I went back so many and so many times. I wasn't homesick. Go anytime I was ready, when I was single. 00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:08.000 Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: I didn't miss it. 00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:11.000 Gottlieb: Did you like it up here pretty well? 00:28:11.000 --> 00:28:18.000 Blake: Yes indeed. Why I stayed. I could have stayed at Braddock, Rankin, Pittsburgh. I like Homestead. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:28:18.000 --> 00:28:22.000 Gottlieb: Did you see it as being different from Braddock or Rankin or Duquesne or-- 00:28:22.000 --> 00:28:33.000 Blake: [simultaneous talking] No. To me, I just couldn't see any different. But I just like Homestead. Yeah, we went around and traveled, you know? But all of it's alright. But I just like Homestead. 00:28:33.000 --> 00:28:39.000 Gottlieb: Did you continue to go back to South Carolina after you had married and-- 00:28:39.000 --> 00:28:54.000 Blake: Well, after I got married. Uh, once a year. No, once, bout once every two years. Every time we drove, we drove down to. 00:28:54.000 --> 00:29:36.000 Blake: We had the first down. We went down after my first baby was born. A girl, five months old, we went down and. My mother and father, the first time they saw my wife. Course back then, 11 years since I saw them. My parents, you know, and my mother tell me, she said to me, the way you describe her to me, she is no stranger. I could just see her, she appeared, and she looked just like how I picture her. And we had a time where she did so after that every so often we go down. We call, go down there. I never did forsake my parents. 00:29:36.000 --> 00:29:40.000 Blake: And my wife liked them. 00:29:40.000 --> 00:30:04.000 Gottlieb: Well, I can't right off hand think of many other questions I would have to ask you. But anything that you remember that particularly stands out in your memory from the-- from the years that you first came in to Homestead that you could tell me, I'd be interested in hearing them. I think I've just about gone through all the questions. 00:30:04.000 --> 00:30:05.000 Blake: I think it's pretty good. 00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:06.000 Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:30:06.000 --> 00:30:10.000 Blake: I've never been questioned that much in my life. Never did. 00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:13.000 Gottlieb: I hope you don't think I've been nosy or anything. 00:30:13.000 --> 00:30:26.000 Blake: If you didn't, I wouldn't tell you. A lot of things. I could have, didn't, you-- didn't have to tell you. But first I'm concerned, I'm enjoying it. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: And what I've been said, I've enjoyed it. Gottlieb: Yeah. Blake: [unintelligible] 00:30:26.000 --> 00:30:37.000 Gottlieb: When you went-- When you used to go back to South Carolina, around every-- Blake: Christmas. Gottlieb: Every Christmas, did you say you go back with other other people from up here or would you go by yourself? 00:30:37.000 --> 00:30:48.000 Blake: By myself, yeah. After my buddy, he went someplace else and I went by myself and the rest of them went different places, you know. But I go down there and come back in. Gottlieb: Yeah. 00:30:48.000 --> 00:31:01.000 Gottlieb: Did you say, when you first came up to Homestead, you said that there were four of you from South Carolina. 00:31:01.000 --> 00:31:04.000 Blake: Three of us. Yeah. 00:31:04.000 --> 00:31:07.000 Gottlieb: Do you know them as a-- as a young man? Is that how you know-- 00:31:07.000 --> 00:31:10.000 Blake: We grew up together. We grew up together. Sure, grew up together. 00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:14.000 Gottlieb: How did it come to be that you all came up here together? 00:31:14.000 --> 00:32:14.000 Blake: Well, two of us come.
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