C., Chick, February 21, 1976, tape 1, side 2

Charner C.: I was told. That's right.

Peter Gottlieb: And so they picked you from that line.

Charner C.: Mhm. Because they had never seen me before. No.

Gottlieb: Well, why do you think that they, they, they said for you to come over?

Charner C.: Well, I just. That's because they had never seen me I reckon. They never hired me before.

Gottlieb: So I guess it was just a matter of luck that they pointed to you and not some other fellow.

Charner C.: I don't call it a whole lot lucky because at the time they was shipping people in. They wanted wanted help, wanted men. They wanted men very plenty. Wanted plenty of men that-- it is telling me that what I was hearing, telling me.

Gottlieb: As a matter of fact, I remember that Joe Gator came up on transportation. From Richmond. By the way he told it to me, he left South Carolina and he went to Wilmington, North Carolina, where he worked in a fertilizer plant. And after that, he went to Richmond and they were bringing him in from Richmond.

Charner C.: Bringing him in from-- [audio cuts]

Gottlieb: It was in 1926 that you went that you went back and married her. And you also mentioned to me that her people are in the-- are in Detroit now.

Charner C.: It was but practically all of them is gone now.

Gottlieb: Had they moved up there from North Carolina? The way you did?

Charner C.: No. The was a-- her father and family. They, they still on-- they passed on down, down there. See, these are relations-- kinfolk, cousins, aunts, some are uncles too were there at the time.

Gottlieb: Were they there when you were there?

Charner C.: Uh huh. They were there.

Gottlieb: Did that have anything to do with the-- with why you kept writing back to her?

Charner C.: No, I knew her before. I know they was even there getting around at that time. We went to school together. They come up in school together.

Gottlieb: Were you courting her before you left home, or did this, [Charner C.: Yeah] did this develop--

Charner C.: I was trying to, you know, I wasn't hardly old enough for this lacking, you know, like, you know how girls and boys go to school now? Yeah, I never. I never started.

Gottlieb: Wasn't it kind of hard to keep up interest in a person over that distance just by letters without going back to visit them?

Charner C.: Oh, no, we wouldn't do-- too hard for me. She always. She always believed me you know and liked me it looked like in the school all the time. Going to school, you see all the time.

Gottlieb: Did her father farm, too?

Charner C.: Yes he farmed. He had two plantations, one place-- it was his and his mother's plantation. Yeah.

Gottlieb: And he worked both of them then?

Charner C.: Mm. Beg pardon?

Gottlieb: He worked both of those farms?

Charner C.: Yeah, he had-- he hired people to work with him, you know, like, hired people to work with him.

Gottlieb: Uh, did they live close to you, there?

Charner C.: Oh, about-- About 12 meters. Just I said-- just about to cross the bridge over there. You know where you cross a little bit of bridge accross?

Gottlieb: About that far?

Charner C.: Yeah, about that distance. A little further than eighth Avenue from here. It's about across that distance there.

Gottlieb: And you got to know her by going to the same school in Richmond. Charner C.: Yeah. Right, Right. Gottlieb: Did she also go to the same church as you did?

Charner C.: Sometimes. Sometime we went to the same church. And then again, she was a Baptist, and my people went to the Methodist church. But sometime I'd go to that church anyhow, you know, cause she was there.

Gottlieb: Back in those days, was it customary for a young man like yourself to ask the parent's permission before you, before you married this, this woman?

Charner C.: Mhm. I did. Yes. Yeah. See, I wrote her people and asked. Asked him. Gottlieb: Right.

Gottlieb: Did you make up your mind to get married in 1926, or had you decided to get married early than that and just didn't get around to it?

Charner C.: No, I didn't. I, uh. I, uh, I decided to get married in 26, but what I had been talking-- we had been talking before. For that, for that year about getting married, you know, through the letter we've been talking about. And then before-- before 26, I wrote to her parents, her father and asked it. And then I went home and got married.

Gottlieb: What kind of preparations did you make here in Homestead, uh, for, for your wife-- bringing your wife up? Did you have to find a new place to live?

Charner C.: Uh huh. Yeah, I-- at the time, I had a room with a man, he's passed now, by the name of Dave Moore. His name was Dave Moore down in Beechwood, down near the mill. Down near the mill. And we stayed there, I guess about 2 or 3 months as I could guess at it good. And then, then I got another place with a man who had a church up there called Tommy Williams, he's passed here too. Now he's gone. He's dead. I stayed there, I guess a year or more. And then the next, next time I got a place at 108 up here with this same West 15, West 15, 108-- that's why you get off the streetcar to come out here. Arrive at the other side, 108. And I stayed there until I-- then I bought this place here.

Gottlieb: Is that the first place you lived with your wife? 108?

Charner C.: No, I lived with my wife all the time. See, I married my wife down-- I had my wife down with each place I tell you about. Down in Beechwood. And that's where I brought her. When I went home and married her I brought her back to back here. You see, in those days, a place was hard to get. You couldn't pick a place, you know, like come on back again now. And so I just stayed around where I could until I got the place where I could buy this place here.

Gottlieb: And where had you been living before you got married? Did you ever live with your friend Pink?

Charner C.: No, not no more than just a week-- a night or two or something like a week or two like. I never did-- Me and my wife never did live there. Never did live with her, no. They'd come in and we'd go dancing and she'd been here and all. But I never did live with her with him.

Gottlieb: Did she ever come up to visit you before you got married? Charner C.: Who did? Gottlieb: Your wife?

Charner C.: No. She never was here til I got married.

Gottlieb: What did what did she think of Homestead when she first saw it?

Charner C.: Well, she-- she liked it, all right. She, she, she is satisfied the way I was. That's what she told me.

Gottlieb: Did you stay in Carlisle very long for the wedding?

Charner C.: I guess 2 or 3 days. Not all four days. Not all four days. Something like that.

Gottlieb: And you came right back.

Charner C.: Mhm. See, I was working. Gottlieb: Right. Charner C.: Yeah.

Gottlieb: Did you tell your boss anything in the middle when you left?

Charner C.: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. He had to pull off. Yeah oh yeah.

Charner C.: At a certain time, I had a certain time to be back.

Gottlieb: What-- was it okay with him that you took off these days and went back?

Speaker3: Yeah.

Gottlieb: Did any of her people ever come up here, move to Homestead or to the Pittsburgh area?

Charner C.: No, not. Not. Not this moved here. Some of her-- she had a half sister, came here and stayed a while after. Right here in this house.

Gottlieb: What about your kin? Did they ever-- did any other cousins, aunts, uncles, anybody ever come to the Pittsburgh area after you moved here?

Charner C.: Not to live. No, not to live. Gottlieb: So you're the only one?

Gottlieb: Only C. who moved to, uh, to the Pittsburgh area? Charner C.: Right, right.

Gottlieb: Did, uh. Did your younger brothers or sisters ever, ever leave South Carolina after you did and come north?

Charner C.: Yeah, we all left about the same time. They went. They went to different places, you know? Yeah, we all left about the same time. Right. Now, they all, they all have been here since I've been here. Married here. But they didn't stay, you know? Just visit me.

Gottlieb: Why-- why, why didn't you all go to the same place in the north? Charner C.: Well-- Gottlieb: instead of splitting up and going--

Charner C.: Well, I think that would have been too much on, on the 1 or 2 of the families. You understand what I mean? If you just-- Yeah, it went to different families. Different.

Gottlieb: So you were telling me that, uh, you have, uh, or some of your siblings had originally gone to Ohio, one to Boston, Massachusetts, one to Tennessee.

Charner C.: Right, right.

Charner C.: That's where they had relations. I see. And they didn't have nobody with them much. And that's why that. It would have been quite expensive on one family to take all of us. You understand what I mean? Right.

Gottlieb: So the first time you had ever gone back to South Carolina was when you got married in 1926.

Gottlieb: And the next time you told me that you went back was when your father died in 1930.

Charner C.: Right.

Gottlieb: Did you ever get homesick for, uh, for South Carolina after you moved north?

Charner C.: No. No, not not necessarily. I don't call it necessarily Homestead. You see, I was interested in making, you know, getting myself something together. You know, I was working and making myself.

Gottlieb: You don't think that there was as much opportunity for you in South Carolina as there was up here?

Charner C.: No, not really.

Gottlieb: Because I remember asking you the last time I was here, did farming suit you and you said then that, yes, it did when you were younger and you were a young boy. But now it wouldn't have.

Gottlieb: Had you gotten tired of farming by the time you left, were you looking for something else at the time your mother passed?

Charner C.: No, no, no, no, I wasn't. I wasn't I wasn't looking up there. But what I mean, since the things have changed from way back then. Probably, probably might have been farming longer, that is if my mother had lived longer. You understand what I mean? Yeah.

Gottlieb: Is that-- is that what you had thought you would be doing when you were a young boy? Thinking about yourself and you grew up? Did you always think of becoming a farmer?

Charner C.: Well, I hadn't give that too much of a thought when I was young, You know. I didn't do that too much.

Gottlieb: Uh, can you tell me what department you worked in when you were first hired?

Charner C.: In the Labor Department. When I was first hired, in the labor department.

Gottlieb: Can you tell me what kind of work people in the Labor Department have to do?

Charner C.: Well, that's, that's labor work that they do. All kind of heavy and hard work and pick and shovel and things like that. Right.

Gottlieb: What, what part of the mill was that in?

Charner C.: All over. In the labor gang. You go everywhere. That's where they order you. You know, it's everywhere. Yeah, right.

Gottlieb: Was there one was there one part of the mill that you used to work in more often than other parts? Maybe open hearth or anything like that?

Charner C.: Not when I first started. See, when you live, but since I-- after I got a different job then I was stationed to that one place. Yeah, just one place.

Gottlieb: How did you get promoted out of the. Out of the labor gang?

Charner C.: Well, a friend that I know told me how to go take off and had some time and go to talk to a man and the boss man in the mill. Like when you, when you, when you have time off, when you're not working, you know, it's like something like lunch hour, anytime you have time to go and talk. And I did, I did that and that's where I got. Promoted to where I was, got the job.

Gottlieb: So you had to go and ask somebody for it?

Gottlieb: How, how long--

Gottlieb: How long had you been working in the labor gang? Charner C.: Oh.

Charner C.: About a year or more.

Gottlieb: Were you dissatisfied with that, with that job?

Charner C.: No, I wasn't dissatisfied. But by moving, I could make more money. You understand what I mean? Yeah. That's right.

Gottlieb: Do you remember how much they were paying back then?

Charner C.: I think it started around four something. I believe it was four something or three something when it first started.

Gottlieb: Per day?

Charner C.: Yeah.

Gottlieb: Who was this friend? Who told you who to who to go see? Do you remember him?

Charner C.: I don't remember. I believe he's dead now.

Charner C.: I forget his name now. It's been so long. But anyway, he's from-- he's from South Carolina, too. But he went-- I think he passed and he went back, went back home. And they came up, came up here and got his body or some part is like that. I can't think of what it was now. He's from down that way.

Gottlieb: Did he work with you in the labor gang?

Charner C.: No, no.

Charner C.: No, he just. He just, he just knew me. That's got-- know me, you see?

Gottlieb: And what, what part of the mill was your new job in? The job you got after Labor Gang?

Charner C.: It was in-- they called old 140, they called it. 140. It's a stockyard now. They got out since they built this new mill down here. At the mill I was taken off of, as you come across the bridge, on the left coming in, that left side down there, that's that 160 they called it. You might have heard somebody say about 160 mill and on the right going, is the 180 on the, on the, on the right that way. It's on the left to going in but it's on the right coming out. Up on the right is 180 and below is 160. The last one built. That's the last mill. Now, the church was down there where-- the church I go to now was down there when. Right.

Gottlieb: Didn't it used to be on Fourth Avenue?

Speaker3: Right, right, right.

Gottlieb: Um, what, what kind of work did they put you at in the in the 140.

Charner C.: Well they called it a piling gang, but see, they cut that name out now. And since they built this new mill as a unit, they call it a unit-- work on a unit. They just working one place and turn loose like it go from one place to another. But first we had a door and back here, back then take care of the steel when you come out. That's why they shared a steel lock, you know, and cut it off and pile it up. Ready to ship it out and put it in cars and trucks and things. That's what finishing part like. They call it finished.

Gottlieb: So. So your job really involved just piling up pieces of metal that had been cut?

Charner C.: Right. Right. Getting it-- Right. That's right.

Gottlieb: Were there, uh, was it a mixed crew of Black and White men or were just--

Charner C.: Right, right.

Gottlieb: Did you stay at that job for the rest of the time you were at the Mill?

Charner C.: Mhm. The finishing off part of it. That was the job.

Gottlieb: Was a pile gang, a place where they put a person who was pretty new to the mill. Or was it a place that you had to have some experience to work in?

Charner C.: It was a place where you'd have to have some experience. Right. Yeah

Gottlieb: What about the labor gang?

Charner C.: You don't have to have experience in the labor gang. That's why they call it a labor gang.

Gottlieb: Is that where almost all the people that they hired the first day, they put them on labor?

Charner C.: Most of them do. Most of them. And you take quite a few people sometime there. They can tell by the-- talking with them and-- promoted and education, the schooling they have, they can tell what they know about what they can do or what they can take care of. Now the best-- but not too many of them that didn't come by labor somewhere or another. One part of the way or another. You know?

Gottlieb: What did you think of the job in the In the Pile gang? Was it, was it a pretty good job as far as you were concerned?

Charner C.: A pretty good job. I was pretty satisfied. Pretty satisfied.

Gottlieb: Wasn't it pretty heavy? Pretty heavy work.

Charner C.: Well, it-- at first when, when-- in the old mill is pretty heavy. Pretty heavy and hard work. Yeah. But I could-- that's the only way I could make money.

Gottlieb: How did they, how did they change the job as the years went on? Did they did they take some of the some of the the sweat out of it by, by automating it a little bit.

Charner C.: By putting-- making these new mills. New things-- machines and things in the meal, that that makes it better.

Gottlieb: What, what, what was, uh, what was changed actually in, in terms of what you, what you actually had to do on the pile game when they built the new mill.

Charner C.: See well, when, when they had the piling gang it was about six. About six.

Charner C.: Yeah. Six, six men on that side and six on this side. But now when they when they put the new mill in, there's only one man on this side and one on this side and, and the power one man in the middle. And I took one side and my buddy, he took care of the other side. But just in the old mill that had been 12 men. You understand what I mean? 12 men.

Gottlieb: So what did they have? A machine to do some of the lifting?

Charner C.: You push a button and work a button, and sometimes you pull a lever and they bring it to you. You know, like that, right. That's what late [??] is. That's what late--

Gottlieb: Was there ever a job in the, uh, mill that you wanted to get? You tried to apply for, but you couldn't get it for some reason?

Charner C.: Yeah, when I first started. Yeah.

Gottlieb: Can you tell me about that?

Charner C.: Uh, was a job in the same place in this old mill I'm telling you about where they had 12 men. Well, there's this job right ahead. Just ahead of that job, what they call the share helping, you call it share helping. Well, it was a hard job, the same hard kind of jerk. But you made more money on the-- when you share helping, you know, and you work when you be put on the pile gang. You use wrenches and the things, the same thing, use your arm you wrenching same thing but the share helping job paid more than the piling helping job but it's the same kind of way you use a wrench with your hand. Yeah.

Gottlieb: Did they pay that, uh, uh, on a tonnage basis?

Charner C.: Right, right.

Charner C.: But that's what-- Tonnage. But now they don't call it tonnage in the mill no more now. It's incentives, you see, but it's the same thing, the same name. Same thing but when tonnage was-- incentives, see? Yeah. that's what I was thinking of. Incentives. I got incentives all the time. You put out so much and you get so much-- do get so much you see?

Gottlieb: Was the same true on the pile gang? Were you were you paid tonnage there or were you just paid a certain amount per hour?

Charner C.: No.

Charner C.: No, you didn't. You didn't, you didn't get no tonnage on on the piling gang up there. But you did down here. Right.

Gottlieb: Did your-- did the people you worked with in the labor gang and on the Pile Gang, were they your friends here? Did you ever see them or do anything with them when the,when the, when the work day was over.

Charner C.: Um. Yeah I'd see em sometimes, Yeah. Never done nothing in particular. Never done anything like that? No. But never had no-- the first friend as far as I could know. They never. We never had no fusses or nothing like that. No, nothing like that.

Gottlieb: You never got to be particularly good friends with anybody that, that worked on the pile gang with you down there.

Charner C.: Whatcha mean?

Gottlieb: Well, I mean, just a person that maybe you and your wife would visit some-- on weekend night or something like that, or a person you maybe worked with in the church or went to a baseball game or something like that?

Charner C.: Oh, yes. Yes. Somebody I went to the ball game with. No, I didn't work on

Gottlieb: Did you ever used to do anything with a group of men that you worked with down there as a group?

Charner C.: You mean after work? Gottlieb: Yeah. That's what I mean. Charner C.: No, no.

Charner C.: No. That's the way it was.

Gottlieb: What about, what about just the Black man who worked down there? Did you ever used to get together with them?

Charner C.: Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Now again, we'd be together talking and go to the ball game and go down the street or something like that and maybe go to the barber shop and talk and things like that.

Gottlieb: Do you remember these men now? You think back. The men that you were working with on the Pile Gang way back in the 20s?

Charner C.: I'm trying to think now if I could find any of them. I don't know if any of them living now. They don't live here.

Gottlieb: Did any of them stay as long as you did there? You know?

Charner C.: Oh, yeah. Yeah, sure. Yeah.

Charner C.: But after so long, we, all of us, I see all that piling gang men. They just like-- they did just like I did. They went to different parts of the mill, you know, after so long, got better jobs in different parts of the mill, right. Some went to the open hearth and some went to a different place and some went to 180. When old men come that gave way for a different job, see. When it change that-- we always changed for a job, getting more money, paying more money like that. Right. That's the way they did this. Scattered out like. Yeah. But it's the same company. That's the same, you know, all the time, the same company.

Gottlieb: Do you remember any of the, the foreman in the departments where you worked?

Charner C.: Mhm. Yeah.

Gottlieb: How did they treat you? How did they treat the Black people from the South who were working at the Mill at that time.

Charner C.: Pretty good. They treat em pretty nice. I didn't see no difference in them doing any different from them. That wasn't from the South. I didn't see any difference. No.

Gottlieb: Was there any foreman that you remember who was particularly helpful to you or that, that you liked better than the other?

Charner C.: Mhm. His name was Wally Jones. He's passed now too.

Gottlieb: Was he in the, uh-- was he over the piling gang.

Speaker3: Right. Right.

Gottlieb: How did, how did he use to, to, to treat you?

Charner C.: Very nice. Very good. One time I had to go. I wanted to go to the, to New York to visit my sister. And she's in Brooklyn at that time. And my vacation was supposed to come up-- I think before. Yeah, before I wanted to go. And so, I had asked him would he change my vacation to a certain time that I could take it and my brother would come by and pick me up and that saved me from paying my way back up there, you know, and back. And he did it. He did that for me.

Gottlieb Were there any--

Gottlieb: Were there ever any Black foremen there in the Pile Gang, when you worked there?

Charner C.: No. There wasn't.

Gottlieb: Did you know a man named Joseph Moorfield?

Charner C.: Yeah.

Charner C.: Not, not, not. Not-- he didn't work down there. I know him. I know him, though. Yeah, Yeah, I know him.

Gottlieb: But he didn't work in the same part of the mill that you did?

Charner C.: No, no. I know him.

Gottlieb: What about a man named Silas Barts?

Charner C.: I know him.

Gottlieb: Do you know him from the, from the Mill or from some other part?

Charner C.: From, from the Mill. I know him from the Mill.

Gottlieb: Did he work there in the Pile Gang.

Charner C.: I worked with him. I worked with him.

Gottlieb: Was that back in the day, in the early days when you first started working or was that in the new mill?

Charner C.: That was, that was in the old mill. Yeah. I never worked with him in the new mill. That was in the old mill. Old 140 they called it.

Gottlieb: Because I've spoken with both of those men, Joseph Moorfield and Silas Barts. Charner C.: Did you? did you? Gottlieb: Were there any parts in the Mill where the company kind of segregated Blacks from Whites? Any departments where you might find only Black, Black people working?

Charner C.: No, I didn't see no place there in the mill where that was. We see some of both colors anywhere you went in there.

Gottlieb: All the restrooms, cafeteria, everything like that.

Charner C.: Well, I don't remember too much about the restrooms, but I'm thinking. I think there'd be a-- 1 or 2 different colors in them place, but maybe-- may not be as much. One of the colors may not be as much as the other one. But I think it was this kind of mixture everywhere I went. Everywhere I went in there, I see something different. Right. Different race.

Gottlieb: Where did-- when you first came to Homestead. When you were visiting your friend. Did you stay with him? And the next place you stayed after that, was that down there on Peach Way?

Charner C.: Yeah. It was in Peach Way. But not, not with this man that I tell you about when I got married. It was Mrs. Brown. I think she run the rooming house. Was named-- the lady was named Mrs. Brown. She had, oh, I don't know, 15 or 20 or more room-- rooms, you know, the men room and board in there. That's where I stayed.

Gottlieb: Did you stay there until you got married? Until your wife came up or did you?

Charner C.: No, no. I stayed there until I got a room like I wanted to for myself and this room for myself.

Gottlieb: How did you find out about places to stay when you were looking for a room or you were looking for maybe a lodging house or something like that? How did you find out where, where people had rooms for rent?