Interview with Evelyn Clary, Russell Clary, and Bruce Clary

GEORGE STONEY: Here's a group of fellows marching from one mill to another, trying to get them to shut down. They called them flying squadrons. Do you remember that?

RUSSELL CLARY: Uh-huh. (protest sounds)

EVELYN CLARY: Is that you, Russell, that guy? Could that be you right there?

RUSSELL CLARY: It might be.

EVELYN CLARY: You sure can holler.

STONEY: Of course, this is, we know that this is the Loray Mill here.

BRUCE CLARY: Firestone.

STONEY: It wasn't Firestone then, but you --

BRUCE CLARY: (inaudible)

EVELYN CLARY: It was Loray then.

STONEY: Yeah, it was Loray then.

EVELYN CLARY: Look at that old car. (inaudible)

STONEY: This is at the Loray mill. Now, this is Parkdale. People are coming out.

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah.

EVELYN CLARY: There you are, Russell. I'm telling you.

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah.

EVELYN CLARY: I see you. You got on overalls, I believe.

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah.

EVELYN CLARY: I see you.

STONEY: Let me freeze frame just a moment and see if we can't - no, that's 00:02:00not going to work. Let's see.

M1: Try the frame advance.

STONEY: OK, I've got it. Just a moment. Could you go over there and just point out where -

EVELYN CLARY: Is it not by [Giddings?]?

JUDITH HELFAND: Maybe she should do it from the other side?

EVELYN CLARY: I'm still crawlin'.

STONEY: Yeah? I can go back. OK.

BRUCE CLARY: I couldn't tell if that was him playing the drums in there or 00:03:00not. The old films, they were so fast moving.

STONEY: Right, yeah.

EVELYN CLARY: But they got him in it.

STONEY: Yeah, this has all been saved over at the University of South Carolina.

HELFAND: Are you ready? Jamie's ready.

STONEY: Yeah.

M1: Yeah, why don't you just let it go? See if you can try to slow advance.

STONEY: All right. That's slow advance. (video begins playing again)

M1: Maybe I should have pointed out. We're just (inaudible).

STONEY: Want to go back on that and see it again?

HELFAND: Was that -

STONEY: Huh?

HELFAND: - when they were outside the building, that she saw him?

STONEY: I think so.

EVELYN CLARY: I saw him coming right through there.

STONEY: Mm-mhh.

BRUCE CLARY: That didn't look like the same scene.

HELFAND: It was when they were coming out of the building I think, out of the mill, that she saw him.

STONEY: Out of the mill, OK. Let's see if I can get this then.

HELFAND: Is that right? When they were all coming out of the mill, that's when -

STONEY: OK. Then I'll go back on that. Let's see.

HELFAND: When and where?

F: I may be coming back over here.

HELFAND: OK.

STONEY: That's more of that Albert Hinson speech.

HELFAND: It was around here, George.

STONEY: Yeah, that's what I thought. OK. (video begins playing again) Just cut down the sound, off the sound, [Seth?]. All the way off.

EVELYN CLARY: Right there. Right there, you are, in them overalls.

STONEY: Let's go back on it a little.

EVELYN CLARY: Right by -

STONEY: Am I going back?

HELFAND: Hit play. Hit play.

STONEY: I think - no, I should have - sorry, I'll get it back in just a 00:06:00moment. This is the scene. OK. So we'll start again now. OK?

EVELYN CLARY: Right there. There you are.

STONEY: (laughter) That's interesting. So tell us -

HELFAND: You know what, George, why don't we do this? Since now we know where he is, why don't we roll it? She could come down and say, "There it is," and come back, and we could keep it clean. Because when you stop it like that - right from the couch? Since it was right there.

STONEY: Yeah. Yeah.

BRUCE CLARY: That's where she was.

HELFAND: OK. Do you want to sit in here? We're all excited because you found him.

STONEY: OK. Coming out of the - crawling out of the windows there in Parkdale.

RUSSELL CLARY: (inaudible).

STONEY: Yeah.

HELFAND: Weren't you on assignment?

BRUCE CLARY: (inaudible).

EVELYN CLARY: Russell, right there you are. I see you going right down through here. You had on overalls. It goes away too fast. (laughter) See, there you are. You got them overalls, and you got on a white shirt.

STONEY: Russell, tell me what you remember about that day, going around shutting those mills down?

RUSSELL CLARY: You mean, when we dropped our [partners?] all around?

STONEY: Mm-hmm.

RUSSELL CLARY: Well, it's like I said, Albert was up there, I don't think it was on the back of a truck. We didn't make (inaudible) talk. He got everybody all stirred up about the union, a lot of them, they join now, they get a big discount, and it wouldn't be longer without. Shorter hours, more, more money a hour, and all that good stuff. So when he got through talking, everybody had gathered around, what little of them did, that had a little bit of 00:09:00money. And those of us that didn't, we just forgot about it. We knew we couldn't pay it anyway. And so he just told us, said it [wouldn't be longer without?], shorter hours and more pay, and better working conditions. That we could negotiate, get what we wanted. So they let, Mr. Dilling let Albert Hinson go, he fired him. He had to move off the village. I don't remember where he moved to, but he moved around at one of these mills, and went to work. Like they said, it wasn't too very long until we started getting shorter hours, 00:10:00eight hours a day.

STONEY: Now we have papers (phone rings) from Washington that say that Mr. Dilling claimed he fired Albert Hinson not because he was working for the union, but because he was drinking.

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah.

STONEY: Was -- do you remember Albert Hinson as a drinker?

RUSSELL CLARY: I don't remember if he was drinking or not, because I didn't know what drinking was.

EVELYN CLARY: He was drinking water, wasn't he? (laughter)

STONEY: Were there many people there who --

HELFAND: I can hear him. You could wait till he's talking.

STONEY: OK, let's see that. (interruption?) We have a document here from Washington.

HELFAND: King Dilling. (laughter)

STONEY: It was dated November the 25th, 1934. And it's subject the A. M. 00:11:00Smyre Manufacturing Company, Gastonia, and it's written to Dr. B. M. Squires, of the Textile Labor Relations Board in Washington. There's a complaint that says that Mr. Marshall Dilling, the superintendent of this mill, would not promise the board in Washington that he would put any of the workers back to work. So there are six men who were active in the union during the strike, and he fired them. "These men are being held out of work because the superintendent said that they were guilty of violence, but there was none, and the company is trying to put these men out of the company houses." That's what this is saying.

EVELYN CLARY: Yeah, I'd say, and I'll grant you, I'll guarantee you that. 00:12:00That's the way he was.

STONEY: Then it says here, "A. W. Hinson, president of the Local 2115, United Textile Workers of America, R.L. Reed, an active member of the union, and C.J. [Haas?], who was dropped from the company rolls sometime before the textile strike began on September the 4th, they have come to me and charged discrimination." And the answer here is that the superintendent says he does not discriminate against union men, though he admits some opposition to unionism. He admits his intention to evict these men from the company houses, but says this is because the company requires that the head of a family accompanying -- occupying one of the houses must be an employee of the mill. I 00:13:00guess - what does that mean?

EVELYN CLARY: That means that one person in the family has to be employed by the mill, Smyre Mill, or they can't live in one of the mill houses.

STONEY: I see. And he says, "He's very anxious to keep drinking out of the company village. He is a pronounced prohibitionist and seems to be a man of extremely conservative and narrow views."

EVELYN CLARY: Yeah, I remember that, because, see, I was going to school when he was over there.

STONEY: "I learned from an outsider that he is called 'King Dilling.'"

EVELYN CLARY: I hadn't ever heard him called that, I don't believe. I saw it on that paper. But that's what he tried to be.

STONEY: And so he's saying here that he's firing these fellows not because they were members of the union, but because they were drinking.

EVELYN CLARY: Well, probably, the union brought it on probably.

STONEY: Do you recall him firing anybody else because they were drinking?

RUSSELL CLARY: Do what?

STONEY: Do you recall Mr. Dilling firing anybody else because they were drinking?

EVELYN CLARY: Would he fire anybody if they was drinking?

RUSSELL CLARY: Yes, he would.

EVELYN CLARY: If he found out they was drinking?

RUSSELL CLARY: Some of them, especially if they was baseball players, he'd give them another chance.

EVELYN CLARY: You had to bow down to him, in other words?

RUSSELL CLARY: Keep those boys playing ball. He'd make them go to church down there, so many days, nights, or whatever, to pay restitution for acting up like 00:15:00they did. I was always bowing down to him myself. That's what I called it.

STONEY: Were you a baseball player?

RUSSELL CLARY: Nothing except junior. I never did grow up big enough to play on the big team. I would loved to have, because I really loved to play ball.

STONEY: Tell us about your team, the team that the - the Smyre Manufacturing Company had its own team, did it?

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah, they had their own team. They had what they called a textile league. They played Parkdale, and Rex Mill Village over there. They had a team. Mount Holly, and Belmont. There were several of them in this 00:16:00textile league that played one another.

STONEY: And what would happen if one of the baseball players got caught drinking?

RUSSELL CLARY: It was like I said, Mr. Dilling let them go, and then he'd hire them back on a basis of if they go to church. In order to keep a good baseball player, he'd let them.

EVELYN CLARY: Wonder somebody hadn't a killed him, ain't it? Wonder they hadn't a got hold of him.

RUSSELL CLARY: Well, if they didn't play baseball and he caught them drinking or anything, he'd fire them. That was it.

STONEY: How do you feel about that?

RUSSELL CLARY: I don't think it was any of his business what people done, as 00:17:00long as they're on the job. I really think that people ought to do what they want to do, as long as they ain't hurting somebody else. That's what we ought to do.

STONEY: Do you think that a union could have helped to do that?

RUSSELL CLARY: Do what?

STONEY: Do you think a union could have helped to deal with Mr. Dilling?

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah. They done the company a favor by organizing, for good pay - that's the whole thing in there.

M1: Just pick it up at -

STONEY: OK. Could you tell us about the women in the mills? We see them in the parade, but we never see them in union meetings or anything like that.

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah, we had a few come to the meetings, we sure did.

STONEY: Women? Women coming to the meetings?

RUSSELL CLARY: Up here to Ranlo, at a little old store building behind this brick building up here at the stop light. It was a little old store building. We met back there about once a week and practiced the band. Sometimes we had a pretty good crowd, just to hear us practice and come to a union meeting, too. We enjoyed them coming.

EVELYN CLARY: Would they allow the women to come? Would they allow the women to come?

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah.

EVELYN CLARY: OK.

RUSSELL CLARY: There was a good many of them come.

STONEY: Did they ever get up and speak?

RUSSELL CLARY: No, they never did. You don't get up and speak. But they'd cheer Albert on, on his speaking. 00:19:00Get them all or Loray wanted all of them.

STONEY: Did you ever get on the picket line up here?

RUSSELL CLARY: No, I never did get on the picket line.

STONEY: Smyre's closed down, didn't it, during the strike? Smyre's, your mill closed down during the strike?

RUSSELL CLARY: Oh, yeah.

EVELYN CLARY: For how long?

RUSSELL CLARY: Just a few days. For a few days.

STONEY: One of the things that we're trying to figure out is that just before the strike we have a lot of stuff in the Charlotte Observer from the manufacturers, from the mill owners, saying that "our workers will never strike." And then when Labor Day came, everybody came out, and for the next 00:20:00three weeks there were only a couple of mills in all of Gaston County that were open, and that surprised them greatly. Why do you think that the manufacturers were so misled?

RUSSELL CLARY: It was now that -- shorter hours, more pay. That's what misled them more than anything. They were just fooled into doing what the company wanted them to do. More or less, that's the whole thing in a nutshell.

STONEY: Do you remember any later attempts to organize?

RUSSELL CLARY: Do I what?

STONEY: Do you remember any later attempts to organize?

RUSSELL CLARY: There wasn't any, any more attempts, except, like I said, they gave you, it won't be long, but they'll give you shorter hours and more pay. It wasn't too long, just a few days or so, till they said we was going to get the shorter hours and more pay, and that the union wouldn't charge no more than they had to, to let you join, if you wanted to. They made it a -- really offered to do whatever you wanted to do. Take your own choice. Observe them in 00:22:00that way. That's all it took.

STONEY: Now back to Albert Hinson. Was he a church man?

RUSSELL CLARY: Yeah, he went to church. He went to Smyre -- they made a little Methodist Church down there.

STONEY: Was he a preacher?

RUSSELL CLARY: No, he wasn't a preacher, just a plain old feller, like me.

STONEY: (laughter) We've heard so much about preachers who took part in the union.

RUSSELL CLARY: Oh, yeah.

STONEY: Did the Methodist -- did Mr. Dilling's church preach against the union?

RUSSELL CLARY: Well, I really don't know, because I didn't go down there.

EVELYN CLARY: I went down there, but I don't remember it. I went down there from the time I was born.

STONEY: What church did you go to?

RUSSELL CLARY: Ranlo Baptist.

STONEY: Did your church -- did they discourage the union or were they for it?

RUSSELL CLARY: No, our preacher said that we oughta all chime in together and work for peace and security and be friends with and love everybody, just like Christ loved us. I remember preaching sermons like that, which I think was good. That's about all I know.

STONEY: Did he preach against the union?

RUSSELL CLARY: Like I said, he said that we should all work together. He was mediating, just organize our own self together, and do like the Lord wanted us to do. 00:24:00That's about it.

STONEY: OK. Well, this has been a great big help, and I hope we haven't tired you out too much. This has been a great big help. Let's just hold it just a moment. And get -- we'll get our 30 seconds, and I'm going to try again, if you don't mind, Jamie.

HELFAND: Why don't we all take a little break?

M1: No, let's just get thirty seconds, because I can get more.

EVELYN CLARY: Would y'all like something to drink? (inaudible)

STONEY: OK. Good. OK. Oh, that was great. I'm going to get this name of 00:25:00this man over in the village, Smyre Village.

EVELYN CLARY: OK. Paul Brown, I'll get his number for you. Or you want me to call him?

STONEY: Yes, mm-hmm.

M1: OK. Dad? I just want you to nod -

STONEY: Yeah. Judy?

HELFAND: Yeah.

STONEY: Why don't we go over there this, little while?

HELFAND: Sure.

STONEY: Just a moment. Let me - tell her -

EVELYN CLARY: They're not at home. No, they're not there. They've 00:26:00probably gone out to eat somewhere or something.

STONEY: OK. Well, we'll try in a little while then. I need to get his signature and yours, just saying we had your permission to do this.

EVELYN CLARY: All right.

STONEY: OK, you want to - and if you put your name and address and telephone number, so then we can notify you when the -

BRUCE CLARY: When I can get time, I'll see about the Hinson boy I know.

STONEY: Yeah, good.

BRUCE CLARY: And see what he says.

STONEY: It's interesting how clear your father's memory of him is.

BRUCE CLARY: You say his name is Albert -

STONEY: Albert Hinson, yeah.

BRUCE CLARY: Albert Hinson. I'll see if this was his grandfather or whatever.

STONEY: How old is this Hinson boy?

BRUCE CLARY: He's probably around 30 years old.

STONEY: Yeah, then it would have been his grandfather, if it's the same fellow.

BRUCE CLARY: Yeah, if it's the same fellow.

STONEY: The interesting thing is that so many of these people who got fired, like Hinson, had to leave town, so they're gone somewhere else.

EVELYN CLARY: You want him to sign it, too?

BRUCE CLARY: I know when I first started working in the mill, I was only making like $1.85 an hour, when I was 16. I worked over here when my dad worked at A.M. Smyre.

M1: Was that the first time you'd seen a picture of him, in relation to the union?

BRUCE CLARY: Yeah.

STONEY: Did you know anything about his work in the union?

BRUCE CLARY: No, I didn't. I hadn't really, you know, that was kind of kept 00:28:00quiet because of the, I guess of the bad parts of it, you know, people were getting hurt and stuff like that. It was kept kind of quieted down, and then plus the fact that it didn't last long, too, I guess, you know. If it would have been a longer-going thing, you know, people had to work, and they say the companies were privately owned, they were owned like by one man, most of them, or one family or something like that, so they ruled what happened, whether they opened the doors to let you work or not.

HELFAND: Did the union ever come to organize your mill while you were there? George, can you ask?

STONEY: Did the union ever come and try to organize you while you were there?

BRUCE CLARY: I don't ever remember. I think they've come around some in the 00:29:00past years, you know, talking to people, and in some of these other plants, they've got, like FreightLiner, our parts plant. Of course, you still have some of these trucking companies and stuff like that, that you still have the option to join it or not to join it.

STONEY: Oh, we'd better get your father back in.

BRUCE CLARY: OK, let me help him.

STONEY: Yeah, thank you.

RUSSELL CLARY: (inaudible).

EVELYN CLARY: He's wanting to use the bathroom.

BRUCE CLARY: OK.

EVELYN CLARY: You got him?

BRUCE CLARY: Yeah.

M1: Turn here soon.

STONEY: I think we're crossing this -

M1: Now look to this side over here. Up a bit.

STONEY: Oh, yes. OK.

M1: OK. Now ask about the brown lung.

STONEY: Yeah. Did you get any compensation for your physical ailment? Do you think that your condition has anything to do with working in the mills?

M1: Look right down at my hand.

STONEY: Do you think your condition had anything to do with you working in the mills?

M1: OK. And ask about that one owner.

STONEY: What about Mr. Dillinger [Dilling]?

M1: OK.

EVELYN CLARY: Play (inaudible).

HELFAND: And this is your granddaughter?

EVELYN CLARY: Yes, this is [Holly?]. She's thirteen. She takes music, but she plays by ear, too. 00:32:00(music plays)

(music plays)

STONEY: That's - Mr. [Clary?], I need to get your - (interruption?)

HELFAND: Wow that was great! Thank you. (inaudible)

M1: Do you know who wrote that?

EVELYN CLARY: She makes them up.

HELFAND: Did you write that?

GRANDDAUGHTER: I didn't write it, because I don't know how to write the music, but -

STONEY: You composed it? Nice! (inaudible)

(long pause)

(long pause)

EVELYN CLARY: Corn on the cob, right out of the patch.

STONEY: Did you have patches like that over at Smyre's village?

EVELYN CLARY: Well, we just have a small lot, but used to, when I was at home, we did, we had a garden, and we had a little corn, not too much. We mostly bought the corn. You could get it cheap then. We got a garden out here now, but it's about dried up.

STONEY: I noticed you got a lot of tomatoes.

EVELYN CLARY: Oh, yeah. Our friends brought us tomatoes galore, and then another one brought some more this morning. They was all a bunch. We got enough to make a few sandwiches.

STONEY: Could you talk about what it was like to grow up over at the Smyre's?

EVELYN CLARY: It was pretty rough. (laughter) All we did was climb trees and 00:38:00roam the fields, go down to the ballpark. If they had a donkey ball game or anything, we'd climb up in the trees to watch it, because we didn't have the money to pay to go in, and we'd get to watch them free. They had donkey ball games, and they had all kinds of things down in there. We had a park down there, but they just put the swings up like once in a while, like just on special occasions they put the swings up and let us swing, and then they'd take them back down and put them in the community house.

M1: So they even controlled when you got to play?

EVELYN CLARY: Right. And then they finally got horse shoes and croquet and all that down there, and they had Bible school, and we always went to Rankin Lake at the end of Bible school and had a picnic, and they'd make us ride in an 00:39:00open-bed truck. And take us all, get us packed -- we'd be packed in there like sardines, and they was all swarming around me, and I thought I'd smother, I was just a screaming and a crying. That made me smother that much worse. I thought they was going to kill me. And we'd have a picnic. I'm telling you.

STONEY: What do you remember about Mr. Dilling[er]?

EVELYN CLARY: All I remember is that if you didn't walk the chalk line, and if you didn't do what he told you to, like if you -- we couldn't even climb a tree. Mr. John Strange, see, he was trying to get in goods with him. You know, he was bow down. And he'd get him to watch. And if we saw John Strange coming, we'd holler, "Here comes John Strange. Don't climb the tree!" And we'd just jump back down, see, because we didn't want Mr. Dilling to get 00:40:00into us. And one day me and my friend was coming across through there, we always cut through there, you know, a shortcut to school, because we'd walk over here to Ranlo, had to walk about a mile. And he'd come out there and says, "Don't y'all be coming through here no more." Said, "This is mill property," and boy, he really give us [jazzy?], so we didn't ever go back through there no more. He was the boss. But one thing, when we'd get a report card, we'd go to the mill office, because, see, he'd give us money. He'd give us like 10 cents -- for every A, you'd get like 10 cents, so if you had a good report card you might get 50 cents, so we liked that. Let's see. And we had chickens and pigs, and we had pigs down in the field down in there, down in the pasture, and we'd go blackberry picking and everything down 00:41:00in there. Sometimes the big old bull would get after you, and you'd have to take off a running. What you wanting?

STONEY: I'm just trying to cut off the freezer.

EVELYN CLARY: Oh, it's probably OK. There was five of us children in our family, but we always had boarders, because my daddy drove a taxi, and he hauled mill passengers and he took us to school most of the time, but a lot of times we had to walk or walk home. So he wasn't there that much. He'd go to Detroit every year and trade cars.

STONEY: How long did you work in the mill?

EVELYN CLARY: I didn't ever work in it. See, lucky me. (laughter)

STONEY: Why do you say that?

EVELYN CLARY: I don't know. I just heard it was rough.

STONEY: What about your sisters, or brothers?

EVELYN CLARY: My sister, yeah, my sister worked, Nell, she worked in there for I guess 20 or more years. She's retired now. My brother worked, but when he 00:42:00started to working in the mill, they worked for nothing, till they learned. You had to work for a week or two or however long it took you to learn, and then you'd get paid then. So. If my daddy was here, he could really tell you about Mr. Dilling. Boy, he really knew all about him. I don't know what I'd done, because I didn't bow down to nobody, but that's just the way it is.

STONEY: When did Mr. Dilling[er] leave as superintendent?

EVELYN CLARY: Let's see. I'm not really sure whether it was like when they sold the mill houses, let's say, I believe, in like '30.

HELFAND: Could you say -- I'm sorry.

EVELYN CLARY: When they sold the mill houses? Like in '38 or '39, I believe I was nine years old when we moved, and moved up on the Second Street, or the Third. And I believe that's when it was. I don't remember how long he 00:43:00lived after that. I forgot how old he was when he passed away.

HELFAND: Tell her to keep on cooking and we'll talk --

STONEY: You can keep on, as we talk, you can keep on making sandwiches and what all.

HELFAND: Yeah, we'll just see -- we don't want to interrupt.

EVELYN CLARY: I'm just talking and not working. Good thing I don't work in the mill. (inaudible)

EVELYN CLARY: All we had for heat was a little fireplace, and we about froze to death. At night you had to have a whole bunch of quilts on you. And the bedbugs would bite. (laughter) I could have left that one out, couldn't I?

STONEY: Did you move from house to house over there?

EVELYN CLARY: I didn't ever move but one time, from Third Street to Second, until I met my husband, Russell. I was 22 when we got married, so we moved on First Street then, lived there 10 years, then we moved over here.

STONEY: Was there any difference between living on First or Second Street?

EVELYN CLARY: Yeah, there was a little bit of difference, because we was right at the mill and right at the train track, and if you was talking on the phone or anything, well, that train would come by and just shake your house and all that. And when they was building the boarding house, my brother was like - he was five or six years old, and one day they was out hunting him, and they couldn't find him, and he was up on the boarding house, up in the rafters, a playing, and 00:45:00I think he got a whipping, because he was six years old. I'm 12 years older than him, I mean younger, 12 years younger. But he was something else. He was the only boy, and there was four girls, so we'd give him a rough time I guess, or he'd give us a rough time, one. So that was something else.

HELFAND: Ask her about the union.

STONEY: Did you ever hear anything about your husband and the union?

EVELYN CLARY: No, I don't remember him really telling about it too much. If he did, I wasn't interested. (laughter) I didn't get - I didn't hear him, you know. I always heard that the unions was bad and not to join them, and so I just didn't pay it no attention.

STONEY: Who said it was bad, and they shouldn't join it?

EVELYN CLARY: Well, I've heard a lot of mill workers say. I don't know why 00:46:00they would feel that way about it. So I don't know, but anyway that's the way it was.

STONEY: Did you ever know Mr. Smyre or anybody who ran the -

EVELYN CLARY: Oh, yeah. Yeah, I knew Fred Smyre and his son, Rick, and they used to give us a banquet every year. They'd give all the employees a banquet, and my husband got a watch the first time that they gave it. Well, we wasn't married then. But then after we got married, he would -- they'd have a banquet every year, like up there on Second. I can't even think of the name of the place. Anyway, they'd pitch a big party and have all kind of food. It 00:47:00was great. And they started inviting the wives then, so I got to go. Then they'd recognize the ones that had been there like 20 years or 30 years or and so forth. And so they would really put it on. So I enjoyed that.

STONEY: Did your folks go to those meetings?

EVELYN CLARY: Just me and my husband. Now, see, the others wasn't working there at the time.

HELFAND: Ask her what her brother did during the union organizing.

STONEY: Was your father involved at all with the union organizing?

EVELYN CLARY: I don't really know. See, he's been dead like 14 years, and he was 84 when he died, so I just don't 00:48:00remember him telling it.

STONEY: But he was a taxi driver?

EVELYN CLARY: Right. He drove a taxi for like 30 or 40 years, and we had a car ever since I could remember. Didn't many people have cars. And we always had boarders. He'd move boarders in to drive a taxi, so that he could make money, and they'd move in with us. We had a five-room house, and had about 12 people living there. (laughter)

STONEY: And the mill would let you have boarders in your house?

EVELYN CLARY: Yeah, they didn't never say nothing about that. I don't know if they really knew it or not. They didn't say anything about it.

STONEY: Now there was a streetcar, wasn't there?

EVELYN CLARY: Oh, yeah. I rode that thing every day when I went to beauty school in Charlotte. I rode it every day back and forth. I'd go over there and catch it at 7:00 or 7:15 in the mornings, and then come back at six 00:49:00o'clock in the evening. I think it was like 35 or something cents a day to go back and forth.

HELFAND: What about class (inaudible)?

STONEY: You went to -- where did you go to school?

EVELYN CLARY: You mean just regular school?

STONEY: Mm-hmm.

EVELYN CLARY: Over here at Ranlo. They call it Warlick now. I went over here for eight years, and then I went to Lowell four years, and I finished down there. Graduated from Lowell High School. Now they've changed it to -- they go to junior high down here now, and then they have to go to Ashbrook or over in Dallas.

RUSSELL CLARY: (inaudible).

STONEY: But you had a lot more education than most of the people in the mill village, then didn't you?

EVELYN CLARY: Yes. My mother was determined for me to go to school, and I 00:50:00didn't want to go. And when I got six years old, they said "Go." And she whipped me every morning to come. I got my whipping every morning. I wasn't on going. I couldn't - I didn't know how to read. Boy, she'd get me down every night and make me read. I'd miss every other word. So then my daddy said he couldn't learn, and he didn't ever go to school much, but he knew how to count money. He was - he made like he couldn't learn how to read and write, but he finally learned to write his name. Then he didn't care if we went to school or not, to tell the truth, but my mother did, boy. She made us go. And then after I got in high school I made almost straight A's, I come 00:51:00out a little bit.

STONEY: When you were in high school, you went to school with people from all over the place, and they were not all cotton mill people, were they?

EVELYN CLARY: Right. There were some from - well, some were from Lowell, some from Gastonia. I don't know where all they were from. Most of them was sort of local. We rode the bus when we went to Lowell.

STONEY: Was there any feeling of difference between you people, you people who come out of the mill village, and those people?

EVELYN CLARY: Well, I believe there was a little bit. It seemed like they was a little uppity-up, but I didn't pay them no attention.

STONEY: Did they ever call you a lint head?

EVELYN CLARY: No, if they did, they did it behind my back. (laughter)

STONEY: Did you ever hear that word used?

EVELYN CLARY: No.

STONEY: I ask that because in some places that was a very strong word, and the 00:52:00difference between the mill people and the town people. You knew the owners and the supervisors. Was there a difference in the village between one, the people, where the supervisors lived, and they lived differently from you people?

EVELYN CLARY: Yes, they had a home right over here across from the mill. See, Marshall Dilling had a great big - I can show you his house now. It's over there on North New Hope or South New Hope down here, and his daughter used to live in it. Her name was Jane Alice. But my brother went to school with her. I'm not sure if he graduated - I believe he graduated with her, and I got her picture. I got his picture. He graduated in 1936 or 7. If he was here, he 00:53:00could tell you some stuff, too, but he died three years ago. So he knew Jane Alice well.

STONEY: Now Mr. Dillinger, he didn't live in the mill village then, did he?

EVELYN CLARY: No. But they had a house right over here across from the mill. Later on, the superintendents, like Mr. [Cauble?] and all them lived right there, right across the road, a big white house. I remember that. We'd walk right by their house every day.

STONEY: We should get a picture of Mr. Dillinger's house then, maybe.

HELFAND: Is it Dillinger or Dilling?

EVELYN CLARY: Dilling.

HELFAND: Dilling.

EVELYN CLARY: Dilling.

BRUCE CLARY: But everybody called him --

STONEY: It's spelled in the record as Dillinger [sic], that's what his name --

EVELYN CLARY: Some people back then, if they couldn't read and write, they'd just call it Dillinger or something, but it was D-I-L-L-I-N-G, Dilling. I 00:54:00don't know if y'all like pepper on your sandwiches or not, but I do.

STONEY: That's fine. Well, I should explain that my son has some dietary problems, so he's not going to be eating with us, but the others --

M1: No, ma'am, I'm on a diet. (laughter) I'm limited to two -

STONEY: But other two will be eating, we'll be eating.

M1: I'm on two meals a day.

EVELYN CLARY: I know, but I'm fixing you something you can eat.

HELFAND: No, he just ate a big breakfast, that's all.

M1: I ate a breakfast, and then I eat dinner.

EVELYN CLARY: I've got some apples and - I guess I don't have any bananas, but I've got some canned fruit.

M1: I'm all right. I'm all right.

STONEY: No, he's all right.

M1: I'm just about 20 pounds overweight.

EVELYN CLARY: I'd eat anyway. I'm about 20 over, too, but I'm eating.

M1: I find it's cheaper to lose weight than to buy new clothes these days.

EVELYN CLARY: I've worn the same ones for 20 years, so. (laughter) I don't care. I just stretch right into them. (inaudible)

HELFAND: Can we just get this as a cutaway?

STONEY: Mm-hmm. Sure. OK.

HELFAND: Maybe you could ask about her husband's health.

EVELYN CLARY: I used to have a pet pig, called it Sally [Mauney?]. I'd say, "Come on, Sally Mauney, come on," and he'd come a running, and we'd feed it tomatoes, and it loved tomatoes, and it would just smack. I can hear it now. Smack, smack, on them tomatoes. And my sister, she said, "I just can't eat a tomato now, on account of I can hear that pig." And when they killed it, she said, "I ain't going to eat a bite of it."

STONEY: When did you find out about your husband's emphysema?

EVELYN CLARY: When he retired -

HELFAND: (inaudible)

STONEY: I'm sorry.

EVELYN CLARY: He retired in 1978, '79 I believe. He kept coughing and going 00:56:00on, and I said, "I'll bet you anything" - I've heard of brown lung. I said, "I'll bet you anything, you've got it." And he didn't believe it. And I said, "Well, I guarantee you, you got emphysema and brown lung, because I said you worked in the mill all those years." And Paul Brown, he had already went and got his, you know. And my husband's brother tried to get it, and they wouldn't let him have it, because, for some reason, I don't know, he just didn't get the right lawyer or something. He never did get it. So anyway, I kept telling my husband, so they had this lawyer, Michaels and Jernigan, had an ad in the paper and said they would talk to you about it. So I kept on and on until I finally got him to call them, and so they come right out here. And when they came, they knew that, they figured they had a good case, you know, and they can tell with what you tell them. And so they took down 00:57:00everything he said. And so they went on and told him they'd be working on the case. So they went ahead and got everything together and contacted him again, and they kept coming out here. Finally they sent him to Charlotte, to Dr. Williams for an examination, and they kept him all day long. They had to examine him from head to foot, all day. My son went with him. So they sent him a letter, and they just had like 10 different things on there was wrong with him. And they said he had emphysema. They call it byssinosis and all that. And told him that he needed to quit smoking though - he was smoking at the time - and all that. So anyway, the feller come back, and they set up the date when they was going to take him, and they told him where to meet them. And he went and met them. He wasn't on oxygen then. So they went up to the Holiday Inn, 00:58:00I believe it was, that morning, and Dan [Blyer?], he is one of the big wheels over here - I went to school with him - and they met together up there. And they offered him so much money, and he could have got more, or he could have said, "Well, you have to buy my medicine the rest of my life," and he could have got that, but he was tickled to get anything, so he went ahead and they settled it out of court. So he went and bought me a new car with it. They had to give the lawyer like four thousand.

HELFAND: Ask if Russell, was he frightened to go against the mill like that.

STONEY: When you worked with the lawyers to get the brown lung, was your husband afraid -

HELFAND: Compensation - I'm sorry - compensation. You got some (inaudible)

EVELYN CLARY: I think he was afraid to do anything while he was still working. See, after he retired, well, he knew they couldn't do nothing about it, and so he just - he had it made there. They couldn't do nothing about it then, so.

STONEY: Did any of the people who - any of the other people who got brown lung, were they working in the mill when they got it, or was it after they retired?

EVELYN CLARY: Some of them I think got it while they was working, and they actually told him if he had filed sooner, he'd have got more. I said, well I thought it would be the other way around.

STONEY: Now you mentioned a brown lung association.

EVELYN CLARY: Yeah, these friends of mine told me they go to meetings, like once 01:00:00a month or every so many days. I think Paul Brown was going to it, and this other friend that used to live at Smyre, I think Marie [Busler?] was going, 'cause she's mentioned it to me before. I've just heard they had it, but we never did go to it or anything, so.

M1: I'm out of tape. Last question or whatever.

STONEY: Did you -