C., Lee, June 9, 1976, tape 1, side 2

Peter Gottlieb: They live in the same neighborhood or something like that. That's why I was asking you. Lee C.: Yeah, but she get like, living in, like, a lot of people right here come along to pick and pick you. They were Duquesne and all around you, see. You don't go to church here in Braddock. Yeah, that's what it is. I just let someone live down on Washington Street. He come up to Sixth Street and New Hope Church. I don't know why they do that. You really do that. Gottlieb: But the reason that you went to Willoway is because you-- You knew the pastor there? Lee C.: [simultaneous talking] Yeah, I knew the pastor there. Gottlieb: Had-- Did you ever go to-- did you ever attend services at any other Baptist church before you became a member of Willoway? Lee C.: No. The church was just bout a block from where I lived there.

Gottlieb:: And-- and it's your impression that there weren't too many other people who had come up from the South who were members of Willoway? They were mostly people who had been born in Pennsylvania. Lee C.: No. They born different places belong to the church. They-- they got too from North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, all them places. Gottlieb: Were you active in any church groups? Lee C.: No. I just a member all the time. I didn't want-- I didn't want to, wouldn't want [??] as a kid. Gottlieb: Do you ever sing in the choir or anything like that? Lee C.: I never could sing. [laughs] Gottlieb: Did you belong to any-- any kind of benefit organizations, fraternal societies, anything like that? Lee C.: Often? [??] Gottlieb: Yeah. Did you belong to any, like the Masons? Lee C.: Yeah, I am. Gottlieb: You are a Mason. Lee C.: I am. Gottlieb: You belong to any others besides that? Lee C.: I am coming with you. I am in this room. [??] Gottlieb: Did you join-- Did you first get connected with the Masons in Virginia or did you join up here? Lee C.: I joined up here. 1926. Gottlieb: Can you tell me why you decided to join? Lee C.: Yeah, of course. I see somebody else belong to it, and I wanted to be the same thing. That's why. You, there like you. If you see somebody else that you was, you join it cause you see them. Yeah.

Gottlieb: Who was it? Was it a good friend of yours? Your brother? Lee C.: A good friend of mine. Lee C.: Was this person from Richmond too? Lee C.: No, he from North Carolina. Gottlieb: Tell me a little bit about where you would meet people who later on became good friends of yours. Would you meet them mainly in the mill because you worked in the same department with them? Would you meet them in church-- Lee C.: I meet them-- meet them off the street? Look like, everybody know me and everybody. Everybody in the bottom know me. Gottlieb: Is that what you used to call the part of Braddock where your brother's boarding house was? Lee C.: Yeah. Mhm. Gottlieb: Well, how did these people get to know you? I mean, they didn't just-- after you moved up here. I mean, nobody would have known who you were. Lee C.: By talkin'. By talkin'. You may ask me where I from. I tell you where I from. You tell me where you from. You might say, I got a brother in Richmond. Livin' sister ___[??] Do you know him? I say, No, I don't. Gottlieb: So there would be times, in other words, when you were-- you weren't working at the mill. You just be talking to people on the street. Did you used to spend a lot of your time that way? Lee C.: No, I didn't spend a lot of time, just walk my feet down, everybody, see, wasn't something like that.

Gottlieb: Did you used to do things with this friend of yours who was in the Masons together? Used to, uh, go to see his family and things like that, go to baseball games? Lee C.: Mm-mm. Gottlieb: Were there friends-- Were there people that you worked with in the mill that became very good friends of yours? Lee C.: If he like to work together, we bound to be be good friends because it's like if I do something, maybe I do it wrong. If I'm not a friend to him, you're going to tell me and say, say you's doing wrong, but let me go and do it and get discharged. Gottlieb: What kind of things would you do with the friends you had in the mill when you weren't working? Do you ever see them outside the mill? Lee C.: Oh, yeah. I would see them. See them on the street sometime. Gottlieb: But you would never well, you wouldn't usually do things together with them. Like, let's say, go to a baseball game or-- Lee C.: No. Gottlieb: -- put on a picnic or anything like that. Lee C.: No. Sometimes you meet 'em on, meet 'em on a picnic. Gottlieb: Uh huh. What did you use to like to do in your spare time? Just to-- Just for kind of recreation, to amuse yourself? Lee C.: I would like-- four t-ball then. Gottlieb: Did you ever play ball yourself?

Lee Lee C.: I used to play ball. When I was with them.

Gottlieb: Did you used to take your family to the-- to ball games when you went? Lee C.: Oh, I wasn't married then. Gottlieb: I mean, not-- not in Richmond, but up here. Lee C.: No sir. Gottlieb: Did you used to go down to Forbes Field or would you usually just see the games that were being played around Braddock? Lee C.: No. Gottlieb: Do you think belonging to the Masons has benefited you? Lee C.: I certainly think. Gottlieb: Could you describe in general in what ways it's helped you? Lee C.: You live with me [??]? Gottlieb: Yeah. Lee C.: Well I know it helped me by being one. I know of any other way. Gottlieb: Did they used to sell insurance as a, as a part of belonging to a Mason? Was it that kind of organization, kind of mutual benefit type of thing? Lee C.: Yeah. They used to, yeah. Years ago. You had to get a policy.

Lee C.: I don't why it is now. Gottlieb: Did there used to be meetings that you had to go to regularly? Lee C.: [unintelligible] Gottlieb: Were there any kind of, like public functions that the Masons would have, conventions or parades or things like that that you used to take part in? Lee C.: Oh, yeah. I did not know-- I never go out of Pennsylvania, though. Gottlieb: Did you ever become a-- an officer in your lodge? Lee C.: No. I just told you, I had kids [??] I never left home off it, I never left home off it [??]. 'Cause had to be there. Gottlieb: It's my impression. Tell me whether I'm right about this. That there used to be a lot more of these kind of organizations for Colored men, Colored men used to belong, where they used to be-- Knights of Pythias and Masons, Elks, Oddfellows. They're still around. They're still here. But there don't seem to be as many people who belong to them now as there used to be. Lee C.: No. You see, a lot of people don't-- don't join now because a lot of it just they figure that's a prayer, you know, like anything else. Gottlieb: Yeah. Is it true? Lee C.: Not with me. That what we see, you know. Gottlieb: Did the Masons used to have a lot of members in Braddock when you were here? Lee C.: Yeah, pretty much. Pretty much all of the places had. I think it was-- 5 or 6 different lodges, colorfully [??]. Gottlieb: Just in Braddock? Lee C.: No, not in Braddock. In Pittsburgh. They had ______[??] there. Gottlieb: Were most of the men who were members there, were they employed at Edgar Thompson? Lee C.: No. I don't know, some of them just float around, all around ________[??]. Gottlieb: Well, these are all the questions I had prepared to ask you. But like I said, if you think I've left anything out, it might be important for me to know. Lee C.: No, you ain't left nothing out. I told you what all I know. Gottlieb: Well, thank you very much for helping me.