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Transcript of a conversation recorded in December 1977 by Ralph Brogdon and his uncle, George Patrick "Pat" Baker  PAT: It was on the Brogdon graveyard. I said that Uncle Blue Brogdon, that was a brother to Emmet. Well Uncle [Blue Brogdon] come down years ago and he bought a farm and he give an acre on the south side of the farm for a Brogdon graveyard. And as they died off, they were buried there and others were buried there ... the neighbors was buried there, you know. And it was sold, the place was sold to a farmer by the name of Davis and this graveyard now was fenced and after he moved there, you know, bought it, he tore the fence down. He had some cattle and he tore it down so that the cattle could go and eat the grass and stay in the shade and also built a room to the house and I understood that he went out there and got some headrocks to make the corner posts. And Emmet come down here and I took him out there and it was pitiful to look at .. it had practically been abandoned, no interest taken in it, and nobody being buried there any more. [ed. note: Blue Brogdon was William S. Brogdon, and an uncle to Emmet. No blood relationship to Pat. Pat's half sister, Pearl Baker, married Emmett Brogdon and this couple was Ralph's parents.] RALPH: Do you know whether they registered that in the county when he set aside that acre or not? PAT: No, I don't. That's been probably around 80 years ago and they might not have kept any record at that time, I wouldn't know, but I'll tell you Frank's youngest daughter works over there and she could look and see if it was recorded. RALPH: If it was recorded and some of our family wanted to fence it in, then they would have to let them, if it was registered. When dad first died and I talked to mom on the phone the first time I'd heard about that graveyard all my life and I thought, I said, well are you going to bring him down to the Brogdon graveyard. She got real upset about that because she knew how bad it was, you know, and I didn't I just supposed that it was like any other graveyard. PAT: Well, Emmet was real upset about the shape it was in. RALPH: Do you know how many brothers and sisters that Blue had? PAT: Well, old man Blue, and Albert Brogdon, and Henry Brogdon, and John. Well, let's see, there was Uncle Bud. There was Uncle Bud, Henry and John and Albert, four. RALPH: That was Blue's brothers. And John was my dad's father, and then Lawrence... PAT: Lawrence's other name was Henry. RALPH: That's what I was thinking. PAT: And Emmet's other name was John. RALPH: You know, I never did find that Brogdon that used to be over at Durant. You know when I first moved over here there was a Brogdon that lived over there ... PAT: Yes, John moved over there. Died over there. But they brought him back here and buried him at Georgetown and Annie his wife was about three or four weeks ago that she died and they brought her over here. Now John's boy lives down here on Walker Street. He works at the tire plant, I think. Murray. RALPH: Murray Brogdon. PAT: He's better now and able to work, but he did have some kind of cancer trouble and he went to Dallas and was taking treatments down there, but someone told me not long ago that he was able and was working. You remember Annie, don't you? RALPH Yes... PAT She died about four weeks ago. She still lived at Durant and died there in Durant. Undertakers had charge of the body and everything. But Annie was getting up, I guess she was getting way up into the 80's. RALPH I saw her one time, I remember seeing her .. PAT Her name was Armstrong. There was several, five of the girls, Armstrong. Annie was the oldest one. But she's the only one that's living. RALPH I wanted to ask you about the Phillips that raised your dad, or took him in. Is one of his boys the one you're talking about being in Corsicana and buying a house with your dad? PAT No. Uncle Burt, mother's brother, Burt Banks. And they come through Denison here when they was just surveying the streets and all of that black land around Sherman out there was a dollar and a half an acre. That's what it sold for. They went down around Corsicana and went out east of Corsicana and Uncle Burt bought quite a bit of acreage, just raw land. There was some timber on it and he and dad went and cut logs enough and built a house there. When Uncle Burt died and me and __________ went to the funeral and that house was there and everything and they built on the north side of it a lumber house. And there was a little old bench sitting out there on the south porch that dad made.. and the wash pan dad had made when he was there so that he could wash outside on the porch there. It was still there. RALPH This Brogdon graveyard, is it close to the lake there? PAT Well, it's not too far from the lake. RALPH I just wondered how close it was to the place where Dad's father and mother had, is it close to it? PAT Yes. It ain't too far, and right down north of the graveyard there at Uncle Blue's place, you know, went off in rough land, you know, a big spring was down there and the James boys, that was one of their headquarters when they came through this country, and old man Albert Brogdon told me that he went down there lots of nights and stayed with them after they found out who he was, he would go down there and visit with them. RALPH Well, that's been a while ago, hasn't it? PAT Yes, that's been a long time. Let me tell you another thing that happened ... Emmet wanted me to come to Joplin, [MO] ... when I lived here I raised hogs, I liked to fool with hogs ... and this place he bought had hog pens on it. Well, I sold out and went up there. After I got up there, he had talked to somebody that knew the place and was going into the hog business and that's why I didn't ought to do it. Said it was a lot of hogs used to be raised there and had died with a lot of cholera and the germs were probably still there in the ground and I figure that one of those cholera germs, you know, you could take cholera and so we decided not to and I worked on the farm there. One day Quantrill's last man come into Joplin and in the northwest part and someone seen him come into the house that knew him and they phoned the chief of police and he got an officer and two detectives and they were to come out there and get him. Well, they were coming along and these two detectives would look behind them and see that the chief and his party was coming along. They got within about three or four blocks from the house and the chief's car never did show up and so the record was, now these detectives stopped and they said "Well, what will we do? Will we go on up there and get him, or will we go back." One of them said, "Let's go get him." One of them said "I'll take the north door, you take the south door." and they rushed up there, jumped out of the car, one ran around to the north door, the other to the south door and the north door one ... this Quantrill man was in the north room... and he shoved the door in and he shot at this guy and it went through his hat. At that time the south door detective he had shoved the door in and he ran in there and shot this guy down and he fell across the bed. They said that they held their guns on him about ten minutes because he still had his gun in his hand and they thought might just be a possom, you know, but then they decided that he was dead and they called the undertaker and they came out and got him. And we went up to town some nights to the show. And every night we went up there, we went by the funeral home and seen this guy. They advertised for any of his relatives or friends that wanted him, you know, but nobody ever did claim him and finally the city buried him. That was the last of Quantrill's gang. RALPH And that's been a while ago too, hasn't it? PAT Yeah. RALPH I think that may have been before my time, I'm not sure. PAT But old man Albert would go down there and stay with the James boys for two or three nights out of the week while they was camped down there. RALPH It seems to me like I heard Mom telling about how your dad got grazed by a bullet in the civil war. Did your dad get grazed by a bullet in the civil war? PAT Never did. RALPH I was thinking she said he did. I couldn't remember. PAT He never did. And all the guns that they had to fight with was a little bitty old gun they had to mold the bullet and they had the powder and you had to load it like a musket. It was about that long. And every time they'd shoot it they'd have to reload it. And they lay behind trees, you know, and they'd load it and then shoot at the enemy. And dad said that there was this one fellow that went from Arkansas there that was friendly and whenever he'd shoot at them he'd stick his hand back behind the stump or tree, you know, and motion at them to come on. But there's two places that dad was in big battles. One of them was at Pea Ridge. RALPH Pea Ridge, Arkansas PAT Yes. It was the first station out of Missouri into Arkansas. And the other one was a Prairie Grove. Them was the two biggest battles he was in. And when I was up at Joplin one time I came back through this Prairie Grove and just a locked building there was all it was. And it was in just a grove of little elm trees. The rest of it all the way around it was prairie and that's why they call it Prairie Grove. And you could see the dent of a cannon ball where they hit that store. But then they would get to where they got into it. RALPH Well, they've got a big monument there at Pea Ridge. PAT They have? RALPH They have a big, oh, kind of a museum type thing. PAT [unintelligible] and that first big town was a town the size of Missouri. It was right on the Arkansas line. RALPH They've got a place there that they've got some cannons out ... it's a building with kind of a museum ... and then they've got a cannon or two out there on the lawn. PAT Well, Ralph, we come through there whenever we come back. We missed Prairie Grove. And we come through there and got a lot of pictures of that. That wasn't Pea Ridge. RALPH Well, there's one up there at Pea Ridge, Arkansas. It's right down there close to Eureka. PAT
Pea Ridge the way that dad give it was the first little
town inside of Missouri. Pea Ridge and Prairie Grove was two
of the
biggest battles that he was in. He said lots of times they
was hungry,
you know, hadn't had nothing to eat for a day or two and they'd stop
and
kill a yearling and they'd skin it and then cut them off a piece and
eat
it raw, you know. And he said that lots of times they had to
get
and leave it, the enemy was so close to them and all, that they just
got
up and left the yearling. He said that they killed lots of
calves
and all to get something to eat ... eat it raw.
RALPH I've always wondered what civil war battles he was in, but I never did know. I don't guess mom ever did know which ones. PAT Well, we down when Uncle Burt died. He had a boy and a girl. Tom said to Lynch, that was the boy, said "Lynch, what did Uncle Burt do with that little gun that he went to" and Lynch said that its up there over the door, you know, and he said "Do you want it?" and Tom said "Yeah." And he went and got it and gave it to Tom. Tom came on home and he had a grandson that was in the service and he gave it to him and he swapped it off to somebody in the Army because it it was ... to have it would be a great thing ... RALPH He didn't realize what the history was behind it... PAT No, sure didn't... RALPH That's the way kids are ... PAT But dad said that when they was breaking this land out there there was a lot of prairie chickens and Uncle Burt would take that little old gun and kill 'em and "et" em ... people et 'em. They et lots of 'em. And they would follow along in the rut of the plow and get the worms and Uncle Burt was a dead shot, he said, on them. They et lots of prairie chickens. They was in droves then down there. RALPH I doubt if there's a prairie chicken ... not very many prairie chickens in state of Texas now, is there. There's a lot of them in Kansas and Iowa .. and there's not very many in Missouri, though. PAT They had pretty good sized ones. RALPH I don't know whether you remember or not ... about the time you was up there one time, though, we was trying to raise some pheasants, to turn loose, you know, and never did do any good. But they've got pheasants out in Kansas, northern Kansas. Her brother has just pheasant hunting and that's how come me to overindulge yesterday. He'd cooked us up a bunch of pheasants. Really good. PAT Ralph, just looking at you, you know, you don't look to be as healthy as you was when you was here before. RALPH I'm a little older, Pat. PAT Well, I know it, but you're showing it, too. (Ola Mae): He's been in the hospital, Pat. RALPH I was in the hospital nine days ... PAT Nine days... I've been in the hospital all my life eleven days. I went to a chiropractor in the early thirties, and he died about three or four years ago. And I've been in the hospital about eleven days in all of my life and for the last thirty years I've been taking Geritol every day, although I've missed some days. That's the best medicine that you've ever taken...it's a blood builder and an appetizer. RALPH Well, if it's an appetizer, I don't need it because I'm hungry all the time anyway. PAT It's a good blood builder. RALPH I've had a little trouble with my blood, you know, and ... PAT Well, I've missed ... out of thirty years, you know ... I've missed maybe five or six months. Of course, some guy ... I forget now where... sent me some samples for people over 40 years old. It was a good vitamin, but ... RALPH I didn't know they still made it. Do they still make it? PAT Yep. RALPH I knew that guy had sold out ... Geritol. PAT Lawrence Welk lots of times advertised on his show, you know, about people been taking Geritol so I've been thinking about writing and telling the company how long I've been taking it...they might give me some Geritol. RALPH They might give you a free sample or two... I can't ever keep up with your age, Pat. I don't know why. How old are you now? PAT Ninety-three... RALPH Ninety-three. Well, I apologize to you. I thought you were ninety-five. PAT Nope. I was born in '84 ... the 12th of April. Born here at Denison and I lived in and around Denison all my life with the exception of about two years and a half, or something like that, we was up at Joplin. And all of us kids have been just right close to each other here, save Mary. She went up to Kentucky and stayed about three months and she came back. And with the exception of that, all us kids has been here from within I'd say from a mile to not over 20 miles in a circle, you know. Uncle Burt, when he come up to visit, he said that "I never seen kids stay as close together as Ann's children have." ... That was her name. Well, she requested that and that's what she done. And when she died, before she died, she said "Wid, keep the children all together." And he did. And we used to, back at that old home place there in Arkansas... Tom was old enough and he'd go galavanting at night.. and a lot of times John, he'd go somewhere. Well, us kids ... everything was rail fence, there wasn't no barbed wire... us kids would go get in the corners in the rail fence, you know, and sit there until we got sleepy and then we'd go into the house and we'd go to bed. And our supper was mush and milk. RALPH It's still a good supper, isn't it... PAT Yes sir. That's what we had for supper. And when we was up there and all, the old house was just the same only Mr. Smith had bought it. It had a big basement over there, you know, and it had a trap door over here in the northwest corner of the living room. And they'd go open that door and they'd go down the steps, there. Had apples, cabbage and everything stored down there in the winter... RALPH Was that in Huntsville, Pat? PAT No, in Hinesville. And Smith had closed it and made an entrance out here on the south side with steps and a concrete walk down into there, you know ... and the garden was right north of the house and it was still there and everybody there [unintelligible] and they've got a row or two of ______ in the garden and the [unintelligible] was still there, you know. I know dad said one time they was thrashing, you know, and his mother was a widow lady and him and his mother lived together and they was thrashing and they had dinner there at their place at that time. And he said that they was eating dinner and Mrs. Smith, she talked long and all, she said "Albert, you can't make a guess what I found in a can of lard down in the basement this morning." And he said, "No, mother" he said "What was it?" She said "There was a skunk got in there and died." and she said, "I just brought the lard up here and had it over and restrained it." RALPH [laughing] Well, it ought to have made good lard, hadn't it? PAT I can remember ...I was the least one of them, you know ... and Sadie, Chloe and Burt and them others'd go down in there in the basement, through the door you know, and get apples and eat it down there. And I finally got ahold of a hat pin about that long and they wouldn't let me go down there and I'd go get along that door and ... it was little cracks in it, you know ... and when they'd come up to get out, though, I'd punch that there hat pin at 'em and punch 'em in the head and run 'em back down. I wouldn't let them come out, that why they got _____ a little. RALPH Did you get very many whippings over things like that? PAT Huh? RALPH Did you get your britches warmed for things like that? PAT No. RALPH Got away with it, huh. PAT That was when dad had taken a job selling headrocks ... tombstones, and he was gone from a week to ten days and us kids was just there at home and he ... the only way he had to go was on horseback ... he cut up the rock at mother's grave and (Jonah's?) grave. RALPH Did you ever hear how he got that nickname of "Wid?" PAT Huh? RALPH Did you ever hear how he got his nickname? PAT Wid. RALPH Yes, but how did he come by that? Did he ... PAT Well, his name was William and they just called him Wid. Just nicknamed and called him Wid. RALPH Never heard of that before... PAT It was William Baker, and his mother's name was Ann. Just one name, Ann. And he just had one name, only a nickname. [Francis: Ralph, were you named after him?] RALPH
I chose that William myself. You know they just
named me Ralph when I was born and I didn't like it at all so I chose
the
name William for myself. And I still get mail William Ralph
Brogdon.
My birth certificate reads Ralph.
RALPH ...We got a Christmas card back from them. We sent Beaulah and Mary a Christmas card at Chatsworth and we got it back, address unknown. Although, this oil lease thing has been going through to them, but we haven't heard directly from them. We used to hear from them every year. PAT
The last they were through here they didn't come to see
me, but they always did. And Eddick and Willie Morton lived
out close
to west of Pottsborough and they'd always go by to see them.
And
they didn't come. Someone was here and said "Pat, did you
Mary and
Beaulah when they was here" and I said "No, they didn't
come." Said
"they was here alright because I seen them in Tulksville[?]."
But
they didn't come see me and I haven't heard from them. One
day I
was working out there at the cemetery and all and there was a man and a
woman come down while I was there. And they said "Do you know
where
Earl Baker's grave is?" and I said "Yes, sure I
do." And I
said "Who are you all?" and she was one of the twins. And
they lived
in Wisconsin and I took them down and showed them Earl's
grave. There
was all five of them ... they had five children, two twins, a set of
twins,
and there wasn't either one of them lived in the same state.
RALPH
Raymond, he had done retired out of service, but his
wife was still in service but had so many years to go before she
retired.
So she's retired or died, and I don't know where Raymond is.
Never
hear from him.
PAT Well, when Orel died, why I had him brought back here. RALPH Well, I was over here at the funeral. PAT He's buried there at Georgetown. And ... his girl he was foolish about her. She worked at Denton down there and ... a waitress... RALPH Lena. I saw her a few times, but haven't seen her in a long time. PAT And she come up here and wanted a barren space. Well Burt, my nephew by Tom and all, had a full lot of twelve graves and he didn't need them. And I had taken her out to Burt and Burt sold her half of his lot... he give fifteen and he sold her half, told her she could have it for seven and a half. And she never did pay him. Whenever Earl died and all, he was buried in there on the half lot that Burt let her have. And she put Earl over here on a little old tradition way of burying is face to east, man on the right, woman on the left. Well, whenever they buried Earl she had a space left north of Earl and I figured it all the time that she had it there for Mary, but I don't know. But Earl is just buried up there. So several years ago, I don't know who did it, I figured it was Raymond, he come through here and all, and he bought a headrock about that high, and about that wide and about that thick and never put anything on it but "father Baker". That' all he put on it. So it's out there and I don't know whether Mary and Beaulah is alive or not. RALPH Well, they were the last I heard. I saw a copy of a letter from Beaulah and Mary, both of them, about this oil lease and they had that Chatsworth, California address but I don't know how come we got that Christmas card back and we've never been really able to get their address since. PAT Well, Mary had a sister name of Denny. RALPH Well, now she had leukemia. She sold her interest in that to Bob Ludwith. Oh, it's been several years ago, and she died... I'd say it was fifteen, twenty years, fifteen years ago anyway, or more. PAT I figured that she was dead. RALPH Herbert ... you know her boy ... Herbert Hiram, lived at Lubbock there where she did for a long time. As a matter of fact, Beaulah and ... what was Beaulah's boy's name? Paul. They lived there at Lubbock for a long time. I'd see them when I'd deliver cars out there. Herbert was in the burglar alarm business and he came down to Wichita Falls for a while then he moved back to Amarillo. He was in Amarillo the last I heard. He was still running... the guy that he had worked for, he had bought him out. I hadn't seen him for several years but he was in awful bad health. I think he was living on glycerin pills. PAT Lawrence, him and his mother are buried out there at Georgetown, in the same lot. RALPH I was thinking he was buried right out here. PAT No. They're buried out here at Georgetown. They've got a curb out there. Burt put a curb around their lot up there. And ... RALPH I don't know why, but I was thinking they were buried in this one right up here on the corner. PAT No. They're buried at Georgetown. RALPH Well, who else of our family is buried right up here? Is part of the Bakers buried right up here, around the corner up here. PAT No. RALPH I guess that maybe I'm imagining things, I guess. I was thinking that there was, right up on the ridge up there... PAT I don't know why they didn't bury them in the Brogdon graveyard. Well, it was just in such shape that it was pitiful. And, Mrs. Brogdon bought a full lot up there. And her and Lawrence is buried on it. Lawrence and my nephew, Troy Baker, they joined the service together. RALPH I've got a picture of them. PAT You have? RALPH I'm glad you mentioned that because the other name on there is Troy and I couldn't figure out ... I saw it the other day... and I couldn't figure out who that Troy was. PAT Troy Baker. He died about ... when they got out ... they enlisted for two years ... when they got out Lawrence came home and stayed home. Troy reenlisted and he stayed in for I don't know how long. And when he got out he lived in Hawaii and he married ... I think, I know he married twice and all... those Hawaiian girls, you know ... and he went in the real estate business. And supposed to have made a lot of money. Well, here a few years ago he came over here and visited the folks. He has a sister up at Gordonville and different places. And he went over here west of what used to be the Sloan[?] railroad, you know, and bought quite an acreage over there and was going to put up units, houses you know, and rent them out. Well, he got Burt Brady, his brother in law there at Gordonville. Burt was pretty wealthy you know, and Burt went on his note to buy them. And, by golly, he stayed over here not too long and he went back to Hawaii and he left ... Burt had to buy that land, you know. He was on the note for it. And it's still sitting up there vacant, I guess. So, Troy died about a few months ago and they buried him over there in Hawaii. RALPH Now, this picture has got Lawrence and Troy on it. I knew who Lawrence was, but I couldn't figure out that Troy. And they had on those old leggings that they used to lace all the way up, you know, and they were duded up good. PAT Yeah. Him and Lawrence was buddies here and they joined the service. They joined two years. And Lawrence got out and he stayed home and Troy rejoined and then when he got out he got out at Hawaii and he stayed there the rest of his life. But he's dead now. Died a few months ago. RALPH Well, how is Bootsie's wife? PAT Bootsie's wife? She's just barely here. I talked to her today. She's been diabetic a long time and now she's got cancer of the bone in the back and yesterday she wasn't able to be up. She's just out of the hospital and she wasn't able to be up and I talked to her since noon and she's still in bed. She's just barely here, that's all. Bootsie's boy, the oldest one, he's retired. He worked for a certain outfit and he's pretty well fixed and the youngest one, the one we call [Mattux?] Alva Lee he's had a job for a few years with this building out here where they build these air conditioners. He's been working out there. His uncle worked out there and got to be foreman and all and he got Alva Lee a job out there and Alva Lee's got the first dime that he made out there. RALPH What you think about him... he likes ... and we still call it that... you know he liked to go over and get some Chloe gravy. He called it Chloe gravy ... milk and flour and we still call it Chloe gravy. PAT Alva Lee was a good boy. He worked a whole lot for me out at the cemetery and he's a good boy, but ... RALPH Well, what about ... Have you heard anything about Kay. You know, the one that got crippled in the car wreck. Annice's girl. PAT Who? Oh, they're in Dallas. I don't know, they haven't been up here in some time. And they're both in Dallas. And the one that's crippled, he had a ... she can drive a car. He had things fixed where she can drive a car, and all, but they live in Dallas. They've got a nice home over here in Sherman, but anyway why... and the other girl's got a good job down there in Dallas. RALPH We used to see her pretty often, but we haven't seen her in a long time. PAT Well, some old hag and a guy was coming out to ___ and ___'s resort to spend the night, you know. And they, Annice and Milton were going to Sherman to see the girls and out there on the highway, this old gal, she pulled over to come around the truck, you know, and Milton and Annice were there and so Annice pulled off of the highway and she did too, and she hit them and took Annice's head off, nearly, and killed them both right there. Never did get anything out of it. They had an old car and him and her was coming out to stay all night at ______ one night, the old hag... RALPH And him too! [laughter] Well, we want to put all of it we can on the women, don't we Pat? It's all their fault. PAT Yeah. Well, she was driving. [Francis]: Now, that's heresay. RALPH They hadn't ought to have been there, that's for sure. PAT Now, take Mrs. Brogdon out buried there at Georgetown. She was the Henry Brogdon's wife. RALPH She married... PAT She married two brothers. RALPH
She married John, which was my granddad, then she married
Henry, who would be my great uncle, I guess.
[Editor's note: Pat was a little confused here. Minnie, Ralph's grandmother, married John T. Brogdon and after his death, married his brother, Henry L. Brogdon in about 1896. Henry L., we believe, was divorced from his first wife, Josie, nee Bacon, and it was she that married the Stephens sometime around 1890 . The Douglas Stephens family and Henry Brogdon family were neighbors during the 1900 census. One must wonder how that worked. *S* Billy and Oma mentioned below were Henry's children by Josie.) PAT Billie. Do you remember Billie Brogdon? RALPH Well, no. I never did see him. PAT And Oma. A boy and a girl. And then she married... And they lived a Logan. And Billy a pharmacist out of himself and he worked down here at Dennison and all. And Oma married Edgar Muse, lived over there at Cedar Mills. They're both dead. All of them. Mrs. Stevens is dead. She died of cancer ... and ____, he died with a hernia and all. I know it was one cold night in the wintertime and George lived up there and me and Tom, we'd go see about him when he didn't come down to the store. Lived about a quarter mile south of the store. And if he didn't come down in a day or two we'd go see about him. We went up there one evening late to see about him and he was in misery and all. And, so we called Dr. Greer at Gordonville. He got up and come down. Cold, boy it was cold. And he come down there and all the way of coming he had was in a one-horse cart. And he'd take his clothes down to his hip, put newspapers next to his body ... RALPH To keep the wind out. PAT Wind won't penetrate, you see... and all. And he'd dress up and come down there and sit in that little old hack and get down there. And he come down there and as soon as he looked at Stephen he said "I can't do this man no good." He said that he's got to get to the hospital just as soon as he can. And he asked me and Tom if we could get him there. Well, I had a buggy and a horse and we fixed a bed back in the back seat and got him in there as comfortable as we could. We got out to Sherman the next morning just about daylight and Dr. Greer had said "I'll go down to Sherman the next morning and have everything fixed. This an an emergency." And we got him down there and they took him in and that apparently got out and he couldn't get it back and gangrene set up all in his stomach. They operated on him but he died that night and that was Henry Brogdon's wife's second husband. [deleted some gossipy discussion about individuals who are probably still living] PAT I know they was farming, and this was after Lawrence got out of the service, you know, and old man McKee rented the place from ... and moved down there and farmed on it. And there's about a half a mile or further from the house to the north end of the cultivating land. And it come up a bad cloud, you know, from the west... thundering and lightning and all and Lawrence said to old man McKee, he said "Let's quit and go to the house." He said "It's going to rain or maybe storm." And old man McKee said "Oh, no" he said "I don't care how much it storms or rains" you know." He said "I've been hit on the head three times with lightning." Lawrence said "You're just a damn liar." [laughter] RALPH I expect Lawrence was ready to fight him about that time, wasn't he? PAT Old man was bald headed. He said "I've been hit on the head three times by lightning, never did hurt me." RALPH By the way, you've still got a pretty good bunch of hair. PAT Yeah... RALPH I'm losing mine back there. PAT Well, dad had just about as much hair as I've got. RALPH Well, Earl got plumb bald, didn't he? PAT Yeah. EARL And Eldon, Earl's younger boy, he's plumb bald. PAT Yeah, he is. RALPH Whenever we come up here to Earl's funeral, why, he was bald. PAT Well, this girl was out there at the cemetery getting the names of ... and not a one of them lived in the same space. Raymond was in Germany. But I figure that after Raymond got out he put that rock up at Earl's space. But he never did come see me or anything. RALPH Well, he came to see us several times in Fort Worth. When he was at Ft. Sill and well, when Earl died he went to Fort Worth with us and then he caught a bus to El Paso. And then when he got stationed in Ft. Sill, he came to see us several times. But then he disappeared and we didn't see him any more. And people get separated, and they... just like we don't take time to... we're just a hundred miles over here. PAT Do you remember Dad? RALPH Yes. I remember, just barely remember him. That's all. PAT Go right in there at look and see his picture. RALPH Yeah, I've seen it. Mom used to have one like that, but I don't know what ever happened to it. She had it in a circular frame, but I don't know what ever happened to it. PAT My nephew out here at Pottsboro has got mother's picture. It is just like that. And Jacob, my nephew had this picture and he said "I'm going to give it to you as long as you live, and whenever you die then it comes back to me." and I told him "All right" but Floyd, my nephew out here at Pottsboro has got my mother's picture. Sade had them both made, you know. And she lived out there and she let Floyd have her mother's picture and Jack let me have that one. I never seen Dad with his whiskers off but one time. And we lived there in Denison and all. And he went down to the barbershop one night and had his whiskers all cut off, you know, come back up to the house and knocked on the door and my mother opened the door, stepmother, and all and he said "I'm just kind of lost. I'm looking around, and I'd like to find a place where I could stay all night." And she said, "Why, no!. You can't stay all night here! We don't have room for you, and you can't stay all night." And he jollied her a little, you know, and he said "Well, I'm just going to come in and stay anyway." and he opened the door, and when he did ... and she recognized him. That's the only time I knew him having his whiskers cut. [GAP IN RECORDING] RALPH ...Yeah, because they was always doing something like that. PAT Francis, get the little picture up there of _______. RALPH I've got a picture at home of grandpa. It's a postcard picture and it's him out standing feeding chickens. And he's got his beard, of course. But its sure getting faded. PAT Now that Sade, Chloe, Pearl and myself. This is Pearl here, that's Sade over there, and Chloe under that tree. RALPH That's been quite a while ago, too, hasn't it. About 25 years ago. [Francis]: This was taken at ... out at ... when Bootsie lived out there. We went out, all of us. RALPH Pat, do you feel like telling me again about your dad? PAT Yeah. RALPH About him coming from Tennessee, and I'll get it on here, so I'll be sure and have it. PAT I don't know what county or town he come from but I do know that he was born and lived up to about 18 or 20 years old in Tennessee. His father died and he lived ... him and his mother lived together ... for maybe two years and then she remarried. And when she did he left home and he come over to Huntsville, Arkansas and Uncle Jim Phillips owned quite a little land there, you know. And he had five boys, four boys. And he'd taken dad in and just raised him as one of the boys, you know. And he lived there with them until the war broke out. Him and mother was going together and they agreed between each other that if he got out of the service and all that they would marry. And he got out of the service and all and they married. And then they come to Texas here and come through Dennison when it was just being surveyed off. And they went on down to Corsicana and went on out east of Corsicana and Uncle Burt bought several acres of land down there, raw land. And they cut logs and made a log house there. And then got lumber and made a side room on the north of it. And they cut that in cultivation. Some of it was, but some of it was but some timber and they put that in cultivation and dad made one crop down there and they he come back to Dennison. Uncle Burt stayed on down there and raised his family. He had a boy and a girl and stayed on down there 'til all of them died and all. We went down to Uncle Burt's funeral and all. He was ninety some-odd years old when he died and of course the boy and girl I guess is both dead now and Aunt Mag is dead, you know and I don't know what become of the place. They probably willed it to somebody or something or another. But anyway, Dad said they was building this log house and there was a wild bull out down there, you know. And Uncle Burt was quite a little ways from the house getting something or another, and this here wild bull spied him and made a run at him and all and Dad said he was just bearing. They didn't have a window in the east end of the log house, and he said that Uncle Burt just barely cleared that window when the bull got there. He went right through that window. RALPH Well, he hit it anyway, didn't he. PAT Yeah. If the thing'd gotten out, it'd kill him. RALPH Then they moved back up to Grayson county. He didn't move up to Grayson county before your mother died, I guess. Did he move back up to Grayson county before your mother died. PAT Yes. And they lived out here Hyde Park and a Doctor got them to sell out and go to a higher altitude and he went up to Huntsville, Arkansas. Back to the old home place. And then he come back down to between Huntsville and Federal and bought a 40 acre little farm and all. And we lived there and mother died there. And then ... RALPH Pat, is she buried there? PAT Yes. She's buried at Hinesville. I went up there a few years ago and seen her and _______[Gilrith's?] graves, you know. And whenever we had that place there was an orchard right east of the house there of three different kinds of apples: Ben Davis, Winesap and something else. And we'd put them down in that basement and keep them. The house was about maybe 200 yards off of the road ... east of the road, you know. And big cherry trees on each side of the walkway up there. And the cherries, they was big as quarters. And us kids had a time keeping the birds out of there ... from eating them. Boy, they was really fine and all. But the orchard was all gone, the cherry trees was all gone. The cellar was made out here where you went into the cellar. RALPH Did they raise any grapes up there at that time, or do you remember? PAT I don't know. I never seen a grape. But Maude's brother lived just about a half a mile from us right on south down the road and they had three girls and a boy. Me and Clyde, the boy, was just about the same age and size and we used to sit out in the corners of the railed fence and made cornsilk horses. We was just two little old kids, you know. And since Clyde got grown he went to west Texas and got into some oil company. I've tried a number of times to ask fellows that I've seen from out in there if they ever knew him. One fellow said "I knew of him, but I never did know him." So, I guess Uncle Fate moved to up here in Reneta, Oklahoma. RALPH Is that the Boatwright end, where the Boatwright came in? PAT No, Uncle John Boatwright, he died down here at ... oh, what's the name of that place... they came from Arkansas over there... RALPH There was a Boatwright that had a big store, a department store in Veneta. I was thinking you and mom and Sade and Chloe stopped there and talked to them PAT Well, the Boatwright's was related to the family in a way, but this here ... oh, I can't think of the name of it now ... is down here and then it went all over into Arkansas... RALPH Fort Gibson? PAT Yeah. And they was there. I never did know what become of the Boatwrights. Never did. They lost trace and moved to Veneta, Oklahoma and the kids come down and visited several times. There was three girls and one boy, Clyde. And they're all dead, I guess. RALPH I never could remember whether the Boatwrights were kin to the Bakers or whether they were kin to the Borens. PAT They were kin on my mother's side some way. They wasn't kin to the Bakers but they were related on my stepmother's side. And Jess Boren, my nephew, he drove one by wagon from Arkansas out here. Dad had two wagons and there was nine wagons of us come from Arkansas to Texas. Indian Territory then was Indian territory. It never had become a state. Camping out at night and the Indians over there, there was lots of them and the ugliest humans you ever looked at, and all. And whenever they seen a fire, they'd come to the fire and they all had their horses and saddles and blankets and the women folks was scared to death of them, and all. And they's motion that they wanted something to eat. Well, the men folks would have something fixed for them, give them something to eat. Whenever they 'et they was on their horses and gone. Next morning they was back there for their breakfast. But every night that we stayed in the Indian territory there was some of the menfolks stayed up all night. They didn't go to bed and they just rotated. I forgot how long we was coming through Indian territory. There were nine wagons of us. Jess Boren drove one of dad's wagons out here and he found a job from a man, Stevens out west of town here on a nursery. Worked there several years. Finally married a girl out here at Hyde Park. Then went into raising vegetables and things like that. He was a nervous kind of a fellow and all and he had two girls. ... and it rained, and rained, and rained and ruined his gardens and washed his land and he just got so aggravated he come down here at this spring west of Dennison out here, Katy railroad, up over an underpass, sat down there by a train and shot himself, killed himself. His wife, Effie died about three years ago. I don't know where the girls are living or not. RALPH He just couldn't take it. PAT And then the Borens began to come on up here. They followed Jess up here. Ed come up here. Bought a place down south of Hyde Park out there and then some of the other Borens come out and they went back. Hugh married into the Lamb family. Lamb was pretty wealthy and all. And he got the someplace out here on the road that goes to Laura Lake. Right on the corner. Well, there was a great big oak tree right at the north door of the house. And he got out there, was taking it down. And he got some help and they sawed it down and was trying to twist it around and Newt made a run out this way and the tree twisted around and fell and caught him and killed him. I guess his wife still lives up there at the old someplace. There's lots of things... I've seen lots of things that's happened here at town since I was here and I remember it just as well as it had been yesterday. Just take Main Street there, you know, Joe Jenkins run a blacksmith shop up there in about the fifth block of Main Street. Dirt streets and dirt road in there. He weighed between two-fifty and three hundred pounds. Big blacksmith. Shod horses, worked on wagons and everything right there on Main Street. Kate Kilgore's down here on Crawford Street. Big two story house there and all. Me and Fulkes Harvey was about the same age. I lived at 1130 West Chestnut, he lived at 1100 Chestnut. And we run together after school hours, when school was out. And we used to go down there. He made bricks. Had a brick [shill??] south of his house there. Out of old red clay. A lot of the clay is still here. And that's been, I guess that's been a hundred years. Because I was just a kid and the buildings was here then. And a lot of buildings that was made of that old red clay just crumbled up, you know. [Francis]: Tell Ralph about that song... that song that you was telling us about a while ago. PAT Well, I told him a while ago. RALPH I was gone out to to get the tape recorder. I didn't get to hear it. PAT Well, it was an engineer here. ______? engineer. Bill Lewis and he lived south of the viaduct in a big two-story house. He belonged to the Trinity Methodist Church. And when he was in, off on his run he would get along the steps of the State National Bank down there and and sing and the police would have to keep the traffic moving on the avenue and Main Street to keep it from blocking. People would come to hear him. He was the greatest singer that I ever heard. So, his favorite song was "Life's Railway to Heaven." We lived out at Hyde Park and the Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian would have meetings out there in the summer months and they would get him to come out lots of times and sing. And he'd come sing for either one of the denominations, and all. And here about maybe four, five, six months ago ... I've got up over twenty years about three o'clock every morning. I still wake up at that time. And I don't got back to sleep. Very seldom ever I go back to sleep. And I just lay there and go over my past life. I don't have no future, and I just go there and go over my past life. RALPH Look like you've had a pretty good one. There's a lot of future left, to me. PAT Yeah. That song. I don't know why, but that song came to me just as plain as you sitting here. There was three verses and the chorus of it, and it came to me just as plain. And I still know it and all. And I've been thinking to take some of the oldest members of his church out there and tape it off and get a quartet to sing it in memory of him. RALPH Well, why don't you just sing it for us right now? [Pat sings]: Life's railway is like a road to heaven. Make the wrong successful from the cradle to the grave. Always keep in mindful that your hands are on the throttle and your eye's upon the rail. You will oft times find obstruction. Look for storm or wind and rain. On a curve or fill or tunnel they will almost ditch a train. Put your trust alone in Jesus. Never falter, never fail. Keep your hand upon the throttle, and your eyes upon the rail. As we go across this trestle, spanning ______ and swelling tide. You remember the Union Depot into which the train will glide. There you'll meet the superintendent. God the Father, God the Son. With the heartiest welcome every pilgrim will come home. Blessed Savior there will guide us til we reach that blissful shore. Where the angels wait to join us in the praise forevermore. PAT I haven't heard that song in seventy years or long, and all at once it come to me after I woke up one night. RALPH That's really something. I sure can't remember songs anymore. PAT I've been thinking about having it taped off and getting a good quartet and letting them sing it in his church. Emmet Cottrell, one of the oldest members, he said he just barely could remember Uncle Billy. I don't know of anyone else that was old enough to remember him. RALPH Pat, I ran into a driver over there where I did work. His name was Bill Anderson. He said his mother knew you and mom. PAT Will Anderson? RALPH Well, his name is Bill and he's a great big guy and I think his grandad raised him, I believe. Lived over around Pottsboro someplace. I don't know what his grandad's name was. [Francis]: Maybe that's Bobby's mother. Bobby Baker. RALPH He said his mother knew Pat... [Francis]: She was an Anderson. That Mrs. Anderson that goes to Dr. Gleckler. PAT That was Jess Anderson. I can't remember this here. RALPH I know you knew Fred Purdue, didn't you? Lived over around Pottsboro. PAT He's still living. His folks all are out there at Johnstown. I seen in the paper here a while back where Willie is still living. He got into trouble, his wife did during the war. They done something that wasn't right and the law went out to arrest her and she took the winchester and run them off. That's right. She'd done something that violated the law during the wartime. RALPH Some of the rationing laws, probably. PAT Yeah. They went out to get her and she run them off. But Willie, I don't know whether she's still living or not, but William Purdue is. RALPH There was a boy named Crook that married some of Bootsie's kinfolk. I can't remember what his first name was. PAT That was Crook, and Bootsie's oldest boy, Darryl Wayne married one of the girls. RALPH I knew that there someplace, the boy that I knew, it was his brother that married into the family. PAT Darryl, he went over here to this college at Durant and had taken a course and gotten a job. And he's retired now, and all. And he married Dallas Crook's girl. ... Dallas was a good guy. He worked for me out at the cemetery a whole lot and all. RALPH You talking about going into Oklahoma. They tell me that you had a experience coming to Missouri when I was just a baby one time. PAT Who? RALPH You and mom and I don't know who else was along... in a model T going to Missouri and you stopped and camped one night and found out you was in a hog pen the next morning. Do you remember that. PAT Yeah. That's right. We went to rest at night, in the dark, so we stopped there to stay all night ... we pulled up to the side of ... I believe there was a little store. And we pulled up there and stopped. I got to go on down there a little later on, got away from there, and we had camped where it was a hog pen. And we stayed there 'til daylight and got up and got something to eat and went on up there. I don't know just where that was at. I'd forgot all about that, but I do remember it now. [Francis]: Was that the place that you got the water that night, and then the next morning you saw what you'd got? PAT Yeah. Got it out of the hog pen down there. Pearl was telling you about it, wasn't she. RALPH Yes. PAT Well, that's right. RALPH They tell me that I wasn't saying anything up until then, and I wanted a drink of water and I haven't kept my mouth shut since. PAT That's right. RALPH I don't know, Pat. I've kept you talking here a long time. I guess I'd better let you rest a while. PAT No. It's all right, Ralph. RALPH We just live a hundred miles over there, but it sure is hard to get over here. PAT Yeah. RALPH I though that when I moved to Texas I'd get acquainted with all my kinfolks, and spend a lot of time with them. But I never have had time. PAT I seen lots of changes in Dennison since I was a kid. After dad come back up here from Navarro County he got a job over at Oakwood Cemetery as Sexton. And worked over there quite a while, I don't know how long. My first school was here in Dennison. Houston School. Then we moved out to Hyde Park and me and Sade and Chloe finished our schooling out there. Eighth grade was as high as they taught, and we finished out schooling out there. There was four fellows out there there was Jess Boren, like I told you, and Mr. Ford and Mr. Groman and Mr. Goldman all raised vegetables. And they'd come to Dennison and Sherman and sell them out in the morning. And I went to work for Mr. Ford after school was out, and all, for 40 cents a day. Ten hours, from sun to sun. One hour off at dinner. 40 cents a day. Men were getting seventy-five... that's top wages. And one day he said to me "Patsy," (he called me Patsy) he said "Patsy, I'm going to give you 75 cents a day. You're doing me as good a work as any man I got." RALPH You went home happy, didn't you. PAT Oh boy, I was really happy. But that was high wages. Then I come down here and went to work for the Katy in 1909 and I went down there and he a little shack out there in the yard and I went out there and I said "I'm looking for a job." He said, "We're not hiring anybody." Well, that was in the morning. Noon I went back. I said "I'm looking for a job." "We're not hiring anybody." I went back the next morning he says "I told you we wasn't hiring anybody." I went back the next morning. I said, "Well, I'm still looking for a job." and he said "I'm going to give you a job to get shut of you." and he give me a job. [gap in tape] RALPH Our youngest boy worked for a guy on a paper route who went out on strike about the same time you did, I guess. He went down to Fort Worth and worked on the Star Telegram. He said he was still out on strike. PAT Well, a lot of the boys... we all went out on strike here, you know, and a lot of the boys went down south here at Katy Terminal and got a job under assumed names. Give a different name and they hired them and they belonged to the Union here. But they went on down there to other Union terminals and they hired them and all. Give them a job. They was experienced, they knew. But I never did go back to work. I was offered a good job, but I never did go back to work for the Katy. RALPH You worked on a bread route about that time, didn't you. PAT I went to work ... I went over and I got a job from Scott and Jennings, a furniture store here. I worked for them... I don't know how long... but anyway, I quit and I went out home. Dad was getting kind of poorly, and I went on home and went to farming and taking care of him and all. Old man Frank Jennings tried to get Eric Borden to persuade me to come back and go to work for them. They'd give me a job going out collecting. They'd go out, and they'd send us out, and we'd go out and buy old second hand furniture, an old stove, you know, with all the rods burned out of it and everything. Give them fifty cents for it, take it in and put in new rods and polish it up and all and they'd sell it anywhere from ten to fifteen dollars. Old man Cody Hubbard ran a store out here on Main Street and he went to California and he give me a job working for him while he was gone to California. And so whenever he come back, Bill Center who run a store here, went into the second hand and new furniture business. So I worked for him and all. Some woman at Pottsboro wanted a coal oil stove. One was advertised, so he sent me out and looked at it. I went out and looked at it and all. She wanted fifteen dollars for it. It needed cleaning up and new wicks in it. I gave her ten dollars and we took it in and they cleaned it up and put new wicks in it, called this woman and she come got it. They got thirty-five dollars for it. Old man Hubbard told me, "Pat, I went into the wrong business when I went into the grocery business. If I'd went into the furniture business when I went into the grocery business, I'd have had money to throw away." And his boy is running a furniture store down here in town now. Hubbard Furniture. RALPH I think dad was telling me about some of Blue Brogdon's folks that went out around Bowie. PAT I don't know where he come from. RALPH
Well, no I mean they went over there.. some of them did.
But they disappeared. Nobody ever knew where they went.
PAT He came from Tennessee, I think. RALPH It was some eastern state and he bought that place down there and give an acre for a Brogdon burying ground. There's quite a few buried down there besides the Brogdons. RALPH My oldest boy, he's real anxious to find out where that is and see it and see about doing something about it. He's just now got interested in family history. PAT Well, there was a woman come here from Lubbock and California and they put up out here at that townhouse motel. And they were hunting an old graveyard by the name of Nobb Hill. And somebody happened to be in there and he heard them and they said "You call Pat Baker. If there's a cemetery in this country by the name of Nobb Hill, he'll know it." Well, they called me. Made an appointment with them the next day. And we tried, I called everybody... the oldest people that I could think of... nobody never heard of Nobb Hill. One neighbor had a funeral out at Georgetown. Early Looney was there. Early was an old resident. And he said "Pat, I've got an Uncle buried over there in the old part. I can't find his grave. Do you know where it is?" I said "Yeah, I know just exactly where the Looney headrock is." And I said after the funeral I'll take you over there. So we went over there and he said "That's him." and he told me how long it has been since he realized knowing it. I seen Early then when I was hunting Nobb Hill cemetery, and I said "Early, you ever heard of a cemetery being named Nobb Hill?" He said "Yeah." and down here on the west of it, you go up a high hill. The road does in the Hyde Park neighborhood. And he said "I rode a horse back there many a time up Nobb Hill." Well, Joe Hyronimous married a Clark and on the west side of the cemetery it's a family lot there of the Clarks and Hyronimous is buried there. Chain link fence around it and headrocks, you know. And I asked Joe. "Joe, do you know anything about a grave in there by this name" I forget now. He said, yeah. Its right on the extreme east side of the graveyard. Well, we had been down there and bramble briars was all over it and everything. You'd have to get down and crawl under them, you know, we didn't go far enough down, and Joe told me where it was at and we went down there and I contacted these women and they wanted a chain link fence put around it. And I got a bunch and we went down there and put... the headrock had fell off of the base... and put it up and put a chain link fence around, cleared it all off. And this old man that was dead there was in 1860. Lived in west Texas, had lots of cattle, and they drove them overland to Kansas City market and on the road several days and all. And they got to Kansas City with them, then the old man got sick and the boy then bought a one-horse hack and started back to Texas with his dad, sick. And he got out here in the south part of town, the old man was pretty sick and someone out they took him and kept him until he died. And then they buried him up there on Nobb Hill Cemetery. And I got the record of it and it said it was also used as a military cemetery and that was in 1860. RALPH Did those people come from west Texas just to see where their... PAT Yeah. They drove their cattle from west Texas to Kansas City Market overroad. That's the only way they had, then. RALPH Don' you know that was good tender beef by the time they got it there? 'bout as tough as what we get now. PAT There's a whole lot different now to what it used to be, Ralph. But, I'll tell you, you can't beat some of the old days that we used to have back in my early time. People was sociable. They cared for each other. The few living out here and farming, you got sick there'd be enough cultivators and hoe hands to go in there and clean your crop out in a day's time. Now, they've moved all of the school houses out of the country and put everything in town. There isn't no more sociability in the country anymore, not a bit. And there's lots of it right here in town, where we're living here. Someone right there, we don't know who their neighbor is, you know. We don't know. Someone come along hunting her and asked about her. She lived in this block. I don't know. I never heard of her. And she's your next door neighbor. RALPH That's the way it is where we live. We know very few people. People who go to church with us, and people we work with and that's it. PAT It used to be when I was a young fellow up there at Locus. And I'd a rather went to Locus, of course me and Tom run a store up there for several years, you know. And I'd rather go to Locus now if the old timers was out there that was then. Hate to go to New York City, I sure would. I'd say "take me to Locus" I sure would. Take me to Locus out there where I was raised about thirty-five years and it was my job... I went ... I bet you ninety percent of the kids that was born up there in that neighborhood, I went at night to get the doctors for them. And lots of times I had to go out on the prairie. The phone line would be down...I'd have to go plumb on into Pottsboro to get a doctor to come up. And every time there was a kid born, you know, it was "Get Pat, he'll go get the doctor for us." And I did get them, I never refused anybody. Never did. All in the night and in the daytime. We had a fellow, a blacksmith by the name of Aaron Crabtree. Mr. Golden, lived over there north of Locust about three miles, he was bleeding to death. He'd been bleeding all day. And would tell them that he could feel himself slipping, you know. Well, the neighbors was all in. The doctor'd been in, they couldn't help him and someone happened to be there that knew Aaron Crabtree. And he could stop blood. And they'd say "Why don't you get Aaron Crabtree over here? Aaron will stop that blood." and someone got on a horse and ... it was about three miles ... [intelligible] and get old man Crabtree that ran a blacksmith shop there. And he come over there and he went in and he looked at Mr. Golden a few minutes, went out to himself. I don't know, someone told me there was a certain verse in the bible, that's he'd quote that... he never would tell what it was. Didn't even tell his family before he died what that was. And it wasn't very long 'til Mr. Golden's blood commenced to slowing down. In about 30 minutes, his nose had quit bleeding. And when would get a horse, or cow, or colt caught up in barbed wire, they couldn't stop the blood, they'd go get old man Crabtree and he'd come and stop the blood on animals just like he did the men. And I asked his oldest boy after he died, I said "Hogan, did your dad ever tell you what that was, the way he stopped blood." He said, "No, never did." But he could stop blood, he sure could. RALPH There's a lot of things happen that there's not any explanation for. PAT I've had nosebleeds. Have been for the last two months. One morning here, it bled for an hour and a half until I finally got it stopped, and next day it bled for about an hour and I got it stopped. Then it's bled several times, a little at a time. But nose used to bleed a whole lot. I never did get excited. The folks did, and picking cotton in the fall I just hung my head over and picked cotton and let my nose bleed. I'd stick a piece of cotton up my nose, pull it out, it'd just squirt the blood out. I'd hold my head over here and pick cotton. I never did, but the folks would get uneasy about it. But I never did. That's the first time it's bled though in a long time. RALPH I guess that runs in the family, Pat. My nose used to bleed real easy, when I was a kid. Just look at it and and it'd start bleeding. PAT Yeah, but then got over it. Some people never have a nosebleed, but others have lots of it. RALPH Well, Pat, we're going to have to go home. PAT Well, why don't you stay all night? RALPH Well, we've been gone too long from home now. They may have it all carried off. PAT
Well now, Ralph, I'll tell you this. Whenever the
weather clears up, when it gets to be pretty weather, y'all come up
here
and I'll go to the Brogdon graveyard with you and I'll go down and show
you where Pearl was born. The house ... I called Ed McKee ...
he
bought the farm right west of where Pearl was born and I called Ed not
too long back and asked him about this house and he said "I think the
house
is gone, but I know where it was." And dad used to work for
old man
John Reddick, he owned this here house across the road and farm and dad
worked for him. And he had a mule and a horse. And
Mrs. Reddick
had a conch horn. And the land run up I know of quite a
little ways
from the house. Well, whenever, at eleven o'clock every day
she'd
get out and blow that conch horn, you know to let them know it's dinner
time. And he had a mule and that mule ... he'd been a
working, singing
to himself ... and if that mule was half way to the other end, nobody
couldn't
hold him. He turned around right in the middle of the field
and come
to the house for dinner. Dad said that him and old man John
Reddick
both couldn't hold him. Whenever he'd hear that conch horn,
he'd
just ... wherever he was at, he just turned around and come home.
PAT That's right. He knew it was eating time. [END OF TAPE]
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