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Work Projects Administration

"Arkansas Narratives, Part 2"

One for the kitchen and one
to sleep in. We had homemade furniture. Mighty few of them had bought
furniture. Most of then made it themselves. If you had bought furniture,
that was called fine. There was no rollers to any bed. Food was kept in
the house. Wheat was kept under the bed because they had nowhere else to
keep it. Planks were put around it. We children used to jump up and down
in it.

Rations
"When the white folks got ready to give us milk, they poured it out in a
tub and said, 'Come and git it.'
"They would kill hogs and the colored folks' meat would be put back of
the white folks' meat in the smokehouse. They put the white folks' meat
in the front and the colored folks' meat in the back. When you wanted
something, you would go up to old master and say, 'My meat is out,' and
they would give you some more out of the smokehouse.
"Brandy was kept in the storehouse too; but they didn't give that to the
colored [TR: corrected from 'cullud'] folks--they didn't give any of it
to them. My daddy used to make it and buy it from the white folks and
slip and sell it to the colored folks. He didn't tell the white folks
who he was gettin' it for.
"You didn't have a regular time to git rations.


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