ARTHUR DUNCAN: Did you find it?
F1: Yeah. (inaudible)
M1: That's just the refridgerator running. I belive that it will be ok.
DUNCAN: we can cut it off if you want to.
M1: No I think we're ok.
GEORGE STONEY: I think so.
M1: Ok, could you just count to like 5 for me.
DUNCAN: Yeah.
M1: Just count to five, one.
DUNCAN: One, two, three, four, five.
M1: Ok, I'm ready.
M2: Any time sir.
STONEY: Alright sir.
DUNCAN: You ready for me to walk over?
00:01:00STONEY: Ok now start again.
[break in video]
DUNCAN:-- family before we get started here. And I believe you wanted me to
start with this one right here. This is my family on my mother's side. This is my mother here on the top and this is all her brothers and sisters, except this one right here in this lady's lap is a nephew. The rest of 'em are all children of this -- of my grandmother and granddaddy setting right here in the front. And, ah, Grandmother's holding the youngest baby and Granddaddy's holding next to it over there.STONEY: Ok now were gonna start again—
[break in video]
DUNCAN: Let me show you something about my family to get into going along.
This picture right here is a picture of my mother's family. And my granddaddy was raised an orphan by foster parents and I don't know much about his people, although he was raised -- my grandmother was born in Carroll County, Lizzie 00:02:00Carter, and my granddaddy -- my granddaddy, I think maybe he might have come from Campbell County in -- but my grandmother was born here in this county, in Carroll County. And this is the family and this is my mother right up here on the top and this is all of her brothers and sisters, except this one right here is a nephew. And, ah, he had 14 children, him and her did. Two are not in this picture, but he had 14 children and then my granddaddy married again and had one child by his last wife. So he was he father of 15 children. My grandmother was the father of 14 children. And, ah, 7 each, 7 boys and 7 girls. And, ah, then you said come down here, didn't you? This right here is a picture of my daddy's mother and father. This pic-- this picture -- this picture was taken, I presume, about 18-and-75, around that, one, because it was several years before she died and Grandmother died in 1903. So it must have been taken about 19-- ah, 1875. 00:03:00And, ah, then this picture here is a picture of myself and my oldest brother, taken in 19-and-10. And we was in a buggy. You can recognize the buggy setting here and I was the little mean one here trying to shake the buggy down. And, ah, that was my brother over there next to him -- next to it. This picture right here is my mother and father about two years before my daddy died, which was taken about 19-and-47. That was my daddy and mother in about 1947 and, ah, he died at 69, prostrate cancer. The cancer killed him. And this -- this -- this right here is my oldest grandson and, ah, when he was in the service. He was born in 19-and-28 and this picture was taken about -- I don't know -- I 00:04:00guess about -- well, I guess -- well, I wouldn't say -- just about 15 years ago, anyhow, something like that. And he -- that's my oldest grandson. This picture right here is me and my wife on our 50th anniversary. That was about four years before she died and that was -- this picture was taken in 19-and-ah-78.GEOREG STONEY: Tell us about her death.
DUNCAN: About her death? Okay. Her death -- my wife worked in -- she was like
I -- she come from East Newnan ,but we was left -- on account of being sympathizers, said, with organized labor, they -- we lost out, as some of 'em said. They blacklisted us, but in Hogansville we did get a job and she got a job in what they called the asbestos division of the mill. And we heard it was dangerous so we later on -- we got her out of it and then she went back later on 'cause times got bad and she had to get in -- had to look like she had to make a 00:05:00living. She got in, so she worked about 25 years altogether in asbestos. And from that, she developed asbestosis and died in 1982 with that asbestosis, which was a horrible death. It was a -- you see people gradually smothering to death. They just gradually smothering to death and just nothing you can do about it. No matter what you do, you can't do anything about it. Now I've got her out at night and even had the police a-follerin' me riding her around all over town 'cause she thought maybe she could go -- she did, seemed like, get her breath a little better when the air was blowing in her face. And we would be riding sometime all night long. But, anyway, I have seen the time whenever I'd go in here and I'd go into the room where she'as at, and I have picked her up, because she was very light -- she got down to 70-- ah, 59 pounds before she died. And I have got her plumb out in the yard 'fore she could catch her breath. And, ah, you know, you're never ready to give your companion up, but when you see 'em suffer what I saw 'em, it is a relief, it is a relief to see 'em get out of that 00:06:00suffering. So I was -- and relieved when she got out of all that suffering. And then we, ah, go down here to this bottom part here. This is a picture of my oldest son, my only son, the oldest child and my youngest child. That's my baby over here on this side. This was -- he was born in 1931 -- I mean 19-- yeah, 1921. And she was born in 19-- no, '31. She was born -- wait a minute. I'll get it right directly. He was born in 1930, January, 1930, and she was '39, in '39. So there was a -- in December '39. So there was almost 10 years between they two -- they two births. But all three of my children was born in the same decade -- decade. He come in the first and she went out just as it went out. This here is a picture of my oldest grandson and, ah, great-grandson, oldest great-grandson. And, ah, he's a -- in this picture -- this picture was taken 00:07:00about 10 years ago. And, ah, he was a-playing with his toys there. This picture right here is a picture of my wife's mother and father. And this picture must have been taken about 1901. Well, you don't see -- you can see that my granddaddy got a little baby, had a little baby a-sitting in his lap right there? And that baby was born in 1900, so you can see how old we were. So I'd say it was 1901 at the time that picture was taken. And, ah, this picture right here's a picture of my mother at a Christmastime that we had at my house. We used to have --used to say you never have been to Christmas till you was at the Duncan's house. But my moth -- that was about -- taken about -- about -- about four years before Mother died. So I'd say around 19-and-70. This picture was taken about 19-and-70. And that -- my mother was a great woman and I think -- I think about her a lot. But that's about all that we can see 00:08:00about -- that I've got on the family pictures. And, ah, this over here's the enlargement of my wife's mother and daddy, this small picture. This is a enlargement of this small picture right here, but you notice the baby is left out of it. They left the baby out, so it wouldn't -- you know, it'd just be a picture of her mother and father in -- in there. So that's all the history of my family.STONEY: That's great.
[break in video]
M1: Rolling
STONEY: Ok.
DUNCAN: Let me show you something about my family here. These pictures right
up here, that we see right up here, is a picture of my mother's, ah, family. My mother's family. And, ah –[break in video]
DUNCAN: Let me show you something about my family. This picture right here,
that you see up here at the top, that's a picture of my mother's family. They was raised on a farm. Back in them days, you know, when a child got old enough to farm, ah, work on the farm, they went to work in the field. They'd quit 00:09:00school and go to work in the fields. But they was raised farmers. And my family on my daddy's side was raised farmers. And then this picture -- this picture right here is my and my brother taken in 19-and-10, which was a picture of us sitting right in a buggy, the mode of transportation at the time. We sat in the buggy. This picture over here is my mother and father in the later years of life, just before they died. And then this one down here -- this one right here is a picture of me and my wife on our 50th anniversary whenever we had been married 50 years. That was about four-and-a-half years before she died. And, ah, I believe you'd say that was – be – be all you wanted?STONEY: Now, uh, pick up the picture of your wife and tell us how she died.
DUNCAN: Ok. This picture right here. You notice my wife, she was pretty frail
there, pretty, ah, sickly. She died with asbestosis. She worked about 25 years in a plant where they had as-- asbestosis. They told us at that time it was 00:10:00perfectly safe to work in it, but she worked there about 25 years. Of course, she lived about 8 or 10 years after that, but she developed that asbestosis and she gradually went down-down-down till she got down to 59 pounds and was literally smothered to death. There was just no way that she could live like she was, and it was a relief to me whenever she passed away because I saw she was out of that suffering. And, ah, that's about the limit of my family there that I think you wanted to know about.STONEY: Perfect now—
[break in video]
STONEY: Ok.
M1: (inaudible) on one picture? Which picture (inaudible)?
STONEY: That's it yeah.
(inaudible crosstalk.)
STONEY: No I think this is gonna make cutting a lot easier.
DUNCAN: Did you want this held up?
00:11:00STONEY: No, that's fine. I say get us a little closer on that. Yeah that's
fine. Okay. Is that (inaudible). Okay go back to the other picture just a minute. Go in on it. Sir?DUNCAN: Yes?
STONEY: (inaudible) over here for just a minute. Let's go way--
DUNCAN: By the way, everyone in that film is dead except the baby. That's all
00:12:00they is left. Now that's my mother up at the top up there.STONEY: Go in there for, if you can , for about a three shot on the mother. Is
that absolutely clear? Yeah it is. That's fien ok. Good. Ok now are you in that at all?DUNCAN: No, sir. My mother wasn't even married then.
JUDITH HELFAND: Maybe, maybe he could tell us a little bit about his mom and
that he was rasied on a farm with her until they left. George?DUNCAN: How is that now?
STONEY: Were you raised on a farm?
DUNCAN: Yes, sir. I was raised on a farm till I was about 14 years old.
STONEY: Did you get that?
M1: Mmhmm. I'm rolling.
STONEY: Fine. Ok. And talk about this now.
00:13:00DUNCAN: Yeah, this is a picture of me and my oldest brother there and, ah,
that's me there trying to shake the buggy down on this side. And that's my oldest brother. He departed about three years ago, but I'm the oldest one in the family now. But that's me setting there on this side.STONEY: I want to say that again with, this is me in 190--
DUNCAN: Oh, that's me in 1910.
STONEY: mm-hmm. Okay.
HELFAND: When this picture was taken had they already started cotton --
DUNCAN: Well, yeah, they had already started 'em, but they wasn't as plentiful
as they got later on in years, you know, because they was some of 'em -- now you take one of the mills in Hogansville was built in 1899 and so I know that these -- and in Newnan, I don't think they was quite that old, but they was very near, low in the 1900s.HELFAND: What did you grandpa think about cotton mill work?
DUNCAN: Well, the folk -- in them days they just -- cotton mill people was
looked down on. They just didn't think any -- they thought that was a trash of 00:14:00the world, cotton mill folks, you know. Everybody thought it and, ah, but whenever we first went to cotton mill ourselves, they thought, "Well, I don't want you to go down there and work in that old cotton mill" and I thought of it. But when we got down there and got in it, we found out they was made up of farmers like us that'd come in off'n the farm and most of 'em was, you know, just good country farm people that's been forced out on account of boll weevils and things. But at -- at the time that picture was made, at the time when the cotton mill first started, they was looked down on by everybody.STONEY: Ok let me get that on camera now. Alright so I want you to tell me about
how you got into the cotton mill.DUNCAN: Okay. Well, I -- and in 1923 was the year we left the farm --
STONEY: Stop. I want to make sure that you look at me as much as you can.
DUNCAN: Ok.
STONEY: Ok. Start again.
DUNCAN: In 1923 was the year that we left the cotton mill. We farmed that
year, but boll weevils run us out, how come us to even leave the farm. We had 00:15:0035 acres in cotton and we only got 400 pounds of lint cotton. And, ah, we's -- nothing else to do except get out of farming. And that's what drove us to the cotton mill. Of course, to start with, we went to Newnan, worked a short while in a hosiery mill in Newnan. And then we went -- I went to Mill Number 1 -- Number 1 in Newnan and worked there about 18 months. And then we went to East Newnan down there. And at that time, you know, people wouldn't talk very much of in cotton mill work and our family really ridiculed us (inaudible) for going, but we went on anyhow and we found out was could make a good living there. And so we just left -- we -- when we went, we's just going to where we could do better. But we done better -- I done better there for 51 years. (laughs) I raised my family in the cotton mill and I'm proud of it. I think it was honorable work. It was honorable work that we done. But, anyway, that -- the boll weevil was the cause of us going in the cotton mill.STONEY: Why did you think people looked down on you people in the cotton mill?
Talk about that. 00:16:00DUNCAN: I just -- that -- that's one thing that I never have understood, why
that they did, but it was just one thing you'd --STONEY: Sorry, just start again, say why they did look down on the cotton mill people.
DUNCAN: Okay. Ah, why they looked down on cotton mill people? That, I never
have fully understood. It was a -- back whenever I's a kid, small boy, they were several classes of people and each one of 'em was -- didn't want to associate with the other class. And cotton mill people was counted in the eyes of the public of about the lowest class people there were. They's sort of Bible days with herd-- sheep herders. They was the lowest class people there were. But we found out that that wasn't true when we went to the cotton mills because we found lots of good, honest people there that was just good people that was forced into cotton mill work. So that was a means of us going to the cotton mill, was because of the -- the -- couldn't make a living nowhere else hardly and that was about the only place you could make a living.STONEY: Tell about what you did and what you got paid and what it was like
working in the mill. 00:17:00DUNCAN: Okay. When I first went in the mill, we was -- we had -- I went in and
went to work 60 hours a week. And I made $5.18 for the first 60 hours that I worked. And we went on -- and I went to work sweeping in the -- in the -- in the twister room at Number 1 Mill in Newnan. And at that time they didn't even have any water in the mill. They had wells on the outside and I had to tote -- being a sweeper, I had to tote the water. So I'd go out there and get a bucket of water and bring it in and we had a lit -- a wooden lid we dropped down over it to keep the lint out of it, but you went and drank water out of it, everybody with a dipper, just like the old time was. We had a dipper and everybody'd go there and dip him some out and have the water. And that'as before they ever put 'em in. And then whenever -- in 1925 -- that'as 1923 that I'm talking about. 1925, then we moved to Mill Number 2 and I went in the card department and I went to sweeping in the card department, but I learned to run the machines in my 00:18:00spare time, because everybody had spare time then. The cotton mill was a very easy place to work. You didn't have anything much to do for them -- I'd say the first 10 years we was in cotton mill, it was just -- you know, you could run three jobs at the same like you'as running. But then after that, they begin to tighten down on 'em, begin to give wages raise and -- and they had to improve and get more production for what they was doing. And at the time that I was talking about before this, when you went in the mill you got the top salary, which was, say, $11 or $12 a week, and you never did go higher than that because it wasn't no such a thing as inflation. Everything was just year and year-in and year-out the same way. It was up and down a little on account of slid -- supply and demand, but never was no inflation to account back whenever I's a kid.STONEY: Do you remember when the New Deal came in and Roosevelt and the change?
DUNCAN: Yeah, I remember the New Deal coming in. I know it -- it was -- in
19-and-32 he was elected and he taken office on March the 20th, 1933. And then 00:19:00in July after that, he had done met with the cotton mill people and talked 'em into everything, to 8 hours a day. And, boy, that was tremendous whenever we worked 8 hours a day. But the mill we worked at at East Newnan they worked 7 hours a day and then they wanted to keep that sixth day in there, so they went back and worked 5 hours on Saturday. We worked 7 hours a day through the week and, boy, it looked like we had so much time off we didn't know what to do with it. And, ah -- and we'as getting $12 a week, where we was getting $7.50 before we went in there. So we -- we was living in high cotton there. We had -- we had things made in them days and, ah, it was just wonderful, we thought then, you know.STONEY: Then what happened?
DUNCAN: Well, then -- then they -- they got -- the organization come in. They
begin to organize and the biggest trouble that the organized labor was they happened to pick the wrong kinda leaders that didn't know -- didn't know what to do and how to do it. And -- and it'd been a different matter altogether. But, anyhow, they called a wildcat strikes and one thing and another, you know. So 00:20:00that set the whole community that almost wasn't in the mill -- in the union against the union. That made brother against brother and sister against sister, whatever you wanted to call it, you know. And that was a -- that was a terrible disaster. It was a tragedy to think that it split people up like it did, because at East Newnan we were just a loving family before that. And we finally got back to it again in later years, but --STONEY: What -- what were they organizing for?
DUNCAN: Well, it was main thing was for 'em was to see that they couldn't
discriminate on you. Now if you -- if you walked in the mill and your overseer, immediately over you, if he didn't like you, he could just fire you and let you go. And organized labor was something that would stop that discriminating against people and doing one thing and the other, one of the things. Then another thing was there's a little better wages, you know. And, of course, they never shortened the hours because that was all --it was already down to 8 hours, you know. But on account of that discriminating, I think, was the main thing 00:21:00that they wanted to come into the union for.STONEY: What about the stretch out?
DUNCAN: The what?
STONEY: The stretch out.
DUNCAN: East Newnan Mill, they never did have that. They would just put more
work on people and just automatically. Now that stretch out, I don't know if it ever come into Newnan Mill, because in 1935 after the strike I had to leave there. And I went to Bibb Manufacturing Company, which has the workload. And they -- they'd just give you just about all you could do. That's all it was to it. But they paid pretty good on it and I's making -- I went up there and went to making $25-and-a-half for 48 hours, which I thought was tremendous money. I thought it was the best money I -- was the best money I'd ever made. And I still say I had good times along in it.STONEY: Okay. Now go back and tell us about the union, how you got into the
union, and what happened. 00:22:00DUNCAN: Well, ah, they -- they first said that they wasn't going to fall out
with the people about union. You could go to the -- you could go to the union. Of course, organizers and things, they come around and come to your house and talked to you. And if you was easy to persuade, they'd persuade you to go into it, you know, and tell you how much better things was going to be. So we got in the union on -- on the grounds of them people coming in there. And, as I said, I joined the union, but I never did participate in none of the things. And they didn't -- they didn't object to people having meetings to 'em. And so they -- but they did put what we call -- would call, ordinarily in the government, spies that went in there to catch out and carry back to the company everything that was told in the meetings, you know. And, therefore, that made it more suffocated, you know. And then after they had that wildcat strike, they just refused to work anybody that was in the union. And then -- and they (inaudible) 'em to all the mills around and there's no way you could get -- you could, you know, get a job. And so -- and that's the reason why that President Roosevelt 00:23:00bought that land down at Pine Mountain and developed them farms down there, so people could -- and it was a lot of people that was helped by. There's a lot of people still living right there in Pine Mountain now, but the amazing thing was he done that with his own money. That wasn't government money he done that with.STONEY: Now back to when you joined the union. Tell us how you signed up and
then what happened. Did you have to leave the village or did you have to get out of the house, or what, after -- when they found out?DUNCAN: Well, ah, they -- they didn't actually make 'em get out right then
until after the strike. In other words, when you joined it they was against you and everything, but you didn't have to move and things until after they had the strike. Then after the strike, they fired -- and they wouldn't work you anymore. Well, I -- I stayed there sev-- maybe a year or year-and-a-half after the strike was over. And they didn't force me to get out or nothing, but they didn't -- and didn't charge me no rent. I just lived there, but, ah, they didn't -- in other words, I didn't have no job and I couldn't live down there 00:24:00without a job. So that meant that you had to leave the place. But more or less it was like coming off'n the farm and go in there. You had to do it for survival purposes.STONEY: Do you remember any of the leaders of the strike?
DUNCAN: Yeah, ah, Mutt Jones was one of the main leaders of it. He lived there
in Newnan for years and years and he was the main leader of it and he was the president of the union lodge, and he was a -- he was the main one and I don't remember who his workers was, but he was the head -- head of the union in Newnan.STONEY: Talk about Mutt Jones.
DUNCAN: Well, Mutt Jones was -- I don't know -- was a fella that just -- I
would say we would call 'em bums now, didn't want to get out and do no work or nothing and him and his wife didn't get along and his wife worked and supported him and one thing and another. So that's where I was saying they chose the wrong kinda people for leaders. But he did talk people into following him. You know, you could talk people in to following ya' if you -- if you'll get out there and try, you know. Any way you want to, you can talk somebody into following ye'.STONEY: Why do you think you joined the union?
00:25:00DUNCAN: Well, for that purpose like I was talking about, so the overseer
wouldn't have the chance to could run you off and one thing like that and another and maybe better working conditions. And one thing – another thing was that we had no air condition. It was sweatshops and things like that and we thought maybe that we would have better places to work in, cooler places to work in. And some of the mills later on did put the air condition in, but some of 'em haven't done it till yet. So --STONEY: Talk about your wife in the mill.
DUNCAN: About what?
STONEY: Your wife.
DUNCAN: My wife was a winder. She worked in the winding room (inaudible). And
she went to work, I think, younger than I was, very, very, young. And she -- that's all she ever done was work in the winder room. That was winding ye' own balls -- ye' own balls of yarn, you know. And I don't say with an boasting or bragging, or nothing like 'at, but she was a top-notch worker. She was really good -- everywhere she went, she give satisfaction at her work. And, ah, a lot of them folks that you interviewed, like Opal McMichael and them, they worked 00:26:00out in the winding room with her. You know, she knowed all of them.STONEY: Could you tell us about her relationship to the union?
DUNCAN: Well, she -- she never did. She never would take no part in it. She
wouldn't -- she wouldn't join it because she had a brother-in-law that was a fixer and he was against it -- I mean he was a section man and he was against it. And, therefore, she sided with them. So she never did take no part. That's where I was telling about sometime it turned families against members of the family, you know, and one thing and another, things doing like that. But she never did participate in the union at all.STONEY: How did you talk to her about that?
DUNCAN: Well, we just never did discuss it because we knowed it would be a
different of opinion and we didn't want no argument about it. We just didn't discuss it.STONEY: Did you go to any of the meetings?
DUNCAN: I went to a few of 'em, not to too many.
STONEY: Say I went to a few of the meetings.
DUNCAN: I went to a few of the meetings, but not too many of 'em. I didn't go
to too many, but a few of 'em I did attend. And, ah, we had a hall that they met up in Newnan, and we'd meet maybe twice a month, something like 'at, and 00:27:00tell what -- how it was going on and one thing and another.STONEY: Could you talk about the people that came from Atlanta?
DUNCAN: (inaudible) naw, because this was National Guard that come and got 'em,
you know, and they wasn't actually from Atlanta. They's just from all over the state, but the troops was in Atlanta, you know. You're talking about the ones that come and got 'em. Well, they just come down there. They was National Guard and they just come down there and, of course, they was obeying orders, you know. And they had guns, but they tell me none of 'em was loaded. Now I don't know. They tell me none of 'em was loaded, but they didn't -- they wouldn't have needed 'em, because there wasn't no -- no way of no violence a-happening there 'cause nobody didn't have anything out there to have any violence with other than their fist or something like that. So it couldn't have been no real violence out there, but they wanted to break the strike, you know, and, like I say and some of 'em said Sunday, Herman Talmadge -- Gene Talmadge was running for governor and he was running for re-election. And he told 'em, he made the 00:28:00speech that said, "Well," said, "if you'll stay cool, you've got a friend in the governor's chair." But whenever -- after he got in there, then we lost the friend in the governor's chair! (laughs) So he sent troops out in less than -- about two hours after he was -- known he was really elected. And back then -- it was a primary, all it was, but back then in Georgia whenever you win the primary, you was -- that was it because there's nobody running again -- nobody running against you in the general election at all because Georgia was strictly Democrat. Well, all the South was, you know. They call 'em the "solid South" or "safe South", you know.STONEY: Did you ever go out on any of the trucks to try to close down other mills?
DUNCAN: Naw, sir. Never did do that. The flying squads mostly -- most of 'em,
as I said before, come from Hogansville, what come out on them trucks to scare 'em now. And they would have -- they would have sticks and whenever they'd get 00:29:00out there, they'd form two lines out here and hold them sticks up like masons used to in that Boston march out under them sticks, you know. But now that's the nearest to violence that ever come and they never did strike anybody or did anybody ever get hurt that I know of.