Anonymous, May 3, 1976, tape 1, side 1

Peter Gottlieb: 18th Street. [long pause]

Anonymous: All I ever said.

Gottlieb: Say it. Not too far. Um, can you tell me where your parents were born?

Anonymous: Anywhere? In Virginia. I don't know just what part of Virginia. [recording paused] They were born in Virginia.

Gottlieb: But you don't know exactly what part. Anonymous: No. Gottlieb: Do you know where your-- where your grandparents were from? Anonymous: No. Gottlieb: Okay. Um, did you ever know them? Your grandparents? Anonymous: No. Gottlieb: Can you tell me what kind of work your father did? Anonymous: Farmer. Gottlieb: Uh huh. Uh. What kind of things did he raise?

Anonymous: Corn. Tobacco. Peanuts, sweet potatoes. Cot-- Yeah. Cotton. All kind of around vegetables and we have the-- had our own vegetables.

Gottlieb: Did he sell some of this in order to make--

Anonymous: No, just for our livelihood. Gottlieb: Uh huh.

Gottlieb: What did he do with the tobacco?

Anonymous: Well, he sell that. He-- He didn't grow much tobacco because he didn't like it, but he was selling tobacco. But the other produce was for our five.

Gottlieb: Did he own his farm? Anonymous: No. Gottlieb: Was he a-- Was he what they call a sharecropper or did he pay cash for it?

Anonymous: No, he rent them. He wasn't a share, exactly a sharecropper. [unintelligible] The share of property he owned. Yeah.

Gottlieb: Yeah. I'm sorry. Could you repeat that?

Anonymous: No. Now you won't. You ain't in it now.

Gottlieb: Do you remember how large the farm was? How many acres? Anonymous: Oh. Yeah. [unintelligible] Gottlieb: Just a small place.

Anonymous: Yeah, small. He rented.

Gottlieb: Did your mother ever work outside the home?

Anonymous: Just through-- you know, she worked hard to give her children and she worked on the farm and she had, you know, quite a few children.

Gottlieb: Did she ever take in laundry or anything like that to earn money? Anonymous: No. Gottlieb: How many children did your parents have?

Anonymous: 13, but they only raised eight.

Gottlieb: That would mean five of them died as very young. And which of the eight are you-- the oldest? Anonymous: I'm the third. Third. Gottlieb: Um, how many were boys and how many girls?

Anonymous: We had-- Um, those were the ones that had died.

Gottlieb: If you-- if you can remember, even those who died then.

Anonymous: Of the boys, five boys. Been so long. I forgot everything. They had-- Nathaniel, and Matthew, that's two, [unintelligible], that's four, Eugene and Wile, that's six.

Gottlieb: Six-- Six boys? Anonymous: Six boys.

Anonymous: And count more of the other ones. Ruth and Naomi. Ruth and Naoimi. And Julia. That's two girls, and that's six girls. To. To. I asked you to play this tape over. This is just for your information.

Gottlieb: Did anybody else live with you and your parents when you were growing up? Any other relatives? Did any of your relatives besides yourself, your brothers or your sisters or your mother, father, aunts or uncles come up North at any time in their lives? Anonymous: Did what? Gottlieb: Did they move North?

Anonymous: No. Well, yes, yes. My brothers, I had two brothers and one is still here. But they were all grown. Cause they wasn't young and it wasn't oldest one. I was 26 years old. One was 19, one was 18.

Gottlieb: When they moved? Anonymous: They moved. Gottlieb: Um, what what part of the North did they move to?

Anonymous: Homestead and Pittsburgh and one was in Pittsburgh and one was Homestead.

Gottlieb: Would you remember roughly what year the year that was that they moved up here?

Anonymous: No I don't. All I remember say-- I might have it written down somewhere, but I don't remember.

Gottlieb: Was it before you came up that they moved or after you came? Anonymous: After. Gottlieb: After you. Anonymous: After I.

Anonymous: Was a few years after I came.

Gottlieb: Do you remember why they came? Anonymous: No. They just. Why my sister went home to visit, and they're not-- she already miss them [??]

Gottlieb: Uh, can you tell me how much schooling you got in Virginia?

Anonymous: Well, around, I went to the eighth grade. I didn't. I didn't finish the eighth grade. Then I. Like I said, the seventh grade. Because I go to eighth grade, I go to high school [??].

Gottlieb: Do you remember the-- the school you went to?

Anonymous: You mean the name of the school?

Gottlieb: No. I'm talking more about just where it was, what kind of building it was in, who was the teacher and that kind of thing.

Anonymous: Yeah. There were some other teachers.

Anonymous: Never frame build. Remember one, I remember one of the teachers William Carpenter and one was named Solomon Vincent. And-- that's about all. We didn't have a lot.

Anonymous: We wasn't in school all the year round like these childrens here. They've nothing to do but go to school and play.

Gottlieb: What times of year did you go to school?

Anonymous: In the fall or beginning in-- probably say November and maybe part of December. See we have, we have work to do around the end of the year. That gatherin' crop there, all like that, and then. Oh, January, February, March and April. That was about the gist of our school. And we had to, to then-- May

Anonymous: And June, you know, we begin to get the farm together. Do the work together. Everybody work, the children wouldn't play. Had a lot of play like the children here. Everybody was big enough to work. They had to work because that was our livelihood.

Gottlieb: So about the time you would be old enough to be going to school, you were old enough to do work on the farm too. Anonymous: Right. Gottlieb: Uh huh.

Anonymous: Um, see, we went school at age six. We didn't begin before we were six years old. And that was those little jobs we could do at six years old.

Gottlieb: What-- What kind of things?

Anonymous: Like feeding the chicken. Givin' corn to the pigs. Bringing in water and bringing in the wood. You know, things like that.

Gottlieb: What what part of Virginia did you grow up in?

Anonymous: In-- I was born in Northampton, in Brunswick County, Virginia, and then went from there, right down below Richmond in the country called Valentines, Virginia. That's near Norfolk and [unintelligible].

Gottlieb: And your parents lived in the same place all the time you were growing up? Anonymous: Yes, all the

Anonymous: time that I knew of them.

Gottlieb: And something I often forget to ask married women. What was your maiden name?

Anonymous: Taylor. Gottlieb: Taylor. Okay. Um.

Gottlieb: As you got older, did you have to do different things on the farm than you were doing when you were just a young child? Did you get more responsibility?

Anonymous: Oh, yes. Yes. I could do more harder work. You know. Cook, take you around, wood, you know, helped move wood on the cart or the wagon, rather.

Anonymous: I had heavier work when I got past six years old.

Gottlieb: Did-- did the girls in your family do about the same kind of work as the boys did, or was there a difference?

Anonymous: No, those that were old enough, they did 'bout the same. I mean, maybe the boys, they maybe the cut wood more, you know. We had knock hard wood and it had to be cut in half. And I think I've seen woods cut in all hair. Yeah.

Gottlieb: Did you ever in Virginia have a-- have a job away from your home where you were earning money before you came up North?

Anonymous: Yes. For a little while. Not, not--Not long, because I was needed at home.

Gottlieb: Can you tell me what kind of job that-- Anonymous: I cooked.

Anonymous: If I didn't cook, I didn't eat. That's what I tell you. If I don't cook. I didn't eat. And. Then my-- my my hardest work. More work than has ever been here. Surprising that. Really the hardest work or not. But, you know, I've worked in that plant. The mill down on Felton Avenue, Stanton, filling them with stamping concrete. Yeah, I've worked on that 21 years. Sometime I find I find that harder than some of the work that I left.

Gottlieb: You were cooking for a white family in Virginia? Anonymous: Yeah. Gottlieb: Were you--

Anonymous: This is where I cooked out. That was in North Carolina. The, uh. Well, not too far from. North Carolina. Charles State [??].

Gottlieb: How did you get that job?

Anonymous: Well, they advertised for somebody.

Gottlieb: So you would-- you weren't living with your family when you were working? Anonymous: No, no. Gottlieb: Do you remember how old you were, when you were-- Anonymous: About 20.

Anonymous: 22 years old.

Gottlieb: What would you have been doing with the money that you earned cooking for the white man?

Anonymous: Well, for my livelihood. I got clothes and food.

Gottlieb: So you really were out on your own-- Anonymous: Yes. Gottlieb: --at this time. Did you, uh, contribute anything to your-- To your parents?

Anonymous: Oh, yes, I did. I always did. Even when I came here. Always helped. I feel like that-- Be sure, if I could.

Gottlieb: Did your parents want you to leave home to take this job? Did they encourage you to do it or was it your own desire?

Anonymous: No, they just left to me. You know, we have around-- I was grown up and have a livelihood. There's two wasn't two, wasn't like the, you know, like a shady deal at the time because we were poor and sometimes you on the farm. Sometimes you may even work. And then sometime you didn't. There's only finally the year, the weather. And you know. You know.

Anonymous: I didn't regret it. I love my whole life. I love-- I have no difficult. I do. I didn't have to leave. And I come up on my own and nobody paid my way. I come up on my own.

Gottlieb: Did all your brothers and sisters leave your parents' farm when they got to be of age?

Anonymous: No, not all of 'em. Some of 'em still there. But they're not on the farm. They don't farm anymore. But my mother and father were there. They died, but they're still there. But not on the farm.

Gottlieb: So some of them stayed and helped your father farm?

Anonymous: They-- All this, boys and-- Ex old scar [??]. They stay here. And then finally he stopped farming, you know, when he got too old. Well, he had fun. But it's so easy sometimes.

Gottlieb: You said you only had this job in North Carolina for a short time. Do you remember how long it was that you were? Anonymous: About three years. Gottlieb: About three years, you stayed there. And can you tell me what you did after that?

Anonymous: I came here. I came here and I still cook. I worked in a restaurant.

Gottlieb: How was it that you came to Homestead and not some other place in Pennsylvania or in the northern states?

Anonymous: Well, I-- I had people up here. I had acquaintance up here and-- And-- and I come up on a visit and stayed. Yeah. I didn't know no other place. Fact there was no other place and I left home. But when I found it when I got here and I find out that the, uh.

Anonymous: The wages where you work was a little more than they were in the South. You know, it still wasn't three years, all I learned, it still wasn't just up to par, but it was better. And the cost of living was not quite as high back home as it was here. And now through the years, I found some of the same thing here that I found in the South, maybe a little bit more of some of the same thing. You may you think you have friends, you think they they love you and. We talked about the white against the Black and Black against the white.

Anonymous: I find that no reflection on. Yeah, but I find that the, the, the White in the, in the South, if they were your friends. And if they loved you, they really were a friend to you.

Anonymous: I find here that you're more on the same level and they don't derive, you know you, you, you, you, you you think you're equal with them. But in a way I in the South someplace youse a-- you're not quoting me. You're not going to play this back with nobody else. You promise me. Gottlieb: I promise you. Anonymous: Yeah.

Anonymous: That, um, uh, they thought. I mean, you, you know, you-- you wasn't equal.

Anonymous: You wasn't equal to. But God made everybody the same question, brother Black. No different. But you know they don't class you as being equal with them. And there was no fights, no, uh, rioting like, like, like we have here, you know, everybody. It was peaceful, you know, at your place. You stayed in your place. I mean, this was my years. I don't know how they do it now. And we didn't have all this fighting and and fussing and breaking in, and-- and. Stealin' and workin' against each other. No, we didn't have that. But here, because you have the same opportunity, if you just watch for it. You know, you don't go and take somebody's, hand you something on a silver platter. You have to work for it. And if you if you qualify, you can demand, you know, certain things-- You're saying what I mean. Gottlieb: Yeah. Anonymous: Certain thing. But. You didn't. You didn't have it. It's freely. But I find we find some of the same thing to me, some of the same defects here that we find inside. You would think, you know, that the people in the South, how they come up and. It's muchdifferent here now. Much, much better than worse. And they're out.

Anonymous: I was out there last, I was 26 years old. Now I'm 78. Gottlieb: Yeah, it has. Anonymous: Quite a change. So that's about all I have to tell you.

Gottlieb: Could I-- Do you mind if I ask you some more questions?

Anonymous: Well, if I know the answer. Gottlieb: Okay.

Gottlieb: Did you expect things to be better up here in Pennsylvania when you left Virginia?

Anonymous: No, I didn't. I didn't. I didn't come up expecting, you know, anything to be better, although it was I find it and moving on through the years, it was better. But I didn't come up because I didn't even come up to stay.

Gottlieb: Who was the friend that that you had here, that you knew here?

Anonymous: There was around my-- my-- my brother. He was my oldest brother. But he had he got sick. And there were some friends here in Pittsburgh, the Johnsons. Nobody remind him like that. They were ten still livin' at that. Charlie, Charlie Owen, Marjorie Owen. Shane. Say he was-- some of 'em's dead. Well, they were here, but I didn't leave or I didn't leave to stay. Gottlieb: Yeah.

Gottlieb: And all these people you knew from your home in Virginia.

Anonymous: Because some of them was in North Carolina, but the state of Virginia and North Carolina was-- You all in the state of North Carolina.

Gottlieb: And-- and the reason you came up here was just for a visit.

Anonymous: Yeah, in the-- That's why I didn't-- I didn't come to stay. But when I got here, uh, I found that I really like stay a while. Gottlieb: Uh huh.

Gottlieb: And you didn't have any blood relatives up here at that time? Anonymous: No.

Anonymous: Well, this brother, I'll tell you, but he was over in-- He over in Pittsburgh and he opened-- Columbia Hospital. So I come up on my own. I've been-- paid my own way and come up on my own. Nobody sent for me and. No trouble. I had no trouble, running away from nothing.

Gottlieb: Uh, you had already left this job in North Carolina before you made any plans to come up here? Or did you leave--

Anonymous: No, I leave there. I left there. I went home to visit my mother and--

Gottlieb: But you knew when you left North Carolina that you were coming up here or visit.

Anonymous: I mean. Yes.

Gottlieb: And you came to Homestead, not to Pittsburgh?

Anonymous: No, not to Pittsburgh, Homestead. I lived, I lived in Pittsburgh not too long. I lived all my life in Homestead. When I say all my life. Well, I live the biggest portion of my life in a wheelchair.

Gottlieb: You were-- you were 26 when you came up. Do you remember what year that was? Anonymous: 1923. Gottlieb: When you decided to stay for a while, were you going to stay with the same friends that you had been living with? Anonymous: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean.

Anonymous: I mean, the woman is a stranger to me. I didn't know what. I mean what-- I mean I met her. But the people that I roomed with, they-- They were-- I met them here. They were strangers to me. I never stayed with my own.

Gottlieb: You were-- You were single at this time? Anonymous: Yeah. Gottlieb: Uh. Did you when you made up your mind to stay for a while? Did you go out and try to find work right away?

Anonymous: No, I didn't have to because the-- they, uh, the woman that recommend me to, she had a restaurant and I went to, went to work, right? And I leave. All I have done is, is work. But, I mean, they found a job and didn't have much trouble getting the job and work. And they after my work, after the church, take care of my house anyhow and I went to church. And that's all. I don't know too much about the towns and the doings of the town. You know, I don't know. Gottlieb: Yeah.

Gottlieb: Did you mention the name Johnson? Was this the people who owned the restaurant?

Anonymous: No, they were Edmonds. Gottlieb: The Edmonds? Anonymous: Yeah. And they both dead now.

Gottlieb: And that was right here in Pittsburgh. Anonymous: Right there in-- Gottlieb: In Homestead. Anonymous: In Homestead. Gottlieb: Oh, and they were Black people? Anonymous: Yes. Gottlieb: Do you remember where their restaurant was?

Anonymous: Was on Sixth Avenue. I don't know. I don't know the exact or the number, but it was on Sixth Avenue. But we-- they lived, the home was on up the hill on 12th and the business was on sixth.

Gottlieb: Were they-- Were their patrons, both Black and white? That came to the restaurant?

Anonymous: Oh yes. More Black than white though.

Gottlieb: Um. Mrs. Walker told me that your husband is in a nursing home, and I knew I wouldn't have the opportunity to talk to him. But he, uh--

Anonymous: Now he-- He was sick for a long time, and I'm sick myself. And I had to put him, it isn't exactly a nursing home, is a foster home for the aged. And I had put him there for a time being for me to heal, so I couldn't take care of it. Gottlieb: Yeah. Anonymous: So. But I'm getting stronger, the doctor said.

Gottlieb: I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about where he came from and when he came up.

Anonymous: Well, this is me. I don't really want to talk about him.

Gottlieb: Okay. Did you use-- when you were living up here, did you-- were you homesick for Virginia ever?

Anonymous: Yes, I well, I did, but I went home every year. Gottlieb: Oh, you did? Anonymous: Yeah. Yeah. And my mother and father died in 1958. One died 58, in July. And my, uh. My father died same year in September. Okay. And since I haven't been going back since I. Every year.

Gottlieb: At the same time every year?

Anonymous: Every year at the same time. July.

Gottlieb: Um, can you tell me about the other jobs you had in-- in Pittsburgh or in Homestead after you, um, finished, uh, at the restaurant.

Anonymous: And, um. Yes, I, uh. You mean, I guess you're too young to know anything bout the Depression?

Gottlieb: Well, I didn't live through it.

Anonymous: I-- Do you know anything about Depression here at Homestead?

Gottlieb: Yeah, a little bit. From what people have told me.

Anonymous: Yeah. Huh? I see. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I used to work before I went down to the, uh, the, uh, Standard Government Factory. I worked, did some day work. Over in-- You Jew? Gottlieb: Yes. Anonymous: You Jew? And I worked, I mean, in there all over, uh, Squirrel Hill, mostly for the, uh, the Jews and the Jews and some of the persecuted Jews. But I love the Jews. They-- They-- They knew the oldest one, the Jew was the oldest one, and they would give you a job to work, you know, didn't pay much, though, for a dollar a day and coffee. But you would buy much more for a dollar then you came here three time or $5 some time. And then I used to work with one of them, she was Mrs. Nicholson. Now this is evening. And she would tell me to to eat my breakfast at home and she would give me lunch. And then she go home before supper. But she wanted me to stay wash the dishes, so. Because the time was such a little bit of money and that's almost everything you had. I got to stay and wash dishes, which could give me something to eat. I'm hungry. And then-- and not too long then. And, you know, when the war started. They started to hiring people. Of course, the men were living down in this plant that fell on them and stamping company. They they turned it to a plastic. Now, it's not a-- they don't make anything down there, now they make plastic. Well, that's when I went down there to work and work until I retired. 21 years. Gottlieb: Uh huh.

Gottlieb: And you got that job during the war, you said. So those are--

Anonymous: 1940 and 1944. 43. Yeah, 44. Because they have a policy down there. They didn't hire colored folks. Gottlieb: Uh huh. Anonymous: And then this was here in Pittsburgh. Now I got to tell someone, you know, you find some depressing thing here. You fly down South. Yeah. And they, uh. When-- when the boys all started going through the war, then they had a hire whoever they could get. And then they start to hire.

Anonymous: And I happen to get hired. Been there 21 years. And when some of the girls have that job that I had some of them come back. Now they come back in, the mill, American Bridge, the rubber plant. Was when the war was over, they laid all these girls off. Down there, they lay us off. That was that work there before they come back and want that job back. We found-- We found favor with the bosses down there. They knew it wasn't right to give them the job back. And we had our union, you know, and the union. It has its disadvantages. And it's good, too, in a way, because there's 2 or 3 times a girls want to take my job because they were there before, but they had went somewhere else and were laid off. But with senority here, they couldn't do it. Gottlieb: Yeah.

Gottlieb: So cooking and then working in Squirrel Hill and then at the stamping plant were the three different kinds of work that you did. Anonymous: Uh huh.

Anonymous: Now see. With, with. With. With my cooking and that was just cooking. Then work another one with this day work, that was washing clothes and washing dishes and mopping floors and things like that. But then when I went to McKees Rocks, the plant down there, I was a packer. Start packin' things. Packin' away and ship.

Anonymous: Well, that's where I stayed for 21 years. They pay-- They get much more, much better now than they did when I left them 60 or 65.

Gottlieb: Mhm. Did you lose your job at the restaurant because of the Depression?

Anonymous: No, no, no. You mean that I. That I worked there? Gottlieb: Yeah. Anonymous: Uh, well. Well, in a way I did. Laundry-- But I just like to work. I didn't have to go to work on account of Depression in the beginning. But when. When I tell you about me working in Squirrel Hill and this day's work, that was days the most of the time that I had to work.

Gottlieb: Yeah. I was wondering, though, why you changed your job from the cooking job to working in Squirrel Hill.

Anonymous: Oh, she went out of business. Yeah.

Gottlieb: Was that on account of the Depression?

Anonymous: No, it was on account of her health got bad, and she couldn't-- Nobody would work. You know how that is. You couldn't get nobody that you could trust to take care of the place.

Gottlieb: Did somebody tell you about this job in the stamping plant and did anybody help you get the job in any way?

Anonymous: It was advertised in the paper and they wanted girls and I went to an employment office and put in an application. Gottlieb: Uh huh. Anonymous: That's how I have, uh, I've been blessed enough to probably be on my own.

Gottlieb: Were they hiring both white and Black women?

Anonymous: Yes. And in the beginning, they only I mean, I don't know, nothing real in the plant, but I mean, in the beginning. But I do know that they had a policy to not to hire colored girls. But when the-- when the-- when the boys left, they had a lot of boys, and the boys left and the girls left and went to go to in the mill and went to American Bridge and other places they went for more money. They didn't pay much money down there. They still don't pay now while we pay much more than they did. Because when I first started working, I only got $0.43 an hour. And if I worked every day and didn't lose no, no, no time, I had a $0.07 bonus, which made it $0.50 hour. And so they left when they-- when they could get more money. I was going to the mill myself, but I didn't have a Social Security card. And when I got the Social Security card, then I had changed my mind and wanted to go to mill.

Gottlieb: Do you remember what union it was that had organized that stamping plant? Anonymous: Oh.

Anonymous: Mm. Name of the union. I have the card here somewhere, I could tell you. No name of the union on there, is it?

Gottlieb: No, this looks like an identification card from the company because it just says Federal Enameling and Stamping Company.

Anonymous: I have it somewhere.

Gottlieb: Was it the Steelworkers?

Anonymous: Oh yeah. It was they all. We had the same union that the the men work in the mill had.

Gottlieb: Oh, well, then it was the Steelworkers. Anonymous: Uh huh. Gottlieb: I know that. I know that much history.

Anonymous: Yeah. Yeah. Gottlieb: Was it-- Anonymous: It was, uh. Can't remember what my number was. 17. I can't remember. But anyway, we had the same CIO union. You got have it here.

Anonymous: Must have been in another place. Gottlieb: Was-- Anonymous: Number 1578, you see?

Gottlieb: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Was it organized when in the plant at the time you started to work, or did it come in during the time you were there?

Anonymous: Yeah, when I would have worked because I didn't want to. I didn't want to join the union and is what you call the open plant. They wouldn't give you the job if you didn't join the union. I'm glad I did afterwards. Gottlieb: Yeah. Anonymous: Yeah, yeah.

Gottlieb: Did you like working in that in the plant Better than you liked working in people's homes or cooking?

Anonymous: Oh, yes, much better. Much better. Oh, you mean that I like working in the plant better? Gottlieb: Yes. Anonymous: Oh, yes, it was. It was. I'm. Well, it. Traveling back and forth in wintertime down here was hard, but still I like it better.

Gottlieb: Was it just because there was more money or were there other things you liked about it?

Anonymous: Well, it was more money and the job that I had, in a way, it was my own boss. You know that. They told me what to do, what my job was, and I did it. And I worked in the group in four girls. I worked with me and there's five of us. And they and I are old enough that all of us mothers. And they treated me like a mother. And I treated them like daughters. And we got along fine. And even now, they even take, even, even our church, we even take Mrs. Walker. She was in my Sunday school class and many other of the girls, and I always treated them like they were daughters. I was old enough for their mother and they treat me like a mother.

Gottlieb: Did that group of four younger women stay at the plant all the time you were there?

Anonymous: No. A couple of them left. They just got tired of working. They left. Gottlieb: Mhm.

Anonymous: Then-- now two of them is still there. After I left, I retired and left and they're still there. I tell them stick it out because they, they get much better benefits now I did when I were there so I tell them stick it out and get old enough to get a pension like I did and your pension and be much bigger. Gottlieb: Mhm. Mhm.

Gottlieb: Were a Black and white women segregated in the plant at all? Did they work in different places or were they mixed together?

Anonymous: Now they, they didn't work in different places, though they was qualified for certain jobs. They work together that-- maybe I shouldn't say tell this but you-- this is going to be your record. They ain't going to be for me. Gottlieb: I promise you won't. Anonymous: Okay. They had separate restrooms down there when I first came down there, the same thing that they had had in the South. And I had one of the girls, I call her attention to it, but she was saying that she wouldn't go to the South. She wouldn't like the South. I said, Why? She said, well, they got segregation down there. And I said, yes, there. I say, they have it here. She says, oh no they don't. I say, Yes, you do.

Anonymous: And she says, no. I said, Listen. I said, when we, when we go for lunch. Say, we goes up there, up the steps. The colored go this way. The whites go that way to that room. And the same way with our toilets are the same thing. I said, Now what is that? And she had never thought, you know, so she quit. But it wasn't long 'fore somebody came from Harrisburg. He was reporter. And he come from Harrisburg and they demand change. So that was only, the other, uh, they worked together. Those that are qualified to do the same work. But I enjoyed it. I had no trouble with nobody. I know my place and I know my work.

Gottlieb: And did you stay in the same position all the while you were there, or did you change positions within the plant?

Anonymous: You mean doing different jobs? Gottlieb: Yeah. Anonymous: No, I had the same. Well, in the-- in the very beginning, I worked in somebody's place a while. You wouldn't-- Everybody say I was taking off this, this way. I was put a-- crane and dipped in this paint and hang on the on-- on chains and went through a furnace and baked. Well I worked at that a little while but I proved to be a better packer. And so I was packing and then I had to run-- well in my union, the inside guard in the union. I had that job a long time, so. ___________[??] I had.

Gottlieb: Yeah. Did you ever see any of the other-- these other four women in the group you worked with when you weren't working? Or did they live in different places around Pittsburgh?

Anonymous: No, I didn't have-- only see them in the plant. Some of them live there, down there often with my-- my trauma [??] and the personnel manager.