JUDITH HELFAND: I'll move all this stuff (inaudible)
JAMIE STONEY: Okay, ell me where you want to start.
GEORGE STONEY: Forward.
HELFAND: Oh, you want that.
GEORGE STONEY: Yeah, forward.
JAMIE STONEY: Point it at the VCR.
GEORGE STONEY: Now you have to hit play. You don't want this.
00:01:00[playing video]
HELFAND: - coming out the windows.
00:02:00[playing video]
00:03:00GEORGE STONEY: OK.
(break in audio; break in video)
GEORGE STONEY: Hey Claude, should we just get in the car and go over there?
CLAUDE HELTON: OK, all right.
MABEL HELTON: Here are the keys to both cars. He keeps the keys to that one, so
when he gets mine.GEORGE STONEY: I see.
CLAUDE HELTON: I know you had the keys.
MABEL HELTON: I got the keys to the other one.
GEORGE STONEY: That is the same hat you had this morning?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, mmhm. You want me to wear a different one?
GEORGE STONEY: No, no, that's fine.
(laughter)
00:04:00MABEL HELTON: I'll swap you.
GEORGE STONEY: OK.
MABEL HELTON: It's nice seeing ya'll again.
GEORGE STONEY: Thank you.
JAMIE STONEY: Can you say that one more time?
MABEL HELTON: I said, nice seeing ya'll again.
JAMIE STONEY: Nice seeing you.
CLAUDE HELTON: My wife's daughter's one of the officers in the (inaudible)
bank in Stanley, so she gave me that cap, last week I believe it was. But she had already given me one before that.(break in audio; break in video)
CLAUDE HELTON: If she's going to bring her, take her back here, (inaudible).
JAMIE STONEY: She's going to follow us over there.
GEORGE STONEY: She'll follow us.
CLAUDE HELTON: Going to follow us? That's one of the neighbors. She's the
one that called me. She was going up [60 to Romney?].GEORGE STONEY: Or sell you aluminum siding?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah.
00:05:00GEORGE STONEY: You don't look like a very good prospect for aluminum siding.
CLAUDE HELTON: No.
JAMIE STONEY: So Dad, I'm rolling if you guys want to talk.
CLAUDE HELTON: One of Mr. Moore's sons lives right up here, and I just
wondered if he wanted to talk to him or not.GEORGE STONEY: Who is Mr. Moore?
CLAUDE HELTON: He was the president of our union until he left, and then
[Hartman?]. Now I don't know if you want to talk to him or not.GEORGE STONEY: OK, when we come back we'll stop and talk to him.
00:06:00CLAUDE HELTON: OK. He lives in the house across the street there then. This is
the house that [Ernest Gale?] lived in at the time, during the - I believe he built that after the war, I believe. That's the last house he lived in until he built a motel over here on [Wilson?] Boulevard, and then he sold it and went 00:07:00to Florida. If he wants somebody with experiences and different things that happened, he could really fill you up.GEORGE STONEY: Well, as you know, it was Mr. [Gantt?] who found the News
Observer, I mean, the Charlotte Observer article.CLAUDE HELTON: It was?
GEORGE STONEY: And called us up and told us about you.
00:08:00CLAUDE HELTON: Oh. I was trying to remember some of the names that you gave me
a while ago.GEORGE STONEY: Jamie, get a shot of that building over there. Now this is the
entrance to -CLAUDE HELTON: This was the - there's the gate where the people backed up against.
00:09:00GEORGE STONEY: Let's stop here, right here, and we'll go over, and you'll
get to tell that story.CLAUDE HELTON: What was that?
GEORGE STONEY: Let's stop right here, and we'll go back and get you to tell
that story at that gate.CLAUDE HELTON: I started to - follow. (laughs) That thing was all the way
closed, and I forgot about it.GEORGE STONEY: Yeah. We want to go back to that gate so we can get you to tell
the story about what happened at the gate.CLAUDE HELTON: Well, there won't be the same fellow now.
GEORGE STONEY: No, I know.
CLAUDE HELTON: Here, I'll just show you while I'm here.
GEORGE STONEY: OK.
00:10:00CLAUDE HELTON: The union building was right along here, I'd say right in that
section there, and the road came around from way over there, from [apple?], made a little circle around, up to the union building, which was along there.GEORGE STONEY: What kind of building was it?
CLAUDE HELTON: Well, it was a wood frame, a pretty large building.
GEORGE STONEY: Did you build it?
CLAUDE HELTON: No, it was already built.
GEORGE STONEY: You rented it then?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. There was another house along here.
(break in audio; break in video)
00:11:00CLAUDE HELTON: The position he had and what they did, if that's steel,
that's why he had - you don't talk to him any time that he brings up - he'll say, "Now you was in Europe?" I say, "Yeah. I was in General Patton's Army, in the Third Army." He said, "Well, I was in that army, too." And then he starts in all his experiences. It don't matter how many times you see him, you still, you talk until you're here, and you see him back some other place, and he'll start that war business again. (laughter)GEORGE STONEY: Well, you were going to tell us about what happened at the gate here.
CLAUDE HELTON: It was a different gate than what - it was a different gate. At
that time it was, it ran along across, go along cross there, and, of course, it was open wide, for trucks can go in and out. So this is where a good many of 00:12:00the fellows were picketing, this gate here, see. There was nothing unusual that happened except they were just here when I was trying to go to work, so they just stopped us. So I really don't know anything that I could tell you other than it was something I heard, but I could tell you about our [watch?]. So there was nothing outstanding, but this is the main gate, it was at that time.GEORGE STONEY: Now you mentioned something about somebody getting crushed
against the gate?CLAUDE HELTON: Now that - I don't know, I didn't tell you that.
JAMIE STONEY: I think you said "That's where they pushed us back."
GEORGE STONEY: Oh, yes.
JAMIE STONEY: When you tried to block it, and the guys were all, guys trying to
keep the gates open.JUDITH HELFAND: Let Mr. Helton tell it.
00:13:00JAMIE STONEY: Right.
CLAUDE HELTON: Now I wasn't a part of that. I don't remember that. If it
was - there was nothing like that happened at the back gate that I know of. There might be it happened in the front, because it was like two different armies, one group here, one group the other place.GEORGE STONEY: Could you tell us about the union building again?
CLAUDE HELTON: Well, the union building was an old - I suppose it was an old
grocery store building. Now it was empty at that time, but I don't know what had happened, you know, why it was empty, and that's, that's where we had our meeting. So people came from back over in there and up at Ozark and 00:14:00different places to that union hall. They had some good meetings, (laughs) inspiring, you know, especially some of the union leaders, coming back from their talks.GEORGE STONEY: Did you speak?
CLAUDE HELTON: No. No, I was never called on to speak. But I guess I could
have if they (laughs) -GEORGE STONEY: You were a young man then?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, uh-huh.
GEORGE STONEY: How old then? This is 1934.
CLAUDE HELTON: I was - I would be in my early twenties, along there. That's been so long, it's hard to remember now, isn't it?
00:15:00But I was not married.GEORGE STONEY: Were any of the other members of your family involved?
CLAUDE HELTON: Not actually, just knowing that the union existed. That was the
way my daddy felt about it, and also I had two brothers who did not live in our house. They had already married. So I was the only one that actually had an active part in the union. Now that's about all I can think of, you know, this, since I didn't do anything here (laughs). 00:16:00GEORGE STONEY: Except picket.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, and that was back there.
GEORGE STONEY: The back gate?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, back gate, uh-huh.
GEORGE STONEY: Do you have any idea how many people were picketing?
CLAUDE HELTON: No, not here. But the back gate, I think we must have had about
maybe fifty, which seemed like a big crowd, you know, right, standing out in front of the gate.GEORGE STONEY: And the plant just shut down?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. They didn't try to operate at all after that.
00:17:00GEORGE STONEY: Now in some places, in some places people came over to help other
people shut down. Did that happen here?CLAUDE HELTON: No. Because the mill didn't try to run at all after, it was
closed down, so there wasn't any problem.GEORGE STONEY: Yeah. OK.
JAMIE STONEY: You know, Dad, I still want to get you asking the first question
about what happened here, because we didn't have the [camera?].GEORGE STONEY: OK. Maybe you could tell me what happened here.
CLAUDE HELTON: Pertaining to the union. Well, that's all that I know of
actually, because we backed up to the fence line. Now I don't know what song they sang, but I heard there was a song. (laughs) But there was no, as far as I know, there was no conflict between the strikers and the nonunion people, no 00:18:00involvement like that.GEORGE STONEY: Now how many people did you have in your union?
CLAUDE HELTON: I believe that we had a considerable amount, 1,200 I believe it
was (inaudible) in all. Of course, that included people from Modena, Ozark. Also I believe that some of the Smyre people.GEORGE STONEY: And what percentage of your factory, do you think, were members
of the union?CLAUDE HELTON: It seemed like - I would say that 85% of the employees here were
00:19:00signed up. Now whether they felt unionized or not, but I would say that was about, you know.GEORGE STONEY: Now we were talking with an elderly lady the other night, and she
said that they had to join the union or they would lose their jobs. What did she mean?CLAUDE HELTON: I don't know, because that's - the only thing I knew about
that is when they had a union already, and they have a closed shop, because that way before you can work there you have to join the union. As far as I know. I didn't know of any mills around that had a set up like that. She must have been up north, because I think they had made things 00:20:00like that, but not around here.GEORGE STONEY: OK. Fine.
CLAUDE HELTON: Because nobody was forced to join it. You know, with a closed
shop though, before you can get a job, you have to join the union, which is good in some ways, and in other ways it's not. (laughs)JAMIE STONEY: Look back towards the gate. OK. Look who's playing. Now look
back past me. OK. Want to get 30 seconds here.HELFAND: Well, sure.
(break in audio; break in video)
GEORGE STONEY: Around the house and then come back up this block, so you can
00:21:00tell me about this house. Claude, I have here a petition signed by 108 people from your village and another village here protesting the fact that the employers weren't living up to the NRA code. It's headed - the list is headed by N.B. Thomas. Did you know him?CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, I remember N.B. Thomas.
GEORGE STONEY: Where did he live?
CLAUDE HELTON: He lived on that next street up here. There's nobody else, you see. Now, since then, the houses that were on that side
00:22:00have been torn down.GEORGE STONEY: I see.
CLAUDE HELTON: So he lived, his sons live in the house. It was right along
here, where he lived, in one of the houses.GEORGE STONEY: And A.C. [Pitty?].
CLAUDE HELTON: I don't remember him.
GEORGE STONEY: A.C. Pitty, I think it is.
CLAUDE HELTON: No, I don't remember him.
GEORGE STONEY: And Mr. [Garrett?]?
CLAUDE HELTON: I remember a Garrett, but he seemed to live, lived over on what
you call the old Groves village. I remember he chewed tobacco.GEORGE STONEY: And Charlie [Milton?]?
00:23:00CLAUDE HELTON: And [Milton?] lived - let's see now. I believe he lived on - I
believe somewhere on this street here, it seemed like.GEORGE STONEY: And W.L. [Molano?], [Mulano?]?
CLAUDE HELTON: Is that [Mullinax?]?
GEORGE STONEY: That's right.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. And what's - it was W.L., huh? Now, there was a -
let's see, a Lloyd Earl and Paul and Clyde, there was several boys. He didn't live in a company house at that time. He lived in a house that he had built way down at where we were a while ago. It was a street out in the woods.GEORGE STONEY: What about L.L. Hoffman?
00:24:00CLAUDE HELTON: Well, now Hoffman lived on that street there. At that turn, go
back and he lived about the second or third house on the right there. And, of course, it's been torn down, too.GEORGE STONEY: All right. We'll go on down here then. And Mr. Wright?
CLAUDE HELTON: That's H.L., H.L. Wright, wasn't it?
GEORGE STONEY: Yes.
CLAUDE HELTON: Now, he lived on the front row over there. He lived I suppose
about the fourth house down from where [Farmer?] lived.GEORGE STONEY: And F.R. Robinson?
CLAUDE HELTON: That's the Robinson I can't place right now. There's some
Robinsons that lived in a house right back down the street, but I can't place that initials at all.GEORGE STONEY: An M.N. [Barrett?]?
00:25:00CLAUDE HELTON: Now there's a Barrett that lived down here, and a daughter
married a Thomas, Mary (inaudible), and they lived in this house - I tell you, that house there where [Bud Hartman?] lived in, the end house, that's who became the president. This house, I believe it's this house right here where the Barretts lived.GEORGE STONEY: OK. And then we go to see John R. Moore.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, that's the house that we just left, uh-huh. Now and
[Mathers?] I tell you about lived in that house back there then, who was Moore's son-in-law.GEORGE STONEY: In this house here?
00:26:00CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. Here's where we were a while ago, yeah, uh-huh.
GEORGE STONEY: Let's go by and you just point out the union president's house.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. This house on the left here, the second one right there.
GEORGE STONEY: It's been fixed up quite a bit since then.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, oh, yeah, uh-huh. See, this money was appropriated for -
in order to qualify you had to have a certain income, if you didn't make - and they fixed houses for nothing, no charge. The only requirement, that you could not sell the house within a certain period of time. You had to keep the house.GEORGE STONEY: Well, all that's happened since the '60s, hasn't it?
CLAUDE HELTON: Oh, yeah, uh-huh. Yeah.
GEORGE STONEY: Yeah. Well, let's go around again, and you point out your own
house and your store. We'll go around, and you mention that this is your - 00:27:00this is where I lived and this is where I had a store.CLAUDE HELTON: This is a dead end here, too, so we'll have to turn around
here. So many people have died that were living back at that time that all these houses is about - they're occupied 00:28:00by strange people (laughs).GEORGE STONEY: How does it feel to come back and see it like this?
CLAUDE HELTON: Well, it's - I don't know, it's like I have a kind of a sad
feeling. This was a neighborhood - at that time - there's where I lived, the house, there at 509, and the store building was later. I put up on there, insolvence on a period of years. I added more, as business got better I added more.GEORGE STONEY: How is this different then from what it is now?
00:29:00CLAUDE HELTON: Well, since I haven't lived here, as far as - the people are
different from the people that I knew back then, since they are people that rent.GEORGE STONEY: Were these all dirt streets?
CLAUDE HELTON: All dirt, uh-huh. Yeah, all these streets were dirt. The
streets were named since the strike, all the streets were named. This is called Apple and another street called Pear Street, where I live now, I mean, where I lived.GEORGE STONEY: The streets didn't have names then?
00:30:00CLAUDE HELTON: No. No, just - if you referred to a house, they'd just say new
Groves village or something like that, because that meant that when they built the second mill, it was called the new Groves, or at that time it was maybe number two mill, but it was a new Groves back in here, the new Groves village.GEORGE STONEY: Did you have any particular places to play here?
CLAUDE HELTON: No. No place except out in the streets. That's about it.
Now, there was a place way back over, down Groves Street, back down in the woods. They had a baseball field had been scraped off that place, and it has a 00:31:00little place to play baseball. But as far as any playground or anything like that, wasn't anything like that, we was playing just out in the streets.GEORGE STONEY: What we should do now, I think, I think we've gotten this
pretty well. We should go back and pick up Judy and then we should go over to see if - stop by and see if Mr. Moore's son's there. Jamie, he says that Mr. Moore's -JAMIE STONEY: I know.
GEORGE STONEY: - son is -
JAMIE STONEY: I'm going to cut that, OK?
GEORGE STONEY: OK.
CLAUDE HELTON: Maybe that was, that lot right there, the union owned the lot and
00:32:00a small building there. It was the 1312 union.GEORGE STONEY: The union owned the place there.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. I worked for years and years and no tax paid on it, as far
as I had heard. That was still property of the union, you see. So I really don't know what decision was made on it, except one of the, as I understand, one of the church members -- church members -- union members decided that he would pay the tax on it, and so he just took over the building, at that time. It was a real small building. I don't know how it could be a union place, for as small as it was. Actually there was no suit of any kind. Nobody claimed it, 00:33:00so the fellow, I suppose he - now he's dead now - I suppose he -GEORGE STONEY: But that meant that you had a kind of permanent headquarters there.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, that would mean that. But it had no bearing on it. It
didn't influence the (inaudible) at that time, there was no talk of enlarging or anything like that. It was just a forgotten thing, you know. Now I believe you said you wanted to go back to -GEORGE STONEY: Yes.
CLAUDE HELTON: - to Moore's?
GEORGE STONEY: Yes, that's right. We don't want to lose Judy. Did she make
that turn? Yes, there she comes. 00:34:00CLAUDE HELTON: (pause) Now there's a possibility that he might not want to tell you
some -GEORGE STONEY: That's all right.
CLAUDE HELTON: - of the things. Of course, I -
GEORGE STONEY: Let's just slip over here until Judy catches up with us. We
better just stop until she gets here.CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. Is that not her turning, wanting to turn?
GEORGE STONEY: No, she made it. That's all right. Now it's fine. I didn't realize
00:35:00she made it.CLAUDE HELTON: Well, I'm going to have to get over in this.
GEORGE STONEY: OK. Just recently they re-marked these roads and made a change
there. If you're going to turn right, you have to be on that side, way back there.GEORGE STONEY: Yeah.
CLAUDE HELTON: We'll block them (inaudible).
(laughter)
(break in audio; break in video)
GEORGE STONEY: Sure that the woodpile doesn't show. OK, let's start inside, we'll
00:36:00come on out. OK?HELFAND: Claude, can you talk for a second? Count to ten.
(break in audio; break in video)
RUBY MOORE: Come through here. (inaudible)
GEORGE STONEY: OK, let's go.
CLAUDE HELTON: We're going out this door, uh-huh.
ERNEST MOORE: (inaudible).
GEORGE STONEY: (inaudible). Let's take it. Okay. Take a chair, Claude.
CLAUDE HELTON: Well, I -- that's a --
GEORGE STONEY: Here, you take this (inaudible).
CLAUDE HELTON: That's one of those long ones, isn't it?
RUBY MOORE: There's some more out there, in the carport. The kitchen
[wasn't comfortable?]. 00:37:00ERNEST MOORE: (inaudible) plum trees (inaudible)
GEORGE STONEY: Alright. Okay.
JAMIE STONEY: Watch the wires, Judy
GEORGE STONEY: Let's get in, a little bit in the shade.
GEORGE STONEY: OK, Claude, you want to come over here?
CLAUDE HELTON: OK. Is Ruby not gonna be over?
GEORGE STONEY: I can handle it, I think. OK.
JAMIE STONEY: Speed.
00:38:00GEORGE STONEY: OK. Mr. Moore, tell us about this. Is that the article you saw
in the Observer?ERNEST MOORE: Part of it, mmhm. Yeah.
GEORGE STONEY: Well, tell us about seeing it, would you please? Claude, have you
00:39:00seen this article?CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, the other day when you showed it to me.
GEORGE STONEY: Yeah.
CLAUDE HELTON: I really just looked at the headline mostly, and I couldn't
actually decide what they were talking about, as far as amnesia. That means that you've forgotten something, don't it? And so...ERNEST MOORE: I don't quite unders - have they got that on now?
GEORGE STONEY: Yes. You were saying that you saw that and you were about ready
to call us and then you didn't do it.ERNEST MOORE: Yeah, I saw that in the Charlotte Observer. I decided I just
didn't want to do it right then. Is there any way you can turn that off and 00:40:00we can talk?GEORGE STONEY: Yes, sure.
ERNEST MOORE: I'll get nervous. See, I don't know too much about that.
GEORGE STONEY: No, what we want you to talk about is what you just talked about
in there where you said your father was a president of the local, and you're not ashamed of it, that your brother was - that you were involved, they were trying to help people out. You said it all in there, and that's exactly what we want, just what you said, you saw the article, you were about ready to call us, and then you decided not to, but now you're going to be doing it, you're going to be telling us. That's exactly what we want, just exactly what you did before. If we'd had the camera when we went in, it would have been exactly what we wanted. (laughter)ERNEST MOORE: Ain't no way to play that, to pick that up too well. You ain't
got it on, have you?JAMIE STONEY: No, I'm waiting for you make -- to decide that you want us to roll.
00:41:00ERNEST MOORE: Well, wait a minute.
JAMIE STONEY: Sure.
(break in audio; break in video)
GEORGE STONEY: - hold of Claude. He knows it. He knows about it. He was
secretary of the local. Claude sees us -- Jamie, are you getting this? OK.JAMIE STONEY: Mmhm.
GEORGE STONEY: Claude sees us, and he says, "Mr. Moore, he was president of
the local, his son lives down here, you ought to see his son," so we're here with you now. Tell us about your father.ERNEST MOORE: Well, he was president of the local textile union. And, uh --
GEORGE STONEY: OK, cut. Just a minute.
ERNEST MOORE: You know, I ought to just -
(break in audio; break in video)
00:42:00CLAUDE HELTON: I imagine, so many questions. (laughs)
ERNEST MOORE: I done forgot - I bet you forgot, didn't you?
GEORGE STONEY: No.
CLAUDE HELTON: But I just told them, I said you was in the mill there. And why
I joined, why I felt like being a part of it, because in going to the union meetings I heard different speakers, like Six Hour Red and some of the others, and I liked what he talked about, is six hours, and what it would do would put more people to work. That would create four shifts, and it would put more people to work, and so I thought that was a good idea, that more people could get jobs, and so that impressed me about as much as anything.ERNEST MOORE: You know, I done forgot about that six hours.
CLAUDE HELTON: You have?
ERNEST MOORE: Uh-huh.
CLAUDE HELTON: That stuck with me, because he talked about it so much that that's they
00:43:00called him Six Hour.ERNEST MOORE: You know, [Burt Hartman?], he was the vice president.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah.
ERNEST MOORE: And he's done gone. He was a big leader in it. [Ed Clark?],
he's done gone. I've even got a ticket in there, 1925 I believe it is. What me and my daddy and brother worked in the mill. I think it come up, about $40, $47 all three of us.CLAUDE HELTON: That you made a week?
ERNEST MOORE: Huh?
CLAUDE HELTON: That you made a week or a day?
ERNEST MOORE: I drawed, $14 a week, my brother $13 something a week, my daddy -
my brother was $12, my daddy about $30 some. I still got that ticket. My mother had it, but she died. And I got the pictures of our whole mill, and I 00:44:00got the whole outfit. I got our group and the whole outfit.GEORGE STONEY: Well, now, what did your father do in the union?
ERNEST MOORE: Oh, he was the president.
GEORGE STONEY: He was the president. And why did you think he took that office?
ERNEST MOORE: Well, he done it to help the textile workers have a better living
standard, make more, and make a better living. He really put his whole soul in it, ain't no joke about it. We was - when the strike was called, we had a parade through Gastonia, 00:45:00and my daddy and Ed Clark -CLAUDE HELTON: (inaudible)
ERNEST MOORE: What was the vice president?
HELFAND: Bud Hartman?
ERNEST MOORE: Bud Hartman. They led it, and we paraded through Gastonia.
GEORGE STONEY: We may have a movie of that parade.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah.
GEORGE STONEY: We were showing Claude and his wife this afternoon a parade
through Gastonia.ERNEST MOORE: Oh. Have you got it?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah.
ERNEST MOORE: I want to see that.
GEORGE STONEY: OK. Well, tell us some more about your father.
ERNEST MOORE: Well, I believe we struck - we was on strike I know two weeks.
Groves Mill, they wouldn't - they didn't recognize the union, and they 00:46:00wouldn't close their gates. So we throwed up a picket, back gate and front gate. We held till the strike was called off. But the National Guard was going to come in on Monday. They was going to open them up.GEORGE STONEY: What happened then?
ERNEST MOORE: Well, they - we was 80% organized. When the strike come, there
was 40% stuck, struck, and that's when we closed both gates. And when the strike was called off, everybody who struck didn't go back to work. They told 00:47:00my daddy if he'd just leave, just leave, that everybody would go back to work was in the strike, what didn't cause trouble. But he didn't have to leave Gastonia. He kind of got along with the politicians and the sheriff of Gaston County, why, he was a good Democrat. My daddy was a good Democrat. And he told my daddy when we struck he would not open the gate for us. He told my daddy, said, "You don't have to leave Gastonia. We got your job and your whole family a job if you want to go to another factory." But my daddy decided he'd just go up to Caldwell County, and he moved.GEORGE STONEY: How old were you then?
00:48:00ERNEST MOORE: Let's see, I was -
GEORGE STONEY: When were you born?
ERNEST MOORE: Nineteen and nine, 15th of April.
GEORGE STONEY: You were -
ERNEST MOORE: Thirty-some year old, yeah. And I lived in the village house.
GEORGE STONEY: But why do you think they went to - they took these risks? It
took a lot of courage to do that?ENREST MOORE: What's that? The workers? Oh, they wanted a better living. I
lived in a three-room house, heated with a little coal burner heater, and the 00:49:00houses wasn't insulated, and they was cold. And you didn't make much money. And there was very few times that the mill would ever run five days, you'd get two and three and four.GEORGE STONEY: What happened to the union after that?
ERNEST MOORE: Oh, they must have - they knowed what they was doing. See, most
of the people that struck, they didn't have nothing, and they had to go back to work. And the southern people, they will not, they will not organize, and 00:50:00most of them won't stick, if they do join. Most of them won't stick.GEORGE STONEY: But your father was southern, wasn't he? And he had the
courage to do it.ERNEST MOORE: Oh, yeah.
GEORGE STONEY: How do you feel about your father doing that?
ERNEST MOORE: Oh, I'm proud of him, for he tried to help the textile workers.
GEORGE STONEY: Did you ever get involved in anything like that afterwards?
00:51:00ERNEST MOORE: No, no, I never did. I never [did again?]. I was out of work for
six months. And the textiles in Gastonia had organized, and if they found out you was in the strike, they wouldn't hire you nowhere else. My brother-in-law, he was an overseer, and he had me a job. But the superintendent, that plant, come and told him, said, "No, he was in the strike down at the Groves thread, and we cannot put him to work."CLAUDE HELTON: That's how blackballed. (laughs)
GEORGE STONEY: That's what happened to you, Claude, didn't it?
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah. He was asking why I didn't look for a job, you know,
during that time. I started to go, there wasn't any - 00:52:00ERNEST MOORE: You was out six months, wasn't you?
CLAUDE HELTON: There wasn't any point. There wasn't any point.
ERNEST MOORE: You was out six months.
CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah, I was out 11 months.
ERNEST MOORE: Eleven months.
CLAUDE HELTON: You worked on the - what did you call them? PWA [sic] for FDR?
ERNEST MOORE: Yeah, they had the - you know, Roosevelt put people to work on the
PWA, you know. I worked some on that. Had to make a living some way.CLAUDE HELTON: Yeah.
ERNEST MOORE: I was married, had one child.
GEORGE STONEY: Did the women take any part in this?
ERNEST MOORE: Oh, yeah. Yeah, the women, they - we had many women, probably as
00:53:00many as men. In the general strike, you may have that record, about Honea Path, South Carolina? We went down to visit, when they killed them people down at Honea Path. There was six or seven, but seven, six or seven, and we'd visit every home that people got killed. We walked around the street that they killed, shot them on. They was outside the mill, outside the gate. There was a fence around it, and the road on the street, and they was shot from a window, killed them people. They was in the road, down the street. Nice families. One of them had a grocery store, and he was a weaver, and he worked. He got killed. 00:54:00We went down to their funeral.GEORGE STONEY: We have pictures of that funeral we can show you.
ERNEST MOORE: Well, I was there. I was there.
GEORGE STONEY: Boy, it brings back some memories, doesn't it?
CLAUDE HELTON: Once you start thinking about it, you know, you think of things
that you hadn't thought about in years. (laughs)ERNEST MOORE: You see, you're taking (inaudible), they know how to bust
unions. They wanted to strike before they'd get really organized, so they'd bust them. And we had a sample over here with this truck company in Mount Holly, about a year ago. They struck over there, and the poor textiles, some of 00:55:00the textiles in Gaston County, said they don't need a raise, said they're making more I know than I been making, they don't need no raise.GEORGE STONEY: Well, back to the '33, '34. You were working in the mill
just before Roosevelt came in.ERNEST MOORE: Oh, yeah, uh-huh.
GEORGE STONEY: And then tell us what happened after that. You were working 11
hours a day, weren't you?ERNEST MOORE: Yeah, we was working 11 hours a day, and they - when the Congress,
00:56:00Senate, passed the New Deal, Roosevelt got in. I know a lot what happened along about then. See, the textile owners, they controlled all the textiles in Gastonia. They controlled the chamber of commerce. They wouldn't allow no other industries come in Gastonia, Gaston County. There was 100 and some textiles in Gaston County back then, and they wouldn't bring in other industries. They said textiles would have to pay higher wages if they bring in other industries, maybe make more, see.JAMIE STONEY: I've just got to reload the tape real quick.
GEORGE STONEY: OK.